THE snowshoes were dragging at her feet. She gave Toby a mockresentful glare it was safe because she was glaring at his back. Bullet holes and all, he was obviously not having any trouble. He was barely limping as they scaled the side of another mountain. He’d slowed down, but that didn’t help as much as she’d hoped. If he hadn’t promised her an early camp at the top of the current climb, she probably would have just collapsed where she stood. “Not far,” he said without looking around. Doubtless her panting told him all he needed to know about how tired she was. “Part of it is the altitude,” he told her. “You’re used to more oxygen in the air and have to breathe harder to make up the difference.” He was making excuses for her and it stiffened her spine. She’d make this climb if it killed her. She dug the edge of her snowshoe into the snow in preparation for the next step, and a wild cry echoed through the trees, raising the hair on the back of her neck as it echoed in the mountains.
It sat in unharmed glory amidst foil-covered meals scattered in fanciful patterns with bits and pieces of Toby’s backpack. Typical man, she thought with experimental exasperation, leaving the woman to clean up the mess. She gathered Toby’s clothes and shook them free of snow. She stuffed them into her pack and then started putting the foil-clad meals on top. With a little organization, she was able to put most of the undamaged food in her backpack, but there was no way she would be able to stuff anything more into it. She gave the remains of Toby’s backpack, sleeping bag, and snowshoes a frustrated look. It wouldn’t have bothered her so much, except this was a wilderness area and they weren’t supposed to leave anything behind. She looked closely at Toby’s backpack, but it had been ripped to shreds. The gun had taken Damage, too. She didn’t know much about rifles, but she suspected that they needed a straight barrel to work right. She hit the jackpot, though, when one of the pieces of
IT didn’t take Lauren any time at all to discover that running in snowshoes sucked. They caught in the rocks, they caught in the brush, they brought her to her knees twice, and only Toby’s hand on her elbow kept her from falling all the way down the mountainside. Jumping downed trees was . . . interestingly difficult. However, Toby, without snowshoes, was sinking up to his knees and deeper with each step—so she was properly grateful for hers. That’s not to say they were slow. It amazed Lauren what terror could do for her speed. After the first, terrifying sprint-slide down the steep slope they’d spent hours climbing, she lost track of time and direction. She kept her eyes on Toby’s red coat and stayed with him. When Toby slowed down at last, they were all alone in the forest. Still they didn’t stop. He kept her going at a fast jog for an hour or more, but he chose their path more carefully, staying up where the snow was shallower and his lack of snowshoes didn’t hamper them. He hadn’t
Without knowing how she did it, it’s not worth trying to fight her and risk her defeating us without warning Dads. The wolves, both of them, are not as worrisome as she is. Dads needs to know what’s going on— and maybe Asil can shed some light on who she is and what she wants.” There was something bothering her, but it took a dozen yards of progress before she thought of what it was. “Why here? I mean, I know she was looking for Asil—and it sounds like she got some sort of information indicating he was in Aspen Creek. Did you catch her excitement when you told her he was here? She wasn’t sure. So what is she doing here and not in Aspen Creek?” “Baiting a trap,” he said grimly. “My father was right about that, but not about who or why. All she had to do was kill a few people and make it look like a werewolf, and the Marrok would be sure to send someone after it. Then she could take him and question him. Much safer than driving into Aspen Creek and facing off with my father.” “Do you th
Lauren sniffed the air, too, but she didn’t smell anything. Just trees and winter and wolf. She tried again. “You might as well come out,” Toby growled, looking out into the dadsrkness below their bench. “I know you’re there.” Lauren turned around, but she didn’t see anything out of place. Then she heard the sound of boots in the snow and looked again. A man stepped out of the woods about ten yards down the mountain. If he hadn’t been moving, she probably wouldn’t have seen him. The first thing she noticed was hair. He didn’t wear a hat, and his hair was an odd shade between red and gold; it hung in ragged, ungroomed tangles down his back and blended into a beard that would have done credit to Hill or Gibbons of ZZ Top. He wore an odd combination of animal skins, rags, and new boots and gloves. In one hand he held the bundle she’d made of the things that had been in Toby’s backpack, and her own bright pink backpack was slung over one shoulder. He tossed them both toward Toby, and the
Lauren brought peace and serenity with her wherever she went—at least when she wasn’t scared, hurt, or upset. Some of her power depended upon her being a werewolf, which magnified the effect of her magic. But a larger part of it was the steel backbone that made the best of whatever circumstances she happened to be in, the compassion she’d shown to Asil when he’d tried to scare her, and the way she hadn’t been able to leave poor Dennis out in the cold. Those were conscious decisions. A man made himself Alpha, it wasn’t just an accident of birth. The same was true of Omegas. “Once,” said Dennis quietly, pausing in his eating, “just after a very bad week, I spent an afternoon camped up in a tree in the jungle, watching a village. I can’t remember now if we were supposed to be protecting them or spying on them. This girl came out to hang her wash right under my tree. She was eighteen or nineteen, I suppose, and she was too thin.” His eyes traveled from Lauren to Toby and back to his food.
Did she still regret that? Toby was overcome with the wild desire to kill them all again, Leo and his mate, the whole Chicago pack—but at the same time he was pathetically grateful that his mate was a werewolf who wouldn’t fade and die the way Samuel’s wives all had. Brother Wolf stirred and settled down, just like Dennis had. “The wolf who attacked you didn’t come back to you, then, after you Changed?” Toby asked. Usually when a wolf Changed someone, it was drawn back to the new werewolf for a while. Mostly, Samuel had theorized to him once, some genetic imperative to make sure that an untaught, uncontrolled werewolf wasn’t going to draw too much unwanted attention. Dennis shook his head. “Like I said, I tracked her down myself, after the first full moon—she and that woman. What is she anyway? She sure as hell ain’t human—sorry, ma’am— not with the things I seen her do. She tried to call me to her the first time I Changed. I didn’t know what she was, only that she smelled bad—like th
Afterward, she lay panting and miserable on the ice-crystal-covered snow, too tired to move. Even cold, she discovered, had a smell. Gradually, as her misery faded, she realized that for the first time since last night, when Toby had curled around her and surrounded her with his warmth, she felt toasty-warm. As the initial agony faded to aches and pains, she stretched, making her claws expand and lengthen like a big cat’s. Her back popped and crackled all the way down her spine. She didn’t want to go back and curl up with a strange male only feet away. The wolf wasn’t afraid of the male. She knew he wasn’t likely to behave like the Others. But she didn’t much like the idea of touching anyone other than Toby, either. Near but out of sight, a wolf, Toby, made a quiet sound, not quite a bark or a whine. Wobbly as a newborn foal, she staggered to her feet. She paused to shake the snow off her pelt and give herself a moment to get used to four paws before starting back, her clothes in her