by Terry Spear
“They are so adorable,” Tracey said, her eyes big with excitement as she cuddled one of the six puppies in the litter.
They were only taking the three of them home in another week, but each of them was holding a puppy for now and smiling. Well, Ricky was holding two so the last one wouldn’t feel left out.
Hal knew this was going to work out great. Sure it would be a lot of work making certain the new cougar shifters learned how to cope with their new abilities. Both of the boys were extremely jumpy when loud noises startled them because they weren’t used to hearing so well. And they found it fascinating to listen in on conversations, which Tracey repeatedly told them to quit doing. But it was such a new and fascinating experience for them, they were having a difficult time controlling that aspect of their new enhanced abilities.
But Hal could tell with the puppies, they’d have no trouble taking care of them. Who would have ever thought a cougar family would be so thrilled to take in a couple of dogs. He realized something else too. They truly were a family.
Tracey smiled up at Hal and he smiled back down at her. He suspected their next trip would be to the pet store for toys.
***
The wedding was a fabulous affair—from a sunrise setting and pictures of the bride and groom with the backdrop of the mountains and the colors of the brilliant sunrise and everyone decked out in Western wear. Tracey was wearing a pair of high heeled wedding boots with her wedding dress, special for the occasion, and Hal was grinning at her the whole time.
Following the ceremony, Mick took Anton, his wife, and daughter on a tour of the surrounding area while everyone else ran as cougars through the woods, the first time Ricky and Kolby got to run with so many of the others in the community.
Then they returned for a huge feast out-of-doors. Shannon and Chase were there with their new twin baby girls, the dispatcher, Dottie Brown, with her twin boy and girl, the EMTs who remarked they were glad to be there when no one needed medical attention. The doc, Stryker, and Dan.
Mick was there too, congratulating Tracey and Hal for a job well done and mentioned on the side—though they weren't supposed to be talking business—they'd finally managed to clear away the debris from the cave-in in the gold mine and found more ivory. And a body—belonging to Tobias Mooney.
Tracey stared slack-jawed at her boss. "No."
"Yep. The autopsy revealed he'd been shot a month or two earlier, and had been still healing from the trauma."
Tracey realized then, she hadn't seen Mooney at the café that day, but some imposter who had taken over his home and the business.
"He hadn't lied about being Mrs. Blasdell's nephew. We figured he thought if he mentioned that he was family, we might take his word for it. His nickname is Bear."
"Bear…, wait. Bear Tucker? Ohmigod, he was posing as Mooney at the café and said that a Bear Tucker had quit working for him, but that he didn't think the man was doing anything illegal."
"Right. That's him. When Mooney was caught in the accidental mine shaft collapse at Pine Ridge Gold Mine, Bear, or Leonard, his real name, stepped in to take Mooney's place. He continued to pretend to be Mooney's right-hand man. Mooney was really secretive about what he was up to, so no one suspected that he'd disappeared from the picture for the past few weeks."
"None of them were shifters though?" Tracey asked.
"No. Just Benny and the man who fell to his death in the silver mine shaft. He had to have been the second man who had picked up Benny at your mom's place when Benny was running as a cougar."
She shook her head. "I'm just glad it's all over with."
Tracey’s parents and Jessie, with some new boyfriend, and her father’s retired Special Agent friends came to the wedding and so did Hal’s parents. Even though Ted had been at the ranch that morning, he left early to run an errand as Tracey’s dad was about to give away the bride. Everyone turned when they heard puppies yipping and saw Ted had brought the pups to the cougars' wedding. Stryker had been smiling and shaking his head until Ted gave him one and said it was a present from Hal and Tracey.
Hal didn't think he'd ever seen Stryker more surprised and then pleased about something. As soon as Stryker held the ball of fluff in his hands, several young girls from eight to ten years old joined him to pet the puppy. So much for the puppy being a she-cat magnet that included females of dating age.
The wedding proceeded and then Jessie took tons more pictures of the bride and groom, the wedding party, and attendees. Wildflowers had been collected right off the ranch, the horses looking so picturesque in the Western setting for the photos. But most of all, Tracey was beautiful and fit right in at his ranch.
After the wedding and Hal danced with his bride for the first dance, Mick joined him with glasses of champagne and they watched her dance with her father, then Ricky, Kolby, and lastly, Stryker.
“You sure you want to be her partner?” Mick asked.
“Hell, yeah. I’m one of the partners who survived to tell the tale.” Hal loved her. He would give up everything just to be with her.
“Anton wanted me to ask.”
“He still wants to be partnered up with her?”
“Yeah. She might be a magnet for danger, but she has a lot higher success rate than most of the other agents on the force. I wanted to thank you for taking care of her.”
“My pleasure.”
“I didn’t think she’d agree to marrying you. Or that you’d want to be an agent just so it would work out between the two of you.”
“It’s the perfect scenario.”
“I think so too.”
They watched the two brothers dance with single female cougars.
Hal smiled at the boys. “You know they both want to be Special Agents with your organization now.”
“Kolby’s old enough, but I want him to wait a year so that he’s got his shifting under control.”
“Sounds like a good plan to me. He’s enjoying the ranch, and he and his brother are bonding. Both are learning to ride horses too. You can’t ask for more.”
Tracey finished dancing with Stryker and headed for Hal.
Mick and Hal grinned. “You have your work cut out for you.”
After the wedding, everyone left, including Stryker with his puppy in a box, and a farewell thanks as he took the list with him about what he'd need for the pup's well-being.
The boys and Ted returned to the bunkhouse with other two puppies while Hal and Tracey sat bundled up together on the cushioned bench on the deck and watched the sun set.
“The ceremony, reception, everything was beautiful,” Tracey said, snuggling against Hal.
“Agreed. I wouldn’t have done anything differently—but mainly you were beautiful. You can’t know how much I admired you when your dad brought you to stand next to me—giving you to me to love, cherish, and hold forevermore.”
“I so wanted to race to your side and get the vows over with, so we could run as cougars—as wedded cougars—and then party the rest of the day. Oh, Hal, I love you so.”
He squeezed her tighter. “I couldn’t love you more. Are you ready for that moonlit run to the waterfall as cougars?”
Tracey smiled and pulled him in for another hug. “I thought you’d never ask.”
They heard a rifle shot fired off near one of the ponds. She turned her attention from the distant pond to Hal. “Do you have your badge on you? I’ve got mine.” She patted her side, and before they could take their cougar moonlit run, they were armed with guns and badges and took off to protect the wildlife.
Before they got back to more pleasurable pursuits.
Acknowledgements
Thanks so much to my beta readers, Donna Fournier, Dottie Jones, Bonnie Gill, Maria McIntyre, and Loretta Melvin, who all helped to make the book even better! And to Linda Boulanger for her lovely cover and the banner she created for the two books, for Call of the Cougar and Cougar's Mate.
About the Author:
USA Today bestselling and award-winning
author Terry Spear has written over fifty paranormal romance novels and four medieval Highland historical romances. Her first werewolf romance, Heart of the Wolf, was named a 2008 Publishers Weekly's Best Book of the Year, and her subsequent titles have garnered high praise and hit the USA Today bestseller list. A retired officer of the U.S. Army Reserves, Terry lives in Crawford, Texas, where she is working on her next werewolf romance, shapeshifting jaguars, cougar shifters, vampires, hot Highlanders, and having fun with her young adult novels. For more information, please visit www.terryspear.com, or follow her on Twitter, @TerrySpear. She is also on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/TerrySpearParanormalRomantics. And on Wordpress at:
Terry Spear's Shifters
http://terryspear.wordpress.com/
And her Wilde & Woolley Bears, award-winning teddy bears, that have found homes all over the world: www.celticbears.com
