Aimee didn't say anything right away as if she was mulling over the possibility. Finally she asked, "How could we hope to locate them?"

Cassie shook her head. "I don't know. I've been published in several magazines. Wouldn't they have heard of me and then contacted me?"

"Science types? Nature magazines? Regional? Would our families have read them?"

Cassie had to agree with her cousin. "The chances would be pretty slim."

"Wait." Aimee stood. "Your mother and mine were always researching genealogy, curious if they could discover out how far back our royal lines go. They found a relative in France and two in England, corresponded with them even. Remember? Of course, back then it took a year to hear from them."

"You... you think maybe if they were still living, they might still be researching genealogy roots? They probably have stuff like that online now. Come on."

Cassie and Aimee rushed through Carver's house until they found a computer in an office, but when she turned it on, the access was locked. The same with the computers in the girls' rooms.

Exasperated, Cassie said, "We'll have to do this later." She led her cousin back to the living room, still hopeful they might locate some of their family. "How did you end up here?"

"I teach botany at Portland Community College." She shrugged. "I went from climbing trees when we were young to teaching about them. Well, and other kinds of plants. The nature lover in me, I guess... except I concentrated on plants rather than animals."

"Did you ever run through Forest Park in your wolf form?"

Aimee sighed. "Yeah. I hadn't shifted in eons, but the moon was full and I'd broken up with a geology professor and I just had to run as a wolf to get back on track. You know how it is for us."

"He wasn't one of our kind, was he?"

"No, just a lover and friend. Was a friend. Then he got the hots for a biology teacher at a high school." Aimee growled at the last.

Not wanting to upset her cousin further with the discussion of her former lover, Cassie asked, "Didn't you know about the pack living here?"

"No. I never ran across them. Not as big as Portland is. And many of them live outside of the city limits."

Cassie nodded. "Here I thought it was the she-wolf whose scent Carver and Leidolf had run across in Forest Park."

"No, probably me. But I'd run into Irving and Tynan at a convenience store and overheard them talking about taking over a pack and how they'd picked up a woman who wasn't pliable. They'd murdered her, Cassie. Left her body in the woods. That's when they saw me in a security mirror, listening to them from another aisle. I got out of there as fast as I could, but they followed me. Tried to shoot me, but I shifted and tore off into the woods. After Irving tried to kill me and I saw you, I couldn't leave. Not before I knew the truth. That you were indeed my cousin." She leaned back on the couch and smiled at Cassie. "You took Leidolf as your mate, didn't you?"

"Yes, but only with the agreement that I would continue to do my wolf studies."

"And he agreed?"

"Sure, he had to." Cassie turned to listen to the back door. She swore she heard a noise.

"I believe you've finally met your match." Aimee glanced at the kitchen. "Did you hear someone using a key on the back door?"

Chapter 25

Leidolf and his men combed the woods, careful not to alert Irving and Tynan that they were looking for them. If Irving thought to kill Leidolf, silver was the only kind of bullet that could do the trick.

Carver had tried calling his daughters' cell phones several times, but neither was answering. Fergus had tried Evan's phone also, but his son didn't respond, either. Everyone was tense and silent as they continued the search through the forest.

No more gunfire had sounded. Had Irving and Tynan aborted their mission?

Then lights suddenly appeared like specters, filtering through the thick woodland landscape, bobbing here and there and everywhere. And noisy footfalls. Men approaching. Several. No conversation, though. Silent.

Leidolf motioned for his men to stop. Either they were police or zoo officials, Leidolf assumed. He figured Irving and Tynan would head out of the area pronto before the police caught them carrying rifles.

"Police!" a man shouted, identifying himself to someone deeper in the woods. "Put your hands up where I can see them."

Hell, one of Leidolf's men was in trouble. Leidolf hurried in the direction the police officer's voice came. "We're searching for three teens, Officer," he called out, hoping he wouldn't alarm the man and get shot himself. "Two men are shooting in these woods, and three of our kids got lost. When they called to tell us, they heard gunshots and are hunkered down somewhere."

"And you are?" the officer asked, tall, focused, his brows knit in a frown, gun in hand.

"Leidolf Wildhaven. Own a ranch out of the city, but Carver's house is located right next to the park. His twin sixteen-year-old daughters went for a walk, and Evan, Fergus's seventeen-year-old son went to find them. They may be separated. We don't know. They're not answering their cell phones now, though."

"All right." The man called the specifics in to someone else and gave his location, and the place was soon swarming with police.

"We found them," a policeman said, hurrying through the trees, bringing the girls with him.

They broke free and ran to hug their father, their eyes filled with tears.

"Where's Evan?" Fergus quickly asked.

"We couldn't find him," Alice said. "He went..." She glanced at the police officers and hesitated. "We don't know."

"If it's all right with you, Officer, we'll take the girls back to their father's house in case the shooters are still out here," Leidolf said.

After verifying names and addresses, the police officers released them with a warning. "Until the woods are secured, stay at the house."

"Hell, Leidolf, I've got to locate Evan." Fergus tromped back through the woods to Carver's house, looking like he was ready to kill anyone if they said anything more to him.

"You know he'll be all right--" Leidolf said, but then something made the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention. He wasn't sure what it was--a noise in the distance or just something that set him on edge. "I'm shifting. Take my clothes, Elgin, would you?"

Leidolf quickly stripped and shifted and took off running as if his life depended on it. It wasn't his life he was worried about.

* * *

"They're here," Cassie whispered, smelling the men she assumed were Irving and Tynan. Fear and anger cloaked them, and she and Aimee were in trouble. She pointed to Carver's rifle. "Ammo?"

"Tranquilizer darts."

Cassie frowned.

"He didn't have time to get anything else. And he probably doesn't have silver bullets," she whispered back. Aimee grabbed the sweater she was wearing and started to lift it, but Cassie stopped her.

"I'll shift. You use the rifle."

"But..."

"I could always pin you down, even though you were a little taller than me. You were always a better shot than me. No time to argue." Cassie jerked off the borrowed jeans and shirt she was wearing and shifted.

Aimee turned the TV on in the den, and then they waited to ambush their prey.

Aimee moved to the couch and said out loud, "I love this movie. Romancing the Wolf? Julia Wildthorn sure knows how to write werewolves with just the right touch."

Standing next to the door, ready to pounce, Cassie wanted to growl at Aimee's comment. Aimee silently moved to the other side of the door frame, the rifle ready as the movie progressed.

"You're only a half-blood," the man in the movie was saying with an arrogant air.

"So you're a blue blood. Who says you're any better than me?"

A wolf growled nearby, and the man said, "I can shape-shift and fight the threat. You?"

She chuckled. "They won't like my kind of bullets, so lead on."

"You, remain here, where you can look pretty and stay safe."

"I'm a bounty hunter, Seth. I'm paid to look pretty and take risks." She shoved past him and--

Cassie heard the soft footfalls of two people headed down the hall. The floor creaked a little, and the footfalls died instantly.

Growls erupted on the movie, shattering Cassie's wire-tight nerves.

"No!" the woman screamed on the television.

More growling in the movie erupted, and then the footsteps in the hall hurried toward the den again, faster this time, as if the men thought the noise from the movie would drown them out.

Cassie tensed, never having felt this ready to kill but never so afraid, not for herself this time but for her cousin. She couldn't "lose" her a second time. Only this time could be for good.

The wrong man started through the doorway. The one without the rifle. "She's a wolf!" Blackbeard warned his cousin.

The redheaded man started to come into the room, his rifle ready to shoot, when growling on the movie seemed to echo down the hall. Fierce, angry growling like she'd never heard before.

"Holy shit!" the redhead said, swinging around to shoot at the new threat.

The perfect ambush. Leidolf to the rescue.

Blackbeard grabbed Aimee's rifle, and it would only be a matter of seconds before the much bigger guy would wrest it away from her. Cassie lunged and bit him in the arm, and he immediately let go. He cried out and sank to the floor, his eyes watering, his arm bleeding.

Aimee shot him in the chest and knocked him out, and then Cassie raced into the hall to help Leidolf. He was still growling, his eyes on fire, wickedly large canines fully bared, his hackles raised.

Behind him was Carver, wearing his fur coat, too, and appearing calm, but she recognized under that controlled exterior, he was ready to continue the fight if Leidolf faltered.