by Zoe Chant
“More trouble?” she asked. “What does that mean?”
“It means that those drugs are just the beginning, if you walk out of here now without agreeing to the sale. You think this is a sticky situation? You don’t know anything yet. Me ’n’ my boys’ve been playing nice up until now. But if you want trouble, you got it – and that goes double for the sheriff. Not to mention his little cousin, and everyone else up there at the ranch.”
Charity’s breath caught in her throat. Was that enough? Was the threat enough to convict Jessup? He’d pretty much admitted he was responsible for the meth, too – but Charity wasn’t sure it would be enough. And she wanted to be sure.
“So if I don’t accept this offer you’ll do something to hurt Mason’s family?” she asked. “That’s not fair – they’ve done nothing. This is between you and me.”
Jessup nodded. “For the moment it is,” he said. “And I’d like to keep it that way. We don’t need to get anyone else involved here. Take the offer, and no one will.”
Charity bit her lip, trying to think of some way to keep Jessup talking. “So did you tip off anyone about the drugs? Or were they just a message?”
Jessup seemed to measure her up for a long moment, before he nodded. “I wanted to give you a little time to think about what to do,” he said. “But you better believe I know who to call if you choose wrongly. It’s lucky you showed up when you did – my finger was on the button, all ready to dial.”
Surely, that was enough. Charity slumped back, trying to give the impression she was utterly defeated. But in reality, her heart was racing, excitement coursing through her veins.
I got him. I got him. The thought repeated itself over and over again in her head, threatening to drown out all good sense. Jessup McLeod and the rest of the Reapers were going down. They’d never be able to threaten anyone ever again. She wondered if Mason, listening in wherever he was, was having the same reaction as her.
“Fine,” she said, her voice small. “Fine. I’ll take it.” She glanced up at him. “What do you want me to do?”
“See, I knew she could be amenable. Didn’t I tell you boys she could be amenable?” Jessup laughed, throwing a look to the three remaining Reapers in the room, all of whom had been so silent that Charity had all but forgotten they were there. Now, they joined in with their boss’s rough laughter. The sound grated on Charity’s nerves.
“The offer of cash payment still stands,” Jessup said. “I’m willing to be generous there – but no bank deposits. I hand it to you in person. You give me the deeds to the property, and we both go away happy. How does that sound?”
Charity nodded. “Fine. Whatever. When?”
“Tomorrow.” Jessup’s answer was swift and immediate. “Let’s get this over and done with quick.”
“Fine,” Charity said, not looking at him. “Are we done here?”
Jessup nodded. “We're done.”
Charity stood up, her knees feeling shaky. Was it really over? Would Jessup really just let her stand up and walk out of here? Mason had what he needed now – all the evidence had been transmitted back to him. He could make his arrests and make his calls, and there was nothing Jessup could do about it.
She turned, and headed toward the door.
“Oh,” Jessup said casually, as soon as she’d turned her back to him. “Except for one little thing.”
Charity stopped cold. There was such menace in Jessup’s voice that it froze the blood in her veins. Her fists clenched involuntarily, and she found herself rooted to the spot, unable even to turn or ask him what he meant.
“Your agreement is nice and all, but I want some more assurance. I want you to call that boyfriend of yours, and I want you to get him here.”
Behind her, she could hear Jessup as he rose, before slowly walking around to face her.
“I want him here. I want him to swear, on his own name, and on his alpha’s name that he’s not going to interfere any further. And that he understands the consequences if he does.”
Charity swallowed heavily as Jessup stood in front of her, glowering. She might not have known a lot about shifter social dynamics, but she guessed that making Mason swear anything on his alpha’s name was a big deal. And she knew that Lincoln was already far from pleased with the extent of Mason’s involvement here. Would he be happy once he found out Mason had been swearing things in his name?
Probably not, Charity decided.
Her heart in her throat, she forced herself to shake her head. “No. I’ve agreed to sell you the diner. That’s enough.”
“And I say it isn’t,” Jessup snarled. Putting his hand in his pocket, he pulled out a cell phone. “You call him, and you get him here. And you tell him this – I’m keeping you as insurance until he does.”
Charity stared at Jessup, feeling her heart beating wildly in her chest. It had been too easy, she now realized – of course Jessup had had something else up his sleeve.
“I can’t just tell him –” she started to say, before Jessup’s feral growl cut her off mid-sentence.
“You’ll tell him exactly what I just told you to tell him,” Jessup said, stepping forward until his furious eyes were directly in front of hers. “And you’ll do it now, or –”
“Jessup! Jessup, get out here!”
Whatever Jessup had been going to threaten her with, he never got to say it – he was interrupted by one of his men shouting from outside the house. For a moment, Jessup’s eyes flickered, and then Charity saw his nostrils flare, as if he was scenting something.
She recalled what Mason had told her about being a shifter – that he could call his lion forward when he needed its sharpened senses. In a moment, she realized that Jessup was doing the same thing: he was sniffing out possible danger.
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath, glancing over his shoulder. When he looked back at Charity, his eyes were alight with fire. “You come with me, girl,” he snarled, grabbing her arm and hauling her after him as he marched back across the room toward the front door.
His fingers hurt as they dug into her arm, and for a moment Charity was too dazed to figure out what was happening.
Then, all at once, it hit her: Mason. He’d come.
Of course, she thought, still feeling slightly dazed. He would’ve been able to hear everything Jessup was saying through the wire she was wearing. And when Jessup had threatened her, he’d come.
At that moment, Jessup kicked open the front door, and Charity was momentarily blinded by the light outside. Still, after blinking once or twice, she was able to make out Jessup’s men, standing in a semi-circle around the porch – while in front of it stood the huge, majestic golden lion she knew was Mason’s shifter form.
“Son of a bitch,” Jessup hissed, before turning to Charity, looking her up and down, before comprehension dawned across his face. “You were wearing a wire this whole time. I should’ve known.” His eyes were like flint.
Before Charity had time to breathe, Jessup had moved away from her, and then his body was changing – shifting. He increased in size, his skin becoming a shaggy brown pelt. Huge paws slammed down on the rickety wood of the porch, splintering it.
A bear, Charity thought, fear rippling through her. Jessup had become a massive, hulking bear. Mason’s lion was huge, but she knew how strong bears were. Could he really win this fight?
She bit her lip and stared at Mason as his lion pulled its lips back into a snarl, revealing the massive fangs beneath – thicker and longer than any of her fingers. Mason crouched, lowering his head, a deep, dangerous growl emanating from his throat.
But apparently Jessup was angry enough that he wasn’t waiting for anything. The massive brown bear surged forward, standing on its hind legs to swipe at Mason’s face with its massive paws, claws glinting in the sunlight. Mason sprang back, avoiding the powerful blows, before throwing himself forward, wrapping his forelegs around Jessup’s shoulders, claws sinking into his hide.
The bear roared in pain, tee
th flashing before he sunk them into Mason’s shoulder; Charity gasped, raising a hand to her mouth in shock as she saw red blood trickling from the wound.
“Mason!” she cried, wanting to rush down to him, to somehow put a stop to this – but she knew if she did that, there was a high likelihood of Jessup turning on her, of injuring her to distract Mason and get the better of him. And Mason had explained to her that if he could beat Jessup in a fight, then he could pretty much dictate that the Reapers leave town.
Only that wouldn’t be necessary now – they had hard evidence. They had Jessup’s own voice on tape, admitting to what he’d done.
Charity bit her lip as she watched the two huge beasts grappling with each other, Mason’s golden lion against Jessup’s brown bear. Jessup had his claws embedded in Mason’s side, while Mason had buried his teeth in Jessup’s shoulder. Blood spattered on the ground beneath them.
There has to be something I can do to help, Charity thought desperately. She couldn’t just leave Mason to fight it out – even if he won, she couldn't bear the sight of him being hurt. She had to help him. But how?
Looking around wildly, Charity searched for something – anything – she might be able to use. She didn’t need to hurt Jessup, she thought. She only needed to distract him. She realized she wouldn’t be able to move much: Jessup’s men were still standing all around her, watching the fight intently, some of them calling out their support for Jessup, but most of them standing silently.
If Charity had been as focused on the fight in that moment as most of them, she probably wouldn’t have seen it. But as she glanced around the circle of men, she noticed that one of them – a huge, burly man with tattoos down his forearms and a graying beard that reached halfway down his chest – had taken a pistol from his belt, and was holding it by the barrel.
What is he doing? Charity thought, her thoughts flying. The man was staring at Jessup, and seemed almost to be waiting for something. Charity wasn’t surprised by the gun – all of the men around her were armed. Even the man standing closest to her had a gun tucked into his belt. But something about what he was doing with it made her frightened and suspicious.
She looked back to where Mason and Jessup were still tussling, their bodies turning over and over each other in the red dirt. Hope rose within her – it was clear that Mason was getting the upper hand, and decisively so.
Jessup was tiring, the swipes of his paws becoming unfocused, his back legs dragging on the ground. He spent most of his time now trying to get away from Mason’s attacks, rather than trying to stand and fight. He edged around the circle of men, his bear’s small eyes still on Mason, but moving away from him, getting closer and closer to…
Charity gasped as she suddenly realized what was happening. He was trying to edge around to the man holding the gun. Mason was so focused on Jessup that he hadn’t noticed it. But Charity, from her vantage point on the porch, could see it clearly as it unfolded in front of her.
Her breath frozen in her lungs, Charity couldn’t figure out what she should do. She couldn’t rush the man: he’d knock her off her feet easily. Could she warn Mason in time? Was there some way she could create a distraction?
In the next moment, however, she realized it was too late. In two loping strides, Jessup made his way to his man who was holding the gun.
“Mason!” she cried out, even as Jessup began to shift, his shaggy fur disappearing, his paws becoming hands and feet. In the same instant, the man tossed the gun to him – clearly, this was a well-rehearsed piece. If Jessup got into a fight and was struggling, the man would wait for the right moment, then throw him the weapon. It had been rigged from the start.
Charity felt like screaming.
Raising his hand, Jessup snatched the gun from the air, before turning to level it at Mason’s lion. Mason had pulled up short as Jessup had begun to shift, clearly unwilling to use his massive strength and sharp claws against a human. But his hesitation had given Jessup the second he needed. He held the gun in his hands, a triumphant smirk on his face.
“I’ve got you now, you son of a bitch,” Jessup crowed, his eyes alive with a cruel fire.
No. No. No. The word repeated itself in Charity’s mind. Things couldn’t end this way. She wouldn’t let them.
In the wild moment that followed, she honestly couldn’t say she thought before she moved – that she had any idea of what she was going to do before she did it. Adrenaline suddenly fired through her veins, spurring her to action. Without a second thought, she lunged forward, reaching out toward the man standing nearest to her – and the gun tucked into his belt.
The man was so intent on watching the unfolding situation between Jessup and Mason that he didn’t notice her movement until it was too late. Her fingers wrapped around the cold steel of his pistol, yanking it out of his belt and raising it to the sky.
“Mason!” she shouted, before pulling the trigger, the sound of the pistol shot sounding impossibly loud in the tense silence that surrounded them.
That was all she had time to do before the man she’d swiped the gun from grabbed her arm, yanking his weapon out of her fingers – but it was enough. The sound of the shot had distracted Jessup for a bare moment, but it was all Mason had needed. His lion surged forward in a mighty leap, massive paws slamming into Jessup’s shoulders, knocking him to the ground. The pistol flew from his fingers, skittering through the dirt.
Jessup howled in fury, pinned beneath Mason’s huge body.
“Don’t just stand there, you assholes,” he yelled out. “Shoot this asshole –”
In the moment that followed, Charity almost couldn't understand what was happening. As Jessup yelled and thrashed in the dirt, his men beginning to draw their weapons, four more lions suddenly appeared from around the side of the house, their teeth bared, their deep snarls and growls drowning out the Reapers’ surprised shouts.
It’s Lincoln, Charity realized, dazed. And Joe, and Casey. The fourth lion she wasn’t sure about, though – perhaps it was Mason’s cousin, Heath, the one he’d told her was in the military. They certainly made short work of the Reapers, scattering them, some of them shifting so as to flee all the faster in their animal forms. The man who’d been holding her arms released her in order to turn into a massive eagle and fly away, the wind from his wings beating her face and momentarily stunning her, making her stumble and fall onto the splintered wood of the porch.
She sat, shocked, for a moment, before finally looking up. Only Jessup, still pinned beneath Mason, and a few of his cronies still remained. Lincoln, Joe, Casey and Heath were still in their lion forms, but Mason had turned human again. Somehow, he’d found a pair of handcuffs and had turned Jessup over, securing his hands tightly behind his back. Faintly, she could hear his voice as he read Jessup his rights.
He’s all right. The thought pumped fresh adrenaline into Charity’s veins and she stood, ignoring the few bumps and bruises she’d acquired. Rushing down the porch steps, she ran the short distance to him, before flinging herself bodily against him. She didn’t think she’d truly believe it until she felt the warm solidity of his body against hers, felt his arms around her, his lips on hers.
“Mason,” she breathed when she finally did feel his arms come up to encircle her. She gasped as she noticed a wound on his shoulder, and scratches and bites he’d gotten in his fight with Jessup. But in the next second, his lips on hers, and she was swept away in the power of his kiss. Nothing else existed in that second – and nothing else mattered.
They had won.
Chapter Fourteen
Mason
“It turns out your instincts were right on the money,” Heath said to Mason as they sat by his desk at the county sheriff’s office. “It took me a day, but I told my CO we needed a snap inspection and explained why. He agreed, and we got onto it before there was any chance for word to spread.”
Heath shook his head.
“It was only a couple of guys in the end, and they’re more than willing to talk.
It wasn’t any of the shifters, by the way – seems like Jessup just found the weak link in the chain.”
Mason nodded. Truthfully, he wasn’t that surprised to hear it. Jessup had seemed desperate to get into the market here, and that was really the only thing that made sense, rather than setting up shop at Cedar Hill.
“I appreciate you taking the time to come all the way down here to tell me this yourself,” Mason said. “And for taking what I said seriously.”
Heath shrugged. “Of course I did. I know my cousin, and you don’t tend to throw around words you don’t mean.” He grinned suddenly. “Speaking of, I had to come down anyway to meet your mate – strange as it seems to me to be saying those words!”
Mason laughed. “Come on Heath, you know I was never that into playing the field – I was always on the lookout, hoping I might find her. I just never expected she was here in Coldstream County all along. I would’ve done better just to stay here!”
They laughed together, and Mason reflected on how great it was to have Heath back again. He’d always been off, either completing tours or stationed on some far-off base since he’d joined the military, and Mason had missed him.
“So how did things go with the DEA?” Heath asked.
Mason nodded. “Just fine. Casey gave his statement, and so did Charity. We got the evidence we needed to put Jessup away with the wire, and Casey has said he’ll talk as much as they want, plus he’s a juvenile, so I’m pretty sure he’ll be all right. They’re more than happy to pursue it – it’s a virtually unbeatable case.”
Heath nodded. “They’ll be coming to the base to speak with us over the next few days, as far as I know,” he said. “My CO has my report, and the men who were caught with the drugs are cooling their heels in a cell, waiting to see what’ll happen to them. I’d nail their hides to the wall myself, if I could. But I’ll have to settle for having had the satisfaction of arresting them.”
Mason laughed. “That’s our job, I guess,” he said. “I admit it, though, it felt good to slap those cuffs on Jessup’s wrists. Asshole looked like he still couldn’t figure out what hit him.”