“What the hell?” Reidar raced to his brother’s side in time to break his fall, help guide him to the floor and hear Kelan mumble, “Not again.” His lids closed, and his body became dead weight.
Gunnar growled with full, pissed off puma ferocity.
A scuffle ensued behind Reidar as someone tangled with the shooter. Reidar pulled the tranquilizer dart from Kelan’s shoulder and allowed himself a sigh of relief.
Just knocked out, not—No, he didn’t even want to think the words.
“No, please, you don’t understand,” a woman cried.
That voice was familiar. He looked up and turned to see her.
“I understand you just shot my brother, lady,” Axel damn near snarled, refusing to let go of the woman’s wrists. He’d already knocked the pistol to the floor. Dakota picked it up gingerly, as if it would bite her.
Beth…
“Oh, God! Is he?” Heidi knelt beside them. “Let me see.”
“Stop…Let me go. That cat’s dangerous!” The auburn-haired shooter, teeth bared, continued to struggle with Axel to no avail. The Falke men were stronger than the average human, so she could fight all she wanted.
Axel gritted out, “The only thing dangerous around here is you.”
“He’s okay,” Reidar said to his worried sister who was busy checking Kelan’s pulse. Reidar held up the tiny dart. “He’s just tranq’d.”
Heidi glanced at the dart, gave a quick nod and lifted an eyelid to see Kelan’s pupil.
Despite the chaos—Gunnar hissing, Dakota holding the gun, Axel holding a trigger-happy and squirmy Beth, Torsten and Sindre showing up with the typical, “What’s going on?” and “Who’s she?”
questions, and Heidi telling anyone to call 9-1-1—Reidar suddenly found the whole situation hilarious.
And there Kelan lay, out like a light, missing the whole damn thing.
Reidar’s sudden burst of laughter silenced everyone around him. All gazes—human and catamount alike—turned toward him. His, on the other hand, targeted the auburn beauty caged within Axel’s bear hug.
So this was the scientist that downed Kel? Twice.
He chuckled again. She was still damn cute. Creamy long legs and rounded hips encased in khaki shorts today, a nice-sized chest beneath a double layer of pastel tank tops, and waves of ginger around the unblemished face of a pixie topped off with those adorable glasses, now askew on her nose from her struggles. Reidar shook his head and grinned.
“What’s so amusing?” Axel demanded. He didn’t release the squirmy firebrand.
Reidar ignored the question and climbed to his feet, placing a hand on Gunnar’s neck as if to pet the cat.
The woman’s eyes widened even more as she looked at him, really looked at him, and watched him reach out toward the cougar without losing his hand in the process. Her lips parted, and her gaze collided with his, recognition now obvious in her expression.
Shh, he told his family. I think I can explain. He glanced at Sindre, who’d retrieved a cell phone from his pants pocket. Wait on that call to 9-1-1. Just hear me out.
“Let her go, Ax,” he said aloud.
“I don’t think—” Please. “Beth’s unarmed now. I don’t think she’ll hurt anyone else, will you?” Reidar stared at the flustered woman, waiting for a response.
After an almost imperceptible pause, she shook her head. “Reidar?”
He nodded, pleased she’d recognized him amid his look-alike siblings.
“You know this woman?” Axel asked, his voice full of fury.
“Yes. She’s Beth Coldwell. Kelan and I met her at the Tap ’n Tine the other night.” He glanced at his younger brothers who were now grinning like loons as they realized who she was. “Kelan’ll be fine,” Reidar added. “Groggy and ticked that he missed all of this, but fine.”
Axel looked at Heidi who nodded, and then he let the woman go. She immediately bent to pick up something else she’d dropped in the struggle and flipped a switch on it before dropping it into the purse strapped across her chest.
“What’s that?” Reidar asked, wanting his assumption confirmed.
“A tracking device.” She looked at the cougar, down at Kelan, and then met Reidar’s gaze once more. “I’m so sorry. He jumped the wrong way.”
Only she would think Kelan did that. Reidar knew different. They were a close bunch despite their differences. Kelan saw the threat and leaped to save his brother’s life without hesitation or consideration of the consequences.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone. I never would’ve shot—I was trying to protect him and all of you. I tracked that cougar here. It escaped.” She stared at the cat before reaching into her back pocket.
“I thought it was about to—”
“Careful,” Axel warned, watching her hand.
She slowed her movement, but continued until she’d produced the missing collar. “It was running around loose in the forest yesterday when I tranquilized it. I…we…There’s a team of us from WSU out here this summer conducting a research project, funded by a government grant.”
“What kind of research?”
“We’re tagging pumas to study their habits, track them, and learn more about how their population grows while other large cats around the world are near extinction. I didn’t realize it had this collar on until I got closer.”
“You shot…Falke. Yesterday?” Axel’s suspicious, angry tone put Reidar on edge. He eyed his other siblings; none were smiling now.
Beth nodded. “When I realized it must be someone’s pet, I couldn’t just leave it out there. We thought it must’ve broken free of its enclosure or something, and a semi-domesticated wild cat is a hazard not only to humans but itself too. So we brought it back to our mobile lab. I was searching for its owner, hoping this collar would help, but there’s no ID on it, and the cat escaped last night. Are you the owner?”
“Falke is part of our family,” his brother responded. “No one owns him.”
She frowned at Axel and held up the collar, shaking it at him. “Do you have any idea the kind of danger you’re putting the civilian population of this town in by trying to domesticate a wild animal?
Letting it roam the woods alone—”
“Look, lady—”
“It could run out into the road and get hit by a car, attack a small child—” Reidar cut off her diatribe. “He wasn’t alone.” Again, all eyes turned toward him.
Kelan would owe him big time for this.
“I was hiking…in the forests behind your house, Ax,” he began, easing his way into a story he hoped would explain everything—at least to the mad scientist with a tranq gun. “There’s some great public hiking trails through there that go on for miles, and I…umm…Anyway, Falke here, he was with me.”
Reidar stroked the cougar’s neck and tried not to wince when Gunnar grumbled inside his mind, Knock it off.
“I thought we both needed to get away for a while, burn off some energy. We weren’t in town, so I didn’t see the need for a leash.”
Gunnar growled low and deep.
Giving his brother some space, Reidar continued with his explanation from a safer distance. “At one point, I stopped for a water break. The sun was warm, and I guess I dozed a little. Falke wandered off ahead of me. We got separated, and well, I searched for him but when I couldn’t find him, I went home…uh…where he returned last night.” He shrugged. “I figured Falke could find his way home, and I was right. He always comes back.”
“He has another collar,” Beth observed, then looked around, her brow furrowing in obvious confusion. “You’re all wearing collars?”