Page 47 of Cruel Revenge (Jacky Leon #12)

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

HEATH

H eath slammed his foot on the gas, hyper-vigilant as he blasted through traffic, weaving between other cars. Landon was checking their guns. There was no time to have either of them Change. They were going in with live rounds and a prayer.

Why didn’t they tell me Jacky wasn’t in a good place? She better be alive. God damn it all, she better still be alive.

He couldn’t believe Hasan and Subira weren’t surprised. It was clear that they had an idea it could happen, but no one told him. He would have changed the plans. He would have made sure to check on her more, tried to reach out, tried anything .

“Pa, I’m going to get the headset in,” Landon said, reaching for the bag Dirk had tossed at them.

Heath was grateful for their mate bond. Without a word, Heath had watched them make eye contact, then Dirk was in action, shoving two comms devices into a bag and tossing it across the room in the chaos.

“Good. Prep mine. I’ll toss it on when we get there. Dirk did bring the long-range ones, right?”

“Yup.” Landon pushed in an earpiece and got the wire under his shirt. Heath kept driving, knowing his son was going to make sure everything was good to go. “Dirk, you hear me?”

There was a pause. Heath wished his hearing was as good as a werecat’s, unable to hear Dirk’s reply.

“Yeah, everyone is freaking out, huh? Fuck ‘em. We know we can’t trust a single one of those werewolves not to fill Jacky with silver when they see her. She’s going to be a mess if she’s not already in the Last Change.”

“Is she?” Heath asked softly, his hands tightening as he came to a realization. Landon knew what they might find. Heath didn’t. He knew Jacky had a looser control, but he never really thought there was anything off . Nothing unexplainable. Nothing troubling.

Landon froze at his question.

“Answer me.” There was no power behind the order. Heath just wanted his son to tell him the truth, not his second to bend the knee.

“Yeah… she can do what Fenris used to do… partially changing pieces of herself as her control slips. If she’s fighting the Last Change, but not in her right mind…

I’ve seen her fangs elongate and start trying to leave her mouth.

I’ve seen her fingernails turn into real claws.

Her structure… shifts a little. It’s not super noticeable at first, but when we fought Fenris, she really pushed herself.

It gives her strength more comparable to her werecat form. She went blow for blow with him.”

Heath fought to control his breathing. No one thought to tell him. No one thought to tell him that Jacky had picked up the technique of the mad wolf and had been using it when his back was turned. Everyone knew that Fenris was flirting with the end when he was doing it, and they had all been right.

“Why didn’t you… You should have told me,” Heath tried to say it clearly, but his words were garbled by a growl.

“I didn’t want you to kill her,” Landon admitted softly.

“Because you love her. Because Carey loves her. She is Carey’s mom.

There’s no denying that. There’s never been any denying that…

” Landon swallowed. “And she’s important to me because she’s the one who finally helped me believe in your dream. ”

My dream…

Heath pondered those words. Landon kept everyone at arm’s length except for him, Carey, and once, Richard.

Then Dirk came into the picture. Dirk was now the closest to his son, and Heath played second to that.

It was okay. His son deserved love, and Heath would gladly play second fiddle to the love his son finally had.

He’d always dreamed of that for his middle child. Born from a promise to build a world that fully accepted him. He could have everything that every parent should dream of for their children. Safety in the arms of real love and a place to call his own. Security. No more hate. No more fear.

“I see,” Heath whispered.

“We have strict rules about the Last Change. The only reason Fenris was never put down was his exception from Callahan. We all know why now. It didn’t make it right.

And now Jacky is going to be deeper in that…

madness than we’ve ever seen.” Landon took a deep breath.

“She’s normally perfectly sane. It’s a heat-of-the-moment thing.

She’s in the fight, and she’s continuing to push, but she’s sane. ”

“But if we’re to believe Hasan and Subira, she isn’t right now,” Heath said, understanding fully.

He hadn’t wanted the other werewolves near her the moment they realized she had probably gone alone.

His son had caught his intentions and jumped in without needing a word, and now Heath understood his son’s complete loyalty.

He should have argued. His second should have said it was crazy and tried to collect more of the pack to help, or any other werewolf or ally.

But Landon had just made sure they had what they needed and jumped into the truck with him. Not a single word trying to convince him.

It wasn’t loyalty to him. It wasn’t loyalty to Dirk. It wasn’t even Carey at this point.

It was loyalty to Jacky that had Landon in the car, ready to go against unknown odds without any backup. Just the two of them versus an unknown number of witches, a mad werecat, and a prayer that they got four young people they cared about away from it alive.

Because she helped him believe in Heath’s dream.

“I will never kill the woman I love,” he promised. “I will never raise a weapon or my own might against Jacky Leon, daughter of Hasan and Subira. Never .”

An oath. For whoever heard it and anyone who didn’t, Heath gave his oath.

“No matter what?”

Heath slowed so he could properly look at his middle child. Battered by life, bruised by it time and time again. He saw the child in his eyes, a vulnerability that Landon hadn’t given him in so long.

“No matter what,” Heath swore. “I will do everything in my power until the day I die to keep her among the living.” Heath reached out with one hand and squeezed his son’s shoulder. “Now let’s go save our girls.”

He pushed the pedal to the floor, and the truck worked hard to get to the speed Heath wanted. It cut the travel time down to mere minutes, then he swung into a parking spot. Landon and he were out of the truck in seconds, grabbing everything they needed, gearing up to fight.

He could smell her. Jacky. Wild and peaceful. Her scent was wild yet peaceful. She wasn’t raging. The odd combo made him think of a full moon, running through the woods, a deer running ahead of him. Wild.

And he was focused on what he was doing. Everything for the kill. There was clarity, calmness, knowing what to do and how to do it.

“She’s not raging like a berserker… She’s hunting,” Heath whispered into the wind.

“And she’s damn good at it. The blood in the air is thick,” Landon said, his words not pondering and mystified like Heath’s, but viciously proud.

Heath sniffed the air again, this time forcing himself to ignore the magnetic scent of his lover. The blood was thick. Too thick to figure out how many had bled.

It was their guide. The wind direction gave them their location.

Heath and Landon, guns raised, approached.

Heath listened, focused on the door, and heard the muffled sounds of screams that no human would catch.

The building was secured enough to keep the prisoners inside from letting anyone else know what was happening.

Heath figured it was their way of hiding his daughter and the boys he promised to care for and lead. Now it was hiding their screams as they paid for their transgressions against one very angry werecat. The screams were loud to him as he focused, but after a moment, he caught her.

Jacky’s growl. It was off. It was a werecat’s growl from a human throat. Not the growls every moon cursed did in their human forms, which could be impressive, but never on the scale of their cursed animal forms. It was somewhere in between. It was both right and wrong.

“She’s still alive,” he said softly, getting to the front door of the discreet building that looked like so many of the others.

There was a single-story warehouse area that dominated the building’s first floor and part of the second floor, but several admin areas as well on the second and third floors, offices and the like.

“I’ll tell her parents,” Dirk said softly on comms.

“Good. Let’s go. Dirk, we’re not going to be relaying every little thing.

We’ll tell you when something big happens.

” Landon breached the door, and Heath followed him, knowing his son should have gone second.

With Landon, there were times he had to lead, even if he wasn’t a leader.

His natural inclination was to run ahead alone and might need backup.

So much like Jacky, truthfully. She tried to make sure she had back up, but Heath knew most of the time that she was trying to be smart, even when her instincts wanted something else.

“Help!” a woman yelled, looking up from behind a desk in a little front office space. “There’s a… there’s a…”

“A monster?” Heath asked, looking at her, smiling. The woman finally realized who had entered the building. “Why didn’t you just leave through the front door? It’s right there.”

She didn’t have the chance to answer. She started to try to cast something, though, the scent of magic wafting off her.

Landon shot her.

“If Jacky is killing everyone, we might as well make the job easier for her,” he said, no regret in his eyes as Heath looked at him. “We didn’t bring anything for capture, anyway. They’ll just run when our back is turned, then we'll have to hunt them down again .”

“Fair enough,” Heath said. “She was a witch anyway, and any witch in this building is the enemy and can’t be trusted.” There was no denying that everyone in the building was involved in kidnapping Carey, Arlo, Benjamin, and Kody. That also made them responsible for killing Stacy.

He would make all of them pay for all of it.