"You know he"ll be all right--" Leidolf said, but then something made the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention. He wasn"t sure what it was--a noise in the distance or just something that set him on edge. "I"m shifting. Take my clothes, Elgin, would you?"
Leidolf quickly stripped and shifted and took off running as if his life depended on it. It wasn"t his life he was worried about.
"They"re here," Ca.s.sie whispered, smelling the men she a.s.sumed were Irving and Tynan. Fear and anger cloaked them, and she and Aimee were in trouble. She pointed to Carver"s rifle. "Ammo?"
"Tranquilizer darts."
Ca.s.sie frowned.
"He didn"t have time to get anything else. And he probably doesn"t have silver bullets," she whispered back. Aimee grabbed the sweater she was wearing and started to lift it, but Ca.s.sie stopped her.
"I"ll shift. You use the rifle."
"But..."
"I could always pin you down, even though you were a little taller than me. You were always a better shot than me. No time to argue." Ca.s.sie jerked off the borrowed jeans and shirt she was wearing and shifted.
Aimee turned the TV on in the den, and then they waited to ambush their prey.
Aimee moved to the couch and said out loud, "I love this movie. Romancing the Wolf? Julia Wildthorn sure knows how to write werewolves with just the right touch."
Standing next to the door, ready to pounce, Ca.s.sie wanted to growl at Aimee"s comment. Aimee silently moved to the other side of the door frame, the rifle ready as the movie progressed.
"You"re only a half-blood," the man in the movie was saying with an arrogant air.
"So you"re a blue blood. Who says you"re any better than me?"
A wolf growled nearby, and the man said, "I can shape-shift and fight the threat. You?"
She chuckled. "They won"t like my kind of bullets, so lead on."
"You, remain here, where you can look pretty and stay safe."
"I"m a bounty hunter, Seth. I"m paid to look pretty and take risks." She shoved past him and-- Ca.s.sie heard the soft footfalls of two people headed down the hall. The floor creaked a little, and the footfalls died instantly.
Growls erupted on the movie, shattering Ca.s.sie"s wire-tight nerves.
"No!" the woman screamed on the television.
More growling in the movie erupted, and then the footsteps in the hall hurried toward the den again, faster this time, as if the men thought the noise from the movie would drown them out.
Ca.s.sie tensed, never having felt this ready to kill but never so afraid, not for herself this time but for her cousin. She couldn"t "lose" her a second time. Only this time could be for good.
The wrong man started through the doorway. The one without the rifle. "She"s a wolf!" Blackbeard warned his cousin.
The redheaded man started to come into the room, his rifle ready to shoot, when growling on the movie seemed to echo down the hall. Fierce, angry growling like she"d never heard before.
"Holy s.h.i.t!" the redhead said, swinging around to shoot at the new threat.
The perfect ambush. Leidolf to the rescue.
Blackbeard grabbed Aimee"s rifle, and it would only be a matter of seconds before the much bigger guy would wrest it away from her. Ca.s.sie lunged and bit him in the arm, and he immediately let go. He cried out and sank to the floor, his eyes watering, his arm bleeding.
Aimee shot him in the chest and knocked him out, and then Ca.s.sie raced into the hall to help Leidolf. He was still growling, his eyes on fire, wickedly large canines fully bared, his hackles raised.
Behind him was Carver, wearing his fur coat, too, and appearing calm, but she recognized under that controlled exterior, he was ready to continue the fight if Leidolf faltered.
"They"re not silver," Evan said, gasping for breath as he ran into the hallway behind Carver. "The bullets. They"re not silver. I switched them before Irving and his brother disappeared again--hunting for the cougar. I switched them once before, too, only I forgot to mention it to anyone."
Leidolf"s growl slipped into a small smile, but his eyes shimmered with contempt as he continued to stare the threat down. Ca.s.sie expected him to kill the b.a.s.t.a.r.d. He nodded his head in Ca.s.sie"s direction. Did he mean for her to kill the man?
A gunshot blasted next to her. Aimee had fired the shot. A dart struck the man, and he went down.
It was decided then. Trial between wolves. As soon as the men could shift, when the waxing crescent moon again shone in the night sky and all lupus garous could shift between forms.
"We have new problems," Leidolf said to Ca.s.sie, as they returned to his bedroom at the ranch, but all she could think of was doing more of a search for her family, freeing the red wolf from the zoo, and--she wrinkled her nose--taking a shower to get rid of the smell of the bed of straw that she"d rested on at the zoo.
Aimee was staying in one of the guest rooms until the issue was resolved with Irving and Tynan, and she was grateful that young Evan had saved all their lives by switching the silver bullets for regular ones. Irving and Tynan were incarcerated in Fergus"s cellar. Fergus scheduled his son, Evan, extra ranching duty first thing the next morning for taking Leidolf"s Jag out without permission, for not making sure his elders knew what he was up to, for not telling them about the silver bullets, and for taking matters into his own hands.
"Besides the myriad of other problems we have--financial problems and the difficulty with Pierce, Quincy, and Sarge, not to mention Irving and Tynan--we don"t have a nurse or an accountant." Leidolf glanced at Ca.s.sie hopefully.
"Don"t look at me. I"m neither a nurse, nor do I have a head for figures." She started stripping out of her borrowed clothes, glad that the men had brought her truck to Leidolf"s ranch so she had the two bags of clothes she"d stashed in there. She still needed to return to the woods to reclaim her backpack and favorite safari gear, though. "Do you have Internet access?"
He raised his brows at her and began taking off his clothes. "Already planning to leave to study more wolves?" He sounded a trifle annoyed.
She tilted her chin down and gave him a condemning look. He"d better not have a problem with her leaving every time she suggested it. "I might be able to locate some more of my family."
"Oh, sorry, Ca.s.sie. I thought... you were getting ready to leave me already."
For an instant, she felt guilty. But on the other hand, she was a touch peeved that he"d try to make her feel guilty. She sighed. Maybe she could hang around for a few days until the situation with Irving and Tynan was resolved and she had time to visit her cousin before she took off. Although she had to meet her deadline with the magazine for the article she was supposed to write, and with the red wolf incarcerated in the zoo, that wasn"t happening.
"I"ll have everyone working on it to see if we can locate your family," Leidolf added.
She smiled up at him, but before she could kiss him to show her appreciation, he slipped his hand around hers and led her into the bathroom.
She"d expected to find elegance, but nothing like this. White marble everywhere, floors countertops, and a big, big sauna tub. Bra.s.s and porcelain fixtures, tile mosaics on the wall of wolves lounging at a lake, and a painting of blue skies and puffs of white clouds on the ceiling.
But the shower really caught her eye. She opened the clear gla.s.s door to the shower stall, where the whole back half opened up to take in the cliff-side view of the surrounding woods. A privacy gla.s.s door was all that stood between them and the wilderness. Her lips parted as she thought of what Julia Wildthorn"s take would have been on this for one of her wild romance books.
"Hmm," Ca.s.sie said, leaving the door open to the wild open s.p.a.ces and reached down to turn on the hot water.
Leidolf moved in close behind her, placed his hands on her hips, and pressed his arousal against her b.u.t.t. "Hmm, is right, Ca.s.sie." He rubbed against her, and she chuckled.
"You ready for something?" She was fairly sure that no matter how hot the s.e.x was, he wasn"t going along with her next plan of action--freeing the wild wolf and her pups. But... that was her next goal anyway.
The water sluiced over her shoulders and b.r.e.a.s.t.s, pouring down her waist and lower as he grabbed a bottle of sweet-smelling soft soap, the refreshing fragrance of tangerines and limes heavenly.
He began soaping her up, while she went straight for his package, thick, curved, and ready for action. His member jumped in her hands, and he sucked in a deep breath. He cupped her face with his slippery hands and kissed her mouth roughly, as if he"d been deprived of her affections for way too long, as if he was afraid he"d lose her again soon.
His kiss was anything but gentle--demanding, pressuring, conquering. She nibbled at his lips, his tongue, her hands sliding all over his hardened planes, his chest, his waist, his hips. G.o.d, he was perfection. Her sea G.o.d. Poseidon. Seducer of women, only she was seducing him instead.
Raw pa.s.sion blazed through her as she wrapped a leg around his, hooking her heel around his own, and rubbed her s.e.x against his thigh.
"You"re so wet for me, Ca.s.sie, aren"t you?" he murmured against her lips, his eyes glazed with desire, his voice rough-hewn, the baritone quality sending shimmers of need racing through her.
"Always," she whispered back, pressing her body tightly against his, rubbing, making every bit of her so much more sensitive to his touch, her nipples teasing the light hair of his chest, her feminine lips caressing his taut thigh, her hip playing with his rigid s.e.x.
He groaned and gave her a roguish grin. She had hunted and captured him and he was hers, for all eternity. He leaned down and slid his hand around her backside, lower until he"d found her feminine lips and slipped his fingers inside. "Warm, wet, and willing."
Her skin felt feverish between his touching her and the heat of the water. Only the cool air from outside kept her from burning up on the spot. He dipped his fingers in deeper, priming her even more for his penetration.
Or maybe he had captured her! She meant to prolong the exquisite way he was touching her, stroking her with wild abandon until the slow burn built into a bonfire, the flames flickering heavenward as she neared the peak. Arching away from him, she concentrated on the wicked way he touched her until she exploded with fiery sensations of exquisite bliss. Her body trembling with spent pleasure, she wanted him inside her now. She spread her legs farther apart, rubbed harder against him, and whispered, "If you"re done torturing me..."
He chuckled tightly. "You are the one who is making me suffer." He lifted her legs around him, pressed her back against the shower stall, and entered her with one swift move.
Heavens above, she was in ecstasy! Her own body still convulsing with o.r.g.a.s.m, she tightened her hold on his thrusting c.o.c.k. Deep inside he plunged, his hands holding her tight against him, penetrating with savage urgency.
With a frenzy not his usual style, Leidolf drove again and again, coupling with the woman he loved, expressing the yearning he had for her that could never be extinguished. With every thrust, he took her for his own, his mate forever.
Her silky skin rode against his, every curve of her body a tactile delight. He tackled her mouth again as she breathed hard, her eyes half-closed with desire. He thought again about boosting her over the fence at the zoo, his fingers slipping into her wet cleft and how hard that had made him, despite their predicament.
The woman was an aphrodisiac for him, no matter where they were or what they were doing. She moaned, just as his seed spilled inside her, and for a second, a wicked thought flashed through his mind. Her pregnant, her belly growing with their babies. He groaned as he released the rest of his seed, loving her and wishing she"d never want to leave him.
After letting her down and gently washing her off, he grabbed a towel and began to dry her sweet body, flushed with arousal.
"I wanted you from the moment I saw you," he said, taking a deep breath, his gaze fixed on hers.
She smiled and lifted another towel off the hook and began drying his skin. "You thought I was human."
He smiled. "You loved wolves. That"s all I needed to know. If I"d learned what you were, you"d never have gotten away from me." He lifted her into his arms and carried her to the bed, figuring on sleeping for a while, or not. Depended on whether Ca.s.sie could handle more loving tonight. The way she was teasing his taut nipple, he suspected she wasn"t quite ready for sleep.
Until he heard someone rushing toward his bedroom door. h.e.l.l.
Chapter 26.
Heavy knocking at Leidolf"s bedroom door was followed by Pierce saying, "Elgin sent me to tell you that Thompson is here. Elgin told him to come back at a decent hour, but the man insists that if you don"t speak with him, he"ll get a judge"s order to have the place searched."
Leidolf cursed under his breath and set Ca.s.sie on the bed. "Stay. I"ll be back shortly." Then he yanked on a pair of jeans and tugged a shirt on. b.u.t.toning it, he left the bedroom, shut the door none too gently, and stalked toward the great room with Pierce at his side.
"Sorry, Leidolf. I know you didn"t want to be disturbed, but Elgin said if we didn"t handle this right, you"d really be p.i.s.sed."
"It"s not your fault. I knew this would eventually come back to bite us in the b.u.t.t one way or another."
Elgin hurried to meet Leidolf before he reached the great room. "I"ve got him waiting in the den. But Thompson is here to see you about the red wolves. And that wolf biologist? Alex Wellington? He"s with him."
"h.e.l.l. That"s probably how Thompson knew about us. All right. Warn Felicity and everyone else at the ranch."
Leidolf met Thompson standing in the den and stretched out a hand, giving a firm handshake. Thompson"s blue eyes studied him in return, measuring him, categorizing him. Like a wolf would a.n.a.lyze his potential enemy. Leidolf offered a small smile. Despite the guy tranquilizing him, he admired him for wanting to protect the wolf kind. "Leidolf Wildhaven."
"Henry Thompson." The man looked over at Alex.
"We"ve met. I"m Alex Wellington. Where"s Ca.s.sie? You said you"d tell me when you located her." Alex sounded irritated, but he would realize he"d lost whatever chance he thought he"d had with Ca.s.sie, once he"d learned of Leidolf"s claim to her.
"She"s sleeping." Leidolf motioned for Thompson and Alex to take a seat on a sofa in the den. "What can I do for you?" he asked Thompson.
"I was told you have some wolves on the premises. Rare red wolves." Thompson glanced at Alex, confirming where he"d learned of this.
Leidolf gave Alex a look like he was not surprised.
When Thompson and Alex had settled in place, Leidolf sat down on his recliner, the only piece of furniture Laney had talked him into selecting. As if it was his throne, he was the only one who ever sat on it, even if he offered for others to sit there. They didn"t dare.
Pierce and Quincy joined Leidolf as if they were his backup, along with Sarge, who they were still guarding. He"d better keep his mouth shut. Fergus soon joined them also.
Thompson eyed them briefly, probably wondering why Leidolf seemed to need so much muscle. But pack dynamics being what they were, he wouldn"t keep his people in the dark about a potential problem. If he had to turn Henry Thompson and the wolf biologist, he would. And his people had to know the reason.
Thompson leaned forward. "Let"s get down to why I"m really here."
Leidolf seized the opportunity to turn the scenario around to suit his pack. "You learned we could use your help, right?"
Thompson closed his gaping mouth and sat up a little straighter.
Leidolf shrugged. "A cougar"s been killing our newborn calves. Three of them already. We could just take it down ourselves, but we"d heard you were interested in preserving wildlife whenever possible. Elgin was supposed to have gotten hold of you before this, but we"ve been trying to track down the cougar without success in the meantime."
"A cougar." Thompson was clearly thrown off the wolf trail momentarily. "Elgin didn"t say anything to me about a cougar. But I did tell him I wanted to talk to you about the red wolves you have on your ranch."
Well, h.e.l.l, guess the wolf tracker wasn"t so easily misled.
"You"re not interested in the cougar?" Leidolf sighed dramatically for effect. "I"d hoped you might find a home for it. I"d rather not have to..." He shuddered. "...kill it."
"So you own rifles, Mr. Wildhaven."
"Of course. Living on a ranch way out here makes it a necessity."
"You wouldn"t happen to have tranquilizer darts, would you?"
"Yes. We hoped to take down the cougar ourselves. Peaceably, if possible." Leidolf stretched out his legs. "Who mentioned we had red wolves out here?"
Thompson hesitated to say, as if drawing out the suspense. Then he leaned against the sofa back and waved at Alex. "He finally came forth and said he was the one who found my friend and me tranquilized in Mount Hood National Forest. Do any hunting out there recently? Maybe searching for the cougar? But hit something else by accident?" He raised a brow.