Damn it, he loved his brothers and sister. He couldn’t leave them. He just didn’t understand why Axel was being so…stupid.
Something bit his ass, and he yowled in pain, spinning around to find the bee or wasp that landed its stinger in his butt. What he saw, though, was the white and red tail of a…dart?
He swatted at it, but it just danced about, the embedded needle causing him more pain. He plopped down on his side and twisted his body, trying to get at it, but his vision blurred. He growled and tried to change form, to reach for his human body so he could pull the thing out, but he couldn’t seem to focus his mind.
A tranquilizer? Someone drugged him?
His limbs grew heavy even as he struggled to think.
He had to get out of there, hide from whoever did this to him. He struggled to stand, stumbled and face- planted into the dirt. He sneezed the dust from his nose and tried again. He couldn’t make his legs work. Darkness closed in around him even though the sun was still high.
Beth almost shouted with glee as she watched the massive puma stagger and fall. Her first day in the woods, and she’d gotten the biggest, most beautiful mountain lion she’d ever seen. What a find. And in the middle of the day.
Turning her head, she called, “Tim. Where are you?”
“Coming. I heard you fire. Did you really shoot something?”
“Yes, hurry up.”
“Seriously?” He crashed through the undergrowth, sounding like a herd of bison. “Damn. Ouch.
How do you get through this crap so easily?” he grumped as he trudged into the clearing next to her.
She grinned and pointed. “Look. Isn’t he pretty?”
Tim’s interest visibly piqued when he spotted the downed cat a few dozen yards away. “Oh!
Wow, Lizzy. I thought we were just scouting the area today.”
“We were, but…” Beth was so thrilled with her catch, the silly nickname her friend insisted on calling her didn’t even crack her smile, though she did playfully swat him on the shoulder. “Come on!” Eager for a closer look, she headed toward the beast.
Her heart hammered in her chest, and a sheen of sweat coated her forehead. She thought it would be cooler here in the mountains, but this early June day was in the mid-eighties.
To find a cougar out and about in the middle of the day wasn’t unheard of, but they were mostly nocturnal. She and Tim had planned to scout around, see if there was a spot where they could pick up some fresh tracks, set up a blind and wait for one. She’d only brought the dart gun along just in case, more for personal safety than anything. Was she ever glad she did.
Their grant from Washington State gave them enough money for at least two months of research in the Wenatchee National Forest. She’d been hopeful, but hadn’t let herself get overexcited. A small part of her suspected she’d be chasing tracks and scat all summer and never get to touch a live, breathing, beautiful cougar. Especially this close to town.
“Careful,” Tim warned, and she responded with a nod. As they neared the animal, he searched for and found a stick long and thick enough to use as a poker. With it, he nudged the beast’s butt, looking for a response. When the cat didn’t budge, she slipped around Tim, adrenaline making her laugh with glee.
“Would you look at him! He’s so big.” She knelt at the cougar’s head and reached out to feel for its pulse.
“Is that a collar?” Tim bent and touched the black strip of leather around the cougar’s neck. “I knew we should’ve waited for the professor to arrive. Didn’t I warn you?”
Yes, she’d listened to his dire warnings after they’d set up the mobile lab and she’d suggested scouting some of the trails. He’d wanted to check into the hotel, take a dip in the pool and relax until the professor arrived on Saturday. But he’d caved when she told him she’d just go alone.
“How was I to know we’d even see a cougar today,” she challenged, “or that when we did, it’d have a collar?”
“Point taken.”
She nodded, pushed up her glasses and inspected the collar further. A small, pewter medallion twinkled in the sun, and she slid her fingers over it to take a closer look. An oval with a teeth-bearing cougar head embossed on it. No identification tag.
“It’s a damn pet,” she snarled. “But no ID. Who in their right mind keeps a cougar for a pet?”
“There are people in the world that think having exotic cats for pets is vogue,” Tim said, adding quickly when she scowled at him, “Not that I agree it’s a wise thing to do. I’m just sayin’…people do crazy things.”
“People are idiots.”
“So, do we tag ’im anyway?” he asked.
Pet or no pet, she had a job to do, and until the owners were found, she’d do her job exactly as planned. “Yeah.” She felt for the animal’s pulse. Strong. Good. She glanced over her shoulder, back toward the trails. “But we can’t let him go or leave him here defenseless. That tranq should keep him knocked out for a while. We need to take this big guy to the lab while we search for its owner. He’s out here running wild, and that’s potential for disaster with all the kids and pets around Leavenworth.”
She shook her head in disgust. The professor hadn’t even arrived yet, and they’d already have to move locations. With a damn pet roaming the area, there wasn’t likely to be any wild pumas around.
They were too territorial and had too wide of a range. Damn it all. She’d liked the fact she was doing research yet had a nice, cozy hotel room to sleep and shower in. They’d have to move deeper into the forest, which meant pitching the tents and digging a latrine.
There went her happy mood. “Go get the four-wheeler. We can’t carry this guy. He’s two hundred pounds if he’s an ounce.”
“There’s no way to get the four-wheeler up here,” Tim said with a frown. “I could barely walk through it.”
“Try over there.” She pointed to a slight break in the trees. “It’s probably just a deer trail, but I’m sure you can get the ATV up it. The locals do it all the time.”
“So, that’s how you did it.” He gave her a little smile, which she returned with a look of wide-eyed innocence. “I see how you are. ‘Let’s split up,’” he quoted the suggestion she’d made when they first arrived. “Send Tim into the thicket while Beth takes the easy trail.”
Beth chuckled, watching him trek toward the trail.
“I’ll remember this,” he teased.
She rolled her eyes when he turned his back. Day one of their two months working together. It was going to be an interesting summer.
Kelan smelled a female.
He couldn’t quite open his eyes for some reason, and his legs were too heavy to move, but he could smell a woman.
Not perfume. The sweet tang of warm flesh. He breathed in deep and purred, wishing whoever she was would come closer so he could taste her.
Then he realized how dry his tongue felt, how thirsty he was. The ground felt awful hard, and flat, and cold. Where had the sun gone? Had he lain here the rest of the day?
“Hey, big boy.”
His ear twitched toward the sultry voice. It seemed familiar.
“You finally waking up?”
His right ear stung like hell. The back of his neck ached, and his butt cheek hurt too.
It all came rushing back to him. The tranquilizer dart in his ass. He growled and finally pried open his eyes. Steel bars surrounded him.
