Iron Flats Rebel: Shifter Realms

by Elle Thorne

  Seems everyone around me’s got something on their brain.

  Jared studied the spot where Darby had fallen. The last couple times he’d been up here to feed Vix while she was unconscious at Gabe’s cabin, he’d sat at the very spot they’d crash-landed and reflected on the events from that day. There was something mysterious about Darby. Some secret, of that he was sure. Could he get her to talk about it one day? Hopefully, before she decided to return back to Silver Peaks? He pushed the thoughts away and pushed himself toward the business of feeding the little fox mama and her kits.

  He scaled the rocks swiftly and nimbly, his shifter skills enabling him to practically blur up the steep side. He took the meat out and whistled softly for Vix.

  The response was a soft whine. That was when he picked it up. Fresh blood. He pulled the air in a flehmen behavior. Fox blood. Coyote piss.

  Fuck. Goddamned coyotes.

  He leaned closer to the crevice, thankful his shifter sight would allow him to see deep into the darkness within. Several eyes glowed, watching him. He put his hand close to the entrance. “Vix?”

  The fox hobbled closer, her leg a mangled mess. Jesus. It looked like a coyote had got the best of her. He counted eyes. Vix’s, plus another four pair. He heaved a sigh of relief. “Little lady, you’re going to need to trust me more than you already have.”

  “Everything okay up there?” Gabe’s voice carried, though his tone was soft.

  Jared turned around slightly. “No. She’s injured. I’ll need to take her to the cabin.”

  “How can I help?”

  Jared paused to assess the situation. He slid a chunk of stew meat her way. Vix snatched it up and swallowed it whole, then she licked his hand over and over, long past after she’d cleaned the beef blood away. “She doesn’t know you, and I don’t want to spook her. I’ll come get the box on the back of the side-by-side, then I’ll load her and the kits up, put a blanket on top and hope to hell she doesn’t try to jump out.”

  Moments later, with no fuss or muss from the injured fox and her trusting kits, Jared had all five in the cargo box. A horse blanket beneath them and another over the top. With Gabe driving, the meat securely at Jared’s feet, they made as slow a progress as possible toward the cabin as they could to keep Vix and the young foxes from becoming upset.

  “What happened to her?” Gabe asked, his voice low.

  “Coyotes, I’d say. She’s lucky to be alive. You didn’t see anything when you came to get the side-by-side did you?”

  “Nothing. You can keep her at the cabin as long as you like. There’s a shed next to the house. Purt’ near empty. Won’t take much to turn it into a den for her and the kits.”

  Purt’ near? Jared was under the impression—based on Judd’s sharing some information about Gabe—that Bonegate wasn’t a Southerner. Or even country. So how long would he have been around someone to pick that phrase up? “How’d you come by my grandfather’s cabin? Not questioning the legality of it. Just wondering what it was that brought that about.” Along with what you are. How long you’ve been here? And how old you are? Those were questions he wasn’t sure he’d get the answer to and didn’t want to push the wrong buttons, so he kept his lip zipped on that.

  “It was a long time ago. Before you were born. Before your father died. For that matter, before your father was even born.”

  “So you’ve been around Iron Flats for a while,” Jared prompted.

  “Could say that.” Gabe turned the wheel slightly, heading past the mesa, which was currently devoid of Luke’s wolf and his human mate. “I did something for your grandfather. The cabin and the land was how he paid the debt he felt he owed for it. It’s official, legal, etc. Binding. There are papers.”

  “I don’t doubt your honesty, Bonegate. Not in the least. What’d you do for my grandfather.?”

  “That’s not my story to tell.”

  “Paw” —what they called Jared’s grandfather— “has been gone a long time. I don’t think he’d mind.” He stroked Vix’s fur to keep her calm. She licked his hand while her kits cuddled up to her, nursing and kneading their mother’s side.

  “He’s not the only party that’s involved in the situation.” Gabe made the final turn that would lead them to the cabin, less than a mile away.

  “Is that supposed to make me feel less curious? Because it’s accomplishing the opposite.”

  “I’m not trying to make you feel anything, Jared Dorsett. I’ve said what I feel comfortable saying. If I ever get the okay to say more, I’ll probably talk to you and your brother about it.”

  Jared fell silent for the short remainder of the ride, murmuring softly to Vix, though his mind raced about what mysteries Gabriel Bonegate was hiding. He’d have to ask Keith what he knew. Then he’d probably talk to Judd about it, because Judd seemed to have gotten closer to the gray-eyed man than any of the others.

  Jared and Gabriel lifted the cargo box and carried it to the shed. Gabriel moved a few things around, then, using some chicken wire, they created a pen that would keep the kits safe. Jared set them up with drinking water and hay to lay on. He placed the cargo box with both blankets in a corner, so she’d have something which resembled the crevice she’d been hiding in.

  “You’ll be safe here,” he told her, then he set up a play area outside the shed for when she wanted to take the kits outside but where they’d be protected from hawks and other predators. “I won’t let you guys out without being with you,” he promised Vix.

  “Let’s tend to her wound,” Gabe said, bringing out a first aid kit. “Need to make sure she heals without problems.”

  Jared kept her busy with loving and petting while Gabe made short work of cleaning the raw flesh and wrapping a bandage around it.

  “Hopefully, she doesn’t rip it off,” Gabe said as they stepped out of the shed and left the fox to rest and care for her kits.

  “Thanks for your help,” Jared told him. “Want a cold one?”

  “Wouldn’t turn one down.”

  Jared grabbed two from the outside fridge on the back deck, and they took up spots on benches at a picnic table under a large elm near the shed, where he could keep an ear out for Darby.

  “Why’d you bring me the side-by-side?” Jared popped the top of the bottle and pitched the cap into a nearby 50-gallon drum.

  “Thought you might could use my help.” Gabe used the longneck to tip his hat back a notch.

  “I’m not buying it, Bonegate. You knew I had it covered.”

  “Guess I thought I should keep an eye on things.” His flat-gray eyes gave nothing away.

  “Things? The cabin? By the way, it’s a lot different from Judd’s, and as I recall, I thought it was similar. Yours has been… upgraded. You did that or my grandfather?” Jared took a long pull off the cold beer then stared at Gabe, waiting for his response.

  Gabe twisted the beer over and over in his hand, twirling it slowly “When I took it over, it mostly was like Judd’s. Maybe a bit more rustic than his.”

  “If by rustic, you mean beat up?”

  “Could be another way of phrasing it, I suppose.”

  Jared laughed, knowing full well the cabin Judd had was the same floor plan and having seen Judd’s and now this one, he would definitely say the word rustic was understating the matter. “So what things are you keeping an eye on exactly? Does this have something to do with Darby?”

  “What makes you say so?”

  “Something you said the first night. When I mentioned she was a shifter, remember? That she’d heal quickly. You said to get her help anyhow.”

  “I remember.” His gaze was suddenly hooded.

  “Don’t shut down on me. You got something to say, then say it.”

  “I told your grandfather a long time ago I’d keep an eye on you and Keith. I’m trying to keep my word.”

  “By saying something but not really nothing? That’s not a whole hell of a lot of help, Bonegate,” Jared said through clenched teeth. He wasn’t some damne
d child. If there was something going on, he deserved to know about it.

  “There’s a fine line between keeping an eye out and interfering. Especially when one isn’t invited.”

  “Well, goddamn. I’m inviting you.” Jared rose to his feet and paced toward the drum, did a tight circle around it, then back to the picnic table. “So this is about Darby. Do you know her?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, fuck-all, then what gives?”

  “You don’t care much for the new mates in your pack.”

  Well, that was out of the blue. “They’re human.” It should be good enough. Should cover exactly why he— “What are you bringing that up for?”

  “Just something I may have noticed. Maybe others noticed.”

  “Others? Like who? Who you been talking to?”

  “You ever wonder why your grandfather was so hellbent on shifters not taking humans as mates?”

  Jared’s head was spinning with the constant flipping of subjects. “Because Paw—” He stopped. “Because—” He shrugged. “Just did.”

  “And taught you the same. And Keith. Except Keith didn’t take it so well.”

  “Keith’s— Hell, I don’t know why Keith didn’t take to Paw’s teachings.”

  “He never told you why he was called Paw, did he? Because you know it wasn’t only his kids’ and grandkids’ nickname for him.”

  The more Gabe spoke, the less Jared felt like he knew the man who’d raised him after his own father passed. “Instead of questions, why don’t you start giving answers? Why’d they call him Paw? Why was he so against shifters and humans mating?”

  “I’ll take another one.” Gabe pitched the empty into the drum, then headed toward the fridge. As soon as he’d returned with his beer and popped the cap, he turned, so he was facing Jared. “A hell of a long time ago, your grandfather fell in love with a human. He brought her to Crooked Arrow.”

  “What? No. I’d have… I never heard of that.”

  “He forbid anyone from talking about it… after.”

  “After what?”

  “After she died. He sent his only son away, the one he’d had with her. Sent him to her family. He was shifter-recessive.”

  “No shit?”

  “Yes. They called the child Samuel. Sam. He didn’t end up with a Dorsett surname. He lived. He’d be your uncle.”

  “Why’d Paw do that?”

  “Hang on. Then he met and mated with a female wolf shifter. Your grandmother. She never knew. No one ever knew, and soon enough, it was like it never happened. Sam Dodge lived in Tahoe. Or somewhere thereabouts. And to my knowledge has no clue he’s a shifter-recessive.” He took a short swig of his beer. “Shifter-recessives have no animal, but they’ve been known to throw shifter offspring. Now, what I don’t know is if it happens when they mate with a human or with another shifter-recessive or even a shifter themselves.”

  “So, Paw didn’t want human-shifter relationships because his mate died?”

  “The heartache hit him hard. If she’d been a shifter, she could have shifted into her animal and healed.”

  Jared needed time to process this. The man who’d taught him shifter and humans ever being together was reprehensible had actually had one of those relationships himself. “Does Keith know? Is it why he’s so tolerant?”

  Gabe chuckled softly. “No, that’s his own nature. If he’d marked her, maybe she’d have had a better chance of surviving, but he never wanted her to feel the pain of the bite.”

  Marking was when a shifter bit his or her mate at the spot where the shoulder and the neck met. It left the one being bit with the mark which identified them as mated. It was their bond. It was definitely painful, and even more so for humans, Jared was sure, since humans had slower healing systems than shifters.

  Gabe finished the second beer in short order. “Your grandfather mourned that human for the rest of his years. He loved your grandmother, but it wasn’t the same kind of love. He was a shell of himself after his first love died. He wanted to save you and Keith from the same heartache.”

  Jared felt like the rug’d been pulled out from under him. Everything he’d thought about his grandfather’s values was based on something intangible. Something like smoke or steam. Nothing substantial. “Why’d they call him Paw?”

  “You never saw him without shoes?”

  “No.”

  “He got his foot caught in a trap when he was young and dumb. An enchanted trap created by a witch. He was never able to shift his foot back. It remained a paw. Specially designed shoes and all that.”

  “I never had a clue. About any of it.” It occurred to Jared how little he knew his grandfather. “How does any of this apply to Darby?” He brought it around full circle, getting back to the topic he’d originally asked about.

  “That’s for her to discuss with you.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Darby tried and tried to get her car started. All that had resulted was she’d damaged her ankle even further. You really did need to be able to use both legs to drive a stick shift. At the very least, she’d have fared better if it had been her left ankle which was injured.

  Finally giving up, she’d limped into the shower and washed away all the perspiration from trying to get her bag loaded into the car and starting the engine. She’d just redressed when she noticed dust rising in the near distance. She squinted into the brightness.

  Looked like Jared—

  And Gabriel Bonegate. The one who knew her secret. She gnashed her teeth.

  Now, what the hell was he doing back? How had he ended up in the ATV with Jared? Damn it. Had he told Jared about the potion?

  She hobbled to the bed and laid in it. She’d sooner feign sleep than talk to Gabriel. Or Jared. Because by now, Gabriel had undoubtedly spilled the tea.

  Fifteen minutes later, no Jared, no Gabriel. No one. She snuck out of bed and toward the large window. Perched behind the hanging egg chair, she studied the land outside. The ATV was there. But where were the guys? She needed a better angle.

  Grabbing the crutches, she limped toward the bathroom then sidled closer to the open window. She heard voices. Peeking around the curtains, she watched as Jared and Gabriel carried a large cargo box into the shed. A bit later, they constructed a closed-in coop using chicken wire, even going so far as to put a layer of the mesh on top.

  What the hell were they doing? He’d gone out to the mesa to feed Vix. So what’d he bring back? What did he need the enclosure for? She pursed her lip as she waited to see if Gabriel would leave.

  It didn’t seem so when Jared went to the fridge on the back deck and pulled out two beers. The men sat at a picnic bench nearby and conversed.

  She hated herself for watching them. She hated who she’d become because of her father. And she’d have left, too, if she hadn’t heard Jared’s question. “So what things are you keeping an eye on exactly? Does this have something to do with Darby?”

  Her ears pricked. Her body chilled as though she’d just received a blood transplant with arctic water. There was no leaving now. She had to hear what Gabe said, even though she felt like spit for what she was doing.

  You suck, she told herself. And she did suck. Sucked big time. Jared deserved better than her.

  She dropped away from the window, lowered the toilet seat, and cried tears of shame, humiliation, and defeat. She would leave. Somehow, she’d get better and get the hell out of here and leave.

  The next words convinced her she should get the heck out of the bathroom.

  Gabe told Jared, “You don’t care much for the new mates in your pack.”

  Jared replied, “They’re human.”

  That served to solidify her notion she needed to leave him as soon as possible. She’d go back to the Silver Peaks pack and face the music. She’d…

  She didn’t know what she’d do, other than leave.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jared peeked in on Darby. She was still in bed. An inert lump under the covers. Had
been like that since he’d seen Gabe off, which was four hours ago. Was she only sleeping? Was she okay? Her pulse didn’t reveal anything to make him think she was awake. It seemed steady. It was slow.

  Huh. Too slow?

  He approached, pulled the covers away from her head, watched for the rhythmic rise and fall of her chest. He took a good look at her face. Swollen. Crying? Why? What did she have to cry about?

  She stirred, opened her eyes. Focused on him. Said nothing. But it was there, in the depths of her gaze. A light had gone out. She wasn’t the girl he’d left behind this morning when he’d taken off to tend to Vix and the kits.

  Should he say something? Or leave it alone? He was already spent from reflecting on Gabe’s revelations. And Gabe’s non-revelations. What was it Gabe knew about Darby that he didn’t? What had she not opened up about? Was it the reason she’d been crying?

  “Want to see something?” He couldn’t think of anything which could cheer up a soul more than baby foxes.

  “Okay.” Not very thrilled, clearly. Definitely not the woman she’d been this morning. She winced as she tried to move her leg out of the covers.

  “Here.” He lifted the blankets and helped her swing her legs out. “Let me.” He picked her up and carried her outside to the shed, opening the door gently. “Hey, Vix. I brought you a friend.”

  “Vix? Why’s—” Her eyes opened wide. “What happened to her leg?”

  “Coyotes.”

  “Oh, my.” Tears filled her eyes. “Lucky you found her.”

  “She’ll be safe here.” He set her on a blanket not far from the foxes, closed the door behind them, then opened the gate for the foxes to come out if they wanted to.

  “You’re a good man, Jared.” Now the tears flowed. More and more.

  Oh, hell. Why’d she say that? What was he supposed to say in return?

  “You’re a good woman, Darby.” And hot. And sexy. And sweet. And someone I think I’d fall in love with if the right wind blew. And by right wind, he pretty much meant any wind.