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Tala’s gaze darted from aisle to aisle as she scanned the grocery store for potential threats with the precision of a wolf on the prowl.

Shelves stacked with boxes of cereal towered over her five-foot-two frame, filling the air with the scent of cardboard and sugar. The squeaky wheel of Kelsey’s shopping cart grated on Tala’s nerves, but otherwise, there was nothing out of the ordinary.

Still, her instincts howled at her. The skin along her forearms itched with the urge to shift.

Someone was watching her—watching them.

She should have gotten used to it in the year since she had been assigned as the commander of Kelsey’s security detail. As the first Wrasa to shift shape on national TV, Kelsey garnered attention wherever she went.

But this time, it felt different—like a real threat rather than an annoyance.

For a moment, Tala regretted having told Zoe, one of her team members, to wait outside. But then again, at least she could be sure that no one was messing with their car while they were in the store.

Snippets of conversations from other shoppers drifted over.

Tala tried to swivel her ears, but, of course, the tiny muscles were unresponsive in her human form.

From behind the shelf of canned soup, people whispered to each other. “I’m telling you, it’s her!”

The stench of fear and hostility hit Tala’s sensitive nose, nearly drowning out subtler notes of curiosity.

She lengthened her stride, gripped Kelsey’s elbow, and rushed her down the aisle. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Wait!” Kelsey tugged softly to free her arm, but Tala hung on. “We still need to get the jalapeno chips Rue loves.”

Tala wrinkled her nose. “She’ll survive without them.” No jalapeno had ever been near those chips anyway. How humans could enjoy those artificial flavors was beyond her.

As they rounded a corner, a rustle of fabric caught Tala’s attention.

She let go of Kelsey’s elbow and whirled around.

A bright-red missile soared through the air. Time seemed to slow as it arced directly toward Kelsey’s head.

Tala’s instincts kicked into overdrive.

She lunged, twisting her body in mid-air to shield Kelsey from the projectile.

The missile hit her in the chest and imploded on impact. Crimson mush splattered all over her crisp white shirt. For a fraction of a second, she thought it was blood. But it wasn’t a coppery odor wafting up; it was the sour stench of an overripe tomato.

Agilely, Tala landed back on her feet, which ached as if claws were about to burst through her shoes. Heat raced along her skin, and it took all of her considerable self-control not to let the transformation take over and charge their attackers.

Not that she needed her animal form to intimidate them.

They were just human pups—three boys of maybe thirteen or fourteen, who were lingering by the produce section.

“Oh Great Hunter! Tala, are you all right?” Kelsey tried to dash around to inspect the damage.

Tala pushed her back, keeping her body between Kelsey and their attackers. “I’m fine. Stay back.” Her upper lip raised in a silent snarl, she squinted at the three teenagers. Tomato mush dripped off her shirt, but she ignored it. “What do you think you’re doing?”

The tallest one had thrown the tomato, but under her glare, he shrank back behind his friends. “It, um, slipped from my hand.”

“Wolf poop! You threw that tomato at her. Apologize—right now!”

“Or what?” the boy on the left asked. He was the smallest, but Tala knew from experience that might also make him the most dangerous.

Other shoppers started to walk over, drawn in by the loud argument like ants checking out left-out candy.

The boy seemed to be bolstered by their presence. “Or you’ll turn into…whatever freaky thing you are and slash us open?”

Only years of military training as a Saru enabled Tala to hold back a growl that would have made the boy pee his pants. “Don’t give me any ideas,” she muttered under her breath.

“Get the manager,” one of the spectators said to a person in a polo shirt adorned with the store’s logo. “They’re getting out of hand!”

Tala wasn’t sure if “they” meant the boys or her and Kelsey, but she had a feeling it was the latter. Humans always seemed quick to blame the Wrasa, no matter the situation.

“That won’t be necessary, Alyssa,” Kelsey said. Either she was reading from the employee’s name tag, or she knew the names of every employee in her favorite store by heart. “It was just a harmless prank. No one got hurt.”

The store employee hesitated, then nodded. “All right.” She pointed at Kelsey. “But you’ll have to pay for the tomato.”

That was ridiculous. “Us? If anyone should have to pay for it, it’s them! They threw it!” Tala stabbed her finger toward the boys. “Besides, it’s not like we can weigh it.” She pointed at the tomato pulp covering her shirt.

The store employee didn’t back down. “We’ll charge you based on the average weight of a tomato. It’s store policy.”

Store policy. Right. Tala was sure it was only enforced on Wrasa, while humans never had to pay for damaged produce.

“Of course.” Kelsey ducked her head. “Don’t worry. We’ll pay for it.”

Tala’s jaw ached, either from clenching it hard or from sharp canines threatening to emerge. She wanted to scream and shout at the injustice of it all, but she knew she couldn’t. Her superiors had made it clear Wrasa needed to stay in the humans’ good graces. Even Syak—wolf-shifters like the pack that had adopted Tala—had to act like docile little lambs.

But her patience had its limits. She wouldn’t let the boys get away with openly attacking a Wrasa.

Kelsey softly touched the small of her back.

Tala fought the instinct to pull away or snarl at her. While Kelsey wasn’t part of her pack and didn’t have the privilege to touch her, Tala knew she was acting on instinct. Omegas like Kelsey tended to seek comfort from a more dominant wolf in tense situations or try to calm them down with a soothing touch. Maybe Tala should have been flattered Kelsey perceived her as a fellow Syak, never once insisting she was a fox. That was the one good thing about this assignment: everyone seemed to accept her chosen identity, despite what their noses might tell them.

As if sensing her unease, Kelsey wrenched her hand away. “They’re just kids, Tala. Probably not even Danny’s age.”

“They’re kids who’ll grow into adults who’re convinced it’s fine to attack Wrasa.” Tala pierced the boys with a steely glare. “Apologize, or we’ll call the police.”

Of course, she wouldn’t. It was a risk she couldn’t take. You never knew if the responding officers harbored any resentment against the Wrasa. With the way human/shape-shifter relations were going, the police might choose to let the boys go and arrest her and Kelsey instead.

But the teenagers—all white and dressed in designer jeans and expensive sneakers—had likely never had to consider something like that, and Tala was counting on it.

Under her unflinching stare, their bravado waned. They squirmed and exchanged uneasy glances. Finally, the tallest boy shuffled his feet and looked away. “Sorry,” he mumbled.

Tala cupped her hand around her ear. “What? I couldn’t hear you,” she said, even though she could detect the squeak of a mouse from more than a hundred feet away.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated more loudly.

The shortest boy elbowed him. “Pussy!”

“Shut up.”

Shoving and jostling each other, they disappeared around the corner.

The onlookers gawked at Tala and Kelsey for a moment longer, then bustled away.

Kelsey exhaled audibly. “Let’s grab what we need and get out of here. Next time, we’ll order online.”

“Like I told you to,” Tala muttered, flicked a bit of tomato off her shirt, and followed Kelsey to the aisle that held the jalapeno chips. She remained on her guard, her senses attuned to every sound, every scent that might announce another attack.

Next time, the humans’ weapon of choice might not be a tomato.

~ ~ ~

As soon as Tala parked the car in the driveway and got out, she caught a stranger’s scent.

It wasn’t a human. Her nose immediately identified the intruder as a Syak, a fellow wolf. But that didn’t necessarily mean Kelsey wasn’t in danger. Many Wrasa blamed Kelsey for all the restrictions humans had placed on them since finding out about their existence.

“Stay with Kelsey,” Tala told Zoe, the panther-shifter who was part of her unit. Muscles coiled with tension, she scanned the circular driveway.

A tall man was leaning against one of the stone lions flanking the entrance of Rue’s two-story mansion.

The tiny hairs along Tala’s neck bristled. The audacity! How dare he not only enter her territory without her permission but also act as if it was his!

Okay, strictly speaking, it was Rue and Kelsey’s property, not her own, but that was beside the point.

He took two steps toward her, his stride measured and his expression giving nothing away. His entire demeanor screamed Saru.

Ah. Part of the tension fled Tala’s muscles. So that was why he hadn’t asked permission. He didn’t need it. Even now that they were no longer tasked with keeping the Wrasa’s existence hidden, their elite soldiers stood above pack hierarchy.

But Tala was one of them too. She straightened her spine and angled her shoulders to appear taller and broader. Then she stood motionless, forcing him to come to her instead of approaching him.

“Tala Peterson?” he asked, his voice a low rumble.

She gave a terse nod.

He raked his gaze over her—up, down, then up again, as if he couldn’t believe someone with such a diminutive build could be the Saru’s best tracker. Or maybe he was eyeing the half-dried tomato juice covering the front of her once-white shirt, probably making her look like a pup in need of a bib.

Tala acted as if it were a fashion accessory and coolly returned his stare. “You didn’t come all the way from Boise to admire the view, did you?”

He flinched. “How did you…?”

Easy. Tala held back a satisfied smirk. The aroma of recycled air and stale airline pretzels clung to his clothes, so it hadn’t been hard to guess that he’d spent most of the day traveling. Few Wrasa would get on an airplane unless they really had to—or a superior had ordered it. And not just any superior. Judging by his self-important stance, he was here on orders of the High Council, which was located in Boise, Idaho.

“So?” She waved her hand at him. “You have a message from the council?”

He closed his gaping jaw, his poker face returning. “I do.”

Kelsey approached with her head bent respectfully. “What do they want from me?” She was too polite to add “this time,” but Tala could practically hear it anyway.

She couldn’t blame Kelsey. Any time the council sent a message—either by pigeon post or by one of their lackeys showing up—they had another event they wanted Kelsey to go to, an interview they wanted her to give, or something else they needed her to do.

But the Saru shook his head. “Nothing.” He turned back to face Tala. “The message is for you.”

Tala raised her eyebrows. For her? What could they want from her, now that she was no longer a tracker who was called in when the council needed her? “What is it?”

“You’ve been transferred,” the Saru said.

Oh thank the Great Hunter! Her higher-ups had finally listened to her pleas and decided she’d been punished enough for failing to keep the Wrasa’s existence secret.

No more babysitting a human and her submissive mate. No more fending off tomato attacks. No more being under the microscope twenty-four seven because she was Kelsey Yates’s bodyguard. She could breathe freely again and maybe do a job where she didn’t have to deal with humans and their hateful attitude toward her kind every day. If such a job even still existed.

“Transferred? Oh no!” Kelsey clutched the back of Tala’s shirt.

The touch made Tala sigh, but the shirt was toast anyway, so a few wrinkles wouldn’t matter. “Where to?”

“They didn’t tell me that. They’ll give you your new assignment once you get to Boise.” He pulled something from the inside pocket of his coat and handed it to Tala.

It was an airplane ticket—and her name was on it.

She nodded at him, and he nodded back, then turned to go.

“Wait!” Tala called after him.

He glanced over his shoulder.

“What about her?” She pointed at Kelsey, who still clung to the back of her shirt like a scared puppy. “What will happen to her once I’m gone? We can’t leave Kelsey and her mate without protection.”

“Without protection?” Zoe muttered. “What about me and the three other Saru guards in your unit? Are we just pretty decorations?”

If Tala were human, she would have rolled her eyes. Cats. They got their feelings hurt so easily. “Even a good unit needs a strong leader, kitten.”

“Don’t worry,” the council’s messenger said. “Someone will arrive within the hour to replace you.”

But Tala stood her ground, not yet satisfied. While Rue, Kelsey, and their son weren’t exactly pack, she wanted to make sure they were safe. “Who?”

“Theodora Wylder.”

Tala barely managed to hold back a surprised yip. Theodora Wylder was one of only a handful of bear-shifters serving as a Saru and the only one to ever reach the rank of tas, the title of a commander. Most of them didn’t have the emotional control to keep from shifting when things got dangerous, but Theodora Wylder did…and then some.

She gave Kelsey a short pat on the arm, knowing Kelsey as a nederi would find physical contact from a higher-ranking wolf reassuring. “I’ve heard only good things about Tas Wylder. You’ll be in good paws.”

“And you?” Kelsey asked quietly as she followed her into the house. “Will you be okay too?”

“I’ll be fine.” Tala had no idea where the council would send her next, but after being attacked by human pups with an overripe tomato, things could only get better.