“That’d be the ticket.” Joe lifted a cell phone to his ear. “Hey, we got her! Yeah, the wolf’s a she, not a he as I’d a.s.sumed. No s.h.i.t! I told you I’d seen her running through here last weekend.”
Why hadn’t she seen these men? Smelled their pungent odors? Heard them?
She had let down her guard, and now she would pay.
“Yeah, she’s a big one.” Joe nodded. “We figured one dart would be enough... took two.” He ran his hand over her side. She attempted her most terrifying growl, but it sounded more like a sickly, low moan. “Maybe 110 pounds, more the size of a gray.” He chuckled. “I know, I know, I told you she’s big. No, not fat. Lean as they come, just longer legged and longer bodied, and she has the prettiest red pelt you ever did see.”
He ran his hand over her back. “Okay, we’ll pack her out of here. Be there in about three hours; longer, if she comes to. The tranquilizers each were set for a 40-pound wolf, not one as big as she is. But we didn’t want to overdo it. And let ‘em know Big Red can have a mate now. No need for the Melbourne, Florida, zoo to send us a loaner. Unless she’s been mating with coyotes, she’s about due for a hunk of a red wolf.”
He laughed, undoubtedly amused by the response to his comment on the other end of the line.
She groaned inwardly.
“All right, out here.” He turned to the blond. “Seems a shame if she’s doing so well in these woods that we have to put her into captivity, Thompson.”
“Hey, like you said, she won’t find any of her kind around here. We’re doing her a favor.”
Inwardly, she fumed, and if she hadn’t been so doped up, she’d have bitten both of them.
Three days later, Bella paced across her new zoo home — nice flat boulders for her to rest on, tree-shaded areas, and an indoor exhibit where humans gawked at her through fingerprint-smudged gla.s.s windows.
Furious with the hunters, and even more so with herself, a growl rumbled in her throat. How could she have been so lax in her run not to have noticed them before this?
She paused and took a deep breath, then glanced up at the top of the pen. No way to climb up above. Even if she changed into her human form, she’d never make it, given the way the cliff arched back over the top, providing shade on a sunny day.
She wandered over to the water trough. When she dipped her tongue into the water, Big Red slinked in behind her. She growled. He backed off. The poor old h.o.r.n.y red wolf was dying to mate with her. She smelled perfectly ripe, the precise mating time for a wolf, so what was wrong with her, she was sure he wondered.
She shuddered. Mating with a pure wolf... the very thought.
She resumed her pacing, but when the familiar scent of lupus garou caught her off guard, she stopped. Two men, both around five-ten in height, leaned over the wrought iron railing across the moat. The breeze carried their scent to her, musky and wild. But she recognized the scent of one of them from the Cascades when she went on her run. OhmiG.o.d, they’d followed her all the way here? Unless they lived in Portland or the surrounding area... not good.
She studied them closer. Both men wore their brown hair — tinged with a slight reddish cast — short, and watched her with intrigue. But they both had small chins, not a nice square manly jaw like Devlyn had, and both were scrawny compared to the taller, st.u.r.dier built grays.
Red lupus garou. Her heart took a dive. She hadn’t seen her kind in human form since she lost her own people when she turned six.
They smiled as she observed them, and tilted their noses up slightly, smelling the breeze when it shifted.
“h.e.l.lo, sweetheart,” the older man said, who appeared to be in his late twenties. “Where have you been all of my life?”
She looked over at the other, probably closer to her age. He grinned like he advertised teeth whitener. “Yeah, Alfred, she’s one of us all right. Understands every word we say. The right mating age, too.”
“Yeah, and in heat, too.” Alfred rubbed his smooth chin. “Got yourself in kind of a bind, eh?” He glanced around, and seeing no other visitors nearby, turned back to her and winked. “We’ll risk getting you out, but on one condition.”
She bared her teeth at him, and he burst out laughing. His friend joined in on the chorus.
“Maybe she’d rather have me,” the other man said, poking his thumb at his chest. “She surely can’t want him.” He pointed at Big Red. Folding his arms, he said, “She’s the one from the woods, don’t you think?”
Alfred nodded, the smile on his lips not reaching his darkened eyes. “From all accounts, she’s the one.” He grabbed his companion’s shoulder. “Make sure n.o.body’s coming.”
His friend turned around and served as lookout as Alfred unzipped his pants. He obviously planned to rescue her and make her his mate. The wolf urge to mark his territory overwhelmed his better human judgment. After he urinated along the bottom edge of the fence, he zipped his pants and smiled. “We’ll be back later, sweet thing.” G.o.d help me.
The keeper’s door creaked opened, and she turned when Thompson walked in with the dark-haired man. Thompson folded his arms as she stared at him. “So what have they been feeding her, Joe?”
“They fast ‘em once a week. Feed ‘em bone or muscle meat once a week. Two-thirds canine maintenance, one-third frozen feline diet the remainder of the week. She’s eating well. Don’t know what seems to be the problem. She won’t let him near her to breed.”
You’d better believe it, Joe.
She strolled off, found a protected area in the sun near the entrance to their faux cave, lay down, and rested her head on her paws.
“We’ve thought of sending her to another zoo. Several are interested in pairing her up with a male to provide some more offspring. They’re trying to introduce some more red wolves into the Smokies, but they need to be feral. She’d certainly do if they could find her a mate as wild as she is.”
She raised her head and looked back at them. If she could have glared at them, she would have.
Thompson smiled. “Seems that might interest her. But unsettling her again might do more harm than good. Let her grow used to him for a couple of more weeks. Then if she’s still not ready, we’ll move her.”
Joe pushed his baseball cap back off his forehead. “You don’t think she’s too young.”
“No, she’s ready. She’s just a little shy.”
Hmpf. Shy, that’d be the day. Then she had an idea. Maybe Thompson would make a good mate. He looked strong enough to take Volan on, and he did like wolves. Maybe he could be the one, if she could get over the fact that he had shot her and stuck her in a zoo with a h.o.r.n.y, big red wolf. She laid her head back on her legs.
But then a horrible thought dawned on her. When would the moon fade from the sky? d.a.m.n. The waning crescent would pa.s.s shortly. Then it would be the new moon again. Jumping up, she began to pace.
She had to make her escape before that happened, before she became a human with no chance to remain a wolf, not until the return of the moon. It would be seven days until the new moon from the beginning of the waning crescent. But three days had pa.s.sed and when she took her fatal run she’d already observed the waning crescent for...
She couldn’t remember. Two days? Three?
d.a.m.n.
“There’s been some unusual recent interest in her,” Thompson said.
She stopped pacing and turned to listen.
Thompson placed his hands on his hips. “Now isn’t it interesting how she listens to our conversation?”
“She seems to sometimes. She’s really gentle.”
You should see me on a bad day.
Thompson shook his head. “A wolf is a wolf, still wild at heart. Anyway, a man was interested in transferring her to another zoo. But... “ He looked at his feet. “I don’t know. I didn’t trust him. He seemed to have something else in mind.”
When he looked up, his blue eyes widened, and he straightened his back. He motioned with his head toward the railing. “In fact, there’s the man, right there.”
She turned to look at the railing, and her heart nearly stopped.
“See what I mean? It’s like she understands everything we say.”
Staring at Devlyn, she couldn’t unlock her gaze from him. So many lonely years, dreaming of his hard embrace, and now he stood across the moat from her in the flesh. Her heart beat so hard it was sure to bruise her ribs. Adrenaline coursed through her body at breakneck speeds, the thought that he’d come to free her giving her hope. What she wouldn’t give to nip him in the neck, to tackle him and force him to the ground. To have his heated kisses, his firm touch embracing her with wanton desire.
She took a steadying breath. She couldn’t deny he still held her heart captive.
Like before, a strap tied his shoulder-length dark brown hair back. A black leather jacket fitted over his broad shoulders, and denims stretched comfortably down his long, muscular legs to his well-worn western boots. He was every bit as handsome as she remembered him, only much taller and more imposing and real than the photos Argos had sent her.
She focused on Devlyn’s mouth. How many women had he kissed since he’d kissed her? Her veins turned to ice as an uncontrollable jealousy washed over her.
Was he already mated? Her gut tightened with the idea. She shifted her gaze back to his eyes. His dark brown eyes turned into black quartz, angry with a hint of concern.
Did he recognize her? Sure he did. If she caught him in his wolf suit, she’d know him any day. But how had he found her? unless... unless... somehow the fact that a red wolf was living in the Cascades, when none should, got big-time media. Great. That’s how he’d found her. He must realize the predicament she faced and the danger to all of them. That’s why he’d tried to move her from the zoo. If she turned into a human by the new moon, she could be used to prove legendary werewolves truly exist.
Did he have a plan? He moved his hands over the black wrought iron posts, up and down. His actions hypnotized her. What was his plan?