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I nod. Echoing the motion, she gives a last worried look at the street and my house, and then she hurries to her little yellow coupe, climbs in, and speeds off.
“Miss?” the cop calls from behind me.
“Time to go,” Zeb says.
Phineas doesn’t wait. Hauling me with him, he strides over to the car while Zeb flashes that rich-shark smile back at the cop. “My office will be in touch.”
Ignoring the policeman’s protests, the guys bundle me into their car and race away.
Chapter 9
Mabel
We drive a circuitous path through town, taking turns seemingly at random, but to my surprise, we end up at the guys’ apartment building.
“You sure we want to come back here?” I ask. “What if they’re hunting for you too?”
“Two reasons,” Zeb says. “One, nobody followed the car, and two, we have enough security on this place to rival my family compound.”
“That’s a lot,” Huck translates for me.
Zeb smiles. “If any traders try to come after you here, they won’t make it past the first floor.”
I wonder if we should have brought Tamira with us after all. But then, doing that would still put a target on her back.
If there isn’t one already.
Phineas pulls into the covered circle drive at the front of the building. “Get her inside. I’ll keep watch out here for a bit.”
The others nod, and Huck opens the door.
I don’t move. Maybe I’m being silly—he looks like a human mountain and he’s a Jekyll besides—but I’m suddenly worried for the somber guy. “Are you going to be okay?”
He glances over his shoulder at me, and there’s an unexpected trace of softness in his eyes. “I’ll be fine. Go.”
A quivery, warm feeling tangles in me, but I try to hide it as I nod and climb from the car. Huck motions fast for me to get into the building, while Zeb is already waiting at the door.
The lobby is far from empty when we go inside. Between the elevator and the door, there’s a pair of women chatting about something on their phones, a guy leaning against the door to the stairwell texting, and two more working from laptops in the lounge to my right.
As we pass each of them, their eyes flick to us and they give Zeb a brief nod. The women don’t even break the flow of their conversation to do it.
“They’re all your security?” I ask Zeb while we get in the elevator.
“Plus more watching the cameras and stationed at various points outside.”
“Are they… human?”
He shakes his head. “Supernatural mercenaries on loan from Cerberus.”
I blink at the name. “The wolf shifters? You know them?”
“Of them, yes. Enough to make contact with their people.” He gives me a reassuring look. “Trust me when I say the folks who work for them all have very vicious opinions about traders. A number of them have lost family to the bastards. We don’t have to worry about them selling us out.”
“Especially with what Cerberus would do to them if they did,” Huck adds.
I swallow hard, hoping they’re right. I’ve never met the three wolf shifters known as Cerberus—I’ve never even met anyone who has—but gods, the stories are extreme enough.
We ride back up to their floor, and I note yet again how Huck doesn’t quite reflect the same as Zeb or I do in the mirrored door. Neither of them says a word about it, though, and when we get to the apartment, Zeb unlocks the door, glances around, and then gives a brief nod to Huck. “Stay with her, yeah? I’m going to make some calls.”
