Michael
MICHAEL
Baxter bustled into the room, his mood so jovial it was almost sickening. ’s anxiety went through the roof. There could only be one reason for Baxter to be so satisfied, given the last couple of days. There really wasn’t anything much to feel happy about around Taiga at the moment.
Agents were still mopping up the mess that had been left when a small explosion had gone off in a lab in E Block.
‘Some new weapon the scientists were working on, nothing to worry about. All under control,’ had been told as he’d been dragged from his room, still drunk from a half-bottle of scotch. Gretchen had watched silently with wide, fear-filled eyes as he was led away.
It wasn’t until he was brought to the control center of the facility and told he was to remain there until they found the two escapees that it had all come to light.
Jack had escaped.
Jack and the female hybrid Daphne had spoken of had managed to use that explosion and the temporary power outage that followed to slash the guts out of a young agent, almost killing her. They’d escaped via the roof. Jack had grown wings … enormous, feathered wings, and flown away with her in his arms. Like a golden avenging angel.
Baxter had made watch the footage from the rooftop. ’s teeth hurt from grinding them so hard to stop from screaming as he watched them shoot his son out of the sky. Watched him fall, still protecting that female, into the forest.
Their bodies hadn’t been found yet. There was still no sign of them two days later.
He hadn’t seen Gretchen in that long. His fists clenched and unclenched under the table, the only way he could let out his anxiety without Baxter and the other agents noticing. His nails dug into the flesh. They were getting long.
He tried to focus on the positives. Jack hadn’t been found, which meant he wasn’t dead.
Probably.
They would have found him if he were , repeated for the umpteenth time. Clench. Unclench. His knuckles ached from it.
Gretchen didn’t know that Jack was missing. She’d been kept very much in the dark. He told himself it was for the best. Being locked up in their comfortable room was the safest place for her. And him not seeing her was necessary—she’d take one look at him and immediately know everything had gone completely sideways.
More sideways than it already had, anyway.
At the same time … she shouldn’t be left alone. Some days, he was sure that only his presence stopped her from … he didn’t even want to think the word.
“She’s being monitored by agents around the clock, ,” Baxter said, his falsely reassuring tone and little smirk sent waves of nausea through . He knew exactly how bad Gretchen’s mental state was, and he didn’t give a fuck.
How had they ever thought this man was sane enough to do business with? Business involving their own offspring, no less.
“Well, I have some very positive news, everyone!” Baxter crowed, snatching up a remote and pointing it at the screen at the end of the meeting room. “A drone has located the absconders.”
’s throat closed over as he and the assorted agents turned to the screen. Drone footage appeared, that eerie green of night vision over the trees. And then a clearing came into view.
A clearing with a cabin.
The drone zoomed in on a tall, broad, light-haired male, pinning a tall, lithe, dark-haired female to the porch post. Kissing her greedily. The female had her fingers digging into his hips. They were pressed together so tightly that it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.
They were both wearing Taiga-issue jumpsuits.
looked away.
Jack was alive.
Jack had saved himself and the girl.
But Baxter had found them.
Clench. Unclench.
“Their location is a clearing almost ninety miles from here,” Baxter added, his eyes shining with admiration.
He’s fucking insane , thought.
Clench. Unclench.
One of the other agents whistled. “No wonder it took us a hot minute to locate them!” he said. “That’s much further than we’d expected them to get!”
Baxter nodded. “But we should have factored in their Shifter strength, speed, and endurance. In any case, we have them now.”
’s stomach bottomed out.
“Do you want me to assemble a team to extract them?” one of the other agents asked, his tone businesslike. As if bringing back two escaped prisoners to who knew what punishment was just another day in the office.
But Baxter shook his head. He rewound the footage, playing the kiss again. sat, eyes down, while the rest of them watched his son’s passion with this girl like a bunch of sick voyeurs.
“We hold off,” Baxter said. “We know where they are. They believe themselves safe. They have shelter. We can monitor the situation via drone, but given our … endgame with this pair, perhaps it is better to let them spend some time alone in the wild. Perhaps, this way, nature will take its course, in a way that our more … clinical approach here inside Taiga was unable to achieve.”
Clench. Unclench.
tasted blood. He’d bitten his tongue.
What Daphne had said had been right. They wanted to see if Jack and this female were in fact, mates … Baxter was watching them kiss, watching them almost devour one another, and thinking—probably correctly—that it wouldn’t take much for a kiss to lead to … mating.
But what had Daphne said? That there was one step in the process that Mercer hadn’t worked out yet.
Perhaps Jack wouldn’t know that step either, and so the mating wouldn’t be complete, even if he and this girl ended up sleeping together.
It was a tiny thread of hope, but grabbed hold of it with everything he had left in his cold, numb heart.
Clench.