GRAY Wolf Mate Page 12

  Cole had ended up in a group home.

  The Guardian explained later that Cole’s mother had eluded the person he’d tasked with following that branch of the Gallize family bloodline. Just like the majority of Gallize shifters, Cole had been born to a human. He and his Gallize brethren only popped up every few generations since they lived so long. They sometimes became fathers of another Gallize, but not often.

  Years passed as the Guardian searched all over the world for Cole after he’d fallen off the radar. The Guardian had located Cole while he was in college and set a three-man task force on keeping track of him.

  Gallize descendants who carried the shifter DNA had a lavender aura until their animal was called up the first time, then the aura turned a vibrant blue.

  The night Cole’s beast decided it wanted out, evidently Cole’s aura became bright enough to call in backup.

  He thought back seven years to the night he’d been kidnapped. That might not be a fair description, knowing what he did now, but what else was he to think when a black ops team snatched him from the woods where he’d been running. They’d shoved his head into a black bag, then carted him up to this penthouse.

  He’d been out of his mind, shouting and howling.

  The howling should have been a clue.

  He’d imagined a hundred bad scenarios while that team manhandled him, but nothing he imagined ended with this man telling him he was a wolf shifter, then proving it by using his Gallize guardian power to force Cole to shift.

  The Guardian had grown quiet. He watched Cole with the stoic patience of an eagle eyeing the world below him. “To have your wolf surface at only nineteen was extremely unusual, Cole. I’ve pondered it often. I had hoped you wouldn’t face the mating curse younger than you should, but we both know that is exactly what’s happening. Right?”

  Cornered, he admitted, “I have a few issues. Nothing major.”

  “Has it ever occurred to you why you shifted so early?”

  Shrugging, Cole said, “Thought you said it was the dominance of my wolf.”

  “I did say that and your wolf is a brute, but that’s not the entire reason. You found your mate before you knew you were a shifter. You chose her and were ready to ask her to marry you the night you ran into the woods unsure of what was happening to you.”

  “You think my wolf surfaced because of ...” Cole stopped short, not wanting to bring Tess into this.

  “I think you falling in love with that young woman at college triggered the change. You were willing to bond your life to hers even as a human.”

  Shit. Cole leaned forward and dropped his head into his hands. He’d suspected that recently, but he would not blame her for this. Looking up, he said, “It’s not her fault.”

  “I realize that. You’re determined to fix Sammy’s problem, but what about yours?”

  Cole gave a sad laugh. “I’ll have a better chance of convincing Katelyn to go back to Sammy than getting the human daughter of a senator who hates shifters and lost her mother in a shifter attack to consider being my mate. Also, this woman is in a position of authority at SCIS. I have to bond with a mate who can accept my powers to stop the curse. To say it would be impossible with Tess is a severe understatement.”

  “Only if you believe it is.”

  Leave it to the Guardian to quote the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland as words of wisdom.

  Cole’s hackles lifted when the words sank in. “Are you saying I should risk her death to bond?”

  “No. We do not risk anyone for our own well-being. I’m only pointing out that we’ve solved many seemingly impossible mission problems by tackling them from every direction. Are you sure you’ve looked at this every possible way? Have you researched her history?”

  Sitting back, Cole nodded. “I see what you’re saying. You want to know if she could possibly be a Gallize.”

  “If she is, she has her own core power even if she hasn’t discovered it. Some females displayed very unusual gifts many years ago. We’d have a better chance of determining whether a woman possessed Gallize blood if the females had not lost their guardian more than two hundred years back. For you to be so strongly drawn to Tess even before your wolf manifested, it leads me to think she could be one. If so, that would allow her to bond with you.”

  Tess was special in so many ways, but not that one. Cole admitted, “Guess I should confess that I thought about it often in my early days as a shifter, more like fantasized about it. I did try to match her to the requirements for being a Gallize female. She doesn’t possess an important one.”

  “I see.”

  So did Cole. He saw his future, a dead end coming at him at light speed.

  Chapter 16

  Glad to finally be home, even if it was after dark and this apartment in downtown Spartanburg was only home for while, Tess peeled out of the business suit she’d worn to face her SCIS chief. That had been the low point of her day and it had gone downhill from there. He didn’t blow his stack often, but losing a potential Black River pack member had pushed him over the edge.

  One more day until Friday, the official end of a normal workweek.

  Not for her.

  Friday used to mean something special, but these days it was just the start of her work weekend.

  She tossed her suit on top of her ruined black dress from the night of the bombing.

  Could the drycleaner get the smell of smoke out of the material? It wasn’t as though she dressed up much, but she’d worn that dress to please her father who had asked her to join him Monday night at a fundraiser in Charlotte, North Carolina.

  He’d been so happy she was attending, until she called to cancel a minute before she went tearing out to meet up with her SCIS team.

  Stepping into a hot shower, she started soaping her body, thinking about Colin. Had he actually survived? Was he a pawn in some game being orchestrated by unknown players or just as guilty as Brantley thought?

  Where was Colin tonight?

  She brushed her nipples with the washrag and hissed at the sensitive buds. Her body had felt odd for days. Like it had a mind of its own and wanted something.

  What? A man?

  Well, duh. She hadn’t been with anyone in ...

  Trying to calculate how long was too depressing. This crazy, over-sensitive state was Colin’s fault.

  Had to be.

  It had started the minute he’d touched her wrist. That was all. It wasn’t as if the man had stroked between her legs.

  Oh, crap. Just thinking about that sent heat pooling down there. She locked her legs together and stood in the rush of water, thinking about changing it to a cold blast. Damn her traitorous hormones because they were begging for a better way to be wet and hot ... with a wet and hot man.

  Not Colin. How could she be reacting to him this way? He was a shifter, not exactly dating material in her little world.

  And even if she were willing to go there, he wasn’t around and the chances of her ever seeing him again were slim to none.

  This was just her twisted heart trying to confuse that shifter with Cole because of what Collin had said right before he was put in the transport. Those last words had raised the hair on her neck as well as a memory she’d fought years to get past. She kept those moments shoved down deep, out of her daily life.

  But Colin’s voice had sounded so much like Cole’s in that one moment. Everything she’d loved about Cole had come rushing back at her in a tidal wave of emotion.

  Shaking her head, she scoffed at her weakness. She was only worked up by the ghost of sex past. She missed the touch of the man she’d given her heart to. The one who had stomped on it when he disappeared.

  Hadn’t she sworn to never let Cole Cavanaugh take another day from her after all that he’d destroyed?

  Blaming Colin for stirring up these emotions was unfair. Words were just words. Beyond that, the shifter had only touched her wrist.

  And stroked his thumb across her skin.

  And made he
r feel as if she were being pulled to him, inside him. She’d struggled to leave his side every time she’d been in his room.

  Had he somehow ... infected her with a shifter cootie?

  She slapped her forehead, laughing at the silly thought. “Good grief, Tess, you moron. It isn’t like he can turn you into a werewolf or a sex nymph with one touch,” she muttered. “I just need someone to scratch an itch. Isn’t that what a man would say?”

  But she didn’t want that.

  She wanted more than just great sex. She wanted to look into a man’s eyes and see her happiness reflected.

  More than a quickie with a stranger.

  Irritated for a lot of reasons, unwanted arousal being just one, she scrubbed her aching breasts then finished washing with brisk efficiency. Lingering could end with her satisfying herself, but to be honest, she hadn’t been very happy dealing with her love life single-handed.

  Stepping out, she dried quickly.

  Blast it. Even the towel brushing over her skin bothered her. She might just have to take matters into her own hands tonight after all.

  Too many days working with no playtime demanded a price.

  Evidently it was her sanity.

  She pulled on silk boxers and a thin knit top that would cause the least abrasion, then smoothed lotion on her skin on the way to her bed. Even her king-size bed was a perpetual workspace covered in paperwork.

  If not for her laptop, the other half of the bed would be empty.

  Sitting down with her legs crossed, she opened an email and had started scanning it when her skin pricked with an innate awareness that she was not alone.

  The freaky energy in her body revved up.

  She couldn’t say how, but she knew for sure someone was inside her apartment.

  Her building had top security and she lived on the seventh floor. Who could make it past the front doorman and a key-carded elevator?

  She covertly checked around the room.

  Her walk-in closet was open to view. No one there.

  She’d just been in the bathroom. No one there.

  Her gaze moved to the door leading to her living room and kitchen. Hadn’t she left that open all the way? It was almost closed now.

  Next to that doorway, the alarm panel display still showed as ready to arm. She hadn’t set it yet, but she normally didn’t until she was ready for sleep.

  But wouldn’t she have heard the normal ding if the door had opened?

  That did nothing to instill confidence in her or quiet the fast beating of her heart.

  Having spent many years alone, she wasn’t rattled easily, but dammit, this was bugging her.

  She had to think. No fast movements.

  Picking up the closest work papers as if she planned to read them, she casually reached to her left where a writing pen sat next to her Glock 17 on the nightstand.

  In one move, she snatched up the loaded 9mm and dropped the papers to wrap both hands around the grip.

  She ordered in a loud voice, “Show yourself or I’ll shoot through the door.” Not really. She’d never risk the bullet going through a wall to hit an innocent.

  When no one admitted to being inside, she started feeling like a fool, but she was going to clear the rooms herself, then call security to ask if any nonresident had traveled to her floor in the last half hour.

  Before she could make a move, the door to the living room opened slowly, as if given a little shove.

  Her heart tried to climb up into her throat. Was she ready to shoot someone? Oh, she’d trained and could nail a headshot at twenty-five yards, but she had never faced actually shooting a real person.

  There was a first time for everything. If she saw a weapon, she was shooting.

  Hands raised, a man stepped into view.

  It can’t be.

  Cole.

  Her eyes rushed up and down, taking in every bit of him. All of it was far bigger than it had been in college. As a cross-country runner, he’d been sexy as they came back then, but the man standing in front of her had a beefed-up body and a dangerous edge about him.

  One part remained the same.

  That searing blue gaze. The last time she recalled seeing those eyes and that face up close, he’d been leaning over her as he drove deep inside ...

  Damn. That was not the visual she needed in the middle of this moment.

  Her mind raced with questions. Her heart jumped into panic gear, beating as fast as the wings of a hummingbird on crack.

  What the hell was he doing here?

  For that matter, where had he disappeared to all those years ago? He’d been hot as the devil back then, but he was off the charts now.

  “Hello, Tess.” He lowered his arms slowly and crossed those drool-worthy forearms.

  His voice had deepened. In fact, it sounded like Colin.

  Now she was projecting Colin’s attributes onto Cole, but if she put the two side by side, they’d match up in size.

  Cole took his time reviewing her during the silence then said, “Long time no see.”

  She needed to slap herself. Drool worthy?

  No. This man had vanished without a word, then just showed up now? Had broken into her apartment? He wanted to chat as if nothing had transpired between them?

  Anger shoved aside the ball of hurt growing in her chest at seeing him again.

  Anger she could manage much better than the emotions crashing around inside her.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked, glad to hear the brusque professionalism drown out her quaking heart.

  “I just want to talk.” He took another step forward. “I’m not armed.”

  “Stop right there.” She raised the gun a notch higher. “Armed or not, you can’t just break into my apartment after being gone sev-en years and expect me to offer you coffee.”

  “I don’t expect anything. But I do need to talk to you.”

  She quickly sorted through her options and came up with holding the gun on him while she called security.

  She couldn’t do that. They would call the police.

  Even if she wanted to suffer the potential news that would leak out, which would be inevitable since her father was a US senator, Cole wouldn’t be willing to answer questions if she had him arrested.

  Those years of wondering what had happened tipped in favor of allowing him to stay.

  She kept the gun pointed at his chest. “So talk.”

  “Your arms are going to get tired.”

  When she said nothing, he shrugged. “You have a leak in your SCIS division. Someone is undermining everything you do.”

  Not what she expected him to say. “How can you possibly know anything about what I do or my agency?”

  His eyes finally dropped away, but before they did, she saw a flood of disappointment. Why?

  When he looked back up, he said, “Because I just spent three days in your facility and barely survived your jackals trying to kill me.”

  Blood rushed from her head.

  He was saying ... no, that ... the room spun. Her arms felt heavy, dropping.

  “Tess?” He stepped toward her.

  She snapped the gun back into place fast and shook off the dizzy wave. “What the hell are you saying?”

  “I didn’t want to tell you this way, baby.”

  “Don’t you fucking call me baby!” Tears sprang from her eyes, but she could see just fine to hit center of body mass four yards away. She tried to swallow and coughed, choking on what she couldn’t believe.

  Her voice came out broken. “You can’t be ... you aren’t ... Colin.”

  “Colin is a cover name.”

  “Don’t play with me, Cole. You know what I’m saying.”

  He moved his jaw around as if trying to form words. “I am a wolf shifter, but I’m not with the Black River pack. I’m hunting them.”

  A wolf shifter. Her heart had tried to tell her, but her mind hadn’t gotten on board. In fact, her mind still wasn’t accepting it. “I don’t believe
you, Cole. Get out.”

  He jerked as if from a phantom slap.

  She didn’t care. He’d destroyed her once and was doing it all over again.

  “Tess, please. I want to explain what happened.”

  “Why? To convince me not to turn you over to the police, or if you want to maintain you’re a shifter, maybe SCIS security?”

  “If you don’t believe what I have to tell you, then I’ll understand whatever action you choose to take.”

  Why was he being so damn nice?

  She bent her legs so she could prop her arms on her knees.

  He lifted an eyebrow, reminding her he’d said the gun would get heavy.

  That pissed her off all over again. She gave him an evil smile. “If I empty out a few rounds, the gun will feel lighter.”

  His face fell.

  Oh, he didn’t find that amusing?

  He muttered, “You were nicer when I was burned half to death.”

  He could only know that if ... he was actually the person who had called himself Colin.

  No wonder she kept mixing together Cole and Colin, but the strange feeling she’d been having was not natural. Like that weird energy stirring up havoc in her chest. What was causing that to get stronger?

  She asked, “Are you really a ... shifter?”

  “Yes, but it’s not like I’ve turned into a zombie or something like that.”

  She didn’t say anything that could be construed as agreeing with him. “Did you do anything to me when you touched me yesterday?”

  Frowning with disbelief, he said, “Like what? I’d never harm you.”

  Colin’s voice kept echoing in her head. He’d also said he wouldn’t harm her, but both men were the same, and Colin had not tried to hurt her.

  Was she really going to tell Cole her sexual appetite had quadrupled since his touch? Only if she were an idiot. “Never mind. I just wanted to know if you passed along anything.”

  Now he looked insulted. “Like a germ or a disease? No. Human diseases can’t touch us. Anything you might have gotten came from a human.”

  “I didn’t say I had anything.”

  “Good.” That one word had been full of relief.

  “I don’t understand any of this, Cole.”