Dylan looked past her to Ellison. "Are you making a mate-claim then?"

"I wouldn't have accepted if he had," Maria said, raising her chin. She'd decided once she'd climbed out of that bas.e.m.e.nt that she'd never let anyone talk over her again. "It's only kissing."

"Maria." Ellison's voice was low and warning.

"I don't care. You all say it is the woman's choice to accept a mate-claim, and then you talk like it's decided for me. I'm not mating anyone."

"Maria," Ellison said again. He put a broad hand on her shoulder. "It's all right. I'm not in their pack. I'm not about to let them bully me."

"Pride," Sean corrected. "Felines have prides. Lupines have packs."

"Well, no s.h.i.t," Ellison said, his drawl broad.

"That was for Maria's benefit." Sean gave her a half smile, but Maria's heart still pounded with the unspoken threats. "I like that she's choosy. Makes good sense."

Dylan alone remained silent. He was a hundred years older than the others, which made him more careful.

His gaze was for Maria now, not Ellison. Dylan had looked Maria over when she'd first been rescued, when she'd stood on a hot, dry airstrip in Mexico, understanding that she was to go away with more Shifters. Dylan's gaze had been calm, holding the weight of ages. He'd not looked at Maria in hunger, as Luis and Miguel and his Shifters had, but in watchfulness.

Now Dylan's watchfulness returned. But there was something new in his eyes-concern for Maria, and also respect.

She saw the same in Sean. The Morrisseys had watched Maria like the overbearing father and older brothers she no longer had. She was grateful to them for it, but she would not let them browbeat her.

"Are we going to go talk to this Pablo?" she asked.

She felt Ellison tense behind her, his hand still on her shoulder. Dylan, Maria knew, would not get one step closer to her, and neither would Sean.

Dylan looked from Maria to Ellison and back to Maria again. "Yes," Dylan said, giving her a quiet nod. "Sean, fetch Spike, and we'll go."

Ellison's warmth felt fine on Maria's left side as he drove her in his big black pickup the short journey to speak to Mr. Marquez. Maria sat between Ellison and Spike, Spike's tattooed bulk squeezed into the cab with them. Dylan's small white pickup followed with Dylan and Sean and the Sword of the Guardian.

Spike bulged with muscle, his entire body covered with tatts, and he kept his head shaved. In the last six or so months, Spike had relaxed, changing from a man who lived for nothing but fighting to one who had more to love. Discovering he had a four-year-old cub, and finding his mate, Myka, had softened the Feline who'd once been hard as granite.

Ellison drove them to a warehouse district and a large mechanic shop housed in one of the older warehouses. When the two pickups pulled up, Spike and Ellison emerging from one truck, Sean and Dylan from the other, the guys working on cars stopped and slowly straightened. Gazes followed the four Shifters and Maria, with Sean's sword obvious on his back, as they moved toward the entrance.

The man called Pablo Marquez had an office in the back of the warehouse, shut away from the noise of the men working on cars. Pablo had dark hair and eyes, Latino coloring, wore a business suit, and rose smoothly when they came in.

He was also a criminal. Maria sensed that before she took two steps inside. He didn't shout the fact-his clothing was tasteful and he didn't flash jewelry, but she knew. He was too congenial, too courteous, and there weren't enough cars being worked on to pay for this cushy office and his thousand-dollar suit.

"I saw you coming," Pablo said, remaining on his side of the desk. "Which means you wanted me to. How are you, Dylan? Sean. Ellison." He cleared his throat as he looked up at Spike. "Eron."

Spike gave him a nod, not betraying surprise that Pablo called him by his real name. Only Myka called Spike Eron, but Pablo seemed the kind of man who knew everything.

"Drink?" Pablo asked without moving. "I have plenty of cold beer, stronger if you want it."

He carefully didn't look at Maria. Maria saw his curiosity about her, but he was acknowledging that she belonged to the Shifters, and he wouldn't poach.

Not long from now, Maria thought with conviction, I won't be treated like a possession. By anyone. I'll stand up and tell people like Pablo Marquez what to do with themselves. She started to smile, imagining it.

Ellison didn't see her smile, because he was standing in front of her, a barricade between her and Pablo, but Sean shot her a puzzled look.

"What did you come to ask me to do?" Pablo said, lacing his fingers together. "And why does it take four Shifters and a civilian to ask it?"

"Ellison," Dylan said.

Ellison described what had happened in the tunnels-how he'd found Olaf about to be abducted by the three men with a net and a tranq rifle, how he'd chased them out of the culvert to see them leap into an SUV. Ellison rattled off the license number, but Pablo held up his hand.

"I don't have to look it up. High-dollar SUV, professional thugs with top-of-the-line equipment, fake plates. That's Clifford Bradley." Pablo shook his head. "He's dangerous. Very dangerous. Even for you, I think."

"If he's so dangerous, why haven't I heard of him?" Dylan asked.

"He's a recent arrival. From Atlanta, but he works the entire country. He also doesn't have his finger in things you'd be involved in-you'll never see him at the Shifter fight club or throwing back a beer at a local bar. He's high dollar. The higher the better. He has clients in New York, Los Angeles, London, Paris . . ."

"Clients for what?" Dylan asked in his quiet voice.

"Drugs mostly. The very expensive kind that fund wars. Weapons. Diamonds. Anything he can move that's sought after by the ultrarich and untouchable. I'm too small-time for him-I don't even think he knows I'm alive. Fine with me. I leave him alone."

"Why would he try to take Olaf?" Maria asked. "Not for ransom, was it?" She knew that kidnapping was a lucrative business in some third-world countries. Even people who couldn't pay much for the return of their loved ones would manage to pay something.

On the other hand, though Shifters had more resources than most humans realized, they were perceived to live close to the bone. A man who dealt in diamonds might not believe he'd get much from Shifters.

Pablo spread his hands. "I've heard rumors-and I haven't heard them lately-that some very rich people like to keep captive Shifters, especially when they're young." He swallowed and looked at the Shifters, who were watching him in absolute stillness. "As pets."

Silence descended. Outside the office, the clink, clink of tools went on, a sudden clatter and a swear word in Spanish as someone dropped a wrench.

Ellison was the first to speak, his Texas drawl toned way down. "And you didn't bother to tell us this, because . . . ?"

"I said I hadn't heard of it happening lately. Last time was before I ever met you."

Dylan remained in place, standing with the utter stillness of a big cat as he watched prey play not far from him. Entirely his choice whether to remain quiet and not attack, or reach out and take down the unfortunate animal within reach. Sean stood as quietly as his father, and Maria swore she saw the sword's hilt on his back shimmer once.

Ellison and Spike were just as still. Maria stood close enough to Ellison to hear the low growl working up in his throat. Spike's hands balled into fists, the tatts on his arms stretching, while his dark eyes pinned Marquez, who wet his lips.

Maria knew enough about Shifter encounters to know who had all the power in this room. It wasn't Marquez with his guys outside and probably weapons hidden everywhere. Dylan ruled, with Sean, Ellison, and Spike tying for second. Marquez was at the bottom of the food chain, and Maria was neutral, an observer, and protected. If Marquez made any attempt to use her as leverage over the Shifters, he'd die quickly, and by the look on his face, he knew it.

"I want to meet this Bradley," Dylan said.

"No, you really don't," Marquez said quickly. "He has ice in his veins. He doesn't care about family, or life, or even the stuff he buys with his money. It's all about him being in control. He's . . . what do you call those people with no conscience? A sociopath."

"Find out," Dylan said in a hard voice. "I want to know for certain if he's behind the attempted abduction, and where he is now, and then I will meet him. He's made a mistake."

"Yeah, I know." Pablo rubbed his forehead. "Austin's your territory. You said."

Maria had to lean around Ellison to ask her question. "What happens to the cubs when they get too big to handle?"

Pablo shrugged, looking uneasy. "I don't know. They keep them on as bodyguards, maybe as servants? I have no idea."

"You will find out," Dylan said. Not a suggestion.

Maria knew that no grown Shifter would allow him or herself to live as a servant or bodyguard against his or her will. Even the smallest of cubs could be difficult to manage-she knew how much she struggled to make Olaf mind her, and he was one of the more docile cubs. She watched Spike chase little Jordan around Shiftertown every day, and Spike was . . . Spike.

Cubs went through Transitions to adulthood at some point. Scott, another of Ronan's brood, was going through his Transition-hormones flooding his body and filling him with mating frenzy, which made him crazed and dangerous. And whenever humans thought a Shifter endangered them . . .

"They kill them," Maria said, her mouth stiff. "Don't they?"

"Maybe," Pablo said.

The sword definitely shimmered that time. Dylan fixed Pablo with a gaze that had become white blue. "Find out every single person who's bought a captured Shifter and what happened to that Shifter. I want names and locations. I want them soon."

"I don't work for you," Pablo said. "You know that, right?"

Dylan flicked his gaze up and down Pablo, and Pablo's face lost a little color. "Do it," Dylan said. "As a favor."

"You're asking for a h.e.l.l of a favor. Does that mean you'll owe me one back?"

Dylan held his gaze a moment longer then turned and walked away in silence, fading into the shadows.

Spike and Sean followed, their rigid backs betraying their barely contained rage. Ellison pivoted but remained as a shield between Maria and Pablo as he started to walk her out.

"You're Maria Ortega, am I right?" Pablo asked in Spanish.

Maria stopped. Ellison did too, turning to face Pablo but again keeping himself a protective barrier for Maria.

"Why?" Maria countered.

"You're the one they brought back from Mexico," Pablo went on, switching to English, which meant he wanted Ellison to know what they were talking about. "From the feral pack. I heard how your brother treated you when you tried to live with him. If you want, I could always explain to him that he needs to be kinder to you."

Maria thought about her brother and his old-fashioned ideas about how women should fit into the family. They were to be pure angels, married off to men of their parents' choice, to produce children to strengthen the line. A ruined woman was of no value at all, except to be unpaid help to her brothers and sisters and their children.

Maria had put up with that at her brother's house until she couldn't anymore, but that didn't mean she hated her brother. He was caught up in his own life with his wife and children, ignorant of what Maria had truly gone through. She could never make her brother understand, and she knew it.

"No," Maria said sharply.

"He's an officious little b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Pablo said. "I could make life very hard for him."

"No," Maria repeated. Pablo wasn't wrong about her brother, but she wouldn't wish harm on him. If she became nasty and vindictive, Miguel would have won. "Please leave him alone."

"You heard the lady," Ellison said, still standing like a pillar between Maria and Pablo. "Touch her family, and I'll make you regret it."

Pablo eyed Ellison a moment, then his severe expression softened into a grin. The smile made him go from hard-a.s.s to almost friendly in an instant. "Yeah, that's what I thought."

Ellison growled then ushered Maria out to the lot where Dylan and the others waited, Pablo chuckling behind them.

Maria paced back and forth on Ellison's porch, the breeze of her pa.s.sing touching Ellison where he leaned on the porch rail. Deni had joined them, folding herself up in a porch chair, watching Maria work out her distress.

Ellison couldn't stop looking at Maria-her dark hair mussed from the ride home in the open-windowed truck, her body swaying as she walked back and forth, back and forth, her face flushed, her agitation uncontained.

"We need to do something. I need to do something." Maria shook out her hands as she walked. "Mr. Marquez can possibly raise an army, and so can Shifters. We go after these men before they hurt the cubs."

"We will go after them, sweetheart. Definitely. Dylan's in there planning things." He nodded at the house across the street, to which Dylan and Sean had retreated after they'd returned, and into which Liam had disappeared a few minutes ago. Spike had all but sprinted home when they got back to Shiftertown, worried about Jordan, but he'd walked back to Dylan's house a little later. "They'll come get me, and then we'll go kick some a.s.s."

The only reason Ellison wasn't in with the other Shifters was that he'd wanted to stick with Maria. She was too upset, too horrified. The need to comfort her, to rea.s.sure her, overrode everything else.

"I need to do something now," Maria said, her dark eyes flashing. "Call Pablo and ask him where we find Bradley's headquarters, and we'll go drag him out."

Ellison pushed himself away from the railing. "I'm as mad as you are, sweetheart, but I know Liam and Dylan will put together a good plan. I'll go with them, and Ronan, and we'll get this guy. Trust me."

Ellison itched to feel Bradley's throat between his hands, wanted to see fear in the man's eyes. After that, he'd explain to the three goons who'd tried to s.n.a.t.c.h Olaf why that had been a bad idea. He'd explain so hard they'd never get up again.

Killing humans was dangerous for all Shifters, as Ellison had tried to explain to Tiger, but only if the dead were obviously victims of a Shifter attack. Ellison could think of a number of ways to make it not obvious.

On the other hand, Maria wanting to rush up to Bradley and shake her fist in the man's face scared the s.h.i.t out of Ellison. Maria was crazy-furious enough to try it, and then some goon would try to shoot her. Or grab her and have fun with her.

No one was touching Maria. A growl of feral rage worked up in his throat, and Ellison caught Maria's hand as she skimmed by again. "Come on."

Maria stopped, agitated. "Come on, where?"

"Somewhere you can work this off."

She blinked up at him. "We can't leave Deni alone."

Deni spoke from the shadows. "Since when? I'm not that fragile."

Deni was upset, though, not happy about what Ellison had told her. Ellison had feared that the news of Bradley kidnapping and selling cubs might trigger another of Deni's violent episodes, but she'd remained cognizant, if distressed.

Now she made a shooing motion. "Will and Jackson will be home soon. They'll take care of me. You do what you need to do."

Ellison tightened his grip on Maria's hand. "We're going."

He half dragged Maria down the porch steps to the motorcycle that waited in the driveway on the side of the house before she could think of more arguments to stop him. Technically, the motorcycle was Deni's, bought by Ellison to replace the one she'd been on when she'd wrecked, but Ellison was the only one who rode it now.

He knew exactly where to take Maria. He got her mounted behind him on the bike, warming to the way she confidently slid her arms around him, started the motorcycle, and slid it onto the street.

Chapter Eight.

Ellison drove out of Shiftertown, and down to the Bastrop Highway to head east. Austin had spread in the last twenty years toward the smaller towns around it, but once past the last strip malls and housing developments, the land rolled into Hill Country. Roads were long, miles into nothing.

A while back, while exploring out here, Ellison had found a dirt road that wound up into hills by the river, the road shielded by a spread of trees that followed the small ridge. Few came this way, a perfect place for Ellison to change to wolf and enjoy loping through woods and up and down the hills. The main roads were distant, and not many knew about this place, not even other Shifters.