Cowboy in Wolf's Clothing

by Kait Ballenger

  She was bending that rule now with the high commander of the Grey Wolf armies lying asleep on the cabin bed. She wasn’t doing the greatest job of hiding from the law either, considering he was the law, at least for their kind.

  She looked toward Colt again. He was still asleep but he stirred, his eyelids fluttering. He looked years younger when he slept. All the harsh angles of his face softened.

  How had she ended up here? Alone in a cabin with a Grey Wolf cowboy—and not just any cowboy but the highest-ranking Grey Wolf soldier in existence. Subordinate only to Maverick Grey and whoever the Grey Wolf second-in-command was. Though the last she’d heard several months ago, the Grey Wolves still hadn’t appointed someone after the death of their last second.

  One word from this man, and she’d be in a cell again before she could blink.

  At the very least, he didn’t recognize who she was. Even her name hadn’t triggered any recollection, which meant when he left, she would return to her original plan. She knew exactly where she was headed. Back to the rodeo. To her old life. To healing cowboys’ wounds and broken bones. The life she had loved before the Wild Eight. It hadn’t been perfect, but it had treated her well.

  She perched on the edge of the bed to check his pulse again. But as she did so, a sudden blur of movement caught her off guard. She was suddenly on the bed and he was on top of her, the knife, which had been sitting on the bedside, clutched in his hand. The blade pushed against her throat as she lay caged on the mattress beneath him.

  Fear froze her in place. Maybe he did know her identity after all.

  He stared down at her with alert eyes, far more alert than someone newly awake should be. His breathing was rough, labored as if he’d run a marathon. As his eyes scanned over her, he swore under his breath, immediately casting the blade aside, much to her relief. She was suddenly breathless herself as she marveled at the intense gray of his eyes. Cold, calculating, yet they burned into her.

  What she wouldn’t give to see that tenderness reflected there again…

  They lingered like this, their bodies pressed together for a long beat. That same blazing heat returned to her center, the one she’d first felt when she’d been in his arms. She knew she should have been terrified, but there was something about this man, despite the evidence of the violent life he lived, that made her fearless, brave—terms she never would have used to describe herself.

  Or maybe reckless and stupid. She couldn’t be certain.

  “Oh, it’s you,” he mumbled.

  Any thought of romance flew out the window. “I see you’re feeling better.”

  He cleared his throat and pushed off her, scratching a large, masculine hand through the scruff on his face before he ran his fingers through his hair. It gave him the sexiest kind of bed head. Belle bit her lower lip and averted her eyes. The Grey Wolf high commander held the power to destroy her with a single word, and here she was, panting after him like a she-wolf in heat.

  Colt grumbled some unintelligible just-woken-male response.

  “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten my name already. ‘Oh, it’s you’ isn’t exactly what a woman wants to hear after she saves your life.”

  “I didn’t forget your name, Belle.” His voice was still graveled from sleep, and there was a glint of teasing in his eyes. “Would you have preferred ‘Oh, it’s the horse thief’? or ‘Good afternoon, she-wolf voyeur’?”

  Yes, she much preferred him when he was sleeping. Already he was trying to get a rise out of her. Though in some ways it frustrated her, she liked their banter more than she cared to admit.

  With the early afternoon light streaming through the window, the sun highlighted the blondish undertones of his messy brown hair. God, he was equal parts gorgeous and terrifying. He was still shirtless from where she’d tended his wounds, exposing the rippled muscles of his abs and pecs as well as the scars and ink that made him appear rough. The snug blue jeans he wore accentuated the trim of his legs and that behind she knew was so muscled, she wanted to take a bite out of it. His body had been hardened by a combination of ranch work and battle, and her eyes fell to a black tribal tattoo of the sun that sat on his left pectoral overtop his heart.

  It was entirely unfair. This man had everything going for him. Looks, power, privilege.

  “We need to head back to the Missoula ranch,” he announced, instantly cutting the tension between them. “I’d like to arrive by morning, and it will slow Silver down to carry us both.”

  He said it as if it were an order. He was likely used to making decisions for others without consulting them. But not for her. She was done with a life of alpha males bossing her around.

  She straightened the bedsheets, refusing to look at him. “We?”

  Those intense eyes followed her. “You’re not returning to your pack?”

  She made a show of fluffing the pillows. Really, she was beating out her frustration on them, but she didn’t think he’d notice. “No, I’m not.”

  “Are you running from something?”

  She pretended not to hear him. The question cut straight to the heart of the matter. She couldn’t tell him the Grey Wolves weren’t her pack. Some would have called the Wild Eight her pack for a time when she’d served as their physician, but she hadn’t been able to leave. Not then. Not without abandoning Dalia to Wyatt’s mistreatment. Her thoughts turned to the old woman, and a tinge of sadness hit her heart. If only she’d known what the outcome would be. As far as she was concerned, she’d never had a pack. And she was running. From the Grey Wolves, the Wild Eight. All of it. She was running back to her old life, to freedom, to the rodeo.

  When she finished beating the ever-loving piss out of the pillows until they were puffed, fluffy clouds, she started tucking in the bedsheets.

  “If this is about you being out in the woods after curfew, forget it. I’m a man who pays my debts. I’ll overlook it,” he said.

  She stilled at his words. So that was what she’d be to him? A debt to be paid. She shouldn’t have cared how he would remember her. They were strangers, and after he left this cabin, she was certain she’d never see him again.

  Years ago, before she’d gotten tangled up with the Wild Eight, she’d tended countless riders in the rodeo she never saw again. There was likely to be a rodeo within fifty miles anywhere in the States, so she’d worked wherever she wanted and kept only a handful of connections. She’d never needed anyone, never cared what they thought, so long as she did her job and healed them. So why did this cowboy’s opinion matter so much?

  Because he risked his life for you, and you know he would do it again in a heartbeat…

  Pushing the thoughts aside, she finished making the bed. “I’m not going back to the Missoula ranch.”

  He towered over her, dwarfing both her and the cottage, examining her with weary, suspicious eyes that seemed to know too much. “You want to be alone? Out here in the woods?”

  “I do.” She gathered the dirty rags and threw them into the sink before she turned on the cold-water faucet. There was no washer or dryer at a Rogue house, but the cold water and some dish soap would work the blood out all the same.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “West.”

  “And what’s your plan?”

  She remained silent.

  “You could just tell me the truth, you know.” He pegged her with a scrutinizing stare. “You’re not a Grey Wolf.”

  Belle stiffened.

  “I’m the Grey Wolf high commander, Belle. You thought I wouldn’t recognize a Rogue house when I saw one?” he asked.

  Glaring at Colt, she snatched the bowl of bloody water off the table. She didn’t address him. If she spoke, she’d give too much away, though her silence was likely doing so already. His questions were a double-edged sword, and there was no way she’d win this battle. Better not to engage.

 
“The Rogue is one of our top enemies. He’s a troublemaker for all packleaders. The houses may be convenient, but it’s not worth the chance of getting mixed up with the likes of that bastard vigilante,” he added.

  Belle disagreed. From her knowledge, the Rogue in all his mysteriousness didn’t condone violence against the packs. He might have been a troublemaker, and she wouldn’t want to cross paths with him in a dark alley, but he worked for the betterment of her kind. Carrying the bowl carefully, she exited the cabin. She’d dump it in the utility sink around back.

  “There’re a few men’s shirts in the closet. Go ahead and take your pick,” she said over her shoulder as she went. Another fortunate feature of the Rogue houses was that they remained packed with plentiful survival supplies and essentials.

  As she stepped outside, the cold wind hit her hard, chilling her to the bone. But that was the lingering Montana winter. She couldn’t wait till spring gave way fully. She descended the porch steps and headed around back, her cowgirl boots shielding her from the inches of snow she trudged through as she dumped the bloody water into the utility sink, trying not to think of Colt’s realization about her pack affiliation.

  She was ready for him to leave. When he’d been passed out, he’d appeared harmless. Not to mention she’d felt grateful to him since he’d risked his life to save her. It had all worked as a horrible cocktail that softened her to him.

  But now, she was growing more anxious by the second. There was nothing harmless about this man. And that had little to do with her unwanted attraction to him or the way his nearness made her melt like chocolate in the hot sun, thank you very much.

  When she returned to the cabin’s small wooden porch, he stood there, watching her. She wasn’t sure what alerted her, but something about his gaze had changed. He stared at her as if she were a piece to a puzzle he was trying to solve.

  “You said your friends call you Belle, which means your true name is something different. Perhaps…” He examined her with careful eyes. “Elizabeth?” he questioned. As he tested her name on his tongue, his eyes narrowed and his brow scrunched low.

  Belle froze. She watched in fear as the creases in his brow disappeared. Those liquid gray eyes grew wide, and that was when she knew he’d recognized her.

  Which meant she had no other choice but to run.

  Chapter 4

  Colt had been about to ask where he’d heard her name before, but as he’d watched her pretty features become stricken with terror, he’d recognized her in an instant. He’d seen her once before in a photograph. A photograph inside a file at Grey Wolf command control back at Wolf Pack Run.

  A file labeled Wanted Wild Eight.

  “Belle Beaumont,” he said, recognition flooding over him.

  The Wild Eight’s only physician.

  Which meant this woman who’d saved his life, who he’d held naked beneath him until he was aching with anticipation and pleasure…was his enemy.

  She dropped the empty basin in her hands as the fear in her eyes deepened. And then she ran.

  Shit.

  Colt raced after her. He couldn’t let this woman go. She bolted into the trees as he chased her, rounding pine trunks and leaping over mounds of snow. She was fast, but even with her head start, he gained on her quickly.

  She darted off course to where the trees thickened. Colt followed, but by the time he reached the trees, she was gone, hidden behind one of the thick layers of pine needles.

  “You can run, Belle, but you can’t hide,” he called after her. “Not from me.”

  Silence answered him, but he knew she was close. He sensed it. Slowly, he prowled through the trees, searching for her. A rustling of branches sounded behind him. She was trying to keep moving to throw him off her trail. But he was only a few feet away from her.

  It was now or never.

  Colt pounced, tackling her from the side. She shrieked as they both toppled to the ground in a tangle of limbs. They landed in the snow, Belle on top of him, writhing and struggling. The ordeal sent a sharp burst of pain through his still-healing wound, but Colt locked his arms around her. With one quick twist of his hips, he had her pinned beneath him.

  “Let me go!” she growled. Her dark curls sprawled out over the melting snow beneath her. Anger blazed in her eyes.

  “I can’t do that.” Not now that he knew who she was.

  She tried to wiggle away, but that did nothing except draw his attention to the soft mounds of her breasts pushed against him.

  With her beneath him like this, his body was instantly back in the Missoula territory, where the feel of the heat between her legs had pressed over his throbbing cock. The darker part of him was enjoying this. Yet she was his enemy and his own darkest secret rolled into one. Even if she’d saved him. Damn it all to hell.

  He moved to stand, drawing her up by the arm. As soon as she was on her feet, he had ahold of her. There was no way she’d dare try to overpower him. It would be a losing battle, and she had to recognize that.

  “Walk,” he ordered, nodding in the direction of the cabin and, more importantly, Silver. He needed to get this woman subdued and back to the Missoula ranch. Savior or not, she was one of only five active Wild Eight remaining. The nefarious pack had been disbanded following the start of the war, and the Grey Wolves had been searching for the remaining few survivors ever since. Maverick wasn’t a fan of loose ends, and neither was Colt.

  Especially not when it came to the legacy of the Wild Eight.

  “You’re making a mistake,” she pleaded.

  As far as he was concerned, this was the first action he’d been certain of since he’d found her naked and stealing his horse in that clearing. He should never have gone after her.

  “Please,” she continued. “Don’t put me back in that cell again.”

  The pieces of the puzzle fell into place. That was why she’d been in the forest. She hadn’t been violating the ban; she had been making a run for it. Her capture must have been recent, because her paperwork had yet to be forwarded from the Missoula ranch to the main ranchlands at Wolf Pack Run. With all the pack’s guards and soldiers addressing the vampire threat last night, she must have found a way to escape from the cellblock, right out from under his and his men’s noses.

  She’d made complete fools of them all.

  Colt growled. “How did you escape?”

  “I used a bobby pin to pick the lock,” she confessed. “It was stuck in my hair from when they took me captive.”

  He scowled. Not shy and meek or innocent as he’d first thought in that clearing. Not at all. If anything, she was smart, clever, brave, and defiant as all get-out, with a past as complicated as his own. He’d been misjudging her from the start. To think she’d escaped a Grey Wolf prison. While the subpacks weren’t as tight on security as Wolf Pack Run, a fact he’d come to their territory to help correct, courtesy of the war, her escape was impressive nevertheless.

  And she’d done it with a bobby pin.

  It was an oversight he couldn’t afford to risk. Not again.

  When they reached the cabin, Colt beckoned Silver. The horse trotted obediently to his side, allowing Colt to reach into the saddlebag and retrieve a pair of silver handcuffs. At the sight of the cuffs, Silver’s eyes darted to Belle. He clearly had an impression of what was about to happen, because he chose that moment to snap at Colt’s hand.

  Colt swatted the horse away. “Disloyal bastard.” He wasn’t sure what made Silver so taken with Belle, but he supposed that made two of them.

  “You keep spare handcuffs in your saddlebag? You really are a control freak,” Belle said.

  “You have no idea,” Colt grumbled.

  Silver huffed as if in agreement, and Colt scowled.

  Enemy or not, Colt could think of a few things he’d like to do with this she-wolf and a pair of handcuffs, things that involved him buryi
ng himself between her thighs and pleasuring her so thoroughly, she wouldn’t walk straight for a week.

  Pushing the fantasy aside, Colt slapped the cuffs on her wrists. The cuffs would suffice to hold her for now.

  “You don’t have to do this. I saved your life.”

  Colt almost laughed. “After dragging me miles away from the Missoula ranch. You can’t expect me to believe you had no ulterior motive, sweetheart. I wouldn’t be surprised if your Wild Eight buddies showed up any minute.”

  “If by ‘ulterior motive’ you mean saving your life from the vampires trying to abduct you, then yes, I did have an ulterior motive,” she said.

  Colt froze. Abduct. Not kill or maim. His thoughts turned to Lucas’s offer. Gripping her shoulders, he guided her until she faced him. “Abduct? You mean take me alive?”

  “That’s typically what abduction means,” she quipped.

  He knew exactly what it meant. It meant this situation was growing more complicated by the second.

  “How do you know this?”

  “After the vampire attacked you and I saved your life,” she emphasized, “I overheard something nearby. I might not have noticed if it weren’t for Biscuit over there.” Her gaze darted toward Silver, who flicked his tail appreciatively at the attention. He might as well have been blushing like a bride.

  Colt scowled in response.

  From the annoyed look the horse cast him, he was clearly pleased by only one wolf’s attention over the past twenty-four hours—and it wasn’t Colt’s. Needy beast of a horse.

  “What did you overhear?” Colt urged.

  “Just voices. I followed them,” Belle continued. “I thought it might have been some of your soldiers. I figured I could draw their attention to you, then hightail it out of there, but I found vampires, not wolves. They were talking about finding you. A vampire named Lucas saw you get injured, and his men were looking for you. They said if they didn’t find you in the woods, they’d take you when you returned to the ranch. That’s why I brought you here instead. And…” Her voice trailed off.