Black Kat by Kirsten DeMuzio Page B

situation here?” Bass asked, and Colin had to resist the urge to land one on the old bastard’s jaw.
    Kat broke eye contact and looked toward Bass.  In a matter of fact tone she said, “There are several women being held in that house.  Drugged and tied down.  And…there might be a rather large man with a gunshot wound to his upper right thigh.”
    Bass raised both bushy eyebrows.  “Really?”
    Kat shrugged.  “Maybe.”
    Bass turned to greet the LVPD officers who had just arrived.  C olin stayed right where he was.
    Scrubbing both hands over his face and through his short brown hair, Colin said, “How do you know that, Kat?”
    She leaned back against her car and crossed her arms over her chest, a classic Kat defensive pose.  “You probably don’t want to know.”
    “Jesus Christ, Kat!  What the fuck are you doing?  Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
    Kat merely watched him as he had a semi-meltdown.  The thought of her putting herself directly in danger like that was enough to make him go postal.  Normally any implication on his part that she couldn’t take care of herself was met with an equal amount of yelling on her part.  Today, though, she watched him and said nothing while he lectured her.
    “Colin, I’m okay.”
    Colin raked his eyes over her lean body and enchanting face and saw that she was in fact unharmed, although there was a red mark high on her left cheekbone.  H is hand itched to reach out and caress her face, but he held back.
    “Tell me what’s going on, Kat?”
    “I came here to find a woman that may have been held in the same place as me.  I found a lot more in that house than I bargained for.”
    Colin scoffed and shook his head.  There were no words for the squeezing pressure in his chest when he thought of Kat being hurt - again.
    “How…how did you know where to go?”
    Kat wouldn’t meet his eyes, and Colin had a sinking feeling he knew where the intel had come from.  His vision was already hazing over with the redness of rage when Kat confirmed his suspicions.
    “A tip from Alexander.”
    Colin’s hands clenched into fists at his sides.  “I swear to God, I will kill him!  Does he have any idea what he was sending you into?” Colin shouted.
    Kat stepped forward to wrap her fingers around his biceps.  The fact that this was the first and only time Kat had ever initiated physical contact with him didn’t go unnoticed.
    “He didn’t know I was coming here.  He only called to let me know what his investigator had found.  Alexander was going to send his own men to check it out.”
    “Then why are you here?”
    Kat let go of his arms and looked straight into his blue eyes.  “I had to.  Colin, I can’t move on until I find him.  He has to die for what he did to me.”  She motioned toward the house behind them that was now swarming with LVPD.  “And for what he’s done to them.  And God knows how many other women.”
    Colin spun around and shoved his hands into his hair.  He understood what she needed; he just wished she didn’t feel the need to exact revenge herself.
    “Thank you,” Kat’s voice was soft as it spoke those two simple words from behind him.
    Slowly he turned back around and saw that curious emotion again in her eyes.  When he furrowed his brow in question, Kat continued, “Thank you for saving me, Colin.  I have spent a lo t of time thinking about what had been done to me in the past.  Today, in that house, I saw what didn’t happen to me.  What you saved me from.”
    Colin was momentarily speechless.  Saving her had been enough.  He never expected her gratitude.  Though he had long hoped for her feelings to be returned, he had come to th e conclusion that she might be incapable.  Now though, seeing something new in her eyes, and hearing her say those two simple words to him, hope flared anew in his heart.
    Kat tentatively took a step forward and lifted her arms slightly.  Colin didn’t need any more