She stared up at Carol for a minute, trying to get her bearings.
“Time for dinner. You slept all afternoon,” Carol said. “Everyone is dying to see you. How are you feeling?”
Without moving? Fine. “Much, much better. Thank you.”
Elizabeth wasn’t used to all the concern and would have been just as happy without it. Her wrist felt much better, though.
“I’m glad you feel better,” Carol said.
Elizabeth knew Carol judged the way she moved. She was certain the nurse recognized that she still felt some discomfort, but she appreciated that Carol didn’t make a big deal of it.
Elizabeth would get better soon.
“Just a little background before we go down. Darien’s a gray wolf and Lelandi a red wolf, like I mentioned. Alicia was human, turned by a gray wolf and now mated to Jake. Ryan, my mate, is a gray wolf, and you already know I’m a human turned red wolf. We’re an unusual couple of wolf packs, so don’t feel you won’t fit in. We’re all different in our own ways.”
“Thanks, Carol.” Elizabeth couldn’t help but feel that she was more of an oddity, being a wolf-coyote mix, and she still had a hard time believing that anyone could truly accept her for what she was. She was just a novelty to them.
“Let’s go down to dinner, shall we?” Carol said.
Elizabeth wished she’d had a meal with Bertha back at the B and B and could have skipped all this fanfare. Even if she had it all wrong and they would accept her, she felt like she would be the center of attention she didn’t want any part of.
***
Tom met Elizabeth on the stairs and escorted her to the table, introducing everyone right away. He loved his family, each of them smiling and trying to make her feel welcome.
She appeared a little overwhelmed. Even though she was an alpha, meeting each of their gazes as she greeted them back, he noted that she glanced at the floor several times, and he saw the tears in her eyes when she caught his gaze.
Had no one ever treated her the way a family should? He hated to think that was the case.
He ushered her to a seat beside him. Everyone had already taken their seats at the large oak dining table and started passing around spaghetti and meatballs, Italian loaves, parmesan cheese, and salad.
“Can I help with anything?” she asked, looking uncomfortable that she couldn’t assist.
“No,” he said almost too vehemently. She had been pushed down a ski slope only hours ago, for heaven’s sake. This woman didn’t know when to quit.
“I’m not usually pampered like this.”
He smiled at her. “Let me get you whatever you need tonight.”
“Okay.” She let out her breath as if the notion didn’t agree with her but let him dutifully scoop up whatever she wanted. “Did you look over the photos I took?”
Everyone stopped whatever they were doing to hear what Tom had to say.
“We couldn’t see any faces, but we’ve got a description of what the two men were wearing. Jake will look at your camera to see if he can fix it,” Tom said as he returned to his seat, setting a plate piled high with spaghetti and plenty of meatballs in front of Elizabeth.
“Thank you,” she said.
Jake cleared his throat. “I’ll take good care of it. See what I can do.”
Darien turned to Carol. “Do you see anything about what happened to Elizabeth?”
Elizabeth stared at Carol. “You actually do have psychic ability? When you told me you foresaw what would happen to you before you were turned, I hadn’t thought you meant it literally.”
“Yeah, I see things sometimes.” Carol shook her head at Darien. “Since I’ve joined Ryan’s pack, my focus has been there. I haven’t seen anything new about members of your pack.”
“Did Trevor or Peter discover anything at the B and B?” Elizabeth asked.
“The two men left a trail through the woods behind the B and B, backtracked into town, and must have driven off in a vehicle parked out front,” Darien said.
“With all my stuff,” Elizabeth growled. “Did nobody see them?”
Tom wanted to touch Elizabeth to calm her, but he didn’t think she’d appreciate it. What the hell. He reached over and took her good hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. She glanced at him, and at first he thought she’d be annoyed with him. Instead, she looked at him with those crystal eyes as if trying to read him. He gazed back at her, wanting to take care of her. To find the bastards and beat them to within an inch of their lives.
He wanted to wrap his arm around her and hold her close, to let her know she had him to count on, but he couldn’t. Not yet.
“We’ve put out the alert to all the pack,” Darien said, studying them. “If anyone saw anything, they’ll let me know. Nobody’s been following you?”
“When I rode with Tom to the ski resort, I didn’t pay any attention to traffic.” Elizabeth glanced at Tom to see his take on it.
He shook his head. “I didn’t really notice on the way to the resort.” Between the snowy roads and Elizabeth, he hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything else. She was a total distraction.
“Why would they take all my stuff?” she asked.
“Sounds personal to me,” Lelandi said.
“Taking my ID forces me to stay here,” Elizabeth pointed out.
Jake said, “More likely it’s for identity theft. It doesn’t necessarily mean they wanted to keep you from leaving here.”
“Okay.” Elizabeth seemed more relaxed about that, which Tom took as meaning she wanted to leave as soon as she was able. He stiffened.
He had hoped she’d feel comfortable with his pack and remain with them for more time than she’d planned. But what had happened to her here, he could understand her reluctance to stay any longer than necessary. She couldn’t even ski if she wanted to take more pictures for her story.
“Is there any way that I can get a replacement ID so I can travel?” she asked.
“Yeah, we can do it. You don’t want to stay until we can unravel who did this to you?” Darien asked.
Tom gave Darien points for trying to convince Elizabeth to stay longer. He couldn’t think of a thing to say.
“I’ve got a deadline on the newspaper back home. And I probably won’t be able to ski again while I’m here.” Elizabeth grimaced as though she were loath to admit the fact.