Undercover Wolf
Undercover Wolf
Linda O. Johnston
Danger and desire collide in this race against time… PI Quinn Parran’s new mission is to join Alpha Force, a unique military team of shapeshifters, and use their new elixir that will enhance his shapeshifting abilities. But with Sergeant Kristine Norwood, each shifting experiment sparks a volatile primal passion.And when Quinn’s brother vanishes on his honeymoon, he must join forces with Kristine and go undercover as newlyweds to investigate. While Kristine is attracted to the ruggedly handsome Quinn she isn’t about to get involved with a shapeshifter – until their quest becomes more dangerous.Now they must cross the divide between shifter and human, because every minute they’re apart brings the threat closer.
“We’ll find them and straighten out this whole mess.”
“We will,” Kristine agreed with obvious determination.
He couldn’t help it. He bent down and kissed her gently on the mouth.
Within the space of a moment, they stood still on a secluded path and he kissed her once more.
Hell, Quinn didn’t just want to share kisses with her. He wanted to touch her everywhere.
That wasn’t going to happen now. Probably wouldn’t happen ever. It shouldn’t happen.
Reluctantly, he pulled back. “Guess that was for luck,” he said, making a joke of it.
“Yours or mine?”
“Both.”
Dear Reader,
Even honeymooning members of Alpha Force can get into trouble, and it takes both family and friends—shapeshifters or not—to help them out.
In Undercover Wolf, the protagonists of the preceding Alpha Force story, Lt. Grace Andreas Parran and her new husband, Lt. Simon Parran, have gone missing on their honeymoon. Simon’s brother, Lt. Quinn Parran, and Staff Sergeant Kristine Norwood, Grace’s Alpha Force aide and good friend, go undercover, unofficially and against orders, to find them. It’s hard enough ignoring their own growing attraction but their undercover identities require that they pretend to be honeymooners! Kristine must also act as Quinn’s aide for shifting into wolf form, which means she keeps seeing him naked!
I had great fun writing Undercover Wolf, the fourth novel about Alpha Force—a highly covert military unit partly comprised of shapeshifters. I hope you enjoy the story.
Please come visit me at my website, www.LindaOJohnston.com, and at my blog: http://KillerHobbies.blogspot.com. And, yes, I’m on Facebook, too.
Linda O. Johnston
About the Author
LINDA O. JOHNSTON loves to write. More than one genre at a time? That’s part of the fun. While honing her writing skills, she started working in advertising and public relations, then became a lawyer … and still enjoys writing contracts. Linda’s first published fiction novel appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and won a Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for Best First Mystery Short Story of the Year. It was the beginning of her versatile fiction-writing career. Linda now spends most of her time creating memorable tales of paranormal romance and mystery.
Linda lives in the Hollywood Hills with her husband and two Cavalier King Charles spaniels. Visit her at her website, www.LindaOJohnston.com.
Undercover
Wolf
Linda O. Johnston
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
I’ve been visiting a number of national parks lately and enjoying them immensely. Acadia National Park, near Bar Harbor, Maine, has been one of my favorites, so I had to set a story there. But as always, I have invoked poetic license—this time to make sure those who investigate the fictional crime that happens there handle it the way I want them to, not necessarily as real law enforcement folks might operate. But real law enforcement folks might find problems with having Alpha Force members shapeshift in their jurisdiction!
Those who read my books will expect that this one, too, is dedicated to my husband, Fred, who enjoys travel even more than I do and has fun visiting national parks.
Chapter 1
Why do I feel so unnerved?
It wasn’t as if Staff Sgt. Kristine Norwood hadn’t seen a lot of naked male bodies during her years as a nurse, before she’d become a member of the covert military unit Alpha Force.
Maybe it was because she had foolishly allowed herself to notice exactly how good-looking and sexy her new but temporary superior officer, Lt. Quinn Parran, was when they’d first been introduced a few days ago.
They had just reached the test mission’s planned location—a woodsy area at the far end of Ft. Lukman, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Clad in her usual camo uniform and boots, Kristine had hurried in this direction with her heavy backpack over her shoulders. She stopped now and could sense the presence of the man who had kept up with her along the path through the most remote area of the military base where Alpha Force was headquartered.
She ignored that niggling uneasiness, embarrassment—and something she didn’t even want to think about, lust—as she turned toward him.
“This the place?” He glanced around at the pin oak trees looming around them.
“Yes, sir.”
She caught the sardonic raise of his dark brows over his golden-brown eyes.
“Stop calling me ‘sir,’” he said. “You called me Quinn when we were introduced at Simon’s wedding.”
“Yes, sir, but we weren’t on an official exercise then.” And she hadn’t felt so uneasy at the wedding of her regular superior officer, Lt. Grace Andreas, to Quinn’s brother Lt. Simon Parran, who had also just recently joined Alpha Force. Kristine had been maid of honor and Quinn was best man.
He had undoubtedly been the best-looking man there.
Grace and Simon were on their honeymoon now, which was why Kristine and Quinn were temporarily assigned to work together.
He was right, though. She usually called other Alpha Force members by their first names from the time she met them, no matter what their rank. She was friendly enough with Grace and others to joke around with them. But this was different. Way different.
“You want to play military?” he asked. Hell, they were military, even if he chafed at it. “Here’s my next order, Kristine. Stop considering this an official exercise.”
Kristine couldn’t help herself. She smiled both at his words and at his exasperated expression. His military haircut hadn’t compelled him to do a great job of shaving, and the hint of dark stubble on his face emphasized the razor-sharpness of his cheekbones. She ignored the sexiness of the look and how it caused her insides to churn and simmer, and responded, “Can’t do that, sir. But I’ll call you Quinn.”
“But this is only quasi-official.” What, did the guy just love to argue, or was he serious? “It’s a test, both for me and your oh-so-secret military unit. Our military unit.” He’d obviously seen her scowl and was reacting to it. That was a good thing. “We both want to see how I do during my first time using the Alpha Force elixir that my brother Simon has described so glowingly to me. He wants to know, too.”
Quinn was a new recruit. He had obtained his rank because of what he was, not because of training or achievement. At least not yet. And so far, Kristine’s impression was that he had joined the military not because he wanted to—as she had—but for some very unusual benefits he would not have received otherwise.
Like this—using the elixir.
He obviously had some issues with it all, though. She, on the other hand, was perfectly happy following military protocols … most of the time. Tonight, though—well, she would obey orders notwithstanding how uncomfortable she was.
And that meant acting as Quinn’s aide for this very special session. Mission. Official mission.
Quinn was taller than his brother, with wide shoulders and a devil-may-care stance he affected even now that he was a soldier. His uniform was similar to hers—much crisper, though. Probably never worn before. It displayed the bars showing he was a commissioned officer. And now, he was about to remove it….
Orders or not, how could she stay completely remote and objective as she did all the things necessary to assist Quinn?
She simply would, because she had to. Having her temporary commanding officer naked in front of her was not beyond the call of her very special duty. After all, she’d seen Grace naked a lot when her superior had shapeshifted into wolf form and back.
Now it was time for Quinn to do the same.
Yeah, but Grace was a woman, argued Kristine’s logical mind. She’d seen nothing different from what she saw in the mirror, just in the unique configuration that was Grace’s instead of her own.
But Quinn? He was all man. Well, almost all man, except for what she knew about him and what he was about to accomplish here.
After she saw him naked …
“Tell you what,” he said. “Let’s do it all backward. You give me some orders. What do we do next?”
“I assume this won’t be your first time shifting outside a full moon,” Kristine said, buying a little time. Plus, she was curious. This would be his debut shifting as a member of Alpha Force, but he’d had other resources before.
“That’s right. I’ve taken some of the shifting pills that Simon developed, so I’ve already changed now and then at different times. I’ve even taken his medication during a full moon because it helps to keep us from changing automatically then. Mostly. My bro’s a smart guy, but his pills need work.”
“You probably know that some of what he did has been incorporated into the new Alpha Force formula,” Kristine said. “It was already good stuff, but now it’s better.”
That wasn’t her area of expertise, of course. But she, like all Alpha Force members, knew that the basis for what Quinn would be drinking here was the most current version of the Alpha Force elixir that had first been developed by one of its commanding officers, Maj. Drew Connell, even before he had helped to form the very unique, very covert military unit composed partly of shapeshifters.
The formula had been modified over the few years of Alpha Force’s existence, improved by development and experimentation.
And now, Kristine had heard, they had also made some initial modifications to the elixir that were triggered by the formula first developed by Quinn’s brother Simon. That blend was still in experimental stages and not yet in common use. Simon’s prior version was not as sophisticated in most ways as what Alpha Force was using—but it contained some very desirable qualities.
“Bring it on,” he said. “I’ve been waiting to try it.”
Kristine inhaled deeply. “Okay, then.” She kept her tone crisp. “I’ll give you a dose of the elixir. You remove your clothes, then I’ll shine the light on you.”
“It’s supposed to mimic the intensity of a full moon, right?” Quinn asked. He didn’t even comment about the fact that he was to completely strip in front of her. Maybe it was no big deal to him.
She wouldn’t let it be a big deal to her.
“That’s right,” she said.
“Fair enough.”
Kristine removed a vial of elixir from the backpack where it had been carefully stowed. As he drank it, she also extracted the moderate-size battery-operated light.
She pretended not to be especially aware of what he was doing as he removed his shirt, then his slacks. But she did sneak a glance in his direction. Damn, but his body was as buff as she had anticipated from seeing him fully clothed.
Then he removed his black boxers. She felt her face redden as she turned the light on and aimed it toward him. She had no choice but to look then. Oh, yes. His male parts were as large and enticing as she had imagined, too. She quickly lifted her gaze toward his face.
He obviously was aware of her discomfort. As she bathed him in light she could see his masculine expression that clearly said, Like what you see?
And then, as anticipated, his shift began. Kristine watched, as always amazed yet accepting of the miracle she observed so often.
Quinn’s body writhed, and he dropped to all fours on the ground. His limbs contorted as fur erupted from his skin. His grimace elongated into a canine muzzle.
Soon, he would be, for all intents and purposes, a wolf.
Standing still, paws grounded on the soft dirt of the earthen path, he stared at the beautiful human who had aided his change. She had turned off the bright light and stood watching him in the darkness, eased now only by the distant lights of the military base. She remained unmoving. Her head was tilted, as if she studied him. Wondered about him.
Except for his family, he had never had any company while shifting.
The fact he could think about that now was astounding. Always before, even when using Simon’s treasured pill that helped to control shifting nearly anytime—at least somewhat—his thoughts while changed had been as wild and uncontrolled as his wolfen body.
But this Alpha Force formula allowed him to keep all his human awareness. He loved it!
What else was different now? He had to know.
He would not find out by remaining here.
He dragged his gaze from the wide blue eyes watching him, bared his teeth for an instant to convey his intent to be on his own and began to run.
The late summer nighttime breeze wafted around his long silver-black pelt. Smells of trees, of large birds of prey, of small squirrels sleeping in branches above, filled him with a sense of belonging.
He circled the vast area inside the fence, remaining within the confines of Ft. Lukman.
He had an urge to run and never return. But his alert mind acknowledged the wish while ensuring that sensibility and caution governed all.
Wise or not, he had taken an oath to become a soldier. With his new ability to think as consciously as a human, he remained aware of the penalties for a soldier’s going AWOL, no matter what his assignment. Or the form of his body.
Besides, he wanted more access to the formula.
For a long while, Quinn ran in loops, circling the perimeter of the military base, staying far from the buildings. He watched for people to ensure he got nowhere near them—though he was fully aware that many among this group of humans, more than any other, would understand what he was. Accept it. Accept him.
Yet he preferred being on his own, absorbing every nuance of the sights and sounds and smells utilizing his enhanced senses and his maintained ability to understand.
He didn’t feel he would ever grow tired. But he had not taken a large quantity of the changing formula for this, his first experiment with the medication that was so new to him.
For the first time since reluctantly agreeing to join his brother and enlist in this unique military force, he started to believe it was not a mistake.
Yet would this new environment, this new job, ever feel important enough to quell his natural curiosity? Would he ever be comfortable acting like a soldier, taking orders, especially if there were any he felt to be needless or ludicrous?
Could he, as he had been promised, ever use all the prized abilities that he had carefully honed over his years as a private investigator?
He would have to wait and find out.
Eventually, he began to feel tugs beneath his skin, a sure signal that he would soon change back. Reluctantly, he turned in the direction from which he had come.
The woman who had helped him remained there, sitting on the ground near where he had left her, a softly lit electronic reader on her lap. She was reading. Waiting for him.
He wanted to greet her. Thank her.
Instead, what poured from his throat for now was a soft growl.
She immediately looked at him as if startled.
And then she nodded.
“That’s great stuff,” Quinn said. “The shifting formula.” He had hardly stopped grinning since changing back from his wolf form.
He looked entirely human now. He was also fully clothed. Kristine, walking beside him on the path to the center of Ft. Lukman with her backpack again over her shoulders, resisted glancing toward the private areas of him that she had glimpsed—and considered potentially great stuff. They were all hidden now anyway.
And staring wouldn’t be professional.
Of course, the heated stirrings inside her, being close to this man again, were anything but professional.
“Once we’re back at the main building, I’ll conduct a recorded interview with you and enter your description into our computer database.”
“I’ll have a lot to say,” he responded. “All of it complimentary.”
Her thoughts, too—about him—but of course she didn’t mention that. She would be a lot more comfortable when Grace returned and she could get back to being her regular charge’s aide. She didn’t know who would be there for Quinn, but at least it wouldn’t be her.
Ft. Lukman was a fairly large base, but it didn’t take long to return to the building where they had started their trek earlier. The aboveground portion held quite a few dog kennels for the canines that acted as partial cover for the wolfen shapeshifters headquartered here.
Quinn and she immediately headed for a stairway down to the lab areas, clean rooms and primary Alpha Force offices. This, Kristine knew, was where those supposedly magical formulations of the Alpha Force elixir were mixed and changed and improved. She sometimes wished she knew more about how they worked, how they acted to enhance the process and conditions of shapeshifting.
But she never wished that she were a shapeshifter. Oh, she admired them. Liked working with them. But when all was said and done, she preferred being … well, herself.
At the bottom, Quinn reached around to open the door for her. She appreciated the gentlemanly gesture. Maybe there was hope for him to be a real soldier yet.
Not that it really mattered to her.
She gasped as a backlighted body clad in a camo uniform loomed before them in the hallway. It was late, and she hadn’t expected to see anyone there.
“Glad you two are finally back,” said Maj. Drew Connell, commanding officer of Alpha Force. “Come with me. There’s something important going on that I need to brief you about.”
Kristine had thought it interesting and fitting that a shifter had been designated to command this covert unit. At first she had wondered whether she would accept taking orders from those who were so different from her. Now, it was second nature.
If Drew said something significant was happening, that meant it was definitely critical.
He ushered them into the small office off the main lab facility where he and others worked on the shifting formulation. He was not only the one who had developed the prototype, but he had also stayed closely involved with its modifications.
“Sit down. Please.” It was an order, but people around here tended to give orders more politely than the rest of the military, as if Alpha Force was different.
Which it was.
“What’s up?” asked Quinn, as he settled his large frame into the designated seat across from Drew’s desk. “Sir,” he added when Drew’s suddenly chilly golden eyes reminded him where they were and who outranked whom.
Was this some kind of alpha thing, too, among male shifters? Interesting, Kristine thought.
“Yes, please tell us what’s going on, sir,” she added in a respectful tone, one she hoped Quinn would use himself in the future.
“A couple of people were killed two nights ago in Acadia National Park,” he said, his face grim.
That had been a night when the moon was full, Kristine realized.
Before Drew could continue, Quinn interrupted. “That’s near Bar Harbor, Maine. Where Simon and Grace went on their honeymoon. I haven’t been in touch for a couple of days—didn’t want to bother them. Are they okay?” He had stood abruptly, and Kristine empathized, although she remained seated. She was worried, too.
“Unknown so far,” Drew said. “The victims have been identified and aren’t Grace and Simon, so you needn’t worry about that. They were apparently attacked by some kind of wild animal, and the first assessment indicates the wounds could have been caused by canines.”
“Are there wild wolves in that park?” Quinn demanded.
“Used to be, a long time ago, but not now,” Drew said.
The three of them were silent for a long moment, staring at one another.
“Could the attackers have been … werewolves?” Kristine asked quietly.
“That’s not been proposed officially, even by those who know about Alpha Force,” Drew said.
“But—”
“Has anyone talked to Simon?” Quinn demanded. “To Grace?”
“Several of us have tried to call them on their cell phones and at their hotel,” Drew replied. “We haven’t been able to reach either of them.”
Chapter 2
The time was 0930. Kristine was surprised that this group of people, which included both brass and nonmilitary honchos, could come together so quickly here in such a remote location, but it had happened. Around twenty people were gathered in the assembly room on the first floor of the building at the heart of Ft. Lukman, where the offices of the commanding officers and others were located. Of course most were familiar Alpha Force members, including Lt. Autumn Katers, a shifting hawk, and her aide, Sgt. Ruby Belmont, who had been on a mission with Kristine and Grace in Arizona when Grace had met Simon.
There were also some relatively new recruits, like Lt. Colleen Hodell, a cougar shifter, and Sgt. Jason Connell, a wolf shifter related to one of the unit’s commanding officers.
Then there were the others.
Kristine had entered the room fifteen minutes before and taken a seat out of the mainstream of the Alpha Force group, on one of the theater-style chairs mounted on the concrete floor. She had left a chair empty beside her in case Quinn decided to join her.
Quinn had just come in with Maj. Connell and Lt. Patrick Worley, the hands-on commanding officers of Alpha Force, whom he’d probably waylaid in the hall. He stood with them now at the front of the room, apparently attempting to pump them in advance for information. But he didn’t seem overly pushy, at least not from Kristine’s perspective. His expression seemed interested, his nods deferential. Had he decided to accept where he ranked in the military, or was he just acting that way to get what he wanted? Or was she entirely wrong in her interpretation from this distance?
Damn, but she wanted to join them.
She glanced at her watch. The meeting was scheduled to begin in about two minutes. The officers wouldn’t appreciate her interrupting them—that would only delay the assembly they’d thrown together so quickly.
She couldn’t help feeling a bit riled. Quinn should have contacted her, involved her in his discussion. They were a team, at least for the moment. He ought to recognize that. Live by it.
Even so, she recognized that though they had similar interests in what was about to be discussed, his interest was even greater than hers. She was a buddy and comrade-in-arms with Grace.
He was Simon’s brother.
Apparently Quinn and she weren’t the only ones worried about what was happening with the two missing Alpha Force members. The concerns of most of these people, though, might be more about the effect of the current situation on the unit than on the individual members involved.
Okay, call her cynical. She gave a damn about Alpha Force, a lot more than, say, Quinn did. And, most likely, more than those now in an apparently intense discussion with Gen. Greg Yarrow near the door at the side of the room, including a couple of suits and a higher-ranking general.
But the people involved, and what was happening to them, were important, too.
That was why she had tried calling Grace’s cell phone. Three times.
And left three messages, each more urgent than the last.
None had been returned.
“Okay, let’s get started.” Drew broke away from his discussion with Quinn and Patrick and stood at the front of the room in front of the U.S. flag to address the whole gathering. Quinn did not look pleased, but he moved quickly toward her, beyond the couple of rows filled mostly with others in camo uniforms—both shifting and nonshifting members of Alpha Force. Kristine had already noticed that among them was Dr. Melanie Harding-Connell, a local veterinarian and Drew’s wife. They’d had a baby a few months ago, and the little girl, Emily, was sleeping in a nearby stroller. Melanie was not a member of the military and was also not a shifter, although her husband was both.
More than once, Kristine had wondered what little Emily’s shifting abilities might eventually be. Her understanding was that the gene was dominant, so the baby would grow into a werewolf.
Interesting, that Melanie would choose to marry and have an unusual child. Kristine was aware that most shifters were the result of mixed marriages. She loved working with shifters, but marrying one? Giving birth to a baby shifter?
How would a nonshifting parent cope?
Maybe she was too traditional, despite being part of Alpha Force, but give her a nice, calm, loving marriage someday, preferably to another soldier, and a home filled with regular kids. Kids who were loved. Well cared for. A family that was way different from her own disastrous childhood.
Hell, she’d risen above all that. It had brought her here, where she belonged.
Quinn sat down beside her on the aisle seat, nodding grimly. She, too, remained silent. She knew he had a close relationship with his brother and could only imagine what he was feeling now, with Simon the center of a situation that could only be bad, whatever the explanation. She had an unwelcome urge to reach over and squeeze Quinn’s large hand, now resting on his leg, in a gesture of comfort, but that wasn’t appropriate.
“I think you all know why we’re here,” Drew said. He stood in front of the group, speaking without a microphone since everyone had gathered at the front of the room. He probably hadn’t gotten any more sleep than Kristine had after their quick briefing last night, but he looked alert, his golden eyes sweeping the crowd. “Even so, I’ll describe my understanding of the situation.”
He briefly went over what he had said to Quinn and her last night. There’d apparently been no further information gathered since then. Two tourists were fatally mauled. Simon and Grace, who had been honeymooning in the area, were missing. The news had been picked up by local media but national coverage was minimal. So far.
“Are you certain the two things are related?” This came from one of the two men in suits seated in the first row near the generals. The speaker was now standing. Kristine recognized him from the wedding: Darren Olivante, team leader for domestic projects at the Defense Special Projects Agency—the agency within the Department of Defense that had assisted in the creation of Alpha Force and now helped monitor it.
As Olivante turned to glance around the room, Kristine noticed that his salt-and-pepper hair was longer than the traditional cut of the military members he worked with. He wore glasses and a challenging expression on a round and flabby face.
General Yarrow rose and walked to the front of the room beside Drew. He, too, had been at Grace and Simon’s wedding. Although he was headquartered at the Pentagon like the Defense Special Projects Agency, he also maintained an office at Ft. Lukman. Kristine hadn’t seen him around here lately, so he must have dashed here for this meeting.
The general was in his sixties but well preserved, and his hair, although behind a receding hairline, was still black. The wrinkles on his face seemed to show up mostly when he scowled, and he maintained a strong-looking physique.
“We have received no evidence that the killings and the disappearance of our two officers are related, but it’s a potentially logical assumption,” the general said. “Of course, given the special nature of Alpha Force and its members, we’re hoping the Parrans weren’t involved in mauling those tourists, but the information we’ve been given indicates that the wounds appear to have been caused by at least one wild animal, probably canine. That could indicate—”
Quinn stood beside Kristine. She tried to grab him, to warn him not to interrupt, but it was too late. His otherwise handsome face had turned an angry shade of red, and he shouted, “If you’re insinuating that my brother and his wife attacked some humans for no reason while shifted, forget it. Isn’t this Alpha Force organization intended to be a pack of sorts? Pack members have each other’s backs. We don’t level false accusations at one another.”
The DSPA official had remained standing. He glared at Quinn, then turned toward General Yarrow. “I think this is a good example of why the plans we’ve been discussing are the way to go, General,” he said. “And why it’s been so difficult to ensure that funding for Alpha Force stays intact.” Even from several rows back, Kristine could hear the ice dripping from his words.
But what was he talking about? What plans?
And was Alpha Force in jeopardy? Without adequate funding, it could disappear. What would happen to its members?
“My suggestion, sir, is to approach the investigation in a two-pronged way,” General Yarrow said. “And to make sure it’s successful. That will convince the powers that be to appropriate funding. But this isn’t the place to discuss it all.” He turned from the civilian to face Quinn, who remained standing with his hands clenched into tense fists. “Lt. Parran,” the general said, “we will have a private briefing as soon as this meeting is over. For now, you are dismissed.”
Drew Connell, who stood beside the general, gave a curt nod toward Quinn, seconding the order.
Quinn didn’t move, except that his gold-tinged brown eyes narrowed. Kristine half expected him to erupt in a heated volcano of protest and fury.
But he was now a member of Alpha Force. Of the military. He had taken an oath that involved following orders. He’d spoken of the pack mentality of Alpha Force. Surely, he would at least bow to that, to Drew Connell’s authority—wouldn’t he?
In any event, she was his acting aide.
She reached up and grabbed his forearm. As she had anticipated, tension had turned it into a steely rod. “Don’t protest,” she whispered up at him. “We’ll talk to the general and the major later and get this all sorted out.”
He glanced down at her. She almost winced under the barbed anger in his gaze. But in moments, he relaxed. Closed those eyes for an instant.
Then he called to the ranking officers, “Yes, sirs.” The tone was sardonic, and the salute he flashed after Kristine released his arm was a parody. He turned and started down the aisle toward the door.
Kristine remained worried for him. He was her charge, after all, at least for now. She had an urge to follow him.
But she needed to know what was said here. He needed to know, too, whether or not he realized it.
She remained seated while Drew and General Yarrow described the situation in Maine and the Alpha Force position.
Then Olivante joined them and commented.
Kristine was afraid she knew how the investigation was going to be handled. And it wasn’t the best way for Alpha Force.
They sat in a small room outside the general’s office waiting for Major Connell and General Yarrow to call them in.
“I take it that my attitude—even though I was right—didn’t help my brother’s position,” Quinn said to Kristine with a shrug. He had stayed outside the assembly room, pacing back and forth, until the meeting had disbanded and Kristine joined him. Despite his keen wolflike hearing, even in human form, he hadn’t been able to make out much of what was said.
Since the meeting had been short, he didn’t expect that there’d been much of substance anyway.
Only speculation.
While waiting, he had tried texting, then calling Simon and Grace again. Both calls had gone straight to voice mail, and he had received no responses to any of his attempts to reach them.
“Probably not,” Kristine answered. Sitting in a stiff military pose in the chair beside him, she raised her head, jutting her chin out in a characteristic motion he had noticed before. It showed her determination. Her stubbornness. Her beauty.
All right, maybe it wasn’t her most beautiful feature, but he liked it. Enough that he had an urge to touch that strong chin with his fingers. Better yet, cup it and pull her forward so he could test her stubbornness with a kiss …
He stopped, mentally punching himself. Where had that come from? He had just met her a few days ago, at Simon’s wedding. Yeah, she was a looker, and she’d seen him buck naked—and the thought of her eyes on him started his privates stirring even now.
But she was also all military. His assigned aide. A nonshifter. Not someone to get all hot over.
Was worry for his brother turning him into some kind of nutcase?
Maybe. He’d have to be careful. “So the powers that be, people I don’t even know who can send orders down the pipeline to me, think that my brother and his wife just went on some kind of shifting rampage and killed a couple of innocent folks right out of the blue?”
Kristine ducked her head, causing the cap of her dark hair to feather around her face. “You could say that.” She grimaced. “They did.”
Before Quinn could express what he thought of that, the door opened and Drew appeared. “Come on in,” he said.
Quinn had been in the general’s office before—when he’d been interrogated about whether he really wanted to join Alpha Force, and also what he could do for it.
It was quite an office. Not that Quinn had any idea what military offices were supposed to look like, but he figured this might be the epitome. The desk was made of a dark polished wood that looked like mahogany. There was the usual U.S. flag, but the brass pole was anything but ordinary. Then there were the worn classic books on shelves behind the general, written by some of the English-speaking world’s most renowned authors, like Robert Louis Stevenson and Bram Stoker.
There was a slight scent of brandy that Quinn could smell with his enhanced senses. He glanced toward a closed wooden cabinet behind the desk. The general might fortify himself in here for what he faced while commanding Alpha Force.
Drew had told Quinn after the last time he’d been here that the general had subsidized all the office furnishings himself just because he wanted to, and this was a getaway from the Pentagon.
Quinn waved Kristine through the door before him. He might as well act like a gentleman here, since he was committed to being a soldier.
Damn it.
Where are you, bro? his mind shouted silently. What the hell’s going on?
Quinn liked his new sister-in-law, Grace. Had been glad that his brother seemed so happy.
But he hadn’t been thrilled at being the best man at the wedding, wearing a monkey suit. Being in the middle of a bunch of fawning people, most of whom he didn’t know. Military types. Even a couple of Department of Defense guys, including the one from the DSPA.
At least he’d never have to do it again. Wolves mated for life. Even shifters.
Grace was part of their pack. He was as concerned about her as he was about his brother. Almost.
Drew, Kristine and he sat in the chairs facing the general’s desk. Greg Yarrow stood, then glared at Quinn. “I should strip you of your rank for insubordination,” he growled.
Quinn closed his eyes for just a second. He had a role to play here, and he’d better do it right if he wanted any chance at helping Simon. And Grace. “I understand, sir,” he said quietly. “I would like to apologize and—”
“Let’s not lay it on too thick.” Greg smiled grimly, causing divots to form in the cheeks of his aging face.
“Okay.” Quinn smiled briefly, too. Then waited.
“Here’s where we are,” Drew said from beside him. “Acadia is a national park, so the feds are involved in the investigation into the deaths of the tourists. So are the local police. Since the disappearance of Simon and Grace is assumed to be related, both are looking into that, too.”
“So we go as members of Alpha Force and find out what the hell happened,” Quinn predicted.
“No.” The general stood. “That’s what I hoped for, in the multipronged investigation. But I’ve been told in no uncertain terms that since members of Alpha Force might be the perpetrators of a crime here, we need to let other agencies take the lead.”
“No!” Quinn almost stood but felt Kristine’s restraining hand on his arm again. He took a deep breath, then another. “Sorry, sir,” he managed. “But my brother wouldn’t have killed anyone, whether he was shifted or not.”
He would probably have been shifted under the full moon, on the night of the killings. He might have taken the new version of the changing elixir even then, because of its benefits. As Kristine and he had discussed, some of the modifications resulted from incorporation of parts of Simon’s shifting medication, now that he had joined Alpha Force and turned over his formula.
But the combined new version might not have been tested adequately….
Yet Quinn had felt fine after taking it. Once. A reduced dose. Still, he wasn’t about to mention even a hint of concern about that.
Besides, he didn’t know for certain whether Simon had brought any of the Alpha Force elixir with him, or his own medication, or any shifting formula at all.
“We hope you’re right,” the general said. “But suspicion otherwise is partly what Team Leader Olivante’s dig was about. There’s a faction in the DoD that doesn’t know details of Alpha Force’s special abilities but even so doesn’t trust a unit that’s different. They’ll potentially shut Alpha Force down if it’s proven that any of its members have gone rogue.”
“I can help as much as anyone to find Simon and Grace. Maybe better.” Quinn struggled to keep his tone controlled. Of course he felt frustrated. Why the hell hadn’t Simon responded to any of his attempts to reach him? “And with that attitude in the organization … well, I don’t trust anyone else to find them safely. To find the truth. You know my background, sir. I’m a private investigator. You’ve got to let me …” He stopped, hazarding a glance down at Kristine who nodded encouragingly. “Okay. I enlisted. I get it. You don’t have to do anything I say. But I do have investigative skills I’ve developed over time. I’ve got to at least try to find Simon and Grace and figure out what happened. Please, sir.”
That last was a real effort, but he intended to do all he had to, to help his brother and new sister-in-law. Even act the role in which Simon had cast him.
Before either Greg or Drew responded, Kristine spoke up. “You know, sirs, I haven’t taken a leave for a long time now. I realize that Lt. Parran is too new a recruit to be entitled to one, but … well, I think he and I both need to take some time off. Maybe even take a trip. To Maine. And if we happen to end up in Bar Harbor just for the fun of it, who knows what we might uncover?”
General Yarrow’s laugh was a bark of humor. “I wasn’t exactly going to approach it that way, but I had something similar in mind.” He looked toward Drew. “What do you think, Major? Could you give these two Alpha Forcers a little time off to have some … fun on their own?”
“Sounds like a workable situation to me,” Drew said.
“Can our leave start tomorrow?” Kristine asked. “I just can’t wait to take my vacation as soon as possible.”
“Ditto that, sirs,” Quinn said. Was he laying it on too thick?
Most likely, there was no such thing.
“Then you’ve got it,” Drew said. “Although your leave will have to be short. We need answers fast, and we’ll have to disavow any knowledge of what you’re up to. And you’d better not plan on a military transport to Maine.”
“No, sir,” Kristine said. “For this leave, we’re going to go civilian all the way.”
“But you’ll still report to me,” Drew said.
“Absolutely, sir.”
And Quinn forced himself to imitate Kristine’s smart salute without a grimace.
Chapter 3
“We need to plan this.”
Kristine walked at Quinn’s side after the meeting, working hard to keep up with him. He hurried along one of the walkways at Ft. Lukman that led away from the building where the meeting had just been held. His stride was purposeful, his face grim.
Two other soldiers, also dressed in camo, approached from the opposite direction. They must have seen something in Quinn’s expression, too, since both seemed to do double takes before hurrying past.
Kristine didn’t slow down. She wondered what Quinn was thinking. Well, he needed to tell her, at least some of it.
“We have to figure out where and when we’re going,” she continued, trying not to sound out of breath. “How we’ll get there, how we’ll play it when we’re there, how—”
“Yeah, I get it,” Quinn finally grumbled. “In fact, I’m working on it.”
“How?” she demanded. “I need to know. I’m in on it, too.”
He stopped dead beside her and she had to make an effort to stop alongside him. “You don’t need to be,” he said in a tone that edged too close to threatening. “I can handle this myself.”
“Sure you can.” She leaned closer, looking up so her chin edged belligerently toward him. She kept her voice low but equally gruff. “You’ll be trying to figure out what happened. Maybe shifting. Maybe needing to shift by using the elixir you just tried for the first time. Without help? Maybe, but I don’t think so. Besides …”
She let her voice trail off, staring straight into those harsh golden eyes. Lord, but the guy was good-looking, even when he appeared grim and determined and angry.
He reacted the way she wanted him to, at least. “Besides what?” he demanded.
“Your new sister-in-law, Grace, is not just my commanding officer. She’s my friend. I intend to help her. Period.”
She continued to stand her ground and glare straight into his return glower.
He was the one to flinch. Well, not flinch, exactly. He smiled. And if she’d thought his rugged features to be a turn-on before, now he was absolutely the hottest man she had ever seen.
Her recollection of seeing him naked only reinforced the current of heat that passed through her. But she shrugged that off. She had to.
“Okay,” he said. “And you’re right. I’m sure I can use the help. But I want to think this through before we rush up there. And we are going to rush up there. No later than tomorrow.”
“I’m game,” Kristine said. “Let’s find somewhere private to discuss this.”
They crossed a wide driveway, passing the main gate into Ft. Lukman.
Quinn was leading Kristine to someplace they probably shouldn’t go: his apartment in the Bachelor Officers Quarters. If anyone saw them inside the building, it might appear as if they were fraternizing, and that was a military no-no. She wasn’t a commissioned officer. He was.
In a world where things were fair, their roles should be reversed. She had told him she was career military and had planned it that way forever. She had trained to become a nurse, then had enlisted. She had been in the service for a few years and was now a staff sergeant.
She should be his superior officer.
He was the newcomer, and yet because of who he was—no, what he became when he shifted—he’d come into the service as a ready-made officer, outranking her.
As a result of all that, she could be his aide but not—officially, at least—his date. Let alone someone he snuck into his quarters. Not that he gave a damn about that kind of prohibition, but she would.
And she was right. He needed her help—as much as he hated to admit it, even to himself.
“Glad to see things are quiet around here,” Kristine remarked as they started up the sidewalk in the direction of the BOQ. He glanced down at her. She’d slowed a bit, and he figured she, too, was thinking about the military taboo they might be about to violate.
Fraternizing. That suggested more than holding a meeting to plan their approach to Bar Harbor and learning what happened to Simon and Grace.
Not that he intended to seduce Kristine—although the idea was far from repulsive. Instead, while alone in his quarters, they would discuss what they’d do to help find Simon and Grace.
To start with, Quinn needed to do some more online research, using some of the resources already programmed into the laptop computer in his room.
“Here we are,” he told her softly, using a key to open the BOQ’s side door nearest his apartment. Good thing they could get in through a side door that was relatively remote and sheltered by its nearness to the next-door parking garage. They would definitely give the appearance of fraternizing later, if the plan that had been forming in his mind reached fruition. But it would be worse if they were caught around here, where others could see.
Soon, they were inside his unit with the door closed. As far as he knew, no one had seen them.
He had an urge to take the lovely, determined Kristine into his arms and kiss her. Only out of relief, of course.
But that was a bad idea. And she was already checking out his place. It was filled with government-issue furniture and not much else. He hadn’t been there long. He’d never been sure how long he would stay in the military, even if he hadn’t been about to undertake this unofficial mission. A lot depended on whether his appreciation for the shifting elixir outweighed his unease at being a soldier and following orders.
But one thing he did know. They would head to Bar Harbor tomorrow—and before they left, he had a lot of online investigating to do.
Kristine pulled a chair from the kitchen into the well-lighted alcove that Quinn used as an office in his small apartment.
She had been in BOQ units before—mostly Grace’s. It was larger than this. But Grace had been in Alpha Force for a while, had proven herself as excellent military, as well as a shapeshifter. She’d clearly been entitled to a comfortable place to sleep.
Sleep? Kristine had purposely not even glanced through the door that apparently led to Quinn’s bedroom. Sleep—and what else people did in bedrooms—weren’t why she was here.
Even though her body throbbed just a little at the idea of joining Quinn, with that amazing body of his, in bed.
That wouldn’t happen.
Instead, she sat determinedly beside Quinn, who had already booted up the small computer that lay on a shelf that acted like a desk in that alcove.
First, though, he pulled out his smartphone. “I’ve tried this before,” he said, “but I’ll call each of them again, just to see if they answer.”
They didn’t. Nor did they respond even now to any of the many text messages and emails he’d sent. He had even resorted to trying to contact them through Twitter and Facebook. Nothing.
Quinn and she had asked both Major Connell and General Yarrow if they’d continued to try to reach Simon and Grace. They had—also to no avail.
The last anyone had heard of them—or so it seemed—was a call Simon had made to Quinn while sightseeing along the Mount Desert Island coast just after they had reached the Acadia Park area.
Which made Kristine fear the worst. Were they dead? If not, were they ignoring calls because they were, indeed, guilty of the mutilations and murders?
She didn’t want to think about either. But they had to know.
“So what are we looking for?” she asked Quinn as he sat and began typing in a web address. His home page had wallpaper depicting a big question mark in the center of it.
Interesting. Was that because he was a private investigator by background, used to answering questions?
“Okay, first I’m putting on my P.I. hat,” Quinn said, not surprising her. “I’ve already checked to see when my bro or his bride last got into their bank accounts or used their credit cards. I found nothing useful, but I’ll do it again before we decide what’s next.”
He had typed in the web address of a major credit-card company and now inserted a number and password. Had he already known Simon’s account information, or had he used his investigation resources to learn it? He next did the same with Grace’s account—and he was less likely to have been given her info than his brother’s.
He checked not only on this site but a couple of others, apparently knowing data on multiple accounts, including a bank where he said Simon maintained checking and savings accounts. “Grace and he have already opened a joint account here,” Quinn told Kristine. But after scanning the latest page of each, he shook his head. “There’s a charge for a bed-and-breakfast in Bar Harbor and some meals, ending a couple of days ago. Then nothing. Not even a visit to an ATM for cash.”
“Oh,” Kristine said sadly. That gave no further answers. But it did suggest that something awful had happened to the newlyweds.
If the suspicions expressed at the earlier meetings were true, that they’d planned this attack to undermine Alpha Force somehow, they could have started new accounts under assumed names.
But at least they could still be alive.
No. She wanted to believe they were okay, and she knew they wouldn’t—couldn’t—be responsible for the attacks.
“I’ll check some news sites next,” Quinn said, “looking for more current detail about that damned fatal assault in Acadia.”
Where two people had apparently been mauled by wild animals and died. Not something Kristine would usually want to learn the gory details about, but this was different. Maybe somehow those details could lead to more information about Grace and Simon.
“Good idea,” she said and watched as his long, thick fingers sailed over the keys. She had a passing wonderment about how those fingers would feel playing over her … Ridiculous!
She settled down to watch the screen over his shoulder. There wasn’t a lot of data in most of the news stories Quinn brought up at first, but enough to make Kristine wonder.
Even so, she still wasn’t willing to accept Simon and Grace’s involvement.
Quinn turned on the sound as he went into a video news clip from a local Bar Harbor television station.
That one was so horrible that parts of the pictures were blurred.
Enough was shown to display how mutilated the bodies were—gashed and bloodied, as if ripped by teeth and claws.
“The authorities are still investigating,” the announcer intoned as the camera panned around what appeared to be a clearing in a forest, described as part of Acadia National Park. “So far, they appear to believe this was an attack by some kind of wild animal that has not yet been identified. This is the worst event in the park since a man walking his dog apparently fell to his death and, before that, a young tourist was killed by a rogue wave along the shore several years ago. Back to you, John.” The picture returned to an announcer in a studio somewhere before phasing out.
“Some kind of wild animal,” Kristine mused aloud.
“A wolf?” said Quinn. “Two wolves?”
“They’re not speculating on that—or at least this reporter didn’t,” Kristine responded.
“Yeah, but—” Quinn clicked on another site, one for which he had to enter a password. Kristine couldn’t be sure, but it appeared to be some kind of official law enforcement website, although Quinn got off the main page immediately to do a search for Acadia.
What showed on the screen was a detailed list of crimes in the Bar Harbor area. Next, he clicked on something that brought up this specific crime.
Kristine watched his face as Quinn squinted at the small print that came up. “Couple of agencies are involved in this investigation,” he said. “There’s some speculation about what kinds of animals could be involved. Species that still have habitats around there include foxes, coyotes, bobcats and black bears. Used to be mountain lions, too—and gray wolves.”
Wolves. The word hung in the air this time.
“Not Grace and Simon,” Kristine whispered, hoping it was true. She put her hand on Quinn’s shoulder—whether to reassure him or convince him, she wasn’t sure.
The touch was like a bolt of lightning, making her even more cognizant of his hot and alluring presence. But she wasn’t a wimp. She had courage—of all kinds. She let her hand rest there … for now.
Even when he turned his head a little and looked at her with those golden eyes.
“So what do you think?” she asked him.
“What do you think?” he countered. “You willing to go there to help me investigate—in any form I need to be? Your commanding officers—our commanding officers—apparently have to act dead set against our being there.”
He’d used the word dead. Like the two mutilated tourists.
Like Alpha Force would be, if the perpetrators really were Grace and Simon, and that got out to the world.
Kristine understood why the muckety-mucks like General Yarrow and that guy Olivante from the Department of Defense’s Defense Special Projects Agency were so concerned.
Not everyone, even in the military, knew about Alpha Force. But if it were ever shown that the killings were done by shapeshifters, and that those shapeshifters were not just part of some grotesque horror story but members of a very covert and elite U.S. military force, the repercussions could be terrible.
Terrible to the U.S. Armed Forces.
And potentially devastating—fatal—to the existence of Alpha Force.
What would happen to its members then—especially its shapeshifter members?
They’d be humiliated at the least. Outed. Paraded as absurd freaks through the media.
They would never be able to use their very special, unique and amazing abilities to help with national security ever again.
The people like General Yarrow and Team Leader Olivante would be out to do the best damage control they could.
If that meant dealing with Grace and Simon in some terrible way, they’d do it—even the general, who clearly loved Alpha Force. If they needed scapegoats—scapewolves—they’d do what they had to.
But both Quinn and she would have different agendas. His might be different from hers, as well.
She wanted to learn the truth. Protect Grace and Simon if they were innocent, which she prayed they were.
But she would protect Alpha Force, too.
Quinn? Well, his main agenda might be to help his brother and sister-in-law, no matter what.
She would work with him, at least until their agendas diverged. Then, she would see.
“Let’s do it,” she said.
“Good.” He paused, then stood. She couldn’t read the expression on his face, but it seemed challenging. With a touch of humor added? “Here’s what we’ll do, then. We’ll go to Bar Harbor tomorrow, undercover. And know what our cover IDs will be?”
“No,” she said, sure she wouldn’t like the response.
“To get the most information about our missing honeymoon couple—” he paused dramatically, then grinned “—you and I will be there on our honeymoon, too.”
“What?” Kristine froze. What was he talking about?
And why did the words send the tiniest shiver of anticipation through her?
She shrugged it off. She knew what he meant. But—
“With assumed identities, of course,” he said curtly. “Like I said, undercover.” Although when she dared to look at him she saw not only humor, but also challenge, in his expression. “That’ll help us get the most information possible as we investigate.”
“Of course. Great idea.” She attempted to sound nonchalant. “We’ll try to follow Grace and Simon’s trail as much as possible. We’ll find and clear them.
You’ll see.”
Chapter 4
The hotel was charming, a converted Victorian mansion right in the heart of Bar Harbor. From what Kristine had seen of it so far, the downtown area was a small, charismatic collection of stores and restaurants, inns and parks and churches, mostly near the water, since the town was located on Mount Desert Island.
A wonderful place for a honeymoon, she thought—if the lovers stayed in their rooms and out of trouble.
But these new, false honeymooners—Quinn and her? They would soon be out and about and looking for trouble … looking for what had happened to their real newlywed counterparts.
“You ready for this?” Quinn sat in the driver’s seat of the sedan they had rented after flying into Bangor, about fifty miles away. This was the first time she had seen him out of his uniform since the wedding … unless she counted when she had seen him in nothing at all.
The thought shot a plume of fire through her insides—from anxiety, she told herself. That was all. Before they had left Ft. Lukman, they had talked their plans over with Drew Connell. Since they were here very unofficially, he had agreed that it was better for them to really go undercover, take on alternate identities. Act as if they had nothing to do with the military. Or Alpha Force.
Honeymooners? He’d raised his eyebrows at that but hadn’t objected. In fact, he seemed to support the idea.
And despite Kristine’s deep misgivings, the pretense actually did make sense. They might get the same kinds of responses to their questions that the missing couple had been given. Be treated similarly by people they ran into here.
Learn something faster than if they pretended just to be acquaintances vacationing together.
They would therefore sleep in the same room. They would pretend, outside that room, to be lovey-dovey. Sexually attracted to one another.
One major problem, Kristine thought, was that it would be too easy for her to feign the latter …
“Sure. Let’s go in.” She responded to Quinn’s question with an assumed bravado.
She jumped out of the car, opened the door to the backseat and pulled out her backpack, which contained mostly clothes. It would have been hard to hide the Alpha Force elixir and light in carry-on baggage, so she had packed them in a suitcase and checked it. Even so, they had identified themselves as military to the Transportation Security Administration folks at the airport. These days, checked luggage screening looked for anything that could be turned into a terrorist bomb. An intense light might not get anyone’s attention, but the quantity of elixir might. So might the weapons they had packed.
They had given no explanation of their travel plans to the TSA people who had checked them out. Fortunately, no one had questioned them too closely. Not that they’d admit what they were up to—or that one of the tools they would take advantage of here, as soon as possible, was Quinn’s shapeshifting ability.
“I’ll take that, honey.”
Quinn’s deep voice behind her made her jump. Honey? The word shouldn’t give her shivers—at least not of pleasure. No, it was the harbinger of the night before them.
“No, thank you, dear.” She turned and gave him a couple of bats of her eyelashes, concurrently lifting her chin as if challenging him. “I can handle this, as long as you get our large bags out of the trunk and take care of them.”
“They’re on wheels.” His voice was no longer syrupy sweet. He evidently didn’t like her contradicting him. “You can pull yours.”
Too bad.
“I appreciate the offer, sweetheart, but as you know, I’m used to carrying my own backpack.” She reached over, patted his cheek that suggested the initial coarseness from the black shadow of a beard, then maneuvered the pack onto her shoulders. She started toward the door of the hotel without making sure he was dealing with the bags. She knew he would do just fine.
He caught up with her as she reached the registration desk. Amazingly, in only the short amount of time they’d had after making their decision and heading here, Quinn had already obtained fake IDs for them, including driver’s licenses and credit cards.
He had obviously maintained his contacts as a private investigator despite enlisting in the military—and not just his online skills and passwords. Maybe he intended his enlistment to be temporary. Very temporary.
She just hoped that would be the right thing for Alpha Force.
She, on the other hand, considered herself all military despite the civilian roles they played now.
“Hi,” she said to the woman behind the desk, who was clad in a brown suit and weary smile. “We’re the Scotts.” The first names on their ID cards matched their real ones, for ease of remembering them, but they’d taken on a false surname for their investigation. “Kristine and Quinn. Do you have our reservation?”
The woman, with a pin on her lapel that said she was Betty from Newport, began typing on a computer on the desk in front of her, and then her grin widened. “Yes, we do.” She ran through the formalities of taking a credit card—with their newly acquired IDs—and putting together key cards for their room. “Enjoy your stay,” she said.
“I’m sure we will.” Kristine made herself gush, even though she wasn’t a gushy person. Then she leaned toward Betty conspiratorially. “Do many other people come here on their honeymoon?”
“Why, yes.” By then Betty was beaming. “Another newlywed couple even checked in a few days ago. They’re gone now, though.”
“Did they have a good time?” Quinn asked from beside Kristine.
“I’ll bet they did, although I didn’t see them again. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your stay.”
On their way to the elevator, Kristine said, “Your seeing their credit card charge doesn’t mean anything. The way checking out is handled now at most hotels, with bills just slipped under the door during the last night of a reservation, there wasn’t anything suspicious about how Simon and Grace disappeared, except—”
“Except that word might have gotten around to the staff if they’d failed to take their belongings.”
“Right. So they apparently took their stuff. If so—”
“Where are they?” he finished.
Quinn had pretended not to notice Kristine’s dismay when they reached their quaint room with antique furnishings that suited the character of the converted mansion—and found only one queen-size bed in it. She hadn’t said anything except to thank him for hefting her suitcase onto one of the folding luggage stands.
They had already decided to unpack quickly, then leave right away to grab dinner at whatever spot the concierge at the inn said was the place he recommended most often to guests.
That meant it could be the place where he’d sent Simon and Grace.
Quinn and Kristine were there now, sitting at a table with a red checked tablecloth in the center of the main room. The BarHar Bistro was crowded, including the anterooms off to the sides. Apparently their concierge wasn’t the only one to recommend it—or locals already knew about, and frequented, the place. There wasn’t much space for the waitstaff to maneuver between tables, and the elbow room for diners was limited, as well.
Quinn hoped that the overcrowding was a sign that the food was good, not just that it was an in place where people dined simply because it was popular.
The place smelled tantalizing to Quinn’s enhanced senses. The acoustics weren’t great, though—probably not even for a regular human with lesser hearing. The undercurrent of voices was a loud, unpleasant hum.
Kristine had been pretending to study the menu, but he saw her eyes darting sideways often.
“What looks good to you, dear?” he asked aloud, then leaned slightly across the table toward her. “I suspect,” he added more softly, “that strangers here wouldn’t be noticed much.”
She nodded glumly. “My thoughts, too.”
A perky blonde in black pants and white shirt sidled around one of the tables nearby and approached them. “Welcome to BarHar. My name is Steph, and I’ll be your server this evening. Can I start you with something to drink?”
Showtime, Quinn thought. “You sure can. Champagne. We’re celebrating.”
“Really?” Steph asked, as Kristine forced a sunny smile onto her face. “What are you celebrating?”
“We just got married,” Kristine chimed in. “Do you recommend any particular champagne to other newlyweds who come in here?”
“That’s assuming we’re not the first,” Quinn added with a laugh.
Steph responded as they’d attempted to program her. “Oh, you’re definitely not the first.”
“But we’re the most recent,” Kristine said. “Aren’t we?”
“Well, yes. At least I don’t know of any others here tonight. But there was at least one other couple here last week.”
“Really? I’ll bet they weren’t as good-looking as us.” Quinn knew he was laying it on too thick. In fact, this might not be a good idea. He was well aware that Simon and he resembled one another—and it might be a bad thing to have anyone associate the two of them, especially if Simon was suspected of committing a crime.
But if Bar Harbor authorities suspected Simon and Grace, that, thankfully, didn’t seem to have gotten out even to the local media, nor had it otherwise been made public.
Yet.
“Maybe not,” Steph said. “But they were good tippers.” She winked at them. “Here’s the champagne I recommended to them.” She pointed to a fairly expensive one on the wine list Quinn had been pretending to study.
“Looks good to me. Did you recommend any entrées to them, too?”
“I did, but I think they both ordered steaks.”
Ah. That was a good indication that the couple were his brother and new sister-in-law. Shifters, at least those who changed into werewolves, ate a lot of red meat to satisfy their feral needs.
He glanced up at Kristine, who nodded slightly. She’d gotten it, too.
“Well, please bring us the same champagne, and we’ll figure out what else to order.” The steak sounded good to Quinn, but Kristine might not yet have decided.
When the server left, Kristine was the one to lean toward Quinn. “Looks like we’re on the right track. But just following … them … won’t necessarily get us the information we need.” He liked how she was being discreet. Not that it was likely for anyone to be eavesdropping on them, but even if someone at a neighboring table was listening in, they wouldn’t be able to follow the underlying meaning of their conversation.
“No, but it’s a start. We’ll be more proactive soon. Although—” Quinn had started doing his own eavesdropping—much more easily, with his abilities, than anyone else in this room was likely to be able to do. He now focused in on who had uttered the words he had been listening for: Acadia and body.
Fortunately, the speakers were at a nearby table, one just behind him. He slid his chair back slightly and said to Kristine, “Excuse me for a minute, dear.” But instead of rising and heading for the restroom, he turned toward the speaker. “Sorry to interrupt, but I couldn’t help hearing you mention those awful deaths that occurred a few nights ago. My wife—” He stopped and grinned at that, as if he was enjoying using the word for nearly the first time. “We just got married and we’re here on our honeymoon, but we almost changed our plans, hearing about such a terrible thing. Wild animals killed some tourists in the park, right?”
There were four young, brawny guys around the table. “That’s right,” said a tall basketball-player sort with spiky hair. “We came here planning to hike through the park but we’ve got second thoughts, too.”
“I live here,” said a young woman at the next table over. “All of us in town are also concerned. But you tourists—well, as long as you’re careful, you should be fine.”
“Spoken like a good local promoter,” Steph, the server, said, joining them. She had their champagne, plus two empty flutes, on a tray. She put them on the table and poured a little into each glass. As Quinn and Kristine both took preliminary sips, she moved around again and continued, “But … well, I enjoy hiking in my spare time, too. I haven’t heard what’s going on with the investigation, except that the thought is like you said, some kind of wild animal got those tourists. No one’s sure, though.”
“Are there many wild animals in Acadia?” Quinn asked. “I mean, I’m sure there are squirrels and rats and such, but what kind might be dangerous enough to kill people?”
He noticed that Kristine had maneuvered her chair around the table to sit beside him, notwithstanding the crush of other nearby patrons. She was listening attentively. He liked the seriousness of her expression beneath her sexy and short hair, as dark as a moonless night sky. She was one attractive soldier, and she was doing a hell of a job as his undercover wife.
“There are coyotes,” the local woman said. “Bears, too, and even bobcats. But they don’t usually attack people. I heard in the news that the people killed were two sisters from St. Louis who were active members of a national wildlife preservation organization. Maybe they got too up close and personal with some creature.”
“Can happen anywhere that there are wild animals like that,” said one of the guys at the table who hadn’t spoken before. “Too bad we can’t shoot ‘em.”
“No hunting and trapping in Acadia,” the woman chimed in, looking angry that killing wild animals had even been mentioned. Quinn liked that attitude.
“But park rangers can probably kill vicious animals that hurt people,” said Basketball Player, and his comrades nodded.
“Whatever happened,” said Steph, “I’m sure everyone visiting the park will be on guard to make sure it can’t happen again. Now—” She faced Quinn and Kristine. “May I take your order?”
“At least we have a general idea of the position of townspeople and tourists,” Kristine said later as they walked along the sidewalk, past souvenir, clothing and other shops still open for visitors’ pleasure. It was dark outside, but the narrow street was lined with lights.
“Yeah, and fortunately no one we spoke with has claimed that the killings could have been done by shapeshifters,” Quinn responded. He reached over and took her hand. At her glance, he prepared to remind her of their cover.
But she didn’t pull away. In fact, she grasped his hand even harder.
Which almost made him smile. At least until her next words.
“Even if there are any suspicions like that,” she said, “no one’s about to admit them aloud without any evidence. Not unless they want other people to doubt their sanity.”
He stopped and looked at her. “Right. Sane people don’t believe in shapeshifters, do they?”
“Looks like there’s a lot of insanity going around,” she said, and smiled. She raised her chin a little. He’d already begun to appreciate that as a characteristic gesture, a statement of challenge and determination. “But we still haven’t gotten any clue about where Simon and Grace might be,” Kristine continued. “You’re the investigator.”
“Yeah, I’m the professional investigator,” he agreed, “but I heard from Grace how much she relied on your ideas to help in Alpha Force assignments.”
Kristine’s grin looked proud but she shrugged her shoulders modestly. He liked her unassuming nature despite her obvious drive and intelligence.
“We’ll work on it more tomorrow,” he said. “Take the same tour they did, for starters. I’m also working on some other ideas.”
“Sounds good.”
They walked on for a while in silence. Kristine halted outside one small shop that sold pet supplies. “I’ll bet that Grace stopped in here. She’d have wanted to bring something back for Tilly.” That was Grace’s cover dog. All of the shifters had one that resembled them in shifted form.
Quinn hadn’t gotten one yet, and neither had Simon. They were too new to Alpha Force. But he had seen how Kristine had lovingly said goodbye to her own assigned dog, Bailey, who had traveled with her on her last assignment along with Grace and Tilly.
Another admirable trait. The woman liked dogs. Real dogs. And apparently she also cared for shifters.
He was going to have to watch himself around Staff Sgt. Kristine Norwood. He was coming to like her too much.
And that could be a mistake.
“So what’s your next idea?” Kristine finally asked, breaking the growing silence between them. Not that Quinn had found it uncomfortable—but he had been using it to think. And to plan.
“The night’s still young,” he said. “Why waste it? I’m ready to prowl.”
He knew, of course, that Acadia was a national park with established entrances. At least this first time, before they had oriented themselves about locations, he didn’t want to be seen driving in so late in the evening. Not many tourists were likely to be around, even though the park was open—or at least the campgrounds were.
As a result, he drove them both in the rental car along one road at the park’s outer perimeter, and then another, until he spotted a turnout surrounded by lots of vegetation, right beside a sheer cliff.
Insurmountable for mere humans. Not for a shapeshifter.
“Let’s do it,” he said.
“Here?” Kristine looked both puzzled and skeptical. He enjoyed watching the expressions play across her unconventionally pretty face.
“Here,” he confirmed. He parked at the end of the turnout closest to the thickest shrubbery. “It’s fairly isolated and I doubt we’ll see many cars at this hour.”
“Okay.” She opened her door. He popped the trunk open and she extracted her ubiquitous backpack—once more filled with the equipment he needed.
In only a few minutes, he had drunk a dose of the elixir and stripped—enjoying Kristine’s attempt to appear nonchalant and disinterested while sneaking peeks at his bare body. Which only made said body react the way he knew it would. But only for a minute—until the light she trained on him began its job.
He felt the usual tugging and pulling … and then his shift continued.
This was as much bliss as a shapeshifter could experience. No full moon. Complete mental sharpness.
If only his leap onto the mountainside five minutes ago, and his initial stalking into the park, could yield useful information.
Unlikely, though. It was a distance from where he thought he’d heard the mauling of the tourists had occurred.
He inhaled the complicated and intriguing scents of other wildlife—the coyotes and bobcats he had anticipated, as well as smaller, unimportant creatures.
This was merely an initial foray, a more-than-pleasant test. He would accomplish more with future shifts around here, but at least he had gotten his first wild taste of Acadia.
For now, he would simply revel in the freedom and ability to enjoy it. Not to mention his current, undoubtedly brief independence from the military, its structure, its orders.
He had wondered long before enlisting if the elixir Simon had told him about would be enticing enough for him to give up his life, his freedom, his sanity.
If all had gone well, perhaps it would have been more than enough to experience this amazing kind of shift as often as possible.
But all was not going well, with his brother, and now with him—while he was, in some respects, AWOL from his official assignment.
What would happen if he found Simon and Grace?
What would happen if he didn’t?
He had to find them, of course. Alive and well, and with a full, logical explanation of where they had been, and how they had not been involved in the park killings.
And then he would not have to wonder whether he could continue to immerse himself in a life that required him to follow the orders of strangers, some of whom he despised.
But a life that included this marvelous elixir.
And an aide like Kristine. For now.
Kristine, the dedicated and permanent soldier. Attractive, smart and sexy … but a nonshifter.
A scent blew toward him—a coyote. Drawing closer. It must have smelled him, too.
He paced farther into the forest. Not even a hint of the aromas of Simon or Grace, shifted or not.
His frustrations mounted.
No answers tonight.
Chapter 5
Kristine sat alone in the locked, dark car. Waiting.
She hated waiting for anything.
But she had taught herself patience while staying behind as her shapeshifting charge Grace dashed about the countryside in wolf form after Kristine helped her shift.
She had worked a lot with Grace. Learned her habits. Helped her not only as a shifting soldier, but also in the solution of a problem that could have put the entire world at risk of unleashed biohazards.
Kristine had gotten shot in the process. But she was fine now, physically.
Mentally, too, she reminded herself—although she was damned worried about her charge, her friend, Grace.
One step at a time. Quinn and she would find Grace and Simon. They had to.
For now, she watched through the windshield and the car’s side windows, scouring the mountainside in the scant light of the bright stars overhead for any movement that would indicate the return of the wolf that was Quinn.
Since this wasn’t a night of a full moon, and turning on any kind of light was a bad idea in this area, where she wanted no one to spot her, she merely slumped behind the steering wheel of the rental car.
Too bad she didn’t have the senses that her charges did while shifted, or even some of their enhanced senses in human form. Grace had described them to her, at least somewhat.
If Kristine had better hearing, maybe she could at least hear when—
There. Right in front of her. A movement within her line of vision.
Something had leaped off the hillside. In the little that she could see in the almost complete darkness, the shrubbery clinging to the side of the mountain remained in motion.
A figure moved in front of her on the roadside turnout. A wolf?
Just in case it wasn’t what she anticipated, she clutched the service weapon she had brought along, preparing to use it if necessary.
As quietly as she could, she opened the car door.
That created a haze of light—light in which she could see that something writhed in the bushes in front of her.
A shifter regaining its human shape?
The hell with being seen. Holding the gun in one hand, she grabbed a flashlight, too, turned it on and aimed them both at the moving figure.
In time to see the last of Quinn’s transformation back into human form.
He was back in the car, back in his jeans and T-shirt. Exhausted partly from the shift and partly from his ongoing frustration.
“Did you see anything useful?” Kristine asked, as she drove the car from the turnoff onto the twisting mountain road.
“No. I didn’t see, smell or hear anything at all that could help us. But at least I’ve oriented myself a bit more to this area and shifting around here.”
Beside him, Kristine said nothing for a minute. And then, “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Fine.” And he actually was. As he breathed deeply, he felt his strength—and his determination—increasing. He was here. Simon and Grace had to be somewhere around this area, too.
Of course he would find them.
They would find them. Kristine, with all her military training and dedication, would continue to be an asset.
As she had already been, tonight.
“Thanks for watching my back,” he said gruffly, only to see her turn her head to glance at him.
“It’s what I’m here for,” she retorted in an equally gruff tone that made him smile.
The time Kristine had been dreading had arrived.
Okay, it wasn’t that big a deal. They were here undercover. They were both adults, rational people, soldiers.
At least she was a soldier, and he had enlisted as one. But that shouldn’t matter here anyway.
The point was that they were here under assumed identities. False ones.
And now, after dinner, a preliminary assessment of the town, plus the first of Quinn’s shifts in this area—and she anticipated many more—they had to get some sleep to be rested enough to dive right into their roles tomorrow.
Find answers.
Learn where Grace and Simon were, and rescue them, if necessary.
Assuming they were still alive.
That was what was important.
Who was sleeping where, in this small, quaint room with only one bed, was not a big deal. No bigger a deal than her acting as Quinn’s aide for shifting.
He had just crossed the room and closed the drapes. The room didn’t get any darker, since the lights were on.
“Would you like to use the bathroom first?” Kristine asked neutrally.
“After you, sweetheart.” His tone was ironic. Not serious at all.
A good thing.
“Fine,” she said briskly. “Then, when you’re changing, I can take the duvet and make myself a bed on the floor. I think you’ll be okay with the sheets already on the bed, and—”
“And you don’t think the maid would notice tomorrow?” His brows were raised, emphasizing that irony he had already projected.
“We can remake the bed in the morning to look as if we used it like the honeymooners we’re pretending to be.”
She looked him straight in the eye, challenging him to object. He certainly didn’t think they were going to have sex as part of their cover … did he?
And why did the idea twist her insides with molten lava?
She liked how they were getting along so far—on a friendly and professional basis. That was all. But she had convinced herself that any sexual attraction she felt for him was absurd. Unmilitary. Something she would laugh off. Ignore.
Wouldn’t she?
“No need for you or me to sleep on the floor.” His tone was sharp now, as if he was responding to an insult. “We can both act professionally. Share the bed without … sharing anything else. Okay?” Now he was the one challenging her.
“Okay,” she responded as coldly as she could manage.
But as their eyes met, the challenge felt clear. Hell, she could handle it. She could handle him.
Almost as if she was daring him, she took a step closer. Or did he move first? Suddenly, she was in his arms. His lips were hot, tasting as human as any man’s she had sampled before. But not the same. Better. They were sexier. More searching. Magnetic and alluring.
Challenging.
His body against hers—it was as hard as she had imagined. Especially there, below. Where the thick, sexy organ she had viewed before was now touching her, taunting her. Sure, there were clothes between them, but she felt him now. Hard. Erotic. Causing her insides to react with a need she didn’t want.
Didn’t want.
She pulled away fast, before she could change her mind. “Very interesting,” she said, trying not to sound out of breath at all. “All the more reason I should sleep on the floor. But I won’t.” This time, it definitely was a challenge.
“Fine.”
A while later, when they both had settled onto the bed, backs toward one another, Kristine was even more aware of Quinn Parran’s large, warm—highly sexy—presence behind her.
He’s a shapeshifter, she reminded herself yet again. She might like them, but sleeping with one? Plus, he was a new soldier. A renegade, not a dedicated member of the military the way she was. An investigator she needed to work with for Grace’s and Simon’s sake. That was all.
But she lay there, eyes open, long into the night, listening to Quinn Parran’s deep breathing, and not moving at all.
Otherwise, she just might touch him once more.
Most mornings, Kristine enjoyed her first cup of coffee but figured she could survive without it.
Not now. There was a lot she had to accomplish today, and since she’d hardly gotten any sleep last night, a strong dose of caffeine was first on her morning agenda.
She only wished it contained ingredients to rein in her libido.
At the moment, she sat across from Quinn at a table in a coffee shop along Main Street, the primary tourist avenue in Bar Harbor, just a couple of blocks from their hotel. The only good result of her restless night—fully aware of his presence luring her—was that he, too, looked tired. There was a slight dullness behind his golden eyes, and he also held on to the coffee mug in front of him as if it were a lifeline.
Had he remained aware of her, too—and had that also made him lose sleep? Perversely, she hoped so. If she had to suffer that way, then why shouldn’t he?
Maybe, for the sake of the mission they’d taken on, they could prevent another morning like this by indulging in sex tonight….
The thought disseminated electric tingles everywhere within her, even as she rejected it. It would only be a diversion. They had to find Grace and Simon—and ensure that they hadn’t been involved with the deaths in Acadia. That was paramount to anything else.
No matter how tempting.
She took another sip of coffee, glad that the server had left an entire pot. They were still waiting for their breakfasts to be served.
“So what do you think?” Quinn asked, breaking the silence at their table, although the restaurant was crowded and they were surrounded by low conversations. Like her, he had on jeans today. With hers, she wore a pale green buttoned blouse that she hadn’t tucked in. She couldn’t help noticing how Quinn’s black T-shirt hugged the muscles of his chest and upper arms. At the moment, the table blocked her view of below—a good thing. “Are you up for a bus tour?”
Anyone eavesdropping would think they were tourists attempting to decide what to do today. But they already knew.
There was a rack containing tourist information near the front desk at their hotel. Prominently featured were brochures for one of the island’s tour-bus lines. That line was also the one recommended by the concierge on duty that morning. He’d said that all guests to whom they recommended that outfit came back pleased, so it was the tour company they suggested most often.
When he continued to extol their services, Kristine wondered if the concierge received kickbacks. Fine. Quinn and she needed to learn all they could about the Bar Harbor area as fast as possible. And if they could learn it from the most likely company to have shown last week’s newlyweds around, all the better for collecting information.
“A bus tour sounds great, honey.” Kristine beamed as the server brought her breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast.
“Good thing, since I already made reservations for the one recommended at the hotel. We leave in forty-five minutes.” Why did the way he quirked one edge of his mouth look so sexy? She knew that what he said was intended to be yet another kind of challenge. She had made it clear that she wanted to be involved in all decisions despite the fact he outranked her in the military.
But what they were doing here was independent of Alpha Force—at least somewhat.
So, Kristine didn’t bite at his goading. She didn’t even start to chew him out.
She suddenly realized that even after working as an aide to a shifter for as long as she had, her thought processes hadn’t completely adapted. Thinking about biting and chewing in the presence of a werewolf … She smiled at the idea.
Quinn raised his dark brows slightly, then smiled back. He had ordered an egg dish, too—a combo that included a small steak.
“We’d better finish our breakfasts as soon as we can,” Kristine said. “I’d like to stop in at the local tourist center to see what other information we can pick up.” Shorthand for saying they’d also ask about any recent visitors who’d admitted to being honeymooners.
But as it turned out, they learned half an hour later, no one at the town’s main tourist information center remembered seeing anyone like Grace and Simon—even though Quinn gave detailed descriptions. His skill wasn’t surprising, Kristine thought, with Quinn’s private investigator background. He might have tracked other people before—in both of his forms. Knowing how to ask the right questions in the right way had to be part of his former career.
They hurried to the parking lot for the bus tour Quinn had scheduled. Quinn grabbed her hand to help quicken her pace. Kristine continued to play along with their honeymooner cover while much too aware again of the innocent contact.
As they sprinted along the narrow Bar Harbor sidewalks, past stores and tourists, Kristine kept reminding herself that the man whose sleek, muscular form raced by her side was someone she could only pretend to want to touch all over.
Doing it while they spent at least another few nights together remained off-limits.
Quinn muscled them into the bus before any of the other tourists. Now they sat on the right side, across from the tour guide, who was positioned behind the driver.
Quinn had the aisle seat, and Kristine sat by the window. Stragglers still entered the bus, which was already warm and crowded even with most windows open.
That prevented Quinn from getting too friendly with the guide. The questions that formed much of the reason for this tour had to wait.
The vehicle was configured like a school bus. Maybe it actually had transported students in its youth, since the seats weren’t particularly wide.
Which meant Quinn’s hips were snug against Kristine’s, reminding him of his uncomfortable night of knowing she was in the room with him. Hearing her breathe—and not the deep respiration of sleep most of the time.
Kissing her. Feeling her against him, however briefly, as he’d taunted her. And then sensing her warm, sexy presence right beside him in that bed that might as well have been a mile wide, considering how far they stayed from each other.
Yeah, they might be undercover, but they weren’t under covers—not together. He had to keep reminding himself that they weren’t really even coworkers. He was her temporary superior officer, and she was his aide.
Another good reason for him not to have joined the military: all the protocol and rules about fraternization and other similar nonsense.
But he remained resolved never to push Kristine to have sex with him, no matter how badly he ached to touch her all over, to bury himself in her. His feral instincts hadn’t taken over completely. He wouldn’t let them, no matter which form he was in.
And no matter that Kristine had seen him naked, both before and after his shifts so far with the Alpha Force elixir.
For the sake of learning what was going on with his brother and sister-in-law, he’d follow the rules, at least all he could. He’d act like a good little soldier despite being on an unofficial mission. He’d follow Kristine’s lead wherever it made sense, since she was more experienced.
At the moment, she was thumbing through a Bar Harbor magazine, though her speed suggested she wasn’t paying much attention to the articles and ads. He turned back toward her. “Is that worth looking at?”
“We won’t find what we’re looking for in it,” she said with a sigh, her chin raised in its normal challenge to the world. He resisted an urge to touch it.
“But we might get some ideas of where else to look,” he reminded her. “Like … well, other than Acadia Park itself, are there any wildlife sanctuaries? You know I’m particularly interested in seeing local animals.”
And trying to learn if there were any kinds that could have attacked those tourists. Especially if those victims had brought it on themselves by purposely getting too close to dangerous wildlife.
“There is a private conservation easement on some property bordering Acadia.” Kristine turned a few pages and pointed to a description of a local sanctuary. “I’m not sure if anyone can visit, but it’s seeking donations.”
“Not necessarily helpful, but—”
“Okay, ladies and gentlemen,” interrupted a gruff male voice over the bus’s loudspeaker. “We’re finally ready to get on our way.”
Quinn turned back toward the tour guide. He appeared to be in his fifties, with a scruffy salt-and-pepper beard and a green Acadia cap preventing anyone from seeing whether the rest of his hair matched. He wore a gray long-sleeved shirt and coordinated pants that looked vaguely like a uniform, and he wedged a small microphone near his narrow lips.
“I’m Wendell, your guide today.” He gave a spiel reciting rules and suggestions, then told the bus driver he was ready and they took off.
The narration was loud and would have been really interesting had Quinn actually been a tourist. In fact, he did look through the windshield toward the sights the guide pointed out—churches and parks and museums, including one specializing in local Native American culture and another focusing on natural history. Some architectural features on buildings were also worth noting. Because this was an island, the coastline appeared now and then; the Atlantic Ocean was brilliant blue beneath a clear sky, and calm that day.
Finally, they headed toward Acadia National Park. Despite his previous evening visits, that remained the place of most interest to Quinn. Plus, the tour leader got quiet while the driver headed in that direction.
Quinn felt a light squeeze on his arm. He looked over and saw Kristine’s eyes wide, her full lips pursed slightly, as if she sent him a silent message: it was time.
He smiled, covered her hand with his—a feigned newlywed gesture—and nodded. He didn’t release her hand, though. He liked the feel of it as he gripped it.
His body, unsurprisingly, also reacted as if she was doing more than touching his arm.
Squelching a sigh, he turned back toward the guide.
But Kristine acted first, squeezing his arm harder as if to communicate something—like, let me—then called to the man across the aisle.
“Wendell, my new husband and I have planned to come here for our honeymoon for ages—but now we’re a bit worried. We heard about those poor tourists’ deaths in Acadia National Park. They were mauled, weren’t they? Do the authorities know what kind of animal did it?”
The man looked stricken, hazel eyes huge beneath his scruffy gray brows. He pulled the microphone away from his mouth, clearly not wanting the crowd on the filled bus to hear. His voice was hardly audible over the bus’s growling engine. “No, ma’am, ‘fraid they don’t have any answers yet—at least none they’re talking about, though they’re looking. I assure you that we’ll keep all of you close on this tour. No one’ll be hurt.”
“Thank you so much, Wendell.” Kristine sounded relieved and even a bit flirtatious.
Maybe she was the better one to take the lead on this. What man wouldn’t try to soothe the concerns of a woman as pretty as her—especially when she turned on her vast charm? She hadn’t done that with him, though. Probably a good thing.
“But,” she continued, “I read that it could be wolves. Are there wolves in Acadia? I researched the park on the internet and thought that there weren’t any wolves around here now.”
“That’s right.” Wendell nodded. “Used to be in the past, I’ve heard, but not at present. Could be coyotes or even wild dogs, I suppose, though I’ve never heard of any attacking people before. I’m sure the authorities will figure it out soon. Meantime, we’ll just be extra careful. Ah, here we are.”
The bus pulled in through a gate, and Wendell talked to the park rangers standing in the booth.
In a short while, the bus was moving again. The park was an amazing conglomeration of mountains overlooking the ocean, as well as numerous lakes. The vistas were wide. The forests were vast—and could hide any number of wild animals such as those Quinn had sensed last night.
But most wild animals stayed far from humans, even those that presented possible danger. If they attacked, there had to be a reason like hunger, or fear.
Considering how lush this area appeared, it probably hid a lot of possible prey, so hunger was unlikely.
Fear? Maybe. Those tourists could have come across some creature in the wild and baited it in some way—even just out of wildlife-loving curiosity—until it attacked.
But the most likely scenario, in Quinn’s opinion, was that someone—who? and how?—knew of Simon and Grace, their belonging to Alpha Force, and what Alpha Force was. The attack did, after all, occur on the night of a full moon.
The clues so far were few. But to save Simon and Grace—and maybe even Alpha Force—Kristine and he would nevertheless locate those newlyweds. Fast. They had to.
And they would also uncover who was trying to frame them, and how … and why.
Chapter 6
The bus bumped and climbed slowly along a narrow uphill road. Kristine watched from her sideways angle as the Asian-American driver concentrated on what he was doing. His hands were clasped tightly on the wheel and he frowned while staring straight ahead.
Glancing out the window beside her, Kristine looked out onto a cliff composed of magnificent rock formations that plunged down to the water below.
And smiled as she took in the gorgeous sight.
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“Yeah.”
At his uncharacteristically soft tone, Kristine glanced toward Quinn. He was looking at her.
She swallowed in confusion. Well, gee. They were supposed to be acting like honeymooners. He was just doing a good job.
Even so, she quickly turned away from both Quinn and the window.
Wendell now leaned back in his seat, apparently assuming he’d answered everything Kristine intended to ask. Not so.
Why wasn’t Quinn jumping in with questions, too? He was the former investigator, not her. So far, Kristine had kept things general and vague. She hadn’t figured out a graceful way to segue into what they really needed to know: Had Grace and Simon been on this tour? That could be hard to ask since the guide hadn’t sought the names of his current passengers, nor even where they were from. He probably didn’t get to know any tourists well enough to identify them by name.
But there was one thing he could do: now that they were in the park, he could surely point out where the mauled tourists’ bodies had been found.
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Linda O. Johnston
Danger and desire collide in this race against time… PI Quinn Parran’s new mission is to join Alpha Force, a unique military team of shapeshifters, and use their new elixir that will enhance his shapeshifting abilities. But with Sergeant Kristine Norwood, each shifting experiment sparks a volatile primal passion.And when Quinn’s brother vanishes on his honeymoon, he must join forces with Kristine and go undercover as newlyweds to investigate. While Kristine is attracted to the ruggedly handsome Quinn she isn’t about to get involved with a shapeshifter – until their quest becomes more dangerous.Now they must cross the divide between shifter and human, because every minute they’re apart brings the threat closer.
“We’ll find them and straighten out this whole mess.”
“We will,” Kristine agreed with obvious determination.
He couldn’t help it. He bent down and kissed her gently on the mouth.
Within the space of a moment, they stood still on a secluded path and he kissed her once more.
Hell, Quinn didn’t just want to share kisses with her. He wanted to touch her everywhere.
That wasn’t going to happen now. Probably wouldn’t happen ever. It shouldn’t happen.
Reluctantly, he pulled back. “Guess that was for luck,” he said, making a joke of it.
“Yours or mine?”
“Both.”
Dear Reader,
Even honeymooning members of Alpha Force can get into trouble, and it takes both family and friends—shapeshifters or not—to help them out.
In Undercover Wolf, the protagonists of the preceding Alpha Force story, Lt. Grace Andreas Parran and her new husband, Lt. Simon Parran, have gone missing on their honeymoon. Simon’s brother, Lt. Quinn Parran, and Staff Sergeant Kristine Norwood, Grace’s Alpha Force aide and good friend, go undercover, unofficially and against orders, to find them. It’s hard enough ignoring their own growing attraction but their undercover identities require that they pretend to be honeymooners! Kristine must also act as Quinn’s aide for shifting into wolf form, which means she keeps seeing him naked!
I had great fun writing Undercover Wolf, the fourth novel about Alpha Force—a highly covert military unit partly comprised of shapeshifters. I hope you enjoy the story.
Please come visit me at my website, www.LindaOJohnston.com, and at my blog: http://KillerHobbies.blogspot.com. And, yes, I’m on Facebook, too.
Linda O. Johnston
About the Author
LINDA O. JOHNSTON loves to write. More than one genre at a time? That’s part of the fun. While honing her writing skills, she started working in advertising and public relations, then became a lawyer … and still enjoys writing contracts. Linda’s first published fiction novel appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and won a Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for Best First Mystery Short Story of the Year. It was the beginning of her versatile fiction-writing career. Linda now spends most of her time creating memorable tales of paranormal romance and mystery.
Linda lives in the Hollywood Hills with her husband and two Cavalier King Charles spaniels. Visit her at her website, www.LindaOJohnston.com.
Undercover
Wolf
Linda O. Johnston
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
I’ve been visiting a number of national parks lately and enjoying them immensely. Acadia National Park, near Bar Harbor, Maine, has been one of my favorites, so I had to set a story there. But as always, I have invoked poetic license—this time to make sure those who investigate the fictional crime that happens there handle it the way I want them to, not necessarily as real law enforcement folks might operate. But real law enforcement folks might find problems with having Alpha Force members shapeshift in their jurisdiction!
Those who read my books will expect that this one, too, is dedicated to my husband, Fred, who enjoys travel even more than I do and has fun visiting national parks.
Chapter 1
Why do I feel so unnerved?
It wasn’t as if Staff Sgt. Kristine Norwood hadn’t seen a lot of naked male bodies during her years as a nurse, before she’d become a member of the covert military unit Alpha Force.
Maybe it was because she had foolishly allowed herself to notice exactly how good-looking and sexy her new but temporary superior officer, Lt. Quinn Parran, was when they’d first been introduced a few days ago.
They had just reached the test mission’s planned location—a woodsy area at the far end of Ft. Lukman, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Clad in her usual camo uniform and boots, Kristine had hurried in this direction with her heavy backpack over her shoulders. She stopped now and could sense the presence of the man who had kept up with her along the path through the most remote area of the military base where Alpha Force was headquartered.
She ignored that niggling uneasiness, embarrassment—and something she didn’t even want to think about, lust—as she turned toward him.
“This the place?” He glanced around at the pin oak trees looming around them.
“Yes, sir.”
She caught the sardonic raise of his dark brows over his golden-brown eyes.
“Stop calling me ‘sir,’” he said. “You called me Quinn when we were introduced at Simon’s wedding.”
“Yes, sir, but we weren’t on an official exercise then.” And she hadn’t felt so uneasy at the wedding of her regular superior officer, Lt. Grace Andreas, to Quinn’s brother Lt. Simon Parran, who had also just recently joined Alpha Force. Kristine had been maid of honor and Quinn was best man.
He had undoubtedly been the best-looking man there.
Grace and Simon were on their honeymoon now, which was why Kristine and Quinn were temporarily assigned to work together.
He was right, though. She usually called other Alpha Force members by their first names from the time she met them, no matter what their rank. She was friendly enough with Grace and others to joke around with them. But this was different. Way different.
“You want to play military?” he asked. Hell, they were military, even if he chafed at it. “Here’s my next order, Kristine. Stop considering this an official exercise.”
Kristine couldn’t help herself. She smiled both at his words and at his exasperated expression. His military haircut hadn’t compelled him to do a great job of shaving, and the hint of dark stubble on his face emphasized the razor-sharpness of his cheekbones. She ignored the sexiness of the look and how it caused her insides to churn and simmer, and responded, “Can’t do that, sir. But I’ll call you Quinn.”
“But this is only quasi-official.” What, did the guy just love to argue, or was he serious? “It’s a test, both for me and your oh-so-secret military unit. Our military unit.” He’d obviously seen her scowl and was reacting to it. That was a good thing. “We both want to see how I do during my first time using the Alpha Force elixir that my brother Simon has described so glowingly to me. He wants to know, too.”
Quinn was a new recruit. He had obtained his rank because of what he was, not because of training or achievement. At least not yet. And so far, Kristine’s impression was that he had joined the military not because he wanted to—as she had—but for some very unusual benefits he would not have received otherwise.
Like this—using the elixir.
He obviously had some issues with it all, though. She, on the other hand, was perfectly happy following military protocols … most of the time. Tonight, though—well, she would obey orders notwithstanding how uncomfortable she was.
And that meant acting as Quinn’s aide for this very special session. Mission. Official mission.
Quinn was taller than his brother, with wide shoulders and a devil-may-care stance he affected even now that he was a soldier. His uniform was similar to hers—much crisper, though. Probably never worn before. It displayed the bars showing he was a commissioned officer. And now, he was about to remove it….
Orders or not, how could she stay completely remote and objective as she did all the things necessary to assist Quinn?
She simply would, because she had to. Having her temporary commanding officer naked in front of her was not beyond the call of her very special duty. After all, she’d seen Grace naked a lot when her superior had shapeshifted into wolf form and back.
Now it was time for Quinn to do the same.
Yeah, but Grace was a woman, argued Kristine’s logical mind. She’d seen nothing different from what she saw in the mirror, just in the unique configuration that was Grace’s instead of her own.
But Quinn? He was all man. Well, almost all man, except for what she knew about him and what he was about to accomplish here.
After she saw him naked …
“Tell you what,” he said. “Let’s do it all backward. You give me some orders. What do we do next?”
“I assume this won’t be your first time shifting outside a full moon,” Kristine said, buying a little time. Plus, she was curious. This would be his debut shifting as a member of Alpha Force, but he’d had other resources before.
“That’s right. I’ve taken some of the shifting pills that Simon developed, so I’ve already changed now and then at different times. I’ve even taken his medication during a full moon because it helps to keep us from changing automatically then. Mostly. My bro’s a smart guy, but his pills need work.”
“You probably know that some of what he did has been incorporated into the new Alpha Force formula,” Kristine said. “It was already good stuff, but now it’s better.”
That wasn’t her area of expertise, of course. But she, like all Alpha Force members, knew that the basis for what Quinn would be drinking here was the most current version of the Alpha Force elixir that had first been developed by one of its commanding officers, Maj. Drew Connell, even before he had helped to form the very unique, very covert military unit composed partly of shapeshifters.
The formula had been modified over the few years of Alpha Force’s existence, improved by development and experimentation.
And now, Kristine had heard, they had also made some initial modifications to the elixir that were triggered by the formula first developed by Quinn’s brother Simon. That blend was still in experimental stages and not yet in common use. Simon’s prior version was not as sophisticated in most ways as what Alpha Force was using—but it contained some very desirable qualities.
“Bring it on,” he said. “I’ve been waiting to try it.”
Kristine inhaled deeply. “Okay, then.” She kept her tone crisp. “I’ll give you a dose of the elixir. You remove your clothes, then I’ll shine the light on you.”
“It’s supposed to mimic the intensity of a full moon, right?” Quinn asked. He didn’t even comment about the fact that he was to completely strip in front of her. Maybe it was no big deal to him.
She wouldn’t let it be a big deal to her.
“That’s right,” she said.
“Fair enough.”
Kristine removed a vial of elixir from the backpack where it had been carefully stowed. As he drank it, she also extracted the moderate-size battery-operated light.
She pretended not to be especially aware of what he was doing as he removed his shirt, then his slacks. But she did sneak a glance in his direction. Damn, but his body was as buff as she had anticipated from seeing him fully clothed.
Then he removed his black boxers. She felt her face redden as she turned the light on and aimed it toward him. She had no choice but to look then. Oh, yes. His male parts were as large and enticing as she had imagined, too. She quickly lifted her gaze toward his face.
He obviously was aware of her discomfort. As she bathed him in light she could see his masculine expression that clearly said, Like what you see?
And then, as anticipated, his shift began. Kristine watched, as always amazed yet accepting of the miracle she observed so often.
Quinn’s body writhed, and he dropped to all fours on the ground. His limbs contorted as fur erupted from his skin. His grimace elongated into a canine muzzle.
Soon, he would be, for all intents and purposes, a wolf.
Standing still, paws grounded on the soft dirt of the earthen path, he stared at the beautiful human who had aided his change. She had turned off the bright light and stood watching him in the darkness, eased now only by the distant lights of the military base. She remained unmoving. Her head was tilted, as if she studied him. Wondered about him.
Except for his family, he had never had any company while shifting.
The fact he could think about that now was astounding. Always before, even when using Simon’s treasured pill that helped to control shifting nearly anytime—at least somewhat—his thoughts while changed had been as wild and uncontrolled as his wolfen body.
But this Alpha Force formula allowed him to keep all his human awareness. He loved it!
What else was different now? He had to know.
He would not find out by remaining here.
He dragged his gaze from the wide blue eyes watching him, bared his teeth for an instant to convey his intent to be on his own and began to run.
The late summer nighttime breeze wafted around his long silver-black pelt. Smells of trees, of large birds of prey, of small squirrels sleeping in branches above, filled him with a sense of belonging.
He circled the vast area inside the fence, remaining within the confines of Ft. Lukman.
He had an urge to run and never return. But his alert mind acknowledged the wish while ensuring that sensibility and caution governed all.
Wise or not, he had taken an oath to become a soldier. With his new ability to think as consciously as a human, he remained aware of the penalties for a soldier’s going AWOL, no matter what his assignment. Or the form of his body.
Besides, he wanted more access to the formula.
For a long while, Quinn ran in loops, circling the perimeter of the military base, staying far from the buildings. He watched for people to ensure he got nowhere near them—though he was fully aware that many among this group of humans, more than any other, would understand what he was. Accept it. Accept him.
Yet he preferred being on his own, absorbing every nuance of the sights and sounds and smells utilizing his enhanced senses and his maintained ability to understand.
He didn’t feel he would ever grow tired. But he had not taken a large quantity of the changing formula for this, his first experiment with the medication that was so new to him.
For the first time since reluctantly agreeing to join his brother and enlist in this unique military force, he started to believe it was not a mistake.
Yet would this new environment, this new job, ever feel important enough to quell his natural curiosity? Would he ever be comfortable acting like a soldier, taking orders, especially if there were any he felt to be needless or ludicrous?
Could he, as he had been promised, ever use all the prized abilities that he had carefully honed over his years as a private investigator?
He would have to wait and find out.
Eventually, he began to feel tugs beneath his skin, a sure signal that he would soon change back. Reluctantly, he turned in the direction from which he had come.
The woman who had helped him remained there, sitting on the ground near where he had left her, a softly lit electronic reader on her lap. She was reading. Waiting for him.
He wanted to greet her. Thank her.
Instead, what poured from his throat for now was a soft growl.
She immediately looked at him as if startled.
And then she nodded.
“That’s great stuff,” Quinn said. “The shifting formula.” He had hardly stopped grinning since changing back from his wolf form.
He looked entirely human now. He was also fully clothed. Kristine, walking beside him on the path to the center of Ft. Lukman with her backpack again over her shoulders, resisted glancing toward the private areas of him that she had glimpsed—and considered potentially great stuff. They were all hidden now anyway.
And staring wouldn’t be professional.
Of course, the heated stirrings inside her, being close to this man again, were anything but professional.
“Once we’re back at the main building, I’ll conduct a recorded interview with you and enter your description into our computer database.”
“I’ll have a lot to say,” he responded. “All of it complimentary.”
Her thoughts, too—about him—but of course she didn’t mention that. She would be a lot more comfortable when Grace returned and she could get back to being her regular charge’s aide. She didn’t know who would be there for Quinn, but at least it wouldn’t be her.
Ft. Lukman was a fairly large base, but it didn’t take long to return to the building where they had started their trek earlier. The aboveground portion held quite a few dog kennels for the canines that acted as partial cover for the wolfen shapeshifters headquartered here.
Quinn and she immediately headed for a stairway down to the lab areas, clean rooms and primary Alpha Force offices. This, Kristine knew, was where those supposedly magical formulations of the Alpha Force elixir were mixed and changed and improved. She sometimes wished she knew more about how they worked, how they acted to enhance the process and conditions of shapeshifting.
But she never wished that she were a shapeshifter. Oh, she admired them. Liked working with them. But when all was said and done, she preferred being … well, herself.
At the bottom, Quinn reached around to open the door for her. She appreciated the gentlemanly gesture. Maybe there was hope for him to be a real soldier yet.
Not that it really mattered to her.
She gasped as a backlighted body clad in a camo uniform loomed before them in the hallway. It was late, and she hadn’t expected to see anyone there.
“Glad you two are finally back,” said Maj. Drew Connell, commanding officer of Alpha Force. “Come with me. There’s something important going on that I need to brief you about.”
Kristine had thought it interesting and fitting that a shifter had been designated to command this covert unit. At first she had wondered whether she would accept taking orders from those who were so different from her. Now, it was second nature.
If Drew said something significant was happening, that meant it was definitely critical.
He ushered them into the small office off the main lab facility where he and others worked on the shifting formulation. He was not only the one who had developed the prototype, but he had also stayed closely involved with its modifications.
“Sit down. Please.” It was an order, but people around here tended to give orders more politely than the rest of the military, as if Alpha Force was different.
Which it was.
“What’s up?” asked Quinn, as he settled his large frame into the designated seat across from Drew’s desk. “Sir,” he added when Drew’s suddenly chilly golden eyes reminded him where they were and who outranked whom.
Was this some kind of alpha thing, too, among male shifters? Interesting, Kristine thought.
“Yes, please tell us what’s going on, sir,” she added in a respectful tone, one she hoped Quinn would use himself in the future.
“A couple of people were killed two nights ago in Acadia National Park,” he said, his face grim.
That had been a night when the moon was full, Kristine realized.
Before Drew could continue, Quinn interrupted. “That’s near Bar Harbor, Maine. Where Simon and Grace went on their honeymoon. I haven’t been in touch for a couple of days—didn’t want to bother them. Are they okay?” He had stood abruptly, and Kristine empathized, although she remained seated. She was worried, too.
“Unknown so far,” Drew said. “The victims have been identified and aren’t Grace and Simon, so you needn’t worry about that. They were apparently attacked by some kind of wild animal, and the first assessment indicates the wounds could have been caused by canines.”
“Are there wild wolves in that park?” Quinn demanded.
“Used to be, a long time ago, but not now,” Drew said.
The three of them were silent for a long moment, staring at one another.
“Could the attackers have been … werewolves?” Kristine asked quietly.
“That’s not been proposed officially, even by those who know about Alpha Force,” Drew said.
“But—”
“Has anyone talked to Simon?” Quinn demanded. “To Grace?”
“Several of us have tried to call them on their cell phones and at their hotel,” Drew replied. “We haven’t been able to reach either of them.”
Chapter 2
The time was 0930. Kristine was surprised that this group of people, which included both brass and nonmilitary honchos, could come together so quickly here in such a remote location, but it had happened. Around twenty people were gathered in the assembly room on the first floor of the building at the heart of Ft. Lukman, where the offices of the commanding officers and others were located. Of course most were familiar Alpha Force members, including Lt. Autumn Katers, a shifting hawk, and her aide, Sgt. Ruby Belmont, who had been on a mission with Kristine and Grace in Arizona when Grace had met Simon.
There were also some relatively new recruits, like Lt. Colleen Hodell, a cougar shifter, and Sgt. Jason Connell, a wolf shifter related to one of the unit’s commanding officers.
Then there were the others.
Kristine had entered the room fifteen minutes before and taken a seat out of the mainstream of the Alpha Force group, on one of the theater-style chairs mounted on the concrete floor. She had left a chair empty beside her in case Quinn decided to join her.
Quinn had just come in with Maj. Connell and Lt. Patrick Worley, the hands-on commanding officers of Alpha Force, whom he’d probably waylaid in the hall. He stood with them now at the front of the room, apparently attempting to pump them in advance for information. But he didn’t seem overly pushy, at least not from Kristine’s perspective. His expression seemed interested, his nods deferential. Had he decided to accept where he ranked in the military, or was he just acting that way to get what he wanted? Or was she entirely wrong in her interpretation from this distance?
Damn, but she wanted to join them.
She glanced at her watch. The meeting was scheduled to begin in about two minutes. The officers wouldn’t appreciate her interrupting them—that would only delay the assembly they’d thrown together so quickly.
She couldn’t help feeling a bit riled. Quinn should have contacted her, involved her in his discussion. They were a team, at least for the moment. He ought to recognize that. Live by it.
Even so, she recognized that though they had similar interests in what was about to be discussed, his interest was even greater than hers. She was a buddy and comrade-in-arms with Grace.
He was Simon’s brother.
Apparently Quinn and she weren’t the only ones worried about what was happening with the two missing Alpha Force members. The concerns of most of these people, though, might be more about the effect of the current situation on the unit than on the individual members involved.
Okay, call her cynical. She gave a damn about Alpha Force, a lot more than, say, Quinn did. And, most likely, more than those now in an apparently intense discussion with Gen. Greg Yarrow near the door at the side of the room, including a couple of suits and a higher-ranking general.
But the people involved, and what was happening to them, were important, too.
That was why she had tried calling Grace’s cell phone. Three times.
And left three messages, each more urgent than the last.
None had been returned.
“Okay, let’s get started.” Drew broke away from his discussion with Quinn and Patrick and stood at the front of the room in front of the U.S. flag to address the whole gathering. Quinn did not look pleased, but he moved quickly toward her, beyond the couple of rows filled mostly with others in camo uniforms—both shifting and nonshifting members of Alpha Force. Kristine had already noticed that among them was Dr. Melanie Harding-Connell, a local veterinarian and Drew’s wife. They’d had a baby a few months ago, and the little girl, Emily, was sleeping in a nearby stroller. Melanie was not a member of the military and was also not a shifter, although her husband was both.
More than once, Kristine had wondered what little Emily’s shifting abilities might eventually be. Her understanding was that the gene was dominant, so the baby would grow into a werewolf.
Interesting, that Melanie would choose to marry and have an unusual child. Kristine was aware that most shifters were the result of mixed marriages. She loved working with shifters, but marrying one? Giving birth to a baby shifter?
How would a nonshifting parent cope?
Maybe she was too traditional, despite being part of Alpha Force, but give her a nice, calm, loving marriage someday, preferably to another soldier, and a home filled with regular kids. Kids who were loved. Well cared for. A family that was way different from her own disastrous childhood.
Hell, she’d risen above all that. It had brought her here, where she belonged.
Quinn sat down beside her on the aisle seat, nodding grimly. She, too, remained silent. She knew he had a close relationship with his brother and could only imagine what he was feeling now, with Simon the center of a situation that could only be bad, whatever the explanation. She had an unwelcome urge to reach over and squeeze Quinn’s large hand, now resting on his leg, in a gesture of comfort, but that wasn’t appropriate.
“I think you all know why we’re here,” Drew said. He stood in front of the group, speaking without a microphone since everyone had gathered at the front of the room. He probably hadn’t gotten any more sleep than Kristine had after their quick briefing last night, but he looked alert, his golden eyes sweeping the crowd. “Even so, I’ll describe my understanding of the situation.”
He briefly went over what he had said to Quinn and her last night. There’d apparently been no further information gathered since then. Two tourists were fatally mauled. Simon and Grace, who had been honeymooning in the area, were missing. The news had been picked up by local media but national coverage was minimal. So far.
“Are you certain the two things are related?” This came from one of the two men in suits seated in the first row near the generals. The speaker was now standing. Kristine recognized him from the wedding: Darren Olivante, team leader for domestic projects at the Defense Special Projects Agency—the agency within the Department of Defense that had assisted in the creation of Alpha Force and now helped monitor it.
As Olivante turned to glance around the room, Kristine noticed that his salt-and-pepper hair was longer than the traditional cut of the military members he worked with. He wore glasses and a challenging expression on a round and flabby face.
General Yarrow rose and walked to the front of the room beside Drew. He, too, had been at Grace and Simon’s wedding. Although he was headquartered at the Pentagon like the Defense Special Projects Agency, he also maintained an office at Ft. Lukman. Kristine hadn’t seen him around here lately, so he must have dashed here for this meeting.
The general was in his sixties but well preserved, and his hair, although behind a receding hairline, was still black. The wrinkles on his face seemed to show up mostly when he scowled, and he maintained a strong-looking physique.
“We have received no evidence that the killings and the disappearance of our two officers are related, but it’s a potentially logical assumption,” the general said. “Of course, given the special nature of Alpha Force and its members, we’re hoping the Parrans weren’t involved in mauling those tourists, but the information we’ve been given indicates that the wounds appear to have been caused by at least one wild animal, probably canine. That could indicate—”
Quinn stood beside Kristine. She tried to grab him, to warn him not to interrupt, but it was too late. His otherwise handsome face had turned an angry shade of red, and he shouted, “If you’re insinuating that my brother and his wife attacked some humans for no reason while shifted, forget it. Isn’t this Alpha Force organization intended to be a pack of sorts? Pack members have each other’s backs. We don’t level false accusations at one another.”
The DSPA official had remained standing. He glared at Quinn, then turned toward General Yarrow. “I think this is a good example of why the plans we’ve been discussing are the way to go, General,” he said. “And why it’s been so difficult to ensure that funding for Alpha Force stays intact.” Even from several rows back, Kristine could hear the ice dripping from his words.
But what was he talking about? What plans?
And was Alpha Force in jeopardy? Without adequate funding, it could disappear. What would happen to its members?
“My suggestion, sir, is to approach the investigation in a two-pronged way,” General Yarrow said. “And to make sure it’s successful. That will convince the powers that be to appropriate funding. But this isn’t the place to discuss it all.” He turned from the civilian to face Quinn, who remained standing with his hands clenched into tense fists. “Lt. Parran,” the general said, “we will have a private briefing as soon as this meeting is over. For now, you are dismissed.”
Drew Connell, who stood beside the general, gave a curt nod toward Quinn, seconding the order.
Quinn didn’t move, except that his gold-tinged brown eyes narrowed. Kristine half expected him to erupt in a heated volcano of protest and fury.
But he was now a member of Alpha Force. Of the military. He had taken an oath that involved following orders. He’d spoken of the pack mentality of Alpha Force. Surely, he would at least bow to that, to Drew Connell’s authority—wouldn’t he?
In any event, she was his acting aide.
She reached up and grabbed his forearm. As she had anticipated, tension had turned it into a steely rod. “Don’t protest,” she whispered up at him. “We’ll talk to the general and the major later and get this all sorted out.”
He glanced down at her. She almost winced under the barbed anger in his gaze. But in moments, he relaxed. Closed those eyes for an instant.
Then he called to the ranking officers, “Yes, sirs.” The tone was sardonic, and the salute he flashed after Kristine released his arm was a parody. He turned and started down the aisle toward the door.
Kristine remained worried for him. He was her charge, after all, at least for now. She had an urge to follow him.
But she needed to know what was said here. He needed to know, too, whether or not he realized it.
She remained seated while Drew and General Yarrow described the situation in Maine and the Alpha Force position.
Then Olivante joined them and commented.
Kristine was afraid she knew how the investigation was going to be handled. And it wasn’t the best way for Alpha Force.
They sat in a small room outside the general’s office waiting for Major Connell and General Yarrow to call them in.
“I take it that my attitude—even though I was right—didn’t help my brother’s position,” Quinn said to Kristine with a shrug. He had stayed outside the assembly room, pacing back and forth, until the meeting had disbanded and Kristine joined him. Despite his keen wolflike hearing, even in human form, he hadn’t been able to make out much of what was said.
Since the meeting had been short, he didn’t expect that there’d been much of substance anyway.
Only speculation.
While waiting, he had tried texting, then calling Simon and Grace again. Both calls had gone straight to voice mail, and he had received no responses to any of his attempts to reach them.
“Probably not,” Kristine answered. Sitting in a stiff military pose in the chair beside him, she raised her head, jutting her chin out in a characteristic motion he had noticed before. It showed her determination. Her stubbornness. Her beauty.
All right, maybe it wasn’t her most beautiful feature, but he liked it. Enough that he had an urge to touch that strong chin with his fingers. Better yet, cup it and pull her forward so he could test her stubbornness with a kiss …
He stopped, mentally punching himself. Where had that come from? He had just met her a few days ago, at Simon’s wedding. Yeah, she was a looker, and she’d seen him buck naked—and the thought of her eyes on him started his privates stirring even now.
But she was also all military. His assigned aide. A nonshifter. Not someone to get all hot over.
Was worry for his brother turning him into some kind of nutcase?
Maybe. He’d have to be careful. “So the powers that be, people I don’t even know who can send orders down the pipeline to me, think that my brother and his wife just went on some kind of shifting rampage and killed a couple of innocent folks right out of the blue?”
Kristine ducked her head, causing the cap of her dark hair to feather around her face. “You could say that.” She grimaced. “They did.”
Before Quinn could express what he thought of that, the door opened and Drew appeared. “Come on in,” he said.
Quinn had been in the general’s office before—when he’d been interrogated about whether he really wanted to join Alpha Force, and also what he could do for it.
It was quite an office. Not that Quinn had any idea what military offices were supposed to look like, but he figured this might be the epitome. The desk was made of a dark polished wood that looked like mahogany. There was the usual U.S. flag, but the brass pole was anything but ordinary. Then there were the worn classic books on shelves behind the general, written by some of the English-speaking world’s most renowned authors, like Robert Louis Stevenson and Bram Stoker.
There was a slight scent of brandy that Quinn could smell with his enhanced senses. He glanced toward a closed wooden cabinet behind the desk. The general might fortify himself in here for what he faced while commanding Alpha Force.
Drew had told Quinn after the last time he’d been here that the general had subsidized all the office furnishings himself just because he wanted to, and this was a getaway from the Pentagon.
Quinn waved Kristine through the door before him. He might as well act like a gentleman here, since he was committed to being a soldier.
Damn it.
Where are you, bro? his mind shouted silently. What the hell’s going on?
Quinn liked his new sister-in-law, Grace. Had been glad that his brother seemed so happy.
But he hadn’t been thrilled at being the best man at the wedding, wearing a monkey suit. Being in the middle of a bunch of fawning people, most of whom he didn’t know. Military types. Even a couple of Department of Defense guys, including the one from the DSPA.
At least he’d never have to do it again. Wolves mated for life. Even shifters.
Grace was part of their pack. He was as concerned about her as he was about his brother. Almost.
Drew, Kristine and he sat in the chairs facing the general’s desk. Greg Yarrow stood, then glared at Quinn. “I should strip you of your rank for insubordination,” he growled.
Quinn closed his eyes for just a second. He had a role to play here, and he’d better do it right if he wanted any chance at helping Simon. And Grace. “I understand, sir,” he said quietly. “I would like to apologize and—”
“Let’s not lay it on too thick.” Greg smiled grimly, causing divots to form in the cheeks of his aging face.
“Okay.” Quinn smiled briefly, too. Then waited.
“Here’s where we are,” Drew said from beside him. “Acadia is a national park, so the feds are involved in the investigation into the deaths of the tourists. So are the local police. Since the disappearance of Simon and Grace is assumed to be related, both are looking into that, too.”
“So we go as members of Alpha Force and find out what the hell happened,” Quinn predicted.
“No.” The general stood. “That’s what I hoped for, in the multipronged investigation. But I’ve been told in no uncertain terms that since members of Alpha Force might be the perpetrators of a crime here, we need to let other agencies take the lead.”
“No!” Quinn almost stood but felt Kristine’s restraining hand on his arm again. He took a deep breath, then another. “Sorry, sir,” he managed. “But my brother wouldn’t have killed anyone, whether he was shifted or not.”
He would probably have been shifted under the full moon, on the night of the killings. He might have taken the new version of the changing elixir even then, because of its benefits. As Kristine and he had discussed, some of the modifications resulted from incorporation of parts of Simon’s shifting medication, now that he had joined Alpha Force and turned over his formula.
But the combined new version might not have been tested adequately….
Yet Quinn had felt fine after taking it. Once. A reduced dose. Still, he wasn’t about to mention even a hint of concern about that.
Besides, he didn’t know for certain whether Simon had brought any of the Alpha Force elixir with him, or his own medication, or any shifting formula at all.
“We hope you’re right,” the general said. “But suspicion otherwise is partly what Team Leader Olivante’s dig was about. There’s a faction in the DoD that doesn’t know details of Alpha Force’s special abilities but even so doesn’t trust a unit that’s different. They’ll potentially shut Alpha Force down if it’s proven that any of its members have gone rogue.”
“I can help as much as anyone to find Simon and Grace. Maybe better.” Quinn struggled to keep his tone controlled. Of course he felt frustrated. Why the hell hadn’t Simon responded to any of his attempts to reach him? “And with that attitude in the organization … well, I don’t trust anyone else to find them safely. To find the truth. You know my background, sir. I’m a private investigator. You’ve got to let me …” He stopped, hazarding a glance down at Kristine who nodded encouragingly. “Okay. I enlisted. I get it. You don’t have to do anything I say. But I do have investigative skills I’ve developed over time. I’ve got to at least try to find Simon and Grace and figure out what happened. Please, sir.”
That last was a real effort, but he intended to do all he had to, to help his brother and new sister-in-law. Even act the role in which Simon had cast him.
Before either Greg or Drew responded, Kristine spoke up. “You know, sirs, I haven’t taken a leave for a long time now. I realize that Lt. Parran is too new a recruit to be entitled to one, but … well, I think he and I both need to take some time off. Maybe even take a trip. To Maine. And if we happen to end up in Bar Harbor just for the fun of it, who knows what we might uncover?”
General Yarrow’s laugh was a bark of humor. “I wasn’t exactly going to approach it that way, but I had something similar in mind.” He looked toward Drew. “What do you think, Major? Could you give these two Alpha Forcers a little time off to have some … fun on their own?”
“Sounds like a workable situation to me,” Drew said.
“Can our leave start tomorrow?” Kristine asked. “I just can’t wait to take my vacation as soon as possible.”
“Ditto that, sirs,” Quinn said. Was he laying it on too thick?
Most likely, there was no such thing.
“Then you’ve got it,” Drew said. “Although your leave will have to be short. We need answers fast, and we’ll have to disavow any knowledge of what you’re up to. And you’d better not plan on a military transport to Maine.”
“No, sir,” Kristine said. “For this leave, we’re going to go civilian all the way.”
“But you’ll still report to me,” Drew said.
“Absolutely, sir.”
And Quinn forced himself to imitate Kristine’s smart salute without a grimace.
Chapter 3
“We need to plan this.”
Kristine walked at Quinn’s side after the meeting, working hard to keep up with him. He hurried along one of the walkways at Ft. Lukman that led away from the building where the meeting had just been held. His stride was purposeful, his face grim.
Two other soldiers, also dressed in camo, approached from the opposite direction. They must have seen something in Quinn’s expression, too, since both seemed to do double takes before hurrying past.
Kristine didn’t slow down. She wondered what Quinn was thinking. Well, he needed to tell her, at least some of it.
“We have to figure out where and when we’re going,” she continued, trying not to sound out of breath. “How we’ll get there, how we’ll play it when we’re there, how—”
“Yeah, I get it,” Quinn finally grumbled. “In fact, I’m working on it.”
“How?” she demanded. “I need to know. I’m in on it, too.”
He stopped dead beside her and she had to make an effort to stop alongside him. “You don’t need to be,” he said in a tone that edged too close to threatening. “I can handle this myself.”
“Sure you can.” She leaned closer, looking up so her chin edged belligerently toward him. She kept her voice low but equally gruff. “You’ll be trying to figure out what happened. Maybe shifting. Maybe needing to shift by using the elixir you just tried for the first time. Without help? Maybe, but I don’t think so. Besides …”
She let her voice trail off, staring straight into those harsh golden eyes. Lord, but the guy was good-looking, even when he appeared grim and determined and angry.
He reacted the way she wanted him to, at least. “Besides what?” he demanded.
“Your new sister-in-law, Grace, is not just my commanding officer. She’s my friend. I intend to help her. Period.”
She continued to stand her ground and glare straight into his return glower.
He was the one to flinch. Well, not flinch, exactly. He smiled. And if she’d thought his rugged features to be a turn-on before, now he was absolutely the hottest man she had ever seen.
Her recollection of seeing him naked only reinforced the current of heat that passed through her. But she shrugged that off. She had to.
“Okay,” he said. “And you’re right. I’m sure I can use the help. But I want to think this through before we rush up there. And we are going to rush up there. No later than tomorrow.”
“I’m game,” Kristine said. “Let’s find somewhere private to discuss this.”
They crossed a wide driveway, passing the main gate into Ft. Lukman.
Quinn was leading Kristine to someplace they probably shouldn’t go: his apartment in the Bachelor Officers Quarters. If anyone saw them inside the building, it might appear as if they were fraternizing, and that was a military no-no. She wasn’t a commissioned officer. He was.
In a world where things were fair, their roles should be reversed. She had told him she was career military and had planned it that way forever. She had trained to become a nurse, then had enlisted. She had been in the service for a few years and was now a staff sergeant.
She should be his superior officer.
He was the newcomer, and yet because of who he was—no, what he became when he shifted—he’d come into the service as a ready-made officer, outranking her.
As a result of all that, she could be his aide but not—officially, at least—his date. Let alone someone he snuck into his quarters. Not that he gave a damn about that kind of prohibition, but she would.
And she was right. He needed her help—as much as he hated to admit it, even to himself.
“Glad to see things are quiet around here,” Kristine remarked as they started up the sidewalk in the direction of the BOQ. He glanced down at her. She’d slowed a bit, and he figured she, too, was thinking about the military taboo they might be about to violate.
Fraternizing. That suggested more than holding a meeting to plan their approach to Bar Harbor and learning what happened to Simon and Grace.
Not that he intended to seduce Kristine—although the idea was far from repulsive. Instead, while alone in his quarters, they would discuss what they’d do to help find Simon and Grace.
To start with, Quinn needed to do some more online research, using some of the resources already programmed into the laptop computer in his room.
“Here we are,” he told her softly, using a key to open the BOQ’s side door nearest his apartment. Good thing they could get in through a side door that was relatively remote and sheltered by its nearness to the next-door parking garage. They would definitely give the appearance of fraternizing later, if the plan that had been forming in his mind reached fruition. But it would be worse if they were caught around here, where others could see.
Soon, they were inside his unit with the door closed. As far as he knew, no one had seen them.
He had an urge to take the lovely, determined Kristine into his arms and kiss her. Only out of relief, of course.
But that was a bad idea. And she was already checking out his place. It was filled with government-issue furniture and not much else. He hadn’t been there long. He’d never been sure how long he would stay in the military, even if he hadn’t been about to undertake this unofficial mission. A lot depended on whether his appreciation for the shifting elixir outweighed his unease at being a soldier and following orders.
But one thing he did know. They would head to Bar Harbor tomorrow—and before they left, he had a lot of online investigating to do.
Kristine pulled a chair from the kitchen into the well-lighted alcove that Quinn used as an office in his small apartment.
She had been in BOQ units before—mostly Grace’s. It was larger than this. But Grace had been in Alpha Force for a while, had proven herself as excellent military, as well as a shapeshifter. She’d clearly been entitled to a comfortable place to sleep.
Sleep? Kristine had purposely not even glanced through the door that apparently led to Quinn’s bedroom. Sleep—and what else people did in bedrooms—weren’t why she was here.
Even though her body throbbed just a little at the idea of joining Quinn, with that amazing body of his, in bed.
That wouldn’t happen.
Instead, she sat determinedly beside Quinn, who had already booted up the small computer that lay on a shelf that acted like a desk in that alcove.
First, though, he pulled out his smartphone. “I’ve tried this before,” he said, “but I’ll call each of them again, just to see if they answer.”
They didn’t. Nor did they respond even now to any of the many text messages and emails he’d sent. He had even resorted to trying to contact them through Twitter and Facebook. Nothing.
Quinn and she had asked both Major Connell and General Yarrow if they’d continued to try to reach Simon and Grace. They had—also to no avail.
The last anyone had heard of them—or so it seemed—was a call Simon had made to Quinn while sightseeing along the Mount Desert Island coast just after they had reached the Acadia Park area.
Which made Kristine fear the worst. Were they dead? If not, were they ignoring calls because they were, indeed, guilty of the mutilations and murders?
She didn’t want to think about either. But they had to know.
“So what are we looking for?” she asked Quinn as he sat and began typing in a web address. His home page had wallpaper depicting a big question mark in the center of it.
Interesting. Was that because he was a private investigator by background, used to answering questions?
“Okay, first I’m putting on my P.I. hat,” Quinn said, not surprising her. “I’ve already checked to see when my bro or his bride last got into their bank accounts or used their credit cards. I found nothing useful, but I’ll do it again before we decide what’s next.”
He had typed in the web address of a major credit-card company and now inserted a number and password. Had he already known Simon’s account information, or had he used his investigation resources to learn it? He next did the same with Grace’s account—and he was less likely to have been given her info than his brother’s.
He checked not only on this site but a couple of others, apparently knowing data on multiple accounts, including a bank where he said Simon maintained checking and savings accounts. “Grace and he have already opened a joint account here,” Quinn told Kristine. But after scanning the latest page of each, he shook his head. “There’s a charge for a bed-and-breakfast in Bar Harbor and some meals, ending a couple of days ago. Then nothing. Not even a visit to an ATM for cash.”
“Oh,” Kristine said sadly. That gave no further answers. But it did suggest that something awful had happened to the newlyweds.
If the suspicions expressed at the earlier meetings were true, that they’d planned this attack to undermine Alpha Force somehow, they could have started new accounts under assumed names.
But at least they could still be alive.
No. She wanted to believe they were okay, and she knew they wouldn’t—couldn’t—be responsible for the attacks.
“I’ll check some news sites next,” Quinn said, “looking for more current detail about that damned fatal assault in Acadia.”
Where two people had apparently been mauled by wild animals and died. Not something Kristine would usually want to learn the gory details about, but this was different. Maybe somehow those details could lead to more information about Grace and Simon.
“Good idea,” she said and watched as his long, thick fingers sailed over the keys. She had a passing wonderment about how those fingers would feel playing over her … Ridiculous!
She settled down to watch the screen over his shoulder. There wasn’t a lot of data in most of the news stories Quinn brought up at first, but enough to make Kristine wonder.
Even so, she still wasn’t willing to accept Simon and Grace’s involvement.
Quinn turned on the sound as he went into a video news clip from a local Bar Harbor television station.
That one was so horrible that parts of the pictures were blurred.
Enough was shown to display how mutilated the bodies were—gashed and bloodied, as if ripped by teeth and claws.
“The authorities are still investigating,” the announcer intoned as the camera panned around what appeared to be a clearing in a forest, described as part of Acadia National Park. “So far, they appear to believe this was an attack by some kind of wild animal that has not yet been identified. This is the worst event in the park since a man walking his dog apparently fell to his death and, before that, a young tourist was killed by a rogue wave along the shore several years ago. Back to you, John.” The picture returned to an announcer in a studio somewhere before phasing out.
“Some kind of wild animal,” Kristine mused aloud.
“A wolf?” said Quinn. “Two wolves?”
“They’re not speculating on that—or at least this reporter didn’t,” Kristine responded.
“Yeah, but—” Quinn clicked on another site, one for which he had to enter a password. Kristine couldn’t be sure, but it appeared to be some kind of official law enforcement website, although Quinn got off the main page immediately to do a search for Acadia.
What showed on the screen was a detailed list of crimes in the Bar Harbor area. Next, he clicked on something that brought up this specific crime.
Kristine watched his face as Quinn squinted at the small print that came up. “Couple of agencies are involved in this investigation,” he said. “There’s some speculation about what kinds of animals could be involved. Species that still have habitats around there include foxes, coyotes, bobcats and black bears. Used to be mountain lions, too—and gray wolves.”
Wolves. The word hung in the air this time.
“Not Grace and Simon,” Kristine whispered, hoping it was true. She put her hand on Quinn’s shoulder—whether to reassure him or convince him, she wasn’t sure.
The touch was like a bolt of lightning, making her even more cognizant of his hot and alluring presence. But she wasn’t a wimp. She had courage—of all kinds. She let her hand rest there … for now.
Even when he turned his head a little and looked at her with those golden eyes.
“So what do you think?” she asked him.
“What do you think?” he countered. “You willing to go there to help me investigate—in any form I need to be? Your commanding officers—our commanding officers—apparently have to act dead set against our being there.”
He’d used the word dead. Like the two mutilated tourists.
Like Alpha Force would be, if the perpetrators really were Grace and Simon, and that got out to the world.
Kristine understood why the muckety-mucks like General Yarrow and that guy Olivante from the Department of Defense’s Defense Special Projects Agency were so concerned.
Not everyone, even in the military, knew about Alpha Force. But if it were ever shown that the killings were done by shapeshifters, and that those shapeshifters were not just part of some grotesque horror story but members of a very covert and elite U.S. military force, the repercussions could be terrible.
Terrible to the U.S. Armed Forces.
And potentially devastating—fatal—to the existence of Alpha Force.
What would happen to its members then—especially its shapeshifter members?
They’d be humiliated at the least. Outed. Paraded as absurd freaks through the media.
They would never be able to use their very special, unique and amazing abilities to help with national security ever again.
The people like General Yarrow and Team Leader Olivante would be out to do the best damage control they could.
If that meant dealing with Grace and Simon in some terrible way, they’d do it—even the general, who clearly loved Alpha Force. If they needed scapegoats—scapewolves—they’d do what they had to.
But both Quinn and she would have different agendas. His might be different from hers, as well.
She wanted to learn the truth. Protect Grace and Simon if they were innocent, which she prayed they were.
But she would protect Alpha Force, too.
Quinn? Well, his main agenda might be to help his brother and sister-in-law, no matter what.
She would work with him, at least until their agendas diverged. Then, she would see.
“Let’s do it,” she said.
“Good.” He paused, then stood. She couldn’t read the expression on his face, but it seemed challenging. With a touch of humor added? “Here’s what we’ll do, then. We’ll go to Bar Harbor tomorrow, undercover. And know what our cover IDs will be?”
“No,” she said, sure she wouldn’t like the response.
“To get the most information about our missing honeymoon couple—” he paused dramatically, then grinned “—you and I will be there on our honeymoon, too.”
“What?” Kristine froze. What was he talking about?
And why did the words send the tiniest shiver of anticipation through her?
She shrugged it off. She knew what he meant. But—
“With assumed identities, of course,” he said curtly. “Like I said, undercover.” Although when she dared to look at him she saw not only humor, but also challenge, in his expression. “That’ll help us get the most information possible as we investigate.”
“Of course. Great idea.” She attempted to sound nonchalant. “We’ll try to follow Grace and Simon’s trail as much as possible. We’ll find and clear them.
You’ll see.”
Chapter 4
The hotel was charming, a converted Victorian mansion right in the heart of Bar Harbor. From what Kristine had seen of it so far, the downtown area was a small, charismatic collection of stores and restaurants, inns and parks and churches, mostly near the water, since the town was located on Mount Desert Island.
A wonderful place for a honeymoon, she thought—if the lovers stayed in their rooms and out of trouble.
But these new, false honeymooners—Quinn and her? They would soon be out and about and looking for trouble … looking for what had happened to their real newlywed counterparts.
“You ready for this?” Quinn sat in the driver’s seat of the sedan they had rented after flying into Bangor, about fifty miles away. This was the first time she had seen him out of his uniform since the wedding … unless she counted when she had seen him in nothing at all.
The thought shot a plume of fire through her insides—from anxiety, she told herself. That was all. Before they had left Ft. Lukman, they had talked their plans over with Drew Connell. Since they were here very unofficially, he had agreed that it was better for them to really go undercover, take on alternate identities. Act as if they had nothing to do with the military. Or Alpha Force.
Honeymooners? He’d raised his eyebrows at that but hadn’t objected. In fact, he seemed to support the idea.
And despite Kristine’s deep misgivings, the pretense actually did make sense. They might get the same kinds of responses to their questions that the missing couple had been given. Be treated similarly by people they ran into here.
Learn something faster than if they pretended just to be acquaintances vacationing together.
They would therefore sleep in the same room. They would pretend, outside that room, to be lovey-dovey. Sexually attracted to one another.
One major problem, Kristine thought, was that it would be too easy for her to feign the latter …
“Sure. Let’s go in.” She responded to Quinn’s question with an assumed bravado.
She jumped out of the car, opened the door to the backseat and pulled out her backpack, which contained mostly clothes. It would have been hard to hide the Alpha Force elixir and light in carry-on baggage, so she had packed them in a suitcase and checked it. Even so, they had identified themselves as military to the Transportation Security Administration folks at the airport. These days, checked luggage screening looked for anything that could be turned into a terrorist bomb. An intense light might not get anyone’s attention, but the quantity of elixir might. So might the weapons they had packed.
They had given no explanation of their travel plans to the TSA people who had checked them out. Fortunately, no one had questioned them too closely. Not that they’d admit what they were up to—or that one of the tools they would take advantage of here, as soon as possible, was Quinn’s shapeshifting ability.
“I’ll take that, honey.”
Quinn’s deep voice behind her made her jump. Honey? The word shouldn’t give her shivers—at least not of pleasure. No, it was the harbinger of the night before them.
“No, thank you, dear.” She turned and gave him a couple of bats of her eyelashes, concurrently lifting her chin as if challenging him. “I can handle this, as long as you get our large bags out of the trunk and take care of them.”
“They’re on wheels.” His voice was no longer syrupy sweet. He evidently didn’t like her contradicting him. “You can pull yours.”
Too bad.
“I appreciate the offer, sweetheart, but as you know, I’m used to carrying my own backpack.” She reached over, patted his cheek that suggested the initial coarseness from the black shadow of a beard, then maneuvered the pack onto her shoulders. She started toward the door of the hotel without making sure he was dealing with the bags. She knew he would do just fine.
He caught up with her as she reached the registration desk. Amazingly, in only the short amount of time they’d had after making their decision and heading here, Quinn had already obtained fake IDs for them, including driver’s licenses and credit cards.
He had obviously maintained his contacts as a private investigator despite enlisting in the military—and not just his online skills and passwords. Maybe he intended his enlistment to be temporary. Very temporary.
She just hoped that would be the right thing for Alpha Force.
She, on the other hand, considered herself all military despite the civilian roles they played now.
“Hi,” she said to the woman behind the desk, who was clad in a brown suit and weary smile. “We’re the Scotts.” The first names on their ID cards matched their real ones, for ease of remembering them, but they’d taken on a false surname for their investigation. “Kristine and Quinn. Do you have our reservation?”
The woman, with a pin on her lapel that said she was Betty from Newport, began typing on a computer on the desk in front of her, and then her grin widened. “Yes, we do.” She ran through the formalities of taking a credit card—with their newly acquired IDs—and putting together key cards for their room. “Enjoy your stay,” she said.
“I’m sure we will.” Kristine made herself gush, even though she wasn’t a gushy person. Then she leaned toward Betty conspiratorially. “Do many other people come here on their honeymoon?”
“Why, yes.” By then Betty was beaming. “Another newlywed couple even checked in a few days ago. They’re gone now, though.”
“Did they have a good time?” Quinn asked from beside Kristine.
“I’ll bet they did, although I didn’t see them again. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your stay.”
On their way to the elevator, Kristine said, “Your seeing their credit card charge doesn’t mean anything. The way checking out is handled now at most hotels, with bills just slipped under the door during the last night of a reservation, there wasn’t anything suspicious about how Simon and Grace disappeared, except—”
“Except that word might have gotten around to the staff if they’d failed to take their belongings.”
“Right. So they apparently took their stuff. If so—”
“Where are they?” he finished.
Quinn had pretended not to notice Kristine’s dismay when they reached their quaint room with antique furnishings that suited the character of the converted mansion—and found only one queen-size bed in it. She hadn’t said anything except to thank him for hefting her suitcase onto one of the folding luggage stands.
They had already decided to unpack quickly, then leave right away to grab dinner at whatever spot the concierge at the inn said was the place he recommended most often to guests.
That meant it could be the place where he’d sent Simon and Grace.
Quinn and Kristine were there now, sitting at a table with a red checked tablecloth in the center of the main room. The BarHar Bistro was crowded, including the anterooms off to the sides. Apparently their concierge wasn’t the only one to recommend it—or locals already knew about, and frequented, the place. There wasn’t much space for the waitstaff to maneuver between tables, and the elbow room for diners was limited, as well.
Quinn hoped that the overcrowding was a sign that the food was good, not just that it was an in place where people dined simply because it was popular.
The place smelled tantalizing to Quinn’s enhanced senses. The acoustics weren’t great, though—probably not even for a regular human with lesser hearing. The undercurrent of voices was a loud, unpleasant hum.
Kristine had been pretending to study the menu, but he saw her eyes darting sideways often.
“What looks good to you, dear?” he asked aloud, then leaned slightly across the table toward her. “I suspect,” he added more softly, “that strangers here wouldn’t be noticed much.”
She nodded glumly. “My thoughts, too.”
A perky blonde in black pants and white shirt sidled around one of the tables nearby and approached them. “Welcome to BarHar. My name is Steph, and I’ll be your server this evening. Can I start you with something to drink?”
Showtime, Quinn thought. “You sure can. Champagne. We’re celebrating.”
“Really?” Steph asked, as Kristine forced a sunny smile onto her face. “What are you celebrating?”
“We just got married,” Kristine chimed in. “Do you recommend any particular champagne to other newlyweds who come in here?”
“That’s assuming we’re not the first,” Quinn added with a laugh.
Steph responded as they’d attempted to program her. “Oh, you’re definitely not the first.”
“But we’re the most recent,” Kristine said. “Aren’t we?”
“Well, yes. At least I don’t know of any others here tonight. But there was at least one other couple here last week.”
“Really? I’ll bet they weren’t as good-looking as us.” Quinn knew he was laying it on too thick. In fact, this might not be a good idea. He was well aware that Simon and he resembled one another—and it might be a bad thing to have anyone associate the two of them, especially if Simon was suspected of committing a crime.
But if Bar Harbor authorities suspected Simon and Grace, that, thankfully, didn’t seem to have gotten out even to the local media, nor had it otherwise been made public.
Yet.
“Maybe not,” Steph said. “But they were good tippers.” She winked at them. “Here’s the champagne I recommended to them.” She pointed to a fairly expensive one on the wine list Quinn had been pretending to study.
“Looks good to me. Did you recommend any entrées to them, too?”
“I did, but I think they both ordered steaks.”
Ah. That was a good indication that the couple were his brother and new sister-in-law. Shifters, at least those who changed into werewolves, ate a lot of red meat to satisfy their feral needs.
He glanced up at Kristine, who nodded slightly. She’d gotten it, too.
“Well, please bring us the same champagne, and we’ll figure out what else to order.” The steak sounded good to Quinn, but Kristine might not yet have decided.
When the server left, Kristine was the one to lean toward Quinn. “Looks like we’re on the right track. But just following … them … won’t necessarily get us the information we need.” He liked how she was being discreet. Not that it was likely for anyone to be eavesdropping on them, but even if someone at a neighboring table was listening in, they wouldn’t be able to follow the underlying meaning of their conversation.
“No, but it’s a start. We’ll be more proactive soon. Although—” Quinn had started doing his own eavesdropping—much more easily, with his abilities, than anyone else in this room was likely to be able to do. He now focused in on who had uttered the words he had been listening for: Acadia and body.
Fortunately, the speakers were at a nearby table, one just behind him. He slid his chair back slightly and said to Kristine, “Excuse me for a minute, dear.” But instead of rising and heading for the restroom, he turned toward the speaker. “Sorry to interrupt, but I couldn’t help hearing you mention those awful deaths that occurred a few nights ago. My wife—” He stopped and grinned at that, as if he was enjoying using the word for nearly the first time. “We just got married and we’re here on our honeymoon, but we almost changed our plans, hearing about such a terrible thing. Wild animals killed some tourists in the park, right?”
There were four young, brawny guys around the table. “That’s right,” said a tall basketball-player sort with spiky hair. “We came here planning to hike through the park but we’ve got second thoughts, too.”
“I live here,” said a young woman at the next table over. “All of us in town are also concerned. But you tourists—well, as long as you’re careful, you should be fine.”
“Spoken like a good local promoter,” Steph, the server, said, joining them. She had their champagne, plus two empty flutes, on a tray. She put them on the table and poured a little into each glass. As Quinn and Kristine both took preliminary sips, she moved around again and continued, “But … well, I enjoy hiking in my spare time, too. I haven’t heard what’s going on with the investigation, except that the thought is like you said, some kind of wild animal got those tourists. No one’s sure, though.”
“Are there many wild animals in Acadia?” Quinn asked. “I mean, I’m sure there are squirrels and rats and such, but what kind might be dangerous enough to kill people?”
He noticed that Kristine had maneuvered her chair around the table to sit beside him, notwithstanding the crush of other nearby patrons. She was listening attentively. He liked the seriousness of her expression beneath her sexy and short hair, as dark as a moonless night sky. She was one attractive soldier, and she was doing a hell of a job as his undercover wife.
“There are coyotes,” the local woman said. “Bears, too, and even bobcats. But they don’t usually attack people. I heard in the news that the people killed were two sisters from St. Louis who were active members of a national wildlife preservation organization. Maybe they got too up close and personal with some creature.”
“Can happen anywhere that there are wild animals like that,” said one of the guys at the table who hadn’t spoken before. “Too bad we can’t shoot ‘em.”
“No hunting and trapping in Acadia,” the woman chimed in, looking angry that killing wild animals had even been mentioned. Quinn liked that attitude.
“But park rangers can probably kill vicious animals that hurt people,” said Basketball Player, and his comrades nodded.
“Whatever happened,” said Steph, “I’m sure everyone visiting the park will be on guard to make sure it can’t happen again. Now—” She faced Quinn and Kristine. “May I take your order?”
“At least we have a general idea of the position of townspeople and tourists,” Kristine said later as they walked along the sidewalk, past souvenir, clothing and other shops still open for visitors’ pleasure. It was dark outside, but the narrow street was lined with lights.
“Yeah, and fortunately no one we spoke with has claimed that the killings could have been done by shapeshifters,” Quinn responded. He reached over and took her hand. At her glance, he prepared to remind her of their cover.
But she didn’t pull away. In fact, she grasped his hand even harder.
Which almost made him smile. At least until her next words.
“Even if there are any suspicions like that,” she said, “no one’s about to admit them aloud without any evidence. Not unless they want other people to doubt their sanity.”
He stopped and looked at her. “Right. Sane people don’t believe in shapeshifters, do they?”
“Looks like there’s a lot of insanity going around,” she said, and smiled. She raised her chin a little. He’d already begun to appreciate that as a characteristic gesture, a statement of challenge and determination. “But we still haven’t gotten any clue about where Simon and Grace might be,” Kristine continued. “You’re the investigator.”
“Yeah, I’m the professional investigator,” he agreed, “but I heard from Grace how much she relied on your ideas to help in Alpha Force assignments.”
Kristine’s grin looked proud but she shrugged her shoulders modestly. He liked her unassuming nature despite her obvious drive and intelligence.
“We’ll work on it more tomorrow,” he said. “Take the same tour they did, for starters. I’m also working on some other ideas.”
“Sounds good.”
They walked on for a while in silence. Kristine halted outside one small shop that sold pet supplies. “I’ll bet that Grace stopped in here. She’d have wanted to bring something back for Tilly.” That was Grace’s cover dog. All of the shifters had one that resembled them in shifted form.
Quinn hadn’t gotten one yet, and neither had Simon. They were too new to Alpha Force. But he had seen how Kristine had lovingly said goodbye to her own assigned dog, Bailey, who had traveled with her on her last assignment along with Grace and Tilly.
Another admirable trait. The woman liked dogs. Real dogs. And apparently she also cared for shifters.
He was going to have to watch himself around Staff Sgt. Kristine Norwood. He was coming to like her too much.
And that could be a mistake.
“So what’s your next idea?” Kristine finally asked, breaking the growing silence between them. Not that Quinn had found it uncomfortable—but he had been using it to think. And to plan.
“The night’s still young,” he said. “Why waste it? I’m ready to prowl.”
He knew, of course, that Acadia was a national park with established entrances. At least this first time, before they had oriented themselves about locations, he didn’t want to be seen driving in so late in the evening. Not many tourists were likely to be around, even though the park was open—or at least the campgrounds were.
As a result, he drove them both in the rental car along one road at the park’s outer perimeter, and then another, until he spotted a turnout surrounded by lots of vegetation, right beside a sheer cliff.
Insurmountable for mere humans. Not for a shapeshifter.
“Let’s do it,” he said.
“Here?” Kristine looked both puzzled and skeptical. He enjoyed watching the expressions play across her unconventionally pretty face.
“Here,” he confirmed. He parked at the end of the turnout closest to the thickest shrubbery. “It’s fairly isolated and I doubt we’ll see many cars at this hour.”
“Okay.” She opened her door. He popped the trunk open and she extracted her ubiquitous backpack—once more filled with the equipment he needed.
In only a few minutes, he had drunk a dose of the elixir and stripped—enjoying Kristine’s attempt to appear nonchalant and disinterested while sneaking peeks at his bare body. Which only made said body react the way he knew it would. But only for a minute—until the light she trained on him began its job.
He felt the usual tugging and pulling … and then his shift continued.
This was as much bliss as a shapeshifter could experience. No full moon. Complete mental sharpness.
If only his leap onto the mountainside five minutes ago, and his initial stalking into the park, could yield useful information.
Unlikely, though. It was a distance from where he thought he’d heard the mauling of the tourists had occurred.
He inhaled the complicated and intriguing scents of other wildlife—the coyotes and bobcats he had anticipated, as well as smaller, unimportant creatures.
This was merely an initial foray, a more-than-pleasant test. He would accomplish more with future shifts around here, but at least he had gotten his first wild taste of Acadia.
For now, he would simply revel in the freedom and ability to enjoy it. Not to mention his current, undoubtedly brief independence from the military, its structure, its orders.
He had wondered long before enlisting if the elixir Simon had told him about would be enticing enough for him to give up his life, his freedom, his sanity.
If all had gone well, perhaps it would have been more than enough to experience this amazing kind of shift as often as possible.
But all was not going well, with his brother, and now with him—while he was, in some respects, AWOL from his official assignment.
What would happen if he found Simon and Grace?
What would happen if he didn’t?
He had to find them, of course. Alive and well, and with a full, logical explanation of where they had been, and how they had not been involved in the park killings.
And then he would not have to wonder whether he could continue to immerse himself in a life that required him to follow the orders of strangers, some of whom he despised.
But a life that included this marvelous elixir.
And an aide like Kristine. For now.
Kristine, the dedicated and permanent soldier. Attractive, smart and sexy … but a nonshifter.
A scent blew toward him—a coyote. Drawing closer. It must have smelled him, too.
He paced farther into the forest. Not even a hint of the aromas of Simon or Grace, shifted or not.
His frustrations mounted.
No answers tonight.
Chapter 5
Kristine sat alone in the locked, dark car. Waiting.
She hated waiting for anything.
But she had taught herself patience while staying behind as her shapeshifting charge Grace dashed about the countryside in wolf form after Kristine helped her shift.
She had worked a lot with Grace. Learned her habits. Helped her not only as a shifting soldier, but also in the solution of a problem that could have put the entire world at risk of unleashed biohazards.
Kristine had gotten shot in the process. But she was fine now, physically.
Mentally, too, she reminded herself—although she was damned worried about her charge, her friend, Grace.
One step at a time. Quinn and she would find Grace and Simon. They had to.
For now, she watched through the windshield and the car’s side windows, scouring the mountainside in the scant light of the bright stars overhead for any movement that would indicate the return of the wolf that was Quinn.
Since this wasn’t a night of a full moon, and turning on any kind of light was a bad idea in this area, where she wanted no one to spot her, she merely slumped behind the steering wheel of the rental car.
Too bad she didn’t have the senses that her charges did while shifted, or even some of their enhanced senses in human form. Grace had described them to her, at least somewhat.
If Kristine had better hearing, maybe she could at least hear when—
There. Right in front of her. A movement within her line of vision.
Something had leaped off the hillside. In the little that she could see in the almost complete darkness, the shrubbery clinging to the side of the mountain remained in motion.
A figure moved in front of her on the roadside turnout. A wolf?
Just in case it wasn’t what she anticipated, she clutched the service weapon she had brought along, preparing to use it if necessary.
As quietly as she could, she opened the car door.
That created a haze of light—light in which she could see that something writhed in the bushes in front of her.
A shifter regaining its human shape?
The hell with being seen. Holding the gun in one hand, she grabbed a flashlight, too, turned it on and aimed them both at the moving figure.
In time to see the last of Quinn’s transformation back into human form.
He was back in the car, back in his jeans and T-shirt. Exhausted partly from the shift and partly from his ongoing frustration.
“Did you see anything useful?” Kristine asked, as she drove the car from the turnoff onto the twisting mountain road.
“No. I didn’t see, smell or hear anything at all that could help us. But at least I’ve oriented myself a bit more to this area and shifting around here.”
Beside him, Kristine said nothing for a minute. And then, “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Fine.” And he actually was. As he breathed deeply, he felt his strength—and his determination—increasing. He was here. Simon and Grace had to be somewhere around this area, too.
Of course he would find them.
They would find them. Kristine, with all her military training and dedication, would continue to be an asset.
As she had already been, tonight.
“Thanks for watching my back,” he said gruffly, only to see her turn her head to glance at him.
“It’s what I’m here for,” she retorted in an equally gruff tone that made him smile.
The time Kristine had been dreading had arrived.
Okay, it wasn’t that big a deal. They were here undercover. They were both adults, rational people, soldiers.
At least she was a soldier, and he had enlisted as one. But that shouldn’t matter here anyway.
The point was that they were here under assumed identities. False ones.
And now, after dinner, a preliminary assessment of the town, plus the first of Quinn’s shifts in this area—and she anticipated many more—they had to get some sleep to be rested enough to dive right into their roles tomorrow.
Find answers.
Learn where Grace and Simon were, and rescue them, if necessary.
Assuming they were still alive.
That was what was important.
Who was sleeping where, in this small, quaint room with only one bed, was not a big deal. No bigger a deal than her acting as Quinn’s aide for shifting.
He had just crossed the room and closed the drapes. The room didn’t get any darker, since the lights were on.
“Would you like to use the bathroom first?” Kristine asked neutrally.
“After you, sweetheart.” His tone was ironic. Not serious at all.
A good thing.
“Fine,” she said briskly. “Then, when you’re changing, I can take the duvet and make myself a bed on the floor. I think you’ll be okay with the sheets already on the bed, and—”
“And you don’t think the maid would notice tomorrow?” His brows were raised, emphasizing that irony he had already projected.
“We can remake the bed in the morning to look as if we used it like the honeymooners we’re pretending to be.”
She looked him straight in the eye, challenging him to object. He certainly didn’t think they were going to have sex as part of their cover … did he?
And why did the idea twist her insides with molten lava?
She liked how they were getting along so far—on a friendly and professional basis. That was all. But she had convinced herself that any sexual attraction she felt for him was absurd. Unmilitary. Something she would laugh off. Ignore.
Wouldn’t she?
“No need for you or me to sleep on the floor.” His tone was sharp now, as if he was responding to an insult. “We can both act professionally. Share the bed without … sharing anything else. Okay?” Now he was the one challenging her.
“Okay,” she responded as coldly as she could manage.
But as their eyes met, the challenge felt clear. Hell, she could handle it. She could handle him.
Almost as if she was daring him, she took a step closer. Or did he move first? Suddenly, she was in his arms. His lips were hot, tasting as human as any man’s she had sampled before. But not the same. Better. They were sexier. More searching. Magnetic and alluring.
Challenging.
His body against hers—it was as hard as she had imagined. Especially there, below. Where the thick, sexy organ she had viewed before was now touching her, taunting her. Sure, there were clothes between them, but she felt him now. Hard. Erotic. Causing her insides to react with a need she didn’t want.
Didn’t want.
She pulled away fast, before she could change her mind. “Very interesting,” she said, trying not to sound out of breath at all. “All the more reason I should sleep on the floor. But I won’t.” This time, it definitely was a challenge.
“Fine.”
A while later, when they both had settled onto the bed, backs toward one another, Kristine was even more aware of Quinn Parran’s large, warm—highly sexy—presence behind her.
He’s a shapeshifter, she reminded herself yet again. She might like them, but sleeping with one? Plus, he was a new soldier. A renegade, not a dedicated member of the military the way she was. An investigator she needed to work with for Grace’s and Simon’s sake. That was all.
But she lay there, eyes open, long into the night, listening to Quinn Parran’s deep breathing, and not moving at all.
Otherwise, she just might touch him once more.
Most mornings, Kristine enjoyed her first cup of coffee but figured she could survive without it.
Not now. There was a lot she had to accomplish today, and since she’d hardly gotten any sleep last night, a strong dose of caffeine was first on her morning agenda.
She only wished it contained ingredients to rein in her libido.
At the moment, she sat across from Quinn at a table in a coffee shop along Main Street, the primary tourist avenue in Bar Harbor, just a couple of blocks from their hotel. The only good result of her restless night—fully aware of his presence luring her—was that he, too, looked tired. There was a slight dullness behind his golden eyes, and he also held on to the coffee mug in front of him as if it were a lifeline.
Had he remained aware of her, too—and had that also made him lose sleep? Perversely, she hoped so. If she had to suffer that way, then why shouldn’t he?
Maybe, for the sake of the mission they’d taken on, they could prevent another morning like this by indulging in sex tonight….
The thought disseminated electric tingles everywhere within her, even as she rejected it. It would only be a diversion. They had to find Grace and Simon—and ensure that they hadn’t been involved with the deaths in Acadia. That was paramount to anything else.
No matter how tempting.
She took another sip of coffee, glad that the server had left an entire pot. They were still waiting for their breakfasts to be served.
“So what do you think?” Quinn asked, breaking the silence at their table, although the restaurant was crowded and they were surrounded by low conversations. Like her, he had on jeans today. With hers, she wore a pale green buttoned blouse that she hadn’t tucked in. She couldn’t help noticing how Quinn’s black T-shirt hugged the muscles of his chest and upper arms. At the moment, the table blocked her view of below—a good thing. “Are you up for a bus tour?”
Anyone eavesdropping would think they were tourists attempting to decide what to do today. But they already knew.
There was a rack containing tourist information near the front desk at their hotel. Prominently featured were brochures for one of the island’s tour-bus lines. That line was also the one recommended by the concierge on duty that morning. He’d said that all guests to whom they recommended that outfit came back pleased, so it was the tour company they suggested most often.
When he continued to extol their services, Kristine wondered if the concierge received kickbacks. Fine. Quinn and she needed to learn all they could about the Bar Harbor area as fast as possible. And if they could learn it from the most likely company to have shown last week’s newlyweds around, all the better for collecting information.
“A bus tour sounds great, honey.” Kristine beamed as the server brought her breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast.
“Good thing, since I already made reservations for the one recommended at the hotel. We leave in forty-five minutes.” Why did the way he quirked one edge of his mouth look so sexy? She knew that what he said was intended to be yet another kind of challenge. She had made it clear that she wanted to be involved in all decisions despite the fact he outranked her in the military.
But what they were doing here was independent of Alpha Force—at least somewhat.
So, Kristine didn’t bite at his goading. She didn’t even start to chew him out.
She suddenly realized that even after working as an aide to a shifter for as long as she had, her thought processes hadn’t completely adapted. Thinking about biting and chewing in the presence of a werewolf … She smiled at the idea.
Quinn raised his dark brows slightly, then smiled back. He had ordered an egg dish, too—a combo that included a small steak.
“We’d better finish our breakfasts as soon as we can,” Kristine said. “I’d like to stop in at the local tourist center to see what other information we can pick up.” Shorthand for saying they’d also ask about any recent visitors who’d admitted to being honeymooners.
But as it turned out, they learned half an hour later, no one at the town’s main tourist information center remembered seeing anyone like Grace and Simon—even though Quinn gave detailed descriptions. His skill wasn’t surprising, Kristine thought, with Quinn’s private investigator background. He might have tracked other people before—in both of his forms. Knowing how to ask the right questions in the right way had to be part of his former career.
They hurried to the parking lot for the bus tour Quinn had scheduled. Quinn grabbed her hand to help quicken her pace. Kristine continued to play along with their honeymooner cover while much too aware again of the innocent contact.
As they sprinted along the narrow Bar Harbor sidewalks, past stores and tourists, Kristine kept reminding herself that the man whose sleek, muscular form raced by her side was someone she could only pretend to want to touch all over.
Doing it while they spent at least another few nights together remained off-limits.
Quinn muscled them into the bus before any of the other tourists. Now they sat on the right side, across from the tour guide, who was positioned behind the driver.
Quinn had the aisle seat, and Kristine sat by the window. Stragglers still entered the bus, which was already warm and crowded even with most windows open.
That prevented Quinn from getting too friendly with the guide. The questions that formed much of the reason for this tour had to wait.
The vehicle was configured like a school bus. Maybe it actually had transported students in its youth, since the seats weren’t particularly wide.
Which meant Quinn’s hips were snug against Kristine’s, reminding him of his uncomfortable night of knowing she was in the room with him. Hearing her breathe—and not the deep respiration of sleep most of the time.
Kissing her. Feeling her against him, however briefly, as he’d taunted her. And then sensing her warm, sexy presence right beside him in that bed that might as well have been a mile wide, considering how far they stayed from each other.
Yeah, they might be undercover, but they weren’t under covers—not together. He had to keep reminding himself that they weren’t really even coworkers. He was her temporary superior officer, and she was his aide.
Another good reason for him not to have joined the military: all the protocol and rules about fraternization and other similar nonsense.
But he remained resolved never to push Kristine to have sex with him, no matter how badly he ached to touch her all over, to bury himself in her. His feral instincts hadn’t taken over completely. He wouldn’t let them, no matter which form he was in.
And no matter that Kristine had seen him naked, both before and after his shifts so far with the Alpha Force elixir.
For the sake of learning what was going on with his brother and sister-in-law, he’d follow the rules, at least all he could. He’d act like a good little soldier despite being on an unofficial mission. He’d follow Kristine’s lead wherever it made sense, since she was more experienced.
At the moment, she was thumbing through a Bar Harbor magazine, though her speed suggested she wasn’t paying much attention to the articles and ads. He turned back toward her. “Is that worth looking at?”
“We won’t find what we’re looking for in it,” she said with a sigh, her chin raised in its normal challenge to the world. He resisted an urge to touch it.
“But we might get some ideas of where else to look,” he reminded her. “Like … well, other than Acadia Park itself, are there any wildlife sanctuaries? You know I’m particularly interested in seeing local animals.”
And trying to learn if there were any kinds that could have attacked those tourists. Especially if those victims had brought it on themselves by purposely getting too close to dangerous wildlife.
“There is a private conservation easement on some property bordering Acadia.” Kristine turned a few pages and pointed to a description of a local sanctuary. “I’m not sure if anyone can visit, but it’s seeking donations.”
“Not necessarily helpful, but—”
“Okay, ladies and gentlemen,” interrupted a gruff male voice over the bus’s loudspeaker. “We’re finally ready to get on our way.”
Quinn turned back toward the tour guide. He appeared to be in his fifties, with a scruffy salt-and-pepper beard and a green Acadia cap preventing anyone from seeing whether the rest of his hair matched. He wore a gray long-sleeved shirt and coordinated pants that looked vaguely like a uniform, and he wedged a small microphone near his narrow lips.
“I’m Wendell, your guide today.” He gave a spiel reciting rules and suggestions, then told the bus driver he was ready and they took off.
The narration was loud and would have been really interesting had Quinn actually been a tourist. In fact, he did look through the windshield toward the sights the guide pointed out—churches and parks and museums, including one specializing in local Native American culture and another focusing on natural history. Some architectural features on buildings were also worth noting. Because this was an island, the coastline appeared now and then; the Atlantic Ocean was brilliant blue beneath a clear sky, and calm that day.
Finally, they headed toward Acadia National Park. Despite his previous evening visits, that remained the place of most interest to Quinn. Plus, the tour leader got quiet while the driver headed in that direction.
Quinn felt a light squeeze on his arm. He looked over and saw Kristine’s eyes wide, her full lips pursed slightly, as if she sent him a silent message: it was time.
He smiled, covered her hand with his—a feigned newlywed gesture—and nodded. He didn’t release her hand, though. He liked the feel of it as he gripped it.
His body, unsurprisingly, also reacted as if she was doing more than touching his arm.
Squelching a sigh, he turned back toward the guide.
But Kristine acted first, squeezing his arm harder as if to communicate something—like, let me—then called to the man across the aisle.
“Wendell, my new husband and I have planned to come here for our honeymoon for ages—but now we’re a bit worried. We heard about those poor tourists’ deaths in Acadia National Park. They were mauled, weren’t they? Do the authorities know what kind of animal did it?”
The man looked stricken, hazel eyes huge beneath his scruffy gray brows. He pulled the microphone away from his mouth, clearly not wanting the crowd on the filled bus to hear. His voice was hardly audible over the bus’s growling engine. “No, ma’am, ‘fraid they don’t have any answers yet—at least none they’re talking about, though they’re looking. I assure you that we’ll keep all of you close on this tour. No one’ll be hurt.”
“Thank you so much, Wendell.” Kristine sounded relieved and even a bit flirtatious.
Maybe she was the better one to take the lead on this. What man wouldn’t try to soothe the concerns of a woman as pretty as her—especially when she turned on her vast charm? She hadn’t done that with him, though. Probably a good thing.
“But,” she continued, “I read that it could be wolves. Are there wolves in Acadia? I researched the park on the internet and thought that there weren’t any wolves around here now.”
“That’s right.” Wendell nodded. “Used to be in the past, I’ve heard, but not at present. Could be coyotes or even wild dogs, I suppose, though I’ve never heard of any attacking people before. I’m sure the authorities will figure it out soon. Meantime, we’ll just be extra careful. Ah, here we are.”
The bus pulled in through a gate, and Wendell talked to the park rangers standing in the booth.
In a short while, the bus was moving again. The park was an amazing conglomeration of mountains overlooking the ocean, as well as numerous lakes. The vistas were wide. The forests were vast—and could hide any number of wild animals such as those Quinn had sensed last night.
But most wild animals stayed far from humans, even those that presented possible danger. If they attacked, there had to be a reason like hunger, or fear.
Considering how lush this area appeared, it probably hid a lot of possible prey, so hunger was unlikely.
Fear? Maybe. Those tourists could have come across some creature in the wild and baited it in some way—even just out of wildlife-loving curiosity—until it attacked.
But the most likely scenario, in Quinn’s opinion, was that someone—who? and how?—knew of Simon and Grace, their belonging to Alpha Force, and what Alpha Force was. The attack did, after all, occur on the night of a full moon.
The clues so far were few. But to save Simon and Grace—and maybe even Alpha Force—Kristine and he would nevertheless locate those newlyweds. Fast. They had to.
And they would also uncover who was trying to frame them, and how … and why.
Chapter 6
The bus bumped and climbed slowly along a narrow uphill road. Kristine watched from her sideways angle as the Asian-American driver concentrated on what he was doing. His hands were clasped tightly on the wheel and he frowned while staring straight ahead.
Glancing out the window beside her, Kristine looked out onto a cliff composed of magnificent rock formations that plunged down to the water below.
And smiled as she took in the gorgeous sight.
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“Yeah.”
At his uncharacteristically soft tone, Kristine glanced toward Quinn. He was looking at her.
She swallowed in confusion. Well, gee. They were supposed to be acting like honeymooners. He was just doing a good job.
Even so, she quickly turned away from both Quinn and the window.
Wendell now leaned back in his seat, apparently assuming he’d answered everything Kristine intended to ask. Not so.
Why wasn’t Quinn jumping in with questions, too? He was the former investigator, not her. So far, Kristine had kept things general and vague. She hadn’t figured out a graceful way to segue into what they really needed to know: Had Grace and Simon been on this tour? That could be hard to ask since the guide hadn’t sought the names of his current passengers, nor even where they were from. He probably didn’t get to know any tourists well enough to identify them by name.
But there was one thing he could do: now that they were in the park, he could surely point out where the mauled tourists’ bodies had been found.
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Linda Johnston
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Danger and desire collide in this race against time… PI Quinn Parran’s new mission is to join Alpha Force, a unique military team of shapeshifters, and use their new elixir that will enhance his shapeshifting abilities. But with Sergeant Kristine Norwood, each shifting experiment sparks a volatile primal passion.And when Quinn’s brother vanishes on his honeymoon, he must join forces with Kristine and go undercover as newlyweds to investigate. While Kristine is attracted to the ruggedly handsome Quinn she isn’t about to get involved with a shapeshifter – until their quest becomes more dangerous.Now they must cross the divide between shifter and human, because every minute they’re apart brings the threat closer.