Forever Is Not Enough [Council Enforcers 2] (Siren Publishing Classic)

what he was saying over the alarm. Finally, he scrambled out of bed and tossed her clothes to her before getting dressed himself.
    Jacqueline stared down at the rags in her lap that had formerly been her clothes and shook her head. She knew they were under attack and that she should have a sense of urgency about her, but for some reason, she was having trouble concentrating with the noise. She felt as though her skull was going to explode and wondered how Ben was able to ignore it.
    He was suddenly on the bed and shaking her shoulders. Jacqueline could tell he was shouting at her, but his voice sounded as though it were underwater. Thankfully, the sound was cut off, leaving her ears ringing.
    “You have to move, little mate. That alarm signaled a perimeter breach, which means we only have a few minutes to get into position.”
    She noticed he was fully dressed and nodded. Jacqueline shook off the last of the effects of the noise and climbed out of bed. “Go. I’ll be fine.” She knew the plan and how important his part in it was. “The noise just got to me for a moment. I’m fine now. I promise.”
    Ben stood and stared at her, concerned. “Get to the safe room. I’ll come for you as soon as this is over.” When Jacqueline nodded, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her. “I love you, little mate.”
    “I love you, too.” She watched Ben head to the bedroom door and remembered the whole reason she had woke him up in the first place. “Wait,” she yelled and grabbed the syringe off the nightstand. She ran over to him and lifted the arm of his T-shirt and injected the antidote before he could say anything. “Now, you can go.” Ben just nodded and turned to look at her one last time before he left, closing the door behind him. Ignoring the sudden feeling of loss, she ran to the dresser and pulled out a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.
    Jacqueline heard the next round of Ben’s explosives going off just as she was zipping up her jeans, letting her know she only had minutes to get herself in the safe room. She ran down the hall and headed for the stairs, cursing the fact that she had forgotten to ask Ben to show her where the safe room upstairs was hidden. It would have certainly been faster to go to that one where she assumed Tessa and Nico were than the one all the way in the basement.
    At the bottom of the stairs, Jacqueline gasped. Through the large picture window Mitch loved sunning himself in front of so much, she saw dozens of her father’s men out in the yard. Some were in their shifted form, and some were human with claws and fangs, but they were all surrounding Mitch and Ken, who had both shifted. Mitch had shifted into his large golden lion, and Ken into a very frightening grizzly bear. They were all standing still as if they were under a spell, waiting to see who made the first move. Jacqueline seemed to be under the same spell as she stood rooted at the bottom of the steps, holding her breath, waiting to see what would happen.
    All of a sudden, the rogue shifters started dropping one at a time to the ground, and Jacqueline frowned until she saw blood starting to bloom on each of their foreheads, letting her know her mate and Ryan were carrying out their part of the plan. It didn’t take long for the rogues to realize what was happening. They all moved at once, attacking Mitch and Ken, who seemed to have no problem handling themselves with the large number of rogues. With one last look, Jacqueline turned and headed for the basement.
    “Wait,” she yelled at the bottom of the basement stairs when she saw the safe room door slowly closing. She had assumed Tessa and Nico were in the room upstairs, but she let out a sigh of relief when the woman peeped around the door with those eerie ice-blue eyes that matched her son’s. Jacqueline was glad she wouldn’t be alone waiting and wondering what was going on outside.
    She skirted around Nico’s tiny table and then her own. She was about ten feet from the door when she saw Tessa’s eyes go wide and her mouth open to scream. Before Jacqueline could turn to see what Tessa was looking at, her hair was caught in a vise grip, and she was yanked to a complete stop.
    “There you are. I’ve been looking all over for you.”
    Jacqueline started to shake in fear from the playful voice coming from behind her. She shouldn’t have been surprised her father had found a way into the house without anyone knowing, but the man had definitely caught her off