Roscoe started to speak and came to a befuddled halt.“No.”
“Maybe one of your men will know,” Mikhail suggested because he had nothing, and they needed information.“I’ll speak with them.Will you take care of Edwina?Bridget darted her and shot her.”
“Go,” Roscoe said.“I’ll watch things here.”
“Weapon?”Mikhail asked.
Roscoe pushed upright with a groan.He lumbered to his desk and pulled out a key.He removed a picture from the wall, opened a safe, and handed Mikhail a gun.
“You remember my men?Don’t shoot them by mistake.”He lowered his voice.“They’re shifters and will heal, but bullet holes will shorten their tempers.If you fire, make certain of your target.”
“I will,” Mikhail promised and checked the safety.
“It’s loaded.”Roscoe gingerly prodded his scalp.“Someone is banging inside my head with hammers.”
“Know the feeling.”Mikhail didn’t linger.He strode through the house, instinct giving him directions.The various scents aided him, and he accepted the knowledge without question.
Several men loitered in front of the cottage.They glanced at him and stood straighter, but not one of them pulled a weapon.Roscoe’s men.
“Roscoe can’t recall what happened and why Bridget Smirnoff came.Did he tell any of you?”
“Edwina and Roscoe met with her.Bridget demanded your return to the Smirnoff estate.She expected you to teach her the business and continue to work with her father.That’s all I heard before the gunfire.”His brow crinkled.“The discharge wasn’t loud.”
An experimental weapon in Smirnoff hands.Not ideal for their opposition.Had they used it on him?His memories were damn fuzzy, and Roscoe demonstrated similar symptoms.He concentrated and only fragments of the last week made sense.The harder he pushed to fill the gaps, the fiercer his headache.
“Thanks,” he said.“Roscoe is awake, and the healer is attending him.His memory is spotty, but he’ll survive.What happened to Bridget?”
“We’ve locked her in a secure room,” a shifter replied.
“Excellent.I have ideas, but I’ll run them past Roscoe first.”Mikhail returned to the house and sought Roscoe.His housekeeper had made Roscoe and the healers hot drinks.“How is Edwina?”he asked.She’d bled way more than a shifter… His thoughts trailed off when he recalled the tiger who’d haunted his mind.He was a shifter.A roar almost deafened him.He winced before realizing the sound had been internal.Mikhail pictured an animal, and claws burst from beneath his fingernails.
“Stop!”Roscoe barked.
The tiger image burst, and the claws receded.Mikhael’s breath came in hot pants, panic at the control slip bursting over him.
Mikhail glanced at the healers, who were whispering together.The older one set down her tea and hurried from the room with the younger one on her heels.
“Edwina?”Mikhail murmured, staring after them.
“Wait until their return.They assured me she’ll recover.She has regained consciousness, but Margot told me she displayed confusion.My memories are still hazy.”
“I am a tiger shifter,” Mikhail said, gazing at Roscoe.“Until now, I’d forgotten.”
Roscoe’s brow puckered.“But your shifter half?”
“Was present, but I didn’t understand.Thought I was crazy.”
The younger healer entered the room.“She is asking for you.”
Mikhail sped down the hall, his long strides propelling him toward Edwina.
Edwina sat, propped up by pillows.Her face was pale, but her smile lit the room.It lit him.Mikhail was at her side in seconds.
He grasped her hands.“How are you?”
She stared, tears shimmering in her beautiful green eyes.“You remember me?”
“You’re Edwina, my beloved wife.”
