“Since the place is really ours, it should be free of charge.” Stanton smiled again.
Acting alpha-like, he was waiting for her to cower a bit. She wasn’t afraid of him. Not that he couldn’t be dangerous, but she just wasn’t going to be cowed by him.
She tapped her pen on the countertop. He slowly pulled out a wallet and then handed a credit card to her. She said, “And I’ll need to see some photo ID.”
His brothers chuckled.
“We have a TV show,” Stanton reminded her.
“That I don’t watch.” She eyed his photo ID carefully, memorizing his address, and then began to fill in the information on her computer. “And you’re staying a week and checking out on…”
“Two weeks.”
She looked up from her computer. “You made reservations for a week, checking out on Saturday morning by ten.”
Stanton turned to his brothers. “I thought you said we had reservations for two weeks.”
“That’s what I changed it to. Don’t remember who I talked to, and I didn’t get any confirmation number,” Vernon said.
“Then you didn’t get any reservation extension. We already have the rooms booked after that.”
“Then when do you have the next available opening?” Stanton leaned against the counter, getting into her space.
“Not for three more months.”
“I don’t believe you.” He tried to see her computer, and she turned the monitor so he couldn’t observe it. “That’s fine. We’ll stay at Bertha’s bed and breakfast.”
Lelandi came out of the kitchen and smiled at the men. “Gentlemen, enjoy your stay here.” Then she turned to Laurel. “Thanks for accommodating my brother’s…friends for the coming month. They’ve looked forward to skiing here while my brother, his wife, and their children visit with Darien and me.”
“I can’t wait to meet them,” Laurel said cheerfully, then handed the keys to the Wernicke brothers. “Your rooms are the first three on the right as you reach the top of the stairs.”
The brothers left then and headed to the stairs.
Lelandi whispered to her, “CJ was supposed to be back already, but he saw the white wolf you thought you had seen—only this time it was on the other side of the river.”
Laurel’s heart skipped a beat. “You’re kidding.”
“No. So he and some others are trying to reach that side of the river and track the wolf down. Trevor’s coming here to keep an eye on things for you until CJ returns. I’ll stick around until he arrives.”
“You don’t really have to.” Laurel knew Lelandi had little ones to take care of.
“Someone needs to stay here with you in case you have trouble, given the circumstances. CJ would, but he had the notion to check out the white wolf and just happened to see it.”
“It’s not one of yours?”
“No.”
“A full-blooded wolf?”
“Maybe, or one of our kind. Just not one of our pack. Anyway, we need to know the truth, and if it’s one of our kind, we’ll see. Oh, and about the hotel bookings,” Lelandi said softly, for Laurel’s hearing only, “we’ll ensure your place stays booked.”
“They’ll just stay at Bertha’s.”
“It’s also booked, guaranteed.”
Laurel smiled. She loved this wolf pack.
* * *
CJ got ahold of Darien, then contemplated how to get to the other side of the river. A bridge crossed to the other side ten miles down the road, but he didn’t want to lose the opportunity.
“I’m shifting,” he said over his phone to Darien.
“Are you sure you don’t want to wait until you have backup?” Darien asked. “I’ve had the alert roster called. Your brothers are at the top of the list, and Peter’s coming.”
“What about Laurel and the hotel?” He was supposed to be there, keeping an eye on the Wernicke brothers.
“Lelandi is there with her.”
CJ didn’t like it. Two women were no match for three aggressive male wolves.
“Trevor’s joining them as soon as he can get there.”
“All right.”
“But about this wolf—”
“It’s just one wolf. And because it’s white, it could be old or injured.”
“Or an Arctic wolf, healthy and strong. Could you tell?”
“No. The wind was whipping the fresh snow around and pushing the snow from the pine branches, making for a screen of white.”
“Are you sure it’s not a gray wolf and the snow was making it appear white?”
“I don’t think so. I’ve stripped. Got to shift and go.”
“Take care, CJ. Howl if you find anything. I’m on my way.”
“Will do.”
They ended the call, and CJ buried his clothes and phone underneath a pile of snow. Using his enhanced sense of smell as a wolf, he would easily locate his belongings when he returned.
He shifted, his muscles and skin heating as the welcome change came over him, the chill of the wind instantly blocked as his double coat of fur protected him from the elements—both cold and heat. Then he raced to the rocky riverbank, slipped down the rocks until he was no longer standing on the smooth stone river bottom, and swam against the strong flow of the current.
He hoped that if the wolf was older, he could reach him before long. But if this was the same wolf others had said they had witnessed—the ghost wolf that had never been located—he might be so good at evasion that even CJ wouldn’t be able to locate him.
CJ struggled against the pull of the cold, black water. If the wolf had not driven off in the truck like they had previously surmised, had he managed to swim across the river that night, evading them that way? CJ wasn’t sure when the first sightings of the wolf had been reported, though he’d never heard anyone say it was a white wolf. And he’d never known anyone personally who had witnessed the wolf. Or at least who had let on.
When he finally reached the other side of the river and found purchase on the slippery stones, he made his way up the bank and ran into the piney woods. He was here, ready for the chase and whatever he found, but he wished he could be in three places at once: here looking for the white wolf, watching over the hotel to ensure the Wernicke brothers didn’t give the sisters any further grief, and at the sisters’ home, learning if Laurel and her sisters had found anything hidden in their aunt’s furniture when it arrived. He hadn’t told Darien or anyone, because she hadn’t wanted to divulge the furniture’s secret compartments. If she found anything, she would tell him. And Darien and Lelandi if it was beneficial to the case.
But he was here for now. He wanted in the worst way to learn who the wolf was—to at least solve one of the mysteries they had run across.
He concentrated hard on looking for a wolf blending with the snow-covered trees. He was smelling for it and listening for any sign that it was moving through the woods. With the wind whipping about and the snow making popping sounds as it fell off the trees in clumps, he didn’t sense the wolf anywhere.
Worse, he had just climbed on top of a snow-covered, tangled mass of fallen trees and branches, and as soon as he stepped on it, he felt it move. The timber suddenly cracked and snapped. His heart went into his throat, and before he could leap off it, the deadfall broke beneath his weight and he fell.
* * *
Laurel’s sisters arrived nearly at midnight. As soon as the men off-loaded the furniture into the house and left, Laurel gave both her sisters hugs in greeting. Then Ellie said, “Okay, spill the beans.”
Laurel couldn’t stop worrying about CJ. No one had heard from him in hours, and Lelandi had updated her every hour on the hour. He’d taken off after the white wolf and then vanished. All Laurel could think of was the way in which their aunt and the Wernicke brother and sister had disappeared. At one point, she thought of alien abductions, which was nuts, sure, but she couldn’t quit thinking about CJ and wanting to go in search of him. Lelandi had told her that they had at least forty men out looking for him now. They would find him and he’d be fine, Laurel kept telling herself.