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on your head making you sleep?” he asked the
unconscious woman, careful y lifting first one and then the
other of her eyelids. Again relieved to see her pupils
appeared normal and even, Alec sat down and took off his
boots. He then stood up and started stripping off his own
wet clothes as he studied what was definitely a ful -bred
wolf. A northern timber wolf, he would guess; its long guard
hairs muted black over a soft pelt of gray, with piercing
eyes of hazel-gold watching him from a broad wet face.
“Aye, you’re a good partner in a fight,” he said as he
shoved off his pants and boxers. “And I thank you for not
going for my throat.”
The wolf’s brows were al that moved as its gaze fol owed
Alec around the shelter as he dried off with another towel
and slipped into clean clothes. He pul ed the band off his
wet hair, toweled it dry as wel , then combed his fingers
through the shoulder-length waves before tying them
against the nape of his neck again. He crouched down and
laid a hand on the woman’s forehead, gently smoothing her
brow with his thumb. “She’s going to be okay,” he promised
the wolf as he stood up and walked to the front rail of the
three-wal ed lean-to that sat twenty yards up from the trail.
The storm was final y making its way north between
the mountain they were on and the one at the end of the
fiord, leaving in its wake an almost obscene silence but for
the water gently dripping off the leaves. Alec glanced in the
direction of the men and blew out a sigh, then walked to the
rear wal and pul ed down a smal backpack. He placed a
coil of rope inside, along with the resort’s satel ite phone
and the medical kit, and slipped the pack over his
shoulders. He sat down and dug two pairs of socks out of
his duffel, putting on one pair fol owed by his boots, then
rol ed to his knees and peeled back the bottom of the
sleeping bag.
He slid off the woman’s socks—one of them
shredded from her ru
her feet with his hands to take away some of the chil . He
then slipped his oversized socks on her and tucked the bag
around her legs before moving to her head. Alec reached
inside the sleeping bag, pressed his palm just below her
col arbone, and felt her steady heartbeat and even
breathing.
“Ye stay here and keep warming her up,” he told the wolf,
tucking the bag tightly around the woman before standing
up, “while I go tie our two sorry friends to a tree and cal the
sheriff to come get them. And I’l cal the resort to come get
your lady.” He gri
riding in a helicopter.”
Alec started to leave, but stopped when the woman
suddenly moaned, and he turned to see her lift a hand from
the confines of the sleeping bag when the wolf licked her
face. He crouched down beside her again, laying a
steadying hand on her shoulder when she tried to sit up.
“Easy, now. You’re safe. No one’s going to hurt you.”
She pressed back into the pil ow, confusion clouding
the deepest green eyes he’d ever seen. “Wh-who are you?
Where am I?” she asked, her gaze darting around the
shelter. She started to pul her other hand free, only to
gather the oversized T-shirt she was wearing into her fist,
her gaze snapping to his. “You undressed me.”
He nodded. “I needed to get you dry to warm ye up,” he
explained, stifling a grin when her other hand moved inside
the bag and she gasped. “Don’t worry, I kept my eyes
closed,” he said with a wink when her emerald gaze
narrowed, her indignation assuring him she was wel on the
road to recovery. “What’s your name, lass?”
She blinked up at him, saying nothing.
Alec shrugged and stood up. “If you’l excuse me, then, I
have some trash I need to deal with. I’l cal the sheriff and
then the resort to have their helicopter come pick you up.”
He nodded toward the wolf. “Does your tenacious protector
have a name, at least? Because I’m thinking he deserves a
few slobbering kisses in return for the way he ran to your
rescue.”
She pul ed the sleeping bag up to her chin, again saying
nothing.
“Okay then, I guess I’l be on my way.”
“Wait,” she said when he walked down the steps, making
him turn back. She rose up on one elbow, causing the towel
to fal off her hair. “I don’t … Could you please not …” She
took a deep breath. “Please don’t cal the authorities. I don’t
want anyone to know I’m here.”
“You can’t be serious,” he said, scaling the steps to
crouch down beside her again. “Your family must be going
out of their minds looking for you.” He touched her bruised
wrist. “You’ve obviously been missing for several days.”
“But nobody knows I’m missing,” she whispered,
clutching his arm. “Please, could you let me stay here with
you for a few days, just until I get my strength back and can
decide what I need to do?”
Was she serious? “Hel , woman, for al you know I could
be more dangerous than the bastards who had you. You
don’t know a damn thing about me.”
“I know you didn’t hesitate to save me from two armed
men.”
“The wolf took care of one of them,” he snapped,
standing up. Why in hel was she asking him to stay? Was
someone stil after her? Or was that bump on her head
making her delirious? “What’s your name?”
Her gaze lowered. “Jane.”
“Jane what?”
“Smith,” she said, her cheeks darkening with her obvious
lie.
“Wel , Jane Smith,” he muttered, walking off the platform
again. He stopped and looked at her. “We’l discuss your
staying when I get back from dealing with the trash before it
crawls away.”
“You could just kil them,” she said quietly, “and bury their
bodies under a rock.”
Okay then, he must be delirious, because he’d swear
she’d just asked him to commit murder. “No, I can’t,” he
said just as quietly, “because then I would have to kil any
witnesses.”
She didn’t even bat an eyelash. “I won’t watch.”
At a complete loss as to how to respond, Alec strode off
—only to stop when she cal ed to him again. “I have a
couple of bags,” she said. “But I had to leave them when I
realized the men were gaining on me. Could you get them
for me, please?”
“Are they ful of gold? Stolen art? Drugs? ”
“No,” she said, startled. “They’re ful of my clothes.” She
reached behind her and gave the wolf a shove. “Kitty knows
where they are.”
Alec closed his eyes. “Please tel me ye didn’t just cal
that noble beast Kitty.”
“And could you feed me when you get back from dealing
with the … trash? I haven’t eaten for three days.”
She was a rather bossy victim. “I’l see if Kitty and I can’t hunt down a squirrel or two while we’re at it,” he said,
turning away to hide his grin and jogging down the trail
before she thought of something else she’d like him to do—
other than commit murder and find her clothes and rush
back to feed her.
Oh, but he was tempted to let her stay, if for no other
reason than to keep himself entertained for a few days.
That is, until he remembered her battered though otherwise
flawless body and felt his groin grow heavy. Hel , spending
even one night in the same lean-to as the beautiful woman
would likely test the noble intentions of a saint, much less a
man who’d been alone in the woods al summer.
Alec fol owed the wolf into the forest from where they’d
emerged onto the trail earlier and tried to remember when