“We’re going to a tree farm to get a real tree for my place like my uncle always did.”

  She smiled, surprised about that, but she thought maybe she had made him feel more in the Christmas spirit and she was glad if that was so.

  “My uncle always had artificial trees for the cabins, but he always had a real tree in his own home to bring in the scent of the woods inside. He felt it made it feel more Christmas like. After discussing how he always decorated the resort for the holidays, I feel the need to carry forth his tradition. It’s only right.”

  “Are you sure you want to go to all that trouble?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I haven’t celebrated Christmas except every so often. It’s about the Christmas cheer, not just about present giving.”

  “Seriously.” She felt bad that he hadn’t been able to spend that much time with his uncle and she thought it would be sad if he didn’t have any family to celebrate Christmas with this year especially since he was finally home for the holidays and his uncle was gone. “Okay, sure. Listen, I was thinking, you don’t have any guests at the resort for Christmas. I’ll be gone before then. You need to come out to my sister and her mate’s horse ranch outside of Yuma Town and enjoy Christmas with us—feasting, playing games, family and friends. I don’t want you to be alone.”

  He smiled. “But—”

  “My sister has already checked you out. You’re good to go.”

  He chuckled, but he didn’t agree or disagree. She really hoped he would join them for Christmas. It would be awful to think of him just sitting in the house at the empty resort all alone for the holidays. She was almost thinking of staying here with him so he wouldn’t be alone, if he didn’t feel comfortable about meeting her whole family for Christmas. Which could be understandable. That could be a little overwhelming, particularly since they weren’t even dating.

  They dropped by a Christmas farm and wandered through it until they found a six-foot tall tree, perfect to set up in the corner of his living room. She loved the artificial tree in her cabin, but a real tree was so nice and fragrant.

  When they got home, she asked, “Do you like eggnog and brandy? I’ll go get some and we can have it while we’re decorating the tree and putting up the lights. It’s one of our family traditions.” She was looking forward to seeing all the Christmas decorations. Here she thought she would be working on her word count, but she couldn’t let him do this alone. Not after he helped decorate her cabin so she could be in the Christmas spirit for writing.

  “Sure, thanks, Jessie.” Emerson couldn’t believe how good he felt about the holidays with Jessie being here, though the downside of all this would be she would leave before Christmas actually arrived. He could only visit her for the next few days. And he realized how short that time really was. He wasn’t sure about seeing her family for Christmas. He couldn’t imagine staying with her protective family and being scrutinized.

  Without Jessie asking him to do so, he started playing Christmas music and went out to the shed to get more Christmas decorations. By the time he arrived at the house with the box of decorations, he figured Jessie would have brought the eggnog and brandy and returned to the house. She’d turned on the Christmas lights at her place, the tree lit up in the window, and the ones hanging from the house shining brightly in a multitude of colors. She was probably using the bathroom or maybe she had gotten a call from her sister.

  But after the bear incident, he couldn’t take the chance that everything was all right.

  He hurried to her cabin and knocked on the door. There wasn’t any answer.

  “Jessie!” He unlocked the door and tore inside. The eggnog was sitting on the counter, the fridge door wide open. Hell. He practically threw the carton of eggnog in the fridge and slammed the door shut, just in case he was jumping to conclusions and she was just fine. Then he saw her clothes on the back patio. She had shifted? That surprised the hell out of him.

  He tore off his clothes and shifted, then raced out through the cougar door as a big cat. If the bears were back, at least they couldn’t fit through the cougar doors.

  His heart was beating pell-mell, worried she was in a world of danger. Why didn’t she alert him? No time?

  At least he could follow her scent easily, and he could see her trail, but two bears had made a path through the snow too. Or bear shifters, to be exact.

  He snarled a cougar warning, telling her and telling them he was coming. A cougar would have to move quickly to stay out of the bears’ reach, but with their springy action, they could do it. Then he thought of the nightmare she’d told him about this morning—how she’d been treed by a bear and leaped into a tree while the bear climbed up to reach her.

  Two cougars fighting against two bears wasn’t a real contest. If there had been only one bear, they could chase it off. He was afraid this was going to go only one way. Terminate them, when he hadn’t wanted to do any more of that. Still, he wasn’t about to let them hurt Jessie, if he could reach her in time. He was glad she was calling her law enforcement friends in Yuma Town to aid them when he’d never had to rely on anyone but himself and occasionally a small team of operatives, who he knew well—but only on Black Ops’ missions.

  He heard her call out to him as a cougar, not in fear or that she was hurt, but saying she was okay, safe, waiting for him. She was straight ahead. He ran in her direction and saw her sitting on a branch in a tree, but there was no sign of the bears. There was no scent from them either. They were still wearing hunter concealment. Which meant they had to know he and Jessie were cougars or they wouldn’t have to hide their scent.

  He ran to the tree and leaped up into it to join Jessie and nuzzled her face, both their hearts drumming like crazy. He wanted to reassure her in the worst way that she would be safe with him. Why had she run? Why had the bears returned?

  They needed to get to the house. He didn’t know what to think, but at least at the house he had an arsenal of guns. He wasn’t letting her stay at the cabin on her own any longer. Not after what had happened. He even had it in mind that she should return home, but he was worried they would follow her there and run her off the road. What the hell did they want?

  He coaxed Jessie to come with him and then he jumped down into the snow. He waited for her to come to him. She jumped down into the snow, licked his face, glanced in the direction the bears had taken off, and then she raced him back to the resort. He ran after her, glad she was safe, but he didn’t want to let her out of his sight again.

  As soon as they reached her cabin and went inside, they shifted and she shut the back door of her cabin. They both started dressing. Once he had on his boxer briefs and pants and she had on her panties, jeans and bra, she surprised him by pulling him into her arms and kissing him.

  “Thanks, for coming to my rescue. I did have them just where I wanted them though.”

  Smiling a little, he arched a brow. “Really? Did I mess up your plans?” He couldn’t imagine she could think she could take them down.

  “No. I was glad you arrived when you did.”

  “So what happened? Exactly?” he asked.

  “They were in the cabin. I had set the eggnog on the counter and was about to close the fridge door when the two of them headed outside. They’d been in the house.”

  “You chased after them? I thought they’d gone after you.”

  “No. I chased them.”

  “Jessie.” He shook his head. He couldn’t believe she was so fearless.

  “No, I was okay. They didn’t seem to want to hurt me.”

  “Really. But what if they had?”

  “You were coming to my rescue.”

  He couldn’t understand what was going on. “I want you to move in with me.”

  She laughed. “You sure move fast.”

  He smiled. “Well, I was going to say I would be there for your protection, but maybe I should say I need to be there for the bears’ protection.”

  “Exactly.” She smiled brightly at him.

  “They couldn’t grab anything as bears. If they were looking for something in your cabin, how could they?”

  “They were naked first. Men.”

  His jaw dropped. “Hell.”

  “Yeah, I thought so too. A naked black-haired man with a beard, both about six-two or so. The other guy had brown hair and a brown beard, longer, shaggier.”

  “That sounds like the men in the blue pickup that I saw. Did you get pictures of them?” He didn’t think she would have had time. He hadn’t taken pictures of them either when he’d seen them in their human forms, but he’d had no reason to at the time, or at least he hadn’t thought he had. He really thought she had invited them to visit with her at the resort.

  She got her cell phone out and handed it to him. “I have to help my friends in Yuma Town to figure out who these guys are.”

  He eyed the photo of them. “Yeah that’s them. And they didn’t see you taking a picture of them?” He was surprised they didn’t wrench her phone away from her and take it with them, at the very least.

  “They were too busy trying to get out of the cabin. The door was locked and they had come through the cougar door as humans and left the same way, then shifted outside.”

  “Okay, well let’s get you out of here. I’ll help you pack everything and you’ll move in with me. Remember, you’ve already had me checked out, so we’re good for staying together.”

  “All right. You’re Florence Fitzgerald approved, so that’s important.”

  “She better have.” He loaded up Jessie’s food in a box and put it in the trunk of her car. Then he helped her with her bags. He was glad she was agreeable about coming with him, but he couldn’t believe she had run after the bears! They could have easily killed her. Which made him again wonder what they were after and why they hadn’t hurt her.

  “They didn’t even make an effort to stop and scare me off,” she said as he got into her car and she drove it to his garage and parked inside.

  “I just don’t know what to make of it,” he said.

  “Well, for now, we’re going to decorate your tree and put up your lights. And have cheerful Christmas thoughts. So what do you want for Christmas?” She grabbed a couple of her bags.

  “I just get what I need when I need it. Christmas presents aren’t necessary.” He grabbed the big box of groceries.

  They finished carrying in her food and other items. Then they put the perishable food in his fridge and her canned items in the cupboards. He helped carry her bags into the guest bedroom.

  “I don’t blame you. Sorry, I guess since you’ve been alone and haven’t been celebrating a lot of Christmases, you wouldn’t make any Christmas lists.” She helped him set up the tree in the stand in the living room in one corner next to the fireplace.

  Even before they began decorating it, it made the room seem more cheerful to him. Well, truth be told, Jessie was what made the whole place seem warmer and more cheerful.

  “Yeah, that’s about right. Uncle Paul would send a care package, and I’d send him some things he would like. I guess with him being gone this year, I just haven’t really given it a thought.” He had. Not in a Christmas gift-giving way, but that he would miss his uncle.

  “I don’t blame you.”

  Emerson and Jessie began to hang up decorations on the tree.

  “I love the ornaments. When I’d come to get movies from your uncle, I always enjoyed seeing them.” She made them some eggnog and brandy and gave Emerson a glass.

  They clinked their glasses together. “To solving a mystery,” he said.

  “To making new friends,” she said. “So what would you like for Christmas?”

  He smiled.

  She drank some of her eggnog and put the glass down on the coffee table, then hung some more ornaments. “You have to tell me or you could end up with something you don’t want.”

  “What do you want for Christmas?” he asked, not expecting this turn of events. He suspected she felt that he needed to have a present or two and she’d feel better about it. He would get her a couple of gifts also in the spirit of Christmas giving.

  She pulled her phone from her pocket. “My list.” She handed him her phone.

  He laughed as he looked over all the gifts she had listed on her account.

  “For birthdays and Christmas. I just put things on there when I need something important.”

  “A new laptop.”

  “Yes, like that. It’s not that anyone will get it for me, but if family members went together to get it for me, I’d be all set. It beats just getting stuff you don’t really need or want.”

  He hung up some ornaments. “Okay, then I’ll have to think about it and add a couple of things to my list.”

  “Lots of things. Because you never know what people will be able to afford to get you.”

  “So I go for inexpensive things.”

  “No, just an assortment. What if they want to give you something really expensive? So give a list of all kinds of things. And not just stuff you need, but fun stuff you’d like to have.”

  “All right.” He hoped she didn’t plan to give the list to the rest of her family.

  They finished decorating the tree, and he said, “I’m going to hang the lights outside.”

  “I’ll help you.”

  “I was thinking you could work on your story, if you would like.” After everything they’d done today, and with plans to go to the cemetery tonight, he was afraid she wouldn’t have time to get all her writing in.

  “I need to. I got part of my word count done before we went to see the lighthouse. I’ll do the rest after we get the lights up on your house. I want to help you with this.” She was already putting her coat back on and there looked to be no dissuading her.

  “Okay, thanks.” He realized he really enjoyed decorating the tree with her. It wouldn’t have been the same without her. He certainly wouldn’t have bothered if it hadn’t been for her coming here and wanting her cabin decorated for Christmas.

  He also wanted to give her the quiet time she needed while she worked on her story and not disturb her, and he still wanted to go to the crypt and see if his uncle was really interned there. But he would have to take her with him. Not only wouldn’t he risk leaving her alone at the resort, he would need her to help him remove the coffin.

  “So when do we go to the crypt?” he asked her as he brought the ladder out of the shed and she untangled the outdoor lights.

  “Tonight? We’ll try to do it without anyone being aware of it.” She finished untangling one strand and plugged it in to make sure all the lights were working.

  “Yeah. When we get inside, we’ll need to pull off the bronze rosettes, the decorative marble cover, and then unscrew the plastic cover and we’re in. The coffin is on the bottom, so we can pull it out.” He was glad he had watched them seal it so he knew what was at stake.

  “Okay. I sure hope we discover he’s not there.”

  “Me too.” That was enough of a Christmas present for him. Well, and finding his uncle was safe somewhere was next.

  They hung up the Christmas lights around the house, admired how pretty it was, though tonight it would be even better, and then they went inside to warm up.

  “I’m going to fix us some dinner while you work on your story.” He took their empty eggnog glasses into the kitchen, and he realized just how much he wanted to impress Jessie, even though he’d never worried about doing that for a woman—ever.

  Chapter 9

  Jessie uploaded pictures on her laptop that she had taken at the lighthouse and on their walk. Then she began typing away on her story. She was so glad Emerson had wanted to decorate for Christmas since she was now sitting in his house working on her Christmas story. The tree smelled heavenly, and she thought he was so sweet to have put Christmas music on in the background.

  “Do pork chops, mashed potatoes, and asparagus sound good to you for dinner?” he asked.

  “Yeah, sure, that would be great.” She got a call from Leyton Hill, Dr. Kate’s mate, and she was so relieved, assuming he was going to tell her who was coming to help them out from CSF. “Hi, are you the one who’s coming to aid us?” she asked Leyton.

  “Yeah, and Chet Kensington is on his way also from Cheyenne, Wyoming. Jack Barrington’s riding up with me. All of us should be there by tomorrow night.”

  “Okay, good. We had another incident. The bears were in my cabin and then took off.”

  “As bears?” Leyton sounded astounded.

  “Naked men and then they shifted outside.”

  “Hell. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, thanks, Leyton. I’m staying with Emerson now, just for safety reasons.”

  “Okay, good. We’ve checked him out as much as we could, given his secret ops missions, but Florence vouched for him.”

  “That’s good.” She smiled, glad Emerson had given that job up. “You can stay in my cabin. It has enough room for all three of you. Oh, and we have another mission for you but this might wait until after Christmas.” She explained about Emerson’s last mission.

  “Hell, Jessie. He sounds like a dangerous man to be around.” Leyton sounded worried about her but she felt safe with him.

  “Who? Smith? I’d say so.” She knew he was talking about Emerson, but…

  “No. Emerson. Tell him he’d better stay with you at all times.”

  “He knows to.” Then they ended the call and she typed some more on her story.

  “What do I know to do?” Emerson asked as he cooked the meal.

  “Stay with me at all times.”

  “That’s a given. Was that a call from our reinforcements?”

  “Yeah.” She told Emerson who all was coming.

  “Three Cougar Shifter Force special agents?” Emerson sounded surprised that many would join them.

  “Yeah. When it comes to protecting one of their own, and you now fall under that umbrella—”

  “Because we’re dating…”