“I know. Unfortunately. How is everything going with our current assignments?”
“Excellent!”
“Jax, Heath, and Bobbi all came to an agreement?” Kenneth was skeptical. Jax and Bobbi were fated mates, a wolf and coyote shifter, respectively. Jax had a tendency to growl and complain when Bobbi accepted assignments that might put her in the line of danger. Heath Gallagher, a bear shifter and her adopted older brother did the same. The notion of them all agreeing on who should be assigned to a particular job was highly suspect.
“Of course they did. Bobbi was out for the day running errands, so I gave the information to Jax, Jax passed along the information to Bobbi, and she was fine with it.”
“Okay.” Something about that didn’t sound right. Something was setting off warning bells in Kenneth’s head, but he was too distracted by Chloe to try to figure out what, exactly.
No, not Chloe, he reminded himself. He was too distracted by the fact that there were mysterious break-ins and art thefts occurring at homes he owned around the world, and Chloe’s family might know why, and she refused to talk to him. That was all. Chloe didn’t distract him in the slightest. She was a fairly attractive, stubborn, highly annoying panther with terrible taste in men. The fact that she had taken an instant dislike to him was proof of that.
“Good luck, then,” he said doubtfully. “I’ll be home soon.”
“No worries,” Tyler assured him. “Dominick, put down-” As the phone clicked off, Kenneth heard screams in the background.
Chapter Two
Chloe’s house
Russettville, New York
Chloe paced on her back porch, feet crunching on freshly fallen leaves, cell phone pressed against her ear. There was a delicious chill in the air, and a breeze ruffled the branches of the pine and oak trees that clustered around her small rented Colonial-style house.
Chloe’s mother picked up on the fourth ring. She’d been debating exactly how to break this to her mother. The Chamberlin family was a touchy subject. Telling her mother that in a few short hours she would be at a fancy dress ball which was also being attended by Kenneth Chamberlin was not likely to go over well.
Telling her that she’d met Kenneth in person and worse, had a bizarre physical reaction to him, almost as if he were her fated mate, although of course that couldn’t be…that would be the perfect way to send her mother into hysterics.
“Novak Antiques,” her mother said. “Hilary speaking.” Her mother owned an antique store in Syracuse, an hour from where Chloe lived and taught.
“Mother! Long time no speak.”
“Hello, dear, how nice to hear from you. How’s my favorite academic superstar daughter?”
“You mean you have more than one? And I’m your current favorite?”
“Current favorite, yes, but if you don’t post to your Facebook a little more often, you might lose your favorite child standing. It’s hard to cyberstalk you if you’re never online.”
“I hate social media,” Chloe grumbled. “I can’t believe that my own mother is more social media obsessed than I am; it’s against the natural order of things.”
“Do you know how many sales I make by having a Facebook page? And of course, Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr. By the way, I can’t help but notice you’re still single, unless you’ve just forgotten to update your status. . You need to update your profile picture. I’ve met some very nice men on the online dating sites.”
“Eek.” Chloe’s father had passed away several years earlier, and her mother had finally decided to get back in the dating game. Chloe didn’t want to know. She just really, truly didn’t want to know.
“Eek, what? I’m a woman. I have needs.”
“Mother!” Chloe groaned, mortified. Oh, lord, she needed to rein this conversation in quickly. And her mother wondered why she didn’t call more often?
“In fact, I’m pretty good at writing up online profiles. I was thinking-”
“Listen, mother,” Chloe interrupted quickly. Her mother could go on for ages. If Chloe didn’t cut her off quickly, she was in serious danger of having her own mother write up a dating profile for her and upload it herself. “I was wondering…remember how I told you Kenneth Chamberlin’s been leaving messages and trying to call me at my office?”Her mother’s voice instantly grew wary. “Yes. I got those messages, too. And?”
“I was just wondering if you knew why he suddenly, urgently needs to speak to us.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Who understands how people like that think?” Her mother’s light, happy toned turned bitter. “Perhaps the Chamberlins have decided they want to ruin another generation of our family?”