I’d been in enough libraries to know even the tiny ones had wifi their patrons could use. People prepping their CV, submitting job applications, doing ancestry research, and parents logging into baby and toddler groups could get online at the local library.
“But what’s the point of looking at human elephant or rhino poachers?” Roland leaned against the railing outside the library. “How will that help us?”
I took his arm, noting how good he smelled and wished we could spend the rest of the day in bed.
“Because I memorized my password to log into the shifter databases.”
“Clever you.” He planted a kiss on my nose, and I puffed out my chest.
But my bear punched a hole in my inflated ego.Don’t get cocky. You haven’t found anything yet.
We hadn’t booked a computer, so we had to wait our turn, and I wanted one in a corner where no one could look over my shoulder and ask what I was researching. We perused the shelves, and I noted a book that was in the wrong place. I re-shelved it, and Roland gave me a look.
I shrugged. “Someone might really want that book one day and they wouldn’t have been able to find it if I hadn’t moved it.”
When we finally sat down at the computer, I was a little paranoid, wondering if I could even access the sites I wanted on this ancient machine. But I needn’t have worried, and when my password was successful, I gave a little cheer.
“Right, I’m in.”
I did a search for unicorns and got lost in the history of how they came to be.
Roland nudged me to forget that. “I can sum it up in a few sentences.”
“Fine.” I typed in “poaching shifters” and tapped my fingers as I waited. Either the internet was slow or it was the computer chugging along trying to retrieve the files.
But the screen populated with file names, and I clicked on one titled “security.”
I scanned the dense lines of text. “Oh, shoot.”
A guy in the next cubicle shushed me, and I apologized. I tapped the screen to draw Roland’s attention to it.
“They could be tracking you through your phone,” I whispered.
Roland dropped the phone onto the desk and flapped his hand as though the device had burned it. “Get rid of it.”
“No, we just have to dump the SIM card and get you a new one.” I removed the card, bent it in half, and told Roland to flush it down the toilet.
He scurried off while I read more files, and when he returned, I had ten tabs open.
“It says here unicorn poachers are often comprised of both shifters and humans.”
“Why humans, do you think?”
“Because just like the dark side of shifter society, they bow to the gods of money. They don’t give a damn how they acquire it, trampling over people’s rights and safety and often destroying the environment as an added bonus.”
His brows shot up. ”That was a lot of words.”
“Yeah, sorry, but I’ve read a lot about the slimy side of life since I’ve been rogue, but I’ll get off my soap box now.”
Roland grabbed another chair. “But it says that when the humans are hired, they think they are going big game hunting and they just need to keep clear of the animal reserve rangers.”
“Mmmm. They have no idea there’s a person inside.” I closed my eyes, trying not to imagine how the shifter’s human reacted as their horn was hacked off.
And much like I’d been telling Roland since he brought up the subject of poachers, I reminded him, “Don’t shift, no matter how much your beast begs.”
As we scrolled through the documents, I thought of how the poachers might have been tracking Roland through his phone. They could be waiting outside, ready to kidnap him and hold him prisoner until he shifted. Nah, that made no sense. They weren’t going to wait around for years.
“How does someone entice a unicorn shifter to take his skin? Is that even possible?”
