Zen (20 page)

“Sure. I wasn’t going to anyway. Just stay safe,” Jimmie told her.

“I will. Thanks, Jimmie.”

“Anytime, sweetheart.”

Shawna hung up the phone. She picked up her laptop to do some work, but she was just not motivated. She picked up the bottle of relaxants the healers had sent over with Rachel and Rage. She took a tablet and went back to bed. She snuggled into Zen’s pillow, taking in his scent. She relaxed and fell asleep.

“How is she?” Rage asked Zen when he got to the training facility.

“She is trying to act like she isn’t scared, but I know she is still shaken,” Zen told him.

“She should be somewhere safer.”

“I’m not arguing with you. She refuses to leave.”

“She refuses to leave you. You should be strong enough to send her away,” Rage snorted.

Zen had enough of Rage’s attitude. “You know what, Rage, I don’t care what you think. I did at first because you were my friend. But now, you are stepping in my business.”

“Shawna is my sister, which makes this my business.”

“Shawna is mine! My mate! I want her safe, but if she refuses to leave, then I will make sure she stays safe with me.”

“Mate?” Rage looked like the air sucked out of his lungs.

“Yes. She is my mate. I haven’t fully mated with her yet but I plan to. I am in love with her and want her with me always,” Zen told him.

“Mate. I just didn’t think you were the settling down type,” Rage told him. “You love her?”

“With everything in me, I love her,” Zen confirmed.

“I can’t say I’ll be able to give my full approval, but I won’t stand in your way. I want Shawna in my life and I don’t want my opinion of your relationship to affect my relationship with her. I plan to help watch over and protect her, especially with this insane person targeting both of you. You’ll be seeing a lot of me.”

“I can live with that,” Zen said. Not really happy that Rage would be around so much. He disapproved of Zen being with Shawna, but he wasn’t going to interfere.

They didn’t talk about anything else while they concentrated on their training. But the heaviness of Zen’s stalker situation hung over their heads. Zen was glad Rage was going to help look after Shawna and give her the added protection that she needed. He hoped Rachel and Trig found this person and soon.

“I don’t like this, Rach. Not only did this stalker get into one of the GCFA suites, but two of them without being detected.”

“Guy, what have you found on the video feed?” Rachel asked her security person, Guy, to go through the feeds on the floor of Zen’s and Shawna’s around the time they believed the rooms were entered.

“I didn’t see anything unusual. People passing by and then the housekeeping staff,” Guy told them.

“Play the feeds, showing the housekeeping staff,” Trig told him. He and Rachel went to stand behind Guy’s seat and watched the video that came up on the many monitors they had on the wall.

“The housekeep for both was a male,” Guy responded.

Rachel watched the images of what appeared to be a short-haired man with a mustache, in his mid-twenties, five foot five inches, one hundred and thirty pounds. The man used a generic housekeeping key to swipe access to the room.

“Check the log and see who that man is who is accessing the room,” Rachel said. She rubbed her head that was throbbing. This was not the first time her security had been breached, but she was damn sure going to make sure it didn't happen again. She turned to Trig.

“I want all remaining fighters to be relocated as we did for Talon and Zen to the top two levels. Only those with the approved security can access those floors. I want more cameras on every floor to get us better views. Call housekeeping and tell them to set specific scheduled times for rooms to be accessed. That way if someone goes to clean at an unapproved time we will be alerted immediately.” Rachel listed off what she wanted done. Trig used his phone to send out messages to get the fighters relocated.

“Ma’am, there is a discrepancy here,” Guy called out.

Rachel and Trig both turned to look at Guy. “What is it?”

“The video feed shows the same male accessing both rooms. But the electronic key used was signed out by a female housekeeper, Clarisse Jones.”

“Okay, then we know for sure the person posing as housekeeping is the stalker. Shut down all housekeeping services until further notice. But do it quietly, I don’t want this person escaping. Let’s go to housekeeping and see if we can find this person.” Rachel and Trig left with Guy and two more security officers following behind.

Shawna was feeling groggy from the medication. Why was she trying to get up? Oh yeah, her phone was ringing. She looked but didn’t recognize the number. She wasn’t going to answer but it started ringing again causing her head to hurt from the shrill sound.

“Hello?” Shawna mumbled.

“Shawna, I am leaving,” her mother’s voice rang over the line.

“Whose phone are you calling from?”

“I got one of those disposable ones. That’s not important. I am going back home and since you refuse to come with me, I thought the least you could do is meet me outside and on the spaceport ramp to say goodbye.”

She really didn’t feel up to it, but if it got her mother to leave that much sooner, she’d do it. “Okay. When are you leaving?”

“In fifteen minutes,” her mother replied.

“What?” Shawna pulled herself into a sitting position. Her head was a little dizzy. “You called me fifteen minutes before you had to leave?”

“We’re wasting time, dear. Meet me outside on the spaceport ramp in…fourteen minutes.” Her mother then hung up.

Shawna stared at her phone wanting to smash it against the wall. It wasn’t the phone’s fault her mother was a selfish, inconsiderate person. She sighed as she got to her feet. The bag Rachel had brought to her last night had some of her clothes that weren’t ruined with the dead animal smell. She pulled on a sweatshirt and jogging pants. She stuck her feet in tennis shoes without socks.

She glanced at her image in the mirror and almost didn’t recognize herself. Her hair was strewed in all different directions. Her eyeliner from last night was smeared. Her normally golden complexion was white. Her eyes were still cloudy from the medications. She looked sickly. How did Zen find the will to kiss her goodbye this morning? She pulled her hair up in a messy ponytail and headed for the door. Ten minutes left to get to the lobby.

The security guard followed closely looking around for any signs of danger. She felt awkward having the man there. She didn’t even know his name.

When they got into the elevator she tried to introduce herself. “Hi, I’m Shawna by the way. I appreciate your help in keeping me safe.”

“Fang,” he replied.

“Excuse me?”

“My name is Fang.”

“Oh, well nice to meet you…Fang.” Shawna didn’t say anything else. The fact that the man’s name was Fang made her think of long spiky teeth. She shivered.

The GCFA ship had docked at the next region’s spaceport sometime yesterday morning. Shawna had been completely unaware of it. She walked out of the main entrance and down the wide port ramp. She looked around for her mother but didn’t see anyone. Was she late?

A shuttle pulled up and the door to it opened. Her mother called from inside. “Come here, dear, and say goodbye. I don’t want to be late.”

“Wait! Let me check the shuttle out first,” Fang told her as he pushed her to the side gently.

“It’s just my mother, Fang,” Shawna protested.

Fang bent down and enter slowly part way into the shuttle. Shawna didn’t notice right away when he sort of slumped over. He was pulled into the shuttle. “Fang? Mother?”

She felt a sharp needle like pain at the base of her neck. She tried to turn around. She knocked the hand away making the syringe and needle fall to the ground.

“Bitch!” the voice called out. She was slapped across the face and then grabbed roughly and shoved toward the shuttle. Shawna tried to push away but whatever was injected into her worked fast. Everything went cloudy. She couldn’t see but she still heard foggy voices.

“Pull her into the shuttle,” a stranger’s voice demanded.

“You weren’t supposed to hurt her!” It sounded like her mother’s voice.

“It is just to stop her from struggling. Now help pull her in. I need to tie up the security guard before he comes to,” the stranger’s voice said.

Shawna tried to speak but it was so hard. “Mother,” she whispered groggily.

“Don’t worry, it will all be over soon.”

Zen’s security guard, Tex, checked his phone and frowned. Zen was immediately on him. “What is it?”

“Fang texted thirty minutes ago that he was escorting Shawna to the spaceport ramp to say goodbye to her mother. He was supposed to text me to let me know when they were headed back to the room. He hasn’t texted and he isn’t answering my texts,” Tex told him.

Rage walked up overhearing the conversation. “Call Rachel and let her know we are checking it out.” He and Zen started for the entrance of the training facility. They didn’t bother to change out of their workout clothes. Tex followed after them, calling Rachel as he left.

Zen and Rage stopped right outside on the spaceport's ramp. They inhaled but only got a small scent of Shawna. There was no Shawna, her mother wasn’t there, and neither was the security guard, Fang.

A minute later Rachel rushed out to meet them. “Where are they?”

“Not here. Did they go back inside?” Zen asked.

“Fang isn’t answering his phone. With the security elevated risk, he would not refuse to answer,” Trig told them.

Zen smelled Shawna’s blood. It was very faint. He looked at the ground and saw the syringe. He bent to pick it up. “This has Shawna’s blood.”

“Are you sure?” Rachel pulled on gloves and came over to him.

“Yes, it’s her blood,” Rage agreed.

Other security came out. Rachel yelled out, “Call the IDJ, we need their labs to analyze this stat and we need to start tracking Fang’s phone.”

“On it!” Trig responded.

“She’s gone.” Zen looked and felt helpless.

“We’ll get her back. And the person who took her, will be sorry,” Rage told him.