Page 3 of Kidnapped By the Wolf

Camping in Colorado isn’t bad in the summer, but the nights have been getting progressively colder, and soon we’ll have snow. I won’t make it another week without some proper winter clothes.

The more pressing problem is where I’m going to stay once it’s too cold to camp. I’ve made it this long without driving to oneof the shelters west of Denver, and I don’t intend to go once the snow starts to fly. It just doesn’t seem right to take a handout when I’m fully capable of holding down a job.

The trouble is that most of the businesses in Gold Creek are either wolf-owned or frequented by my father’s bears. If I got a job in town, it wouldn’t be long before someone learned who I was — or dragged me back to my father’s pack.

I know I’m going to have to move on if I want to land a steady job that will allow me to sublet a place for the winter. The only reason I’ve stuck around this long is that I know the forest service guys out here, and they’ve turned a blind eye to me keeping the bus parked indefinitely on public lands.

Dread unfurls in my gut. I know what I have to do.

I have to sneak back into McGregor pack territory and gather up the rest of my belongings. That will buy me some time to figure out my next move.

I just can’t get caught.

CHAPTER TWO

CASSIE

I waituntil ten to make my move, since my father always calls a pack meeting on Saturdays. That window between ten and noon is my best chance of getting in and out without being caught, but it’s still not a sure thing.

All shifters have heightened animal senses, and a bear’s sense of smell is particularly strong. Since I’ve spent the last three months bathing in a cold creek, I know I must be especially pungent.

Parking the bus a good half mile away, I hoof it up the steep dirt road that leads to my father’s land. He owns ten acres of dense pine forest that is right on the edge of wolf territory.

A rusty mobile home comes into view, and my heart squeezes in my chest.

Camp McGregor appears deserted, but looks can be deceiving. My father’s asshole pack members like to get drunk, shift, and wander off into the woods to fuck. It wouldn’t be unusual for one of them to come stumbling out of the trees naked.

Saturday meetings are held in my father’s cabin, which is on the opposite side of the property. It’s the only permanentstructure here. The rest of the pack lives in mobile homes scattered across the land.

My whole body tenses as I approach the beat-up camper I used to call home. I’m sure someone else has been crashing there since I left — a fact that’s confirmed when I see the giant dent in the front door and the dingy old towel flapping in the window opening.

It looks as though someone tried to kick the door in, and when that didn’t work, they broke a window.

For a moment, I hesitate, and my throat constricts with the memory of Dane’s fingers wrapping around my neck. It’s a scene that plays out frequently in my nightmares — one that wakes me in the middle of the night with a familiar terror squeezing my insides.

Bear shifters don’t kowtow to an alpha the way wolves do, but there is a clear pecking order. Dane is my father’s second-in-command, if only because he’s the biggest. He’s one of the few males in the pack I’m not related to.

If it were up to my father, I’d already be mated to Dane and knocked up with his cub. That way, once my father is too old to dominate the other bears, his progeny will be tied to the new pack leader.

Dane’s escalating violence — and my father’s insistence that I mate with him — are what finally pushed me to leave.

Mating isn’t a formality like marriage. It’s a permanent, unbreakable bond. It doesn’t matter that the females here are all bear shifters with superhuman strength. The males in the packowntheir mates.

A ratty winter coat and a few warm clothes aren’t worth being shackled to Dane for the rest of my life, but I can’t afford to buy all new things. Dragging in a deep breath, I try the door to the camper and find it unlocked.

Glancing around one more time to make sure I’m alone, I open the door and slip inside.

My old camper smells like stale beer, week-old garbage, and sweaty, unwashed males. Empty cans are scattered across the small counter, and every other available surface is covered in trash and dirty clothes.

I spot a few of my possessions laying about, but the place has been taken over by another of my father’s pack mates — one without good housekeeping skills.

Kicking an empty condom wrapper out of my path, I open one of my dresser drawers. The one upside to the new inhabitant being a slob is that he hasn’t touched the drawers. All of my cold-weather clothes are still inside, and I start pulling out hoodies, sweaters, jeans, and thermals.

At least my father didn’t have my possessions burned when I left.

Rifling around under the bed, I find a wool stocking cap, a pair of snow boots, and my winter jacket. Stuffing everything into a ratty old duffel, I throw open the door and come face to face with Dane.

The burly bear shifter is well over six feet tall and must weigh two hundred and fifty pounds in human form. His hair is matted, his eyes are bloodshot, and his face is peppered with stubble.

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