by Nora Roberts
9
Since she had more to pack up and deal with than he did, Coop fried up some bacon, made coffee. By the time she’d made her calls, gotten her gear, he’d put a trail breakfast together and set his campsite to rights. He was saddling his horse when she came over to saddle her own.
“What are you going to do with her?”
“Immobilize. With the drug gun I brought, I can get within two feet of her, inject a dart into her without hurting her. I’ll take blood and hair samples, gauge her weight, age, size, and so on. Fit her with a radio collar. Thanks,” she added, obviously distracted when he handed her a mug of coffee. “I plan on giving her a small dose, but it’ll keep her out a couple of hours, so I’ll have to stand by until she comes out of it, recovers. Until she’s recovered fully from the drug, she’s vulnerable. It’s a good day’s work, but if things go well, by noon she’ll be on her way, and I’ll have what I came for.”
“And what does all that give you?”
“You mean besides satisfaction?” As the sun pinked the rims of the eastern hills, she swung into the saddle. “Information. The cougar’s listed as a near-threatened species. Most people, I’m talking people who live and travel in known cougar territories, never see one.”
“Most people wouldn’t be you.” He mounted, offered her one of the bacon biscuits he’d put together.
“No, they wouldn’t.” She looked at the biscuit, then at him. “You made breakfast. Now I feel guilty about bitching about you coming along.”
“That’s a nice side benefit.”
“Anyway”—she took a bite as they turned the horses toward the trail—“most of the sightings reported turn out to be bobcat, or the occasional pet. People buy exotic cats—and we get calls every month from someone who did, and doesn’t know what the hell to do now that Fuzzy isn’t a cute little kitten anymore.” She took another bite. “But mostly, people see a bobcat and think—holy shit, cougar. And even on the rare occasion it is holy shit, cougar, most people don’t understand it isn’t looking for man meat.”
“There was a woman right in Deadwood a year or so ago who almost had one join her in her hot tub.”
“Yeah, that was cool.” Lil polished off the biscuit. “The point that might be missed is it wasn’t interested in her—didn’t attack. It was stalking deer and ended up on her back deck at the same time she was having her soak. It took a look at her, probably thought, Not dinner—went away. We encroach, Coop, and you don’t want to get me started on my conservation riff, believe me. But we do. So we have to learn how to live with them, protect the species. They don’t want to be around us. They don’t want to be around one another unless it’s time to mate. They’re solitary, and while they interact with others higher on the apex in some habitats, we’re their only predator once they reach maturity.”
“Might make me think twice about putting in a hot tub.”
She laughed. “One’s unlikely to join you. They can swim, but they don’t much care for it. The girl up there’s wondering how the hell she got trapped? She’s got about another eight, nine years if she hits the average life span for a female in the wild. She’ll mate every couple of years, have a litter, again on average of three. Two of those three will likely die before their first year. She’ll feed them, defend them to the death, teach them to hunt. She’ll love them until it’s time to let them go. She might range a hundred and fifty square miles of territory during her life span.”
“And you’ll track that with the radio collar.”
“Where she goes, and when, how she gets there, how long it takes. When she mates. I’m doing a generational study. I’ve already tagged two generations through Baby’s littermate and a subadult male I captured and tagged last year in the canyon. I’ll start another with this one.”
They moved into an easy trot when the trail allowed. “Don’t you already know everything there is to know about cougars by this point?”
“You never know it all. Biology and behavior, ecological role, distribution and habitat, even mythology. It adds to the wealth, and the more there is, the better we know how to preserve the species. Plus, funding. Contributors like to see and hear and know cool stuff. I give the new girl up there a name, put a shot of her on the Web page, and add her to the Track-A-Cat section. Funding. And by exploiting her, in a sense, I add to the coffers going to protect, study, and understand her and her kind. Plus, I want to know.”
She looked his way. “And tell the truth, it’s a great way to start the morning.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“Fresh air, a good horse under you, miles of what people pay good money for in art books, and an interesting job to do. It’s a good deal.” She cocked her head. “Even for an urbanite.”
“The city’s not better or worse. It’s just different.”
“Do you miss it? Your work there?”
“I’m doing what I want. Just like you.”
“It counts. Being able to do what you want. You’re good at it. The horses,” she added. “You always were.” She leaned over to stroke her gelding’s neck. “We’re still going to dicker over the price for this one, but you were right. Rocky suits me.”
She frowned, slowed. “There’s our friend again.” She gestured at the tracks. “He cut across, picked up the trail here. Long strides. Not running but moving fast. What the hell is he up to?” Something tripped in her heart. “He’s heading toward the grassland. Toward the cougar.”
Even as she spoke, the scream ripped and echoed. “He’s there. He’s up there.” She pushed the horse into a gallop.
The scream echoed again, full of fury. And the third, high and sharp, cut off with the snapping report of a gunshot.
“No!” She rode half blind, dragging at the reins to steer around trees, clinging, pushing as her mount raced through the snowpack.
She slapped out at Coop when he pulled up alongside and grabbed her reins. “Let go. Get off! He shot her. He shot her.”
“If he did you can’t change it.” Shortening Rocky’s reins, he kept his voice low to calm the horses. “There’s somebody up there, armed. You’re not rushing up, risking breaking that horse’s leg and your neck in the bargain. Stop. Think.”
“He’s already got a good fifteen, twenty minutes on us. She’s trapped. I have to—”
“Stop. Think. Use your phone. Call this in.”
“If you think I’m just going to sit here while—”
“You’re going to call it in.” His voice was as cold and flat as his eyes. “And we’re going to follow the tracks. We’re going to take it one step at a time. Call your people, see if the camera’s still up. Have them report the gunshot. Then you’re going to stay behind me, because I’m the one with a real gun. That’s it. Do it now.”
She might have argued with the tone, she might have argued with the orders. But he was right about the camera. She pulled her phone out while Coop took the lead. “I’ve got a rifle if I need it,” she told him.
She reached a sleepy-voiced Tansy. “Hey, Lil. Where—”
“Check the camera. Number eleven. The one I fixed yesterday. Check it now.”
“Sure. I’ve been watching since you called. I went out to check on the animals, brought Eric back with me so. . . . Hell, it’s down again. Are—”
“Listen to me. Cooper and I are about twenty minutes from the site. Somebody’s up there, been up there. There was a shot.”
“Oh, my God. You don’t think—”
“I need you to put the police and game warden on alert. We’ll know in about twenty minutes. Get Matt on call. If she’s wounded I’ll get her in. We may need an airlift for that.”
“I’ll take care of it. Stay in contact, Lil, and be careful.” The line clicked dead before Lil could respond.
“We can move faster than this,” Lil insisted.
“Yeah, and we can move right into the crosshairs. It’s not how I want to spend my morning. We don’t know who’s up there, or what he has in mind. What we know is
he has a weapon, and he’s had time to run, or find cover and lie in wait.”
Or he could have doubled back, Coop thought, and even now could be setting himself up for some human target practice. He couldn’t be sure, so he couldn’t follow the urge to immobilize Lil and tie her to a damn tree while he went on without her.
“We’d better go on foot from here.” He turned his head, met her eyes. “It’ll be quieter, and we make smaller targets. Take your knife, the drug gun, the phone. Anything happens, you run. You know the territory better than anyone else. Get lost, call for help, and stay lost until it comes. Clear?”
“This isn’t New York. You’re not a cop anymore.”
His gaze was frigid. “And this isn’t a bag-and-tag anymore either. How much time do you want to waste arguing with somebody who’s bigger than you are?”
She dismounted because he was right, and loaded a small pack with what she felt she needed. She kept the tranquilizer gun in her hand.
“Behind me,” he ordered. “Single file.”
He moved quickly, covering ground. She kept pace as he knew she would. Then he stopped, pulled out his field glasses, and using the brush for cover, scanned the grassland up ahead.
“Can you see the cage?”
“Hold on.”
He could see trampled snow, the line of trees, the jut of boulders. Countless opportunities for cover.
He scanned over. The angle was poor, but he could see part of the cage, part of the cat. And the blood on the snow.
“I can’t get a good look from here. But she’s down.”
Lil closed her eyes for a moment. Even so, he watched grief rush over her face. “We’ll cut over, come up behind the cage. It’s better cover.”
“Okay.”
It took longer, and the way was a battle with incline, knee-deep snow, rough and slippery ground.
She shoved through brush, accepted Coop’s hand for a boost when she needed it.
And on the bright, crisp air, she scented blood. She scented death.
“I’m going out to her.” Lil’s voice held calm and nothing else. “He’d have heard us coming if he stuck around. He’d have had time to circle around, take cover, and pick us off if that’s what he wanted. He shot a trapped animal. He’s a coward. He’s gone.”
“Can you help her?”
“I doubt it, but I’m going out to her. He could’ve shot you last night, the minute you stepped out of the tent.”
“I go first. Nonnegotiable.”
“I don’t care. Go on, then. I need to get to her.”
Stupid, he told himself. A risk that solved nothing. But he thought of helping Lil set up the cage, how he’d watched with her as the trap sprang.
He couldn’t leave the cat there.
“Maybe you should fire a couple of rounds, so he knows we’re armed, too.”
“He might take that as a challenge.” He glanced back at her. “You’re thinking it’s easier to kill a trapped animal, or an animal anyway, than it is a human being. It’s a mistake to think that. It depends on who’s doing the shooting. Stay back, and stay down until I tell you.”
He stepped into the open.
For a moment his skin was alive, his muscles tight and tensed. He’d been shot once, and it wasn’t an experience he wanted to repeat.
Overhead a hawk circled and cried. He watched the trees. A movement brought his weapon up. The mule deer waded through the snow, leading the way for the herd that came behind.
He turned and walked to the cage.
He hadn’t expected her to stay once he moved, and of course, she didn’t. She stepped around him, knelt on the frozen ground.
“Would you turn the camera on? If he didn’t wreck it, that is. We need to document this.”
In the cage, the cat lay on her side. Blood and gore from the heat of the shot soiled the ground. She buried the urge to open the cage, to stroke, to mourn, to weep. Instead, she contacted her base.
“Tansy, we’re bringing the camera back up. The female’s been shot. A head wound. She’s gone.”
“Oh, Lil.”
“Make the calls, and make a copy of the video. We need the authorities here, and transportation to get her out.”
“I’ll take care of it right now. I’m so sorry, Lil.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
She clicked off, looked over at Coop. “The camera?”
“Just turned off, like before.”
“There’s a short, restricted hunting season on cougar. We’re outside that now. And this is private land, posted land. He had no right.”
Though her voice remained steady, firm, she’d gone very pale, so her eyes shone like black pools.
“Even if she hadn’t been caged, defenseless, he had no right. I understand hunting. For food, as a sport, the arguments for ecological balance as we take over more and more habitat areas. But this wasn’t hunting. This was murder. He shot a caged animal. And I put her in the cage. I put her there.”
“You’re not stupid enough to blame yourself.”
“No.” Those eyes kindled now with pure rage. “The bastard who walked up to the cage and put a bullet in her head’s to blame. But I’m a factor. I’m the reason he could.”
She sat back on her haunches, took a breath. “It looks like he came up the trail, crossed to the camera, disabled it. He circled the cage, took a look at her, stirred her up. She gave her warning call. He kept her stirred up. Maybe it was more exciting that way, who knows. Then he shot her. Fairly close range, I’d guess. But I don’t know for sure. Can’t tell. We’ll do an autopsy, recover the bullet. The police will take it and tell us what kind of gun he used.”
“A handgun from the sound of it. Small-caliber from the look of the wound.”
“You’d know more about that, I suppose.”
She did what she needed to do now, and he said nothing about the integrity of a crime scene when she opened the cage. She laid her hand on the ruined head of the young female who by her estimation had lived only one full year. Who’d learned to hunt and ranged free. Who kept to her secret places and avoided company.
She stroked. And when her shoulders began to tremble she rose to walk out of camera range. Because he had nothing else to offer, Coop went to her, turned her, held her while she wept. And wept.
She was dry-eyed and professional when the authorities arrived. He knew the county sheriff slightly, but imagined Lil had known him most of her life.
He’d be in his early thirties, Coop judged. Tough-bodied, tough-faced, sturdy in his Wolverines as he assessed. His name was William Johannsen, but like most who knew him, Lil called him Willy.
While he spoke to Lil, Coop watched a deputy take pictures of the scene, the cage, the tracks. He saw, too, Willy lay a hand on Lil’s shoulder, give it a pat before he stepped away and headed in Coop’s direction.
“Mr. Sullivan.” Willy paused, stood beside Coop and looked at the dead cat. “That’s a terrible, cowardly thing. You hunt?”
“No. Never got the taste for it.”
“I get a buck every season. I like being outdoors, pitting myself against their instincts. My wife makes a good venison stew. Never hunted cougar. My pa, he’s a hunt-it-eat-it man, and taught me the same. Don’t fancy chowing down on cougar. Well, cold out here. Got some wind going. Lil says you’ve got horses standing down yonder.”
“Yeah. I’d like to get to them.”
“I’ll walk you down a ways. Said she called her pa, and he’s on his way to meet you back where the two of you camped last night. Help you load up.”
“She needs to go with the cougar.”
“Yeah.” Willy nodded. “I’ll walk down some with you and you can tell me what’s what. I need more, I’ll get it from you later on, after you’ve had a chance to get back. Warmed up.”
“All right. Give me a minute.”
Without waiting for assent, Coop went back to Lil. Unlike Willy, he didn’t give her a comforting pat. Her eyes were dry when they met his. Dry, and
a little distant. “I’ll get the horses, meet Joe back at the campsite. We’ll get your gear to you.”
“I’m grateful, Coop. I don’t know what I’d’ve done if you hadn’t been along.”
“Handled it. I’ll be by later.”
“You don’t need to—”
“I’ll be by later.”
With that, he walked away, and Willy fell into step with him.