Dangerous Mating (A.L.F.A., #3)(5)

Oh shit. She hoped it wasn’t a true or false. She hated those questions, she always chose the wrong one.

“Miss Tomlin, you have decoded many classified items for us,” he paused.

“Yes, sir.” Where was he going with this?

His hands clasped together on the desk. “Do you know about the shifters in our community?

She sat quietly, thinking. What was the right answer here? If she said no, would that keep her from going? If she said yes, would someone hunt her down and kill her for knowing something she shouldn’t?

“I have decoded a couple messages that had information about . . . others. Of course, I’ve never talked about it with anyone. So I just thought ‘that’s cool’ and didn’t worry about it.” Please be the right answer, please be the right answer. Please—

“Wonderful, Miss Tomlin.” He smiled. “Then I don’t have to go into all that. I figured you had, so I knew you were the person for this assignment.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” She was ready to come out of her skin. “What is the organization?”

“It’s ALFA, Alpha League Federal Agency,” he simply replied.

That meant absolutely nothing to her. Never heard of them. “Great.” She sprang to her feet. “I won’t let you down, sir.” With that she hurried out the door. In the hallway, she held her first victory dance in a long time. Her arms pumped, booty shook. Yes, she was going into the field. Oh, wait. She knocked on the door again.

“Yes, Miss Tomlin.”

She felt her face melting from embarrassment. “Um, sir. Where do I go for the briefing and when?”

The director came to her and handed her a sticky note with an address scribbled on it. “There is no name on the building, but the number is easy to see. Josh Tumbel, the director, would like you to go over as soon as you can for briefing.”


*

After packing her laptop and talking with her boss, she made it to the ALFA building in record time. She had enough excitement built up inside to fuel a jet plane across the ocean. She knocked on the door that had a plaque that read Director Josh Tumbel. She wondered if his first name was Joshua. She couldn’t imagine “Josh” being a shifter.

She wondered what his animal looked like. Would he have big teeth if he was a wolf? How about lots of hair all over his body? If he was an elephant, he’d have a six-foot dong, according to the Animal Channel. She couldn’t imagine—six feet long.

The door flew open, startling her. A gorgeous man smiled at her. Damn, was he married? Hubba, hubba.

“You must be Kari.” They shook hands.

“Yes” was all she could manage. Josh looked like a human, no hint of an animal at all.

“Come in,” he said. He gestured to another gorgeous man sitting in front of a desk. Good god. Did they need a receptionist? Shit, she’d type and file the whole damn day if she got to stare at them.

“This is Sheldon Loper. You’ll be working with him on this assignment.”

She stepped up to the man sitting and shook his hand, exchanging greetings. Her foot caught on one of the chair legs, tripping her enough to lose her balance. Figures, she thought as she tried to catch herself. Story of her life. But hands were there to steady her before she had a chance to react. These shifters were damn fast. Carefully, she sat in the second chair in front of the desk.

“So,” Josh started, sitting behind his desk, “first off, I want to thank you, Miss Tomlin, for volunteering.”

“Please call me Kari,” she said. “Unless we have code names.” She perked up instantly at that thought. How cool would that be?

“No, for this mission, you can use your real names,” Josh said. He glanced at Sheldon in the chair next to hers, then back at her. “Is this by chance your first undercover assignment?”

Her heart about stopped. How could they tell? Did she look like a kid in a candy store? Well, she sure as hell was! “My first field assignment,” she replied.

Josh nodded. “That’s fine. This op isn’t too . . . demanding. Your role is to be a girlfriend to Sheldon and you’re on a trip to visit the city.”

“What city would that be, sir?” she asked.

“Cloustien.”

Her jaw dropped. “No way.” She looked at both men to make sure they weren’t joking. “This is so awesome.”

Josh said, “I guess you’ve heard of the place?”

“Well, yeah? Who hasn’t?” she said.

Josh looked at Sheldon. “Indeed.” Sheldon shrugged. Josh held out a packet to her. “Here is information about the organization you’re touring with. They arrived in Cloustien yesterday, but are allowing you two to join them. Their organizer has no idea you are undercover. She thinks you are regular people coming at the last second.”

She took the envelope from him. “What is the mission? What are we really doing?” she asked.

Josh slid a file folder onto his desk. “One of our agents, Bryon Day, has gone missing and Sheldon will be searching for his whereabouts.” He handed the folder to her. She opened to the headshot inside. Her breath caught in her throat, her eyes fixed on his, and her panties became very wet. Could you fall in love with a photograph? This man was the most stunning thing she’d ever seen.

She scanned his stats on the sheet under the picture. The only one she really cared about was marital status. On that line was the letter S. She could cry at this moment; he was available. As long as he didn’t have a girlfriend. And let’s be real, how could a man like him not have an equally gorgeous female draping off his arm. Maybe females, plural.