Wolf Shield Investigations: Boxset

by Dee Bridgnorth

  She pulled her head back, her face on fire. It was probably the same color as her hair. Had he lost his mind? “Is this your new angle?” she spat, horrified and embarrassed.

  “Huh?”

  “Flirting? Is that your new angle? Your plan of attack?”

  He burst out laughing, which somehow only managed to humiliate her. “What?” she demanded, raising her voice so he could hear her over the donkey bray of his laughter. “It’s so unbelievable that you’d flirt? What, am I a hag?”

  “No,” he chuckled. “Oh, shit, I haven’t laughed that hard in a while.”

  “I’m so glad I gave you a reason to laugh.” She punched her pillow, since punching him would probably get her in trouble. She would’ve loved nothing more.

  Maybe not nothing. The thought of those arms of his sent her thoughts moving in other directions.

  “Listen.” He sat up, propping one elbow on the mattress. “I’m not laughing at you. I mean, I was laughing at you but not for the reason you think.”

  “Whatever.”

  “No, not whatever. Don’t be immature.”

  “Says the guy who might’ve peed himself just now laughing at me.”

  “Laughing because you think everything I do is to trick you. I was just making a comment. I wasn’t serious.”

  “Oh, God forbid. I would never have guessed you were serious.” She rolled her eyes.

  “I wouldn’t ever have guessed you were so touchy.” He lowered himself to the floor, snickering.

  “No. Wait. Hold on.” She leaned over again. “Let’s get this straight. I don’t see any reason for there to be any joking right now. This isn’t a jokey, fun situation. I know somebody wants me dead.”

  “Somebody wants me dead, too,” he reminded her, and he wasn’t snickering anymore. His face had turned to stone. “Don’t act like you’re the only one. I’m just as much under fire as you are.”

  “Why do they want you dead?”

  “None of your business.”

  “I told you why they want me dead.”

  “Good for you. I could’ve told without you explaining it.” He closed his eyes like he expected that to end the conversation.

  “Did you cross them?”

  “Stop,” he warned. “I mean it.”

  “You crossed them somehow. It doesn’t matter how. They eliminate anybody they think is a threat.”

  “I don’t wanna talk about this. At all. Let it go.”

  “No. Now I really want to know. I mean, seriously, no joke. You’re the good guys, right? You’re the ones who want to help people and protect them. Why you?”

  “Why anybody? Who’s to say? I don’t even know exactly who we’re talking about.” There was a softness in that, a vulnerability. Did he even know how he sounded? How he looked like he was in pain?

  “I wish I could help you with that. I do,” she insisted when he opened one eye to shoot her a look. “Really. I’m not holding out on purpose. I really don’t know how to reach them.”

  “I know a way you can help.” Both eyes opened fully now. “Tell me your name. Your full name. Give our team at headquarters your full name, first and last. Let them trace your bank transfers. You can be of help to us. It’s not like you’re powerless.”

  She’d known this was coming, of course. He was bound to want to know her full name. She couldn’t keep her secrets forever. “Tell me why they want you dead.”

  There was no taking it back, no pretending she hadn’t said it. His eyes opened just a fraction more, his jaw tightening as he sat up.

  She sat up, too, legs folded. “I mean it.”

  “What if I told you I already know your last name?” he whispered. It wasn’t a soft sound, the sort of sound a man might whisper to a woman in the dark. More like the sound of a snake about to strike.

  “You don’t know the password to my bank account, where all that lovely wire transfer information can be found.” She found herself smiling. They were on an even footing again. Even-ish, at least.

  “How about I tell you we can get into any bank account we want? We have a hacker who could get into the bank itself, forget your account.”

  “Ah,” she whispered. “But which bank?”

  His mouth opened, but he paused. “You got me,” he admitted with a snicker. “You weren’t carrying a wallet.”

  “No. I wasn’t.” She settled in. “Tell me. Why do they want you guys? What’s the big deal?”

  He was fighting with himself, practically vibrating from the effort. Whatever the reason, it had to be something big for him to fight so hard to keep it a secret. “We know things we shouldn’t. I really can’t tell you more than that.”

  She blinked. “And? That doesn’t tell me anything. Are you sure that’s even what it is? You don’t know who’s doing this to you, but you know why they’re doing it? It makes no sense.”

  “It doesn’t have to make sense to you. Believe me, it might be better that it doesn’t.”

  “Now I have to know. You don’t say something like that, then leave me hanging.”

  “Yeah. I do. That’s all I can tell you. We know too much. It would make them happy if our mouths were permanently shut. Just like you because you know too much.” His mouth tipped up at the corners. “See? Something else we have in common.”

  “What’s my last name?” she asked. “Since you know it.”

  “Niles.”

  Damn. It took effort to keep from swaying a little. “She is good, that researcher of yours.”

  “Two tours,” he murmured.

  “Yeah.”

  “Nothing after that,” he concluded. “Which tells us somebody wanted to make you disappear a long time ago.”

  This time, she couldn’t pretend to not care. She swayed a little, clutching her pillow. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah. I mean, you didn’t know that?”

  “No. I mean, I don’t do social media. I don’t put my life out there. But… nothing? At all?”

  “If Val can’t find it, it doesn’t exist.”

  “Oh.” Just like that, she forgot what they were originally talking about. She settled back down on the bed, not caring that he was still sitting up, staring at her.

  “Are you okay? I didn’t… I mean, I assumed you knew you’re a virtual ghost.”

  She shook her head. “I guess it makes sense. Right? They’d want me unfindable. Untraceable. I feel sort of… violated. Yes. That’s a good word for it. Violated.”

  “Wow.”

  She looked at him, sitting there in the light from the streetlamps. “What?”

  “Another thing we have in common,” he whispered, getting to his knees in one fluid motion. “Who would’ve guessed?”

  “They did that to you, too?”

  “In a different way but yeah,” he nodded, coming closer. She swallowed, finding her throat dry. “They violated us. And they keep doing it, the monsters. Even now, they can’t let us go. They have to keep coming at us. We didn’t ask for this, and neither did you.”

  “I didn’t,” she whispered.

  He reached out, stroking back the hair that had fallen over her forehead. It was too long—she’d been meaning to get it cut for weeks, maybe months. Things like that tended to fall by the wayside more often than she wanted to admit.

  It was like all the air had been sucked from the room the second his fingers made contact. He wasn’t even touching her skin, yet she broke out in goosebumps just the same.

  There was no ulterior motive now. There couldn’t be. This guy wasn’t exactly skilled when it came to hiding his feelings—they showed all over, from his expression to his voice to the way he carried himself. If he’d been hiding something or deliberately cozying up to her just to get information, she would’ve known it right off.

  Nobody could be as tender as he was, brushing back her hair with the gentlest motion, and not mean it.

  It had been so long since somebody had touched her that way, since she’d allowed herself to be touche
d. All at once, something cried out inside her. Something neglected, starved, sickly. Something she’d turned her back on over and over in favor of—what? Survival? Safety?

  She lifted her head slightly to meet the brush of his lips against hers, and her heart nearly exploded from the sweetness of his kiss. The simplicity. There was no urgency, no desperate need to take her. No, he explored. He tasted, teased both of them with every touch of his lips, every feather-light touch of his tongue.

  She rolled onto her back, inviting him, practically begging him with her body to do what he wanted because she wanted it too, that connection. The sense of being seen, heard, felt. The sense that she was more than a ghost, more than someone without a name or a home or a family.

  It didn’t matter who he was or who she was. All of that was extra, in the way, clouding what really mattered—this intimacy, this connection. He knew what it was like to feel the way she did. That was enough for her just then.

  And he started to climb onto the bed too, placing one hand on either side of her and beginning to shift his weight from the floor—when he stopped.

  She bit back a whimper but just barely. “What is it?” she whispered, his face hovering over hers. How she craved his weight on top of her, that glorious sensation.

  But no, his body went stiff. He looked up, toward the window. “Do you smell that?”

  “Smell what?” She sniffed the air but smelled nothing but him. She wanted to wrap herself in his scent, to get it all over her.

  “Smoke.” He exchanged one wide-eyed glance with her before bolting upright. “Get your shoes on. Now.”

  “I don’t smell anything!” Even so, she knew better than to argue, sliding into her boots.

  “I do. God damn it.” He pulled his jeans over his shorts and shoved his feet into his boots before flinging open the window.

  That was when she smelled it. It was enough to choke her. “Oh, my God!” she gasped, horrified even though she knew none of the homes were occupied. “What could’ve done that?”

  He didn’t say anything at first, shutting the window before getting on the phone. “Hurry up,” he barked before leaving the bedroom, shouting things into his phone.

  “Wait! Wait, Zane!” She raced out of the bedroom and nearly tackled him as he headed to the front door. “No, no! What if this is what they want? What if they’re trying to flush us out?”

  His eyes darted over her face, and for a second she could hardly believe the effect adrenaline was having on her because for a moment, they didn’t look like his eyes. They were… wider. Darker. And absolutely filled with loathing.

  He blinked, and the illusion shattered. He was only himself. “Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. Stay in here.”

  “Wait!”

  “No!” he roared loud enough to practically blow her hair back. She fell back a step in surprise.

  “I’m not letting you go out there alone!”

  He muttered a curse while pulling his pistol from its holster. “Here. Use it if you have to, but do not leave this house unless a fire breaks out in here. Do you understand? I’ll leave the front door open. Do not step foot out there unless you hear me call for you.”

  “Don’t do this,” she begged. What was she saying? What was she thinking? Since when did it matter so much what happened to him? One little kiss didn’t change anything.

  No. It had changed everything.

  “Just stay, damn it.” He thrust the gun into her hand—for a brief moment, she reflected on how he must trust her, handing her a weapon—before heading outside where the glow of the fire that blazed in the house across the street lit everything as bright as day.

  Chapter Nineteen

  He had no idea what to think when he stepped outside. “Fire,” he barked into the phone, his head on a swivel.

  “Dammit,” Logan growled.

  Zane looked down the line of houses, and to his dismay he found one after the other beginning to smoke. “It looks like they’re still here.”

  “Get her out of there as quick as you can,” Logan implored. “Before the firefighters come.”

  But Zane had other ideas. He ended the call, leaving his phone in the grass beside the house before quickly stripping down and letting the shift take over.

  So long as she stayed inside the house, he should be able to get away with this.

  The second his human consciousness was pushed back to allow the wolf to come through, the acrid smoke became that much more pungent. He trained his ears to the sound of any movement across the way—the crackling of flames threatened to drown it out, but he could hear someone. Someone running, someone setting the fires intended to draw them out of one of the houses.

  He took off at a run, cutting across the empty street, darting into the shadows. The smoke was thicker over here, and the house directly across from where Aimee waited was now almost fully ablaze. If somebody didn’t get out there soon and beat back the fire, the woods behind the homes might become engulfed, too.

  Of course, whoever set the fires didn’t think about that. All that mattered was bringing her out into the open, along with anyone with her.

  He ran from one house to the next, careful to keep himself hidden. It was nearly impossible to scent the intruder thanks to the smoke, the pungent stench of burning wood, insulation, plastic. The heat from the flames was evident even at a distance.

  The wolf panted, thirsty for something beyond water. It had been too long since he’d tasted blood.

  Then, he spotted his target, and the thirst only increased. It was all-consuming, the need to run down and tackle the man crouched in the hedges between two empty houses. He was big, though nowhere near as big as Zane and the rest of them. Dressed in black, which came as no surprise. There was a backpack slung over one shoulder, and the man reached inside to pull out what even a distance was clearly an incendiary device just like the ones he’d used up and down the row.

  Did the man know the houses were empty? How could he? No, for all he knew, he was murdering one sleeping family after another. This, on top of everything else racing through the mind of Zane’s wolf, sent him leaping out of the shadows with jaws snapping, claws extended.

  The man in question barely had time to turn before Zane was on him. They tussled for a second or two, sheer adrenaline and surprise giving the arsonist a burst of strength.

  But he was no match for a bloodthirsty wolf. Zane pinned him to the ground on his back, jaws dripping, poised inches over the man’s throat.

  There was a choice to be made here.

  His human consciousness struggled with the wolf’s. He could either kill this man here, which would have been immensely satisfying and no better than what an arsonist like him deserved, or he could attempt to question him. There was no questioning him now as the wolf.

  He could find out who sent this man, but what were the odds of getting an honest answer?

  No, he had to die. His blood had to flow. He didn’t deserve mercy, not after what he’d already done. Going from house to house, killing indiscriminately for all he knew.

  Yes, but wouldn’t that make the wolf no better than him?

  The man was obviously no threat—he trembled and quaked beneath Zane’s paws, whimpering, tears rolling down the sides of his face and illuminated in the glow of the fire he’d set. His heart hammered out of control, the drumbeat plain in Zane’s ears.

  Rather than tear out his throat, Zane settled on fixing his teeth around the man’s pant leg. He pulled him, dragging him along the ground as he cried out and struggled to be free. He even kicked out with his free foot, which earned him a reward of Zane’s fangs biting into his flesh.

  He howled in pain, the coward, but it was enough to make him stop kicking.

  “Stop! Stop!” the arsonist begged instead, still trying to break free. Zane dragged him across the street, only coming to a stop once he reached the place where he’d left his things.

  He then did something he would never have done under any other circumstances,
for any reason.

  He shifted back, right in front of the guy, still on top of him.

  The arsonist barely had time to register what had just happened—and the fact that a huge, naked man was now pinning him to the ground—before Zane snarled in his face. “Are you alone?”

  “Wh—what?” the man gasped, terrified.

  “Are you alone?” he bellowed.

  “Yes!” he cried out. “Yes, I’m alone! Please, don’t—”

  Zane picked up a block used for edging a nearby garden bed and struck the man on the side of the head, knocking him unconscious.

  By the time Aimee ran out, pistol at the ready, he was dressed. She took one look at him, then at the man on the ground, and asked, “What happened?”

  He wished he knew what to say. Just like he wished he could trust the woman in front of him, the woman he’d actually gone so far as to hand his weapon to. He held out his hand, silently asking to have it back, and she handed it over without protest.

  A point in her favor, he guessed, but still.

  “We have to get out of here,” he muttered. The smoke was getting thicker by the second, enough to practically choke him. Aimee coughed, stretching her T-shirt up over her nose and mouth.

  “What are you going to do with him?” she asked, looking down at the unconscious man. Blood trickled down the side of his head.

  “He’ll have to come with us.” Zane looked up at her. “Do you know him?”

  She shook her head without hesitation. “I’ve never seen him before.” He would have to take her word on that.

  “Go in the house, and get the rope. I have to tie him.” She ran back into the house, leaving him alone to wonder what the hell was happening. Hadn’t she been the one to ask him that question? There was no way of answering since he didn’t have the first clue.

  It seemed there was more to this than just arson, but he couldn’t put his finger on exactly why this bothered him the way you did.

  “Do you think he was alone?” she asked, tossing in the rope.

  He got down on one knee, working quickly. “He said he was before I knocked him out,” he settled for replying. There was no way for him to explain that he hadn’t smelled the presence of anyone else, either.