Howl for a Highlander

by Terry Spear

  She should have planned this better, made sure she and Duncan had some kind of code to use in the event something like this happened.

  Who was she kidding? She never thought she would run into Duncan’s target out here. Or anywhere else, for that matter. She thought the guy would remain secluded at his island estate.

  But she had to tell Duncan the man was most likely here and let the Scot decide how he wanted to deal with the news. Somehow. She pulled her phone out of her pouch and dialed his number.

  The footfalls seemed to quicken in her direction. Great.

  “Why are we in such a rush now?” the woman said to Sal.

  “I thought you wanted to take a dip in the pool. If you wait too long, you’ll get burned.”

  “Thanks for worrying about me but I never burn. Will you swim with me?”

  “Not this time,” he said.

  Shelley dropped back into a crouch with her phone still to her ear. She was pretending to look at a termite hill and wishing Duncan would answer the phone when she heard his voice mail.

  Frustrated that she couldn’t reach him pronto, she quickly said, “It’s me.” She figured Duncan would recognize either her voice or her phone number, since she didn’t want to say her name out loud in the forest. She had to say something in some sort of code, but she wasn’t sure he’d figure it out. Still, she didn’t have any other choice. “I just found the plant specimen I know you wanted to locate. It’s really important. Call me!”

  She hung up and was just taking another close-up picture of a mahogany tree when the man named Sal and the woman edged into view. Shelley turned slightly to acknowledge them, get a good look at both of them, and categorize them like she did her plants in the event she saw them again. She was dying to take a picture of them to give to Duncan to verify that this was the man he was after.

  Instead, she gave them a half smile in greeting, said a perfunctory “Hello,” and began writing in her notebook again as if they didn’t interest her in the least.

  Sal had light-brown hair with streaks of gray threaded through it and looked to be in his midfifties in human years. He was wearing a white polo shirt and black jeans and muddy, white boat shoes. His face was tanned as if he spent a lot of time in the islands. If this was Duncan’s thief, he was using Duncan’s family’s savings—as well as those of others and the college—to enjoy the island paradise. He was fairly nondescript beyond that, except for his eyes. They were a wolf’s eyes—amber, curious, intrigued.

  The woman was closer to being in her early twenties. She quickly wrapped her arm around the man’s waist as if she was afraid he might stray as soon as he saw Shelley. Especially because of the way he was showing his interest in her. The woman was wearing hot pink shorts and a hot pink halter top with nothing to hold up her swaying breasts, which had to be enhanced, considering how big they were and how petite the rest of her was. The woman’s hair was long and blond, and either the wind had done a number on it, or she thought it looked sexy without being combed after she’d fallen out of bed that morning.

  “Hello,” Sal said to Shelley, drawing close and obviously interested in or suspicious of her.

  Probably interested. Because she was a female wolf. She figured he didn’t have a reason to be suspicious of her; her worry about who he might be had probably put her on edge.

  She surreptitiously sniffed the air to ascertain if he was a wolf, and a slight smile touched his lips at seeing her check him out. Yeah, he was a wolf, and he liked that she knew he was. Bastard. The woman was strictly human and wearing too much cloying perfume. Shelley wondered how he could stand it, considering how sensitive a wolf’s sense of smell was. Natural, sweet-smelling soaps and shampoos were one thing, but heavy perfumes or colognes quite another.

  “Are you here on vacation?” he asked Shelley, his voice dark and an attempt at sexy, but she found Duncan’s voice much more appealing and this guy even more of a lout. Duncan was sexy without trying. This guy was trying way too hard and falling far short of anything appealing.

  She suspected the warrior in Duncan, the power to persuade people with a look and a word, made her take notice. This man was more like a parasite, using others’ money for power. He wouldn’t have been powerful among a pack of wolves and would never have lasted there.

  He raised a brow when she hesitated to answer his question about whether she was on vacation, shaking her loose of her thoughts. Maybe he believed she was reluctant to speak with a stranger. A beta wolf who might meekly give in to his every desire. She lifted her chin, showing him she was no beta wolf.

  She really didn’t want to answer his question, wanted to tell him it was none of his business, but what if she could help Duncan with his mission? Even if he didn’t want her help. She didn’t want to alienate this man. “I’m here to do some research on plants. I’m a professor of botany.”

  A definite light shown in his eyes. He was impressed. She wasn’t sure if it was because of what she was doing or that she wasn’t about to be cowed. “Ah.”

  From the earlier conversation she’d heard, Shelley could tell Sal wasn’t interested in plants, so she was surprised when he said, “I have quite a garden at my place. One in France as well.”

  The girlfriend looked up at him with narrowed eyes. “You never told me you had a place in France. Switzerland, yes.”

  Despite not wanting to show any interest, Shelley was intrigued. How she’d love to see gardens in France. Not his particularly, but the great gardens of Versailles immediately came to mind.

  He shrugged and said to Shelley, “If you’d like to stop by for drinks later, you could see my gardens.”

  And what else?

  But her thoughts were spinning with the ramifications. Oh. My. God. Duncan, where are you when you should be right here, right now?

  She stood a little taller, and in a calmer voice than she’d thought she could muster, she asked, “Could you… give me your phone number? I’ve got to talk to my girlfriend. I’ll have to confirm that we don’t have any other plans.”

  Even though she wasn’t an undercover-spy kind of girl, what if she could get into his house and learn something? Maybe he’d reveal something that he wouldn’t tell anyone else.

  She was trying to keep this professional without turning him off or getting in over her head, so she hoped her attempt would work.

  “Drinks?” the woman said shrilly, her scowl growing even more rabid. It really wasn’t becoming. “With her?”

  Sal ignored the woman, fished a business card out of a gold card holder, and wrote on the back. His private number, Shelley thought.

  Duncan would give her hell for even speaking with the man, she figured. And even more for taking Sal’s business card instead of immediately saying she wasn’t interested. But she had called Duncan, and he hadn’t answered his phone. So what was she supposed to do?

  Sal must have assumed she’d throw aside any plans she’d had because he said, “I’ll have a limo pick you up at seven tonight.”

  “If you’ll give me the address, I’ll drop by… if I can make it. But I’ll let you know one way or another.”

  He seemed more amused than perturbed at her reluctance to fall at his feet. He had to know that had to do with her being a wolf. He might even be considering that Shelley wouldn’t like his girlfriend tagging along.

  He confirmed that when he said, “Lola will be going out for the night.”

  Lola glowered at him, her lips parted in shock. Before she could say a word, he bowed his head a little to Shelley, a gentlemanly wolf’s way of bidding her good-bye, and then quickly pulled Lola past Shelley before the woman started spitting fire.

  “What do you mean I’m going out for the night? You didn’t even ask what her name was. Did you know her? What if I don’t want to go out for the night? You can’t do this to me!”

  He could and he would. That’s the kind of man he was. Loyal only to himself, Shelley thought.

  “Be quiet,” he snapped at Lola under his
breath. The threat in his tone said that if Lola didn’t obey him, she’d be out on her ear, flying home at the earliest convenience.

  The woman didn’t say another word, apparently getting the message loud and clear, and Shelley wondered if Sal had given her an ultimatum before. Girlfriends were replaceable.

  Shelley was still thoroughly rattled, partly because she’d met the monster Duncan wanted to take down, but also because Sal wanted to get to know her better. She couldn’t think about plants or writing notes or taking pictures as she stared at the path where Sal had disappeared with the woman who appeared to be closer to a daughter’s age than a girlfriend’s.

  When Shelley’s phone rang, she stifled a cry of surprise. She pulled out the phone and looked at the caller ID. Duncan. What if Sal had heard her phone ringing? Could hear everything she said?

  She hurried away in the opposite direction from the one Sal and his girlfriend had taken toward the trailhead. She didn’t hear them any longer, but she still was worried that Sal might be watching and listening to her conversation while he made Lola stand silently with him in the forest.

  “Hello,” Shelley said to Duncan, her voice quieter than it would have been normally, but she knew Duncan could hear her anyway. She just hoped Sal couldn’t.

  “Shelley, what kind of cryptic message was that?” Duncan asked, sounding somewhat perturbed. “I told you I don’t know anything about plants, and…”

  “This one you’d want to see. But it’s too late. Don’t come to pick me up now. I’ve got more work to do.” What else could she say? His target was here? Come now? By the time he got here, Sal would be gone.

  “I wasn’t scheduled to pick you up for another hour and a half.” Duncan sounded slightly incredulous.

  She wasn’t getting through to him, but she didn’t want to blurt out that Salisbury Silverman was here. Particularly since she shouldn’t have known his last name, and he might be listening down the path.

  “Oh, the dinner cruise,” she said, as if Duncan had just told her he was taking her on one, and she’d forgotten all about it. She knew that was not going to go over well with Duncan, who wouldn’t know what the hell she was talking about. But she had to have a cover if Sal was within hearing distance.

  “What dinner cruise?” Duncan sounded thoroughly confused and a little cross.

  Play along, damn it.

  Shelley sighed. “I thought we were going tomorrow night. I guess I got my nights mixed up. Okay, let me know if you can reschedule for tomorrow night. If not, I’ll just have to say no to having drinks at the estate of…” She paused, reading the back of the business card with Sal’s name and a personal phone number scrawled on it and then flipping it over to the front to see a firm’s name, address, website, and phone number in expensive gold lettering. “Salisbury Silverton of Malicon Investments.”

  She didn’t know if that was a faux name for the guy’s business or not, since warrants were out for his arrest and surely he wouldn’t pass out cards like that to just anyone. Maybe he hadn’t had time to make new business cards that would conceal his beleaguered investment firm and figured she’d be too clueless to know he was a bad guy. That would have been the case if Duncan hadn’t told her about him. She hadn’t heard of the name of the man’s investment company, and he might use several as fronts for his scheming.

  Dead silence filled the air waves. That’s when she assumed that Duncan recognized the name of the firm or the other name Sal was using.

  “I’m coming to get you.” Duncan’s voice was so dark that she envisioned him wearing a kilt and with a claymore at his back as he rushed to the reserve.

  This couldn’t be good.

  “No! I’m not through cataloging plants!” She couldn’t allow Duncan to run into the man right here in the reserve, even though at first she’d thought it might be a good idea. Now she was thinking it might be better if they somehow strung the guy along and Duncan could see him alone, instead of with a human woman clinging to his arm who could serve as a witness to anything that might occur between Duncan and Sal.

  “Is he still there, damn it?” Duncan was so angry that she figured he was barely thinking straight.

  “Most likely. Pick me up later like we had planned. I still have tons of work to do. All right?”

  She just hoped she could get her mind back on her work. She doubted she could. She’d wanted to relish every delectable moment of describing every detail and taking pictures of every new specimen of plant, hoping she might discover one to test and learn if it could have an effect on werewolves’ ability to shape-shift. But instead, she was going to be thinking of Duncan and how angry he was. She envisioned him pacing across the villa, ready to kill Sal for even speaking with her.

  “All right?” she repeated, having to get his agreement.

  Shelley could just see the two men running into each other, ditching their clothes, and shifting. She assumed Duncan would win because he was a warrior at heart. Sal was a businessman who destroyed lives through investment fraud, but physically he couldn’t beat Duncan. And Sal’s girlfriend? Well, hell, Shelley would have to take care of Lola once she saw the two men shift into wolves.

  Humans who saw a werewolf shift had only two choices—death or joining the werewolves. In good conscience, she couldn’t add a woman like that to their ranks. The woman could easily give their kind away if she was turned. And the fake boobs would have to go. Genetically when the werewolf kind shifted, they became all wolf or all human. But if a human had fake components like implants, Shelley was certain the silicon wouldn’t dissolve with the change. A wolf with silicon implants was sure to cause a stir.

  Not that killing a woman was anything Shelley wanted to do, either. That’s what she was hoping to avoid.

  “All right?” she said again, not wanting to say Duncan’s name out loud in case Sal was listening. If she could, she would have said his name in a firm and commanding way, wanting to shake him out of his angry haze. If he had a middle name, she would have used it, too.

  “I’ll call you as soon as I get there.” Then he hung up on her.

  Her mouth open, she stared at the phone and swore under her breath. He did not just hang up on her.

  Okay, so she knew he was the kind of man who set his own rules, but she thought the plan she’d devised made sense. He should have listened to her. He was so angry that he wasn’t thinking clearly.

  Trying to overcome her own discomfiture and feeling as though Sal was lurking behind every massive, ancient tree, she began taking pictures and documenting the plants again, her heart in her throat as she made her way to a huge, yellow mastic tree with roots stretching across the path.

  She tried to pretend the world couldn’t come crashing down around her ears if the two men tangled as wolves.

  ***

  Shelley had thought Duncan would be trouble if he stayed with her?

  Hell, how had this happened? He’d been checking out Silverman’s house again, discovering four Doberman guard dogs and two men roaming the place along with a couple of gardeners. All of the men were human, which was a blessing. They couldn’t spot him in the dark of night, and they couldn’t smell him if the breeze blew in his favor. His survey of the staff seemed to confirm that Silverman surrounded himself with humans. Probably because wolves would have known how risky stealing fortunes from wealthy families would be.

  This time, Duncan had joined others at the beach near Silverman’s house, swimming with several people of different ages—older men and women, teens, and children—so he looked like one of the tourists. Many were walking along the beach and looking at the large estates. He was walking with some of them when he checked his phone messages and realized Shelley must have called while he was swimming.

  The cryptic message about wanting to see a plant specimen had totally thrown him. He almost didn’t call her back, being not in the least interested in a discussion of plants of any variety, especially not while he was trying to figure a way to get to Silverman.
>
  But her message sounded so urgent, and something else bothered him about it. He couldn’t decide what it was. A deeper anxiety, he thought. And whispered. That’s what it was. She’d whispered her message to him like she was in some kind of trouble. So he called her to make sure she was all right. If her call was only about plants, he had intended to set her straight on how much they didn’t interest him.

  Her response was so thoroughly confusing that he felt as if she’d had a conversation with him that morning and somehow he’d missed the gist of it. Who would have blamed him when he kept staring at that silky, barely there robe and wanting to glimpse the naked flesh underneath?

  When had she mentioned that they were going on a dinner cruise?

  He thought maybe she’d been out in the sun too long and was dehydrated, but the forest was shaded. He had packed two bottles of water for her because of the humidity in the air. Unless she’d been so excited about the plants that she hadn’t been drinking her water.

  He couldn’t understand it. He was ready to join her, make her drink the water, and get her back to the villa to cool down before she passed out. But then he learned that Sal was there with her. Bloody hell.

  A red haze had filled his vision, his heartbeat pounded ominously in his ears, and his blood was on fire as he tried to keep his wits about him.

  Why in the hell had Sal been at the reserve? Of all the places on the island, Duncan would never have worried about the bastard venturing there. Now Shelley had caught his eye.

  She was a female wolf, unmated and a real looker. Damn it.

  He tried telling himself she might be right, that he should stay away from the reserve until Silverman left the area. But if he was still there, Duncan didn’t want him anywhere near Shelley. He didn’t want her seeing Silverman for drinks or any other business later this evening, either. He worried she still might think she could help get the money from the bastard, and he didn’t want her involved.

  Duncan was already flooring the gas pedal to reach the reserve and make sure Shelley was okay. He could tell from her voice that she was strong, capable, and determined to play any role he wanted, but he wasn’t letting her take part in it.