Page 69 of Rescued

The rest of the pack lined the track, Dealer laying odds and taking bets.

Gunn was the official starter, with a pistol full of blanks for the start gun.

It actually was funny as fuck to watch. Matéo fell out of his tube three-quarters of the way around the track, landing face-first in a mud puddle. Dobe went flying and did a mid-air somersault before landing on his ass. And somebody else hit a bump, flew out of his tube, and landed on top of Rex’s, so they both went over the finish line together.

That started a fight over whether they both made it through the heat.

But the best part about it was how much fun Breanna was having. She jumped up and down during the races, yelling at the top of her lungs and cheering for her friends.

And when Boomer’s brother ran Boomer’s truck through a puddle right next to her, splashing her from head to foot with mud as he dragged Boomer behind, whooping and hollering, she just laughed like a lunatic and kept cheering for them.

After they won, she turned to Switch. “Oh my god, that was so much fun! And nobody even died.”

He looked down at her, plastered with mud with her hair in rat tails, and not even caring how she looked.

He leaned over and kissed her. “You look gorgeous,” he said.

“Hah. I look like the Creature from the Black Lagoon.” She looked at him, barely splashed. “How the hell did you get away clean?”

“Pfft. I ducked behind you, of course.”

“You did not say that.” She rubbed her hand over his face, covering it with mud. “That’ll teach you.”

“Hey!” he protested, grabbing for her.

She dodged away. “Some women pay hundreds of dollars for mud masks. Yours is free. You’re welcome.”

He was about to go after her when his phone buzzed with a priority alert. The Big House.

Groaning, he hit the button. “Bad time, Sugar.”

“Happy to have inconvenienced you. Thanatos would like me to convey to you that one of our contacts is prepared to pose as a buyer for Moreno’s illicit goods, and is even now in negotiations for a delivery. Once that deal is in progress, we can move in and take him down. We should have something tangible as far as time and place within forty-eight hours.”

Switch felt a stab in his gut. Everything was coming to a head—which meant that everything was riding on his talk with Breanna tonight. “Okay. Thanks. And I want in on this mission. Is there anything I can do to help it along?”

“We’ll let you know.” Which undoubtedly meant ‘fuck off.’

He was about to cut the call when Sugar said, “One more thing. Thanatos is uncomfortable with Miss Carter going out into the world with the knowledge she possesses about Outlaw Ridge. He believes that the best course of action would be to blur her memories of this place before relocating her.”

Switch felt like he’d been sucker punched. Altering humans’ memories of shifters wasn’t unheard-of, if it meant keeping them from outing shifters to the world. The Shifter Council had made a practice of it for decades.

But it was potentially dangerous. And they were not mucking around in Breanna’s brain. Not on his watch.

He said evenly, “Do not even try that. Tell Thanatos if he messes with even one brain cell in Breanna’s head without her consent, I will fucking clean out Boomer’s explosives stash and blow the Big House to smithereens. With both of you in it.”

He hung up.

Taking a shaky breath, Switch looked around for Breanna. He saw her under some trees with the guys who had been in the race, who were all getting sluiced off with garden hoses before going to change.

Sanchez was spraying down Breanna, and they were both laughing. Sanchez reached over and pulled a stray leaf out of her hair.

His wolf snarled. Stop him. She is ours.

All his fury immediately redirected onto Sanchez. Striding over, he shoved him away from Breanna. “Stop it,” he snarled.

Breanna said, “Switch? What’s the matter? He wasn’t doing anything.”

“He was coming on to you.”