She didn’t talk to any one Breed or human with more interest than the other, and she only danced with the human males. A few male Breeds showed some interest in her, watched her with a surfeit of it, but none approached her
. If she approached them they talked with her but watched her with suspicion and a hint of question. A few actually glanced over at him disapprovingly as they talked to her.
His jaw tightened in satisfaction that it was his scent that stopped them. He’d made certain she carried it as he kissed and tasted every inch of flesh he could get to before she left with those two damned Wolf Breeds earlier.
Draeger and Tobias had been far too smug, too satisfied as they left the house with her. Something about their expressions and the gleam of knowledge in their eyes as they glanced back at him had set his teeth on edge.
The two Breeds in question were currently making their way to where he stood at the bar, their hard, savage expressions drawing looks of wary interest from the women they passed.
Draeger, black haired, his dark blue eyes intense, didn’t draw the gazes his partner Tobias did, though. Red hair, carefully cropped beard and mustache and grayish green eyes were rare enough in a man. In a Breed, when combined with the rough-hewn features, years of savage training and an innate determined force, it ensured he’d never be overlooked.
Both men wore jeans, dark T-shirts and boots, similar attire to everyone else at the club. Still, like every other Breed there, they stood out, drew notice.
“Maverick.” Draeger nodded as he slid up to the bar on one side of Cullen while Tobias slid in on the other side. He didn’t miss the fact that they were attempting to close him in, to make him feel hemmed in, restrained.
Most Breeds would have instinctively felt that way about two others they were uncertain of. Cullen wasn’t uncertain of the Wolf Breeds, though. He knew why they were with Chelsea, he just couldn’t figure out what the hell she was doing that caused her to need them.
“Took the two of you long enough to visit,” Cullen murmured, lifting his beer to his lips as his gaze sought out Chelsea again.
She gave Draeger and Tobias a long, probing look, met his gaze, then turned away as he tipped his beer in her direction.
She wasn’t happy with his presence there any more than her Wolf Breed shadows were. And he hated that. There was a time that she would have smiled at him, her dark eyes filled with warmth and a subtle invitation. An invitation he hadn’t allowed himself to accept while she was with the Agency. Now, in the weeks since she’d left, that invitation had been replaced with a gleam of hurt and no small amount of anger.
“You going to make a habit of following her everywhere she goes?” Tobias cut straight to the point. “That’s not very smart. You’re just going to call more attention to her.”
No one had ever accused the Breed of being tactful, Cullen guessed.
“Looks that way,” he drawled, keeping his eyes on Chelsea. God only knew what kind of trouble she’d get into if he actually took his eyes off her. “And from what I understand, it would be hard to draw more attention to her. Wasn’t she just attacked a few nights ago?” His fist clenched at the thought of the knife-wielding Coyote the two Wolf Breeds had been forced to kill to defend her.
“Anomaly.” Draeger shrugged. “She’s not in any danger, unless you make an issue of this. Is that what you want to do?”
The warning tone of the Breed’s voice didn’t sit real well with him. If the Wolf thought Cullen was going to back down in the face of it, then he’d better think again.
“If making an issue of it becomes a problem, then I’ll be here to take care of it, now won’t I?” he informed them coldly. “The two of you are wasting your time. If you don’t have anything constructive to say, then go back to your corners and become shadows again.”
The two Breeds glanced at each other, their expressions closed, revealing little but the wariness he knew he was causing them.
Assholes. Unless they wanted to tell him what the hell was going on, then he had no use for them.
“You’re becoming a problem, Commander,” Draeger commented. “You ignore her for weeks, then think you can step in and play white knight? Stay the hell way from her. Your scent is becoming a deterrent to other Breeds and placing her off-limits. And we both know you have no intentions of keeping her.”
And what exactly was Chelsea up to that required her to associate so closely with male Breeds? He wanted to ask that question so bad his back teeth ached as he locked them tight to hold it back. Asking wouldn’t get him anywhere, and he knew it.
“Pest control.” Cullen grinned. “I’ll have to remember that. As for keeping her, last I heard, she wasn’t a possession.”
The two Breeds were silent for long moments, obviously debating their next words, wondering the best way to get rid of him, short of killing him. And killing him could prove difficult for them. Perhaps not impossible, but difficult.
From what he’d gathered on the two over the past hours through several sources he’d contacted, Draeger and Tobias were supposedly not aligned with any particular pack or alpha leader. They weren’t associated with the Bureau of Breed Affairs or any of the smaller task forces working to identify and control the Breeds still working for the elusive Genetics Council.
Who the two Breeds were working for, Cullen hadn’t been able to learn. The fact that they were indeed employed wasn’t in doubt. Just as Chelsea’s employment now wasn’t in doubt. But if anyone knew who had retained their services, they weren’t saying.
“Four weeks since she parted ways with your Agency and you’re only now becoming curious in regard to how she’s using the training you gave her while she was with you?” Tobias asked as Chelsea and Ashley moved to join a small group of feline Breed males and their human dates. “Why now?”
It was obvious they were unaware it was Chelsea who’d rescued the little girl in the desert weeks before, then disappeared.
The attack had no reason or explanation. Council Coyotes didn’t just attack for the hell of it. If she’d somehow been identified as Louisa’s rescuer, now, that would be a reason for an attack. Or someone knew what she was involved in with these two.
“She wasn’t in danger until now.” He shot Tobias a look of promised retribution. And he would repay the two Breeds just as soon as he figured out what they had drawn Chelsea into. “I’ll put a stop to whoever sent those Coyotes after her the other night, and when I do, then I’ll come looking for the two of you,” he promised.