Diana’s eyes were drooping as Fergus ran his hands through her fur. He could see that the rhythm was lulling her to sleep, and he was glad.
He looked at Lorne. “Inside job?”
The tiger shook his head, “I don’t know. I was the alpha of Clear Water. We moved to defend the pups but…” He blinked his eyes forcefully as if to dispel the grief and tears. “There was nothing left to protect.”
“I’m sorry.”
Lorne looked away at the cabin. “There are more of them than just three. And it wasn’t just my pack. All these shifters here have had their packs decimated.”
His voice was quiet as he looked at the wolf alpha. “We might just be at war with the human race.”
Chapter 3
The two children had attached themselves to Matt and refused to let go of him. And if Lorne was right, then the kittens had no place to call home, making them effectively orphans. The rest of the shifters had departed, and only these three were left.
The tiger alpha had not said anything, but it was like he was waiting to see what Fergus would do. After hearing his story, Fergus felt relieved in segregating his pack’s pups. If only a handful of pack members knew where the nursery was, then it was improbable that these humans would have known.
Matt and Alan entered the cabin to do a thorough search, and Lorne sat on a rock, looking into the forest, lost in his thoughts. Fergus looked at Diana’s form and wondered why she hadn’t recognized him. He searched for the mating bond that had always been inside of him. Diana was alive which meant it should still be there. After he had thought she was dead, he had been so lost and empty. The bond had been sniffed out after Diana’s last communication with him. Maybe it was just smothered.
He felt the connection that had become second nature to him in just a few days before being ripped out of his life so abruptly. He closed his eyes to seek out that unique thread that tied him to his mate.
It was there. However, it no longer pulsed with life and virility. Instead, it lay dormant, almost empty.
“She your mate?”
Lorne’s voice made him raise his head, and his voice was gruff when he answered, “Yeah.”
The tiger’s hair was long, reaching his shoulder, black with dark orange streaks. His amber eyes, although shadowed in grief, were fixed on Diana, and then to him.
“She was special. It was worse for her, you know.”
When Fergus’ jaw clenched, Lorne shook his head. “Not trying to rile you, man. Just preparing you. I don’t know whether she will recover. They asked her all sorts of questions, and then they would torture her for hours on end.” He looked away, sounding angry. “There wasn’t anything they didn’t do to her.”
The anger and helplessness flowed through the wolf alpha enough that it woke up Diana. Seeing his human form so close frightened her, and she pulled away, stumbling over herself in the process. Fergus remained still and waited for her to come to terms with her surroundings.
It took her a few seconds of disorientation, but she recognized the man in front of her as the one who had helped the imprisoned shifters.
“Diana.”
Her ears cocked in his direction.
Was that her name?
“Diana, you need to shift.”
That got her attention.
No. Bad things happened to her when she was in her other form. They hurt her more.
“Sweetheart, you need to shift.”
She growled at the silver-haired man. A part of her felt that he could be trusted, but the human part of her warned her to be careful.
When he kneeled on the ground and stretched out his hand, she snapped at it, but he didn’t move.
“Diana, please.”
He needed to access her injuries in human form, but she was refusing to come out from behind her wolf. He couldn’t convince her through their bond since it lay there dormant.
Diana snapped at his hand again, as if testing to see if he would move it away. However, the man was adamant.
She raised a paw and pushed at him as he frowned. “It’s for your own good,” he said.
She pushed at him again. Her wolf had been restrained for so long that it perked up in interest at this game. She hit him with her paw, and he didn’t budge.
She shoved him again.
“She’s playing with you,” Lorne marveled.
“She’s being stubborn,” Fergus said dryly. “She doesn’t want to shift, so she’s trying to distract me.”
Her wolf agreed.
She didn’t want her human form.
How long had it been since she had been out in the open?
This freedom relaxed her mind.
She circled around the man who had now withdrawn his hand and was staring at her. She sniffed at him and then put a paw on his face experimentally.
He wouldn’t hurt her. That nagging feeling in the back of her mind had now settled.
He was safe.
The man pushed down her paw, and she immediately pounced on him, settling on his stomach.
Hearing him growl at her, Diana cocked her head and stared at him.
A sound from behind them made her stiffen, and she immediately jumped off and started backing away defensively.
It was the other two shifters.
“Fergus.”
Fergus? They had referred to him by that name before, but it hadn’t registered then.
The kittens crept up to where Matt stood and attached themselves to his legs. The paternal wolf put a hand on each of their heads, acknowledging their presence.
“They have logs dating back to the 1400s.” Alan sounded grim, “Shifters, their habits, information about packs that disappeared centuries ago. Some of these are even in different languages. These are hunters, Fergus.”
“Their weapons are next level,” Matt spoke. “From what I can see, they’re a step up from military grade even.”
“How would hunters get their hands on something even the military doesn’t have?” Fergus asked. “This is serious. I’ll get in touch with Kevin.”
When he stood up, Diana immediately backed a few steps, alert.
He stood still, and she sniffed at his ankles and then circled around, still sniffing.
“She okay, Boss?” Alan asked, befuddled by the behavior of his alpha’s mate.
It was Lorne who answered, his voice holding traces of weariness, “She’s testing him, familiarizing herself with him. I’ll just tell you, but you’ll have to be very patient with that one. I don’t know how anybody can stay sane after what they did.”
“Ten years is a bloody long time,” Matt said quietly. “She doesn’t know who you are, does she?”
Fergus ran a hand over hers and watched her freeze and then relax as she let him pet her. “I don’t think she does. She refuses to shift.”
Alan pursed his lips. “She doesn’t trust us. Since she already has a bond with you, even if she doesn’t remember you, her wolf finds you familiar.” He looked at Matt, “Maybe if we leave, she’ll shift.”
Fergus looked at Lorne and the two children. “You guys have no place to go, do you?”
The tiger shifter offered a painful shrug and the kittens just clung onto Matt even tighter as if afraid he would abandon them.
“They’ve been here for nearly six months,” Lorne said.
Fergus looked at his packmates and then walked over to where the tiger sat. Naked as the day he was born, Fergus raised his brow, and said, “We could use someone with your years of experience in our pack.”
“I’m a tiger.”
Fergus shrugged. “So?”
Lorne slid off the rock. “So, if that doesn’t bother you, why should it bother me?” He extended his hand. “Lorne Thunder.”
“Fergus Adoff. Welcome to the pack.” Fergus shook his hand and gave his subordinates a look. “You all return to the pack. I’ll bring Diana in a while. She might not be able to take so may packmates all at once.”
Alan nodded, and then to Lorn
e, he said, “Come along, pussycat.”
Although the tiger shifter’s eyes were heavy with grief, he bared his teeth. “I’ve got some major claws, mutt.”
They set fire to the cabin and buried all the hides they had found.
As the fire raged on, they watched in silence.
“This is the first time that I’ve heard of humans who hunt others,” Alan said to Fergus. “I’m taking the logs with me, and I’ll share them with Samuel and Abigail.”
“I’ll inform Luke.” His alpha nodded.
They parted ways, and Fergus waited until the party was well out of sight. Then he shifted. His wolf was two sizes larger than Diana’s, and he took advantage of that fact. Sniffing out the nearest stream, he nudged her along, determined to clean her and get rid of that god-awful stench.
She was too weak to wade in the water, and he shifted so he could help keep her up if she moved toward the deeper parts. The had run across a small lake, and they were far too exposed for Fergus’ liking.
He quickly cleaned his mate’s fur and dunked in himself. He moved her toward the trees and found a spot where the sun beams were particularly generous.
Tired, Diana laid down in the sun and felt the silver wolf – no, Fergus – settle down next to her. He put one paw over her back in a gesture that soothed her more than it should have in its familiarity. Against her best wishes, she dozed off again, aware of how alert her silver wolf was.
As Fergus kept watch as his mate slipped into a deep healing sleep, he thought back to the cabin, and his blood ran cold as he realized that nowhere in the cabin or the torture chambers had he scented any humans.
Not even the three hunters they had killed had carried the stench of humans.
Had these humans managed to somehow mask their scent?
***End of Preview***
>>>Click to Purchase for $0.99 or FREE with Kindle Unlimited<<<
Exclusive Book
I’m giving away a free copy of Unbearable Love, the prequel to my Shadow Claw Series (no strings attached). This book is exclusive to my newsletter subscribers.
>>>Click Here<<<
Desired by Alpha Bear Page 60
