Colorblind (Moonlight) (26 page)

A jerky nod followed, and he carefully removed his hand. She only stared at him wide-eyed. Étienne scented the air, pinpointing the men who’d obviously been waiting for them to pass. There were three men, each in different locations. They were obviously after Penny.

His ears picked up on movement. One of the men was heading their way, slowly and silently. Another began closing in from the opposite direction. Hunters.

Étienne lifted Penny over one shoulder and placed Jolie over the other. With two charges, could he outrun the men? He did not know but he would try. Plus, he had the pistol in his pocket he would use, if it came to that. He’d been running for seconds when something slammed him forward. Jolie shrieked as his weight slammed her into the ground. Quickly, Étienne released them and pushed away, landing on his shoulder.

He groaned in torture as fire burned its way across his stomach. Rolling to his back, he felt for the injury he knew was there. A medium-sized hole greeted his fingers, and he cursed.
Musket
. Dear Gods!

Even as the pain bit into him, he could feel his muscles knitting back together. Determined, he pushed himself up and moved back to Jolie and Penny. Jolie was pressed up against a tree, her eyes wide with fright.

He stopped before her first and muttered one word. “Run.” As if only needing to hear it, Jolie did just that. She took off in the opposite direction. If she kept on the path at that pace, she would reach the plantation in under an hour.

Branches snapped to his left, and he turned, noticing the slight shifting of the tall grass. He crouched low and distanced himself from Penny, not wanting the bright light of the change to alert their attackers of her whereabouts. After his change, he moved from the spot immediately, tracking the one who was closest to him. Within moments, he had the man’s neck in his jaws. The beginning of a scream escaped, and a sharp crack followed.

The second man walked directly into his path, and he suffered more. Étienne caught his gun arm first, crushing the wrist before going for his throat.

With that done, he returned to check on Penny.
Still there
.

The third was harder to find. His scent was difficult to pinpoint with the smell of blood and death so pungent on the air. As he slowly made his way through the tall stalks of grass, ears alert for movement, nose scenting him out, he sent up a mental call to Leon.

What’s wrong?
Even in his head, Leon sounded antsy.

Hunters.
It was risky to mentally call his brother as he searched for the third man. With his attention distracted, he opened himself to attack. Still, it was necessary.

Where?

Before the main road. Penny’s hit. Drugged.

Something moved to his left and he turned just in time to see the flash of a recoiling gun. Étienne shifted to his right moments before pain exploded in his side. The pain burned with an intensity unlike any other he’d felt before. Even the previous wound to his stomach had not hurt as much, which meant this bullet was tainted. Silver. It had to be.

His legs gave out under him and he crashed to the dirt. Black winked in and out of his vision.

Hit. Careful. Silver.

The grass next to him shifted and his vision cleared briefly to reveal a grinning older man with a musket aimed directly at his head.

***

To say Patrick Ryder was happy was a gross understatement. When Aisha, the slave girl who’d become his eyes and ears on Arnaud’s plantation after her attempt to bargain with him, had told him of Penny’s disappearance, he’d been both suspicious and angered. The rumor had been that she’d been loaned to Abigail Hodgkins, though the reasons were unclear. He’d followed up, contacting William Hodgkins about his acquisition of a new slave, but the man had informed him that he’d made no recent purchases.

So, Patrick bided his time, knowing something else was afoot. When Aisha had told him of the newly arrived slaver, one of the men who’d taken her brother away, it had only heightened his suspicions. The men he’d contracted to hunt “wild” animals on Arnaud’s plantation afterhours had turned up nothing, as he’d expected. If Aisha was right about the rumors surrounding Penny, then she was the creature he was looking for. And if she was missing, they would find nothing. Still, he’d had them patrol Arnaud’s estate, just in case. Days ago, his tenacity had paid off. Two of the men he’d hired had lost their lives, but that was nothing compared to what he’d accomplished.

There were two shifters. The large, blond wolf currently drugged and spread out in the cage before him, and Penny, if the rumors about her were true. She’d woken numerous times from her sedation but he’d only drugged her again. It would not do to have her launching herself at him on their journey to his Georgia plantation. Arnaud could not accuse him of stealing his property if he could not find her, and by the time the younger man thought to look for him in this location, neither he nor his foundlings were going to be there. Plus, Arnaud should thank him for taking a
shifter
off his hands.

A smile touched his lips. He’d placed Penny in a room upstairs, securing her arms and legs to the bed by silver bands wrapped in leather. From what he knew of the shifters, that should weaken her should she waken. And if he was wrong, and Penny was simply a rebellious nigger with no voodoo coursing through her, he would still take pleasure in her. He had waited long enough to have her at his mercy, and he was going to enjoy every moment of it.

But first, he needed the creature in the cage to change. Anyone who saw him would simply believe him a large, injured wolf, not a man who could change at will into a beast. When he’d pulled the trigger that neutralized the creature, he’d thought the wolf was Penny. That had been laid to rest when the rest of the hunting party had found an unconscious, but human, Penny feet away. From that, Patrick Ryder had come to his greatest conclusion yet. Shifters did not have to be niggers. He was almost positive the drugged wolf was the slaver. It was male, which eliminated the girl who’d escaped. Still, was it was possible the slaver had run and another male had come to fight for Penny?

Footsteps sounded behind him and he spun to face the regal man who entered the room. A house girl trailed after him, looking uneasy and passing Patrick a sorry stare. He dismissed her with a wave of his hand. No doubt the man had simply brushed his way past her. Still, she would have to be punished.

“Have you finally caught one of your creatures, Ryder?” the newcomer asked curiously, a slight degree of mockery in his voice as he moved toward the cage.

“I didn’t know you were in Georgia, Cronin.”

Maximilian Cronin was a wealthy plantation owner. He had holdings in almost all of the cotton- and sugar-rich states in America, and vast estates in Europe. When he was in America, which was infrequent, he was a highly coveted guest. Over a game of cards, and deep in his cups, Patrick had shared what he’d witnessed years ago. The younger man’s laughter had followed him out.

“Paris isn’t what it used to be. I’m easily bored.” Cronin tapped the cage with his fashionable wooden cane. “So this is your ‘shifter’? He looks no different from a regular wolf.” He circled the cage. “Where did you find him?”

Ignoring the last question completely, Patrick Ryder smirked. “You are young, Maximilian, and haven’t been exposed to things as I have.”

A slight narrowing of hazel eyes greeted his proclamation.

Ryder ignored it. It was true. Cronin was a boy, barely weaned off his mother’s teat, compared to him. It was only money that gave Maximilian Cronin the respect he now wore. Another reason he’d been so adamant about proving the existence of shifters was Cronin. He’d been laughed at by a man who was half his age and barely sporting whiskers. He wanted to see the look of horror on his face when the wolf shifted, wanted to see him reduced to the boy he was when the creature turned those inhuman eyes on him.

“Perhaps,” Cronin conceded with the barest lifting of the lips. “But your wolf, although awake and injured, is still a wolf.” He inclined his head to the cage where the wolf was shaking its large head as if trying to clear it. “If what you are claiming is true, prove it. Make him change.”

***

Étienne shook his head and blinked. He felt sluggish, but the pain was also immobilizing. His throat was dry, as if he hadn’t had liquid for days. He blinked again. The light wasn’t much, but it was brutal on his sensitive eyes. Someone was speaking. Two people. About him. He tilted his head and looked through the bars of the cage that held him, into a familiar face. It took seconds, but his memory returned.

Penny!

Hunters had been after her. He’d tried to save her, had been shot in the process. He remembered the burning, the pain. Silver. And the man who’d stood above him, he was the one who now looked down at him.

Trying to push himself up proved futile. His limbs were not working.

Where was she? He sniffed the air, trying to find a scent that would give him her location. Étienne found nothing.

“I know what you are.” The man who’d shot him was speaking. “I know you are creature of magic and that you can change at will into a man. Do so now and I won’t kill you.”

Étienne produced a soft growl. It was all that he could manage. Whoever this man was would have to die. He and the younger one standing behind him. He surveyed the other one for a long time, before recognition dawned. There was another scent in the room, an inhuman scent. The hunter was human, but the younger man was something else. Grabbing a hold of his scattered wits, Étienne sniffed it out.
Witch
.

It was then that his eyes narrowed. A witch was working with a human? To what end? It was no new knowledge that witches and werewolves were not close, but most immortal avoided humans like the plague. They were too unreliable, and easily broken. Yet here stood a witch, in tandem with a human.

“Change!” the older man hissed, much to the amusement of the witch.

“This is your shifter, Ryder? A terrified and injured wolf trapped in a cage?” A mocking laugh left his lips as he leaned closer to the cage. His eyes flashed black briefly and Étienne didn’t doubt it was for his benefit only. “I’ve seen wild dogs better able to perform tricks.”

He retreated with another laugh.

“You don’t understand.” The older man—Ryder—was speaking. “He can change—”

“Enough,” the witch said calmly, holding up a bejeweled hand. “You’ve had your fun at our expense. Now return the wolf to the wild or mount his head, it is your choice, but lay to rest this idea that there are shifters. It only makes you appear…unstable.”

Ryder didn’t take kindly to those words. He strode over to the other side of the room and returned moments later with a long stick. A cattle prod?

Étienne tensed.

“Change or I’ll stick you with this until you do. Understand?”

He understood well, but he wasn’t changing anytime soon. The silver and the drugs were still coursing in his veins, which meant he was weak. As a human, he would be defenseless. At least in his wolf’s body, he could snap at anyone who came too close.

“Ryder, I didn’t take you for one who tortures animals?” The witch was once more amused, and Étienne vowed to kill both him and this Ryder when the drug wore off.

“Change, damn you!”

When he only continued to stare up at the man, he jabbed the cattle prod into the cage. Étienne’s teeth clenched as the sharpened tip lanced his wound. The bullet was still in there, poisoning him, and the pain was excruciating.

“You shot him?” the witch asked.

“Silver bullets wound them,” was Ryder’s response.

Laughter erupted in the room. “Silver bullets? Shifters? Ryder, have you fallen into your cups in the time I’ve been absent from this country?”

“No,” Ryder answered through clenched teeth, lifting the prod from Étienne’s wound. “You’ll see. He’ll change soon, and you’ll see.”

The prod came down again, once again with precision against his wound. Étienne couldn’t help the moan of pain that escaped his lips. Bright lights danced before his eyes and he snarled. Finally, the pain lessened. Ryder tossed the prod away in anger.

“Change!” he roared.

Even if he wanted to, Étienne doubted he could. His body throbbed. The bullet needed to be removed.

“Instead of torturing the poor creature, maybe you should give it incentive,” Cronin suggested in a bored voice.

“Incentive?”

“Yes. A pup, or something else that is valuable?”

Étienne felt his heart thump wildly in his chest. As soon as he got out of this cage, he would happily sink his teeth into the witch’s neck.

“Pup?” Ryder repeated slowly, thoughtfully. “No. No pups.”

Praying that was the end of it, Étienne growled low when Ryder continued, “But there is something—
someone
—that may be able to help us.”

“Someone?” the witch prodded.

“A slave girl,” Ryder continued with a broad grin. “He was trying to protect her.”

“Well, have her brought here. If the wolf is a shifter as you say, he’ll do whatever is necessary to protect the girl, correct?”

Ryder nodded eagerly, before bellowing a name. A terrified slave girl pushed her head through the door.

“Bring one of the field boys in. A strong one. I have a task that requires heavy lifting.”

***

For the second time in her life, Julia found herself making her way, willingly, to the master’s bedchambers. She navigated the dark easily though she moved with the quickness of a snail. This was done to allow her time to retreat, to go back to the safe haven she shared with Maud.

Her steps slowed even more, and she finally halted. What was she doing? What did hope to accomplish by going to him like this? The answer was at the forefront of her mind.

She wanted to feel how she’d felt when he touched her, kissed her. The emotion was one she’d never encountered, and it was nice. After what had happened in his study, she’d felt a constant need to touch him, and be touched by him. She wanted to see his eyes darken even more as he looked at her in
that
way.