Viper Game (GhostWalkers 11)

Wyatt let him get his feet under him and set himself back in his warrior's stance. He exploded into action, gliding in, hitting Larry hard with two straight rights to the left eye, both shockingly hard, knocking Larry's head back rapidly. The third punch was a left roundhouse to the jaw. Larry's body shuddered. His legs turned to rubber and he went down. Wyatt stepped back a second time. He wasn't even breathing hard and he hadn't broken a sweat.

"You might want to drop by Grand-mere's house and apologize. She's hell on wheels with a gun, but if you come by all sorry, with your tail tucked between your legs, she'll feed you and forgive you, because that's what we do here." The soft voice changed. "Get up. We're not nearly finished."

Larry rolled over and stared up at the night sky. "You hit like a damn jackhammer." His left eye was already swollen shut. "I've never been punched that hard in my life. I didn't know anyone could hit that hard."

"Swamp rats learn how to punch on the way outa their mama's womb. Stand up. And for the record, I'm takin' it easy on you."

Larry held up his hand. "I'm done, man. I get it. I'll apologize. The place was crazy that day and she was just in the way."

Wyatt reached down and yanked him off the ground with one hand as he struck three more times in the mouth with the other. He dragged Larry close to him, looking eye to eye. "This is our land. You don' own anythin' beyond that fence. Those acres of plants belong to the people of the bayou. We use them for medicine. You don' come onto our land and dictate to us when we can harvest them. She wasn' in your way. You were in her way."

Wyatt released Larry's shirt and the man dropped again to ground. The earth beneath them shivered. It was a small tremor, but it was there, indicating Wyatt's temper was rising, not diminishing.

"Wyatt, don't get all crazy on us," Malichai warned. "You don't want to bring their house down."

"I want Nonny's knife. That knife is important to her, you thief."

Larry rolled over, glaring with his one good eye. Blood bubbled around his split lip and inside his mouth. "You want her knife?" He yanked the knife from his boot and stood up, staggering a little. "Come and get it."

"Oh, now that's just downright stupid," Wyatt said softly. "Real stupid. How do you think we killed the food we ate? Do you really think we had the money for bullets? I cut my teeth on knives, killin' game, fightin' with my friends and protectin' our property. You really don' learn, do you? That's called bein' too stupid to live. You don' choose a man's weapon and then expect to live through the fight."

Wyatt circled Larry, watching his eyes. He definitely couldn't see out of his left eye, so he moved to Larry's left, forcing him to turn to keep him in sight at all times. The man spit blood out several times, and twice he looked as if he might fall, but he didn't drop the knife.

Wyatt moved in with blinding speed, for the first time using his enhanced cat reflexes. He caught the man's wrist in a brutal grip, controlling the knife as he stepped back behind Larry, taking the arm with him. Larry went flying down, screaming at the pressure on his arm. Wyatt held him there, removed the knife from his hand and slipped it into his own boot and then casually stuck the boot in Larry's throat.

"You're damn lucky I don' break your arm. This is me not bein' angry. You don' want to ever make me come for you again because I won't spank you sweetly like I've done. I'll shove a knife down your throat and toss your body to the gators. I expect you'll be by to tell Grand-mere how bad you feel for shovin' her into the swamp."

There was no let up on the arm at all. Wyatt made it clear that he could break the bone at any time. The pressure on the throat remained just as steady. "Our people will be here to replant the plants you trampled on. You aren' goin' to give them trouble. Not you and not any of your friends. I don' really give a damn what you're doin' behind that fence, but you don' get to come onto our land and treat anyone like you own it all. Do we have an understandin'?"

"I think we do," Blake said. "Let him up."

"I need him to say it," Wyatt said quietly. "It's been a long day and I'm damn tired. Get it done or I'll end it for you."

"I understand," Larry bit out between his teeth.

Wyatt released him immediately and stepped back. He moved into the shadows of the trees, keeping his gaze on all three men.

Blake and Jim hurried over to Larry to help him stand. The dog remained standing, not looking toward Wyatt or the two men concealed in the trees. Wyatt knew that meant Ezekiel had control of the animal.

"Our guns?" Jim asked quietly.

"We'll leave them for you outside the gate," Wyatt replied. "We wouldn't want anyone to lose his temper and do somethin' stupid. It seems you don' have any more sense than you do manners."

Blake shot him a look that said he'd be more than happy to lose his temper, but all three men turned back toward the compound, Larry between the other two.

Wyatt waited until they were all the way inside with the gate closed before he moved.

"That was you being nice," Malichai said. "Impressive. You didn't even break a sweat."

"We grew up fightin' in the bayou, no rules, just gettin' it done," Wyatt said. "What idiot would pull a knife on me?"

Malichai leapt from the tree and landed easily on the balls of his feet. "Not me, bayou badass. I'm all for going back home and seeing what Grand-mere has left on the stove. Watching you expend all that energy just helped me work up an appetite."

"Not quite yet," Wyatt said. "I think we need to figure out just what spooked those boys tonight."

"Grand-mere's Rougarou, is my guess," Ezekiel said as he jumped from the tree. "Those guards were scared. All three of them. And the dog too."

"I wonder why. They were armed to the teeth," Wyatt mused, looking toward the swamp where the fast-moving figure had disappeared.

"Does the Rougarou have babies?" Malichai asked. "Because there was a little scary thing running faster than possible and disappearing into the swamp. I swear the damned thing glowed."

"I saw it too," Ezekiel admitted. "But I wasn't going to say anything."

"At night, the swamp can get you all mixed up," Wyatt admitted.

His gaze drifted back to the compound and the three men limping their way to the building. He didn't trust them not to come runni

ng back with automatic weapons - but then he wasn't a trusting man.

"As far back as I can remember, I've heard tales of monsters in the swamps. They say we don' have panthers here, but I've seen 'em. They say a lot of things, but the truth is, no one knows what's true and what's not. I don' believe in the Rougarou, but it was fun as a child to be scared. I think we're chasin' something else, but what it is, I have no idea," Wyatt said with a small shrug.

He was used to chasing myths in the swamps, and it didn't bother him in the least. Screams and strange noises abounded. Sometimes the swamp went eerily quiet. It didn't matter. It was home to him. He thrived there. Felt alive. The humidity. The heat. The insects. The way of life. It was home. If that included a monster or two, well, that just provided unexpected excitement.

"The guards are inside," Wyatt announced. "Let's move."

He was already leading the way, heading toward the spot in the swamp where he'd last seen the blurred images. The three of them cast around for signs and scents of the mysterious intruders.

"Over here, Wyatt," Ezekiel said. "I've got a partial track, but it looks like a baby's bare footprint. Am I looking at a bear cub? A really small one?"

Wyatt crouched down to examine the small smear of a footprint in the muddy leaves. He brushed the debris from the track, but there was only a heel mark and what had to be the ball of a foot. But it was tiny. Far too small to be a bear, even a cub.

"There's blood over here," Malichai informed them. "It's splashed on the leaves and there are a couple of spots on the ground. The guards sprayed bullets over this entire area and they must have hit something."

"If the guards actually did hit something, the wound didn't slow it down," Wyatt said. "I was watching it run, although it was so fast and smooth, I honestly couldn't see an image, just a blur, but if they were hit, the body didn't even jerk and they didn't miss a step."

"It's a lot of blood, Wyatt," Malichai said, moving through the brush.

"It's the adult, not the infant," Ezekiel added.

Wyatt frowned. Could whatever have been moving that fast be human? He doubted it. They were enhanced, all three of them, with animal DNA, and they could move with blurring speed, but no way could he have caught that entity, not the way it was moving.