As slowly as they'd gone up, Alistair's hands went down. “The resort is rigged,” he said confidently. “Everything is in place to go up at sunset tonight. It's a shame no one will survive. But you know how unpredictable natural gas fuel can be, and construction regulations in a country like this can be a little lax. And they're only shifters.”
“You're a monster,” Amber spat, thinking of all the innocent resort guests who would be killed in the tragedy.
“You're the ones who turn into animals,” Alistair said in disgust, raking her naked body with his glance. “You have to keep me alive,” he insisted. “If you want any chance of disarming...”
Amber pulled the trigger, racked the slide and fired again, sending a second dart straight into his chest beside the first.
Alistair's face twisted in anger and then went slack as he collapsed over the chair and fell to the ground as it rolled away. Amber resisted the urge to shift just so she could claw him in the face and dropped the gun to pounce at the control panel.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Tony's roars subsided to growls as the pain from the shock faded. His anger was not the slightest bit banked, and he gnashed his teeth.
The inhabitants of other cages were agitated, many of them up and pacing at the front of their enclosures. None of them volunteered to shift into human, or touch Tony's mind with speech.
He wondered how long Alistair had spent with his box of pain, training them to stay to animal shape, and how far gone they were, trapped within their animal forms.
He longed to reach for Amber with his mind, but feared drawing her back in to Alistair's trap. With luck, she was far, far away by now, not even aware of the commotion that had drawn Beehag away from his zoo.
When the lock at his cage did an unexpected whir-click, Tony thought he must be imagining it. He heard other clicks, all up and down the row of cages.
Then a mind brushed his own. Tony? I think I unlocked the cages?
You beautiful, sexy genius, he answered, shifting so he could reach through and unlatch the door. But didn't I tell you to get out of here?
My social worker always told me I was unreasonably defiant when I was a kid, Amber said smugly. Guess I never grew out of it.
Don't ever, Tony said with a mental caress. I love you just the way you are. He gratefully left the cage and went to the one next door.
A maned red wolf stared back at him.
“You're free,” Tony said, voice pitched to carry. “You're all free!” He unlatched the wolf's door, and it circled once before tentatively stepping out onto the pavement, still in wolf form.
Down the path, a few doors unlatched, and several naked people stepped tentatively out, blinking and flexing fingers curiously. More of the animals whined and refused to shift, waiting for someone to come open their cages; Tony had to wonder if they had forgotten how to be human, or if they were still just afraid. Several of them hid in the backs of their cages and didn't come out even when the doors were opened for them. A gazelle simply fled, hooves clattering on the pavement as it bolted randomly towards the back wall.
The red wolf changed at last, into a crouched man with blazing red hair. He stood up unsteadily, then walked with more confidence to Tony. “You have a way to get us out of here?” he growled, as if his vocal chords hadn't been used in years.
On cue, Amber appeared, rushing from the house, burdened with an armload of guns. “They're tranquilizers,” she panted. “And I heard one of the goons say they turned you human, too. We have to go help Scarlet and her staff at the front gate if we want to get out of here.”
The red wolf shifter took one, checking the chamber expertly, and several other human figures ghosted forward to take their own. A white tiger, staying in animal form, shook his head and snarled, lifting one paw and unsheathing his claws suggestively. An ocelot and a red panda circled Amber curiously, but didn't shift. The other people and animals hung back, listening.
Tony took Amber's last gun, and swept her into a bone-crunching hug. “You were supposed to get out,” he repeated.
“I saw an opportunity to do more good here,” Amber said with the breath she had left from his crushing embrace. It was terrifically distracting having her up against him with both of them naked, but there were more important things happening.
Because just then, shots rang out from the front of the house.
The red-haired wolf shifter pointed to the east of the house, pointed at Tony, and pointed west. Without a word, he selected a handful of the fittest humans and the white tiger, then led them around the corner of the house at an easy lope.
Tony gripped the rifle in one hand and Amber's hand in the other and they broke into a run, a ragged sea of animals and people surging with them. It was a motley crew at best, broken-spirited animals and staggering humans–most of them naked. Counting the red wolf's crew, there were still only eight guns, between them all, and although most of the animals were predators, many of them were not. The only thing they had on their side was the element of surprise, and Tony prayed it would be enough.
“Oh, Tony, there's more,” Amber said breathlessly, as they ran. “Beehag has rigged the resort to explode! At sunset! All the poor guests!”
Tony looked at the sky–midafternoon, and it was a several hour drive from the estate to the resort. “We'd never make it in time to disarm an explosive!”
“I saw a helicopter on the roof of one of the buildings in back,” Amber panted. “Can you fly one?”
Tony had to laugh, because the whole situation was beyond crazy. “Of course I can,” he said with mock arrogance. “I'm a super spy, right?”