Vengence of The Cat Men: A Shifter Romance (The Pride Book 3) (3 page)

The taxi cab parked out front in the loading area and Alison got out, handing money to the driver.  She didn’t bother speaking to him again, he was behind her now in more ways than one.  She didn’t have her passkey anymore so once she passed the outer doors she was stopped.  She peered in and saw that there was a woman sitting at her old desk.  For some reason that made her even angrier.

She knocked on the glass.

The new woman’s head snapped up and Alison saw her eyes were large and scared.  Just like her own would have been a month ago if a stranger had been knocking.  The woman pushed the intercom button.

“I’m sorry this is a closed facility,” she said, her voice coming over the little speaker by the door.

“You new here?” Alison asked her.  The woman looked taken aback.

“Yes, I, um, I just started a week ago,” she stammered.  Jesus, they hadn’t even waited to see if she was alive before they replaced her.  It wasn’t a real job, it was just camouflage for what really happened upstairs, and they had replaced her the instant they thought she was dead.

“Well let me let you in on a little secret,” Alison said into the speaker. “You are going to want to call security right away, and the easiest way to do that is the check the master phone number list.  It is on the right, by my aloe plant.”

“Wait, your aloe plant?” the new woman asked, looking over to her right and seeing the list and the pot with the plant growing in it.  “They said the last girl that worked here had gotten married and moved to California.”

“Not quite,” she said.  “Now call them, it’s important.”

The woman took her finger off the intercom button and picked up Alison’s old phone, her free hand tracing a line down the list of phone numbers before finding the one she needed.  She dialed and waited.  Alison could no longer hear the conversation but could imagine it easily.  She would say that the woman that worked here was back, they wouldn’t believe her, she would insist, and then they would send someone they actually trusted down to take a look.

The woman hung up the phone and pushed the intercom button again.

“Officer Dayton will be here in a minute to talk to you,” she said and Alison rolled her eyes.  She waited and watched through the window to see the elevator indicator lights.  It was coming down from the top floor.

When it opened a man wearing a security guard’s uniform walked out, looking at her through the window as soon as he could.  His eyes went wide with surprise, he obviously recognized her.  She remembered him as well, just in passing as he would leave after his shift.  He, like all the people that worked there, ignored her like she was a piece of furniture. 

Alison couldn’t hear anything still but she saw his tell the new woman behind the desk something while gesturing to the door.  She flipped the switch and it swung open and Alison walked in.

“Sorry, I lost my badge,” she said and liked the look of shock she saw on his face.

“Ma’am, we really need to debrief you.  You have been missing for days,” he said.

“I bet you were worried.  Looks like you already hired a replacement, though, huh?”

“That wasn’t my decision, but this is.  You aren’t going anywhere until I call Mr. Gold.”

“Not going anywhere?  You couldn’t stop me.  And in case you missed it, I came here to you, not the other way around.  Don’t be an idiot.”

The guard was about to say something snotty in response when he saw the look in her eyes, fierce as the sun grew ever closer to setting, he baulked and decided against it. 

“I’m sorry ma’am.  I understand that you are under no onus but we had no idea what happened to you, we really need to know where you have been, for security reasons.”

“Just tell your boss that I know where the Cat Men are right now.  Tell him that I escaped when he sent his mercenaries into their lair.  And tell him I can show you where to go to capture them, tonight if he wants,” she said.  She watched the look of horror on his face when she revealed the real reason for this business in front of the receptionist, who should have been just as much as Alison was when she held that job.  He started to reply but instead he picked up the phone off receptionist’s the desk and dialed a number.

“Mr. Gold, this is Office Dayton in the lobby, we have someone here and I think you need to meet her,” he said.  Alison waited while he listened to the man on the other end of the phone.  He took a long breath before replying.

“Um, I’m sorry sir, but because she used to work here and she says she just escaped from the people we have been looking for.  She says she knows where they are and can take us to them.”

This was what it all came down to.  She could tell it would be minutes before she underwent the change and if they didn’t believe her it was all over.  She had to trust her instincts and they told her that they would risk almost anything to find the missing Pride.

She was right.

“Would you please escort me upstairs, Mr. Gold would like to speak to you,” he asked her.  His attitude had completely changed to one of precise politeness but even as he said it, she saw that his hand lowered to hover closer to the pistol on his hip.

“Who is Mr. Gold?” she asked.

“Sebastian Gold is the, well, the owner of this business.  The company that owns this building.  He was your boss when you worked here, even if you never met him,” he said and reached out to touch her arm to lead her to the elevator.  She considered tanking her arm away but didn’t.  Time was running out and it seemed like he was going to force her to go exactly where she desired the most.

When the doors opened he waited for her to get into the elevator before going in himself, standing in front of the door until it closed.  Instead of pushing one of the buttons on the wall, the guard took a key ring from his pocket and used it to unlock the panel on the elevator, and flipped a switch inside.  The elevator began to rise and Alison knew that this destination would be something that the scientists that she had seen every day when working would never have access to.  She saw that the indicator light on the inside of the elevator were not even showing anymore, evidently cut off with the switch.

When the door opened she saw that she could walk directly into an office.  Office Dayton put his hand on her again, this time on the small of her back, to push her forward.  In the first few steps she could tell something was wrong.  The office would have been completely nondescript in any way except for the fact that it was nearly demolished.  There was a smashed laptop on the floor and papers thrown everywhere.  The lamps were tipped over and so were the large plants, the dirt kicked across the carpet.  It looked like a child had a temper tantrum and tried to smash everything it could.

“Pardon our dust,” came a voice.  She saw that there was a man sitting behind the desk, silhouetted by the large window. 

“Office Dayton, would you excuse us please?” he asked, and it was clear that it wasn’t a question.  The guard quickly reentered the elevator and the doors closed.  Alison and Sebastian Gold were alone.

“What happened to your office?” she asked him.

“I have a little bit of a temper,” he said, still seated at his desk, gesturing to the chaos around him. “But you are going help resolve that.  You see I was so upset that I lost a test subject that I unfortunately took it out on my poor office here.”

Alison could feel the change was so close that her, and could see the sun through the window behind Sebastian.  It had just the smallest sliver of light visible on the horizon.

“Now we are going to make everything all right.  It’s amazing how these things just work out, you know?  You see I was just about to scrap my whole operation here and start over.  I had no leads and no idea of what to do next.  And now I have you delivered right to my lap, alive and well,” he said.

“And you want me to tell you where to find the Pride?” she asked.  Sebastian nodded, a broad grin on his face.

“Let’s call them what they are, test subjects.  They had kidnapped you, taken you to their pit?  I’d bet you’d want them brought in so they couldn’t hurt anyone else, yes?”  He got up from his desk chair and came around to stand in front of her.

“What’s in it for me?” she asked him, her eyes still on the sunset behind him.

“Anything you want, within reason.  Would you like your old job back?  I can have Jessica tossed out on her ass before the elevator gets to the lobby.  How about a raise, extra vacation days?  How about instead of working anymore we just keep sending you your paychecks, for free?”

“I’m not going to tell you where they are,” she said, low and dangerous.  Her voice was starting to take on a growl and her skin was itching from where the fur was about to grow.

“What?” he asked, momentarily unable to understand.  When her words sunk in he stabbed his finger at her face, nearly touching it.  “You listen to me you stupid cunt, I will make you fucking tell me what I want to know or I will destroy you.  This isn’t a discussion, this is you giving me what I want or... urgk...”

The last of his rant was cut off mid-sentence when Alison grabbed his pointing finger and broke it off.  She felt her body exploding around her, her muscles growing lean and strong, her fur growing and her claws sprouting from her fingernails.  Sebastian back peddled, holding his bleeding hand, until he tripped over the refuse on the floor and tumbled do his backside.  Alison felt her clothes tearing as she were stretched too far to accommodate her larger body.  She screeched as she finished her transformation and dropped to a crouch.

“You are one of them?” Sebastian screamed.

“I always was one of them!” she screamed back, leaping to pounce on the man.  She extended her claws and made a deep gash on his cheek.

She brought her face close to his and licked the streak of blood from him.

“You don’t get it do you?  We infiltrated your pathetic organization years ago, and I am not the only one,” she lied.  It was a risk, but if it worked.

“You will never know who to trust, because we have always been here, always watching you!”  She wanted him to think that it was hopeless to continue his pursuit, and it was working.

“You mean that this was all under your control, all along, the change?” he asked.

“We can control that if we wish, you truly don’t know anything about us and now are going to suffer for it,” she said.

“I’ll stop, just please, please, don’t hurt me,” he pleaded.  It had worked, she had convinced him.

“You don’t want to die for your hunt?  Because it is that simple, give it up now, and forever, or we will end it for you.  It won’t be me, it won’t be tonight, but someone you trust will rip your heart out.”

“You have my word, just please let me go,” he said.

Alison got off the man to crouch next to him on the floor.  She decided one more turn of the screw, to drive her point home.

“You understand it is over, correct?  We have allowed you for too long to play pretend, as if you were in charge.  You are out of chances, if there is one single more attempt at locating us you are a dead man.”

“I understand,” he said, it almost coming out as a sob.

Alison saw that the elevator was still gone but it didn’t matter.  She shoved a claw into the crack and ripped the doors open.  Leaping strongly she jumped into the elevator shaft and climbed of to reach the top.  She saw a vent and torn it open so she could reach the outside air.

Gerald and William were both there, waiting for her on the top off the roof.

“You promised you would let me do this myself!” she shouted at them, angry but also relieved to see them.

“We did let you, but we also promised to keep you safe so we waited here, just in case.”  She couldn’t blame them for that.

“They won’t bother us ever again,” she said.  Neither man asked her to explain. 

“Come on, follow our lead, we have some distance to cover,” Gerald said and he leapt from the roof to soar across the ally to the building rooftop next door.  Alison followed him, taking a few steps first to get a run at it before jumping with all her might.  She landed on all fours, still amazed at what her body could now accomplish.  William landed next to her a second later.

The three made their way, roof top to roof top, back to where the Pride waited for them.

*******

“S
o they are done?” asked Jena Luc, and the relief was evident on his face.  Gerald clapped him on the shoulder. 

“Our new member has seen to that!” Gerald said, partially bellowing with his joy.

“So we can rebuild the den?” Jacob asked.

“Yes, but in a new location.  That area is still too under attention from outsiders to simply move back.  Don’t worry, my friend, we will find a new den soon enough.”

“A bigger one, now that our family is bigger,” Samuel said.  There was a pause at that and William stepped forward.

“I’m not sure that will be necessary,” He said and the others looked at him expectantly.

“Davidson and I will not be staying long.  Now that the Pride is secure, we are leaving you,”

“I don’t understand,” Mathew said, but Alison did.  William knew that as the second he would always be behind Gerald.  It had cost him his chance to be with her, and now he wasn’t going to allow himself to be in the same situation again.

“There will be another Pride,” he explained.  “Davidson and I only, to start.  We will add our own brothers,” he paused and looked at Alison.  “...and sisters.”

“And this is your choice, as well?” Gerald asked Davidson, who nodded.

Gerald sighed and nodded too.

“It was bound to happen,’ he said, “I knew I couldn’t keep you forever, men need to eventually set out on their own, to make their own lives and families.”

“Their own Pride,” Alison added.  William looked at her one last time and smiled before turning and leaving with Davidson, their future uncertain but bright.  She had no doubts that William would have a Pride of his own very soon and find what he was looking for, just like she had with Gerald.

She nuzzled Gerald’s powerful body and he put his clawed hand on her head, scratching gently behind her ear.  She couldn’t believe how good it felt.