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

darkness,
Kylie forced herself to look anyway. Even in the darkness, she knew that the
blob that was a lighter shade of darkness curled against the far wall was the
body of an animal.
    Kylie hastily got out of the way as Maxim backpedalled and shut the
door. “That was probably the coyote shifter Jack mentioned,” he said, so angry
that his words were barely more than a series of growls. “We can’t help him
anymore.”
    She grabbed onto Hunter’s arm, feeling both sick and furious. How awful
it must have been, to have died all alone in the cold darkness after you had
lost your mind to the point of completely losing your humanity, terrified and
in unimaginable pain. That all of their missing loved ones must have been
forced to live locked up like this for months, for years…
    A snarl fell from her lips. She wanted to go back to the young man in
the lab coat Maxim had decked and rip out his throat with her teeth, to go back
above and do the same to the piece of shit geneticist they’d left in the car.
But then Hunter said one word that instantly snapped her out of the killing
rage she had inadvertently fallen into.
    “Ryder.”
    Kylie shook her head violently. What was wrong with her? She had to get
it together, dammit! There were people counting on her right now.
    Without a word, Kylie followed Hunter to the next door and then to the
next, moving down corridor after corridor until they had all been opened and
searched and they found themselves at a different stairwell than the one they
had left with no sign of another living soul.
    “Up or down?” Maxim asked.
    “Down,” Hunter said immediately. “The others are probably searching the
two floors above us as we speak. While this floor reeks of various shifters,
none of the scents are particularly fresh. Either they were moved because of
Jack’s escape, or we tripped a silent alarm that your people didn’t catch and
they were forewarned to move them somewhere deeper and likely more protected.”
    “Then maybe we should wait for the others to catch up,” Kylie said. “We
could very well step into a room full of lions with guns rather than needles.”
    She fully expected Hunter to at least argue with her—she could
practically taste the urgency to find his brother rolling off him—so she was
shocked when both men nodded.
    “Let’s return to the other stairwell,” Maxim suggested. “Once we meet
up, half can follow me down this one while the other half continue down the
other with you two.”
    Retracing their steps, they had nearly reached the door to the
stairwell when a hail of gunfire erupted from somewhere above, freezing them
where they stood for a few, heart-pounding seconds. Unfortunately, the door
didn’t have a window as some stairwell entrances did.
    “Get into that room!” Hunter hissed, steering Kylie by the elbow
towards the first room they had inspected, his Glock clutched tightly in his right
hand.
    Then the stairwell door exploded open before she could move more than a
couple of steps, and a mass of bodies spilled into the hall.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
     
     
    “Shit!” Hunter snarled, bringing his gun around to face these newest
invaders—only to let out a surprised laugh. “You guys fucking scared the shit
out of us!” he hissed.
    Kylie turned around and saw several familiar faces. Her shoulders
sagged in relief.
    “We’d hoped you all had gotten down this far when we didn’t run into
you topside,” one of the tigers whose name her frazzled brain couldn’t remember
at the moment said.
    “How many are shooting at you?” Maxim demanded.
    “At least a dozen. They came from somewhere within the house, itself, I
think. As far as we could tell, the bobcats took out all the security guards
outside before we even made it in.”
    “I guess we’ll all have to use the other stairs,” Maxim said. “Follow
us. We were just waiting for you all before heading down to continue the
search.”
    “Have you been able to locate any of the