The sheriff shifted his attention to Cassie. "No driver's license, half-dressed, driving a borrowed car that you didn't have permission to take... You're in a bit of trouble, miss. But Mr. Wildhaven said you and he had a tiff and that you were down on your luck, so he's coming to retrieve his Jag and take you home." He shrugged. "The thought of marriage can be overwhelming at times, but I've been married for twenty-seven years, and young lady, you'll do just fine."
Marriage? She felt her face heat. Leidolf better not have said he and she were getting married. Did the sheriff think Leidolf meant to take her to her own home? She knew that wasn't going to happen.
"Who's the guy with you?" the sheriff asked, as if confirming Sarge's story, and she wondered if he was worried that maybe Sarge was playacting, pretending to be a really subservient guy while, in reality, he had forced her to take him for a ride in the Jag.
"One of Leidolf's ranch hands, Elmer, like he said." She smiled. Teach Sarge to coerce her to take him along with her.
"All right. I'll let Mr. Wildhaven know you're both here. He should be joining us in just a few minutes."
That would be the end of her chance to take care of the she-wolf and the pups and locate Alex. Wait, if Alex made the 911 call, the sheriff would probably know, and she could possibly learn if he was all right. Then she would only have to search for the mother and her pups.
She cleared her throat. "I heard about the men found tranquilized in the woods. Did Alex Wellington call it in?"
The sheriff's eyes widened. "What do you know about any of that?"
Her lips parted. Not good. If the sheriff discovered she'd been there, he might assume she knew about the murderers, too. What if he put her under some kind of house arrest? At the very least, if Leidolf learned about it, he probably would. Well, more so than she was already.
She attempted to appear nonchalant with a shrug. "Just sounds like something he might have done. I think he was supposed to be conducting some wolf biologist studies in the area."
"We don't... well, we didn't have any wolves out here." He narrowed his eyes at her. "At least I'd never heard of any before. What makes you suspect he was here?"
"He's always looking for them. How would I know?"
"You just said..." The sheriff shook his head. "The guy who called the 911 operator gave us the location and took off. We figured he was afraid the ones he said had murdered someone might locate him and kill him. Do you think he might be this guy named Alex Wellington?"
Hell, she really had thought Alex had stayed to ensure the zoo men were safe until the police arrived. That way, when the police showed up, they would have known who Alex was. "Uh, no. Come to think of it, he was working on a project in the Canadian Arctic."
"Canadian Arctic?" The sheriff didn't sound like he believed her. She wouldn't have, either. "You can't be his girlfriend if you're marrying Leidolf."
She laughed and hoped the sound wasn't too faked. "He doesn't have regular girlfriends. I'm just a friend." She was getting them both in a deeper and deeper hole. Now she was afraid that if the sheriff began searching for Alex, word might get out to the murderers that he was the one who had been out in the woods listening to their conversation.
"Do you have a number or place of employment for him so I can verify where he is currently?"
She began to climb out of the car. "No. He's self-employed. I don't have his number, and he moves around a lot."
Sarge reached out and touched her arm as if to deter her, but she gave him a look that said if he tried to stop her, he'd be in real trouble. He quickly pulled his hand back.
The sheriff frowned and looked again at her bare legs. "You don't have to get out of the car. It's cold, and the way you're dressed--"
That was the last he said as she pulled her foot off the brake, hopped out of the car, and the Jag began to roll down the hill. She hoped the sheriff would catch it before it ran into anything, that he didn't try to stop her instead, and that Sarge wasn't injured in the runaway vehicle. It was the break she needed, and it served Sarge right for forcing her to take him with her. Besides, Leidolf would soon be here to take the guy back into custody. Not her, though.
"Hell!" The sheriff tore off down the road, too busy trying to reach the car as it picked up speed to give her a second glance.
She thought Sarge might try to get into the driver's seat and take off in the car. As soon as the sheriff raced after the Jag, she couldn't worry about anything else while she ran for the woods, knowing Leidolf would soon take care of Sarge and the Jag.
She contemplated heading for the pups, but getting her clothes and a good pair of hiking boots from her truck seemed a better choice. So in Leidolf's socks that were way too big, she dashed through the underbrush, the twigs and branches scratching her bare legs while she wished she could run along the road instead. Would have been much faster. She just hoped the sheriff would catch the Jag and stop Sarge from going anywhere until Leidolf arrived.
Normally, her wolf's sense of self-preservation would have forced her to slow down, to make the least amount of noise, but another part of her hoped that if she made enough of a racket, if hunters were looking for all the feral red wolves roaming the woods, they'd realize she couldn't be a wolf, as noisy as she was.
She smelled the faint odor of a mountain lion and cursed under her breath. Still, she thought it was quite a way off. But what if that meant the lion might locate the pups' den?
She stopped and stood still, her heart pounding hard, the blood rushing in her ears, trying to muffle any other sound. Change, her mind screamed at her. Shift and go back to find the pups. She'd be warmer and could run a hell of a lot faster, more quietly, and less conspicuously.
Then from a distance, the sound of something tromping through the brush in her direction gave her more of a worry. Hunters? Reporters? The zoo men? The murderers? Alex? The sheriff would have been coming in the opposite direction. She doubted he'd race through the woods in the dark after her, or that he would have had time to stop the car and then chase after her. And it sounded like two people, not one.
She dropped low, crouching, hiding herself in the undergrowth, but her movement must have caught their attention as both swiveled their heads in her direction. Hell, they were outfitted with those night-vision goggles attached to their headgear, their breaths coming hard, as they shoved away branches and looked straight at her. One hundred fifty yards and closing. But their pace was slower now, as if they were afraid to scare away their newly found prey.
She lifted her nose slightly and smelled. Her heart beating frantically, her blood ran cold. Both were hunters, both wearing scruffy beards, camouflage gear, and olive-drab caps. For a second, she feared they would shoot her, thinking she was a wolf, being as paranoid as anyone else looking to kill a bunch of feral predators and expecting anything that moved to be one of them.
At first, the hunters stared at her slack-jawed and moved toward her even more slowly. She imagined that, because of the lack of moon or stars on the overcast night and the shadows of the woods, they hadn't seen her until she'd moved. That's what had given her away.
Suddenly, they stopped cold and observed her. As if they were seeing a ghost, unsure of what they were actually observing. Thankfully. So they weren't going to just shoot her without checking her out further.
But did they recognize she was a woman, hiding in the woods and not doing a very good job of it? They wouldn't know she could see them, too, but they had to realize she would have heard their approach. Maybe they figured she got scared then and stopped dead in her tracks. If they had been wolves, lupus garou, or those who studied wolves like she did, they'd know she was ready to bolt. She doubted they'd recognize that. And she didn't think they'd catch her if they gave chase.
"Holy moly, Ben. She's not one of those red wolves," the man whispered to the other. "What would she be doing out here?"
Ben responded in a hushed voice, shouldering his rifle. "Hell, if I didn't know better, I'd say she was that wolf biologist I told you about that talked real pretty about wolves."
Crap, it couldn't be the man who hounded her when she lectured at the town hall.
"I dunno, but she's got to be in some kinda trouble. You move around that way, really quiet like so's not to spook her."
Ben gave a thumbs-up and began to circle slightly to Cassie's left.
She let out her breath in exasperation. Then she had another thought. What if she could get hold of the men's goggles and ditch them? The men wouldn't be able to see in the dark without them and follow her, and they couldn't look for the female wolf or her pups, either. Cassie kept a smile to herself. Then how in the hell was she going to get the goggles away from the men?
"Are you... Dr. Roux, miss?" Ben asked, drawing a couple of steps closer. "Are you hurt?"
She stood up: no sense in pretending she couldn't be seen.
He lowered his binoculars as he looked down her legs to her feet where the socks rested in a puddle at her ankles.
She hadn't expected wolf killers to express concern for her safety, as normal humans would. But even though they seemed human in that respect, the hunters still were dangerous for the lupus garous and the wolves she'd made it her calling to study. She dashed for the cover of the forest, figuring she could outrun them. Ben took a couple of hefty strides and snagged her wrist.
Chapter 17
Leidolf's cell phone jingled and he jerked it off his belt, flipped it open, and saw Sheriff Whittaker was calling again.
"Yeah?" Leidolf said, wholeheartedly expecting that the sheriff had Cassie and the Jag, that he'd learn if Sarge was with her, and that everything was well under control.
That misconception was instantly shattered when the sheriff spoke over the phone, huffing and puffing, half-winded. "Got the Jag in good condition, Mr. Wildhaven."
Hell, Leidolf didn't care anything about the Jag. It was the former pack leader's chick magnet. Leidolf didn't need anything that flashy, and the car was the next item on his agenda to get rid of.