Buried and Shadowed (Branded Packs #3)(33)

Each of them accepted that being a part of the Unseen’s secret plot to destroy the SAU would put them in danger.

“Mira isn’t a follower.” He tried to explain the unexplainable. “She’s a human, not a member of our Pack. Hell, she’s not even a believer of our cause.”

Rios continued to study him with that assessing gaze. “I’m assuming you didn’t force her,” Rios drawled.

“Not technically.”

Rios lifted his brows. “Is there a non-technical way to force someone?”

Sinclair swallowed a growl. Why had he never noticed just how annoying his companion could be?

“I used her attraction to me to coerce her into using her position at the CDC to get the intel we needed,” he admitted.

“Hey, my motto is use it or lose it,” Rios said.

Sinclair rolled his eyes. The handsome jaguar didn’t have to worry about losing it. He’d been breaking female hearts for years.

“I took advantage of her,” Sinclair said in grim tones.

“And now you feel guilty?”

He felt a lot of stuff. Most of it a tangle of emotions he wasn’t prepared to share with anyone.

“Yeah, I feel guilty,” he said.

Rios’s teasing expression settled into somber lines as his hand tightened on Sinclair’s shoulder.

“I get that, amigo. But if something happened to you-”

“Then you would take my place,” Sinclair interrupted. “But nothing is going to happen. I’m going to find Mira and bring her here. End of story.”

With a curse, Rios accepted the inevitable. Taking a step back, he squared his shoulders. He might argue with Sinclair when he thought the older male was wrong, but he never forgot who was the Alpha.

Sinclair’s word was law.

“How can I help?” he asked.

“We’re on the clock,” Sinclair said. He, better than anyone, understood that they had limited time to turn public opinion in their direction before the SAU decided that genocide was the only way to control the animals they both feared and hated. “I want you to collect all the intel we have and streamline it into one cohesive document.”

Rios nodded, already distracted as he considered the vast amount of work waiting for him.

“Okay. Is that all?”

Sinclair braced himself. He knew his next request was going to ignite Rios’s very short fuse.

“Then I want you to work with Bree so she fully understands the timeline, as well as the evidence that we have to back up our claims.”

Golden eyes smoldered with the power of his cat as Rios’s breath hissed between his teeth—almost as if he’d been punched in the stomach.

“You can’t be serious.”

Sinclair shrugged. He’d never asked what’d happened between his top lieutenant and the female wolf who passed herself off as a human and worked as a newscaster at a Denver television station.

He just knew that when the two were in the same room, the air prickled with a heat that indicated a desire for naked, sweaty sex…or murder.

Unfortunately, Sinclair didn’t have a choice but to force the two to work together.

“She’s our PR point person, and the only one with access to the media,” he said, his voice warning that he wasn’t offering a suggestion. It was an order. Period. “Who else would we trust to do our…” He grimaced as he tried to remember Rios’s name for the upcoming battle. “Grand Reveal?”

“Fine,” the younger man said.

“This is important, Rios,” he warned. “She’s going to stand before millions of people and denounce the SAU. She has to be fully prepared to answer any question. Got it?”

Rios dipped his head, a bead of sweat trailing down his cheek as Sinclair’s power thundered through the air.

“Got it.”





Chapter 2


Less than two hours later, Sinclair was driving his pickup through the streets of Fort Collins. Like most cities, the town was a weird combination of abandoned homes, burned businesses, and tiny pockets of civilization that struggled to remain impervious to the destruction around them.

Slowing, he turned into the little cul-de-sac that had six small homes tucked behind white picket fences. He pulled into Mira’s driveway, turning off the engine as he studied his surroundings.

He half expected Mira to peek out the window, or even open her front door to see who was visiting. When nothing happened, he climbed out of the truck and made a quick sweep around the small brick house with white shutters and a narrow porch complete with a swing.

Nothing looked out of place, but Sinclair’s inner wolf was on full alert as he entered the garage to find her car. There was no scent of Mira inside. Which meant that she was out with friends who’d picked her up. Or…

He gave a sharp shake of his head as he moved to break the lock on the door leading into her house. He couldn’t let his seething fear distract him. Not when he was increasingly convinced that Mira was in trouble.

He wouldn’t do her any damned good if he walked into a trap.

Entering the kitchen, he noticed the lack of dishes. Even the coffee pot was empty. Silently, he moved past the table that was located near the back door, as if Mira preferred to look outside while she was eating.

An odd pang tugged at his heart. He came from a large, noisy Pack, who often ate together in the communal center of the den. The thought of Mira seated alone at the table cut through him like a knife.