Free Loving Her (Keeping Her) by Kelly Lucille Page A

show the forest or courtyard garden.  Still
there were comfortable couches and a full kitchen.
    “Huh,” she said, looking
around a little disappointed.
    “What?”
    “I guess I expected an arsenal
and a wall of stacked MRE’s,” she said.  “This looks like a basement
apartment.”
    “There’s an arsenal and a
shitload of MRE’s for long sieges, along with water and air filtration.  For
short stays we have real food.”
    “Cool.  Frozen pizza,” Ian
said from inside the opened fridge.  “And like ten kinds of beer.”
    Cassie gave him a look.
    “Well, real man food.”  Ben
finished, “There's a whole freezer of meat."  Leading Cassie over to one of
the closed doors, he opened the door with another code and there was a wall of
monitors and a whole lot of buttons. 
    “This is command center. 
You can see every room in the house from here, as well as the cameras we have
around the perimeter.  They are motion sensing so there will be an alert if
someone tries to come over the wall.  We have another one upstairs so this one
will only turn on if that one is compromised or one of us switched it over.” 
He pushed her down in one of the chairs.  “Ian and Cleo both know the system,
so follow their instructions to the letter.  And Cassie, no matter what you see
when they switch over, you stay here.”
    “20 rampaging wolves, you
mean?”  She asked on a shaky smile.  She hated that Ben and Mac would be out
there, and she was hiding in here, but she knew without them saying it, that she
would be a liability against shapeshifting crazies.
    “Something like that.”  His
voice was soft, his eyes, devoid of their usual humor, on her.  “I never had
anything worth losing before.  It makes a difference.”  She leaned up the same
time he leaned down, their lips melding, his hand touching her face.  Then he
was gone.

Chapter 8
    After Cleo showed Shawn
where she last saw Roxanne, she was forcibly pushed back toward the house. 
    “I can help,” she said, her
eyes taking on a steely resolve.
    Shawn narrowed his eyes. 
“Don’t push me on this Cleo.  If I have to drag your ass back to the vault it
will waste time I could be using finding Roxanne.  You want to work with your
dad?  That means you take orders just like the rest of us.”
    She huffed out a breath but
nodded, resigned.  “You’re right.”  She turned to go, heading back to the
house, “but I won’t always be working for my dad.”
    Shawn really didn’t like
the sound of that, but once he was sure she was headed back to safety, he put
it on the back burner.  Right now, he had a six year old to find.  He would
worry about the, too beautiful for her own good, and way too young, lioness
when the current mission was over.  Of course, if he flew his first search
pattern on the path she took back, it was no one’s business but his own.
    Demon was the one who found
Roxanne, or more accurately, Roxanne found him.  He was close to two miles out
and nearly to the back wall of their property.  She fell into his arms,
literally from where she’s been hiding in one of the trees.  She reeked of wild
mint.  Demon caught her flying figure and nearly tossed her back.
    He opened his mouth to
curse, but her tiny little hand on his mouth stopped him.
    “Shh.”  Her voice was the
volume of a quiet wind.  “They’ll hear.”
    “Who?” he whispered back
just as low.
    She shrugged her tiny
shoulders.  She was covered in dirt and leaves, her hair a shambles; it looked
like she had purposefully covered herself with mud and then rolled in mint to
avoid detection.  Essie was right about one thing.  Roxanne kicked ass at hide
and seek.  She was going to need another bath.  At this rate they’d be giving
her one every damn day.
    She pushed up in his arms
and whispered right into his ear.  “The ones from home.  They came to eat me.” 
She must have noticed his dubious expression, because she nodded her head with
six-year-old