Page 12 of Romeo

Cyrus’s phone rattled on the table as an alert sounded. He checked the screen. “No luck on our security cameras. She was caught on the security cameras running away from you and Lance, but only her back is visible. She managed to avoid detection to get close to the house and seemed to know where to go to not be caught face-first by any of the cameras.” He set the phone down. “I’d be impressed by her stealth if I wasn’t so pissed.”

Shit. Romeo had hoped to get a clear image of her face on one of the cameras so they could get a name and address from the government.

“Well, now you’re really screwed,” Midas said. He brought Maya’s hand to his lips and kissed it, then continued, “Romeo, ramp up security. It’s got to be Brent Foley watching us, because I don’t believe for a second that a journalist was watching our ceremony. The average human wouldn’t know to mask their scent the way this female did, so that means she intended to hide from us, and that can really only mean that she didn’t have good intentions.”

“I’d say it speaks pretty clearly that she’s working for Humans Against Shifters,” Calvin, one of the elders, said.

Romeo wanted to protest that there was no way in hell his truemate would work for such a terrible organization, but the knot in his gut was telling him to keep his mouth shut.

Until he knew for sure why she’d been in the woods watching them, he wasn’t going to do anything but his job. Right now, that meant making sure the ambush was safe.

Then he’d figure out how to find her.

Somehow.

* * *

Ashley wantedto slam her foot on the gas and peel the hell away from the outskirts of Whisper Creek, but she didn’t want to draw any unnecessary attention to her location. She’d made it away from both men who’d grabbed her and didn’t think she’d been followed, but she also could hardly focus on anything as she’d made her way to her car.

Once in her car, she drove as normally as she could, abiding by the speed limit and even stopping longer than necessary at stop signs. Once she hit the edge of town a few minutes later, constantly watching her mirrors to see if anyone was following her, it seemed fairly clear that she hadn’t been followed.

It wasn’t until she was on the highway and headed back to her temporary home that she felt like she could relax. But there was a knot in her stomach the size of a bowling ball, and her heart wouldn’t stop aching.

Stress, she was sure.

It wasn’t like she was thinking about the sexy guy who’d marched her through the woods and then tackled the guy who’d grabbed her when she’d gotten free of him. She still couldn’t fathom why he’d done that. He’d wanted her held captive so he could figure out why she was in the woods in the first place, but instead of taking her from the guy who had his arms around her, he set her free. She wished she knew what his name was.

She shivered as she remembered the angry growl he’d uttered when he tackled the guy holding her. It had sounded not just angry but possessive and protective too.

Shaking her head to dislodge the wayward thoughts, she pressed on the gas and put Whisper Creek behind her.

There was no way she was going to be tracked, tiger shifter or not. She’d masked her scent with a chemical designed to make her smell like nothing, not even a human, and she wasn’t in any government databases, assuming they had access to facial recognition software. When she’d come to work for Brent, he’d had his people scrub her presence from everything. And she’d been careful not to trigger the security cameras.

No one could find her, and no one knew she worked for Brent and Humans Against Shifters.

She was a ghost. A figment.

And damn good at her job.

But Sexy McSexyPants had somehow gotten the drop on her.

The scene played over in her mind again. She thought she would sneak away but hadn’t been fast enough. Or, more likely, he was just that much faster than her. She’d been too stunned to move when their gazes had locked across that vast distance. How the hell had he known she was there?

Something panged within her, that strange feral feeling that had plagued her in the woods, a longing she hadn’t felt for anything or anyone before.

Hard pass.

She slapped that feeling away and ground her teeth together.

Pushing thoughts of the dangerous man away, she focused on the drive.

She’d clean up and check in with Brent.

He wouldnotbe happy, but that was life.

She didn’t always get what she needed the first go-round of spying, but she would get Brent the information he needed. Maybe not on his twenty-four-hour timeline as he’d requested, but she’d help him take down the tigers one way or another.

Brent had helped her get vengeance and justice for her sister. She wasn’t going to go against him now. No matter how much she wanted to turn around and go back to Whisper Creek.

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