Ryland (22 page)

The other gun appeared in Cunningham’s
hand, and Ryland could smell the drugs. He was going to dart her. But before he
could move to her one of the cats swiped at Cunningham’s leg. The shot went way
off its mark as he fell. The second shot, one that came from the regular gun,
fired, but he was going after Cunningham and didn’t see where it hit.

“You hurt?” She told him no. “Get to
Neal. He’s hurt and needs to get to the house.” She told him she’d take care of
it.

“Don’t kill him.” He nearly tumbled over
a log he was in the process of jumping over when she said that. “He has some
information I want and if you kill him, I won’t get it.”

He saw Cunningham then, running as
quickly as he could, falling every few feet. He leapt at him the last five feet
and took him down. Another cat, this one smaller than even Bronwyn’s cat, stood
nearby.

Cunningham was begging. He was promising
him everything under the sun to things that would be impossible for anyone to
think he would ever get from him. The most outlandish thing was a ticket on the
next space shuttle to the moon. Cunningham apparently knew people.

When Crawford sat beside him, Bronwyn
was with him. The cat was bleeding from the chest. He looked at her and she
shook her head. The shot had apparently found a mark in the cat. He moved out
of the cat’s way when he put his paw over Cunningham’s chest.

“He’s giving you and me his ambush for
this. He said we’re welcome to them.” He looked at the four cats near them and
nodded to each of them. “Crawford said that there are others that he has at the
lab too, humans mostly, that he wants us to care for.”

“Done. What does he want in return?”
She nodded to
Cunningham.
“He wants to kill him?”

“No. He wants them to.” She nodded to
his right and then pointed to his left. There were about two dozen tigers there
and most of them looked bloodied. He nearly asked her where the rest were when
she spoke again.

“Your brothers are very good men. Will
they be able to live with what they’ve done tonight?” So they had killed. “It
was them or those dead tigers. They left them no choice.”

“They’ll be fine. They’ll feel like
they’ve done right by their family, so they’ll be more than fine.”

She nodded.

“What’s he doing?”

“You don’t want to know.” She moved past
them and toward the house. “I have to do one more thing. Can you stay with your
family until I get back?”

“No. Let me come with you.”
She stopped and
turned to look at him.
“Please?”

“It’s not going to be pretty. It’s going
to be…I’ve been in one of these labs before, you haven’t. You’ll be better off
if you stay out.”

He nodded, but moved with her when she
started walking again.

“You’re a stubborn ass, has anyone ever
told you that before?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, they have. Alistair
did. He said you and I were a perfect match in that department.”

He followed her, stopping once to shift
and change. He caught up with her in the driveway. She said that everyone
inside was safe. He looked up at his mom when she waved at him. She looked
worried too.

He got into the passenger seat beside
her and she asked him once more if he wanted to stay behind. He put on his
seatbelt as an answer. She put it into drive and left the house. He tried to think
what could be so bad at the labs that she was this sad about. Christ, he hoped
this wasn’t a mistake.

~~~

Alistair stared at the dead man. Or what
was left of a dead man. They had torn him apart. As soon as Ryland had turned
his back and walked away with Bronwyn, the big cat with his paw on Cunningham’s
chest had roared. The other tigers with him had done the same. As soon as
Crawford fell on top of Cunningham, he had scrambled out from under him, no
small feat considering how big Crawford was, and ran. Big mistake.

Alistair and his brothers made their way
back to the house as he’d thought of what the other tigers had done next. They
had toyed with him, played with him, clawing at his flesh just enough to make
him bleed, but not enough to kill him. When he’d drawn out his gun one of the
tigers had lunged for it and had been killed. Another tore his hand off from
the elbow down. The screams from Cunningham put the other cats into a killing
frenzy.

They pounced on him in seconds. Screams
were long and loud as they tore at him. Alistair wanted to look away, but found
that he couldn’t, needing to make sure that the fucking bastard was dead. But
he knew it was more than that; it was the fact that he simply couldn’t look
away from the carnage. When he heard bones being crushed in powerful jaws, he
stood up slowly; when the screams suddenly stopped, he stood stock still, as
did the rest of the family.

The larger cat stood near the dead body
and roared again. As soon as the others joined in he stopped and looked at him.
Alistair knew that if he made any sort of sudden move he would be dead, so he only
nodded at him. Then as Alistair watched, the big cat pissed on Cunningham’s
body. The rest of them did the same. He moved away, leading his brothers home
when they finished.

“Why did they do that?”

Startled out of his memories, Alistair
looked at Brock.
“They all pissed on him, why? Were they marking him?”

“I suppose you could call it that, but
not in the way a dog marks a tree. They were warning others what could happen
if they fuck with them. And their scent will make sure they know who killed
him.”

Alistair moved to the place where their
clothes were and noticed that Ryland’s were gone. He was relieved. He hadn’t
seen him in a while and had worried something had happened.

Finding his mom and Sindy in the house,
he asked where Ryland was and neither of them answered him. He’d tried
contacting him, but he was either blocking him or Bronwyn was. He followed his
mom into the kitchen when she said she was making sandwiches.

“She got into the truck and he went with
her. I think they’re going to that lab now.” She sounded upset and he asked her
what had happened. “Sindy told me some of the things that had happened to Bronwyn
at that place. She said that Bronwyn had nightmares still about it because of
the things she’d had happen there.”

She was crying when he took her into his
arms. He wasn’t sure what to tell her and decided to say nothing. What could he
say? That it would be all right? He had no idea. When she pulled away, she
started to fuss with the luncheon meats and slapping it onto buns. When he took
her hands she looked up at him.

“What if she still wants to leave? What
if she won’t stay even after we all fell in love with her? And poor Ryland?
He’ll be beside himself if she leaves after this.”

“She’s not leaving.” She shook her head.
“No, listen to me, she’s not leaving. She and Ryland are fixing up the big
house he bought. She’s putting down roots and is happy here.”

“Will that be enough?” His mom put three
more sandwiches together before she threw it down on the tray and sat on the
chair. “I have a good mind to give her a piece of my mind.”

Alistair pulled out his cell and handed
it to her. “I don’t know if she carries one, but Ryland has one. Call him and
ask to speak to her. Tell her what you think.”

She snatched the phone from him and
opened it. He started making the sandwiches more suitable then started to
assemble more as he listened in on the conversation.

“I would like to speak to your mate,
please.” Alistair grinned when his mother snorted. “You put her on right now
and tell her I said if she doesn’t want to talk and drive to pull over. I have
something to say to her and it won’t wait.”

He wanted to ask her what was taking so
long, but he could see his mom swinging her foot a mile a minute. It was a good
indicator that she was pissed off. He put a large bowl on the table and filled
it with the three bags of chips and other snack food he found in the cabinet. He
was nearly ready to call in the others when his mom spoke again.

“You tell me right this minute what you
think you’re doing. And I want an answer as to why you didn’t come into this
house and tell me that my sons were all right. Don’t you think I might have
been just a little worried?” There was a long pause. “Well that’s not the same
thing as telling me in person now, is it? I would love to have seen that you
were all right as well. Made sure that you—”

He watched her shoot up off the chair as
if she’d been in a cannon. He waited as she glared at the cabinets in front of
her and thought maybe this was not such a good idea. Then she started speaking
again.

“When I ask you a question or am
speaking, you do not interrupt me. I may be retired, but I’m still the head of
this household, especially if you plan on abandoning us at the first sign of
trouble… You most certainly did so.”

He handed the tray of sandwiches to
Keith when he came through the door and stood there waiting with the two bowls
of chips in his hands to shove at the next person who poked their head in. It
just happened to be Neal and Brock. He nearly knocked Jules over with a case of
waters when he came through. Dinner was served.

His mom put the phone down and smiled. He
wasn’t sure if he should trust that or assume everything was fine. When she got
up and started pulling out pickles and other condiments, he called for them to
come back in here and fix their sandwiches. Each of them stared at her when she
started humming. He realized they’d heard everything, including the phone
conversation.

“Mom? What happened? Is she coming back
with Ryland?” She nodded. “Is she staying?”

“Well of course she is. Why wouldn’t
she? I don’t know why you were so worked up about it. Everything is just fine.”

Alistair looked around, more confused
than ever as she continued.

“There are times, Alistair, that I just
don’t know where your head is. Worrying over nothing like that. What are you
going to do when you find your own mate?”

“I don’t…I guess I just don’t know.” He
sat down and picked up a sandwich. He was trying to wrap his head around the
bizarreness of what happened when he heard Ryland.

“There is no cell phone service here.
Could you call for help? We’re fine, but there are…Christ, Alistair, it’s worse
than… I was going to say worse than I thought, but I could never have imagined
anything at all like this. They were cutting them up while they were still
living.”

He pulled out his phone, handed it to
his mom, and mouthed for her to call 911 for the lab. She asked if they were
all right and he nodded. She dialed and asked him the address. Ryland told him
as he repeated it to his mom.

“We’re coming there now. Don’t even try
to stop us.”
Ryland said he wouldn’t, but not to bring Mom.
“I don’t think you’re going
to be able to stop her. She’s gathering supplies up now and having everyone put
them in the trucks.”

“Figures.”
He laughed
slightly.
“Did you know that mom called Bronwyn? They got into it big time
just before we got here. I think it was perfect timing. Is Mom okay?”

“Yes. She blamed it on me. Is Bronwyn
okay?”
The silence was telling.
“I’m guessing not.”

“No. She’s moving through the building
like she’s on a search and rescue mission. That’s pretty much what it is, I
suppose.”
Ryland didn’t say anything more for a long while until they were about half a
mile from the building.
“The code to get in is four-two-eleven. Make sure
you close the door when you come in. There are still…things here that could get
out.”

Chapter 18

It took them over a week to sort through
the mess in the lab. Bronwyn moved though the building several times a day,
looking for and helping pull out bodies. The people at the labs had gotten to
the point that there had been too many to bury daily, so they’d started putting
them in empty offices and stairwells. They had found over two hundred bodies
and more than three dozen parts of other bodies that didn’t seem to come from
any of them. The people she was helping were appalled and in shock.

“There’s a woman outside that says her
husband owns this building and she wants to talk to him. Right now, she said.”

Bronwyn looked at Mike Hopper as he
delivered the message.

“She has two kids with her and I think
they belong to Cunningham.”

She nodded and went to speak to her. Mike
stayed at her side. The only time he left her was when Ryland was with her or
she was at home. He hadn’t left her since the night of the attack. He told her
after what she’d done for his friend he could do no less than to protect her
from now on.

“Mrs. Cunningham, my name is—”

She cut her off with a slap to the face.
Bronwyn nearly didn’t catch Mike before he attacked her. She saw Ryland coming
toward her.

“You never call me that name again. And
where the hell is my husband? That son of a bitch is taking his kids right now.
I’ve had it up to my ass in problems with them and if he thinks I’m giving up
my vacation at the spa for some tramp, you tell him it won’t work.”