Burning Wild (49 page)

The scent of the female was a powerful aphrodisiac, and the leopard kept lifting his head and curling his lip, taking her into his lungs. The sound of crying children bothered him, but the overpowering scent of blood beckoned to everything wild in him. His priorities had been laid out. The adult female first. The infant female second. The male child was the last resort. His paw shifted, became fingers and settled around the knob. With great stealth, he turned it and opened the door a crack and crept out.

There was one bodyguard, the one called Evan, and Susan and Emma were left in the house with the two children. He crept through the darkened halls, avoiding the spills of dim light from the lanterns. The group was at the top of the stairs. The babies were sobbing and Emma tried to comfort them, pacing back and forth with both in her arms.

“Andraya, just wait. Daddy will be right back,” Emma said. She spoke into the radio. “Say you’re coming back, Jake, let her hear your voice.”

Jake shoved his hand through his wet hair. Drops were in his eyes, cold against his skin. The helicopter was already on the pad warming up, blades rotating fast. Justin Right, his pilot, came running out to them.

“Please, Jake. They’re so upset.”

Emma was so upset. She needed a way to be back in control, to make things right for the children. Jake let his breath out, angry that he couldn’t be in two places at one time. “Draya, be a brave girl for Mommy. I’ll be right back.” He hated this, Emma needing him, the children needing him, sending Drake to the hospital with Conner when Jake should be going with him. Love was a cruel thing, tearing a man’s heart out.

“See, Andraya? Did you hear Daddy?” Emma had both children in her arms now, ignoring the way their small bodies rubbed against her many wounds. Their hands dug into the bite marks and puncture wounds around her neck and throat, but nothing mattered to her other than comforting them. Even Susan was crying. She’d held up, trying to be cheerful, alone in the safe room, but once Joshua had come, she’d broken down right along with the children.

Emma alternated kisses between Andraya and Kyle. “Come on, I’ll make hot chocolate for everyone.”

“Emma, the generator isn’t fixed. You can’t,” Evan said.

She glared at him as the children cried more. “Cold chocolate then. It will be fun. We’ll sit at the table, all together. Come on, Susan, come sit with us.”

Andraya hiccupped and clasped Emma tighter around her neck. “Don’t go.”

“I’m not going anywhere, baby,” she crooned softly. “We’re all going together.”

“Come on, Kyle, don’t you want chocolate?” Evan asked.

Kyle nodded his head over and over, but didn’t look up from her shoulder. Evan held out his hands to take him but neither child would leave Emma. Emma shrugged and carried them, one on each hip, praying her robe would stay on, as she went down the stairs to the long hall. She avoided the area where Drake’s blood hadn’t been cleaned up. The lanterns didn’t throw off much light, so the two children saw very little, but Susan, who was following, gasped aloud. Evan’s hand on her shoulder steadied her and they went on through to the kitchen.

She bent to settle Kyle in his chair. The windows rattled and a howling shriek caused Andraya to bury her face against Emma’s neck. Kyle screamed and threw himself at Evan, who immediately wrapped his arms around the little boy.

“The wind seems to be blowing harder,” Emma said, uneasy. “Do you think the helicopter got off all right?”

“I’ll check for you,” Evan said and stepped to the window to look outside at the helipad. “The lights are gone, Emma, so Jake is on his way back.”

“Thank God,” she breathed and for the first time all day, she truly relaxed. She hadn’t realized how much she really counted on Jake and his strong presence. There was just something invincible and powerful about him.

Kyle wiggled and turned boneless, trying to escape Evan to get back to Emma. Evan put him down so he could run to her.

Evan reached out his hand. “Come on, Kyle, give Mommy a break. I’ll put you in your high chair. Emma, you look like you’re going to fall down, and your neck is bleeding through the bandages.”

Emma reached up to press her fingers against the bandages where the puncture wounds were and came away with smears of blood.

Susan gasped. “Here, Emma.” She held out a small handkerchief.

Emma half turned toward her when she heard Evan grunt and she spun back around. She saw his large body stagger. Emma ran toward Kyle as Evan toppled to the ground, firing the gun in his hand at a large, snarling cat as it leapt toward Kyle. Emma’s hand missed the back of Kyle’s shirt as the leopard snatched him on the run and nearly slammed into the door, one hand shifting to open it. Evan rolled over and started to fire a second time, but Emma screamed, “No! You might hit Kyle.”

The leopard flashed through the door with her son, leapt over the flowers and the low garden wall to disappear into the night.

Susan screamed. Andraya became hysterical. Emma caught Susan by the shoulders. “Lock down the house and do your best to help Evan. Tell Jake what happened. I’m going after them.”

“You can’t,” Susan protested. “Wait for Jake. You’ll be killed.”

Evan tried to catch her leg as she ran past him, but he missed, cursing. He tried to get to his feet, but his ribs were broken and it was difficult to draw a breath. Susan crouched beside him, looking warily into the night.

“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 scaring 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?”