Page 1 of Bah Humbug Mate

CHAPTER 1

DASH

Mystic River, Alaska

United States

Dash Samuels made his way down the stairs from his apartment over The Workshop to check-in with the morning staff and do some bookwork. It was still relatively early, but Dash had learned there was money to be made in the breakfast trade.

He liked owning The Workshop. It provided him with the closest thing he’d ever had to a family. Many thought it was unnatural for a caribou shifter to live on his own, but it was all Dash had ever known.

Northwest Territory, Canada

Twenty-Odd Years Ago

The forest snapped and crackled as the flames leapt from tree to tree, bringing light and death to everything around him. Dash had shifted from human to caribou to go for a run in the forest. Dash loved to run—leaping and bounding over the Canadian landscape. His parents forbade him from doing it, considering it too dangerous for a child to go wandering around or exploring on his own. They might have been right for a human child of ten, but the same age in his caribou form was fully mature. It was the odd juxtaposition most shifters faced.

He wasn’t sure how the fire started. All he knew was that by the time he was aware of it, the fire had engulfed the tinderbox that characterized the trees and undergrowth at this time of year. A wall of flame now separated him from his family and his herd.

Dash charged to the top of the ridge to watch the fire burn—the acrid smell of smoke and destruction filled his nostrils. The little boy inside cried out for his parents. The caribou into which he’d shifted knew he and the boy were in danger and turned from the flames, bounding away to safety.

By the time it had been safe to return, there was nothing left but rubble. His family and herd were dead. Death permeated the air and the child within hid in the corner of the caribou’s mind and grieved. The caribou turned east and headed away from where the herd wintered. The child would not be safe until he had grown into a man.

Until then, the caribou would keep him safe.

Mystic River, Alaska

Present Day

“Well, if it isn’t the reindeer-shifter,” called one of his regular patrons.

Dash had grown tired of trying to correct people politely. “I’m not a reindeer. I’m a caribou. My kind have always been caribou, not some childish fantasy that flies around the world, drawing a sleigh with a fat man and a bag of toys.”

“Nah, this time of year, you’re a reindeer,” said the man who was already inebriated.

Dash looked to his bartender who gave him a nod, indicating he was aware of the situation, had the guy’s keys, and would ensure he didn’t drive himself home.

“Nope. Caribou. Do you see any fucking tinsel on my antlers?” The phone rang in the background. “No, you do not.”

“Dash? It’s for you. Guy says it’s important.”

* * *

Toronto, Ontario

Canada

That had been three days ago. Now he sat in the waiting room of a lawyer’s office in Toronto, waiting to meet a man about a grandmother Dash had never known.

Grandmother? If I have a grandmother, where the hell has she been the past twenty years? Why didn’t she seek me out any time during what was a lonely and frightening childhood?

Dash slipped his finger inside the collar of his button-down shirt. The shirt his friend Derek Grayson had insisted he had to have. In fact, Derek and his mate, Tess, had insisted on dragging him to Seattle to buy a proper suit for this meeting. Dash hadn’t seen the need. After all, the lawyer had requested his presence in Toronto for the reading of his grandmother’s will.

Dash took in his surroundings. From the look of it, his grandmother must have been loaded to afford a lawyer with such posh surroundings. Everything seemed dark and opulent—from the dark paneled walls to the dark furniture to the dark, oriental rug. Places like this gave him the heebie jeebies. They were designed to impress and intimidate. They exerted control and power. Dash was used to Alaska—the last great frontier.

The people weren’t much better. They were all done up, unfriendly, and seemed to know his suit was off-the-rack. It was an expensive rack, but Dash was fairly certain that the guy shooting him daggers with his eyes from across the room was well aware of that fact. The man’s florid complexion and red nose indicated a man who indulged in far too much booze—owning a tavern, Dash knew the type. Dash’s keen sense of smell told him that the man, and the frightened-looking woman sitting next to him were shifters—most likely caribou shifters. But the man’s body language practically screamed ‘don’t ask.’

He wondered again what he was doing here and why he cared. He could answer the first part. The paralegal he’d spoken to on the phone had indicated his grandmother had named him in her will. He’d hinted that as a beneficiary, it would behoove him to come, as the will had a few conditions before he could inherit some undisclosed amount. Considering the plumbing work that needed to be done at The Workshop and the gathering storm of the Shadow League, an inheritance couldn’t have come at a better time.

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