Spotting His Leopard (Shifters, Inc.) (12 page)

                The limo had left the center of town and was heading towards the outskirts, and Gwenneth turned away from Nadette and the chief, staring out the window in silence. Wherever they were going, it was almost certainly the end of the line for her. Her only hope was that she could pick the lock on the collar, shift, and create enough of a distraction that the children could escape.

                Tyler sniffed around at the ground, his fur standing on end.  Off in the distance, he could hear Corran huffing and puffing, his feet thudding on the ground as he ran to catch up.

                Pern had taken Tyler and Corran to the last place he’d seen Gwenneth and the queen, and Tyler had shifted and followed their scent from there, with Pern loping along at his heels.

                Their scents told a story. A story with an unhappy ending.  Everything had been fine for Gwenneth and the queen until they’d reached this spot. Then dozens of male jaguars had closed in on them, and he recognized the scent of Police Chief Angara. He could smell anger and fear.  He also smelled Nadette’s scent.  To his great relief, he did not smell any blood.

                But he did pick up the lingering scent of exhaust, sweeping towards him on a stiff breeze.  Gwenneth and the queen had been forced into a car, he was sure of it. 

                “What happened?” Corran wheezed, skidding to a stop next to Tyler and Pern. He held Tyler’s backpack, which he tossed to the ground at Tyler’s feet as Tyler shifted back into human form.

                “You might want to renew your gym membership.” Tyler ignored his question and scowled in thought, debating his next move. Pern paced anxiously, tail twitching, sniffing the air.

                “Hey, I’m in tip-top shape, for a human.” He gasped for breath, bent over with his hands braced on his knees. “You’re a wolf, damn it, I can’t be expected to keep up. You could have slowed down and waited for me.”

                “I could have.” Tyler scowled fiercely, sniffing at the air again. Pern shifted back into human form, looking worried.

                “So what did you find?” Corran asked between heaving gulps of breath.

                “A bunch of male jaguar shifters abducted Gwenneth and a female jaguar who I’m assuming is the queen.  They left in a car.” He gritted the words out, struggling to quell the rising fury and panic inside him.

                The message that she’d sent to him through Pern– she’d been trying to save him. Trying to trick him into abandoning her.

                As ever, his fated mate wasn’t very good at lying.  He knew she was his, and he knew she knew it.  She was his heartbeat, his life, and he would not sleep until he found her.

                “So now what’s our next move?” Corran asked impatiently.

                As he spoke, the wind shifted, and he picked up another scent that made him freeze in his tracks.   

                Lion shifter, and several bears, and the coppery tang of blood.

                “Corran, get out of here,” he said quickly. “Run. The Shadow Lord’s heading this way.”

                “Screw it,” Corran said wearily. “If he wants me dead, I’m dead. I’d rather face my death like a man.”

                “Don’t be an idiot.  Leave so I can explain things to him,” Tyler snapped.

                “No explanation necessary.” A man’s voice rang out from behind a pile of broken chipboard furniture, and then he stepped out.  Lion shifter. The Shadow Lord.

                A big man with a brutal face, thick brows, the burn of silver on one cheek – the one scar that would never heal or fade.  He wore a leather coat, seemingly unbothered by the heat, looking as cool as a cucumber.  Bear shifters flanked him on either side, and he was holding a severed head by the hair in his right hand.

                “Farruki,” Pern choked out.

                “He was, yes,” the Shadow Lord said, and tossed Farruki’s head onto a pile of garbage. “Do you work for him?”

                Pern cringed, and Tyler stepped forward in front of him, letting out a low growl. “Leave him alone,” he snapped. “He’s just a boy, and he didn’t work for him. He just paid protection money to him, the way you Thieves’ Guild leeches steal money from children everywhere.”

                The lion looked at him with eyes of ice blue. “I do not take money from children.”

                Tyler scoffed. “Forgive me if I don’t take the word of a criminal as the gospel truth.”

                The bears on either side of him growled, but the lion shifter appeared to be unfazed. “You’re the security contractor from California.”

                Tyler tried to place the man’s accent but couldn’t. It was American, but the Shadow Lord didn’t have any regional twang to his voice, or he’d made sure that he erased it.

                From what little Tyler knew about the Shadow Lord, he moved around the globe, never staying in one country for long. He was one of the underworld’s most powerful brokers; if you wanted to acquire an object that was impossible to steal, you went to him.

                The lion glanced at Corran. “Corran. Good to see you again.” Corran swallowed hard, and Tyler could have sworn he went a shade paler, but he didn’t say anything.

                “You understand that I’m not going to stand here and let you harm either one of them,” Tyler said, letting fur ripple on his face as he glanced at Corran and Pern.

                That seemed to amuse the lion. “Suicidally brave.  An admirable quality.  But you might want to wait before you leap into my jaws. You’re about to go and try to rescue your fated mate, I assume.  I’m here to offer you my assistance.”

                “Me? Work with you?”

                “For the time being.” He glanced at Tyler. “Unless you have a small army at your immediate disposal…like I do.”

                “What exactly are you proposing?”

                Corran raised a hand. “Hello, I hate to interrupt, but does this mean you’re not actually going to kill me?”

                The lion shifter ignored him. “Can you scent where she was taken? That should lead me to some people I need to speak to. I’ve been betrayed, and that never ends well. For those foolish enough to betray me, that is.” He glanced over at Farruki’s head.

                “I don’t know how much you know about what really happened, but the woman who was supposed to steal the Eye is not the one who betrayed you.”

                “I know.” The lion shifter nodded, and the icy glitter of anger in his eyes grew even colder. “So will you take me to them? I can find them with or without you, but it will probably be faster with you. And there’s a certain police chief who’s going to be trying to get rid of any loose ends sooner rather than later. Your girlfriend is a loose end.”

                “So is the queen!” Pern said anxiously. The lion shifter shrugged, the picture of indifference.

                Make a deal with the devil, a notorious criminal and murderer, in order to save Gwenneth?

                In a heartbeat.

                “Let’s go,” Tyler said. “I’ll lead the way.”

                The old bottling factory was located on the outskirts of town.  There were jaguar police officers already on guard there, and they snapped to attention when Chief Angara climbed out of his limo.

              They looked a little less sure when Queen Serena and Gwenneth climbed out.

              The Queen raked all of them with a look of loathing and contempt.

              “Traitors, all of you,” she said loudly.  “Have you seen what is happening to our island because of this man? You are destroying your own people!”  None of them would meet her eye.

              “Move along!” Chief Angara growled, prodding her hard with his finger. Several of the soldiers flinched at that, but nobody moved to help her.

  Gwenneth and the queen were herded inside by Chief Angara and six jaguar police officers, past rows and rows of rusting, idle machinery, through dusty rooms that made Gwenneth sneeze and reeked of bird droppings.

                The police officers and the chief had all dressed as they were being driven through town, and had donned their gun belts. Her nose twitched at the scent of their silver-coated bullets.

                Nadette stalked through the room with her head held high and her eyes blazing with wounded pride.  She shot looks of murderous rage at Gwenneth, who ignored her. Nadette no longer mattered. One way or another, her days were numbered.

                “My God,” the queen exclaimed n horror as she looked around. 

                Some of the children were sitting on old cardboard boxes. A few were wandering around barefoot on the dirty floor. Gwenneth gritted her teeth in fury.  The bastards hadn’t even put mats down on the concrete for them to sleep on, and they’d put copper collars on all their necks.

                Tana was sitting cross-legged, drawing in the dust on the floor with a stick.  She leaped to her feet when they walked in.  “You came for me!”  she cried. She ran over to Gwenneth, jumped into her arms and gave her an enormous hug. As she did, Gwenneth felt Tana picking the lock on her neck with a tiny twist of wire, and she hid a smile by burying her face in Tana’s hair.

                “All our collars are loose; we were just waiting for you, because we knew you would come for us,” Tana whispered in her ear. “Just give us the signal.”

                “The guards have silver bullets,” Gwenneth replied in a low murmur. “Just let me distract the police chief, and when I do, do your best to get everyone out of here.”

                She glanced over at the queen, who was looking frantically around the room. The queen’s eyes lit on Tam, or rather, Hiro, who was standing by a stack of boxes, staring at her uncertainly.

                “Tam! My son!” Serena rushed over and knelt down next to him. She swept the boy up in a hug, and he stared at her in confusion and put his hand on her face.

                “Who are you?” he asked her, looking into her eyes with wonder. “You look like a queen.”

                “I am a queen. You are my son, and you are a prince.”

                He giggled at that. “Me! A prince!” Then he hugged her and buried his face in her shoulder, and Gwenneth saw that he was picking her lock also. A proud smile spread across Serena’s face; she knew what he was doing.

                Gwenneth walked over to the police chief, who impatiently waved the confessions at her.

                “Just give her five minutes with him before you take us,” Gwenneth said to the police chief.  “After all, it’s her last goodbye to her son.” She wanted time to assess the room and decide what her best options were.

                Nadette stamped her foot. “No!  You’ve stalled enough!” she snarled.

                She just didn’t learn. Her ego would be her undoing, Gwenneth thought.

                Chief Angara glared at her. “No woman tells me what to do. I give the orders here.” He cast a cold glance at Gwenneth. “Five minutes,” he snapped, glancing at his watch. He leaned against the wall, his arms folded across his chest, watching them. Nadette turned on her heel and stalked out of the room.

                Good. One less person to fight.  Seven armed cops, versus the queen and Gwenneth and fourteen children who could shift into jaguars…there was a good chance at least some of the gang would make it out alive.

                Gwenneth knelt down and whispered to Tana, “When I give the signal, be ready to move. Get the kids out of here, don’t look back, don’t stop for me.”

                She glanced around. There should have been fourteen little street urchins there. She saw only eight. Tana caught her eye and gave her a tiny nod.

                That was a good start.

                “They are up in the rafters,” Tana whispered back. “When I give the signal, they will jump down on the guards.”

                Several minutes later, the police chief keyed the microphone on his radio and spoke.  Gwenneth couldn’t hear his words, but she saw the expression on his face.  He looked unhappy. He spoke into the radio again, and apparently there was no answer, because he sent one of the guards out of the room.

                A minute went by, and the guard didn’t return.  The chief pressed the button on his radio again. There was still no answer.  Now he was starting to look panicked and angry.  Hope rose inside of Gwenneth. Could Tyler have come for her? But Tyler alone, or even with Corran’s help, couldn’t have taken out all of those men outside.

                “You two! Get over here!” Chief Angara shouted at them from across the room.

                “Come get me,” Gwenneth taunted him.

                He pointed his gun at Tana, who stared back at him, unblinking.

                “I will blow her head off on the count of three.”

                “If you hurt her, I’ll never sign your confession,” Gwenneth said, standing up quickly, but she began moving towards him, putting herself between him and Tana. The queen thrust her son behind a box and did the same, hurrying towards the chief.

                The police officers began crowding in around them.

Tana gave a wild cry, and jaguar cubs dropped from the ceiling, landing on the police officers. They clawed and snarled, and the police officers pulled out their guns and fired wildly.

                At the same time, Gwenneth and the queen ripped their collars off and shifted, lunging at Chief Angara. 

                As he shifted, Gwenneth raked his face with her claws, savagely slashing through one eye. All around her she could hear howls and hisses and growls and thuds.

                Then the door burst open.

                As it did, she felt something slam into her ribs with agonizing pain. Silver. She’d been shot with silver.

                She fell to the ground, gasping, and heard a roar of fury. It couldn’t be…but there she was.

                Rhonwen. In jaguar form, but she’d know her twin anywhere.

                Blood streamed down Chief Angara’s face. He swung towards Rhonwen, levelling his gun, but Rhonwen knocked him off his feet before he could fire a shot.  She bit his hand clean off, and it fell to the ground, blood spurting from the stump.  An enormous lion joined her, savagely slashing at him. The chief’s roars of rage turned to screams of agony.

                There were lions and bears and jaguars and…Tyler? Pain seared through Gwenneth and she gasped for breath.

               She heard Tyler’s voice. “Hold on, baby, I’m sorry!” She looked up, and Tyler and her sister, still in jaguar form, were crouched over her where she lay.

                Her sister put her paws on her and held her down as Tyler clawed the silver bullet out of her rib. Her abdomen was on fire; she screamed with pain and passed out.