Driving the speed limit while on a mission was important as she did not want to get stopped for a ticket. A cop would remember her if something went wrong during her investigation. She hadn’t seen any headlights behind her for the past half hour. Nathan and Bjornolf were probably snoring in happy unison.
Patches of ice made her tires slip a little as ghostly snowflakes drifted from the heavens in the dark night. By the time she arrived at the tree farm, the light snow had covered everything in a sheet of pristine white. She drove past the gift shop and parking lot. The shop’s sign was still lit and a few security lights illuminated the ghostly mist of snow in the chilly air, but the store windows were dark.
She parked off to the side of the road alongside a chain link fence. In the dark, she supposed she was safe enough from discovery. She climbed over the fence, hating the way the metal rattled. To her wolf’s hearing it sounded as loud as an ear-piercing alarm signal.
With barely a sound, she landed on the other side in a soft snowdrift, then headed toward the area where she had smelled the dead bodies. Half an hour later, as she was poking around the pine-needle-covered ground with the toe of her boot, using a small flashlight to aid her, she discovered something. She swept away the light layer of snow and found a small piece of half-buried metal. When she tugged, it pulled free of the matted pine needles, and she found it was attached to a long chain. Dog tags.
She gave a little involuntary shudder. Had the other man been a SEAL, too? Or just another former service member?
Her heart quickening, she shoved the dog tags in her pocket, anxious to get this information back to Bjornolf and Hunter. She wondered why the dog tags had been left there. They wouldn’t have fallen off the man. The killer wouldn’t have tugged them off and discarded them, leaving evidence behind. The pine needles wouldn’t have buried the tags from seasons past since the deaths had occurred very recently unless the mulch was applied lately. In the dead of winter? She didn’t think so.
Had the man struggled with his murderer here? Was he able to remove his dog tags and bury them with the hope that someone might discover the truth?
She would discover the truth. The murderer would pay dearly for the wolves’ deaths.
The crunch of footsteps coming toward her instantly caught her attention. Her skin prickled with awareness and her body chilled even further.
She turned off her flashlight and quickly headed down a lane of trees. She moved away from the footsteps, her own steps light and soundless, like a wolf’s.
Without warning, a stout, black-haired man stepped in front of her, towering over her, his fleshy fat cheeks red. Her heart did a flip. Flashlight in his gloved hand, he pointed the beam of light into her eyes.
Blinded, she squinted, her heart still racing.
“Stealing a tree in the middle of the night, are we?” he asked gruffly. He was wearing gray pants, a brown coat smudged with dirt, muddy work boots, and a black knit ski cap. He looked like someone who might work on the farm.
Her spine tingling from surprise, she felt a lot more rattled than she liked. She took a deep breath to smell him and couldn’t detect that he was a wolf. Once he lowered the flashlight and gave her a really good look, she saw his eyes were blue. Not a wolf then.
She might look like a cat burglar ready to steal the family jewels. A tree thief? Hardly.
“Stealing a tree? No. Nathan, my nephew who works here, called and said he’d lost his watch out here. He said he was getting ready for bed when he realized it,” Anna smoothly said. “I told him I’d come and help him look for it. You know his parents died last year, right? His father gave it to him on his sixteenth birthday and he’s really torn up about it.”
“So where is he?” The man didn’t take his cold eyes off her.
“I don’t know. I couldn’t find him, so I thought I’d hunt for it myself since I was here already.” She looked down at the ground again as if she might still be searching for the watch. “He said he lost it out here where he’d taken us to look at the trees earlier today.” She flipped on her flashlight and waved it around the area. “He dropped off the tree we bought at our house. We weren’t home at the time. Then he came back to look for it, and when he couldn’t find it, he called me to help. I thought he’d still be here.”
“In the dark.” It wasn’t a question.
“We were afraid one of your sleds would run over it during the day and ruin it. And it’s supposed to snow more. It’s not waterproof. I figured I’d check since I was here already, and I might just see it. You know how kids are. They can never find anything on their own.”
The man narrowed his beady eyes at her. “I’ve never seen him wearing a watch.”
He was bluffing, watching her for a reaction. How would he know whether Nathan wore a watch or not? Not that Nathan did. Lupus garous didn’t wear watches or other jewelry because it was too much of a nuisance if they had to shift quickly.
“Why are you out here alone tonight?” he asked, taking a step closer.
Her heartbeat sped up. If he grabbed her, he’d find himself flat on his back, but she didn’t want to get physical with him and make him even more suspicious.
Footsteps from behind her sounded. Expecting another guard on duty protecting Christmas trees, Anna turned and saw Bjornolf headed in her direction, his steely dark eyes focused on the man questioning her. He looked like he was still on the jungle mission, ready to protect her and kill any man who threatened her.
She took a breath in relief. In the jungle, they took down the enemies. No problem. In a case like this, the man was harmless. She couldn’t do anything but try to provide a cover for herself and not look like she was a thief.
The man took a couple of steps back. A bit of warmth seeped into her bones as Bjornolf drew nearer.
“My wife isn’t alone.” Bjornolf slipped his left arm around Anna’s shoulders and she leaned into him a little, savoring his protectiveness and warmth. He extended his right hand to the man for a handshake in greeting. “Bjorn and Anna Jorgenson.”
The man hesitated, looking as though he doubted that they were just Nathan’s relatives. He didn’t take Bjornolf’s hand but instead said, “Lemme see some ID.”
Bjornolf released Anna and dragged out a wallet, then pulled out a driver’s license and gave it to him. The man flashed the light over it, then nodded and handed it back. “Yours?” he said to Anna.
“Former cop?” she asked, caustically. She knew he wasn’t, knew he was taking the proper precautions after having come across trespassers in the dark, but she didn’t have to like it. She didn’t have any ID that showed she was Anna “Jorgenson,” either.
She passed over her driver’s license, waited for the man to say something, and was prepared with an answer about her last name being different from Bjornolf’s.
He cocked a brow, looked at her, and said, “Says here your name is Anna Johnson.”
Bjornolf grinned. “We’re newlyweds.” He gave Anna a squeeze, either for show or reminding her that she was supposed to remember the role she was playing.
She instantly said, “I’m not changing my name.” She smiled up at Bjornolf. “Woman’s prerogative. It’s too much of a hassle. What if the honeymoon doesn’t last?”
“Oh, honey, it’ll last.” Bjornolf gave her a look like he would show her just how much so, once they were back at the cottage. She swore he wasn’t playacting, either. And she had to admit his comment made her wish he wasn’t just playing a role. “Come on. I know Nathan’s upset about this, but we can return at daybreak and see if we can locate it then.”
She gave him another smile that said, “Right.” Then she looked at the man. “Your name is…?”
“Everton. The owner. Tell Nathan if he wants to make arrangements to have his kinfolk come look for something of his in the middle of the night to get permission first.”
“So… can we have permission?” she asked, trying to sound sweet and innocent.
“No. Come back in the morning when we’re open.”
She looked up at Bjornolf, slipped her arm around his waist, and said, “Guess we ought to go home to bed, then.”
“Exactly what I had in mind, honey.”
They turned to leave and had taken a couple of steps, when the man said in a surly, commanding way, “Wait!”
Bjornolf stiffened beside her, his eyes narrowing as they faced the man.
“I didn’t hear you calling Nathan’s name. If you were looking for him,” Everton said.
“She was. She has a soft voice,” Bjornolf growled as if he didn’t like that the man was questioning Anna’s story, and if they needed to take this to a physical level, he was game.
Anna loved him for it. She expected the man to ask why he didn’t hear Bjornolf calling out Nathan’s name and she stiffened a little.
“Anything else?” Bjornolf asked the question as though the man had better not pose another one.
Everton slid his gaze from Bjornolf to Anna, his expression irritated. He looked like he didn’t believe them. “Nah. Just don’t come back here again when we’re closed.”
Anna was dying to ask Everton why he was wandering around the property in the middle of the night. Bjornolf quickly said good night and escorted her off the farm.
She had to admit Bjornolf was good for a rescue. She was also glad they had their own vehicles at the Christmas tree farm. That way she didn’t have to hear his guff the whole drive back to the cottage about why she shouldn’t have gone alone tonight.
What she didn’t expect was for him to escort her through the parking lot, walk her all the way to her car, pull her into a hard embrace, and kiss her like they were newlyweds. Long and penetrating, hard and gentle, and every kind of delicious kiss in between. He finally released her and dragged in a breath of cold air. His heart was pounding furiously, his breath short, puffs of white vapor floating between them.
The kiss was nothing short of miraculous, full of feeling, and she wondered if he’d been worried that a bad guy might have taken her out. Any team member wouldn’t want to lose their partner, but his concern for her seemed like it was much more than that.