Page 13

Faith quietly unlocked her front door and tiptoed into the house, even though it wasn’t necessary since Chloe was with Jon until tomorrow. At this point, it was just habit.

She kicked off her shoes, sank onto the couch, and retrieved the USB stick that had sat in her pocket like a rock the entire night.

It appeared entirely inconspicuous—a simple black device with nothing on it but the brand’s logo and 64GB in tiny letters.

A wave of guilt washed over her. Stealing the USB drive still didn’t feel right. But if there was something incriminating on it—or something that could prove the Wrasa’s innocence—maybe it would be worth it.

She pulled her phone from her back pocket. Her finger hovered over the contacts app.

Should she FaceTime her father so they could check out what was on the USB stick together? Or was it better to take a look first and call him if there was anything he needed to know?

Her phone rang before she could decide.

Faith flinched and nearly dropped it.

Dad flashed across the screen.

Hastily, she swiped to accept the call. “Hi, Dad.”

“How did it go?” her father asked without a greeting.

If this had been any other date—a real one—the answer would have been easy. She’d actually had fun.

Was that weird?

They had bantered back and forth all evening, and Tala had only grumbled a little when she’d followed Faith’s advice and picked Baby Mario for their second round. Faith had even thrown an olive at her and had teased her mercilessly for losing two of their three races.

If Faith hadn’t felt the USB stick in her pocket the entire time, reminding her why she had been there, she would have had a wonderful evening.

And if Tala had been human, she reminded herself.

How startling that this addition felt like an afterthought.

Had she allowed Tala to lure her into a false sense of security?

“Faith? Are you there?”

Her father’s voice wrenched her from her thoughts.

“Yeah, sorry. How do you know I made it home?” she asked instead of answering his initial question. He wouldn’t have risked calling if there was a chance she was still at Tala’s; she knew that.

“I sent Noah and Violet,” her father said. “They sat in their car across the street from the shifter’s apartment, just to be close in case you called for help.”

That no longer surprised Faith. But the surge of defensiveness that swept through her did. “That wasn’t necessary, Dad. Tala was a perfect gentlewoman.”

“Yeah. Until she isn’t,” her father muttered. “So, how did it go? I tried to listen in via the bug, but all I heard was some clanking and clinking.”

Faith sighed. “Don’t be surprised if the next thing you hear is another discussion about a grocery list.”

“What?”

“Apparently, Wrasa don’t drink alcohol. She put the bottle with the bug in the kitchen, and I bet she’ll give it to her neighbors too, like she did with the flowers.”

Her father groaned. “We really have the worst of luck.” He was silent for a moment as if he needed to wrestle down his disappointment. “Did you find out anything helpful?”

Faith curled her fist around the USB stick. “Actually…” She cleared her throat. “I rummaged through her laptop bag. She had a folder with a dossier on me…and one on you too.”

“I knew it!” Something clattered in the background, probably as her father had jumped up. “This is all part of a bigger plan.”

That much was obvious. She opened her fingers, which had turned pale from her tight grip, and glanced at the tiny device. “Maybe the USB drive I, um, swiped will tell us what they’re planning.”

“You got your hands on a USB drive?” Her father’s voice went up an octave. “What’s on it?”

“I haven’t had the time to look at it yet,” Faith said.

“What are you waiting for? Let’s find out!”

Faith put him on speakerphone so she had both hands free as she pulled out her laptop and inserted the USB stick. Her heart pounded, and she couldn’t say whether it was with excitement or dread. “Okay, I’ve got it.”

“Good. Let’s see what those monsters are hiding.”

Faith clicked open the USB drive and scanned its contents. “It’s five folders. The first one says Undercover Ops . The others are Tortured , Doomsday , Deadly Beasts , and Not Safe .”

“This is it,” her father whispered. “Their secret plans. Open one.”

Faith double-clicked the first folder. “There must be at least fifty files. And their names…” Each one sounded more alarming than the one before. Faith pressed her free hand to her chest while she scrolled. “ Clean Kill , Art of the Chase , A Quiet Death , Murder by Tradition …”

“Dear God!” Her father’s voice cracked. “It’s their secret handbook on how to murder humans and get away with it!”

With shaking fingers, Faith scrolled down on her trackpad and paused on a file. “Oh no. There’s a file named Informants .”

Her father inhaled sharply. “I can’t believe any human would work with the shifters and betray their own kind! Does it have any names?”

“Let’s see…” Faith held her breath as she opened the file and started to read.

“Say something. Please.”

Jordan appeared stunned, and Ellie admitted to herself that she could have handled the situation better.

What? Faith’s gaze darted to the top of the page.

Two words in bold letters jumped out at her:

Chapter One.

This wasn’t a list of informants.

It was a detective novel.

“Faith?” her father asked. “What did you find?”

“I’m not sure. Give me one second.” Quickly, she closed the file and opened another. Its title was The Red Files .

Wait a minute!

Faith scanned the first page. A very familiar page. The title of chapter one was unmistakable too: I’ll Show You My Goats .

“What did you find?” her father asked again, sounding more urgent.

“They’re novels.” Sapphic suspense novels, but she didn’t want to mention that to her father.

“Of course it’s all novel. These monsters are usually much too nefarious to leave any evidence lying around. No one has ever come across their secret handbook.”

Faith shook her head, even though her father couldn’t see it. “No, Dad. Not novel. Novels. Mysteries. Thrillers. Romantic suspense. That kind of thing.”

“What? That can’t be right. Open another folder.”

She clicked on the folder named Doomsday . “Looks like dystopian fiction.”

“Keep going.” Her father’s voice became more strained with every word. “There has to be something on there!”

Faith opened the folder tagged Deadly Beasts . It contained dozens of vampire and werewolf romances, all of them sapphic. “Just books here too.”

“Next one!”

The folder titled Tortured included Faith’s favorite grumpy/sunshine romance, The Roommate Arrangement . Apparently, it stood for heroines with a tortured past . “More novels.”

“Next!” her father barked.

“Dad, calm down. Your blood pressure is probably through the roof.”

“Next,” he said again, only marginally calmer.

When she opened the last folder, Not Safe , she already had an inkling of what she might find. She peeked at the opening scene of one ebook and instantly fanned herself.

Oh yeah. Not Safe definitely stood for Not Safe For Work .

She closed the file and slammed her laptop shut. “It’s all just fiction, Dad.”

Not a piece of damning evidence to be found on the entire USB drive.

Although a few HASS members might think otherwise, since some of them considered homosexuality a sin.

Her father was quiet for some time. “Are you sure you’re reading this right?” he finally asked. “Maybe they’re using novels as a disguise to hide secret instructions on how to kill and torture humans. Send them over so I can read them!”

Heat shot into Faith’s cheeks at the thought of her father reading Thirteen Hours and the other sapphic romances with graphic love scenes. “No! Um, I mean, I don’t think that’s necessary. I recognize several of those novels. They’re published works of fiction, and from what I can tell, the ebooks on Tala’s USB drive are identical to the versions I have read.”

“Dammit,” her father grumbled. “So the USB stick is a dead end too. But we’re not giving up. I’m sure there’s proof of their sinister plans somewhere; we just have to find it.”

Faith made a noncommittal sound. Deep down, a kernel of doubt started to grow. “What if there isn’t?” she asked quietly.

“Of course there is. The shifters might be cunning, but they’re not criminal masterminds who can make every bit of evidence disappear.”

That hadn’t been what Faith meant. What if there wasn’t anything sinister to find, not just on the USB drive but anywhere? Maybe the Wrasa were as harmless as they insisted.

She stared at the shiny black surface of the USB stick, but, of course, it held no answers.

Well, maybe one.

It was pretty clear where Tala had gotten the impression that humans winked all the time.

“Did you just…giggle?” her father asked, sounding perplexed.

“No, of course not.” She hadn’t chuckled, had she? Faith pressed her hand to her lips. Probably just the tension she’d been under draining way. “I know this is serious.”

“It is. Deadly serious. Human lives are at stake, Faith.” He sighed. “And as much as I hate to say it, that’s why I have to ask you to go on another date with that monster.”

Faith winced at his choice of words. She inhaled, then exhaled slowly. “Okay. I’ll do it.” At least that way, she might be able to return Tala’s digital library before she noticed the ebooks were gone.

~ ~ ~

Jeff Madsen’s face appeared on the Zoom screen, but instead of saying anything, he pressed his index finger to his lips.

Tala froze. What was going on?

A notification pinged at the bottom of the screen.

Tala glanced at it.

A message from Madsen had popped up in the Zoom chat. Don’t say anything, he had typed. Where’s the bottle?

What bottle, sir? she messaged back.

He waved impatiently, then typed: The bottle of alcohol Ms.MacAllister brought to your apartment.

Tala frowned. Was I supposed to keep it? I gave it to my human neighbors. Even if she couldn’t convince Faith the Wrasa were the good guys, she was starting to win the Lawsons over with all the presents she gave them.

Madsen leaned back in his leather chair. “Good. We can speak freely, then.”

“What’s going on, sir?”

“We have reason to believe Peter MacAllister and his people bugged the bottle,” Madsen said. “And the flowers she gave you on the first date have been bugged too.”

“That lousy human scum! Did Faith know?” Tala held up her hand before he could answer. “Of course she knew.”

Madsen nodded. “She knew.”

Why was he so calm? Maybe because, unlike her, he had expected Faith to do something like that all along.

With her soft features, friendly smile, and warm brown eyes, Faith appeared harmless—and Tala had bought her innocent act hook, line, and sinker. Dammit! Tala was the best Saru on the East Coast! She wasn’t supposed to let a human civilian trick her!

Especially not again, after Rue and Kelsey had tricked her, leading to the Wrasa being outed on national TV.

“So?” Jeff Madsen’s intense gaze zeroed in on Tala through the Zoom screen. “How did tonight go?”

Tala gave him a nod. “It worked, sir. I checked as soon as she left. She took the USB drive.”

Madsen didn’t seem surprised at all, as if he had already known that. “Very good.”

Yeah, it was very good. Their plan had worked. But Tala couldn’t help being disappointed.

Not only had Faith tried to plant a bug in her apartment, she had also failed their little test. She had taken the first opportunity to steal information and deliver it straight to Daddy.

That wasn’t a big surprise. She had warned Madsen all along that it would happen. At the same time, a part of her had hoped Faith would prove her wrong.

At least Faith seemed to feel guilty about it. That was probably why her scent had changed and she’d been so jumpy when Tala had stepped back into the living room.

“What now?” Tala asked. “Are we stopping this fake-relationship experiment?”

Madsen looked at her as if she had suggested every wolf-shifter in North America should go vegan. “Of course not. We’ll continue Operation Make-Believe Mate.”

He couldn’t be serious, could he? “But, sir, clearly we can’t trust her. Every little thing I tell her, she’ll take straight to Daddy and his organization of Wrasa haters!”

“Actually,” Madsen said. “She didn’t.”

“What?”

“She took the USB stick home but didn’t call her father. He called her.”

“Same difference,” Tala grumbled. Then she paused. “Wait, how do you even know that?”

Madsen showed his teeth in a superior grin. “We bugged the USB drive before you downloaded the ebooks to it. Our techs put in the tiniest listening device I have ever seen.”

Tala stared at him. That meant the council had listened in on every word she and Faith had said tonight. “You bugged the USB drive?” she echoed.

Madsen shrugged. “We considered going with spyware, but even the best one can be detected if someone does a deep enough check, and we didn’t want to risk tipping off HASS. Besides, Ms.MacAllister likely talks to her father on the phone or in person rather than via email.”

“So you planted a bug in my apartment without telling me?”

“It’s the council’s apartment,” Madsen said. “And we decided to eliminate any chance of you accidentally giving it away by not telling you ahead of time.”

Tala gritted her teeth. Clearly, the council thought she was incompetent. One fuck-up and her hard-won reputation was ruined.

“We didn’t think you’d object,” Madsen added. “It’s not like you have anything to hide, is it?”

“Of course not.” She had only flirted with Faith because it was part of her mission. “But I would have appreciated a heads-up.”

“Noted,” Madsen said.

What he didn’t say was that he’d keep her in the loop from now on.

Tala had a feeling there was more about this mission he hadn’t shared with her.

At least she now understood why Madsen had been so calm about Faith planting a bug—because the council had done the same.

Apparently, they were at an impasse. This entire situation was so messed up, with humans and Wrasa trying to spy on each other, not trusting the other even the tiniest bit. Tala didn’t see a way forward. Certainly their fake relationship wouldn’t make a difference.

“So,” she finally said, “what did we find out?”

“She told her father that the two HASS goons who watched your apartment all night were unnecessary because you were a perfect gentlewoman.”

Faith had said that? Tala sat a little straighter. But then again, not attacking or molesting her was a low bar, so it wasn’t exactly high praise.

“She told him that we don’t drink alcohol but didn’t mention why,” Madsen continued.

Tala rubbed her chin. Okay, that was interesting. Why hadn’t Faith immediately told her father about a weak spot they could use to harm all Wrasa?

“So she kept some of the information she found out to herself, at least for now,” Tala said, more to herself than to Madsen. “I wonder why.”

“Hopefully, it’s because she’s starting to realize how paranoid her father is and that the Wrasa are hiding nothing more than bad romance novels.”

Tala bit back a passionate protest. Defending romance novels probably wouldn’t help her reputation as a tough Saru commander.

“It’s your mission to give her more nudges in that direction,” Madsen added.

So now she was supposed to focus on Faith? “I thought my mission was to convince the world that we’re dating?”

“That too,” Madsen answered. “A mission you’re failing at spectacularly.”

“Pardon me?” Tala tapped her laptop’s speakers, sure she hadn’t heard him correctly.

“The video material from the gym required serious editing before we could post it on social media.”

Tala squinted at him. “What was wrong with the video?”

“It was too confrontational. You were competing like mortal enemies, for the Great Hunter’s sake! You came across like a predator who needs to win at all costs.”

Tala had opened her mouth to protest. Now she snapped it closed. Okay, she could see his point. She had underestimated how much Faith had struggled to keep up on the treadmill, maybe because the drive to outrun Faith had distracted her. That and the intoxicating aroma of the mate scent perfume mingling with Faith’s sweat. “But tonight’s material is much better.”

“That’s not what our PR people are telling me,” Madsen replied.

“What?” Tala barked out. “It was a friendly game of Mario Kart. How could humans possibly misinterpret that?”

“It doesn’t sound very friendly when you growl every time you lose!” Madsen replied, a growl of his own in his voice.

Every time? Tala mentally echoed. She had lost exactly twice and had won the last race, so it could hardly be called every time . “I wasn’t growling. It was more of a…” She cut herself off before she could say, whine . Because no matter what Faith said, she hadn’t whined.

“You growled! Which is ridiculous anyway because Rtar don’t growl.”

“Fox-shifters might not growl, but Syak do.” Tala barely resisted the urge to snarl at him to prove her point. She stared directly into the camera, despite knowing she should have lowered her gaze and accepted whatever he said. He was the speaker of the High Council and the Syak’s most powerful alpha. Challenging him was just not done. It was career suicide, and yet she couldn’t give in. Not on this—her very identity. She had fought too hard to be accepted as a wolf.

Finally, Madsen huffed and waved his hand as if swatting at an annoying fly. “Then you’re a Syak who needs to rein in her animalistic tendencies. No growling on the next date. No competing. We need something romantic and tender.”

“Tender?” Tala echoed.

One corner of Madsen’s mouth twitched with a smirk. “Well, if you read some of those romance novels, you probably have a good idea what humans consider a tender, romantic moment between lovers. Think of something.” Then he ended the call without waiting for an answer.