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  She shrugged one shoulder and pulled the magazine he’d had out on the counter toward her. “Hunting and Fishing?” she asked.

  He felt his neck warm slightly. Sure, he hunted with his claws and fished with his teeth, but yes, he enjoyed the human magazine. Would she mock him, as she tended to mock anything human?

  “I’d like to do some hunting while I’m here,” she said. “We had mandatory wolf time back at the compound, but it wasn’t like I just got to run free in places like this.” She gestured to the beautiful lakes, streams and forests portrayed in the magazine.

  He sniffed the air as he cracked eggs into the pan. She’d gone back to wearing her synthetic male hormones. Heaven knew she needed them. Her face was beyond pretty, and any male would be suspicious in an instant if it weren’t for the fact that most of them weren’t very aware of the scientific developments in artificial pheromones.

  He hadn’t been aware of it when he first met her, that was for sure.

  He served eggs and cheese onto a plate and slid it toward her. She ate it absentmindedly while reading the magazine.

  He sat next to her, watching each morsel as it moved into her perfect pink lips, unable to believe he could feel jealous of eggs. “There are some amazing streams and lakes around here. I’d be happy to take you out to look at some.”

  She nodded. “That would be satisfactory.”

  He shook his head and started to clean up the kitchen. She was so entitled and she didn’t even know it. Well, she could figure that out later. Right now she just needed time to adjust.

  A knock sounded on the door, and he wiped his hands on the dish towel he was holding and strode to the door. That would be Ernie, bringing the things he’d told him to bring for Matt. He cast a quick glance at the smaller wolf seated at his counter, and sincerely hoped Matt could fool Ernie if the need arose.

  * * *

  Matt watched with narrowed eyes as the young, gray-haired man greeted Thor and pulled him into a rough hug. Thor pulled back to look the other man in the eyes and asked him questions in a low tone that said he didn’t want her to hear. She cocked an ear, then noticed the new man looking in her direction and quickly turned away, ears burning.

  She didn’t need excess attention and Thor should have known that. She thought over what the man at the door looked like. There was something vaguely familiar about him, but she couldn’t make it out. The silver hair looked odd with his mid-twenties features, and he had a masculine face, square and plain with friendly but slightly empty blue eyes. Just medium, regular blue.

  She felt a shiver up her spine. She didn’t like the way he looked at her. She didn’t even know why.

  She’d been creeped on a lot in her work for the Tribunal. The fact that she was a Tribunal official hadn’t stopped a lot of wolves, male and female, from thinking she was there to be dominated. Simply because she was small and pretty, at least for a male. Well, she’d show anyone who thought they could bother her.

  She was strong and able to fight. She’d done it countless times, using her body to get out of trouble when she couldn’t do it with her mouth alone.

  She laughed darkly to herself. Next time Thor tried something she’d make sure to show him who was boss.

  As long as her mutinous body didn’t melt at his touch first.

  He wanted to mate her. Her. Her body felt warm at the thought and she squirmed on the stool, trying not to think about it as she focused on the fish and game in the magazine Thor had on the counter. Fish and game weren’t sexy.

  An image of her and Thor splashing out of a stream as wolves, playing and biting, and then making their way to a soft patch of grass together, laying down in the…

  She shook her head. No way in hell! She flipped frantically though the pages as the men continued to talk in low voices. She heard scuffing on the ground, and turned to see that the other man had pushed past Thor to come over to her. She turned on her stool to look at him imperiously.

  He froze in place for a moment under her cold stare. She’d learned it from her father and more than a few men had fallen victim to it, unable to keep doing what they were doing when so much haughty disapproval was leveled on them.

  It was an alpha stare, one of her powers.

  The man glared at her for a moment and then looked back at Thor, who caught up to him and pulled him back roughly by the shoulder and turned him around to say something else in a low voice.

  She slipped off the stool and walked over to them, not liking the secrecy or feeling like she had no control over the situation.

  “Who is this?” she asked Thor, circling the newcomer as Thor held him.

  “This is Ernie,” Thor said. “My second in command.”

  She sneered, letting Ernie see it. “Your beta?” She looked him up and down. “Were there no others to challenge for it?”

  Ernie scowled, but she refused to be cowed by it. Thor seemed to think she was being rude, but Thor didn’t understand what she saw. That Ernie wasn’t a good wolf, and that the only way to deal with him was by letting him know up front that you wouldn’t take any crap from him.

  She’d gotten to know far more wolves in her day than Thor ever would and she could read them well.

  Ernie handed a bag he’d been carrying to Thor. “The things you asked me to get,” he said in a low, gravelly voice. He smirked as he looked her up and down, making her skin crawl. “I can see why you need it. She’s sure to stand out.”

  “You mean he,” Thor said.

  Ernie raised a dark gray eyebrow. “You’re kidding. I assumed it was a girl in boy clothes.”

  “Can’t you scent it?” Thor asked, sharing a quick glance with Matt to make sure she didn’t say anything.

  Ernie scented the air. “Ah, you’re right.” He laughed, and it was a sound she didn’t like. “I guess the face just threw me off.” He reached for her and she moved away, but he caught her around the waist and tried to turn her face to him. “So pretty, though.”

  Bile rose in her at his touch and she heard a low snarl from Thor. Things were about to get complicated.

  7

  Thor growled and lunged forward to separate them, but before he could, he heard a loud crack as Matt’s head ducked and her leg swung into the air in a fast spinning kick that whacked Ernie’s hand away from her and put her a pace or two away from him. She grabbed the bag from Thor’s hands and let out an angry hiss and strode away into her room.

  “Call me if you need me,” she said, before slamming the door behind her.

  Thor rubbed a hand over his neck. “Damn.”

  Ernie groaned and held out his busted-looking hand. “I think she broke my damn wrist.”

  “Hmm,” Thor said coldly. “You’d do well to stop thinking of him as a she.”

  Ernie nodded reluctantly. “Damn, it hurts.”

  “It’ll heal quick,” Thor said. “What were you thinking, grabbing him like that?”

  “I still can’t believe that’s a him. In fact, I don’t think I even care.” He took a step toward the door Matt had exited through.

  Thor stepped in front of him, growling. It was a much lower, more threatening sound than he’d used before, and Ernie stopped.

  “Fine.” He shook his head and folded his arms. “You’re going to need more than a wig for that one. That kind of beauty isn’t going to stay underground very easily. What’s his name?”

  Thor hesitated. He wasn’t good at lying, at intrigue. He was an honest person and generally expected the same from others. But for some reason, he didn’t really feel like sharing anything about Matt with Ernie. “He’s a family friend,” he said.

  Ernie raised a brow. “Really? I didn’t know your family had any friends.”

  Thor felt a lump in his throat. Had Ernie always been this much of a jackass, and he just hadn’t noticed?

  It hadn’t been easy coming back to take over the pack, and he’d been glad to have a beta who was happy to assist. But he wasn’t the most sensitive of males and so if E
rnie had had some bad personality quirks, he wouldn’t necessarily have noticed.

  “Nevertheless, he’s a friend, and I’ll expect you to treat him with respect.” When Ernie gave him an odd look, he cleared his throat. “As long as I’m alpha here.”

  Ernie nodded, but continued to look at Matt’s door with a strange gleam in his eye. “Don’t you want to claim him? I know it’s odd, because he’s a dude, but there’s something…weird…about him.”

  Thor clenched his teeth at the other man’s mention of wanting his mate. That’s right, he was already thinking of her as his, try as he might to slow himself down. Her hot little body had told him everything he needed to know. Now he just needed to give her time to come to the same conclusion.

  Time without someone like Ernie sniffing around.

  “If that’s all, then you can go. Thanks for picking things up for me,” Thor said, ushering Eddie, who was still sneaking looks at Matt’s door, out of the cabin.

  “Fine.” Eddie seemed reluctant to go, but Thor needed to go talk to Matt.

  “Ernie, I need you to play this one close to the chest, okay? There are some big people involved.”

  Ernie nodded. He’d never given Thor a reason not to trust him, and if he’d sided with Thor’s treacherous uncle, he could have done irreparable damage. Luckily, he seemed to have as much reason to hate the man as Thor did. “All right. I understand.”

  “And if you put hands on him again…”

  Ernie raised his hands. “I get it, I get it. Odd pheromones. I blame the pheromones.”

  Now that was the Ernie he knew. He shuffled him outside and shut the door behind him, locking it. He could hear angry cursing coming from the direction of Matt’s room.

  He walked over cautiously, listening to what she was saying. Something about “impudent males”…

  The door banged open. “If you’re going to eavesdrop, you might as well come in.”

  Thor’s jaw dropped. Matt was standing at the door, hands on her hips, the short black wig he’d had Ernie buy atop her head, covering her blond hair. Her eyes looked even lighter by comparison, her eyelashes and eyebrows had nearly disappeared.

  But there was no disguising her beauty. She took his breath away. Maybe she always had. Maybe it was destined somehow. Certainly no female had ever gotten under his skin as much as Matt did, even as a male.

  “You look great,” he said.

  “Think it’ll work?”

  “I think if they find you, they find you. But in the meantime, at least if anyone is asking around about a missing blond wolf, they won’t find them.”

  She nodded, turning to a mirror on the wall of her room to pull the short pieces of the wig into place. “It’s itchy.”

  “I’m sure,” he said. “Want me to take you out and show you around to distract you?”

  She nodded. “Sure. Let me get my jacket.” She shrugged into it and Thor led the way out of the cabin.

  They walked down a dirt trail lined with gravel, enjoying the smell of the wet grass, the fresh mountain air. He was pleased to have her at his side. It already felt just right. He could see her living here with him. Having cubs here.

  But would she be able to see the same thing? Would he ever be more than a mongrel to her? Would anything he could give her feel small compared to what she’d had before?

  They walked until they came to a stream that led to a small pond. It was glistening in the morning sun, partially shaded by clouds and the mountain just behind it.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  He was pleased. He couldn’t give her the world and its millions. But he could give her a little stream, a little pond, and mountains to run wild in. Maybe at some point she’d stop missing the other stuff.

  “I’m glad you think so.”

  She looked up at him with a happy smile and his heart thumped in his chest. No one had ever affected him this way.

  Was it just that he knew she was a female now? No, it was something else. She was being honest and open, letting him see the person behind the mask.

  Not to mention she’d melted like hot butter in his arms and made the wolf in him stand up and howl in pleasure.

  She picked up a stone, studied it for smoothness, and then chucked it out across the lake, watching it skitter, making little ripples across the surface. “Wow. That’s oddly satisfying.”

  “I know,” he said, picking up a stone, studying it, and then sending it skimming out across the water, twice as far as hers. He grinned at her.

  “Show-off,” she teased. She started walking around the side of the pond, through the tall grass, and didn’t seem to mind that her shoes and pants were getting wet. “Damn, I love the smell out here.”

  “It’s nice, huh?” he asked. “After living here, I don’t think I could ever be a city wolf.”

  There was a small beat of silence, as he realized the implications of his words. She knew he wanted to mate her, and he’d just said that he couldn’t be in her world. How would she react?

  “Me neither,” she said.

  His grin deepened. She was perfect. His groin ached at the thought of showing her again just how perfect she was.

  He could hardly wait to mate her.

  She walked a little further and then sat down on a log to rest and look out at the water.

  “Tired?” he asked, sitting beside her. The log leaned perilously under his weight and he groaned and took a nearby boulder instead.

  “Fatso,” she said playfully.

  “Hmph.” He flexed his arms, enjoying the way her cheeks flushed as she checked out his muscles. “Really?”

  “Whatever,” she grumbled, looking away.

  “And what about you?” he asked. “You’re so skinny.”

  She shot him a glare. “Skinny or not, it’s not polite to comment on women’s bodies.”

  He shrugged. “I’m not a very polite person then, I guess.”

  “That, my friend, would be the understatement of the century.”

  He frowned. The word “friend” ricocheted through him. He should be glad they were friends instead of enemies. Instead, he just sort of felt vaguely unsatisfied, because friends wasn’t even half of what he wanted. “So what are you going to do if they don’t find you?” he asked. “Make a home here?”

  “Or move on,” she said. “Hide somewhere new. As long as I’m free, I don’t mind.”

  “A life on the run, no one to depend on? That doesn’t sound like my kind of freedom.”

  She gave him a meaningful look and then stared out at the lake. “You’ve never had my kind of prison.”

  “This is true,” he said quietly, watching her. “I’m sorry. I’ll respect what you want.”

  “It’s like, just because I came here in a moment of crisis, that doesn’t mean you should take advantage,” she said. “What if I don’t want to take a mate? What if it would be too weird after living as a male for so long?”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t think of that. All I thought about was the fact that you were just what I’d been looking for and it would help you, too. It would makes things less complicated.”

  “How does making a decision to be mated for life make things less complicated?” She shook her head. “Besides, you deserve to mate for other reasons.”

  “What reasons?” he asked.

  “Love, like you mentioned. Not out of convenience.”

  “I need to mate with someone who will benefit the pack. I need an alpha female.”

  “And if you can’t find one?” she asked.

  He threw another rock out across the lake. “Then I guess I’ll stay alone.”

  She exhaled and leaned back on the log. Over here by the edge of the pond, the smell was murkier, earthier, but still rich and moist and a delight to be next to.

  If she wasn’t here to stay, at least he could give her something nice while she was here. Though something in him just fell apart at the thought of her leaving.

  “So, if you mated me, it would o
nly be because you finally found the alpha female you were looking for?” she asked.

  He couldn’t read her expression, but he expected there was more to those words than just the spoken part. “Yes, but not only because of that. I’m attracted to you.”

  “What if you hadn’t found out I was female?” she asked.

  “I admit I was a little attracted to you either way. But the thing is, I need to procreate. I need to further my pack. I need someone who can stand beside me as we rebuild everything my parents had.”

  “And I could never do that, could I?” she asked. “Because the minute the Tribunal heard, they could try to ruin you.”

  He blinked. Was she right? No, he’d ruin the Tribunal first. “They can try,” he said. She sat up a little straighter, looking over at him.

  “Not much scares you, does it?” she asked.

  He shrugged and tossed another rock. “I guess not. I mean, I grew up getting the crap beat out of me by the only parental figure I had. Me and Lock had no one. After you almost die, what is there to be afraid of?”

  “It happening again?” she said, resting her chin in her hands.

  “I’m not a kid anymore,” he said. “I had to rely on those around me back then. But now I’d like to see anyone try and take away the man I’ve become.”

  She tilted her head. “With words like that, you might convince me to be your mate after all.”

  He grinned. Jackpot. “Well, maybe I’ve re-thought it? After all, as you said, you could cause me trouble.”

  She sniffed. “You should be so lucky.”

  He tossed a rock and laughed. “To be with a cross-dressing Tribunal lackey?” He rested his hands on his knees and looked over. “Sure.”

  He frowned when he realized he’d hit a sore mark. Damn, why did one of them have to hurt the other’s pride any time they were opening up? Dammit!

  She folded her arms. “I get it. I was horrible to you. To all of the others back at the mansion. And I have nothing to justify the superiority. Except it was all I had. I knew I would never have the life others would have. I wouldn’t be able to have a mate—”