Page 21 of Mysterious Mate

“Good luck,” Cage said.

“Same to you. I have to go.”

“Go be a hero and save your mate. Maybe she’ll throw herself into your arms…”

“Maybe, but not likely,” Colby chuckled. “Claim the girl. It’s safest for all of us.”

Colby ended the call before Cage could respond. Colby had to have known there was no way Brie could have overheard the conversation. If she had, most likely she’d have kicked Colby’s nuts back up into his body cavity. Brie was mean like that—but she was also incredibly sexy.

After hanging up, Cage leaned back in his chair, mulling over Colby’s words. How was he supposed to have that conversation? How was he even supposed to start it? Should he just shift and let her see that he was a bear? Did he take her to bed and fuck her until she couldn’t move and then tell her?

He didn’t want to frighten her, but the need to claim her as his own was becoming the only thing that mattered to him. At this point, maybe having her close would allow him to focus better on his job. Or maybe that was his bear just trying to get her into their bed.

WILLOW

Willow Carlyle watched from the shadows of the hidden wine vault, too terrified to move.

Three men had come to see Frank. Like him, they had been dressed in expensive, handmade suits, Italian shoes, and silk ties. The fact that her husband, the notorious arms dealer La Faucheuse, appeared to be frightened not only made her curious, but she had to admit it made the butterflies in her stomach flutter—and not in a bad way. She knew that was wrong, but the fact was, people feared Frank, not the other way around.

Frank was the only person she’d ever been truly afraid of, and he was now being terrorized and beaten by something she couldn’t explain. It was usually her husband Frank who did the torturing, terrorizing, and murdering, but this time he was the victim and not the perpetrator.

“You do not give orders to the Shadow League,” said the thug as he slammed his fist into Frank’s cheekbone, which made an awful cracking noise.

The frightening part wasn’t so much that a goon who was much younger, taller, and more muscular than her husband was beating on him. It was what had come immediately before the beating had begun that had terrified her down to the marrow of her bones. The three men had entered the room, and one of them had restrained Frank from behind while the other gagged him. Then the man who was now bloodying both his fists and Frank’s face had been enveloped by some kind of weird, localized swirling mist, from which a silverback gorilla had emerged. The gorilla had cuffed Frank viciously once and had then been surrounded by the maelstrom and somehow miraculously switched back to a human—a very naked human. That had been enough to stun her into silence, but she’d had to bite her fist to remain thus.

Willow had accepted that her husband had long ago lost interest in her as anything other than something to be dangled on his arm. For a long time, she had been willing to turn a blind eye to his illegal dealings. But then one night, she’d witnessed him supervising dumping deformed carcasses off their yacht in the Aegean Sea—some of whom hadn’t been dead. She’d feigned ignorance once again, but she wasn’t sure Frank believed her. It was then she had begun to amass information on his dealings and evidence against him.

Finally, Willow had managed to reach out to an old friend, Katie O’Neill, who had arranged a meeting with someone she thought could help. They were to meet later on tonight. If she could stay alive long enough to slip away, she might survive the night.

“Do you hear me La Faucheuse? You work for the Shadow League, not the other way around.” The man’s fists punctuated his words.

Frank nodded, trying to plead through the gag. The man ripped the gag from Frank’s mouth.

“Do you understand?” the man said again, leaning in.

“Ye… yes.”

“Your ability to dispose of NLGP’s refuse makes you a commodity that is useful to us. You do not want us to doubt your value.”

NLGP? Frank had invested in the Northern Lights Genome Project up in Reykjavik, Iceland. What did they have to do with those people Frank and his minions had tossed into the sea? They were a legit medical research company, weren’t they? At one point Willow had wondered if he’d been using them to launder his ill-gotten gains. So much for that thought.

“N… no. I’ll do what you want,” stammered Frank.

“Of course you will,” said the man who’d been leaning against the credenza. He walked over and patted Frank’s unbroken cheek. “Be a good boy and don’t cause us any more trouble. We don’t want to have to pay you another visit. Or maybe we’ll visit that pretty little wife of yours.”

“Willow?” Frank barked a laugh. “You’d be doing me a favor.”

Later that night, Willow sent an urgent message to Katie, arranging to meet between one and three in the morning, and then slipped away from her old life. She took only what she had on her back, as well as a single change of clothes and something to sleep in. She didn’t dare take anything that might be perceived to be a travel bag. She had been systematically storing everything she had against Frank on flash drives. Those she tucked into her bra before making her way down to their private dock and stealing away into the night.

Willow knew she would be at the rendezvous destination long before midnight, but she planned to stay hidden away so that she could watch for at least an hour. If no one came to meet her and get her to safety before three in the morning, she would have no choice but to strike out on her own and disappear forever.

She sailed toward a small, hidden cove not far from the designated meeting spot. Regardless of what happened, she would never return to the sailboat. A slow leak would have it residing on the bottom of the cove come sunrise, and by then, she would be long gone from this place. Taking the small, but powerful Zodiac, carried behind the sailboat, she made her way toward her rendezvous. She looked back to see the beautiful sailboat beginning its long, slow descent into the sea.

Willow's heart pounded as the Zodiac skimmed across the choppy water. All in all, things had been going well. Her self-congratulations were drowned out by the roar of a speed boat behind her. The roar of its engines grew louder as a powerful searchlight began combing the water. Shit. A quick glance over her shoulder confirmed her worst fears. As the sound grew louder, she could see its sleek hull cutting through the waves with terrifying speed. She hunkered down in the Zodiac, asking it for all the speed it could give her.

She risked another look behind her and could make out three men on board, their grim faces illuminated by the moonlight, which had chosen this precise moment to break through the storm clouds above. They worked for Frank, had never been fans of hers, and seemed intent on gaining on her. Willow vowed she would not let them take her back.

The black water rippled beneath her boat. She needed to come up with a plan. She’d known they would be after her, but she hadn’t thought it would be so fast. Willow had thought she’d at least have until sunrise. Did she continue on or try and somehow keep the Zodiac going as fast as it could away from her after she dove into the water? She could disappear under the waves, not to end it all, but to make them think she had or that she’d fallen out and drowned. She was considering the odds when she realized that in this part of the world, at this time of year, she would most likely succumb to marine predators long before she could get to shore and get away. Even if she didn’t, there was nothing to say that the spotlight wouldn’t catch her great escape plan, and they would simply come fish her out. Abandoning the Zodiac seemed like a poor plan.

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