Island Stripe Pride - Chapter 32: Chapter 32

Trench entered the 135th Precinct as he had a hundred times or more and headed straight for Rami Llewelyn’s desk. The detective had texted him a half hour ago with a tip on some urgent information.
“Yo,” Rami called, motioning for the Tiger to come to his new office.
“Moving up in the world?” Trench asked, taking note of the boxes and eco-friendly cups full of stale coffee.
“Yeah, yeah. Cornetti?” he offered, holding up a box of fresh pastries.
Trench eyed the delicious little delicacies made by the detective’s new mate, Noemi. The woman was a terrific pastry chef and owned the most fantastic little shop called D’Angelo’s Bakery. Trench was a regular. As a Tiger with a sweet tooth, he knew where to find all the goods.
“Thanks, man. So, you got news?” he asked, seating himself in one of the Shifter sized chairs available to him.
“Yeah. A 911 call came in a few hours ago, a young woman claiming she was attacked by three guys in her building’s basement,” he explained.
“That’s terrible and all, but so what?”
“The so what part is my guys were tracing the lead you sent about that video evidence of the Wolf shifting behind The Stripe Club, and it leads right to this woman’s email account. Her name is, uh,” Rami glanced at the file on his desk. “Grotto. Bria Grotto.”
“So, we think she has something to do with this video?”
“I don’t know, but you know we’re swamped here, and the SCNYC is supposed to be in on this,” Rami said, using the acronym for the Shifter Council of NYC.
“A couple of normals went and interviewed her already, but since the attackers were gone, and she didn’t mention the video, there was nothing they could do about it.”
“What else do we know?”
“We know Ms. Grotto has a pretty popular vlog where she records paranormal sightings and encounters. She actually invites guests on her video blog where she conducts interviews and holds panels about what she calls supernatural stumbles. It’s like where normals happen upon the likes of us. She’s bright and funny,” Rami remarked, grinning like the ridiculously hairy house cat most Lions were.
“Cute too.”
Rami flashed him a screenshot of the female, and Trench’s inner beastie seemed to still. First time that had happened to him like that and he didn’t like it. Not one bit.
The woman was young, maybe thirty, and rounder than most normals. She had a dimple on the right side of her full lips. In the picture, said lips were turned up in a warm smile that reached her sparkling brown eyes. She seemed to be enjoying herself, in spite of, or maybe because of, the ridiculous headband with cat ears she wore on her head, along with some plastic whiskers attached to her nose.
“Cute, right?”
“Oh, yeah?” Trench asked, suddenly annoyed.
“Does Noemi think so?”
“Hey, no call to be nasty. So, you gonna investigate or what?”
Trench mulled it over for a few minutes. Tiger Shifters liked to consider things from all angles before they attacked. It was why they were such good hunters. Thorough and precise, they stalked their prey before taking them down.
Tigers didn’t rely on their females like the Lions did. Nor did they allow their passions to rule them, like the Wolves. They were lethal, steady apex predators who enjoyed working alone. Trench would hunt this Bria Grotto, and he would retrieve the damning footage and ensure his kind were protected. That was his job.
“Alright, give me what you got,” Trench said, taking the file and an apricot cornetto for the road.
“That’s the last apricot!” the Lion growled.
Trench just grinned, popping it into his mouth, and finishing the delicious morsel in one bite. He winked at Rami and strutted out of the precinct with his file in hand.
Bria Grotto lived at the Madison Arms with a slew of roommates. She’d been vlogging for the past year or more, having only moved to NYC nine months ago from her hometown of Paramus, New Jersey. From her picture, he noted she was a curvy little human. Cute too.
What the fuck?
Trench shook his head. He must be delirious. Reading the file, he noted her interests were strongly fixed on proving the supernatural existed. And wasn’t that his kind’s biggest fear?
Foolish woman was in a heap of trouble. The McLeesh Wolf Pack would be out for blood, and Dean might not be able to stop them from getting it. Though the Tiger King was typically levelheaded, there were some things even he could not stop.
Shifters needed their secrets kept. After all, who wanted to live their lives in a lab? And that’s what would happen. Worldwide incarceration and forced medical tests on all of his kind. No fucking way.
Was it the Shifters’ fault humans forgot their origins? That they could no longer connect to the magic that had created them. Call it God, gods, some fucking explosion or what have you, it all amounted to the same thing. Creation came from the beautiful chaos that was magic.
But it wasn’t Trench’s job to educate the masses. It was his job to protect the Pride, and while his Neta was head of the Council, that extended to all supes. If that meant grabbing this little girl before she let the cat out of the bag, he would. Too bad though. She really was cute.
Grrr.
“Looks like you picked the wrong topic for your vlog,” Trench murmured as his eyes went to the grainy image taken from the security feed of her building’s back door.
The three hulking men who’d attacked her were familiar to him. Another second, and he knew why. They were Wolf Shifters. And at least two of them had been at the Council meeting.
Fuck. This was not good. This was going to get messy. He had a feeling about those kinds of things.
Dammit. Trench hated it when shit got complicated. He took out his cell phone and texted his Neta, bringing him up to speed on the turn of events.
The video has been traced to a human female, a video blogger. Some dogs are on her trail.
The phone chimed, and Trench read his Neta’s reply and grunted.
Get there first. Secure the normal and get her to safety. And keep the bodies to a minimum, would you please?
Trench grunted at the last. He was not making any promises. He frowned as he reread the message. Why should his Neta care if the woman was safe? Maybe the man had grown a soft spot for humans. After all, he’d mated one.
Whatever.
It wasn’t Trench’s business. He was an Enforcer and would do as he was told. It was in his training. His Neta wanted him to get the girl, so he would get the girl. Period. Even if his stomach was doing cartwheels and his Tiger was chuffing for no real reason. Trench felt the hair on his neck stand up like something was about to happen.
Whatever it was, he’d be ready.