Her photo hadn’t captured the way she moved, the fluid and dangerous power of her toned, slim body. It hadn’t captured the energy that preceded her into the room, sharp-edged and electric. His bear surged forward with desperation, and every cell in his body wanted to claim her.
She stopped mid-stride. Something flickered across her face as she took him in. There was a beat of silence that stretched between them as they stood five feet apart, with Valeria watching them. Everything faded into nothing. There was only her and him and the impossible weight of recognition.
“We should speak in private,” she said briskly. She turned on her heel, expecting him to follow, and he did, like a lost puppy who had found its home again. She strode into a conference room and closed the door behind him.
“You’re Reaper Wolf,” he said, his voice hoarse.
She closed her eyes for half a second. When she opened them again, her gaze was steady and controlled.
“And you’re Folk Bear.”
The moment hung between them. His bear was howling, pushing against his control. The mate bond thrummed in the air, undeniable and impossible to ignore. Everything he wanted to say to her crowded his throat. Why did you reject me? Why can’t we try?
“This is a complication,” she said, her voice strained. “You have information about Carl Unger’s murder.”
Right. A man was dead. Reed had evidence. People might come after him for it. This wasn’t the time to have a conversation about mate bonds and rejection and the ache that had lived in his chest since yesterday morning.
“Okay,” he said. She motioned for him to have a seat at the conference room table. They sank into the chairs, her at the head and him at the corner beside her.
“I’m Siren Cross. I handle intelligence for Steel Protection.”
“I’m Reed Bright. My brother is Ash Bright, the fire chief. My father is Corey Bright, the founder of the Bright Institute and mate.com.”
She stared at him and nodded once. Her posture was straight and her hands were flat on the surface of the polished conference table.
“Now that we have introductions out of the way, tell me what happened. What information do you have about Carl Unger’s murder?”
Reed told her everything. The gig at Fate Mountain Brewery on Sunday night. The ambient recording he’d made for his live tracks, the field recorder he’d set on the patio to capture the atmosphere.
The news about Carl Unger’s body on Monday morning, and the cold shock of recognition when he’d heard the name and remembered the nervous bartender who’d disappeared halfway through his second set. He told her about going home after he heard the news and playing the file. He told her what he’d heard.
She listened without interrupting, and her eyes never left his face.
“The recording,” she said. “Do you have it with you?”
Reed pulled out his thumb drive and handed it to her.
“You haven’t played this for anyone else?” she asked.
He shook his head. Siren opened a laptop and pushed the thumb drive into the USB port.
Chapter
Five
The laptop saton the table between them, the tinny speakers filling up the small conference room with the sounds from Sunday night. The ambient noise. Crickets. The distant murmur of music leaking through the patio door.
Then voices.
“I’ve been patient,” a nervous male voice said. “Two years of feeding you everything. Who’s talking. Who’s not. I flagged the dispatcher before she became a problem. I earned my out.”
Siren leaned closer.
The dispatcher. Becca Matthews. She was the emergency communication worker who started investigating the response delays during the Crown Mountain attacks. She was the woman whose murder Dom had been framed for.
“You’ve earned a conversation,” the second voice said. It was calm, neutral, professional. “That’s what this is.”
“I want extraction. A new identity. The fifty thousand you owe me.” It was the nervous voice again. Presumably Carl Unger. Hewas pushing harder now, his desperation growing. “I know how Meridian works. I know where the money comes from.”
