The Bear and the Unicorn (Supernatural Enforcers Agency Book 6) (7 page)

Chapter Ten

Zane’s bear couldn’t understand the problem.  But then the bear never did.  The beast didn’t see what was wrong with pulling off someone’s side mirror and trying to beat them with it just because they parked in the spot you wanted.  The bear didn’t get that you can’t rear end someone, just because they cut you off.  To the bear, those things were perfectly reasonable reactions.

But the problem now was Sky.  There was something about her, something that called to him.  He was glad she wasn’t hung up on her ex, but the ex – Esther or something - sounded depressingly like Zane.

How many times had he got in arguments over nothing?  At the time, the fact that the pizza guy forgot the
jalapeño
s
seemed big, and was well worth the argument, but now…  Now throwing the pizza at him seemed kind of childish and possibly an overreaction.  His bear still growled in disagreement.

The bear had no restraint.  On the other hand, Zane was trying to learn restraint.  He was trying to be better.  He’d already lost his job over his outbursts; he didn’t want to lose anything else – like his freedom.  Maybe he could show her he was different to her ex.  Maybe she didn’t need to see explosive Zane – maybe she just needed to see kind Zane.  The Zane that said good morning to strangers on the street instead of sneering.  The Zane that didn’t mind when other people talked in movie theaters and didn’t threaten to ram their popcorn down their throats.  The Zane that was sweet and generous…  Well, that Zane didn’t exist yet, but he was getting there…
ish
.

He just didn’t know how easy it was going to be.  His beast was already prowling over all the bugs he found in her apartment.  They were on their way to buy new locks but would that be enough to appease him that she was safe? 
No, it definitely wouldn’t
.  He almost laughed at himself – of course not, that was a no-brainer.

He flicked a look at her, making sure she didn’t notice as he flipped off a woman on a scooter.  She was an elderly lady, and it was a mobility scooter – she shouldn’t be on the freaking road!

“Maybe you should move,” he growled at her.  Into his apartment would be fine, nay, preferable.

Sky shrugged making her breasts ripple quite attractively.  “I appreciate that you’re helping me,” she said in a lyrical voice, “but I’d rather not do anything drastic.”

“What if it isn’t Eustace doing this?”

“Ethan – and I’m beginning to suspect you keep forgetting his name on purpose.”

Zane flashed her an innocent look, and she giggled.

“What if it isn’t Lyle?  You any idea who else it might be?”  So he could add them to his list for a good ass kicking.

She looked out the window quickly, and Zane felt her fear resurfacing.  There was something she didn’t want to tell him and it angered him… but he was gong to control that – because he was becoming a better guy for her.  He could be a good guy for her – he could be the guy she wanted. 
Even if it killed him.

“There’s a guy at work who’s kind of been asking me out,” she said after a few moments.  “And I already know he’s a perv.  He spies on the women at the salon across the street from us.  Plus, it wasn’t proved, but we found a spy hole that went into the women’s locker room – I’m certain he made it.”

Zane gripped the steering wheel.  “He ask you out a lot?”

“Yeah, every day I’m working.”

“You give me his details, and I’ll check him out along with Dorian.”

Sky shook her head.  “Not even trying now, are you?”

Zane smiled, something that froze as his phone rang.  He would ignore it, but there was a possibility that Mercy was calling about a new client.  Or his mom telling him his dad had suffered a heart attack – wouldn’t want to miss that.  He managed to grab it out of his pocket and gave the screen a cursory glance. 
Crap - Melissa
.  He’d been mooning over her for months, and she rings now?

“You need me to get that?” offered Sky, holding out her hand.

He felt the old familiar pull, but it didn’t feel as urgent as it once did.  In fact, it seemed to be fading.  With every second he spent with Sky, the more Melissa faded into the background. 
Good
smirked his bear.

He threw the phone on the dash.  “Nah, it’ll keep.”

“Okay.”  She shrugged again, and the ripple happened again.  It was…
lovely
.  Not a word he usually used.

She beamed at him, sunlight illuminating her form, making her ethereal beauty more pronounced.  He sighed.  Then withheld about fourteen cusses as he almost plowed into a truck.

*

Booker snarled down the phone as his gorilla moved restlessly.  Disturbingly, it felt like he was being told off, and he really didn’t like that.  He certainly wasn’t going to take it from his prissy pants partner.  Booker did all the hard work – all his partner had to do was get buyers. 
How hard was that?!

“Your doctor made a mistake,” snapped Booker.  “She told me it was a slam dunk.”  The doctor he was forced to work with, who was supposed to make his job easier.
  Yeah-fucking-right.

“Didn’t you check?  Didn’t you fucking investigate?  Ten fucking years we’ve been doing this, and you didn’t check first?!”

The doctor had been quick to report the problem with the giraffe shifter, and Booker’s solution. 
Bitch
.

“Look, she’s not the first we had to put down.”

He groaned.  “Tell me you covered your tracks.”

Booker held his tongue.  Did he think this was his first day?  “We dumped the body in a shitty part of town, and the van’s in a chop shop.  There’s no way it can come back to us.  SEA will be chasing their tails.”

“It better not get back to you.  If it does, you’re on your own.”

His gorilla sneered.  “Yeah, wouldn’t want to ruin your reputation.”

The male bristled.  “You get paid well for all the risks you take, don’t you?”

“Humph.  How’s the auction shaping up?”

“Not great.  I don’t even have half the interest I had last year.”

Booker sighed.  “Yeah, well, last year we had a pterodactyl – that was a real fucking boon.”

The guy who bought her paid millions.  Apparently, she now lives in a cage in the buyer’s bedroom.  Could be worse, some of these rich bastards buy the rare species to eat.  Booker wasn’t easily disgusted, but that did it for him.

“I sent out a few preliminary pictures of the sabre-tooth tiger, and I have a lot of females interested in him.  Women love cats.  And there’s high interest in the mammoth but not much else.  Doubt we’ll even break a million for a giant penguin.  We need more.”

“Yeah, I’m working on it, but pickings are slim.”  He thought of Sky Danvers.  “I might have something big, but I can’t be sure yet.”  Bitch was making it difficult for him by refusing to shift.  Course he could just abduct her and kill her if she turned out to be a regular horse.  But killing wasn’t his first choice – mostly because it heightened the chance of getting caught, and Sky’s uncle was the alpha of a pretty affluent herd in Montana.

He blew out a breath.  “I’ll have the doctor send out some more feelers.”

Booker snorted.  “Fat lot of fucking good that’ll do.”

“She’s useful.”

“Yeah, for Vargas to dip his wick.”  Far as he could see, her only use was in keeping Vargas in line.  Fucking expensive and whiny prostitute.

“She’s an expert on extinct species, her spiel at the auction will be useful.  She stays.”

“Sure.”  Vargas will be thrilled.

“Just… just be careful of the next one.  We don’t want the SEA sniffing around.”

Booker laughed.  “Ten years and they haven’t caught on; they won’t start now.”

Chapter Eleven

Zane fit new locks; her apartment was as safe and secure as it was going to get without bars on the windows, guard dogs, and electronic locks. 
All good ideas that Sky shot down.

Zane grabbed his phone and called Wes – a liger shifter he used to work with at the SEA.

The liger, currently temporarily assigned to missing persons, sounded harassed and complained about his caseload while Zane listened impatiently.  But yeah, eventually, he agreed to run some background checks.  Zane wanted them for Ethan and Erik.

“Maybe this is something that should be reported to the SEA officially,” Wes said.

Maybe
Zane thought guiltily.  And his bear was in two minds about that too.  For one thing, he didn’t want anyone getting near her – and that included any random male SEA agents.  Then again, the SEA had a heck of a lot more resources than he did, even though he was currently making use of most of them.  But the SEA was busy and tied up in knots by dumb laws.  If they found out it was Ethan being a dick, all they would do was get a restraining order.  Yeah, like a fucking piece of paper would ever stop a shit for brains wolf shifter.  No, if it was Ethan, Zane was already considering a more
permanent
solution…

“You got time to deal with a girl and her asshole ex?” grouched Zane.

“Well…”

“All you could do is get her a restraining order.”

“Maybe.  But what can you do?  Actually, don’t tell me.  Plausible deniability and all that.  I’ll e-mail you the results.”

Zane grunted and then in some recess of his mind a small nudge forced the next word out of his mouth – with some difficulty it must be noted.  “Th… thanks.”

Wes hooted with laughter.  “Wow, I don’t think I ever heard you use that word before.  Boy, that sounded painful.  You need to lie down?  Never mind, I’ll e-mail you the results of the checks.”

He hung up, and Zane panted.  Sweaty brow but he was okay. 
See, manners weren’t that hard
.  They shouldn’t be.  Thank you was just a word.  He didn’t even have to mean it – all he had to do was say it.  Still felt hard, still felt like he was giving in and showing weakness.  Manners were something his parents had tried to instill in him from a young age, from his mom when she denied him ice cream to his dad who took his belt to him.  He never gave in, though. 
Nope
.  He was just as stubborn when he was a kid.  Now, though, now he wanted to be better, wanted control, wanted to impress a certain horse shifter client.  Yeah, maybe she was worth showing a little weakness.  His bear grumbled but didn’t argue.  Yeah, he was okay.

Even more so when Sky glided into the room and handed him a glass of lemonade.  Her cheeks pinkened prettily as she passed him a glass and he took a big gulp and… almost barfed at the taste.  The liquid swirled around his mouth, and he tried his hardest to swallow despite the urge to spit it out.  It tasted…
funky
.

“That’s… unusual.”  That was the least offensive word he or his bear could come up with on short notice.  He’d need a few days and a thesaurus to do any better.

“Yes, I sweetened it with agave nectar.”

“Ah.”  That sounds terrible.

“It’s derived from plants that grow in hot countries.  It’s a good substitute for sugar.”

He was right.  There is no substitute for sugar.

“It’s supposed to be better for you than sugar,” she explained in between mouthfuls.  “A friend of mine claims it relieves stress, but I don’t know about that.  She also claims that patting your face with butter every night before you go to bed stops wrinkles.  She’s not entirely a reliable source of information.”

Sky smiled sweetly at him, and he melted just a little more.  He’d never been partial to chatty women.  He always seemed to prefer women who were either bossing him around or cooing at him.  But Sky seemed to do neither.  She took her cues from him and then prattled on about everything and nothing, always with that sweet smile on her face.  When she wasn’t afraid. 
Grrr
.  Well, she wasn’t going to be afraid for long.  He would see to that.

“Do you like it?” she asked.

“Ummm, yeah.”

He took another gulp, hating himself just a little bit. 
What?
  She said it was supposed to relieve stress.  Although tasting the
gawdawful
lemonade wasn’t exactly helping his anger issues.

His phone rang again, and he ignored it in favor of looking at Sky.

“Don’t you need to…” she started.

“Nah.  I’ll call them back later.”

It was Melissa again.  After months of ignoring him, apparently, she couldn’t wait to get hold of him.  Before Sky Danvers strolled into his office, he probably would have fallen over his feet running to take that call.  He’d always felt like he was being gripped by Melissa - like she had hold of him in some way, and whenever she needed him, demanded something of him, the grip tightened.  But now, he was in the grip of something else.  It wasn’t the same.  He didn’t feel like Sky was demanding anything from him.  More like she was calling to him.  Her voice, her scent, her huge green eyes, the way her cheeks slowly turned pink as she babbled about inane subjects – they all called to him.  Soft tendrils of desire wrapped around him with every passing second he spent with her, and he wanted nothing more than to be near her, to touch her, hold her, kiss her, ravish her senseless…

“Are you okay?” she asked.

A slim hand pressed against his chest, and he realized his lustful thoughts had propelled him across the room until he was pressing her up against a wall.  Concern filled her eyes but no fear, thankfully not that.  But then, she hadn’t seen him lose his temper yet.  The soft looks she gave him now could easily flutter away like a leaf on the wind. 
Or get stomped like chewing gum under a combat boot
.

“Sorry, just thinking.  I was miles away,” he muttered.

He turned away and did a drool check, walking over to the window on the pretense of checking out what was going on out there.  Nothing worse than a drooling bear.  Speaking of grips, he needed to get a hold of himself, preferably in a shower where he could grip himself to his heart's content because his attraction to Sky was starting to become painful. 
Hammer nails in wood painful
.

Actually… he spotted a red SUV that he swore was parked at the same shopping mall they went to earlier to grab Sky’s new locks.  He used to go to a little hardware store over on Raven Avenue.  But since an incident with a nail gun and superglue, he was banned.  He now had to do all his shopping at The Happy Mega Deal Tool Outlet – crappy products served by pimply-faced teenagers without a smile.

But that red SUV…  Zane squinted, and his bear’s hackles went up.  He didn’t catch the license plate earlier – he spotted the vehicle when they were walking back to his car, and the SUV was beating a hasty retreat.  But both had a dent on the passenger door, with the same black scrapes.  Clearly, the driver had a little altercation with another black vehicle.

Perhaps they were following Sky. 
They had to be
his bear insisted.  He felt anger at them – how dare they?  There was elation that he may have already
nearly
caught whoever was after her.  Then there was disappointment that he may have
already
nearly caught whoever was after her.  He’d kind of envisioned at least a week of playing her bodyguard.  But no – that was dumb.  If the guy was out there spying on Sky, he had to stop them.  His anger came first – always.  Which was something he was trying to change, but for now he would just run with it.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

Zane nodded at her to come over to the window.  He held her back from it, slipping an arm around her waist, making sure she didn’t get too close.  Well, they could have a sniper rifle!  Just because he took a moment to enjoy how perfect her slender frame fit against his bulky body was neither here nor there.

He cocked his head at the window.  “Recognize that red SUV?”

She pressed further against him, peering through the glass.  The bear purred like a kitten. 
Now who’s the pussy?

“Uh-uh.  They’re in a visitor parking space – maybe they’re just visiting someone else who lives here.”

“I saw the SUV at the mall.”

Her eyes widened a fraction, and he could have sworn they turned violet for just a second.  Interesting.

“You mean while we were at the mall?”  She shook her head.  “Yes, of course, that’s what you mean.  So you think they may be following us?”

“Following you,” he said gruffly.  No one in their right mind would want to stalk him.  Well, okay, no one in their right mind stalks anyone.  Then his bear snorted laughter at him – most of his job involved stalking people to catch them doing something they shouldn’t be doing.

Sky chewed on her lip and lowered her lashes until her eyes nearly closed.  Her body pressed against his as she burrowed into him.

“Maybe it’s a coincidence.”

Zane grunted.  “I’m going to find out.”

*

The otter shifter yelped, and his sandwich went flying as Zane yanked him out of the car.  Luckily the driver side window was open,
or unluckily
amended his bear.  Maybe getting pulled trough a sheet of glass would teach the young man a lesson.  Like,
stay away from our horse shifter!

On regaining a little composure, the otter started swearing.  “What the f….”

The F sound lasted a while and then fluttered away like a whisper.  By now, the otter realized who was clutching him – a six-foot-ten bear shifter with black eyes and a face that would give hardened robbers nightmares.

“What’s happening?”

Zane rolled his eyes as Sky’s voice floated towards him.  “I told you to stay inside.”

“Sky, help!” squeaked the otter shifter, his eyes darting between Zane and Sky.

“Oh, Danny!  Zane, that’s Danny!”

“Danny?” repeated Zane through clenched teeth.  He had the otter, and he had a lot of rage – he was reluctant to let either go.

His bear’s opinion was that they’d caught someone, and anyone would do.  But Sky’s hand on his arm and a pleading look on her face made him rethink that.

“It’s Danny; he’s dating Emily - my neighbor from upstairs.”

Zane heaved a few breaths before dropping the trembling Danny.  The otter slithered to the ground on jelly legs.

“Danny!” wailed a high-pitched voice that Zane guessed belonged to the eponymous Emily.

Zane took a step back, and Sky placed a hand on his chest as a pleasantly plump young woman rounded on him, putting herself between him and Danny.

“What the hell is going on?”

Sky patted his chest before he could say anything, which was probably a good thing because nothing nice was coming out of his mouth.

“I’m sorry, Emily.  I’m having a bit of trouble at the moment – I’m being… well, I’m being stalked and when we saw this vehicle out here…”

Emily harrumphed and kneeled down next to Danny, settling his head on her prodigious chest.  He didn’t seem quite so put out anymore.

“Danny is borrowing his brother’s SUV while his car is in the shop.  Perhaps you should have asked first!” she scolded.  Zane later found out that Emily was a schoolteacher, and wasn’t so surprised that her hectoring tone brought back many a bad memory of Sunday school with his Aunt Myrtle and her yardstick. 
His knuckles were red until he was fifteen
.

“He was at the mall earlier!” accused Zane, trying to shake the feeling of being an errant five-year-old.  He was a grown man damnit!  “And why was he skulking in his car?”

Emily pursed her lips, not immediately having a satisfactory answer to either of those things and being annoyed that she didn’t.  She dislodged Danny’s head from her bosom and trained her displeased gaze on him.

“You told me you were visiting your mother this morning, and why were you dawdling out here?  Why didn’t you come inside to visit me?”

Danny hesitated for a moment; his eyes flicking to Sky, and for a second Zane really did think he could be her stalker.  But the soppy expression on his face when he looked at the fearsome Emily dispelled that worry immediately.

“I did visit my mother,” he said tentatively.  “I had to get something from her, but then I had to go to the mall to get it resized.  I was sitting out here trying to work up the nerve but, ah, I guess now is as good a time as any.”  He rolled to his knees, still a little unsteady since Zane laid his hands on him.  He pulled a small box out of his pocket and flipped it open.  “Emily, will you…”

“Yes!” she squealed and pounced on him.  He flattened under her with a happy oof and she lavished kisses over his face.  “This is the happiest moment of my life!  It’s almost perfect.”  She stopped to shoot a glare at Zane.

“Congratulations,” murmured Sky, moving forward to help them to their feet.

Zane – trying to keep the peace – picked up Danny’s fallen sandwich, dusted it off and handed it back to him.