Wolf with Benefits

CHAPTER SIX

Ulrich Van Holtz disconnected the call, the speaker phone shutting off, and looked over at the two females who had been sitting in his office with him for the last three hours while he was on the phone.

“They sounded . . . tense,” he remarked about the bosses of the organizations they all worked for.

Cella “Bare Knuckles” Malone, his hockey team’s head coach and lead contractor for the feline protection agency KZS, had her head resting on her crossed arms on his desk. It’s where her head had been the last half-hour of this meeting. “I don’t know what the fuck they’re expecting,” she complained. “They act like we’ve been sitting on our asses the last few months.”

“Maybe ’cause your ass has been gettin’ so large,” Dee-Ann, Ric’s mate, joked.

“My ass is perfect, canine. Don’t be bitter because you got that flat ass.”

“Can we have the ass discussion another time?” Ric asked, desperate to end the conversation mostly because talking about his mate’s ass made him horny. That quickly reminded him that he’d be leaving the country in a few hours. He didn’t want to go. He didn’t like being away from Dee-Ann for so long.

Unlike some mates, Ric and Dee-Ann didn’t spend unlimited time together. He had several businesses, including the Carnivores, an all-shifter hockey team that he owned and was also goalie and team captain; plus his work as one of the head chefs in the mid-Manhattan five-star and Michelin-starred Van Holtz Steak House; and one of the team leads for his Uncle Van’s shifter protection agency, The Group.

Dee-Ann, however, had one job as The Group’s top agent. For some it might not seem like she had much to do with her one job. But by God, the woman did that one job to the best of her ability. She actually was home less than Ric. One time she was gone for three days and no one knew where the hell she was. Just when he was beginning to panic, he found her sitting on their couch, watching TV, icing a broken collarbone that was in mid-healing, and enjoying warm cornbread and a tall glass of buttermilk. Ric didn’t ask her what she’d been up to. He’d quickly learned not to because she’d tell him. Everything. Down to the last blood-and-brain-covered detail. That was something Ric really didn’t need to hear. He soon came to the realization that the only thing he needed to know about the woman he loved was that whatever she did when she wasn’t with him was for the good of their kind.

Still, leaving all this on Dee’s and Cella’s powerful shoulders so that he could go to the Van Holtz family meeting in Germany was not something he really wanted to do.

And then after the meeting in Germany, Ric and his cousin—who, yes, he still called Uncle Van because of their age differences—would be heading out to the campgrounds in Montana for the last two weeks of the Van Holtz cooking summer camp. That meant Ric would be out of New York for at least a month.

“What have we got?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“Nothing,” both women said in unison.

“And before you ask,” Cella went on, “Crush and Dez don’t have anything, either.” Crush, an enormous polar bear and Cella’s mate, and Desiree MacDermot-Llewellyn, full-human and mate to Mace Llewellyn, were detectives in the NYPD’s shifter-run division. They often worked with Dee and Cella on the more difficult cases, handling a lot of the research and managing any NYPD presence.

“Clearly we need to come up with something,” Ric remarked. “I can tell the powers-that-be want Whitlan, and they’re tired of waiting.”

Frankie Whitlan. A gangster and conman and one-time police snitch who used the NYPD to take down anyone who got in his way or cut into his business. At one point, Whitlan had disappeared, leading everyone to think he was dead. He wasn’t. Instead, he just remade himself again and returned with a business that catered to a certain type of full-human.

Very rich full-humans who enjoyed hunting shifters and stuffing them. Their trophies of lions and bears and wolves decorated their expensive hunting cabins or family homes like mooseheads.

It was something that Ric’s kind simply couldn’t and wouldn’t ignore, but Whitlan was very smart and very good at getting lost. When they’d finally closed in on him, he’d disappeared again and had yet to come up anywhere that their three groups—NYPD for local, The Group for nationwide, and KZS for international—had people searching.

“I know we’ve talked to Whitlan’s past associates who are still on the outside,” Ric said. “But what about those inside?”

“We haven’t done that yet,” Dee told him.

“Then do it. Maybe if we’re lucky, it’ll give us something new.”

“I’ll—” Cella began.

Ric quickly cut her off. “No. Dee-Ann, work with Desiree and Crushek on getting together a list of names of anyone that was once a cellmate or prison buddy of Whitlan. Go back as far as you need to. Once you’re ready, bring in Cella.”

“Why can’t I help now?”

“Because I’d like for my team to at least have a shot at getting into this year’s championships.”

“I’m working on it,” Cella snarled. “But you know it’s not been easy.”

“You wanted to keep Novikov on,” Ric reminded her, speaking of his least favorite human being. “Even after what he did to Heller.”

She shrugged and made excuses. “That was an accident. Heller got in Novikov’s way.”

“You don’t really believe that, Cella.”

“Accident!”

And, as if summoned from the pits of hell Ric always accused him of originating from, Bo “The Marauder” Novikov stalked into Ric’s office. No knock. No request to come in. Just throwing the door open and barreling his way into the room of his team’s owner and captain, the way Ric imagined Novikov’s Mongolian ancestors barreled into China.

Yet what horrified Ric was not that Novikov stood there with wet hair, a dozen roses, and a box of chocolates from the high-end chocolate store down the street under one arm, but that he held Toni under the other.

Ric would admit that until this very moment, he’d forgotten that Toni had been waiting outside for a job interview, but it had never occurred to him that he’d be putting her in danger by having her sit out in the goddamn waiting room!

“Wait!” Cella bellowed, and Ric looked away from Novikov long enough to see that Dee-Ann had been startled to her feet, her favorite bowie knife that Dee had named Big Betty out and ready to use. Which didn’t really bother him unless poor Toni got in the way.

“It’s just Novikov,” Cella snapped. “So fucking calm down, canine.”

“That boy better learn how to enter a room right,” Dee muttered.

“Why are you touching my cousin?” Ric demanded.

“Another cousin?” Cella asked him. “Seriously? You Van Holtzes are worse than the Malones.”

“She ain’t blood.” Dee-Ann dropped back into her chair.

“That makes it weirder,” Cella said softly as if she were really analyzing something so damn meaningless.

Ric ignored her and snarled at Novikov. “Put her down. Now!”

But instead of putting her down, Novikov roared and kind of shook Toni at them. To be honest, Ric couldn’t understand what the She-jackal could have done to piss off Novikov this much. Although easy to rage when it came to hockey, Novikov mostly ignored the rest of the world unless they fucked with his oh-so-precious schedule. Now, if this was one of Toni’s brothers or sisters, then, well . . . yeah. They probably deserved it because that was one batch of kids who could wield words the way samurai could wield swords. But this was Toni. Rational, calm Toni.

With her gaze locked on Novikov, Dee slapped the flat of the blade against her palm and warned the hybrid, “Looks like it might be time to start the killin’, boy.” And Dee-Ann meant that threat because she liked Toni. Amazing since Dee didn’t really like many people. But she did like Toni, and Dee protected her friends.

Yet before Dee could prove how much, Toni calmly stated, “Or everyone could just take a breath and not . . . you know . . . start the killin’.”

“Are you okay?” Ric asked Toni.

“I’m fine.” And she sounded fine. She was even smiling. Not in a forced way, either, which he’d seen her do when she was trying to smooth over something one of her siblings had done or said. Usually Kyle or Oriana. “He’s just in a rush and frustrated,” she went on, “so he’s having a hard time getting his feelings across without the roaring.” Wait. Was she trying to explain the completely irrational actions of a completely irrational idiot?

Toni tapped her fingers against Novikov’s arm. “You better go.” Novikov responded by viciously growling. “Don’t worry,” Toni replied, as if she understood his nonsensical noises. “I’ll talk to them.” Novikov bared a fang and Toni’s smile grew. “I promise. Now go. You don’t want to miss your flight. And have fun tonight. Relax. You deserve it.”

Novikov finally nodded and carefully placed her on the ground. Then he glowered at Ric and Cella and roared. Loudly. Thankfully, because their offices were underground, there were no windows to break. Novikov started to turn away, stopped long enough to look at Cella and say, “Tell Crush I’ll call him tomorrow at seven p.m.”

“Will do.”

Ric still didn’t know how the incredibly cool and good-natured Lou “Crush” Crushek and Novikov had become friends. Because Ric really liked Crushek. And he hated Novikov. So it all seemed so wrong.

The hybrid patted Toni on the shoulder and walked out. She followed him into the hallway. “Make sure you have your ID,” she called after him. “You’ll need it to get on your flight. And I already told your driver not to bother you with too much chatter, but even if he does speak to you when you don’t want him to, tip him anyway.”

With her eyes still staring down the hallway, but keeping her voice low, she said to the rest of them, “He won’t tip him, but I already did just in case. I’m thinking Bo considers ‘hello’ and ‘do you need anything, sir?’ to be too much talking.”

She was exactly right about that.

“I also couldn’t get him a regular flight to Chicago at the time he needed, so I booked him a private one.” She lowered her voice even more. “I had to charge it to the team because I didn’t have his card and the company’s card was in the bobcat’s desk—which you may want to move. It seems kind of dangerous to have that there if there are any foxes working in your office. Now I figured charging Bo Novikov’s personal flight to the team would piss you off, Ric”—and she was right!—“so I contacted the Sports Center in Chicago and let the stadium manager know that Bo was going to be in town to see his girlfriend’s derby game or bout or whatever they call it. We discussed it, and he’s going to set up a promo thing for hockey fans. I warned him, though, that Bo wouldn’t like that, but apparently the hockey fans like the abuse, so the manager still thinks it’s a good idea. This way you and the team will get some good PR. Plus, his being at that derby thing will bring attention to his girlfriend’s team, which if I remember correctly, you also own.” She shrugged. “So I figured it all kind of balanced out in the end. And this makes it a tax write-off.” She continued to focus down the hallway for a few more seconds before she let out a sigh and walked into the office. She smiled at them.

“Anyway—”

“Wait,” Ric cut in. “Before you go on . . . why’s your arm in a sling?”

“I have one word for you, Ulrich,” Toni stated flatly. “Mom.”

“Oh.” Ric nodded. “I see. So Novikov didn’t—”

“No, no. Not at all. I was just trying to help.”

Ricky Lee Reed suddenly ambled up behind Toni. Reed, like Dee-Ann, ambled rather than walked and seemed to take life as it came. Unlike his brothers, who had a little more drive. Yet Ric always felt the middle Reed brother treated Dee-Ann more as a big sister than as someone he hadn’t yet nailed, which made Ricky Lee more likable to Ric than the other Reed brothers.

“What are you doing here?” Dee-Ann asked the big Southern wolf.

“Keeping an eye on Miss Antonella here.”

“Good job when that Novikov is carrying her around like a load of Momma’s laundry.”

“I asked if she needed me to get involved and she said no. You and Ronnie Lee always go on and on about letting females make their own decision—”

“Shut up,” Dee drawled. “Before I find another use for Big Betty.”

“Wait.” Toni looked back and forth between Dee and Ricky. “How do you two know each other?”

“Dee-Ann has always loved me from afar but she knew she could never have me.”

“Betty,” Dee threatened.

“We’re Packmates,” Ricky clarified.

“Huh,” Toni said. “You’re the first member of the Smith Pack I’ve met since Dee-Ann mated with Ric.”

“She’s ashamed of her poor wolf kin, so she hides us from all those rich Van Holtz friends of hers. We’re not invited to Washington for all those fancy dinners and get-togethers they have. Not even her own cousins, Bobby Ray and Sissy Mae, are invited. Off our little Dee-Ann goes, just leavin’ the rest of us behind . . . sad and alone. Ain’t that right, Dee-Ann?”

“What’s sad is that my momma stopped me from burying you in our backyard like I tried to when I was ten. Had a hole dug for you and everything.”

“Lord, you are so your father’s child.”

“And nothing makes me prouder. Ain’t my fault your daddy’s scared of him.”

“My daddy ain’t scared of nothin’. Especially Eggie Ray Smith.”

“Anyway,” Ric cut in to the sibling-like bickering, “you were saying¸ Toni? About Novikov?”

“Actually, this is kind of interesting. Who’s Eggie?”

“Antonella.”

“Okay, okay. I was just curious.” Toni thought a moment. “So, um, I saw on Novikov’s schedule that there’s a team meeting tomorrow afternoon, so the return flight for him and his girlfriend . . . or fiancée . . . or whatever . . . leaves Chicago at eight a.m., and a driver will bring him right to the Sports Center in time for the meeting. Then he can get his workout in after that.”

Ric and Cella looked at each other and Ric asked Toni, “Why?”

“Well, I’m relatively certain if he doesn’t get in some form of workout, he’s going to be impossible to deal with. He reminds me of Dennis. He’s my five-year-old brother,” she told the others. “He has OCD, too, and if he doesn’t get a certain amount of time painting—he’s a painter—he gets completely unruly. You wouldn’t think a five-year-old could do that much damage . . . but he can. And he’s barely fifty pounds. Bo is way bigger, so I readjusted the amount of damage based on the size of the man and guessed it would be substantially worse. I figured you wouldn’t want that.”

“No, no,” Ric clarified. “We wouldn’t. But my question is why did you feel the need to help him?”

“Oh.” Toni thought on that a moment. “Well . . . he looked like he needed help, and I was just sitting there.” She suddenly sighed. “And to be quite honest, I really didn’t want to have to testify against him if he murdered that bobcat.”

“Floyd,” Ric and Cella said at the same time. Floyd wasn’t bad as a receptionist, but the man continued to piss off the persnickety Novikov. Then again, so did Ric—and the universe. Only Novikov’s fiancée, Blayne, managed to avoid Novikov’s wrath, mostly . . . as long as she was on time.

“It just seemed easier to help the man since you guys are clearly busy and I knew once he was done with . . . Floyd?” They nodded. “Yes, Floyd. I knew he’d come looking for you, and I didn’t want to see you without most of your skin, Ric. We do consider you family, after all.”

“Thank you.”

“Look, I’m sorry if I stepped on any toes here. I’m just used to dealing with people like him, and it was nothing for me to help out. I was just sitting there.”

Cella swung her legs off the desk. “He didn’t make you nervous?”

“Bo? No. Not at all.” She smiled. “He’s very funny.”

“Do you mean weird funny?” Ric asked. “Like odd and off-putting?”

“No, Ric. I mean funny. As in humorous.”

“He’s humorous?”

Treating him like a true cousin, Toni rolled her eyes and said, “I’ll let you get back to work.”

“Wait,” Cella pushed. “So you didn’t find Bo Novikov hard to work with?”

Toni laughed. “Hard. Him?” She laughed some more. But when no one joined her, she cleared her throat and said, “Look, based on what I’ve heard from Kyle, Bo Novikov is considered the best at what he does. And there’s a level of commitment and focus that comes with being the best. I understand how that is because I was raised around the best of the best. My ten sisters and brothers and my mom are the best at what they do. So my father and I have, over the years, learned to manage them. For their own good and ours.” She thought a moment and added, “And society’s.”

“And what does that entail?” Ric coaxed. “Managing them?”

“Well . . . you know.” When he just stared at her, she shrugged and said, “The main thing is to understand that because they are the best, their focus is incredibly myopic and that nothing you or I or anyone else says will change that. So instead of trying to change them, you work within the confines of that myopic vision. And while you’re helping them, you’re also protecting them from outside distractions that will just set them off and make your life hell for several hours to several days. I guess I’m saying that managing the best is really just a way to protect myself. Once you understand the man or the woman, the rest is really easy.”

“And you understand Bo Novikov?”

“Yes,” she said confidently. “Actually, he’s super easy because he just lays it out there. One of my brothers doesn’t let you know anything’s wrong until he starts setting fires. When one of my sisters gets upset, her hair starts to fall out. So in order to prevent my brother from going to prison or my sister sobbing hysterically every time she showers, I have to guess when they’re upset. Mr. Novikov is like a breath of fresh air. All that snarling and growling, it makes him incredibly easy to read.” She glanced around the room. “Anything else?”

“Actually, yes,” Cella said, briefly glancing at Ric. “Are you really busy right now?”

“Just waiting for my interview.”

“Great. Then can you do me a huge favor?”

“Sure.”

“We need to delay your interview anyway.”

Clearly disappointed but trying to hide it, Toni said, “That’s fine. What do you need?”

“One of our players has to get on a flight in the next couple of hours. He’s sometimes easily distracted, so would you mind escorting him? Just make sure he gets on the plane. He’s got everything he needs. His tickets, his luggage. Just needs to get on the plane to Alaska. He’s going to a hockey camp for shifter pups and cubs and he’s one of the guest trainers for the next week. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”

“Not at all.”

“Then come back here when you’re done and we can have our little interview. Okay?”

Seeming surprised the interview would still take place today, Toni nodded. “Oh . . . okay.”

Cella added, “You can find the player, Bert, down in the player’s locker room.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

Toni smiled at Ric and headed out.

“You going with her, Ricky Lee?” Dee asked Reed.

“Might as well.”

“Good idea since your sister is still looking for you.”

The wolf rolled his eyes and followed Toni down the hall. That’s when Ric looked at Cella.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Giving your not-really-a-cousin a shot at the big time.”

“Or a chance to get permanent facial lacerations.” Cella shrugged. “You say tomato . . .”

Ricky Lee waited for Toni to step on the elevator before following her in. He pressed the button for the floor where the team’s locker rooms were located.

“You spend a lot of time here, don’t you?” she asked him.

He nodded at Toni’s question. “Yep. My brother being one of the players gives me all sorts of access. Well, that and no one really asks me anything anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

He shrugged. “I just mean that I go where I need to and always make sure I look like I know where I’m going. People are less likely to bother you or question you as long as you appear to know where you’re going. It’s only when you wander around with your mouth open, staring up at the big buildings or trying to sort out office numbers, that people start wondering what the hell you’re doing. Thought it would only work here in the States, but it worked even when I was doing some work for the company in Japan, Italy, France.”

“Really? I’ve been to and sometimes lived in all those places with my family over the years, and I find that surprising. I mean, you’re just so . . . American.”

“Lord, I hope so. Being that I was born and reared here and all.” He chuckled as the elevator doors slid open. He waited for Toni to step out before he followed. “But I always looked like I knew where I was going. People may have watched me, especially in Japan. But no one ever questioned where I was going or stopped me from going there. It’s always worked to my benefit.”

“I’ll have to try it. I’m always getting stopped.”

They turned a corner and paused. Bert was just coming out of the locker room. He had a plain black duffel and a hockey bag for all his equipment.

They looked at each other.

“You know this is probably a setup, right?” Ricky asked her. “A test to see what you can handle.”

“Oh, I know.”

“Not sure what kind of test, though. Bert’s a real nice guy . . . for a bear.”

“He’s probably slipped onto a no-fly list or something and they want to see how I’d get past that.”

“You think you can?”

She grinned. “No problem. You sure you really want to tag along?”

“See you in action?” He returned her grin, enjoying himself immensely. “I wouldn’t miss it.”