Blaze of Glory: Dark Leopards MC Page 2
“I’ll deal with that when the time comes. I’ve got some contacts high up that should nip that shit in the bud,” I authoritatively state. Shifters are everywhere. In every office, including that of our commander in chief.
“I’ll set it up to where it hits the five o’clock news,” he informs me before disconnecting the call.
Now that they know they’re being watched, they’ll be overly cautious, which means a mistake will be made. I just need them to make one. I call Kane and inform him that things are fixing to get interesting for us. My men are knowledgeable on a brief basis, but I’ve kept some things close to the vest, things I know I’m gonna have to lay out the details to for them all later.
Glory
Angela doesn’t become a shell of a woman; she becomes a fighter for her daughter’s cause. We’ve been printing out missing person flyers and hanging them in every store window, all town poles, and some have made their way onto the internet’s numerous sites for missing and exploited children. The only thing that bothers me, is that we’ve found out that there are twelve missing women and children in our area alone.
How does this even happen without it becoming public knowledge? Why would the town bury this and not make it public knowledge? Something isn’t settling right in my gut; I’m fixing to call out all of these politicians and public figures asses if something isn’t done soon.
I’m on my laptop when something catches my attention. I’ve done a google reverse search using Maritsa’s photograph and have happened upon an auction site. One very deeply embedded in the dark web. Not easily found, but it’s hit on her thanks to facial recognition.
Fuck, she’s being auctioned off like cattle! I have to get to Blaze and tell him immediately. I can’t let Angela see this, especially seeing as Maritsa’s currently being bid on. I feel like a shit friend hiding this from her, but there are words used that threaten my kind.
My shifter brethren.
This is not good. I fear for what’s being done to Maritsa now and what possibly could happen if we don’t find her quickly.
Young mates.
Breeders.
Those are the two key phrases that stick out like a sore, abused thumb. They are kidnapping humans in order to change them into shifters and use them for breeding purposes. Some give up waiting on their destined mates to find them, needing offspring to carry on their lineage. But this, this is going too far. It has to be stopped. I make my excuses and leave Angela, who is lost in her own world and barely acknowledges that I’m leaving.
“Blaze,” I reach out using our mate link. He doesn’t answer, which means he’s blocked any outside interference. Looks like I’m gonna have to search him out the old-fashioned way and invade whatever it is he and the men are up to.
There are certain things, as his mate, I get away with that no one else would. Not usually interrupting their private meetings, but in this instance, I think he’ll forgive me… eventually anyways.
Blaze
We’ve just wrapped up church and I’m sitting in my office chair when the door bangs open. It’s déjà vu when Glory comes charging in. “You have to see this,” she demands as she opens up her laptop in front of me. Is that the way I’m gonna be greeted by her these days? She’s on a mission it seems and has forgotten the right way to greet her mate.
“Well, hello to you too, Glory,” I tease her. She gives me a no-nonsense look as she finds the page she was searching for.
“This isn’t a joking matter, Blaze. Look!” My eyes follow her finger and widen when I see what she’s pointing at.
“Motherfucking, son-of-a-bitch!” I roar out as I read the site’s details. They’re offering human women to be changed as potential, unwilling mates, and auctioned off as breeding stock to all shifters. “How did you find this?”
“Remember that program I downloaded a few years back when I was searching for my father?” I nod my head remembering her doing just that. “I did a Google picture reverse search using it, and voila!” She points to the picture of Maritsa in a cage, eyes wide and a terrified look plastered on her face. “I’ve heard ramblings of shifters freaking out due to their kind going extinct. I never in a million years thought they’d be taking this road.”
“Desperation does crazy things to a man. I still find that I have a hard time understanding them hitting this level, however. We have to stop this. Glory, I need you to send this link to me in an email. Can you do that for me?” I’m nowhere near as technologically adept as she is, but I can click on a link and follow it.
“Yeah, do you want me to send it to Dakota as well?” Dakota is known to the brothers as Decoder, but Glory was around as he grew up and always calls him by his given name. He’s a whiz on a computer and can break any code, but I haven’t made this a priority to him yet, although, it looks as if his other projects will be placed on hold. This cannot continue to happen, I understand the loneliness these shifters must be feeling, but this is the wrong way to go about finding a mate for themselves.
“No, babe. I’ll take care of it,” I promise her.
“I’m gonna keep my eye on this site though,” she emphatically informs me. Knowing her the way I do; I recognize determination in her and know there’s no way I can dissuade her from doing this.
“Only observe, Glory. I mean it,” I state, pointing a finger at her.
“Fine, I’ll only watch. But Blaze, if I feel she’s being sold off I’m gonna bid.” She innocently shrugs her shoulders.
“I don’t want you in the middle of this, Glory.”
“Too late,” she says, closing her laptop. She leans over, giving me a quick kiss and exits the room. I shake my head at her brazen balls and chuckle under my breath. I love her loyalty to her friend, but now, it seems I’ll have to have Decoder keeping an eye on her and her activity.
Damn woman’s gonna end up being the death of me.
Blaze
I called Chief Anderson and told him to cancel his media briefing. When he informed me it was too late to do so, I asked that he keep us out of it, for now. Shifters will know when our name is announced as assisting, exactly who we are. We are well-known, especially in the community of supernaturals.
We’re known for our ruthless ways, our take-no-shit attitudes, and every single being knows how we feel about trafficking… human and shifter alike. We will not sit idly by and let them steal humans, change them, then breed them.
Not on my damn watch. I’ll fight this shit until there’s no oxygen left in my lungs and my body ceases to exist.
Shifters mates are precious to them, although some grow tired of waiting to find that other missing piece of their soul. They get desperate and steal an unwilling human from the streets. That’s horrible enough as it stands, but this, it’s fucking ludicrous. I pick up my cell and call Kane, my VP, in for a meeting. We need to put our heads together and come up with a solid plan before bringing in our enforcers and the club’s SAA.
My frame of thinking is we need to get someone inside of this organization. We need to take them down from the inside out. I send out a brief text to Kane asking him to come into my office. Getting up from my chair, I walk over to my humidifier and pull out one of my Cuban cigars. Taking my cutter, I place it on the end and cut off the tip. Luckily, being a shifter means I don’t need to worry that my lungs will catch cancer from my vice.
Just as I kick back in my chair and begin to relax, a plume of smoke leaving my mouth, there’s a swift knock on my door before Kane enters. He closes the door behind him then walks over to my liquor cabinet. He raises two shot glasses and my favorite bottle of whiskey in the air. I nod my head in agreement and he fills them to the rim. Walking back over to me, he hands me one then takes the seat in front of my desk. We both silently salute each other before downing our shots. The liquid fire races its way through my bloodstream. I take a puff of my cigar and prepare myself to inform my VP of what all I’ve been dealing with. He knows some, but he’s gonna blow his top when he finds out there’s thin
gs I literally haven’t shared with him.
“Are you trying to keep me in suspense as to why you’ve summoned me to your office, Blaze?” he inquires, eyebrows raised high.
“No, but this shit is tough. It’s a very touchy topic to speak on. Chief Anderson has reached out to me about women who’ve come up missing in our town. Just so happens, that Glory’s friend from work, Angela, her daugher, Maritsa, seems to be one of the young girls who’ve vanished.”
“Christ,” Kane harshly states. “How many women are we talking about here? I know that you’ve reported for us to keep our eyes open for any trespassers, and that we were looking for wayward women, but why didn’t you tell me all of it, Blaze?” He’s understandably angry, and I feel horrible for keeping secrets, but I needed to wrap my head around this and figure out our play.
“Worldwide, or just our town? Kane, we have over a handful of girls from our town alone. Wanna know the worst part of it all?”
“There’s more than just missing women we need to contend with? Isn’t it bad enough that women are vanishing out of the thin blue air?” He harrumphs, crossing his arms over his chest, giving me a scathing look, one that only he can get away with. Understandable, so I let it go and don’t mention it, even though my pride is taking a hit at letting this happen without reminding him exactly who’s the head honcho here.
“Glory did a facial recognition something or another on Maritsa through Google. Wanna know what she discovered?” It’s not really a question I’m putting out to him, it’s me biding my time, trying not to lose my shit at what’s been found out.
“Fucking hell, Blaze, spit it out already, would ya?” His irritation has his hands shaking as he lifts his empty glass to his mouth. Disgustingly, he roughly sets it on my desk.
“She discovered Maritsa’s face on a site, a site that specifically caters to shifters. Find your mate, is the site’s name.”
“Excuse the holy hell out of me! What the fuck did you just say? Please tell me shifters are not kidnapping innocent women from the streets!”
“Wish I could, Kane. These women are being auctioned off to the highest bidder for turning and breeding purposes. Human women are being turned into animals against their will.”
“That’s preposterous, Blaze. This is what you’ve kept from me and the boys? Turning humans is against shifter law. It’s only acceptable and permitted as long as the human is a mate. What the fuck are we going to do to put an end to this?”
“I’ll tell ya what we’re gonna do, Kane. We’re going to take them down from the inside out.”
“How?” he bewilderedly asks me.
“That, my friend, is what we’re going to figure out. We need to get someone inside. Someone who’s either already there who’s willing to lend a helping hand to us, or someone that’s not already affiliated with them who we believe can infiltrate them.”
“We need to get Decoder on this, as quickly as possible, Blaze.”
“I sent him the facial recognition that Glory did, and sent him the site she found. He’s secretly working on it. I had him put all other projects on hold… for now.”
Kane is an anomaly in our group. We made special accomodations for him to hold an officer patch. See, he’s a jaguar, same family, different species all together. He proved himself invaluable to our club. He saved my life and the lives of several officers from other chapters once upon a time. We had a special vote and gave him a pass on not being born the ‘acceptable’ feline to hold a position.
It initially caused waves, but he’s earned his place and showed us that he’ll always go above and beyond for our club. It wasn’t a popular decision, it was one we all had to fight for; but at the end of the day, our brothers would lay their lives on the line to protect him. He climbed the ranks like we all did, and earned his patch through hard work and dedication.
“Then let’s get Bolt in here and fill him in. As the SAA he needs to know in order to protect the club when this shit blows the fuck up in our faces. And believe me, brother… things are about to get downright dirty.”
“The fuck!” Bolt roars in anguish when he is given all the facts. “Human women being kidnapped, turned and bred! It goes against the shifter code of honor. We have to put an end to this sooner rather than later, Blaze.”
“We know, Bolt, and we will. Now settle your ass down before you fry us all. Your fingers are zapping with energy,” I state, as I look at his hands and notice tinges of lightning streaks dancing from the tips of his fingers.
“I’m gonna turn them all to ash,” Bolt angrily states. “It’s men like this that give shifters a bad reputation. It’s why we hold our secrets close and don’t share them with the public. They’d fear us and want to use us for scientific experiments. These are the animals that cause fear to wrack our bodies when we find mates who happen to be human. Folklore has them already skeptical of us, but these situations breed fear in humans. We’d all be burned at the damn stake like the witches of Salem if it’s discovered our kind is behind these missing women.”
“Keep your zapping to yourself over there, boyo,” Kane pointedly looks at Bolt. He looks ready to jump and haul ass at a moment's notice if Bolt’s fingers begin to produce more energetic, lengthy streaks than the tiny zaps of electricity that are dancing from finger to finger. Bolt shakes his hands in the air, then closes his eyes and concentrates on pulling the currents back into his body. When he has control of himself, he opens his eyes and nods his head at me.
“I’m good,” he promises. “Now, we need to find out who all is inside and who we can buy out. There’s no way this late in the game we can find someone to fit in and become entrusted with inside knowledge of the operation. In my personal opinion, that’s our best hope.”
“Kane, go get with Decoder and see where he’s at. Let him know what we want him looking for. There has to be someone desperate enough for money to betray the organizers. I want to know how high up this goes; we need to chop the head off the head snake so the rest will crumble.”
“We are taking them all out, though, correct?” Bolt asks the question.
“Abso-fucking-lutely,” I tell him. “I need to shift, either one of you wanna join me?”
“Damn straight,” Bolt declares.
“Right behind ya,” Kane adds. “I’m gonna stop by and give Decoder your orders before joining y’all. Won’t be long.”
We take off our clothes once we hit the back acreage. True to Kane’s words, he wasn’t but a minute or two behind us. We have miles and miles of terrain at our fingertips. We don’t worry about trespassers, the town fears us and knows better than to step foot on our property.
As soon as my body begins reforming and my bones break to make way for my leopard, I close my eyes and allow the magic of my transformation take hold. I love the way my shift happens… I don’t feel the pain much anymore, it’s something I’ve become accustomed to.
The power that takes hold of my mind with my feline fellow counterpart, is indescribable. The sense of empowerment and indestructability, always gives me a feeling of coming home.
After the last few days I’ve had, it feels good to stretch my paws and dig my nails into earth’s dirt. The three of us race, jumping over fallen trees, chasing wildlife and catching a snack. I climb up a tree and rest myself on a limb as I watch Kane and Bolt’s cats enjoy the freedom that comes with their shift. They are both big cats, not as big as mine seeing as I’m Alpha born, but intimidating enough to anyone who crosses their path.
I begin grooming myself, cleaning off the dirt and debris from my padded paws. As I sit here thinking, my mind travels to my mate and what she may be getting herself into. I need to bring her out for a run, just the two of us. It’s been awhile since we’ve frolicked and played. I miss her cat, my cat misses hers, he lets out a yowl of longing.
Soon, I promise him.
This pacifies him temporarily, but it’s a promise I have to keep or he could shed my skin, without permission from me, and seek out his mate.
We have to let our leopards out to play with one anothers or they grow restless and can potentially become uncontrollable.
Glory
I’ve been keeping an eye on the website. I’ve come in as an anonymous bidder on Maritsa. I’ve rerouted my IP address to where it looks as if I’m making inquiries on her from overseas. My hope is that if I can win her bid, then I can give the location for the pick-up to the guys. They are looking at the bigger picture; my goal is to free my friend’s daughter and let the rest of the pieces fall apart once the men get involved.
I’ve been splitting my time between work at the school, taking care of Angela, doing my duties as the old lady of the president, plus making sure the homestead stays maintained. I’m doing three people’s jobs, and at the end of the day, I’m a walking, talking zombie.
Blaze has been taking his anguish out on my body every night, but I feel as if I’ve let him down by basically being a third party to our lovemaking. I’m there physically, but my mind is always elsewhere. If he’s noticed, he hasn’t said anything to me. But that’s the spectacular thing about mates.
We know when to push a topic, and when to just show our love and support to one another and let the other one work out what’s plaguing their mind. Relationships are all about give and take, and these days, we’re both taking what we need from the other and giving the other the space needed to work through our turmoils.
Today, I’m solely concentrating on the bidding. Maritsa is up, and I can’t take my eyes off the competitors for even a split second. I may get outbid and that cannot happen. Her life as she knows it is at stake if I do.
I hope she makes it out of this situation alive, human, and willing to never speak of the things she’s witnessed and heard while in captivity. If she’s a threat to our kind, we’ll have no choice but to turn her so that she will keep our closely guarded secret. If her life is on the line along with the rest of ours, she’ll have to be proactive to stay living.