***
Properly fed and rid of any stomach distractions, the pair sat down in the front lobby.
“Okay, so here’s the deal. The biggest thing you need to do is memorize parts of town.”
He frowned. “Only parts?”
Gray nodded. “The rest will come in time as you work at it. But right away, there’s a few things you should learn. Main streets, main trouble spots, and the embassy, all in location to one another. It happens rarely, but it’s not uncommon that you’ll respond to one location, deal with a problem, and then have to hit up another one right away.”
Noah watched as his boss half-shuddered. “Which is why you need to carry this.” He slid a black object across to Noah.
“A cell phone?”
“Unfortunately. I’m not a big fan, but we need them. That one’s yours. The phone number is taped to it. Get used to it. Anyone who can help will help. We’re in this together.”
He smiled. Shifters were not exactly technological geniuses. Most of them were like him, and vehemently against its use. But if it was necessary for work, then he would do what was required of him.
“Got it. First step, memorize map. Second, learn how to use this thing.” He gave the phone a shake. “Where can I do step one?”
Gray hiked a thumb over his shoulder. “Wall. Map. Big. Easy to read. Enjoy.”
Noah glanced in the direction and saw that the wall underneath the right-hand staircase was covered in a giant map labeled Cloud Lake at the top.
“Perfect,” he muttered, resolving to spend a lot of time studying it.
They had barely begun to talk about life as a guard in Cloud Lake when the phone rang. Gray snatched it up before the first ring had stopped echoing in the lobby and spoke quickly into it. Noah didn’t bother trying to listen. He knew Gray would explain if he needed to know anything. By listening in there was a good chance he would get a mixed or even incorrect message.
“Let’s go,” Gray said before the phone was even back on the receiver.
Noah was on his feet, headed for the door when he realized that Gray was charging up the stairs. Skidding to a halt, he reversed direction and took the stairs in two quick bounds to catch up, clearing seven or eight steps at a time.
“First thing you do when responding to a call,” Gray said as he stopped at a specific door, “is rouse the on-call guard.” He hammered on the door. “You’re up.”
Someone replied from inside and then Gray was gone, headed for the stairs. “Faster to do it that way than call the room,” he muttered as they rushed out the front doors and into the cold winter night.
The sun was gone from the sky and the stars would be out overhead if they weren’t obscured by cloud cover that had moved in at some point. Noah wondered if they were going to get hit with a storm at some point.
“We’re going to one of the gentlemen’s clubs,” Gray said, preempting the question he was about to ask. “Where someone isn’t acting like a gentleman.”
“I take it that would be a shifter. I’m assuming we don’t handle human issues?”
“Not unless it concerns us, the women in their complex, or—” Gray cut off abruptly. “Yeah. If it doesn’t concern either of those, then no, we let local security or the police deal with it.”
Noah nodded to himself as they ran, taking mental notes. They raced down one main street until they hit the downtown strip. Gray took them on to one side street where they came to a halt in front of a club that was lit up with signs in red lettering and yellowish-gold decorations. It was a garish, cheap look, but it proclaimed dancing girls, adult entertainment and the like.
It was also busy.
“Classy establishment,” he said as Gray pulled open the front door and they headed inside.
“Not even close,” his new boss said angrily.
They went through the second set of solid doors, designed to keep daylight from revealing the true quality of the club, and came to a halt.
“Just watch my back and stay clear this time,” Gray said before he plunged into the crowd. “I’m not used to working with a partner, and I don’t want to screw this up worse. Eyes only, make sure nobody slugs me in the back of the head.”
Noah jerked a nod and then moved parallel with Gray into the crowd, keeping some distance. He was one of the tallest people in the club, so he kind of stood out, but it didn’t matter. Six feet in front of them the crowd thinned and came to a stop. It became abruptly clear to him why there was such a press of bodies near the door and around the edge of the huge room.
In the center stood an angry shifter, with two women in various states of undress on the floor by his legs. He noted a third one nearby, but she appeared to have fainted. A security guard was standing between the enraged shifter and several more scantily clad women.
Noah had to clamp down on his instinctive urge to let a growl fill the room as fury rose up within him at the sight of the women being threatened by one of his kind. It took him a second then to realize that the noise that did cut through the buzz of the crowd wasn’t coming from him. It was coming from Gray.
“What do you think you’re doing, Rook?”
The angry shifter’s head snapped around to focus on Gray. “Back off buddy-cop. This don’t have nothing to do with you.”
Gray bared his teeth while Noah watched. “You’re going to pay for that remark. But first, let’s go. Outside. You’re done for the night.”
Rook shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. They’re going to give me what I want. What they promised.”
Noah’s jaw dropped open as Gray rolled his eyes, pointed behind Rook at the security guard, and nodded. “Okay, give him what he wants. It’s fine.”
Rook turned to look at the security guard, a triumphant gloating grin splayed wide on his face. It stayed there too as Gray calmly walked up behind Rook, wrapped his arm under the shifter’s chin, and started to choke him into submission. Rook went ballistic, but Gray was huge even for a shifter, and he bore the other man to the ground. Noah watched as Rook’s face went red and he began to struggle to breathe.
Something clunked and he turned to see a second shifter emerge from the crowd and go for Gray, a metal pole or pipe of some kind held in a firm two-handed grip.
Shit. Gray had said to let him act on his own, but also to watch his back. Noah knew if Gray turned to try and stop the newcomer that Rook would recover and then he’d be up against the two. So without waiting for confirmation he pushed through the crowd and approached the other shifter from the side, tapping him on the shoulder.
“Hi,” he said politely, then smashed his head into the man’s face.
While the other shifter reeled Noah reached out, grasped his hands, planted his leg, and swung the other man around, lining him up with the doors. The crowd seemed to sense what was coming and parted like he was Moses at the Red Sea.
“Bye,” Noah said, and used his booted foot to kick the stunned shifter twenty feet through the air and out the doors. Metal screeched and one of the doors ripped from its hinges under the impact, but the outer door was open and the shifter bounced on the sidewalk and into the road where a car slammed to a halt, its front bumper crumpling ever so slightly around the unlucky shifter.
Noah darted outside, checking on the occupant. but the man was fine, waving him off.
“Let’s go, punk,” he growled and yanked the other shifter to his feet, throwing him up against the exterior wall.
The shifter tried to fight back, throwing an elbow behind him aimed at Noah’s head. So he snatched the forearm up, straightened the arm, and snapped it backward over his shoulder. His foe howled in pain and tried to strike him with this other arm, but Noah dropped him with a short but powerful jab to the nose as he spun. Bone broke again and blood began to pour down his face.
“Try it again, I dare you,” Noah said as he picked the man up and slammed him into the wall, brick façade breaking and crumbling down around him. But the shifter had had enough and just stood there breathing hard and bleeding.
“What the hell?!”
Noah looked over as Gray came out the entrance, hauling an unconscious Rook behind him.
“What are you doing, Noah?”
He frowned. “You said watch your back. He came at you with a metal pole.”
“I didn’t say wreck the place while you were at it. Didn’t you see anything from how I dealt with this idiot? Quietly, with as little collateral damage as possible.” His eyes narrowed, glinting with steel. “Kicking him through the door into traffic, and then busting down a wall doesn’t quite qualify.”
Noah had to force himself not to wilt under the barrage. He had screwed up. Royally, and Gray was making sure he was aware of it. This wasn’t Cadia where he could just pound on his victim as he chose. They were among humans, and he would need to learn that through to his core, so that his instinctive actions would reflect it.
“Sorry,” he said, pulling the unnamed shifter away from the wall.
More brick fell to the ground in a pile.
Gray frowned. “Bill the Cadian embassy,” he said.
Noah looked over his shoulder to see him talking to the driver of the vehicle who had stopped and gotten out.
“Will do, Gray. Thanks.”
“No problem,” Gray said and waved the older man on his way. Then he turned to the security guard who had come outside as well. “Same deal. Bill us. Sorry Jeremy, he’s new.”
“Sorry,” Noah said, not wanting to stand around and be chastised. “I’ll come help you replace it if you want.”
“Sure, that’d be great,” Jeremy said, nodding at them and heading inside.
Noah looked over at Gray, only to find himself being studied by the senior embassy guard. Nothing was said, but his boss’s head swiveled to the shifter in front of him. “You were going to hit me over the head with a metal pole, Manny? Seriously?”
Manny looked away and spat blood, refusing to answer.
Gray laughed. “Oh you two are so, so fucked. Idiots. Come on, back to the embassy with you.” He started to walk, still dragging Rook behind him.
Noah pushed Manny ahead of him, forcing the injured shifter to start walking.
“It’s not always like this,” Gray said as they walked at a much slower pace now thanks to their cargo. “But every two weeks we get a new batch of vacationers, and there’s almost always an idiot among them. This week it turns out there were two. Lucky us.”
Noah just nodded in agreement, not wanting to say anything more that might make Gray angry with him.
“By the way,” Gray said after some time. “Thanks for having my back.”
“Anytime,” he replied, knowing he was still in trouble, but appreciative of Gray acknowledging his help.
Maybe things could still be salvaged after all.