by Marla Monroe
The smells of gun oil and human sweat jerked her back from her thoughts. This was getting her nowhere. She’d drifted in her mind and allowed humans to get close to her. What was wrong with her? Her wolf should have sensed them long before they were this close.
Her wolf sniffed the air in every direction, trying to pinpoint which direction the stench originated from. It seemed to swirl around, making it impossible to figure out which direction would be safe to flee. Gabby groaned inwardly as her wolf finally settled on a direction and loped out of the bushes she’d been hiding in.
An excited yell close by turned her blood to ice. She’d been spotted. Why hadn’t she known the man was near? He was upwind of her. She should have smelled him. Instead, she’d nearly run directly into his clutches. As it was, the human let loose a volley of bullets that whizzed past her much too closely. Another yell joined the first man’s whoop, and now there were two of them chasing and shooting at her.
I’m going to die. Why didn’t I know they were so close?
Just as she reached a ditch carved from a stream that swelled after each spring thaw, burning pain lanced across her right hip as she leapt across the six foot wide gully, nearly making her miss the jump. Her back paws scrambled for purchase, wasting valuable seconds she desperately needed to put distance between her and the men chasing her.
Each time her back paw dug into the ground jarring her injury, pain spiked through her hip. It wasn’t the first time she’d endured something like that, but it was her first time to be shot at, much less shot. It hurt far worse than she expected. Either that, or she was more of a wuss than she thought. She had never thought of herself as being a whiner or weak, but she really had to fight the urge to stop and lick her wound.
Gabby’s wolf snarled in her head, urging her to concentrate. She no longer heard the sounds of the men behind her, but she didn’t trust her own judgment anymore. After they had managed to sneak up on her earlier, taking the chance that she would hear them this time wasn’t something she was willing to risk.
Finally, familiar scents met her nose as she raced between the trees, still not daring to let up the pace. Despite the absence of human scent, fear kept her moving through the pain. She could tell that she was weak from blood loss, but she felt that as long as she kept moving, she was okay. The moment she stopped, the adrenaline would wane, and the extra strength and speed she now had would disappear. Shock would set in, and Gabby would lose her ability to continue.
A low growl to her left was all the warning she had before another wolf plowed into her, sending her sprawling to the ground beneath its heavy weight. Another wolf slid to a stop right in front of her. Terror immobilized her as the male wolf on her back growled. It took her a second to realize that Levi had been the wolf to bring her down while Aaron stood directly in front of her. What were they doing out there? Why was Levi growling at her?
Aaron whined and nudged her shoulder as Levi stood up, stepping a mere foot away from her. She climbed unsteadily to her feet, swaying but upright. It was obvious they wanted her to return home. She started to trot off in that direction, but her left hip wasn’t cooperating. She stumbled and nearly fell.
Levi lunged toward her, nipping her front shoulder to stop. He and Aaron both ran their noses over her until Levi located her wound. He growled, then whined, before giving a short bark at Aaron. Gabby wasn’t sure how much longer she could remain on her feet. She needed to go now while she could. The sight of Levi crouching next to her stilled her movements in shock as the magic of his shift flowed over the man.
Though she saw it often among her people, it never grew old watching one of their kind shift. Levi slowly flowed from wolf to man in something that resembled a visual song. He was amazing as his wolf, but as a man, Levi was beautiful. He would argue that men couldn’t be beautiful, but Gabby would disagree. His shaggy black hair reached his shoulders and curled in every conceivable direction, giving him a wild appearance. At around six-one, he was the shortest of his brothers, despite his future position as their Alpha. No one would ever entertain the idea of challenging him. The man could fight and dominate any adversary. He was a powerful man and wolf.
Looking up into his furious dark eyes, Gabby whimpered and sank lower to the ground, dropping her gaze to assure he didn’t take her perusal of his amazing sculptured body as a challenge. One did not challenge an Alpha, especially not Levi.
“You’re bleeding,” Levi ground out with a growl to his voice. “I’m going to carry you. Hold still.”
Gabby couldn’t stop the growl that escaped her as he carefully picked her up and cradled her in his arms against his bare chest. How Gabby longed to feel his bare skin on her flesh instead of her coarse fur. She was sure he would feel amazing. She was also sure she would never find out. Misery poured through her veins to surge toward her heart at that depressing realization. He and Aaron were her mates, yet they hadn’t so much as acknowledged her once. The insult wouldn’t have been so bad, except that they’d had plenty of opportunities over the last four days to say something to her. She knew Aaron felt the mating heat now. He’d rubbed against her, scent marking her until Levi had shifted and picked her up. Levi hadn’t touched her in any way except for where he had to in order to carry her. Maybe that was why they hadn’t approached her. It was obvious to her that the future Alpha’s wolf didn’t recognize her as his mate. Maybe they were confused over what to do when they didn’t agree on their mate.
She refused to let it show just how much his rejection hurt. Instead, Gabby tightened her hold on the need to scream and cry from both the pain of her wound and the devastation his rejection had on her heart and soul. He would never know that she had already fallen in love with both Aaron and him. As a good friend to their mother, Gabrielle often spent a good deal of time with the family planning events and handling the day-to-day challenges of running a large pack.
Levi strode directly to her cabin once they’d cleared the dense forest area. She noticed their truck was parked in her drive as if they’d come looking for her. Why? Then she remembered her planned visit with Nessa. Guilt niggled at her that she’d worried the other woman. With her carrying her mates’ twins, she didn’t need the stress. She wanted to call the other woman and beg her forgiveness right then, but first she had one pissed off wolf to deal with in whose arms she still lay.
When he walked up the porch steps, she wiggled despite the building pain in hopes he would let her down now. Gabby wanted to hurry inside and shift before they entered her home. She really didn’t want them in her little cabin. Their scent would linger for days, maybe weeks if they stayed for any length of time. She did not want to have to live with it as a reminder that she wasn’t good enough.
She whined and wiggled again, but a yelp eked out as she pulled on her hip where the bullet remained wedged inside the muscle.
“Be still, Gabrielle. You’re only making the pain worse and opening the wound again. You’ve started bleeding again.” Levi’s gruff voice stung.
Aaron suddenly appeared by them wearing a pair of sweatpants and carrying another pair for his brother. She briefly mourned the fact that she’d missed seeing his shift and, as a result, his gorgeous body.
“I’ve got the door. Let’s put her on the bed so she can shift. I’ll call Harper,” Aaron said, opening the door for Levi to carry her inside.
Levi crossed the room in long, smooth strides, shoving her bedroom door open with his shoulder. He gently laid her on the bed, then stepped back to pull on the sweats Aaron held out to him.
“Go ahead, Gabrielle. Shift,” he said.
She wanted them to leave her alone to do it. Gabby had never had a problem with nudity that resulted from shifting, but these two men might have been her mates had Levi not rejected her. She was too emotional to handle their presence after being shot on the day after learning that Levi and Avery were lovers. The man who should have belonged to her was sleeping with her closest friend. The ache in her chest matched the one in her hi
p.
Both men stared at her with frowns. Aaron knelt by the bed and gently ran his hand over the fur of her neck. He looked up at his brother with a worried expression.
“Do you think she can’t shift for some reason?” he asked.
Levi frowned. “I don’t know. Did you notice anything odd about her scent when we first stopped her in the woods?”
Aaron shook his head. “No. I was a little distracted by the smell of her blood.”
Levi just shook his head before turning back to her. “Gabrielle. You need to pull your wolf back inside so we can see how bad the wound is. Shift for us.”
The power he pushed into his voice called to her shift, easing the magic through her body until she lay naked and shivering on the bed. Shifters were never cold, their body heat adjusting to keep them safe in all types of weather.
“She’s going into shock, Levi.” Aaron threw a blanket over her before exposing just her hip to assess the damage.
Gabby wanted to assure them she was okay, but the truth was she was hurting and knew the bullet would have to come out before she would heal. They did heal at an amazing rate, but if there was anything foreign in them, the healing process was arrested until it was removed.
“Fuck! She’s been shot,” Levi ground out.
“Shot? We have hunters in our woods, on our property? Why haven’t our guards sensed them?” Aaron hung over Levi’s shoulder.
“Stop hovering and call Harper to get his ass over here,” Levi reminded him.
Their words flew over her as she concentrated on remaining conscious. Either she’d lost more blood than she thought, or Aaron was right and she was going into shock in reaction to being shot. It just didn’t make sense to her. Why hadn’t she known the men were there, and why was she so weak if it wasn’t from blood loss?
The sound of someone banging on the door jarred her, sending searing pain down her leg, and Gabby sank into nothingness.
* * * *
“She’s been shot, Harper,” Levi said in a low growl.
“Shot? Where was she?” Harper looked as shocked as Levi felt.
“I don’t know for sure, but she was on pack land when we found her,” Levi answered.
Harper had dropped his bag on the floor by the bed and was bent over, examining Gabrielle, when he suddenly stood up and took a step back, staring down at her.
“What is it?” Aaron demanded.
“Magic. I sense a dulling spell clinging to her,” Harper said.
Levi’s eyes widened as his head jerked around to stare at the other man. Magic again! What the hell was going on?
“Levi? What is up with all the magic all of a sudden?” Aaron voiced those same thoughts.
“I don’t know, but we’re going to find out. Harper?” Levi looked back at their healer. “Will it prevent you from removing the bullet for some reason?”
“No. It just startled me for a second. I’ll remove it. I don’t see that it will be a problem.”
Aaron had stepped out of the bedroom but returned as he pulled his phone away from his ear. He looked over at Levi with a grim expression on his face.
“What is it?” Levi asked, fixing his stare on his brother.
“The guards swear no one has been on pack land. That would mean she had to have been somewhere else.”
Levi growled. He didn’t like this at all. “Unless whatever dulling magic is clinging to Gabrielle is affecting our guards.”
“Hell! What is going on?” Aaron jabbed his hands on his hips and paced.
“I need you two to settle down or leave the room while I remove this bullet,” Harper told them.
Levi looked over to where Harper was preparing to operate. He moved closer to the head of the bed and bent over her to caress her cheek. Just the feel of her soft skin awakened desire in him despite her injuries. He couldn’t help feeling guilty over that. Still, the mating heat wasn’t there. It worried him.
His brother interrupted his thoughts, giving him a reprieve from his troubled thoughts.
“We need to find out where she’s been, Levi. If there is someone practicing magic near us, the bleed over could get dangerous.”
“Or they are there for a reason and plan to use magic against us,” Levi said.
“Out, you two. Now!” Harper barked.
Aaron eased past Levi to lean down and kiss Gabrielle’s cheek, running his hand over the top of her head in a gentle caress before straightening up with a worried frown. They both walked out of the bedroom, closing the door behind them.
“What do we do, Levi?”
“We find out where she’s been, then we find out who owns the land she was on if it wasn’t ours. I want to know if she saw anyone and what they looked like.” Levi paced the living room as he spoke.
“Agreed. I want to know why she blew off Nessa in the first place to go running alone outside our land. What would cause her to be so reckless?” Aaron asked.
Levi had the bad feeling that he was responsible for her lack of judgment for some reason. It left a bitter taste in his mouth.
“Brother, if she is feeling the mating heat as our mate, then that is all the reason she needs to act out of character. We haven’t approached her. She probably feels rejected, and it would hurt. I never even considered her feelings or that our lack of response might hurt her. I’m an arrogant ass, Aaron. You should have said something to me.”
Aaron shook his head. “I’m too screwed up with need to claim her. I wasn’t thinking clearly, either.”
“Regardless of the reason now, we have to figure out how to fix this and find out what is going on around us. If someone can get past us using magic, none of us are safe, especially our females.” Levi ran his hands over his head with frustration.
“Do you think this is related to the residual magic we had? Maybe it wasn’t from the cat’s pride in the first place,” Aaron said.
“That’s what I’m wondering. Still, we can’t rule anything out until we figure out what is going on,” Levi said.
“Do you feel it?” Aaron suddenly asked out of the blue.
“The magic?” Levi asked, frowning.
“You don’t, do you?” Aaron said. “You didn’t feel the mating heat, even with her in the same room.”
Levi froze. He’d hoped to keep that from his brother for a little bit longer until he could think about it some more. Looking up, he schooled his features.
“I do feel it, Aaron, but it’s not strong. I wanted to explore it a bit more before I said anything to you. I wanted to be sure I’m not picking up more on your heat than feeling it for myself. I don’t understand what is going on, Aaron.” He shook his head in disgust.
“What are we going to do? We’re bond mates. What does this mean for us, and for Gabby?” Aaron asked.
“I don’t know. I just don’t fucking know.”
Chapter Five
Her hip ached as she slowly opened her eyes. She searched her memory to figure out what had happened that she hurt there. The dim room smelled like her, so she knew she was at home, but she could also smell Harper, Aaron, and Levi. What were they doing there? She shifted on the bed and moaned when her hip burned.
The door to her bedroom flew open, and Aaron hurried inside with Levi right behind him. No wonder she could smell them. They were still there.
“Are you okay, Gabby? Do you need something for pain?” Aaron asked.
Levi stood behind his brother as Aaron bent over the bed to cup her cheek in his hand. It was clear to her that he didn’t feel the need to touch her like mates would feel. The concrete proof that he didn’t feel the mating heat slapped her across the face and shot through her heart like an arrow.
“W–what happened?” she asked, looking back at Aaron.
“You don’t remember?” Levi asked, frowning down at her.
Gabby thought back, trying to remember what might have happened that she would get hurt. She remembered the pack meeting from the night before and how depressed she’d been after see
ing Levi with her friend, but after that it got a little fuzzy. Something must have shown on her face because Aaron spoke up, giving her a hint of what had happened.
“What were you doing out running, and why didn’t you show up to meet with Nessa? She’s worried about you,” Aaron said.
It jarred her memory enough that it all rushed back into her head along with a splitting headache. Her hands went to her head, squeezing it even as the memory of being shot reminded her of the pain in her hip. She jerked her eyes back to Aaron’s, then over to where Levi leaned against the bookshelf next to her bed. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking behind the mask he always had in place.
“I went for a run this morning. It was such a nice day. I forgot about lunch with Nessa. I feel terrible about that,” she said.
“Where did you go, Gabrielle? You were shot, dammit!” Levi pushed away from the shelves to move closer to the bed.
“I’m not real sure. I was just running and not paying attention. I didn’t realize I had crossed over pack land. I didn’t mean to,” she said, afraid that she was in trouble.
“Do you remember the general direction you had gone?” Aaron asked.
She shifted her gaze over to Aaron’s worried one. At least his feelings showed. She didn’t feel as if she’d done something wrong looking at him.
“I was running along the stream bed and left it going a little west, I think. It was odd because I didn’t feel like I had gone that far, and I never sensed anyone else near me until they were right on top of me. I should have smelled them long before they made it so close to me. When I did smell them, they reeked of gun oil and sweat.”
“Did you recognize any of them either by scent or sight?” Levi asked.
Startled that he’d ask, she looked up at him again. “No. I didn’t. I don’t believe I’ve ever been around them before. I didn’t really see them, though. I caught sight of their camouflage outfits and smelled them just before I ran away.”
