“You’re a bunch of pussies,” Pops declares. “Never thought I’d live to see the day that my boys became all girly.” He wiggles his fingers at us in a ladylike fashion.
“Can we change the subject?” Bolt inquires. “I’d personally like to diminish the thoughts running through my head.”
“Amen. There’s something about one’s parents a kid should never be privy to,” I state, giving Pops a narrow eyed glare.
“Fine, fine. The bunch of you are pansy asses. What did you bring me here for?” Pops asks, walking back around the desk and taking my seat… again. I want to remind him he’s retired and that’s my position of authority, but I have a feeling he’ll need that comfort and security to deal with the things he’s fixing to learn.
“Pops, this is hard for me to say.” I swallow the saliva that’s formed in my throat. “Anston, he’s not who we believed him to be.” Pops leans forward in his chair, his eyebrows are extended to his hairline as he awaits for me to further explain my declaration of his friend. Gathering my composure, I continue, “The club’s been dealing with missing women… human women, the oldest so far is twenty years old. Decoder has been working hard to obtain any leads by following the breadcrumbs on the web. Do you remember the bear, lion, wolf and snake shifters we had problems with in town?” He nods his head in acknowledgement but doesn’t otherwise utter a single word. “They’re the front men, they are the ones who go out scouring the towns and ultimately kidnapping the women.” Pops grounds out a collective curse before standing up, where he begins pacing the area behind my desk.
“What are these women being used for, Son?” Pops stops long enough to ask me this before he continues wearing a hole in my flooring.
“Involuntary mates,” I answer to another string of curses coming from Pops. “They’re kidnapping these women, then auctioning them off to be turned and bred.”
“And Anston knows about this?” The look in my pops’ eyes as he asks this has me hesitating in answering.
“He’s actually one of their financial backers,” Kane answers on my behalf, knowing how hard this is on me.
“One of them? There are more?” Pops flops back into his seat, head down in what appears to be shame. I can’t let him take this on as a guilt he should carry. It’s not his burden to bear, it’s these shifters who’ve violated our laws and ethics.
“Pops, don’t…” I don’t get to finish before he’s waving me away, hands held high in the air as he’s angrily swatting them. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear he was trying to get rid of an annoying fly or gnat. In any other circumstance, I’d be chuckling at his unusual display of annoyance. Pops has always been able to hold his emotions closely guarded inside of himself, so these are unusual gestures for me; I don’t know how to react or the right words to say to get him to settle down.
“Who else?” Pops demands. The three of us look at each other, knowing that he’s going to flip his shit… all of the men funding this are shifters. Ones we helped get elected to office, ones my father has relations with one way or another.
Ultimately, I’m the one to answer his question. “Jason Glemson and Markus Carmichael.”
“No fucking way! You’ve got to be shitting me. This has to be some fucking nightmare that I can’t seem to wake from,” Dad shouts; his leopard is trying to make an outwardly appearance. Pops’ nails have become long sharp points, fur has broken out over his arms, and his fangs have elongated in need to puncture something.
“I wish I was, Pops. This is why I called you in, how the fuck do we take them down? They are so politically connected and coveted by our kind, no one’s going to take word of mouth seriously. Even with all the intel we have; it potentially won’t be believed. How do I handle this and keep the club from gaining unwanted enemies?”
“Jake Broker,” Pops announces, catching me off guard.
“The FBI guy?” I question not only him but his sanity at this point. We can’t let humans get involved in shifter take downs. It would shake our already shaken point of views on humans. Shifters have always been wary of the intentions humans would have, if they ever discovered us and our existence. We know they’d want to use us for scientific experimentation and possibly exploit us during times of war. We are all unbelievably strong, heal quick, and have additional abilities that could help the military branches. Our capability of hearing and smelling things that mere humans can’t would be useful to the military, and there’s no way I want my shifter brethren used in that capacity.
“Yes,” Pops hisses out his disdain for my previous words. “That FBI guy, Jake, he’s a cougar shifter. He’s one of us, Son. He was placed there for times such as this. Although, I have to admit, we never foresaw having to actually use him.”
“Shit, Pops. Why didn’t I know this?” As the president of this club, I should have all inside knowledge at my disposal.
“You would have, Blaze… eventually. We keep his secret for a reason; when the time was right, I would’ve told you.”
“Well, I guess now is as good of a time as any,” Kane states, only his tone is one of frustration and hurt. Secrets like these, if not shared, could be buried with the holder of those facts. Facts, as president, I should’ve been aware of alongside that of my officers. I’m equal parts pissed and hurt that Pops withheld this information from me.
“Jake’s been undercover, it wasn’t safe for him to be exposed. I need to send
