Taken by Her Wolf

  Samantha Leal

  Pamela Avery

  Books in the Mossy Ridge Shifters Series

  Enemy Daddy Bear (Book 1)

  Fated Mate Protector (Book 2)

  Faking for Her Bear (Book 3)

  Taken by Her Wolf (Book 4)

  Taken by Her Wolf

  Copyright ©2021 by Samantha Leal & Pamela Avery

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic of mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the author’s permission.

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  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  Lucas couldn’t believe it had worked. He looked in the backseat of the truck and the kids were sitting quietly, holding hands. They looked comfortable, if still a little shocked. He shook his head. It had been over a year that he’d been searching for them. A year. Finding them would stand as one of the best moments of his life, forever. He didn’t think he’d ever knock on a door again without remembering their door.

  He’d gotten a tip from an old friend, that maybe the woman had holed up with another ex of hers. He’d gone through the list he had, starting at the bottom this time, working quickly before she could move again. The first one had been a bust. The guy was drunk and could barely shake his head no when Lucas said her name. The second one though…

  Lucas had walked up the cracking concrete path to the house, the ironwork by the door rusted and broken in places. He’d knocked once. Before he’d hit the door a second time, it had opened. The girl at the door looked at him wildly and mouthed ‘help’ before a large woman appeared behind her.

  “What have I told you about opening the door to strangers?! Get back in your room!”

  The girl looked at him beseechingly as she turned away. The big woman barred his line of vision into the house.

  “What do you want?” she asked in a haughty voice.

  “Well, ma’am, I’m looking for the kids of a friend of mine. I am pretty damn sure I just met one of them. Where’s the boy?”

  The woman tried to close the door on Lucas, but he’d already pushed his way past her, yelling the names of the kids.

  “Lucy! Joe! Are you here? Grab what you need and come to me! I’m taking you to your dad, Max! We’ve been looking this whole time!”

  From different areas, he heard feet scrambling. Around two corners, he watched as the kids came running, faces flushed and backpacks in hand.

  The woman was yelling for help out the door.

  Lucas walked up to her, close, causing her to quiet and step back. “Do you really want help to arrive, Essie? Do you? You don’t even recognize me! It’s Lucas, evil one. You want the truth to come out about what you did to these kids, to Max? It’s been more than a year! How can you live with yourself? Don’t even think of looking for them.” Lucas was yelling at this point. He looked over to see the kids looking frightened. He took a deep breath.

  “Sorry guys, I’m okay, just mad. Let’s get out of here. We’ve got a pretty long drive to get to your dad. Let’s go.”

  He had walked out the door with the kids in front of him.

  It was time to get to Max. The kids could start their healing right this second.

  “You guys like French fries?”

  Lucy and Joe smiled at each other and nodded.

  Chapter 2

  Harriet was behind the counter, like she always was, her hands covered in tiny coffee grounds, and no matter how often she wiped herself down, she’d find another bit of coffee at the end of the day. She loved coffee, it was the best thing in the world, but she was so damn tired of it today. She was a full mix of emotions today. Between The Cup, the only good coffee in town, and the shifters, she had zero time to herself. ZERO. And today, when her shift was done, she was starting what would be her first vacation in maybe forever.

  It was going to be half staycation and half bed-and-breakfast heaven. She wasn’t going far, but she just needed to get out of the house and be out of Mossy Ridge. She didn’t mind all her responsibilities, but really, it did wear her down to be so responsible all the time. And so single. It did wear her down to not have someone to come home to, to share the load with. Her brother, Max, was a big help at the café, and with the shifter community, but he had his own hardships to bear, and she never wanted to load him up with hers.

  There were just a couple of hours left before she was done. She’d already gotten everything prepped for the week, double checked that every supply was well stocked and brought in trained help to cover her usual shifts. She wanted to make the most of it; she planned on pajamas for the first three days, and books, and she was going to lock her phone in the car and only check it once a day. If there was an emergency, the shifters would find her, she didn’t need to listen for them. There were three movies on her list, and she had printed out the menus of the take-out joints in town and gotten the ingredients for her favorite foods. It was going to be heaven. And it started in just a few hours. Six days without a single coffee ground under her fingernails.

  The door snapped open−the wind sometimes did that on weird weather days. Someone was standing in the doorway. It was almost absurd how the light was framing the man standing in the door. It looked like a scene from an old movie, where the mysterious hero walks into the saloon. He even had broad shoulders and a thin waist, like a cowboy. Harriet laughed. She felt a wave of delirium and certainty settle over her. What is going on? What am I feeling right now? Is this a spell? She looked up at the man who had just come in. He had two bedraggled little ones with him, and he ushered them in front of him. “Hello, um, I’m looking for Max. Is he here?”

  Harriet wiped her hands on the towel. “He’ll be here in the morning. I’m his sister, is there something I can help you with?” Harriet smiled at the kids, who seemed nervous and unsure of where they were. They had both looked at each other when she’d started speaking, as if she’d said something interesting. “You guys want some hot chocolate or something, while your dad leaves his message for Max?”

  The little boy piped up, “He’s not our dad.”

  Harriet looked over at the man, her intuition now on fire with caution and warning.

  “Oh?” Harriet was sending out every thread of the magic she had, to see what she could see in this man and nothing was coming back.

  “Please, ma’am, I’m their caretaker. It’s exhausting trying to keep you out of my space, could you stop? I mean no harm, I swear.”

  Harriet was taken aback. No one had ever ‘felt’ her techniques before. Who was this guy? “Oh, I’m sorry, sure. I just… okay.” She dropped all pretense of knowing what was going on here.

  “My name is Lucas. I’m looking for Max, Max Ahearn. I know him from an earlier time in his life, when he needed an ally. I am a friend, ma’am, I swear. Can you tell me how I can see him? I can’t wait for the morning.”

  “Why don’t you go over and have a seat, Lucas. I’ll give Max a call and see if he wants to drop by here this afternoon. What did you say your last name was?”

  “Lucas Sargent. Max will know me. Tell him I have company, would you?” Lucas shepherded the kids over to a table to wait. They followed meekly but not unhappily. The little boy asked Lucas a question and his face lit up in a beautiful smile at the answer he got.

  Harriet felt a little relief at seeing that the kids were comfortable and picked up the phone to call Max.

  He picked up on the first ring, clearly curious at why she’d call from work on his off day.

  When she told him who was there, and that Lucas had kids with him, she heard a swift intake of breath and a clatter as if he’d dropped the phone.

  “I’ll be right there.” Max hung up.

  “Okay,” Harriet said to an empty line. “He’ll be here shortly, Mr. Sargent.”

  Harriet walked over to their table and dropped off two hot chocolates to the kids. She looked at Lucas. “So, how do you know Max exactly?” Her spidey-senses were all tingly at the table. What on Earth is going on here?

  At that thought, she saw Max walk shirtless by the front window. Woah. He must’ve run here as a Wolf. What the hell?

  Max came in the fro
nt door, pulling a shirt over his head. He looked for them and fell to his knees at the sight of them all. The kids ran to his arms, the girl faster than the boy. “Daddy!” she yelled.

  Harriet felt her jaw drop. Daddy? Max was somebody’s daddy? Good god, that made her an aunt! She put a hand out to steady herself and it landed on Lucas’ shoulder. He reached up a hand and held hers there. “It’s been a long time, ma’am. I tried as hard as I could to make it shorter, but it’s been a long damn time.”

  “Call me Harriet, Lucas, I’m not your damn mother. Just Harriet, okay?”

  “Got it, Harriet.”

  She could feel the smile on his face even as she stood behind him still, watching the most tender reunion she could imagine. Max was running his hands over the kids’ bodies, checking that they were real, and the kids were talking nonstop. He had tears running down his face and was laughing at the same time. At this point, he was sitting on the floor, and one kid was on each leg. The whole café was watching this beautiful moment.

  Harriet sighed. “I didn’t even know he had kids. How could I not know that about my brother?”

  Lucas answered, “There’s a lot he’d never have been able to tell you. It just wasn’t safe. It’ll be better now, I think, for everyone.”

  Harriet narrowed her eyes at that and leaned forward to whisper in his ear, “Who the hell are you?”

  Chapter 3

  Lucas couldn’t let go of her hand. Didn’t want to, wasn’t really sure if he’d spin off into the sky if he did. He was overwhelmed by her scent, her aura, everything a big tough guy wasn’t supposed to notice. But he had been floored from the first second he laid eyes on her. Her hair hung in auburn waves down to her shoulders. She was wearing a navy-blue top that clung to her every curve. Its V-neck had let him dream of falling down her cleavage. She was it. She was it.

  As she stood behind him watching the kids and Max fall into each other in relief and joy, she was radiating love. He could feel it. Holding her hand had connected him to that love, even if she’d almost achieved straight-up venom when she asked him who he was.

  He released her hand and felt the loss of her love and heat. He turned to her and held out his hand again. “My name is Lucas Sargent, Harriet. Again. I’m an old friend of Max’s, from the old pack. Please sit down. I’ll tell you how it goes, well, how it went.”

  Harriet looked at him through narrowed eyes, and then relaxed. “I really can’t believe Max has kids. I mean, in a way, it kind of makes sense. He’s always been so desperate to find any of the Wolves that have shown up and he’s been so depressed that they were all so damaged. I just thought it was because he couldn’t figure out what his pack was doing, but he must have been seeking word on the kids.” She shook her head. “Did his old pack take them? Is that part of what went wrong? He’s never even told me everything. I mean, obviously.” Harriet gestured to where Max and the kids were moving behind the coffee counter.

  Lucas looked down. “It was part of it. I mean, you know Max was trying to hunt your parents’ killers, right?”

  Harriet nodded sadly.

  “That trail was long cold, it was so long ago, whoever was responsible could have died years ago, it was just dead cold. But Max decided to stay with us, found a woman in the pack and had the kids. The woman he was with ran off, leaving Max with the kids. She was no good and Max did pretty well on his own, but the whole thing exploded.”

  Lucas shuffled his feet. “The bitch who had them? She was their grandmother, technically, at least. I think she was using them to collect from the state. She certainly didn’t care for them. They were kept pretty isolated and moved a hell of a lot. The thing was, she was being financially aided by the pack. It’s why they were so hard to find. They came running to me, and I was a complete stranger. They came running.”

  Harriet sighed, looking over at Max and the kids. “That goddamn pack. They’ve screwed Max in so many ways. These poor kids. Why didn’t Max tell me about them? Why couldn’t I feel about them? What’s up with you feeling my gift?” Harriet laughed. “That’s a lot. Can you answer any of those? Did his pack have anything to do with the kids leaving? I mean, he hates them with an unholy passion, like I’ve never seen.”

  Lucas looked across the table at Harriet. “That’s the thing. Max came to believe me, that the pack was responsible for the grandmother taking the kids. I don’t think the current leadership had anything to do with it, but they didn’t want to look into it, so it just got dropped. But he believed it enough to leave. I know he searched, but I think he also lost himself a little. I know the last time I saw him, he was on the edge of losing it. I tried to get him to come back with me, get connected again, but he was too far gone. I’m assuming you found him close to that time because he is certainly not lost anymore.”

  Harriet nodded, and Lucas took another deep breath. “And, as for your magic? I think it’s because I have similar magic that I can feel you trying to get into my mind, or my space anyway. I can do the same sort of thing, but of course,” he said wryly, “I do not try to jump into the space of strangers, generally.”

  Harriet blushed. She looked so damn cute when she was embarrassed, Lucas thought.

  “I’ve never had anyone notice before, ever,” she said. “I guess it is a little invasive,” she stammered. She paused. “But you are a Wolf shifter, right? I know I wasn’t wrong about that. How can you have both?”

  “Well, Harriet, I don’t entirely know. But I’ve always been this way. I’ve found very few people like me, like us.” Lucas looked at her directly. “Like us,” he said again.

  Chapter 4

  Harriet sat back in the armchair she’d been perched at the edge of. What was he saying? Were they related, is that why she was so struck by him? Because they were related? Oh God, what a damn shame. She’d been so heightened in her awareness of him, as a man, and it was all for nothing. Nothing.

  “So, we’re related?” she said in a stilting voice. She could almost feel the disappointment wafting off of her.

  Lucas laughed. “No. No. Definitely not. I’m not your long-lost brother or anything. I just mean that we share the same lineage, a mix of Fae and whatever else we are. We have the magic and then some. What else can you do? Maybe I can sort it out for you?”

  Harriet snorted. “Like I’m a circus animal? What tricks can I do?”

  She stood up. She put her hands out to calm him as he realized how she’d taken his comment. His face was so sorrowful! God, he’s handsome. “I’m sorry, Lucas. I know you didn’t mean it that way. It’s been a pretty news heavy day, and I’m feeling defensive, I think. I don’t even know everything I can do, really. It feels pretty much like I can do what I want, most of the time. I didn’t know my birth parents and the people who raised Max and I valued us like their own, knowing we were both ‘charmed’, as they put it. They were such hippies. They wanted ‘all kinds to grow up together’. I’m pretty sure they knew about shifters, but they weren’t in any pack beyond themselves. My mom had some magic, and my dad was a Wolf shifter. They loved us as their own, but we don’t know much of anything about what happened before we got to them. We were only ten when they were killed. That is why the trail was so cold. It’s ancient history.”

  Harriet looked down at him, his short brown hair curling slightly at his temples. I’m so glad he is not my brother, she thought.

  Lucas nodded, and smiled.

  Wait! Wait! Lucas Sargent! Are you reading me?!