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Mitya glanced back. “Move it, Ania, keep us out in front of them.”
She accelerated immediately, and used a road he’d never been on, a shortcut he presumed. The surface wasn’t asphalt, but more gravel, stone and rock set with oil. She didn’t slow down, even when she made the sharp turn onto the road. It was narrow with a deep drainage ditch on either side. Mitya and Sevastyan exchanged a long look, and Mitya shook his head. His woman was a little terrifying, and sexy as hell with her confidence and driving skills.
“Miron?”
“Hanging in there. I got the bleeding under control, but he needs a medic. They’ll have one waiting,” Sevastyan reiterated.
“They’re on us,” Mitya told Ania.
She didn’t so much as glance at him but kept driving down the narrow road. There was water in the ditches and occasionally a very large culvert. She looked relaxed, as if she were driving leisurely on a country road, not hurtling along at a high rate of speed over what amounted to gravel.
He saw the passenger in the lead car stick his head out the window, gun in hand. Mitya threw himself to the passenger side and immediately had his window down. The driver accelerated. Ania suddenly hit the brakes. The Audi tried to do the same when it realized they were going to hit. The shooter caught at the door frame and Mitya shot him in the head. Ania hit the gas just as the other car hit their bumper. Had they not been moving forward so quickly, the car would have taken quite a jolt, but they barely felt it.
She shot the town car through the narrow lane and up around a curve to a dirt road that threw so much powdery dust into the air behind them, Mitya couldn’t even see the other cars. Then she made another swift turn and they were on the main road leading to the high-end estates back in the hills.
“We’re about to reach a half mile from Bannaconni’s ranch. Tell me where you want to go,” Ania ordered.
“Get us right past the cattle road there.”
“Do you want them on our tail?”
“Absolutely. By a couple of car lengths. We’re cutting them off, giving them nowhere to go.”
“They’re leopard,” Mitya reminded. “They’ll want to shift when they see they’re caught in a squeeze.”
“We’re prepared,” Sevastyan said.
“I’m letting Dymka loose,” Mitya said. “He can mop up. Let Fyodor and the others know.”
“Don’t like that, Mitya,” Sevastyan cautioned. “He’s difficult to protect and so are you when you turn into a loose cannon.”
“I want you with Ania,” Mitya said. “I mean it, Sevastyan. I don’t want a fuckin’ scratch on her.” He was already shedding clothes again, calling up his raging leopard, feeding the animal his own wrath. They’d come at him over and over. They’d killed Ania’s family. He’d had enough.
“Mitya, it’s my job to protect you.”
“It’s your job to do what I ask you to do. She’s my world. You take care of her.”
Ania opened her mouth once to object, but his eyes met hers in the mirror and she closed her mouth, seeing who he really was. He wasn’t taking shit from anyone, not one objection. The car accelerated slightly as the two cars giving chase picked up speed to catch up.
“The minute they come in behind you with a barrier, you drive to the house,” Mitya ordered Ania. “Straight to the house. I want her in the safe room, even if you have to carry her there yourself.”
Ania drove past the cattle road and instantly accelerated to get out of the way. Behind them, a huge semi rolled out straight across the road, hauling a cattle trailer filled with hay. As it did, the first, then second car slammed into it. Immediately the sound of gunfire filled the air as the men concealed behind the hay opened fire on those in the Audi and SUV.
“Stop.” Mitya had the door open and was already shifting before Ania could stop the car.
The huge leopard leapt from the car and rushed toward the two cars caught now between two cattle trucks. The cars couldn’t move forward or backward. Gunfire mowed down two occupants, the driver and front passenger of the Audi. The back doors popped open and a leopard rushed out, running full out, zigzagging to take him into the brush, using the cover of his friends as they returned fire.
Dymka immediately changed direction and went after him. The leopard was big, nearly black with rosettes set deep in his fur. Dymka increased his speed in order to cut him off from escape. He hit the dark leopard in the side hard, driving him off his feet, so that he rolled partially down the small slope they were on. Dymka followed him, roaring his challenge, daring the dark leopard to get to his feet and fight.
The leopard rolled over once more and sprang up, using his flexible spine to spin his body toward Dymka, rising in the air on his hind legs to meet Mitya’s cat as he came in, all teeth and stiletto claws. They crashed together, slicing at each other, trying to tear open bellies and rip at genitals. They hit the ground at the same time, slashing at muzzles and trying to get an advantage so they could get to the neck and deliver a suffocating bite.
Loose skin and roped muscles prevented either leopard from immediately and effectively ending the fight. They broke apart and circled each other. Mitya felt the fierce joy in his leopard as if it were his own. The leopard reveled in the challenge of the fight, and this leopard was worthy of his attention.
The dark leopard feigned an attack, coming in toward his neck and then suddenly whipping around to go at Dymka’s hindquarters. He tried to grab with both front paws, looking to hook deep and drag his opponent back and then throw him down. Dymka had seen it all and he was ready, using incredible speed and power to nearly fold his body in half as he spun around to face the other leopard and drive forward, coming under the head straight at the neck. He caught the cat in his jaws, teeth biting deep.
The dark leopard fought valiantly, ripping at him with his front claws, but Dymka was big and strong. He shook his opponent hard, throwing him off his feet and then, taking a firmer grip on the throat, held him pinned to the ground. They stared at each other, eye to eye. Mitya had hoped he could spare this one to interrogate later, but he could see the leopard was not going to submit. The hatred and resolution were there, regarding Dymka, even knowing that submission might save his life.
Dymka held him there while he struggled and then grew still, until the life faded from his eyes, leaving a magnificent leopard dead. Mitya cursed as Dymka stepped back from the body, roaring his victory. He paced away, slapping dirt and grass with his paw and then raced back to the leopard and swiped at him. It took several minutes for Mitya to get his leopard to control his nature and look toward the battle.
The sound of gunfire had faded. He saw Fyodor and Timur standing beside the two cars. There were bodies on the ground. Fyodor signaled to him, pointing toward the hillside across from them. Dymka turned his head and then, leaving the others to clean up and hopefully take any live prisoners back to the house, he sprinted up the hill, looking for the lone escapee Fyodor had indicated had come this way.
It only took a few minutes before he caught the leopard’s stench. He pulled his lips back in a silent snarl and wrinkled his nose in a warning display. The leopard had made it into a grove of trees on Bannaconni’s extensive property. Dymka followed him unerringly, catching a glimpse of his passing, a partial track mark, bruised leaves on a bush and the unmistakable stench of his spray proclaiming the territory belonged to him.
Without warning, a bullet skimmed Dymka’s shoulder, so that a bright hot flame of pain burst through him. The big leopard dodged and rolled, coming to his feet on the other side of the bush his opponent had marked. He crawled back toward the trees and deeper cover on his belly, careful not to move any branches and give his position away. That didn’t stop the man from firing his weapon over and over into the brush where Dymka had disappeared.
The shifter had had the good sense to take a pack with him, something Mitya hadn’t done. He’d been so ea
ger to fight, to challenge other leopards and give his cat a workout when he was so moody and dangerous. He also hoped to be able to interrogate one of the men trying to kill him. Kill him? Or Ania?
They had found her grandfather’s journal. He should have read all the passages leading up to his death, maybe that would have given him a clue as to who was behind this plot to start a war.
Dymka continued his forward momentum. The shooter had moved after he’d fired the first shot and then followed that with a volley, but Dymka knew all about that ploy. The cat had sprayed his offending odor everywhere, hoping Dymka wouldn’t be able to track him. Hoping he’d be intimidated by the leopard claiming the territory as his own. Dymka raged to get at the enemy, but he was an experienced fighter and he didn’t make the mistake of just rushing after the man with the gun. Mitya was certain their enemy had deliberately used the weapon in the hopes that Dymka would come after him.
Leopards were notorious for turning back on their enemies and hunting them. Dymka was no exception, but he’d also been learning lessons on fighting technique since he was a very small cub and Mitya’s father had his lieutenants turn their leopards on him. Sometimes Lazar’s leopard joined in the frenzy of ripping the young cub apart. He’d learned patience in a very hard world.
Dymka circled around to get behind the man. He had him spotted now. The man was up in a tree, naked, ready to shift when needed, but he was swiveling from one side to the other, trying to spot his enemy. Dymka inched forward, using the freeze-frame stalk of his kind. He couldn’t rush the man as long as he was in the tree, so he stayed very still, not moving a single blade of grass.
Time passed. Gunfire had long since ceased. The sound of trucks starting up could be heard in the distance. Dymka didn’t so much as twitch his tail. His hot gaze never left his prey. The man took his time, studying the terrain around him, looking with more than human senses, relying on his leopard to find any enemy close.
Dymka was downwind and never moved a muscle. He just waited with the patience taught to him by the lessons those terrible leopards had given him as he’d grown up.
Eventually the man began to climb down from the tree. Mitya studied him, trying to place him, but he could swear he’d never seen the man before. He had darker skin, as if he spent time in the sun. He looked weathered, although he was on the younger side, perhaps in his late twenties. This was not a man he had any kind of feud with. He wasn’t Russian. He slipped once, scraping his backside on the bark and swearing in a language often spoken in Bolivia—Aymara. That shocked him.
Drake Donovan definitely had ties in Bolivia and throughout all of South and Central America. He had ties practically all over the world. Was the vendetta against Drake? If it was, it didn’t explain why after Ania’s grandfather was killed, her father was shot and she was targeted.
Dymka didn’t move as the man jumped the last few feet, landing in a crouch and going still, looking all around him. Dymka lay about ten feet from him, concealed by taller grass, blending in with his surroundings.
Other than the pack he wore around his neck, the man was naked, and he didn’t seem in a hurry to dress. Clearly, he intended to shift and travel as a leopard across the Bannaconni ranch. He took a cautionary step in Dymka’s direction, still grasping the gun.
Dymka kept his eyes on the weapon. The man took another step, still looking around him, the gun dropping almost to his side. The big leopard charged, exploding from the grass, crossing the short distance in half a second, swiping one paw at the gun, nearly severing the arm as he sent the weapon flying.
Immediately, the man tried to shift, his body contorting fast, jaw elongating, fur beginning to burst through skin. Dymka took him all the way over, his heavy body pinning his enemy, teeth closing on the throat.
Mitya tried to back him off. He needed a prisoner to question, but there was no stopping Dymka once he went for the kill, not when he was so enraged and frustrated in the midst of the Han Vol Dan. He killed the man and then dragged his body over the hillside, back to the group of men waiting for him.
Mitya waited until Dymka released the body, dropping it almost at his cousin’s feet, and then he shifted. “Prisoners?” It was the first word out of his mouth. He needed a prisoner. Just one. Two would be better, but one would do. He needed to get to the bottom of this mess.
Fyodor shook his head. “Sorry, Mitya. They’re all dead.”
Mitya caught the jeans Timur tossed to him and stepped into them with the ease of long practice. “What the hell, Fyodor? Not one alive? That’s bullshit.”
Fyodor shrugged. “There were two left alive. No one shot them. One surrendered. He put his hands into the air and we all ceased fire. The other one shot his friend in the back of the head and then shot himself. There wasn’t a whole hell of a lot we could do.”
“We’ll need their identities. Someone has to know them.”
“They’re definitely from out of the country,” Fyodor said. “South America, I’d guess. None of them have identification on them. Their clothes are new. None of them had anything on them that would give their identities away.” As he spoke, he was eyeing his cousin’s shoulder, where blood leaked down his arm in a steady stream. “You might want to take care of that.”
Mitya glanced down at his shoulder, a little surprised to see the blood. The pain had faded as he’d fought the second leopard, and he had regarded the slice through his skin as nothing more than a nuisance.
“You look like hell, Mitya,” Timur said as he tossed a towel to his cousin. “Sevastyan is royally pissed. I don’t think your woman was very cooperative either, so that made him really angry.”
That sobered Mitya immediately. Sevastyan wasn’t a man who got angry often, but when he did, no one was safe. “Not cooperative?” he echoed.
“She fights dirty,” Timur continued. “And she’s apparently skilled.”
Mitya closed his eyes for a moment and sent a few curses out into the universe. Ania was going to be equally as pissed as Sevastyan. “Maybe I’ll wait before I head home. See if Jake’s wife can do something with this shoulder.”
“Coward,” Fyodor said. He signaled for the men to back the cattle cars off the road and out of sight. They’d piled the bodies onto the trailers in the hay. They would be gone over with a fine-tooth comb, subjected to fingerprinting, photographs, facial recognition, every kind of way to identify the men who had tried to kill them.
“Couple of things bother me,” Timur said as he walked with Mitya toward the car waiting for them. “These men had nothing whatsoever on them to identify who they were, yet in the lead car, there was a matchbook from the port in Houston. None of them smoked, or if they did, they didn’t carry cigarettes on them, but conveniently, there is a matchbook identifying the port and, specifically, the Caruso restaurant.”
Mitya didn’t like that either. He slid into the back seat and moved to make room for Fyodor. Timur took the front passenger seat. Their men would continue with cleanup. They’d contacted Bannaconni to let him know of the ambush and what had happened, so he wouldn’t be blindsided. His security had to have heard the shots, and they didn’t want law enforcement called until all evidence was gone. Every leopard body had to be properly disposed of. That meant burning them was necessary, but Mitya wanted to identify the men and where they came from. Burning them immediately might keep that from ever happening.
“We found an advertisement for the company that does bulletproof glass, the Anwar company, but in the SUV.” Timur continued. “That isn’t all, Mitya.”
By the tone of his voice, Mitya knew he wasn’t going to like what was said next. He wrapped his arm with the towel and leaned forward to get the water bottles out of the ice. He handed one to each of his cousins. “Just tell me.”
“There was evidence pointing to you, as if you had something to do with killing Ania’s family. I’ve got all of it and was careful not to touch it so w
e can lift prints off it, but—”
“What kind of evidence?”
“I imagine it’s the gun that was used to shoot Antosha Dover. It was in a bag and has your fingerprint on it. Fyodor could see there was a print and he lifted it and tested it, using the fingerprint scanner. We’re all in the FBI database. Your name popped up instantly, Mitya.”
Mitya was silent, frowning. The car was already in motion, carrying him back to his house—to Ania and Sevastyan. “This doesn’t make a lot of sense unless someone wants to start a war between all the families.”
“A war?” Gorya echoed. He was driving, and he glanced over his shoulder at his cousin. “Why would someone want to start a war? That doesn’t even make sense. No one wins.”
“What other explanation is there? Why else would they be planning on planting evidence against both of the Houston families and against me? They probably have other items they can scatter around to indicate some of the other families,” Mitya said.
“If that’s true,” Fyodor replied, “then that little notebook that was on its way to the Anwar family has to contain incriminating evidence, manufactured or not, against Drake Donovan and Jake Bannaconni. We’re all being played.”
There was a small silence. Mitya drank half the bottle of ice-cold water. He put his head back and closed his eyes. If that gun had been found by the police, he could have been arrested for Antosha’s murder. Would Ania believe him to be innocent? They had a very delicate balance going.
Jewel had been very suspicious of him, believing he might harm Ania. The two leopards had a rocky start and still weren’t fully bonded. He certainly hadn’t convinced Ania that she was his world. He hadn’t had that chance. Neither had Dymka. Each time they tried, something catastrophic seemed to happen to prevent that final sealing.
That lack of bonding was slowly driving Dymka insane with jealousy, rage and sexual frustration. In turn, those black moods were on Mitya. That didn’t make it easy to show love and be gentle with his woman. He wanted to hit something. He thought Dymka challenging and fighting the two big leopards would take the edge off his dark moods, but if he was anything to go by, it hadn’t helped.