Free Tempted by the Jaguar #4: Infiltration (Riverford Shifters) by Cristina Rayne Page A

“I won’t let anything happen
to you.”
    Kylie matched his determined expression. “We’ll look out for each
other.”
    She was still feeling more than a little guilty nearly an hour later as
Hunter and she boarded Maxim’s plane. She could still see the flash of panic in
Paul’s eyes when he had realized she meant to throw herself into the thick of
things. He had spent a good portion of his life keeping her hidden away from
the lions only to have her willingly enter into their domain in the end and
knowing there wasn’t a thing he could do to stop her from doing it, or worse,
being unable to do anything about it, even join her, because he was currently
stuck in a hospital bed.
    “Promise me that you’ll bring my little girl back to me.”
    The look in Paul’s eyes when he had said that to Hunter was seared into
her soul forever.
    “The rest of the group are already on the road,” Maxim informed them as
they settled into the rear-most seats while the three wolves he had brought for
their security filled the rest. He then gestured to the cell phone clutched
tightly in Kylie’s hand. “Has Karen tried to contact you yet? I’m sorry to say
my people haven’t been able to locate her or Mitch.”
    “No, and that fact really has me worried,” Kylie replied.
    “Maybe we should contact her first,” Hunter suggested, “send her the
text you mentioned earlier about Kylie and Paul being moved to a more secure
location.”
    Maxim nodded. “Do it, and then turn your phone off until this whole
mess is over. That goes for us, too. We can’t be sure that they won’t try to
track them. We can buy a few pre-paid phones once we reach Lubbock.”
    “Fine by me. Gaither has already sent me over a dozen texts today,”
Hunter said with a grimace. “Needless to say, he’s less than pleased that I’m
ignoring him.”
    “I hope he doesn’t start pestering Paul,” Kylie fretted.
    Hunter leaned over and kissed her forehead tenderly. “Your father took
on a lion assassin without hesitation. Compared to that, taking on an Elder,
even one as insufferable as Gaither, should be a piece of cake.”
    “The Elders are going to be so pissed when they find out we’ve left
them out of all this,” Kylie said.
    “No doubt,” Hunter agreed, “but we still have no idea about the
identity of the gator who kidnapped your friend or even if it was a gator at
all. Plus, with all the Sniffers suddenly popping up everywhere, even they will
have to admit that keeping our rescue plans close to the chest was the smartest
move here.”
    “That’s enough yapping out of you three!” Sasha called from the front
of the plane in a no-nonsense tone. “I offered to fly the plane to give you a
chance to rest, Max, and I expect you to take it! Buckle up. We’re about to
take off.”
    Maxim sighed and turned to sit down in his seat properly without a word.
    Hunter laced their hands together and looked at the back of Maxim’s
head with a faint smile.
    Score one for Sasha.

CHAPTER ELEVEN
     
     
    Kylie brushed her lips lightly over Hunter’s lips, making her lover
scrunch his nose adorably as his eyes fluttered open. “We’re here,” she said.
    Hunter blinked a few more times, then lifted his head from where it had
been resting on Kylie’s shoulder.
    “I only meant to close my eyes for a few minutes,” he said sheepishly.
    Kylie smiled. “I’m sure that’s what Maxim thought, but I think he
drifted off the moment his eyes closed. I wish we didn’t have to wake him up.”
    “Sasha will make sure he gets plenty of rest at the estate; I guarantee
it. I’m actually glad she bullied him into allowing her to fly us here. She’s
really the only one that can force him to take care of himself sometimes.”
    Thirty minutes later, Kylie was shaking the hand of Maxim’s cousin,
Lev, a blond, handsome man in his mid-thirties and then they were climbing into
his black Escalade. She ended up squished in between Hunter and Maxim in