by Alpha Wolf
Drew stopped talking, as if giving Melanie an opportunity to assimilate everything. Did she believe it?
How could she not? She’d seen Drew change.
She took a deep breath, watching him. He remained alert and remote and tense. And damnably handsome.
“I understand,” Melanie finally said. “And I appreciate your candor.” She turned to look at the lab around them. She noticed a large window at its far side. Whatever was beyond it was entirely dark. She was all alone, in the super secret basement of a remote military base with a man who was nearly a total stranger—and who had some kind of strange body composition that turned him into an animal.
And despite all that, she was intrigued, not scared.
“If you’re using your abilities to change for national security purposes, does that mean you have some control over it?” she asked.
“Yes, though not entirely. My family developed, over many centuries, a tonic that permits us to change almost anytime. We’ve also nearly perfected a version that allows us to maintain human consciousness while in animal form. We still change under the full moon with no control over it, but we’re working on that, too, here.” He gestured toward the lab.
“Then you formulate your tonic here?”
He nodded. “And study it—and us and our reactions as we modify the formulas. We intend to develop an unstoppable force of shapeshifters who can completely control the process and what we do with it.” He leaned forward. “That’s where you might be able to help.”
She nodded slowly, even as her heart raced. While in veterinary school in California, she had participated in research projects to earn credits and tuition money. They’d involved work on inoculations against canine diseases as well as studies of genetics and aging.
She had a knowledge of lab procedures and analysis, and the use of control groups and studies. She also had a fascination with the experimental process, even though she had elected to specialize in hands-on treatment of animal patients.
“I’d like that,” she said simply, then gave him a rundown of her background.
“Good stuff,” he said when she was done. “I took on what research I could in medical school, too.”
“How on earth could you get through that kind of intense curriculum while not giving your…special talents away?”
“Not easy,” he admitted. “I had a number of ‘family crises’ to tend to now and then.”
“I’ll bet.” She grinned, and was graced with one heck of a breathtaking smile in return. She basked in it, then said, “Okay, let’s discuss the nature of your current experiments and how I can help.”
“Soon,” he said. “We’ll need to work on getting your security clearance. Because of the sensitive nature of our work, special clearance is required to be here officially.”
“Okay.”
He stood and approached her. “But in the meantime….”
She stood, too, wondering what was on his mind, especially with that amazingly sexy gleam in his eyes. He stopped, facing her. Close to her. She was even more aware of his height. His muscular breadth. His masculine scent—nothing but human and sensuous and appealing.
“If you happened to be romantically involved with someone here,” he said in a low, throaty voice, “it wouldn’t be much of a surprise if you turned up here often.”
“No,” she agreed, equally huskily as she studied his face. “It wouldn’t.”
His arms went around her, even as his mouth touched hers, softly at first, and then filled with suggestions and promises that weakened her knees.
His tongue parted her lips, parried with hers. Heat rocketed through her, from every point of contact with him, down to where they were not touching…yet. But, oh lord, she wanted him. And he clearly wanted her, too, judging by the hard pressure of him against her midsection.
“Drew,” she murmured, wanting to ask where the nearest place was that they could go for privacy. Couldn’t other people access this lab?
But before he answered, the silence was interrupted by the absurd sound of dogs barking to the tune of “How Much Is That Doggy In The Window?”
She pulled away, laughing regretfully. “My cell phone,” she said breathlessly, then reached below the chair where she had tossed her purse.
The phone number in the caller ID screen wasn’t familiar. “Sorry,” she mouthed to Drew, even as she opened the phone and said, “Dr. Harding here.”
“Melanie, this is Angus Ellenbogen. I’m back at your clinic. There’s been a breakin.”
Chapter 15
I n her office, Melanie hugged Rudy, the Jack Russell terrier with the injured leg, who had been limping around loose when she reached the clinic. His recovery collar was still on, and the poor pup shivered in her arms. At least he was here, safe. So were the other couple of dogs who remained in the infirmary. Rudy had been the only one out of his enclosure. Melanie had intended to send him home tomorrow, and he fortunately still seemed well enough to leave.
Drew stood in the doorway, his angular features irate and intense, even as he appeared to hide the residual pain from his wound. Grunge, on a leash, sat obediently at his side. The military dog was much larger than the small terrier and much calmer, even as his long nose sniffed the air.
Drew and Melanie had stayed on the base only long enough for him to get his dog from his quarters. Drew hadn’t even changed from his uniform into civilian clothes. They had sped back here in separate vehicles, Melanie in the lead.
“Can you tell if anything’s been taken?” Chief Angus Ellenbogen asked, his bloodhound features on alert. Someone driving along Mary Glen Boulevard had spotted Rudy running loose, and his collar had been a giveaway as to where he’d come from. The Good Samaritan had called the cops, and the patrol officers had discovered the clinic’s open door. Fortunately, they had retrieved Rudy on the way.
“I-I’ll check,” Melanie stammered. Why would anyone break in here? This wasn’t a hospital for humans. The medications she kept weren’t kinds drug addicts would go after…were they?
She tucked Rudy under her arm and approached her desk. A couple of drawers were open and clearly rifled, with things hanging over the edges or on the floor below. She didn’t keep anything too noteworthy there—only pens, pads of paper, some personal correspondence…
“Oh,” she said as she thought of what she had stuck in the bottom of a box of doggy vitamin samples in her top drawer, for want of a better place to put it.
She gently set Rudy down on the floor and looked inside that drawer. Most of its contents had been dumped out, but the box of vitamins was still there. Alone, in the front.
Her heart sinking, she pulled it out. It no longer contained a small plastic bag at the bottom. What the bag had held was gone.
The bullet that had passed through Drew.
She had already found it. Before leaving for Ft. Lukman, she had scrubbed it, hopefully removing all blood residue that could complicate the cover story she had helped to devise for Drew.
She had intended to “discover” it and turn it over to Angus after cleansing it more carefully. She hated the idea that she’d obliterate any evidence the shooter might have left on it, like fingerprints, but it was critical that Drew not be found out.
Should she mention the missing bullet now? The chief would suspect she had tampered with evidence. If he only knew the half of it! She had intended to turn the bullet over clean and say that was how she had found it, but doubted she would be entirely believed.
If she didn’t tell Angus now, the intruder was even more likely to get away with the theft.
That person just might have gotten exactly what they’d been after: proof that Drew was a shapeshifter.
“What is it?” the chief asked, obviously aware Melanie had something on her mind.
She glanced toward Drew, who watched her intently. He looked a little pale, which might be a good thing since they maintained he had been hit by that missing bullet.
He had been hit by it, she
reminded herself. And his injuries were every bit as painful as the dog’s had been—since he had been that dog. Wolf. Whatever.
She took a deep breath, then realized that, since the bullet was no longer within any semblance of a chain of custody, there would always be an argument that whoever had stolen it had been the one to “fix” it to provide evidence of whatever he or she wanted to prove. If any slight trace of canine blood remained on it, that might not matter.
“The bullet that hit Drew,” she said, shaking her head. “I found it while walking one of my patients today but I had an emergency come in and forgot about it. I’d planned to call you, hand it over, but now it’s gone.”
“Damn!” the chief exclaimed. He turned a suspicious scowl on her. “Why didn’t you have one of your staff call me right away? I’d have sent someone to pick it up. You’ll need to show my crime scene folks exactly where you found it.”
“Of course,” she lied. Despite her efforts, any blood residue there could be the wrong kind. Why, exactly, was she lying so much to the cops?
To save Drew’s nice, firm, military—human—butt.
Besides, right now, she had no choice about lying, to save her own butt. She had already told so many untruths that she’d be arrested for obstructing justice if Angus ever figured it out.
“Chief, Grunge is a trained scent dog,” Drew interrupted. “Let me see if he picks up anything on whoever was in here.”
Melanie felt relieved that, at least for now, attention was being redirected away from her. If the chief demanded that Drew take him outside to show where he was shot, he’d be able to obfuscate the location and any evidence there, too.
She watched as Drew brought Grunge to the desk and let him smell the area. “Follow,” he told the dog.
Grunge seemed to pick up a scent, then track it along the floor, out of the office, down the hall and into the infirmary. The couple of dogs still there stood in their crates and jumped around in excitement.
“Hang on, Sherman,” Melanie said soothingly to the medium-sized dog being boarded for a few more days. “You, too, Wrangler,” she said to the shepherd mix there for observation for a mild fever after surgery. She reached into their crates and stroked their heads. Both settled down.
Whoever had gotten in must have come through the window. Melanie usually liked that the place where she kept her charges overnight was airy and had light pouring in during the day.
Now, its large window only seemed ominous.
Drew took Grunge outside, where he again picked up the scent in the small, fenced yard. He lost it at the driveway. “Probably got into his vehicle here,” Drew said. “Unless someone saw it drive in or away, we won’t be able to tell who it was. Might have left prints inside, though.”
Angus had already called his crime scene investigator on duty, and the lady soon arrived. She quickly determined there was no evidence she could lift from the scene.
“Dead ends,” the chief said as he sat in the clinic’s reception area with Drew and Melanie. “Too many of ’em. Anyway, my guys checked your house while they were here, Doc. No sign of a breakin there, at least.”
No, because whoever had done this had looked in the most obvious spot for Melanie to hide what they were seeking. And of course it had been there.
Why hadn’t she been more creative? Secreted the bagged bullet in the area where the animals’ defecations were dumped temporarily, or someplace equally repulsive?
“You might still want to stay in a hotel tonight,” the chief said, looking morosely at Melanie. “And I’d suggest you get a security system here. Hate the idea that such things are necessary in Mary Glen, but you don’t want this happening again.”
“No, I don’t,” Melanie said quietly. “But I can’t go somewhere else while I still have animals here, not after this.”
“Grunge and I will hang around,” Drew said. “He’ll let us know if anyone who doesn’t belong comes back.”
“But—” Melanie protested.
“Good idea,” Chief Ellenbogen said. “You can call about that security system tomorrow, Doc. Meantime, having a military guy and his dog around will be a deterrent to other mischief—now that the major’s on alert and unlikely to let himself get shot again. I’ll also have my officers patrol this area every half hour or so. It’s got to have been one of those werewolf-chasing strangers. That’s what I figure. I’ll go talk to them in the morning.”
“Thanks, Angus,” Melanie said. That was what she figured, too.
But whoever it was, the fact that they had the bullet could wind up being very damaging to Drew.
“Great job covering for me,” Drew said. “I appreciate it.”
They were in her house. It was nearly twenty-two hundred hours that Wednesday evening, and Melanie still looked wide awake. She sat on her bright red sofa that was covered in a fuzzy, velvety material. Her entire living room was decorated in bright reds and golds, a combination that somehow fit the dynamic, outspoken veterinarian. The aromas of the place suggested that she cooked her own meals and favored citrus-scented cleaning agents.
“Yeah, well, I’m a whiz at lying to the authorities to protect werewolves I know.” Her wry smile lifted one edge of her full lips, and he laughed.
Even as he made himself sit still on the golden loveseat at the side of her oval oak coffee table. If he moved, he might grab her and kiss away both that smile and the slightly frightened look in her brilliant blue eyes.
“What do you think Chief Ellenbogen really believes?” Melanie continued. “I think he bought that I had the bullet and it was stolen, which was true. But how did he think I came across it? Or why I didn’t call him immediately when I found it? Or who—or what—really was shot the night before last?”
“If he’d hinted he didn’t believe it was me, I’d have shown him my wounds.”
A look of concern immediately shadowed her lovely face. “You should go back to your place now,” she said. “I’ll be fine, and you need some rest so you can heal.”
“Like I told Angus, I’m staying here tonight. Grunge, too.” He looked down at the gold rug where his dog lay. Hearing his name, Grunge lifted his head and gave a couple of pants with his long tongue out, then settled down again.
Melanie closed her eyes. “Drew, I need some time alone now, to assimilate this whole situation. I’ve been pretending that I wasn’t bothered by what I saw, but I am. You’re a werewolf.” She gave a short, almost hysterical laugh and covered her face with her hands. “I can’t believe I just said that out loud, let alone believe that it’s true.”
He took a seat beside her on the couch. “Yeah, it’s not part of what most people grow up believing in, is it?”
“The stuff of old horror movies. I used to like them as a kid, till I got older and realized how silly they were.” She shook her head. “If I’d only known.”
“Where I grew up, in a remote part of Wisconsin, there were quite a few of us,” Drew told her. “A lot of us were related. My family settled there because the real gray wolf population is substantial, so a few more sightings weren’t noticed much. Plus, the human population isn’t large outside major urban areas. It was a good place for us to do our experiments. Our ancestors had already developed some of the basic tonics that my family worked with, and that I helped to improve as I got older. Same stuff I’m trying to refine today to let us control when we shift and what our human awareness is in feral form.”
“You make it sound so normal. I grew up in California, and the biggest hereditary issue I had to deal with was whether I’d hit puberty as late as my mother told me she and her mother did. Both were around fifteen before their bodies started to develop, and that worried me when I turned twelve and my friends began growing breasts before I did.”
“I’d say you caught up.” Drew glanced appreciatively toward that part of her anatomy. Melanie no longer wore the suit jacket she’d had on earlier, and her white blouse, although businesslike, was soft enough to hug her lush curves.
“I guess.” She sounded a little embarrassed.
Their eyes met, and she all but leaped off the couch, away from him, apparently seeing on his face how much he wanted to touch her. To kiss her. Again.
He stood, too. “There may be things, and people, around here to be nervous about, Melanie, but I’m not one of them.”
“But you’re—” she began.
“A man,” he said, and as if to prove it he got close enough to gather her into his arms and press his body against hers.
He lowered his mouth, willing to fight for what he wanted. But despite her initial shying away, her lips met his as eagerly as if she’d been the one to initiate the encounter. He groaned, even as he moved against her.
Her body was soft, curvaceous, yet slender. He wanted to feel not just her flimsy shirt and concealing pants, but her. All of her. Her flesh against his.
Still pressed tightly to her, his mouth savoring hers, he pulled up her shirt. Her skin was soft and warm and inviting. Her floral scent was enhanced by a womanly aroma that proved she was as sensually excited as he. Even as he stroked her warm, damp flesh, she managed to run her fingertips along the bare skin of his back and beneath his shirt.
“Drew,” she moaned. “We shouldn’t—”
“Shouldn’t what?” he murmured against her mouth. “This?” He moved to cup one breast in his hand, rubbing the nipple still beneath the silky fabric of her bra. “This?” He slipped a finger beneath that obstruction until he was able to play softly with her and she moaned again.
“No, this,” she whispered. Her hands, which had been stroking his back, moved forward, pressed against his straining erection.
His turn to moan. He could only guess where her bedroom was. Didn’t want to wait. Quickly, he pulled her blouse over her head without completely unbuttoning it. Stared at her lovely, curvy body even as he managed to remove her bra.
Dipped down to take first one golden nipple, then the other into his mouth. His enhanced senses drove him wild with lust as he tasted ambrosia.
