The Catalyst (20 page)

This wasn’t safe. It was too open. Fiona wasn’t sure
why her brain still glitched on this, but in her head, small, dark
spaces were safe and hidden. This was open, and though beautiful,
terrifying. Her mind had trouble with the idea that the magical
thugs who had taken her were a greater danger than being out of her
comfort zone in the cottage or the cave.

When the sedan rolled to a stop, she noticed the
plane. There was no way she was getting on that thing. Before the
sorcerers could get out, Fiona opened her door and bolted for the
cover of the trees. She was almost there when a wall of fire
stopped her. She turned to find the fire circling around her,
trapping her in the middle.

The two men jogged up to the outside of the fire
ring.

“You shouldn’t waste your energy.” One said to the
other.

“She’s driving me batshit. I’m putting her to
sleep.”

“But the boss may want to talk to her.”

“Then he can wake her up.”

The other sorcerer shrugged, and they both began to
chant. Fiona wasn’t sure if they’d put the fire out, but she felt
cooler as she tumbled into blackness.

Chapter Eleven

Z parked his motorcycle across the street from the
Java Junkie. Cherry worked all the damned time. If only he could
learn her schedule, he might still be able to get his coffee during
her off times. But not today he wouldn’t. Her car was right out
front.

He grumbled, his eyes changing briefly. He’d have to
settle for the diner on State Street. Their coffee was too
acidic.

“What can I get for ya?” the bottle blonde asked when
he stepped in the diner. She popped her gum and smelled of
cigarettes. She had to be pushing hard against fifty.

“Just a tuna melt and some coffee.”

She raised a brow and cocked her head to the side
like a curious poodle. “Tuna melt? You’re a brave one.”

Z had a stomach like iron. You could pour poison
straight down his throat, and his stomach would take care of it, no
problem. He hadn’t tested the theory, but he’d never had a bout of
food poisoning in his life, and he’d eaten in worse dives than
this.

He slipped into a corner booth and pulled out his
cell phone to dial the number he’d been trying not to dial since
he’d left Fiona at her cottage. He had no idea what he’d say to
her. ‘Hey, sorry I’m such a schmuck, but how are you?’ It rang six
or eight times, but no one picked up.
She’s okay. She just
doesn’t want to talk to you. Leave her alone.

He wasn’t sure what he’d do if she answered the
phone. How was that conversation going to go? He was still the same
guy he’d been when he’d told her he couldn’t give her anything.
Nothing monumental had happened to change that in the past several
hours.

Z stared out the window until a familiar figure
passed into his line of sight. He tensed when he saw the priest’s
collar. It was the vampire who liked to
absolve
people.

The priest’s gaze locked with Z’s as the moon rose in
the sky. If it had been the sun, with the way the vamp was standing
in the middle of the street staring at him, he’d think he was being
challenged to a duel.

After a minute or two of intimidation, the priest
began moving toward the diner. The bell over the door dinged, and
ominous footsteps plodded to the back corner, stopping at his
booth. Z tried to look bored, but he knew the vampire could hear
the blood pumping faster than it should as his heart pounded out a
staccato beat. At least therian minds
couldn’t be
controlled
by vampires.

“Panther,” the priest said.

“Vampire,” Z mocked.

The vamp glanced around, but there was nobody else in
the diner save for the cook and the waitress, and they were busy
with Z’s ever-so-complicated order of tuna and cheese on toasted
bread.

Without an invitation, the vampire slid into the seat
across from him. “I don’t normally like to have my back to the
door, but I’m sure you’ll watch out for me.”

The waitress appeared with burnt coffee and a tuna
melt that looked like it might be able to get up and walk off the
plate on its own, but Z didn’t care. How this place had stayed in
business even before the Java Junkie was anybody’s guess.

“Can I get you something, Father?” the waitress
asked. She’d gotten rid of her gum, or at least had the courtesy
not to smack it at him.

The priest’s smile was mild, but the disgust was
clear in his eyes as he looked from the tuna melt to the
waitress.

“I’m afraid not,” he said. She nodded and stuck her
pencil behind her ear, then went back to wipe down the counters.
The vampire turned his attention to Z. “Where’s your witch?”

Z had only taken a couple of bites of the sandwich,
but now he wasn’t hungry, and it wasn’t the less-than-appetizing
food. “My what?” Maybe he hadn’t heard him right. Maybe he was just
preoccupied with Fiona, and the moping was causing him to hear
things.

“Don’t play stupid. We know you have a witch in your
care. Or she
was
in your care. Now she’s in our care.”

Z lunged across the table, grabbing the vampire by
the collar. The waitress came rushing out at the commotion with a
burly, tattooed cook in tow.

“Is there a problem here? You should leave the priest
alone,” the cook said. He was simple-minded enough to assume
religious clergy were all spotless lambs, so the priest
couldn’t
have instigated this scene.

“You should listen to him,” the vampire said, forcing
a thin smile to his lips.

Z turned on the cook and bared his fangs, letting
them see his sharp teeth and inhuman eyes. A low growl rumbled from
his throat. “Go back to the fucking kitchen and learn how to make a
proper tuna melt. This isn’t your concern.”

The waitress had scurried to the back the moment Z’s
face had shifted. The cook backed up slowly, not wanting to look
weak, but not wanting to take the panther on, either. In the end,
he followed the path she’d taken.

When they were alone, Z turned back to the vampire.
“You think you can take me in panther form? Are you that
confident?”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me. You’ll have to thrall those two anyway, may
as well make it a good show. You don’t feel very old to me. Not
more than a few decades. I can probably take you, and I haven’t
even hunted today.” He’d been too busy moping.

The vampire growled and pried Z’s hands from his
clerics. “We have your witch. By now she’s arrived at my employer’s
compound. We have the pup as well. If you want to see her alive
again, you will tell the wolf to come to us at this address.”

Z backed off as the vampire slammed a piece of paper
on the table with an address in Washington state. Fiona would be
terrified being that far from home.

“How do you know about the wolf?” Z knew the vamp was
referring to daddy wolf.

“He left a scent trail, but it disappears into
nothing. We suspect he’s got some way to travel through dimensions.
We just don’t know how that’s possible or where the portals are. If
he was looking for his pup, he would have left a way to contact him
in case you learned anything. Wouldn’t that be the normal thing to
do in this situation?”

Z got out of the booth and prowled around the diner,
fighting not to change and rip the vampire apart. “Why did you
bring her into it? She has nothing to do with whatever you want the
pup for.”

“You have an in with the wolf. I think the witch
motivates you more than the pup. They told me what you did in the
clearing. You killed two of ours for her, and you would have killed
more. You chose her over the pup, so she has something to do with
this now. Tell Cole to be at that address by 8pm tomorrow night and
we’ll release her.”

Z was taken aback that he knew the werewolf’s name.
This wasn’t some random kidnapping of a therian born in his fur.
They’d known who the pup belonged to from the start. The vampire
slid gracefully out of the booth. To his credit, he didn’t flinch
or show any fear of the panther as he made his way back to the
kitchen to take care of the security leak.

Z threw money down on the counter and headed for his
motorcycle.

When he got to the cave, he went straight for the
kitchen and dumped the contents of the garbage can out on the
floor. He cursed when he cut his hand on some glass, trying to sort
through the trash to find the crumpled piece of paper with Cole’s
number on it.

Thank God he’d thrown it in the trash instead of the
fire like he’d done with the priest’s number. But then, despite his
bravado, he’d wanted to leave the door open to the werewolf in case
he got a lead on the missing pup.

***

Cole stared at his computer screen deep in thought
when Jane came in and put a cup of coffee on the desk. He smiled
sheepishly at her. “Thanks.” He was trying to forget about behaving
like some whipped pup in front of her.

“You looked like you could use it. Have you found any
leads yet?”

“A couple. Mick is sending the information now.”

When he’d snapped out of his premature mourning, he’d
realized that if somebody had taken the pup for a ritual, they
still had a few days until the next full moon. Anyone who’d taken
him to release and steal his power would wait until the time when
it would give them the best results. Therians born in their fur
were rare enough that you didn’t take their power half-assed on any
night. There was still a chance this could end well.

Whatever they needed it for, chances were good they’d
tried to get werewolf blood through other means first. That was
when the idea had come to check the theriantype.com order
databases. He’d been emailing with Mick to determine who’d tried to
order werewolf blood from their company. If Mick had turned
somebody away, they might have started a hunt for someone with
strong blood who was vulnerable. Which was where the pup came
in.

That left a huge mystery as to how they’d stumbled
upon the pup to begin with, but the only thing that mattered right
now was finding him and getting him back to the hive and his pack
safe and sound.

Cole swiveled in his chair as the fax machine spit
out several pieces of paper.

“I still think we should contact Dayne. He could do a
spell and help us pinpoint the location.” Jane sounded defensive,
like she thought he was going to argue with her. He wasn’t going to
argue with her.

He was finished being stupid and stubborn. Whatever
they had to do to get the pup back, they’d do.

“No, you’re right. It was a good idea. We need to
know which of these suspects could have the pup, and we don’t have
time to follow every lead, not before the full moon comes.” Cole’s
money was on suspect one, though. The first suspect wasn’t a magic
user, but a werewolf pack alpha from Alabama.

Close proximity to Georgia. Check. And, being a
werewolf, one could see how the pup’s power would benefit him. The
other suspect was a male magic user who claimed to be a wizard, but
had tripped something during the psychological screening. He’d been
flagged, but it wasn’t obvious why he’d need a wolf pup. Plus he
was in Maine.

“Will you get me my cell? It’s in my pants in the
bedroom where I shifted.”

Jane nodded and slipped out of the room to retrieve
the phone while Cole looked at the information and photos they’d
gathered on the two suspects. He swiveled back to the computer and
typed another email to his tech support guy:

Mick, I know I asked you to go back just one month,
but that might not be enough. Could you check the past year to be
safe and forward me the files of anyone we turned away? I want to
see everybody.

Thx.

Jane handed him the phone. “You missed a call.”

“Hmmm. I must have had it on vibrate. I’ll call back
later.”

“I think you should call now. It might be that
panther or the witch.”

Cole was anxious to get on the phone with Dayne. He’d
have to reinstate his ordering privileges with the site, and even
then he wasn’t sure the sorcerer would help him, which was why he
wanted to get that phone call over with so he could know if he was
getting his hopes up for nothing. But the look in Jane’s eyes had
him dialing the missed call first.

“Cole?” The panther said in answer.

Even as long as caller ID had been around, it still
spooked him when somebody called him by name when they answered
their phone.

The werewolf tensed. “Yes? Do you know where my pup
is?”

“I do. A vampire hand-delivered me a location. It’s
in Washington State.”

“Tell me.” Cole growled. He knew who had his pup, but
all he cared about was getting the information.

“They’ve got Fiona. I’m going. You come get me, and
we’ll go together.”

“Fine.” He stabbed the button angrily to end the
call, arguing with the panther would only waste time, and if he
wanted to lend some extra muscle, so much the better.

“Well?” Jane looked anxious.

“We were wrong. There’s no ritual.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s Anthony. He’ll want a trade. The location of
the hive for the pup.”

***

Fiona heard a snapping sound. She opened her eyes to
find a hand near her face trying to get her attention.

“Ah. There she is. I’m so glad you could join us,
hours after you were bespelled. Are you sure this woman’s a
witch?”

“Yes, sir. She’s a witch, just not a very good
one.”

Fiona would be angry if it weren’t for the
mind-numbing terror. Her vision blurred as she opened her eyes.
Everything looked strange and warped, like she’d been drugged. She
took a deep breath and things began to clear. She scooted away from
the hand that had been snapping at her.

“Drink this.”