Midnight Wolf (Shifters Unbound #11)(93)

Haider led the three agents as they strode forward. “See any Shifters around here?” Haider asked Zander.

He didn’t seem to note that Zander was Shifter, though Angus wasn’t sure how he could miss the signs. Zander was huge, solidly muscled, with intense dark eyes, and did not bother to dress in a low-key way. His white-blond hair, braids, and black duster coat would make him stand out even if he were human.

“Nope,” Zander answered Haider without unease. “This isn’t even our trailer. Belongs to a friend. We heard of trouble and came to check it out.”

“If you see any Shifters, give us a call,” Haider said, his voice still reasonable. “We’re Shifter Bureau. Number’s on our website.”

“Sure thing,” Zander said.

“Seriously?” Tamsin whispered. “This is the same guy who forced you to hunt me? Who threatened to dissect me?” She let out a breath. “Wow, Lady Aisling is good.”

“Is that what she meant about giving you a boost?” Angus whispered back.

“I don’t know.” Tamsin leaned against him. “Maybe Lady Aisling is letting us elude notice in Haider’s brain, like Ben eludes notice by using shadows. That is power. Let’s go out and see what happens.”

Angus gripped her shoulder to try to hold her back, even though he knew by now Tamsin couldn’t be stopped if she didn’t want to be. She slipped easily from his grasp, stepped through the door, and dropped to the muddy grass outside, landing with grace, the pattering rain glistening in her hair.

Angus sprang down after her, putting himself in front of her again. She stuck close to him as they walked carefully around the cops and Haider.

Haider didn’t notice Angus and Tamsin at all. He’d holstered his gun and stood with arms folded, listening to Ben and Zander explain to the human police how they’d come upon the men who’d broken into the trailer.

A handful of cops moved away to carefully check out the scene. Two climbed inside the trailer while a few others walked around it. The two inside called back when they found the storage area, but reported there was nothing but grainy dirt inside. They emerged again, and the lead cop speculated that a local gang had possibly been looking for a cache of meth to steal.

Throughout these undertakings, none of the police or the Bureau agents noticed Tamsin or Angus.

Tamsin broke from Angus to walk straight to Haider and look directly at him. The man didn’t turn his head or so much as glance at her. He didn’t appear to see Angus either.

Tamsin turned away, a dazed look on her face. She took Angus’s hand and together they walked slowly around the police and Shifter Bureau agents and to the pickup.

Haider continued to watch Zander and the head cop. None of the humans paid attention to Angus or Tamsin in any way—the two Shifters didn’t exist for them.

Angus and Tamsin walked hand in hand to the pickup and got in, and Angus quietly closed the door. In a moment, they were joined by Tiger.

“We should go now,” Tiger said.

Angus started the truck as quietly as he could, no gunning the engine. He turned and drove slowly past all the cars, down the lane toward the road.

His heart beat swiftly and his hands sweated on the steering wheel, but no one stopped them, no one challenged them. Even Ben and Zander didn’t appear to notice them go. Only Tiger, it seemed, had seen them.

Once on the highway heading back to town, Tamsin blew out her breath and leaned against Angus.

“I never want to do that again,” she said. “I thought Haider would look at us any second, stop us, shoot us.” She raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Thank you, Lady Aisling.”

“It was not Lady Aisling,” Tiger said. “It was you.”

Tamsin jerked upright. “What?”

“I saw,” Tiger went on. “Lady Aisling began it, but you, Tamsin, took the magic and widened it, strengthened it. I can see . . . what others can’t.” He briefly touched his eyelids.

“How was I doing that?” she demanded. Her tension came through the mate bond, and Angus longed to gather her to him, to hold her, soothe her. “I’m a Shifter,” Tamsin declared. “I don’t know how to work magic.” Her voice rose to a frantic note.

Angus broke in. “But you’re not a Shifter like I am, or even like Tiger is. If your ancestors were bred by the Tuil Erdannan, created differently, then your abilities will be different. Think about it—your mother was rounded up and you weren’t. Your sister, whose genetic makeup went to the Feline side of the family, was caught by hunters and you were not. You thought it was because you were fast, and good at hiding, but what if you instinctively put up this barrier—a glam, as Ben calls it?”

Tamsin paled. “You mean I used magic to escape, when my sister couldn’t? When my mother couldn’t?”

Angus gentled his voice. “You didn’t know you were doing it.”

Tamsin put her face in her hands and was silent.

Again, Angus wanted to hold her, shut out the world until her anguish went away. The best he could do while speeding down the road at sixty miles an hour was put his arm around her shoulder and draw her close. “It wasn’t your fault, love.”

“No,” Tiger agreed. “The abilities we are given, whatever they are, were not chosen by us. We have to learn them, understand them, even when they hurt us.”