Defender Cave Bear (Protection, Inc: Defenders Book 1) Read online

  For all he knew, that hacker female might be the Dark Knight’s mate!

  He scowled so darkly at that thought that a pedestrian who caught his eye edged backward and bumped into a fruit cart, sending a cascade of oranges rolling down the street.

  Mortals, he thought with scorn as everyone in the vicinity scrambled to pick them up. Scurrying like the ants that they are.

  Well, even if that troublesome female was his Dark Knight’s mate, it would make no difference. Once he had rested and recovered his power, he would track them down. The female was a helpless cripple, and he knew the key to making the Dark Knight his own. They would not escape again.

  And once all the Dark Knights were assembled, the wizards’ plan, which had been so long in the making, would finally become a reality.

  CHAPTER 15

  P ete felt pretty guilty over not helping Tirzah with the cleanup and kitten catching, but if the last hour had demonstrated one thing, it was that any attempts to help that involved standing up would only make things worse. So he stayed in bed, letting Spike lick him with his rasping tongue, and tried to think of where Batcat might be hiding.

  The mystery was solved a minute before the shouting began, when he heard a gnawing sound from under his bed. Pete rolled over and peered under it. A pair of disembodied yellow demon eyes stared back at him, and then Batcat went back to trying to eat one of his sneakers.

  Pete reached under the bed and extracted Batcat. The kitten squeaked in protest, but he kept a firm grip on her. If he let her go, there was no telling where she’d go. He’d just hold her till Tirzah came back.

  He was about to yell that he’d caught her when he heard the front door open. A moment later, there was a shout and a crash. Spike tensed to fly, so Pete grabbed him too. An instant later, both kittens were flapping and struggling in his hands as Caro started yelling about naked wheelchair burglars.

  “She’s not a burglar!” Pete shouted. “She’s my client!”

  He wasn’t sure anyone had even heard him. Pete was debating trying to hide the kittens in the closet (likely to end with him on the floor and them circling the ceiling) when his mother called, “Pete? Mijo? Where are you?”

  “In my bedroom!” Pete called. “I’m sick!”

  Footsteps approached rapidly. In desperation, he crammed both kittens into his pillowcase, then sat up so he was leaning against the headboard rather than on them, but his body hid any visible squirming. He hoped.

  He wasn’t a moment too soon. His door opened and in marched his mother, followed by Caro and a very disheveled (but, to his guilty disappointment, not actually half-naked) Tirzah with what looked like lawn clippings in her hair. A moment later, Mom and Caro were standing over him, and Tirzah was… sitting… over him. She did have grass in her hair.

  Two furry lumps squirmed against his back, and one began worrying at his shirt. He suspected Batcat. He’d recognize those needle teeth anywhere.

  “Mijo!” His mother put her hand to his forehead. Pete braced himself against the pain, which was far worse than that of the cuts, until she lifted it. “You don’t look good. What’s the matter?”

  “I… uh…” Pete considered and rejected “a cold” (not serious enough to keep him in bed), “the flu” (contagious, which wouldn’t work as he wanted to get his mom and Caro out of the room but keep Tirzah in it), and “heatstroke” (too serious, Mom would insist on a doctor.) Then it came to him. “Food poisoning. I must’ve eaten a bad burger.”

  A kitten hurled itself into his back, and another one tried to climb up it. He leaned back a little harder, blocking its access.

  “Why’s she here?” Caro asked suspiciously. “Why’s she wearing the shirt I gave you?”

  “I threw up on her dress.”

  “EWWWWWWW!” Caro shrieked. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Tirzah stifling a grin.

  “And I think I’m about to throw up again, so if you could all…” He waved a hand toward the door.

  Caro fled, but his mother wasn’t so easily grossed out.

  “Do you need help getting to the bathroom?” Mom asked. “A bucket?”

  “I can manage—”

  One of the kittens squeaked, which Pete covered with a loud gagging noise. And apparently not a very convincing one, because Mom’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Mijo…” she began, then sneezed.

  “Bless you,” Pete and Tirzah said simultaneously.

  “Thank you.” Mom sneezed again, then wiped at watery eyes. “I feel just like there’s a cat in here. Hmm. I wonder if Caro smuggled one into her room. Maybe the lawn clippings were to make a nest for it. Or makeshift kitty litter.”

  Pete felt completely at sea. “The lawn clippings were from Caro’s room?”

  “I have a cat,” Tirzah volunteered. “I’m probably covered in cat hair. Sorry.”

  “Not in Pete’s shirt, you’re not,” Mom said.

  “Cat saliva,” Tirzah said. “She licks me all the time. People who’re allergic to cat fur are usually allergic to their spit too. And she likes to climb on my head, so my hair’s bound to have fur all over it. I’ll take a shower… Um…”

  “You can use mine,” Pete said.

  Mom’s eyes seemed to bore into him. Just like the forty kitten claws currently boring into his back. “I see. Well, you certainly don’t look well. I’ll make you some soup. Tirzah, I’ll bring you something from my closet for you to wear.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Valdez,” Tirzah said.

  “Please,” Mom said. “Call me Lola.”

  “Thank you, Lola.”

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  Mom sneezed again, shot a suspicious glance at Pete and an incredulous one at Tirzah’s hair, then went out. To Pete’s relief, she closed the door behind her.

  “I couldn’t find Batcat,” Tirzah whispered.

  “I’ve got her,” Pete said. “Spike too.”

  “You do? Where are they, in the closet?”

  He shook his head. “In my pillow.”

  “What?!” Tirzah burst into giggles.

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Come in!” Pete called.

  Mom came in with clothes draped over one hand and a plastic bucket in the other. With a twinkle in her eye, she deposited the bucket by the bed and handed the clothes to Tirzah. “Here you go. I’ll have soup ready in half an hour.”

  As soon as she closed the door behind her, Pete said, “I think Mom thinks we… uh… have something going on. She never knocks.”

  Tirzah flushed a pretty pink. Avoiding his eyes, she said, “I guess that saves us having to come up with a more convincing explanation.”

  Both kittens bit Pete hard, saving him from having to respond to Tirzah’s implication that they should go ahead and fake-date by default. “Ow!”

  He leaned forward and handed her the kittens, pillow and all. “Can you put them in the bathroom? It’s got a pretty thick door, so if it’s closed, hopefully no one can hear them. And they can drink out of the sink.”

  “Hope they can use the toilet, too,” she muttered.

  “Or we could lay down some newspaper. I could get today’s from the living room.” With an exasperated sigh, he said, “I mean, you could get it.”

  “Hey, tough guy.” Tirzah’s voice was gentle. “It’s okay. You got hurt saving my life. I’ll get the newspaper, and hide the kittens, and say… whatever… to your family. You rest. You earned it.”

  Pete opened his mouth to say he was fine, then closed it again. Sure, he’d be better soon—the one thing he liked about being a shifter was the speed with which he recovered from injuries—but he wasn’t now. And it didn’t make her think less of him, any more than it made him think less of her because she couldn’t walk.

  You don’t need to hide from her, his cave bear rumbled unexpectedly.

  Pete wasn’t so sure about that. But maybe he could hide… less.

  “Okay.” His voice came out thick, and he swallowed. “Hey, I’m really tired. If
I’m asleep when Mom comes in with the soup, can you tell her to wake me up?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, Pete. You get some sleep.”

  Pete lay back down, turned over, and settled his head against the other pillow. He expected Tirzah to leave, but instead she leaned over the kitten pillow and put her hand on his shoulder. He’d gotten used to her touch, a little bit; the pleasure of it no longer came as such a shock, but it was no less of a pleasure for that. She stroked the bare skin at the nape of his neck, then worked her way farther down, easing her hand under his collar. He drew in a deep breath, relaxing into it, as she rubbed the unbandaged parts of his back.

  His cave bear made that deep rumbling sound that was almost a purr.

  I can’t fall asleep now, Pete thought. I don’t want to miss a single second of this.

  But he did.

  CHAPTER 16

  C aro pushed a piece of acorn squash around her plate, then reluctantly ate the part that had melted butter on it. Abuelita would get on her case if she didn’t eat some vegetables. “Can I have some more soup to take to Dad?”

  “He’s sleeping now,” Abuelita said. “He can have the rest later, when he wakes up on his own.”

  “That might be tomorrow morning. Nobody wants soup for breakfast!”

  “He will if he’s still sick,” Abuelita said firmly. “Eat your squash.”

  Caro shot a pointed look at Tirzah, who was also poking at her squash. “She’s not eating hers.”

  In a very soft voice, Tirzah said, “You’re a smart cookie, Caro. Very observant.” Then she shoved a bite of squash in her mouth and spoke for Abuelita’s ears. “‘S’delish.”

  Caro couldn’t help being pleased that Dad’s client thought she was smart, which annoyed her because she wanted to keep on being mad at Tirzah for barging into her room. But more than any of those feelings, she was curious over Tirzah’s extremely short and unsatisfactory explanation of why she’d hired Dad and what she was doing in their house. “So why did you have a stalker? Like, how did he find you?”

  “Princesa, let’s not talk about stalkers at the dinner table.” Abuelita offered her a dish. “Green beans?”

  Caro ignored the disgusting beans. “But I’m really curious. Dad never talks about his job!”

  “Yes, well, that’s the problem,” Tirzah said. “Your father’s job involves a lot of private stuff. I probably shouldn’t have even said it was a stalker without checking with him first. So sorry, Caro, but I shouldn’t say anything more until I get a chance to ask him what it’s all right for me to tell you.”

  “He’ll say, ‘nothing,’” Caro said. “Just like how he used to take off and we’d never know if the next time we’d hear from him would be next week or in six months, and then when he came back, all he’d ever say was ‘Sorry, Lina, I’m not allowed to talk about it.’ And when we went swimming, he’d have new scars.”

  A silence fell. Both her grandmother and Tirzah were eyeing her like they thought they understood and felt sorry for her. Caro hated being pitied, and they didn’t understand.

  She pushed back her chair. “I’m done! Good night!”

  Caro fled before Abuelita could stop her, running into her bedroom and slamming the door. She clicked the lock behind her and turned on some music on her phone, and only then allowed herself to look for Moonbow.

  Her beautiful, brilliant, magnificent, magical stallion stood on her bedroom floor, grazing on lawn clippings. Her breath caught in her throat as she knelt to gaze at him.

  So the rest of her life sucked. So her dad didn’t trust her with secrets and could barely stand to hug her, so everyone in her neighborhood was a hundred and twelve, so she wasn’t allowed to go anywhere by herself, so she was in danger of flunking computer science, so she had some weird woman in a wheelchair snooping around her room, so Abuelita still hadn’t figured out that she hated green beans—none of that mattered, because she had a tiny flying pony, and that made up for everything else.

  “You’re so smart,” she whispered, softly enough that no one outside her room could hear her over the music. “You held so still that you tricked the half-naked wheelchair burglar into thinking you were a toy!”

  Moonbow playfully froze again, making her laugh. Then he went back to grazing.

  Caro watched him, hugging her knees to her chest and her secret to her heart. Thank goodness she’d come home in time! That snoopy Tirzah might’ve picked him up if Caro hadn’t been there to stop her, and then stolen him or sold him to a lab or kept him for herself. Tirzah had claimed that she was going into Caro’s room to look for pants that would fit her, and Caro wasn’t sure whether to be mad because Tirzah might’ve been lying, or mad because she might’ve been telling the truth. Borrowing other people’s clothes without their permission was not okay.

  Moonbow finished his meal, pranced around the floor for a while, then trotted to her and nuzzled her. She stroked his silken coat and sleek feathers, and used a doll’s hairbrush to comb out his mane and tail. The stallion seemed restless and fidgety, often stamping and breaking away from her to fly near the window, only to come back.

  “What’s so interesting outside, huh?” she asked. All she could see was the moon as a half-circle of silver outside her window.

  The little stallion followed Caro’s gaze. His ears pricked up, he stamped again, and he flew to the closed window and landed on the ledge.

  Caro smiled. He’d never seen the moon this big before, at least not from her window; when he’d arrived, it had been a mere crescent. “Pretty, isn’t it? Want to go flying in the moonlight?”

  Moonbow whinnied eagerly, and tapped one hoof against the window. It made a sharp chime against the glass.

  She hurried to open the window before anyone heard the sound. “Here you go!”

  Moonbow flew out into the night. When the moon bathed him in its silvery light, it grew brighter, surrounding him in a glittering, opalescent halo. And as the halo expanded, so did he. In the blink of an eye, he went from being small enough for Caro to hold in her hand and hovering outside her window to a full-size pony like the ones she used to ride and standing on the lawn outside.

  Caro gasped in amazement and wonder. The pale moonlight turned his coat and feathers to purest silver, and his mane and tail to living opals. He was the horse of her dreams, gazing at her with huge dark eyes that reflected the waxing moon.

  She reached out to stroke his velvet nose. He nuzzled her, then tossed his head, sending his mane flying. Moonbow extended a wingtip and batted her shoulder with it, then gave an impatient stamp.

  Caro suddenly understood the message he was trying to convey. He wanted to fly. And he wanted her to ride.

  She climbed out her window and slid on to his back. There was a hollow in his back, just in front of his great wings, that she fitted into perfectly. His hide was sleek and warm, and she could feel the power of his muscles held in check. She’d never ridden bareback before, let alone ridden anything that flew. But she knew Moonbow would never let her fall.

  She gripped tight with her legs, took his mane in both hands, and whispered, “Fly.”

  The winged stallion sprang aloft, his powerful white wings beating. Caro’s heart soared with him as he flew up and up, then circled high above her house. The whole world seemed spread out below her. She could see the lights of the city like a dragon’s hoard of diamonds, and above her the winking stars. The air was chilly, but Moonbow was very warm.

  She gave a gentle tug on his mane with her left hand, as if it was a rein. Obediently, he flew to the left. Caro made him turn and circle, fly up and down and even, after some experimentation, figured out how to make him hover by giving a rapid flip of his mane with both hands.

  Caro had no idea how long they flew. Moonbow was so responsive that it was as if she and the winged stallion were a single being. Nothing had ever been more glorious, and she didn’t want it to end.

  But after what felt like far too short a time, Moonbow stopped obeying her commands and began t
o fly in a single direction. Soon she saw a familiar set of identical buildings, and realized he was returning home.

  “Tired, huh?” she asked him, suppressing a yawn. “Me too.”

  Moonbow began flying down. She supposed it was toward her house, though it was harder to see now. The moon was setting, its silvery light growing dim…

  “Oh!” Caro exclaimed. “Can you only get big by the light of the moon?”

  He beat his wings faster, hurrying downward in a tightening spiral. She held tight, sensing his urgency. A sliver of cold fear pierced her chest as she imagined him becoming small again in mid-air, imagined herself falling…

  Moonbow gave a snort, as if to tell her she was being silly. The house and lawn grew bigger and bigger, until she knew she wouldn’t be hurt even if she did fall. And then he was landing in the backyard, light as a feather. He folded his wings and snorted again. Caro scrambled off him.

  A moment after her feet touched the ground, the moon set. And Moonbow was once again small enough that the grass reached his belly.

  Caro crouched down, smiling. “I should’ve trusted you, huh? Should’ve known you’d get me safely home.”

  He gave a soft nicker. She held out her hand, palm stiff, and he trotted on to it.

  A door-slam and a thud made her whirl around. There on the porch was Tirzah, clutching an umbrella which she seemed to be using as a cane. “Caro? What’re you doing?”

  CHAPTER 17

  C aro leaped to her feet and whipped her hand behind her back. “Nothing! Nothing!”

  Well, that certainly wasn’t suspicious. Tirzah debated whether to ignore it—after all, Caro wasn’t her kid—and yet, she felt somehow responsible. Caro’s father and grandmother weren’t there, and Tirzah was. She didn’t care that Caro had to be up way past her bedtime, given that it was midnight, but she was obviously up to something more than just that. Tirzah vividly remembered being thirteen, and knew that kids that age did all sorts of wild and even dangerous things.