Police officers and an ambulance crew had already rescued the drugged men who worked for the zoo. Alex had kept a low profile, watching from the woods to ensure they would be all right, never revealing himself or his identity. But what kept him from leaving the area was Cassie's truck. He peered inside it again. She hadn't been here since she left it yesterday sometime, and he couldn't help worrying about her. No matter how much he told himself she was a capable woman when roaming through the wilderness, he couldn't help the concern that nagged at him. What if she'd run afoul of the murderers? Or she ran into some other trouble? An injury? A wild-animal attack? Other hunters mistaking her for a deer?
Then he recalled the man's footprints that had followed Cassie's. Had he been with her or stalking her?
He let out his breath in exasperation, threw his backpack over his shoulders, and headed into the woods again, determined to stay in the national forest until he could locate her.
As soon as Leidolf stepped inside the bedroom, Cassie yanked the covers back over her body, trying to pretend she hadn't intended to run off. She was sure he could hear her heart beating too fast. He smiled at Cassie in a way that said he knew just what she'd been planning. As hot as her cheeks felt, they were probably flushed.
"Two young ladies in our pack would like to visit with you," Leidolf said, but instead of anyone else coming into the room as she expected, he shut the door. "But first, I wanted to talk to you further."
Oh, brother, more of his trying to convince her she needed to join his pack. Not about to be swayed, but to be polite for their caring for her, she took a deep breath, sat back against the pillows with the covers tucked up under her arms, and motioned to the recliner. "Go ahead."
She had no intention of saying anything further about herself, though. The less said, the better.
He gave her a shadow of a smile, his expression saying that there was no way he was putting that much distance between them, and then sat on the mattress next to her, his hip pressed against hers. He was the personification of seduction.
She would not look at his lips again, calculating how they would feel pressed against hers. Instead, she tilted her chin up, and when he didn't say anything, she prompted again, "Proceed."
She didn't know if his need to talk was a delaying tactic to give Laney more time to arrive, or if he wanted to stay close to Cassie longer, but whatever it was, the more she was with him, the more she couldn't see Leidolf as just a one-night-stand kind of guy. That wasn't helping her remain objective in the least.
He finally reached down and took hold of her hand and massaged the top with his thumb using a gentle stroke, which again, wasn't helping her objectivity one iota.
"I left my pack a couple of years ago because of problems with the leadership, but it was a dangerous situation for my family," Leidolf began, his voice dark.
Already she didn't like the tone of this talk. She kept her eyes focused on his when she wanted to turn away, bury her feelings deep, and not speak about families or danger or what had become of them.
"Because I left them, my sister died."
Cassie swallowed hard and this time looked away. What if she had been the reason her family died? Because she'd run off to be with the wolf pack that day? What if she had been home instead, and she could have warned her family before they were murdered?
"I tried to get my family to move away, but they wouldn't. My father owned the territory before he was injured permanently in an avalanche, and he was bound and determined to stay. It had been his family's home for generations," Leidolf continued.
Cassie looked back at him. He still watched her and analyzed her expression to learn whatever he could from her reactions. She'd never met a man who was so attuned to watching people's actions and reactions while attempting to understand them.
"I tried to get my sisters to come with me at least. But I didn't have any luck, and one of my sisters died."
"It wasn't your fault," Cassie said. She knew it wasn't. Even if Leidolf thought he was responsible. He couldn't be, not the way he had taken over this pack, one that, in his own words, had been abused. She swallowed hard. Although she was sure it couldn't have been his fault, she still couldn't come to grips with the way she felt about her own family.
"You're right, Cassie, but for a long time I felt it was my fault, that I was the cause of my sister's death. My remaining sister blamed me. What's worse, she was the one who tried to uncover what had happened to our sister when I should have been the one to do so. But I didn't know that Larissa had run off, or mated with a gray, and then was murdered. Even so, she was my responsibility."
"Your father's, since he was still alive," Cassie said.
"My father was disabled."
"Yet she listened to him, not you. What if your father had moved the family?"
Leidolf nodded, but the pain was still reflected in his expression.
"It wasn't your fault," Cassie said again, softly, with feeling.
"I came here to live, away from my home in Colorado, the life of a loner in the wilderness, a mountain man."
"Poseidon," she said under her breath.
"What?"
She took a deep breath and shook her head. "A mountain man. Or nature lover. That's what I thought you were when I saw you at the lake." And Poseidon, god-like, seductive, edible.
"I had been a mountain man, scruffy, scraggly beard, long hair."
She smiled.
He chuckled. "I looked like a wolf even without my fur coat on."
"Not when I saw you. I figured you were just..." She shrugged.
"Sexy as hell?" He leaned over, kissed her forehead, and then leaned back and gave her one of those unbelievably devilish winks that said he knew her too damned well. "I thought that about you, too."
She folded her arms and tilted her chin up. "What had you intended to do when you came stalking out of the lake after me?"
"See your reaction. See if you stayed, ran away, or stalked in my direction, intending to have your way with me, like you sure seemed intent on."
She smiled and touched the top button on his shirt, her gaze switching to his. Her lips curved up a little.
He sighed and removed her hand from his shirt and then kissed it again. "We are a lot more alike than you think, Cassie. A lot more." He rose from the bed. "The girls wanted to meet you."
More of the "let's see which pack member can convince you to stay" routine.
Leidolf opened the door and motioned for the girls to enter the room. "They're to keep you company until Laney returns with clothes for you."
The auburn-haired teen girls entered Leidolf's bedroom, both smiling like rays of sunshine on a gray, foggy day, their amber eyes just as gleeful as they greeted Cassie. She remembered them attending her lecture. Neither of the girls had asked her a question. And why should they have? They probably knew as much about wolves as she did.
The way Leidolf gave them each a stern look, the unspoken message meant, Guard our guest, and don't let her get away.
He bowed his head to Cassie and left the girls alone with her, keeping the door wide open.
Just in case they had to cry out for help if Cassie tried to steal away anyway.
"I'm Alice, and this is my twin sister, Sarah. Leidolf told us to keep you company while Laney went to fetch clothes for you. We live next door to Forest Park in Portland. When Leidolf went in search of you in the Mount Hood National Forest, the whole pack, even those scattered in nearby towns around Portland, heard about it. They gathered here while you were sleeping. Everyone was dying to see you. Even though Leidolf hadn't called for a pack meeting."
"Yeah, I think he was a little bit surprised at first to see everyone here," Sarah chirped. "He figured he had you mostly to his own." She grinned. "But I think he's enjoying showing you off."