The Killing Game

by Anderson, Toni

  “Let’s try for alive unless he’s a threat. Then all bets are off. We’ll stay out of sight until we receive orders. Maybe the old fecker doesn’t know we’re here. He might have realized the biologists were uncollaring the leopards and got pissed off.”

  “It might not even be him,” Cullen put in.

  Dempsey nodded and trudged down the valley to the yurts. If only he could forget the fierce flash of betrayal in Axelle’s eyes the moment she’d worked it all out. Because, yes, he’d always intended to use her leopards as bait. He was a soldier and he had a job to do—he was still planning on getting rid of her poacher, which would ultimately save her cats. But maybe too late…

  He reined in his runaway thoughts and concentrated on the barren landscape. It didn’t matter what Axelle Dehn thought of him. With any luck he’d be gone before daybreak and she’d never cross his path again.

  ***

  Axelle shoved back the yurt flap. Anji flung up his hands in surprise and gave a nervous laugh. “You’re back. You scared me.”

  “There’s a lot of that going around.”

  He smiled at her, brown eyes twinkling. “Josef was worried when the horse came back without you, but I told him you be okay.”

  Anji had more faith in her than she did. He returned to whatever he was doing with the cubs.

  She strode to the computer and opened her email and read the message. Christ, the Trust really had forbidden her to release the animals. She inhaled deeply and tried to calm the rage that continued to burn inside. They thought she was overreacting and had no proof, and in the next sentence they told her it was too dangerous for her and Josef to go after a guy with a gun. Josef came slowly into the tent. She didn’t know if he was scared or angry. He had a right to be both.

  “Did you reply to this email?” She was vibrating with emotion. Moisture filmed her eyes but it wasn’t tears.

  “No.” He stood behind her.

  “Did they ask for receipt of confirmation?”

  “No.” He frowned.

  She pressed delete. “Then it never arrived.” She held his gaze. “Are you okay with that?”

  His blue eyes flicked to the computer screen and back. He nodded.

  “Good. I’ll resend the original email again after we get a few hours sleep.”

  “What about those men?”

  “What about them?” She wanted to pretend they didn’t exist, that she’d never met Dempsey or exposed some of her darkest secrets in the shadow of the mountain. She should have known he was buttering her up so he could use her. It was all about the mission. That was what made a man a soldier.

  She went and stood before the fire because she had no new answers and was so tired and wrung out she could barely see straight. She needed a few hours’ sleep before she got back to releasing collars. Surely the man hunting the leopards was also tired? Surely he needed sleep? She helped herself to salted yak’s milk tea and flatbread. Grimaced. You might acquire a taste for local food but it didn’t mean you didn’t miss Starbucks.

  The cubs clambered over Anji’s legs and drew a smile from her lips. “How are they doing?”

  “They eat plenty.” He looked up and smiled. “They survive and get fat, Inshallah.”

  The ice around her heart cracked a little. “Good.”

  “I fix other fire in your yurt.”

  “Thanks.” Propriety demanded she sleep separate to the men but for the first time in years she didn’t want to be alone.

  She hugged herself with little comfort. The memories of Gideon had been brief but searing. She didn’t let herself think about him often and that brought its own guilt. He’d been a wonderful man. An honorable man. She’d loved him fiercely. He’d joined the Marines because his best friend had died fighting for his country and he’d been compelled to do the same. Pity he hadn’t asked his wife’s opinion first.

  She didn’t think about him because it hurt too damn much.

  “Did that guy really help you release G-man?” Josef broke into her thoughts.

  She nodded. Some of her anger cooled. Dempsey had helped her; in fact she might not have caught G-man at all if he hadn’t been there.

  A man hunting terrorists would use any means available, and she’d do the same to save her cats. She squeezed her temples with her thumb and index finger. She needed to apologize to him but at the same time she hoped she never saw him again. “He said he’s British Army but he’s not wearing a uniform.”

  “Special Forces.” Josef’s eyes gleamed. “Probably SAS. Some of the most respected soldiers in the world. Dangerous men.”

  He’d exuded danger and skill. But, except for that first heart-stopping moment when he’d disarmed her—easily disarmed her, now she thought about it—she hadn’t been scared of him at all. Not even when he’d grabbed her in front of Josef.

  “Why? Why are they even here?” She dragged her fingers through her bedraggled hair.

  “Do you trust them?” he asked.

  Wearily she shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess if they’d wanted us dead we’d be dead.” Maybe that was the only truth that mattered. Her eyelids started to droop. She needed sleep. “I’ll see you at dawn.” She went outside and the air was clean and fresh. Pink seeped along the edges of twilight. She could barely drag one foot in front of the other as she headed to her tent. She glanced at the surrounding hills and wondered where Dempsey was. They’d spent the night together and somehow forged a bond. What it meant, she didn’t know.

  Her scratches were sore and her bones ached. But there was also this weird sense of loneliness that she hadn’t felt in years. She half expected Dempsey to be sitting on her bed, waiting to chew her out for yelling at him earlier. That thought tangled in her brain and slowed her feet because she wasn’t sure what she’d do if she found him there.

  She threw back the flap but her tent was empty. The quick stab of disappointment was shoved into the furthest corners of her mind. She lit the fire, shook out her bedclothes and took off her boots. Then she lay down and slept like the dead.

  ***

  Dempsey sat and watched as Josef started the dirt bike and headed to the top of the ridge with the radio receiver. Why hadn’t Dmitri Volkov booby-trapped that carcass? Why hadn’t he planted mines or explosives to take them out? The questions nagged him constantly.

  He didn’t know.

  All he knew was catching Dmitri Volkov alive would provide valuable intel and save lives. Sergeant Ty Dempsey wasn’t here to save leopards or babysit biologists. He was here to catch a traitor. The Russian knew things. He had connections. He was dangerous.

  Yet these biologists were directly in the line of fire…

  “I think we need a change of plan.” Dempsey spoke into his radio so the whole squad could hear. He and Baxter had already packed their kit. They started trudging down the slope.

  “What are you thinking, Irish?” Taz’s voice was calm and even.

  “Come on down, bring the gear.” He stared at the thin blue sky. “I think we’re about to become field biologists.” There was a high chance the Russian knew there were soldiers in the area. Dempsey had spoken to HQ and they were sending in more troopers.

  When they got to the camp Dempsey’s eyes flashed up to Josef on the ridge. “Keep your eye on the big man.”

  Baxter nodded and sat on the sunny side of yurt.

  Inside the main tent a local man, Wakhi from the look of his features, was brewing tea and jiggling something gray and furry in his arms. It took a moment for Dempsey to realize it was a snow leopard cub, and there was another one, who began to squawk from the bottom of a large box.

  “Where’s Axelle?” he asked quietly.

  The Wakhi man pointed east. “Next yurt.” Dempsey took a step away but the little man shook his finger wildly in a “no” action. He thrust the squalling kitten at him and Dempsey took it, followed by a bottle of warm milk. “Go feed cub. Leave Axelle sleep,” the man scolded.

  Dempsey raised his brows and did as he was told
. He assumed feeding a baby leopard was much like feeding a baby human, and as he had a huge family, with enough cousins to take on the Regiment, he did have some experience feeding babies. But it had been a long time.

  He stuffed the teat into the eager pink mouth and realized he’d missed this. He’d missed feeding his nieces and nephews. He’d missed seeing them grow up. He missed the connection, the roots. His stand for a peaceful future for the Province of Northern Ireland, for an end to sectarian violence, had led to the total destruction of his place within his family. The irony wasn’t lost on him that he was the one with the weapons now. He hoped he had the sense and skill to know when to use them, as opposed to bombing innocents in market towns or kneecapping informers.

  Dempsey held the warm body in the crook of his arm and went to peek at Axelle despite the hissing protestations of her bodyguard. Sheesh where was this guy when she’d been out in the wilds all alone?

  She lay snuggled deep in her sleeping bag. The bag lifted and fell steadily, and her cheeks flushed with rosy heat. He didn’t have the heart to wake her. He went back outside, careful of the cub suckling greedily. He walked over to Baxter who stroked the cub’s tummy.

  He heard the dirt bike start up and saw Josef coming back down the hill. He rolled up beside them and started past them into the yurt without a word.

  Dempsey stopped him. “What’s going on, mate?”

  There was no anger in Josef’s gaze today. Acceptance. A reluctant interest. “No snares were tripped in the night. I’m going to check the collar coordinates and see where our cats are.”

  Taz joined them and looked at Josef with pensive brown eyes. “Do you get many poachers here?”

  “Not like this. Who are you looking for anyway?” Josef’s eyes sharpened. Axelle would have told him they were soldiers. “A terrorist?”

  Dempsey weighed his options about what he could say. “Someone the British government wants to talk to.”

  “You’re going to stop this poacher from killing our leopards?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Good.”

  Dempsey looked at the seemingly endless spread of the Hindu Kush and across the valley to the Pamirs in the north. He passed the satisfied kitten to Baxter, who was eyeing it with look usually reserved for beautiful women.

  “We can help each other,” said Josef.

  Dempsey nodded. He should be feeling satisfied too. He should have been feeling bloody marvelous but these people were not the sort of partners he wanted when hunting one of the world’s most notorious terrorists. So what if GCHQ thought the guy had been inactive—presumed dead—for a decade? To Dempsey that spelled some seriously dodgy connections. And an even more sinister reason for coming out of hiding now.

  Axelle was a liability. Rash, brash and female—a powder-keg of trouble in a country like Afghanistan. Maybe he should hogtie her, release the horses, dismantle the computer, take the motherboard and Sat Link with him. But the Russian had come to them; they hadn’t gone searching for the Russian. They were already involved in this mess, and something about the determined set of Axelle’s jaw told him he’d have a fight on his hands if he tried to shut them down. As fun as that might be under normal circumstances, he couldn’t afford the distraction when this mission might cost lives. He had to work with her. And he had the feeling it was going to cost him more than swallowing a bit of false pride.

  ***

  When she woke she was staring straight into the startling cobalt eyes of Sergeant Tyrone Dempsey. He looked like he’d wait all day for her to wake up.

  “I must be dreaming,” she croaked.

  He held out a mug of black tea.

  “Definitely dreaming.” She sat up, took it, and sipped. The warm liquid eased her dry throat. “Thanks. What time is it?”

  “0600.” His voice rolled over her. She blinked groggily. There was enough of a burr in his accent to make his voice very sexy and she figured he was laying on the charm this morning.

  His face was scrubbed and clean-shaven. She found herself studying his features. The vivid eyes shaded by thick brows, the cheeks scraped smooth, the jaw firm and obstinate, his nose too flat to be conventionally handsome. Yet the combination stirred up her insides like hot coals. She fought the urge run her fingers through his short blond hair. He was tall and lean and he looked really, really good.

  She did not like the whip of attraction that shot through her veins when those blue eyes twinkled. Damn. She needed distance, not attraction. “I was a bitch yesterday.”

  “Is that an apology?”

  “More of a reminder.” Reluctantly one side of her mouth curled. “But it’s probably as close as you’re going to get to an apology.” She squinted at him. The lines around his eyes were cut deeper today. Had he slept? Or had he been up all night searching for the man he was chasing? The same man killing her leopards.

  “My CO has been in contact with your bosses at the Trust. I’ve been ordered to use any means possible to apprehend this individual.”

  Fury engulfed her, but he moved into her space, sitting down on the edge of the bunk and trapping her in her sleeping bag. “So I’d like to propose a compromise.” His expression remained even but lines around his eyes creased as she tried to spit out words. He reached out and removed the mug from her hand. “I’m going to put this over here in case you get any ideas.”

  The brush of his fingers against hers caused all sorts of fireworks to explode inside her that had nothing to do with anger. The man knocked her off-balance, made her crazy. More crazy, she conceded as she forced herself to get a grip. “What sort of compromise?”

  “I’ve called for more men and equipment so we can start tracking our target properly. In the meantime, we’ll split up and stake out the cats using the signals and”—he raised his voice as she tried to cut in—“we will help you release any animals you snare.”

  The sudden silence pulsed against the walls of the tent. “You’ll let me uncollar them?”

  “Yes.”

  They held each other’s gaze for a long silent moment. “Why? Why not force me to leave them collared until you catch this guy?”

  One side of his mouth dragged back in a wry smile before he answered. “You’re not the only person in the world who gives a damn about endangered species, Dr. Dehn. However, capturing this man is my mission and the mission is my priority. Otherwise I wouldn’t be a very good soldier”—his eyebrows rose—“now, would I?”

  He stood and walked to the door of her yurt.

  She was back to being Dr. Dehn, she registered. “And that’s really important to you. Being a good soldier?”

  He paused inside the tent with his hand on the felt. “Maybe it’s all I’ve got.”

  “Sergeant…” A slice of pain at saying the military rank out loud made her suck in a breath. “Dempsey,” she said urgently to stop him from leaving.

  He looked over his shoulder, the sun coating his silhouette with gold.

  “Thank you.” She held his gaze, willing him to understand what his gesture meant to her.

  He grinned, blue eyes flashing as they swept over her disheveled form, reminding her that while he might be a soldier he was most definitely a guy. “You can thank me when this is over.” Then he was gone.

  ***

  A beep told Axelle she’d got email. When she checked the message every other thought fled as she realized she had a download from one of her camera traps.

  “Dempsey!” she yelled.

  There were six hidden cameras set up in three pairs around the mountains. Placed in obscure valleys and passes to try to avoid people, and more important in this region, goats, from triggering them. No one wanted five hundred pictures of goats. The camera images automatically uploaded to satellites whenever the data storage units were full and then were emailed to her server in the States. Dempsey came inside and walked over to her side. She clicked on the first image and they watched as, pixel by pixel, a photograph of a white-haired man leading a yak do
wnloaded to the screen. He was dressed as a local. The pants, the jerkin, the pakol hat. His build was tall, slim, broad at the shoulder, but his facial features were not Asian or Arabian. He looked fair-skinned, his beard as red as Josef’s, his eyes iced with lines of bitterness.

  She sat stunned, her eyes taking in every detail of the man’s face, looking for some whisper of compassion in the deep rugged lines on his face. Strapped over the back of the yak was a rolled-up pelt with a trimming of dappled fur, over his shoulder was a high-powered hunting rifle. Fear and fury swirled in the depths of her stomach. This was the hunter. To put a face on this monster made everything more real, more dangerous. “Sonofabitch,” she whispered. “Is this who you’re looking for?”

  Dempsey leaned over her, trapping her between his arms as his fingers typed furiously. He pulled up some sort of secure website and uploaded the image into the database. She could feel his breath on her neck, his lips close to her ear. She shivered. He smelled of clean warm skin and the Ivory soap that they kept in their improvised shower cubicle. His hands were square, the fingers long and tapered. Small hairs shone white gold on his wrist and forearms. Every cell in her body was acutely aware of this man.

  He finished, cleared the history, shut down the web browser, and went perfectly still as if he suddenly realized his arms were around her. Or maybe he could tell the effect he was having on her nervous system. His breathing changed and heat began to build in Axelle’s veins. She turned her head a fraction and found her lips an inch from his. They held each other’s gaze warily, a wave of something startling shooting through her body. Dempsey’s gaze dropped to her mouth and her lips parted. He started to lean toward her, but a noise outside made him break away, leaving her to grab a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

  “I’ll get the guys ready to go.” His voice was gruff and he avoided looking at her.

  She nodded. She couldn’t have formed words for three wishes and a genie.