Smokejumpers Werebear 6: Quint and Lystra Read online

  “Dragon,” she said. His mouth dropped and she smiled.

  Until that moment he didn’t believe that dragon shifters still existed. Of course the SEA would recruit any remaining dragon shifters. They were the most powerful shifters in existence.

  “I’ve never met a dragon shifter,” he said.

  “Neither have I.” She smiled and it made his heart skip a beat. Her eyes lit up a brighter shade of orange when she smiled. They were so captivating. But she was the enemy. She was the one keeping him behind bars.

  “Why didn’t you burn my friends’ plane down?” he asked. “I heard Logan order you to do that but I didn’t understand what he meant. Why didn’t you do it?”

  “I couldn’t,” she said. “My dragon was a little…preoccupied.”

  He knew it. She had been bonding back to him.

  Quint rubbed his tattooed arm. “I think my bear was feeling the same thing.”

  She looked down and smiled shyly. “It’s a little weird.”

  “Totally,” he said laughing. “It’s pretty awkward.”

  “It’s like our inner animals bond to whomever they want and we have no say.”

  Quint knew what she meant. “I definitely wouldn’t have chosen the person that is locking me up,” he said. “Talk about the ultimate Stockholm syndrome.”

  She flinched at the comment. He tried to recover. “I mean don’t get me wrong,” he said. “I’m…I just wish you weren’t imprisoning me is all.”

  “You’re not the only prisoner,” she whispered.

  There was a long, awkward pause.

  She pulled something from her pockets. “I snuck you some food,” she said. “I know that they don’t always feed you in here.”

  Quint was starving. They had barely fed him since he arrived. He had to be hungry to be dreaming of Sander’s cooking.

  She tossed four granola bars onto his bed.

  “Are my friends safe?”

  She nodded and there was a sudden lightness in him after an unexpected release of tension. He had been so worried about them.

  “The SEA doesn’t know where they are. They’re looking for them now.”

  “You,” he said. “You’re looking for them now.”

  She glanced down at the SEA badge on her sleeve of her tight black uniform. “Right.” She sighed.

  “I’m not going to tell you anything,” Quint said, his eyes getting hard. “I’m not going to betray my friends.”

  Quint knew what the SEA were doing. They thought that he would have a weakness for this woman because his bear bonded to her. She would come in acting like a friend, offering him food and smiles and then she would extract information when he let his guard down.

  But Quint wasn’t going to let down his brothers.

  “I’m not asking you to betray anybody,” she said, placing her hand on her chest.

  He crossed his arms. “Then why are you here?”

  “I just,” she trailed off and looked at the floor. “I just felt compelled to see you.”

  “Well you did,” he said. His inner bear grumbled at the way he was treating her but she was an SEA agent and she couldn’t be trusted. It was better this way. “Now I have to get back to staring at the wall. Agent Lystra.”

  She nodded and walked out the door without looking back.

  three

  “We have someone who may know something?” Logan said, arriving from down the hall.

  Lystra stood outside of the closed door to the interrogation room. She had been waiting for Logan after he had summoned her.

  “Who is it?”

  Logan cracked his knuckles. “Barbara Jacoby,” he said. “The alpha and second of the Hudson Crew’s mother.”

  He opened the door and Lystra followed him in. A large, powerful woman was sitting on a metal chair. She was glaring at them, wearing a white, stained, waitress uniform. She had wisps of gray hair in her ponytail and a weathered but proud face. She was a bear shifter. Lystra could smell it. Plus her riled up bear was filling the small interrogation room with angry grumbling.

  Logan pulled up a chair, the metal leg screeching as it dragged along the floor. He sat on it backwards.

  “Where is Beckett?” he asked, glaring at Barbara with hard eyes.

  “Who is Beckett?” she asked.

  The thick, ugly vein on his neck bulged. “You want to play it this way?” He unbuttoned his top button and loosened his tie.

  “Your sons and their Crew are accused of housing a reporter,” he said, rolling up his sleeve.

  Lystra felt a quiver in her stomach. She had seen how Logan ‘interrogated’ witnesses before.

  He started on the other sleeve. “They were going to release the secret out to the general population. They’re criminals.”

  Barbara snorted a laugh. “Please,” she said. “The SEA are the only criminals. My boys are good men. They’re good shifters.”

  Logan sprang up, throwing his chair. It clanged against the back wall. “Where are they?” he screamed.

  Lystra gasped, her body tense.

  Barbara didn’t even flinch. Logan towered over her, breathing heavy. Barbara glared back at him with unimpressed eyes.

  “They attacked SEA agents,” he said, squeezing his hands into fists. “They broke the law.”

  She gave him a flat look with narrowed eyes. “You really expect me to turn in my sons?”

  “I expect you to turn in criminals.”

  She raised her chin. “Like I said. The SEA are the only criminals.”

  Logan lowered his head to hers, his nostrils flaring. “When I find them I’ll slit their throats in front of you.”

  Her fist shot out as fast as a bullet. A loud crack roared through the room like a gun shot as her fist connected with Logan’s face. He sailed back and smashed into the wall behind him.

  Barbara rose from the chair, her hands in fists. “Nobody threatens my boys.”

  Logan touched his nose and glanced at his bloody fingers in shock. His nose was crooked. Broken.

  The corner of Lystra’s mouth curled up in a smile.

  “You bitch,” he muttered, standing up. He grabbed the metal chair and lifted it over his head, and stepped towards Barbara.

  Lystra sprung forward and placed her hand on his hard forearm. “Let me try,” she whispered. “I know how to talk to a mother.”

  Logan glanced at Lystra. He was breathing so heavily. Every muscle in his body was jacked and tight. Blood was pouring out of his nose, down his chin and onto his suit.

  “I can get the information from her,” she said. “Go fix your nose.”

  He exhaled hard and threw the chair behind him. It clanged on the floor. “Fine.”

  Lystra sighed in relief as he stormed out of the interrogation room. He slammed the door behind him.

  Lystra smiled a tight, quick smile at Barbara. She picked up the chair from the corner and placed it in front of her. “Please sit,” Lystra said, motioning to Barbara’s chair.

  Barbara looked at her with narrow eyes. “You smell like burnt coal.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” Lystra said, sitting down.

  Barbara sat down slowly. “What’s inside you?”

  Lystra looked at the white tiled floor. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “I didn’t think that any of your kind remained,” she said. “Of course the SEA has one of the last dragon shifters. You could do so much good. Why would you work with such savages?”

  Lystra shrugged. “I’m sorry about all of this,” she said, shaking her head.

  Barbara wiped her bloody knuckles on her jeans.

  “I’m not even going to try to ask you,” Lystra said. “I know that you’d never give up your cubs.”

  “Are you a mother?” Barbara asked.

  Lystra looked down and sighed. Was she still a mother? A mother raised her kids. She made them lunches and gave them baths. Mothers sang their kids songs before bed and kissed their scraped knees. She didn’
t do any of these things.

  But she did have the love of a mother. The SEA could take away everything else but they couldn’t take away that.

  She nodded and whispered a ‘yes.’

  Barbara leaned forward. “There’s a lot of pain in those dazzling eyes of yours,” she said. “Something tells me you’re not here by choice. Am I right?”

  Lystra’s chest tightened. She closed her eyes as the horrible images came flashing back. Agents rushing into her home, grabbing her son, her enraged dragon burning down the house, burning down half the block. She rubbed her forehead, trying to erase the memories. The dead wolves and lions on her lawn with their burnt, smoking bodies. The panicked, empty feeling in the pit of her stomach as the electricity flowed through her, dropping her, immobilizing her, as they drove Micha away in a van.

  She opened her eyes and breathed in. The rage long ago replaced with a worse feeling. The feeling of hopelessness.

  “I didn’t have a choice,” she said, her voice cracking, holding back tears.

  Barbara touched Lystra’s knee and leaned forward. “You always have a choice.”

  Lystra shook her head. “No. Not always.”

  She could tell Barbara what they did to Micha. What they did to her. She had a feeling about this mama bear; that she would listen and keep quiet. It would be nice to tell someone. She had been keeping it bottled up for three years.

  Lystra took a deep breath and turned away. No. This was her burden to bare.

  “Don’t worry,” she said, “they have no idea where your boys are.”

  Barbara took her hand back and exhaled in relief. “They told me that they have one of them captured. Is that true?”

  Lystra nodded. “Quint. He stayed behind for…” She looked down and smiled. “He stayed behind to save the others. To let them escape.”

  She glanced back up and Barbara was looking at her with her eyebrows raised. “Say what you were going to say,” she said. This woman’s bullshit meter was incredible. I guess after you have kids you hear every kind of lie possible. She was a human lie detector machine.

  “He stayed behind for what?” she asked. “For you?”

  Lystra chuckled. You couldn’t get anything past this woman.

  “I thought that Quint had bonded to his wine cellar,” she said with a laugh. She looked Lystra up and down and nodded. “I can see what his bear saw in you. There’s good in you. I can see it too.”

  Lystra felt her cheeks redden. Was there still good in her? After everything she did the past three years, helping the SEA?

  “Do dragons bond?” Barbara asked.

  Lystra nodded. “I didn’t think we did. Until I saw him.”

  Barbara grabbed her hand. “Something tells me that your role in this is not over,” she said. “As one mother to another can I ask you for a favor?”

  “Anything.”

  Barbara looked at her with worried eyes. “Can you help keep my boys safe?”

  Lystra felt a tightness in her stomach. How could she keep this woman’s sons safe against the most powerful force on the planet? How could she keep them safe when she couldn’t even keep her own son safe?

  Barbara looked at her with a pained gaze, filled with worry and dread. Lystra recognized that look. The painful look of a mother worried about her children. She had seen it many times before.

  In the mirror.

  Lystra nodded. “I’ll keep them safe.”

  Quint sat on the floor of his cell and stared at the bottle in front of him. He licked his lips.

  Man I need a drink.

  He reached out for the plastic bottle and then pulled his hand back. It wasn’t ready yet.

  Quint spent all morning making it. Prison-made wine.

  First he had soaked the slice of bread they gave him for breakfast in the bucket of water that was meant for him to wash up with. The bread expanded and eventually broke apart. He collected the tiny amount of yeast that separated from the bread. He mixed it with two mornings worth of grape juice into an empty, plastic water bottle.

  Next he poured in a packet of sugar that came with a bowl of oatmeal two days before. He squeezed the lid on and shook it for a full five minutes. Now all he had to do was wait for it to ferment and then he would have wine. Sweet, beautiful wine.

  It wouldn’t be anything like the regular, delicious vintage wine that he made back in camp but it would do.

  But he had to wait at least a week. He reached out with an impatient finger to touch it. It had been twelve minutes.

  It was going to be a long week.

  Man I need a drink.

  A rattling coming from inside the back wall caught his ear. He walked over and put his ear to the cold, steel panel.

  He could hear a muffled voice. He slid his fingertips over the wall and gasped when a small panel near the floor came loose. An escape tunnel?

  He peeled it back carefully with his fingers and the panel popped off. Crap. There was nothing there. Only a small, barred, vent in the cement wall that a mouse could barely fit through.

  Quint picked up the panel to snap it back in place when a voice came through the vent. “Hello.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Your neighbor. I’m in the next cell. My name is Sue.”

  “A boy named Sue?” Quint asked.

  There was a pause on the other end of the vent. He must have gotten that question a lot.

  “My Dad was a big Johnny Cash fan,” he said. “He was also an asshole.” He let out a deep booming chuckle that echoed through the vent.

  Quint stuck his nose up to the vent and sniffed. Bear shifter. But was he friend or foe?

  “And you?”

  “I’m Quint.”

  “What are you in here for Quint?”

  Quint sighed. “A girl. And you?

  “A girl.”

  Quint laughed. “Why is it always a girl?”

  “What else would it be?”

  Quint glanced at his prison-made wine fermenting and his shoulders slumped. Had it been a week yet? There must be a pub close to here. If only he could escape.

  “Any way out of here?” he asked.

  Sue burst out laughing. Quint exhaled, feeling weighed-down. Looks like he would still be here when his wine was ready.

  “I’ll take your enthusiastic laughing as a no.”

  “There’s no way,” Sue said. “Unless…”

  “Yeah?” Quint perked up.

  “Unless you’re a Godzilla shifter.” Deep laughter exploded through the vent.

  “What about a dragon shifter?” he asked. It was out before he could think twice about it. But Lystra would never help him escape. She helped put him in here. And especially after the way Quint ended her visit.

  Sue stopped laughing. “Do you know that they have one here?” His voice was quieter, more of a whisper. “The gorgeous black girl with the orange eyes.”

  Quint could picture her. Every detail of her mesmerizing face. Every curve of her tantalizing body.

  “I’ve seen her. What do you know about her?” Quint asked, trying to dig for some information.

  “Apparently she’s here against her will,” he said. “She has a son.”

  A son? Quint’s knees weakened. Was there a husband too?

  “They kidnapped her son so that she’ll work for them,” he continued. “It’s pretty fucked up.”

  Quint froze, a lump forming in his throat. He had no idea. His heart panged when he thought about what he had said to her. He had been hard on her. He didn’t realize that she was a victim of the SEA as well. But how could he have known?

  Quint still wasn’t sure if this guy could be trusted or not.

  “They’re keeping her son in a locked down compound about fifty miles from here.”

  “Wait.” Quint perked up. “You know where the child is?”

  “I know exactly where he is.”

  Quint ran his hand through his hair. “Why don’t you tell her?”

  Sue snorted a laugh.
“Because she’s the bitch who locked me in here!”

  four

  Lystra was curled up in her bed crying.

  Three months until she saw Micha again. Three months. How was she going to do it?

  She pictured his face during her last visit. He had grown up a lot since the month before. His hair was long and in need of a cut. She had wondered who had cut it. His guardians? Did they take him to a barber shop or just cut it wherever they kept him? She only had an hour with him and didn’t want to waste it talking about haircuts.

  He was looking like her more and more as he grew up. He had the high cheekbones that ran in her family and his smile resembled hers. He was growing fast and was going to be tall like the men in her family.

  But his eyes were brown. He was human.

  Lystra was happy that he wouldn’t be forced to live a life like hers. The SEA would keep him prisoner forever if he was a dragon shifter. But it also meant that he was disposable. The SEA could always just dispose of him if she disobeyed or betrayed them. They weren’t above killing kids. She saw Logan do it before.

  She wiped her eyes on her sheets and sat up in her bed. How would Micha look the next time she saw him in three months? Would he even recognize her? That was the hardest part. She loved him with all of her heart. She always would. But he was beginning to look at her more like a stranger than a mom. He would give her a half-hearted hug and then sit beside her. He would glance at the magazines on the table, only giving her one word answers as she asked him questions. The last visit he had asked if they could watch TV. It was heartbreaking. She was just that woman that he had to go visit for an hour a month. He stopped looking at her how kids look at their moms.

  But it wasn’t his fault. She didn’t blame him. They took Micha from her when he was three years old. He was six now. She hadn’t been a mom to him for the past three years. He didn’t realize that it was the only thing she wanted in the whole world.

  She should have just said yes when the SEA first approached her. She had been regretting that ever since.

  Lystra stepped out of bed and wiped her eyes. It was after two in the morning but she wasn’t going to sleep. She could never sleep when she started thinking about Micha like this. Which was pretty often.