The bear must have gone back to his dinner. He would protect it and bury it, while he fed from it for several days, so Paul hoped the hunter realized he’d lost his prize. Hell, he wasn’t even supposed to be hunting elk at this time of year. Paul had every intention of reporting the poacher as soon as he was able.
Paul had planned to leave their clothes where they were and return to the cabin, waiting to retrieve their things until the bear had settled down a bit. As long as the wind was still blowing in Paul’s favor, he’d be all set. Then he realized he had his cell phone in his pants pocket, and Lori might have had hers with her too. One of his guns and a knife were also with his clothes. Not that he expected anyone to come across their things and grab them when the bear was so close by.
Beyond that, Lori had her necklace with her things, and after finding it in the lake, he didn’t want her to lose it again. As much as he didn’t want to return to the area where the highly agitated bear would be protecting its prey, Paul needed to.
Keeping low like a wolf on the prowl, Paul finally reached their clothes. Through the cover of the trees and underbrush, he saw the bear behind the elk remains, snorting, clacking his teeth, and then swaying his head. The hunter was gone, not foolhardy enough to believe he could carve up his kill and haul it out of there while Paul and Lori were distracting the bear.
As a wolf, Lori suddenly materialized out of the underbrush and joined Paul. He shifted and remained crouched, then proceeded to put on his clothes as quietly as he could to avoid alerting the bear. Lori stayed in her wolf form to protect him if necessary. He sure as hell would be at a disadvantage if the bear caught sight of him now, half-dressed. Even if Paul could scramble up a tree, some grizzlies could climb them also, and even if this one couldn’t, it could reach up to a height of ten feet.
At least Paul and Lori were downwind of the bear. The problem was that bears’ senses of smell and hearing were exceptional. Eyesight not as much. So as long as the bear didn’t smell or hear them, Lori and Paul should make it all right.
Once Paul was dressed and he had Lori’s clothes in hand, he walked at a crouch until they were deeper in the woods. Then he sprinted for the cabin. Lori stuck close to him like a wolf guardian. She would make a damn good SEAL teammate in wolf form, he thought.
He planned to track down the hunter next, but as soon as Lori entered the cabin, she shifted, took her clothes from him, and began to dress. “I picked up his scent trail. I followed him for a while, but I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Distracted at seeing her naked, Paul barely heard what she was saying. As soon as she slipped into her black, silky panties, his focus turned to her beautiful breasts, with rosy nipples, rigid and mouthwatering. She grabbed her black lace push-up bra and secured her breasts, but when she folded her arms across her naked belly, he finally glanced up from feasting on her beautiful body and saw her raised brows. “Did you hear what I said?”
“I’m still getting over being chased by a bear.” The bear was nothing compared to seeing Lori naked.
“Right.” Then she pulled on her jeans.
He hadn’t wanted her anywhere near the bear, but then again, he wouldn’t have wanted her anywhere near the hunter either, just in case he decided to shoot a wolf too. A poacher couldn’t be trusted.
“I remembered we’d left our cell phones with our clothes and couldn’t even call the sheriff about the poacher,” Lori said.
“And you left your necklace behind.”
She pulled her shirt over her head. “And your shirt.”
He did love that shirt. But mostly because she had bought it for him and grinned so broadly when he’d shown the rest of his SEAL team that he had no qualms about wearing it. “I’m going to throw on something a little less noticeable.” He got an olive-green T-shirt from his room. “If we’re going to chase after the hunter, maybe we should wear clothes that will blend in more.”
“Agreed.”
“Do you want to go hunting with me?”
She smiled and he realized just how much asking pleased her.
She hurried to her bedroom and replaced the hot-pink shirt with an olive-green one that matched his, only hers dipped low enough to show off the swell of her breasts. “If we’re wearing clothes that disguise us, won’t he be liable to shoot us and say it was an accident?”
“Only one of us,” Paul said. “A second shooting would be too risky.”
She chuckled.
He pulled her in for a hug. “I don’t know, but I think we’re going to do some heavy-duty talking once we return.”
She looked up at him with a serious expression. “You mean cutting back the trees and shrubs comes later?”
He didn’t answer her right away, thinking about the weather and wanting to finish the tasks on Emma’s list.
Lori’s eyes sparkled with mirth. “The list comes first.”
“We can talk while we work.”
“Yeah, somehow I knew that list would take priority.”
“Not a priority, but we can do both at the same time.”
Smiling, she shook her head. Then they headed out, Lori with a couple of cans of bear spray repellent, and Paul with his 9 mm semiautomatic Glock pistol and a knife.
For two miles, they tracked the man. He was a typical human, and though he was wearing some hunter spray, both Paul and Lori smelled his sweat and fear and…
Paul wrinkled his nose.
Urine. The bear charging him probably had something to do with it. In any event, they had no trouble tracking the hunter’s scent. They heard a truck engine’s heavy-duty rumbling. It sounded like it had a performance exhaust upgrade, so Paul would recognize it anywhere if they heard it again. By the time they raced to where the hunter had parked the pickup truck, the vehicle had driven off. He was probably worried that the man who sent the wolves to distract the bear would call the police about him poaching.
Wishing he could have at least gotten a license plate, Paul said, “I guess that’s it for now. Ready to do some more of our chores?”
Lori let out her breath on a heavy sigh, looking totally peeved. “Too bad we missed him.”
“Agreed. I’d love to see him get a hefty fine and maybe some jail time to deter him from doing it again.”
“Lengthy jail time,” Lori said.
When they reached Lori’s place, they still had a couple more hours of light, but Paul wanted to stick close to the cabin. Tomorrow, they could trim more of the tree limbs next to the drive. He called the sheriff, told him where the man had headed, what he looked like, what he was wearing, what he’d killed, and where the elk was, not to mention the bear that was now feasting off it.
Lori removed her boots and socks, and went barefoot onto the deck, where she began clipping back twigs and small branches next to the deck’s railing. When he’d ended the call, Paul put on a pair of work gloves and started pruning the branches on the opposite side of the deck so he wouldn’t be in Lori’s way.
“So what did you want to ask me in the SUV earlier?”
Looking a little surprised, she glanced at him and hesitated to say.
“I want us to talk. I want you to tell me what’s bothering you.”
“Okay.” She still hesitated, as if she was either gathering the courage or wanted to be careful about what she said.
She should know she didn’t have to tiptoe around him. If he didn’t like the question, he just wouldn’t bare his soul.
“I wanted to ask about your last mission. About how you feel once you’ve been on one. Do you keep thinking about it? Do you wish you’d done anything differently? Is it hard to let it go?”
That was it? Hell, the number of questions was almost as long as Emma’s honey-do list. “Anything else?”
“Well, for starters, that’s it.”
Although he didn’t want to discuss this with anyone but A
llan, since he’d been there and lived through it with him, Paul knew he couldn’t avoid telling Lori the truth. Not when he’d told her they’d talk. He was just as happy to push it out of his mind completely, not wanting Lori to hear how he’d failed to protect the woman he was meant to rescue. In truth, he’d let it go while he’d been busy working or spending time with Lori. Dredging it all up would make him remember what he’d prefer to forget.
“All right,” he said with reluctance. “Do you know anything about this last mission?”
“No.”
He suspected she knew something or she wouldn’t be asking.
“Four third-year botany students from a college back east went trekking into the Amazon jungle without anyone to watch their backs. Many of the researchers who venture into the jungle take armed muscle with them for protection. It’s just one of those things. Some get by without any trouble, but others don’t. It’s always better to be safe than risk being taken hostage.” Paul continued to chop away at the overgrown limbs. He felt better talking about it if he could remain physically active.
“The students were all young, between twenty and twenty-two. Three guys and a girl. It took us forever to locate them because their captors had moved the students around a lot. We finally found them tied to trees, starved and dehydrated. Which wasn’t good. They were weak and we were going to have problems getting them out of there quickly and safely to a point where we could rally for help.” He paused to exchange a tree-limb lopper for a saw. The trimming had been sorely neglected over the years, and he vowed to help out more around Emma’s places when he could.
“What about the guards?”
“We were fortunate that nobody was watching the students. We guessed they figured the students weren’t going anywhere, and as isolated as they were from civilization, no one was likely to come across them. If it wasn’t for our keen wolf sense of smell, we might not have found them either.”
“You couldn’t call for a helicopter to come pick them up right there at the campsite?” she asked.
“We had to assume that their captors were still in the area. We needed to get the students as far away from there as possible and to a better extraction point where a helicopter could reach us. We freed the students, gave them water and nutrition bars, and then hiked for nearly three hours, barely resting, despite their condition. Not one of the students complained about it, knowing all our lives depended on it. The woman was having the worst time of it. Both Allan and I had taken turns carrying her.”
Paul put the saw down, grabbed a smaller clipper, and cut away at the twigs, but he realized Lori wasn’t working any longer. Either she was done, or she was too engrossed in what he had to say. He didn’t want to look at her, didn’t want to see how she would view his failure. He realized then how hard that was for him to deal with—Lori seeing him as less of a hero and less of a man.
“We had safely crossed several streams, but after the last one, we heard men shouting in the distance. Their shouts were coming from every direction. Except for up above the cliffs. We had one choice. After climbing the cliffs, one of us would lead the students out, while the other pinned down the kidnappers with a barrage of gunfire.
“At that point, neither Allan nor I could carry the woman up the cliff. The male students could barely make it on their own. We had a rope harness attached to her, and I was guiding her up. Allan had climbed the rest of the way to the top with the others. I left her, hurried to the top, and between Allan and me, we were pulling her up. I grabbed one of her hands and then the other while Allan continued to tug her the rest of the way up using the harness.”
Paul took a ragged breath. “The bastards began shooting from across the stream. Allan had to stop pulling her up by the rope harness to return fire. I continued to draw her the rest of the way as quickly as I could. But I was too late.”
Lori touched his arm, and he realized she’d crossed the deck without him even being aware of it. She took his clippers and set them aside, and then pulled him into her arms.
He swallowed hard. “She didn’t make it,” he said, barely able to get the words out. “I couldn’t let her go, Lori. I had to get her home to her family.”
“I know you, Paul. You would have done all that was humanly possible. Just think of the men you saved who might have perished along with her! You’ve always been there for us when things were so bad. We were broken. The whole pack. Yet you organized us and made sure we had shelter and could fend off the rabid wolf pack until you, Allan, and Catherine killed them. And then when we were starting over, you were the one who took charge and got us back on our feet. You’ve always taken care of us. But sometimes we need to take care of you.”
He looked down at her and saw she was dead serious.
She tilted her chin up stubbornly. “You’re always concerned about everyone else, Paul. You’ve always felt you should carry everyone else’s burden. And…well, you should.”
He hadn’t expected her to say that. Somehow, she always knew the right thing to say to make him feel better. “Oh, I should, should I?”
“Yes. You should. Your pack needs you. More than ever before.”
“What if Allan took over and—”
“Not only does he not want the job, but you’re the one who always took charge. Everyone expects you to take it over and be here for us.” Lori let her breath out on a heavy sigh. “I know you don’t want to give up what you do. When you do, we’ll be waiting for you.”
“What about you? Will you be waiting for me the next time I come home? Not disappearing to avoid me?”
“Who says—”
“I do. You can deny it all you want, but it’s the truth. I can live with it for now, as long as you’re not avoiding me because you hate me or something.”
“Yeah, right. I wouldn’t want you to lead our pack if I hated you.”
“Then it’s because you get upset that I’m leaving again.”
“Like I don’t have anything better to do than think about you every minute you’re gone?”
“Every minute?” He smiled a little.
Lori was glad she’d made him feel better. He’d make her feel better if he stuck around. She noticed the sun was beginning to set, so she led him over to the outdoor chairs. She was beginning to think she’d made an awful mistake in leaving every time he’d come home before. But she knew he hadn’t been ready to settle down, and every time he’d left, she’d felt bad.
He didn’t let go of her hand when he sat down. She wasn’t sure what he was up to until he pulled her into his lap and wrapped his arms around her waist. They sat there like that, watching the sun set in silence.
He still hadn’t once said he wanted to stay here for them. Not yet. And she didn’t want to push him on it. Which was why she hadn’t said anything more about her concern for Rose.
Chapter 12
Lori sat in Paul’s lap, leaning back against him. She felt his arousal take on a life of its own, his hand gently caressing her arm while they were supposed to be watching the sunset. She decided he was sleeping with her tonight. Wolves mated for life, so she couldn’t have sex with him, but she wanted him in her bed and wanted to share the closeness. She did not want to mate him though, not if he was so determined to stay away from the pack for months on end.
She had no qualms about being his mate and sharing in the responsibilities of leading the pack that, unbeknownst to him, would be growing by leaps and bounds once he declared he was their leader. There was time enough later to share that news. But she wouldn’t be his mate if he was going to leave all the time, possibly getting himself killed in the Amazon jungle and leaving her to run the pack alone.
She took a deep breath and let it out, loving this side of him, the sexy tenderness that was Paul. She was so sorry for what he’d been through—for the woman they’d lost and for the woman’s family. Yet Lori sensed he was somewhat relieved to h
ave shared the story with her.
Something clicked with her at that moment, and she wondered if he needed someone to convince him to stay. She’d always thought he should make the decision on his own. But she was coming to the conclusion that he didn’t believe they truly needed him. That maybe he thought he’d step on toes because they had managed for themselves ever since he joined Hunter’s SEAL team.
It was late and she normally would have felt tired, but the way he was stroking her arm, the way she felt his arousal pressed against her back, she couldn’t help but think of him in bed, and any tiredness that might have claimed her slipped away.
The sun had long ago disappeared behind the distant mountains, and yet they still sat there together, neither of them calling it a night. Was he thinking of asking her to come to his bed? Or was he hoping she’d ask him?
She couldn’t believe how nervous she felt about it. What if he said no? That he didn’t want to compromise her? What if he really didn’t want to go to bed with her?
“Do you want to go to bed?” he asked, breaking through her muddled thoughts.
Maybe she was a worrywart.
“Yeah, the sun has already set.” As if he didn’t realize it had. She didn’t make a move to disengage herself from him, loving the closeness they shared. It was the first time when he’d been home that they’d been really close like this.
The night air grew cooler while the warmth of his body heated hers. He continued to run his hand over her arm in a soothing manner. Well, more than soothing. She was already getting turned on.
And he could smell it. Just like she could smell his arousal and his piney scent from the run through the woods.
He leaned down and nuzzled her cheek with his face. She smiled at the scratchiness of the hint of stubble on his cheek. “You’re scratchy.”
His lips swept over her cheek and they were soft and masculine. She turned to look at him, to see his expression. His eyes were dark with interest. He leaned down and kissed her mouth, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, wanting to press her breasts against his chest, wanting to crush her body against his.