Page 4 of The Enforcers: KANE

Kane did not need this right now.

Moving with snakelike quickness, he swung Noah around and slammed him against the wall of the building. Probably harder than necessary.

He got right up in the kid’s face, Wolf snarling in his chest.

“Let me reiterate, Reilly,” he said. “A high-tech gang is robbing shifter-owned casinos, moving east from the Pacific Ocean. That means every shifter-owned business is in the line of fire. If the thieves should happen to come here between eleven at night and seven in the morning, your job is to stop them. So if you can’t keep your mind off your dick for eight hours in a row, I’d be happy to help you by ripping your balls off and shoving them down your throat. Because this is not getting fucked up on my watch. Is that clear?”

Noah gazed into his eyes. “Yes, sir.”

“Good. Now go do your job. And turn your damned personal phone off.”

Kane released the hormone-crazed idiot and strode off before Wolf did something they’d both regret.

Chapter 2

From the stage, Rachelle watched him leave the room. Again. Night after night he came to her show, sitting at the same shadowy corner table, all alone.

He had one drink, maybe two. He never took his eyes off the stage, except to close them in what looked like pain. And he drank in her songs with an intensity that she could feel from where she sat. It was like an invisible cord was strung between them, connecting them.

But he never stayed. He always left in the middle of the same song—as if he couldn’t bear to hear it all the way through.

Rachelle snorted to herself. More likely, he had to get home to his wife.

It was stupid to build this man up in her mind. She didn’t know anything about him. Hell, with the spotlights on the stage and the dim lighting in the bar, she could barely see him, really. He was a shadow of dark hair and gleaming eyes.

She was making a fantasy out of someone who was probably just a depressed alcoholic.

And yet each time he left, it felt like he took part of her with him. She always put her whole heart into that song now, hoping somehow to call him back with the intensity of her emotion.

She wanted to heal him with the song, but she could never reach him.

Ah, well.

She finished the set and took her bows. The audience was sparse tonight. That didn’t matter to her—it was the pleasure of reaching them with her music that she enjoyed.

And, of course, there was the little fact that the singing was just a cover.

She was here on a mission.

Rogue shifters were targeting shifter-owned casinos, and the Agency’s intel said that the Silver Cloud was going to be their next target. That put her ahead of the Feds, who knew nothing about shifters and had no idea that was the connection between the targets that had already been hit.

It also put her ahead of the Shifter Council; they were dividing their attention between several possibilities along the thieves’ path east from Washington and Oregon.

Which was a good thing.

Because she needed to be the one to bring these people down. It wasn’t about justice or public service.

For her, it was personal.

She couldn’t afford to get distracted by a man, however brooding and soulful and sexy he might seem.

She had a job to do. Years ago, Selina Douglass had taken Hunter from her and destroyed him.

She still had to pay.

And now she was going to.

Even so, after she’d changed out of her costume and taken off her theatrical makeup, Rachelle went back through the lounge on her way home. Manny, the bartender, was stacking clean glasses.