Shadow - Dohner Laurann (книги онлайн полностью TXT) 📗

“She will struggle when she hits the water. It’s instinct,” one of them muttered. “She’ll surface and we’ll grab her.”

Beauty twisted her wrist, pointing the gun at her chest. “Will I survive a bullet to the heart? One shot and it’s over. You’ll have done all of this for nothing. I’m not going back.” She hoped they believed her bluff. “Get away from me.”

“Goddamn crazy bitch,” one of them swore. “You won’t shoot yourself.” He looked unsure though.

“I was caged and chained, kept in the dark and only brought out when Master wanted to see me.” She raised her chin as she inched a little closer to the edge near the water, her gaze darting around for an escape. There wasn’t one. “They kept me weak from lack of food and water, bathed only when Master decided I should be clean when he put his hands on me.” Rage deepened her voice into a soft growl. “Do you think I won’t prefer to die before being sent back to him?” She paused. “A bullet is kinder and faster than suffering that fate.”

A low branch kept drawing her attention. She kicked off her shoes and the men frowned.

“What are you doing?” One of them stepped closer.

She reacted by jerking the gun away from her chest and firing at him. It didn’t matter if she hit them or not. He dived out of the way but so did the other two, the way she’d hoped. She shoved the warm gun into her pants and jumped at the branch, her feet hitting the tree trunk. She was a primate and hoped instinct gave her a strong ability to climb.

She scrambled faster than she’d thought possible, getting higher as her hands curled around the branches, moving as fast as she could. The bottoms of her feet burned a little from the rough bark but she didn’t care. She was in a tree!

“Get down here,” one of them yelled. “Fuck! Climb after her, Bob.”

“She moves fast,” he complained. “Damn, look how high she’s going.”

“I don’t give a fuck,” the first one snapped. “Go after her!”

“What is she? A monkey?”

“She kinda looks like a chimp,” one of them stated. “Did you see her eyes and nose? She’s small for a woman too.”

She kept climbing until she couldn’t get any higher without fear of the thinning branches snapping from her weight. The one she hugged swayed when the wind blew. A sick feeling gripped her stomach as she looked down. She had to be fifty or so feet in the air. All three men stared up at her.

“Get down!” The one in charge pointed a finger at her. “Right now! We don’t have time for this.”

“The chopper is incoming,” Bob announced. “It’s about to land.”

She looked out to see if she could spot it but too many trees blocked her view even from that height. She listened and heard the noise then, probably too focused on the men to notice before. She turned her head and spotted it. It was flying low, just over the treetops, and coming closer.

She climbed down the trunk slightly until she sat on a lower limb and hugged it tightly, fearful they would try to snatch her from above. She glanced down, instantly sorry. Bob had started climbing after her.

She pulled out the gun, her belly aching from where she was sure she’d been burned from the warm barrel after firing it, and she aimed. He looked up and froze.

“Stay away from me.”

“How many bullets are left?” The one in charge spoke softly but she heard.

“I don’t know, Dillon.” Bob answered. “She’s discharged three but that’s a Glock 9. I don’t know how many were fired off before she stole it and it might have big mag. Could be a lot left.”

She frantically looked for an escape. The other trees were too far away to safely transfer. Some primates were known for jumping from branch to branch but she wasn’t willing to risk falling to her death. Her hand shook slightly as she aimed the gun at the man drawing closer.

“I’ll shoot you. Stop!”

He climbed to the other side of the wide trunk, out of sight. She shifted forward, trying to keep him in view. Thick branches protected him. She glanced around again, praying help would arrive.

It was as if Shadow heard her silent plea. He suddenly rushed out of the foliage behind the two on the ground. She watched in utter amazement as he grabbed both mercenaries by the backs of their necks, lifted, and threw them. One hit the dirt under the three while the second one wasn’t so lucky. He slammed into the trunk. The enraged Species wasn’t done.

He tore their weapons off them, flinging them into the river. The man in the dirt put up a struggle but one punch from Shadow kept him down. The one who’d hit the trunk recovered a lot slower. Shadow’s head snapped up and their gazes caught and held for an instant before he looked at the third one in the tree. He howled.

Startled, Bob lost his hold on the tree and fell about ten feet into thick bushes. Shadow went after him, dragged the groaning man out by his boot and disarmed him. Guns and knives were tossed into the river. Beauty watched in rapt fascination as Shadow centered himself in the middle of the three mercenaries.

“You thought you could take her from me? Fight me. You are cowards for going after a small female. Lie there whimpering as you die. I. Don’t. Care. I’ll attack either way.”

Beauty kept silent despite being tempted to warn the humans that fighting an enraged Species would be stupid. Shadow clearly wanted to beat on them and they complied when they attacked. Of course he left them with no choice, his threat to kill them as loud as his snarled words. They probably thought their three-to-one odds boded well against Shadow but he’d made certain they could only fight with their bodies. She lowered the gun, afraid it would accidently discharge and hit Shadow.

Her gaze ran over Shadow. He wasn’t bleeding much. His arms and face had scratches but nothing serious that she could spot from her high perch. He moved as if he were unharmed as he dodged a fist aimed at his face and threw his own. She picked up a slight crunching noise before Bob screamed, stumbling back as blood poured from his smashed nose and mouth, landing hard on his ass.

Shadow’s foot shot out as the leader of the mercenaries tried to come at him. The scream that came out of Dillon was horrifying when the heel slammed into his groin area. Beauty winced as the injured mercenary just dropped, rolling into a ball. Shadow wasn’t fighting nice but he was inflicting pain. He showed no sympathy for his opponents. They had tried to kill two Species and had come to return her to a hellish existence.

The third man hesitated before he launched himself at Shadow’s back. Shadow must have sensed it though and dodged, bent a little, and the guy landed in the dirt instead. Shadow came down on his torso, knees first, probably breaking his ribs in the process. Fists pummeled the human as the Species nailed him. Beauty glanced away but then forced her attention back. She wasn’t weak stomached. Not anymore.

Bob tried to crawl to the river, probably attempting to escape. Shadow rose from his bloodied opponent and stomped on the back of Bob’s leg. A snarl tore from his mouth as the fallen man screamed in agony, suffering a broken leg to match his nose. Shadow reached down, fisted his hair and said something she couldn’t hear. Bob sobbed, begging for his life, but Shadow just slammed his head down hard into the earth.

“Beauty?” Shadow’s head snapped upward. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay.” Her voice came out shaky.

“Come down here. Can you do that or do you need me to climb to you?”

“I can do it.” Her hands trembled slightly as she shoved the gun back into her waistband and began the descent. It was tougher than climbing up had been. It might have just seemed that way since blind panic no longer gripped her so she did it more slowly.

Shadow held utterly still until she reached the lowest branch and then both his arms rose. She bent forward enough for him to grip her hips. She braced her arms on his shoulders and fell into him. She had absolute trust he’d catch her and he did.