Vivian Arend - Wolf Flight

“We need to finish. The others could be here anytime.”

Deep breath.

Tad nodded. He dropped one final kiss on her mouth, a fleeting brush of lips, the promise of more. Simply touching her made his body ache. There was no way he could deny the attraction between them. It was time he made up his mind, and right now his wolf side was losing the battle. Waiting to find forever with a wolf mate was one choice, but perhaps he could find forever in a different direction.

Alone in her hotel room that night Missy paced, unable to sit still with the energy surging through her. The day had turned out nothing like she expected. She still felt Tad’s mouth on hers, the caress of his hands on her body. Never before had she experienced such a strong attraction. The connection with Tad was overpowering, a little frightening and divinely potent. Was it what she wanted?

Was it what she needed?

After fleeing Whistler she had worked days and researched at night until nearly a month later she found a possible solution to her problem.

Wolf hormones.

The genetic differences between werewolves and humans were small but profound. It was the presence of unique chemicals that made possible the physical transformation between forms. Those same compounds caused the incredible bond between wolf couples to occur. The creation of lifetime mates was a blessing, but there was a hidden curse. Male wolves built up an excess supply of the hormones during adolescence.

While wolves and humans could have sex, the chemicals were only released during intimacy with a female wolf. A cousin once told Missy guys jokingly called the situation “double virginity”. No matter how active their sex life with humans, males still had to lose their wolf virginity with a female more powerful than them or the huge amount of hormones released could backfire, creating a pheromone overload.

The female would become hopelessly obsessed with her partner due to nothing more than a chemical chain reaction. A false mate, with the lifetime connection on only one side.

That was how her brother-in-law had hoped to gain control over her. Doug thought compelling Missy into marriage with his inexperienced brother would trap her.

Missy opened the window to let in the cold night air, the room suddenly close and unbearable. She leaned her head against the windowsill, fighting down the shudders that threatened to overtake her as she remembered her wedding night. It wasn’t the sex that had scared her, but she hadn’t been in love and her terror of becoming trapped had made the experience hell. Missy had always considered it a miracle she was a stronger wolf than anyone expected.

And now she discovered an overload would not only have forced a false mate, the destructive chemical reaction would have also eliminated her latent Omega talents.

She resumed pacing, the small space of the hotel room like a cage around her. The solution had been there all the time. Wolf society knew about false mates and had guidelines in the code to help prevent it. They had even developed the ritual of FirstMate once it was discovered that if a male’s first experience was with a wolf who was already mated, the chemicals had no effect.

If she could provide FirstMate to a powerful wolf, it could destroy her talents and she would be free. Doug would have no use for her without intact Omega abilities. Giving up a part of herself to avoid being used as a tool seemed an acceptable sacrifice. Even if it meant she would forever love someone who didn’t love her back.

But who should she approach to offer FirstMate? Only strong wolves or mated females with their husband’s approval could offer to act as a guide. In her case it would be assumed as a widow she would be safe from the hormone backlash. If the attempt failed she had decided she would shift into her wolf and disappear from human society forever. The Yukon was a logical safe haven. Her time was running out and if FirstMate didn’t work, going feral seemed the only choice left.

And Tad was in the north. Missy had always remembered him and his face was the first to rush to her mind, perhaps for a good reason. They had only kept their hands off each other during the afternoon’s work because the crew from LRG joined them. Was it possible that she was already reacting to a false mating? Just from a kiss?

Did Tad know he had wolf genes? She couldn’t let him make love to her and then leave him to face a world for which he wasn’t prepared. Because he was a half-blood, having sex with her would trigger his wolf, and by the next full moon he would be able to shift. He needed to be warned, trained, and she wouldn’t be here after their rendezvous. She would either return to Whistler to prove her skills were gone or she would disappear into the wilderness.

Missy forced herself to stop daydreaming about Tad. There were other goals yet to accomplish. Opening her laptop she logged into the first stage of the Whistler-wolf-pack website. Maggie was still online. Her sister’s habitual evening online chat was their prearranged set-up. It gave Missy information she would never be able to access otherwise. When Maggie signed out at nine p.m., Missy entered her sister’s pass code with a false ISP number and snuck into the system while the time clock stayed motionless. Missy took a big breath and blew it out in a slow stream. The records would continue to show her sister’s presence until the mandatory one-hour system shutdown occurred. Missy checked her watch and set to work.

Accessing Doug’s daily email records and his private message box was a piece of cake with her computer skills. She was relieved to see that while her brother-in-law continued to track her, he hadn’t put out a call to make her return before her time was up and there were no plans in place to harass her sister.

Missy snooped around to gather more information on the pack’s illegal activities to use as ammunition to challenge Doug. Perhaps she could leak the information to the authorities and get him arrested by the human system if the wolf council was unable to help. She did a little archive research on Omega wolf characteristics and one hour later, Missy logged out. She was still safe.

For now.

Tad completed a few more official flight papers. He pulled a beer from the fridge and turned the TV on low in the background as he sat and flipped through a couple of the magazines on the table.

He was wasting time until he could go and pick up Missy for the evening and he knew it. She said she’d be ready by eight and he was fretting and worrying like he was back in high school. Three days he’d been waiting since Saturday, three nights of his mind producing the most erotic of dreams to haunt him. He had a permanent hard-on and every little glimpse of Missy at the work site simply drove his need higher.

A date with Missy, a real actual grown-up date. It was enough to make his worries about getting triggered fade into the background, at least temporarily. The phone rang and his heart leapt. Then he realized it wasn’t his house phone or his cell phone.

Crap. He couldn’t believe he’d forgotten about his sister. It was Tuesday and Robyn was supposed to check in tonight. Good thing he’d still been home or she would have flipped. He opened the satellite phone to check for a text message. A voice rose from the speaker instead.

Weird. Robyn never spoke out loud. She was deaf. She signed or she wrote notes or she stomped and threw things.

“Hello?” Tad said hesitantly.

“Hi, Tad, this is Keil Lynus. How are you, man?”

“Hey. I’m doing great.” He glanced down at the phone trying to figure out what was strange about this call. Keil was a regular client, a wilderness guide and a great guy who just happened to be a wolf. He was also the one who’d explained about werewolves in the first place when his little brother had screwed up and accidentally shifted in front of Tad. “What’s up? Troubles with TJ? Need help rescuing him?”