Chapter 23
The tiny cottage in the quiet suburbs was so inconspicuous as to be suspicious as Dyson had termed it while he was holstering his gun and putting on his game face before getting out of the car.
"Guess, I don't even need to ask who's gonna play the bad cop," his human partner scoffed, "Obviously, the same guy who was tossing and turning n his fever and drooling onto his pillow just an hour ago."
"That's a low blow. Thought we agreed not to talk about it," the wolf said sternly, an amused twinkle belying his serious expression.
"We agreed not to talk about you getting scared of a squirrel and whining, tail tucked, in a swamp," Kenzi shrugged with her own twinkle of entertainment, "And I am pretty sure you won't need firearms or clawy arms against a geeky scientist."
"Have you met him?" the man asked casually, his sharp eyes trained at the silent cottage.
"No, not personally but Lauren talked about him. Back then, at the times we were still really talking with my sister", she replied with a fresh surge of misery, "she said he was a brilliant mind, a sweet gentle man and a failed suitor. The poor sucker didn't realize Lori was more of a love rival to him than a potential partner."
Dyson's brows shot up in puzzlement as her turned to face Kenzi.
"What? Really that dumb?" she guffawed, "My sister is not a men girl, quite apart from not really being a people person, she's heavily into girls, I mean … ."
"Ok, I got it, I am old but not thick," the wolf grumbled back, "And I saw her wooing our captive succubus, just thought it was the succubus thing not the lifestyle thing."
"You know Bo?" Kenzi was suddenly curious and read the wolf's smirk for what it was, a little flicker of triumph.
"Oh, I so do, rather did. Her. A dozen of unforgettable times," Dyson sighed with mock modesty.
"Under more relaxed circumstances I would bring over some pop-corn and angle for a meticulously detailed rendition, but right now the reminiscing is officially over, " the girl caught his drift and cut it short, "The visual of you banging my sis's lover is something I would, at gunpoint, settle for over a hole in the head but only just."
The image of the luscious succubus riding the wolf, both of them panting and sweating and writhing in indescribable pleasure, popped unbidden to the forefront of her mind and she shook it off with a bit more effort than she would have thought necessary.
"Jealous much?" she looked up to see Dyson smiling mischievously, "What with your proclivity to steer the conversation round to my lovers."
"Nyet," the girl drawled with all the nonchalance she could work up, "But I totally get it now why my sis hates your canine guts."
"Yes, Bo must have given me glowing recommendations," the shifter exposed most of his teeth in a delighted grin, which sent Kenzi, for once at a loss for a comeback, scurrying out of the car.
They halted on the porch before the door and Kenzi insisted on knocking while the fae's plan of action was more along the lines of kicking it in and striding in, riding the element of surprise.
"We're gonna be polite, geniuses can be skittish," she instructed with a pointed look, "Let me do the talking before starting to flex your muscles or brandish your badge. This negotiation needs a human touch. And don't you even think of hurting him whether he agrees to cooperate or not."
"Not ready to be as ruthless as your sis?" the wolf smirked, "Thought it ran in the family."
"He's a human," the girl tossed back.
"So, if he was fae, you'd give your blessing to me torturing him to my heart's content?" the man's smirk was gone, ousted by a brooding, heavy look.
"If he was fae, you probably would think twice before getting physical with him," she rivaled him with a simmering look of her own, "As a human, he's fair game for you."
"As far as killing and hurting goes, I don't discriminate, Kenz," Dyson snapped, surprising himself by the unexpected need to explain, "For centuries I have used humans for running errands or doing work I couldn't or wouldn't do, for sex or other forms of entertainment but I have never hurt or killed a human just because I could."
Properly rebuked, Kenzi braced herself for an apology but the wolf, as if alerted by something, suddenly inched forward and leaned against the door, pressing his ear unceremoniously to the chink of the doorframe. His face scrunched up in concentration as he was listening in to whatever had caught his fancy and Kenzi involuntarily held her breath. "What is it?" she finally whispered when the wolf straightened and rapped a decisive knock on the door.
"Nothing much, just a bit of recon," he replied smugly and rather uninformatively, "The floor is all yours, babe. You can handle it with as much human touch as you think fit"
Before Kenzi could rile at the use of the endearment, the door swung open and a man appeared at the threshold – nothing like a nerdy bespectacled hunched-over figure she had imagined. A tall muscular-looking guy in his early forties with a pleasant, to the point of manly handsome, face and a distracted look in his big grey eyes.
"May I help you?" he started, his gaze shifting doubtfully from the short pretty girl to the tall scruffy man on his porch, his hand sliding unobtrusively to the back of his back.
"You absolutely may," the wolf nodded as Kenzi glowered at him for snatching the promised floor from her, "By not connecting your fingers to that gun tucked behind the belt in the small of your back. Will safe me the trouble of breaking your arm. Will save you an arm, come to think of it."
"I take it you're not law enforcement," the man said drily as his hand made all the way from behind his back to within visibility, "If you're into robbery, you've chosen the wrong place - nothing of street value in here."
"Apart from your outstanding mind," Kenzi stepped forward and tried for a disarming smile that knocked a couple of years off her 24-year-old face, "And the gruff one here is a copper, so pardon the manners or the lack thereof. In fact, we need your help, doctor."
Taft visibly relaxed and instinctively turned to the non- threatening looking stranger.
"If that is police investigation, I'd be glad to be of assistance but I am afraid I haven't seen or heard anything suspicious recently – it's a quiet neighborhood, Miss…?" he raised his voice with a questioning inflexion and looked about to ask for their badges.
"Malikova," Kenzi replied promptly and saw a flicker of recognition behind the doctor's guarded expression.
"That's a rare name," he muttered, "Russian?"
"Yes, my father's," the girl nodded, "He died when I was five and the name's all I have left of him. Though my sister dropped it like a hot potato as soon as she got into college and left home. Thought she would blend in better with a standard-issue conventional English surname. Don't think she has ever mastered the blending trick. Thing is, she is a genius, doctor, like you."
"You are Lauren's little sister," Taft was quick to connect the dots and his expression mellowed, his eyes getting softer with a thick undercurrent of sad, "Why are you here? Looking for her? Unfortunately, I have no idea where your sister is. One day about 6 years ago she just disappeared from the campus and I have heard neither from her nor of her ever since."
"Well, that might be something I can help you with," Kenzi mirrored the sadness in his gaze with one of her own, perfected over the years, "I know where she is and I am here to ask you to help save her."
"Save her from what?" an edge crept into the man's voice.
"From herself primarily," the girl sighed, "Lori is going down a dangerous path, losing herself in her insatiable quest for knowledge and power, making enemies by the bucketful and getting her priorities all screwed up. As I've said, she is a genius and we need another genius to try and stop her."
"Quite apart from the fact I have no idea what you're talking about," the man sounded more bitter than surprised, "Why would I help Lauren Lewis?"
"Because you cared for her? Because she needs you and you just might be her last chance?" Kenzi didn't pick up on any surge of the old flame in the doctor's cautious expression and shifted from appealing to the man in him to appealing to the scientist in him, "Because the depths of science you can delve into in here is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."
"If the depths you're hinting at have been enough to lead Lauren to a dangerous brink then they will gulp me alive," Taft shook his head like a former alcoholic drawing on his last strength of resolve to turn down a fee drink, "I have a life, I have a girl-friend and I don't want any more of the heart ache Lauren brought to me all those years back. I am sorry, I don't think I can help you."
He made as if to turn and close the door in his unwelcome visitors' faces when the shifter suddenly lunged forward making both humans flinch with a flutter of fear.
"Dyson, don't," Kenzi almost shrieked stretching an arm in an attempt to intercept the charging clawed and fanged predator but let it drop as she saw a perfectly human Dyson lean into Taft's face with a surprisingly mild, almost solicitous, expression.
"The girl-friend who is not returning your calls?" his tone was ringing with false camaraderie, "the one whose disappearance was driving you to distraction seconds before we knocked? The one on a life-threatening mission who might well be dead or, if I know anything about Lauren Lewis, dissected and taken apart into atoms in the name of science right now."
The closest comparison Kenzi could draw was to a rabbit cornered by a wolf as Dyson leaned an inch further, nostrils flared, teeth slightly bared, look triumphant, and Taft shrank from him, puzzlement mixed with anxiety painted across his face.
"How do you..?" the doctor stuttered, nearing a breakdown, "What do you know about her?"
"I know that we can help each other, doctor," the wolf flashed a pair of oversized canines, yellow seeping into the blue of his eyes, "but we will all need to try and do something completely new and lay our cards on the table. And cut the preliminaries."
"You're fae, aren't you?" the man asked, awed more than he was scared, "Un-enthralled fae? What are you fighting for?"
"For my people. And for her," Dyson motioned with his chin towards the human girl who was watching the men, confused, her arms hugged around herself against the perpetual cold, "I used to think offing your dearest colleague would be the quickest fix for the fae's current predicament but for that little one I am willing to try a different avenue."
"I want to get Lauren back, the Lauren we used to know, Isaac," Kenzi spoke up, her voice shaky, "And stop her from sinking deeper into the atrocity of her own creation. We will do the fighting, help us with the science."
"How?" Taft was looking down, drawn and miserable.
"Therapy obviously won't help, and a Hallmark moment of her coming to her senses and realizing how much love there's in this world just won't happen, she's too far gone to reason with, " the girl made herself drop her arms along her sides, her anxiety subsiding, "She is just as intoxicated as her thralls. She was first poisoned with revenge but now she's getting off on power. That's what we need to take away from her, that's our last hope. I have samples, data, whatever I could swipe from under Lauren's nose. If you can work your magic and find a way to counteract her enthralling potion, that will render her helpless, with any luck, human again."
"That's a little something, a flash drive and a tube with a sample," her hand slid into the inner pocket and pulled out a small plastic box that she extended towards the scientist. The doctor finally raised his eyes to meet hers and carefully, almost reverently, took the box from her fingers.
"Come on in," he waved a hand stepping back into the hall, "Plenty of things not to hash out on the porch."
A/N: Ok, sorry for the all talk and little action but Isaac had to be brought in, not tossed in. Things will be heating up in the next chapter.