Toxic Game (GhostWalkers 15)

He continued moving fast. If there was a problem with the tiger, better he took care of it than her. She would regret having to kill the animal for the rest of her life. He wouldn’t like harming the big cat, but he could get past it, especially if by doing so it meant saving her from having to. As he moved closer, he felt the laughter drain out of her, leaving her mind serious and then going from serious to horrified.

Draden, he’s caught in a trap and he’s going crazy.

Draden could hear the tiger, roaring his challenge, pain wracking the furious snarls that rose to almost a howling pitch.

Don’t you go near it. You stay in that tree, I’m almost there.

I should have been looking for signs of poachers. They always leave signs to warn others the area has traps laid. There were tears in her mind, but not in her voice. She was angry. He’s ripping at the tree trunk the cable is anchored around. So many of them have died just like that, starving, chewing at their own legs. Draden, I have to do something.

“I’m here,” he said softly, stepping onto the branch where she clung, her horrified gaze fixed on the wildly fighting tiger.

The noose was wrapped around its right back leg and the animal fought back, attacking the tree in a frenzied attempt to get loose. It clawed at the trunk, leaving deep rake marks in between biting at its paw and leg and even the trap.

“Do you have anything nonlethal on you? Something we can dart him with? Put him out? Neither one of us can help him when he’s like that. It’s too dangerous.”

“They should have something at the ranger station,” Shylah said, still not taking her eyes off the thrashing, fighting animal.

Even Draden, who attempted to be nothing but hardened steel, felt a little heartbroken when watching the animal struggle to survive. He was trained to be a heat-seeking missile, going after the enemy, not to take on any other tasks along the way. But he was also GhostWalker special forces, and that called for thinking independently. In this case, his thinking veered toward wiping out the poachers along with the terrorists.

“You had to have studied the region before you were dropped in,” he said, deferring to her greater knowledge. He had come to get in and get out, not for an extended stay, and the only other information had been provided by Malichai. “What hazards besides the tiger are we facing?” He was calm, matter-of-fact. When Shylah continued to stare silently down at the raging, fighting animal, he poured command into his voice. “Shylah, I need data now.”

She looked up at him, blinking rapidly, and his heart stuttered when he saw her lashes were wet. She nodded twice, clearly forcing herself under control. “Poachers set multiple traps in the same area. They knew this tiger frequented this area. There are probably eight or nine more traps on the ground. They leave signs to warn others that they’ve already laid the traps. I should have been looking. I was concentrating on the enemy.”

“Stay in the trees then and make your way back to the station fast. I’ll keep watch over him and examine the ground. I should be able to find the other traps and remove them while I’m waiting for you. Maybe I can find a way to calm him down.” He said it more to soothe her than because he believed that he could.

She nodded. “You might be able to. In the park where you see tigers more often, when one is trapped, often the others protect it, or at least that’s what quite a few of the natives think. So, who knows? When the rangers try to remove snares, they can be risking their lives going into tiger territory. He might view you as a protector.”

Draden doubted it. He was more of a hunter, a predator, and the tiger most likely would scent that in him. Still, darting a big cat was dangerous. Exotics were difficult to take down without killing them because there was no set dosage even if they were the same weight and age. He only knew that because he had worked at a zoo for a short while in his younger years, before he’d found the comfort of the nursery and the rows of peonies that soothed him when he couldn’t contain his anger. The zoo veterinarian had often talked to him about the dangers of taking down a large cat.

Adrenaline poured through the big cats and they fought the drug until the very last moment before they dropped, and then they could easily go into cardiac arrest. Even if the rangers had ketamine to knock the tiger out, he wasn’t certain of the dosage. Worse, he knew the vet always had yohimbe on hand to reverse the ketamine, and he didn’t have a clue what to do with that drug.

“Forget trying to get back to the ranger station. I’m going to clear the traps from the area and you can help me do that. You should be able to scent them. Or feel for them before you reach them. Talk to the tiger while we do the clearing. Get him used to the sound of your voice.”

“What do you plan to do?” There was suspicion.

He wasn’t about to tell her his insane plan. Instead, he dropped down from the tree and began to move in an ever-widening circle with the raging tiger as the center. The tiger stopped raking the tree and turned to face him, snarling.

“Yeah, you don’t like me much, do you?” He sent Shylah a smirk. “He likes you though, and I’m way too close to you. You’re giving off the vibe.”

“What vibe?” Shylah demanded, daring him to say it aloud.

His smirk turned into a grin. “The very sexy and oh-so-alluring, I’m-so-ready-to-get-laid vibe.”

She tossed her head so her hair, which had been in a tidy braid, went flying. Tendrils of hair had pulled loose on her wild run through the branches of the trees and she looked every bit as exotic and beautiful as the tiger. “This is not true.” She narrowed her eyes. “And dangerous of you to say so.”

He sent her a quick grin. She was so damned adorable and just as sexy. “I must have been mistaken.”

“You were.”

He laughed, and she did too. For one moment their eyes met and his heart clenched hard. He needed to keep his head in the game or one or both were going to be mauled by the tiger.

“Keep talking to him. He likes your voice.” Draden liked it too, but he refrained from mentioning that. “You’re female and he senses that. I’m a male, a rival, and he’d like to shred me. Talk to him, get him used to the sound of your voice.”

All the while she talked, he searched for the snares. There was a pattern to them and within a short period of time he had discovered six more. He removed them while she continued to talk to the tiger. He moved into position while she occupied the animal’s attention.

What are you doing? Shylah kept talking in a soothing voice, working her way close to the animal, but staying just out of its range.

The tiger was calmer, staring at her, but showing teeth to let her know she’d better not get too close. Draden didn’t hesitate. If he did, he would be killed. He was on the tiger, using his enhanced strength, his arm choking the animal, holding it to the ground while it fought and tried to turn its head to sink its teeth into him. One leg was tied up, but it tried to rake with its other three.

You’re insane, Shylah whispered into his mind, but she’d already leapt into action, working fast to try to untangle the cable from around the tiger’s paw.

Adrenaline poured through Draden’s body. He could feel the hot breath of hatred exploding against his arm, but the tiger couldn’t reach him with claws or teeth. The difficult part was the dismount. Taking the tiger to the ground had been easy because the tiger was completely focused on Shylah. Now, it was completely focused on him.

Ready? Shylah’s voice shook.

Not yet. When I give the word, you take the cable all the way off then leap for the tree the instant he’s free, he instructed. And don’t give me any shit either. Just do it. I’ll tell you when to take it off. Understand?

Yes.

Good. Then get ready. They both had to be ready.

He had to be ready. He had to be able to count on her to do exactly what he said because his attention couldn’t be divided. He didn’t want the tiger to touch him. Not one single rake on his skin. He was uncertain how the virus was transmitted because he couldn’

t study it. The remote lab was a good one as field labs went, but it wasn’t as safe as he would like it to be, not when he knew Trap would be sending for blood and virus both and the military lab he would be using would be far better equipped, with far better safety protocols.

Of course, Draden should have taken the virus straight to the remote lab, and called in transport, everything else be damned, but there was that quiver in Shylah’s voice that had turned him inside out. For the first time, knowing he did something completely out of character for him, something that was important to the rest of the world, that he’d done what he’d wanted to do, felt damned great, even with a tiger’s teeth inches from his face.

I’m ready. No argument. She was a partner a man could depend on.

He took a breath, let it out. “Listen, buddy, we’re trying to help you here. Just give me a minute to get into the tree before you start trying to chew on my spine, rip off my leg, gut me and eat me, okay?”

Draden. Shylah breathed his name into his mind. Softly. Aware. Touching him somewhere deep.