Chapter One
Those bastards had cut her fence again.
Virginia Howard cursed, kicked a clump of grass at her feet and eyed the damaged span of fence before her. Large sections of it lay bare and broken, the barbed wire that had stretched between the posts sliced clean through. It curled around the posts, shiny and mocking.
“Brand new God damned fence.” And God knew how many cattle lost. She’d never get them all rounded up before dark, even if they all bore the Lazy H brand. But some were still clean skinned, new calves or additions to her stock that weren’t due for branding until the fall.
She cursed again, though the epithet morphed into a growl. That those cowardly asses would pull such a stunt this close to the full moon only proved their real purpose. Driving her out of business would be good, but what they really wanted was to drive her down. Make her submit like a good little lady.
Some of them didn’t like independence in a woman, especially one who’d already refused a few of them. They obviously meant to make her an example.
“Well, f**k that,” Ginny muttered. A click of her tongue brought her horse, Lightning Bug, trotting over. She’d held out on her own, just the way she liked it, for as long as she could. Now she had no choice.
She needed the alpha’s help.
* * *
Jack Owens had an office next to the mayor’s in the run-down old City Hall building, but the only people who visited it were humans. When werewolves needed to speak with the alpha of the Lonely River Pack they went to his home, a sprawling ranch house on the edge of town that bordered on a large private forest. Humans never strayed in the woods that belonged to the pack, making it a safe place to run for all wolves.
And they needed that now more than ever. More than fifty years had passed since the last Great War, when biomechanical warfare had been introduced by both sides. No one knew how it started, how the nanotechnology meant to incapacitate enemy soldiers had corrupted and begun infecting civilians.
Had begun killing.
The remaining humans had reacted to the War the only way they’d known, by shunning technology and essentially setting themselves back into the nineteenth century. All computers and complex machines had been destroyed. Vehicles sat, abandoned, on cracked asphalt roads grown over with vegetation. Most cleanup had been done in the cities, where space was at a premium. In places like Greenbriar, people tended to let the now-useless machinery stand. It was easier to work around it than to move it.
Werewolves, once hidden, had been immune to the Plague. And, as the numbers of humans thinned, the wolves had been able to come out of hiding to build societies for themselves. The humans left had no choice but to accept them, though many hated them. Were frightened of them.
That was dangerous, and made it important that wolves have a place of their own, away from humans, where all were welcome.
Even Ginny. Jack had extended the invitation more than once, always with that quiet smile that clashed with the look in his eyes. Patient. Predatory. The alpha never pushed her, but he was always there, letting her know with a look or a touch that he was biding his time.
It would have been easy enough to ignore, if only she didn’t want to answer the sensual challenge in his eyes. The wolf inside her yearned for him, for the strength and power she knew mirrored her own. And the woman wanted something else entirely.
He was so damn handsome, with thick blond hair and eyes the color of the sky on a clear winter morning. And he was tall, broad through the shoulders, leanly muscled in a way that made her want to press her hands against him, to test the resilience of the hard planes of his body.
But she couldn’t. A man -- a wolf -- like Jack Owens wouldn’t let her walk away after a night of hot sex. He’d lay claim to her, keep her.
Ginny had to force down the panic that rose. She belonged to no one. She was free to say and do anything she wanted.
Except that now she had to knock on the door and go inside.
The soft light of a kerosene lamp still burned in a window downstairs. “Quit stalling, Ginny.” She dropped from Lightning Bug’s back and lashed him to the post between the house and the barn before making her way slowly to the porch.
It occurred to her that her heart was pounding more loudly than her fist on the door, but she didn’t have time to berate herself for her own foolishness. The door opened, and Jack greeted her with that damn smile that made her crazy. “Virginia.” He stepped back and pulled the door open wide. “Please, come in.”
“Jack.” He’d discarded his vest and rolled up his shirtsleeves, and the slightly rumpled look was sexier than anything she could recall seeing in recent years. “Thank you.”
She tugged off her hat and walked past him, resolute and determined. She could ignore the pull of his body calling to hers, if only she didn’t have to look into his eyes. “I’m afraid I’m having a little bit of trouble, and I didn’t --” The words hung in her burning throat like glass shards. She forced them out anyway. “I need your help.”
The sudden tension in the room was palpable. “What did they do this time?” Jack demanded, his low voice filled with enough anger to make her fight a flinch.
She steeled herself and turned to face him. “Cut the fence in the south pasture. The one Ollie Russell helped me string last week.”
Rage flooded his features for a single heartbeat before he regained his control. “Did you recognize any scent at the scene, or had too much time passed?”
“I didn’t come here to get you riled up and out for blood,” Ginny protested. “I just want it to stop.”
He crossed the space between them in two steps, stopping so close she could feel the heat from his body as he leaned down until scant inches separated them. “We’ve passed the point of pretty words and asking nicely. You came here for my help, Virginia. You may not take it back.”
“My name is Ginny.” She instantly regretted the correction. The last thing she needed was to invite more of Jack’s familiarity, especially when she’d just put herself under his protection. And that’s the first step, isn’t it? First his protection, then his authority. “I only want you to talk to them. I mean, it isn’t as if I’m part of your pack, not like they are. I know that. But I don’t know how else to keep things from sliding toward bloodshed.”
The anger flashed in his eyes again, and this time he didn’t pull it back. His magic, the power that gave him his strength and authority as a wolf, crackled through the air as he growled. “You think I haven’t talked to them already? You think I’ve watched them torment you and done nothing?”
“No. I don’t know.” She looked away, her teeth digging into her lower lip as she fought a whimper. Everything in her demanded that she placate him with a soothing apology. That she offer him her submission. “I know I’ve flouted your authority.” She barely heard her own voice over the blood rushing in her ears. “I wouldn’t blame you if you’d left it alone. I wouldn’t blame you if you chose to do so now.”
Strong fingers slid along her jaw and forced her to look at him. “Every wolf in my territory is my responsibility. I warned Dawson and the others that there would be repercussions for bothering you again. Which means they intend to make sure you’re not around to lodge a complaint.”
Ginny fought not to drop her head back and offer him her throat. She barely succeeded. “I suppose they don’t care that I didn’t do anything to them. I’m a woman alone. An oddity.”
“An oddity,” he agreed quietly. “You and Charlotte certainly make my life interesting, don’t you?”
“If you told Lottie to do something, she would. She’s not interested in reminding you that you don’t own her.” She lifted her chin even more and watched his eyes. “I am, though. All I want is to be left alone. I like it that way, Jack.”
His hand dropped away. “You’re nearly out of options, Ginny. You came to me, and that makes you mine. Mine to protect, anyway.” He smiled, small and bitter, before turning his back on her abruptly and striding to the table. “Don’t worry yourself too much. When you’re safe, I’ll leave you alone, if that’s what you want.”
“Will you?” He couldn’t mean it, not with the way he’d been watching her for months.
Jack picked up a heavy leather gun belt and buckled it around his waist. “If that’s what you want.”
Of course it is. She opened her mouth to tell him so, but what came out was, “You’re not riding out to Dawson’s spread now, are you? Alone?”
“No.” He tightened the belt and reached for his coat. “I’m going home with you.”
She stared at the back of his head in disbelief. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I’m going home with you. You’ll need help rounding up your stock, and you’re not going to be out there alone until I’ve dealt with them. So you stay here, or I go there. Your choice.”
He’d be in her home. It was the one place she knew she could escape from everything, everyone, and Jack would be there. “But --” She looked at the tense set of his shoulders and swallowed the rest of her protest. “I don’t have a spare bedroom. You’ll have to bunk down in the parlor.” She couldn’t help the challenge that crept into her voice.
He just sounded amused when he answered. “Bunked down in worse places.”
Ginny wanted him in her bed. The knowledge should have shocked her, but it had been a long time since she’d slept any way but alone. Hard up and horny, she thought dourly. Might f**k anything with two legs and a pulse at this point. Doesn’t mean anything. “Let’s go.”
* * *
Jack pulled his horse to a stop at the fence that surrounded Ginny’s property and closed his eyes, letting the scents and sounds of the night come to him. The moon hung low in the sky tonight, nearly full, and the call of it tickled at the edges of his senses as he reached out with his power.
He sensed Ginny first, a strong, vibrant presence just behind him, and the wolf inside him paused. The wolf always perked up when Ginny was around, always rode him hard and demanded he lay claim to her. He was alpha, the leader, and it was fitting that such a female should belong to him and no other.