Seducing Their Mate (8 page)

His brother and cousins were filing into the great room when both he and Rand reached it.

“Problem?”

Ethan’s face was stone. “We found some dead wolves and one injured. We brought it with us.”

“Not our kind?” Rand asked.

“No. But, it is pretty clear it was clawed.”

“There’s an injured wolf?” Eve asked from behind him and Rand. He turned to face her. Damn, she was going to have to wear some clothes, or the family wasn’t going to get anything done. She was wearing another of his shirts, a flannel. It flapped around her legs as she descended the stairs. The scent of her filled the room, and he could sense everyone’s attention shift to her.

“Ethan?” she asked.

His brother shook his head as if to clear it. “Oh, sorry. Yes, looks like it was clawed.”

“Do you have anything here?” she asked Noah.

“Yes. Ethan has his own lab.”

She nodded. “Let me grab my clothes, and I’ll join you.”

She turned to leave, and Noah stopped her by touching her arm. She looked at him, her mind already on the wolf he knew. It was part of her he loved. She cared so much for animals, particularly wolves. She probably didn’t understand her genetic makeup or why she was so drawn to them. So, instead of telling her, he brushed a kiss over her mouth.

“I wanted to give you a bath.”

Her face flushed. Damn, he didn’t know if he would ever get used to seeing her blush. It was such a turn-on. Innocence had never been something that attracted him before Eve. Now, though, he found himself entranced by every blush. She glanced toward the pack then back at him.

She raised her gaze to his, and he felt his heart thump against his chest.

“After.” With that promise, she hurried upstairs to get dressed.

“Damn,” Max said.

He smiled as he turned toward them. “I told you, and as I have said more than once in our long lives, it’s good to be right.”

Ethan didn’t laugh. He wouldn’t find humor, Noah knew. The incidents were growing, and now they seemed to be getting closer to their homes. “Can you show Eve where the lab is? I didn’t want to leave him for very long.”

Noah nodded and watched him leave. “He was the one who found the other two,” Max said quietly. “He refused to let us see how bad it was.”

Noah nodded. “Understandable.”

Eve was already walking down the stairs. “Where’d Ethan go?”

“He went to the lab. He sedated the wolf, but he didn’t want to leave the guy alone,” Shane said.

She nodded in that absentminded manner he had gotten used to. She was already thinking, her head whirling with the problems of helping the wolf.

“Where are my boots?”

“Right over here,” Noah said. He led her to the mudroom.

“I forgot I left them here...was that last night?” She shook her head as she sat on the bench. “I’ve lost track of time.”

He smiled. “Yeah, easy to do this time of year. It’s about eight at night.”

She looked up at him, her eyes wide with disbelief. “Oh, crap. I had things to do. I had to check on that pack up on the ridge.”

“Ethan did it. He’s been keeping track of what you’ve been working on, so he did the checking.”

She sighed with relief. “I still don’t like shirking my duties. You’ll just have to control yourself from now on.”

For a moment, he didn’t understand what she was talking about. Then it hit him. She had tied her second boot then stood. He grabbed her by the hand and pulled her to him for a hot, wet kiss. He was the one who ended it.

“I think you need to worry about yourself.”

She closed her eyes and shoved her hands through her hair. “I never had to before. You all are turning me into some sex-crazed maniac.” When she opened her eyes, she was smiling. “I never would have thought anyone could do it.”

He wanted to tell her why. Wanted her to understand that she was theirs, forever. She was their mate and would remain theirs until their demise. But, he knew that talk was for later. Much later.

She shook herself, the duty she had on her mind. “Show me the way. We have a wolf to help.”

With a feeling of contentment, he took her hand and led the way.

* * * *

Ethan tried his best to keep his temper under control, but it was hard. His gloved hands were covered in the warm blood of a wolf. It wasn’t one of their kind, but everything on their land was theirs. And someone had done this on purpose. He knew this was something more than they thought. This wasn’t someone just trying to get some land from them. He pulled out a needle, wanting to have another sedative ready just in case the old boy woke.

Someone did this to hurt, to threaten. He hadn’t let the others see what he did. They had smelled it, knew it wasn’t something normal. It looked like the wolf had been clawed by something, maybe a bear. But the smell had been wrong. What he had smelled had a toxic scent, part human, part something else. That something else was bothering him. He didn’t want to think it was one of the other totem shifters in the area. They had always lived together peacefully. But there was always a chance someone had decided they wanted to run the preserve.

“Oh, no,” Eve said as she rushed in. “He looks like a bear got him.”

Ethan made eye contact with Noah and shook his head. It was best he knew something else was going on. They would discuss it later, but he would have to contact the other packs in the area to let them know.

“I’ll leave you all to take care of it.”

Eve’s focus was on the wolf, so Noah kissed the top of her head and left them alone.

Having her in the room was a bit of a distraction. Even now, even after having her just hours earlier, his body started to respond to having her near. It was one of the reasons he had kept his distance. Ethan didn’t like losing control to anything. Everything could be sorted out with scientific reasoning. Except his response to the little woman beside him. It had been since his teens that he had his palms sweating.

“You have gloves?” she asked, her attention on their patient.

He shook himself from his thoughts and grabbed a pair for her. She put them on, looked up at him, worry darkening her green eyes. “Let’s get the guy sewed up.”

An hour later, they were finally done. It had taken a lot of work, but it looked good for the wolf. In fact, the attack had been close to fatal, but whatever had attacked him had missed some vital organs, by a hair.

“He lost a lot of blood,” Eve said as she pulled off her gloves. She looked tired, and her worry weighed on her shoulders.

“I think he has a great chance, thanks to you.”

She smiled at him as she tossed her gloves into the trash. “Thanks to both of us. It was nice to work with someone. I rarely do that.”

“Even when you were in the lower forty-eight?”

She shook her head. “No.”

He frowned. “What about school?”

She shook her head again. “No. I was homeschooled until I entered college. I did that at age thirteen.”

“Thirteen?”

He knew she had a PhD and was a veterinarian, but he had no idea she had started school so early. He understood that she had a clever mind, one that would thrive in that environment. And with her parents’ careers, he could understand why they schooled her themselves. Although, he thought, if they really had wanted a daughter, they should have put some of that on hold instead of dragging her all over the world.

“Yeah, so you can imagine that I had little to no social life.”

He could not even imagine entering college then, especially after spending most of his life on the move from one country to the next. “Your parents approved?”

She gave him a strange look. “Of course. They had taught me. Plus, with me in college, it allowed them to have more free time for their own careers.”

Eve sounded as if she didn’t care, on the surface. Beneath, he heard the loneliness that she must have felt. No matter what she said, it sounded selfish to him. No wonder she seemed so untouched.

She yawned gustily then apologized.

“You need some rest.”

She smiled at him. “So do you.”

“Naw, I can go days without sleep. I’ll take first watch then come get you.”

She nodded as she brushed the head of the wolf. “It wasn’t a bear, was it?”

He knew she would figure it out. She was too smart not to. “No.”

“The marks were too precise. It was the person who has been killing them. I will never understand a person who hurts a defenseless animal.”

Since he felt the same way, he had nothing to add. He didn’t want her to know that the person who had done this would pay and probably with his life. Noah didn’t take any attack on their land lightly. Especially not something this thick.

“It was really great working with you, Ethan.”

“Right back at ya.”

She walked up the stairs, and he watched her until the door closed behind her. His body still hummed from that little smile, telling him if he didn’t have her again soon, he would likely become a blabbering idiot. But there was definitely something else there, something that scared him more than their faceless enemy killing wolves.

He just hoped it didn’t ruin him.

* * * *

Eve walked into the kitchen and drew in the wonderful smell of bacon. “Oh, God, tell me that is real bacon.”

Max glanced over his shoulder at her and shot her a smile that had body warming. “Nothing but real meat here.”

“I made some coffee,” Shane said. He was pouring said coffee into a big, blue mug. “How do you take it?”

“Black.”

He brought it to her and waited for her to take a sip. She hummed. “Oh, that tastes good.”

He smiled as if she had given him a gift. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

She nodded and sat at the kitchen bar. She had always liked their kitchen. She wasn’t that great of a cook, but she loved the functionality of theirs. Blues and grays dominated the decoration. The bar area had seven seats, and the table itself was massive. The six-burner stove was older but well taken care of. She could imagine it got a lot of use with six men in the house.

“How do you like your eggs?” Max asked.

“Scrambled.”

“Cheese?”

She shook her head.

He turned back to work, and she watched both men move around the kitchen. She could tell the brothers were as comfortable here as they were in one of their trucks or out hiking. Her father would never be in the kitchen working. For that matter, neither would her mother. They didn’t bother themselves with such mundane tasks. But these men were different. It was odd to find such masculine men content with this kind of task. But, she thought, maybe that is what made them so masculine. It wasn’t the task but how a man went about the task.

“I can squeeze some oranges if you want some juice,” Shane offered.

She realized then they were waiting on her as if she were some kind of prize. There was a part of her that knew she shouldn’t fall for it. She was an independent woman who didn’t need a man to wait on her. Still, it was nice since she had never had it happen before. She shook her head. “No, this is just fine. I love a good cup of coffee.”