“Okay, I have to agree. Wow, now I don’t know what to do. The others in the pack always said that humans who knew about us would have to be turned or eliminated. We couldn’t risk that anyone would learn about us.”

  “I agree. But because of her wealth and how well known she is in the area, I don’t think that’s a viable option either way.”

  Chapter 4

  Becky was so shocked to learn that a wolf had rescued Pamela when she was a girl that she didn’t know what to think. That her mother was the one who had saved Pamela was even more of a surprise. That Pamela might know that Becky was a wolf just blew her mind.

  She immediately wondered if Pamela had seen her running as a wolf on her property. But then Becky thought that maybe Pamela had wildlife cameras about. Becky had never realized they could be set up in the woods. Great. Just great. She would never be able to run as a wolf out there again. She hoped that Max wasn’t right in his assumptions, but she didn’t think he was wrong. It was just too much of a coincidence that Pamela set her up with Max and that she’d hired Becky after her mother had saved Pamela’s life when she was a girl. Becky wondered just what Pamela had thought of her when she hired her. She’d had to wonder if Becky was a wolf too, unless Pamela’s family had convinced her that werewolves were just imaginary creatures.

  Becky wanted to talk to her about it. She wanted to quit her job and leave town. She felt conflicted. She loved her job and had never wanted to leave it. Pamela had made her feel like a friend and confidante, yet she knew so much more about her than Becky knew about Pamela. She couldn’t believe it. She sighed and knew she had to just focus on the current job, learn what she could about the boyfriend and the new guy, and go from there. Becky wanted to tell Pamela she knew and understood and hoped Pamela would keep their secret. But maybe she would anyway. Maybe she realized that Becky needed someone in her life—a wolf—just like Pamela wanted someone in her own life. If that was the case, Becky appreciated her boss all the more.

  “What do we do now?” Becky asked Max.

  “We do just what we planned to do. We learn about Christopher, and beyond that, we talk to Ryan and Carol, my pack leaders, about what’s going on. They need to learn the truth when it involves anyone knowing about wolf shifters in the pack, and in your case too.”

  “I just can’t believe this.”

  “I can’t believe your mother rescued her. But it sounds to me like Pamela wants to pay her back in some way by taking you in, giving you a job, and finding a mate for you.”

  Becky smiled. “She doesn’t know anything about our kind. That we mate for life and relationships have to be for a lifetime.”

  “I agree, but I think that’s what this is all about. The date bit and to see what you thought of me as far as looking into her relationship.”

  “Do you think that’s all on the up and up? What if she doesn’t really need anyone looked into? That you can’t find anything about this Christopher boyfriend?”

  “In the kind of work I do, anything is possible.”

  “Okay. You’re coming for dinner?”

  “Yeah, sure. I can’t wait.”

  * * *

  That night, Max drove to Becky’s house for dinner, eager to enjoy her company again, and she made pork chops, fried dollar potatoes, and a cauliflower and broccoli blend.

  After dinner, she took away the dishes and put them in the dishwasher. “What if Pamela has wildlife cameras set up on her property and she has recorded where I’ve been running as a wolf?”

  Max frowned. “Wouldn’t you have noticed that she was having them set up? You’re in charge of all that, right?”

  “Normally, yeah, but if she wanted to catch me at it, then maybe not. Maybe she had them set up before I interviewed for the job. Then again, it would have been smarter to have done so on the trail I normally take.”

  “Let’s take a walk. You show me where you usually run. I don’t see a dog door, so she didn’t have one installed for you.”

  “No. But she’s always said I could have a dog and have a dog door installed if I would like.”

  Max raised a brow as they headed outside. “You made a trail where you walked?”

  “Yeah, I never thought anyone would be watching me going on my runs. I would always shift way out in the woods.”

  “Always at the same place?”

  “Yeah, I’m totally a creature of habit. I always felt safe there, never ran into any problems, and moving to another location might not have been the same for me. So I didn’t want to chance going somewhere else.”

  He thought it was a nice night for a walk in the woods with Becky, though he would have loved to run here with her as a wolf too. Every chance he had at changing into his wolf form when he could do so safely was something he loved to do. He was looking up at the trees for any sign of trail cameras along the path Becky always took, the grass worn down here, evidence that a hiker’s trail had been made.

  He smelled her lingering scent in the woods, and if he’d come upon her scent before, he would have wanted to find the wolf that it belonged to. A she-wolf, sweet and saucy. He smiled down at her, but she was looking a little worried, and he realized this wasn’t just a pleasant walk in the woods with him but an investigation into whether she’d been observed as a wolf running through the area.

  “Have you ever seen her on your runs through the woods as a wolf?” he asked. As wolves, they saw movement and were really observant of their surroundings. They had to be, since they were wary of danger to themselves, so he figured Becky wouldn’t have just run through the property without thinking of that, no matter how vast the land was or how little it was tramped on by anyone else.

  “No. And yes, I naturally watched for any sign of anyone. Even though it’s posted all over that no hunting is allowed, it’s always a concern that hunters will ignore the signs and try to hunt on the property. So I’m always cautious when I go out. I haven’t seen anything that looks like a camera in a tree, have you?”

  “No.” But that didn’t mean Pamela didn’t have trail cameras watching for wildlife in other locations or just for security. Even if she just had them up to watch any wildlife—cougars, deer, anything that might move around on her property. “You could ask her.”

  “Then she might suspect that I realize she knows about me.”

  “You could smell her scent and see her reaction.” As wolves, they were much more attuned to changes in people’s behavior and their corresponding scent. “Um, not that I want to worry you, but I think I’ll go over your home with a bug detector to make sure there are no listening devices in your place and no hidden cameras either.”

  “Oh, great. I never thought of that.”

  “I’ve been hired to check a home, office, vehicles over for that very thing.”

  Becky’s eyes widened. “Did you find any?”

  “In one client’s office and home, yes. But it wasn’t what I thought.”

  “Like espionage? Someone trying to learn about their products or something?”

  “FBI surveillance. They called me in and told me what was up. The surveillance was legit and what the client was doing wasn’t.”

  She arched a brow, waiting to hear what the client had been doing that wasn’t right.

  “Drugs. He was running a big pharmaceutical drug ring, and I nearly messed up the sting operation.”

  “So what happened?”

  “I had removed the devices and destroyed them, then the FBI took me into their confidence and had a little talk with me. I could be charged with obstruction, or I could agree to plant new devices.”

  “Did you?”

  “Sure. I work for the good guys. I told the client that I needed to do another sweep in a few days to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, then slipped in several more bugs than the FBI had managed to plant the first time around. I was off the hook and they arrested the bad guy, who had incriminated himself fully.” Max shrugged. “All in a day’s work.”

  “Wow. I’m glad you didn’t get charged for a crime.”

  “Well, Ryan wasn’t happy about it. He doesn’t like it if we end up with a client who’s a bad egg. It’s bad news if we look like we’re helping a scoundrel get away with illegal stuff. So yeah, we started screening clients better. Though they can slip through the cracks sometimes. Like with Pamela. Digging deeper, I found the connection with our kind. On the surface, she seems to be just a nice woman who cared about you having a date out. Then it morphed into me looking into a guy she’d been dating. And now? Maybe something even bigger—as it relates to us. Has she ever said anything to you that would lead you to believe she knows about you? Or us?”

  “No, this is all a shock to me. I mean, she’s always so nice to me. She can be a bear when it comes to other people who work for her. I don’t mean in a bad way, but when people do her wrong, she doesn’t let it slide. I admire her for it. It’s not that she expects perfection. People make mistakes and she’s forgiving, but man, if you knowingly do something to undermine her or steal from her, she will really come down on you. For instance, we had a maid who was selling Pamela’s stories to a tabloid. It was hitting too close to home for it not to be coming from someone who was on staff.

  “Pamela trusted me, as if she thought I had a bigger moral compass, and I guess as a wolf, I do, because none of us want to end up in jail. So I set up a situation where I would give staff members different stories, nothing that would hurt Pamela but that sounded juicy and were so far-fetched that no one would believe them. But coming from me, the people who worked for her would. Only one person, the maid, knew the story I had shared with her, and it went straight to the tabloid. I gave her one more story, though by this point, I knew it had to be her, and then I followed her around, just out of sight like a wolf would, until she made the mistake of calling the tabloid on her phone. Our enhanced hearing being what it is, I was able to listen in beyond the wall. I looked up the man’s name, Mr. Quinlin, and found him to be one of the reporters for the tabloid.”

  “The maid could have been talking to him about something else.”

  “No, she was sharing the story I had given her. Pamela was at a luncheon in town at the time, and I think the maid thought she was being covert about the whole thing. In truth, she had shared several stories before we caught her at it.”

  “Hell, you would make a great PI.”

  Becky laughed. “It only worked because I’m a wolf and I work for Pamela. Anyway, Pamela fired her. She wouldn’t give her a referral, and if anyone asks her about her employment with Pamela, she’ll tell them the truth. If a prospective hirer wants his or her life exposed to the tabloids, the maid is the one to hire.”

  Max smiled. “I doubt anyone of consequence will hire her. It’s ironic that the maid wanted the extra money but was too shortsighted to realize she had a steady income all along.”

  “And lots of benefits. Pamela believes in educating her employees. Some are high school dropouts. She doesn’t care. She wants them to have the best opportunities in life they can have, like she had, when they leave her employ. One girl, who had been a maid for her, had dreamed of being a nurse. She’s an RN now. Pamela made that happen.”

  “She sounds like a really great employer to work for.” Max continued to search the area, walking with Becky to all the usual places she ran as a wolf. They reached the pond where Pamela could have died. “I could have missed trail cameras set up in areas where you don’t go that frequently,” he admitted. He didn’t want Becky to believe he had been totally successful just because he hadn’t found any cameras. He was hoping that Pamela hadn’t set up any. If she had and she was willing to keep the secret, someone like the corrupt maid wouldn’t. What a story for the tabloids—and actually for any of the news sources—that would be. He wrapped his arm around Becky as the air chilled.

  “Well, I guess I’ll just have to come to your place to go running from now on,” Becky said.

  Max smiled down at her and then leaned in and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him back, and they opened their mouths to each other, tasting the bouquet of the wine they’d had with their dinner. This was an even nicer end to a date. He hadn’t expected to kiss her again.

  Then they heard movement in the woods and Max turned. He saw a tan-colored cougar watching them, and he yelled at it to go away. But it just stood there with its amber eyes aglow, looking like it was eyeing them as a meal. “Remain standing upright. I’m going to grab a stone and throw it at him, but we don’t both want to lean down. With a cougar, we need to look big and menacing.”

  “Then I’ll get the rock and you remain standing tall. You’re taller than me after all.”

  He agreed. “Sure, go for it.”

  She moved a few paces away from him, but he followed her to stay close, and she grabbed a big stone. Max yelled at the cougar again, but the big cat was keeping his distance and not moving a muscle to leave. Becky returned with the rock and Max pitched it at the cougar. The big cat jumped back but didn’t run away like they had hoped. He was stubborn, hungry, and he probably thought humans should be on the menu. Becky got another couple of rocks and gave one to Max. This time, he ran at the cougar, throwing the rock, and she did the same. Hers didn’t go as far as his, but still, with two wolves running at him, albeit in their human form, they scared the cat off. At least for the moment.

  “Let’s head back to your place, but keep a lookout for the cat. Sometimes they’ll begin stalking someone once they have their back turned to them,” Max said.

  “I’ve never seen one here before.”

  “He might have come to drink from the pond and we’re in his way, or he could be adding us to his meal-to-go along with a drink from the pond.” Max gathered some rocks, and so did Becky.

  “I would have smelled him before when I went for a run.”

  “He might be new to the territory.”

  “I’m definitely running as a wolf at your place.”

  Max began thinking about the issue with Pamela again. He had to learn the truth from her about whether she believed wolves were real or not.

  “I think what you do is fascinating,” Becky said. “It’s remarkable how you connect all the dots between these news stories concerning wolf issues.”

  He smiled at her. “It has its ups and downs. But I do like what I do.”

  Max heard something moving through the woods behind them. They both glanced back at the same time, and he knew Becky had heard the same thing. The cougar was back. “I guess he wasn’t looking for water like I had hoped,” Max said.

  They began walking backward, to keep an eye on the cat. They couldn’t run, climb trees, or turn their backs as that could make him chase them down and kill one of them. He was eyeing Becky, the smaller of the two targets. They yelled at him but kept their ammunition in case he got too close. He was following them, keeping the same distance. Max wanted to change into his wolf coat and tackle the cougar, but then Becky would need to also. And he was afraid there still might be trail cameras. Before he could even mention that to her, Becky was stripping off her hiking boots, socks, and jeans. He watched the cougar while she stripped the rest of her clothes off and shifted in a blur of forms. As a wolf, she growled low at the cougar while Max quickly stripped out of his cargo pants, boots, socks, and T-shirt and shifted. Now the cougar had two much more ominous characters to threaten.

  Still, the cougar didn’t run off. Not until both Max and Becky ran at him. Max wasn’t sure she wanted to at first, but then she charged, and he was ahead of her in a second, not wanting her to have to face the threat of the cat’s wicked claws and teeth. The cat jumped straight in the air and took off running. Max thought they would run after the cat for a short distance until they figured it had enough of two wolves chasing him. But Becky wasn’t stopping so Max kept up with her, racing through the tall grass and feathered, needled pines. They kept running until the cougar was well away from the pond, and then she slowed her run, and so did Max. He figured she was done now.

  He assumed the cougar would stay away and wouldn’t try to follow them any farther. It was one thing to lob rocks at him. Another to give him a race with death. Not that they planned to kill him, but they had to impress upon him that this territory was theirs.

  They licked each other’s faces in camaraderie, telling each other they had done good. Then they watched for the cougar for a little bit longer, but it didn’t seem to be returning. Max motioned with his head and a little woof to say they needed to get back, and Becky woofed at him. They both raced off, the wind in their fur, their tails straight out in an alpha posture as they headed back to their clothes. He realized even in the face of danger, they worked well as a team. Even as fast as they were running, it took them some time to return to where they’d stripped out of their clothes. Then they shifted and hurried to shake out their clothes and dress. Once they were done, they hugged and kissed each other.

  “Outings with you are fun,” he said.

  “Ditto for me. I never thought I would run into another predator on the prowl out here. Thanks for helping me look for cameras and chasing off the cougar.” Despite Becky saying so, she gathered her rocks back up. “Just in case.”

  “He would be dumb to return to stalk us.” But Max picked up his rocks too, because it was better to be safe and prepared than sorry.

  They finally reached her house and set the stones in a pile around a tree where Becky already appeared to be nurturing a sedum rock garden.

  “I think we need to speak with Pamela about this wolf business,” Max said.

  “I was afraid you might say that, but are you sure? The notion of letting sleeping dogs lie comes to mind.”

  “I’m certain you’re going to feel differently about her now. You can’t help but think she might be watching your every move as a wolf. I propose we somehow bring up the situation with her nearly drowning at the pond. I’ll run it past Ryan because wolf stuff like this needs to be discussed, but if you think we could do it, we will. If you think you would have a better chance at it alone or that I would, we can talk about that too. I just think from now on, you’ll behave slightly different around her. We need to learn if she truly knows about us or not.”