Chimera and the Cat Burglar (FUC Academy #46)

Chapter 3

Chapter

Three

Gone! Zeb had vanished.

Willy continued staring at the empty space where Zeb had lain inside the classroom, Boo by his side.

Willy blinked, not believing his own eyes, but when Boo looked up with shock on her face, he knew she’d seen the same thing.

Boo’s earlier words about a curse rang in his memory. Had Zeb come into the classroom, located the artifact, touched it with bare hands, and then fallen to its curse?

Ridiculous… curses didn’t exist. Objects weren’t actually magical.

But that empty spot where Zeb had just been made Willy question everything he once thought true.

Then the air shimmered in iridescent hues. Boo’s gaze ripped from Willy’s, and they both stared at the spot where Zeb had been, just in time for the faintest image of Zeb to reappear, darkening until…

Holy guacamole, Zeb returned!

But where had he gone? Willy hadn’t the foggiest idea, but he crouched, assessing the agent.

Zeb’s limbs remained slack, and the man’s ashen complexion gave him a deathly look, but Willy could just make out the slight rise and fall of his chest. Zeb’s eyes were set in a half-opened position. Zeb might not be dead, but he seemed to be frozen in some kind of limbo state after reappearing.

“Willy, do something.” Boo blinked up at him, demanding help.

Willy’s throat knotted with emotions, making it impossible for him to give voice to his racing thoughts of awe, fear, and dread. But he pushed through his pain, calling out, “Medic. We need a medic.”

“Move back. Everyone, give the man space.”

The stagnant commotion behind Willy seemed far off, but he recognized Alyce’s commanding presence as she came to stand beside him.

She pressed a phone to her ear as she phoned the medical team, gave directions, and then clicked to end the call.

She knelt beside Willy. “What happened, and why is Zeb unconscious? What’s going on with my agent and cadets?”

The alarm in her tone spun Willy to face his mentor. Alyce asked the question everybody wasn’t asking while he was trying to convince his mind that Zeb had disappeared before reappearing and he had witnessed the impossible.

Willy swallowed repeatedly, trying to rid his throat of emotion so he could answer Alyce. It hurt his heart to see the unconscious agent’s limp hand in Boo’s and her wiping tears with her free hand.

Feeling the weight of the situation pressing down on him, he responded, “I believe Zeb came in contact with the statue when he found the thief hiding in the classroom and fell victim to the curse.”

“Curse?” Alyce placed a hand on the passed-out man, feeling his pulse along his neck, and then opening his eyelids and inspecting the dilated pupils.

“Will he be okay?” Boo asked, her voice cracking.

“He’s no more cursed than any of us,” Alyce said with a shake of her head. “I suspect he’s been poisoned, and as for the rest of you? Smells like a lot of cannabis.”

She looked at the agents who’d straggled in behind her, some who appeared about ready to pass out, others with goofy grins on their faces.

Willy recalled the skunky scent from earlier. He was no expert, but he was pretty sure the scent came from animal pheromones, not a plant product. He didn’t like doubting Alyce, but in this case, he was pretty sure she was wrong.

“No. Time suspended.” Willy murmured, trying to make sense of his experience. “Poison doesn’t make people disappear.”

“What Alyce is saying would make sense,” Boo told him softly. “The statue is said to be cursed, but folklore often has a scientific explanation. Perhaps in the case of the artifact, it has to do with toxins that are released and cause hallucinations.”

“That’s not what I witnessed.” Willy leaned into the conversation, unwilling to give into Boo’s argument. “The agent actually vanished for a full five seconds.”

“I know it seemed that way, but it was an illusion, from the toxic fumes .” Boo narrowed her gaze and coughed into the crook of her arm.

Was Boo warning him not to interrupt her again? Willy said, “Go on.”

“I’m uncertain how far-reaching its mind-bending attributes extend,” Boo admitted. “It’s probably dissipated enough that it’s not affecting you, Director Cooper, and it’s not affecting me and Willy as bad as some of your agents because we’re feline shifters. It looks like Zeb got the worst of it because he probably had physical contact with the object.”

“Your theory seems sound.” Alyce nodded. “We need all agents looking for this thief before some unsuspecting person falls victim to it like Zeb did.”

Willy grew rigid, his shadow under the light elongating. Not only did he object to being talked over, but why was Boo lying to Alyce? Boo wasn’t mentioning the time distortion, how reality seemed to hover in the air, freezing everyone except for them. He was looking at Boo the entire time, and there was no way she hadn’t seen the same he had.

This meant there had to be a good reason why Boo didn’t want Alyce to know what had happened, and he planned to get to the bottom of it as soon as they had a private moment.

For now, he kept that to himself, considering the side eye Boo shot him, which he’d seen a time or two in the past. Not all information needed blasting, like what DIC had done to him.

Or why Boo had been charged as a grave robber.

Willy shoved revisiting that nightmare behind him. What did the pain he’d endured or the fact that Boo had been charged with desecration of a corpse have to do with their current problem?

Nothing.

Their skeletons were better left in the past. Shame had caused both of them to change and twist truths.

He set his focus on making sure no one else got hurt.

Willy gestured toward the open window behind him that led to the outside quad. In the distance, he could make out the cadet housing, and he noticed the full moon descending. “We’re wasting hours standing around. There could be another afflicted by this paralyzing toxin if they get trapped with the object like Zeb.”

Alyce threw up her hand. “Whoa, whoa. Have you forgotten that you’re still cadets? Under my protection here at the Academy? You’re not full FUC agents ready to go out on a mission to catch a thief.”

Willy glanced outside the open door. Several agents were sitting under the moonlight, their heads hanging between their knees, as if that time distortion had affected them physically and they were still trying to grasp reality.

Alyce touched Willy’s arm to get his attention.

She motioned to the open window inside the classroom. “What you can do to help is give me all the information you have on the situation. Did either of you see the suspect?”

The window was the first thing Willy had noticed and his ability to recognize an animal’s heat signature proved the thief had escaped using that window, the heat dissipating as he stood there watching the lavender aura fade.

“No,” Willy said. “We never saw anyone leave the room once we found Zeb. Thankfully, Boo and I are unharmed.”

Alyce sighed. “Thank goodness.”

Willy rolled his tight shoulders, begging the knots to unravel. The very thought of something terrible happening to Boo threatened a migraine to explode behind his eyeballs.

But the fact that he and Boo were unaffected was his bargaining chip. “If feline shifters are less affected than non-felines, wouldn’t you want to use all of them you have to track this thing?”

Alyce retrieved her cell phone. “I’ll call in feline agents from other offices.”

“And they’ll be here a day late,” Willy retorted. “While we’re here, now.”

Alyce clucked. “Like I said, I’m not comfortable getting you two involved.”

Meanwhile, the burglar was getting away. “But I am. I’m ready now.”

“No.” Alyce jabbed a finger in his direction, making sure he understood that she called the shots when it came to her cadets.

“Then let me do it,” Boo piped up. “I’ll track down the thief so no one else will get hurt. Zeb needs medical attention, and while he’s getting the help he needs, I’m your best choice.”

“You?” Willy scoffed. “I’m a chimera with superb healing abilities. I’ll go.” The faint sound of agents approaching alerted him to the medical unit’s arrival at the open door.

“Neither of you are going.” Alyce helped Boo to stand as they allowed the medics to tend to Zeb.

Once outside, Alyce said, “I won’t send any cadet without a backup. We’re not going to charge into this without a plan. I need time to gather some feline agents and brief them.”

That didn’t sit well with Willy. Knowing the object was out there and could affect the unaware worried Willy. Any unsuspecting person could be in close proximity and fall ill, like the agents had. Letting time pass without acting to retrieve it seemed a poor decision.

Willy urged, “Alyce, call in all the feline FUC agents. Brief them. Get them up to speed. Let them join Boo and me when they’re ready. But let us get started now so the case doesn’t stagnate.”

Alyce let out a deep breath. “Fine, this is what we’re going to do. I will get started bringing in agents, but the two of you aren’t going to go off half-cocked. I don’t have time to interrogate you on anything you witnessed, seeing as I need to organize a feline team. So I want the two of you to start working on this case by going into town, getting some food, and getting down all the details you can, so I can add it to the mission brief.”

Willy smiled, surprised yet pleased that Alyce finally relented. “Thank you.”

“You won’t regret it,” Boo added.

“I better not.” Alyce watched the medics wheel the ashen-skinned agent out of the classroom on a gurney.

A medic stopped to tell Alyce, “We can’t know if Zeb touched the object before entering the auditorium or if he came in contact with the poison inside the classroom.”

“Or if we’re all part of a time-bending matrix,” Willy muttered under his breath.

Willy no sooner made that comment that Boo picked her head up and shot him a wide-eyed warning glare.

Buy why? Why did Boo demand his silence?

“Hallucinations is what Willy’s referencing,” Boo said.

The medic nodded. “The poison could be monkshood, cyanide, arsenic, ricin… Both the sweet scent of chloromethane and the rotten-egg smell of hydrogen sulfide were picked up in the classroom. The symptoms were similar to ingesting magic mushrooms or peyote or licking cane toads.”

Willy had met a cane toad shifter. The thought of getting the man’s ooze on him caused Willy to shiver.

Or did he shiver from fear and from the idea of someone using poison to keep a person from directly handling the artifact?

He broke off from the two women and followed the gurney, stopping after a bit to watch them wheel Zeb off to the medical wing.

Boo came up behind him. “Zeb looks bad, and it’s my fault.”

“It’s no more your fault than it is mine.” Willy defended his ex. Boo had always put others before herself. Even in grave robbing, she’d had the best intentions.

He recalled all the details about Zeb he’d observed with his acute chimera sensory capabilities. “Zeb didn’t have tremors. He wasn’t drooling. His heart wasn’t pounding outside his chest. He may have been poisoned and fallen victim to its effects, but something else is wonky with this missing golden wanker, and that has nothing to do with you. Maybe Zeb had an enemy targeting him specifically.”

Boo inched closer, brushing her arm against his as she shook her head. “The statue’s designer could have applied poison to deter the wrong person from using the statue maliciously, but if someone wanted Zeb dead, he’d be dead.”

“And Zeb is alive. He’s heading to the med wing where they’ll figure out how to revive him. He’s in the best hands, and it’s up to the best felines, who happen to be the two of us, to solve this case.”

“You mean we happen to be the only felines at Alyce’s disposal,” Boo countered.

“Which makes us the best.” Willy winked then glanced over Boo’s head, noting that Alyce gave them space, turning to her agents and speaking to each.

Alyce caught Willy looking at her and lifted her index finger, showing him she wasn’t finished with them yet and not to leave.

Boo took the free time to corral Willy. “I was serious when I said you should stay away from this. Whatever the cause of Zeb’s condition, it’s serious.”

“Really?” Willy asked incredulously. “Look, we don’t have time to debate this. Alyce doesn’t have a feline shifter at her ready. It’s up to you and me to find this phallus and bury it where the sun doesn’t shine.”

“I’m not working with you on this.” She shook her head and took a step away from him.

“Why?” Memories of the bad blood between them surfaced. “You can’t let the past between us stand in the way of us finding a dangerous artifact. As FUC cadets, we’re sworn to protect?—”

“It’s not that,” she interrupted. “It’s not about my feelings for you. It’s about the fact that this artifact is dangerous, more dangerous than you know.”

“I don’t understand why you’re being so strange about this. I have feline DNA, just like you. What makes you better suited for this than me?”

She bit her lip before sighing and admitting, “The truth is the Bastet statue is part of my lineage and belongs to my ancestors. I’m the only one who knows how to handle it safely. A man is unconscious. I don’t know when or if he’ll wake up, and I don’t want you chasing after something you have zero knowledge of, trusting or targeting the wrong person, and ending up like Zeb.”

He heard the truth and real worry in her voice. While Willy never backed down when he made up his mind, Boo had him questioning his intention.

Willy recalled his past. He’d made the mistake of not being careful once, and it had been the worst mistake of his life. He’d kept quiet about the strange feeling he had about a man following him around their hometown of Willow Wisp when he was eighteen. He’d trusted the man because Mr. Duke was a local bus driver who’d driven Willy home from elementary school and beyond with his Bernedoodle riding shotgun. So when Mr. Duke asked for help looking for his lost dog, Willy had entered Mr. Duke’s van without a second thought.

Then Mr. Duke, aka DIC, the mad scientist, used Willy’s easy-going personality to his advantage. DIC had jabbed him full of poison and inflicted Willy with scientific shit he still didn’t understand and couldn’t explain, but it had permanently changed him.

Missteps could be deadly or life-altering.

But Willy wasn’t going to take his past as a lesson in hiding and playing it safe. He signed up for FUC training because he wanted to be a hero. He wanted to protect others from danger.

Willy shoved up his sleeves. “I want to help find the person who did this to Zeb and return the artifact.”

“That golden feline is deadly. Is that so hard for you to understand?” Boo let out a long exhale.

Maybe she cared about him still.

Nah. She was in it for herself, pushing him away, still trying to earn her mother’s approval like she had all those years ago.

“We can’t waste a minute talking about it. Just accept that we’d work best paired up since we’re both immune to the artifact.”

“Allegedly immune,” Boo added, lowering her shoulders.

Willy asked, “What aren’t you saying?”

“I don’t want you to get hurt. Satisfied?” She shifted one foot, giving him her profile.

He visualized her flicking her long, curvy tail in defiance. Her confidence drove him wild. She was sexiest when she was sure of her limits, reminding Willy that he was still learning his new body and, along with it, his desires for a new future.

“Willy and Boo.” Alyce tapped each of their shoulders as she came up behind them, trying to infuse her control over the frustration everyone was no doubt feeling. The director often showed how much she cared about her students, as if they were her children.

Alyce looked each up and down. “Instead of convening the feline contingent of FUC agents here, we’re all going to fan out. If the item is dangerous, as it seems to be, the thief will want to unload it quickly, so we’re going to head to different towns and investigate dealers, auctions, museums, and the like. Since you two are from Willow Wisp, I’m tasking you to go there.”

“As in, on a mission?” Willy couldn’t believe Alyce was actually assigning them to the case.

Willy gaped briefly before closing his mouth. Finding the artifact was his one chance to show he was ready to become a FUC agent.

Fly with that, Professor Condor .

“Thank you, Director Cooper.” Willy beamed. “We won’t let you down.”

“Don’t be rash, Cadet Tagger. The world is counting on us to locate that statue.” Alyce pulled both into a private huddle. “I don’t know what kind of poison boobytraps this artifact has put on it, and I don’t take putting my cadets at risk lightly. Little is known about the stolen artifact, according to Mr. Ramet, curator of the Grand Egyptian Museum.”

Apparently, Alyce had contacts.

“Legend says only Egyptian royalty—a lineage that sprang from an Abyssinian shifter—can destroy the artifact’s power.”

“What’s an Abyssinian?” Willy asked.

“It’s an ancient breed of cat,” Boo explained. “A lean and stealthy feline with a smooth, ticked tabby coat. Each individual hair is banded in different earthy colors, making the cat appear orangish.”

Willy thought his fur resembled that, although he’d come to label himself more of a puma shifter than a tiger when his chimerism sent him in a feline direction when he shifted.

Then Willy remembered something. “Zeb mentioned a Chosen One before he fell unconscious, but I’m no more an Abys shifter than Boo, so if it’s not us, who is it?”

A thought flashed through his mind that DIC may have injected him with some ancient breed… He wouldn’t put it past the jailed mad scientist.

“Tagger, we know better than to believe folklore that talks about curses and magic.” Alyce shook her head. “Whatever Zeb said to you in those moments were the utterances of a sick man.”

Boo cleared her throat. “So, we’re to go to Willow Wisp and put out feelers for some black-market dealings?”

Just then Alyce’s phone chimed. She looked at it, and a smile formed on her face. “And here is a good lead for you. Apparently, there is a black-market auction taking place there in three days.”

Three days. A lot could happen in that amount of time. Waiting that long seemed like a waste of Willy’s talents and abilities, but what else could he do? Search every corner of every town in the area? He might not like it, but Alyce’s lead was the best they had.

“Won’t it look weird, the two of us returning to our hometown together?” Boo asked, drawing him out of his thoughts. “We might not be able to get intel if we’re walking around, looking suspicious.”

“Good thoughts, Cadet Bombay,” Alyce replied. She thought for a moment before declaring, “What would make the most sense is if you returned as a couple. Fiancé and fiancée.”

“What?” Boo and Willy both screeched at the same time.

An engagement of convenience?

Alyce nodded confidently. “Yes, this will work. I’ll get you tickets and a monetary allowance.”

Boo gasped, and her eyes morphed into the size of quarters. “Now, Alyce?—”

“It’s the only way.” Alyce snapped her jacket.

Willy’s heart stuttered.

Boo had fought against partnering with Willy not five minutes ago. He doubted she’d go along with him as her sidekick, let alone his fiancée for this gig. But he’d take whatever punishment she dished out to help a future fellow agent, even if he had questions. “To what degree do we have to showcase our relationship?”

“Just be a convincing couple.” Alyce twisted a ring on her finger, the diamond as large as an olive. The more she twisted and the further the ring slid to her fingertip, the surer the assignment became.

“I don’t have to like it.” Boo’s gaze drifted as Alyce handed the ring to Willy.

Willy clutched the ring. Alyce fawned over her students, making sure every detail fit the part. He held out his hand, asking Boo for hers, remembering when he’d dreamed of slipping a ring on her finger for real. “I don’t bite.”

She rolled her eyes.

Willy’s chest tightened. She had loved when he’d nibble that spot below her ear, and she’d climaxed every time he’d taken her from behind and sank his teeth into her shoulder, claiming her.

Boo coughed, and he thought she might sputter up a hairball at the idea of their fake engagement, but she inhaled and placed her hand in his. “Fine.”

He pushed the ring onto her manicured hand, the red polish highlighting the beauty of the stone. “It’s fake, Boo.”

Until I can make it real.