“They are animals.” Terry glared at her. “You’re sticking up for them?”

“You’re calling them that? That’s priceless coming from four thugs who kidnapped me.” She snorted loudly and rolled her eyes.

“Bitch!” Ned yelled as he lurched to his feet. “You broke my nose. I’ll show you what kind of animal I can be.”

Paul gripped his arm. “Sit down.”

“She’s asking for it,” Ned whined but he sat.

Terry sighed. “She’s never going to do what we want. We should just get rid of her and tell our boss she accidently died when we grabbed her.”

“You don’t go against the doctor’s orders ever. I told him I’d make this happen and that, in the end, he’d get her alive when we were done with her.” Paul shot a frightened look at his men, seeming to be in charge of them. “Trust me. That’s one man you never want to disappoint. He is allowing us to get a taped statement from her but after that, he plans to use her for one of his experiments. Our informant believes something sexual happened between her and the animal who took her. He overheard a conversation between Justice North and one of the security animals. They said she could be hurt and they wanted a doctor to check her out but she refused to press charges against the animal for rape. They didn’t say attempted rape. He was clear about that.”

Tammy knew the color drained from her face. Someone had leaked information to a hate group, someone close to Justice North. She’d never met him but she’d seen him in interviews on television since he was the most well-known New Species. His people had voted him into leadership as though he were some kind of president. He made most of the decisions for them. Someone obviously was spying on him and telling these men what was being said. Worse, they knew about her and Valiant. Not good.

Four pairs of eyes studied her. Tammy glared back. She guessed the only way out of the mess would be to convince them they had the wrong information. She could only hope they wouldn’t kill her.

“I don’t know who you’ve been talking to but it’s bullshit. That never happened,” she bluffed. “I’d find someone more reliable if you’re paying that person to feed you information. Maybe you should hire them to write fiction since they seem to be good at making up stuff. Is your informant some reporter for one of those gossip rags? Did an alien attack me too?”

“She f**ked one of those animals?” Terry sounded stunned as he stared at her as if she were something he’d never seen before, something disgusting. “You screwed an animal?”

She closed her eyes, counted to five, and opened them. “Listen, cowboy. Did you just hear me? Whoever told you this crap is full of it.”

“That’s what we were told,” Paul confirmed. “He hauled her up off the ground and carried her away. Our informant heard the conversation between the head animal and his security dog.”

“I think his head of security is a cat.” Ned shrugged.

“Does it matter? Dog? Cat? What’s the difference?” Terry snorted. “They are animals that walk around on two legs thinking they are as good as us but they aren’t. They are nothing more than test rats that grew brains. I’m so sick of them breathing and seeing idiots on the news praising those abominations for what they are doing by setting up their own living environment. It’s like patting a bird on the back for making a nest in their cage with newspaper bits. They are tainting our country and now they are putting their dirty paws our women. We’ve got to stop them.”

Ned stared at Tammy. “Maybe he brainwashed her. We know it’s possible.” He leaned over, staring at her. “Is that why you’re protecting your animal lover? Did he torture you into submission? Maybe he bit her and infected her with some disease that makes her one of them. Is that it? Are you infected? Have you started to grow a tail or fur?”

Tammy couldn’t believe she’d been kidnapped by such morons. It made her almost feel ashamed that they’d succeeded. “Why don’t you come over here and take a look?” She wanted to kick the son of a bitch since legs that weren’t tied down.

He stood and walked toward her. Tammy tensed. When he was close enough she twisted and kicked him as hard as she could in his shin. He screamed, jumped back and fell on his ass.

“You bitch!” he yelled.

“You moron!” Tammy shouted back.

“Enough,” Paul demanded. “Stay away from her. She’s obviously sick in her head if she let one of them touch her. We’ll have the doctor take care of her. He’s a vicious son of a bitch.”

“It’s a good thing those animals are shooting blanks or she could have a litter of puppies if she got pregnant by that thing.” It was the unhurt man who spoke while he studied her. “Do you think, if it was possible, that she’d have as many as a dog bitch would have? My pit bull had six puppies last time.”

“Shut up, Mark.” Paul shot him a glare. “Everyone knows they are sterile so don’t even go there. It makes me sick. That’s a blessing they can’t have kids. They probably would breed like animals, with litters. Let’s just get some sleep, rest up, and in the morning we’ll hike out of here and take her to the house. Our reinforcements will hit town the day after tomorrow with the doctor. We just need to keep her alive until he arrives. That should give us plenty of time to make her tape a statement that we can send out to the press to show everyone that those things are dangerous.”