Page 22 of Stray Cat

Grateful, Lindsay ducked behind a boulder and quickly undressed, stuffing her clothes into the small bag she’d brought along. The cold was brutal against her bare skin, encouraging her to shift more quickly.

At least, shewantedto shift more quickly. Her wildcat had other ideas.

Lindsay stifled a yowl as her body slowly and painfully changed form, but finally she landed on four paws and shook out her fur.

The chill instantly receded, becoming nothing but a minor annoyance. Lindsay shoved her bag behind a rock with one paw and trotted out to rejoin the others.

AC stared in mild shock as she approached, as though he’d never seen a Shifter in animal form before. It was unnerving. Lindsay resisted the temptation to sit down and wash her whiskers, to see how he’d react.

Xav scowled at him, impatient to get on with it.

“I need the hat,” AC said.

Lindsay blinked, wondering what the statement meant, but one of the DX guys pulled a baseball hat out of his pocket and handed it to AC, who took it awkwardly, his hands still bound.

AC showed it to Lindsay. “This is Dean’s. I found it in his apartment. I hope his scent hasn’t worn off since these guys confiscated it.”

Diego’s men would have searched AC, removing everything he had on him. Even a hat could become a weapon, or at least a distraction.

Lindsay rested on her haunches and gazed at AC impassively.

“I brought it so you could get a scent from it.” AC spoke slowly and loudly, as though Lindsay had suddenly lost the ability to understand him. “You can track Dean from this, can’t you?”

Lindsay intensified her stare. She had no intention of taking a nose-full of someone’s stinky hat. She could smell the unwashed hair from here.

“She doesn’t need to,” Neal said. “All she needs isyourscent.”

AC looked puzzled. “Why?”

“Humans who share DNA have a similar scent,” Neal explained. “You wouldn’t notice, but we do. She can find Dean based on you.”

AC frowned but tentatively stepped forward, offering his arm for a sniff. Lindsay backed off, wrinkling her nose. She could already smell him fine.

While AC growled, Lindsay moved a few steps into the depression in the ground and tested the air.

All these people around weren’t helping. She picked up a lot of scents, Xav’s most distracting of all.

His was smoky and dark, sexy and inviting. Lindsay wished they were alone, somewhere they could be themselves, without anger and frustration between them.

But a man might be in danger, and Lindsay couldn’t in good conscience leave him to suffer when she could help.

The brother, Dean, had been here, that was certain. He and whoever had taken him had entered the cave for a bit, maybe to get out of the winter rain that had pounded the area a few days ago, but they hadn’t stayed long. They’d climbed out again, leaving the strongest scents outside the cave, which was a relief. Lindsay wouldn’t need to descend all the way into it.

Dean had been with five human men, though none had scents Lindsay recognized.

It would have been nice to pinpoint exactly who’d taken Dean and so have some lead on where they might have gone with him, but life rarely worked out so neatly.

Lindsay delicately sniffed the air again, separating scents, tucking them into precise compartments in her mind. The men and Dean had lingered here outside the cave—why, she couldn’t say—and then they’d walked away.

Her nose told her they’d headed back to flatter ground. Lindsay followed the scent trail around the group of men who watched her and into the open, heading north. She knew that a small campground lay outside a wildlife refuge at the foot of the mountains in that direction. Worth checking out.

Xav and the others followed Lindsay cautiously as she proceeded, trying to ignore the sounds of them tramping after her.

Dean’s group had moved toward the base of the mountain range from which Gass Peak poked six thousand and more feet into the sky. Good hiking, Lindsay had always heard, though she’d never been up there herself.

Lindsay wondered why they’d chosen to take Dean straight across the desert floor. The nearby highway offered a much easier to navigate route to the campground, while hiking across country brought many perils.

All kinds of hidden washes and sinkholes under thin-crusted soil could trap the unwary, or at the very least break an ankle. Getting stranded out here for any length of time could be deadly.

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