Bonded (49 page)

The sound of
someone giving a shout drew her attention and she craned her neck
to see what was going on. A small group of individuals was
approaching. It was Klaus, followed by Peter, Aran, and Darcy as
well as some of the wolves that she’d seen hiding in the woods. She
gave a sigh of relief knowing Klaus would explain what was going
on. In just a few minutes this whole misunderstanding would be
straightened out and she’d be free to go after Reno.

Eagerly she
watched the men talking, wishing she could hear the conversation
but between the rain and the noise the Enforcers were making it was
impossible. The captain gestured towards her and she waited
expectantly for Klaus’ look of shock. She grinned, thinking of how
her Alpha would rip into the captain for treating a member of his
pack this way. If she weren’t so anxious to be free, she might have
enjoyed watching a confrontation between the two strong
personalities.

However, the
longer they talked, the more confused she became. No war of words
seemed to be ensuing. If anything, the men had stepped closer
together. Brandi leaned forward, nibbling on her lower lip and
wondering what was going on. Whatever the captain was saying, Klaus
seemed to be listening intently to it, his face clouding, his hands
curling into fists. Finally he turned, but it was only to shoot a
condemning look her way.

Brandi felt the
iciness of his stare cut right through her. Shocked, she shook her
head in denial but Klaus turned away, rejecting the plea for help
that she was sure had been on her face. What had the captain told
him? And why did Klaus obviously believe the preposterous tale?
Even Peter was casting glares in her direction! Surely after their
long talks while jailed in the town hall, the man should know she
was incapable of conspiring with the Purists.

Her shoulders
slumped as the hope that had welled inside her deflated. The men
had turned their backs on her in an age old gesture of rejection
and she knew there’d be no rescue coming from that front. Around
her, Enforcers—men she’d worked with on numerous cases—walked past
as if she weren’t even there; no more deserving of notice than an
annoying insect or something nasty stuck on the bottom of a
shoe.

A lump formed in
her throat as she contemplated how her world was falling apart
around her. Her own pack, the people who’d raised her, who she’d
spent the last few days trying to help, believed the worst of her.
Her mate—a man who didn’t even know he
was
her mate—was out
there, somewhere, being hunted down by his own men. And here she
was tied up waiting who knew what fate, surrounded by people who
seemed to hold her in contempt. Tears spilled from her eyes, mixing
with the drops of rain that fell off her face. She shivered in the
cold, a feeling of despair filling her.

“So, what are you
in for?” A mocking voice suddenly sounded by her ear and she jerked
around, stunned to see Reno’s partner, Damien, hunkered down beside
her. He must have moved so stealthily that she hadn’t even heard
his approach.

In a quick glance,
she took in his features. His thick black hair was wet and slicked
back from his face while his shirt was soaked, clinging to his
torso and outlining his impressive build. If she weren’t already in
love with Reno, her heart would probably be doing flip-flops right
now. Instead, it was only aching with worry.

“What...?” She
clamped her lips shut and glanced around to make sure no one was
looking her way before continuing. “What are you doing here?” As
Reno’s partner, she wondered if he were under suspicion as
well.

“I came to help.”
He shrugged and gave her a crooked grin. “I called the captain,
said I was sorry I missed his summons to return but that Beth was
very understanding and insisted I should go help out my squad.”

“Beth? Your latest
girlfriend?” Brandi frowned trying to recall the most recent
rumours about Damien’s love life.

“My mate.” A look
of love and pride came into his eyes when he said those words and
Brandi’s heart did a little skip. Would Reno ever look that way
when speaking about her?

“Your mate? Oh.
Um... Congratulations.” The revelation stunned her. She’d never
thought of Damien as the kind to settle down and the concept left
her tongue-tied.

“Thanks.” He
grinned at her cheekily, obviously enjoying her confusion. “We’re
supposedly on our honeymoon, or at least that’s what I told Lycan
Link to explain my sudden absence. Reno said he needed me here and
it just all sort of meshed together.”

“And the captain
believed that you’d give up your honeymoon to help out?” Brandi
raised her brows. “He’s not an idiot.”

“No. But he
is
overwhelmed right now and very busy. He thought he was
dealing with the simple capture of one or two officers suspected of
conspiring with the Purists. Instead he arrives at the airport here
and finds an urgent anonymous tip waiting for him. Turns out that a
major Purist meeting is taking place in Kolding’s Pass and the
captain’s suddenly left scrambling to bring in enough manpower to
deal with the situation. He’s just grateful that I checked in.”

“An anonymous
tip?” Brandi cocked her head, trying to figure out how that could
have happened.

“Uh-huh. My Beth
is a good, upstanding Lycan. When she overheard a conversation
about Purists gathering in Kolding’s Pass, she just had to report
it...anonymously.” Damien gave her a wink but then sobered,
studying her carefully. “So, did you do it?”

“Do what? No one’s
telling me anything.” She tried to gesture with her hands to show
her confusion but of course they were still bound behind her. It
only increased her frustration and bitterness. “That idiot,
Jackson, tackled me just as I was going to help Reno. He told me I
was under arrest, and dragged me over to the captain acting like
he’d caught a hardened criminal. The captain just said I was
conspiring with the Purists and told Jackson to tie me up and stick
me over here until he had time to deal with me.” Her anger over
that treatment heated up again and she was surprised the rain
didn’t sizzle when it landed on her skin.

“Apparently you’ve
been hacking into private files at Lycan Link and passing the
information on to the Purists.”

“Me? Hacking into
files?” The possibility of that happening was so far from reality
that she actually laughed.

“Yep, and Reno’s
been helping you.”

“That’s
ridiculous. I can barely change my password without help and Reno
hates Purists.”

“Your file at
Lycan Link shows you took a computer course at the Academy and
passed with flying colours.”

Brandi felt her
mouth drop open. “No way! That was my room-mate, Tabi, not me. She
was a whizz at the things but I never took a single computer
course; the damn machines hate me! Someone’s altered my
records.”

“Hmmm...” Damien
studied her for a moment then gave a quick nod and began to untie
her wrists.

“You believe
me?”

“Yep. This is all
too neat and tidy for my liking. If you really were hacking, you’d
have changed your records to remove the computer course, not leave
it there for anyone to find. Besides, Reno likes you and that’s
good enough for me. The man has great instincts.”

“Oh.” She really
didn’t know what else to say. Once her wrists were free, she rubbed
the tender skin while checking that no one was watching. So far, so
good. The captain was still busy conversing with Klaus and had
moved even farther away. Several of the Enforcers were talking to
Peter and Darcy while Aran and some of the others were walking
towards Victor’s bunker. “Now what?”

Damien surveyed
the scene with a smug smile. “The captain seems to have everything
under control. I say we go find Reno.”

“Yes!” She barely
kept herself from shouting the word and eased herself off the
bumper to follow Damien as he dodged from the shelter of one
vehicle to the next. “Do you think we can get out of here
unnoticed?”

“No problem. Your
friends have everyone occupied.” Damien took her by the hand and
urged her onward.

“My friends?” She
glanced back.

“Yeah, I met this
old guy named Klaus up in the hills with a group of humans. They
were planning some hare-brained scheme to come waltzing in here and
save you. We found out we had a common cause.”

Brandi blinked and
slowly smiled: Klaus, Peter and the others had actually been
providing a diversion so Damien could free her! “You’ll have to
tell me about that meeting one day.”

“It
was...interesting.” Damien gave a huff of laughter, and then caught
her arm as she slipped on the muddy ground. “Careful.”

“I’m all right.
Just in a hurry to find Reno.”

They were
sheltered by the trees now, the leaves filtering the rain but the
wind was still cool. Goose bumps rose on Brandi’s damp skin, the
wet fabric of her shirt clinging to her. She clenched her teeth to
keep them from chattering and brushed the tangle of wet curls from
her face. There’d been no hiding from the elements when she’d been
tied to the van, but no one had seemed concerned about that
fact.

Damien was equally
wet yet appeared indifferent to the discomfort. His nostrils flared
as he scented the air but after a moment he frowned. “Which way?
This rain is messing up the scent trails.”

“They were headed
in that direction.” Brandi pointed to where she’d last seen Reno
heading and Damien nodded.

“Then that’s where
we’ll go.” Before her eyes, he shifted into a large black wolf and
then looked at her expectantly.

Brandi tried to
shift, to focus on harnessing her energy and directing it towards
the molecular restructuring of her form. There was a faint tingling
on the surface of her skin yet nothing happened. She tried again,
embarrassed at this show of weakness and determined to do what
should come so naturally, but it was useless. “I’m sorry, Damien. I
can’t. I’m just too tired to do it.”

He huffed and
shifted back. “Hey, it happens. And it looks like you’ve had a
pretty rough go of it these past few days.”

She gave a
half-hearted smile. “That’s a polite way of saying I look like
shit, right?”

Damien laughed and
set off without another word. At times, he would pause and scan the
area around them. Brandi strained her senses as well, wondering
what he was noting with his superior senses. There were definite
disadvantages to being a rogue, but having one’s wolf so close to
the surface did give a certain edge.

On several
occasions, he’d tell her to wait and then he’d disappear among the
trees only to return and shake his head having found nothing.

“The hills are
full of Purists,” he explained. “But they seem more intent on
escaping than anything else. There’s enough ACS here to round them
up. We won’t waste our time on them unless they attack.”

That was fine with
Brandi; she was more interested in finding Reno.

For a while they
travelled without speaking, only the thudding of the rain on the
leafy canopy and the sound of the wind breaking the silence. Brandi
constantly looked for signs of Reno, worry eating away at her. She
knew he was tired, injured, and weak from loss of blood. Her own
exhaustion was eroding her mental self-control and with increasing
frequency she was getting glimpses into his mind. What she was
finding there wasn’t comforting. He needed to rest, to let the ACS
take over the hunt for Victor, but his damned sense of duty
wouldn’t allow him.

She rubbed her
forehead and forced the mental wall back into place. Knowing his
thoughts wasn’t helping her, or him, and she still feared her
mental intrusion might distract him at a crucial moment. God, how
did fully blood bonded mates ever stand this?

Unexpectedly,
Damien grabbed her arm. “Duck down here.” Unceremoniously, he
shoved her under a shrub and melted into the shadows.

Snapping her mouth
shut on her instinctive protest, Brandi stayed in her hiding place,
trying to ignore the small twigs poking her neck and the large
spider that was suspended nearby. Ugh! She hated the creatures.

Easing as far away
as possible, she pondered what Damien might have seen or heard.
Something had caught his attention but what? An ACS Enforcer? A
Purist? Her question didn’t go unanswered for long. A cacophony of
snarls and growls filled the air, followed by a high pitched yelp
and then nothing.

Brandi clenched
her hands into fists, not caring that her nails were digging into
her palms. She didn’t know Damien well enough to be able to
determine if the yelp had been his, or someone else’s. Hopefully it
was the latter, but if not she was in trouble.

The soft sounds of
approaching paws had her peering out from her leafy hideaway
wondering who was coming. Slowly, she got to her feet while
remaining crouched ready to spring into action if necessary. The
presence of the spider no longer bothered her. She had bigger foes
to fight now.

Taking a deep
breath, she tensed her muscles only to let it out in big whoosh as
Damien came into sight. His fur was covered in mud and streaks of
saliva but he seemed unharmed.

Brandi crawled out
of her hiding spot. “What was—”

Before she could
finish her question, he gave his fur a shake and drops of mud
splattered everywhere. Cursing loudly, Brandi wiped the filth away
and then glared at Damien’s now laughing face. He’d transformed and
except for a faint bruise on his cheek and a rapidly healing
scratch on his hand, he appeared fine.

“A Purist was
following us,” he explained. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out
a cell-phone and contacted the command post. “Masterson here.
Reporting a Purist at this location ... Status? Dead ... He tried
to ambush me. It didn’t work.”