Legend of the White Wolf

Chapter 4

THE FIRE GLOWED IN THE MASSIVE STONE FIREPLACE AS Kintail Silverman paced across his lodge's great room miles from where his new troubles lay, wondering how the hell he was going to remedy this mess while other members of his pack kept an eye on Owen and David in the den.

Kintail glanced at Lila Grayson. She looked a little contrite for once and he frowned. "You were supposed to be watching Owen. David will do anything we say, but Owen... he's trouble. How many phone calls did he make before Trevor caught him? And twice, he's tried to escape. The only good thing about any of this is we're too remote for him to get word out, he doesn't know his way around out here, and he doesn't have a clue how to deal with the shapeshifting aspect." Kintail stared out one of the picture windows at the blowing snow, the cold so invigorating, even now he wanted to shift and run like the wolf he was.

He couldn't kill Owen, not yet. He knew the man needed some time to adjust. If only his partner, Cameron MacPherson, wasn't on the way to rescue Owen and David now. That's what was causing him all the heartburn.

Lila cocked her head in her arrogant way, yet he knew insecurities about something in her past fed her actions. Given time, he figured she would eventually come around.

"You shouldn't have changed them. Or at least David."

She smiled. "I don't think Owen's forgiven me for biting him."

Kintail liked it when she smiled, as if a part of her gentler nature was trying to reveal itself. But now wasn't the time to concern himself about his issues with Lila. Neither David or Owen had any family left in Seattle. Kintail hadn't thought one of their partners would look into the situation.

Kintail shook his head. "If we didn't have so many hunting parties scheduled for the next several weeks, we'd leave early for Yellowknife. Take them with us and isolate ourselves. But we can't split up the pack, and we can't leave right now. Not without hurting our business and ruining our reputation here."

He loved living here half of the year, flaunting what they were while the locals and tourists didn't have a clue. Except for the Cree in the area—they knew, but they revered the wolf, which worked to Kintail and his people's advantage. "I'm sure nowhere else in the States can a werewolf pack show off their pack members in broad daylight, anywhere and everywhere, and get away with it."

Lila stretched her arms above her head, then crossed them. "I agree, and that's what's so much fun about living here in the winter, being around people who are clueless as to what we are, thinking that our wolves are like old good-natured dogs. But what about this Cameron MacPherson? Can't we just change him, too?"

Kintail didn't care for the interest in Lila's tone of voice or the expression on her face. He knew her well enough to recognize she was intrigued with the man. Did she think maybe she could convince Cameron to take over the pack and then mate with her just because Kintail wasn't freely mating with her? Cameron? A newly turned lupus garou? She had to be nuts if she thought Kintail would lose against the newcomer. Besides, her secretive past was what was keeping her from letting Kintail get close to her. He doubted she could get close to Cameron anymore than she could with him.

"If he's coming to rescue his partners, he's sure to be an alpha. There's only one way to deal with him."

"Hmm, well, can't we just make an offer first? Then if he says no, whatever happens to him is his own damned fault?" she asked.

Kintail gave her a hard look.

She lifted a shoulder and pushed her hair back into a ponytail, and he inwardly groaned at how enticing the woman looked. "You're the boss of course. But it seems to me if we can get him to join us, that would be the best scenario." Then she curled her lips down, and he knew what was coming next. "What about the woman? She's been snooping around, asking about Trevor. Looking for information on her father's trip here."

"Trevor swore Kenneth O'Malley didn't see anything, but Hilson says he has evidence that her father saw one of us shapeshifting."

Lila sat down on one of the velvet couches. "So… my question, again, is what do we do with her? What we should have done with her father when he was here before, is my way of thinking."

Kintail gave Lila a sly smile. "She could make a nice addition to the pack." Lila had only joined his pack two years ago from a group in Finland. He still wasn't sure what her deal was, except she had been born a lupus garou like him. But she hadn't allowed any of his pack members to get close to her. Especially not him. Unless she thought she could get him to bend to her wishes. She really didn't know him that well. Yet.

"We have enough females in the pack," Lila snapped.

"We can never have enough females what with the shortages there are. Besides, Hilson wants to deal with her."

"Hmph, if he'd dealt with her when he first staked her old man out, we wouldn't have this new situation. What's your brother's problem? She's not too alpha for him, is she?"

Kintail rubbed his chin and looked back out the window. He wondered why his brother hadn't already taken the woman for his own. Maybe she was too alpha for him.

Cameron didn't see anything near the lake where he'd heard the man yell, although the way voices traveled, he might have been much farther away. But when the sound of snowmobiles started up at the cabins, his intuition immediately kicked in, warning him something wasn't right.

He trudged through the knee-deep snow as fast as he could manage in the blowing wind, retracing his steps as much as possible to make it easier to run. The snowmobiles sounded like they were leaving the area around Faith's cabin. Which he assumed meant only one thing. At least two people were stealing them.

But as soon as he saw Faith racing around the side of her cabin half dressed, wearing no parka, gloves, or ski hat, shouting, "Bastards!" his heart nearly froze.

"Faith!"

She whipped around, her brows knit in a deep frown, her mouth curved down, her bare fists held tight at her sides. "They stole our snowmobiles!" She stiffly waved down the road.

"Go inside," he warned, as the snow covered her hair and stuck to her sweater, the wind still not subsiding, and he figured she'd catch pneumonia the way she was dressed.

She waded through the deep snow, stopped, looked down, then fished a cast-iron frying pan out of a snow drift, whisked around, and returned to the porch. In disbelief, he watched her. Hell, the woman was lethal. Despite the circumstances, he smiled, then hurried around the cabin and looked down the road. The snow mobiles were long gone.

When he stepped inside and closed the door, Faith was busily jotting down information. "Blue parka, black ski mask, scrawny build but tall, jeans, cowboy boots, black gloves, yellow goggles. Other guy—black parka, black ski mask, heftier, same approximate height, jeans, snow boots, brown gloves, 9mm," she muttered under her breath.

"One of the bastards had a gun?" Cameron pulled off his gloves, parka, and hat, setting each of them on the chair near the wood-burning stove, then lifted a blue floral towel she'd hung over the log footboard of the bed.

"Yeah, pointed it at me when I started chasing them."

"Before or after you pitched the frying pan at them?" He joined her and ran the towel over her wet hair. She melted a little under his ministrations, and he leaned over and kissed her cheek, her skin still cold. "Hell, Faith, didn't they ever teach you not to chase armed men when you don't have a weapon of equal or superior might?" he scolded, dropped the towel on a chair and pulled her tightly into his arms.

She turned her head and frowned up at him. "I didn't know he had a gun at first. Not until he pointed it at me. Bastards."

"The snowmobiles are insured."

"Well, yours has a slight dent on the tail end now. But it doesn't make me any less angry knowing they're insured."

"You hit my snowmobile?" He released her and began massaging her tense shoulders, her sweater soft, slippery, and springtime fragrant. She leaned into his touch, and he was ready to carry her off to bed, to sooth his frayed nerves… in his own way.

"I aimed for the guy, but that frying pan weighs a ton so it didn't have the lift I'd hoped for." She growled, then purred as he continued to massage. "Good thing you brought your stuff in or they would have stolen your gear, too."

"All I care about is they didn't steal you away." Even now his heart was still racing from worrying she might have come to harm. "Did they do anything other than take the machines?"

"Not that I saw. What about you? Did you find anyone in trouble out there?"

"It might have been a diversion to draw me away from the cabin. They might have suspected that if only one of us was here, they could steal the snowmobiles."

"One of us. You mean the weaker sex." She pulled away and dished up the spinach.

Chuckling, he squeezed her arm to reassure her he didn't feel that way in the least about her, then served up the salmon on hefty-sized dark brown plates. "Believe me, I don't want to ever make you that angry. Weaker sex? How much damage did you do to my snowmobile with that frying pan?"

She gave an evil smile. "At least if I see it again, I can recognize it better."

When they sat down to eat, Cameron wondered if his insurance or hers would cover the damage to his snow mobile given the circumstances for the bash. He was about to cut into his fish when he spied his couple-sized, down sleeping bag spread out over the mattress like a welcome mat through the open bedroom door. He tried to conceal his smile before she caught it, but what could he say? His motives were usually crystal clear when it came to women.

"Trying to take all your stuff to your cabin in this storm without the use of a snowmobile isn't a good idea," she said, matter-of-factly.

He nodded, very serious-like, as he took a bite of his salmon. But the thing of it was, she had to have laid out the sleeping bag earlier, before the machines were stolen. Had to have, because she wouldn't have had time to do it afterward without his catching her when he came inside.

"I wholeheartedly agree."

"Besides, you owe me breakfast and there's no way I'm traipsing in the cold all the way to your place at six in the morning to have it."

"Six in the morning?" Hell, he thought that was just this morning's schedule, a way to get ahead of the incoming snowstorm.

"Yes, that's when I'm always raring to go."

"I thought this was a vacation for you." Now maybe he'd get the truth out of her.

The sound of her laughter was lighthearted and fun loving. "My internal alarm clock wakes me at five every morning. It's amazing what I can accomplish by getting up early."

"Maybe you just haven't had the right incentive to stay in bed yet." He was afraid his smile was a little too wolfish when her cheeks blossomed with color, but the coy smile she offered in return made her eyes sparkle with humor.

She saluted him with her cup of green tea. He saluted her back with the awful stuff.

Yeah, he'd make it worth her while to stay in bed until it was a decent wake-up time in the morning. Especially if he couldn't have a cup of coffee first thing.

Now, he was glad he'd brought his made-especially for-couples sleeping bag. And to think the reason he'd taken that one and not his single sleeper was it would serve more like real bedding while he stayed in the cabin, and truthfully, it was lighter weight and easier to compress than his old one. For the first time, he didn't mind that an earlier girlfriend had ditched him before they had the chance to try it out. Or that his latest girl friend wouldn't have taken a step in any direction that had to do with sleeping bags.

If he could just get a good fix on his friends and maybe even help Faith with whatever reason she was really here, this could turn out to be a nice little getaway. Notwithstanding that they had to get word to the police in Millinocket whenever they could that their snowmobiles had been stolen.

After eating lunch, Cameron helped clear away the dishes. Without snowmobiles, or the lodge owners in residence at the moment, there wasn't much else to do with the snowstorm still pelting them, but hunker down in the cabin… or…

Cameron glanced back in the direction of the main lodge. The cedar hot tub was supposed to be fired up nightly. Two heated shower facilities with flush toilets were connected to it. Since no one was here to object, maybe he'd heat up the hot tub a little early.

"Did you bring a swimsuit?" he asked.

Faith stopped putting some of her sweaters in a drawer of a small three drawer chest and looked at him as if he'd lost his mind. "Lake's frozen solid. And I'm not a member of the polar bear swim club either."

"I was thinking more in the line of a hot tub."

Her expression brightened considerably. "Oh, I forgot about that." Then she seemed subdued again. "But the owners aren't here." She returned to the kitchen and pulled the cans of groceries from a plastic sack, then tucked them under the cabinet.

"And the owners should be in residence. Besides, we wouldn't do anything they wouldn't do if they were here. So I figure, why not?"

She shook her head. "I thought you were an Eagle Scout."

"I am, but…" He shrugged. "So, do you have a swimsuit?"

Looking thoughtful, she pulled a golden curl behind her ear, which made him want to nibble her lobe, right then and there.

"I wonder how many other guests are here?"

She was going for it! And he bet she didn't have a swimsuit.

"Not many. Looked like at least half of the eight cabins were under renovation, closed tight. I saw lights on in one of the remaining ones. None on in the other. And of course there's mine, which is vacant. Otherwise, that's it."

"One renter. Could be an active family with tons of kids. What if they showed up about the time we did our illegal firing up of the hot tub in the late afternoon? Here we'd be, snuggled down in the hot soupy water, and kids with floaties would pour onto the deck, chattering, and laughing, and—"

"I'll heat up the hot tub and be right back." He didn't wait for another objection—if she was even going to offer one—shoved his jacket on, and hurried outside.

He thought about what she might wear for their excursion. Something pink and lacy? White, maybe? Daring red? Black and seductive?

The stiff wind hit him with a blast of snow. He wished he hadn't been in such a hurry and had taken his goggles and ski hat. Next trip, when he escorted his date to the spa, he'd be better prepared.

When he reached the deck attached to the shower house, he plowed through the snow and retracted the cover on the spa. Steam rose from the heated water. He pulled off a glove and stuck his hand in. Warm, not really hot. After turning the heat up and the jets on, he pulled his glove back on and rubbed his hands. Billions of bubbles popped up, creating a white foam, soon hiding the Caribbean blue marble effect on the walls of the circular tub.

He would have opted for one that was couple-sized, but the spa looked like it could hold six to seven adults, not half as cozy as he would have liked. And the awful thought it could be filled with lots of kids came to mind. He turned on the lights around the edge of the tub, then found a snow shovel in a utility shed, and cleared as much of a path on the deck as he could up to the cedar surrounded spa from the changing rooms. He envisioned Faith in the tub with him and how hot things could get if he and Faith could have more privacy. Too bad they didn't have one inside their own cabin.

Then he went inside the changing room to warm it up so they could shed the majority of their clothes. A gust of bitter cold wind blew in through the doorway and he turned, thinking Faith couldn't wait to join him. But no, it was some other woman, and he felt a pang of disappointment. If she was a guest, that was the end of his plans to share some private time with Faith. But then he wondered if this woman was one of the owners ready to give him a dressing down for heating up the hot tub without permission.

"Lila Grayson," she said, slamming the door shut behind her with a lot more force than needed.

Lila Grayson, the one from Back Country Tours—it hit him as odd that she'd arrive here of all places. Wearing ski boots, an ivory wool sweater, and ski pants, she looked ready for cold weather expeditions, minus the ski jacket. Tangled by the wind, her platinum blond hair drifted past her shoulders. Her golden eyes wary, she was a looker, with skin the same color as her clothes and ruby lips glossed for show. High angled cheekbones gave her the look of a movie star, but her tiny nose contradicted that image. She pulled off her glove and extended a hand.

"Cameron MacPherson," he said, shaking her hand. "You run Back Country Tours?" Now maybe he'd get some answers concerning his friends.

She lifted her nose and sniffed. "You were in my office earlier today? Along with a woman friend? Found one of my employees dead, according to the police?"

So, she hadn't just happened to run across him here. She was investigating him.

"Yeah, I was looking for you or your partner, Kintail Silverman. Two of my friends went on a hunt and haven't returned."

"Owen and David are quitting. Haven't they told you?" She raised a brow and smiled just a hint, but it was icy like her whole demeanor.

"Quitting the hunt."

"No, quitting your business. They're going up north with us, joining our hunting guide team. They're tired of the P.I. work. Didn't they tell you?"

Cameron stared at the woman as if she'd managed to turn him into a frog. "I'll hear it from them first."

"Owen said he called your partner, Gavin. Said he told him they were quitting the business. Since you were…"—she smiled—"checking out our office, I figured you might not have gotten the official word yet."

"I'll get the official word directly from them."

"Hmm," she purred and took a step toward him, and he envisioned a lioness on a hunt, her eyes fixed on him, just waiting for the right moment to pounce and rip out his jugular. She reached her hand out and trailed her fingernails down his sweater. "Maybe you could quit your job, too. Come join us."

That's when the door suddenly opened and Faith stalked inside, a frozen smile on her lips, her eyes narrowed in a confrontational way. She looked as though she was ready to punch out her competition, and he loved it. "Forgot your towel, honey." Faith waved the blue towel at him and slid her arm around his waist, snuggling up next to him. She gave Lila a get-lost look.

He was ready to play the lover's role for real.

Lila sniffed the air. "She's the one with you at my office this morning. Are you looking for his partners, too? Or something else?" she asked Faith.

Faith stiffened. "Office? You're from Back Country Tours?"

"Lila Grayson."

"I'm looking for Trevor Hodges. He works for you, right?"

Her smile faked, Lila said, "Not of late. What did you want him for?"

"He guided my father on a… tour. I wanted to see the route they took."

Lila narrowed her eyes. "And you are?"

"Faith O'Malley."

The woman's eyes widened a little in recognition. Then she smiled slyly. "Well, old Trevor Hodges could be anywhere out there." She waved her hand around in the direction of Baxter Park and the surrounding woods. Then she glanced outside at the steamy spa. "Don't want to let your water get cold." She smiled again at Cameron. "Offer still stands, if you decide to come work with us."

"Have David and Owen meet me at the lodge, and I'll hear for myself if they plan to quit our partnership."

"I'll be sure to give them the message." Lila whipped around and headed out of the building, shoving the door against the wall as she left the place.

Faith hurried to close the door against the blowing wind.

"Why did she recognize your name?" Cameron asked, pulling off his sweater.

"Dad seems to have made an impression on a lot of people. And she might have met him when he hired Trevor to take him on the tour." Faith dumped her ski coat on one of the cedar benches.

"I thought maybe there'd been some trouble when your father came on his trip here. At least the way Lila responded it sounded that way."

Faith tossed her sweater onto her coat. "What was the business offer she proposed to you?"

The fact Faith changed the topic so quickly made him wonder even more what this was all about. "She wanted me to become one of her guides."

"And you don't believe your friends would quit the partnership like that?"

"Nope. We've been friends since grade school. Always talked of having a partnership. And even if they did want to jump ship, they'd never do it like this without discussing it with us, and then giving us time to downsize or get a couple of new partners."

"Hmm, so it sounds like Lila Grayson and probably her partner, Kintail Silverman, have something going on."

"Yeah." But what was the deal with Faith, her father, and Trevor Hodges? "Do you believe that Trevor Hodges no longer works for Back Country Tours?"

"Nope. No more than I believe your friends are leaving you and your other partner high and dry without saying so face-to-face." She unbuttoned her blouse.

He felt like a kid in a candy store, waiting to see all the treats. He turned around and pulled off his shirt to give her some privacy. When he tugged off his jeans, the door squeaked open and shut, and he looked around to see she'd left him. Smiling, he hurried to join her outside. The cold wind whipped across his bare skin, as she quickly slipped into the hot water with a splash. He got an eyeful of blue bikini panties, a matching blue bra cut nice and low, and pristine peach flesh covered in goose bumps. She lowered herself into the bubbling water, the swell of her breasts lifted above the foam. Her gaze moved lower, her expression bemused; his body was certainly responding. He hoped he wouldn't embarrass himself.

"Warm enough?" Although as hot as she looked, he figured she could heat the water right up.

"Hmm, perfect." She closed her eyes and rubbed the hot water over her neck and shoulders and sank lower into the tub.

Yeah, perfect was right. No matter what the woman wore, or didn't wear, she was a sight for deprived eyes.

Cameron climbed into the water and settled next to Faith, wanting to make the night with her something special. The warm water and powerful massaging jets that targeted his lower back and calves were only half the fun. The sound of gentle moving water through amplifiers built into the tub casing covered the noise of the jets. "This makes the cold and the trip well worth it."

Before he could settle in nice and close to her and take advantage of her soft expressive mouth, a gray-haired old lady waddled from the back side of the building in a coat and short snow boots, but her white, hairy legs were bare. She smiled. "Be right out, folks." She entered the changing room and shut the door.

Cameron scooted even closer to Faith, his body touching hers, the image of her half naked sitting this close to him in the heated water, stirring up a raging need. Before the woman returned, he shifted restlessly, his gaze moving from the shower house to the object of his most fervent desire. Faith. Her lips wore a tentative smile, but her eyes—they challenged him to take the first step. He couldn't help being irritated with the stranger, to say it mildly. But he wasn't about to let the woman stop what he had in mind to do.

He leaned over and pressed his lips against Faith's mouth, savoring the velvety softness, the way she woke to his touch, lifting her chin to accommodate him, closing her eyes, her hands clutching at his forearms. He touched her supple breasts and she moaned softly, but the moment was all too short.

Shattering the mood, the older woman exited the room, wearing a tent-size bathing suit in hot shimmering pink and the furry boots. "Charles must have fired up the hot tub earlier than usual, although I haven't heard a peep out of his sled dogs. He must've figured we couldn't get out in this weather to ice fish. Always so considerate of his guests. I'm Mary."

"Faith, Cameron," he said, pulling away from Faith, although his leg and hip still rested against hers. His hand shifted to her thigh, caressing, enjoying her silky skin, and the way she leaned against him. But even though her eyes were smoky with desire, the newcomer's presence caught Faith's focus. All he could hope for at this point was that Mary would tire of the tub quick enough and leave so he could get back to business.

"On your honeymoon?" Mary asked, smiling as if she were a woman in the know.

Faith said yes as he said no. The old woman laughed. "I've been there, done that myself."

As soon as she had her boots off, the sound of crunching snow from the direction of the backside of the shower house warned them others were coming. Faith gave Cameron an I-told-you-so look, and he figured it was time to leave before the woman's grandkids showed up with the floaties. Except that the way the newcomers moved, the footfalls sounded more like adults' and not overzealous kids'.

Three men around Cameron's age came into view and gave Faith interested looks, then went inside the changing room.

"Do you want to leave?" Cameron asked, figuring she'd want to, as he certainly did.

She patted him on the leg and leaned over to speak in his ear, her whisper soft voice rousing him even more, which made him wish the others would just vanish in a puff of mist. "I hate to be run off, Cameron. The jets feel so good on my back." She snuggled closer and kept her hand on his thigh.

Hell, now he was really ready to take her back to the cabin and try out his new sleeping bag for two with her. "Are you sure?" He ran his hand over her arm and kissed her cheek, hoping to coax her away so they could have more privacy.

She gave him an interested smile. Yeah, she was game, but she still wasn't leaving the warmth of the hot tub. Couldn't blame her there. The heat and pulsing jets were only part of the draw though—the sexy, nearly naked body snuggled up beside him, soft and malleable and hot and wet—that's what inspired him to stay a while longer.

The raggedy-looking guy with frizzy red hair and a shaggy beard exited the building and gave Faith a wink, his green eyes challenging her to join him— later. Barefooted, the other men hurried out of the shower house and across the snowy deck to reach the tub pronto.

Cameron wrapped his arm around Faith's shoulders and gave her a squeeze, not caring if he was showing his possessiveness. Besides, he was keeping Faith warm, in case she needed him to. She responded by leaning her head on his shoulder and caressing his thigh, way too erotic for all the company they had, although with all of the millions of bubbles rolling to the surface of the water, no one could see a thing. Speculation was another story, and he imagined everyone was speculating away. "He wasn't no Bigfoot," the redhead said to his companions as he climbed into the sauna and sat next to Mary.

The old lady laughed. "Bigfoot, Chris? When I was a girl, three of my friends and me saw him. Or might've been a her. Twelve foot tall he was. Hairy, slouched over like a bent-shaped man, only naked and bigger. He glimpsed us in the woods, sniffed the air, then hurried into the shelter of the trees, and disappeared. I wanted to follow him. See where he went. But the other kids were too chicken."

"You saw him around here?" Faith asked, at once her body stiffening with interest, surprising the hell out of Cameron.

He really didn't think she'd be interested in hearing about fairy tales, since she was a forensic scientist, dealing in scientific fact.

"North of here. Toward Baxter Park," Mary said, nodding vigorously, as if she'd gotten a live one to listen to her tall tale.

The black-haired man of the three shook his head and looked over at Faith. There was something about the way he observed her, not as if he was interested in her sexually, but something else. Almost as if he were a cop, watching for her reaction. "Not Bigfoot this time," the guy said. "It's one of those others, and we need to take care of business."

"One of what others?" Faith asked, sounding a little too interested.

Don't encourage them, Cameron wanted to say. Hell, next they'd be talking about little green men and being poked and probed on a spaceship from a galaxy far, far away.

Chris smiled at her, then looked at his friends, but the expressions on their faces said that this was still a secret and they weren't about to share their findings with a couple of strangers.

Cameron was just as glad. But Faith persisted. "What was it you saw?"

Chris cleared his throat and gave her a half smile. "Maybe we can talk about it in private sometime."

"Ah, Chris, can't you see the two are together?" Mary teased.

"Her loss," he said, grinning at Faith.

Cameron wanted to wipe the grin off Chris's face, and although he wanted to take Faith out of here pronto, he couldn't now. It had to be her call, or he'd look like a possessive, overbearing lout.

Chris turned to the black-haired guy who was patting the bubbles on the surface of the water, his nearly ebony gaze still on Faith. "Should we tell her, Matt?"

Matt shook his head. "Privately, if she wants, just like you said." His voice was cold and calculating, and Cameron didn't like it one bit.

Faith stared Matt down, and then turned her head and looked up at Cameron with the most adoring expression. He thought it was faked just for their audience's benefit, but he was willing to believe. "Ready to call it a night, honey?" she asked, her tone seductively enticing.

Well past ready, but his heated gaze wasn't in the least bit false.

"It's about that time. Wait, and I'll get your towel." What he wanted to do was kick the men's asses out of here while Faith got out, and he would have, too, if she'd agreed.

He climbed out of the hot tub, grabbed her floral towel, and held it down close to the water so she could leave without showing off her wet bra and panties. No one said a word, and he suspected the guys were watching her in rabid fascination, but he was too busy trying to shield her from them to see. With the towel wrapped around her, she headed into the women's shower room, and he entered the men's room.

Once he was dressed, he left the changing room, out of view of the hot tub to wait for her near the path they would take to her cabin, when he saw three feral looking white wolves in the trees near the main lodge, the blowing snow almost disguising them. Lila stepped out of the forest to join them, her red lips turned up in a half smile. "Kintail told me to bring you to our hunting camp. You can see Owen and David there."

He wanted to speak to them. But not like this. Not off in the wilderness somewhere that he couldn't communicate with authorities if need be. Not without some kind of backup.

"I'll take your suggestion under consideration. In the meantime, I've told the police about my missing friends."

Her lips curved up even more. "Good for you. I imagine they were readying the search parties right away."

The woman had him there.

She snorted. "Didn't think so. See you around, Cameron."

She turned and took a few steps in the direction of the snow-cloaked spruces, and he swore, dressed all in white still, she evaporated into the snow-filled wonder land. Her wolves eyed him longer, then one by one, they whipped around and vanished, too.

"Cameron!" Faith hollered from around the backside of the shower and hot tub building, sounding distressed and in need of his help.

In full rescue mode, the adrenaline pumping pell-mell through his blood, Cameron dashed around the building to save her.