He heard the boy hissing like a small leopard cub and wondered if the cat would emerge to help the child. Imelda slapped at the struggling boy. She screamed suddenly and the slaps grew louder and more frantic. The boy must have hurt her. He heard a thud as she dropped him on the platform and began kicking him.

The sounds and smells triggered the leopard’s survival instincts. He felt his muscles begin to contort and he allowed it to happen, welcoming the shift, tearing his clothes off in strips even as he tried to keep moving upward. Just as he had almost completed the change, he heard Rio shout a warning and he looked up.

Mateo came hurtling over the edge, the boy’s face a mask of terror—that same look he’d seen on Isabeau’s face the night before. Conner leapt into empty space, completing the shift, his hands forming outstretched claws. The boy hit hard and cried out as the leopard’s mouth came around his body. Conner twisted in midair, righting his body, knowing they were high enough up that even his cat could be injured. He did his best to protect the boy as they landed. The shock went up his legs, but he kept his mouth soft and the boy high enough to prevent him from striking the ground. The moment he could move, he opened his mouth and Mateo dropped.

He turned back to the tower.

20

UNDER Rio’s covering fire, Elijah raced across the open yard to the water tower. Flames began to lick along the bottom of one of the legs of the wooden structure. Elijah scooped up Mateo.

“We’re rescuing you,” he said as the boy began to fight, hissing and spitting and digging sharp nails into Elijah’s arm. “That’s your brother, Conner, Mateo. He’s come for you. Your mother must have told you about Conner.”

The boy went quiet in his arms and peeked over his shoulder to see the leopard moving fast up the framework toward the top where Imelda crouched, shouting orders to her men in the hopes of taking command. It was impossible to make out her exact words over the roar of the flames, but her shrill voice was punctuated by the firing of a gun.

Mateo began to wiggle again. “I go help him,” he stated.

Elijah laughed. “You would. But not this time. He wants you in the forest taking care of his wife, Isabeau. He said to tell you to look out for her until he can get there. She’s got an enemy—a leopard. Only another leopard can protect her.”

The boy pushed out his small chest. “I can do it.”

“Let’s go then.” Elijah anxiously assessed the fire. In a few more minutes it was going to cut off their escape route. They had to go. He signaled to Rio that he was moving with the boy. He shifted Mateo to his back. “Hold on. We’re on the move,” he barked into his radio, not wanting his own men to accidentally shoot them.

The fire was becoming a larger threat than the erratic gunfire. Rio signaled to his men to follow Elijah and get out. They couldn’t wait any longer. He tried to warn Conner that the base of the tower was on fire, but the leopard had already made it to the top and was just beneath the platform. He didn’t want to give Imelda any warning of the cat’s presence, not when she seemed to have a small arsenal at her fingertips.

The smoke rolled into the air, turning everything grayish black, dropping visibility. It was helpful to Elijah as he took the boy out of the compound into the safety of the rain forest, but the smoke was nearly choking Rio. He covered his mouth with a handkerchief as he strained to see what was happening above him on the tower. He no longer could see Imelda, but she had to be aware of the crackling flames greedily rushing up the supporting legs of the tower.

THE smell of the fire was overpowering to the large leopard. Every survival instinct he possessed urged him to run for his life. The leopard snarled as the smoke stung his eyes, but he kept climbing, determined to put a stop to the gunfire as Imelda continued to fire into the hazy yard below her. Conner’s leopard dragged himself onto the platform in absolute silence.

Through the swirling clouds of billowing smoke, he could see the woman, lying on top of the tower, weapons strewn around her, an automatic gun sweeping the yard below with no regard for who she might hit. Below, the men broke under the assault, abandoning their tries to put out the fire, running instead to get out. The ground below was in chaos.

Imelda screamed at them, swearing and hurling curses, most directed at Elijah and Marcos. She must have believed that they had deceived her in order to take over her drug routes. It obviously didn’t occur to her that they had come to rescue the children. She swore vengeance and death to their families as she continued to shoot at anything that moved below her.

The leopard fixed his stare on her, focusing completely on his prey. He began the slow, freeze-frame stalk that took him step by slow step across more than half of the tower platform. He went to his belly and moved even slower, not making a sound as he neared her.

Imelda suddenly stiffened. She turned slowly, her eyes widening in terror. “Ottila. I would never tell anyone.” She lifted her hand, palm out, as if that would stop a charging leopard. “I’ll double your pay.” Even as she said it, she whipped up the gun, finger already on the trigger, spraying bullets across the platform as she tried to bring the weapon up into position against the leopard’s charge.

Conner felt the stings just before he hit her, one near his hip and one just grazing his shoulder, and then he was using his powerful legs for the spring, hitting her with the force of a freight train. Filled with loathing, he drove them both over the edge—the same one she’d thrown Mateo over. He heard the air rush from her lungs, felt everything break apart inside of her. Her mouth stretched wide in a scream, but the sound was torn from her, disappearing into the smoke.