Bengal's Heart

◆ CHAPTER 17 ◆

He followed her. Cassa had expected it. He was her mate. He was her hormonal, biological match. She would have snorted at that thought if she weren’t so pissed off at him.

The walk back to town was a chilly one, but it gave her a chance to think, a chance to put things in perspective a bit more than she had already. Not that she had anything worked out, because she didn’t.

When he pulled up next to her and the passenger door of the Raider slid open, she turned, looked at him for a long moment, then slammed the door closed.

She was here for a story; she wasn’t here to be psychoanalyzed by a Bengal that had no idea the torment she had lived through because of his suffering. And she wasn’t here to fight for the heart of a man who obviously didn’t want to open his heart to her.

When she hit town, her legs were burning, her anger was building. She was nearing the entrance to the Kanawha Falls when a wicked, powerful black Harley pulled in from the parking lot and drew to a stop.

Dog.

His smirk was mocking, amused, as he glanced from her to the Raider.

“Want a ride?” he asked.

“I won’t ride with him, why would I ride with you?” she snapped.

“Maybe because I’ll give you answers, and he’d die and go to hell first?” he asked as she drew to a stop a second before Cabal did.

“Better hurry, here he comes,” Dog laughed as the Raider drew to a quick stop.

Cassa pushed aside her misgivings about Dog, jumped on the back of the Harley and crossed her fingers with a prayer that she’d survive the ride.

Dog wouldn’t hurt her so blatantly, she told herself, as she heard Cabal’s vicious curse behind her and Dog roared off.

“Answers,” she bit out furiously. “As you said, we don’t have much time.”

“You’ve been fucking up, Ms. Hawkins,” he called back to her as she gripped the leather jacket he wore rather than wrapping her arms around him. She couldn’t bear the thought of embracing him.

“No kidding,” she said tersely. “Now tell me something I don’t know.”

Dog took the curves through the little town faster than she would have liked. The motorcycle vibrated and hummed like a powerful beast between her thighs and reminded her of the fact that she shouldn’t be here, not like this, not with this Breed.

“Something you don’t know?” he called back. “Something you don’t know, Ms. Hawkins, is the same thing that your Bengal is figuring out.”

“Just keep me in suspense, why don’t you?” she called back as they neared the inn. “And if you don’t mind, don’t pass up my lodging.”

His big body vibrated with a chuckle as he turned into the inn’s parking lot, pulled around and parked close to the entrance, as Cabal pulled in behind them.

“Ask him why the killer contacted you, Ms. Hawkins,” Dog suggested as she slid off the motorcycle. “Because he knows why you’re here.”

His statement had her stopping and staring back at him, her eyes narrowing, aware that Cabal was jumping from the Raider and moving toward them.

“Why?” she snapped.

“Because Watts was part of the Dozen, Cassa. He was part of it, and he’s the one the killer wants.”

With that surprising statement, Dog gunned the motor on the Harley and shot out of his parking space a second ahead of Cabal reaching them.

Cassa stared up at her mate, shock resounding through her as she saw the suspicion in his eyes, the knowledge. It was there, in the brilliant pinpoints of amber that gazed back at her. He had a piece of the puzzle that she should have had. He’d known something that important, and he hadn’t told her.

“What would make your rogue killer think I can bring Douglas back from the dead? Or does he just think I should continue paying for his crimes?” Her voice was hoarse with tears she refused to shed, with an anger she refused to let free.

“Fuck!” The muttered curse was a testament to the rare honesty Dog had become afflicted with.

A part of her had hoped it was a lie, that the Coyote Breed didn’t know what he was talking about. Dog wasn’t known for his loyalty to the Breed community, quite the contrary. He was known for working with their enemies. In his own way of course. Rumor in the past year was that even Dog’s handler wasn’t always certain which side he was playing on.

“Yes, fuck,” she stated with cold emphasis on the curse. “Fuck all of it, Cabal.”

Turning, she stalked away from the Bengal, ignoring the need just for his touch. It wasn’t sexual this time, and it should have been. Mating heat was reputed to always be sexual.

No, the need twisting inside her now was a need for his touch, for his hold. A need to curl against him and, for once in too many years, just heal a little.

She’d been alone since her parents’ deaths, twelve years before. On the heels of that had been her marriage. Douglas had moved in, taken over and slowly destroyed the self-confidence Cassa had had within herself.

How easy she had been, she thought as she pushed into her room and tossed her pack on the nearby table. She had thought she loved him when she married him, but as the months went by, she realized it had been her grief that had had her leaning on him.

By then, it had been too late. Douglas had integrated himself into her life and had already begun sowing the seeds of her destruction.

She cursed her own ignorance with him. She’d been cursing it for eleven years now. She had made the mistake in trusting him, and she was still paying the price for it.

Sometimes she wondered if she would continue paying until the last breath she took. And beyond.

Death watched the light flicker on in the room at the inn. How warm and inviting it looked from the opposite bank of the river. How many memories it brought back.

Too many memories. They were stacked from one end of the mind to the other, flickering across the imagination as pain ripped through a soul that had felt shattered for too many years.

Valentine’s night. It had all happened then. Another anniversary was moving in quickly. Another year without a mate that had brightened every corner of a life that had been dark before that mating.

Death rubbed at arms that were still sensitive, that still ached for touch. There wasn’t a cell that didn’t miss the presence of the mate. It was like a disease, a steadily building fever that eventually destroyed the mind.

It never ended.

Once there had been warmth, laughter. There had been a place to belong. None of that existed now. There was no longer that place to belong or those arms to be held by. There was no longer the kiss that was needed to still the hunger that never stopped growing, never stopped tormenting or torturing the body or the mind.

It had created Death. This horrifying, gnawing emptiness that never went away. That never eased. The agony never eased, it never went away. It pulsed and echoed through the spirit until insanity would be a relief.

Many would think it was insanity now. It wasn’t. Insanity was the inability to accept that what one did was wrong. Death was very well aware there was nothing right here. It was simply justice. And justice was all that mattered for the lives that had been taken. For the lives that could never be returned.

“You were once a handsome man.” Death turned and stared at the bound, gagged victim who lay at the edge of the water.

His eyes were narrowed and filled with loathing. Filled with fury.

A smile crossed Death’s lips. It was a brutal smile. One that flashed with razor-sharp teeth and intent.

Yes, Cash Winslow, a former CIA agent. He had once been a very handsome man. Tall and fit, his hair dark and silky, his eyes deceptively friendly. Once he had been someone Death had trusted. Trusted and been betrayed by.

“I remember that fishing trip we went on,” Death said quietly, looking at the man Cash Winslow had aged into. “Do you remember?”

There were muffled sounds of rage behind the duct tape that covered his mouth.

“I caught the bigger fish. That big ole catfish. You ate with us, planned with us. We ate that big ole fish, tough as he was.” And they had laughed, planned for Breed freedom and lives that were far different from the danger they had faced then.

Death turned back to Cash then, stared into those eyes. Those deceptive, lying eyes.

“You betrayed us all.”

The chill from the river wrapped around a body that had been far colder than this on many nights. Nights when blankets didn’t ease the chill, when even the memories couldn’t warm the ice growing inside.

Death tapped gloved fingers against Winslow’s forehead. His hair was gray now. He was a little over sixy. Aging. He wasn’t as quick as he used to be, nor was he as intuitive. It had paid to allow time to pass before exacting revenge. The victims weren’t nearly as agile as they used to be.

“I remember how close you were with so many of them,” Death sighed painfully. “All of us.”

Muttered sounds came from beneath the tape as Cash struggled desperately. It was pathetic really. He had once been fit and hard, muscular and rather handsome. He was now just a paunchy, overweight, balding old man. With a fishing line around his neck.

He had been bait once before. He had drawn them to the Coyote Breed that had supposedly escaped and needed help over the mountain.

“You came to us. You swore he was a victim, you argued for his freedom and his safety. And you were our friend, we believed in you.”

Standing straight and tall, Death stared down at Winslow with a heavy, broken soul.

“We believed in you.”

There was no more time to waste. Gripping him beneath the shoulders, it was no hardship to lift him and scoot him the small distance to the edge of the river, to the boulders several feet away.

He struggled, but that was okay. The struggle was preferable. That meant there was still some life left in him. When he went under the water, he would suffer. He would know pain, for a few moments at least.

“The water is very cold. Cold enough that hypothermia will come fairly quickly. Which is really too bad. I was hoping to make you suffer just a while longer. I was hoping to taste your blood, but this is the wrong time for that, isn’t it?”

Blood would have been nice. Ripping his throat out would have been so much better than simply watching him drown. But his death needed to leave a message. Bait. There were many who would know what this meant. Many who would see the significance, but none who would know the answer.

“Loyalty,” Death whispered. “It’s repaid. Just as death is avenged. You killed us all.”

He was struggling, fighting. It wouldn’t do any good. There was only one place on the bank that he could reach safety, and she had that covered. He was going to die, and she was going to watch him die.

“You and Watts.” The hiss was filled with hatred, with the brutal need for blood. “You and Watts planned it. You executed it.”

A strong, hard kick to his back sent him tumbling into the water. The splash wasn’t nearly as satisfying as the sounds of screams when their throats came out, but it was better than watching him breathe. It was better than knowing he lived so much as a moment longer.

Gripping the line looped around Winslow’s neck, it was an easy matter to keep him in the deep pool of water chosen for his deathbed.

Wickedly sharp canines flashed in the night as a smile pulled at chilled, chapped lips. He was struggling, fighting the line, searching for a toehold, a way to draw in air, and there was no way to do so.

Tugging at the line, Death hummed a little melody and stared into the cloud-laden skies. It would snow by morning. The Breeds would find an icy corpse, and no trace of the murderer. That was the best way to kill. Without a trace. No DNA. No evidence, just the body to show the passing of life.

As Winslow’s struggles ceased and his body became a deadweight against the line, Death knelt on a boulder and stared into the murky water at the body below.

“Roses are red. Violets are blue. I remember, mate, and how I miss you.”

There were tears in the voice that whispered the words. Tears and grief. Had it truly been more than two decades since life had turned so dark and bleak? It hurt as though it had happened yesterday. An hour ago. It hurt until the agony was like an open, festering wound that refused to heal.

“I miss both of you.”

Death wiped at a face without tears. They had stopped falling so long ago.

Moving slowly, the fishing line was attached to a sturdy limb of a nearby tree, and on its end a photo was attached.

Let them make of this what they would.

Turning to stare into the well-lit window of the room Cassa Hawkins had taken, bleak eyes narrowed and rage built again.

She had mated that Bengal. Damn her. She had mated a Breed. That made it harder. It shouldn’t have. Death hadn’t thought it would. But it did. There was regret, but so little remorse.

A mate would have to be sacrificed. But so many had already been sacrificed, did another really matter? The end result was what mattered. The end result, and the death of those who had destroyed so much.

“Good-bye, Cash Winslow,” Death whispered with a feeling of relief. “Seven down. Four to go. And one to die again.”