Chapter Fourteen

Nomad

The situation was getting more fucked up with each new revelation. The things they'd done and made Cosmo do were… fucked if Nomad knew how to put them into words. Yes, Nomad had worked for the council and done their bidding, but he'd not been stolen and forced to preform like a damn pet.

Keeping his anger contained grew harder and harder as those who'd come to offer their support talked about the next steps and how—or more who—would go out and start removing the threats to the shifter population as a whole, while Cosmo gave him and Harley another piece of the puzzle.

Owls, they were tricky by nature with their ability to blend in and that they kept to themselves made them illusive. In fact, Nomad had no memory of ever meeting one… which now that he thought about it, was fucking odd. Could the council have created a species just for their uses? If that were the case, then all this shit had been going on for a very fucking long time.

Bird's smell varied very little and make it harder to keep watch for them. As far back as his memory went, he couldn't recall owls ever being recorded as a threat, not in any reported news. To have a council assassin kill one… what did it prove?

Nomad looked at Harley, keeping hold of Cosmo, who snuggled closer to him, offering comfort while he and Harley processed his thoughts. He could feel them following Cosmo's thought patterns.

Harley barely moved his head in reaction to all he'd learned. We don't know enough to make that kind of judgement call, Nomad. Because if the council has created a species for the sole purpose of spying on us, and the shifter population found out, then they'll get hunted to extinction. Can we justify all those deaths?

What should we do? Cosmo appeared to have lost interest in the conversation around them and was looking at Nomad with worried eyes. I only know what the owl I killed told me. I was young and a novice. There was no consideration of checking those eyes of his for something to help me with my situation.

He sounded utterly miserable, and Nomad needed to make it better. This isn't your fault, so don't even go blaming yourself, otherwise I will have to spank you.

The shiver that came with the threat was not because Cosmo felt frightened, what came from him was pleasure at how much Nomad cared and was eager to show it anyway Cosmo needed him too.

It was a little too distracting, and he realized quickly he'd lost the thread of the conversation when Harley gave him a mental nudge. Bree asked you a question .

Nomad gave Bree an apologetic smile. "I got lost in my thoughts. Can you repeat what you asked?"

A brow quired up and a look Nomad had used to show disapproval at a sub for misbehaving got aimed at him.

He ignored it.

"Do you personally want to take care of those on the council who came after Cosmo when we figure out who they are?"

Nomad looked from Bree to Harley, then at Cosmo's cherub face, his heart skipping a beat at the intent coming from both mates. "We'll take those fuckers. By the time we've finished with them, they'll wish they'd never been born. Death will be the least of their worries when we get our claws into them." His gaze was granite hard. "So let's get started on allocating and coordinating when this is going to happen. It needs to happen before the next meeting, which will be some time in the next six weeks. We can't afford to miss the time frame or we'll be well and truly fucked."

"Stenton, grab my tablet, use Cosmo's list, and add the names to a spreadsheet, and then we'll assign shifters." Bree looked out at the crowded lawn. "For those of you who have a preference to kick their ass, let Stenton know. No one leaves here today without knowing who they are targeting and who is helping them. Got it!"

Harley

The loud chorus of ‘yes' rang out and did little to deter Harley's lusty thoughts with how Nomad's propensity for protecting what was his came with an angelic smile from Cosmo. Who all but preened on Nomad's hip at his words.

Before Harley could dampen his thought, Bash approached, giving him something else to focus on. Harley couldn't miss Nomad's ire at the other shifter for having laid hands on Cosmo. Nomad offered more of a grimace than a smile when Bash came to a halt in front of them. He nodded at Bree, then turned his serious gaze to Nomad. "I think I can help you identify who's after Cosmo. Or more to the point, who is scared enough to want to silence him and the rhino shifters that were stolen."

"What… has something happened to the children?" Cosmo's distress was immediate.

Bash shook his head, his large shoulders sagging. "No, but nearly. The family homes of the two boys were blown up, much like your home two nights ago. Only I'd the foresight to put both families into protective measures away from the crash. The children that were stolen overheard conversations and witnessed who they were between. The older boy, Nicky, said he recognized two men from the TV." Bash's expression was grave. "Councilmen Shepard, shifter leader for the whole Midwest and Councilmen Lawless, who got newly appointed last year as the senior aid to the Southwest district."

A silence descended. The crowd of shifters, Harley sensed all at once, truly understanding what a dire situation they all were in. They'd sort of got it before, but the weight those two shifters held, and the power meant they could—with great ease—wipe out the whole town without batting an eyelid and pass it off as some sort of natural disaster. Harley had seen it done before. Fuck, Nomad, and he had helped do this!

"Are you sure? Is the boy sure?" Nomad asked, no infliction of his feelings showing. His mind was screaming at Harley, but not with any words, just with his devastation they might have caused untold harm to people who didn't deserve it.

"I'm sure. The boy described them before I let him point them out to me on my tablet."

"Then that's who we'll be going after," Nomad growled through dropped fangs.

Harley nodded his agreement as Cosmo hissed, "They're mine, Daddy."

Nomad ran a hand through Cosmo's curls, moving a stray one from his forehead before pressing a kiss to his temple. His gaze locked with Harley's. Harley didn't need words or thoughts to know that Nomad would rather cut off his arm than deny Cosmo. Harley's cat was wary but didn't put up a fuss.

Then let's go figure out how to get to the fuckers so Cosmo can play kitty cat with them.

Both his mates laughed, but neither held any humor. They all knew this was going to be hard. All trained by the council, they understand those who'd they'd be fighting would be the same. Their only element of attack right now was surprise, as long as the fucking owls weren't watching!

Cosmo

The later it grew, the harder it was to sit still. He didn't want to hear anymore talk, make another list, or look at any other maps. A low hiss began building in his chest, so he kept his face pressed to his Daddy's shoulder to keep from letting it out.

Was so hard though.

Daddy's fingers combed through his hair, but Cosmo was growing impatient with that too. Even held in his Daddy's arms, his smell was getting too mixed up with everyone else and it was getting even harder to smell Daddy Nomad. With frustration and the stress of his newly mated smell being almost completely gone now, it was only Cosmo's council training that kept him sitting still.

They couldn't leave until his Daddies were ready and Cosmo wouldn't embarrass them by being squirmy. Instead, he focused on his breathing, slowing it down like he was preparing to unleash his knives at someone.

Never hold your breath, always throw on the exhale, everything has rhythm, find the rhythm to find your flow. Right now, the only thing that needed to flow was air, in and out, so he didn't let on just how much the day had started to weigh on him.

Along came the memories of the things he'd done in the name of a Counsil who was unworthy of the faith and trust that had been bestowed upon them by the shifter community. Even knowing that there were still good, trustworthy council members didn't lesson the growing feelings of despondency. It pressed down on him like it wanted to crush him, and deep down he was starting to feel like he'd deserve it if it did.

If only he'd refused…resisted the training…

You'd have been killed!

Daddy Harley's voice hissed through his thoughts, coupled with a sharp pinch to his thigh that yanked Cosmo out of his mental spiral.

He bit his lip, choking back his startled gasp following the pinch, and projected twin emotions of outrange and gratitude.

Keep away from that line of thinking . Daddy Harley warned.

Hard.

I know. We will be dealing with them later .

Was it a threat or a warning? Cosmo didn't know, but he hesitated to think the question, not wanting to distract Daddy from the conversation the way he had earlier. That hadn't been good behavior either.

Silence seemed the best way to deal with all he was feeling. No longer near the verge of his little space, Cosmo pressed his face back against Daddy's shoulder, and started working backward through his earlier missions to see if there was anything else that had stood out about hunting that owl.

He recalled the difficulty of it and the way his cat had been at a disadvantage, despite his skill at climbing trees. Each time his target had led him on a merry chase that had seen Cosmo take pursuit both over the ground and leaping from branch to branch, resulting in a fall that had left him bruised up and tender for days.

He tried ambush tactics next but stalking the owl without being detected had proven difficult and for several weeks they'd engaged in a vicious game of cat and mouse with both drawing blood on the other. It was only after Cosmo had trapped and netted him that he finally got the upper hand on the other shifter. There had been little the owl could do with those barbs Cosmo had outfitted the net which snarled in the feathers of his wings.

He still remembered how he camouflaged them too.

Not that he expected them to need it, but Cosmo conveyed his method of bringing down the owl to his Daddies, along with the one other thing that had stood out to him. The way that owl had kept going back to the same tangled forest deep at the bottom of the mountain range. The path down had been treacherous, even for his cat, and though he'd been curious, with his mission complete, he'd seen no need to investigate what had been so important about that place.

It sat just on the other side of this very range, and though it was probably nothing, he sent the thought to Harley and went back to his musings. Complete the mission and move on had always been his philosophy, and when that had grown too difficult, he'd found his way to clubs like Gabai's where he could lose himself and the memories for a little while.

Slumping against his Daddy, Cosmo pressed his face against Harley's shoulder hard enough to make breathing difficult, but at least it finally started to block out all of those distracting scents. He just hoped he could keep them at bay for a while longer…before his cat went batshit crazy.