Wild Cat

The front door was still closed, but Reid wasn’t in the apartment. Diego checked it, room by room, gun ready, but there was no sign of Reid. He’d simply vanished.

When he came back to the kitchen, he found Cassidy, human again, sitting in one of Reid’s ordinary kitchen chairs, the man’s groceries spilling over the table. Her Collar had stopped sparking, but her hands were over her face, and she was weeping.

Diego holstered his Sig and crouched next to her. To see this beautiful, brave, strong woman crying wrenched his heart. “Cass. Shh.” He stroked her hair.

“He killed Donovan,” she said brokenly.

Reid had claimed not to have touched him, but Diego knew what Cassidy meant. Whether Reid pulled the trigger himself or had someone else do it was irrelevant. Reid knew about the death, had been involved.

Diego kissed Cassidy’s cheek. Her green eyes were wet with tears, and Diego nuzzled her. “I’ll get him for that, Cass. I promise you.”

She looked up, the anger in her like fire. “I’ll get him. I’m going to find out exactly what he did and who helped him, and I’m going to gut them all.”

Diego said nothing. He kept on stroking her hair, trying to soothe her, while she wept in rage and grief. He knew damn well that if Cassidy touched Reid, or anyone else, she’d be dead, possibly her whole family with her. He couldn’t let her hunt him.

On the other hand, Diego could round up these people and show her Reid’s body on a platter. He had the power to make that happen, and he would. He’d do anything, he thought, anything at all, to ease the hurt and grief he now saw in Cassidy Warden’s beautiful eyes.

The Shifters were getting used to Diego’s T-Bird moving through the streets of Shiftertown. Several waved as Diego drove by, and Diego knew enough by now to make sure he lifted a hand in greeting back.

Nell, on her front porch, watched Diego and Cassidy emerge from the car, Cassidy’s shirt torn from her sudden shifting, and came alert. “Everything all right, Cass? You need me?”

Cassidy shook her head and went on into the house.

“She’s all right,” Diego said. Nell watched in suspicion, but she stayed on her porch.

The door to the Warden house stood open, the screen door letting in cool spring air. It was a beautiful evening, a reminder that they had only a month or two to enjoy the fine weather before triple-digit temperatures struck.

Cassidy walked right through the living room, heading for her bedroom, ignoring the tangle of two leopards that lay on the floor, dozing together like house cats.

The smaller of the wildcats—probably Jace—lifted his head and yawned, red mouth and long white teeth flashing in the dusk. He rose, still in cat form, and wandered down the back hall after Cassidy.

The larger cat rose, stretched, and became Eric. “Diego,” he said. “Sit. I’ll get you a beer.”

Weird to watch a man saunter toward the kitchen, unworried about his naked ass.

Cassidy came out of the back again, but not as her human self. She was her wildcat, the beautiful snow leopard she’d been out in the mountains. Except that now she looked sad, so sad. When Diego sat on the sofa, she climbed up next to him, settled down, and draped her front paws over Diego’s legs.

Diego thought about how she’d cried in Reid’s apartment and how she’d been last night after she’d fought Reid and her Collar had gone off. She’d been tired, hurt, broken. Diego stroked her, trying to comfort her.

Her coat was soft, studded with little black dots, which were almost lost in creamy white fur. Cassidy sighed a little, her eyes drifting closed.

Eric plunked a beer on the table at Diego’s elbow. A swift glance showed Diego that Eric had pulled on a pair of sweatpants, and Eric didn’t hide his amusement that Diego had checked.

“She all right?” Eric said, looking at Cassidy. “Was he the guy?”

Diego rubbed Cassidy’s throat. “We found him, yes. She tried to attack him, her Collar went off, and he vanished. Into thin air.”

Eric paused a second, then half fell into a chair and put his feet on the coffee table. Cassidy looked up at him, but she stayed cat.

“Tell me,” Eric said.

“He’s a cop in Shifter Division,” Diego said. “Stuart Reid. He’d been assigned to watch you and your family. I had to talk to him sometimes about this case, which is why you smelled him on me.”

“A cop?” Eric stared. “Can’t be. We’re after a Fae.”

“We cornered him tonight in his apartment, and he had wounds that Cassidy gave him last night. He admitted he attacked her and said something about needing Shifter blood for a ritual. Claimed he was trying to return to fairyland.”

“Faerie,” Eric said softly. “Shit.”

Jace came out of the back, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. “If he’s a cop at the police station, why didn’t Cassidy smell him when she was there? Why didn’t you, Dad? Or me?”

“I never took Cassidy anywhere near Shifter Division,” Diego said. “We were in the interrogation rooms I always use, which are on a different floor. I hadn’t talked to Reid at all before then. Most of us never have much to do with Shifter Division.”

Jace put his feet on the table in a manner identical to his father’s. “There’s still no way a Fae could live here and be a police officer. Iron makes them sick, kills them with enough exposure. That’s why they retreated to Faerie centuries ago and now avoid most interaction with the human world.”