.357 held between both hands, pointed at the ceiling. She’d take care of the killer. She had the gun.
She knew where to shoot to kill, and she had the skill to do it. “You’re not going to do this Javier.”
Chata...
Tears burned her eyes. “Does it matter how it ends as long as it ends?”
“Sis,” Axel said softly, holding his hand out to her. “He is alpha. Don’t make him fight you for his right to avenge the death of his family. You know I would do the same, and so would our dads and each of our brothers. It is our way.”
Her gut told her not to move. Nothing good could come of this. Fear burned her throat and eyes and made her stomach tumble with nausea. “It’s not my way,” she said desperately, but she stepped away from the door and lowered her hands to her sides, the revolver loose in her grip. Gunnar took it from her.
Javier touched her hand with his muzzle and licked her palm.
Footsteps on the porch. A knock.
Axel pushed Heidi behind him, and Gunnar took a defensive position next to the door, flicking off the revolver’s safety before reaching for the doorknob.
“I love you,” Heidi whispered, but she didn’t know if Javier heard, because just then, a deep voice, foreign and snide, came through the door.
“I tire of this cat and mouse game. Montero! I know you’re in there. I never took you for a coward to hide behind a female...or another cat’s tail. Have you turned beta, old friend?”
Javier lunged toward the locked door with a roar the likes of which her brothers could not produce in their catamount form. In the blink of an eye, Gunnar opened the door, and Javier shouted telepathically, I am not your friend, pendejo.
“Then come out here and face me. It’s what you’ve wanted is it not, ever since the day I put your stupid brother and his bitch out of their misery? You know the cartels gave me a reward for the death of your brother? He’d been a thorn in their side for far too long. And to think, all of this could’ve been avoided had he merely accepted their money.”
Oh, God, Heidi thought as she watched for the impact of the man’s words on the jaguar. Javier stood so still, almost frozen in place, but his claws were out and his ears back. She wanted to run to him, to wrap him in her arms and make the pain go away. She wanted to scream at the bastard to shut up.
She took a step toward Javier.
Heidi, don’t. Axel’s words, whispered in her mind, stopped her in her tracks. Don’t disgrace him.
He must do this alone.
With tears welling, she remained behind as the jaguar stepped through the doorway. The man outside laughed as Javier limped out onto the porch.
Had he reinjured himself?
Alarmed, Heidi shoved Axel out of her way in time to see the stranger shift into the form of a big-pawed snow leopard. The most horrendous cat scream she’d ever heard chilled her blood, making all the hair on her arms stand on end.
Stay out of this, the snow leopard told them with a vicious snarl.
“Your fight with him is no concern of ours,” Axel called out.
Javier took that chance to leap at the snow leopard, showing no signs of weakness in his hind leg this time, but Durchenko reacted quickly with a swipe of massive claws at Javier’s side. When she would have rushed out onto the porch, Axel wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pinning her to his chest. “No, Heidi.”
The snow leopard made horrible sounds while Javier growled and roared, the battle more vicious than any she’d witnessed between her brothers over the years. The two cats snapped and bit, their long fangs ripping into each other. They gouged with claws, the snow leopard aiming repeatedly for the jaguar’s weakness, his hind leg. They moved so fast, so furiously, if not for the drastic difference in their coloring, she would never be able to tell them apart.
A sob ripped from her soul when Javier cried out in pain as the leopard gripped his right foreleg with sharp teeth.
And then, if by some unseen force, the two cats flew apart. The leopard turned on its heels and dashed into the undergrowth at the side of the house. Javier sprinted after him, and they both disappeared.
Heidi jerked away from Axel and ran outside onto the porch, but they were gone. She couldn’t even hear them in the woods. Turning back to her brothers, she said frantically, “Go after them. Please.
Help Javier.”
Both brothers shook their heads.
“It’s his fight alone, Heidi,” Gunnar said.
“Go after them. Please,” she begged, grabbing the front of his shirt as tears dripped down her cheeks. “Make sure he’s okay.”
Gunnar wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into a hug she tried to fight. “Shh, sis.”
The tears came, and she slumped against her brother.
Javier was right behind the bastard as they wound through the undergrowth, heading deeper into the forest. He would not get away, not this time.
His memory returned in a rush, and he knew why he’d been in the woods to be shot by Heidi’s friend. He’d been chasing Durchenko. Just like this.
He ignored the pain radiating from his injured foreleg. Durchenko had tried crushing it between his teeth. Though he hadn’t succeeded in disabling him, it hurt like hell and was obviously fractured. His hind leg ached from the strain he put on the limb so soon after the shooting. But Durchenko must’ve realized Javier wasn’t as weak as he might’ve appeared at first, because the bastard darted when the fight had just begun.
The snow leopard was much smaller, so it was easier for Durchenko to maneuver under and around fallen trees, boulders and the thick underbrush. But Javier was determined, and just as they reached a small clearing, he made the leap and landed on the leopard’s back, digging his teeth into the back of Durchenko’s neck.
The smaller cat collapsed onto the ground and practically somersaulted tail over head, knocking Javier loose. In a flash, he switched direction, grabbing Javier under the chin with his teeth at the same time, scoring his underbelly with sharp claws from both hind feet.
Using his front claws, Javier gouged at Durchenko’s face and neck and sides, shredding skin and fur, fighting for his life. The leopard had his windpipe, and he felt blood pouring from his stomach.
A picture of his brother, disemboweled on their bedroom floor, came to his mind, and the anger that surged through him gave him enough strength to throw himself to the side. The leopard screamed in pain as Javier dug his claws into the bastard’s belly, and with his last bit of strength, Javier tore out Durchenko’s throat with his teeth.
The leopard jerked once, twice, then lay still.
Javier tried to stand up, but he had no strength left. He looked down at himself, saw the wounds, but he seemed to be intact. He had a hard time drawing breath, and he collapsed to his side. Durchenko was dead. He’d succeeded.
The world around him grew dim as darkness closed in from his periphery.
When he closed his eyes, Heidi’s face was all he saw. Her sweet smile. Her stubborn little chin.
That cute pug nose. And he heard once again the soft declaration of, “I love you,” she’d whispered just before he left her house to fight his enemy.
He tried to take a deep breath, but his lungs burned.
Pain pierced his chest and stomach. He couldn’t draw air.
And then, there was no more pain.
Chapter Fourteen
Heidi picked up her jacket from the hook behind her office door and headed through the clinic. She found Beth in one of the exam rooms, sterilizing the table.