Sticks & Stones

Deuce was thankful they’d been able to keep the blankets and extra clothing. He was pretty sure they would all freeze if they were still wet, because it was getting colder as the sun set. After the trial of crossing the river—and losing the man they’d known only as Redjacket—no one mentioned trying to gear up and get any farther before nightfall. Dinner was slow cooking, mainly because they were all too listless and exhausted to mess with it. But as Deuce warmed a little, the psychiatrist in him began to have a fit.



So far two men were dead; Zane had shot one and they’d watched one pretty much commit suicide trying to escape justice. Deuce supposed Redjacket could be alive somewhere downstream. In his opinion it was unlikely. So unlikely that they’d elected not to waste time and energy trying to find him. He glanced to Earflaps, sprawled on the ground on the far side of the fire, trussed up and snoring noisily.



Deuce looked up across the fire at Earl, who sat staring into the flames with a frown set on his face. It didn’t seem the time or the place to address any issues pertaining to his father and Ty, did it? Or was he just terrified of doing it and being in the middle? He shook his head and glanced to the side, where Ty and Zane sat next to one another. Ty was hunched over and rocking slightly, just like he always did when he let his self-control slip a little. And it was probably serving a secondary purpose of keeping him warm.



It was alternately fascinating and painful, watching Ty and Zane together. They fought and they argued, sometimes cruelly. But Ty had brought Zane up here, hoping Deuce would help him, and Zane had been willing to leap into that river with nothing but dumb luck as a lifeline just on the off chance that he might be able to help Ty. They were a study in extremes, and as much as they denied it, they seemed well matched. After watching Zane take Ty’s face in his hands and lean forward to speak to him—when it had very much looked like he’d been about to kiss him—Deuce suspected they were better matched than they knew themselves. But that wasn’t really a topic Deuce could bring up now, either, not in front of Earl.



Deuce squeezed his eyes closed and massaged the bridge of his nose, fighting a headache. “So, Ty,” he finally decided on, tired of the tense silence. “That was some distraction ploy you used back in the camp,” he complimented, looking at his brother closely in the flickering light. “How’d you know they wouldn’t shoot you?”



Ty looked up at him blankly, appearing not to understand. “What?” he asked in confusion. Zane turned his chin, watching Ty with a small frown.



“Yelling at the assholes with guns,” Deuce provided with a small smile. “Pretending you were losing it.”



Ty pressed his lips together tightly and then looked back down at the tin plate he held. “Yeah,” he answered flatly.



Deuce continued to look at him. So, mental breakdown and not a clever ploy, then. That was good to know, at any rate. Just as worrisome were the slight changes on Zane’s face when Deuce glanced at him; the frown went flat, Zane’s eyes narrowed, and then he squeezed them shut for a few seconds before reopening them and focusing on Ty again.



“You were pretending, right?” Deuce asked Ty.



Ty looked up and glared at him.



“He’s a dumbass for doin’ the yellin’,” Earl stated, pulling his blanket tighter around his shoulders.



Deuce looked over at his father as his head began to pound harder. “Dad,” he said in frustration. “Would you just shut the hell up for one fucking minute?”



Earl looked up slowly, looking at Deuce in shock. Ty stared at Deuce with much the same expression Earl was, his mouth slightly agape. Zane snorted and ducked his head as he rubbed at his eyes.



“Is there a reason you’re on his case more than usual, or are you just getting meaner in your old age? ’Cause you sure as hell ain’t gettin’ smarter,” Deuce snapped.



“Deacon,” Ty said softly, his voice surprised and full of dread.



Deuce didn’t look away from his father. He saw Earl’s jaw tighten as he ground his teeth. Neither of his sons had ever spoken to him like that. In fact, Deuce was pretty sure no one had ever spoken to Earl Grady like that and walked away except perhaps for Mara. Earl looked as if he was about to say something, but then he began to nod slowly, and he sighed. He looked from Deuce to Ty slowly. Ty met his eyes, though he did so with clear trepidation, and he shifted nervously where he sat. Deuce thought he might have caught sight of Zane’s hand gently settling on Ty’s leg.



“He’s right,” Earl said to Ty in a rough voice. “I’m sorry, boy,” he offered.



Ty stared at him in obvious surprise for long, tense moments before he nodded jerkily. “Yes, sir,” he responded almost inaudibly.



Zane leaned closer to Ty and murmured something—he didn’t look at all appeased. When Ty just shook his head, Zane leaned back and kept his mouth shut. But his dark eyes were filled with something menacing that confused Deuce. Not many emotions inspired that kind of darkness: fury, desperation… utter devotion.



One thing was certain. If Zane ever came to any family holidays with Ty, it would be interesting.



They ate in silence, all of them too tired and too hungry to argue any more or try to make idle conversation. As soon as Earl had finished, he stood with his bedroll. “Night, boys,” was all he said as he turned and walked a few feet away to settle down for the night.



Deuce waited until his father had done so before he scooted closer to Ty and Zane and lowered his voice. “You didn’t have a plan, did you?” he asked Ty. It came out as more of a statement than a question. Ty glanced at him sideways before looking back down at the tin plate in his hand. He shook his head in answer. Zane looked up as well, but this time there was no emotion to be read on his face.



Deuce watched them both in growing anger. “Do you two have any idea how completely dysfunctional you are?” he asked them.



“Dysfunctional?” Zane repeated, though his voice was low.



“You’re both practically suicidal,” Deuce pointed out, forcing himself to keep his voice low. The last thing they needed was for Earl or Earflaps to weigh in on this. “First Ty goes ballistic and starts begging people to shoot him; then you go off and try to dive into that river without even thinking about how you’d get back out.”



Ty flinched and turned to look at Zane questioningly, but Zane was watching Deuce. Deuce rolled his eyes and looked away. “Dysfunctional” was an understatement.



“Look, can this wait until we’re not all freezing our balls off?” Ty asked sedately as he continued to eat slowly. They’d taken all the MREs they could carry from the ATV, and that was all the food they had unless they wanted to forage. “Thought I was done with these damn things,” Ty muttered as he poked at the food.



“Here,” Zane murmured, handing over the little mini-package of M&Ms out of his meal.



Ty glanced at it and then up at Zane with a small, tired smile. “Keep your damn chocolate,” he muttered gruffly.



Deuce put his chin in his hand and watched them silently. He couldn’t read Zane, but he thought the man’s projected emotions were fairly straightforward. When they were visible at all. Right now, Zane was focused on Ty, and that anger appeared to be totally gone, replaced by something milder. Warmer.



But Ty? Deuce snorted. Not in love, his ass. Ty could fool Zane, maybe. He could even fool himself for a while longer. But Ty couldn’t fool Deuce, not anymore.



Chapter 14



“I GOTTA take a leak,” Earflaps said petulantly.



Ty jerked and gasped, yanked from his doze by the man’s voice. He shook his head and rubbed at his eyes, leaning forward to pile more sticks into the stuttering fire before looking over at the prisoner hatefully. “I should let you just piss yourself,” he told the man irritably.



“Too bad you’re a Fed,” Earflaps observed.



Ty narrowed his eyes and sighed. Unfortunately, the asshole was right. No cruel and unusual punishment. He muttered to himself as he unfolded his stiff limbs and stood. He gave Zane’s foot a gentle nudge. Zane’s eyes opened immediately. Ty should have known he wasn’t asleep. Maybe he should make Zane take the guy out in the woods.



“Playing escort,” he told Zane softly instead as he fished out a flashlight from the nearest pack. It was one of only two left. “If we’re not back in five, come shoot him,” he joked.



“Sure,” Zane said, a small smile curving his lips. “I’ve still got more than half a magazine.”



“Good boy,” Ty said with a patronizing pat of Zane’s head. He moved to untie the ropes from Earflaps’ ankles. He grabbed the man’s coat and hefted him to his feet, bringing them nose to nose. “Any funny business, I’ll leave you tied up out there, got it?” he threatened. Earflaps sneered at him, but then he thought better of his response and merely nodded. “Move,” Ty ordered as he picked up the shotgun and pushed the man in front of him. He left the flashlight off, conserving the battery while the moon was actually peeking through the clouds to give them light.



He gave the man some leeway in his wandering, partly because he knew no one back at the fire wanted to hear this guy do his business any more than he did. But also because his mind was struggling to keep up; he was tired, cold, sore, and having more and more trouble giving a shit. The only thing he did care about at this point was getting home. These mountains could make unsuspecting victims out of even the most experienced of travelers, and Ty found that he couldn’t stop worrying about Zane out here. It probably hadn’t been the greatest idea, dragging him up here for his first hike. But Ty was sure he’d been enjoying himself before they were almost killed. Repeatedly.



He sighed heavily and slid his hands into his pockets, carrying the shotgun in the crook of his arm against his hip. He shivered slightly in the cold air. Hell. He was probably getting sick after that damn cold water. That would be his luck. Avoid the traps and the bullets and drowning and then die of pneumonia before they could get back.



The thought actually made him smile crookedly in the darkness.



He realized they’d been trekking into the forest for almost five minutes before he snapped out of it. “Hey,” he said sharply. Earflaps took a few more slow steps before stopping. “This’ll do fine,” Ty told him.



Earflaps looked around. “Turn around,” he told Ty.



“Go to hell,” Ty replied easily.



“Well, can I go behind a tree?” the man asked irritably.



Ty glared at him. He glanced around the small clearing the man had found. If he did make a run for it, Ty could easily catch him. And if he somehow escaped, there was really nowhere for him to go that didn’t involve freezing to death, being eaten by an animal, or getting lost and starving. He was about to tell the man to be quick about it when a noise that was out of place caught his attention and stopped him in his verbal tracks. He tensed, cursing himself for not paying more attention and allowing Earflaps to lead him so far from the fire.



“Come on, man!” Earflaps whined.



“Shut up,” Ty hissed. He raised his shotgun slightly. “Do you hear that?” he whispered.



“You ain’t gonna scare me, hillbilly,” Earlfaps declared stubbornly.



Ty shook his head, hushing the man again and pressing the butt of the gun against his shoulder, at the ready. A twig broke somewhere to his left, then another.



“I heard that,” Earflaps said, suddenly quiet and serious, looking off into the dark woods.



Ty tensed and remained motionless, a chill crawling up his spine. He instinctively felt they were being stalked, and by something with far more skill than the three treasure hunters they’d been dealing with.



“Come over here,” Ty whispered, and Earflaps didn’t argue as he began to move. “Slowly!” Ty hissed. Earflaps froze and glanced around nervously. Ty could relate. He resisted the urge to call out for help, knowing it might just trigger an attack. And whoever came to their aid would be in danger too. Ty couldn’t have that. Even as he thought it, there was a rustling sound in the underbrush to his right. Jesus, it moved fast. That or there was more than one. A strange sound, almost like a purr, emitted from the darkness.



Ty’s entire body went cold, and he began to shake almost uncontrollably as he gripped the shotgun. They were rare, but there was only one thing in these mountains that purred.



He tried to keep from breathing too heavily as he went over what little he knew about cougars. They were supposed to be endangered in these mountains, a population so sparse they were more of a myth than a fact. Ty supposed it was just his shitty luck to stumble over one. At least he now knew why there were no small animals in the area and what had been driving the snakes to lower climates.



A large cat emerged from the undergrowth, appearing suddenly and without further warning, its tan fur almost silver in the moonlight. It growled at them both, circling them warily.



“Oh Christ,” Ty breathed as he watched it, not quite believing what he was seeing. The cat was almost two feet high at the shoulders and at least six feet long from nose to tail. When it moved its shoulders rolled and its tail swished sinuously behind it.



It was the most terrifying thing Ty had ever seen.



“Oh shit,” Earflaps echoed.



“Don’t move,” Ty told him. He knew that to run or play dead would just trigger the chase and kill instincts in the cat, and he forced himself to stand there and stare at it. He hoped it couldn’t smell fear, or they were both dead men.



Ty knew one thing: if it had wanted to kill them, they never would have seen it coming. They’d probably just stumbled too close to its babies and it was trying to warn them off. Cougars were ambush predators. He had studied the way they and other animals killed when he’d been on the Recon team, curious to see if he could learn anything from them. He had learned quite a lot. He knew that cougars were solitary hunters, so he didn’t have to worry about a second one anywhere. But they could leap over twenty feet in one go and run up to thirty-five miles an hour; they had a vertical of nearly fifteen feet, and when they struck, they did so from the side or rear, severing the spinal cord and then either eating their prey alive or letting it bleed out to save for later.

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