Oz
“This best be fucking important.”Still reeling from the cold manner Laura had slammed the door in my face, I folded my frame into the one remaining chair around the table. Ace had set up a makeshift conference table in his hotel room. Which was a lot bigger than mine, I noticed.
He glowered at me. “Where the fuck have you been? We have been ringing you for the last hour.”
“He’s been with his little human mate.” Ash, the only dragon in the alpha troop, chuckled. “Can’t you smell her all over him?”
Now, Ash was a good guy, a little grumpy at times, but all in all, he was the one who had made me feel welcome from the start. But his words didn’t make me smile. I glared at him, which just made him laugh even more. Holding his hands up, palms outward, he swung back on his chair. “Hey, don’t start, not my fault her scent is all over you.” He waggled his eyebrows in my direction. “Did you two young love birds have fun?”
I didn’t answer him.
Next to Ash, King laughed, and his brother and twin Leo joined it. It always shocked me seeing them together. They weren’t truly identical, but it was close. Tall, built and with their shining golden hair they looked more like male models than trained killers. “Not as much fun as he wanted to from the look on his face. No one who just got laid looks that grumpy.”
Everyone around the table fell about laughing. Everyone but me and Ace. My commander was looking at me quizzically. “You and her getting it on?”
“Not going to answer that, Ace. She’s my mate and a gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell.”
“That’s why he’s looking like he does. All he got was a frustrated make-out session.” Someone laughed, one of the twins.
“Shut up,” Ace snarled before I could get the words out. “And settle down. This is important.”
A hush fell over the table and all eyes turned towards him.
“What’s going on, Ace? This is meant to be an exercise, nothing more. What’s so important?” Leo muttered.
“Things change.” Ace’s eyes flashed. “When Oz came to me about the man who was pestering his girl, I did a little digging.”
I leant forward before I could help myself. When I had told him, I hadn’t expected him to do anything about it. Hell, I half expected him to laugh it off. “And?”
“There’s no record of shifters in this area, but…”
I liked the fact there were no shifters around here, but I didn’t like the sound of that ‘but’.
“But what?” Under the table, my fingers clenched into a fist.
“Women go missing around here. Not a lot of women, but one or two every few years.”
Next to him, Ash swore under his breath. Out of all of us, he was the one who was most protective of women. It had something to do with the dragon part of him. “You think someone is murdering them?”
Surprisingly, Ace shook his head. “This has been going on for a century or more. Some of the women turn up after a few years, but they’re traumatised. They don’t speak about their ordeal.” One by one, he made sure we met his eyes. “But there’s something on this damn mountain. Even the locals whisper how it’s not safe for women to go up there alone. We have all heard them. We thought they were ghost stories, but now…”
“Wait a minute,” I held up my hand, “when I first saw Laura, she was there by herself. She’s local and she…”
“She looked terrified,” King growled. “We just assumed it was because your hairy ass was chasing after her, but maybe it was something else. What’s the job?” The excitement shone out of his eyes.
“It’s not a job. I just want to know what is on that mountain and how the hell it has hidden from us all these years. We are the best of the best; we should have seen something. But whatever we do now, we have to do it quietly. I’m going to go up the mountain with Ash. The rest of you work the town. Speak to the people you are friendly with and find out their legends. If something or someone is up there and hurting women, then I want it neutralised before we have to leave.”
“And me?” I only had one contact in this town.
Ace smiled. “You’re going to find out why your mate was up on that mountain before dawn, Oz, because I have a feeling she knows something we don’t.”
I blinked at him in surprise. “She was just hiking.” Even as I said it, I knew it wasn’t the truth.
“You should be glad I’m giving you all the free time with your little human as you need to secure her affections. Just find out what she knows.” His eyebrows slammed down over his piercing eyes. “You can fuck it out of her for all I care. Just get the job done.”
I stared at him for a full minute, my nails cutting into my palms from how hard I was making fists under the table. “Don’t, Ace, don’t ask me to use her like that.” Surely, he wouldn’t expect me to betray her confidence. She was my mate whether she knew it or not.
“Is following orders going to be a problem for you, Oz? Should I start your paperwork now? Send you back to whatever lame ass regiment you were in before?”
I could feel everyone’s eyes on me. They wanted to know where my loyalties lay. Before I had arrived, I wouldn’t have even hesitated in confirming it was with them, but now I had actually found my mate? I was torn. I lowered my eyes. My shoulders slumped. “My loyalty lies with SAF,” I muttered under my breath. Laura would understand. Once I explained to her it was to save young women, she would have to understand. It wasn’t like I was actually using her to gather information. I cared for her, she belonged to me.
She would understand.
I hoped.
