“I can’t see her anymore.”
“Don’t worry. Jake and the others will come running. They had to have heard the shot.” He couldn’t get to his feet, so he dragged himself to the door in an effort to close it.
Jake, Conner and Joshua burst out of the darkness as if the wild wind had driven them, howling at their heels every step of the way. They were soaked, barefoot and shirtless, running flat-out, yet hardly winded. Susan screamed again and backed away as Jake towered over Evan, his face a mask of fury.
Crouching low, he nearly jerked Evan off the floor, his fists twisted in the front of Evan’s shirt, death in his slashing gaze. “Where is she?” He bit out each word distinctly, his teeth sharper, his canines longer in the dim lighting.
“She went after the leopard.” Evan had to gasp out every word. “He took Kyle. I couldn’t stop her, Jake.”
Jake swore, and let go of the man. “Lock the fucking door, Susan.” He pressed Evan’s fingers around the gun. “Shoot to kill next time.”
Jake spun around and ran into the night, Conner and Joshua following close behind. They found Emma’s robe just outside the flower beds and they picked up their pace, peeling off their jeans, shedding them just beyond the yard and shifting as they ran.
The scent of blood was strong in a couple of places, along with that of the male leopard. This, then, was Clayton, the other man hired by the enemies and Trent. He was flat-out running, holding Kyle in his mouth. It couldn’t have been easy; the boy had to be squirming and fighting, although he might have been so scared he had gone limp.
Jake ran with his heart in his throat and the taste of terror in his mouth. His son. Kyle. He had held the boy in the palm of his hand. Changed his diapers. Fed him. Looked into his eyes—eyes so like his own. He’d told himself he didn’t love anyone or anything, yet his son had managed to wrap himself tightly around Jake’s heart and refused to let go. Just because Jake hadn’t acknowledged the way he felt out loud—or even to himself—didn’t mean it hadn’t happened. He couldn’t live without the boy, without that trust in his eyes and the love and eagerness shining on his face every morning.
He told himself they would have killed him outright if they’d wanted that. No, this was a kidnapping to secure a leopard, or an attempt to exert control over Jake. And they’d have it. He’d do anything to get Kyle back—anything at all. If he had to trade his life for the boy’s, he would do it without regret.
Jake couldn’t let himself think about how Kyle’s little heart would be beating so fast, the feel of the sharp teeth and hot breath on his skin. Bile rose, and he forced his mind away from his son in order to preserve his sanity while he covered the trail.
The direction Clayton took was odd, not toward one of the open areas, where he could leave Jake’s land, but deeper into the interior. Twice they came across drag marks where Kyle’s heels had forged twin trails in the mud. There were small spots of blood where the skin had been torn off. None of the men looked at each other; they kept running.
Moving as leopards gave them extreme velocity, as their muscles enabled them to run so fast they could actually lift all four feet off the ground and go aerial over long distances. But the leopard form also burned up energy fast. Knowing Clayton was carrying a two-year-old, and would have to readjust his grip often to keep from killing the child, meant that he would be much slower.
Jake’s heart slammed hard in his chest as he realized that meant Emma would catch up with the kidnapper before Jake could reach her. She was smaller, requiring her to move her legs more often to cover the same distance, using more energy, but she had no burdens and he knew her, knew her nature. She would be tenacious and she would give herself over to her cat in order to recover their son.
How much of a head start did Clayton and Emma actually have? Not much. Jake and his men had run back to the house the moment they’d heard the sound of the gun, and they’d already been working their way back from the helipad.
The wind whipped through the trees, nearly bending the trunks double. He heard ominous cracking sounds as branches broke under the assault. The full fury of the storm was back, but it only suited his mood, the rage that had been with him since childhood welling up like bubbling lava, hot and thick and tasting of death. His large paws plunged into the swollen stream without hesitation, wincing a little as he thought of his son in the cold water. Had his face gone under? Had Clayton protected him at all?
Jake clawed his way up the embankment and picked up the trail on the other side, hardly aware of the other two leopards running with him. He now understood what Drake had been silently trying to tell him—to show him. A man did what he had to do. He took care of those who were his, protected them and his friends and his community, just did what he thought was right. All the rest of it, all the temper and day-to-day irritations, didn’t matter. Just this. This merging of his two halves so that he ran as one, thought as one, enjoyed life and faced danger as one. His behavior was his choice.
The leopard was every bit as concerned for Kyle and Emma as Jake was. It ran, plowing through the mud and puddles, never hesitating to plunge into swollen streams or to leap down treacherous embankments with the danger of flash flooding imminent.
Once he found a place where the male leopard had put Kyle down and his son had tried to run away. There was no blood and no more spots, as if the male might have tried to care for the boy before resuming his run. He saw Emma’s smaller tracks inside the big male’s. She was gaining on him fast. Jake increased his speed, pushing the others to keep up with him.
EMMA could hear the sound of the male leopard’s paw splashing through the mud as they neared a clearing. He knew she was behind him and made no attempt to throw her off the chase, or to drop Kyle and backtrack to fight her. That meant he had a specific destination and wherever it was, he would have the advantage.
She was so afraid for Kyle her heart felt like it was bursting. She could hear him crying occasionally, sometimes loud and screaming, other times his voice dwindling down to a piteous moan. The leopard’s muzzle was wet from both the constant rain and her tears, but she never faltered, even when her vision blurred, relying on the radar whiskers to tell her what everything around her was.
The wind was blowing toward her and she could smell the humans now—the enemies—waiting in their expensive trucks to steal her child from her. Cathy and Ryan Bannaconni and the despicable Trent, probably ready to fight over her baby, unless the plan had been for Rory to return with Andraya so they would have two.
She bared her teeth and without hesitation followed the big male leopard and Kyle into the clearing. Emma’s leopard skidded to a halt some distance from the group. They were very aware of her, Trent holding a rifle on her, while Ryan Bannaconni lifted Kyle into the air, ignoring the boy’s struggles. Cathy smirked, although her fascinated gaze kept shifting toward Clayton as the leopard’s body contorted and writhed on the ground for a moment before the man stood, totally naked, all roped muscles and heavy genitals. He stood uncaring of his bare state, inspecting his shoulder where the bullet had kissed him.
As she broke into the clearing and halted, Clayton turned his hungry eyes on her. Emma paid him no attention. Kyle was the only person who mattered to her. She shifted, not quite as fast or as eloquently as the male, but she stood in her human form, naked, only her long hair cloaking her body.
Cathy gasped. Ryan lowered Kyle to the ground, still holding him prisoner.
Trent looked into the trees, shook his head and dropped the rifle to his side, barrel down, a smirk on his face. “I knew it. I knew I was right about her.” He looked at Cathy. “You said she couldn’t shift. The genes were strong, but she couldn’t shift. My family did produce a shape-shifter after all, and a female at that. She belongs to me.”
“I don’t think so, Trent,” Ryan said. “I’m the one with the bargaining chip.” He tightened his grip on Kyle and the boy cried out.
“Give me the child,” Emma said very calmly. “You’re scarin
g him.” She refused to cover herself up, standing as tall and as confidently as she could. Jake would come. The knowledge was her shield. He would come and no matter what, he would keep Kyle safe from these terrible monsters.
“Come to me and I’ll let him go,” Ryan answered, holding Kyle by his hair. “A fully grown female is worth far more to us than this little runt.” He actually lifted Kyle by his hair a couple of inches from the ground and shook him.
Kyle screamed, kicking out with his feet toward Ryan, his eyes glazed with fear.
Cathy laughed. “He’s not quite as stoic as Jake, is he, darling? He probably isn’t even a leopard. Jake never made a sound, no matter what we did to him.” She tilted her head at Emma. “How stoic are you, dear? When you feel the lash or the cane, are you going to scream like this worthless baby or be silent like Jake?”
Emma refused to be intimidated. She let the other woman see death in her eyes. If she had to die this night, Cathy Bannaconni was dying with her. She would not leave her son in the hands of a madwoman. “You’re insane. You know that, don’t you?”
Cathy continued to smile, but her eyes went bright and hard, a flicker of cruelty giving her away before she kicked Kyle hard in the stomach. The boy doubled over and would have fallen but for Ryan’s grip in his hair.
A low, warning growl rumbled in Emma’s throat. She felt her muscles contort and her hands curl. A wave of itching ran beneath her skin and she breathed hard to stave off the change. She forced a smile. “I wonder how you’ll scream when I tear out your heart and show it to you,” Emma said, very calmly, her voice low, meaning every word.
Cathy went pale and glanced quickly toward Clayton, as if for reassurance that he could stop the smaller leopard should it be necessary. She actually took a couple of steps toward the man but he looked her up and down with contempt. It was obvious she wasn’t getting protection from that direction.
“I own her,” Trent said. “It was my money my nephew took to bring back her mother.”
Emma glanced at Clayton, sensing his barely concealed disdain for the others. They carried the leopard blood, but they weren’t shifters, and although Clayton had sold his services to them, he didn’t respect or like them. And with her so close to heat, his leopard was reacting whether he wanted it or not. She sent him a small smile of camaraderie, even an alluring one, moving her body in a slightly sinuous manner, as if her leopard needed to get out, hoping for an ally when the fighting came. She wasn’t going to be able to take them all.
Emma turned back to the enemies, not waiting to see Clayton’s reaction. “No one owns our kind, Trent. You haven’t really learned much after all the years you’ve had to study our species. You’re so arrogant, thinking that thin blood running in your veins makes you special. Clayton allowed you to buy his services. Jake allowed you to torment him as a child. He could have crept into your room any night and killed you both. Have you ever thought about that even once? Probably not because you’re not really very intelligent, are you?
“We have retractable claws, and they’re sharp, Cathy, sharper than any other mammalian claws. Did you know that? They’re rather like stiletto switchblades. We have five on the forefeet and four on the back. A good number to take you out at the breakfast table with, don’t you think? And then there are our teeth. We can shear through muscle like knife blades. I’ll bet Clayton has more than once considered killing you just to shut your insulting mouth. Jake certainly did. A lot of times. Leopards are silent and cunning and you’d never have seen it coming. We don’t do anything we don’t choose to do.”
Cathy took a step toward her, her eyes flat and cold, teeth set. They were nearly pointed, as if she wanted to shift, her fingers curling into claws tipped with bloodred nails. “Really? You wanted those men all over you the other night?” She tossed her head, her sophisticated style long gone in the pouring rain, making Emma think of a drowned rat. “Are you going to want my nails raking down your oh-so-pretty face? Tearing it off?”
Emma looked down at her own hands, held them out and willed the change, admiring the way her thick fur rippled down her arms and over her hands, how the knuckles curled and long, sharp claws burst from the tips of her fingers. She turned them over and showed them to Cathy. “Your pathetic little nails can hardly compare with the real thing. You’re nothing to me, certainly no threat.”
Clayton snickered. Trent laughed. Even Ryan gave a snort of derision.
Cathy’s face rippled with fury. A shrill shriek escaped and she ripped Kyle from Ryan’s hands, slapping the child’s face repeatedly. Kyle screamed. Ryan swore. Clayton moved then, coming to life, his speed incredible, just as Emma did the same. Clayton reached Cathy a split second before Emma, shifting as he did so, his giant paw slicing into Cathy’s skull, knocking her into Ryan so they both fell. He sank his teeth into Cathy’s throat and held in the death grip.
Emma dragged Kyle into her arms as Trent lifted the rifle. She ran for the treeline just as a large male leopard with fiery golden eyes emerged, running at full speed past her, straight at Trent. Two more large leopards flanked him. The sound of the rifle was loud in the night despite the howling wind and rain. She heard Clayton roar and then the night erupted into the horrible sound of growls and screams of agony.
Emma didn’t look back. She ran with Kyle in her arms, heading back toward the house. The boy was sobbing and clinging to her, half limp, half mad with fear and pain. “She can’t hurt you now. She can’t hurt you now,” she soothed over and over, stumbling over the uneven ground, trying to shelter him with her body. Her hair was plastered to her skull and face, hanging in dripping tails down her back.
The wind shrieked, carrying the horrifying sounds of the battle. With it came the scent of blood and flesh and wet cat. And the scent of something else. The merest sound like the scrape of a boot against bark. Emma covered Kyle’s mouth with her hand, her body going still. She hissed at him to be silent, remembering Trent as she’d shifted to human form. They hadn’t been expecting her. They hadn’t thought she could shift. They had expected Jake to be following Kyle and they hadn’t been in a hurry to run.
Kyle’s body went still, as if he knew the urgency and understood the need for silence. His eyes looked into hers, too old, frightened, but determined. She kissed him and hugged him closer as her heart began to hammer loudly in her chest. The leopard had brought Kyle to the clearing on purpose, to draw Jake there. She put Kyle down and put her fingers to her lips, signaling him to remain silent. He was so frightened, she was certain he was nearly frozen to the spot. She crouched beside him.
“Mommy has to help Daddy, baby. You can’t move. I know you’re scared, but I need you to promise me you’ll stay right here and not move, or make a sound.” She pressed his little body into the deeper grass.
He looked up at her with his eyes, so like Jake’s, eyes that seemed to have more intelligence than possible for his age. He took a deep breath and nodded his head slowly. Emma covered him with nearby branches and twigs and swept up the grass around him, taking only seconds as she hid him.
Then she ran toward the scent, shifting as she went, her body going down to the ground, on all fours, fur sliding over her skin, muzzle rounding and expanding to accommodate the teeth bursting through. The experience was becoming less painful, and faster, and she was getting used to the roped muscles and sinewy body that allowed for much easier travel.
She circled to come at him from behind. There. In the tree, he was easing his weight along a thick tree branch, to try to get a better shot. She could imagine the chaos he was viewing through his scope. Four leopards, three humans fighting to the death in a rolling, clawing, tooth-filled battle. He set the rifle to his shoulder and his eye to the scope, settling his finger on the trigger. She came up behind him silently, stealthily, her gaze fixed and focused, hunting the hunter.
“I see you, you big son of a bitch,” the man said softly, satisfaction in his voice.
She leapt, making the jump easily into the tree, la
nding on his back, her weight slamming him down hard against the knotted branch. He grunted, maintaining his hold on his gun as she bent her head and bit down on his shoulder, easily tearing through the thin skin and muscle, puncturing deep. Blood filled her mouth and she recoiled, horrified.
Emma pulled back and the man rolled, falling from the tree to the ground, discharging the rifle. She felt the bullet burn through her fur and she launched herself again, her weight hitting him full in the chest. He tried to bring the rifle up, and when he couldn’t, he used it as a club, slamming it into her shoulder to drive her backward. The leopard raked her claws down his belly and gripped his throat, biting hard more out of fear than aggression.
Emma held on to his neck grimly, tears running down her face. She wanted to throw up, the bile rising. She was so distressed, she had to fight her body to keep from shifting back to her human form. The man struggled, slamming the sides of the leopard with his gun, trying to get it around to fire off a shot. Just when she was certain she couldn’t make herself hold him another moment, Jake came rushing at them.
He was on the man in seconds, and Emma fell back, exhausted, sick, disgusted and horrified all at once. She staggered, fell and began to crawl, dragging the leopard’s body through the mud away from the scene of death. She didn’t want to see or hear any more killing. Once away from the terrible struggle, she shifted, sobbing, bending over to relieve her stomach of all contents in protest of the night’s activities.
She could still taste blood in her mouth and she was desperate to rid herself of it. She turned her face up to the sky, allowing the rain to pour over her, wanting it to cleanse her. She wasn’t sorry, but she hated that she’d had to make a life-and-death choice for another human being. She tried to scrub the blood off her body, shivering continually, although she didn’t know if it was from the cold or from deep revulsion.
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