After lunch, which had been later than normal because of her teaching activities in the yard, she went to her room to rest and check in with Gavin.

He answered the call with his usually perfect hair sticking up in every direction.

“Were you asleep?” she asked.

“It’s still early here, you know.”

She glanced at the time on her laptop. “Seven in the morning is not that early for a work day. You okay?” Then another thought occurred to her. “Or did I interrupt something?”

“What? No. Marco isn’t here. We...we had a little fight.”

Ryenne grimaced. A breakup after only a couple of days wasn’t surprising for Gavin. But every time he fell for a guy, he was sure it was the real thing, so every break-up hurt.

She put her arms on either side of the screen so that her hands met behind it. “Sorry, Gav. Here’s a hug. What happened?”

Usually, Gavin realized real life didn’t live up to the fantasy of the first flush of a new relationship.

“I’d noticed a tattoo on Marco’s ankle our first night together but last night I asked him about it. Turns out he’s a supporter of the Fangs.”

“The Fangs? Who the hell are they? Some band you don’t like?”

Gavin blew out a breath. “No, this is serious, Ry. The Fangs are a group of rogue shifters who believe shifters shouldn’t have to hide who they are and what they can do. They think shifters should rule the world and the humans should kowtow.”

Rogues banding together was bad. The occasional rogue was easily dealt with, but united, they could be unstoppable.

“Is Marco a shifter?”

“No. He’s like a fangirl or something. A Fang groupie.”

“What does the tattoo look like?”

“A bloody fang. Original, huh?” He pushed a hand through his disheveled hair. “I thought I knew him better, that he was the one. But he’s a rogue groupie. Why are there even rogue groupies? What does a human get out of it?”

Ryenne didn’t answer. She was remembering a bloody fang tattoo on a slim ankle lying on the ground of an alley outside a New York City club. Tess must have been a member of the Fangs. Damn. She should have killed her when she had the chance.

A scream shattered the peace of the compound.

“Ryenne? What was that?”

Instead of answering, she ran out and found a leopard at the other end of the long, narrow hallway. It wasn’t the same one she’d seen the previous two occasions. It wasn’t as big and had a different look in its eyes. Less cunning, more desperate. This leopard stalked toward her with base instinct, nothing more.

Was it a new shifter?

The thought chilled her.

She only had her dagger at her back. Not a great weapon for fighting wild animals but it was easy to carry, easy to conceal, and easy to use in close combat. Pulling it from its sheath, she stared the animal down, waited for it.

It snarled and stalked toward her down the long, narrow corridor. Thankfully, an empty corridor.

The scrawny animal reached a point about five feet away from her. Easy striking distance for a leopard. Not close enough for her dagger unless she threw it. She was a good shot with her dagger but then she’d only have the stun gun in her pocket and she’d have to reach it before the injured and angry creature reached her.

Keeping loose, rolling her shoulders, she searched the leopard’s eyes for a sign of recognition. If it was a new shifter, it might be someone she knew.

Oh shit. It might be Innocent.

She couldn’t kill Innocent. If he’d been turned, it was probably against his will. If he attacked her, it was out of a leopard’s instinct.

Shit.

Just as it seemed like the leopard was going to pounce on her, a body rushed past her from behind and launched himself at the animal. Her first thought was that Lucien had finally shown up to help. But it wasn’t Lucien.

It was John.

Her number one suspect.

John wrestled the leopard to the floor, avoiding its gnashing teeth and sharp claws.

While the leopard was otherwise occupied, Ryenne dashed into her room and grabbed the telescoping cattle prod. It had much better reach than her dagger and gave her a chance to fight the animal before it was on top of her.

Back in the hall, John had lost some ground to the leopard. Scratches on his arm were dripping blood onto the floor and a gash over his eye looked like it would need stitches.

She got as close as she could while staying out of the way of flying limbs and sharp teeth and claws, and looked for an opening. She didn’t want to stun John and leave him defenseless to the angry animal.

Man and beast rolled on the floor with snarls and growls and shouts. John couldn’t seem to subdue the leopard, but he hadn’t given up.

Ryenne stomped around them, giving them a wide berth, looking for an opening. The leopard was aware of her presence. Every so often, if she let herself get too close, the animal took a swipe at her with his foreleg. One time, he connected with her shin and she jumped back, cursing.

Finally, John got on the leopard’s back. Before the leopard could throw him off, Ryenne dashed in close and jabbed the cattle prod into the animal’s neck. He shook his shaggy head and growled. She jabbed again, this time making contact with his chest, and held the cattle prod in place until she stunned it to unconsciousness.

It thudded to the floor in a heap. John rolled off, panting, bleeding, eyes closed.

With a small cry, Eleanor came running down the hallway holding a small bag. She dropped to her knees next to John and cleaned his scratches and patched up the largest one on his shoulder.

“I think it needs stitches,” Ryenne said.

Eleanor nodded. “I can do them but we will call the doctor to bring antibiotics. Maybe John will allow me to sew up his wound.”

“But probably not?” Ryenne guessed.

Eleanor looked up and gave Ryenne a wry glance. “Probably not.”

“John, were you bitten or only scratched?”

He blinked at her but didn’t answer.

She shook him by the shoulders. “John, this is important. Did he bite you?”

John’s lips parted. “No. No bites.”

She relaxed back in a crouch. At least John wouldn’t turn into a shifter. Unless he already was one.

The leopard sighed and shifted into the form of a human.

Innocent.

“Damn,” she muttered. She’d suspected it might be him, but she’d really hoped she was wrong. Limping into her room, she found the pair of handcuffs in her luggage and secured Innocent’s wrists behind his back. This position made it difficult to shift because the position wasn’t natural to an animal and would be extremely painful. He was too weak to endure such pain.

After a moment of staring at the skinny, naked, unconscious man, she grabbed the blanket off her bed to cover him. While shifters didn’t much care about nudity, this was a modest culture, and John and Eleanor didn’t need to see Innocent like this.

“Miss Ryenne, are you hurt?”

Ryenne glanced at her leg and felt the warm trickle of blood. There was a gash in her jeans. “It’s nothing, barely more than a scratch.”

After several minutes, John sat up.

Ryenne kicked her toe into the floor. “Thanks for saving my life.”

John shrugged. “It’s my job. You would have been fine without me, I think.”

“Maybe, but I would’ve ended up like you. Bleeding and scratched and needing stitches.”

“I don’t need stitches,” he said, his voice gruff. “I’ll be fine.”

“We shall see,” Eleanor said, crossing her arms in front of her ample chest.

The adrenaline was wearing off and Ryenne knew she’d be dead tired in a few minutes. They still needed to deal with Innocent. They couldn’t leave him here on the floor. Naked.

“How did he get in?” she asked.

“Miss?” a voice from the other end of the hallway said. It was Teddy.

Ryenne noticed the knot of Steven’s men standing there for the first time. She stood in a rush of anger. “What are you all doing back there? Did anyone try to stop the leopard? Have I taught you nothing?”

Teddy and the rest of the men hung their heads as if ashamed.

Luckily, John’s intervention gave her the time to get the proper weapons to fight a leopard. But what if John hadn’t been there? She was good, but good enough for a brand-new shapeshifter in the first throes of blood lust with only short-range weapons to hand?

She had stupidly let her guard down, thinking nothing bad could happen during the day. But she should know, better than anyone, that rogues didn’t follow the rules.

The silence of the guards irked her. Maybe because she really blamed herself. “Well? How did he get in here?”

“Some of us were on break,” Teddy said in a small voice.

“The rest were too scared of the leopard to move,” Eleanor offered. “I saw him from the kitchen window but he moved so fast. Before we knew it, he was in the house.”

Ryenne nodded, letting the anger drain away. A few hours of training was worthless when up against a rogue with this much cunning. He turned Innocent on purpose and then set him loose on the compound, probably knowing he’d have no resistance until he found her.

They weren’t hunters.

She was.

“Okay, is there a spare room in this house?”

Eleanor nodded, stood, and walked to a door farther along the hallway. She took a key out of her pocket and unlocked the room.

John, even wounded, was a massive guy. He stooped and, with no visible effort, scooped Innocent up in his beefy arms and brought him into the room. Leaving him on the bed, John returned to the hallway and crossed his massive arms on his chest as if on guard.

Eleanor locked the door.

“Where’s Jomo?” Ryenne asked, suddenly concerned for the young boy. She didn’t see him among the men.

“When I saw the leopard, I told him to stay in the kitchen and I locked him in for good measure.”

Ryenne nodded her approval. Smart woman.

“Let him out and let’s try to get back to normal. Would Mr. Muteti want us to call the police on Innocent?”

Eleanor’s eyes went wide and scared.

John shook his head. “We handle things ourselves.”

Sure they did. She narrowed her eyes. “And where is your boss?”

“He had me drop him at his office in the warehouse. He finally felt well enough to return to work.”

Ryenne tapped on her tooth with a fingernail. She had a lot to consider and needed to be alone with her thoughts. “Okay, back to work, everyone.” In her room, she slammed the door closed and listened to the sounds of shuffling feet from the hallway.

Her eyes fell on her open laptop on the bed, tumbled sideways from when she ripped the blanket off the bed. “Shit.”

She rushed to the laptop. “Gav, you still there?”

“Cripes, Ryenne, what the hell just happened?” His hair still stuck up every which way and his eyes were wide. Had he waited at the computer for all this time?

She filled him in. “I was sure that either John or Steven was the rogue. But either way, why would John help me with the newly-turned leopard? He’s so loyal to his boss that if Steven decided to send Innocent after me, I don’t see why John would thwart the plan. He may have saved my life.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t make sense.” He took a sip of a drink in a rocks glass.

“Is that alcohol? Geez, Gavin, it’s still morning where you are.”

“I was really scared, Ry. I didn’t know what was going on but I could hear the sounds of a fight.”

Yeah, Gavin wasn’t having the best morning. Remembering her own dark thoughts when she woke, another thought struck her. “You know what else doesn’t make sense? Lucien isn’t here. He didn’t come running when everyone else did, so he must not be in the house. And he wasn’t here when I had lunch. He’s never left the house before without me, so what the hell is he doing?”

“Do you think the hot French wolf could be involved with the rogue?”

That didn’t add up either. Why be here at all, then, if Steven was the rogue? But what if Steven wasn’t the rogue? Then it made perfect sense to have a man inside the investigation.

“Nothing in this case fits, Gav. Why did you get me into this?”

Gavin’s eyebrows rose. “Really? You jumped at the chance to go to freakin’ Africa. You didn’t even invite me along.”

“You were preoccupied with Marco.”

Gavin’s face fell and his eyes glistened.

“Shit, I’m sorry, Gav. I didn’t mean it. This case just has me tied up in knots.”

“Or is it Lucien having that effect on you?”

Good point. She needed to get her head on straight or more people would die.

“I’d better go, but I’m really sorry about Marco. Try to forget him. He didn’t deserve you, anyway. Feel free to plunder my hidden stash of chocolate.”

Gavin blew her a kiss and ended the call.

***

Steven didn’t come to dinner. Jomo explained their boss hadn’t returned from the warehouse yet.

But Lucien did.

He smiled at her from the table when she entered the dining room.

She didn’t give him a chance to explain himself or to spin a web of lies. “Where the hell have you been all day? Do you know what’s been going on?”

The smile fell from his swarthy face and he nodded. “Yes, I got back while Eleanor was cleaning the hall and she told me. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to help you with the shifter. With Innocent.” He shook his head again. “I wish we could have found him last night, but he must have already been taken by the rogue.”

While she had been releasing tension by knocking boots with Lucien, Innocent had been the rogue’s prisoner. He must have been so scared.

Her self-loathing must have shown on her face because Lucien’s eyes narrowed.

“I don’t regret what we did last night, Ryenne. I...have enjoyed our time together. I only regret not finding Innocent before he was bitten.”

“Yeah, and before he was turned into a weapon.” She ignored the rest of what he said and concentrated on their case. The reason they were here.

“You think he was sent after you on purpose?”

She nodded. “It’s not the first time the rogue has targeted me. I wish I knew why. Why me and not us?” She glanced over her shoulder to reassure herself they were alone and lowered her voice. “What I don’t get is, if Steven or John is the rogue, why bring us here at all? Why hire hunters to hunt yourself down? And why then help me fight off the fledgling shifter?”

Lucien sat back and aimlessly moved food around his plate. “Yeah, it doesn’t add up. What if the rogue has multiple personalities or a mental illness? One part of him is the rogue and the other is trying to stop himself?”

She hadn’t considered this. Maybe because it was far-fetched. But since nothing logical worked for them, maybe they needed to think beyond the normal. “We haven’t seen any signs of mental illness in either of them. I guess they could be hiding it or medicated. Maybe they’re trying to throw suspicion off themselves by helping me. It just doesn’t explain why I’ve been targeted in the first place.”

Ryenne was going to tell Lucien about what she’d learned about the Fangs from Gavin but remembered that he hadn’t yet explained his absence all day. He could be in league with the rogue. In which case, she’d already told him too much.

She glanced up and he was staring at her. His eyes sparkled, reminding her of how she’d felt with him early this morning, and she wanted to melt into his eyes and into his embrace.

She gave herself a mental shake. This was no time to get distracted by a French hottie. And one who could be working against her. Regardless, until they caught the rogue, everyone here was in danger. As simple as that.

But not so simple.

A frantic shout came from the hallway and she jumped out of her seat.