Lone Wolf (A Breed MC Book Book 4)

Home > Romance > Lone Wolf (A Breed MC Book Book 4) > Page 13
Lone Wolf (A Breed MC Book Book 4) Page 13

by Anne Marsh


  “Ms. Burkhart-Jones?” The voice on the other end is super cool and emotionless. I wonder if they train their people to sound like automatons or if they just pop a Valium the way the rest of us knock back coffee on our way to work.

  “Yes?” I say. I suspect I sound more demented chipper than professional, but whatever.

  “This is Lena Oxfam from the Weppley Foundation. We’d like to schedule a project review as soon as possible. The directors are concerned about progress and demonstrable results.”

  Translation: they think I’ve taken their money and used it to fund some sort of strange vacation in the Louisiana bayou. I’m not sure how to convey my indignation in work-appropriate words. First of all, I do have ethics. I don’t lie, steal, or commit felonies (other than possibly hanging out with Gator, who seems to attract those things like flies on honey). Secondly, if I did abscond with their money, I’d be somewhere way more exotic, like Tahiti or the Seychelles.

  “Are you firing me? Because I’ve met all my milestones,” I point out in a rush. The foundation requires mountains of paperwork—a veritable Mount Everest of status updates, timelines, documentation, and progress reports.

  “No, but there are some concerns.” Lena’s voice is smooth and complacent, the kind of tone in which you’d expect to hear your flight attendant barking out her Prepare for a water landing heads up. I tense up automatically.

  “What are they?” I ask, trying to keep my voice equally level. You know—no big deal, not an impending financial apocalypse or anything. This grant was the only thing I could land after Nathan finished with me; it’s my ticket back into academia and winning full-time, gainful employment at a university. If the Weppley Foundation deems my research a failure, however, and pulls the plug, that’s going to be one heck of a DNR on what’s left of my professional life.

  “The board is concerned that you’ve uncovered no tangible evidence of any wolf presence during your field research.” Lena sounds like she’s reading the weather report, not hinting at my impending doom. “Other than the initial materials you submitted with your proposal, you have made no additional discoveries.”

  “Wild animals are just that. Wild,” I say carefully. “You can’t issue them an invitation and expect them to RSVP.”

  Behind me, Gator snorts. Unfortunately for me, the man has superior hearing.

  “Ms. Burkhart-Jones,” she says pleasantly. “We’re well aware of that but the Foundation did expect you to make some kind of progress.”

  There’s an unpleasant moment of silence that I’m sure I’m supposed to fill. Except—what can I say? I don’t have anything to show for my months here in the bayou. I’ve spent their money, and I’m technically no closer to proving that wolves have been reintroduced to this area. No matter how loudly my instincts are clamoring that wolves are here, and that I could be just minutes, hours, or days away from the discovery of a lifetime, I don’t have any photographs or video. I don’t have any proof.

  “I had a wolf cadaver,” I point out carefully. “And I sent in scat samples for analysis.”

  “There is some concern that those items may not have been local,” she admits. “It’s unfortunate that the wolf cadaver was lost.”

  “It was stolen,” I protest.

  And… more silence on the other end. I should have let the call roll over to voice mail, except that wouldn’t have made the problem go away. It wouldn’t have solved anything.

  “What do you need from me?” I ask because hanging up still isn’t an option. “I’ve been delivering regular progress updates and status reports, but clearly that isn’t enough. Obviously, I’d like for the Foundation to be satisfied.”

  Lena makes a sort of humming noise. Ding ding ding. I’ve said the magic words.

  “Progress, Ms. Burkhart-Jones. We’d like to see concrete, verifiable evidence that you’ve made progress in proving that wolves have been reintroduced to the local area.”

  “I’m sorry you’ve been disappointed,” I say because slamming my phone into one of these lovely cypress trees would be as counter-productive as chanting fuck you very much.

  The problem with apologies, however, is that the other person has to be willing to accept them. The Foundation’s enforcer doesn’t say no problem or even I understand where you’re coming from. Nope. She proceeds to issue an ultimatum.

  “Two weeks. If we can’t verify that you’ve made progress in two weeks, I’m afraid we’ll have to end your funding.”

  And with that she hangs up. I stare at my phone for a long moment, kind of hoping that I’ve fallen asleep in the sunshine and it’s all a bad dream. I suck in a deep breath through my mouth and push it out through my nose. I read about that calming technique somewhere, and I could use a miracle right about now.

  I turn around. Gator’s still laid out in the sun, face turned up toward the sky. He looks peaceful, and I’m tempted to throw my phone at him. Not that this is his fault, but today sucks.

  The story he told me about how he was injured is ugly. And it’s also kind of sad. It’s hard to look at him and judge him objectively now. Was he good-looking before his midnight encounter with the bayou’s gator population? Is he still? Are the scars some kind of divine judgment, like he seems to think, on his past actions? From where I stand, those scars are simply part of who he is. It’s not like I’ve got some kind of weird scar fetish but they don’t bother me. I don’t see the scars—I see Gator. He’s more than just the marks on his face even if he doesn’t seem to think so. And I understand about scars. Mine are on the inside, but they’re there, too.

  “Problem?” Gator asks.

  Does he really want to know? People ask those kinds of questions, but what they want to hear is that everything’s fine-fucking-dandy. They want sunshine and singing birds and happy moments—not the kind of shitty reality that I’m staring down. Unless I get a whole lot smarter or luckier and find concrete proof of my wolves ASAP, I’m going to lose my job, my ability to pay my bills, and my second chance at a career that I love. Wildlife biology isn’t the biggest field in the world, and people talk. My failing now will only reinforce the belief that Nathan is the reason I got my degree. No one will believe that I didn’t screw my way to success.

  “Not yet.” The last word comes out on a sigh.

  Gator holds out a hand without opening his eyes. “Come here.”

  I’m sure it surprises no one that I do. I walk right on over because it’s easier to let him be strong enough for both of us right now. This is what got me into so much trouble with Nathan, but apparently I’m warming up for a repeat.

  Gator’s fingers close around mine, strong and warm. “Gonna be fine, babe.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  He opens his eyes and looks up at me. “You sure about these wolves?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll find them. Just might not be when or where you expect.”

  “Well I need to hurry it up,” I mutter. “I’ve got two weeks and then my funding gets yanked.”

  “So you can put them in some report and bring every scientist in Louisiana down here to stare at ‘em?”

  “I want to protect them and their habitat.”

  “Fucking heroic of you,” he says calmly. “But maybe shit’s fine as it is with a little mystery in it.”

  “I need to find out,” I argue. “I need to make sure they’re safe. Do you have any idea what happens when an animal has limited habitat and people start encroaching on it?”

  He sighs, his fingers tightening around mine. Such a tiny connection, but I like the way he holds onto me way too much. “Sometimes, the safest thing is to let them go. You don’t fuck with wild animals, babe.”

  He tugs gently on my hand.

  “What?” Men should come with an instructional manual. Possibly a reset button too, to set them back to the factory default. Gator’s impossible to read. The fantasy’s a good one, though. I mean the man doesn’t look anything like Prince Charming, but maybe it�
�s the sheer size of him. He looks like he could protect me from pretty much anything. Tsunami, tornado, an alley full of muggers… Gator would have it handled.

  “Come here,” he growls. And pop… there goes my fantasy bubble. Gator’s big, but he’s not always nice. Okay. He’s rarely nice. His fingers tighten around mine and yank, further proving my point. I land on his chest with an ungraceful thud. He flips me over like I weigh nothing. That part’s not so bad.

  But somehow he’s spread his legs, and I’m planted squarely between the vee, my butt wedged against his crotch. I’m pretty sure his dick doesn’t mind the close contact, because there’s something real hard poking me. It’s getting harder, too. I open my mouth to say something and—

  “Shut up,” he says pleasantly.

  “Do you have any idea how rude that is?”

  He shrugs, his chest lifting beneath my head. Nope. The man doesn’t give a fuck. “You need to calm down. Breathe a little.”

  He’s got his mouth by my ear and he expects me to calm down? I don’t even know where to start. It’s like he’s running down a checklist of all the shit you just don’t say. Rude? Check. Offensive? Check, check. Possibly misogynistic? Well, the jury’s still out on that one and his dick certainly seems to like me just fine. I wiggle a little, trying to get comfortable. Not sure why guys think a hard dick makes such an awesome seat—it’s like trying to get comfortable on a tire iron.

  “Might want to hold still,” he suggests, his mouth against my ear.

  “I have work to do,” I protest. “The world ends in two weeks for me, remember? So I need to get cracking. Find some wolves, log some incontrovertible proof, build an ark.”

  We can’t all sprawl around in the sunshine like some kind of pagan god. Some of us have to work—and make miracles happen.

  “Sun’s out. Weather’s good. Enjoy it a little.” He runs a hand over my hair, his fingers easing the tie free until my hair spills around my face and shoulders. It gets in the way like that, but it’s hard to protest when his fingers start working through my hair, finding sensitive spots on my scalp and pressing. God. It feels good. My girl parts appreciate his efforts greatly.

  “It’s gonna be okay, you hear me?”

  I hear him all right. It’s the belief part I’m struggling with.

  Gator

  Poppy’s tired, and she’s worried about her grant. I’m not her fucking Mr. Fix-It, seeing as how I plan to sabotage her research any chance I get, but I gather her a little closer. Guess I can do this much for her. Glad my brothers can’t see me now, though, because she burrows into my chest and drifts off to sleep like I’m her favorite kind of pillow.

  I tuck my chin against the top of her head.

  The bayou’s peaceful today, the water still and silent. Got some storm damage thanks to last night’s rain, but the sun’s out and there’s no one else here. It’s just the two of us. Sucks to think that I’m the one who’s gonna betray her and take away all the shit she’s dreaming about. She snuffles, settling in against my chest. I swing her up into my arms and start walking back to the house. Gonna tuck her up in my bed where she belongs. She’ll be gone soon enough, so I’ll take what I can, when I can.

  Gator

  “Tell me how this works,” I say to Poppy, jamming my hands in my pockets because I’ve never wanted to touch a woman more. After carrying her back to the house yesterday, I’d stayed out of her bed, but mainly because I didn’t want her to think I was reneging on our deal or changing the stakes. She’s made it perfectly clear that sex isn’t on the table, so I’ll respect that.

  Poppy shoves an enormous bag at me and takes off for the boat. I can practically see her remembering last night’s shit story.

  “You ever do field research?” she calls back to me.

  “You gonna fire me if I say no?” Because the only research I’ve done has been with my teeth and my claws, and I don’t think she’s ready to hear about that. I’m a wolf. I don’t sit around jotting shit down in a little notebook; I go straight for the jugular.

  She starts talking (and talking and talking), and I settle into nodding my head. Most of it seems real standard: she’s the boss (in her dreams), we have to follow “protocols,” and we’re actually not trying to trap any animals (good to know because imagining my brothers in a trap has me fearing for her safety). Then she purses her lips up into an imminently kissable pucker. It’s not like I’m trying to disrespect her or talk to her tits instead of her face, but she’s a beautiful woman and I’m not blind.

  “The most important thing to remember is that when we find wolves, we don’t interfere in any way.”

  I snort.

  “You mean if.”

  She gives me a firm look. Dissent’s apparently not an option today. “When. You think I can’t make this happen, Gator?”

  Christ, I hope not. She’s way too fucking smart, and the evidence she’s collected so far has been dead accurate. This would be easier if she made mistakes, but Poppy is meticulous when it comes to her research. But I have a personal interest in making sure her investigation turns up nothing, and I’m not overly burdened with ethics. Keeping an eye on her while she investigates is just smart.

  Her eyes narrow. “No touching. No wild animal capture. You see a wolf, you hang back.”

  “Gotcha. No touching the wolves,” I say agreeably.

  Her expression turns wistful. “Maybe they’ll show up today. Maybe we’ll turn up at the right time, at the right place.”

  “Why are you doing this?” I ask.

  She drops her load of crap into the boat and jumps in after it. She’s certainly dressed for work in a pair of jeans cut off around her ankles and a gray sweatshirt that announces Alcohol You Later. Got no clue what that means but now’s not the time to ask. The pair of black sneakers she’s got on makes my wolf wonder how she’d feel about a game of chase.

  We take my boat, seeing as how Poppy sank her ride, but you’d think she was captain of a mega-yacht, the way she belts out directions. Poppy has a map on her tablet, which survived her swim the other day. She calls out directions when we get close, and I steer our ride this way and that to accommodate her.

  It’s still early, the sun just setting the edges of the sky on fire. Mist still hangs over the water, orange and gold lighting up the spaces between the branches of the trees we pass. Beneath the mist, the water’s calm and flat, nothing breaking the surface but reflections of cypress, moss, and the occasional early bird heron out to get his fucking worm. If I were him, I’d hold out for Starbucks.

  Poppy bustles around the boat, scanning the banks, rearranging the gear, and looking way too cheerful. Might even be contagious because I don’t mind my lack of sleep as much as I should. She points, I drive, and we make our way deeper and deeper into the bayou. I don’t even mind the way she ignores me, all her attention focused on the wildlife on the banks. After all, she’s on a wolf hunt, and I’m just along for the ride as far as she’s concerned. I’ve got all day to assess what she knows and figure out exactly how much of a threat she poses to the pack. Jace had someone take care of the wolf cadaver she’d stored up in her lab, but she could have other evidence we don’t know about.

  By lunchtime, however, she’s still wolf-less, having found no daytime clues to their presence in my bayou. I, on the other hand, have learned that she’s got video of two apparent red wolves and some scat samples. I make a mental note to ask Jace if he knows who the two idiots are on the tape she shows me. I don’t recognize the markings, which leads me to think they’re not part of the Breed MC. The Breauxs run a tight pack, too, so I doubt it’s one of their boys. Unless we’ve acquired a pair of lone wolves in recent months, the logical candidate is T.D.’s pack of newbies.

  Fucking T.D. has been a pain in our ass. I may be a lone wolf who can take or leave being part of a pack, but he’s more dangerous. He’s jonesing to lead his own pack, and there are only two ways he makes that happen. Either he affects a management change in an existing pack
, or he rounds up his own set of wolves and fights to hold whatever territory he stakes out as his. And since T.D.’s not stupid, he’s gone with Option B. He and a half-dozen wolves are holed up at Rose Bayou, likely drinking beer, comparing dick size, and plotting to complicate my life. The complications come when they leave Rose Bayou and strike out for a little fun run. T.D. and his boys are no fans of rules, and they’ve been running all over the bayou and sometimes in plain sight.

  As the day wears on, however, Poppy gets visibly more anxious. It’s not hard to figure out the reason why. She’s already on notice. When you don’t produce, the good people at Grants-R-Us get nervous—and nervous people have a bad habit of closing their checkbooks, which makes this crunch time in the Poppy-verse. If she wants to keep working, she has to find incontrovertible proof and fast.

  I’m about to chalk the day up as a bust—thank fuck—when she suddenly throws up a hand and starts pointing like a setter on a scent.

  “Pull over,” she hisses. “Right now.”

  I do, and she bolts out of the boat before we’re even completely stationary. Seconds later, she’s tearing up an almost invisible game trail. Got no clue how she spotted that from the boat, but she did. I tie up and follow.

  “You want to tell me what this is about?”

  She scans the trail, walking fast but quiet. “This is where I found the scat.”

  Poppy’s got to be the only female I’ve met who’s excited over the possibility of finding shit. The way she says it, the word scat sounds like winning lottery ticket or holy fucking grail. She practically flies up the trail, slipping between the trees with practiced ease. Game trail’s always a potential landmine, and my nose warns me quick enough that she’s found an old kill site. Nothing too recent—but wolves have definitely been here.

  I pick up the pace and slip past her, ignoring her muttered protests. The bones are scattered around a small clearing. It’s old enough that I can’t tell for certain whose kill this was, but whoever he was, he might as well have hung a blinking, neon sign. The area around the kill is packed tight from wolves coming and going and there’s a patch of crushed vegetation where someone took a fucking siesta. I only have enough time to sweep away the tracks before she bursts into the clearing.

 

‹ Prev