He grunted in acknowledgement as disgust filled him. Anyone who would bid on a woman like that was bottom feeder scum. Buying a kidnapped woman, dragon or not, was a thousand shades of fucked up. And the women had to have been kidnapped. Who would volunteer themselves to be sold off to the highest bidder?
No one except Damara, that was. His chest tightened with worry. She could absolutely take care of herself. She was a badass fighter and an excellent Enforcer. But there was only one of her and God knew how many of them, with unknown gifts.
It was why he would have insisted on staying if Lily wasn’t there. At least with him there, they’d have his ability to sense the shifters gifts when he was around them. Although he supposed that wouldn’t have helped once she went undercover, because he couldn’t follow her there.
“Is Damara a lion, too?” Lily asked, like she was following his line of thinking with Damara.
Half his mouth lifted in a crooked smile. “Sort of?”
He caught a glimpse of her frown as she looked at him. “How can she only be sort of?”
“Are you sure you want to know?”
“Well, yeah. I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t want to know.”
He slanted a look at her as he spoke. “She’s a griffin.”
Her mouth popped open as she stared at him, and he chuckled inwardly as he looked at the road again. He never got tired of that reaction. Not that he got to see it often. Dmitri and Damara kept their animals’ existence a closely guarded secret. The vast majority of people, human and shifter alike, had no clue griffins were real.
“She’s a griffin? Like, half lion, half eagle?” she asked, her voice incredulous.
“Yep. Keep that to yourself, though, okay? Only a select few people know they exist.”
“Of course. I’d never tell anyone. Not about them or any of the Enforcers. Or about shifters, period.” She was quiet for a moment, nibbling on her lower lip. “What kind of animals do the others have?”
“Dmitri’s a griffin, of course, like Damara. Luke’s a lion, Tarun’s a tiger, Blake’s a grizzly, and Liam’s a white raven.”
“A white raven?” she asked, surprise in her voice. “I’ve never seen one of those.”
“He’s basically an albino raven.”
“And Blake’s a grizzly—that’s why you have a grizzly in the Enforcer logo. Because he’s the leader, and that’s his animal. You lied.”
He glanced over to see a smile on her face, and he relaxed as he realized she wasn’t upset. “Yeah. I’m sorry about that, but I couldn’t exactly tell you the real reason when you asked. And he didn’t technically pick it out. We voted on it when the logo was being designed. We all thought it should be his animal in there, since he’s the leader.”
She opened her mouth to speak but paused as her laptop dinged. Frowning, she grew still after she typed some commands in. “Noah—”
His phone rang, interrupting her, and he glanced at the screen, seeing Blake’s name flashing. He pushed a button on the steering wheel, accepting the call. “Blake.”
“Noah, Lily. Damara’s in.”
He frowned. “That was quick. Did they just kidnap her from the festival, or what?”
“She told Liam that a woman approached her and asked if she wanted a private tour of the mansion. When she was showing her a bedroom, the woman locked her in, and she’s still in there. No one has come for her yet.”
“I hope she’s being careful.”
Lily turned to face him, and he glanced at her, stilling when he saw the alarm in her eyes. “Noah, I’ve been caught. And whoever caught me is following us.”
Blake spoke before he could reply. “That was actually what I was calling about. I received a tip that someone on the tech team caught a breach about an hour ago. They left to come after you right after. Apparently, the only ones who know about it are the tech and one other shifter who’s with him. Fernandez hasn’t been notified yet.”
Noah sped up, glancing in the rearview mirror at the deserted highway. “How do you know this? Who’s feeding you these tips?”
Blake sighed, and even through the phone, it sounded frustrated. “I don’t know. Whoever it is, is the one who put us onto Fernandez to begin with. They text little clues here and there, but they’re untraceable. They’re routed through a thousand cell towers and we can’t pinpoint a location. The text I just received is the longest and most detailed yet.”
Lily was still typing away on the computer, her eyes narrowed on the screen. “Almost…”
“Are you getting out of there and wiping it?” he asked, his eyes flicking back and forth from the road to the mirror.