He considered the picture of the lupus garou again. “Where did you get this photo?”
“I took it in California. Right before he lunged at me.”
“When you were on that photo shoot for the magazine?” Rourke asked. “Hell, Tessa, I told you not to take the job, but—”
“He looks just like the one that knocked Rourke out,”
Tessa continued, ignoring Rourke’s scolding. “But he couldn’t be.”
Hunter lied, “They can all look the same.” Well, to an untrained eye, they could. He and his kind easily distinguished the differences. A change in the colors of the masks, or the patterns of coloration on the body and head. Sometimes subtle between wolf siblings, but still anyone who observed them closely enough could see the difference. Personality-wise, they’d be totally dissimilar.
“That’s what I thought.” Yet something in the way Tessa looked at him and her tone of voice, indicated she wasn’t being totally honest with him either.
He wanted to know what made her suspect he wasn’t speaking the truth, or that he at least didn’t understand the truth. She couldn’t know this wolf was the same as the one she’d seen in California.
But that he had followed her from California showed how determined he was to have her.
“Have you seen the wolf that attacked us here before?” he asked.
“In La Grande. I’m pretty sure. I took a photo of him, but he was turned sideways, and I didn’t get a good shot of his face.”
“Has to be another wolf,” Rourke said. “Don’t you think, Hunter? That’s a long ways for one to travel.”
“Yeah.” Hunter knew better. When looking for mates, they’d travel for miles. “Do you have the photo?”
She sighed. “Sure, but we need to take you to the doctor to see about your wound. The animal was probably rabid.” She looked up at him, her eyes shimmering like emeralds awash in tears.
Her upset cut straight into his soul. He didn’t think a human had ever touched him the way she did. Although if he had much to do with them, he probably wasn’t usually this beat up around them. He touched her face and would have leaned down to kiss her as she crouched in front of him, but his shoulder hurt so much, he couldn’t bend if his life depended on it. She stood and helped him into the flannel shirt.
Then she kissed his lips, her touch velvety soft, heating his chilled blood. “I’ll find some blankets for you, but we need to make plans to get you to the clinic.”
He grasped her hand and squeezed tight. “I won’t deny I’m bone weary, Tessa, but the animal didn’t have a case of rabies. I’ll be fine in a day or two.”
She glanced at Rourke as if looking for his support.
“She’s right, Hunter. That wound’s pretty nasty. It’s going to need some sutures.”
Hunter released Tessa’s hand. “No.” He closed his eyes and groaned as he tried to get comfortable. She hurried to help him stretch out on the sofa in front of the blazing fire. “Just make sure everything’s locked up,” he said. “If we drove in this icy snowstorm, we could run off a cliff.”
“We have to get to a doctor,” Tessa whispered to Rourke.
Hunter opened his eyes and scowled. Since when did his word not mean the law? “No! I’ll be fine. I heal fast. Just let me sleep.”
Tessa brushed away tears and then rushed back down the hallway. He only realized then she had been fighting them all along. He hadn’t meant to sound so harsh, but he didn’t need doctors messing with him. Not that they would discover what he was. Thank heavens the lupus garou genetics precluded that. As a wolf, they had only wolf genes and as a human, human genetics. But he still didn’t want anyone seeing how fast he healed. Although as bad as the bite was, it would be a couple of days, maybe more, before it healed properly.
Rourke tried his phone, but shook his head. “Still no reception.”
Tessa returned with an armload of blankets, a pillow, and the other wolf photo.
Hunter studied the two photos. Hell, it was the same lupus garou. “How long ago was this taken?”
“A month ago.”“Have you seen any wolves around here since then?”
“I thought I’d… I’ve heard howling up north.”
“When?”
“About a month ago. Well, the first time. I’ve heard it on and off since then.”
The bastard must have seen her at La Grande and tracked her here. Had he caught a whiff of her? Her special scent that ignited his own cravings?
Or had he taken objection to her photographing him? The fact he was rolling in her sheets meant he wanted her. He was taking her scent back to his wolf mates, declaring she was his and no one else’s.
“I thought maybe he’d been owned before.” She pulled the soft blue blanket up to Hunter’s chin.
“Owned before?”
“Yeah. He doesn’t act like a normal wolf. Well, I mean he does, with the snarling and chasing and all. But—he stares me down like he’s trying to remember a past life, like maybe he was once someone’s pet and I look like the owner, or something.” She gave Hunter a couple of pills.
Rourke shook his head. “No way was that wild animal someone’s pet, unless he already ate his owners.”
Hunter gave him an annoyed look. He wasn’t helping his cause. His shoulder feeling like it was on fire, Hunter offered Tessa a pained smile. “Why would I need a doctor when I’ve got Miss Nightingale?”
Her lips lifted a little, but he could tell her heart wasn’t in it.
He closed his eyes and listened to Rourke and Tessa move to the kitchen where they discussed him and how they would get him to the clinic in town despite what he wanted. He let out an exasperated sigh.
Tessa was not normally a wimp, but she’d fought collapsing when she first saw Hunter’s muscle torn to the bone. He had to have medical attention and soon. But he was right about the driving conditions. She would never normally chance driving in this kind of weather. Anyone with an ounce of sense wouldn’t either. But infection could set in and he couldn’t heal properly without getting some stitches no matter what Hunter said about it. Yet she wondered if he practiced some kind of mind-over-body meditation that helped him heal faster because all the injuries he’d suffered from his swim in the Pacific had healed.
How he could have survived the cold for so long before they reached him, she couldn’t imagine. It was almost as if he’d holed up in a nice warm cabin for a while. Except there were none close by, and he had been too injured to have gone very far.
Rourke let out his breath. “I don’t know what to do, Tessa. He needs a doctor for sure. My phone still isn’t getting a signal or I’d call for an emergency crew to come get us.”
Tessa looked out at the accumulating snow—already drifts had piled up half a foot around the back of the house. “I’m afraid we wouldn’t make the six-mile trip into town. If we ran the truck off into the woods down one of those steep embankments—if we survived—we could all be injured so badly we might not be able to crawl back to the road. Then what? And if we just got stuck, we’d have to walk in these freezing conditions the rest of the way into town. I don’t think Hunter can take any more of the cold as badly injured as he is. But I’m also worried about infection and continued bleeding. And although he says the wolf wasn’t rabid, how does he know? What if it was? The way the animal came into the house and headed for me, he acted more like a rabid wolf than not.”
“Agreed.” Rourke glanced at his watch. “It’s already midnight. One of us will need to keep a vigil on him all night. If he begins to run a fever or gets violently ill, either we can attempt a run into town, or we can wait out the storm and try then. The alternative is I can go by myself and try to get help.”
Tessa shook her head. “I’d worry about your safety. What if you didn’t make it? And then, too, the stalker could still be out there. Oh, hell, I hadn’t thought about it since it happened, but remember, someone rang the doorbell and then disappeared? Do you think the wolf killed the person and dragged him away?”
Rourke collapsed on the dining chair. “Hell. We’ve got to report this as soon as we can. It’s our civic duty, despite what Hunter says.”
Rourke was right, but what kept running through her mind was the strange way Hunter had considered the photographs. The concern etched in his face and actions, the questions he’d asked—all led her to believe he thought the same as her, despite his words to the contrary and how insane the notion could be. The wolf was the same one she’d seen on the three separate occasions, and he was stalking her.
Chapter 7
FOR TWO HOURS, TESS A SAT WITH HUNTER, HIS HEAD RESTING in her lap as he slept fitfully on the couch. Her nerves raw, she wanted to take him to the hospital in the worst way, to have medical personnel—who knew what they were doing—care for him.
Rourke had finally fallen asleep on the other sofa, snoring softly. The fire crackled and cast a soft glow into the room, but the lamps remained on the floor where they had fallen. Not wanting to disturb Hunter’s rest, she’d clean up later. Battling to stay awake, she kept vigilant, watching for any sign Hunter’s condition was worsening.
“Meara,” Hunter mumbled and groaned. “Meara.”
Tessa’s soggy eyes widened, and she strained to hear him speak again. Was he remembering something more? Of course he was. But about a girlfriend or his sister? Her heart skittered with the thought.
She brushed the hair away from his forehead, the shadow of a beard giving him a rugged, sexy appearance, but his cheeks seemed flushed. She touched his cheek, her fingers recoiling at the feel of his skin. No, no. He was burning up.
She hurried to move out from under him, removed his blankets, and went to the kitchen. Pouring water into a glass, she glanced out the window to see how bad the storm was. Maybe they could chance taking him into town.