Missing Ch. 61-70

My sex drive was back with a vengeance, lacking only the mate to take advantage of it. I came hard around my fingers, my hips lifting out of the water as I rode it out. The next was right behind it. Too sensitive to continue, I pulled my fingers out and relaxed back into the bubbles.

I shut things down a few minutes later, heading back inside to rinse the chlorine off and go to bed. There weren't any messages on the burner, but I left one for my mate. "I COULD HAVE USED THAT HARD COCK OF YOURS TONIGHT."

Nothing like extra motivation to find those coyotes, right?

Sleep came quickly, as did my dreams.

I woke with the sunrise, eager to get going on the hunt. He had a powerful desktop in the office and decent internet, but I'd buy a laptop soon to keep working during my periodic "Crazy Bonnie" trips. I imported the files from the jump drive and started looking at what we had. It was a lot of data, but the Council hadn't organized any of it in a useful way.

I'd spent years tracking down fugitives in my law enforcement career, and they got caught for a reason. What I was doing now to stay off the Council's radar wasn't easy; I needed cash, transportation, and lodging. I had two advantages; plenty of liquid funds from my retirement and the sale of our home, and two people I could trust in Clyde and Adrienne. Every relocation was a chance for another wolf to scent me or leave a trace of where I'd been. Having an off-the-books base like this was huge.

Most people on the run don't have lots of money or access to hiding places like this. If they aren't at home, you check those willing to hide them. Relatives, friends, cellmates, fellow gang members, the list isn't that long. It was time to apply that thinking to the Coyotes.

Why? You had to stay in one place and integrate into society to accumulate wealth, as the Packs had done. The Coyotes lived on the periphery of bigger cities and moved if a Pack got close enough to scent them. Living like that meant patterns, and patterns gave me places to look.

I entered the data into a geographic database that interfaced with my downloaded mapping software. For ease of visual interpretation, I colored the sightings for each decade differently. If we could determine how long the coyotes had been there before discovery, that went in. It took me four days to get all the data input complete.

My next step was to plot the Pack Territories of all North American werewolves. I put a 50-mile circle around each of these as an exclusion zone. Plotting the sightings showed my assumption was reasonable, as few sightings occurred this close to active Packs.

Some of the encounters ended with the coyotes dead, and I marked those with an X. With others, we missed capturing them, but we got their names. It was a simple search with the database to trace the movements of specific people throughout the years. The data showed two patterns, the homebodies and the migrants. Homebodies were in the southern United States, where few Packs existed. They stayed until discovered, while the seasonals moved north by summer and back to southern states in the winter. That pattern indicated seasonal work like tourism, agriculture, fishing, or forestry.

Our Cook and his family were seasonals. No one wanted to cook outdoors in a Maine winter.

From the patterns I'd seen, they were East Coast wolves. If he stayed in Canada after the raid, he probably moved north. I highlighted five previous areas where coyotes had been found, then saved the data. I saved the database in an email, encrypted it, and then sent it to his personal email address through an anonymizer.

Opening the burner phone, I sent a text. "SENT YOU SOME INFO. GOING CRAZY TOMORROW. LOVE YOU."

In the morning, I'd ride down to Minneapolis to talk to the FBI and DEA, then to the airport. Crazy was a lot of fun.

Ch. 66

Fixer Clyde Lassiter's POV

North of Two Harbors, MN

Leaving her was hard as hell. My wolf wanted to go back and claim her, then make love to her for days. My head knew that was the wrong move; I had to gain her trust first. So, I was riding my Harley south along scenic Highway 61.

I called Leo on the road to Duluth. "You better not have fucked it up already," he warned me when I said I was returning.

"She's not ready for me, and I couldn't hold my wolf back much longer," I replied. "Bonnie is fine. She's got a lot to see up there while I go back to work. Can I stay overnight before I start riding east?"

"When will you be here?"

"About seven."

"Meet us at the airport. Anthony and Pamela have a flight to Boston at eight-thirty; we'll get you a seat, and you can ride back with them to Baxter or get a ride to Headquarters."

"What about my motorcycle?"

"I'll drive that home and leave it in the garage for the next time you're here. You are coming back, right?"

I had to laugh at that. "The riding up north is pretty damn nice," I replied. I agreed to the plan.

I met the Alphas at a gas station near the airport after they dropped Anthony and Pamela off. Leo took the keys and drove off with my Harley and my guns. Unlike Bonnie, I couldn't fly armed, and I didn't trust the TSA with them. "Tell me what happened with Bonnie," Adrienne ordered.

They were in our corner, so I quickly told her everything. "I convinced her to let me help her find a way to locate and kill the coyotes who killed Sean. She's all right with someone else killing the three if that will allow her to continue living. Meanwhile, she's helping me with the search."

"You did well, Clyde. The search will keep Bonnie busy while knowing her mate waits for her will settle her wolf. Don't share anything we give you on their locations with the Council. Any move toward the killers might be seen as a prelude to breaking command, and the Council will do anything to keep the treaty going. You'd better show progress if you want her to work with you."

"I'll do my best; you know that. Any ideas on how to keep our hands clean?"

She didn't say anything as we drove up the ramp to the departure area and pulled to the curb. "I've got an idea or two. Let me know if you locate them, and I'll see if I can help."

"Thank you, Luna." I grabbed my things and walked into the airport.

I didn't have to be back at Headquarters until Wednesday, so I spent some time in Baxter. Alpha Anthony was happy that Bonnie had relaxed enough to spend time with me. "She had a good weekend. I haven't seen her smile like that since we lost Sean."

"I'm hoping she's turning a corner," I replied. "It's not going to be easy for her, and it's not over. It only takes one memory to send her off the rails again. I've seen dozens of cases where widows lasted for over a year before going feral or committing suicide."

Pamela looked unsure. "Do you think we should make her come home where we can watch her?"

"No," I answered. "Would you say Bonnie looked more at ease here or Miesville?" They didn't have to answer. "She has so many memories here. Going on the road will help her work through her issues. I find a long ride clears my head."

"I hope you're right."

My wolf did a lot of running on their territory, working out the frustrations of not having his mate with him. Her text messages on the burner phone didn't help either. I'd rubbed one out three times since the little minx teased me about the hot tub. I'd get her back later.

The Council sent a car to pick me up Tuesday afternoon. I didn't expect the driver to be Emily, and she didn't look happy to see me. "Emily! How are you doing?"

She glared at me as I tossed my bag into the back seat before sitting down. Then she couldn't look at me as she put the car into gear and drove off. "You could have warned me," she said. "We're partners!"

"Not anymore." I don't think she expected me to respond like that, but she quickly hid the hurt look on her face. "They are putting me in an office until I retire, Emily. I'm in charge of a task force that gathers data and does nothing with it. I couldn't turn down the assignment, but it wasn't the right thing for your career. I told them you needed to stay in the field. That meant another Fixer would have to take over your training."

She looked back at me in concern. "Why retire now? Is something going on that you're not telling me?" I didn't answer right away, and that made her more worried. "Are you sick?"

"I'm sick of being alone, Emily." I knew that stung her. Emily's mate rejected her for a higher-ranking one. Crushed and embarrassed, Emily entered Council Enforcer training shortly after. She rose quickly through the ranks due to her drive and intelligence, but ours was a lonely existence. "I've spent half my life in this job, and for what? What do I have now? Medals? Rank? I have no family and no children. I go home to an empty apartment or a generic hotel room each night. I might have sex, but we both know it is meaningless, short-term mutual physical pleasure followed by awkward silence. I find masturbation to be much simpler and nearly as effective."

She blushed; I bet her battery bill was high. "You aren't wrong. Every time I sleep with someone, I feel like I'm cheating on a mate I might find the next day."

"I've been searching for answers and not liking what I figure out. In the Bible is a verse that resonated with me. 'Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth forever.' Will anyone give a crap about me a month after I die? My office will have another name on it the day I leave. My friends and the government get my stuff, and nothing will remember me before my body decays away."

I let the silence go on for a while. I was a total buzzkill today. "I learned that life is meaningless without someone to share it. All of the people I killed because they went crazy after losing a mate had a point."

"What would that be?"

"Living after your mate is gone is like going through chemotherapy. You suffer immensely, and you don't know if it will work. Will all your pain and suffering accomplish nothing more than pushing off the inevitable?"

Emily wasn't convinced yet. "You want a mate. Luna knows that I understand how you feel! But how is leaving your job going to help you find her? Clyde, your job brings you to dozens of Packs every year, plus the scratch 'n sniffs! Do you think you can do better after you retire?" Translation: Am I making a mistake staying in this job?

"I know this hasn't worked yet," I replied. "I've been wondering what my problem is for decades. What if I don't get a second chance mate? What if Luna thinks I've got too much blood on my teeth to deserve one?"

"I can't believe that's true. Every wolf deserves a mate." She HAD to believe that to keep going, just like I had to all those years ago.

"You don't know what I've done in my life, Emily. The Council doesn't know most of it. As a Fixer, your job is to FIX the problem quickly and permanently. They don't care HOW you do your job as long as it doesn't blow up in their faces. I'm their cutout, their plausible deniability. If it becomes politically necessary, they can kill me and end the evidence trail. You could put them under Alpha command, and they would truthfully say they did not know my actions, never ordered them, and certainly didn't condone it."

"We fill our reports on everything, Clyde. Someone knows."

"Did you ever watch Mission Impossible, Emily?"

"The Tom Cruise movies? Sure. He's kind of hot for an old guy, but he's an asshole."

I shook my head. Kids. They had no idea their hot movies were remakes of things from my childhood. "When given a mission, you always get a choice and a warning. You have the choice of whether to accept it, but I always did. The warning was that if you were captured or killed, the Secretary would disavow any knowledge of your actions. It's all up to me. I accomplish the mission objectives, and no one asks me how." They don't ask about the money, whether it is what I spent or how I got it. That was the source of my alternate identity's fortune.

"I've seen you in action, Clyde."

I laughed. "You've seen the routine, Emily. When I get one of those Mission Impossible assignments, I don't involve other wolves. I don't want to be responsible for the blood on their hands, Emily. I sure as hell don't want them killed if the trail gets too close to the Council."

She didn't say anything for a moment, and I knew why. She looked up to me and wanted to be like me someday, and I'd just popped the bubble about what the job involved. Not many could handle this life. "When are you leaving?"

"When I think I can." For the rest of the drive, we went through my responsibilities, some of which Emily would be taking over with her new Fixer boss. Bonnie wasn't the only wolf I was keeping an eye on. Our group monitored the mental health of the widowed, the rogues, and the threats to our kind.

Emily dropped me off at my apartment. "I worry about you, Clyde. You're not my mate, but I'll miss you when you are gone."

"I appreciate that, Emily. Have a good night." She drove off, and I went into my empty apartment.

Ch. 67

Bonnie Woods' POV

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Friday, June 12, 2020

I'd driven straight to Minneapolis from my new home on Lake Superior, arriving just before noon. I filled out the visitor log as I waited for Keiko Kintani to come down and get me.

We hugged quickly, and she asked me how retirement was. Since I wasn't a credentialed law enforcement agent anymore, I had to leave my 1911 at the security checkpoint of the Drug Enforcement Agency's Minnesota office. A few minutes later, she was leading me through the door of the Intelligence Division to meet her team. Christopher Torken, Amanda Byrnes, and Erica Toda rose to greet me like old friends.

"Nice leathers," Chris said as he checked out my ass. I was in my motorcycle gear, with black leather pants that molded to my toned backside. Combined with my high heel boots, they accentuated my long legs. I wore them for safety, but I didn't underestimate their effect on the male species.

"Thanks. I've been doing a lot of riding lately."

"What brings you back here," Amanda asked? "I heard a rival cartel killed your husband's killers in Canada."

"The cook is still out there," I said. "I may be retired, but I haven't given up hope that we'll catch this fucker."

"We know. After weeks of nothing, we've got three hits on the guy's product in the last two days."

That made my eyes go wide. "Where?"

"Pull that map up, Erica?" She put a map of the Northeast up on the screen. "The yellow dots are the ones we found up to a week after the Sicarios hit the cook site in Chemin Saint-Arnaud. The red dots are the new ones." One was the Sandy Bay border crossing on Highway 201 into Maine. The other two were in Quebec City. "He's still in Canada, and he's got a new cook site going."

"He's got balls," I said. "The Mounties are actively looking for him." I didn't mention that he had two accomplices, a mated were-coyote couple who could keep him hidden.

Erica shook her head. "It's what he knows, and he makes money with it. It took a while to collect all the equipment and chemicals he needed, and then it was back to business. The Cartels don't care about your troubles; they want their product."

"It's not good news for us," Amanda continued. "There is a hell of a lot of wilderness to hide a lab along the St. Lawrence River. Canadian law enforcement doesn't have the experience or resources we have to go after a guy like this; if he's smart, he could evade capture for years."

There had to be another way. "Do we know how he is getting his chemicals? The lab equipment? There has to be a trace somewhere."

"Nothing domestically. We've shared our intelligence on the precursor components the chemist has used with their investigators."

It was going to be hard to track them down, that was for sure. What could one wolf do in thousands of miles of wilderness? I didn't have any ideas for them, and Keiko promised to let me know if it looked like his operations moved back to the States. I thanked them for their help, then headed out. When I got back to my bike, I texted Clyde on the burner phone. "Big cookout near Quebec City recently," I sent. He'd figure it out.

I didn't want to get in trouble so close to the Miesville Pack, so I figured I'd show up at the Kali dojo and get some training in. I'd done some drills during breaks from my work up north. Doing movement drills in the early morning along the rocky lakeshore was inspiring. I called the Minneapolis FBI offices to speak with my favorite Supervisory Special Agent. "Pickett," Thomas answered.

"Thomas, it's Bonnie. Do you have a minute?"

"For you? Sure! Just a second." I heard a door close. "Are you back in town? Can you have dinner with me?"

"Yes, I'm in town, and yes, I can have dinner with you, but you should know I'm in a relationship now. I can offer you a chance to try beating me with sticks after work if you're interested?"

He laughed at the offer. "I can be at the dojo at five unless you want to use the gym here. I've got my sticks, and I should finish with meetings by four."

"Let's meet at the dojo. That way, I can get a few hours of work in before my punching bag shows up."

"Big talk," he said with a laugh. "I'll see you there."

I grabbed some Thai food, then headed south on Chicago Avenue until I reached the Minnesota Kali Group dojo. The instructors were happy to see me and allowed me to help teach a class on knife fighting. I was busy demonstrating defensive tactics against three students at once with my two plastic training knives when I sensed Thomas entering the dojo. He watched me fight for the next two minutes before I ended the drill and addressed the class. "Movement is what takes a three-on-one beatdown and turns it into three consecutive one-on-one fights," I told them. "Your footwork has to be instinctive, and your attack movements automatic. Use walls, objects, and other people to keep your attackers from simultaneous attacks."

A student raised his hand. "What if you don't have room to move?"

"Then you fight like hell and curse your stupidity for getting into that situation." That caused a few to laugh, and the instructor called them to the next drill. Some of the students had recorded the fight on their phones, and it would be on YouTube soon. Thomas tossed me a towel. "Thanks," I said.

"You're pretty damn good," he confessed. "Do you still want to spar?"

"Absolutely. Get changed, and then we can do some drills first." We gave each other a good workout, and he offered to buy me dinner. "Where do you want to eat?"

"I'd love some barbecue," I said.

"I know a place. Follow me?" I got on my bike and followed him back to Washington Avenue. He turned right on 38^th Street and stopped at Ted Cook's 19^th Hole Barbecue, a tiny storefront with a walkup counter. The cherrywood smoke and rib smell made me feel at home. They didn't have tables, so he took the two food boxes and led me further down Washington Avenue. We turned into the parking area for Minnehaha Falls, not far from the airport. "I figured you hadn't seen this little gem, and there are plenty of picnic tables around."

I could hear the water as we walked down the trail. We found a table within sight of the falls, and I dug into my meal. I had a full rack of ribs, jojos, and pecan pie. "I don't know where you put it," Thomas joked. "I fight to keep the weight off even with the exercise."

"Genetics," I responded. We walked down to the falls. The creek had good flow, but the 53-foot drop wasn't impressive after seeing those on the North Shore. The evening had been pleasant, and I hoped Thomas found someone soon. He was a good man who deserved happiness.