Page 11 of Run Free

“What are you talking about? I was never in danger.”

He scrunched up his face and sighed. “You don’t know what that place was like. I couldn’t just leave you there. It was teeming with humans. And eventually the owners would have returned. I tried to walk away, but I couldn’t leave you in that place of death.”

My heart softened. He thought he was protecting me. “Gage, we weren’t in danger there. Those humans were friends. They helped rescue you, twenty-nine other shifters, and more animals than I could keep count of. I have to go back and finish my job.”

He turned and gave me a horrified look. It was the first time I truly got to see him in human form. He was tall and lean. Even with his reduced muscle tone, he was ripped. My mouth watered as I stared at his naked chest. He was only wearing jeans, which hung loosely off his hips. I looked up to search his face and my heart fluttered. He was scruffy with a few weeks’ beard, and his eyes were the same piercing green I’d nearly gotten lost in the first time I saw his wolf. He was ruggedly handsome, like something you’d see on the cover of a western romance novel.

Everything in my body screamed to go to him, but I wasn’t thinking straight. His scent was driving me crazy. I needed to keep the distance, or I’d be acting solely on instincts and forgetting about my duties back at the zoo.

“Your cheeks are flushed, and you have dark circles under your eyes. Are you sick?”

I was certain my cheeks flushed further. Great, he looked like sex-on-a-stick and I looked like complete crap. My cheeks were flushed because I was hornier than I’d ever been in my life, but I wasn’t about to confess that.

“I’m not sick. I’ve been working around the clock for nearly a week trying to save as many animals as possible back at the zoo. I’m an animal activist and veterinarian. I’m in charge of those humans back there.”

He scoffed. “In charge of humans? That’s not possible. Clearly they have no idea what you are.”

I swallowed hard. “Actually, they know exactly who and what I am. They are part of a human faction called the Verndari. They look after our kind and have, all throughout history. They are good people. You can trust them,” I told him.

He gave me an incorrigible look. “You may be naïve enough to trust them, but I know better. Humans can’t be trusted, angel.”

I wasn’t sure why he was calling me angel, but it did something to me each time he did. It was like my insides turned gooey and warm.

“I have to get back there, Gage,” I told him again. “Where are we?”

He sighed. I could see he was struggling with the urge to protect me. Logically I knew it was just the mating call he was feeling. Still, he looked like he wanted to bolt, and after all I’d seen of that place and what they had done to him, I couldn’t blame him one bit. If that was the only exposure he’d really had to humans, of course he wouldn’t trust them. But regardless, I still had a job to do.

“We’re only a few miles away,” he finally said. “Are you a wolf?” he surprised me by asking.

“Yes.”

“Then you should be able to track my scent back the way we came.”

My chest hurt, and the world started spinning uncontrollably. I’d found him, I’d saved him, and he was going to reject me. This was it. I’d never see him again. My only consolation was that I hadn’t acted on my instincts. Our bond was too new to set, so I wouldn’t face the same trauma my sister Elizabeth had faced when being separated from her own mate, but I’d always know he was out there, somewhere. How was I just supposed to move on with that knowledge?

I squeezed my eyes tight, then opened them. “I need you to come back with me, Gage.”

I felt raw and vulnerable admitting that, but I needed him. A primal part of me refused to just walk away from him.

“How do you even know my name?”

“Dave, one of the humans,” I clarified, “found your wallet. Plus, Byron and Tatum had already told me.”

“The snow leopards?” he asked, sounding surprised. “They made it out alive?”

I nodded. “They all made it out alive. They had you hidden well. Byron insisted we find you. It took a few hours of scouring the place, even after we thought we’d covered all the ground there. Your, um, scent helped.”

He smirked. “Are you from here, angel?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No, I work with the Verndari and travel a lot rescuing animals, and often shifters, too.”

He snorted. “Christ, you really are an angel.”

“The sun is up, and they will be frantically looking for me, Gage. I have to get back. I have another long day ahead of me.”

“How can you be so trusting of them? They’re human. They shouldn’t even know about our kind. You’re allowing yourself to be a slave to man by reporting to them.”

“Ouch, that’s a bit harsh,” I said aloud, unable to believe I was being so candid with him. “For your information, I don’t report to them. They report to me.”

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