by Anna Lowe
“He’s coming,” Burman called, more amused than alarmed.
Goode broke into a wide grin and pulled away. “Perfect.”
Before Ella could execute the knee-in-the-balls move she had planned, Goode stunned her with a heavy slap and rearranged her bonds to secure her to the bed frame. Seconds later, he stomped toward the door.
Ella screamed inside. No, Jake. No! Get the others. Get help! Don’t risk yourself.
But it was too late. Jake barely made a sound, but the wind had carried his scent, and her fox ears flicked at the faint sound of careful footsteps padding through the surrounding forest.
Goode chuckled in anticipation. “McBride.”
Chapter Fifteen
Jake ran in a crouch, stopping behind one tree before dashing to the next. Then he stopped cold at the sound of his name.
“We know you’re out there,” Goode announced in that arrogant tone.
Jake frowned. He hadn’t been making a sound. How the hell had Goode picked up on his approach?
He straightened slowly. So much for the element of surprise — the only advantage he had. Clicking his fingers over his phone, he dialed Kai one more time. He’d been trying to reach Boone and Kai throughout the drive — the only two guys whose numbers he had. Every good soldier knew better than to rush into enemy territory without backup or a solid plan. But, shit. Neither Boone nor Kai was picking up. Too busy with the baby emergency, it seemed.
Well, this was an emergency too. Ella had been taken, and every second counted. It was a miracle he’d found his way to the remote property, especially since he hadn’t been paying much attention the one time Ella drove him there. But at every confusing intersection or hidden turn, he’d known where to go as sure as if a navigation unit had been pointing the way. Somehow, he could feel Ella out there, and that drew him on.
“Damn it,” he muttered, pocketing the phone. Then he strode out into the open and stepped onto the lower edge of the sloping property. No flak vest, no helmet, no weapon. Just a spinning mind and a hammering heart.
“About time you came.” Goode stood high and mighty on the front porch, establishing his position immediately. I am boss here, and you have no chance.
Jake didn’t blink. Goode might be the boss of the man standing at the foot of the stairs, but he sure as hell wasn’t Jake’s boss. Both Goode and the other guy appeared unarmed and supremely confident of…what? Tearing him to pieces with their bare hands?
Something in the way Goode’s eyes shone suggested that wasn’t far off.
“Where is she?” Jake demanded.
“Got her right where I want her.” Goode sneered.
“The hell you do,” Ella barked from somewhere inside the house.
Jake took half a step forward before he caught himself. Thank God Ella was alive. Conscious, too, and obviously pissed off. He pictured the layout of the house, trying to pinpoint her.
Goode laughed. “Feisty little thing. Just how I like them.” Then he called to Ella and adjusted the crotch of his pants. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. You won’t have to wait long. I’ll be right in.”
Jake gritted his teeth. Goode was goading him. He had to cut emotion out of the equation if he was going to find a way out of this.
“You and that asshole yes-man of yours, Burman?” she snapped back. “Or do you mean Patel, wherever he is?”
Three men, then. Jake looked around. Goode and a black-haired guy — Burman, he assumed — stood at the bottom of the stairs, but the third was hiding somewhere. Go, Ella, for keeping her head together and conveying that information to him. Of course, with Ella, he expected no less. Her words also indicated she wasn’t being guarded, so she might have some way of working herself free from however they had her tied or cuffed.
Jake snapped his attention back to his adversaries as the third man, Patel, emerged from where he’d been concealed. A tall guy with long, fair hair. For a moment, all Jake could see was a silhouette, and he shook off the feeling of it being familiar somehow. The only thing that mattered right now was buying Ella time to get free. Of course, it would only take those two one squeeze of a trigger, and he’d be dead. But the weird thing was, neither of them had pulled a weapon yet.
“You wanted this property so bad, you kidnapped the owner?” he asked, glancing around surreptitiously for something he could use as a weapon.
Goode loomed over the scene from the front porch, arms crossed, a wicked grin on his face. “There’s so much you don’t understand.”
Jake had no desire to talk to the guy, but he had to keep Goode talking — and ideally, coax him down from the porch to pull his attention away from Ella. “Then why don’t you explain?”
Goode didn’t signal, but Burman nodded and started circling around Jake. Sizing him up, flashing an obnoxious, I know something you don’t know grin.
Jake turned slowly with him, keeping one eye on Goode and Patel, who didn’t budge.
“Collateral damage. You know what that means?” Goode called out as Burman reached a a point behind Jake, forcing him to jerk around in order to keep everyone in his sights. Every muscle in his body tensed. It would have been the perfect moment for them to jump him from opposite sides, but Goode seemed content to draw the tension out.
Jake didn’t bother to answer. Of course he knew what collateral damage was.
“That’s what you might call Miss Kitt.”
Jake clenched his fists. The hell, she was.
“You touch her, and I’ll—”
“Oh, but I have.” Goode leered. “I plan to do a lot more touching, in fact. The funny thing is, I didn’t come to Maui for her.”
Jake forced himself to keep his inner soldier engaged and not the gorilla that urged him to rush Goode then and there. Something glinted behind Patel — the machete Jake had left stuck in a stump before. He calculated how many steps it would take him to get there, but he didn’t make a move. Yet.
A bird swooped overhead, casting a shadow over him, then fluttered into the woods.
“So you came for…?” Jake murmured, only half paying attention while he tried to cobble together some kind of plan.
Goode laughed. “I came for you.”
Jake stopped abruptly. What the fuck?
He would have said that, too, if it hadn’t been for that bird fluttering back. Lower this time, sweeping right over Burman’s head. The black-haired man ducked and cursed as the bird hurtled toward the porch, right at Goode. A big owl with mottled gray wings that matched the shadows of the forest.
“Bitch,” Goode uttered, slapping the air with his hand.
The owl veered away and landed on the low branch of a giant monkeypod tree on one side of the property.
Jake eyed Goode. Bitch? Of all the things to call a bird…
He put a hand over his right pants pocket because, damn. His thigh was itchy under there. Really itchy, like the time Manny had slipped a hot chili pepper into his pocket in one of many practical jokes.
Patel stepped away from Goode’s side, moving through the dappled light, and Jake froze. He knew that guy. Tall man, long hair. The driver of the car that had tried to run him down?
His mind spun. So that hadn’t been a prank. But what the hell did they want?
“You came for me?” Jake held his arms up in surrender. “You got me. Let Ella go. She has nothing to do with this.”
Goode smirked. “Ah, but she does. Moira wanted to send Silas a message that she could strike anywhere, anytime, and that’s done. Even better, the little fox means something to you. She means a lot to you, I suspect. Which is why I am going to take her away, just to even the score.”
Jake’s mind spun. Moira. Fox? What did Goode mean?
“Even the score,” Jake echoed in a perfectly flat voice. He didn’t even know the guy.
A second owl flew into view — so big, the air whistled around its wings. The bird curved around Jake, swept right over Burman, making him duck, and made a graceful landing on a tree opposite the other
owl. There, it shook out its wings and stared at Burman with huge, intelligent eyes.
Just a couple of friends of mine, Ella had joked before.
It was uncanny, the way the birds gave Jake the sense of reinforcements creeping into position. But, hell. Friends of Ella were friends of his. If Goode and Patel were at twelve o’clock from his point of view, the owls were at three and nine o’clock. Burman was the second hand on that clock, sweeping around and around, keeping Jake on his toes. But the owls put Goode and his men on their toes, too, making them swivel their heads the way Jake had been doing. He wasn’t confident that the owls would actually help, but he welcomed the distraction they provided.
Goode shot each bird a dark look and went on. “Of course, I have to even the score. Unless you have five million dollars. I’d be happy to take that instead.”
The guy was nuts. Certifiably nuts. But the longer he talked, the more time Ella had to get free.
Come on, Ella, Jake urged in his mind.
The crazy thing was, he swore he sensed some kind of reply. Just a tickle at the edge of his mind, really, but somehow, it felt like Ella. Grunting something like, Give me another minute, and I’ll make these assholes sorry they were ever born.
His right hand slipped to his leg, tempted to itch that hot spot on his thigh.
“Why would I give you five million?” he asked, turning on his heel to keep an eye on Burman.
“Because that’s what you cost me that day in Kamdesh.”
Jake froze. A stupid move, because if Burman or Patel had been paying closer attention, they could have capitalized on his surprise to jump in. Luckily, one owl screeched to the other just then, distracting them.
Kamdesh. The ambush. The day his unit had swapped positions with another vehicle that had gotten blown to bits.
I’m telling you, man. Someone is taking us out, one by one.
Jake stared at Goode. “The day my unit survived and another unit took the hit?” Did the lunatic want a million for each of the lives lost?
Goode scoffed. “Like it matters to me who lives and who dies. The money was supposed to get through. I had it all set up — the first vehicle with the money was supposed to get through while the others got hammered, but you ruined all that.”
What money? Jake wanted to yell, but he was still reeling from the like it matters to me who lives and who dies part.
Goode checked his watch and snapped his fingers at his men. “Take care of him already. We’ve wasted enough time.”
Patel grinned. “You mean the fun way, right?”
Jake grimaced, wondering what this guy’s version of fun was. Would they back over him a few times with the heaviest truck they could find?
“The fast way,” Goode snapped, then scowled at Jake. “Unless you want a deal?”
Jake made a face. Eyes didn’t lie, and Goode’s had death written in them. He could promise all he wanted; there would be no deal. At least, not one that ended with Goode upholding his end of things.
Still, to keep the clock ticking, he bluffed. “Sure. A deal. You let Ella go.”
Goode laughed. “I love the noble warrior thing, don’t you, boys?” The other two laughed. “That’s why guys like you came back broke while we came home rich.”
Jake tried to process that. Kamdesh. Five million. What kind of dirty deal had Goode been peddling? Drugs…prostitutes…weapons?
“Bastard,” Jake spat.
In the blink of an eye, Goode went from cool and collected to crimson with rage. Apparently, bastard hit a nerve. “Get him. Kill him. Rip him to bits,” he roared.
Jake took a step back. Whoa. The guy was nuts. Certifiably nuts. Then he jerked his head at a growling sound from the right, where Burman stood. An animal growl — and weirder still, the man’s eyes glowed red. The hair on the back of Jake’s neck rose when Burman bared his teeth and raised his arms.
Patel’s chuckle made Jake turn back in that direction, where the man calmly removed his shirt and belt. The owl in the tree behind Patel fluttered its wings and shifted uneasily from foot to foot. When Burman groaned, Jake spun again, and—
“What the…” He trailed off. Burman was convulsing with a seizure of some kind.
“Those friends of yours,” Goode yelled, taunting Jake. “The men of OD-X unit. Ever notice something funny about them?”
Jake stared as Burman dropped to all fours and curved his back. His shirt split down the middle, and the shadows that played over his bare skin took on a striped pattern.
“Something not quite human?” Goode went on, delighting in the bizarre scene. “Superhuman, you might say.”
Jake tried to tune out Goode’s chatter and wheeled around to check on Patel, who was down to briefs and calmly folding his pants over a nearby branch. The owl chirped viciously, and Goode’s words stuck in Jake’s mind.
Not quite human… Superhuman…
Yeah, he’d heard a few wild rumors about Silas’s group. Rumors no sane man would believe.
He backed up two steps. The air crackled with energy, and his thigh itched. A low growl sounded from behind him, and when he turned—
Jake choked on his own exclamation. Burman was hairy as hell, and he had a tail. Stripes too. Huge white fangs.
Jake backed up slowly. Burman was a goddamn tiger, and he was snarling for blood.
“What the…” Jake jerked around.
Where Patel had been standing, a big, angry lion moved its tail in slow, greedy swipes.
Jake took another step back, grabbing the only weapon he could find — a sturdy branch from the stack he and Ella had made when they’d cleaned up the yard. The machete would have been a hell of a lot better, but that was all the way over by the porch. He jerked his head between the two felines, who lashed their tails and showed their teeth. Jesus, what was going on?
Goode cackled in glee. “Great weapon you got there, soldier.”
Jake steeled his nerves and gripped the branch tighter. Ella. It was all for Ella. Maybe she could get away. Maybe Boone or Kai had finally received his messages and were on the way.
“Run while you can, soldier,” Goode goaded. “Run while you can.”
Jake gritted his teeth, keeping his back to the nearest tree. “Maybe you should run.”
The lion and tiger stalked closer in smooth, swinging strides that made their shoulder blades rise with each step. Left, right. Left, right…
“Sure.” Goode smirked. “As if those shifter friends of yours will come to the rescue. Humans are expendable. You’re expendable. They won’t bother to come help you. Oh, they might come for my feisty little fox…”
Goode motioned to the house. Did he mean Ella?
“…but by the time they do, she’ll be long gone, working her new job. I might even visit her from time to time just for the satisfaction of knowing she was once yours.”
“The hell you will,” Jake spat, forcing his mind to quit trying to grasp it all and simply form some kind of plan to save Ella.
Goode snapped his fingers. “I said, get him!”
The lion coiled to jump. The tiger was a heartbeat faster, already airborne and hurtling toward Jake. Jake’s eyes went wide at the huge white claws and flashing stripes, but his hands were steady on the thick branch he wielded, and when he connected with the tiger—
Smack! He batted the beast sideways.
The tiger yowled and rolled, reeling from the blow.
Jake didn’t have time to stare at the branch and wonder if it was laced with kryptonite or something, because the lion was next. He jerked the branch to the right, backhanding the lion. Then he stared at the branch because, holy shit. His blows hadn’t just made the beasts stumble — they sent the felines flying as if they were a quarter of their formidable bulks.
The heat in Jake’s pocket intensified, and he couldn’t help slipping his hand in to itch. His fingers pushed aside the pouch he’d stuck in his pocket earlier, and—
Whoa. The pouch was as warm as a hot potato. That was th
e source of the itch. Or rather, the opal was.
“What the hell…”
The felines growled and circled him, preparing for another attack. Goode heckled and swore. Jake planted his feet wide, trying to anticipate their next moves. Their next attack was more coordinated, with the lion closing in on one side and the tiger from the other, both growling under their breath.
“Try me,” Jake muttered, telling himself it wasn’t terrifying to be eye-to-eye with a couple of wild beasts of their size. That it wasn’t weird to have an opal heat up in his pocket either. That he could handle this. He had to handle it.
The tiger roared and jumped, its jaws spread wide, fangs flashing. The air whooshed, and Jake heard himself yell. Something gray blurred behind the tiger, but he forced himself to focus on those killer jaws. He swung, putting all his strength into a blow that sent the beast sprawling to one side. Keeping the momentum going, Jake swung the branch in a huge arc. The lion was almost on him, about to pounce from behind, and he was sure he was too late. But that flash of gray fluttered between them, and the lion roared. The branch connected with the beast’s muzzle a second later, and Jake and the beast stumbled apart. The lion jumped backward, roaring in anger at the sky.
An owl. That was an owl, and it had just saved Jake. The bird swooped higher to escape the lion while the second owl harried the beast.
“Goddammit!” Goode stamped on the porch steps, making them shudder. “Just kill him!”
Jake looked around. Apparently, the owls were on his side. Weird, but okay. He’d take what he could get. The heat in his pocket throbbed as if he’d just called for volunteers and another hand had shot up. What was up with that gemstone?
He didn’t have time to puzzle that out, because the tiger was moving in again, more furious than ever. Faster too. Jake barely got the branch up to club the beast away when its claws ripped into his shoulder. Lightning bolts of pain shot through his nerves, and he fell backward.
Roll! part of his mind ordered. Roll!
He threw his weight to the left, grappling with the beast. He swatted desperately, trying to avoid the snapping jaws and clawing legs.