by Amy Green
“You were in custody just long enough for Charlie to get out of town unseen.” This was all coming together now. It made sense. He’d been so quiet the night she arrested him, like a brick wall. No anger, no outrage, no fear. It was all because he’d been stalling her, playing for time. “Shit,” she said, cursing herself. “I fell for it.”
“Don’t,” Devon said. “It doesn’t matter anymore. Charlie was your murderer, and he’s dead now.”
But she shook her head. “I made my own mistakes that night, Devon. I had a murder, and I heard a werewolf was in town, and I assumed, just like that, instead of looking deeper and doing a proper investigation.”
“Well, you were right,” he said, his voice gentling. “The werewolf did it. You just got the wrong werewolf.”
Nadine stood and paced the length of the shed. All right, she could admit it—she was a bit mad about that night five years ago. Mad at him, mad at herself. Mad that she’d assumed so much about this man, about the shifters of Shifter Falls, for these long years. With a simple conversation, she could have learned so much.
She stopped pacing and faced him, deciding to be as blunt as he had been. “We’ve wasted time,” she told him.
He raised his eyebrows. He was still sitting on the ground beside the fire.
“Five years ago,” she said, “you didn’t tell me what was happening, and I didn’t ask. I looked at you and I saw a beast, a monster, someone who killed for sport. I didn’t know anything. But I thought I knew so goddamn much.”
He didn’t tell her, she noticed, what he saw when he’d seen her for the first time. He only said, “I’ve wasted a lot more than five years.”
“That’s not true. You saved lives, Devon. You’re right—you could have run, let the responsibility fall to someone else. Instead you let it fall to you. You let everyone think you were a mindless killer, and you saved lives one by one without anyone knowing. I’m going to guess you still haven’t told your brothers that little tidbit.”
He shrugged and looked away.
“That’s my point,” she said. “We’ve wasted all this time, and now we’re here in the middle of nowhere hunting this madman, and we might not have any more time. You see? It could all be over, and all we did was think, and wonder.”
It was pouring through her, this feeling. That she’d spent years of her life like she was looking at it through a glass, waiting for just the right time, just the right thing. Waiting, when waiting was the last thing any of them should be doing.
She paced past him, but he reached out and took her wrist, just as she had with him in the mountains days ago. And she stopped, looked down at his face. He was solemn and he still carried the remnants of his pain, but his eyes carried heat as well.
“You’re right,” he said roughly. “No more waiting. Come here.”
14
His wolf calmed the second he touched her. Just like that, he felt warm, his body humming, his mind quiet. He felt her pulse in her wrist, quick and excited, ready for danger, ready for risk. Ready for him.
She took a breath. He heard that too, in the quiet but for the crackle of the fire and the sound of the rain. After all these years, he’d done it; he’d confessed to her, and then he’d made his offer, his invitation. He wouldn’t command, he would only ask, and he held his breath as he waited for her to decide if she would come.
She came.
She let out her breath and moved closer. He tugged her wrist, bringing her down, and then he tucked her onto his lap, her knees on either side of his hips. She settled herself onto him, bracing her hands on his shoulders, and both the wolf and the man felt dizzy at the contact.
But he had to be careful. She wasn’t his yet—far from it. Still, she was curious, so he cupped her jaw gently in his hands, his fingertips tilting her chin, and he lowered his mouth just behind and below her ear, brushing her with his lips and his beard.
She shivered, and a small sound came from her throat. He scented her desire in a wave, so clearly it made him catch his breath. He kissed her again in the same spot, savoring her, feeling her warm skin, the pulse beneath it. She relaxed into him, her body pressing forward, her head tilting into his hands as she gave him room for more access.
He took it. Keeping his hands on her jaw—now was not the time for groping—he kissed slowly down the side of her neck. His body was raging, but he was used to that. His body had been raging for five years. Another five minutes was nothing, especially when he was so close to his mate. A little patience, and he might have her. The thought made him dizzy again.
She moaned again, softly, her hands fisting his shirt. She leaned forward even further, her breasts brushing his chest. Her breathing was deep and sweet, turned on. She tilted her chin toward him and he took her cue, angling her gently and kissing her mouth.
Slow. He did it slow. He had waited so long for this, he felt no need to rush. He let her kiss him back, let her explore him as he explored her, tasting her. He let his teeth graze her bottom lip and felt her pulse jump in response. She was wet between her legs, but he wouldn’t tell her he knew that. He would simply kiss her until she was even wetter.
She licked him, and he opened her mouth, kissing her more deeply, though not more quickly. She tasted him, and her arms went around his neck, her body pulling closer, rubbing him of its own accord. He liked that very much, but still he kept his hands on her jaw, his fingertips pressing her. He let her grow even more urgent before he broke the kiss.
“Oh,” she sighed.
In response, he dipped his head again and kissed the other side of her neck.
“I am, um…” She was struggling to form words. That was good. “I might be giving you the wrong impression.”
His mate. So forthright, so worried about everyone all the time. “You aren’t,” he told her, his breath against her skin, making her shiver again. “You don’t want to have sex.”
She made a strangled sound of embarrassment, but then her body softened again. “I just—this is good. So good. But I don’t think—”
“Nadine.” He paused, inhaled, let himself take in her scent, with every nuance that he’d been longing to study. God, how he’d wanted to smell her skin all of these years. It told him so much. “You’re curious. You’re turned on. You want me.”
She gave a strangled laugh. “You have no idea.”
“I do,” he countered, breathing her again. His wolf was in heaven. He usually understood her, but to have her scent was to have a glimpse into her beautiful mind and her brave heart. “I know exactly how you want me. I can smell it on your skin. And I can also tell that you don’t want sex right now.”
She was practically panting, but she was overthinking, too. “It’s just that we’re on the ground, and it’s raining—and the Silverman—and it’s cold.” He kissed her neck, sucking the skin gently, and she groaned. “A bed,” she said, her voice throaty. “I want you on a bed.”
That was better. “You’ll have me on a bed,” he said, and he let his hands leave her jaw finally, trail down her back to her waist. She moved uncomfortably on his lap, and for a second both of them paused, locked together in sync. It was going to be so good when he finally had her. So, so good. “You’ll have me any way you want me,” he told her. “That’s how it works.”
She moved her own hands, touching his hair, then down to his shoulders again. She liked his shoulders. “How what works?”
“Sex with a werewolf,” he said. She always hitched a breath when he was blunt, almost crude, and her arousal got hotter. So he kept talking. “When we fuck, I’ll please you. That’s my job. A shifter always pleases his woman. If pleasing her means kissing her and nothing else, then he does it. If pleasing her means taking hours with her, then he does that. And if pleasing her means throwing her down, and ripping her clothes off, and taking her as hard as he can—”
“Oh, my God,” she moaned.
He slid his hands up the sides of her waist and cupped her breasts through the cloth of her shir
t and hoodie, squeezing lightly to let her know he meant business. “You don’t have to tell me what you want,” he said. “You don’t even have to know. You only have to let me figure it out.”
In response, she put her hands to his face and kissed him. He kissed her back, letting go of her breasts. She had liked that, his mate. She had liked him to be a little bit demanding, but still let her be in control. He was learning already.
She broke the kiss and leaned her forehead against his. Thinking, always thinking. “No one can know,” she whispered, and she sounded sad.
“Then no one will know,” he said, brushing his thumb along her cheekbone.
“You make it sound so easy.”
“It is.”
She sighed. “Okay.”
He brushed her cheek again. “Do you have a bedroll? Then get some sleep.”
“We haven’t found the Silverman yet,” she said.
He didn’t tell her he had a suspicion that their prey would find them. “No point in the dark,” he said instead. “Sleep and we’ll track him at first light.”
She unrolled her bedroll and lay near the fire. The ground was damp. Devon stretched himself out behind her, his chest to her back, his arms around her to keep her warm. She moved next to him and lay her head on his bicep.
“This isn’t comfortable for you,” she said.
He laughed softly. “I can’t feel it. Relax. Go to sleep.”
“I shouldn’t,” she said, but in a few minutes she did. Pressed against him for warmth, she drifted off, sleeping soundly.
Devon closed his eyes against the flickering firelight. He could hear her breathing, feel her heartbeat. He was attuned to every part of her. He hadn’t lied; he felt no discomfort, the cold and the damp meaningless to him. His body slowed into a sort of rest that was not quite sleeping and not quite waking.
He stayed that way all night, guarding his mate, waiting for the smell of death in the air.
15
Devon woke her at first light, like he’d promised. Nadine was stiff and hungry and she needed to pee, but otherwise she was surprisingly well-rested after a night on the rainy ground. Having a werewolf next to you, with a body as warm as a furnace, was useful sometimes.
Neither of them said a word as they rose, washed, packed. Nadine ate the rest of the leftover rabbit. It should be awkward between them after last night, but it wasn’t. He was Devon. She liked him and trusted him and when he touched her she went crazy. She liked watching him move in the gray light, putting out the fire, getting a bottle of water from his pack and tossing it to her. His beauty fit with the beauty of the landscape. The rain had stopped, and the sight of the mountains at dawn was nothing short of breathtaking, the air crisp and warm, the smell of the damp trees and earth so keen it made you ache, the green strangely vivid at this time of morning before the sun was up. When a breeze blew, Nadine wished she was naked so she could feel it on her whole skin. Talking, in moments like this, was simply unnecessary.
He made one simple gesture to acknowledge what had happened last night—he took her hand and raised it to his lips, kissing it—and then he said, while her knees went to jelly, “I’ll take you to the hut where the silver was melted.”
She nodded. They picked up their packs and he led her into the trees, taking her in a circle around the edge of the mine to the other side, away from the road and the open lot that had once been cleared out before it became overgrown.
They had only been walking a few minutes when they heard the gunshot.
Both of them tensed, crouched. They were under cover of the trees, and the shot was distant, not close. Someone was shooting further down the mountain. Still, they both went silent and Nadine pulled her service weapon, holding it ready but pointed at the ground, the safety on.
Devon turned and they exchanged a look. “He’s hunting, maybe,” he said in a hoarse whisper. He didn’t need to explain. He meant the Silverman.
She nodded, and he moved off, swift and silent, following the direction of the shot. His sense of direction was perfect once again, taking them through the brush and over a rocky swath of path headed downhill. Nadine followed as quickly and as quietly as she could. She weighed so much less than Devon did, and still she was the elephant of the two of them, her boots making too much noise as they scraped the rocks. Survival course be damned, she thought as sweat started up between her shoulder blades.
They had descended a quarter of a mile, and the sun was higher in the sky now, when another shot was fired. It was followed by three rapid shots—from a different gun, unless Nadine didn’t know her firearms. Her pulse kicked up. Either two men were hunting together—one with a handgun, one with a rifle—or two men were shooting at each other.
They both moved quicker, almost running, though Nadine couldn’t sprint without tripping. Devon was ahead of her, his big body swift on the path, his uneven gait distinctive and graceful.
The first gun fired again, and someone screamed.
“Oh, Jesus,” Nadine said out loud. They were closer to the shots now. They made the bottom of the rocky path and moved into the trees where the ground flattened out, able to move more quickly on the even forest floor. Nadine moved into a trot, then into a slow run, to keep up with Devon. She had to move fast and careful, no mistakes. She couldn’t help whoever was hurt if she had a sprained or a broken ankle.
She was surprised when Devon slowed, then stopped. He waited for her to catch up. “Blood,” he said. “And the Silverman. I smell both.”
Nadine nodded and flicked the safety off her gun.
Devon took her wrist to get her attention. “The blood isn’t his,” he said.
She nodded again. He meant that the Silverman had injured—or killed—someone, not the other way around. “Wolf?” she asked him in a whisper.
He shook his head. “Man,” he replied. “Unfamiliar.”
She thought quickly, then pulled her cell phone from her pocket. “We need backup,” she said, looking at the display. “We still have no signal. You run faster than I do. Go ahead and when there’s a signal, call 911. Tell them where we are and that we have a man hurt. It will take them time to get here. I’ll try to help him, whoever he is.”
He took the phone, his gaze on her face. He hated this, she could tell, even though he could see the logic. “I don’t want to leave you alone with the Silverman,” he said.
She lifted her gun. “I’m armed,” she said. “And I have ammo. We need backup, Devon. An air ambulance, more cops. They need to get here fast. We could save this man’s life.”
He nodded, and then he was gone, flickering into the shadows so fast she didn’t see him move.
Still anchored to the ground like a normal human, Nadine moved forward, quick and quiet. She sped up when she heard a man moan.
“Police!” she shouted, her voice cracking in the still air. “Where are you? Are you hurt?”
“Sheriff!” came the response.
She knew that voice. It was Tate, her youngest deputy. She ran forward, calling his name, and found him on the forest floor, bleeding from a wound in his chest.
“Oh, Jesus.” She knelt next to him, dropped her gun, and unzipped her pack. She had first aid supplies, but not enough… not enough. She grabbed bandages, disinfectant. “Tate, what happened?”
He was breathing unevenly, and his color was the gray of shock. “I came… looking for you. Headed for the old mine. That old bastard…” He took another pained breath. “That old bastard shot me.”
Nadine ripped open his uniform shirt and pressed bandages to the wound there. “You shot him back?” she asked, trying not to let the panic sound in her voice.
“I don’t think I got him,” Tate said. Nadine saw his service weapon on the ground where he’d dropped it when he fell. “He just came… from the trees and didn’t say a damn thing. Just shot me.”
“Relax,” she told him, still trying to sound calm. “I’m getting help.”
“Can’t get help up here, Sheriff,
” Tate said, and he sounded sad.
“I’m getting help,” she repeated firmly. “Just keep breathing and stay with me.”
“Sorry, Sheriff,” Tate said. “I can’t.”
Those were the last words he spoke. Ten minutes later he was gone, as Nadine desperately performed CPR, tears streaming down her face.
This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening. She had to think, think.
Behind her, the safety clicked off a rifle. “Don’t move,” said a voice.
Nadine froze, still bent over Tate’s still body.
“Hands up,” said the voice.
Slowly, she raised her hands, looking longingly at the gun she’d dropped in the grass in order to perform CPR. The safety was already off. One movement, and she could have it. Was she fast enough?
“Stand up,” the man said. “Turn around.”
She stood and turned. And for the first time, she faced the man they called the Silverman.
He was tall, rangy, thin as a stick. He wasn’t bulky, but he was one of those men who was all muscle and no fat, a stringy, indestructible piece of leather. His face was creased and tanned, his scant hair white; he looked seventy at least. He wore army fatigues so old they were faded nearly to gray and cracked leather boots. Held expertly in his strong, knobbed hands, aimed right at her, was a rifle probably a decade old, gleaming and pristine in the way of a man who takes care of his weapon before he takes care of himself.
“Why did you kill him?” Nadine asked the old man. Since he hadn’t shot her yet, she might as well get some answers to her questions.
