He wasn’t even sure which electric company serviced this area. He needed to check it out and report the outage. He should have thought of it earlier.

  Jessie was shining the flashlight on the cabins and surrounding woods, making sure no one sneaked up on them as he closed the breaker box, then he headed back with her through the snow to the house.

  “I didn’t see any sign of anyone and no tracks either. Not even the ones we made earlier tonight, the wind is blowing so hard. I figured when this lets up, we could shift and check it out, but with no scents and no tracks to follow, I think it would be futile,” she said. “Besides, you’re not in any condition to run around in the cold.”

  “I agree.” He wished he could have gone after them, right after he’d been hit, not that he would have been able to. He figured they would have killed him then. Still, they could have initially if they had wanted to and they hadn’t.

  As soon as they were back inside the cozy, warm house, he locked the door and she removed her parka, hat, and gloves and hung them up on his clothes tree as if she belonged with him there. He realized he kind of liked the notion, when here he had thought he would much rather be alone.

  He removed his gloves and hat, but before he could do anything else, she was untying his scarf and then removing his parka and hanging them up. She pulled off her own scarf then.

  “Okay, so I’m kind of relieved he or they hadn’t messed with the electric box,” she said.

  “Me too,” he said.

  “I had a long drive today, and I need to get some sleep, but I want to make sure you’re going to be all right too. Do you need me to do anything for you?”

  “Does your caregiving include patient baths?”

  She chuckled darkly, her face lighting up with amusement. He was glad he could lighten the mood. On her, the look suited her.

  “It sounds to me like you’re healing up nicely. How is your head?” she asked.

  “I have a headache, but nothing worse than it was before.”

  “Good. Do you need help removing your snow boots or anything?”

  She could undress all of him and join him in bed, he was thinking. “No, I’m good. You go and get your rest. If I feel worse in the night, I’ll let you know.”

  She cocked her head to the side. “I doubt it.”

  She was right about that. He’d been wounded so many times in the line of duty, he certainly wouldn’t let a little thing like being clawed by a bear get him down.

  “If you hear anything in the middle of the night that sounds like trouble, shout out a warning, all right? Just in case I’m dead to the world, though I’m normally a light sleeper.” Emerson turned on the light in the hallway and then he began rummaging through a file cabinet in the office that was open to the kitchen and living room.

  “You need to go to bed.”

  He hated to admit he should have called the electric company before they ventured out into the snowy cold. “I’m looking for the name of the electric company that services the resort.”

  Her mouth dropped, then she smiled. “That would have been a good thing to do earlier.”

  “Yeah, I know.” He cast her a little smile. “Neither of us thought of it.”

  “You’re right.” She grabbed her laptop and bag and headed to the first guest room. “Thanks for letting me stay here.”

  “I wouldn’t have had it any other way. Sure, you might have been fine without heat in the cabin as a cougar, but you’re still a paying guest. And at least you were able to watch a movie with me and write some more in your book.”

  “Would you have done the same for other paying guests? A family of five? Humans?”

  He found a bill from the electric company that serviced the resort with the phone number on it for power outages, grabbed the paper, and turned off the living room and office lights. “Yeah. But it wouldn’t have been half as much fun and I wouldn’t have kissed any of them.”

  She chuckled. “You kissed me to thank me.”

  “True.” As if that had been the only reason. “Night, Jessie. Pleasant dreams.”

  “You’ll have to tell me your bear story again tomorrow so I can get more of the details for my novel, only you’re human in the story and you wouldn’t have smelled the scent of a bear.”

  “Just a plain human?” That wouldn’t be much fun.

  “Yeah, psychics are more real than shifters—to some humans. So that’s what I’m writing about.”

  “You’ll have to tell me more about it in the morning.” He kissed her on the forehead and before he got carried away, he left her off at her room and then headed down the hall to his bedroom.

  “And when you remember your full name, you’ll have to tell me that tomorrow also.”

  He smiled at her and entered his bedroom. He turned on his lamp next to the bed, set his phone on the bedside stand, pulled off his clothes, and put on a pair of dry pajama bottoms. Then he climbed into bed and called the electric company’s emergency number for electrical outages.

  He got a recording saying that the electricity was out for 5,000 residents in the area. He really should have checked that before he and Jessie went out into the blizzard where a possible bear was lurking, but he was glad to get confirmation one way or another.

  He turned out his lamplight when he heard light footfalls leaving the guest room and he suspected Jessie was going to the bathroom one last time.

  But her footfalls continued to his room and he turned on the lamplight for her. As soon as she appeared in the room wearing hot pink, plaid pajamas and a hot pink robe and slippers, he smiled.

  She looked like a vibrant flower on a gloomy, cold night.

  “Too much, do you think?” she asked, motioning to her nightwear. She smiled. “My sister knows I love hot pink, but not like this. More as an accessory, like with my gloves. She got the robe, pjs, and slippers for me for last Christmas and they do make me feel cheery on a cold, winter’s night. Like tonight.”

  “They cheered me right up.”

  She laughed. “You, who wear all black all the time?”

  He pulled his covers aside as if inviting her into bed, which he would have, if she’d been game, but he’d only done it to show her he was wearing another pair of navy-blue pajama bottoms. “Blue.”

  “Almost black!”

  “Isn’t black basic for every wardrobe?”

  She sighed. “Okay, so I was thinking about the shed door. Had you locked it? Was it damaged? As in the intruder had to break the lock to get in? I was too busy worrying about you to really check the door over to see if anyone had broken in. I didn’t realize at the time that someone had hit you and I wasn’t positive someone had trashed the shed either. It could have always looked like that.”

  “Hell, I don’t know. I guess I was so out of it, I didn’t even think of that.” He started to get out of bed.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To check it out.”

  “Sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. You’re to stay in bed.”

  “You’re not going to go out and check it, are you?” No way was he allowing Jessie to go out there alone to see if the lock was broken. He really couldn’t remember if it had been or not, just that the door was swinging back and forth and banging as it swung closed again.

  She sighed. “No. I just wanted to see if you knew for sure, then I could go to sleep. I had to shove the door aside since snow was blocking it when I went to look for a sled inside, to haul you back to the house, but then I heard you groan. Sorry, now I guess you’re wondering about it also.”

  “I would have after a bit. Once I shut my eyes and began to revisit what had happened again.” He patted the bed. “Do you want to think about it with me?”

  She gave him a mischievous, little smile. “No. Remember the part I was telling you about how my sister and her husband have to check out the guys I’m with, especially if I’m going to end up with some guy in his bed?”

  He smiled.

  “If you need me, just let me know. Good night.” Then she left his room.

  He really wished he could have convinced her to stay with him. After the night he’d had, it would end on a better note if she had climbed into bed with him.

  He closed his eyes and envisioned the shed door banging and tried to remember if the doorknob had looked damaged in any way. Now, he wanted to go out and check to see if the lock had been broken on the shed.

  Reflecting on the kiss they’d shared and about his offer to join him in bed—to think, ha!—Jessie smiled as she climbed into bed. Emerson was such a cougar. She closed her eyes, but she couldn’t sleep. The wind was whipping around the house and howling through the woods. She couldn’t stop pondering about the bear in the woods, wondering if there were two and if they were shifters. If they were shifters, they had to be rogues and that wasn’t good. She wondered if the Cougar Shifter Force would handle something like that. They took care of their own rogues, but if there were other kinds of shifters out there, who would deal with the rogues?

  She gave her sister a call, even though she wasn’t with CSF. Tracey knew the others well who were. “Hey, Tracey.”

  “Jessie, don’t tell me we need to check on a new guy you’re hanging out with,” Tracey said, goodheartedly.

  “No. I mean, maybe. But I don’t know his last name, or maybe I don’t know his first name yet.”

  “Jessie,” her older twin said in a way that said she knew Jessie was heading for trouble already.

  “I didn’t call about that. Emerson, the owner of the resort where I’m staying, was struck by a bear and we think maybe it was a shifter.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah, really. That’s the way I felt about it. No self-respecting bear would be out running around in a blizzard, foraging for food and Emerson thought there might be two of them. Oh, and they didn’t leave their scent on him, or any scent at all in the area—which spells rogue shifter to us. I was wondering what would happen if bear shifters were real and one was a rogue, who would deal with him?” That was the problem with being a shifter. They had to take care of them themselves and not turn them over to the police. They couldn’t risk having a shifter incarcerated long-term if it got growly and wanted to shift to pay an inmate—or a guard—back.

  “I don’t know, but I’m sure anyone with the CSF could handle it. I was wondering the same about the wolves after we had that incident with William running into the wolf shifter. If the wolf had been a rogue, that would have been bad news. We could have incarcerated him, but I guess it’s something we need to learn about for future cases,” Tracey said. “How to handle other rogue shifters. Are you safe where you are right now? I can get hold of Leyton or Travis and see if they can go up there and meet with you and try to track a bear shifter down. If you feel you’re in danger, though it’s not our sheriff’s department’s jurisdiction, they’ll be up there in a heartbeat to protect you and bring you home.”

  “No, I’m okay. As long as it’s a shifter and not a real bear, you can ask someone from the CSF if they want to investigate this. I’ll call you tomorrow with an update. We’re having a blizzard right now. But when the storm settles and at first light, we can check things out.”

  “You be careful.”

  “Thanks, I will.”

  “Before I let you go, who is this Emerson, exactly? Paul Merriweather was the owner of the Whispering Pines Resort every time you went up there.”

  “Emerson’s the new owner and manager of the resort.”

  “Last name? First name.”

  “Emerson. It’s the only one he gave me.”

  “Okay, thanks. We’ll check him out.”

  Jessie sighed. “Okay, maybe you’ll have better luck learning his full name. I’m off to sleep.”

  “Let us know if anything else happens. You know you’ll have a whole bunch of cougars up there to protect you, if you need them.”

  “Okay, thanks. Good night, Sis.”

  “Night, Jessie.”

  Jessie set her phone on the bedside table, sighed, and closed her eyes. And thought about poor Emerson lying on his stomach in the snow and the injuries he’d suffered. She couldn’t believe a stay at the resort this time would lead to meeting an interesting character, and real trouble too.

  Chapter 5

  The next morning, the bear was chasing Jessie through the snow and she leaped into a tree, but the darn bear started to climb the tree after her! She heard a metal “thunk,” smelled eggs, fried potatoes and bacon cooking, and coffee brewing. The sound of sizzling made her tear her gaze away from the bear and she woke!

  Jessie opened her eyes. No bear, no tree, no snow, just a warm cuddly bed and then she realized the food she’d smelled was cooking in the kitchen. She was out of bed in a flash, throwing on her robe and slipping her feet into her slippers. She was planning on making breakfast while Emerson took it easy. She should have told him last night that he was to rest, and she would fix him breakfast, though she suspected he would have beat her to it as tired as she’d been. She couldn’t believe he was up already or that she’d slept in a little—not her usual style.

  When she hurried down the hall, he smiled at her from the kitchen. “Now there’s a sight for sore eyes.” He was starting to serve up the bacon on a platter, dressed already in his signature black pants, boots, and sweater.

  “I planned to make us breakfast while you took it easy.” She found plates and set them out.

  “I’ve got this. I know where everything is.”

  “I’m sure I could easily have found the bacon and eggs in the fridge,” she said.

  He offered her a smile. “I was feeling just fine. How did you sleep?”

  “I woke, dreaming about the bear coming after me. I figured I was safe when I’d leapt into the tree, but he hesitated, then climbed right after me. How about you? How are you feeling?”

  “I’m not feverish. I just have a slight headache. I still remember who I am.”

  “First name? Last name?”

  He smiled. “Thankfully, I didn’t have any nightmare about the bears. Are scrambled eggs okay? They broke when I cracked open the shells.”

  “Yeah, they’re just as good any way you cook them.”

  “I agree. Would you like some potatoes?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She eyed him warily. “You haven’t been outside investigating the shed or anything, have you? I can’t believe I slept through you cooking breakfast.”

  “You must have needed it. And no, I haven’t been outside yet. I wanted to fix breakfast for us first.”

  “Okay. Well, we’ll do this together. Investigate the break-in, I mean.”

  “Yeah, sure. It’s light out, lightly snowing, but not a blizzard now.”

  “That’s good.” She set out the silverware. “This looks great. Did you need a cup of coffee?”

  “I already got a cup, thanks.”

  She added sugar and milk to her coffee and sat down with him at the dining table. “Thanks for breakfast. Are you sure you are okay?”

  “Yeah. I’m feeling much better. I just needed a rest.”

  “I’ll check your injuries after we eat, then we can get bundled up and look outside for any clues as to what happened,” she said.

  “Okay, we can do that.” He served up some bacon on his plate.

  She took a couple of slices off the platter and added them to her plate.

  “I got a call this morning from someone you might know. A Tracey Haverton?” Emerson arched a dark brow.

  Shocked to the core, Jessie looked up from her food. “Omigod, she called you?” She couldn’t believe her sister would actually call Emerson! Jessie would give her grief big time. He wasn’t supposed to know Tracey was investigating him!

  “Yeah, she sounded just like you. She wanted to know what my whole name was so she could learn all there was to know about me.” He ate some of his eggs.

  “She told you that? She was supposed to do a background search on you without you knowing it.”

  “I thought that only happened when you were dating someone.” His mouth curved up just a tad.

  “Uh, I asked her to call some of the Cougar Shifter Forces special agents about coming up here to investigate if bear shifters hurt you. She wanted to know who I was stuck with by myself in a blizzard. And you wouldn’t give me your full name. I’m sure she was immediately suspicious of you.”

  He chuckled. “You don’t give up, do you?”

  “No, and I’m writing it in the story. Not your real name, whatever the whole thing is, but just that you won’t tell me what it is.”

  He smiled. “I could just give it to you. But what would be the fun in that?”

  “I should have dug through your wallet and found your driver’s license.”

  “While I was sleeping? You would never have managed to do it without waking me.”

  “You hide it in bed with you?”

  “No, but I would have heard you slipping it out of my pants pocket. Cougar hearing, you know.”

  She wondered if it was more than that. The army? Combat trained? Listening for any signs of the enemy in the middle of the night? “You don’t have a gun under your mattress, do you?”

  “No. If I did, I would never get any sleep. Too lumpy, you know.”

  “You mean like the princess and the pea?” She laughed. “What about a gun in your bedside table?”

  He shook his head, got up from the table, and refilled their coffee cups. She noticed he added just the right amount of sugar and milk to hers and realized he had to have watched her make her own cup of coffee. He was observant. She was impressed.

  “So about this business of your sister investigating me—" He handed the cup of coffee to Jessie.

  “You’re not worried my sister will discover anything bad about you, are you?” She sipped from her coffee. “Perfect.”

  He only gave her a small smile.

  “You know what they did to the last rogue cougar I dated.”

  “I didn’t think we were dating,” he said.