“Scents?”
Lawe narrowed his eyes. “The room had been inundated with her perfume.”
Jonas restrained a smile. Heavy perfume could affect Breed senses, hide the scent of another Breed or even a person. “I’d suspect damn near a full bottle of something even I couldn’t pronounce. Cabal said French, around two grand an ounce. The place had been sanitized, but Merc managed to identify the scent of blood in the carpet. Not hers, male blood though.”
“A Breed has taken her,” Jonas mused as he stared beyond Lawe, eyes narrowed, his brain working with possibilities. “Tanner was at the party that night?”
Lawe nodded. “He left a little before ten and returned to his hotel, from where he headed out to Sandy Hook on vacation. He’s currently incommunicado and refusing to take messages. Callan refuses to send them.”
Jonas’s lips twitched. “Tanner’s been planning this vacation for over two years.” That and much more.
“We need him here, Jonas. This is a public relations nightmare.”
“They can’t lay this at the Breeds’ feet,” Jess Warden, the Bureau’s lawyer, spoke up from where she sat on the couch across the room.
Jonas turned his eyes to her. Tall, cool as a mountain lake in winter, as blond and composed as an icy peak.
“I wasn’t worried about that in the least.”
“I’m aware of your concerns.” Her brow drew into a frown. “Anyone with a modicum of public speaking ability can handle this. Popular opinion will hold in the Breeds’ favor.”
“Tanner is our public relations genius,” Jonas reminded her. “It doesn’t matter if anyone else can do it. Tanner can do it better.”
She shook her head at the futility of arguing with him. She had been doing that a lot lately. It wasn’t a good sign.
His attention turned back to Lawe.
“What did Callan say?”
Lawe grimaced. “He said he will contact Tanner if need be. Until then, as he reminded me, Tanner does have an assistant now.”
This time, Jonas grimaced. “Geez. His assistant stutters.”
“She’s on standby to fly in to Washington if you change your mind.”
Jonas sighed. The timid little panther female Tanner had chosen as his assistant and trainee wasn’t exactly a prime choice in his opinion.
“Hell, I couldn’t do any worse than she does,” Jonas sighed.
Jess piped up in a droll challenge. “I dare you.”
He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. She was focused on the papers though, as if his ire or disapproval didn’t matter in the least.
“We’ll continue as we are,” he finally said. “Continue to investigate the disappearance. Has Cabal checked the room?”
“He was first on the scene. He and Jackal were still in D.C. after Tanner left.”
Jonas covered his smile. Ah yes, and so the threads were indeed coming together. Tanner would have left Cabal and Jackal behind to foul any attempt Jonas made at tying Scheme Tallant to Tanner.
“Where are Cabal and Jackal now?” Jonas asked.
“They’re in the barracks below. Waiting on orders.” There was a faint vein of mockery in Lawe’s voice.
“Let them wait.” He pursed his lips. “I’m certain they need the rest. Tell them they’re on call.”
It would be best to keep both men close at hand for the time being.
He loved it when a plan came together. Jonas was certain Cyrus Tallant thought he had managed to keep Jonas out of town with that piddling attempt at an attack that a group of purists had made against him that evening. They hadn’t come close.
Evidently Tallant had learned that Scheme was betraying him. Jonas had found the message on the relay system when he returned to the office. Her request for pickup and asylum and the information that she would meet him at the ball that was held that evening in D.C.
There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that Tanner had Scheme Tallant. Which meant she was exactly where Jonas wanted her to be. With Tanner. Safe for the time being while he pulled the rest of the threads of this little web. Shift a pawn here, pull in one there, whisper the proper words and then wait for the fallout.
“Put Alpha team on covert alert at Sanctuary,” he ordered Lawe. “I want anything out of the ordinary reported to me. Any Breed behaving out of character, asking any questions concerning Ms. Tallant, anything that seems suspicious. And monitor each outgoing transmission, no matter the means made. Cell phone, sat phone, landline and broadband. If so much as a drum taps in rhythm, then I want to know about it.”
Suspicion glinted in Lawe’s gaze. Alpha team was the special, highly organized team of investigative agents working within Sanctuary to uncover Tallant’s spy.
Lawe nodded slowly. “Got it, Boss.”
Jonas’s lips twitched. “Take care of it, Lawe. I expect you to coordinate from here. Check with Mia and she’ll set you up an office.”
Mia, his superefficient, stranger-than-hell secretary. If he hadn’t seen her file himself, he would have never believed she was a Breed.
“Don’t put me behind a desk, Boss,” Lawe snarled, his incisors flashing. “That’s just going to piss me off.”
Jonas arched his brow and stared back at the agent. He just stared. No expression. No comment.
“Goddammit,” Lawe cursed.
Jess spoke up then, her tone chastising. “There’s a lady present. Act like a snarling animal when Jonas lets me leave. Until then, remember a few manners.”
Lawe frowned before jerking his gaze back to Jonas. “Where did we learn manners?”
Jonas sighed.
“You don’t curse in front of women, Agent Justice,” Jess snapped. “Doesn’t matter who she is, where she comes from, how she talks or your opinion of her. Pretend she’s a child. Would you speak like that in front of a child?”
Lawe frowned, his gaze suddenly flickering in indecision. Jonas held back his smile. He knew damned good and well that the only child Lawe allowed himself to interact with was David Lyons. And David’s vocabulary at nine years old was impressive.
“My God,” Jess muttered, turning to make a note on a legal pad. “We’re going to have to work on this.”
“Boss, I’m going to find that office now.” Lawe cleared his throat. “I’ll uh, let you deal with this.”