A Grizzly Kind Of Love (The Mating Game Book 3) (7 page)

After lunch, Wynona realized she’d forgotten her laptop at her office. Zane insisted on driving her there, and walked her to her office door. He stood there and watched her turn the alarm off.

“I have to make a phone call,” he said. “I need to step outside so I can get cell reception. Will you be all right in there alone?”

“In my office? Yeah, I think I can handle it,” Wynona said. “You saw me turn off the alarm. Nobody’s been in there, it’s all good.”

She walked through the reception area and into her office, and realized she’d been overly optimistic.

The man from the parking lot stepped out from behind the door and shut it. Wynona fell back with a startled squeak. He didn’t look particularly murderous, but maybe he was the type who looked perfectly calm right up to the second he ripped your throat out.

“I can’t say that I’m surprised to see you,” Wynona said, managing to sound pretty calm, under the circumstances. “Why didn’t I scent you, though?”

“I used scent spray.”

“How did you know I’d be here on a Saturday afternoon?”

“I hacked into your phone this morning. You called your niece and told her you were stopping by your office to get your laptop.”

It simultaneously pissed her off and alarmed her that he even knew that her niece Daisy existed. She didn’t want Daisy to be on this man’s radar, at all.

“Which begs the question, why are you following me and hacking into my phone?” she asked coolly.

Instead of answering, he leaned over and peered into her purse. “Where’s the dog?” He scowled at her. “Did you take it to the pound?”

“Of course I didn’t bring it to the pound,” she said indignantly. “My crazy assistant has it. You’d like her – she’s as insane as you are about grammar.”

“Will she treat it well? What about her husband; does he like animals?”

“She treats him like a prince, there is no husband, and tell me why you broke into my office.” This was getting less scary and more annoying.

“Well, this is a violation of our code of ethics, but I’m here to warn you that your life is in danger.”

“Whose code of ethics?”

“The assassin code of ethics.” All right, now it was starting to get scary again. She could scream for Zane, but she suspected this guy could kill her before Zane reached her. And what if he had a gun with silver bullets? Then he could kill Zane.

“Assassins have a code of ethics?” she echoed stupidly.

His forehead furrowed in annoyance. “Yes, I just stated that we have. Please keep up.”

She shook her head, utterly baffled now. “I’m trying, but I don’t understand. You’re an assassin, but you’re following me around because you’re trying to help me?”

He sighed. “Originally I was hired to kill you. In fact, I had already retired, but I was convinced to take this one last job due the alleged nature of your evil ways. But then I discovered that the person who hired me had lied about you. I had been informed that you were a sadistic torturer of animals who placed bets on dog fights—”

Wynona sucked in an outraged breath, but he interrupted her before she could speak.

“And therefore I was willing to suspend my personal rule against killing females. However, I had to verify this for myself, and upon investigating you, I found that that I had been deceived.”

“You kill people for a living, but you have rules? I’m just having a hard time wrapping my head around that.”

He looked offended. “My personal code of ethics states that I only kill other assassins. Everyone who has every hired me has known that. As I said, I only considered making an exception in your case because of the allegations of animal torture. My client stated that you had abducted his dog and used it as a bait dog for pit bulls, and he wanted revenge. I do not appreciate being lied to.” He scowled, looking so indignant that she could barely keep herself from laughing.

She shook her head in amazement. “You know, for some reason the thing that’s surprising me the most right now is that Sprinkles actually liked you. So far, with that one exception, his taste has been infallible.”

“Of course he liked me,” the man said huffily. “I have a rescue dog organization and I am of sterling character.”

“Do you have a name, by the way?”

He peered at her as if she were insane. “Of course I have a name.
Everyone
has a name. I don’t understand how a woman of your limited intelligence is running a successful business.”

Wynona bit back a bitchy response. He was basically there to help her, and also, scary assassin. Probably wouldn’t do to rile him. “Would you care to
tell
me your name?”

“No. However, you may call me Leander. I am fond of that name.”

“Who hired you, Leander?”

He scratched at his chin and looked thoughtful. “Well, that is a violation of our—”

“Code of ethics? Listen, if you really are here to help me, I need to know who wants to kill me and why, or I will never be safe. And neither will Sprinkles,” she added. “He could be caught in the crossfire.”

Leander looked considerably more alarmed at that than he had at the thought that she might be in danger. She should be offended, but she didn’t really care right now. All she wanted to know was who had painted a target on her back.

“Sergio Molfetta hired me,” he said. “He wanted to have you killed to hurt Zane.”

A chill washed over her. “I thought he was in an asylum for the criminally insane.”

“He was. He escaped a few months ago.”

She scowled. “Nice of them to let Zane know that he escaped.”

Leander looked at her in puzzlement. “No, actually, to the best of my knowledge, nobody informed Zane that Sergio had escaped.”

Okay, so if it weren’t for the fact that he was a wolf shifter and Gillian was an ocelot shifter, she would swear this man was Gillian’s long-lost twin. He was not only a grammar freak, he was also equally oblivious to sarcasm.

“The owners of the asylum were bribed to let Sergio go and place another inmate in his room. Since it’s an asylum, nobody believed the man when he insisted that he wasn’t Sergio.”

“But what does Sergio have against Zane? It should be the other way around. The Molfettas murdered Zane’s parents. Zane should be the one with the grudge.”

“While the Molfettas were attacking Zane’s parents, Zane apparently killed one of them. He ripped out the throat of the oldest Molfetta brother,” Leander explained gravely. “Apparently the young man was a favorite of their mother, who died of grief upon hearing the news. Sergio was mentally fragile already; seeing his mother die right in front of him tipped him over the edge, and he went on a killing spree that ultimately saw him confined to an asylum.”

“Sergio is blaming Zane for defending himself and his parents? He’s insane!” Wynona said angrily.

“Yes,” Leander said patiently. “That is why he was in an asylum for the criminally insane. Anyway, returning to your present dilemma. Sergio has been planning his revenge ever since he escaped. He could have killed Zane immediately, but decided to wait until Zane had found the woman he wanted to mate, and then kill her. So he would suffer more. Then after Zane had suffered for a while, he would have Zane murdered as well.”

“Zane hasn’t decided to mate me!” Wynona spluttered. This was getting more ridiculous by the minute.

“I am fairly confident that he has. Sergio indicated that they have listening devices at his house, and he waited to hire me until Zane told one of his friends that he had found his life mate,” he said. But she’d only met Zane about a week ago. And Leander had showed up in her parking lot the next day. Zane would have had to have decided that he wanted to be her mate as soon as he met her.

Was that even possible? Of course not. Wouldn’t he have said something to her?

She massaged her temples with her fingers. Her head was starting to pound. “Well, if you aren’t going to kill me, does that mean that I’m safe?”

“No. Sergio sent another assassin after you when I refused the job. That person already attempted to shoot you, and then followed you on your motorcycle ride the other day. I followed him and forced him off the road before he could run you over.”

“Er…thank you?”

“I believe there is no need for a question mark. I did save your life, so proper etiquette says that you would indeed thank me. However, let’s get back to your current problem. I would suggest that the safest course of action is to break things off with Zane and leave the country immediately. Also change your name and cut off all ties with your old life.”

“I’m not dating him!” Wynona spluttered indignantly. “I can’t break up with someone if I’m not dating them!”

“Leave anyway.”

“Or I could try to have Molfetta tracked down and arrested.” She didn’t want to live her life on the run, looking over her shoulder all the time. And if Molfetta couldn’t find her, he would probably just go after Zane.

Leander shrugged. “That’s a much more dangerous route to take. Nobody knows where he is, so it could take a while to track him down. I can tell you that he has already hired a new assassin, whose nickname is the Shark. And, of course, he’s tried to put out a hit on me, which is amusing. Other than that, I cannot help you any further.”

And he walked out the back door of her office.

Wynona’s head whirled as she grabbed her laptop and headed out the front of her building. She turned the alarm on as she shut the door, although she wasn’t sure why she bothered. If Leander could get past it, she imagined that anyone who wanted to get at her could do the same. It was probably enough to keep out amateur burglars, and that was about it.

When she walked outside, Zane was still talking on the phone. She cocked her ears and heard him telling someone how to take an engine apart. “I’m serious, do not let him find out,” she heard him say.

What the hell? What was Zane involved in? As if he didn’t have enough problems with an assassin gunning for him and anyone close to him.

She stomped up to him, and he quickly hung up.

“Are you telling someone how to sabotage an engine?” she demanded.

He looked embarrassed, then shrugged and cleared his throat. “It would be best if you could forget you heard that.”

“Okay, for right now, but only because we have more pressing problems on our hands.”

She told him what had just happened in her office, and Zane swore furiously, yanking the front door of the building open and glaring down the hall.

“You just pulled the door off,” she pointed out to him.

He glared at it, then tossed the door aside.

“I’ll pay for it. Damn it to hell! He’s probably long gone,” he said. “And I can’t leave you out here alone, otherwise I’d go after him.”

“It’s probably not worth it anyway,” she said. “I get the impression that he was telling the truth, and he’s already told me everything he knows. I mean, he could have killed me several times now, and he didn’t. I just don’t know what to do next.”

“I know what
we’re
going to do,” Zane said, putting heavy emphasis on the word “we” and moving in front of her so that he stood between her and the street. He was shielding her with his big, burly body. “We’re going to report this to the authorities, who will put out an APB on Molfetta and also bust those slimebags at the asylum for letting him out. I’m also going to warn Rex, and my clan, in case he decides to go after them too. And until he’s caught, you and I are going underground. I can protect you in a fair fight, but I can’t protect you from a sniper.”

“What about the agency? What about Gillian?”

“I’ll have Rex and the guys from the shop guard Gillian. Gillian can run the business as much as possible from her home. Tell everyone that you were called away on a family emergency. It happens; they’ll have to deal with it. We’re going straight to the police station, and from there we’re leaving town.”

As they drove to the police station, Wynona called up her niece Daisy to tell her that she had to disappear for a while.

“What’s wrong?” Daisy asked, sounding worried. “Are you in some kind of danger?”

“Everything will be fine. I can’t tell you exactly what’s happening, but I can tell you that I’ve got a big, scary bodyguard with me.”

“Huh. That sounds kind of sexy, actually.”

“He is kind of sexy,” Wynona said without thinking, and then was annoyed when Zane glanced at her and winked.

“You and the sexy bodyguard should come and stay with Ryker and me. I have to give my approval of all…bodyguards,” Daisy said. “Especially if this is going to be a permanent bodyguard kind of situation. It is, isn’t it? I can hear it in your voice.”

“You can meet him, but I can’t stay with you right now, and I can’t tell you why, either.” Ryker and his pack were badasses, but they weren’t immune to silver bullets. Daisy had a baby cub named Jasper and was already pregnant with Jasper’s little sister. There was absolutely no way Wynona would stay with them and put them in danger.

Zane was right. The best way for her to keep everybody safe was to just disappear.