by Paige Tyler
“Not suicidal,” Angelo said in between shooting at the hybrids who were jumping from tree to rock, getting closer with every second. “Just low on other options. Landon probably won’t say it, but thanks for showing up.”
Buchanan grunted. “Not only is he ugly, but he’s an ungrateful bastard, too.”
Even with Buchanan’s added fire power, they were still outnumbered. It didn’t help when Stutmeir and his men spread out and fired on the three of them from multiple directions.
“Jumping off the cliff is starting to sound better than I thought,” Buchanan admitted.
Landon opened his mouth to agree when he heard Griffen’s voice in his earpiece. “We’re almost to your location, Captain. Sorry it took us so long. We got turned around in those passageways under the lodge. We’re coming toward you from the trail. If you can move right some, further along that cliff line, we can get them in a crossfire.”
“Copy that.”
Landon moved to the right. So did Angelo and Buchanan. To Stutmeir and his men, it probably looked as if they were in panic mode and doing anything to avoid going over the edge of the cliff.
If Griffen and his other men didn’t get into place soon, Stutmeir was going to get his wish.
That’s when Griffen, Deray, and Marks opened fire on Stutmeir from the left. Stutmeir might have those hard-to-kill hybrids on his side, but Landon now had something he didn’t—superior positioning. Stutmeir and his men were sitting at the two o’clock position and were taking fire from both the twelve o’clock and the four o’clock positions. They couldn’t turn to face one threat without leaving their flank totally exposed. The loss of tactical advantage took them completely by surprise. Within seconds of the first few men going down, the others retreated.
Landon immediately closed the distance between him and the hybrids. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Buchanan and Angelo doing the same. It was dangerous for all of them to move right into the line of fire that Griffen, Deray, and Marks were laying down, but his team had done this countless times before. He trusted his men to adjust their shot line as he moved closer.
Stutmeir shouted for his men to stand fast, regroup, and counterattack, but they weren’t listening. One second they were standing strong, the next second they were running in every direction.
“Go after them,” Landon ordered. “Stutmeir is mine, but I don’t want any of his hybrids making it out of here, either. Take them alive if they’ll let you, but don’t let them escape. And make sure those damn doctors don’t get away, either. They did some things to Ivy that I plan to make them pay for.”
Buchanan took off with a blood-chilling howl, and Landon knew the shifter wouldn’t be bringing any hybrids back alive.
Landon looked for Stutmeir and saw him and the scar-faced man running for the tunnel leading back to the lodge. Evil bastards probably thought if they made it to the vehicles out front they could get away. They weren’t going to get that far. Stutmeir was going to pay for what he’d done to Ivy—Landon was going to make sure of that.
Chapter 17
Someone was coming. Ivy felt it. In retrospect, maybe sending Clayne after Landon had been foolish, but she cared more about Landon’s safety than her own. Even drugged, she could handle whoever was headed this way.
She dragged herself to her feet, forcing her muscles to work even though they were doing their best to ignore her. She’d been drugged so many times in the last few hours it felt as if she was wrapped up in thick, wool blankets.
She looked over at Mickens and Zarina as she shook out her legs and swung her arms. The medic had given Diaz and Tredeau drugs for the pain and was now rigging IVs at the same time he was applying pressure dressings to the wounds. He moved with quick and efficient motions, a man completely tuned in to his task. Zarina was at his side, helping as much as she could.
Kendra was over by the gate, her back to them and her weapon at the ready, acting as if she was the lone protector for their makeshift MASH unit. Maybe she was. Zarina didn’t know which end of a gun the bullets came out of while Mickens would be occupied with his injured charges. And Ivy was certainly still too wobbly to be much help.
But whoever was coming this way was getting closer.
She opened her mouth to warn Kendra, Mickens, and Zarina, but four hybrids hurtled around the wall before she could get the words out.
The creatures skidded to a halt, surprise on their faces. They recovered from their shock fast enough and lifted their weapons.
Kendra spun around and dropped to one knee, shooting the hybrid nearest to her. It caught the three men with him off guard, and they turned their weapons on her, forgetting about Mickens, Zarina, and Ivy.
Ivy gritted her teeth and forced herself to move. Her legs weren’t as strong as they normally were, and the dull pain in her thigh slowed her down a bit, but she still managed a good leap.
She extended her claws as she flew through the air, raking them down one hybrid’s face and chest, knocking him to the ground. He howled as her nails sunk to the bone, taking a large amount of flesh with them.
Ivy straddled his chest, swinging her clawed hands like sickles. Around her, she heard gunfire, but it seemed far away and unimportant. She was starting to zone out. Again. It would have been so easy to give in to her animal nature and let it take over, but she pulled herself back from the brink before it was too late.
She came back to herself to see that the hybrid underneath her was dead. Beside her on the ground was another hybrid, his body full of bullet holes.
Ivy sprang to her feet and spun around.
Zarina was shielding Diaz and Tredeau with her body while Mickens stood between a snarling hybrid and his wounded teammates. He might have been a medic, but he was Special Forces through and through, his face a mask of grit and determination as he pulled the trigger. If the hybrid was going to get to his friends, they’d have to go through his dead body first. The shifter withstood a half dozen rounds of ammunition before he finally fell.
Off to the left, Kendra was putting the final shots through the last hybrid’s chest. When the creature hit the ground, Kendra stepped forward and put one more round in its head.
Ivy gaped. Kendra had never done anything to make her think she was a cold and efficient killer. Clearly, the DCO was using her in the wrong capacity.
Mickens walked up to admire Kendra’s handiwork. “Damn, girl. Are you an animal, too?”
She lowered her weapon and gave him a smile. “Only in bed.”
Ivy almost laughed when Mickens’s jaw dropped. She looked at Zarina and the two wounded soldiers to make sure they hadn’t gotten hit in the barrage of gunfire when a scent on the breeze distracted her. It was faint but unmistakable.
Jeff.
He was close by, and he was running. He was…prey.
Her feet moved in his direction.
“Ivy?” Kendra called. “Where are you going?”
Ivy didn’t answer. She couldn’t. She felt herself slipping into the feline zone, felt that uncontrollable urge to let go and allow her animal to come out and play—and hunt. This time there was no way she could stop it.
“Ivy!”
She turned and ran toward Jeff’s scent. Every other thought in her head disappeared, leaving only one—find the man who had tormented her and kill him.
***
Stutmeir was faster than he looked. Landon chased him for a solid fifteen minutes before getting a glimpse of the ex-Stasi again. It didn’t help that the scar-faced man ran in a different direction, confusing the trail and making it tough to figure out which set of tracks belonged to Stutmeir. Luckily, Landon picked the right one.
Instead of going deeper into the forest, Stutmeir led him into a clearing. Strewn with small boulders, it made for dangerous footing, and Landon had to scramble to keep from falling as he ran across the slope. He raised his gun, aiming it
at Stutmeir, but the German had already disappeared into the forest again.
Landon ran after him. He was halfway across the clearing when he heard the sound of rocks falling above him. He’d just fallen for the oldest trick in the book. Stutmeir had doubled back and gotten into position above Landon on the slope so he could ambush him.
He swore and threw himself behind the only cover he could find—a rock that wasn’t much bigger than a coffee table. He’d barely hit the ground when the dirt exploded around him. He did his best impersonation of a groundhog and tried to bury himself to avoid getting shot, but the rock wasn’t big enough to provide much cover. Landon wasn’t sure exactly where Stutmeir was, either, so he had no idea what angle he had on him. He sure wasn’t going to poke his head up to take a look. He prayed nothing important was hanging out.
What was Stutmeir carrying—an MP5? That meant a thirty-round magazine. But had the man started the ambush with a full clip?
A distinct clack of a bolt locking back as the weapon ran out of ammo answered his question. The sound was clear and unmistakable. Now was his chance to get to more substantial cover before Stutmeir could reload.
He had about two and a half seconds to cross the fifteen feet of rocky, uneven ground between him and the edge of the forest—unless Stutmeir was faster at reloading an MP5 than Landon thought. Not wanting to take the chance, Landon darted out from behind the rock and ran for the forest’s edge. He threw himself the last few feet, hitting the ground in a roll and slamming hard into a tree.
Landon leaned against the tree, waiting for Stutmeir to open fire again. But all he heard was the sound of the ex-Stasi heading farther up the slope. Landon got up and ran after him.
Fighting gravity, the slippery rocks, and the thick undergrowth was hard, but all Landon had to do was think about how Ivy had looked when he’d first found her in the basement of the lodge. All the torture they’d inflicted upon her precious body. The drugs they’d given her. The countless ways they’d made her suffer. That gave him all the strength he needed, and by the time he crested the ridge, he could have killed Stutmeir with his bare hands.
Unfortunately, Stutmeir was nowhere in sight. He must have already gone down the slope and up the far side.
Landon’s first instinct was to barrel down the slope after the man, but he stopped himself. Stutmeir had already proven himself adept at setting up hasty ambushes, and there was absolutely no way the other man could have made it all the way up the far slope in the time it had taken Landon to crest the ridge.
There was a blur of movement above him, then a stabbing pain as something sharp sliced down the outside of his right arm from shoulder to elbow. He swore, but barely got the curse out before Stutmeir hit him square in the chest. The impact knocked the air out of his lungs and sent both of them tumbling down the slope.
***
Tree limbs smacked against Ivy’s legs. Rocks dug into her bare feet. She ignored them. She had Jeff’s scent. Nothing was going to slow her down.
But then the breeze stilled in a heavily overgrown section of the forest and she suddenly lost his trail.
She froze in her tracks, the animal in her so frustrated she almost screamed out loud.
She turned in a slow circle, sniffing the air. She’d worked with Jeff, knew the way he thought. He’d stay on the course he’d been following. If she did the same, she’d catch him.
Letting out a growl, Ivy turned and ran. Within a few hundred yards, she broke out of the heavier old-growth forest, where she picked up his scent again. It was stronger now. He was close.
Movement caught her eye, and she saw him. He was running through the trees, toward the trail that would lead him to the main road. Ivy sped up, determined to cut him off before he got there. With a snarl, she launched herself through the air and pounced on him like the small, scurrying rat he was.
Jeff cried out and tried to twist away, but his own momentum worked against him and he fell to the ground. She tumbled over him, digging her claws into his shoulders and the backs of his thighs as she rolled.
She landed on her feet a few yards away, hands on the ground as she prepared to pounce on him again. When she lifted her head, Jeff was already on his feet, flipping his submachine gun around. It was almost too easy to swipe it out of his grasp and send it spinning into the air.
Jeff swore, his eyes darting to the trees where it had landed, as if he wondered whether to go after it. He must have decided against it because he pulled a knife and dropped into a defensive stance.
Ivy approached him slowly, moving first one way and then the other, testing him. She’d injured him pretty good with her initial attack, not to mention when she’d almost gutted him back at the lodge when he’d tried to rape her again. He wouldn’t have much mobility in his arm or be able to push off with his legs.
“What are you waiting on, bitch?” he demanded. “Attack if you’re going to, so I can gut you like I should have done years ago.”
Ivy stilled, then stared directly into his eyes, letting a slow, drawn-out hiss escape her lips.
Jeff flinched. But he quickly found his spine again and hissed back at her in his own crude way. “Maybe you’re just thinking about letting me finish the game I started back in the lodge? Maybe you want to get on your hands and knees and take it like the animal you are?”
Ivy snarled. Jeff might get in one shot with his blade, but she was going to make him sorry he’d ever met her. By the time she was done, he was going to beg her to kill him.
“You sick bitch. I can see you want it.” Jeff motioned her forward with his free hand. “Come and get it.”
Ivy felt the last vestiges of her human side disappear. She could barely remember who Jeff was, much less what he’d done to her. All she knew was that she wanted to destroy him for it.
Only she didn’t want it to be this way. She wanted to be there when it happened, wanted him to know it was Ivy and not some animal who finished him.
But she was too far gone to ever come back. She didn’t even know how to begin regaining control. Being this deep, she wasn’t sure if she would ever be in control again.
An image suddenly flashed into her mind of her and Landon sitting in a tent in South America. It was so vivid, she could smell him. So intense she could feel his fingers as he tenderly wiped away her tears.
Your animal nature is part of what makes you so good in the field, but it’s not the only part. His voice was soft in the darkness. Your human side plays a part, too. You can’t let one part shove the other into the backseat. You have to be the one in control.
Then he had kissed her, and in her memory, the feel of his mouth on hers was just as powerful as the real thing had been.
And just like that, a path appeared before her, showing her the way back to the Ivy she wanted to be. She grasped at the memory of the kiss as if it were a lifeline leading her out of a dark cave. She focused on Landon’s face, on the touch of his lips, on the way his eyes had filled with tears when he’d rescued her.
“What’re you doing, bitch?” Jeff smirked. “Daydreaming about what I’m going to do to your freak ass?”
Ivy smiled, showing him her canines. She was herself again. “I was just imagining how much better the world is going to be without you in it.”
He snorted. “You don’t have it in you to kill me. The only chance you had to finish me was while you were wrapped up in your inner beast.”
Ivy didn’t answer. Instead, she walked toward him, clawed hands down at her side.
Jeff lunged at her with his knife—just like she knew he would.
She knocked the knife aside with one hand and raked the claws of the other across his throat.
Jeff dropped the knife and clasped his hands around his neck, trying to stop the flow of blood.
Ivy watched as he slowly dropped to his knees, then crumpled to the ground. The anger she’d carried aro
und for so long disappeared. She waited for the light in his eyes to go out completely, then turned and ran for the lodge. She was done here. She needed to find Landon and make sure he was okay.
***
Landon lost his weapon somewhere on the headlong slide down the hill, which ended with him smacking against a jagged rock—hard. He ignored the pain and got to his feet as quickly as he could.
Stutmeir was already on his feet, a wicked looking survival knife in his hand. It was sharpened on one side and had a ragged set of saw teeth on the other. Stutmeir moved a little gingerly, as if he’d landed awkwardly. Or maybe the man was just faking it, trying to suck Landon into attacking him.
Landon took a quick look at his own arm, assessing the damage. The cut was deep and jagged at the top of his bicep, but it got shallower as it ran down his arm. It wasn’t much more than a scratch near the elbow. It was bleeding a lot, but it wasn’t life threatening.
Landon saw his M4 out of the corner of his eye. It was at the bottom of the slope, maybe fifty or sixty feet away. It might simply be how the weapon was lying in a crevice, but it looked like the collapsible stock had collapsed a whole lot more than it was supposed to. At least Stutmeir didn’t have his gun, either.
Landon reached down for his knife, but the sheath was empty.
Stutmeir spread his legs as Landon approached, balancing his weight on his toes and keeping the knife low. The guy looked like he knew a thing or two about knife fighting. Landon hoped that Stutmeir’s ankle really was gimpy. If not, this could get ugly.
Landon circled around to the right, trying to get on the same level with Stutmeir, but the man slipped sideways to stay in front of him—and keep him lower down on the slope. If his ankle was injured, he wasn’t showing it now.
Landon was just about to move to the left when Stutmeir kicked out with one foot, showering him with dirt. The ex-Stasi immediately followed the move with a lunge.
