Chapter 12 Rafe
Marco’s eyes flashed gold as he glared at Adri over the table, and it was all Rafe could do not to step between them.
“Watch your tongue, Carter. I’m not going to send him alone. You’re going with him,” Marco said.
Rafe suppressed a growl. He didn’t know which was worse—leaving Adri behind to deal with the pack without him and risk him pissing off his Alpha, or bringing him into the middle of a potential terrorist cell that had already ambushed him once.
“They’ll recognise the two of them as associated with the pack,” Luca pointed out, glancing up from his computer. “I can’t hack anything to stop them recognising their faces.”
“I want them to know they’re pack. Rafe will tell them we’re more concerned about the recent deaths than the existence of the fighting ring, and that the cost of their continued operation is submitting to a medical check by us.
If they’re not associated with the D-2S, the fact that it’s the doc visiting and not an enforcer should head off any violence and give you a chance to scope things out.
He’s the closest thing we have to a peaceful envoy.
If things go south, the rest of us will be right here as backup.
Rocco can keep us hidden under a glamour near the entrance.
Rafe and Adri are more than capable of holding their own long enough for us to get there. ”
Unless someone exploded. Or opened fire with silver nitrate bullets. Or they all turned feral. There were so many ways this could go wrong, but Marco’s plan was the best option they had, given the history of how quickly any sources of information died when the D-2S realised they were under threat.
“They already ambushed Adri once. Why risk sending him in at all?” Rafe said, sparking a huff of frustration from his mate.
“There’s a big difference between luring a solo fighter into an ambush and attacking someone who walks up to the door representing the Lunettis.
They’re not going to risk pissing me off.
And if I keep him here, he’s going to charge in to rescue you the second something feels off.
I can’t afford to be distracted containing a pissed-off jaguar,” Marco said.
“Fucking hell. I can control myself,” Adri snapped.
“Not when those instincts you’re so set on ignoring are riding you hard. You’re best-placed to recognise the fighters and what’s going on with them in there. Would you really rather stay behind?” Marco asked, raising an eyebrow.
“No. I’m not leaving the doc unprotected. Can we get on with this already?” Adri said, his sullen voice belied by his keen predatory focus as he shifted his weight to the balls of his feet like he was prepping for a fight.
Warmth filled Rafe’s chest despite the tense circumstances as his wolf basked in the satisfaction of his mate’s protectiveness.
The guard at the entrance drew her weapon on them the second Rafe and Adri stepped past the edge of Rocco’s glamour to approach the abandoned office building.
Every instinct screamed at him to place himself between his mate and the danger, but he had to trust in his packmates hidden behind them to keep them safe.
Rocco wouldn’t let a bullet reach them out here, but once they were inside, it would be a different matter.
Adri was carrying the bag of medical equipment that was their cover, his nonchalant swagger portraying false indifference to the threat.
Raising his hands to show he wasn’t armed, Rafe kept his slow pace walking forward, letting the dominance of his wolf loose to roll over the shifter taking aim at them.
“Put that away unless you want to make an enemy of Alpha Lunetti. We’re here to help, not harm. This time,” Rafe called.
“Stop where you are!” the woman called back. She smelled of wolf and fear.
Rafe let his hands drop to his side and kept walking. “You’re a wolf in vampire territory without the protection of a pack. Are you really going to make it worse by attacking me? I’m here to help. I’m a doctor.”
“He’s not,” the woman said, jerking her chin at Adri.
Something wasn’t right here. He knew the Lunetti Pack was intimidating, but no one put a terrified guard on the entrance to their building if they could help it.
“He’s my mate,” Rafe said, sparking a grumble of annoyance from Adri.
“Are we just announcing that to everyone now?” he hissed.
Rafe’s lips twitched as he suppressed a grin, but he didn’t take his eyes off the woman. “Two of your fighters have been brutally, publicly murdered in the last week.”
The woman shrugged, the gun still trained on him. “I don’t know anything about that.”
“Our Alpha needs the incidents to stop. I’m not here to cause trouble or shut you down. I’m just here to examine you all and make sure no one else dies.”
“Wait here,” the woman said, her hands shaking as she finally holstered her weapon and stepped through the glass door of the old office block to call someone on a radio.
She must’ve really been stressed, because she didn’t even seem to realise she was talking loud enough that he could still hear.
He could only make out her side of the conversation, but he could tell whoever she was speaking with was pissed off.
Her eyes searched the road behind them as she talked, Rocco’s magic doing its job to keep their backup hidden as she reassured whoever she’d called that they’d come alone.
“Okay, you can come in,” she said at last. “But you can’t roam the facility. I’ll bring the fighters down here to meet you.”
That was fine. He’d figure out how to scope the location once he’d started his examinations.
“I’ll start with you,” Rafe said, rescuing his bag from Adri and setting it down on the dusty reception desk nearby.
“I don’t fight in the ring,” the woman said, pretending nonchalance as she messaged someone, presumably the fighters.
Rafe didn’t miss the way her eyes had widened in surprise at his offer, though. Or the way she stared at him like he might hold the answer to a question she was too terrified to ask. As he tried to puzzle out what was going on with her, Adri stepped closer to murmur in his ear.
“There are at least two video cameras monitoring us. Someone’s listening.”
That explained the mismatch he was seeing between her words and her body language.
“What’s your name?” Rafe asked, his voice softening despite himself. He’d always had a weak spot for those in trouble.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Come stand in front of me,” Rafe said, reaching into his bag to take out an old-school stethoscope.
The tool was just a prop, an excuse to stand close to her and touch her without clueing in the people watching through the cameras that he was using his magic to scan her body. The true extent of his healing ability was something he and Marco were careful to keep under wraps.
“Can’t you hear my heartbeat without that thing?” the woman asked, stepping in front of him just like he’d asked.
“Yes, but with extra amplification, I can pinpoint any issues exactly. May I?”
The woman nodded.
She was wearing a dark purple top with a scoop neck that gave him the access he needed.
Pressing the diaphragm of the scope over her heart, he let his magic wash through that point as subtly as he could.
Hopefully, she’d attribute any weird sensation to the cold temperature of the metal against her hot skin.
The sense of wrongness coming from her struck so hard it was all he could do not to rock back.
Letting his power flow up to her brain, he sensed a foreign object embedded there.
One that was interfering with the function of her energy, with the essence of the wild magic that flowed through her veins and made her the shifter she was.
His eyes had dropped to the point where the stethoscope rested on her chest as he focussed his attention beneath her skin. As he looked up to meet her gaze, he saw the knowledge of the violation the terrorists had forced on her in her eyes.
“Help me,” she mouthed, her head carefully angled away from the cameras.
Before he could reply, the glass wall looking out to the street shattered inward, firing shards of glass like shrapnel around them.
Snarling as his bare arms were sliced to shreds, Rafe spun to face the new threat, barely processing the flash of purple that was the guard sprinting deeper into the building, away from the attackers.
Adri had already shifted. The tang of his mate’s blood on the air enraged Rafe’s wolf as he watched the jaguar prowl toward the street, his black fur all too visible in the harsh lighting of the office building. He was a walking target.
The sound of his packmates’ growls only registered for a split-second before all his attention was focussed on three silent, impossibly fast figures closing in on his mate.
Where the fuck had the vampires come from?
He didn’t have time to stop and find out.
Shifting into his wolf form to give himself some protection from their mind tricks, he lunged to bite hard into the back of the knee of the nearest vampire targeting Adri.
The metallic taste of blood filled his mouth as he hamstrung the attacker, immediately following up his advantage by lunging up the vampire’s tumbling body to rip his throat out.
If these were Kyan’s people, he couldn’t risk permanently dispatching them, so he was careful to avoid severing the guy’s spine with his teeth.
The arterial spray across the granite flooring and the hunk of trachea he spat on the ground told him this one wouldn’t be getting up anytime soon, though. Even with vampire healing.