Nora Roberts - Black Hills

So would he.

She was hunted.

The high grass slashed at her legs when she reached the flats. She heard the pursuit, steady, always closer no matter how fast she ran, which direction she took. The moon was a spotlight, mercilessly bright, leaving her no place to hide. Flight, only flight could save her.

But his shadow fell over her, nearly bore her to the ground with its weight. Even as she turned, to face, to fight, the cougar sprang out of the high grass, its fangs bared for her throat.

A day passed, then another. There were reports of sightings of Ethan in Wyoming as far south as Medicine Bow, as far north as Shoshoni. But none panned out.

The search team in Spearfish thinned, and talk in town and the outlying farms turned to other matters. Spring plowing and planting, lambings, the cougar who’d perched in an apple tree in a yard not a quarter-mile from downtown Deadwood.

People agreed over pie at the diner, across the counter of the post office, between sips of beer at the bar that the man who’d killed that poor guy from St. Paul had run off.

The trail had gone cold.

But Lil remembered the dream, and knew they were wrong.

While those around her lowered their guard, she only strengthened hers. She began to slip a knife in her boot every morning. Its weight gave her peace of mind even as she resented the need for it.

Good weather brought the tourists, and the tourists meant increased donations. Mary reported their seven percent increase for the first quarter held steady for the first weeks of the second. Good news, Lil knew, but she couldn’t work up enthusiasm.

The more settled and ordinary the days became, the more her nerves frayed. What was he waiting for?

She asked herself that question as she carried hampers of food, or hosed down enclosures, as she uncarted supplies. Every time she made her rounds of the habitats her muscles braced for attack.

She all but willed it to come. She’d rather see Ethan leap out of the woods armed to the teeth than wait and wait for some unseen trap to spring.

She could watch Boris and Delilah curled together, or see him lead, and her tentatively follow into the grass, and feel pleasure, a sense of accomplishment. But under it brewed worry and stress.

She should be helping Mary and Lucius plan the summer open house, or put real effort into helping Tansy plan her wedding. But all she could think was: When? When would he come? When would it be finished?

“The waiting’s driving me crazy.” Following another new habit, Lil circled the habitats with Coop after the staff had gone for the day.

“Waiting’s what you have to do.”

“I don’t have to like it.”

She wore one of their new Chance Wildlife Refuge hoodies under her oldest jacket, and couldn’t seem to stop playing with the strings.

“It’s not like sitting in a jeep half the night waiting for a pride of lions to come to the watering hole, or even sitting at a computer tracking a collared cougar for a report. That’s doing something.”

“Maybe we were wrong. Maybe he did head west.”

“You know he didn’t.”

Coop shrugged. “Willy’s doing the best he can, but he’s got limited resources. There’s a lot of ground up there, and a lot of hikers, trail riders, and campers making tracks.”

“Willy’s not going to find him. I think we both know that.”

“Luck plays, Lil, and you have a better chance at getting lucky with persistence. Willy’s damn persistent.”

“And you have a better chance of getting lucky if you take a chance. I feel like I’m locked in here, Coop, and worse, just running in place. I need to move, need to act. I need to go up there.”

“No.”

“I’m not asking for your permission. If I decide to do this, you can’t stop me.”

“Yes, I can.” He glanced at her. “And I will.”

“I’m not looking to argue, not looking to fight. You’ve gone up. I know you’ve guided tours on the trail the last couple days. And we both know he’d be happy to hurt you if only to get to me.”

“Calculated risk. Hold it,” he ordered before she could debate. “If he tried to take me out, he’d bring back the full force of the search. He took the time and effort to point the arrow west and the FBI’s followed it. Why bring them back? Second, if he was stupid or impulsive enough to try, I carry a radio, which I show every member of the tour how to use, in case of accident. So he’d have to take me out, and the entire group I’m guiding. Calculated risk,” he repeated.

“And you get to sit your ass on a horse, ride. Breathe.”

He skimmed a hand over her hair, a subtle show of sympathy. “That’s true enough.”

“I know you’re going up hoping to find some signs, pick up a trail. You won’t. You’ve got some skills, but they’re rusty. And you were never as good as I was.”

“Circles back to luck and persistence.”

“I could go up with you, take a group up with you.”

“Then, if he happened to catch sight of us, or you, he might take me out. Then he could force you off at gunpoint, so by the time anyone still alive radioed for help, you’d be gone. Well gone if he used the horses. Waiting means he moves first. He exposes himself first.”

She stalked down the path and back. In his enclosure, Baby mirrored her move. The reflected motion had Coop’s lips curving. “That cougar’s a slave to his love for you.”

She glanced over, nearly smiled herself. “No ball tonight, Baby. We’ll play in the morning.”

He let out a call that Coop would have called a whine if cougars were capable of it.

Lil ducked under the barricade, relenting enough to rub him through the cage, let him butt her head, lick her hand.

“Is he going to be pissed if I come over there?”

“No. He’s seen you with me enough. He’s smelled you on me, and me on you. A cougar’s sense of smell isn’t his strongest asset, but Baby knows my scent. Come over.”

When he’d joined her, Lil put her hand over his, and laid it on Baby’s fur. “He’ll associate you with me. He knows I’m not afraid of you, or threatened. And he really likes to be rubbed. Bump foreheads with me. Just lean down, touch your forehead to mine.”

“He smells your hair,” Coop murmured as he rested his brow against hers. “The way I do. It smells like the hills. Clean, and just a little wild.”

“Now rest your forehead on the bars. It’s an offer of affection. Trust.”

“Trust.” Coop tried not to imagine what those sharp teeth could do. “Are you sure he’s not the jealous type?”

“He won’t hurt what I care about.”

Coop laid his forehead on the fencing. Baby studied him for a moment. Then he rose to his hind legs, bumped his head against Coop’s.

“Did we just shake hands or exchange a sloppy kiss?” Coop wondered.

“Somewhere in between. Three times I tried to release him to the wild. The first, when I took him and his littermates up into the hills, he tracked me back-to my parents. I’d ridden there to visit. You can imagine the surprise we got when we heard him, then opened the back door and saw him sitting on the porch.”

“He followed your scent.”

“For miles, and he shouldn’t have been able to, he shouldn’t have wanted to.”

“Love adds to ability, I’d say, and desire.”

“Unscientific, but… The second time, he tracked me back to the refuge, and the last, I had Tansy and an intern take him. That was guilt on my part. I didn’t want to let him go, but felt I had to try. He beat them back. He came home. His choice. Good night, Baby.”

She moved back to the path. “The other night I dreamed I was being hunted. Running and running, but he kept getting closer. And when I knew I was done, when I had to turn and fight, a cougar leaped out of the grass and went for my throat.”