Page 98 of Wolf Bound

“They might not count your house as the correct one and then I wouldn’t accomplish the mission. They would know just where we are, and we wouldn’t be able to leave here without getting stopped.”

“I could give you a lift,” the farmer said. “I was going to take some pumpkins to market, and I’ll be using the road near where the safehouse is located. I’ll stop at a discreet spot, let you out, and you can make the rest of your way through the woods. No doubt you’ll encounter some trouble the closer you get to the house, but I would love to be part of your adventure like in the good old days. A good agent helping other good agents.”

Fisher really liked Meyers and his wife. “You have never done this before for anyone?”

The farmer hurried to eat his piece of pie. “Nope. You’re the first we’ve had the pleasure of meeting. So what do you say?”

“Sure.” Again, Fisher hoped he wouldn’t regret the decision he was now making, but no one stated there was any rule against it, and as long as the farmer and his wife weren’t really working with the “bad guys,” it couldn’t hurt. Hopefully.

In a real-life situation, he could have used whatever resource he could to accomplish the mission, after all.

26

Agents were scattered all over, watching for Fisher to show up with Parker while Kira was on the lookout at the red safehouse, trying to see her mate running to safety with his charge. She was supposed to stop him, but she really wanted to pretend she didn’t see him. But she had to do her job. She was supposed to be one of the bad guys. She much preferred being a good guy when her mate was. Now if she was working alongside him, and they were both serving as bad guys, that would be fun. Demetria and Everett were totally invested in this and having a blast.

The agents who were acting as the bad guys were just as clueless as to what was going on as Fisher and Parker though. They didn’t know where her mate or his charge were. They could be coming from any direction, either close by or far away. The ones setting up the training were the only ones who might know where Fisher and Parker were. She believed Parker would be wearing a tracker in his clothes, that neither Fisher nor Parker would be aware of, so the trainers would have an idea where the two of them were at least. She wondered if Fisher would make the riskier trip to swim across the river with Parker, or head south or north to one of the two bridges, and they could more easily cross either. The bridges were safe zones because the trainers didn’t want to lose either Fisher or Parker if they chose to swim across the river and ran into difficulty. But they were a lot farther away.

She paced around the grounds of the safehouse. Woodlands surrounded the house, but it had a grassy area, some rock-bordered flowerbeds, trellises covered by climbing roses, and huge Sunshine Ligustrum that was eight feet tall, providing a beautiful backdrop. But it also would help Fisher to move closer to the house without being seen.

As a jaguar, Everett was stretched out on a branch of a live oak tree at the border of the property, keeping an eye out. He’d been pacing across the roof of a storage building for an hour, but Kira suspected he felt too exposed, so he was trying to sit quietly in the tree now. But he’d moved to different branches several times. Even when he was trying to sit still, his tail was swinging back and forth. Which was great for Fisher! She didn’t believe Everett was doing it on purpose to warn Fisher that he was sitting in the tree, waiting for him and he would make his move. He was too competitive for that. She thought he didn’t believe Fisher would have had time to reach the red house yet, just like she didn’t. She laid down on the long grass that hadn’t been mowed in weeks, tired of pacing, worrying that Fisher wouldn’t make it safely to the house with Parker in time. They just had to reach the porch, as far as the trainers said and they were safe.

In the Houston area, everything was in flower even after Thanksgiving, the heat having dissipated, giving the flowering plants a chance to rebloom. Which helped Fisher also. Butterflies and bees were still fluttering about the flowers and that was causing a distraction for the ones waiting for Fisher to show up.

The breeze was blowing hard in a northeasterly direction and the branches and leaves were rustling, while birds were twittering and flitting about from one tree to another or around the shrubs, which would help to disguise Fisher and Parker’s approach also. But if they were moving up from the south, she and Everett would smell them way before they arrived.

She didn’t have any idea about the passage of time. In the other scenario, she had a clock to watch while she was tied up as bait. But here, there were no clocks, so her best guestimate by the position of the sun was that it had been two and a half hours since Fisher left with Parker to find the safehouse. No matter what happened—pass or fail—Fisher wouldn’t really fail. She couldn’t tell him that. He would learn the truth once he finished. It was a way to teach new agents how to solve problems and change strategies for the next time. Every mission was completely different in real life, so it was a great way to learn from the experience.

She glanced back at Everett who was leaping to a new branch, and she smiled. If anyone was going to alert Fisher that he was watching for him, it would be Everett.

Fisher and Parker, and belatedly her mate, thanked Mabel for her delicious pie, left the robes on the bench, and both shifted. Then they ran to the truck and Meyers let them into the cab. They climbed in and he shut the door. “I can’t wait to tell some of my retired friends what Mabel and I had done. Believe me, this has been the most excitement we’ve had in months. They’ll want to come and join us the next time something like this happens. Of course, we never know exactly when a mission will take agents this way. The safehouses are located all over the acreage, and they change out the locations for different exercises.” He drove down the gravel road for about five miles when a large gray wolf ran across the road in front of the truck and stopped. Meyers slammed on his brakes to avoid hitting the wolf.

Fisher figured their goose was cooked because the agent was going to examine the truck and learn Fisher and Parker had hitched a ride, but when Meyers opened the door to get out of the cab, the wolf attacked him. Fisher immediately leaped out of the truck and attacked the wolf and smelled it was Reggie. Hell, he had escaped confinement?

The farmer had fallen, his arm bleeding after the wolf had bitten him. Fisher didn’t want the teen involved in the fight and the older man either because of his age and since he’d been wounded.

But the teen leapt into the fracas, biting at the wolf’s back, not severely and Fisher assumed Parker thought this was part of the exercise and he wasn’t supposed to hurt the guy. Fisher didn’t have time to tell him otherwise, and bit into the wolf’s neck as hard as he could when Reggie turned to attack Parker. Fisher had a hold of Reggie for dear life when someone came up behind him. For a second, Fisher was afraid Reggie’s cohorts had escaped also. But it was Meyers, wearing his jaguar coat. Fisher didn’t want him to have to fight Reggie and wished instead he had called for help on his cell phone.

Reggie whipped his head around to tear into Fisher, but the farmer bit at the wolf’s flank. Parker looked confused. The farmer wasn’t biting decisively either. Fisher thought they could wear the wolf down. But he was afraid Reggie might severely injure the two jaguars before they knew what was going on.

Fisher howled for help right before the wolf tried to bite his neck. Then he dodged the snapping, killer jaws.

Kira howled back and Fisher knew she was on her way. She wasn’t far away, but he didn’t want her hurt either. He needed more backup.

At that point, since Fisher had risked his neck to howl, and another wolf who shouldn’t be on his side howled in response, the farmer and Parker probably realized the wolf wasn’t playing the game. They both began tearing into the wolf in earnest, which gave Fisher a chance to do the same. Reggie broke free and jumped into the cab of the pickup. Fisher knew he was going to try to drive off. Fisher leaped into the truck and bit at Reggie’s neck again, but he had a massive neck, so Fisher wasn’t making any headway there.

The passenger door to the cab opened and the farmer was there in his human form, then shifting. But as soon as he shifted and jumped into the cab, Fisher saw Kira and Everett coming to aid them.

Five other jaguars were coming from different directions, and they were all headed straight for the truck. Even though Fisher wanted to take Reggie down, he knew the jaguars could handle the escaped prisoner, while he needed to accomplish his mission.

Then Fisher jumped out of the truck, licked Kira’s face in greeting, and nudged Parker to go with him, but the teen was still watching the scene between the jaguars and the wolf in the truck play out. Fisher nipped his shoulder, telling him to move now! Sure, Fisher wanted to see the outcome too, but they still had a mission to accomplish.

Then Parker and Fisher ran off for the red safehouse. They were in the clear now that they had the perfect diversion—one escaped fugitive.

They ran until they saw the treed yard with the rock-bordered flowerbeds and tall shrubs. The sight of the red safehouse would forever be etched in his mind as he and Parker sprinted across the yard to the steps of the house, shifted, opened the door, and went inside.

They found their clothes inside where they’d been delivered, in case they reached the house safely. The tracking device was lying on a table next to the clothes. “Your decision to shift saved us from being tracked,” Fisher said, showing Parker the device.

“I never even thought of that. I just believed I could run faster as a jaguar. Who was that guy? I thought he was one of the ‘pretend’ bad guys overplaying his role.”

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