“Or stop us,” Jonathan said, and I paused. I guess both of those were real reasons.
“Yeah,” Jacob said. “I think we should at least get to know her.”
“By taking her away from that asshole,” I replied. I knew that what we were planning wasn’t exactly legal, but it seemed right, for all of our sakes.
One thing that I didn’t want was an all-out war with the wolves. It wouldn’t take much to push our fragile relationship into warlike territory. I knew that the bear council would never forgive us if we caused a war, so we would have to be careful about the way we executed it.
“So, do we have ourselves a plan?” Jacob asked, and I nodded.
“I think so,” I said.
“I’ll plan it out,” Jonathan said and headed to his big computer. I didn’t know what he was going to come up with, but I couldn’t wait to find out.
Chapter Seven
Johnathan
I didn’t ever think that I would be using my design skills to plan a kidnapping. But then, I didn’t think I would use my design skills for a lot of things. We had figured out where Jenny worked, where she lived, and we were on top of getting her schedule from the store by hacking into their system.
I had also tried to figure out when her boyfriend was away from the house. That was a bit harder, but I hacked into things like nearby security and traffic cams to at least figure out a pattern. It seemed that he was away in the early mornings, and he sometimes left the house in the middle of the night.
“I bet he’s cheating,” Jacob said as he read over my data.
“I mean, maybe he is,” Frances replied. “But wouldn’t that motivate her to leave even more?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Some girls are into that, and some girls don’t care...or they actively encourage it or something.”
He raised an eyebrow at me.
“I don’t think there are any women who don’t care if their boyfriend cheats on them.”
“No, there are,” I replied. “They are just not possessive or they just...I don’t know, have little self-esteem so they think they deserve it.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Perhaps I’ve just been stuck in one-night stands and traditional relationships for a while.”
“Since when have you had a traditional relationship?” I asked him. I didn’t think that Jacob had ever had a traditional relationship. I didn’t think any of us had ever had a traditional relationship.
“I haven’t,” he said. “But I assumed that was what I was supposed to be doing.”
“Sure,” I said with a shrug. “Look, our best chance to get to her is in the early morning. She sometimes leaves the house for work when he’s not home yet.”
“Interesting,” he said. “But do you know what time he’ll be coming home?”
“I don’t,” I replied. “But it’s usually in the middle of the day if he isn’t home in the morning. I don’t know, maybe he runs a gambling business or something. He's usually home by the time she gets back from work, and that’s when they fight. The police have been alerted several times during the afternoons when she gets a snack.”
“The police?” Frances responded. “That’s dangerous for a shifter, to have them there.”
“I know,” I said. “You’d think that he’d curtail that behavior.”
“Maybe he likes to live dangerously,” I said as I clicked through a couple more options. “OK, I think I have everything figured out. We can go tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Frances replied. “Don’t you think that is a bit soon?”
“Well, I guess,” I said. “But it depends how long you want to leave this. Do you think there's a chance he could be onto us?”
“I don’t think so,” Frances said. “But who knows. Maybe he has a hacker watching you.”
“Doubt it,” I responded. “Do you know how many lawyers of encryption I have on this thing? No one is watching us.”
“Regardless of anyone watching us,” Jacob cut in. “We shouldn’t leave this too long. I don’t think...I don’t think I could take it if we left it too much longer.”
I knew exactly what he was referring to. This girl was still in my dreams every single night. I wanted her here, in our house, in my bed, and in my life. I hadn’t shared with the rest of them how deep that went, but I knew that Jacob spoke my mind.
“Well, then it’s decided,” I said. “We’ll go tomorrow, and whatever happens, happens.”