A Seacat's Love (Oceanan Trilogy Book 1) (4 page)

The soldier cleared his throat and forced his voice to sound authoritative. “I am Lieutenant McLean, not a pup. I’m ordering you to release that man.”

“I take no orders from a puppy.”

The young man stood straighter. “I am not a child, sir. I’m a lieutenant in the US Army. Now back away.”

“It’s okay. This man works for me,” squeaked Lance. His eyes returned to Rick. “You should go home.”

“Not until this is settled.”

“There’s nothing to be settled here,” Lance said with finality. “Gentlemen, please escort Mr. McCall to the gates.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“Good night, McCall. I will see you on Monday.”

“Lance.” That one word held a great deal of warning.

“Good night.”

Lance’s “good night” held such finality that Rick knew all to well it would do no good to argue. A growl formed deep in his throat. He released Lance and was escorted to the front gates at gunpoint.

Before dawn’s first light the following day, Rick’s dark form materialized from behind a bush. He blended in with the evening’s inky chilliness as he scurried forward. He easily created a hole in the silver-steel web that encased the isolated complex with heavy-duty cutting pliers. Rick squeezed his frame through the jagged, makeshift entrance. His focus never faltered when his black shirt and slacks snagged on the fence.

In a crouch position, Rick raced to the building he had visited the night before. He paused by the dimly lit doorway. Several gloved fingers dove into his shirt pocket in search of a lock pick. With his sharp sights on the small keyhole, Rick tested the doorknob. It turned smoothly.

His forehead creased underneath his mask.
I thought this building was top secret. Who could’ve carelessly left this door unlocked?

Rick placed his ear against the cold metal and listened for signs of life. When he deemed it was safe, he swiftly entered the building and shut the door. He glanced at his watch. It was five o’clock in the morning. Without further delay, his strides soon matched the rapid beating of his heart.

Like a smoky shadow moving across gray walls, Rick easily bypassed all manned security checkpoints. With a phantom’s grace, he floated over the infrared beams, glided around all the motion detectors, sailed past the booby traps, and instantly vanished whenever a security camera turned in his direction. So far, no one knew he was there.

Nearing an elevator with the words “off limits” impressed across it in yellow and black, he thought for the umpteenth time,
What if she was already dead?
As before, Rick would not dwell upon it. The thought of being too late to aid another woman did not sit well with him.

Rick used the short descent in the elevator to make sure his weaponry were all loaded and within easy access. He felt certain, as long as the alarms were not set off, the hardest part would be finding the laboratory. According to his calculations, he had one hour to find the lab, grab the girl, run back to his car, and hightail it out of there before sunrise. If all went according to plan, she will have disappeared before anyone figured out she was gone.

Taking a deep breath, Rick stretched his neck and flexed his hands. He then reached for the six-shot tranquilizer rifle he carried on his back. Though he was no stranger to killing, he had no desire to kill his own people over an alien. Besides, the she-cat might have exaggerated. Some women, when under stress, were known to blow things out of proportion.

The elevator bell announced his arrival. Rick’s senses came alive, ready for action. The only sound he detected came from his heart banging against his ribs. The further he crept through the facility, the quicker and louder it played.

He smiled. His chaotic heartbeat, the shallowness of his breathing, the tension in his muscles, and the anticipation of what was yet to come made his insides quiver with excitement. Rick loved the feel of it. This was the reason he had become a secret agent. Nothing fulfilled him in this way, not even sex. Danger was his addiction. His drug. His aphrodisiac. He never intended to quit.

Around the next corner, two guards posted beside a closed door sparked his interest. He could not tell whether it was the
laboratory or not from his location. Peeking at his watch, he counted fifteen minutes were already up. He had to make a choice, fast. Time was running out.

Taking a calming breath, Rick spun from behind the wall, rifle raised. He took immediate aim, and two small darts zoomed from the base of the rifle with minor sound, hitting their intended targets in the neck. Rick rushed forward, refilling both chambers, as the men simultaneously slid onto their rumps then tilted sideways to the floor.

Rick tested the door. It was locked. He had suspected as much. He checked each officer for the card key. His mood brightened when he recognized the soldier carrying the key was the annoying Lieutenant McLean.

Ha! You bastard. It serves you right
.

After a quick look down both sides of the corridor, Rick used the card and entered the lab, dragging the two sleeping officers into the room behind him. Rick positioned the men to one side of the door before he about-faced. The combined smells of harsh chemicals, feces, and decaying flesh instantly assaulted his nose. Yet, it was what he saw that made Rick wonder who the real animals actually were.

There has to be a logical explanation for all of this
, he thought to himself.
How can anyone who calls himself human do such a thing?
The ghostly image of his wife helped him take his first step.

Rick move past a couple of cages. Inside were two of Earth’s felines. An attentive mountain lion lay leisurely on his side beside his rotting meal. Across from the lion, a chirping cheetah paced agitatedly in her unkempt prison. Beside the nearest computer terminal, Rick spotted a little house cat trapped in a cell that was one size too small. It stared at him with large, sad eyes.

Poor cats
.

A short walk from the felines appeared to be four bodies—two on gurneys, two on lab tables. Each was covered with a dried bloody sheet. Rick headed first to the two bodies closest to the larger cats. He paused next to one of the gurneys. His forehead and nose scrunched up at the source of the pungent stench that saturated the room.

The second hand on the silver clock made its way around the face once, and still, Rick remained motionless. His eyelids closed. His thoughts were on rapid rewind. Rick was back in his car, racing down the streets, hoping to reach his old house and pregnant wife. He forced a deep breath into closed lungs in hopes of controlling his emotions—a bad idea, for the potency of the air caused him to gag and cough.

Rick’s fearful gaze raced over the covered contours of the body, while he did his best to smother the noises. Was it her? Did he fail again?

The sound of a single gunshot echoed in his ears. Rick jolted. The memory of his wife’s falling body took a firm hold of him. The bullet hole at her temple oozed blood. Tears gathered. His scar started to sting. The words “wrong choice” and “failure” made him extremely angry. It was this rage that gave Rick the necessary courage to yank back the sheet.

The corpse was that of a black man with black rosette markings scattered around his body. His torso was sliced from each side of the collarbone, down the center of his trunk to the pubic area. The dried, rotten skin was pulled up and away, exposing cracked and parted ribs. The cavity was excavated. His reproductive organs were exposed and parts were missing. His eyeballs were gone, as well as several of his fingers. Even patches of his flesh and scalp had been taken from him.

“Dear God!” Rick stumbled back and bumped into an elevated table, toppling over a shiny steel tray that held an oscillating saw, rib cutters, an enterotome, scissors, forceps, a Hagedorn needle, and a scalpel.

The loud, metallic crash sent the lion retreating to a safer distance with a short roar. The small kitten hissed. The cheetah flinched in her movements, growled, and continued to pace more nervously.

Rick whirled around and deposited all the contents in his stomach onto the floor. There was not much. As a seasoned warrior, he could not believe what he had just seen, or done.

With nothing left to retch, Rick wiped his mouth along the sleeve of his shirt. He reached behind him with his right arm to reposition the sheet upon the mutilated body. He took a moment to brace himself on his forearms with his head hung low in between. The coolness of the metal wall helped settle his stomach, along with several deep gulps of air.

A slight, sudden movement to the right caught his attention. Rick carefully made his way to that side of the room, while pushing to the back of his mind what was left of the alien. This covered body was situated in the center of the room. Rick mentally braced himself before he lifted the material enough to expose only the face. The sight was enough to force the air out of his lungs in a single gush.

Scattered images of clinging to his dead mother and lifting his wife’s limp body, popped in and out of his head. A picture of Mary in her coffin remained frozen in his mind. She laid motionless with her eyes closed, embracing their tiny baby.

The ache in Rick’s chest intensified. His gloved fingertips roved across her right temple.
I’m so sorry, Mary
. The tears fell.
I never should’ve left you. I should’ve taken you with me
. Time stood still as his wife’s pasty image faded away.

In her place appeared a pale lioness. Without warning, her eyelids snapped open. Rick yanked his hand away as if he had been burnt. Startled and confused, his mind slowly returned to the present.

Rick noticed the woman’s swollen, cracked lips; puffy, red-rimmed eyes; and the tearstains down her dirty cheeks. His innards coiled tight. Her haggard appearance pulled at his heartstrings. Rick had thought that part of him was dead—the part he did not want reborn.

Still, the need to verify she was indeed alive was intense. Rick traced the side of her drawn face before resting his fingers on an artery. He held his breath and concentrated. At the confirmation of a pulse, his tensed muscles relaxed, and his covered head lowered onto her bony chest. The echoing pulsations of her heart flowed through her into him, aiding to calm him further. His lips
curved in a smile, while he absorbed the unusual moment with no desire to move.

{Who are you?}

Rick had not forgotten her telepathic ability. Hearing her words in his head did not startle him as much this time as it did initially. He raised his head and peered into eyes that had stayed with him since viewing them the night before. “It’s me.”

She gasped. {Predator!}

“I’m going to get you out of here.”

{How?}

Rick could not answer. Her eyes robbed him of speech. Like a magnet, they pulled him in.
So pale. So beautiful
.

{Predator?}

Rick blinked several times to break their magical spell. “Uh… trust me.”

“Who in the blazes are you?” someone said.

Rick’s right hand shot for his gun. This time it was his semiautomatic. The gun was aimed and readied before he realized the voice had come from a man with the markings of a tiger.

Since when have I been so careless?
Rick’s sights fixed on the ragged looking cat locked behind steel bars. “A friend of yours?” he asked the lioness, while he placed his gun away.

“Yes,” she answered with a shiver.

Rick glanced at her and noted how flushed her features were becoming. The fact that she was pale a moment before and he was in the center of a research lab, prompted Rick to remove a black glove and touch her forehead.

“My God, you’re burning up,” Rick said. Replacing his glove, he immediately untied her limbs from the thick leather restraints.

“What are you doing? Who are you?”

Rick spared the male alien another look. The cat flashed his teeth menacingly at him. He ignored it.

“I demand to know who you are!” the tiger hollered.

Rick’s fingers skirted over the woman’s jaw. “Stay here,” he whispered.

He went to free the tiger from his captivity but spotted the computer monitor and decided to take a quick peek first. He quickly located the medical logs kept on the aliens. Rick rummaged the desk and found what he needed in one of the smaller drawers. The CD slipped into the drive, and Rick soon had his copy.

This might come in handy
, he thought, placing the silver disk into his shirt pocket.

On his way to the cage, Rick glanced at the reason he was there. The small lioness wobbled to one of the counters. He was extremely grateful to have reached her in time. He recalled the mutilated jaguar, and bile rose in his throat at thoughts of her meeting the same demise. It made him more determined to secure her safety.

Positioned directly above the counter, Rick noticed a safe. He saw the woman punch in several numbers. The sealed chamber hissed opened. He wondered what was inside.

Rick stopped in front of the cage. He did not trust the tiger behind the bars. The way those light green feline eyes regarded him made Rick nervous. Rick wondered why, since no human had the power to do so. He pulled from his shirt pocket a lock pick and knelt before the lock.