Chapter 20
After putting the food in the fridge, Vaughn shifted, ran outside in his wolf coat, and looked all around for Jillian, sniffing the air. Then he smelled her sexy scent and took off after her. She was exploring a way away. He should have known she’d pick up the trail Kira had left when she came to their guest house. Jillian had already run off in wolf-tracking mode. He woofed, telling her he was coming, to hold on. The other jaguars might be somewhere in the area, which was why he wanted to stay close to the buildings and not run off too far until this business was resolved.
When he reached Jillian, he nuzzled her affectionately in greeting, and she licked his muzzle. Then she nipped at him and ran off. He barked and took off after her. Her tail held out straight behind her said she was alpha all the way, ready to enjoy herself.
He loved this part of them—the wolf side that was ready to enjoy nature as they moved closer to the earth.
On natural impulse, he tackled Jillian and took her down. She rolled onto her back, legs up in the air, kicking at him, biting as he bit back, all in a playful way, growling and having fun. Wolf play was always practice for wolf fights, if they had to deal with wolves who had gone rogue. Since Vaughn had never seen her play with other wolves, she was completely unpredictable and suddenly jumped up to tackle him back. Standing on their hind legs, they clashed, teeth exposed, her legs using his to help her stay up. But she was shorter, not as heavy, and he quickly took her down. But not for long.
She slipped out from underneath him and tackled his neck before he could react. He realized she must have had a lot of experience playing with her brother, as good as she was at countering his moves, despite his larger size. He was gentler with her, knowing he could accidentally hurt her if he wasn’t careful, but glad she wasn’t gentle with him. He was used to his brother giving him good exercise sessions, so he was eager to accept the challenge from his mate.
She tore off again, and the chase was on.
Ohmigod, Vaughn was such a wolf. Jillian had played with her own brother tons over the years and loved the way Vaughn could be just as aggressive, but cognizant of her smaller size and lighter weight. As much as Vaughn was panting, she knew she was giving him a great workout too. She could tell she was going to keep in great wolf shape with a mate like Vaughn, and she loved the way they played and exercised. Truly compatible.
With him giving chase, her heart skittered and she felt panicked, not because she was afraid, but just because of the thrill of the chase, the knowledge she couldn’t keep ahead of him because of his longer gait. Before long, he would tackle her again.
She kept smelling whiffs of Kira’s scent though, and that was distracting her. While Vaughn was almost completely focused on her. Almost. She saw him turn his head and take a little sniff a couple of times too, so he wasn’t all business when it came to playing with her. They were still wolves on a mission, and once they had their fill of playing—for the moment, since she could see them playing until they were old and white—she had every intention of searching for where Kira had been.
As if Vaughn thought she might be too tired to play, but he wasn’t quite ready to quit having fun with her in their wolf coats, he lay down on his stomach, then rolled over, exposing his belly and throat, saying she’d won. She was in charge, if she wanted him. Come and play some more.
She took up the challenge and bounded to join him, to tackle him, and nip at his throat. All in play. Wrestling like this with him made her want to run home, shift, and wrestle some more under the covers, woman to man.
And then she straddled him, her chest against his, their hearts beating wildly, both of them panting.
She licked his muzzle in friendship and love. He licked her back, smiling with his wickedly sharp canines exposed. Woofing at him, she rose and moved off him. He stood, motioned with his head to search for Kira’s scent, and Jillian nodded. They made a great team.
Now it was time to search for where Kira had come from. Had someone left her off nearby so she could walk through the woods to the guest house? Or had she left a vehicle behind? That might hold evidence they could use to their advantage.
They’d traveled maybe two miles from the ranch house and had even crossed two streams when they found a gravel road.
There, sitting on the side of the road, was a muddy gray pickup truck. With two flat tires. They sniffed around it, and Jillian smelled both Brutus’s and Kira’s scents. Which meant this had to be their vehicle. Too bad they couldn’t just drive the vehicle to the ranch. Maybe the flat tires were the reason Kira had crossed through the woods to the ranch, and it hadn’t been because she was trying to be sneaky about it. Though Jillian couldn’t imagine Kira had planned to ask Miles nicely about having Brutus released. Not when she had been carrying a weapon.
Jillian shifted and tried a door handle, but the vehicle was locked. Unfortunately, they didn’t have any way to unlock the vehicle. That was until she saw her now-naked mate pick up a large rock. As cold as it was, she shifted and moved away from the truck. He banged the rock against the window until it broke and he could reach in and unlock it.
Once Vaughn had the door open, he unlocked the back doors. Jillian shifted again, opened a back door, and climbed inside, then shut it. The first thing she saw on the floorboard was a rifle and ammo. Four duffel bags too. No scuba gear. Maybe at a hotel?
Or maybe they would rent it like Miles had intended to.
Inside one of the bag’s pockets, Jillian found a hotel receipt. “That’s about five miles from here.”
“Okay, we need to get right on it. But we also need to take that rifle and ammunition back to Leidolf so the police can run ballistics on it to see if the rounds were the same as the ones fired at the jaguar. And they can compare the round that was used on your brother to see if the same weapon fired it.”
“Kira said that Wayne shot Miles. This appears to be Brutus’s gun, but we can have them also confirm if it’s registered to him.”
“Agreed. And make sure he wasn’t really the shooter. We need to take all of this back to the guest house and get dressed, but—”
“We can only do that if we carry it back with us. As much as I hate to do it, we’re wolves and this is something we have to do from time to time. We’ll need to borrow some of their clothes so we can carry it all back.” She began searching for a sweater and pants, hoping she could find shoes to fit her.
Vaughn found camo clothes and hurried to put on the shirt and pants. He held up a shoe. “Brutus has small feet.”
“Did you want to run as a wolf?”
“You couldn’t carry all of that back with you. Even though we have the two jaguars incarcerated, I don’t want to risk having the other jaguars locate it and take off with it, if they have a mind to do so.”
“Right. I’ll give you a foot massage when we get back.”
He smiled, then let out his breath. “Despite the chill in the air and the roughness of the ground in areas, I’ll have to go barefoot. What about you?”
She pulled on the sweater and then zipped up the pants. She frowned at the shoes, then smiled. “Right size. Thank goodness.” She didn’t want to have to walk all the way back to the guest house in bare feet, yet she had to help carry all this stuff. She slid her arms into a spare woman’s jacket.
As soon as they stuffed the boxes of ammo into one of the bags, she checked to see if the rifle was loaded. It was. She pulled out some more rounds then and stuffed them in the jacket pocket, looking up to see what Vaughn was doing. Watching her.
“Ready to shoot someone?” He arched a brow.
She smiled. “I promise, not you this time. But if we run into trouble with the other two jaguars, I’ll definitely be ready to shoot.”
“A jaguar,” he said skeptically, as if he really, truly thought she only shot wolves!
“Yes. If he’s coming after either of us. We wouldn’t stand a chance against a jaguar. Or, if he’s armed with a rifle and shooting at us. I won’t have any qualms taking him down in any case.”
“Good to know.” He pulled her into his arms and kissed her. “Ready to go?”
“Yeah.” She felt bad for him when she saw him climb out of the truck barefooted. “Maybe you could wear heavy-duty socks.”
“Nah, that’s okay.”
She realized he hadn’t buttoned his shirt, and she wondered if he thought to shift into the wolf if they ran into trouble. He would be better off as a wolf than an unarmed human. Though she wondered if he was a better marksman than her.
“If we run into trouble, did you want to take the rifle?” Discussing it now was important, not waiting until they were in the middle of trouble.
“No. I’d rather you were armed with the rifle. I’ll shift. I don’t have any shoes on, and it would take longer for you to strip.”
“Okay. Unless you think you’re a better shot than me.” All that mattered was their survival.
“No. I believe you when you said you could have taken me out with the first shot. The rifle’s all yours.”
Appreciating that he believed in her, Jillian slung the rifle over her shoulder. She glanced back at the truck before they took off, looking into the truck’s bed, but there were no spare tires.
Then they headed back toward the guest house. She recalled then that both of the streams were running high because of all the winter rains. As a wolf crossing them, she hadn’t given it much thought. Their fur acted as a water-repellent insulator and kept them warm. She’d also been concentrating on locating Kira’s scent on the other side of the stream. As a human, it meant wading through ice-cold water that was probably about chest deep on her. It meant keeping the rifle and ammo dry, but getting soaked and having to wear cold, wet clothes on the rest of the trek back to the guest house.
As long as Vaughn didn’t cut his feet on rocks or twigs, he would probably do better than she would in wet shoes. She’d worn wet army boots and wet wool socks during water hazard and leadership obstacle courses, and then had to march for miles, ending up with blisters. Which made her think of a better way of handling this: remove the boots and tie them around her neck when they reached the stream. They didn’t have that option at the army officer courses.
They’d walked for maybe a quarter of a mile when they reached the first of the streams, and she began stripping. Vaughn smiled at her.
“I don’t want to drag through the water and then wear the sopping-wet clothes to the next stream.”
“Just throw everything in one of the bags, and I’ll carry it.”
He was already carrying three bags. She had the rifle and the fourth bags.
“I can do it. I’ll be able to keep everything dry. You can run as a wolf to the next stream, cross it, and then you can shake off and get dressed again,” he said.
She hated making him carry all the stuff.
“I insist.”
The second stream wasn’t too far from this one, so she agreed. “I’m not a pansy.”
He laughed. “I would never think you were. It’s just easy to do it this way since I’m a lot taller, so no problem.”
“This makes me wonder how Kira came to the guest house and wasn’t soaking wet. She must have removed her clothes and waded across.” Jillian stuffed all the clothes into the bag she’d been carrying and handed him the rifle and bag. Then she shifted and watched to see if he really could keep everything dry.
“It would take too long to strip and dress, then have to do the same thing at the next stream. There’s too much distance between the two streams to walk naked to the next one.” He started to wade across, the bags held up as high as he could, the rifle tied up on top. One of the bags he’d been carrying dipped into the water, which would serve to weigh him down. He slipped a little on wet rocks, and finally made it to shore. She swam after him and then loped alongside him while they headed toward the next stream. With their wolves’ night vision and the cloudless sky and brilliant full moon tonight, they could still see well.
But if jaguars were about, they could see just as well as the wolves.
So far, so good. They’d need to have Leidolf’s men pick up the truck too. It wouldn’t be a good idea if it was left unsecured on the gravel road. Who knew if anyone might try to steal it? And they needed to check it over to see if they could gather any further evidence.
Another eighth of a mile, and they’d made it to the second stream and begun to cross. Jillian wanted to ask how Vaughn’s feet were doing. Maybe she could carry the bags and rifle, and he could run as a wolf for a while. Then he could get out of the wet clothes that had to make him feel ten times colder.
As soon as they gave all of this to the team and the police, she was taking Vaughn straight back to the guest house so they could take a hot shower and she could warm him right up.
When he reached the other side, he slipped and she bumped against him with her wolf’s body, as if she could keep him on his feet. Moving away from the stream, he set the bags down and fished out the clothes she’d worn already. She ran away from him, stood and shook several times, then raced back to him so she could shift and dress. The stars twinkled against the dark sky.
Cold, cold, she hurried to pull on the long sweater and then the jacket. “Go ahead,” she said, not liking that he was drenched in the wet clothes and waiting on her to dress. She was already shaking, and she could see he was shivering too.
“I’ll wait.”
Protective mate. “You’ve got to be freezing. I’ll catch up.”
He dropped the bags and began searching through them while she pulled on the pants. Then she realized what he was doing. He pulled out a fresh set of clothes. Before he could begin to pull off the wet ones, she was helping him strip. Not only because it was faster this way, but because she liked the way he was smiling down at her for doing so as she took a soft T-shirt and rubbed his body—all of his body—vigorously to dry him off the quickest she could before he dressed.
She smiled as she witnessed his cock stir to life. “Wow,” she said. “Even in this cold.”
He laughed. “Only you could make it happen.”
“Good thing.” She helped him dress, then sat down to put the boots back on. She was glad they were mostly dry, with the walk they still had to make all the way back to the ranch. He crouched down and tied on one of her boots while she worked on the other.
“Hot shower when we get back?” he asked.
“Absolutely. Back rubs, well, whole body rubs.”
“And more.”
“Hmm,” she said as he pulled her to stand and wrapped his arms around her. “The more is what I’m really looking forward to.”
“What are we waiting for then?”
They were continuing on their way to the ranch when they heard a wolf howl, and then another. Three more in unison. They paused. The howls were a warning. Families stay inside. The men were gathering for trouble. What had happened now?
“What do you think? Should we try to make it back to the guest house with all this stuff?” Vaughn asked quietly.
She didn’t want to leave any of the bags behind, not if some of the stuff inside them could be important to their investigation. But then she saw movement in the woods nearby. “I think it’s too late.” Jillian’s heart was pounding as she was certain she’d seen an animal’s glowing eyes in the woods. She slowly set the bag down. “Jaguar, six o’clock,” she whispered. “I think. If it were a wolf, he’d let us know it. I saw his eyes…glowing about at the level a big cat’s or wolf’s would be when standing still.”
Vaughn dropped the other bags and began to strip off his clothes.
“You can’t fight him if he wants what we have.”
“Which is why you have the rifle.”
She was afraid everything would happen so fast that all they’d have time to do would be to react on instinct. Vaughn quickly shifted, but waited in protective mode beside her. Jillian readied the rifle and called out, “I don’t know which jaguar you are, but if you don’t lie down on the grass to let me know you’re not a threat, I’ll shoot.” She couldn’t just shoot the cat where it stood. Not if he or she didn’t act aggressively.
The cat lay down on its belly, but Jillian was still wary that it might be just a ploy. Vaughn lifted his chin to howl, to let others know they had one of the cats in their sight, but another cat came out of the north, running to attack her. An ambush then. Jaguars were ambush predators. But not usually in pairs. She had the gun, and that could be more lethal than Vaughn as a wolf. That’s why the other cat was targeting her first.
She didn’t have time to consider the first cat’s actions.
Vaughn tore into the cat, but with its punishing claws and swipes, she was afraid the jaguar would kill her mate. She aimed to fire a shot, her hands and breathing as steady as she could make them when she wasn’t feeling calm in the least. Not when the cat and wolf were growling, trying to get the best of each other, snarling and moving with such speed that she was having trouble keeping the cat in her sights. She sure as hell didn’t want to shoot her mate this time.
Just as she thought she had a good shot, she saw the other cat in her peripheral vision racing toward her. Jillian squeezed the trigger and fired a round at the jaguar fighting with her mate. It had to be a male as big as he was.
The jaguar went down, and Jillian swung around and was about ready to aim at the other cat, which was smaller—Kira? But a third jaguar had targeted the cat.
The smaller cat dodged away, and Jillian aimed at the larger one. She wasn’t sure why the jaguar was after her. But then she recalled the two men shooting at Jillian and the other wolves, and at Brutus. Wayne and Simon. Had to be. She only saw the one male jaguar though. Before another could come and help him, howls farther away rent the air.
And a couple of shots were fired. She shot the larger jaguar, only wounding him before he could hurt the female. He stumbled but made another lunge, and she shot him again. Both shots were meant to disable him, not kill him. She’d had to kill the one who had attacked her mate though. She’d had to protect him at all costs.
The jaguar collapsed, and Vaughn ran to watch over him, growling and letting the cat know he’d attack if the jaguar moved from where he was lying on the grass now. Kira ran to see the one Jillian had killed. She nudged at the male, licking his muzzle, trying to get him to move. But he was no longer breathing, his heartbeat stopped.
Jillian felt bad for her, but she wouldn’t have done anything differently. Not when her own mate’s life was at stake. “Kira?” She smelled her scent. And Brutus’s too. “How did the two of you leave the jail?” Somehow they had managed to escape.
That was probably why all the howling had occurred. She prayed neither Brutus nor Kira had killed one of the guards at the jailhouse. And she prayed her own mate wasn’t injured too badly.
“Lie down, Kira,” Jillian said. “I don’t want to have to shoot you too.” But she would—if Kira attacked either her or Vaughn.
Jillian heard wolves racing to join them, barking that they were on their way. A couple of all-terrain vehicles were coming too, and she was glad they could take the jaguars off their hands and take care of Vaughn’s injuries. As soon as one of the vehicles stopped where she was watching over Kira, another parked where Vaughn was keeping the wounded jaguar in line. Three jaguars were riding on the vehicle and they leaped off. They must have been Demetria and Everett with Howard. She recognized Howard this time.
The jaguar Jillian had wounded made a move to get up, and one of the men with the other vehicle fired a shot at him. Her heart nearly quit beating. She stifled the urge to shout out No! They needed the cat for questioning.
The men loaded him onto the vehicle. One of the men motioned for Vaughn to come with them, but he shook his head and ran back to join her.
She loved her stubborn wolf, as much as she wanted to tell him to go with the men and get treatment for his wounds. Another vehicle arrived and pulled up to the one near her.
Leidolf and the doctor were on that one, and they hurried to get out. Leidolf looked over Brutus, and the doc shook his head. “Dead.”
“Well, he would have been anyway. One way or another,” Leidolf said.
“Did he kill the guard?” Jillian asked, handing the rifle to Leidolf and crouching down to gently hug her wolf as they loaded Brutus’s body onto one of the vehicles.
“No, but he’s going to have one hell of a headache and he needed some stitches. The bastard pretended to be sick. Kira was calling out that she thought Brutus was dying. The guard didn’t wait for backup. When he went into the cell to check on him, Brutus was lying on his stomach, making a choking sound,” Doc said, taking a look at Vaughn. “Looks like you’re going to need some patching up. Again.”
Before they could do anything with Kira, she leaped up on the vehicle to join Brutus. One of the men said to Kira, “Pull anything, and I’ll shoot you and ask questions later.” Leidolf’s man got on the vehicle to serve as her guard. But she didn’t seem intent on doing anything but mourning the loss of her lover.
Another man threw the bags onto the other ATV.
“The rifle was Brutus’s,” Jillian said to Leidolf. “Maybe one of your men can tell if it was used to shoot one of the other jaguars. Maybe my brother.”
“We found Simon’s vehicle on one of the ranch roads. Couple of rifles in it too,” Leidolf said. “After we run some ballistics tests on them, we should be able to determine who fired what at whom.”
“I’ve got to get back to the clinic.” Doc climbed onto the vehicle. “Need to take care of the jaguar you shot before we can question him.”
“But one of your pack members shot and killed him.”
Doc shook his head. “Tranquilized him for easier management. He was still too aggressive to take in hand like he was. Then you can question him.”
“Thanks.” Jillian was relieved the jaguar was alive so they could learn what was going on. “What about the other? We heard gunshots.”
“Tranquilized too.”
She sighed with relief, then turned her attention to her mate. “Vaughn, why don’t you go with him? I’ll walk back with the others.”
He wouldn’t budge, so Doc and Leidolf headed back to the ranch with the wounded jaguar.
“Fine.” She stripped and shifted, then nuzzled his side where he didn’t have a mark on him. Together they walked to the clinic, their jaguar agent friends joining them. They were truly a team.