Page 75 of License to Kill

“A few members of the pack will be swinging by my house with a few bottles of cleaner while a pot of cinnamon sticks and cloves boil. By the time they arrive, they won’t be able to smell anything. Oh, Karma. I did speak to your boss, and I suggested he could benefit from listening to a few friends of mine, attorneys with experience handling the sort of situation he’s gotten himself into. I also warned him you were working to reconcile your marriage, and that your permanent residence is here in Baltimore. I gave him a list of replacements he could interview. We then lamented over your accident for a while, as that added complexity. Anyway, since he isn’t doing any of the talking, he won’t violate the terms of his NDA with his client while being able to get to the heart of the matter. He’ll have a much better idea of what sort of evidence and material to ask for—and how to protect himself in the worst-case scenario.”

“Thanks, Gary.”

“Anytime. I didn’t think you’d be happy if your boss was left out to dry, and this sort of law work is beyond your depth, especially since you’ve been out of CARD for so long.”

“I was hardly ever in CARD to begin with.”

Jake grimaced. “We’ll fix—”

“No.” There was no fix for too many of my problems, not without a lot of time—time I wasn’t ready to invest yet. I’d keep my word and submit to return to the FBI, but I’d do it in a way he probably wouldn’t like. “I’m thinking I’ll go back to work solving violent crimes. That’s something I’m actually good at.” The idea of catching criminals that way also didn’t leave my gut cramping with dread whenever it crossed my mind. “During the first bad case, I’ll crack, Jake. I don’t need a shrink to tell me that. And I’m not joining a CARD team with your parents. It wouldn’t work.”

All they’d do was smother me all over again trying to place me in a mold I couldn’t fit into no matter how hard I tried. Worse, they’d find some new way of dividing Jake and I again. I already struggled with the idea we might be able to patch things up enough so we could live in the same state without one of us wanting to run for the hills.

“All right. I can live with that, under the assumption you’ll let me transfer with you.”

“Who else in the FBI is going to put up with my shit?”

Jake huffed while Gary laughed.

“What? It’s true.”

“A little unsolicited advice, Karma,” Gary began before falling quiet long enough to navigate through Baltimore suburbia traffic. I waited. Several minutes later, he sighed. “Don’t write CARD off completely—or even our Alphas. Yes, what they—what we—did was rotten. They probably deserve to be written off. What Jake did was also rotten. You can spend the rest of your life reminding him how much of an idiot he has been lately. But he’s been manipulated about as much as you have been, and he’s had a lot of soul searching to do. That said, Fenerec are overprotective about their children to begin with. Alphas are even more so. They get blinded by what they think is best rather than the reality of the situation. I contributed. We all did. We were all wrong, too, and you and Jake paid the price for it. In many ways, you paid far more than Jake. Maybe you’re right about not being ready to go back to CARD right now, but maybe that’ll change.”

“I’ve heard this before,” I muttered, thinking back on what Mason had told me.

Jake sighed. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, Gary, but you may as well leave it be. I flushed four years of trust down the drain. At the end of the day, I was the one who fucked up. I went along with it. We can tell her day and night what it means to be a Fenerec or why my parents act as they do, but she’s only going to believe what she sees. The burden of proof is on me. How many years do you think you’ll make me work for it, Karma?”

Since Fenerec had absolutely no problems with poking their noses where it didn’t belong, I decided I’d get back a little of my own. “Depends on how good the sex is.”

Gary snickered. “Are you sure you’re not going to regret issuing that sort of challenge?”

“If I’m going to have to put up with him, he may as well at least serve some use.”

Sighing, Jake hung his head and ran his hands through his hair. “I deserved that.”

“I was under the impression you liked it, too.”

“You can’t win this one, Jake. Just surrender.”

Grumbling a curse, Jake shook his head and replied, “All right. You win.”

Gary chuckled. “So, how about that hunt?”

With the feeling they wouldn’t leave it alone until they got their way, I wrinkled my nose and shrugged. “Fine. We’ll hunt. Just don’t you fucking wolves even think about slobbering on me.”

Next time, I would ask for details before agreeing to do anything involving Fenerec. I had wrongly assumed they would hunt nearby in the first respectable forest they found. Instead, I ended up crammed into an SUV with Jake, Gary, Mason, and two other Fenerec who had decided to endure the trip as wolves. One, a tawny male with black spots, insisted on using my feet as a bed. Jake ended up with the other one, and my instant dislike for the female bordered on the psychotic.

Within ten minutes, I wanted to show her my teeth and bite or kick her until she removed her white and red head off Jake’s feet. I didn’t mean to chitter, but one slipped out, and the sound captured the attention of every single Fenerec in the vehicle, including the bitch wrapped around Jake.

“What’s bothering you, Karma?”

Since Jake had asked, I pointed at the female too close to him for my comfort.

“She’s my mate,” Mason said, twisting around in his place as the front passenger. “Her name’s Lillian, we’ve been married for fifty-three years. She’s also a nurse and helped deliver your mate when he was born. Your property is safe, don’t worry.”

“Property?” Jake protested.

Lillian twisted around and sank her teeth into Jake’s leg.