Tiger Born

by Tressie Lockwood

  He stepped from the trees. “What’s wrong, Deja?”

  She shifted, crouched down to the ground. “I smell Heath in that direction, and Ward and the others followed, but it doesn’t feel right.”

  “How so?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’re all good trackers, aren’t you? And if Ward went that way, shouldn’t we?”

  “You’re probably right.” She was about to shift, when he made a noise. “What?”

  He hesitated.

  “Say what you’re thinking, Jake, because I don’t want to get this wrong. He could be in pain, and I’m going to tell you right now, you’re going to see a whole different side to me if those bastards have done something to him.”

  Her friend stared and then swallowed hard. “If it’s a simple thing of finding Heath in that direction, wouldn’t Ward have found him before three days passed? There’s no way that whoever they are caught the alpha and the rest of his guys, right?”

  “Right!”

  She shifted and ran off in the direction she sensed she needed to go. The farther she ran, the stronger the feeling became, and then she recognized it for what it was. Heath called to her. The same way he had that night she went to the house half out of her mind with need for him because he pulled on her. I’m coming, baby. I know you wouldn’t call me out here if you weren’t in bad trouble. I’m coming!

  They ran for what felt like hours. Several times, Jake fell behind because she could easily distance him, and his stamina wasn’t as great. When Heath’s pull made her heart ache and her need to be near him grow to unbearable levels, she forgot about her friend and left him behind. She opened up and gave everything she had to running. Her paws ate up the ground, and she lost track of time. Her lungs burned, and her throat dried.

  Then, through her haze of depending only on Heath’s pull, she began to scent again. Other people were out here and not shifters. She slid to a stop, panting for breath. She sniffed the air. Humans. Lots of them. While she calculated whether she could take them all, she came to another realization that almost made her roar in frustration and anguish. The whole reason she became aware of everything around her was that Heath’s call had been cut off abruptly. Not even the smallest niggle of suggestion remained inside of her. What if they…? No, she couldn’t think that way. She had to stay focused and rescue him at all costs.

  Deja sniffed the air in several directions. Men were trying to surround her. They must have equipment like motion sensors and trackers. Despite that, Heath wasn’t close. She picked up a faint trace of his scent, but wherever they held him, he was far from the place they left the truck. Off in the distance, she picked up the sound of a vehicle, and if she wasn’t worried, she’d have laughed. That damn Jake had gone back for the truck. How he maneuvered around the trees over rough ground, she didn’t know. Well, at least she’d thought ahead to take a four-wheel-drive vehicle, and since her arrival wasn’t a surprise to the humans, she didn’t have to worry about them hearing the truck’s engine.

  Her heartbeat and breathing settled a bit, so she started moving again, but she hadn’t taken more than a few steps before two men jumped out of the trees ahead of her. Deja rolled to avoid the tranqs and sprung from the ground to take out the first man. He cracked his head on the ground and was out. A gunshot split the relative silence around her, and she jerked away from the fallen man.

  “You okay, Deja?” Jake called.

  She glanced over her shoulder. He’d just lowered one of his guns. The other attacker writhed in pain clutching his abdomen as blood spread there. Should have killed the fucker, but then it was Jake, so she was happy he’d hit the target.

  She set off again, and the farther she ran, the more enemies they encountered. Deja fought nonstop. She did her best to dodge the tranqs, and she couldn’t have done it without Jake’s help.

  She worked her way deeper into wooded area, far from civilization, and Heath’s scent grew stronger. Rather than stay on the path she started out on, she circled around where she believed Heath was being kept and slinked through the brush at an excruciatingly slow pace. Ears perked for any sounds that meant men were behind her, she made only the slowest progress. Some time back, she’d lost Jake, but she picked up his scent easy enough. He would be okay, and he wouldn’t turn back until he knew Heath was safe. That much she knew.

  A building came into view, solid and new. The square shape with gray cement walls stood garish against the browns and greens of the forest, and Deja wondered just how long it had been out here. Did it mean Spiderweb knew they were in Siberia all along and had been watching them like lab rats?

  Nausea rolled through her stomach, but she forced it down. Now was not the time to get sick. Heath was here. He filled her awareness until she didn’t hold back. She roared with everything inside of her and broke from the trees to run into the clearing around the building. Men ran at her with fists clenched. One man held a curved knife. Her tiger’s teeth tore into flesh, and her claws did the same. Her muscles ached, but she fought on, and when she made it to the door and knocked a man on his back, who had been coming out, she breathed a sigh of relief that no one stood behind him.

  Had she killed them all?

  Inside the building were smooth tile floors that caused her claws to slip. She stumbled trying to traverse the passages and grumbled in annoyance.

  “Deja,” Jake whispered, and she turned around. He tossed her a pack that he pulled from his back. The zipper not fully closed revealed her jeans and top, and she could have kissed him. She shifted and tore into the bag while keeping an ear out for movements. Jake hadn’t brought her sneakers. Well, this was good enough.

  Dressed with bare feet, she crept along the halls. Cameras along the ceiling moved as she did, so she knew other operatives lurked nearby. There was no doubt in her mind this was another Spiderweb lab, and somewhere inside it was the man she loved. Every single person here would die if they had hurt him.

  She followed his scent and strained her mind to try to pick up the pull he’d used on her. Nothing. Either he’d gone unconscious or… No, he was fine. She needed to believe that. As she rounded corner after corner, she began to wonder if the stupid building had been built to be a maze. Somewhere a printer buzzed and a fish tank bubbled. Behind her, Jake crept with his guns at the ready. She gritted her teeth and stopped outside a closed door with a strong scent of Heath behind it. She tried the knob but found it locked. Unlike the doors in the Nevada lab where she and Heath had been held, there were no number pads. She mentally kicked in her extra strength, and the lock gave. Jake made a sound as if impressed, but she ignored him and opened the door slowly. Rather than a bed with her lover lying in it, a room containing several refrigerators with see-through doors met her gaze. For a minute, she stood there trying to process what she was seeing, and then it clicked. Spiderweb was syphoning Heath’s blood and storing it.

  “Like hell you will,” she raged. She started forward, but Jake grabbed her arm.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t do what you’re thinking, Deja.” He peered up and down the hall from the doorway. “It might bring them down on us. So far, they seem content to watch.”

  She jerked her arm free. “Let them watch this!”

  Vial after vial hit the floor and shattered. She dragged entire racks of test tubes off shelves and let them fall.

  “Stop, stop! You’ll cut your feet.”

  Deja continued to destroy everything. She didn’t leave one vial whole, and when she was done, she turned in the spot she stood and leaped to just outside the door. Jake stared at her as if he’d never seen anything like her, but she didn’t pause. Just as he predicted, more operatives rushed them. As she ran at the men down the long hall, shouts from behind let her know they were surrounded. A flat click, click, click was the first warning that they might be in trouble. Jake had just run out of bullets, and it wasn’t likely he had time to reload.

  “Get your hands off me!”

  Deja sent a fist int
o a man’s jaw and winced in pain. She looked over her shoulder, and her stomach dropped. One of the operatives held a gun to Jake’s head. His deadpan eyes bore into her gaze, and he spoke the words she had dreaded since bringing Jake along. “You can give up now, or we can kill your friend. Your choice.”

  She didn’t move, taking in the number of men. Six on her side, about the same on Jake’s, plus the man holding him. There was no way she could get to Jake before the man hurt him, not to mention taking down all the rest while protecting her friend. Her chest constricted. She hadn’t even found Heath. Tears blurred her vision, and a knot formed in her throat.

  She raised her hands. “I—”

  A thump and a groan made them all look over to her right. A shout sounded beyond Jake, and before she knew it, shifters filled the hall, led by Ward, beating the crap out of every Spiderweb operative. The gun that had been held at Jake’s throat skidded into the room she’d just left, and the man who had held it lay half in and half out of the room, dead.

  “Jake,” she called and ran to him to drag him out of harm’s way. He cowered behind her, shaking as he hadn’t been doing earlier. Tiger roars split the air, and Deja watched one of the big cats leap up and claw a camera with one swipe until it hung useless by a frayed wire. He’d done it just because he could, she supposed.

  Soon, every operative lay on the floor, and Ward shifted into his human form in front of her. “What are you doing here, Deja?” he demanded.

  “Rescuing my man,” she snapped back.

  “That’s funny because it looked like I was rescuing you!”

  “Call it what you want.” She turned away from him and ran down the hall, leaping over prone men and darting around tigers. When she picked up a new scent of Heath, she increased her speed, and soon the stomp of running feet sounded behind her. Two levels below ground, she came to the door she knew Heath lay behind. She ran at the door, but Ward passed her and smashed into it first. The lock snapped and hinges bent. The gray rectangle slammed into a wall.

  “Heath,” Deja cried when she spotted him lying on a bed, an IV sticking out of his arm. Ward growled in anger, but this time she shouldered past him. She fell on Heath’s chest and caressed his face. “Baby, wake up. Please wake up.”

  “Take the IV out,” someone said.

  Ward ripped the needle from Heath’s arm, and she winced but turned back to Heath. Wetness spilled on his face, and she realized she was crying. He lay still. His chest didn’t rise and fall as it would if he breathed. She choked in anguish and lay her head down on him while she clutched his arms.

  “He can’t be, he can’t be,” she choked on sobs. Bile threatened to erupt from her throat, and all she wanted to do was die with him. Her knees gave out, and she sank to the floor, eyes shut. Voices reached her from around the room, but she couldn’t distinguish what anyone said. She clung to Heath’s hand, pressing her lips to his still-warm flesh. She willed him to move, to squeeze her fingers, but he remained lifeless. Someone else sobbed uncontrollably, and she knew it wasn’t her because she didn’t have the strength.

  “Deja.”

  Through her foggy brain, she recognized Ward holding her. The sorrow in his tone took the last vestige of her hope, and she dipped forward, the world going in and out of black around her consciousness. If only she could just slip into darkness, she could escape the pain. Apparently, that would be too merciful. She cried on his shoulder, shaking from head to toe.

  At first, Deja heard nothing over her own despairing thoughts, and then one by one, the stirring of the other men in the room began to penetrate. She assumed they grieved for Heath in their own way until Joe spoke.

  “He’s alive!”

  Deja broke from Ward’s hold and turned. Sure enough, Heath had just opened his eyes. His chest began to rise and fall at a slow rate, as if he had to recall how to breathe again. He turned his head in their direction, and recognition lit his gaze. Joy burst in her chest as he sat up. She took a step toward him, but Tina beat her there, throwing herself into Heath’s arms.

  “I was so worried,” she mumbled. “I thought I’d lost you.”

  Blind rage ignited in Deja so fast, she almost choked on it. She growled and felt her claws grow out. Ward tried grabbing for her, but she was across the room in a heartbeat, her fingers tangled in Tina’s hair. Someone shouted, “Look out,” but the woman’s head snapped back hard at Deja’s pull. She screamed, and Heath worked to disentangle the woman from his body with trembling limbs since he’d lost so much blood. Spiderweb had tried to drain him, to use his blood without a care for his life, and this bitch thought he’d come back to her?

  Deja sent Tina sliding across the floor to slam into the wall, but Tina shook off whatever pain she might have felt and stood up. She snarled and came at Deja so hard Deja found herself in the same position slammed to the opposite wall. Tina followed up with an arm across Deja’s shoulders, pinning her in place. “You don’t deserve him. He’s too good for you.”

  Deja swore. “Oh, and I suppose he’s just right for you? Who the hell do you think you are? Heath is mine, and if you try to stand in my way, I will take you out.”

  Tina sneered. “You’re doing such a great job of it so far.”

  The woman was stronger than Deja could ever imagine anyone being. She fought as hard as she could to shove her back, but it was like moving a brick wall. “I know who I am. I’m Heath’s mate, not you, and what pisses you off, Tina, is there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it!”

  The words must have pissed the woman off enough to lose her focus so that her hold loosened. Deja took advantage of it and brought her arms up hard, knocking Tina’s away. She bent low and thrust hard with her shoulder into the Tina’s chest. When Tina stumbled backward, Deja went after her again, but from nowhere Heath was there, having found the strength to stand. His arms encircled Deja from behind, and they both sank to the floor, her crumpling beneath his heavy weight. He grunted in exhaustion, and one hand braced the two of them to keep them from bumping face down. The anger that had taken hold of Deja dissipated as fast as it came.

  “Are you crazy, Heath? You should be lying down.” She twisted around to hold him, and several others hurried to help get him on the bed.

  “We need to get out of here,” Ward announced. “Carter, Tina, move! You others, make sure our path is clear. I’ll carry Heath. Deja, come with me.” Tina was wiping blood from her cut lip, which Deja didn’t remember causing, but she obeyed Ward with a last scathing look tossed at Deja.

  Deja protested when they pulled Heath from her arms, but he’d gone unconscious again. Ward was right. They needed to get moving. Who knew how many men Spiderweb had recruited, some more could be coming. They made their way out of the building, and when Deja smelled smoke, she looked over her shoulder to find someone had already set a blaze going to destroy the lab. The ground rumbled beneath her feet, and she guessed an explosion had been set off on the lower floors.

  “Jake drove his truck. It shouldn’t be far,” Deja said, and Ward nodded. The sooner they got Heath back to Siberia where Dr. Adams could treat him, the better. Jake had been ordered to the back of the truck, and after Ward had secured clothing for himself and Heath, he took the driver’s seat and Heath and Deja sat in the middle and passenger seat respectively.

  Not soon enough for Deja’s taste, they pulled into Siberia, and stopped at Dr. Adams’s office. Ward had called ahead to be sure she was ready for them. Heath lay in a bed and was rushed to the back in seconds. She hung by his side, and no one dared tell her she had to leave.

  “He’ll need a blood transfusion, won’t he?” she asked Dr. Adams.

  “Yes, Ward is getting ready,” the doctor answered.

  Deja’s eyes widened. “Ward?”

  “He is a blood relative, and I already have his information on file. He’s a perfect match for Heath. Don’t worry, Deja. Your mate is strong. He’ll be just fine.”

  Time seemed to pass at a snail’s pace, but Dr. Adams t
urned out to be right. Before she knew it, Heath rested normally in his bed, his breathing and pulse stable. Deja curled up in a chair at his side and held onto his hand. She took heart at the warmth she felt in it and the way he occasionally gave her a squeeze. At last, he opened his eyes and stared at her. She smiled in return.

  “Hey, you,” she whispered.

  He frowned. “You look tired. You didn’t stay up watching me, did you?”

  “And what if I did?”

  “I will spank you.”

  “Now that would be interesting if you weren’t weak as a little kitten. In fact, I might have heard you mewl like one a little while ago.” She saw the offense in his eyes and laughed then grew serious. “I thought I’d lost you, Heath. I-I couldn’t handle that.”

  He stroked her cheek. “Not now, not ever.”

  They sat in silence for a while holding each other. Deja found she had to do all in her power not to cry over him like an idiot, but she knew he saw it in her eyes, and he kept apologizing like it was his fault he’d been abducted.

  “We need to talk,” she began.

  He shook his head and laid a finger over her mouth. “I’ll tell you everything that happened when I’m out of here and we’re back home.”

  That wasn’t what she referred to, but she accepted his delay. They’d have plenty of time to talk about the baby later.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Deja grunted in annoyance when the phone rang. She waved a hand without opening her eyes and cuddled closer to Heath, her head on his chest. The ringing ceased, and she sighed, but then it started up again.