Lure of the Jaguar: Hades' Carnival, Book 7 Read Online Free PDF Page B

listened.
    She didn’t hear anything at first. The night was quiet. Too quiet. The bayou was always alive with sound. Now it was still, the air heavy. A bead of sweat rolled down her back.
    “Are you sure this is the place?”
    Toni stilled at the whisper only a few feet away from her. She scrunched lower and kept her breathing shallow and light.
    “That’s what he said,” answered another man.
    He ? Who was he ? The only one she knew around here was Stavros, and he wasn’t the kind of man to send someone skulking around a woman’s home.
    “Quiet.” This voice was lower, more ominous. “We need to get her and get out.”
    Toni’s blood ran cold. Did they mean to kidnap her or kill her?
    “Why does he have such a hard-on for this photographer chick?” the first man asked.
    There went the idea that this was a case of mistaken identity. As far as she knew, she was the only photographer chick in the neighborhood. The men moved off to the side of the house and Toni crept to the corner, careful where she put her feet. The last thing she wanted to do was make a sound and alert them to her presence.
    “Don’t know and don’t care.” This came from the last man, the one who seemed to be in charge. “Our job is to deliver her to him.” She couldn’t see any of them well, but this man was larger than the other two. “I don’t want him coming after me.”
    Crap. Her would-be kidnappers were afraid of this mysterious man. That wasn’t good. Toni had no idea who would be after her or what she’d done to gain the attention of such a dangerous person. Not that it mattered. Not now. The only thing she had to concern herself with at the moment was getting away.
    If she made it to the woods, she could hide until morning and then make a run for her car. If they were still here in the morning, she could walk to the nearest gas station, which was about ten miles away. She couldn’t even go to any of the neighbors for help. She had no way of knowing if one of these men was her neighbor.
    Stavros popped in her head again, but she immediately dismissed him. She wouldn’t go to him for help. He’d walked away from her and was virtually a stranger anyway. For all she knew, he was behind this.
    Even as she thought it, she knew that was wrong. Call it instinct. Call it foolish hope. She knew Stavros wouldn’t hurt her.
    Not that he wasn’t dangerous, because he most certainly was. But not to her.
    “I’ll go around back,” one of the men whispered.
    She had to move. Now. If he came around the corner of the house, he’d see her. Toni came up out of her crouch and began to move as quickly and quietly as she could, heading toward a lone shrub about ten feet away. It wasn’t much cover, but she didn’t need it for long. As soon as the men entered the house, she was out of here.
    She almost made it. Would have made it if it weren’t for an errant rock. She tripped and stumbled forward, barely catching herself before she fell. But the noise alerted the men.
    A flashlight beam spotlighted her and she blinked against the sudden glare.
    “Over here,” one of the men yelled.
    Toni wasn’t waiting around to find out which one of them had spotted her. She took off toward the woods, praying she wouldn’t run into a tree and knock herself out cold. She had her hands out in front of her as she lurched over the uneven ground.
    She was almost there when a blood-curdling yowl split the night.
    Toni barely managed to avoid a tree. Grabbing the trunk, she held on to the scratchy bark, trying to orient herself. She heard a low growl that sent a shiver down her spine. It was a big cat, maybe even the cougar she’d seen earlier. And it was close.
    Then she heard a man scream.
    Stavros raced through the night at top speed. With his preternatural vision, he could see everything around him just as easily as he could in the daylight. He jumped over a fallen log without hesitation. He could smell the men now. Their bodies reeked of sweat and