"Henry Thompson." The man looked over at Alex.
"We've met. I'm Alex Wellington. Where's Cassie? You said you'd tell me when you located her." Alex sounded irritated, but he would realize he'd lost whatever chance he thought he'd had with Cassie, once he'd learned of Leidolf's claim to her.
"She's sleeping." Leidolf motioned for Thompson and Alex to take a seat on a sofa in the den. "What can I do for you?" he asked Thompson.
"I was told you have some wolves on the premises. Rare red wolves." Thompson glanced at Alex, confirming where he'd learned of this.
Leidolf gave Alex a look like he was not surprised.
When Thompson and Alex had settled in place, Leidolf sat down on his recliner, the only piece of furniture Laney had talked him into selecting. As if it was his throne, he was the only one who ever sat on it, even if he offered for others to sit there. They didn't dare.
Pierce and Quincy joined Leidolf as if they were his backup, along with Sarge, who they were still guarding. He'd better keep his mouth shut. Fergus soon joined them also.
Thompson eyed them briefly, probably wondering why Leidolf seemed to need so much muscle. But pack dynamics being what they were, he wouldn't keep his people in the dark about a potential problem. If he had to turn Henry Thompson and the wolf biologist, he would. And his people had to know the reason.
Thompson leaned forward. "Let's get down to why I'm really here."
Leidolf seized the opportunity to turn the scenario around to suit his pack. "You learned we could use your help, right?"
Thompson closed his gaping mouth and sat up a little straighter.
Leidolf shrugged. "A cougar's been killing our newborn calves. Three of them already. We could just take it down ourselves, but we'd heard you were interested in preserving wildlife whenever possible. Elgin was supposed to have gotten hold of you before this, but we've been trying to track down the cougar without success in the meantime."
"A cougar." Thompson was clearly thrown off the wolf trail momentarily. "Elgin didn't say anything to me about a cougar. But I did tell him I wanted to talk to you about the red wolves you have on your ranch."
Well, hell, guess the wolf tracker wasn't so easily misled.
"You're not interested in the cougar?" Leidolf sighed dramatically for effect. "I'd hoped you might find a home for it. I'd rather not have to..." He shuddered. "...kill it."
"So you own rifles, Mr. Wildhaven."
"Of course. Living on a ranch way out here makes it a necessity."
"You wouldn't happen to have tranquilizer darts, would you?"
"Yes. We hoped to take down the cougar ourselves. Peaceably, if possible." Leidolf stretched out his legs. "Who mentioned we had red wolves out here?"
Thompson hesitated to say, as if drawing out the suspense. Then he leaned against the sofa back and waved at Alex. "He finally came forth and said he was the one who found my friend and me tranquilized in Mount Hood National Forest. Do any hunting out there recently? Maybe searching for the cougar? But hit something else by accident?" He raised a brow.
"Can't say that I have."
"Mr. Wellington said you were out there looking for your red wolf. Called her Red. Said she protected him from two men, and since he's a wolf biologist, he knew it wasn't natural for a feral wolf, so he figured she had to have been someone's pet. As much as wild wolves can be pets. But two other wolves were with her. So where did you say your wolves are on the ranch?"
To Leidolf's surprise, Cassie stalked into the den. He hadn't wanted Alex to see her ever again. And he didn't want her exposed to Thompson's grilling.
She smiled at Thompson, bowed her head at Alex in greeting, and then headed straight to Leidolf's chair and leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "Did you tell Mr. Thompson about the cougar, darling? How he's killing our poor little calves? I think it's a mother feeding her young. So it would be horrible if she was hunted down and her kits not cared for."
Leidolf pulled Cassie into his lap and wrapped his arms around her.
The look on Thompson's face was strange, as if their actions had revealed something important to him. He rubbed his whiskered chin. "Are you that wolf biologist Alex had been looking for?"
"Cassie Roux, yes. He wasn't searching for me as much as he was wolves for his study."
"From what Alex says, you're from California. Been here long?"
"For a while."
Immediately, Leidolf didn't like Thompson's questioning of his mate. When he gave her body a squeeze to let her know so, she leaned back against him and relaxed, indicating she wasn't concerned about the questions, so Leidolf shouldn't worry. He did worry. Any wrong answer could prove disastrous.
"You wouldn't happen to have known Bella Wilder, would you?" Thompson asked.
She smiled. "I heard about the case. Anything concerning wolves catches my attention."
"You wouldn't have wanted to remove a wolf from the zoo, would you have?"
Still relaxed, she shook her head. "I study wolves in the wild. Caged and human-owned wolf 'pets' don't qualify for the kind of research I do. I study wolf pack dynamics, how they hunt together, act toward one another, the family unit. In a zoo environment, it's not the same."
"So you wouldn't want to see them in a zoo."
She didn't respond.
"She didn't say that at all," Leidolf said, sounding perturbed. She looked annoyed at him for responding on her behalf. He didn't like that she hesitated to respond. It made her sound guiltier than sin. Which he suspected she was when it came to not wanting wolves incarcerated in the zoo.
Thompson cleared his throat, sat taller and folded his arms across his broad chest, and directed his comment to Leidolf. "I believe you tranquilized me and my friend, Joe, when we discovered Rosa injured in Mount Hood National Forest. I suspect that you took off with Rosa, which you refer to as Red. Not only was she one of your pets, but you have a couple more wolves here at the ranch. And I assume that you freed Rosa and her mate from the zoo more recently."
Cassie stiffened her back and Leidolf tightened his hold on her, worried she was going to punch Thompson or say something she ought not to.
"Did you know that a wolf daughter killed her mother and a son killed his father while in captivity, Mr. Thompson?" Cassie asked.
Thompson opened his mouth to speak but clamped his lips shut before he said anything, but he seemed clearly surprised.
Cassie continued, "In the wild, wolves live in family units. Eventually the children move on, start their own packs, become the pack leaders, and start their own families in their very own territories. When they're forced to live in a captive environment, the natural order isn't natural any longer."
She waved her finger at him in a scolding manner. "Let me tell you of yet another scenario, Mr. Thompson. In the wild, the alpha male and alpha female mate. They're affectionate beforehand during the courtship phase. And then she is treated like the queen when she has her pups." She glanced at Leidolf and smiled.
He gave her a smug smile back. "She has to be pregnant first." And getting Cassie that way would only be half the fun.
"I was observing wolves in captivity, Mr. Thompson, where the pack behavior was all askew. A male was trying to mate a female in heat. He mounted her, and she snapped at him, not wanting his attention. His tail and hers were down the whole time. He wasn't the alpha male. Just a horny wolf. The alpha male stood nearby and put his head over the female's back at one point, ears perked up, his tail up, his gaze focused on the troublemaker.
"When the beta male tried to mate with the female again, what did the alpha do? She was trying to get as close to him as she could for protection. The alpha male scooted his rump around her backside some and the alpha male and female stood side by side while he attempted to protect her. Do you think the alpha male would have accepted that behavior from a beta when they're in the wild? He would have bared his teeth, snapped, and snarled. He probably would have bitten him, pinned him down, forced him to accept his leadership."
Thompson opened his mouth but then shut it again without commenting.
"So you see, they're better off in the wild."
"But that doesn't mean we're taking the female and her litter of pups out of the zoo," Leidolf hastily said.
"I suspect that, deep down, you realize how dangerous it would be for the mother wolf and her pups in the wild without a mate." Thompson almost looked sympathetic about the whole mess.
Cassie sighed. "I agree. She couldn't have lasted without another wolf to help her raise the pups."
"So where's her mate then? The father of the pups? Here? At the ranch?" Thompson asked, and this time he sounded like he might have goofed and separated a family.
"She's strictly wild," Cassie said. "I imagine hunters killed her mate."
Thompson switched tactics. "How long have you known Mr. Wildhaven?"
"Why all the questions, Mr. Thompson?" Cassie asked, sounding a little taken aback.
"We've never been able to piece together how Bella was left naked in freezing weather in the zoo. And then the red wolf we placed in the zoo pen with a male wolf disappears. But not the male. Just the female. Anyone who likes wolves might have had an interest in removing her from the pen. Particularly if she'd been a pet and had run off."
"And got in your way?"
"She's a rare red wolf." Thompson looked at Leidolf. "Can I see Rosa... Red?"
"She's not here right now." Leidolf stood, through with the interrogation that he should have ended once it began.
"At least whoever stole the two wolves had enough sense to leave the mother wolf with her pups at the zoo for their own safety." Thompson cast Leidolf a searing look. "But what I don't understand is why no one wants to steal Big Red. Why only Rosa and now her mate?" Thompson drummed his thumbs on the arms of the chair and then rose. "Plenty of safeguards will be in place, in other words, lots of security at the zoo, in the event you're planning on taking her and the pups out."