Chapter Twelve – Kris

 

Our building’s overnight security guard, Larry, had come through on protecting my car from an unwanted towing, and as I fruitlessly scanned the lobby in an attempt to find him, I made a mental note to thank him the next time we saw each other.

Hunter and I rode up the elevator together, silence filling the air between us as we stood on opposite ends of the car, our heads craned upwards as we watched the numbers rise.

“Nervous?” Hunter asked when we were only a few floors away.

“Nervous?” I replied. “Why would I be? These are my men.”

He shrugged. “Just curious. Three months is a long time to be gone. They may have forgotten about both of us in our absence.”

“Maybe you,” I said with a little smile, “but never me.”

I’d worked with these men for years. Delivered their briefings on more operations than I could count, led them into battle, shared rations, even sleeping bags when the weather got too cold. Not in a sexual way, either. The bond I had with them was deeper than any sexuality. It was the kind of connection you could only forge in the heat of battle.

“You know that old saying ‘blood is thicker than water’?” I asked. “Most people think that means family is more important than anything, but they’re wrong. It actually comes from Roman Centurions, and their belief that the men you shed blood with were closer than family. They’ll remember me.”

The elevator bell toned, and we stepped out onto the floor that Full Moon Security leased. Our entryway was little more than a square box with cheap prints on either wall adjacent to the elevator door, and two cameras with darkly tinted globes covering them. Each bubble sat nestled up in the corner like an electronic hornet’s nest watching your every move. A plain glass door, our logo emblazoned on it, stood locked between us and the small lobby on the other side. To the right of the entrance was a small number pad, and beside that an intercom with a small plaque below it, which read:

“To Request Access, Please Press.”

Full Moon didn’t have a receptionist. Not that we couldn’t afford one, of course. But when we’d first established the agency, we ran across a serious conundrum when it came to the usual clerical work that needed doing: how could we get someone with higher than top secret clearance to come answer phones for us in St. Louis? After all, anyone who worked with us had to be initiated into the supernatural world to some degree or another, and had to be completely vetted and trusted to the same degree as any of our agents.

In the end, we went with an automated system. Computers didn’t care if you were shifters or dragons, or that ghosts were actually real, simply because they didn’t care about anything.

On autopilot, my fingers flew as I keyed in my six digit PIN, the door buzzed as the magnetic lock released, and I pulled open the door to let myself and Hunter through into the vacant lobby on the other side.

Samuel Fitzgerald, who had drawn the short straw nearly three years ago when we’d first moved into this place and received the office closest to the front door, was talking to someone quietly on the phone.

“Nah, babe, think I’ll be out of here on time. Ryder got the shit detail this weekend with the new client.” He paused for a second, laughed. “I’ll tell him you said that.” Another pause. “Steak sounds great. Mashed or baked on the taters?” One more pause. “I love you, too. See you soon.”

The phone settled back into its carriage as Hunter and I breezed up to the open door. Inside, Sam Fitzgerald was leaned precariously back in his chair with his legs kicked up on his desk as he balanced on the two rear wheels, hands behind his head like he was relaxing on some beach in Aruba and not milking the clock in St. Louis.

I caught his eye as I went past, flashing mine green just for effect.

His own went wide, and he imbalanced himself with the surprise. “Holy shit!” he exclaimed a split second before his feet began kicking, and his legs started flailing above his desk as he desperately tried to gain purchase that was just out of reach.

Hunter and I were already past the door and down the hall as he went tumbling to the floor of his office with a crash of hardened plastic, synthetic leather, and wolf shifter bones. He flailed about for a moment on the ground like a beached whale, before his stomping boots brought him to the door of his office.

“Kris?” he shouted in excited surprise to my and Hunter’s rear. “Ma’am, you’re back!”

“Course I’m back, Fitzgerald,” I barked back over my shoulder. “Miss me?”

Sam sputtered and stumbled over his words, with Hunter snickering the whole time, but we were already around the corner.

I nodded to Carter, Ryder, and Luke as I kept marching down the way. They’d all appeared from the recesses of their offices, leaning against the doorframes as they watched my approach. To a man, they were all grinning.

“Nice shirt, Hunter,” Ryder said as we walked by. “You taking fashion tips from Carter, now?”

“What did I say in the garage?” Hunter muttered.

“You know they can hear you, right? They’re fucking shifters.”

“How was your vacation?” Carter growled like the big, cuddly bear he was as we came abreast of his massive frame.

“Considered it more of a sabbatical,” I said, coming to a stop in front of him, hands on my hips. “Heard two of you boys practically got hitched while I was away.”

“Uh,” Luke said, so artfully from his little enclave, “kinda, yeah. Sorry, boss.”

“Sorry?” I asked, eyes narrowed as I turned to him. “You’re fucking sorry, Oldham?”

The frown on his face deepened, and he looked for all the world like a scared kitten trying to get away from its mother’s reproachful gaze.

My look softened, and I smiled a little. “Why the hell should you be sorry? I rolled over for these other punks, why not you?” Down the hall, Ryder snickered a little. “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, Williams. You’re just lucky Grant and Fitzgerald already paved the way for your sorry ass. Otherwise, I’d have had you in a sling the second I got through the door.”

I turned to each of them, measuring them up as best I could. They all clearly wanted to say something about my disappearing on a trip with Hunter for three months, to ask hundreds of questions about where I’d been and what I’d been doing. Questions like those could wait, though.

“You men go soft while I was away?”

“No, ma’am,” they said in near-unison.

“Good,” I said, nodding. “That’s good. Tabitha here?”

“Holed up in her workshop, ma’am,” Carter said from just behind me.

“All right.” I turned and headed that way, saying, “Now get back to work. It’s not five yet.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Hunter and I followed the hall down through another turn, with no mutters or whispers following after us. My men were disciplined in at least that regard. We passed by Hunter’s office, and I heard him peel off from behind me and stop to open his door.

“Not coming with me?” I asked.

He gave me a look as if he were questioning my seriousness. “Do you really think you need me in there?”

I shrugged. “We started this together, figured we could finish it that way.”

“One, we didn’t start it together.” He grinned. “And, two, this is far from finished.” He paused, looked into the darkened interior of his office-slash-workshop. “I’m just going to check over my inventories, make sure those hooligans of yours haven’t disrupted anything while I was away.”

I nodded, turned, and continued on my way to Tabitha’s workshop. The door, as unremarkable as any other office door in the world, was opened just a crack. Inside I could hear soft music playing and the arrhythmic tapping of fingers on a keyboard.

Taking a deep breath as I stepped up to the door, I pushed it open and rapped my knuckles on the wooden panel as I entered through the rune-etched threshold guarding the witch’s sanctum, the hair on my arms and the back of my neck standing on end. With my slightly trained eye, I noticed a few new runes, which must have been carved in during my absence. “Knock, knock.”

Tabitha’s workshop was a swirl of controlled madness. Leather-bound tomes filling a whole wall of sagging bookshelves, jars of she-only-knew-what covering iron shelves Carter had personally installed for her, a large rectangular metal table stuffed into one corner, and a space off to the side with the carpet ripped back and a copper and silver circle embedded in the concrete. Needless to say, with the number of modifications we’d made to this place, there was no way we were getting our security deposit back when we moved out.

And there, off to the side, huddled at her little computer desk with three banal and mundane monitors arrayed in front of her, was Tabitha.

With her back to the door. And headphones on over her long blonde hair. She didn’t even shift in her seat as I stalked closer to her, rolling each step from heel to toe on the outside of the sole of my boot.

As much as I loved Tabitha, she really needed to learn a little something about situational awareness.

The typing barely slowed as I crept along, hands raised into mock claws. One step, two steps, three steps. I raised my hands farther, readying myself to give the most hearty dragon roar this human form could muster.

“I know you’re there, Kris,” Tabitha said, deflating my lungs before they could even fill all the way. The grin was so evident in her voice, I could practically see it without even seeing her face. “So don’t even bother.”

I slumped a little. This had become a little bit of a ritual for us, but I guess it was only fun for me. “Oh.”

She spun around in her chair, wide lips pulled back. Her smile dropped a little when she saw the look on my face. “I updated the wards on my shop,” she said as she went to get up from the chair. “Added a little bit of clairvoyance to them so I know who passes over the threshold.”

“Well, isn’t that nice?” I asked, sulky that I’d been so easily thwarted.

Still smiling, she was already on me like a rabid hug-beast, her arms embracing me tightly as she tried to crush the love from my chest. “Oh, shut up!”

I hugged her right back, closing my eyes for a second as I enjoyed the feel of a warm body. Out of all the people I worked with, Tabitha was the closest thing I had to a friend. To a sister. The other shifters were great guys, blood brothers through and through, but Tabitha was the one I could split a bottle of wine with on a lonely Friday night and listen to while she griped about the guys on her online dating app. And, with the way things were looking now, she and Hunter were the only two single people left in the office. Not that it mattered much to me. I was a dragon, after all, and finding a suitable mate wasn’t something I could really manage with a cell phone app.

We broke apart and sized each other up. Not much had really changed for her, but I’m sure I looked one or two steps closer to ragged than I had before. Three months with no sun and no haircut will do that to a woman.

“Would it make you feel better if I sat back down in the chair so you could pretend to scare me? I’ve been working on my screech. Perfected it to twelve-year-old girl level.”

I laughed and pulled her into another hug, grinning. “I’ll live. But thanks for the thought.”

A moment later, we separated. “You look good,” she said, nodding as if her affirmation made it fact.

“Don’t lie to a dragon.”

She shrugged. “Well, you’ve looked better, but still not as bad as I thought you would. Especially with—”

I held up a finger, silencing her. “Is this place secure?”

“Ran a sweep as soon as I got off the phone with you.”

“Find anything?” I asked, arms crossed in front of me.

She shook her head. “If they’re listening in, it’s through a scrying spell.” She stepped out from around me and went over to the circle embedded in the corner of the workshop, beckoning for me to follow after her. “And this should at least scramble it a little.”

I stepped in after her, my whole body prickling for a moment as I entered the weird magical field.

“Now,” she said, lowering her voice as she leveled her gaze on me, “what the fuck is going on? You’ve been looking for the colonel this whole time and haven’t said anything to me?”

I frowned. “It’s complicated, okay? I didn’t want anyone to get their hopes up, and I was worried this was all going to be a wild good chase. We were thin on company resources as it was, and I thought all of you could be better utilized in other capacities.”

“Uh-huh.”

I sighed, trying to ignore the feeling in my gut that her obvious hurt was causing. “Look, Tabitha. I need you to look into something for me.”

“Oh, so now you want my help? Hunter too busy this time around?”

“Dammit, Tabitha, I needed to keep this compartmentalized, discreet.”

“So you’re saying I’m not discreet, now?”

“You know that’s not what I mean. I just wanted to make sure we all—”

She rolled her eyes and sighed, putting a hand up to stop me. “Let’s worry about how much you screwed up later, okay? Right now, you need my help.”

Arms still crossed, I narrowed my eyes as I looked away from her. She was right—I should have brought her in from the beginning on this. Maybe even the rest of the guys. If I had, none of this would be coming out of left field.

“I need you to investigate a new organization called the Paranormal Defense Board. Anything you can find on them.”

“Defense Board?” She blinked in surprise. “What?”

I nodded solemnly. “That’s what he left to do. The colonel’s put a new organization together, Tabitha. He wants me to come on board, but I can’t do that until I know how he’s getting his funding, what his mandate is, what his overall goal is.”

“He won’t tell you?”

I shook my head. “He knows I’m just going to come to you anyways, so I don’t know why he’s bothering with trying to keep it hidden.”

“You know how the colonel is. He’s always been big on forming your own opinions based on the facts. Maybe he’s worried he’ll bias you if he hands over the information directly?”

I shrugged, fought the urge to pace within the small warded circle, and instead ran a hand back through my hair. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe he’s just trying to do that damn dad shit of his. Probably thinks there’s some kind of valuable lesson in it.”

“So he’s trying to get all of us on board with this thing?”

Frowning a little, I looked her in the eye. Without saying a word, I looked away.

“He’s not, is he?” The hurt in her voice was evident when she caught my meaning. “He’s just trying to take a couple with him.”

“Just me, actually,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “But, he’s promised he’s going to get some more resources in here, that FMS is going to basically be the domestic wing of the PDB, if we agree to it.”

When she spoke, the disdain was thick enough to spread on toast. “So we lose a boss, and get a bunch of money?” She paused, and the disdain turned to sadness. “Not only a boss, but I lose a friend?”

“Tabitha…”

She sighed, rubbed her eyes. “It’s fucking bullshit, and you know it.”

“I know. But, what else is there?”

“Stay here, of course.”

“I mean, I could. But he said he needed me, Tabitha.”

She groaned. “Another thing he was always big on. Talk about being manipulative.”

I chuckled. “Yeah. Completely. How soon do you think you can get something?”

“All the information?” She shrugged. “Probably never. You know how these things are, and the way they work.”

“Something usable?”

“More doable.”

“Good, you have four days before I need to make my decision.”

“Four days?” she asked, eyes wide.

“Says he needs me to do a mission before the next full moon. Won’t tell me any details, but from the way he was talking, it sounds international.”

“Okay,” she said with a nod. “Four days. Got it. Anything else?”

Unable to think of anything else, I shook my head. “No, I think that’s about it.” I stepped out of the circle, that familiar tingle from just minutes before passing over my body, and headed for the office door. When I had my hands around the doorknob, Tabitha cleared her throat behind me.

“I missed you, by the way,” she said.

“Thanks,” I said looking back at her with a smile on my face. “Missed you, too, Tabs.”