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“YOUR PACK HAS been the least impacted so far. I’d like your permission to go out and take soil and water samples so that we can test to see if there is something in the area that has offered a sort of natural protection to whatever this thing is.”
Martin was chopping wood in his yard. He swung and the axe head bit deeply into the wood, his arms cording with the effort. He let the handle go and wiped his brow.
“You think it’s environmental?”
“It might be. At this point, we need to look into every possibility.”
“You need to make sure you avoid the locals. We must maintain our secrecy. They outnumber us, and if they ever realized lycans existed I have no doubt it would expose us to the world. Folks around here love to gossip.”
Clay’s mind immediately went to Jade. He would have to tell her they were mates if he hoped to take things with them to the next level. Martin would need to know. It would be seen as disrespectful if he kept the other man in the dark.
“Martin, I met a woman the first day I was here.” Clay felt the back of his ears heat as he mentioned Jade and recounted the basics of that meeting to the alpha. “I’m certain she’s my mate, but she’s not a lycan. I haven’t let things progress very far yet, but I’m going to need to tell her about us if I hope to claim her. It’s a risk for your pack if she can’t accept it. If she can and agrees to mate with me then we will need to figure out the logistics of what happens next.”
“Meaning?” Martin asked, there was a gleam in his eye that echoed the knowledge of what Clay would say, but it was obvious that pack dynamics and politics would force him to say it.
“I’m beta of the Yellow Claw pack but if I mate Jade and she doesn’t want to leave here would you allow us to stay and permit me to join your pack?” Clay hated pack politics it was part of the reason he held the title of Beta and not Alpha. He was powerful enough that his wolf had demanded he rise through the pack ranks but he hadn’t wanted the hassle of being the Alpha. He was happy that his wolf side was in agreement and hadn’t pushed him to challenge for an alpha position.
He would miss Julian if he needed to relocate here and join the pack. It would take time to establish himself in the pecking order and he didn’t want to upset the current hierarchy.
As if reading his mind Martin spoke up. “We’re fairly established here there aren’t often challenges for pack position. We aren’t as big as some of the other packs, meaning there isn’t often a lot of movement in position and rank.” Martin frowned as though imagining the difficulty of incorporating a new member into the dynamic of his pack.
“With respect, it isn’t something I’m eager for. I enjoy my place in my pack and I miss home. I’d prefer to put the entire conversation on hold and deal with one issue at a time. Until I’ve actually claimed my mate it’s pointless to speculate.
CHAPTER EIGHT
She wanted him. There wasn’t much point in denying it and the more time she spent with him the harder denying it was becoming. She found herself watching for him during her shifts at work hoping that he’d stop by. Jade was disappointed when he didn’t come in to eat and distracted when he did.
The sound of a motorcycle engine made her heart pound in her chest and every time her phone rang or dinged with a text message she held her breath hoping it was him.
Yet despite the giddy feeling she got at the mere thought of him or mention of his name. Jade also had a growing feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach that she was unable to shake. She worried he would leave before she could act on the mounting attraction making that pit tighten until her insides felt twisted up in knots.
It wasn’t a reaction she was willing to let continue for much longer. She needed to clear her mind. He was invading so much of her life that she was even dreaming about him now. Intensely carnal dreams that someone with as little experience as she had should find shocking, but she wasn’t shocked. Jade was intrigued. She wondered what his reaction would be if she were to act on them.
Sometimes she dreamed of him as a wolf and she’d begun to wonder if she was seeing his true form. Some witches had the gift of sight, allowing them to see glimpses of the future, but it had never been something she had experienced before. In each dream, he took the same form and they were growing stronger until Jade wasn’t certain if they were dreams at all.
She opened the back door of her small bungalow and took a deep breath drawing the air into her lungs and letting it fully expand her diaphragm held it in and closed her eyes seeking to center herself as she exhaled in a slow controlled movement.
She made her way across her yard and into the woods at the back of her property. She started on the path she normally took when gathering herbs but strayed feeling drawn in another direction.
Normally she would have extended her hands so that the tips of her fingers brushed along the foliage she passed but this time she moved quietly trying to disturb her surroundings as little as possible.
She couldn’t hold back her gasp of shock as she came upon the large wolf. He was crouched by the gathering of boulders to her left with his nose in the dirt sniffing intently.
It was him. The wolf looked remarkably like the one she’d been dreaming about, but even if he hadn’t Jade would still have known that it was him. She wasn’t sure exactly what would have tipped her off but she was confident.
Knowing that the large animal held the intelligence of a man didn’t help the flash of fear that was instinctual. If he wanted to he could still tear her apart with a mouth full of lethal teeth and a jaw that looked strong enough to easily snap bone.
This is the man you’ve been lusting after.She almost nodded acknowledging that her inner voice was correct. She had desired him for the second she laid eyes on him. Seeing him in his animal form didn’t change that. She was lusting after him still.
SHE WAS DOWN wind and if she hadn’t been startled he wouldn’t have known she was there, and he might have done something stupid like shifting back to his human form in front of her.
He had stripped and changed form to better scent the earth before he took his soil samples. His clothes were laying over the boulders his boots tucked at their base. He fought the urge to look over at them reluctant to draw attention to them, in case he was lucky enough that she hadn’t noticed them yet.
Clay knew he should run off into the bush but he was afraid she would stay and discover the discarded clothing which might be worse than if he held his ground.
She stood there as if frozen, but he couldn’t make himself growl at her to scare her away. He watched her carefully trying to decide the best course of action when she shocked him.
