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“All right. Get a move on. We have an operation in progress, and you got in the middle of it.” Malachi let out a heavy sigh.
“Oh. Sorry.”
When the van pulled out, she released her pent-up breath. “That was an epic fail.”
“Definitely didn’t go as expected. Better let the others know they can let these bozos through.”
Static on the radio stopped any further conversation. The only words Cate caught were ‘in pursuit.’
Once back in her truck, they looked into each other’s eyes. The pursuit could be the poacher or the buyer. Or even both. She needed to get those cubs into the custody of Game Commission where they could be protected. And if this operation failed, she only had herself to blame. Then her thoughts went to the game cops chasing the suspects. If they were injured, she couldn’t live with herself.
“Let’s head back to my truck. While you drive, I’ll call on my cell and hopefully get a better connection to find out who their pursuing and why.”
Malachi started his truck and pulled out. He’d received confirmation that Ted Stevens, a Game Commission officer assisting them on the stakeout, had taken off after a suspect who fled the scene when the guy spotted him. Malachi’s nerves were on edge, and he clenched his teeth as he tried to contain his frustration with the risk the officer had taken in choosing to pursue a suspect in these conditions. The last thing he needed was for this to go poorly.
If he hadn’t been so charmed by Cate, he never would’ve agreed to wait when the cubs were in a far more easily controlled environment from the start. It was a mistake. A big one. He couldn’t blame her though. She wasn’t law-enforcement. Her knowledge of how these things worked probably came from her bodyguard brothers and television shows where cops always chose the high-risk, high-reward paths.
He looked at his speedometer. 45 mph. Far too fast for conditions, but a game cop’s life was at stake, and he wouldn’t hesitate to risk his own to help his fellow officer.
The unearthly grinding wail of metal colliding against metal had him tapping his brakes. A man stumbled from a gray SUV that had collided with a DCNR vehicle, flipping it on its side and reversing the way it was facing. Once the guy got his bearings, he ran down the road. A compact car reversed full speed, and before Malachi had time to do more than jump from his truck and sprint toward the crash, the fleeing suspect had jumped into the car and disappeared around a curve. Cate’s truck pulled up as he approached the driver’s side of the DCNR truck. The driver didn’t respond when he tapped on the window. The door wouldn’t open. He looked back at Cate. “There’s a window cutter in the emergency kit in the backseat of my truck.”
She hurried to his truck, while he continued to look for a way into the vehicle. The passenger door was crushed in, but the window was broken. It would be a challenge to pull Stevens through the window on the steep incline. Cate returned, and he met her at the driver’s window. He broke the glass and brushed it away, hoping he wouldn’t cut Ted in the process. Then he released the man’s seatbelt, praying for a miracle.
“Will he be all right?” Cate voiced the question buzzing in his own mind.
He took off his jacket, ignoring the icy chill as fat flakes continued their assault. Malachi laid the coat on the ground then pulled the other man through the window and set him down on it. His forehead was bleeding, and airbag burns and seatbelt marks would do their share of damage, too, but despite the injuries they caused, they likely saved his life. He tried to warm his fingers by rubbing them together to get some of the feeling back before placing them to check the man’s pulse. He blew out a relieved breath when he found one. “I don’t know. But I’m hopeful.” Sirens announced the arrival of EMS, and he gladly stepped back allowing them to take over. He moved to the gray SUV. A Ford Explorer. Three sets of tiny black eyes stared up at him from a dog crate resting on the passenger seat, but it wasn’t puppies inside the crate. “Cate, come here, please.”
Chapter Ten
Donny, the man he’d trusted enough to sell the bear cubs to, stared straight ahead as the snow continued to fall. His grip on the steering wheel was tight enough to turn his knuckles white. Reece sat beside him cracking his neck.
Something had gone terribly wrong. Law-enforcement had known about the exchange. Someone in his inner circle would pay for the breach. So would the buyer. You couldn’t be too careful.
“Where are you driving?” Reece asked.
“I guess wherever you want to go.”
If he was an undercover, he could be trying to find out where Reece was staying. Looking to gather evidence to prove he was into more than wildlife trafficking. That wasn’t going to happen. If they figured out who he was, he’d be going away for the rest of his life. Might even get the death penalty. Taking the man’s life was preferable to taking the chance he might prove to be a problem in the future. Maybe he could let him go. He might not even be the leak. Probably wasn’t. No. He had to go. Donny would have to die. It was a shame, but a necessary evil.
The car slipped on the snow-covered road and Donny quickly righted their course, but it brought on a flash of the wreckage they’d left behind. Had the cop survived? Unlikely.
When they’d driven for about ten minutes, Donny sighed. “Do you mind telling me what happened back there?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.” Reece grabbed his pistol and held it to the other man’s head. “Pull over up ahead.”
Cate tugged on a pair of thick elbow-length gloves. They were rough against her skin and always made her think of the one’s falconers wore when working with birds of prey. Malachi loaded the crate into her truck and hurried over to the ambulance. Pulling out one of the bear cubs, she did a quick examination by headlamp.
In anticipation of finding them, she had lined up a wildlife rescue that could keep the cubs until they found adoptive mothers for them, but she wasn’t sure she’d be able to bring them by this late. Her team had one sow lined up to receive the first of the cubs, but the other two would need to wait until they located suitable adoptive mothers. One seemed smaller and weaker than the other two, so they’d place her first in hopes of giving her a better chance for survival.
Her eyes flicked toward the ambulance as it rode away with Ted Stevens on board. Pausing in her ministrations, she closed her eyes briefly and lifted up a prayer for the officer and his family. Then she forced her focus back to the job at hand, pushing all other thoughts from her mind.
A touch to her shoulder startled her, and her breath caught as she looked over her shoulder into Malachi’s warm gaze.
“Just checking on you and your charges,” he said. His deep voice had a calming effect on her rattled nerves and made her almost wish this wasn’t the end of her assignment here.
“I think they’ll be all right.”
“And you?”
