This Fallen Prey (Rockton #3)(56)

When I saw what Storm was chasing, I knew she could die. I realized death was a very real possibility and maybe even a probability, and it was all my fault. She trusted me, and I should have known better, and who the fuck—who the fuck—was I to think I could protect anything. I have never in my life been able to do that. I’ve spent years barely able to keep myself moving forward.

Don’t rely on me. Just don’t. I will do what I can, everything I can, but please do not rely on me. Do not give me that responsibility. I will fail.

I am about to fail.

Stop. Focus. I have one last chance. Storm can hear me, and any moment now, that cougar will appear and leap from a rock I can’t even see down here.

“Storm? Stop.”

I don’t shout it. I say it. Loud. Firm. Angry even. Let her know I’m angry. That is the key here. She doesn’t understand fear. She doesn’t understand shrieking panic. That is not the language I have taught her.

“Storm. Stop.”

She skids to a halt and glances over her shoulder and in her eyes, I see confusion. Hurt and confusion.

“Storm. Stay. Storm? Bad girl.”

Her ears droop at that, muzzle dipping. She knows she has misbehaved. Knows she has run from me. I must use that.

“Storm? Come.”

I’m still walking, as I extend my hand, reaching for her, my gaze on the rocks above. She’s almost to me when I see a flash of tawny fur. That’s all I see—a blur, as the cougar leaps and shit, oh, shit, no, the big cat is in flight, dropping toward Storm, who is making her way slowly to me, her head and tail down.

I fire. Shot after shot, I fire as the cougar is in flight. The big cat jerks, bullets ripping through its underside in a burst of blood. But it is still falling. Still on trajectory to hit Storm.

“Storm!” I yell, and that only confuses her, and she slows, her head lifting.

The cougar lands square on Storm’s back, and I’m flying forward. A voice in my head shouts for me to stop, just stop. It’s Dalton’s voice, not mine. Mine is silent, accepting, and I’m sailing at the cougar, gun dropped, hands out as if I can physically wrench the big cat off Storm.

The dog bucks, her eyes rolling in terror. The cougar’s jaws open. I hit it, both hands slamming into its side. One massive fang slices into Storm’s shoulder. Slices in and rips as the big cat falls. I’m on it then, and a memory flashes, Cypher telling me he wanted me to teach him aikido so he could take down the man-eating cougar out here. I remember rolling my eyes at that. He was joking. Had to be joking. No one would attempt anything so stupid.

I’m falling, my hands wrapped in brown fur. Fur slick with blood, blood pumping from multiple shots in the cougar’s white underbelly. We go down, and I’m atop the big cat, and all I can think is What the hell are you going to do? Wrestle it to death? I grab for my knife. I’m still pulling it out as we roll, and I rear up, knife raised.

The cougar stays on the ground.

I’m poised there, adrenaline pounding. The big cat lies on its side, flanks heaving, blood pumping from the bullet wounds. The cat’s mouth opens, and it is breathing hard. Its eye rolls to look at me, and in it, I see a look I know well, from Storm when she is injured.

I don’t understand.

I hurt, and I don’t understand.

Storm moves up beside me. Blood seeps from her shoulder, but she’s walking fine. She sniffs the cat’s injured belly and whines. Then she lowers herself at my side and lays her big muzzle on my foot as she watches the cat.

I tentatively reach out and place my hand on the cougar’s shoulder. That amber eye meets mine, but the cat just keeps breathing hard, gasping for air.

Dying.

When I shot Blaine, I saw him die. It took only a moment, but I had to watch it—the outrage, the anger, the disbelief. While he had not deserved what I did, he was not blameless. The punishment simply did not fit the magnitude of his crimes.

This cougar is blameless. It ran from a predator. It tried to stop a threat. It did what it needed to survive. And I shot it. Emptied my gun into it.

It’s a young cougar. I see that now. A male, the size of Storm, which means it isn’t more than a couple of years old. One of the man-eater’s cubs. A beautiful creature, covered in blood, dying and confused.

Storm whimpers, and I know I have to tend to her, but I can’t leave the cat to die alone. Maybe that’s overly sentimental, but I feel I owe it something.

No, I know what I owe it. The question is whether I can do it. I don’t want to. I have to. It is gutshot, like Brent, and if I walk away, it will lie here for hours, slowly dying.

I steady my knife. Then with my left hand, I rub the fur behind its ears. I half expect it to snarl, to tense, but that eye closes and the big cat relaxes under my fingers. I grip the knife firmly in my right hand, find its jugular, and slice, as quickly as I can. The cat’s eye flies open, but it doesn’t lift its head. With the pain from its stomach, it barely notices the cut. I keep rubbing its head, and that eye closes and after a moment the cougar goes still.





31





I take only a second to regroup. Then I’m checking Storm’s shoulder. There’s a gash where the cougar’s fang pierced and then sliced, and that, too, is my fault—I’d hit the cat as the fang caught.

Of course, if I hadn’t hit, all four canines would have ripped out the back of Storm’s neck. But I’m good at taking blame. Two seconds faster, and I could have saved her from any injury at all.