Page 12 of Memphis Heat
Belle chewed her lip, looking down at the pair in recovery.“Damn it, Jarod, this is the third time this week.We’ve got to put a stop to this.”
“Yeah, well, at least the ranks are stronger.”
She didn’t appreciate his cheeky grin.“Not funny.You know how this whole werewolf thing turned our lives upside down.Sundance there is a rookie.She had her whole life ahead of her.”
“She still does.”Jarod shrugged.“And now, no one will call her the Sundance Kid anymore.Or if they do, I’m certain she can… take care of it.”
Belle slugged him in the shoulder.Hard as his muscles were, she knew it didn’t really hurt, but he made her feel better by pretending it did.“I’m serious.”She huffed out a breath, trying to blow a strand of hair out of her eyes.“If we knew exactly what we were dealing with concerning the Russians, I might not feel so badly.As it is, we’re not so much circling the wagons as chasing our tails.”
“Literally.”
She punched him again, for good measure.“Smart ass.”
“Ow!Stop hitting me!”
“Stop being a shit.”
Jarod’s expression went dead serious.“You know, I’m not even sure there are any Russians.”
Jarod might be an ass, but he was an astute ass.If his gut told him something was off about the Russians -- besides the whole werewolf thing -- then she trusted him.Not that she’d give him the satisfaction of ever agreeing with him.“If not the Russians, then who?”
Jarod shook his head.“I don’t know, but it’s too convenient.We need more werewolf cops to handle this situation, and in three days we got three new teams.All single.All married to the job.”He looked down at the clipboard in his hands.“And all veterans.Just like us.Combat trained.Well, all but Sundance there, and she’s an Air Force vet.Maybe she doesn’t have a lot of street experience, but I wouldn’t call her the typical rookie.”
“Three teams we couldn’t have handpicked better.Someone has put a lot of thought into this.”Belle crossed her arms over her chest, studying Jarod.She knew that look.
“Yeah.And I don’t like it one bit.”
“That makes two of us.What do you wanna do about it?”
“I’m ready to stop playing chase the rabbit.Time we turned the tables on these cop hunters.Let’s show ‘em what real wolves look like.”
“I suppose you have an idea here?”
“Yeah, I think I do.”
* * *
Butch rolled groggily to his feet.“What the fuck.”He had the most annoying sensation of being too tall for his equilibrium, like he’d been stretched.He shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs from his brain, but that didn’t help at all.
“Don’t do that.You’ll puke.”
Regan was coming out of the bathroom, towel in hand, dressed in gray sweats and an incredibly tight tee that said MPD across her chest.Under other circumstances he’d have really appreciated the view.
At least he assumed it was a bathroom.The place was unfamiliar, but the layout looked like a standard military hospital room, two beds to a unit, bathroom, lockers, a window it’d be useless to try to open, and a door to the ward.But without knowing where he was or how he’d gotten there, it wasn’t safe to assume anything.He started to shake his head again, then decided to heed her warning.“Where are we?”
“Not sure, precisely.Door’s locked.Decided against breaking it down.Figured being able to stand upright was my first priority.You remember anything at all?From back in the alley?”
“Yeah.Maybe.”He’d kind of hoped he was wrong.“Werewolves?”
“Yeah.Kid was there for bait.We opened fire, but they kept coming.I was sure we were dead.Then there were sirens…”
And that’s where his memory got a little fuzzy.Or he hoped it did.“The cops.The ones who jumped out of the patrol cars…” Butch swallowed hard.“Our backup.They were wolves, too.”
“Yup.”
“Fuck.”He didn’t want to remember what came next.“We’re fucked, aren’t we?”
“That’s about the size of it.”
