The cat just glared at him, tail swishing back and forth.

“Yeah, well, I’m not thrilled either, but see that woman down there scowling up at me like I’m a pain in her ass? That’s because I’m a pain in her ass. If I rescue you, maybe she’ll soften a little bit. So what do you say?”

The cat declined to answer, so he snatched her off the branch. To say she wasn’t pleased with this development was an understatement. She hissed and bit and scratched the shit out of him, nearly causing him to fall out of the tree twice. If his unit could see him now, they’d be rolling on the ground. It wasn’t often he got his ass kicked, especially by a ten-pound, soaking wet feline, but by the time he had them both out of the tree, she’d most definitely won the battle.

When his boots hit the ground, Piper reached out for the she-devil masquerading as a cat. The she-devil who . . . stopped hissing and clawing him and melted into her.

Piper lifted her gaze with a “thank you” on her lips, but broke it off with a gasp as her gaze locked on his hand, which he’d used to rub his chest through his soaked rain jacket. His fingers were streaked with his own blood.

“Oh my God, you’re hurt.”

“I’m fine.” How was it that a cat scratch hurt more than a bullet? “Get inside. Unless there’s another wild animal you need to rescue.”

She didn’t say anything to this, just tucked the now complacent cat under one arm and grabbed his hand, tugging him with her to run across the property toward her house, skidding to a halt twice in shock as lightning hit far too close.

Cam had been to war zones that were less hazardous than this hundred-yard dash.

Finally, Piper shoved open her front door and they stumbled inside. Kicking the door shut behind them, she set down the cat, who meandered off without so much as a thank-you glance.

“Ingrate,” he muttered as Piper moved off as well.

She was back in less than a minute with a lantern that wasn’t dead. Pushing a bunch of mail and an empty pizza box to one end of a coffee table, she set it down. “Should’ve cleaned up,” she muttered. “It’s on my list.”