The thought made him feel physically ill, and he was glad he was leaning against the wall. Otherwise, he might have fallen down.
“Do you think it’s possible she’s—” Becker began, but Zane cut him off.
“No! She was in those places because she was investigating the murders. She isn’t a hunter, I’m sure of it.”
No way she could be a hunter. The woman he knew did not murder werewolves for a living. He’d never believe that.
“Okay.” Becker sighed. “Look, maybe we’re reading way too much into this. From what I can gather, most of the places Alyssa went involved unsolved deaths or disappearances that have no obvious connections to the hunters or werewolves. The circumstances around most of those deaths were a little bizarre to say the least. Gage thinks it’s possible the feds have put together a team to look into unusual cases. If so, it’s possible the U.S. government knows about our existence.”
Bloody hell.
Did Alyssa know he was a werewolf? Had the whole fight in the alley behind the club been a setup to lure him into the open and get him to reveal his true nature? Had there been cameras back there in the darkness? Worse, what if she was in that club for those werewolves? Had Alyssa been playing him the entire time they’d been at the diner?
There was only one way to find out for sure.
“Becker, I’ll talk to you later,” he said. “Make sure you get Rachel and Diego up to speed on all of this. I’m not even going to try and explain it.”
Zane didn’t wait for a reply. Hanging up, he headed toward Alyssa’s room.
* * *
Zane was ready to rip into Alyssa the moment she opened the door, but the sight of her standing there in a pair of shorts and a well-worn T-shirt, her long, blond hair tousled and down around her shoulders, completely took his breath away. The shorts showed off plenty of leg and the T-shirt was thin enough to suggest she wasn’t wearing a bra. Bloody hell, she looked amazing.
“What are you doing here so early?” she snapped as he walked in. “I have a gun and I will shoot you. You know that, right?”
Zane opened his mouth to tell her eight o’clock wasn’t early, but then her sweet scent distracted the hell out of him, leaving him momentarily speechless. He held up the tray of cups and the box from the bakery.
“I brought donuts,” he pointed out, not sure where the righteous anger he’d felt had disappeared to. “You can’t shoot a man who brings you donuts.”
She eyed the box in his hand. “I thought I was supposed to buy breakfast.”
“Donuts aren’t breakfast. They’re the things you eat on special occasions. Like your birthday or Christmas. Except you get to experience it every morning.”
She considered that answer for a few seconds, apparently trying to work through the logic. Finally, she gave up and shook her head.
He turned one side of the tray in her direction. “Coffee with cream and two sugars.”
Alyssa looked a little surprised but nodded, taking the cup from the tray and padding barefoot over to the tiny table in the equally tiny kitchenette in the corner. She took a seat and motioned him toward the other one. The act of sitting made her shorts ride up a bit, exposing even more of those extremely nice thighs. He had a sudden image of those well-toned legs wrapped around him and immediately went hard in his jeans.
He quickly sat down across from her before she saw the bulge in his groin, placing the box of donuts on the table between them. He sipped his tea and glanced around the room. It was a lot nicer than the place he and his teammates were in. There was a small travel bag by the bathroom and another suitcase, not much bigger than the first, set up on one of those hotel luggage racks against the wall by the TV, clothes neatly folded inside it. From the way her scent pervaded every corner of the room, overwhelming all others, it was obvious Alyssa had been there for at least a week, maybe ten days. Yet she hadn’t unpacked. Maybe she wanted to be able to bounce on a moment’s notice.
He surveyed the rest of the room, his gaze settling on the bed. The sheets and blankets were still lying where she’d shoved them down when she’d gotten up to answer the door. The scent wafting off those sheets was so feminine and mesmerizing he wanted to walk over, shove his face right into the middle of them, and breathe deeply. He could only imagine how she’d look at him if he did something like that.
Then again, maybe she wouldn’t be surprised at all. Maybe she’d immediately recognize his werewolf behavior for exactly what it was—because she already knew what he was.
On the other side of the table, Alyssa had opened the box of donuts and was regarding them with amusement. While the confections smelled delectable, it couldn’t compare with her intoxicating scent. “I hope you don’t think I’m eating half of these, because that much sugar in the morning would have me bouncing off the walls.”
Zane snorted as she reached in and grabbed one of the glazed chocolate cake donuts. He went for a cream-filled number, but instead of taking a bite, he set it down on a napkin in front of him. Alyssa must have seen something on his face because she put her donut down, too, her eyes narrowing.
“What?” she asked.
“You’re not assigned to the LA field office.”
He wasn’t as good as some of his other pack mates at knowing when someone was lying, but Zane could pick up on it occasionally. When someone lied, their pulse and breathing rate sped up a little and the scent they gave off changed a bit.
Alyssa regarded him thoughtfully for a moment, then picked up her chocolate donut. “Never said I was.”
She took a bite, and Zane was distracted for a second by the way her lips moved as she chewed. He stopped focusing on how sexy she made something as simple as eating a donut and concentrated on whether she was lying or not. He didn’t pick up anything to make him think she was. Then again, it wasn’t like she’d given him a real answer. For what it was worth, her breathing and pulse were normal. Her scent was the same, too. Not that he could trust it. She’d probably smell like heaven in a skimpy pair of shorts even if she told him she was a pygmy lemur from Madagascar.
