Black Market Bear (A BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) (Genesis Valley Book 2) by Amelia Jade Page A

another level. The entire place was designed to withstand a brutal assault, inflicting mass casualties on anyone that tried to storm it.
    Ajax couldn’t help but wonder just what sort of enemies the organization had.
    Or is making.
    He crept farther along, still seeing no signs of life, or even cameras. The hallway ended in a staircase. He made his way up, pausing at a window that overlooked the rest of the facility.
    Once one got past the entryway, it looked like any normal shipyard. There were two slips for big cargo boats, along with sliding cranes that could take cargo from the ships and put it on the trucks. There was even a big rig parked near a crane now, though it was empty of both a container on its trailer and a driver.
    A noise sounded from somewhere down the hallway on the second level that led closer to the crane and waterfront. Ajax crouched and moved softly along the steel floor, doing his best not to make any noise.
    He heard the scrape of footsteps against the floor, and prepared himself. Calling his bear to him, he used its senses to test the air and see what he was up against.
    The instant the pheromones hit his nose, Ajax jerked upright in surprise.
    No. It couldn’t be!

Chapter Eight
    Arianna
    “Hmm,” she said softly to herself, careful to keep the noise down.
    Her fingers flew across the keypad, trying to unlock the system, to see if she could figure anything out and search for more details. Anything would really be a head start. It would give her something to go on. Something that she could go to Ajax with and be like, “See!” to show him why he should have kept her on the case.
    Arianna had been furious that morning at the blatant dismissal from Ajax. Oh, she understood what he was getting at just fine, but that didn’t mean she had to like it. If she chose to put herself in harm’s way, then so be it. After a long time of living with the threat of being shot just because of where she lived, of people breaking down the door in the middle of the night, she wasn’t afraid of some government organization that thought it was above the law.
    “You have got to be kidding me.” She bashed her fist gently off the terminal as yet another attempt was rejected.
    “You know, if you wanted to remain undetected, you really should stay quieter.”
    Arianna spun at the voice, her heart jumping into her throat as she fought down the urge to yelp at the unexpected noise.
    “Took you long enough,” she snapped as Ajax walked into the room.
    His jaw dropped. “What?”
    “I’ve been here for half an hour trying to work this out. Where the hell have you been?”
    The big shifter stared at her, astonished.
    “I...” he stopped, looking back from the way he had come, to her, and then back and forth again. “Are you serious? What the hell, Ari? I asked you to stay away from this,” he hissed.
    “You what?” she snarled back, still keeping her voice quiet. “You did not ask anything. You ordered me around as if I were subordinate to you or something. Don’t twist the truth on me, mister!”
    He threw his hands up. “Bad choice of words, sorry. But still, you shouldn’t be here. You need to go, now! Before someone catches you.”
    She turned away, fiddling with the terminal some more. “And what are you going to do?” she asked. “Stay here until someone finds you?”
    He frowned. “No, I’m going to look for information.”
    The terminal beeped, showing up red lettering that read Password Incorrect yet again.
    “Well good luck,” she said angrily. “This place may be deserted, but it’s certainly locked down.”
    She stood aside as Ajax stepped up to the computer terminal, looking the room over once again.
    Three terminals sat side by side down the length of the room, all facing away from the door, aimed at a bank of four screens that occupied the far wall. For the moment, they were all off, as were two of the computers.
    “I spent half an hour snooping around inside of here, and this was