the unfamiliar vehicle slowly approached, one by one her dogs came to attention, climbing to their feet, cocking their heads and adapting various poses of alert anticipation. Eerily still, they listened as though they could hear what, in her human form, she could only anticipate.
Closing them off in the den, she went to the front door and opened it. Standing in the doorway, under the overhang, she drew her weapon and watched as the rain-lashed car coasted to a stop in front of her garage. Since she didn’t know exactly what to expect, she was ready for just about anything.
She knew one thing. If her visitor thought she’d go without a battle, they had another think coming.
Annoyed and tense, she watched as her unwanted visitor opened the car door. Without an umbrella, the tall, broad-shouldered figure, unmistakably male, pulled up the hood of his jacket as protection against the downpour before striding up the path toward Kelly. She noted he didn’t even flinch as the brisk wind slapped the cold rain at him like a sodden whip. Something about his bearing said military. Great. Another one of those Protectors. The last thing she wanted or needed.
As the stranger stepped up onto her covered porch and lowered his hood, Kelly got her second shock of the day. Even drenched, the man was beautiful. Breathtakingly, stop-your-heart gorgeous. Worse, she’d seen his face somewhere—in her dreams perhaps? She didn’t remember.
To her disbelief, she felt her body stir to life deep inside. While she tried to grapple with this unpleasant surprise, she drew her weapon, pointing it directly at his heart.
“Inside,” she ordered. “Hands where I can see them.”
He blinked, clearly shocked. As he raised his hands, she saw a muscle working in his jaw, revealing his anger, as he stepped into her foyer.
Tough.
“Who are you and what do you want?” she snarled, kicking the door shut behind him.
She could see his aura, that fine identifying shade encircling him like a faint halo. This—his aura—told Kelly he was a shape-shifter, like her. Which meant he was Pack, as she’d thought. The ones she avoided like the plague. They were the only ones who had even the slightest inkling of what she truly was, and they didn’t even know the half of it. They never gave up, especially those known as the Pack Protectors.
She wondered if she was like a trophy to them and if her constant refusal to join them had turned her into The One That Got Away. She also suspected that they’d finally gotten tired of her constant rejections and had resorted to grabbing what they wanted instead. Like her sister.
Ian’s phone call proved it. They’d started with Bon nie and now had come for her. But she was ready for them. She’d neatly turned the tables.
“Tell me where my sister is,” she demanded. “Or I’ll kill you where you stand. I have silver bullets.”
The too-perfect-to-be-true man stared at her, silently dripping onto her Italian tile floor.
“You’re trespassing,” she warned. “I’m well within my rights to shoot you.”
Ignoring this, he gazed down at her, unafraid and boldly confident. Then, with water running off his tanned skin like diamonds, he flashed a smile so brilliant Kelly felt it like a punch to the gut.
“Afternoon, Tearlach,” he drawled.
She froze at the casual use of the old, now-forbidden word. She’d not heard it spoken out loud since she’d been a teenager living in the wild, distant mountains of Scotland, and even then it had been uttered in a whisper, under the breath, with reverence.
Tearlach. Her father had died because of this word. This stranger, this man had no right to use it so brazenly. She felt a flash of irrational anger, which she quickly tamped down. He wouldn’t understand. The uninformed never did.
While she formulated a response, the stranger continued to stare at her, his amazing eyes boring into her. “I don’t know anything about your sister, but I think you might know about something of mine. How about it, Tearlach? You tell me, and I’ll leave you in peace.”
Ignoring this, she clenched her jaw. “Did the Pack send you?” she asked. Then, without giving him time to formulate an answer, she dismissed him with a flick of her hand, keeping her pistol trained on him. “Of course they did. I don’t want to join your little club, so they sent you to grab me, just like they did my sister. Too bad I’m going to make you tell me where they’ve taken her instead.”
“Put the gun down.” Narrow-eyed, he glared at her as if she was the one in the wrong. “Or at least be careful where you’re pointing it.”
“Answer me and I’ll let you leave,” she told him. “I promise.”
Instead, he smiled again, no doubt well aware of his effect on women. “I’m with the Protectors. I came to offer you our assistance. As many as you need, all armed and ready to help. You say your sister’s been abducted? We can help you find her.”
She sensed he was ad-libbing, making it up as he spoke. “I’ll bet you can.” She stared him down. “Especially since you’re the ones who took her. Where is she?”
“I don’t know.” Inconceivably, he smiled again, a pleasant and oddly compelling smile that infuriated her. “We didn’t have anything to do with her abduction, I swear to you. You’re the only one of your kind we’ve been able to locate, since your father died when you were sixteen. You are aware he was in the middle of negotiating with us?”
“Liar,” she snarled.
“I assure you I’m telling the truth.” He met her gaze. “I have nothing of yours, but you do have something of mine. I’ll help you if you’ll help me. How about it?”
She clenched her teeth. Something of his? What that could be, she had no idea. Nor did she care. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I don’t want to hear your lies. You aren’t the first one they’ve sent to talk to me. Now, I’ll tell you like I told them. I have no interest in joining your Pack. Not now or ever. The answer will always be no.”
As he lowered his hands, reaching for his pocket, she snarled in warning, “Keep your hands where I can see them.”
Immediately, he did as she demanded. “I promise we had nothing to do with your sister being taken. We only want to help. Protect and serve, that’s our motto.”
She cocked her head, considering him. Her sixth sense, which she always trusted, told her this man, no matter what he wanted, was trouble. Nicely packaged, but trouble with a capital T.
Problem was, should she let him go? Her sister had been taken, and even if they weren’t responsible, once the Protectors learned she’d pulled a gun on one of their men, she had no doubt they’d exact retribution. They were like that, with their pseudo good-guy image, working behind the scenes to cause death and destruction. Her father had made the mistake of trusting them. No one in the family would ever make that mistake again.
“You don’t know where Bonnie is?” she asked again.
“No.” His blue gaze never wavered. “But I’m willing to help you find her.”
This time, she sensed he spoke the truth. Partially.
