sorry. You did the right thing. I should not have given you orders you couldn’t follow.”
Keisha’s shoulders slumped and she lowered her head. “I’m sorry I blocked you. I want you to know I absolutely hate going against your directions, but I will when I feel I have to.” She raised her head then, and looked at him directly, without any sense of her earlier submissiveness. “I’m also sorry I didn’t credit your dreams for the warnings they were.”
“I know. I wish I understood them better myself.” As far as Anton was concerned, the issue was closed. He glanced inside the wallet. Credit cards, a California driver’s license and the name of a business located somewhere south of San Francisco. It sounded like a lab of some kind. He quickly handed the wallet back to Keisha. “Stefan and I are going back to the house to help Mei and Oliver. Can you and Xandi take care of these two?”
He saw Keisha glance in Xandi’s direction. Xandi took the second man’s wallet from Stefan and nodded. “We’ll drag them into the cave.” She gestured to the rocky terrace where she’d been hiding. “Their injuries are consistent with a wild animal attack, should anyone ever find them. The odds they’ll ever be discovered are fairly slim.” She took the wallet from Keisha and stuck both of them in the low cleft of a tree to retrieve later.
Anton leaned over and kissed Keisha. “Good idea. Bring the wallets back with you. We need to figure out who the hell these two were, what’s going on, who sent them. I’ll get the info to Luc Stone. C’mon, Stef.”
Anton shifted. Stefan followed him. With a final backward glance at their women, both wolves raced back down the trail and headed toward the house.
The black SUV rolled slowly into the shadows and stopped in darkness just beyond the glow of lights ringing the driveway near the main house. Oliver waited close by. His mottled leopard coat made him nearly invisible.
Mei remained on the porch, tucked down low beside the porch swing. She’d slipped through the open window and moved closer in case Oliver needed her, but first she’d turned all the house lights off. The porch was completely dark. The lights along the drive were solar powered, so she’d not been able to extinguish them, but their light might work to her advantage.
The intruders would be going from bright light to the darkened house, should they get that far.
Igmutaka’s presence was strong within her tonight. She sensed his excitement and his coiled strength. Mei knew that, were she in human form, she might have laughed out loud. Who would have thought that Mik Fuentes’s Sioux grandfather’s spirit guide would end up inhabiting a mongrel Asian shapeshifter from Florida?
Of course, who would have thought little Mei Chen would grow up to be a Chanku shapeshifter in the first place? The many turns her life had taken since Eve Reynolds caught her shoplifting in a little mini-mart in Tampa still boggled her mind.
Mei heard the sound of car doors opening and raised her head, once again fully alert to her surroundings. There was no interior light in the vehicle, but with her powerful night vision Mei picked out at least three shadows moving near the side closest to her. She wasn’t sure if there was a fourth one.
She wished Eve and Adam were here, but they’d gone south to San Francisco to see Mik, Tala, and AJ. A few extra bodies would come in handy about now.
The soft scrape of nails on the far side of the deck caught her attention. Mei jerked her head in the direction of the sound, and recognized the dark wolf as Anton Cheval the moment he rounded the corner. Another wolf, this one with silver-tipped fur, followed close behind him. Stefan Aragat.
Mei growled quietly, alerting both wolves to her presence. They couldn’t communicate while she was in leopard form.
She closed her eyes, thought wolf, and shifted. It always took her a moment to get her bearings, going from leopard to wolf, and she felt Igmutaka’s ire. He did not like this form at all.
I’m here. Silently she spoke to the two wolves, mindtalking in the way of their kind. By the swing. Be very quiet. At least three, maybe four guys just got out of an SUV parked under the big fir tree at the end of the drive. There, just beyond the lights. Oliver’s near them, in leopard form. Are you guys okay? Where are Keisha and Xandi?
Hiding the bodies. Anton’s terse reply told her nothing, yet explained everything.
Mei shifted back to leopard before more of Anton’s thoughts slipped into her head. She’d been reading him much too clearly lately, and his anger at this moment was a living, breathing thing. Right now, she definitely didn’t need the distraction.
Igmutaka filled her with power once again as she settled back to wait, watch, and protect. Anton and Stefan slipped quietly over the wooden railing and landed without sound in the soft grass below the deck.
Oliver? Anton and Stefan are moving toward your position.
Got it. I see them. Thanks.
Mei stayed put. She would guard the babies with her life. Besides, she had a terrific view of the action from her spot here on the wide deck. If the men needed her, she was close by. She watched Stefan and Anton race across the front lawn, two silent, deadly shadows drawing closer to the three men standing beside the SUV. There was no moon, but her leopard eyes saw everything with perfect clarity.
Two of the intruders carried rifles. The third slung a large bag over his shoulder. They moved silently toward the house, walking single file, close to the dark perimeter where landscaping met forest.
There was a swirl of light and dark and the third man, the one at the rear holding the bag over his shoulder, disappeared. The two walking ahead, paused. For a brief moment it appeared they weren’t certain they’d lost their partner.
Suddenly, two dark wolves charged out of the forest, moving so quickly even Mei was startled. Each one took down his target. Mei heard a deep grunt, a sharp snap that could only have been bone, and then silence. She reached out for Oliver. Are you all right?
Yes. We got three of them. I thought I saw a fourth guy get out on the opposite side of the car, but there are just three here.
One of the baby monitors near the door crackled with static. A baby cried out. Alex! The sound ended so quickly the silence shivered. Mei whirled around and leapt through the open window. She raced down the hallway. A dark shape hovered over Alex’s crib.
Oliver! There was a fourth man. He’s here. In the house!
She caught the intruder’s scent, the acrid odor of fear and unwashed human. How had he gotten past her defenses? She was alone, the only one here now, to guard the babies.
Igmutaka roared within. Mei’s powerful haunches bunched beneath her and she covered the distance from doorway to crib in less than a heartbeat.
She locked her jaws on the intruder’s throat, heard a sharp snap. Her weight bore him to the floor. He landed in a heap. She figured he was dead by the limp sprawl of his body, the awkward twist of his head in relation to his shoulder, but she kept her jaws clamped tightly around his throat. Her breath huffed loudly through her nostrils. Saliva and blood soaked the man’s shirt.
She felt the power of the spirit guide lending her strength, giving her the knowledge she needed to kill.
She was not nearly so alone as she’d feared.
When
