Page 13 of Her Wolf Protector

"Let's go, then."

He paused long enough to check there were no otters around before fishing his sampling pole out of Couch Creek. Circle Creek lay deeper in the woods, on a plateau where the trees grew in a perfect circle around the fen that bore the misnomer of Circle Creek. No one knew where the water came from, just that it flowed across the fen like an endless wave, collecting into what had likely been a small crevice in the rock that had widened over time into a creek that ran with crystal clear water until it met and joined the rainwater-fed burn called Fairy Feeder.

He stopped to take samples at Fairy Feeder, gesturing for her to go past him to Circle Creek. "There's a fen up the top with shallow water. There's usually some waterbirds up there, which are always fun to chase." Waterbirds that took off quickly and noisily the moment a wolf appeared, which meant they rarely got caught. Not that she needed to – she'd had more than one rabbit this morning already.

She grinned and bounded up the trail, while Tate made quick work of Fairy Feeder. The water looked cold and clear, and definitely safe to drink, but he didn't allow himself the indulgence of a sip until the samples came back clear. So he wiped his hands, gulped down some of the bottled water he'd taken from the cottage's filtered rainwater taps, before climbing the rise to find his mate.

He found her, all right. She'd already chased off any waterbirds unwise enough to sleep in the fens this late in the morning, though some of them had only fled far enough to take up angry watch in the trees around the clearing, glaring at her until they could return to their watery doze among the reeds.

Except this time, the reeds he remembered were gone. They'd been squeezed out by a bountiful crop of what looked like rosy apples. Which made no sense at all. Who in their right mind would dump a bunch of apples deep in the woods like that?

Then she jumped into the middle of them, and instead of sending the apples rolling everywhere, they sent up a cloud of dust that sparkled in the sun. What in the world?

She bit one of the apples, then trotted over to Tate and dropped it at his feet.

He nudged it with his foot, and it rolled over, revealing layers of stringy frills that looked nothing like an apple. From this angle, it looked almost like the underside of a mushroom. Tate flipped it over again, slower this time. From the top, it looked like a slice of apple, but from every other angle, it was definitely a mushroom. One of those poisonous red ones that Viking berserkers used to eat before going crazy in battle, or so he'd heard. Sienna had one on the side of her catering van, but hers had white spots.

Careful not to touch the mushroom with his bare hand, he used the cap to nudge it into a sample bottle, before screwing it shut. Couldn't hurt to test that, too. Wish he'd gotten some of the golden dust, too, but that had mostly blown away in the breeze. Except for the golden streaks on his mate's coat...

Tate grabbed another sample bottle and scraped it along her side, while she watched with her head tilted to the side. A small sprinkle of dust landed in the bottom of the bottle. He reached out to collect some more, but she shifted away and freaking licked it off her fur instead.

"Don't do that. It might be toxic," he said, but she only gave her side another lick before bounding off into the fen again, sending clouds of the stuff into the air. Then she rolled in the shallow water, stood up and shook. Water sprayed everywhere – some even got on him.

And she just grinned.

Tate sighed. He labelled the sample bottles and stuck them in his satchel. Fairy Feeder and Circle Creek were done. Now he just had Wolf Creek and the loch itself to test, and he was done.

"Ready to go back to the cottage for lunch? Your clothes are dry, so you can put them on when you shift back," he said. When, not if. She was his mate. Her first shift had been almost effortless – shifting back would be no problem. She just had to do it once, and she'd master it for sure.

She leaped out of the fen, scattering water everywhere as she lolloped past him, racing him home.

For a moment, Tate considered shifting into wolf form so he could beat her...but reluctantly chose responsibility instead. The samples were important. He could play chasey with his mate later. Or at least, he hoped so.

ELEVEN

A dozen times, she'd watched Wolf Man morph from wolf to human, feeling his thoughts along the edge of hers. Feelings more than thoughts, but...wrapping her hands around a hot mug of tea, then coffee, then hot chocolate. Putting on her jeans, then tying the laces on her boots. Throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him, bowling him over so she had him pinned on the ground, straddling those muscles and having her way with him...

Okay, the last one was definitely her fantasy, because if he'd been thinking that, he wouldn't have been able to hide the effect it'd have on his human body, but it still didn't work. Every time, he rose from a crouch, naked and lickable, and she stayed furry.

She could also feel his frustration, which echoed hers, but he kept it out of his voice and manner as he made lunch. Some sort of warm chicken salad with roast vegetables and she ate so much of it, she couldn't have squeezed even a rabbit on top of it. Not even a little one.

"I've got to hike back up to my pickup, then drive to the loch for some more samples, and take the lot into town so we can send them to the lab for testing. After that, maybe we can go up to Wuffingas Estate and talk to the pack shaman. She might be able to help you with your shifting, or offer advice on what else we could try. If you come into town with me, we could go straight to the shaman after."

Arwen wanted nothing more than to hide up here where she'd be safe from Ravenna, but she didn't want to be a wolf for the rest of her life. It had its advantages, but she had a life as a person, and she intended to go back it, either here or in the fae realm. Surely a shifter shaman would know what was wrong with her. Wolf Man hadn't said there was anything wrong with her – he seemed more disappointed at himself, not being able to help her – but it was only a matter of time before he turned the blame for this mess on her, and he might be right. There probably was something wrong with her. After all, her mother hadn't been able to shift, so Arwen's own skills were never going to be perfect. If the shaman could help her get her human form back, Arwen would be content to stay that way, and never let her wolf out again. It wasn't everyone who got to experience life as a wolf, even for a day, and get healed from life-threatening heart damage at the same time. She should consider herself lucky.

She'd even got to ogle Wolf Man naked.

She tilted her head to the side, then gave a sharp nod.

TWELVE

Tate parked his pickup on the street outside the office, and headed for the tray in back to grab the box of samples. He'd barely gotten one boot onto the footpath before her paws fell into step beside him.

She'd managed to take off her seatbelt, and open the car door with paws alone? Tate glanced back at the pickup. Somehow, she'd closed the door behind her, too. Even he would have struggled to do that as a wolf, and he'd been one for half his life. Which was why it made no sense that she struggled with shifting back to human.

He couldn't take her into the office, or people would ask questions, so he lingered only long enough to drop off the box and make sure the receptionist knew the samples had to be delivered to the lab by the end of the day, before heading back outside.

"I need to pick up something before we can go to Wuffingas Estate," he told her, but she didn't stop. Instead, she kept going all the way to the pickup, curled her paw under the edge of the door that hadn't quite shut, and leaped into the passenger seat. Then she closed the door behind her and sank out of sight.