“Kins,” Valentina called out to her friend, her voice louder than it would normally be since there was a book in front of Kinsley’s face. The woman was known within the pack for her extreme focus when it came to reading a book. She could tear through one or two books a day because she became completely engrossed in them to the point that she was able to walk around and perform basic tasks, like feeding herself, all while reading. Valentina heard Elijah splutter behind her. Evidently, he was a bit of a prude when it came to nakedness, which amused her greatly.

“Humm?” A pair of wide hazel eyes found hers, though it took her a second to focus.

“Kins, we need a favor.” She paused as Kinsley’s eyes traveled over her shoulder to take in the half-naked Elijah who stood behind her. “Can Anthony track a vehicle for us?”

“Do you have the plate?”

“No, but we know exactly where and when it was at the start; we just want to find out where it goes after that.”

“Probably. I’ll call him.”

“Thanks, sweetheart.” Valentina squeezed the woman’s hand, and they passed by her before she called over her shoulder, “We need it done soon, okay? Like today?”

“Got it.” A distracted voice came back to them.

Valentina sighed. She knew that Kinsley had gone back to her book and wouldn’t call Anthony this instant as she wanted, and she knew that she could force the issue, but once her packmate found a stopping point in her book, she’d call. Besides, right now, they needed to get some clothing on Elijah before she ripped that towel off him and rode his cock until he begged her for mercy. The things that man did to her body . . . She’d never felt anything like it, and she wasn’t sure she could just let that go.

Her stomach growled audibly. They also needed food. The shift and the fight and the sex and the everything that had happened recently had left her and her cat hungry, and she had no doubt that Elijah was hungry, too.

Finally, they were at the guest room he was using. He ducked inside, and she stayed in the hallway, knowing that if she was in there and he got naked, she wouldn’t be able to stop herself, so it was best to remove the temptation.

When he came back out in an olive-green mock henley and some tight jeans, she almost drooled. Thankfully, she was able to keep her mouth closed so there was no embarrassing puddle forming on the floor around her.

Lizzy was downstairs in the kitchen. Valentina had completely lost track of the days and had forgotten that she was coming in to cook for the weekend.

“Hey, sugar. You hungry?” the other woman asked as they walked in. “And who is this tall glass of water?”

“Lizzy, Elijah. Elijah, this is our chef, Lizzy.” She gestured between the two of them, making the introduction.

“Pleasure,” Elijah said in a low voice.

“Well, aren’t you just a handsome devil. You better watch yourself with this one, Val. He’s got his eye on you.” Lizzy shook the spatula she was holding at Valentina as she spoke.

“I’ve got my eye on him, don’t worry.” She chuckled.

“Y’all go through. I’ll whip up some breakfast for you and bring it in.” She turned back to the stove and said over her shoulder, “You must be starved after all that shower business.”

Valentina froze. She couldn’t have heard them all the way down in the kitchen, could she? Liana or Kinsley must have been gossiping with the other woman. That had to be it.

Elijah tugged on her hand, and they went through into the sunroom, but the blush wouldn’t recede from her cheeks. She could still feel them burning from Lizzy’s comment.

“You weren’t that loud,” the panther said, trying to be helpful.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” If they kept talking about it, she would still be blushing by the time Lizzy brought the food in.

“Okay, kitten, whatever you say.” He chuckled.

“Not out here!” she hissed at him. “That is bedroom only.”

“That implies I will be going back to your bedroom at some point.” He grinned and cocked an eyebrow at her.

“Stop twisting my words.” Her temper was rising, and that was no good for anyone. Her jaguar was a bitch when she got angry.

Lizzy appeared then with the food. “Now, now, no temper tantrums when I’ve made some eggs Benedict for you!”

“Oh, Lizzy!” Valentina’s mood immediately changed. The chef’s eggs Benedict were to die for, and she usually reserved them for special occasions.

“I thought you and you’re . . . friend might like something nice and filling for breakfast.”

“Thank you, Lizzy. It looks delicious,” Elijah said gracefully while she was still trying to get out a response.

“You’re very welcome, my dear. Now, eat up and enjoy.” Just as the chef breezed out of the room, Kinsley came tumbling in, almost running into Lizzy because her nose was still stuck in her book. “Watch yourself, Kins!”

“Sorry, Lizzy,” she muttered as she sat down with Valentina and Elijah, regretfully putting a bookmark in her book to hold her place while she dug out her phone. Her clear hazel eyes looked at Valentina and then at the plate.

“Don’t even think about it.” She picked up her knife and fork and held them protectively around her food. “I’m sure if you ask nicely, Lizzy will make you some.”

She grumbled something under her breath too quietly for even Valentina to hear, and she had excellent hearing even in human form. Sighing, she continued. “Tony will be over shortly to help you with whatever it is you need about that car. He’s bringing his gear, so he should be able to get it done for you while he’s here without having to go home and work.”

“Thanks, Kins.”

“No prob, Bob,” she said as she stood, grabbing her book and eagerly opening it to the marker she had placed in not two minutes before as she walked away.

They had finished eating when her phone buzzed. It was a text from Kinsley that simply read, “He’s here.” A few moments later, they were standing in the great room. The cathedral ceilings with their giant curved wooden beams combined with the wall of windows made this a favorite meeting place for everyone in the house. It didn’t hurt that there was no question that it was the great room. With its stately elegance and multiple fireplaces, it didn’t get much greater than that.

The man they were looking for was standing in front of the windows just far back enough so that he was in the sitting area, but his gaze was focused on the grounds outside. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with an all-American look about him. His dark blond hair was paired with the most piercing blue eyes she’d ever seen on a man, and he completed the look with a closely trimmed goatee. He looked half country music star and half corporate climber with his snug-fitting jeans and a button-up undone at the neck and partway down his chest.

“Anthony!” Valentina called, happy to see a friend of the pack.

“Hey, lady, long time no see.” He grinned and swept her up into a bear hug, spinning her around once before setting her down again. “Who’s your friend?”

“Anthony, this is Elijah. He is the reason we need your help. Elijah, this is Anthony, a good friend to Midnight.” As she turned to look at Elijah, her smile died on her face. The glare he was giving the other man was ice cold.

“So, you’re the troublemaker, huh?” Anthony smiled and extended his hand.

Elijah shook it, but there was a heaviness in the air that made her think there was a subtext she was missing. Or not, as she glanced down at the white-knuckle grip they had on each other’s hands. She should have known it would turn into a pissing contest.

“I see you brought your gear,” she said, trying to distract them both and prevent them from crushing each other’s hands.

“Yeah.” Anthony extracted his hand from Elijah’s and shot Valentina a questioning glance. “Kins said you needed this done quickly.”

As he bent over to unpack some of his nondescript black bags, Valentina glared at Elijah. He had no right to throw the dominant male card around. That was some bullshit she would not put up with. When Elijah just stared at her, she turned back to Anthony. “If you can, that would be great.”

A laptop quickly appeared, as well as a heavy-duty power cord and a smaller black box, which was a mystery to her. “You’re trying to track a vehicle, right?”

“Yes. We know where and when it was, but we don’t have the plate or VIN or anything like that.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” the burly man said as he sat on the couch.

She plopped down next to him, leaving Elijah to decide what to do for himself. If he was going to act like a jerk, then he could sit all by himself.

“Where was the vehicle?” Anthony asked after pulling up a number of different complicated-looking windows.

“Outside Pale Moon Light on Grove Hill Road.”

“How long ago are we talking?”

“Two weeks ago, on Friday,” she said, feeling Elijah’s eyes on her the whole time.

“It might take a while to go that far back.”

Valentina watched as Anthony pulled up a list of IP addresses and went into a variety of security cameras until he found one that was somewhat pointing at the front of the bar. When her panther got up and started pacing in front of them, she could feel the tension radiating off him. Leaving Anthony to do his thing, she stood and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows where she could look out over a small but important section of her territory.

This was the heart of her pack, of the area she had claimed, and now she felt as though it were under attack. It didn’t help matters that the High Clan would tear Midnight apart if they felt she couldn’t hold the land, if Traders and Reapers came in and took it over.

There was much more to this than Elijah realized. Anthony, on the other hand, was a true blood shifter and knew exactly what was at stake. It was hard for people who were turned, who were new to the world of the supernatural, to understand the nuances, or how sometimes everything could hang by a thread. She had fought for this territory tooth and claw, and she’d fight like hell to keep it.

When a hand landed on her shoulder, she turned, bearing her teeth at the unfamiliar touch. Elijah’s shocked face was directly in front of her, and she tried to rein in her reaction before she scared him.

“Sorry,” she said after a moment. “I was caught up in my thoughts.”

“Everything okay?” he asked in a low tone that implied he was trying to have a private conversation with her.

“Fine. I’m just worried about the Reaper attack and whoever turned you, that’s all.” She sensed Anthony’s reaction to the revelation rather than heard or saw it, and she wanted to kick herself for being so careless. Yes, the polar bear could be trusted, but that was not her story to tell. It was Elijah’s.

“We will find them and kick their asses. It doesn’t matter who they are.” The panther was overly confident. He hadn’t seen Reapers lay waste to entire families. Men, women, children, the elderly, none of them were safe from a Reaper blade.

“I hope so,” she said under her breath as she lost herself in his direct, purely alpha stare.

His hand came around and rested on the small of her back, his fingertips rubbing small, soothing circles. It was an extremely intimate gesture, and one that she hadn’t expected but appreciated. She turned back around to face the window, though, so she didn’t get overly excited in front of Anthony. The last thing she needed was someone from outside the pack thinking she had stepped aside for this new alpha panther to take control.

Elijah’s arms wrapped around her middle and pulled her back into him gently so she was just resting against him. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest. This felt so good, so right, that she didn’t know how to react, so she just relaxed into it. The heat from his body warmed her through her clothes as she looked out across the pond and the rolling hills of their property.

“I’ve got your van. It’s not exactly inconspicuous,” Anthony said, startling her from her confused thoughts.

Quickly, she pulled away from Elijah, forcing herself to leave his embrace before it was too late and her emotions got the better of her. When she turned to Anthony, his expression confused her. He looked almost hurt. His eyebrows had drawn up in the middle and his lips had thinned. When they made eye contact, the expression disappeared as though he had never felt it.

As she sat down next to him, he pointed to the white van on the screen. Even from the angle the camera shot at, she could see Elijah being loaded in through the side door. They still couldn’t get a plate, but hopefully something like that didn’t matter as much to Anthony as it did to law-abiding citizens.

“Can you track it?”

“Yeah, that’s what I’ve been doing while you were flirting by the window,” he said with a slight huff, sounding grumpy. He began to tab through images as he spoke. “You can see it turn left from Grove Hill to Shermaine and then”—he paused, tabbing furiously. The images began to move so fast that it almost looked like a live feed—“a left onto Harvard Avenue, which will turn into Rugby Drive here in a bit.”

“How are you tracking it?” Elijah piped up.

This time, the icy glare came from Anthony. “I hacked the street cameras.”

“Surely those are only in the city, though?”

“Surprisingly, no. They extend fairly far out, especially in the richy-rich areas.” He sighed, and his eyes dropped to his screen where he maximized another window, replacing the images they had been looking at. This one still held the white-paneled van, but it was much harder to see as it was almost completely blurry. “I’m pretty sure this is still the same van. They are much further along Rugby Drive, but the timing pretty much works out. We can see them turn right on Burlington, but that’s where I lose them for a while. They don’t appear on any of the cameras around the interchange with the ninety, or at the next big light on Burlington, but they do appear by this construction company, and then by this scrap yard, but that’s it. They should be in this area somewhere, since I wasn’t able to pick them up again,” he said, pointing to the screen where there was a big green patch of forest preserve and a few small businesses.

If Elijah had been held somewhere around there, it would take them forever to find it, at least if they relied solely on scent. The forest preserve was massive, not to mention it was surrounded by farms and only a few businesses. She sighed. “Thanks, Anthony. You got us a hell of a lot closer than we would have been otherwise.”

“No problem. Do I need to be on the lookout for anything?” he asked, clearly remembering the comment earlier about Elijah being turned.

“I don’t think so.” She glanced over at the panther, who shrugged. Either he couldn’t tell what she was trying to communicate to him, or he didn’t care. “Elijah was kidnapped from the bar as you saw, and he was turned. Put in a cage with a shifter. I think it’s a fighting ring that’s pitting shifters against humans or something like that, from what Elijah remembers. Just be careful, okay? There are Reapers around, so watch your back. If you need to shift, you’re welcome to use our land.”

Anthony’s eyes widened at the offer; most alphas guarded their land as if it were their hoard and they a dragon. Valentina didn’t see the need for that. Maybe if Anthony was affiliated with another pack, but he was a true blood rogue, having chosen to leave his family pack and move away without contacting a new pack to take him in. It wasn’t that uncommon for bears, since they tended to be loners most of the time, and what they termed a pack was much different from what Valentina termed a pack, and she didn’t even want to think about the differences between a bear pack and a wolf pack. It all made her head hurt.

“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind,” he said as he packed up his equipment. “So, what are you guys going to do from here?” he asked, first looking at Valentina and then at Elijah.

“I have some contacts I’m going to reach out to, see if we can locate them using magical methods.”

Elijah’s brows drew together in confusion. This would be another shift to his understanding of the world, and it made her tired just thinking about it.

“Well, good luck,” Anthony said as he awkwardly patted her on the shoulder before gathering his things and heading out.

“Magical methods? What are you going to do, pull a bunny from a hat?” Elijah chuckled.

“There is still a lot you don’t know or understand about our world,” she said, scolding him. “You’ve seen less than half a percent, so can the judgment, okay?”

He held up his hands in a defensive position. “I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m sorry.”

She could smell the sincerity radiating from him, and it placated her enough to settle back into the couch, knowing this would be a long conversation.