Linda O. Johnston

by Alpha Wolf

  “All right, so you don’t know how it started,” she said. “Explain it. I mean, the legends say werewolves change at night, under a full moon. Of course I didn’t see you on the night of the full moon, just the morning after. Did you change then? And how did you change last night, when the moon wasn’t full?”

  “This is where we get close to some questions I can’t answer, because the information is classified.”

  “Yeah, I bet the fact that you’re a werewolf is classified, too. Assuming that anyone else…Hey, are there other shapeshifters at Ft. Lukman? Is that your wolf pack? Is Patrick Worley one? Were his parents werewolves? That would explain their being killed by silver bullets. But you are one. Why didn’t you die? Oh, that didn’t come out right. I’m glad you didn’t die.”

  “Thanks.” Despite his coolness of a moment ago, his smile reverberated in his tone.

  Melanie had stopped at a stop sign that led to an entrance to a highway. Streetlights illuminated the area, and she glanced toward her passenger. Sure enough, there was a grin on his face.

  “You sure ask a lot of questions,” he continued.

  “Your situation generated them.”

  “Yeah, I get that. Okay, Melanie, look. Let’s get through this alibi scenario now. Once we do, I’ll do something I never anticipated doing before—going through proper military channels to be able to disclose classified information to a civilian without top-secret clearance. But you’re right. You deserve answers to a lot of your questions. One condition, though.”

  Still not driving forward, Melanie regarded Drew suspiciously. “What’s that?”

  “Now that you know what you know, I’m going to suggest taking you up on your offer to become the base’s official veterinarian. There are other dogs like Grunge that could use additional care.”

  “What about the shapeshifters?”

  “Would you like to help them while in animal form? Because I think you could be of real assistance. And you might even get some of your curiosity satisfied. Interested, Dr. Harding?”

  “Of course.” But Melanie wondered exactly what she might be setting herself up for.

  Chapter 13

  “S o how the hell did you get off the base without me seeing you?” Captain Jonas Truro demanded the next day, stopping the Army issue sedan at a red light on the way back to Ft. Lukman. After flicking on the left turn signal, he turned to glare. That didn’t bother Drew, who knew his aide felt guilty about what had happened. Better that he react by grousing than blaming himself.

  Even though he should have been more alert. Sure, Drew had been fully aware of what he had been doing when he had slipped through the back gate in the chain-link fence surrounding the base, but he’d thought his subordinate would remain close behind him. Watch his back, as always.

  Like when Grunge was shot. Jonas had, as usual, been assigned to keep watch over Drew while he was in wolf form on the night of the full moon. That same gate had somehow been left ajar, and a couple of K-9s had gotten out—chaos on a night like that, when so many in the unit were in animal form.

  Drew had, of course, gone after Grunge. At first, the pace had been leisurely, even over a long distance through the fragrant and fascinating woodlands. But at the sound of that gunshot, Drew had taken off at the speed of a pursuing wolf, leaving Jonas far behind. Drew was alone when he found Grunge and managed to drag him to the area of the veterinary clinic.

  “I’d like to know how you lost me, too,” Drew told him. “I wasn’t attempting to elude you, especially after last time. You were with me when I picked up the scent in the lab. I figured you’d follow me as I tracked it into the parking lot.”

  “I did.” Jonas’s frown seemed to age his otherwise young face, pleating a forehead exaggeratedly high thanks to his nearly clean-shaven head. “And I watched you leave the parking lot. Thought you were going back inside, but then I saw you head toward the lot behind the BX. Only it wasn’t you. It turned out to be one of the K-9s that had gotten loose.” He scooped a chocolate kiss from where he’d put a bunch on the dashboard, unwrapped it and stuck it in his mouth.

  “If you’ve seen one K-9 pack member, you’ve seen us all, right?”

  “Yeah, after a night of dizziness and puking,” Jonas admitted. “Next time, don’t initiate a change to take advantage of all those enhanced senses of yours till I’m at my best.”

  “Fine, if whoever broke into the lab is nice enough next time to wait till the mood suits you.”

  “So how’d you get off the base this time? And why the hell did you go all the way to Mary Glen?”

  “I went through the back exit, along the dirt road till it entered the highway. Didn’t know you weren’t behind me.” Of course, he hadn’t checked. He knew that someone had gone to a lot of trouble to get onto the base, then disguise his—or her—scent in a painfully odiferous manner most likely to sour a canine on following it.

  Only…the trail had led to a parking space where a vehicle had been dripping oil. And that was the scent Drew had followed off the base. Along roads, both paved and not, toward Mary Glen.

  Until he lost it. And was shot.

  Drew settled back into the passenger seat and closed his eyes, exhausted and hurting. He wasn’t used to being a passenger as much as he’d been since last night. He preferred driving. But that only worked well when he could see straight. And at the moment, while he was pumped full of painkillers and antibiotics, being a passenger beat running off the road.

  He had stayed overnight at the hospital after Melanie brought him in yesterday. It was part of his cover story. Shapeshifters surely couldn’t be treated the same medically as any ordinary human being. At least that would be their argument if anyone tried to assert that he’d been brought into Melanie’s clinic as a wounded dog and left as a wounded person.

  The truth? Fortunately, his secret was unlikely to be revealed in the hospital stay. Shapeshifters in human form were regular people, with normal blood and body parts.

  Difference appeared genetically, though. Research was a continuous process, refined as technology improved, and always conducted covertly. What was know so far was that the DNA of the shapeshifters appeared to contain extra, dynamic chromosomes that resembled some from the kinds of creatures they shifted into.

  It was now late afternoon. Melanie had left early that morning to return to her clinic for its regular hours and give a report of the shooting to Chief Ellenbogen.

  The shooting of an unarmed man by an unseen sniper.

  “You doing okay?” Jonas eventually ventured.

  “Well enough, all things considered.” They were nearing the fort now, and Drew’s mind spun with all he had to accomplish.

  Like convince the C.O. to make Melanie part of their team. General Yarrow would get it, but he wouldn’t like it.

  Melanie had seen him change, and he’d not been able to do a damned thing to prevent it. Surprisingly, she hadn’t gone mad with terror or horror. Had even accepted it—maybe.

  Damned admirable woman. Too curious for her own good? Maybe. Even so…

  She was the only non-shapeshifter besides Alpha team members who had ever watched him in transition. She had taken it amazingly well.

  They could use her services as a veterinarian, which she had already offered.

  That way, they could also keep an eye on her. Convince her to keep what she’d seen to herself—or get a feel for whether she intended to take advantage of her knowledge, tell the world.

  That possibility gnawed at his gut.

  Been there, done that, he thought—and put an end to it in time. At least his ex hadn’t seen the real thing. He’d merely told her about it. And when she’d threatened to sell the story, he’d laughed that she had believed the “lie” he had told to test her, then dumped her like a bucket of sewer water.

  “Anyhow, I’m sorry,” Jonas mumbled. “I shouldn’t have let you out of my sight.” He pulled the car up to the entrance, and the familiar guard in the kiosk waved them in. “Good
thing silver bullets aren’t what those damned stories claim they are to shapeshifters. Otherwise, you’d be toast. Literally.”

  “Well, they still hurt like hell,” Drew said mildly. “And it came awfully close to the heart—which would have been the end.” He figured that was one of the many things that stoked Melanie’s curiosity—how he had survived, since to her he probably really seemed the stuff of legends. He’d have to ponder just how much to tell her, assuming he was given clearance to tell her anything.

  Or whether he would do it anyway.

  He left Jonas returning the car to the motor pool. Fortunately, he got in to see Greg immediately. The general waved Drew into a soft leather chair facing his mahogany desk. Drew sank into it gratefully. He was tired. And sore. Still in jeans instead of his uniform.

  And not particularly looking forward to this meeting.

  The general stood beside the U.S. flag near his office window. He wore a formal uniform that suggested he had visited his Pentagon office earlier that day.

  He had known, of course, that Drew intended to take a dose of the current generation of tonic that allowed shapeshifting when the moon was not full. Measures beyond normal investigation or recon had been urgent due to the lack of clues about who had broken into the lab.

  “Okay, so you accomplished your change and followed the scent trail. Any success?”

  “Yes, as far as it went.” He described finding the fresh oil smell and tracing it all the way to Mary Glen. “I was jazzed, felt I was hot on the trail. But I figure now that it all was a setup.”

  “You mean that whoever broke into the lab intended to lure you to Mary Glen to shoot you? Seems a stretch.”

  “Yeah. But nothing appeared to be missing. The only indication was the computer abnormality. There had to be a reason for the breakin. And the trail wasn’t hard to follow.”

  Greg, in his leather desk chair, folded his arms, his long face pinched and irritable. “What’s your plan to figure all this out?”

  Drew’s turn to frown. “What plan? I need to finalize the latest form of tonic and let the others try it, too. The trail, such as it is, will be cold by then. But there’s something else we need to talk about: Dr. Harding. We can enhance the cover our regular mutts provide to Alpha’s mission by having a vet make scheduled visits…and at the same time we’ll get a veterinary view of our situation when in animal form.”

  “So you’ve decided the vet can be trusted?” The general’s tone was clipped, his expression skeptical.

  “Affirmative—maybe. If nothing else, I need to ensure her discretion. She was present when I changed back to human form yesterday.”

  Greg glared at him. “Bad move, Drew.”

  “No choice in the matter, considering the condition I was in. She took good veterinary care of me when she figured I was all dog. And later, though she had to be freaked out after watching me change, she helped me work out a cover story. But I had to promise her a better explanation than I’ve given so far.”

  The general rose. “If you’re asking my permission to tell her more, it’s not like you’ve left me a choice, Major.”

  “Not my choice, either, Greg,” Drew said stonily. Trust her? Hell, he trusted no one. But so far, Melanie hadn’t pushed his mistrust button overly hard. “If we expedite her security clearance and bring her on board, we can also make it clear what the penalties are for breaching that security.”

  “Do what you have to.” The general sounded resigned. “I want to meet her as soon as possible. And I’m relying on your opinion.”

  Drew exited the office, churning with ambivalence. Yeah, he’d see Dr. Melanie Harding again. Despite how attracted he felt, that might be a damned bad decision. He’d even vouched for her—sort of—with the general.

  With his track record of relying on the wrong people, he could only hope he wasn’t about to endanger not only himself, but all of Alpha.

  “That reporter June Jenkins is still in the waiting room.” Carla stood outside the examination room Melanie had just exited, arms folded and face glum. “She won’t leave till you talk to her.”

  “Or until Chief Ellenbogen gets here,” Melanie said. “He’ll throw her out.” She hoped. But she had been back at the clinic seeing patients for a few hours, and so far the only cops who’d been there were a couple of Angus Ellenbogen’s subordinates. They’d asked numerous questions and acted as if they didn’t believe even a fraction of her answers.

  Shoving her fists into the pockets of her lab coat, she wondered if they’d have accepted what she said better if she’d told them the truth. This was, after all, Mary Glen. Home of wild werewolf tales.

  She swallowed hard. Never—until last night—had she imagined any were true.

  “Any idea when Angus is coming?” Carla sounded as dubious as Melanie felt.

  “Soon, I hope.” She’d been told he’d stayed in Annapolis overnight after attending a meeting for state police chiefs in Maryland’s capital. That had been a good thing, since he hadn’t come right away when Melanie called the station this morning to report last night’s shooting. If he had arrived immediately, asking questions, pressing her about the story already circulating in Mary Glen that there’d been another dog shot rather than a person, Melanie might have a harder time covering for Drew.

  Why did she even want to cover for him?

  Heck, she knew exactly why. She was attracted to him—really attracted and turned on by him as a human being. And the fact that he was so different, not so human…well, how could she accept that?

  She couldn’t. And yet, what choice did she have? She had promised to help him.

  Even so, under these circumstances, how could she?

  And would her mind ever clear of this confusion?

  “Want me to call the police station again?” Carla asked. “Tell them to send someone else to chase that reporter off?”

  “I’ll deal with her,” Melanie said, thrusting aside, for now, how conflicted she felt. “You check on how Astrid is doing with cleaning the storeroom shelves.”

  “In other words, stay back here so I don’t get interviewed, too?” Carla seemed to pout. “Are you afraid I’ll spout some of Nolan’s stuff?”

  “No use taking any chances,” Melanie said lightly. When Carla stomped off down the hall, Melanie headed toward the reception area. She grinned when she spotted Keeley Janes sitting there with her Yorkie. “Hi, Keeley,” Melanie said, relieved to have a fun diversion. “How’s our new mama doing? And the pups?”

  “The babies are thriving.” Keeley beamed. Matronly, with her pudginess emphasized by the tightness of her Baltimore Ravens T-shirt, she looked like a doting grandma. “But poor Missie is getting sore from their sucking. Is there anything I can rub on to make her feel better?”

  As Melanie discussed possibilities for easing the puppy nursing process with her patient’s owner, she stole a glance toward the far end of the reception area. A familiar woman in a bright red suit sat there, unabashedly listening. Acting like a reporter.

  Melanie ignored her until she sent Keeley and Missie on their way with some healing salve to rub onto the sore mama dog. And then she approached the grinning woman, who stood and held out her hand. “Dr. Harding? I’m June Jenkins, with the Maryland Reality Gazette. I interviewed you before.”

  “I recall seeing you,” Melanie admitted with a frown, “but I’m not familiar with that publication.”

  “The Gazette isn’t large, but we’re growing,” June said. “Well-respected. We syndicate our articles, plus they’re available online.” She handed Melanie a card.

  Melanie wondered if this reporter also did television news, since the amount of makeup she wore seemed over-the-top. She might have been attractive, if not for all that pink blush emphasizing her high cheekbones and the dark purple shadow around her eyes.

  At least she was here alone.

  “Not that I’m complaining, but how come you’re the only one here? The other day, there were hordes of reporters bombarding
me with questions and they wouldn’t leave.”

  “You also didn’t say much that they found interesting,” June chided. “I talked to a couple after we got word that you treated another dog that had been shot, and they yawned. Not me. Tell me, did that dog turn into a person in daylight?” She had a personal digital assistant in her hand—recording this conversation, Melanie felt sure.

  “I don’t want to be interviewed, and certainly not recorded,” Melanie asserted. “But at least get your basic facts correct. I did not treat a dog or any other animal last night. However, I did assist a man who had been shot by some imbecile who’d apparently used a silver bullet.” She looked June Jenkins straight in her skeptical brown eyes. “Now, please excuse me, I have patients to treat.” She turned her back.

  Good thing liars’ noses didn’t really grow, as Pinocchio’s did, or her muzzle would be as long as a…wolf’s.

  She swallowed her own ironic snort, happy to hear the clinic’s door open behind her. Good. Was the reporter leaving?

  She turned to check and saw Chief Angus Ellenbogen entering the reception area. June Jenkins strutted up and introduced herself.

  “I know who you are,” said the police chief. “And right now, I’ll have to ask you to leave. I need to speak to Dr. Harding alone.”

  “I’ll just wait outside, then, and—”

  “This may take a while. You can return when Dr. Harding invites you.”

  Melanie shot him a grateful smile. “Certainly, Chief. I’ll see you…oh, let’s see. How about when hell forms an ice hockey team? Goodbye, Ms. Jenkins.”

  “I’ll see you a lot sooner than that, Dr. Harding.” The reporter flounced out.

  It didn’t take long, though, before Melanie half wished she weren’t alone with the police chief. Where was Carla now that Melanie wished she’d barge in as usual?

  They both sat in waiting room chairs as the chief asked questions. He seemed to doubt her answers. She’d thought he was smart enough not to believe in those—supposedly—ludicrous werewolf stories. But this afternoon, she wondered what he really thought as he went over and over the same information.