Chapter 22
Tonya knew within seconds of entering the house that Elisabeth wasn’t here.
No cougar-shifter stink. No animal wariness from Grandma and Grandpa who opened their home so easily.
And certainly no young children running around unless it was one of the many grandchildren who visited every Sunday, according to the elderly couple.
But Holly had gotten this phone number somehow, and so Tonya had to flash the picture and hope that one of the two had a good memory for faces.
The good news was that Grandma remembered Elisabeth right away.
She even remembered the quiet boy who’d hung back in the shadows seemingly too afraid to speak.
Elisabeth hadn’t even wanted to come inside, but had said that her cell phone was broken.
Of course Grandma had offered her landline and that was how Holly had gotten a call from this phone.
But when asked where Elisabeth was living, neither grandparent had a clue.
The woman and boy had gone on bicycles to the grocery store.
All of that added up to exactly what they already knew.
Elisabeth and her charges were somewhere in the neighborhood.
Tonya thanked the couple and stepped out.
She asked the local detectives to chat a little longer and get details on the neighborhood.
Meanwhile, Tonya would update Alan and start scouting.
Together, their noses would go a long way to narrowing down options.
Except when she stepped outside, Alan was nowhere to be found.
Too soon to start panicking about what he was doing.
He could have simply gone for a walk to scent the neighborhood.
But fear started clawing in her gut. Elisabeth was here somewhere, as was her bastard cousin.
What if he came across them? What if he lost control and attacked them? What if they killed him?
Her bear began to shift uneasily beneath her skin. Her mate might be in danger.
She was just about to call the detectives for help. Three could search the neighborhood faster than one. But then the lackluster breeze brought her the nauseating scent of Alan in full shifter battle.
Danger!
Her grizzly nearly burst out of her skin, but Tonya was experienced in keeping her reined in. But what to do? Alan was fully shifted. She couldn’t call in the locals. They’d shoot him on sight. Which meant it was up to her and her nose.
Good thing that was exactly what her grizzly wanted. Letting her senses expand, Tonya tracked Alan’s scent. Fortunately, that was an easy thing to do.
Over there. A few doors down. Backyard.
She started at a jog then quickly went full tilt.
She burst through the gate quick enough to see the flash of a cougar tail as it disappeared through a door into the back of the garage.
The yard was thick with Alan’s stench, someone’s blood, and damn, someone had ripped the shit out of the air conditioner.
She didn’t pause, though she did take a breath hard enough to bellow, “Police!”
And then she heard the roars. Two of them. Cougar and…
Alan.
No time to choke on her fear. No time to even process the possibilities. She pulled her gun and ran through the door, ducking in case the cougar was waiting.
Good choice. The fucking cat leapt right at her the moment she crossed the threshold.
Her nose told her it was the male cousin, not the bitch.
His claws were razor sharp but his aim was off.
He clipped her shoulder and a hot flash of pain burned through her body.
Didn’t matter. She was more than capable of rolling with the blow and turning it to her advantage.
She came back up into a crouch with her gun aimed dead center at one pissed-off shifter cat.
Then she pulled the trigger. Twice.
Two shots dead-center mass. The cat went splat against a rusty sedan. Protocol said she needed to check him to be sure he was dead. Shifters could survive an awful lot, but more sounds banged through her brain. A fight. Right above her in the attic space. Damn it, how the hell did she get up there?
Into the house, through the kitchen, and then a door to a stairway.
She tore through them, her gun ready, only to fall back a step.
Something heavy landed against the door, slamming it shut right in Tonya’s face.
Hell. She could hear the battle, but it would be suicide to try and push into the middle of a shifter fight.
Her other senses fed her data. Scent came with the most information.
Alan’s blood. Cougar shifters. Illness. But how many attackers?
The scents were too varied for her to process, and the sounds completely chaotic.
Hiss from a cat. Grunts from Alan. Thank God he was still alive, but the battle was crashing into walls and someone was screaming. A boy? It was too hard to tell.
But she couldn’t just sit here and wait. Not with Alan fighting for his life. She’d bet on him to win out in the open, but in so tiny a space, the cat would have the advantage. She had to do it.
“Police!” she bellowed, then she shoved open the door.
Her mind cataloged the scene with clinical precision.
Alan and a cougar were grappling. They were rolling about the floor in furious battle.
Two small beds, one smashed to splinters, the other filled with a small unconscious girl, flushed with fever.
But it was the boy who grabbed her attention.
He was standing protectively over the girl, a pistol in his hand as he aimed at the combatants.
“Police!” Tonya barked. “Put it down!” She hated to aim at the boy but she couldn’t let him shoot Alan.
The kid didn’t even flinch. His eyes were trained on the fighters just as Alan heaved the cat away from him. He didn’t shove her far. The cougar had her jaw locked on his shoulder, but it was enough to get some distance. And to tear her free from his body.
God, he was covered in blood and he stumbled as he got free. His face was thick with fur and large jaws, but he was still fighting.
“Elisabeth!” Tonya bellowed as she resighted on the cat. “Stay down! Elisabeth!”
She was about to yell something at Alan. Something about stepping away or Don’t fucking bleed out. But she didn’t have the breath. Then, to her relief, Alan straightened up. Jesus, he was bleeding from a dozen different wounds, but he was standing tall as he faced Elisabeth.
Tonya’s gaze cut to the bitch. She was struggling on a damaged leg, fighting to right herself. Right there was the opening. Alan was fast enough to close the distance and snap the animal’s neck, but he didn’t. Instead, he started to shift back to human.
Tonya couldn’t believe it, but there it was. His jaw shrank, his bared teeth slid away from view, and his claws became hands.
“Fuck you, bitch. My mother was a bear.”
Then he turned away from her, his gaze landing hard on Tonya’s.
Then he nodded and it was enough for him to communicate everything she wanted to hear.
He was telling her to take care of Elisabeth.
She had the gun, now pointed straight at the cougar.
He was going to save the kids. So he started crossing to the cot.
Bang! Bangbangbang!
Elisabeth fell back in a spray of blood and torn flesh.
Alan jerked his gaze back to Tonya, but it hadn’t been her. It was the boy. Pulling the trigger as fast as his shaking fingers could manage. Shit, he was emptying his clip into Elisabeth.
Alan was the one who ended it. Long before Tonya could order the kid to stop, he slapped out, not with his claws, but with his hand.
He chopped at the boy’s wrist, knocking the pistol wide.
The boy rounded on him, his eyes turning to slits.
Hell. The boy was another forced shifter like Alan.
Had to be as another stink permeated the room.
Time for shifter battle number three.
But before it could happen, Alan leapt. He tackled the kid and covered him with his own body. Not pinning him, but full-body protection even though the boy was the one who creating the problem.
The child screamed and the stench grew thicker. Tonya saw fur and teeth. Hell. A writhing mass of animal fury trapped between Alan and the floor.
“It’s over. Get control.” Alan’s low voice continued as a steady murmur against the roaring fury of the boy. “I know you’re pissed. I hear you.”
Tonya stayed tense. She didn’t want to shoot the kid, but she sure as hell didn’t want Alan getting ripped to shreds. Best she could do to help was find the gun and secure it. She took care of that then glanced at Elisabeth.
Score: one dead villainess. Even a shifter couldn’t come back from having her brains splattered against the wall. Next stop was the little girl. Damn, the child was burning up.
And all the while, Alan kept murmuring to the boy. “I know you’re angry. I hear you.”
In time, it worked. The boy stopped squirming, either because he’d found a way to pull it together or because Alan was squashing the breath out of him. And in the silence, he gasped out one furious sentence.
“Take. Sister. Doctor!”
Which is when the two local cops came thudding up the stairs. Heavy feet. Rapid pulse. Tight stench of adrenaline.
“Don’t shoot!” Tonya called. “We’re contained.” And she prayed that they were. The last thing she needed was two local cops seeing a half-shifted boy.
“Are you all right?” one of the detectives called as he cleared the top step.
Alan was the one who answered. “Call an ambulance.”
And when Tonya looked over, she saw that the boy was completely human again. As was Alan, though his shoulder looked a bloody mess as he wrapped up the girl in a blanket and lifted her up in his arms.
“She needs my doctor,” Alan said as he looked at Tonya. She didn’t need to guess at his meaning. The girl was going through the same process as Alan had. As the boy obviously had. The girl’s shifter DNA was activated and it wasn’t taking well.
“I’ll take care of it,” she said.
Alan nodded and the cops stepped out of the way as he started down the stairs. One had already called for an ambulance. The other was taking in the scene, his eyes wide and horrified.
“Is the animal downstairs—” she began.
“Dead,” he answered. “Jesus, who would leave kids with two wild cougars?”
Tonya didn’t answer. There was no explaining the logic of this to anyone.
Besides, her attention was on Alan. God, he looked awful covered in blood, and yet she’d never seen him more powerful.
More in control. He seemed magnificent to her, and she started to follow him.
Just like she’d always follow him. But the detective grabbed her arm, holding her back.
“What the hell happened here? And what is that smell?”
“I’ll explain later. I need to—”
“You need to do it now, Deputy,” the man said, his words hard.
There were more words. Questions. Procedures.
All the annoying law-and-order shit she’d sworn to obey the moment she first got her badge.
She knew it was important, but she wanted to be with Alan.
She needed to be with the man she loved.
“Let me make sure he gets to the hospital first,” she said.
The detective gave her a quick nod, but kept a hand on her.
She could have broken free, but what was the point?
The scream of a siren cut through the air and an ambulance tore up the street.
She’d barely made it to the driveway when the paramedics hopped out and took charge of the girl.
Alan tried to step aside, but with all the blood still seeping from his shoulder, no one was letting him go anywhere.
She tried to get to him. All she needed was a single private moment to tell him how proud she was of him. He’d done it all perfectly. He was still alive. The kids were safe. And she loved him. She so completely and totally loved him.
But there was no privacy and no time. She caught his gaze once and held it. And in that moment, she read absolutely nothing. No resignation. No reassurance. Just an enigmatic stare before the doors shut and he was driven off to the hospital.
Gone.