Dark Wolf (Shadow Pack Book 1) (9 page)

Katie remained stiff against him, though her heart was troubled. His hesitation before his last word emphasized one true thing. He needed her. She still fumed, however, and refused to meet his eyes as he turned to go.

Hurt and still aching for David’s touch, Katie stood defiantly in her “nest,” watching him leap over the snow and back up the mountainside. She then turned, circled, and lay down on the thick carpet of pine needles, sadly watching the cascading falls, which were at least thirty feet high and again as wide, icicles and snow tucked into and hanging from crevices and rocks. Eyes alert, she began her watch, anxiously waiting for her uncle and soul mate to return. The creeping cold terror that always possessed her when she made the Change began to seep back into her soul the farther David got from her.

The grizzly ran uphill toward the clearing where he heard the last of his targets scrounging around. Frank stopped to sniff the air and take stock of his surroundings. He had a couple of wounds, but nothing a night’s sleep wouldn’t cure. He quickly resumed his way up the mountainside, smelling only one man nearby. The man had the foul stench that always floated around the truly evil beings of the world,, but Frank thought ruefully,
it’s sad that the stupid don’t put out a scent because this guy would have it in spades, going in snowshoes up the side of a mountain after a grizzly bear that took out several of his men. Idiot.

He charged nimbly through the trees, taking every precaution to be quiet. The forest was deadly still as he circled around behind his prey. The florid-faced man was sitting on a boulder, winded from his uphill sprint, his rifle unattended in his lap. He was breathing like a bellows and not bothering to look about at his surroundings.

Frank took a deep breath and concentrated. The kind of Change he was about to do took a lot of effort, but he wanted to send the strongest message possible to the man’s boss. A blue nimbus began to alight around his bear body, and he slowly began to change shape. Where the grizzly had stood off to the side hidden in the trees, there now stood the most terrible form of a were-bear, a true mixing of man and bear. Frank now looked like a creature from the depths of hell with a man’s form covered in a bear’s brown pelt, and instead of a human head, a huge grizzly head topped off his body. He’d looked at himself in the mirror a few times when he had done this and scared the hell out of
himself
. The teeth alone were absolutely terrifying. He used this form rarely for were-Halloween parties and for scaring the crap out of teenagers that
used
to try to hold outdoor drinking parties in remote corners of his property.

The man was slowly recovering his breath in the bright sunlight of the glade. Frank sauntered up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder. The man turned and gaped at him in abject terror, the pale blue eyes tearing up immediately. Frank suddenly smelled the distinct tang of urine in the air, and the man’s rifle clattered to the ground. The hardened mercenary started to blubber and tried to scramble away backward, but the rock blocked him. The man cowered on the ground, looking up at a monster, crying like a baby.

Frank gave him the best bear grin he could manage. “Pardon me, old fellow, you wouldn’t happen to have any Grey Poupon, would you? I love a spoonful spread over fresh human flesh.” His voice in this form was unbelievably deep and rasping, frightening enough to turn hair white and make eyes bulge. Frank leaned down to breathe into the man’s face and reached out one razor-tipped hand to run a claw under the scraggly excuse for a goatee. He lowered his voice to a hissing growl. “Tell Ambrose he’ll live longer if he forgets about the girl. But if he decides not to forget,
I
will be waiting. Now run along and change your pants…you have made yourself absolutely unappetizing to me.”

The hunter remained staring up into the face of a nightmare. His bloodshot eyes bulged, and he let out a tiny squeak before taking off down the hillside with a shriek, forgetting his snowshoes, falling and flailing in the snow. He managed to run painfully into a few trees as he descended, the thumps of his body making Frank want to bellow with laughter, but that would not be seemly for a were-bear. He stood above the man’s path, his arms crossed over his chest, watching the escape and waving encouragingly every time the man looked behind him. Finally, he turned to find David lumbering up behind him through the snow in his human form. The man was already fully dressed, with his arms full of their clothes. David looked as if his face would split with laughter as he approached Frank’s most intimidating incarnation.

Frank did a little bear dance in the snow. “Boy, I haven’t had that good a laugh since I snuck down into a Japanese sniper’s nest during World War II and went bear on them. What an idiot!”

David began to laugh out loud. “I figured you had it handled, so I picked up our clothes at the Humvee.”

Grinning self-consciously, Frank instantly Changed into his human form and went to take the bundle from David’s arms.

∙•∙

On closer examination, there was a red splotch on Frank’s leg and a furrow on his forehead that was probably carved by a bullet, David mused as he stood knee-deep in the snow, freezing his butt off for the second time that day.

“It looks like we’ll have the same head wounds. We’re starting to have entirely too much in common. Where are all of your other little friends?” David asked.

The other man grinned viciously. “Only five came after me. They were expecting a hunt for a wolf and some humans. A larger-than-average grizzly bear was not on their list of things they could handle. Especially when it’s sneaky enough to jump out of the bushes and stomp a few of them. One of them actually pissed his pants like this guy did after I took a hunk out of his arm. It must be some kind of custom for these guys. One of them stayed to go back with their injured, and some other idiot who kept swearing to the others that I was ‘only a little bear’ came after me. The others basically rolled down the mountain. It was like that cartoon where the guy rolls down a snow-covered mountain and turns into a giant snowball.” Frank’s face turned grim. “But you can be sure they will be back. We need to fetch Katie and get to the cave. Is she all right?”

“Of course, other than being miffed about my insisting that she stay near the falls and remain in her wolf form.” David turned to keep watch as Frank jerked his clothes on as quickly as his shivering hands would let him. “I have a better idea than a cave. How would you like to be my guest at Hawkeye? We can take better care of your wounds and plot in decadent comfort.” The picture of Katie lying naked on the carpet in front of his fireplace once again hit him both between the eyes and between his legs. He stumbled and caught himself quickly. He glanced at Frank. The other man either had not noticed his moment of lust or was simply being polite.

“A big house won’t protect us, boy.”

“It’s not just a big house, Frank. While we stroll through this knee-high snow to fetch this woman who seems to have my dander up, I’ll place a scrambled call to my groundskeeper to come and get us. Then I will explain why my house is probably as safe as Fort Knox.”

The other man looked at him suspiciously.

It was David’s turn to grin viciously. “Have you ever wondered how effective a government operative would be if he could turn into a wolf at will? My government did at one point many, many years ago.” They started off to join Katie, the bear man breaking the trail and David striding in the other’s lumbering wake.

»»•««

Katie did not acknowledge either of them when they arrived at the stream. She simply Changed, pulled her clothes on, and then followed them down a hidden path by the water back to the highway.

They piled into Bill’s truck when he arrived, leaving the battered Humvee behind to be picked up later. Frank seemed completely at ease with allowing David to whisk them to Hawkeye Manor, not muttering one word of concern as David explained to her where they were going.

The two men had looked thick as thieves when they had plowed down the hill toward her. Still stinging from being left behind, she decided to firmly ignore them both.

Katie sank gratefully down onto the bed with a sigh. A steaming bath would be heavenly in the sunken tub she had glimpsed in the bathroom, but she was too tired to move at the moment. She had the familiar filthy feeling the Change gave her, the taint of the wolf.

Don’t think about it too much, or you’ll run into
his
bathroom screaming to scour your skin off to get clean-clean. Besides, getting too comfortable in one of his guest suites is not an option.

Her resentful musings were disturbed by a gentle knock from Nan, who brought in a soft white T-shirt, jeans, a black sweater, and fresh undergarments, surprisingly in her size. The slender housekeeper also inquired if she was coming down to dine with the rest of the household.

“No, thank you. I assume I’ll not be allowed to go to my own home this evening?” she asked, trying to remember her manners and not speak sharply to the gentle-sounding woman.

“Your uncle and David think this house is secure enough for the moment, but I don’t think either of them would be too happy about you wandering about the mountain at this time of the night after what happened today, dear,” Nan replied in a sweet voice tinged with yet another gentle Scottish burr. “I will bring supper to your room, Katie, but I think that you are going to
have
to see and talk to him at some point.” The firmness of her tone was explicit. The woman, who was a normal human being, knew very well what kind of storm was brewing between David and Katie.

Great
, Katie thought as she sprawled on the bed,
why doesn’t he take out a full-page ad announcing it’s freak mating season!

She closed her eyes and buried her head in a pillow. She had to admit David’s home was magnificent. The bathroom she had peeked into earlier was a palace of tumbled warm, off-white marble and designer fixtures. Thick white towels were piled beside a bank of candles. A grouping of lush plantings in stone urns acted as a screen for the window behind the tub.

The wide halls and expansive windows of the house purposefully brought the outdoors inside, effectively combating the sense of panic that assailed a Were when he or she was in a confined space. It was for that reason that Katie had rented the one room log cabin down the road, because of the incredible windows Uncle Frank had gruffly stated would make the little house a bitch to heat. The room she now occupied was a study in understated elegance. It contained a suite with a black-framed king-size bed adorned with a lavish white Egyptian cotton duvet and a mountain of snowy down pillows. Scarlet tapestry furniture and silk tasseled pillows faced a fireplace topped with an ebony mantle. A large sheepskin was on the floor in front of the merrily burning fire in the grate. The scene was the same in front of every fireplace in every room she had managed to peek into on the way up. She wondered if he had bought a flock of sheep to hunt down for his own pleasure in wolf form or had gone to New Zealand to buy sheepskins in bulk. The picture the thick rug inevitably brought to her mind made her knees weak.

Later, after eating an amazing meal of rich French onion soup covered with an asiago cheese crust, a Roquefort Caesar salad, and a petite chocolate mousse with raspberry sauce, washed down with an excellent cabernet, Katie decided to make the best of it and drain David’s hot water heaters. The events of the day left her feeling she couldn’t get clean enough. She took a long shower, scrubbing her skin raw to wash off the thought that she had allowed herself to become a wolf again. She then filled the tub and climbed into the suds-filled depths to soak the aching and stressed muscles of her back. Taking a handful of soap, she reached under the water to gently stroke her aching center, swollen for most of the day with need. The moment her fingers touched her soft pubic curls, she moaned softly, imagining David’s fingers stroking her and then dipping his thick fingers into her depths to bring the taste of her sex to his lips.

The heavy door of the bathroom did not make a sound when David walked in, uninvited. Katie did not have to open her eyes to know he was there. She could now recognize the familiar mixture of scents that shouted his presence to her wolf senses from miles away. Without opening her eyes, she spoke, counting on the mounds of bubbles in the tub to cover her busy hands and hoping she had shielded her thoughts well enough that he could not read them.

“What do you want?” She was proud of how calm and cold her voice sounded. She endeavored to keep her eyes closed ever so slightly and not squeeze them shut to keep from looking at him. “You seem to assume an awful lot because you have my uncle’s blessing to do me.”

There was a long, silent moment.

“Uh…David?” Katie tried to keep her voice normal, but it managed to find a sensuous tone of its own accord. She thought he would have looked angrily at her as he usually did, but his eyes were glazed, boring a hole through the side of the tub. She noted he had changed into faded Levis and a soft navy sweatshirt. The sight of his bare feet on the thick carpet and his rumpled dark hair made her heart melt alongside her other organs.
I should be furious, damn it.

∙•∙

David had not meant to walk into the partially opened bathroom door. He had scented the strength of her arousal in the hall during the walk back to his own room. It wound about him like an invisible chain, tightening every muscle in his body to bowstring tautness, especially those muscles powering his cock that could not be pushed much farther. When Katie did not answer his knock or strangled sounding call, he had poked his head in the room. No Katie. He did see the flickering light streaming from the bathroom, however. As if a metaphysical rope strung around his waist was pulling him, his feet led him inexorably to the bathroom door. When she spoke to him in those husky tones, the image of her golden body naked beneath the silky caress of the perfumed water shot through his brain and stole his voice.