Her cubs are not babies. She is not starving. She’s not at full weight or energy yet either, and she is intelligent enough to know that this will be no easy kill. Five humans and a dog. The odds are not strongly enough in her favor. So she is thinking. Considering. Assessing. And all we need to do is make one wrong move, one wrong noise, and she will attack. But for now … Breathe. Just breathe.
Her eyes lock on mine. As for the gun, it is a mere extension of my puny, clawless hands. It’s my eyes that she watches, as if knowing that’s the key to dealing with humans. Watch the eyes. Their true weapon lies behind it.
I keep my eyes wide and clear and calm, even when a string of drool hits my brow.
“Casey?” Dalton says.
“I’ve got this.”
“I don’t like—”
“I know. Has she moved?”
Hesitation. Then a reluctant “No.”
“Am I on target?”
A grunt now, frustrated that I’m being calm and logical when everything in him itches to pull his trigger. I know that because it’s what I’d be doing if he were the one lying here.
Just let me shoot, damn it. Forget the other bears. This is the one with her jaws a foot above your face. Let me shoot.
“It’s okay,” I murmur, as much to the bear as to him. “Everything is okay.”
The bear huffs. It’s a soft sound, though. Discomfort and mild stress.
“You want this to be done as much as I do, don’t you?” I say. “You want to walk away with your family, and I want to walk away with mine, and we don’t quite know how to do that.”
Her eyes flick, but she doesn’t move.
“Casey?” Dalton says. “This is a stalemate.”
“I know.”
“We need to end it.”
“Not yet.”
I swallow as carefully as I can. As hard as I’m struggling to stay calm, anxiety strums through me. Focus. Just focus and stay in the moment.
“Do the cubs have an escape route?”
“Yes. The first is to your left. No one’s near it. Storm’s watching this one, and he’s still too fucking curious but…”
“He’s calm?”
“Yeah.”
“Then let’s wait.”
Dalton grumbles under his breath, but he knows that if he were lying here, he’d say the same. The situation is temporarily under control.
“You can go,” I murmur to the bear. “No one will stop you. Take your babies and go.”
Of course she can’t understand, but I’m hoping the tone of my voice will tell her I’m not a threat. I continue talking, just as I would to a suspect holding a weapon on me. She stays right where she is, hot breath streaming down on me, jaws closing and then cracking open, drool dripping. I think I see a change in her eyes, a gradual easing of tension. Then, just when I’m sure I’m imagining it, she huffs and swings her gaze on Dalton.
My heart stops. My finger tenses on the trigger. I’ve had it there the whole time. This isn’t a situation like with Sophie where my finger stays clear until I decide to shoot. I might not get that extra moment if she attacks.
When she looks at Dalton, my finger tenses reflexively, but she only eyes him. Storm comes next, the bear’s gaze assessing the canine. Then she checks the first cub, the one safely on my other side. Out of the corner of my eye, I see it clawing at a dead log. It’s grown bored of the situation and started digging for a grub snack. Its sibling shows signs of the same boredom, having sat down to scratch its ear.