Indirect Lines: Halle Shifters, Book 5 (2 page)

Without another word he took the box and carried it to the front door of Cynful. He handed it over, nodded once, and was off to whatever it was Hunters did when they weren’t in their home territories.

Heather shook her head and carried the box into the shop. “I’m back…”

Chapter Two

“Get off my couch, cat.”

The only answer Barney got was a yawn. A yawn with huge teeth involved. A striped tail swished lazily as the big white head settled on the arm of Barney’s leather sofa.

“Don’t you scent mark my shit, you asshole.” He threw his pencil at the big pain in his behind. “Get the hell out, Artemis.”

The Tiger grunted and stretched. Barney could hear the distinct sound of leather popping before the cat landed on the floor.

Barney wanted to inspect his couch for damage, but the Tiger was there, getting changed. While nudity among shifters wasn’t uncommon, it was still considered polite to give someone a little privacy when their bits and pieces were dangling out. “Why did you come here?”

“Apollonia kicked me out.” Artemis moved with all the slow, graceful movements cats were known for as he dressed. Barney wanted to tell him to hurry the hell up. “She thinks I damaged her car. Again.”

“Did you?” Not that it mattered much to Barney, but if the two Tigers had a real fight he’d be the one trying to get them to knock it the fuck off.

“Maybe.” Artemis pouted. “She called me a pain in the ass.”

Barney kept his lips clamped. Artemis
was
a pain, and lazy, and one of the deadliest shifters Barney had ever met.

Still, if Artemis had ripped Barney’s couch, he’d have a brand new Tiger-striped rug.

“Are you done yet?” He had shit to do that didn’t involve babysitting Artemis Smith.

Another grunt and a yawn. A plain T-shirt went over Artemis’s head, his words muffled by the cloth as he replied, “Yup.” His head popped out. “I’ll be out of your hair in a minute.”

For one of the Tiger twins, a minute wasn’t what it was for most other people. It was like they moved on Island time, getting there when they got there, not bothered in the least if they were early or late. Mostly late. “Get your fuzzy ass gone. I have work to do, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah. You’ve been grumbling all afternoon.” The Tiger shot him a wounded look. “Didn’t you know I was trying to sleep?”

Barney wanted to throw the table at him. “Two becomes one, one becomes three. Bear knows the way, but Fox holds the key.”

Artemis blinked lazily. “Huh?”

“That’s what I’m working on.” Barney shook his head. No way was he explaining himself to Artemis. The Tiger could just suck up his curiosity like the cat he was and choke on it. Artemis’s sole job was to protect Chloe Williams and nothing more.

Artemis stared at him blandly. “Want some help?”

“No.” He’d rather eat fire ants. Live ones. Hold the honey.

“You sure?” The Tiger tilted his head, his dark hair falling across his forehead. One strand of white showed.

Barney scowled. That strand of white meant that the Tiger had been using his powers, and for a Tiger, that meant fighting. Biggest of the shifters, Tigers had the ability to take on a half-man, half-Tiger form, making them the most formidable fighters in the shifter world. “What have you been up to?”

Artemis shrugged. “A little of this, a little of that. A little trip down to a certain tattoo parlor to check on a cute little redhead.” Artemis licked his lips, and Barney wanted to deck him. “She’s delicious.”

Holding his rage by a thread, Barney pointed toward the door. “Out.”

“But—”

“Now!” The roar echoed off the walls of his tiny apartment. Damn it, the neighbors would probably complain again.

“Your funeral.” Artemis strolled to the door, pulling it open. “Just remember, Fox holds the key.” The door shut behind him with a soft click.

Barney ran for the door, pulling it open, ready to demand that the Tiger come back. But somehow, some way, that lazy ass Tiger was gone, a bare hint of his scent left in the wind. “I hate that fucker.” Barney slammed his door shut.

Barney stared at around the tiny, one-bedroom apartment he’d gotten when he’d come to Halle to investigate Chloe Williams on the Leo’s orders. This thing with the white shifters was becoming bigger than he’d thought possible. There was Senate involvement, mercenaries, a riddle and attacks on innocent people. Chloe Williams had nearly died, Julian’s mate had been attacked, and Hunters were popping into the area faster than Wawa’s with gas stations.

Normally Hunters worried themselves over rogue shifters, those who either couldn’t or wouldn’t abide by the laws laid down by the Senate for the protection of all shifter kind. But if the Senate was clandestinely hunting white shifters, people who’d done nothing wrong, something had changed dramatically. As annoying as Artemis was, he hadn’t done anything to set Barney’s Hunter instincts tingling. If anything, his Bear was actually amused by the lazy S.O.B. Chloe had been a simple college student. And Julian was a Kermode, one of the rarest of the Bears, so his presence in Halle was something of an anomaly. He was the only one of his kind to leave his home territory since…

Ever. Barney didn’t think they ever left British Columbia. Yet this all started when Julian appeared, searching for something he couldn’t name and saving Chloe’s life.

Hell. The only way Barney would be able to solve the case was by solving the cryptic riddle told to Julian DuCharme and Chloe Williams by Fox and Bear. It had haunted Barney day and night, and the more he learned the farther away the answer seemed to be. He wished he could speak to the spirits the way they did, but that privilege was granted to only a few, and they were all white.

He sat back at the table and stared at the message the spirits had sent.

Two becomes one.
Well. That one, and the second line,
One becomes three
, confused the hell out of him. The list of things that could go from two to one were staggering, but he was slowly narrowing it down. But then to have it go from one to three? It made no sense whatsoever, no matter how he twisted it around in his head.

His Hunter senses weren’t just tingling, they were singing the goddamn “Imperial March”. That symphony was all for the Senate, who’d sent him here to investigate, and, if necessary, bring in Chloe Williams, the white Fox. But the Leo had given him completely different orders, and it was those he intended to follow.

The Senate was a loose conglomerate of all of the shifter species. Its main purpose was to see to it that humans did not learn of the existence of shifters, with the only exception being human mates. Over the years the Senate had also instituted certain laws that all shifters abided by, one of them being the sanctioning of new Packs and Prides. Every six years the different races would elect one of their own to a seat on the Senate.

The shifter Senate also ran a legal corporation, the Wildlife Conservation Federation. It was a charitable organization that was mostly concerned with the conservation of endangered species, funding those places that gave sanctuary to them. It was the shifters’ way of thanking the animals for giving their human half not only the ability to shift, but a lifetime companion. The foundation only accepted donations from shifters, so they didn’t fall under public scrutiny. As far as Barney knew, they didn’t even have a website.

And it was all headed by the Leo, a white Lion born of the Lowe family. It had been that way for centuries, and no one had expected that to change anytime soon.

So what did the riddle have to do with all of this? It was burned into Barney’s brain, driving him insane. The connections between Chloe, Julian and the Leo were thin at best. Add in Artemis, the white Tiger, and none of it came together in a neat, tidy package.

The only part that made any sense was
Bear knows the way but Fox holds the key
. If that didn’t scream the Bunsuns, Williamses and Allens, he didn’t know what did. That family was chock-full of Foxes and Bears. But according to Chloe, she wasn’t the Fox spoken of in the rhyme. And the Bear wasn’t Julian DuCharme. So who were they? And were they the two becomes one? And was the key something physical, or metaphorical?

Worst of all, he and some of his compatriots had uncovered evidence that half-breed children, like the daughter of Tabby the Wolf and Alex the Bear, were being targeted and killed before their first shift. But he didn’t know who was targeting them or why, or if it even had anything to do with the riddle or the white shifters.

The worst thing he could think of was that those in the Senate organizing the attacks here in Halle and elsewhere had already figured this riddle out. If they were using it to make sure that whatever it was the spirits wanted never came to pass…

That couldn’t be good.

The thought that the riddle had nothing to do with the white shifters had crossed his mind, but it was quickly dismissed. Too many factors pointed right toward them. There was no way they weren’t involved somehow in whatever was going on.

Thank God Heather isn’t one of them.

Barney sighed and rubbed his eyes. Well. That made ten whole minutes without thinking about Heather Allen. It might be a new personal best. He’d been avoiding her all week, and his Bear was giving him fits about it.

The thought that Heather, rather than Chloe, could have been the white Fox, could have almost died, drove him insane. He had nightmares where Heather was beaten, half-dead, kidnapped or worse. The thought that he might have lost her before he even knew she existed was too much to bear. Alex had told him all about the attack on Heather when she’d been ten years old, how some adult male Bears had tried to force his tiny cousin to shift when she wasn’t physically ready. It had puzzled him for some time, and still did. They’d ripped her clothes, taunted and teased her, terrified her to the point where she probably still had nightmares.

But they hadn’t done the unthinkable. Either Alex got there fast enough to stop that horror, or they’d never intended to rape her to begin with. Sometimes he wondered if those men hadn’t attacked her because she was a mixed-blood Fox and might be a white shifter. He still hadn’t figured out why mixed-blooded shifters would sometimes turn up white, but he had the feeling that someday he’d find the answer to that riddle as well.

Thank God Heather
wasn’t
the white Fox. The life of a Hunter was dangerous enough. If he’d been mated to a white shifter, things would have become far more deadly than anything he’d ever dealt with before. He would have given up everything to ensure her safety, even his own sanity.

This was why Barney had always felt that Hunters shouldn’t mate. His focus wasn’t split, it was twisted around the object of his mating instincts. Everything in his life seemed to lead right back to Heather, and it was driving him insane. He wasn’t certain anymore if he could trust his own hunches where this case was concerned, but calling in another Hunter to protect Heather was out of the question. Only Barney was capable of taking care of her the way she needed.

Pushing her away had worked in the beginning, but it was becoming more and more impossible to drive her out of his life. One look into her big green eyes and his world came alive in ways he’d never experienced before. One smile and he was ready to hand her anything she desired. One sad little sigh and he wanted to eviscerate anyone who’d made her cry—past, present or future. He had to figure out a way to bring her into his life but keep her safe at the same time.

Maybe bubble wrap would work. But then he’d have the urge to pop all the bubbles, and that couldn’t end well.

The desire to head to the tattoo parlor to check up on her was so strong he was at the front door before he even realized he’d moved. His hand was on the knob, his Bear growling with anticipation. He needed to see her and make certain she was safe. It didn’t matter that Ryan was there, another Hunter, protecting the Cynful girls. No one had the right to watch over Heather but Barney.

Barney forced his hand off the doorknob, successfully pissing his Bear off. Now wasn’t the time to be thinking about mates and whether or not they were as bendy as they looked. Nope. He wasn’t going to think about putting her pert little ass over the arm of the sofa. He wasn’t going to imagine all that bright red hair spread out beneath her as he fucked her into oblivion.

Nope.

Wasn’t gonna.

So why was he standing on the front porch?

“Fuck my life.” Barney dug out his keys and locked his apartment door. Fine. He’d drive by Cynful Tattoos, but he wasn’t going to get out of the car. He was going to head over to the diner and have lunch, then come back and work on the riddle some more. He wouldn’t mate Heather until he was certain he could protect her from not only rogue shifters but the Senate itself.

He considered himself a reasonable Bear, but when it came to his mate all bets were off. He’d yank the balls off anyone who so much as touched a hair on Heather’s head.

It didn’t take long for Barney to make it to Cynful Tattoos. His apartment was only a few blocks away, but he didn’t want to be seen strolling by Cynful without having anything new to tell the girls. What was he going to say, that he’d gotten a headache from trying to figure shit out?

Barney closed his eyes and shivered as the sweetest sound in the world drifted to his ears. Heather was laughing, the sound bright, young and full of an innocence he’d kill to protect. His mate should be sheltered from all the dark things that lurked in the shadows. It was his right as her mate to keep them at bay.

If that innocence was shattered, he didn’t know what he would do.

Heather glanced out the window, almost as if she sensed his presence. Before he could find out if that was true or not he put the car in gear and headed for Frank’s diner. It was almost time for Cynful to close for the night anyway. Ryan would take care of getting Heather home, so Barney didn’t have to worry about her. Maybe grabbing a bite to eat would help clear the cobwebs from his mind.

Nothing much could make them worse.