Cougar Christmas Calamity (Heart of the Cougar Book 8) Read online

  He checked on Robertson who looked near death. A medic on the flight kept him alive though as Emerson and the others tried to help. He was thinking he’d send Christmas gifts to the kids, but they didn’t know each other’s identities. It was safer that way for just this reason. Smith would want them all dead still, and Emerson didn’t want Robertson’s family in the crosshairs.

  Once Emerson was feeling better, he was going after Smith, with or without Condor and the rest of the men’s help. At least with his faster cougar healing genetics, Emerson would be in good shape soon.

  Condor could be another story if he really had a bullet in his skull—even as a wolf shifter. Kline appeared to be in stable condition. Robertson was touch and go. Emerson glanced at Gardiner’s body and promised him, “Smith is a dead man walking.”

  Jessie Whittington said goodbye to her mom and dad and took off from Loveland, Colorado to go to Whispering Pines Resort on Lake Superior. She’d made a special German chocolate cake for Mr. Paul Merriweather, who owned and managed the resort. He was sixty, a cougar, widowed and he had always been so kind to her. He gave her a discount on her stay at the resort and she brought him a special treat every time she visited—which was going on five years now. Her mom had a cake business and she made cakes for special occasions and Jessie was used to helping her with them, but this one she made herself.

  In the car, she got a call on her dashboard from Deputy Sheriff Nina Hill, who had been sharing some psychic stories with Jessie for the romantic suspense novel she was writing. Jessie’s story would be fiction, but Nina and her twin sister, Ava, were the real deal when it came to seeing future events from time-to-time.

  “Hi, Nina, I’m driving up to the resort up on Lake Superior. Do you have another story for me to incorporate in my novel?” Jessie couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get another story idea from Nina or her sister. Jessie found their stories fascinating, which was why she was writing about a psychic hero and heroine and villain this time.

  “Listen, I talked to Ava to see if she had any visions about you but she hasn’t had any.”

  “About me?” Now that wasn’t what Jessie had expected to hear.

  “I saw you chasing two bears while you were wearing your cougar coat.”

  Jessie smiled. “You must have been having a dream or nightmare like I have.”

  “Maybe, but if it’s a premonition, promise me you won’t chase after a couple of bears through the woods up there.”

  “All right, I promise. I’ve never even seen a bear out at the resort, mostly because I go up there in the winter and they’re hibernating.”

  “Oh, you’re right. I never even considered that. Forget what I said. It must have been just a weird dream I had last night then,” Nina said.

  “Do I win the confrontation with the bears?” Jessie figured she might as well learn that, even though she didn’t think she’d do well against two bears, even in a dream.

  “I have no idea. All I know is that you were chasing them. Hmm, come to think of it, you were chasing them through the snow.”

  “See? I imagine, even if a bear woke up out of hibernation and went looking for a meal, there wouldn’t be two of them. Not running together.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  “Okay, anything else?” Jessie asked.

  “The coffin will be empty.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Sorry, I told you my visions could be mixed up, just like dreams are. They’re not in any perfect story order. They’re bits and pieces like in dreams.”

  “A coffin?”

  “Yes, it’s empty.”

  Jessie bit her lip. “Okay, I have no intention of checking out any coffins. Was it like I was thinking of purchasing one?” She wouldn’t be, though it did make her worry that someone close to her was going to need one, and she didn’t want to even consider such a possibility. That was the problem with having friends who had actual psychic visions if they were something ominous.

  “No. You were just greatly relieved when you saw that nobody was in the coffin.”

  “All right. So was this before or after I was chasing two bears in the snowy woods?” At least this was giving Jessie some ideas for her stories, even if they weren’t really psychic predictions but just a typical mixed-up dream. The characters in her story would still have the same issues as Nina and Ava did when it came to their sixth sense.

  “Before, but you know my dreams or visions can be out of order.”

  Jessie thought it was interesting that Nina and her twin sister often didn’t share the same visions concerning people. But they were fun to have at festivities, especially when running the fortune-telling booth. Most of the time, they tried not to tell anyone anything but good news. Sometimes it backfired.

  Jessie remembered her twin sister, Tracey, telling her that Nina had congratulated a mother-to-be on her twins when it turned out the woman’s husband hadn’t been the father and neither she nor he had known she was pregnant.

  “Oh, well, have a safe trip and forget what I said. You’ll have a great time and you won’t encounter any bears or coffins, empty or otherwise. Only I will—so it seems—in my dreams.”

  Jessie laughed. “Okay, thanks, Nina. I’ll be seeing you sometime for the Christmas holidays when my family visits my sister and her family in Yuma Town.”

  “It won’t be long.”

  “I agree. I can’t wait.” Yet, Jessie could. She was looking forward to her vacation at the resort.

  Then they ended the call.

  Chasing bears and checking for bodies in empty coffins at the Whispering Pine Resort in the dead of winter? That would be the day.

  Chapter 1

  “Why did you choose Dr. Smith for your alias?” Reginald Bates asked Girard Smith.

  “Did you ever watch ‘Lost in Space?’ Dr. Smith was intelligent, conniving, manipulative, and would sacrifice anyone who got in his way. I really respected him. The whole family that went on the mission with him were easily manipulated, despite supposedly being a bunch of brainy scientists. It goes to show deceptiveness can win over morality every time.” Smith readjusted the plant lights on his indoor garden. “Not to change the subject but I’ve got to terminate Thor, Condor, and the rest of the team. They should never have escaped that mission.”

  Reginald smiled and lit a cigarette. ”I really don’t believe any of the team members knew you orchestrated the faux rescue of the college students. They saved them and were none the wiser that it hadn’t been in the plans.”

  “Vengeance be mine. And put out the damn cigarette. How many times do I have to tell you I don’t allow smoking in my home?” Smith was a cougar and with his sensitive sense of smell, he couldn’t stand smoke. It reminded him of a forest fire out of control, and imminent danger to his kind in the wild.

  “Sorry. I forget you don’t like smoking.”

  Reginald was sorry, all right. “If Thor and his team hadn’t gone in and rescued the hostages ahead of my well-planned schedule, the parents would have seen that their rescuers had died and they had only one option left to them—to pay up or lose their precious kids. When Thor changed the timeline, it made me believe he knew something was wrong when he ignored my carefully laid plans as far as the schedule went. I can’t believe he got away this time.”

  “And most of the rest of the team. You should have finished them all off.”

  Smith cast him a cutting glower. Reginald could easily be replaced, but Smith still needed him to help him eliminate Thor and the others. Sometimes it seemed as though Reginald thought he was indispensable in this business. No one who worked for Smith was. He just needed to learn where the members of the team were hiding. Once Smith located them, he’d hire new mercenaries to kill them. Of course, Smith would be there—in the shadows—to see that it was done right this time.

  “What about that other Black Ops team?” Reginald asked.

  They were a thorn in Smith’s side too. That group had gotten away with only a few i
njuries too. It had been the first time Smith had arranged a setup of a Black Ops mission like that. He was still learning how to do it so he got it right. Thor was a cougar shifter and he’d still walked right into his trap, so Smith knew it was doable.

  “I’ll get them too,” Smith said.

  “They’re going to know you set them up. Thor especially since he saw you make your escape.”

  Smith usually didn’t like Reginald’s inferences and Reginald was being a lot more vocal about it of late. But that was just the way Dr. Smith was. Always coming out on top of the food chain no matter how wimpy Dr. Smith of “Lost in Space” fame seemed or how things didn’t seem to work out his way. He had the intelligence and cunning to get things done eventually the way he wanted them to. This Smith wasn’t wimpy in the least. Sure, he didn’t fight the battles. That’s what made him so cunning. He had everyone else do it for him.

  Smith babied his indoor garden as the snow piled up outside of his Minnesota home.

  He needed to think of something else while he was waiting to hear word about where Thor and the others were hiding out. Maybe it was time for Smith to look up one of his girlfriends and just have some fun. He had another mission coming up after the new year though. He really needed to get rid of the men on both those teams if he was to have any peace of mind. He couldn’t think of a better Christmas present.

  “You got a team in mind to take those guys out when you find Thor and the others?” Reginald asked, glancing out at the snow.

  “Yeah. And you’re leading them.” It was time for Reginald to show what a badass he could be. Besides, Reginald knew Thor personally too. They’d served as army rangers together. Reginald was strictly human though.

  Did Smith have any regret that he planned the demise of a fellow cougar? Hell no. Thor had loused up one hell of a payoff and he knew way too much. The team members had been wounded in the fight that should have ended their miserable lives. But since it had killed only one them, Smith knew they would be teaming up to take him down. They had to go.

  Reginald looked a little surprised that Smith told him he would be in charge of the team.

  “Are you worried they’ll get the best of you?” Smith asked.

  “Hell no.”

  Smith hoped Thor would, but only if another of Smith’s hired killers took Thor out. Smith was thinking Reginald was getting a little too mouthy for his own good. He just couldn’t afford any other mistakes. He pulled out his phone and checked out his girlfriends on Facebook. He would friend them and check their posts to see if they mentioned where they were at. None of them suspected what he did for a living or that he thought of himself as the Dr. Smith of “Lost in Space” fame. He was just a fun-loving guy, generous on a date and always running off on an important mission to keep entanglements down. None of them would ever guess he had a string of women all over the world at his beck and call either.

  Now that was his Don Juan persona. The “Lost in Space” Dr. Smith didn’t date.

  Emerson returned home, still healing up from the gunshot wound. He fully expected to find his Uncle Paul at the resort, who would have been thrilled to learn that Emerson was done with the job and here for good—though Emerson had every intention of keeping the bad news from his uncle that Smith was still a threat to him and that Emerson had been wounded.

  Instead, Emerson had learned his uncle had died of a massive heart attack. No one in his family had any issues with heart disease. Emerson couldn’t believe it! And he was sick about it. He was finally going to be home for Christmas with his uncle, his last living relative. He closed down the resort, pending the transfer of title into his name, and refunded all the cabin renters’ money, well, all except for one stubborn woman—Jessie Whittington—who absolutely wouldn’t take a refund, insisting on coming. He had told everyone else that his uncle had died, and he would be opening up the resort again in the spring.

  Except for Jessie. She had refused to take the refund and though he could have insisted further, something about her made him give in.

  He didn’t care anything about the resort right now. He felt bereft with his uncle gone. This had been Emerson’s home for many years until he went into the army and then later was working Black Ops. He loved it here. He had always planned to take it over when his uncle wanted to retire, and before that, just to help his uncle run things as he got older.

  A week after he’d returned home, Jessie Whittington was arriving. Emerson glanced outside at the snow-laden clouds, at the wintry setting, the snow a foot high and the drive and walk to Jessie’s cabin cleared, but he was having a hard time putting on a good face for her visit when he normally would have been just like his uncle, cheerful that the guest had arrived, welcoming.

  On top of that, his damn arm was aching where the bullet had been removed. It was getting better by the day, but it was still giving him grief. Most likely because he’d been chopping wood for the fireplace and doing a ton of other chores around the place, like clearing the snow before Jessie’s arrival. He had promised his uncle he would stay here and run things, keep the place as part of their heritage, yet he was so upset his uncle had died, he didn’t want to deal with it or anything else. And he was never like that.

  If he had been firmer with Jessie, like he should have been, she wouldn’t be coming here and he could take off and try and find Smith, though he had no idea where to look. He’d contacted several of his acquaintances, both former Black Ops team members and contractors who had given him missions before, but no one seemed to have a clue who he was or where he could find Smith.

  He got a call where the caller said, “Red,” and Emerson answered with, “Blue.”

  “Hey.” It was Condor. Emerson hadn’t heard from him since the mission and he was glad he still seemed to have his wits about him.

  “How are you?”

  “Healing. You?” Emerson asked, keeping the conversation brief for safety sake.

  “Same. Potential wife number six dumped me.”

  Emerson smiled. “So, what’s new?” The guy had a revolving door of she-wolves to date, though with wolves, Emerson had learned, they waited to consummate a relationship when they agreed to a mating and they were mated for life, so he understood why they had to be careful when trying to decide on a mate. With the cougars, they were more like humans. But Emerson and Condor were used to giving each other a hard time.

  “Still looking. You?”

  “No clue.”

  “Everyone’s on this. R pulled through, divorced W. K is good. Keep looking.”

  “You too.” Robertson had pulled through after all and divorced his wife. Emerson was glad for that and to hear that Kline was good.

  That was good news. Then they ended the call. Emerson took a deep, settling breath. They didn’t want to alert Smith if he should be trying to monitor their phones, though neither of them had the same phones they had used when he had been in contact with them for the mission. Still, they had to be careful in case Smith ever learned of their new numbers. But Emerson was glad Condor and the others were all right.

  Emerson chopped some more wood. The snowstorm was coming in tomorrow, and so was his only guest at the cabin. He hoped she made it in time, but he wished she had just taken a refund for her cabin rental, like all the others had.

  Hoping she wouldn’t be sidetracked with the impending winter storm on its way, the author of ten photography books, Jessie had never written a novel before. She planned to write more of her paranormal romance book at the cabin on the North Shore of Lake Superior at Whispering Pines Resort soon. In her new book, the hero and heroine were both psychics and dealing with a psychic killer. She thought about writing a cougar shifter romance, but nobody would believe anything that far out, despite that she definitely knew her subject matter and editors always told her to write about what she knew. That wasn’t something she could divulge to the rest of the human population though.

  Every year, she stayed at Whispering Pines before Christmas to get away and work
on a book, and every year it seemed she did so while she was getting over yet another tumultuous relationship. Her older twin sister, Tracey, who was a special agent with U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), and Tracey’s mate, Hal Haverton, a rancher and a part-time deputy sheriff out of Yuma Town, were always concerned with Jessie when she started dating again. In fact, they’d gotten into the habit of doing background checks on the guys she was seeing and that helped keep her from getting too involved with them if Hal and Tracey learned the cougars were rogues.

  Jessie stopped overnight at a hotel and then drove the next day, finally reaching the Whispering Pines Resort and parking at the owner/manager’s house to check in and get the key to her cabin before the sun set. She was glad to get here before the blizzard started. It was snowing already and the visibility with the wind blowing it all across the road was getting to be hazardous.

  Paul Merriweather was always glad to see her. He was a widowed, gray-haired cougar who always had a smile for her and all kinds of advice of what to do and where to go when she visited. He had even given her dating tips, though he’d told Jessie he had only dated one cougar in his lifetime, and she had been the woman he had loved and married and lost. Jessie was always arriving after a breakup and so Paul would be waiting to see what had gone wrong this time with her former relationship and help her to see how much better off she was without the guy. She loved Paul for it.

  Jessie went inside Mr. Merriweather’s home to check-in and get her cabin key, carrying the German chocolate cake she’d made just for him as a fun treat. As soon as she did, she met a dark-haired man she’d never seen before. She was more than a little surprised. He wore all black—sweater, pants, boots. She swore if she saw his underwear they would be just as black—and why she was even thinking of that, she hadn’t a clue—except he was drop-dead gorgeous, with an angular face and a scruffy beard that gave him character, and he was a cougar.

  “Is the owner in? Mr. Merriweather?” Jessie asked.