Joe waved his gun at her and spoke in a hushed voice. “Silver bullets, Lelandi. So don’t try me. She was my one true mate. She told me everything about that abusive red mate of hers, how she couldn’t stand Darien’s touch, but went along with the mating so he’d protect her against Crassus. Not to mention that Darien insisted she was his because he’d seen her in the damned dreams. When I saw you, I figured you were the one he dreamed of.”
“What… what are you going to do?”
“Clean up loose ends.”
Which meant? He’d kill Doc because he’d known about the pregnancy. She lunged for the heavy brass paperweight, but Joe grabbed her arm, and they fell to the floor with a thud. “Shit, woman. I’m not going to kill you. I have to get rid of the medical records.”
She didn’t believe him for an instant. She and Doc knew about her sister’s babies. Why wouldn’t Joe kill them both? Hell, he had silver bullets in his gun. Why would he even be armed if he didn’t intend to murder someone?
She tried to squirm loose, but Joe kept her effectively pinned down.
“Listen, I’ll get the records for you and you can leave,” she coaxed.
“Nice try, Lelandi. What would prevent you from telling Darien everything you know? Even if you tried to keep your promise, he could force you to tell him the truth. I’ve made arrangements with your cousin Ural to take you away from here, and I want to stay with the pack. So you’ll have to leave,” he whispered against her ear.
And Doc? She wanted to ask him what he intended to do to Doc, but she had a pretty good idea. She feared Joe would be desperate enough to do anything to cover up his deeds.
“Okay, I’ll go quietly with you. Let’s get the files.” She hoped she could come up with a plan before anyone got hurt.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Ritka hollered down the hall at someone. “Visiting hours are from ten to five, and as far as I know you don’t have any relatives in the hospital.”
“I need to see the doctor. It’s an emergency.”
Carol Wood?
“Oh, no you don’t. Darien already said you can’t have a job here.”
“It’s urgent and has nothing to do with working.”
Joe pulled Lelandi off the floor and motioned for her to brace the wall. Then he began shuffling through the files.
“You can’t go down there to see him! He’s with a patient right now!” Ritka’s footfalls pounded after Carol Wood’s.
Then a thud sounded against the doctor’s door. Carol swore, but the door banged open, and she fell into Doc’s office, landing on her hands and knees.
Lelandi and Joe froze.
For a heartbeat, both Ritka and Carol stared at Joe and Lelandi, then Ritka shouted, “Deputy Trevor! Break-in in progress!”
Joe whipped the gun around and fired two shots at Ritka, the gunfire exploding in Lelandi’s ears. She leapt at Joe and seized the weapon as Ritka crumpled to the floor. He thrust Lelandi aside. Carol screamed and scrambled to her feet, but Doc Oliver appeared in the entryway, blocking her escape. Joe fired at Doc. Clutching his chest, his eyes round, he collapsed. Carol dashed out of the office, and Lelandi dove for the brass weight.
With a lightning reaction, Joe struck the butt of his gun against her head and sent her sprawling. Flashes of pain streaked through her skull. Momentarily, she saw nothing but blackness, heard nothing, felt nothing. But then files crashed to the floor while Joe ransacked the file cabinet, until he found Larissa’s. He shoved it inside his jacket, went to the window, and jerked it open.
A mixture of snow and ice blew into the office, chilling her. She blinked her eyes, trying to clear her head.
Where the hell was Deputy Trevor? And what if Doc Mitchell arrived with Caitlin and became embroiled in this mess. And the other teens, too. She could see Cody and Anthony trying to rescue her.
Doc Oliver groaned. His face was sickly pale. Lelandi crawled over to him. Ritka was out cold, and Carol had vanished. Lelandi ripped open Doc’s shirt and meant to dig out the bullet with her fingers, but Joe grabbed her hair and yanked her back. Pain shot through her scalp.
“Time to go.”
“No!” she screamed, wanting to save Doc, and clawed at Joe’s fingers to free herself.
Joe seized her arm and wrenched her to the window.
“You hadn’t done anything wrong before this. Why now?” Lelandi struggled to break free of his iron grip, trying to control her tears. She couldn’t fall apart now.
Carol peeked through the doorway with a cell phone to her ear.
“Get the bullets out of the nurse and Doc! They’ll kill them. Don’t wait for help!” Lelandi shouted, hoping the bastard wouldn’t shoot her, too.
Joe shoved Lelandi through the window, and she fell into a blanket of snow. Before she could move, he climbed after her, then aimed through the window at Carol. Her heart in her throat, Lelandi scrambled to her feet and jerked his gun arm upward. The gun went off with a bang, and the bullet struck the ceiling. Bits of plaster and paint snowed down on the desk. Carol screamed and ducked down the hallway.
“Damn it, woman. I ought to kill you.”
Lelandi believed he would anyway. “Why shoot Ritka and the doc?” she sobbed. She hoped Carol could save their lives.
“Doc knew about your sister’s pregnancy. Larissa was certain of it. He’d have told Darien, and by pack law Darien would terminate me.” He yanked her toward a pickup.
Lights flashing and sirens wailing, several vehicles surrounded the hospital.
“Shit.” Joe took off running, pulling Lelandi into the woods.
Hell, not again. “You can’t outrun all of Darien’s pack,” Lelandi said as Joe nearly pulled her arm out of the socket, tugging her over the rough terrain.
She stumbled knee deep in a snowdrift, and he yanked her up. She growled. He gave her a slight smile, then they scrambled down a steep incline, half-sliding, half-falling until they reached the bottom of the ravine.
He pulled her across a brook, the icy water freezing her to the core again. The snow was still falling so heavily and the wind blowing it so hard, she could barely see.
“Where are you taking me?”
Joe dragged her up the mountain on the other side.
“Climb,” he hollered at her.
She balked.
He pointed the gun at her temple. “Darien can’t save you here. If I put a bullet in that pretty head of yours, they wouldn’t arrive in time to get it out. So climb. It’s your only hope.”
Clenching her teeth, her hands numb from the frigid water and her wet clothes sticking to her like icy Saran Wrap, she struggled to make the climb.
“Keep going straight up,” he ordered.
She looked up, but couldn’t see where he had in mind to take her. They couldn’t climb mountains all day.
Unless… She glanced back at him. He was to the right of her, resting while she did.
“Go!”
Unless a cave was up here. She began climbing again. Maybe a secret hideaway where he’d taken Larissa? Lelandi wanted to empty her lunch and kill the bastard for shooting Doc and Ritka.
Men shouted on the ridge from the direction of town. Darien and his men were coming for her. Her heart lifted, but Joe’s expression turned darker. “Move!”
She tried to make it appear she was too weak to climb quickly, although as frozen as she was, it wasn’t all pretense. He drew closer and struck her in the shoulder. She gasped and nearly fell. Her heart pounding furiously, she clung to the rugged rock face, her fingers so numb she couldn’t feel the jagged edges, wishing she could have put Caitlin’s gloves on.
“Move, damn you! Quit stalling. Larissa wasn’t half as capable as you, and she made it up this ridge twice as fast as you’re going.”
“I’m half-frozen,” Lelandi snapped back.
She moved at the same pace as before, hoping she wouldn’t fall to her death on the icy mountain, until she saw the ledge he pointed to. He yanked her up the last few feet and pulled her into the cave. Hopefully, someone in Darien’s party knew about it.
“Was this a silver mine?” She tugged Caitlin’s gloves out of the pocket and shoved her icy fingers into them.
“Until it played out seventy years ago. Then it shut down.” He grabbed a lantern and lighted it, despite not needing it. But even the flicker of flame radiated a tiny glow of heat she welcomed. Inside the cave, it was slightly warmer than the blowing snow outside, and he handed her a hardhat. “Put it on.”
He was going to shoot her in the head with a silver bullet, but now he wanted to protect her from falling rocks? That was the least of her worries though as they traveled deeper into the bowels of the cave. The walls drew closer, the passageway narrower, the ceiling shorter and Lelandi began to feel hemmed in. “Does this open up pretty soon?”
He shook his head.
“They came this way!” Darien shouted.
Lelandi’s spirits soared when she heard Darien’s voice. But it was so far away, she imagined they hadn’t even begun the climb up the mountain.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked Joe, raising her voice, hoping her words would carry through the cave and back down the ridge.
“Shut up!” Joe yanked her deeper, and she gave a hopeful smile, thinking Darien might have heard Joe’s yelling if her words hadn’t carried that far.
Water glistened off the granite walls and dripped on her hat, and she jerked her head to look up. The place smelled like wet earth and the air turned colder. She shivered.
“Forty-four degrees down here no matter what the temperature is outside,” he said.
Still, it was warmer than the raging blizzard outside. But her wet clothes made it feel colder.
The ceiling sank so low, they had to crawl. The rough stone tore at the gloves, and her jeans were no protection for her knees, bruising with every inch she traversed. The place reminded her of the time she got lost in a cave of tunnels, playing hide-and-seek with her brother and sister, then fell into a small hole she couldn’t get out of. Boy, were their parents mad. But since then, she cringed whenever she had to go into small places, even as a wolf.