by Marla Monroe
It was past time for her to stand up for herself and tell him she’d had enough. She wasn’t a bloodhound or a springer spaniel to lead him on his hunts anymore. She was a grown woman who needed to find her backbone and be assertive.
But how am I going to manage to tell him without getting myself killed?
Run. Don’t stand up to him and run like the coward that she was. How else did a snitch save themselves? First, she needed a plan that would get her out of town and far away from them so that they couldn’t track her. Then she’d figure out a way to make up at least some of the damage she’d done in getting so many shifters killed.
If any of them ever find out what I’ve done, they’ll kill me, as well. I have no worth to them just like my only worth to my father is in locating targets he can kill. That makes me one worthless piece of human flesh.
To begin with, she wouldn’t find any shifters while they were in town. Then she’d just leave one day when they were sleeping off their nightly bar monitoring. She needed to make a plan so that when the opportunity flagged her down, she was ready to hop in and ride to freedom.
Shay finished shopping in record time. She made sure the two men weren’t anywhere around when she finally rolled the cart out of the grocery store. Charlie jumped out of the truck and started throwing bags in the back seat, cursing the entire time.
“Well, did you spot any of them?” he finally asked when she’d slid onto the seat and reached to buckle her seat belt.
“No.” She didn’t bother elaborating.
“Are you sure you aren’t broke or something? You haven’t found any since we first rolled into this backwoods place. Your father was sure there would be some from the information he was sent.”
“Did he ever hook up with the person who sent it?”
“No.”
“Sounds to me like someone set him up. There probably aren’t any shifters out here.”
“You thought you found some when we first arrived,” he reminded her.
“No, I said that some of the men we were around stank to high heaven. They hadn’t had a real bath in months. I sure haven’t found any since then. Maybe if there were any they were passing through, I don’t know. I think this is a waste of time.”
Shay leaned back against the seat and looked out the side window. Charlie kept trying to talk to her and even reached over and pinched her when she quit talking to him. Somehow slapping his hand didn’t give her the satisfaction she’d hoped for. Nothing short of kicking him in the balls was going to make her feel better at this point.
She knew something was wrong the instant they walked through the door of the old rental. The scent of fear and anger filled her head. Her father had someone, but it wasn’t a shifter.
Chapter Three
“Tell me again what it felt like.” Levi, their future Alpha, paced as Evan went over it again.
“This guy that she was with sounds like one of the men that’s been asking questions and stirring things up at the bar. She might be a lure for shifters.” Aaron scratched at his chest. “I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I.” Levi stood up and walked over to the window that overlooked their land.
Lee knew his brothers were going to tell them to ignore the pull of their mate. He didn’t believe she was actually theirs.
I don’t know what to believe. She feels like our mate. She smells like our mate. Hell, she even reacted like our mate with the way she leaned in toward me. I can’t just dismiss all of that.
“Lee?” Aaron cocked his head. “You don’t agree with us, do you?”
“Honestly, I don’t know what to think. My body and my soul tell me she belongs to us. You aren’t going to convince Evan otherwise. He’s already got the signs of the mating. His scent is changing.”
“We’re well aware of that. You’re going to have to rein him in until we get to the bottom of this. It has to be more magic HAS is using against us. We’ll have Sienna and Ariel check you both.”
“I’m right fucking here.” Evan’s voice vibrated with a growl. “Lee doesn’t rein me in or control me. He pisses me off most days.”
“Ah, come on, brother. Don’t be harsh. I know better than to assume that.”
“I’ve never understood how the two of you ended up bonded,” Levi said.
“Once you’ve been checked for any magic or whatever it is that the Sylphies and Sienna sense, I want you at the bar checking out the men causing all the trouble. Since you’ve already been in contact with this Charlie guy, it will be easier to talk with him and the others.” Levi walked back over to sit behind the desk again. “See if there are more HAS members showing up in town. We’ve got to be proactive about their existence in Cascade.”
“I think we need to extend that to Marquand, as well. Just because they aren’t staying in Cascade doesn’t mean they aren’t traveling here to search us out,” Aaron said.
“We’ll put Caleb and Dawson on Marquand. With Kindle and Galen guarding Ariel and the others, we don’t need too many of our people off the mountain.” Levi reached for the phone. “When is Ariel scheduled to travel to the cats’ territory?”
“The negotiations between us and the cats isn’t concluded yet. I believe it will be another week or two before they can travel,” Aaron said.
“Lee, Evan, you will be very careful, and do not attempt to spend any time with this female. Just being close to her may tag you as shifters to these lunatics.” Levi punched in a number and nodded at them, an indication they were dismissed.
“I don’t agree with them, Lee. She’s our mate, and she’s in danger. I don’t like that Charlie guy being anywhere around her.” Evan strode toward the kitchen.
“I’m not sure what to think. She feels like our mate, but she’s obviously with that guy and he made no secret of the idea that he hates shifters. That puts our pack in danger, brother.”
“I know, but I can’t ignore the pull.”
“You have to for now.”
“If she’s at that bar, I can’t stay away from her.” Evan pulled open the industrial-sized refrigerator door and pulled out what he wanted to make sandwiches.
“I figure as long as we’re at the bar by seven, we’ll have plenty of time to observe these nuts. It might even help if we pretend to go along with them to a small degree. Let them try and convert us to their way of thinking and see where that gets us in obtaining the information we need.”
His brother nodded then held up a sandwich. Lee took it as Evan started working on another one. As shifters, their appetites were ferocious, when it came to food and to sex. Maybe that was one of the reasons they were so drawn to this female. They hadn’t indulged in sex with any of the unmated female wolves in a long time. Maybe they needed to remedy that.
The instant he thought that, his balls drew up. He had no desire to have sex with any of them. His wolf wanted his mate. End of discussion.
“Let’s go find the females, Sienna and Ariel. They need to check us before we drive back down to town. I want to make sure there isn’t some type of spell on us.” Lee helped Evan clean up then followed the other wolf over to Gabby’s old cabin.
Once Levi and Aaron had officially mated with Gabby, she’d moved in with them. However, the Sylphies and Sienna had taken it over as their home while they were with the wolves. Kindle and Galen also stayed there much to Ariel’s disgust. Lee didn’t understand why Levi kept those two on as guards to the females when Ariel didn’t hide the fact that she didn’t like being around them.
Evan knocked on the door, which Kindle opened almost immediately.
“Aaron said you’d be over to have the females scan you for magic. What’s going on, guys?”
“We had an odd encounter at the grocery store and feel strange, so they want us checked out,” Evan answered before Lee had the chance to get a single word out.
He couldn’t help but wonder why he didn’t want their brothers to know about a possible mate. Was he having doubts, as well, or did he not want som
eone else to suggest it wasn’t real?
“Come on in. They’re all waiting in the living room.” Kindle stepped back and let them walk through.
“Hello, Evan, Lee. Stand about a yard apart and we’ll scan you individually first then together. Don’t talk or move.” Ariel joined hands with her sisters, Krista and Yvette.
For the next ten or so minutes, Lee remained still, having to bite his tongue to keep from talking. He liked talking, so this being quiet and still was torturous for him. His brother, Evan, wouldn’t have a problem with it. The man rarely talked anyway.
“We don’t sense anything on you separately. Now stand right next to each other so that you touch from shoulder to fingers. We’ll scan you that way, as well,” Ariel said.
Less than five minutes later, the females stepped apart with all three of them shaking their heads. Ariel spoke up.
“Nothing. We don’t sense anything that could be interfering with your natural abilities to scent or feel. Maybe Sienna will find something.” Ariel turned to where the white witch and elemental sat with her feet crossed on the couch. She still wore the iron bracelets on her wrists but had allowed the removal of the collar.
She’d wanted them off originally so she could do the honorable thing and kill herself since she’d allowed herself to be taken for evil use. They’d finally convinced her that it hadn’t been her fault she’d been kidnapped, so she had no reason to commit suicide. Also, they convinced her that they needed her help with combating the evil being used by HAS to annihilate shifters.
Still, they kept the wristbands in place to assure she didn’t change her mind and attempt to harm herself.
The tiny female uncrossed her legs and plopped off the couch to stand next to Lee first. She lifted her hands and moved them around the front of his body. Then she looked up at him.
“Would it be okay to touch you? It is much easier to read with the lead against my skin.”
“Of course.”
She ran her hands lightly across his chest several times then stood on tip toe to touch his forehead before laying one hand against each side of his face. No hint of what she noted appeared in her expression. It remained neutral, unchanged from before she’d touched him. She made one trip around his body, touching his shoulders then his back before returning to touch his chest over his heart once more.
Without saying a word, she walked over to where Evan remained standing from earlier, and after asking permission of his brother, began the same pattern of touching and circling before she finally finished and stepped back into the semi-circle of the other three.
“The only thing I can find is your own natural magic. Everything surrounding you is of you.” She didn’t say anything more, but Lee felt as if she knew something else.
When everyone relaxed and began talking, he sought her out. “What else was it you sensed?”
“The initial scent of a mating. I assumed since you hadn’t said anything that you didn’t want the others to know.”
“Yet you said there wasn’t anything around us. You lied?” he asked.
“No. I said there was nothing except your natural magic and what was of you. A mating is a natural occurring magic for shifters. There is nothing magical clinging to it, so it is a true mating. I think that is what you were here to discover anyway.” Sienna’s power rolled over his skin like ants in a marching band.
“That’s true. Our Alpha questions it because of some circumstances that surround it.” Lee didn’t feel he could reveal anything more to the little witch.
“Sometimes what we end up with isn’t what we’d hoped for. Still, if it was fated, it is the right thing and we have to embrace it in order to form it into what we can accept.”
“Lee, let’s go.” Evan’s voice jerked him out of the moment, and he realized that Sienna had already returned to the others while he’d been, what, daydreaming or just drifting in his thoughts?
Sienna had more power than any of them realized. They needed to watch her closely. He’d have to tell Levi and Aaron this when they returned from the bar. And he’d tell them that she said the mating was natural and not the work of outside magic. That thought brought a smile to his face.
* * * *
“I detest the smells in this place.” Evan wanted to leave, but he also wanted to detect any threat that might be found in this place, especially any that would affect their mate. So far they’d noted the Charlie bastard along with four other men sitting at a table toward the back. One of the men appeared much older than the other four. He wore a short, yellowing beard that matched the thinning hair on top of his head. Charlie sat on one side of him, and another male with oily unkempt hair along the same age as Charlie sat on the other side of the older man. He looked a little less greasy than Charlie, but still just as slimy otherwise.
“The table next to them has opened up. Let’s take it. Even with this crowd we should be able to hear their conversation if we’re close.” Evan led the way to the vacant table.
Once they’d sat down, the men’s conversations quieted for several minutes but soon picked back up as if they’d dismissed them as being any sort of threat to them. That amused Evan. They were the biggest threat in the room. Well, the grizzly sipping on his beer in the far corner would be the biggest threat of all, but still.
“What has that smile on your face? It worries me.” Lee’s expression could double for his constipated look.
“Other than the grizzly over there, we’re the most dangerous beings in the room and they don’t even realize it.” He nodded toward the table full of shifter-hating humans.
“Yeah. Kind of ironic, isn’t it?”
“Can I get you guys a refill?” Dede, one of the regular waitresses in the bar, grinned down at them.
They’d stopped by a time of two for a few beers, but that was all they imbibed on. Sex with humans didn’t do it for them. Some of the males of their pack liked doing humans. They claimed it made them appreciate their female wolves for their ferociousness and strength even more.
“I’ll take another.” His brother lifted his bottle to her.
“Me, too.”
She wandered off to take more orders then headed to the bar.
“Can you hear them?” Lee asked his brother.
“Yeah, listen.”
“So you’re sure there are shifters in the area?” the older man asked.
“Yep. Seen too many wolves in this area to be all natural. Wolves run in packs, but in the wild, it’s rarely more than six or eight. Any more than that, and you end up with a lot of dominance fights. Haven’t been any around here that I’ve heard of in a long time,” one of the other men said.
“Besides, we’ve got our own brand of magic to hunt them out and get to them. How do you guys figure out who’s a shifter and who’s not? You can’t just go around killing humans just because they act different.” This came from one of the other men at the table.
Charlie snickered and opened his mouth to say something, but the older man slapped his hand on the table and spoke up. “Been studying and chasing them so long I’ve developed a sort of sixth sense in finding them. I can more often than not pick up on the way they walk and move. They don’t act like humans if you really watch them.”
The man on the other side of him spoke up next. “We rely on rumors to direct us to a town or community, and then we just observe until we either find one or we don’t. That’s when we move on.”
“Well, I can tell you there’s a nest of ‘um here. Catching them is more of the problem. We don’t know what they look like in their human skins. Found that it’s much easier to capture them in their wolf skin then make them change so we know for sure they’re shifters.” This came from the first man who’d spoken earlier.
Lee leaned over to speak low in Evan’s ear. “The two with the old man are new in town. The other two are with HAS, from the sounds of it. I also recognize their faces as having been in the area for at least a few months, maybe four or more.”
“Yeah. The blond-headed one is working part time at the lumber yard. Not sure about the brown-haired one. I’ve seen him around, but not sure for how long.”
“They’re actively hunting shifters and using magic to catch them then turn them.”
Evan nodded just the slightest of movements. “She’s not here. That’s good. She may not know or have anything at all to do with their activities, Lee.”
“Let’s hope not. Are you ready to go? I think we’ve found out all we will tonight. All they’re discussing now is what they like to do to them once they’ve got them. It’s making me sick.”
Evan nodded, and they finished the fresh beers Dede had brought them while they’d been listening to the guys at the next table.
Once outside, they decided to walk down to the hotel and back to think over what they’d heard and what hadn’t been said.
“I think the three sitting together are a team and don’t exactly trust the two HAS members. I don’t think those three are actually members of the group. They’re working on their own,” Evan said.
“I agree. We know who they are now. Wish they’d mentioned each other’s names, but it’s not necessary at this point. We’ve identified the enemies and their goals. All we need to do is come up with a plan to eliminate them.”
“Eliminate them. I like the sound of that.” Evan felt his teeth lengthen with his smile.
“Yeah. I like that thought, as well.”
“I want that Charlie guy. The one who touched our mate.”
“I’m sure the other male is just as much a problem as Charlie. I’ll take him.”
Evan stopped so swiftly that his brother took two more steps before he managed to halt, as well.
“What?”
“She’s nearby. Can’t you sense her?” Evan couldn’t miss the taste that coated his tongue even as it filled his nose with her essence.
“Crap! Yes. We need to head back home before we cross paths with her,” Lee said.
