Chapter 38

38

T abby had forgotten that Clancy was a horse shifter too, until he turned into a big rough-coated buckskin and fought Logan in earnest.

For one awful moment after she dove, she was sure that she'd done a dumb thing and was going to get herself—or Logan!—shot when she went down with Franzi, but when she could hear again after the round went off near her ear, none of them appeared to have been injured.

Her first priority was getting Franzi as safe as she could get her, tucked into the back seat footwell of Clancy's car. She tucked the luggage tag under the mat and closed the door, then went cursing out into the darkness to try to find the gun. The car was struck several times during the horse battle, and Tabby had to dodge flailing limbs. It was sheer dumb luck that she heard her foot hit the gun and scrape it on the gravel over the sound of the stallions squealing and clashing with each other.

It was a heavy gun, and double action, and it made a satisfying crack as she stopped the battle with it .

But Tabby's moment of triumph was short-lived, because Clancy, presumably thinking she wouldn't dare fire at him, turned away from his standoff with Logan and charged her.

Was he planning to shift and tear the gun away from her, knowing it was the only way to stop Logan? Did he think he could simply bowl her over and remove the threat?

Tabby aimed the gun and almost squeezed the trigger, but Logan was on a split-second intercept course, and she didn't dare in case he was too close.

Instead of hitting her, Clancy hit the car with all of Logan's weight driving into him and it rocked in place as Franzi screamed from inside.

Clancy went down with an alarming crunch , and Logan gave a bird-of-prey screech and reared over him, clearly intent on trampling him into the ground.

"Don't!" Tabby cautioned. "Don't kill him!" Would Clancy be human when the cops came? How would she explain either of them as a corpse?

Logan's wicked hooves came down in the gravel so close to Clancy that he probably shaved horse hair off of his cousin's legs.

Shaking, willing her own legs to keep holding her up, Tabby went to train the gun on Clancy. "Shift, you sonuvabitch."

Clancy did, both of his hands spread before him in defeat. One of his legs was crumpled awkwardly beneath him.

"Did you break your leg?" Tabby asked. "Because I'm happy to put you down."

Logan snorted. Tabby wasn't sure if it was rebuke or agreement .

Clancy crawled to his feet, though he limped and looked worse for the wear even in the poor light. "What are you going to do?" he challenged, spitting something to the ground. Tabby hoped it was a tooth. Inside the car, Franzi was wailing.

"I could call the cops," Tabby said, trying to keep her hands steady. She wasn't sure that she actually had the guts to shoot Clancy. Then she remembered that he'd come to steal Franzi, and her resolve hardened. "But there's another agency that can do more good. An agency that keeps shifters in check. They don't appreciate the fact that you're selling out shifter secrets for your own gain."

"I'm not afraid of…"

"You should be," Tabby said ferociously. "You should be really afraid. You just broke into my house and stole my kid at gunpoint."

"Let me go," Clancy countered, suddenly sounding dangerously reasonable again. "You've won and all I'm asking for is a head start. Keep Logan. Keep the brat. Just let me leave."

"How do I know you won't turn around and come right back?" Tabby asked.

"You have my wor?—"

"Your word is worthless," Tabby reminded him. "But here's what you need to remember. You conned me, and I found you. The only motivation I had then was a missing horse that I'd had less than a day. This time, you've threatened my ranch and my family. If you come here and try to take them again, there is no stone I won't turn over. There is nowhere in the world you can take these two that I won't follow you and take them back . You leave here now, and you go to ground, and you stay there , because if I so much as get a whiff of your ugly stink, I will hunt you down and destroy you for good." The weight of the gun in her hand was a comfort, but not as much of a comfort as Logan, who stomped behind her. She wasn't sure that the horse agreed with her decision, but he'd back her up.

And she didn't know what else to do. She couldn't hold Clancy at gunpoint forever. Who even knew when the cops could get there, if she could call them, and the mysterious shifter agency would probably take even longer. She wasn't on record as Franzi's guardian, so the police would never let Tabby keep her, and Logan was still a horse.

She edged to the side and opened the back door of Clancy's car, keeping the gun trained on him.

Franzi popped out like a terrified jack-in-the-box and immediately went behind Tabby, clinging to her legs like a hobble.

"Get in and go," Tabby told Clancy. "Before I change my mind."

Clancy opened his mouth, like he was considering some kind of final parting speech, then closed it. "Goodbye, cousin," he said instead. "You deserve her."

Logan snorted and snapped his teeth.

Tabby couldn't move, because of Franzi's death grip on her knees, so she was uncomfortably close to the car and unable to step back as it swung around in the wide drive and spat gravel behind it as it left. Logan trotted after it, presumably to make sure Clancy truly left, and Tabby lowered the gun in shaking hands as her knees finally gave out. She sank down to sit in the middle of the dark drive between the suitcases and drew Franzi into her lap.

Franzi had stopped shaking by the time Logan returned, and Tabby had plenty of time to second guess her decision to let Clancy go. What if he came back with goons? Was she always going to be afraid to go to sleep? Should she have shot him? Tabby balked at even considering the option. What else could she do ?

She gritted her teeth and rose up to greet Logan. Franzi was heavy, but no heavier than a bag of feed, and Tabby appreciated her desire to cling. How was she going to keep the little girl, when her legal guardian was a horse ? "Did you lock the gate?" It had a pull-shut mechanism with a keypad; Logan should have been able to maneuver it shut if Clancy hadn't broken it on his way in. He'd probably had a keypad cracker like Logan did.

Logan nodded emphatically, and then snuffled her and Franzi thoroughly, making the little girl giggle and turn her face into Tabby's shoulder. "Let's have a glass of milk and go back to bed," she suggested.

Franzi nodded, but as Tabby started to walk back to the house, she suddenly went stiff.

Still on a hair-trigger, Tabby felt a stab of panic.

"My suitcases?" Franzi said quietly near her ear.

Tabby had to put her down to carry them in, and she found the gun she'd dropped with her foot. She shouldn't just leave it in the driveway, but she didn't want to take it inside with her. She lowered the suitcases to pick it up and shoved it down in the back of her truck under a shovel strapped in with a toolbox.

Franzi waited with the suitcases, Logan hovering behind her lipping her hair, and Tabby gave him a kiss on his big velvet-soft nose before she picked them back up and went into the house.

It was weirdly cheerful inside, well-lit and cozy after the cool night air. Tabby went to the fridge to get milk and saw her phone on the counter. Should she call someone? The cops were right out, and she wasn't sure it was worth waking Cherry in the middle of the night. What could her secret shifter agency do now ?

She bumped the phone as she put out glasses, and stared at the notification on the screen. "Your Luggage, Tabby's Tack , has left its verified location."

There was something else she could do.