Tanner's Scheme (36 page)

Oh, how Cyrus Tallant hated those paintings and the high prices they brought.

“You’re very good.” He sighed.

“Unfortunately.” She stared around the main grounds. Behind the house, a pool, patio and small play area for the children had been covered with a camouflaging screen to allow a measure of safety for the inhabitants of the house. But nothing was foolproof.

“Why do you stay here?” she asked. “Vanderale offered the Breeds a sizable portion of land in Africa. The conflicts there have eased, and Vanderale land has always been safe. Why not relocate?”

“We have the right to live,” Tanner answered. “We shouldn’t have to hide, Scheme. Hiding will not further our acceptance in the world.”

“Racial wars are never easily won,” she pointed out. “This war could become more brutal than any other in history. A lot of Breeds will die, Tanner. And there aren’t many of you left now.”

“Could die.” His expression turned predatory. “If done correctly, propaganda will do for us what it could never do in other racial conflicts. We’ll succeed. In the past several years we’ve begun talks with the Wolf Breeds in Colorado that we learned had escaped as well. With the free Coyote Breeds, they number several hundred.”

“Three hundred forty-five as of last month. They’ve lost many of their numbers as well in the past few years. Together, your numbers fall far short of a thousand. The numbers of purists and supremist society members are only growing by the day.”

“We’ll survive this battle, Scheme. Public support means everything, and we hold it.”

“And you’ve decided this simply because it’s the way you want it to go?”

“Because we’re strong enough.” He led her around the side of the house as Cabal moved in carefully behind them. “We’re strong enough to keep the support we have and to build upon it. We’re making ourselves important to several different governments and proving our humanity. We’re winning the battle.”

“What about the children?” she asked carefully. “They’re isolated here. Callan’s son David is taught at home, and he doesn’t have the chance to interact with other children. That’s dangerous.”

“What are you getting at, Scheme?” He was cranky and becoming more so by the moment.

Scheme restrained her smile. She knew exactly why he was cranky. She could feel it herself, the heat building inside her. If it could get this bad with the supplement, she wondered what would happen without it.

“My study of society, interactions and racial conflicts showed me one thing. Without real interaction, the Breeds will never become a part of society. Look at the past. When nations conquered each other, what’s the first thing they did? Soldiers married or raped those they conquered and bred their women. Breeds seem to be succeeding there. But to truly interact, to become accepted, it begins at childhood. The children of those nations mingled, interacted, worked together and fought together. You don’t have that.”

“We have less than a half dozen children born of the matings. There’s no sense in building schools.”

“They should be in public school.” She stopped then and stared up at him. “Each Breed child should be in school and taught to interact. They shouldn’t be trained to kill; they need to be trained to avoid the conflict of racial, or in this case, species distrust.”

His gaze was hooded. “That’s a long way off.”

“Then peace will be even further away,” she informed him bleakly. “The reason I was valuable to the Tallant organization is the fact that I can see the threads that bind events. Where to cut them, where to strengthen them. Because I knew how to profile people and events. If you don’t begin building that critical thread now, then you’re screwed.”

“You tell us in one breath that David is in danger of being abducted by the Council at any time, and you say send him to public school in the next,” he accused.

She shrugged philosophically. “The President’s children have attended school with their Secret Service agents in tow. Create a force just for the protection of these children. It would be easy to do. Buffalo Gap, the small town outside Sanctuary, is very small. Build them a new school, fund it, bring in the supplies they need to better educate their children, and they will cooperate with you.”

“Which will cause the town to grow,” he argued, his golden eyes swirling with frustration. “Which provides a fertile ground for the Council to lay in their soldiers and their killers.”

“That’s the risk you took when you based yourself in the States rather than hiding in Africa.” She turned on him, staring back at him in determination. “You have Breeds that could be trained to teach school. Several files I read marked them as perfect teachers. They’re not just trained to kill; they’re trained to teach. Make them available to a new school with new supplies and better opportunities. Until you do this, the Breeds will never fit in, Tanner, and timing is crucial at this point to keep the pure blood societies from gaining ground.”

She didn’t mention the mating heat, but she knew from what Jonas had said at the caverns that it was the Breeds’ most destructive secret. If Cyrus ever gained this information, he would destroy the Breeds with it.

“The Breed Cabinet convenes monthly for ideas,” he told her then. “You can attend the meeting and propose it.”

Her lips twitched. “I can just see Jonas embracing it, let alone the parents of those children. Breeds are very stubborn, I’ve noticed.”

“So are you.” He gripped her arm, turning her toward the sheltered, camouflaged area farther behind the house. “All you have to do is fight for it.”

She might have a chance if she had a hope of having children herself.

“Live for it,” he whispered a second later.

Scheme jerked her gaze away, staring instead into the dappled sunlight that pierced the netting into the yard.

“Tanner,” she began to protest.

“Scheme.” He crowded her. His larger body seemed to surround her as he backed her into a small grotto of flowering bushes.

“I’m not trying to die, you know,” she bit out, frustrated by the needs of her own body and the need to learn as much as she could to figure out the identity of the assassin within Sanctuary. “This isn’t helping me do my job.”

“I don’t want you to do your fucking job,” he growled. “I want you back in the house. I want you safe until this is over.”

“And how is it supposed to be over?” she hissed back. “I can help here.”

“Not until that spy is caught.”

“I’m the only one who can draw that bastard out.” Her whisper was frustrated. “He won’t try to kill me; he’ll try to take me. Try working with me for a change.”

They had raged over this argument since early that morning, and still Tanner refused to see sense. The only reason she had made it out of the house to begin with was because Cabal had finally out-argued his brother. And Tanner hadn’t been pleased over it.

“I’ve had enough.” His lips drew back from his teeth, red flickering in that golden gaze. “We’ve been out here for more than a half hour, plenty of time to draw him out if he was going to be drawn.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You know better than that, Tanner,” she argued. “I need more time.”

“Time for him to load his rifle and get in place for the shot?” he asked, his voice dangerously calm.

She scoffed. “Not hardly. Time for Cabal to see who’s watching and how close. That’s all the spy will do until he makes his move.”

She lifted her hand to touch his face, marveling at the perfection of it, at least to her. The strong planes and savage angles. The fallen-angel sensuality and long, shielded golden eyes.

“I don’t want to die,” she said. “I want to live and laugh, and fight with you for years to come, but we won’t have that chance if the spy doesn’t show himself.” Her voice dropped. “You know that as well as I do.”

“You terrify me,” he growled. “Waiting around on a bullet is no way to fight back.”

“Trust me Tanner, there will be no bullet.” She let her lips twitch with amusement. “But he will make plans. He’ll watch. He’ll test security. All we need is one mistake and then you can take him down. I promise not to interfere in that.”

“That’s big of you.” He wasn’t in the least placated.

Scheme shrugged as she stared around the grounds. “It will never be easy for either of us, Tanner, you know that. Father will always be waiting for me.”

“He doesn’t have to live forever.” His head lowered, the red in his eyes deepening.

Scheme backed up sharply, her eyes widening. “What are you talking about? For God’s sake, Tanner, what are you planning? You can’t kill him any more than he can kill you without it backfiring.”

His expression instantly closed. “All I’m concerned with is keeping you alive,” he snapped, his fingers curling around her arm as he headed to the back door. “Nothing more.”

“I’m getting sick of you dragging me around like this.” She jerked at her arm. “And I’m getting really sick of you treating me like a dimwit.”

“You are a dimwit,” he snapped as he pulled her into the house. “You just put yourself in danger like tomorrow doesn’t matter.” The back door slammed behind him. “Just fuck it, as far as you’re concerned it’s going to be done your way, period.”

“It’s not like that.”

“The hell it’s not,” he yelled back at her. “You needed a damned keeper. I’ll be damned if I have any idea how you survived this long. You are so fucking stubborn you make me rabid.”

“I’m getting really tired of your insults.” Her teeth clenched against the need to fight back. She was not going to get into a screaming match with a damned Bengal in the middle of a Breed kitchen. “And you were born rabid.”

“Then prove me different.” He threw his hands up at his sides as he turned sharply away from her and headed for the coffeepot. “Go on, Scheme, tell me how fucking wrong I am.”

She turned to Cabal. “Could you help me out here?”

His brow lifted mockingly. “I’ve learned not to argue with him. As you said, he was born rabid. It’s best to let him blow off the steam, then start wearing him down again.”

“Just tell me if you saw anything or if that little trip outside was a fool’s errand?” Tanner growled.

Cabal’s lips thinned. “A faint glint of the sun off metal farther up the mountain. Just for the slightest second and consistent with the gleam of the sun on the new telescopic scopes Vanderale sent last year. They have a single vulnerability. If the sun hits them just right, then it will reflect back for a millisecond before the computerized lens detects it and shifts the shading within the lens. We’ve only just discovered the vulnerability. Not all the Breeds are aware of it yet.”

“And you caught that?” Scheme blinked back at him. She knew of only one Breed in her father’s organization that had been able to pinpoint that one millisecond of light reflecting back from those lenses.

“I’m rather good at some things.” Cabal shrugged. “That’s one of them.”

“Someone had a scope on her!” Tanner’s voice was a low growl of rage as he glared back at her. “No bullets, huh?”

She shrugged placidly. “None were fired.”

“She has a point, Tanner. I had a team move into the place where I detected the reflection, but it was clear. We didn’t even get a scent.”

And that had Scheme’s blood running cold. No scent. That meant a Breed had learned how to camouflage himself.

“Who’s accessed the scent neutralizer Ely created?” Tanner shocked her as he questioned Cabal.

“You have a scent neutralizer?” She turned back to him in surprise. “Since when? Even the Council scientists couldn’t come up with anything to keep Breeds from detecting Breeds.”

“Vanderale Laboratories has been helping us with it.” Tanner poured a cup of coffee, his voice still tight, his body tense. “We developed it with their help just this past month and just started testing it. Evidently it works.”

“Only Ely’s supposed to have access to that,” Cabal said. “But according to her, Jolian had been in the labs lately chatting with her.”

“Chatting with her?” Tanner asked dangerously.

“Chatting,” Cabal said coldly. “Passing the time of day. Ely says they’re friends.”

Tanner turned an accusing eye on Scheme. “Harmless, is she?”

“We don’t have enough to confine her yet, Tanner,” Cabal informed him, his voice still hard. “Until we do, all we can do is watch her.”

“Then you watch her,” Tanner ordered harshly as Scheme leaned back against the kitchen island, crossed her arms over her breasts and waited.

She wasn’t going to debate this one.

“By the way, Scheme’s clothes came in this morning.” Cabal surprised her with the announcement. “She has several dresses in there to choose from for the party tomorrow night.”

“Finally, some decent clothes.” She straightened and headed for the door as she glanced back at the two men following her. “Has it ever occurred to you two that sometimes you get a little intense over things?”

She caught their confused looks.

“What the hell do you think we’re too intense over now?” Tanner bit out.

Scheme paused, turned to them, and smiled sweetly. “The wrong person.”

And she wasn’t wrong about Jolian. There had been a few Breeds that Scheme had taken a personal interest in over the years. Jolian had been one of them.

“Has it ever occurred to you that you can be too damned trusting?” Tanner retorted harshly.

“Yeah. It has.” She nodded somberly. “Every day of my life for the past eight years. But this isn’t one of those cases.”

With that, she turned on her heel and entered the foyer, before striding quickly to the stairs.

She had been too trusting many times, but not since Chaz. Chaz had taught her the value of questioning any trust she had. She no longer trusted in people; she trusted in herself. In her ability to profile.

She hadn’t failed in suspecting Tanner of being the spy; his profile had fit the
possibility.
Jolian didn’t even come close to a possibility.

“God forbid we ever give her the chance to say ‘I told you so,’” Cabal muttered.

“Don’t tempt fate,” Tanner growled. “Because I have a feeling she would exact payment out of our hides.”

Scheme smiled. Of course she would.

As they topped the stairs, Callan was heading from the end of the hall, where it turned to his family suite, his expression tight, his eyes glowing with fury.