No sound. No confirmation they’d heard her. Not good. She couldn’t smell them, but that didn’t mean anything. They could be near an air-conditioning vent or fresh-air exchange. Wouldn’t be the first time it’d happened. She chanced a glance back to see what they were doing, and saw no sign of them. Shit! They’d either bailed, left her to take the fall, or they’d already been apprehended while she’d been preoccupied with cleaning out the teller stations.
As she turned to address the cop, her weapon was wrenched away and the butt caught her in the jaw. Xio dropped like a bag of rocks. Her wolf wasn’t helping her out of this one. That was what she got for letting her ego get involved.
“Good morning, Miss Davis. Let me introduce myself. I’m Special Agent Marcus Cazador of the FBI. Didn’t anyone ever tell you banks are most often robbed within the first few minutes of opening? We figured you’d be here, after the invitation we’d extended. Safest bank in Texas. I can see you liked the billboard at the port of entry. You and I have a lot to talk about, but business first.”
He’d used her real name, one she hadn’t heard in ten years. It sounded strange coming from his mouth, but also right, as though he’d been born to say it. Not good. This man was dangerous in so many ways. “Bite me.”
“You have no idea how much I’d like to.” A knee pressed down into the center of her back, and he yanked her arms behind her and slapped cuffs around her wrists. He rolled her to her back, sat her up, and tugged the mask from her face. “At last we meet.” And then he spoke the words she’d hoped never to hear. “You have the right to remain silent.”
Ten years earlier
Xio stomped down the road, pissed for more reasons than she could count. Since she’d dropped out of school, Magnum, the pack’s Alpha, had been on her case about everything. Get her GED. Find a mate. Be a good little wolfie. Screw him. She didn’t blame his son for running away. The cocksucker would drive anyone to it. Who put him in charge of her life, anyway?
Well, she was running away, too. Drew wasn’t the only one with smarts enough to get out.
“Want a ride, China Doll?” The voice, with a heavy Spanish accent, came from her left. A cherry-red motorcycle pulled up alongside her and stopped. Of course, she’d heard him coming from miles away and hadn’t needed her wolf hearing for that. It was why she’d decided to hit the highway after she’d ditched her companion, the man Magnum had assigned to keep an eye on her. She had great knot-tying skills, and it would be a while before he caught up to her. By then, she’d be long gone—courtesy of her new amigo.
What the man on the bike called her amounted to a racial slur and insult, but Xio let it pass because she needed his help. Even though she was only one-quarter Asian, her long, dark hair and almond-shaped eyes dominated her features, to the point she’d been mistaken more than once for full-blooded Chinese. She could understand his assumption. Whatever. He could call her Lucy, for all she cared, but only once. The man was her ticket out of Los Lobos—and on a Night Rod.
Xio turned to him to let him know she wouldn’t let it pass a second time. “Some people would consider that rude.”
“Would they? How about you? Do you consider it rude?”
“Not this time. Let’s leave it at that, but don’t do it again.” She glanced down at a Bowie knife she kept sheathed on the side of her boot. The boots had been a gift from her twin brother, Xan, sent to her via mail from somewhere unknown, after he’d joined the CIA. Custom-made to hold a sticker, something she handled quite well, they were her most cherished possession. As long as she had them, all would be well.
His gaze traveled down and stopped on the bone handle, inlaid with a jade dragon. A huge grin spread on his face. “Something tells me you can be more than a handful if you want to be.”
“Test me and find out, cowboy.” Not that she needed a blade. She and her brother had been taught to fight since they could walk—the one thing Magnum had done right. Aikido, karate, judo, all the fine defensive arts, and a few of the killing ones, too.
She could be lethal without the blade, but it got her point across a lot quicker, so she always carried it. Besides, with her petite frame and delicate features, it kept the predators from mistaking her for prey.
And he was right about being a handful. Restraint had never been one of her strengths. Her wolf was wild and had a bit of a temper. Some said she was Alpha material—if she could learn a little self-control. Yeah, like that was going to happen. Besides, to be an Alpha, you kind of had to hook up with one, and she had no inclination to seek out another pack or find a mate.
No man would ever control her. They could try to tell her until they were blue in the face that she would stand beside them, but she’d yet to see an Alpha that let his mate do that on equal terms. Magnum certainly hadn’t. That was why she was getting out of Los Lobos, before Magnum got any ideas and used her to make a political play with another pack, enslaving her to some wolf. Xio lifted a brow. “So, you’re going my way?”