Table of Contents
Call of the Cougar
Call of the Cougar
Dedication
Also by Terry Spear:
Synopsis
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Author:
Call of the Cougar
Heart of the Cougar, Book 2
Terry Spear
Call of the Cougar
Copyright © 2014 by Terry Spear
Cover: Tale-Tale Designs
ISBN-10: 1633110044
ISBN-13: 978-1-63311-004-5
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
Discover more about Terry Spear at:
http://www.terryspear.com/
Dedication
Thanks to Lor Melvin who worked with horses and gave me all kinds of great tips concerning the business, and helped me to brainstorm a lot of the book, which was a lot of fun! Thanks tons!
Also by Terry Spear:
The Highlanders Series: Winning the Highlander's Heart, The Accidental Highland Hero, Highland Rake, Taming the Wild Highlander, Her Highland Hero, (2014), The Viking's Highland Lass (2015)
Other historical romances: Lady Caroline & the Egotistical Earl, A Ghost of a Chance at Love
Heart of the Wolf Series: Heart of the Wolf, Destiny of the Wolf, To Tempt the Wolf, Legend of the White Wolf, Seduced by the Wolf, Wolf Fever, Heart of the Highland Wolf, Dreaming of the Wolf, A SEAL in Wolf's Clothing, A Howl for a Highlander, A Highland Werewolf Wedding, A SEAL Wolf Christmas, Silence of the Wolf, Hero of a Highland Wolf (Aug, 2014), A Highland Wolf Christmas (Oct, 2014); A SEAL Wolf Hunting (June, 2015), A Silver Wolf Christmas (Oct 2015)
Heart of the Jaguar Series: Savage Hunger, Jaguar Fever, Jaguar Hunt, Jaguar Pride (Feb 2015)
Heart of the Cougar Series: Cougar's Mate, Call of the Cougar (2014)
Vampire romances: Killing the Bloodlust, Deadly Liaisons, Huntress for Hire, Forbidden Love
Romantic Suspense: Deadly Fortunes, In the Dead of the Night, Relative Danger, Bound by Danger
Further broken down into wolf pack series:
SEAL Wolves: To Tempt the Wolf, A SEAL in Wolf's Clothing, A SEAL Wolf Christmas
Silver Bros Wolves: Destiny of the Wolf, Wolf Fever, Dreaming of the Wolf, Silence of the Wolf, A Silver Wolf Christmas (Oct 2015)
Highland Wolves: Heart of the Highland Wolf, A Howl for a Highlander, A Highland Werewolf Wedding, Hero of a Highland Wolf, A Highland Wolf Christmas
Synopsis
Special Agent for the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife Services, Tracey Whittington, takes down wildlife traffickers and more, but what she doesn't expect is to be in a shootout, multiple times, when the business turns deadly. Nor does she suspect she'll be working with Hal Haverton, who serves as a part-time deputy for Yuma Town, Colorado, and runs his own horse ranch. As long as he doesn't stop her investigative work—she has been placed on administrative leave due to the last shootout—she'll be just fine.
Hal Haverton has every intention of keeping the wild cat safe, even if it means helping her to solve the case when every time he turns around, she's involved in another shootout. When her boss asks their good friend, the sheriff, to have one of his deputies serve as a bodyguard for the cougar shifter, Hal's all for it. So is the other deputy, but Hal's got this covered. Even if getting somewhere with the lady means having his gun ready at all times. There are definite perks to getting to know the Special Agent better—if they live long enough to do something about it.
Prologue
New Year’s Day, Suburbs of Loveland, Colorado
After a harrowing case of nabbing two men in a scheme to sell jaguar body parts to prospective buyers, Special Agent for the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife Services Tracey Whittington was glad that ordeal was over, and settled down in her apartment to eat lunch early that Saturday afternoon. She worked side by side with the Colorado Department of Parks and Wildlife. And she took her job seriously.
The problem was that she’d take one rotten wildlife trafficker down and two more would slip into his place. Stiffer punishment might help. But until wildlife trafficking was taken more seriously, she figured it would continue to be a profitable deal for some criminals. Today was the beginning of a new year and she swore she wasn’t going to think about the other case she’d been working on until Monday morning, bright and early.
She placed her plate of steak fajitas and a hot mug of cherry tea on the oak coffee table, curled up on her blue velvet couch, and clicked on the T.V. The snow was lightly falling, though the area was covered in snow from the storm they had last night, and she was looking forward to having a nice weekend off from the job. No investigating anything for the moment. Just enjoying the beautiful snowy day. The sky was a little gray, but at least she didn't have to go out in the cold weather for now. She was thinking about whether she should make New Year's resolutions, like— on New Year's Eve at the end of this new year—she should have a date and go to a party. Right.
She loved the quiet life when she wasn't tracking down the scum of the earth.
She started watching 3:10 to Yuma, rolled up her first fajita and was just about to take a bite of the steak, bell peppers, onions, shredded cheese, lettuce, and her absolute favorite—guacamole—without it, it wasn't a fajita, when her phone rang. She glanced at the caller I.D.
Crap.
Honey. Her informant.
Last year, he had aided her in taking down a trafficker of rhino horns and elephant ivory, and helped to get the trafficker sentenced to nearly six years in federal prison and forfeiture of the $3.5 million in the monies he'd received in his smuggling pursuit. A lot of sentences weren't strong enough for these lowlifes, so she was glad he got as much of a sentence as he did. So she had no intention of ignoring Honey's call.
"Yeah…Honey?" She hated using his nickname, but he always seemed to be where the action was, and she needed him. She wasn't sure how he learned about the trafficking going down—though she'd asked, but he wouldn't say. She often wondered if he was playing both sides of the game—getting money from her and from trafficking. Maybe even putting his own competition out of business.
He was a good-looking guy—dark brown hair with blond streaks as the bangs flopped over one dark eye—fashion model material. It was sad that he was in a situation where he was around the kind of people who were involved in this seedy business.
"Happy New Years. Is that 3:10 to Yuma playing in the background?"
She muted it.
"Love that movie. Got something for you, Agent."
"What do you have?" She set her uneaten fajita on the plate, afraid that was the end of her quiet weekend off. But if it meant finding evidence that could take down another trafficker, she wouldn’t hesitate to give up her weekend. Crime didn’t allow for breaks.
Whatever word he'd gotten about traffickers was seventy-five percent of the time on the money. She'd never had any trouble with making
arrests or finding evidence when she investigated the leads that he'd given her that had led to a virtual goldmine. Only twenty-five percent of the time, the tips led nowhere. She had a much higher rate of success than many of her fellow investigators. Some of it she attributed to her enhanced cougar senses.
No matter what, she always checked them out. Her agency paid well for his time, when the job led to an arrest and conviction. All they needed was some good evidence and the proper handling of it to support their case.
"Do you know where the town of Anderson is?" he finally asked.
"The ghost town?" That was the only one she was acquainted with in the state of Colorado. And yes, she knew it well.
"Yeah, that's the one. Word on the street is that some trafficker was storing ivory in one of the old boarded-up buildings. But then he moved it. I know it's a longshot, but you still might find some evidence up there."
"Which building?"
"That's all I know. Sorry."
"Okay, thanks. You know the drill."
"Yeah. Good luck. My money's riding on you."
"Yeah. And the agency's riding on you."
They ended the call in the same way every time. There didn’t seem to be any reason to change it.
She punched in her partner's number. A pain-in-the-butt, Bill Peterson was getting close to retirement from Special Agent duty. He hated that some women were now Special Agents in the field. Particularly her, because she was his partner and he had to work with her. She suspected some of his animosity had to do with his bitter divorce and him not liking any woman right now.
Surprisingly, he'd begrudgingly acknowledged she was damn good at her job. Having the senses of a big cat really helped. Though he was unaware of it. He'd given her an offhanded bit of praise every once in a while. His seniority on the job and his gruffness toward her appealed for some weird reason. He wasn't going to like being called on New Year's Day to back her up. He especially didn't like it that Honey always called her, refusing to talk to her partner.
"Honey called."
"Shit."
She smiled, expecting that kind of a response. "He says someone was storing ivory at Anderson, but it's been moved by now."
"Good. We can check it out at the end of the week." Bill sounded like he'd tied one on. Which, given that he was home alone on New Year's Day and had no work to do, not to mention he was still getting over his divorce, his condition was understandable.
But it didn't help her case one iota. "I'm going to go check it out. Since they've moved the ivory, there shouldn't be anyone there. I'll probably find nothing anyway. So no need for you to go."
Which there wasn’t. She wasn’t sure why she’d even called him. Force of habit, she supposed. And what if by some miracle he had wanted to go? She should have known better.
"End of the week, Whittington."
She wasn't waiting on this. "Get some rest. And…happy New Year."
Then she hung up on him, turned off the T.V., grabbed her plate of fajitas, and returned to the kitchen. Sometimes, a microwave was her best friend.
It would take her three hours to reach the abandoned silver mine town of Anderson, maybe longer in this weather. Then she'd have to hike in three miles from the point where the road ended. Not that the road was really a road. It had been a wagon trail at one time, now so badly eroded that she was glad she had a Hummer that could make it even that far.
She couldn't delay if she wanted to do this before it got dark and the fall of night hampered her investigation. She packed her gear in her field pack, including a high-powered lantern and a headlamp. Even though she could see in dim light with her cat's vision, she still wanted to have a little extra light for seeing small details if there was any evidence there at all.
She drove the three hours in the snow, admiring the trees coated in flakes, the view of the Rocky Mountains, and finally reached the landmark she knew from her youth—an old two-story wooden, white house. Mrs. Blasdell, widowed three years ago, had owned it forever. She was like a security force of one, watching all who traveled on the old wagon trail as if she was guarding the ghosts of the past. The back of the house faced the old wagon trail. Her new red Cadillac was parked in front of the garage. Tracey was sure that when she drove by the house, Mrs. Blasdell would be watching.
Sure enough, Tracey saw the woman peer through the blinds covering one of the windows. She was about Tracey's mother's age—in her mid-forties. Tracey thought she must be lonely out here by herself, and yet, Tracey was alone too, and it wasn't any big deal. Mrs. Blasdell probably just preferred it that way like Tracey did.
Tracey smiled, waved, and continued driving toward the ghost town and past two abandoned hovels from the same time period, miners' houses, where kids partied when they weren't supposed to. She and her twin sister, Jessie, had explored the old ghost town as teens when they were old enough to drive and loved to fool around in the old buildings, acting like they had time-traveled to the past.
She always thought about it in a good way because of all the fun they'd have, even shifting into their cougar forms and climbing the rocky cliffs to investigate the miners' houses clinging to the mountain. She hated to think traffickers were using it for their criminal activities now.
She reached the spot where she couldn't drive any further, the area surrounded by pinyon pines, junipers, and blue spruce, all dusted in white snow. She climbed out of her Hummer, grabbed her field pack, and locked up the vehicle, the bitter cold wind slicing right through her. She thought of how much warmer she'd be as a big cat. Or back home. She was often driven to catch the bad guys, but she wondered if Bill had been right. Not that she should wait a week to check on this, but at least she could have taken New Year's Day off.
Then again, she wouldn't have been able to stop thinking about it.
The scenery was beautiful, the trees and shrubs covered in white powder and encroaching on the path as she trudged through the four inches of snow, careful not to twist an ankle on the badly rutted trail.
After hiking three miles, she finally reached the ghost town. At one time, it had boasted a population of two-thousand residents—women, children, but mostly men—during the height of the prospecting business. She couldn't even imagine all the goings-on that had to have occurred here before, when now all she heard was the sound of the wind whistling through the town.
All of the wooden buildings were boarded up: two hotels, a school, two churches, four saloons, three dance halls, two gambling halls, and two parlor houses. She wondered what the people back then would have been doing on New Year's Day.
She took a deep breath of the snow-chilled air and began methodically checking the first of the buildings—a church, like the rest of the wooden structures, built in the early 1800's. Specifically, she was searching for any recent sign of breaking and entering, indicating someone might have used any of the buildings for illegal business.
After inspecting the first three buildings and finding no sign of forced entry, she discovered a loose board over a window at the old schoolhouse, the glass broken out long ago.
The sun was beginning to set, casting long shadows across the snow. She shivered from the cold, then readied her lantern, helmet, and headlamp. She climbed into the dark building, lit only by her headlamp and her lantern.
Inside the schoolhouse, she hesitated, listening to any sign of movement. Even the mice or rats or other varmints wouldn't be out this winter's day.
Her heart was thumping loud in her ears, the thrill of a potential find nearby, she hoped, as she began to search the bare wooden floors for any sign of footprints—when she saw dozens, or the same people had trekked back and forth across the dusty floors. Recent, too. Or new layers of dust would have covered them.
Then she heard movement outside. She pulled out her Glock and hurried to the window. She looked between the slatted boards, forgetting she had the damn headlamp on. Then she saw her partner, Bill, following her trail of footprints in the snow. He was frowning at her, his d
ark hair windswept, and his dark eyes narrowed because of the biting wind blowing his way.
"Way to go, Whittington. Good thing I wasn't one of the bad guys."
He was referring to her headlamp, shining through the slats over the window.
But she was pleased for the company, even as grumpy as her partner appeared to be. "Glad you could make it."
"Yeah, well, hell, I figured I'd be forced to retire early if I didn't watch your ass and you got it shot off. Did you find anything? Or should we have waited until the end of the week, like I said."
Which meant he was right and she was wrong. She could watch a movie anytime, but finding evidence to put these guys away? She couldn't risk losing the opportunity.
"Someone has accessed this schoolhouse recently and could have hidden something here. I haven't found anything yet. They could have been using another building to store stuff. The first few were all sealed up tight."
Bill pulled back the board and climbed inside. "You can be a real pain in the ass, you know?"
"Yeah, I know. But you didn't have to come. I was fine." And she had been the last couple of times too, when he'd had one of these mid-life—or whatever they were—crises again, and she had found evidence on her own, letting on to their boss that she hadn't been alone, covering Bill's ass. She'd felt sorry for him at the time. But maybe early retirement wouldn't be such a bad thing for him after all. His heart just wasn't in the business of catching these guys any longer.
When he moved closer to her location, he looked bleary-eyed, and she got a heavy whiff of the pungent smell of bourbon on his breath. She wanted to shake her head. He should never have driven here. She doubted she could talk him into allowing her to drive him home. Especially when they'd have to leave his Humvee out here in the boonies and risk having it stolen or vandalized.
He took a seat on an old wooden crate, making it creak. It was the only piece of "furnishing" in the building. She turned away from him, wondering why he was here in the first place. Then she began to search the floorboards, looking for any that might be loose, making for the perfect hiding spot.