ALPHA’S PREY

I take them and dump the food into my canvas sacks and hand the bags back to him. “I don’t need these, thanks.”

As I head out the door, I hear him call after me, “You be careful, you hear?”

“Yep, I will. Thank you!”

Inside my Subaru, Bear gives a happy bark to see me return.

I open the door and put the bags of groceries on the passenger seat while Bear lunges forward and tries to kiss my face from the back seat. “You ready to go to the cabin, boy?”

He chuffs and tries to lick some more.

I angle my face away and give him a quick head rub. “Go lie down,” I tell him.

He promptly hops over the back seat into the trunk area, where I put his bed, and curls into it.

I smile into the rear view mirror. “Good boy.”

Snowflakes hit my windshield, and I say a prayer to the weather gods. The weather app I checked said there’d be a light wintry mix but would clear up tomorrow. It will be chilly, but I should be able to complete my research and get home by the end of the week.

Caleb

IT’S SNOWING.

All I can think about is the redhead and whether she made it to her cabin safely. I feel a cold front coming in, and my bear’s telling me it’s gonna be a bad snowstorm. Weather turns quickly up here.

The good thing about the snow is it might deter the psycho who preys on female hikers.

The bad thing is it makes the determined researcher far more vulnerable. If she’s snowed in there, she’ll have nowhere to run.

Stupid, headstrong female.

No, not stupid. She’s a scientist. Probably extremely smart.

But I push back my grudging admiration of sturdy, self-sufficient woman like her.

I consider the danger she might be in. There’s something out there that stalks pretty young women.

Doubtful it’s the same fuck who killed my family, but I’m after him, just the same. Because I know what it’s like to have someone you love taken from you. And I won’t stand by and let that tragedy befall others.

Not in my woods.

He must live somewhere close. Trouble is, I know everyone in town. And I think my instincts would tell me if there was someone off in Pecos. Plus, I would recognize the scent. You can’t fool my nose. A bear’s sense of smell is 2100 times better than a human’s. Seven times better than the best bloodhound. And I remember the smell that mingled with blood and death on my family. It wasn’t bear. It wasn’t human, either.

It wasn’t any kind of animal scent I recognize.

And maybe this is a lead, maybe it’s not, but I caught the scent of something similar in Tucson. Not the same-hell, it if had been the same, the guy would be dead. But there were a few guys at the Fight Club. They were shifters, but I couldn’t figure out what animal.

And that doesn’t make sense.

But I didn’t trust my senses when I was there. And being around all those shifters, being in the city-if you can call Tucson a city, and I do-had my bear so on edge, I was slipping between human and animal form the whole time I was there. Barely keeping my mind intact. It made me cranky as hell, and a danger to all those around me. All I wanted to do was get back on I-10 and drive away as fast as I could.

It’s only here, back at my cabin where I can be the antisocial hermit I am, I’ve sorted through my impressions. Now I wish I had stayed and asked questions about that scent.

I stand in my open doorway and stare out at the snow falling. Looks like going back into hibernation isn’t going to be an option. I have to go check on the human.

I’m not going to drive up to the research cabin-that would only scare the shit out of her. She’d think I’m the psycho stalker. I’m sure she’s been warned about the danger. It’s getting too cold to walk now, though. At least in human form.

I could wait until morning and hike over.

My bear rumbles.

Fuck.

Looks like we’re going for a four-legged hike.

I strip out of my clothes and stow them just inside the door. Outside, it’s started to snow harder. The flakes stings my bare skin and the soles of my feet as I shut the door in human form. Then I close my eyes and drop to all fours, the bear always so close to the surface, ready to take over.

He runs.

He fucking loves to run.

If he had his way, I’d give up all humanity. Roam these woods as bear. Forget all the pain, the tragedy. The life hardly worth living.

I almost gave into him in the months after Jen and Gretchen died. I wanted to. I hoped he’d swallow every last bit of Caleb, leave me without the ability to go back.

But the wolves intervened. I don’t know how they got word, but the Tucson wolf pack showed up on their bikes, scaring the snot out of the inhabitants of Pecos, who thought the Hell’s Angels had invaded.

They hunted me as a pack. Cornered me in a fight. They’re lucky I didn’t kill them all. The wolves kept me cornered and Garrett Green, their alpha, took his human form and ordered me to shift. He carried enough alpha command to make me do it.

They dragged me back to my cabin and stayed with me until I was human again. Forced me back to human form every time I tried to shift.

I guess they think I ought to be grateful.

I’m not.

I hate the fuckers.

They brought me back into my pain. Into a life I don’t want to lead.

On the other hand, there is something about knowing an entire pack of shifters have my back. Bears are generally solitary animals, so it was strange to be claimed by a pack. I still don’t know why they did it.