Another shout begging for help had Carter putting on the speed. He didn’t care if anyone saw how fast he could move now. Someone was in trouble.
He heard whimpering just as he rounded a bend in the path and saw a woman on the ground. A fraction of a second later, his less-than-reliable nose told him that she was bleeding.
Carter moved forward quickly at the same time he checked around for threats but didn’t see anyone else. The woman was curled up in a ball, hands clenched to her stomach, shaking uncontrollably, though whether it was from the sobbing or the pain, he couldn’t tell which. Off to the side of the path, a jogging stroller was on its side, a blanket and a stuffed animal lying carelessly in the grass.
He dropped down to one knee beside the woman and gently touched her shoulder, rolling her over slightly so he could get a look at her face. She jumped at the contact, cringing as if she expected someone else, but when she saw him, she pulled one hand away from her stomach to grab his arm, relief in her eyes.
“You have to help me!” she begged. “He took my baby! You have to stop him!”
Carter’s head started spinning. Between the scent of blood and the fear rolling off the woman in waves, his inner wolf was doing everything it could to slip out. He fought his omega for control. He needed a clear head so he could figure out what the hell had happened here.
“Who took your baby?” he asked, glancing at the other hand still pressed to the wound in her stomach. Since he hadn’t heard a gunshot and couldn’t smell the acrid stench of smokeless powder, she must have been stabbed. “Which direction did he go?”
“My ex-husband. He went that way,” she said, taking her hand from his arm to point further down the running path before clutching at him again, her eyes wet with tears. “He lost custody of our daughter a month ago and threatened that he’d get her back. He was with his brother. You have to get my little girl back!”
Carter nodded, his inner wolf responding instinctively to a mother’s love for her child. “I’ll get her back.” He pressed both of the woman’s hands against her stomach. “Keep pressure on the wound. Paramedics will be here soon.”
Then he was running, hoping the woman’s pain-induced delirium would keep her from understanding just how fast he was moving.
He pulled out his phone, dialing 9-1-1 as he sprinted. “This is Officer Carter Nelson, Dallas PD. There’s been a stabbing on the north side of Bachman Lake where Bachman Drive meets Northwest Highway. Female victim is down on the path with a wound to the stomach. I’m on foot pursuit following two male suspects who’ve kidnapped a little girl. Possible custodial kidnapping. Requesting back-up.”
Dispatch had a ton of questions that Carter didn’t have time to answer, so he quickly repeated that he was in pursuit of two suspects with a small child, probably heading for the parking area, then hung up.
His omega nose was only so much help when it came to tracking the suspects as he headed north, so he mostly listened to his instincts, trusting them to help follow the two men who’d stabbed a mother and left her for dead, taking her child as she lay there bleeding out.
Carter was running at full speed by the time he reached the highway and the small parking area there, his claws out and his fangs desperately trying to make an appearance. There were several other cars there, probably from other people running the path. But then he saw the F350 truck at the end of the lot, the driver’s side and rear king cab doors open. Two men were fumbling in the back seat with something, one standing in the doorway while the other was inside the crew cab. It only took the cries of a little girl to figure out that the a-holes were trying to strap the baby into the seat belt.
“Step out of the truck and away from the child,” he ordered in a firm voice. “And before you start making excuses, I found the woman you just stabbed.”
The guy standing outside the truck spun around, his eyes taking in Carter, as well as his empty hands, before apparently concluding that he didn’t pose a threat. A moment later, the man reached into the bed of the truck, coming out with a lug wrench. Then he launched himself at Carter, shouting at the other guy to start the truck.
“Don’t kill him. Don’t kill him. Don’t kill him,” Carter whispered to himself over and over again, fighting to get his claws back in as the man charged his way, lug wench swinging high. The urge to swipe his arm up and out, to rip the guy to shreds, was damn hard to resist, but he did—barely.
Carter caught the metal club on his forearm, control of his inner omega slipping even further as pain flared and bone broke. At the last second, he closed his hand into a fist and punched the man in the chest instead of tearing it open.
The guy grunted and flew backward, bouncing off the cab of the truck. There was a thud as the man’s head hit something hard, the lug wrench clattering to the pavement. Carter didn’t think the guy was dead—hoped he wasn’t—but had no time to check as the truck roared to life and slammed into gear.
The back wheels of the vehicle squealed and spun up a thick fog of burnt rubber as the driver tried to get out of the space, the front bumper clipping Carter and sending him flying. Any remaining grip he had on his inner wolf slipped away and he got shoved into the background as an invisible shroud covered him and his omega took over.
Carter was back to his feet in a flash, watching as his wolf charged forward, damn near attacking the driver’s side door of the truck. The guy behind the wheel reached out with a knife, trying to slash at his face and chest. The knowledge that this was the a-hole who’d stabbed the woman enraged his omega and Carter slid even further into the background, everything around him getting hazy as his inner wolf growled in rage.
Carter watched in surreal fascination as his hand batted the knife aside long enough to reach inside the vehicle and get a grip on the steering wheel and the frame of the door. The man yanked the truck into drive and floored the accelerator, trying to get away, but Carter’s werewolf stood firm and yanked hard with a savage snarl. There was a shriek of twisting metal as his omega ripped off the steering wheel and then the door.
Carter tumbled backward, rolling across the pavement, the door of the vehicle tumbling with him. He felt himself fading further into unawareness until the world went black.
It only seemed like he was out for a few seconds, but when he finally came back to himself, he was sitting on the pavement of the parking lot, disoriented. In the distance, he could hear the sound of sirens approaching, and somewhere nearby, a child was crying.
He looked over his shoulder to see the F350 truck sitting halfway up on the back end of a small sedan. The crying was coming from the backseat where the baby was still sitting, thankfully unharmed.
The man who’d been driving was lying on the pavement ten feet away, not moving. For one horrified moment, Carter was sure he’d killed another person without remembering it. Then he heard a groan and realized with relief that the guy was still kicking.
Carter started to push himself to his feet but stopped at a painful twinge in his pec muscle. He glanced down to see a knife sticking out of the right side of his chest. Cursing, he wrapped his hand around the hilt and pulled the blade out, then placed it on the ground beside him. The wound would heal before backup arrived.
He considered checking on the child but then decided against it. He was lousy with kids at the best of times, and in the moments right after one of his episodes, he wasn’t sure if he trusted himself around anyone that tiny.
So, he sat there keeping an eye on the baby from afar, at the same time taking in the scene around him. In addition to the door and steering wheel he’d yanked off still lying in the grass, and the two unconscious suspects, there was blood covering the front of his shirt. How the hell was he going to explain any of this when he didn’t remember most of what had happened?
Maybe he should call Dr. Delacroix and cancel his appointment. Then again, considering the mess his life was turning into, maybe he should ask for a double session.
