One thing I knew for sure: their army would never expect what we’d have waiting for them when they got here.
Chapter 24
“I’M TOMÁS, AND THIS is Bronwyn,” the cat-shifter said.
“Call me Bron,” the bird added.
“I’m sorry we didn’t call,” Tomás said, “but I’m pretty sure your phones have all been tapped.”
I blinked down at the phone on my desk, trying to remember everything I’d said on it in the last few days.
“What do you mean, take out the lamias for good?” I asked.
“I mean,” Tomás said, “they plan to kill you and the children.”
“Kill the children? The babies? The lamia babies?”
Tomás nodded. “As far as we can tell, that’s the plan.”
My heart started to race, my eyes filling up with tears. “We can’t let that happen. We have to stop them.” I turned around and glanced at Kade, who was still holding Serena. “You need to get her out of here.”
A sudden knock on the door sounded and everyone other than Tomás and Bron jumped, and Tomás added, “That will be Brian and Jeff. Brian drove us in from Shreveport. Jeff is...going to need some help.”
He moved to the door and opened it wide enough to let another man, slightly younger than Tomás, slip through the door, supporting another older man around the waist.
“No sign of anything yet,” the new arrival said, helping the other man to a chair. I couldn’t tell much about Brian—he was good-looking, in a bland sort of way.
I could tell even less about Jeff, as he had been beaten beyond easy recognition. He had salt-and-pepper hair and was about 5’10”. His eyes were swollen shut, his lips puffed and purple, most of his exposed skin crusted in blood, and one arm hung at an odd angle. He slumped down on a chair, either unconscious or in so much pain that he might as well have been.
I was sure these two were also shifters, though I couldn’t tell what kind.
Kade leaped out of his chair, handing off Serena to Eduardo so he could begin examining the man. Kade also waved Jeremiah out of his seat and pointed at the dark-haired female shifter to take it so he could look her over, too. “What happened?” he asked.
She stared at him warily, but only for a few seconds before her bright, dark eyes flitted around the room, and she moved to sit.
Definitely a bird.
“Torture,” she said shortly. Her voice was deeper than I had anticipated, scratchier, almost.
But not a songbird, as I first suspected.
Tomás saw me watching them. “She’s a raven,” he said. “I’m a jaguar.” His voice was almost defiant as if daring me to comment on the oddness of their pairings.
I gestured around the room, introducing everyone by their name and animal. “Dr. Nevala—that’s Kade right there—is a mongoose shifter. He’s my boyfriend.” The jaguar shifter blinked a couple of times but managed to keep his expression neutral otherwise.
“Jeremiah over in the corner is a hyena—and his partner, Shadow? She’s a Hunter.” This time, Tomás did twitch. I glanced at Shadow out of the corner of my eye and found her grinning openly at me. I allowed myself a smile in return.
“You’re not going to find any judgment here,” I said.
Tomás nodded.
In the meantime, Kade had finished a quick examination of Jeff and convinced Bron to let him check her wounds.
“How many times have you shifted since this happened?” Kade asked.
“Just the once.” She sounded tired, ragged. “We drove straight here—there wasn’t time for anything else.”
“We didn’t know how far they were behind us,” Brian added. I realized that still, no one had told me what kind of shifter he was.
“We’re hoping that blowing up part of the casino slowed them down,” Tomás interjected.
“Pardon me,” Jeremiah said in his beautiful, lilting African accent. “But did you say you blew up a casino?”
Tomás shrugged and nodded toward Bron. “They pissed me off.”
Eduardo snorted aloud at that. Shadow nodded her approval.
“Okay.” I tried to get my thoughts in order, but I was still tired from the battle we’d just fought. “I need to call Janice and get the Council in on this. I guess maybe retreat to some place more defensible?”
I glanced around at the shifters crowded into the room with me.
I don’t know how to fight a war.
I had my tiny little ragtag army, but wolves were used to working together, fighting in packs. We would have to come up with a plan on the fly, exhausted, several of us hurt.
Fear spun in my belly, making me dizzy.
But I didn’t have time for anxiety.
I glanced at Jeremiah. “Will the hyenas help us?”
He turned one hand out in a kind of half shrug. “I do not know for certain. We are still fragile.” He shot a look at Shadow. “I’m uncertain what they will say. Keeya has not even made its final determination about whether she will accept Shadow. But I will ask if she will fight for you.”
“Thanks. That’s all anyone could expect.”
I shifted my attention to Eduardo.
“You know the Shields have your back,” he said. “I will begin contacting them.”
“I can call some people in, too,” Tomás said. His mouth slanted up in a slight grin. “Actually, I already have. My crew should hit the Dallas-Fort Worth area sometime in the next two hours or so.”
“Your crew?” I asked.
From her seat in the chair where Kade had put her, the raven shifter spoke up. “Tomás runs a security firm. He’s got all kinds of connections.”
Eduardo spoke up for the first time. “Tomás Nahual?” When Tomás nodded, he continued, “I’ve heard of you. You and your guys do good work.”
“I know you have no real reason to trust us,” Bron said. “But we want to help.” It was difficult for her to speak as Kade manipulated her arm, which I now saw was broken in at least two places. Her face was white and sweat beaded along her hairline. As Kade moved his hand down her arm a little further, I saw that it also had a horrible wound, loosely bandaged and still seeping, almost sullenly.
“I need to take both Jeff and you into the hospital,” Kade announced.
“Take Jeff,” Bron said, her voice still breathless with pain. “I’m fine.”
“You have to go, too. I need to set this arm, get stitches into you, and run some antibiotics through your system.” Kade’s voice had taken on that brusque, authoritative tone he used when dealing with recalcitrant patients. “You need rest and you need to shift. Those are the only things that are going to fully heal this wing of yours.”
“I don’t have time,” Bron said, the fist of her other hand tightening.
“Do you want to be able to fly again?” Kade asked bluntly.
Her face paled even further, if possible, and she turned stricken eyes up to him. “I want to. But I’ll deal with whatever comes.”
Kade softened a bit at the panic in Bron’s voice. “You got the message to us here. You did what needed to be done. Now let me fix this for you.”