Chapter 15

15

S hannon had made ravioli for lunch and while she was serving it, Chase was making garlic toast. The girls set the table and Kira and Fisher placed glasses of water out for everyone.

"So," Chase said, "we couldn't find anything out our way while we were searching for the kidnappers."

"I sure wish we had all of them in custody," Kira said.

"We've alerted everyone in the area to be on the lookout for the men and to keep a close eye on everyone's kids and vehicles to make sure they don't grab someone's vehicle either," Chase said.

"You sound like us as far as our pack alert system goes," Fisher said.

"Yeah, we have emergency call lists," Shannon said.

They all took seats at the table. Then Kira got a call. "It's my boss." She answered the call. "Hello, Martin. Fisher and I are having lunch with Deputy Chase Buchanan and his lovely family."

"I'm glad that the townspeople have all been so instrumental in helping you with this case. Everett called me and said that Royce wasn't forthcoming on information about the other men."

"Did Everett tell you that a CSF special agent, Bridget, can read minds? She has listened in on the conversations and told us when he's not telling the truth," Kira said.

"We need her to work for us," Martin said.

"Yes. We suggested it but her mate also works for CSF and they're not giving her up."

Martin chuckled. "I don't blame them. I talked to Everett about bringing Royce to Houston. If his cousin and his friend think they can free him, they won't be able to while he's incarcerated down here."

"Who's going with him?"

"Demetria and Everett. You're still on the case to locate the other two men. As long as Fisher and his brothers and cousins can help out, you'll be in good hands."

"Alright. I agree. Unless we use Royce as bait to try and get one or both the men to come for him, then I think he should stay here, and we'll try to capture the other guys," Kira said.

Martin didn't say anything for a moment. "But it could cause problems for the townspeople."

"Who are all cougars. So they are not exactly just plain human citizens and they're all for helping us with the case. It impacts on them also."

"Okay, we'll try it for two days. If the kidnappers don't show up, Demetria and Everett will take him to the confinement facility in Houston," Martin said.

"Yes, sir."

"How's Fisher doing?"

She smiled at Fisher. "He's doing great."

"I knew he would be. Enjoy your lunch and we'll talk later."

"Thanks, Martin." Then they ended the call, and she began to eat some of her ravioli. "This is delicious, Shannon."

"It's made with special spices. Even the kids love it," Shannon said.

"Well, it's great," Kira said.

"I agree," Fisher said.

"I made a chocolate cake also, but you kids need to eat your ravioli first," Shannon said to her girls.

"So what is the plan now?" Chase asked, then bit into his garlic toast.

"We'll keep Royce at the jailhouse for a couple of days, waiting to see if the other men will come to get him. If they don't, then Demetria and Everett will deliver him to the jaguar confinement facility in the Houston area," Kira said.

"Okay, that works for me." Chase got on the phone and called Dan. "We're going to keep Royce for a couple of days and use him as bait." He chuckled. "Yep. Maybe we'll get lucky."

"Bait like fishing bait, daddy?" Zoey asked.

"To catch big, bad fish, right," Chase said.

Muddy suddenly started barking, and they wondered if he heard someone coming to the front door. Though Kira hadn't heard anything, and her hearing was better than a dog's.

Chase hurried to check it out. Fisher went with him, just in case he needed backup. But there was no one at the door.

"Maybe it was just a case of the wind blowing something out here."

"The windchimes or something else alerted them that had nothing to do with any people?" Fisher asked.

"Yeah, it could be. I don't smell any scents except for ours." Then Chase and Fisher went back to the dining room to eat the rest of their lunch.

"Nothing?" Shannon asked.

"Nah, just the wind or something," Chase said. "You know how the dog is. One little sound and he's all jumpy."

"That's for sure," Shannon said. "We can bump the table with our knee and send him into a barking fit. Though sometimes it's a bear smelling our good home cooking."

"A real bear?" Kira asked. "We were told you have bear shifters around here."

"Yeah, the bear shifters don't live here permanently, but sometimes they come through. But we do get real bears, wolves, and cougars too."

Then they heard a car drive up and Shannon rolled her eyes. "That's Carl Nelson's car. Hal's mom and dad run the newspaper and he's one of their reporters. You know Deputy Sheriff Ricky Jones? He and his brother Kolby bit Carl—long story. So he's one of us now. But he's always looking for a story. Knowing him, he went to Dan already and he said no to giving him the scoop about the kidnapper since he's a wolf."

"So what do we do?" Kira asked. "If it's just in the local paper…but then I guess if someone picked it up and ran with it, the FBI would be here."

"Exactly," Chase said.

Kira realized Muddy didn't bark this time, she guessed because they knew who he was.

Chase got up from the table again and went to greet Carl.

"If he wants a story, he has uncanny timing, always showing up when we're eating," Shannon said. "Does anyone want any more ravioli or garlic toast?"

"Cake," the girls both said.

"Okay, you ate all your food." Shannon cleared their dishes away. She cut a couple of slices of chocolate cake for them.

"Hey, I hope I'm not interrupting anything." Carl smelled at the air and smiled. "Ravioli."

"Have you eaten?" Chase asked, bringing Carl into the dining room.

"I haven't, but I don't want to bother you none," Carl said, eyeing Kira and Fisher. "I heard that some wolves and a couple of jaguars arrived in Yuma Town. I also heard that it was about three wolves who are kidnappers."

The word had to have gotten around because Dan had told everyone to be on the lookout for the three men and their SUV.

"Would you like some lunch?" Shannon asked Carl.

"Yeah, thanks. You make the best ravioli."

"You say that about all my meals." Smiling, Shannon returned to the kitchen.

"So what's going on with these guys?" Carl asked, sitting next to Kira.

"Did you ask Dan?" Chase asked.

"Yeah, but you know he's always closed mouth about these cases, except that everyone is supposed to report if they see the men or their vehicle," Carl said.

Shannon set a plate full of ravioli and a slice of garlic toast at Carl's place setting.

"Thanks, Shannon." Carl turned to Kira. "You're in charge of the investigation." He said it in a way that meant it was up to her, not Dan, as to what she wanted to reveal, if anything, about the mission. But they were in cougar country and Dan knew more about Carl than she did so it was his call.

"I am, but I'll have to defer to Dan on the topic," Kira said.

Carl smiled. "What about you?" He raised his fork to point it at Fisher.

"I'm just here to help the USF special agents in any way that I can," Fisher said.

"Yeah, but from what I learned, one of the kidnappers shot you. Was it the one who is in jail?" Carl asked.

"Is that why Ricky and Kolby bit you?" Fisher drank some of his water. "Because you asked too many questions?"

Carl smiled and lifted his garlic toast off his plate. "It was just all a big misunderstanding. How was I to know that they were cougar shifters and not real cougars?" Carl took a bite out of his toast and then ate some more of his ravioli.

"So how does this work for you now that you're a cougar too? Do you report on fun happenings? But stay away from anything that might lead human law enforcement here?" Kira finished her meal.

The girls finished their cake and were dismissed to watch animated features in the den. The dog ran off to join the girls.

"Yeah, sure. Social events, births, deaths, weddings, awards, and commendations—the usual stuff. But I also report on any human trouble we have here. Like a couple of cars filled with humans racing down our highway, who eventually wrecked with each other, or human hunters targeting animals on our land. I say ours because the land is for all the cougars in Yuma Town. When it comes to shifter news—I mean in the real sense of the word—I have to be careful. Now, if a human tried to kidnap a cougar, that's frontline news because they are turned over to the human police, based on that and any other crimes he or she has committed.

"One of the worst cases we had was a human woman who tried to steal one of three triplets from the clinic after a cougar shifter passing through here had birthed them. It was a brazen act on the kidnapper's part, but she didn't stand a chance to even grab one. Not when she smelled like a human and Dan, Chase, and Stryker were called in to arrest her. She swore up and down that one of the babies was hers and that the mother had stolen the one from her," Carl said. "Of course, Dr. Kate had delivered them so she knew differently. Not to mention the woman was human and the babies were all cougars, in their human form at the time."

"Oh, wow," Kira said. "How did the woman even know about the triplets being born?"

"She was at Mrs. Fitz's shop when the lady went into labor there and then the would-be baby-napper followed the ambulance to the clinic. The woman hung around the waiting room since there was such a hustle and bustle of nurses and both doctors working together with the cougar mother in delivery. No one even noticed the baby-napper until she came down the hall, looking for the babies. That's when a nurse asked what she was doing in the clinic—because she was human and didn't belong—though she didn't tell her that. If someone has an emergency, they'll take care of a human, then send them to another city, usually Colorado City, to take care of the patient."

Kira couldn't imagine anything more horrible than one of the mother's babies going missing just after she'd had them. And what a shock it would be to the kidnapper when she discovered the baby was a cougar, not totally human.

"Anyway, FBI agents were following her case, looking for her after she had tried the same thing at three other clinics in Colorado. She'd told her husband she was having his child, and that was the only reason he was staying with her. She'd never been pregnant. Dan and Chase arrested her and then turned her over to the FBI. She went to prison, and her husband divorced her," Carl said.

"That's good," Kira said.

"Right. So those kinds of stories I'm able to report on. The cougar mother and her triplets went back to Denver where her husband was working and she was reunited with him," Carl said.

"So what's your story?" Fisher asked Carl.

"I'm an investigative reporter. I've dug up dirt on cases where no one wants to go. Of course, once I became a cougar, my focus had to change because the cougars work together to take care of each other. We don't have crime and corruption among the cougar residents of Yuma Town. Which was a real shock to me in the beginning. I was used to every town, big and small, having dirty little secrets. Like one small town where they had high stakes gambling, and the Mafia was involved. You would never believe it because they operated out of a shoddy, no-name, square, concrete-block building. They brought diamonds in, drugs, money. It was a real snake pit."

"Did you uncover it?"

"Are you kidding? Government corruption is more my style. And murder cases. When you get into dealings with the Mafia, you go missing, end of story. I'm all for getting to the nitty gritty of a situation, but not with the Mafia. In another case that I was investigating, this guy stole all kinds of money from investors?—"

"Boy, that happens a lot," Kira said.

"Yep. But he also had murdered his wife and told investigators that she flew away to somewhere else to get away from it all. They could never prove it, but when the Securities and Exchange Commission went after him, he committed suicide. So he might have gotten off with murdering his wife, but miffed investors—who had lost lots of money while investing in his scam—finally got him. They were offered so much money as a return on their investments. They should have realized it was a shady deal. Lawyers, judges, doctors, anyone who had money were in on it."

"And you reported on it," Fisher said.

"I sure did. His son and daughter knew he'd murdered his wife. He had a mistress, even though he was still married. He just didn't want to have to give up half his money and estates to his wife if he had divorced her," Carl said.

"The woman he was with didn't know the risk she was taking by staying with a murderer." Shannon began clearing away dishes and Kira helped her.

"So true. I reported on a case where a husband had killed three of his wives before the police got wise to what he was doing." Carl glanced at Chase. "No offense. If you were in charge of the investigation, you would have checked into his background and realized three accidental deaths were a bit much, especially when they had huge insurance payouts. And two of the deaths were identical—falls in bathtubs and subsequent accidental drownings. He figured he got away with it that many times, he might as well keep going with the same scheme. Easy money and lots of it. Most of the criminals like him believe they are smarter than everyone else."

"Exactly," Chase said.

Kira came back with slices of cake for Chase and Fisher. Carl was still eating his lunch. Then she went back to the kitchen to get some cake for herself and for Shannon. Shannon was making a pot of coffee and brewing tea for whoever wanted it.

Then Carl finished his toast and ravioli and took his plates into the kitchen. "Is this slice of cake for me?"

"Yep," Kira said, having cut him a piece in case he wanted some. She figured he would.

Then Shannon brought in coffee for Chase and Carl. Kira, Shannon, and Fisher had tea. Carl brought in his cake and sat back down at the table.

"Have you ever reported on something because everyone was saying the same thing, like for instance, a spouse had murdered his wife, and it turned out the neighbor did it, but the spouse has to live with the accusation for the rest of his life?" Fisher asked.

"No. I want the truth. That's why I'm considered an investigative reporter. I don't repeat something that half of the town, and sometimes even the prosecutor's office, is saying. It's easy to get caught up in the sensationalism of a case, but if you have it wrong?" Carl shook his head. "I don't want to be issuing a statement of apology for getting it wrong. By then? The damage is already done."

"I agree." Kira had a lot more respect for the news reporter then. Her phone jingled and she pulled it out to see that the call was from her boss again. "Yes, sir?"

"Tell Fisher that he is officially a special agent working with us with full pay and benefits now. He'll still have to go through rigorous training with us in Houston once he has fully recovered from his injuries," Martin said.

She smiled broadly at Fisher. "He will be thrilled to learn of it. Would you like to speak to him?"

"Yeah. I tried to call him on his phone, but it's going to voicemail."

"Okay. Martin wants to talk to you, Fisher." She handed the phone to him, beaming.