Dana Myers slipped behind the wheel of the car and slowly turned the key in the ignition. Her heart thumped distractingly in her ears. This was her chance to make a break for it. The hyena pack was passed out from a particularly strong batch of bathtub gin.

For two years, Dana had squirreled away money, biding her time as a servant to the Updike brothers and their hyena clan.

The car motor rumbled to life. Dana didn't feel bad about taking a car. The hyenas who came to the mansion lived in service of the Updike brothers. Everyone shared the resources they brought to the estate.

Everyone except women like Dana.

She had been a trade from her own fox pack, two years ago, when they’d gotten involved with crime.

Dana was an orphan and had been left with relatives to be cared for. Her mother and father would turn over in their graves if they knew what happened to their daughter. But Dana was a strong woman and she wasn’t going to let anything stand in her way any longer.

When she finally saw a chance to sneak away, she took it. Slowly driving down the road with her headlights off, to ensure no one saw her, she made it to the main road. She felt like she was home free for the first time in two years.

As far as she was concerned, she had paid whatever debts her old pack had with the Updikes by working for them without pay for the last couple of years, and she didn’t feel obligated to stay any longer, even if it was to protect anyone. Stealing a car might not be hundred percent morally correct, but after what she had been through, she no longer cared.

She turned out onto the highway and headed west toward the city. There, she knew she would be able to find a new place to stay and hopefully a job. Nothing could be worse than working for the Updikes, and she was willing to take any position she could find. She imagined all the opportunities in front of her as she drove down the highway.

It was clear, starry, midsummer night and the world was her oyster. Never again would she take orders from men like Brandon and Chuck Updike. Her life was her own now, and she was never going back to them.

They had kept her in constant fear for two years, promising to kill her relatives if she left. But since her great uncle died last week, there was no one else in the fox pack that she even remotely cared about. Dana had decided it was no longer her priority. She didn't owe anyone anything. After all, they’d sold her to them in the first place.

Losing her parents had not been easy. She’d lived with her great uncle and his second wife since she was ten. They had not been the most attentive caretakers. Unlike most fox packs, Dana's was neither affectionate nor close. They had begun working with the hyenas soon after the Great War, and she believed that it had truly affected everything about the clan.

They no longer behaved like foxes, and seemed to her to have taken on many of the traits of hyenas. Dana had seen this pattern repeatedly with any shifter pack or clan that got involved with hyenas. Their promise of easy money and total disregard for life enabled them to tear the world apart.

That was not the way that Dana wanted to live. She still dreamed of having a family of her own: a mate and pups who would make her life complete. She wanted to give her children the things that she’d missed out on growing up without her parents.

As she drove down the highway, dreaming about her new life, her engine let out a sputtering snap. Her eyes went wide with surprise when the car suddenly died and ran off the road into a ditch. She was only fifteen miles out of Fate Mountain Village. Not far enough to be safe from the Updikes.

The sun rose in the east, breaking over the mountains and stretching in yellow claws over the land. She swore under her breath and dug through her purse, looking for the phone her uncle had still been paying for.

She had a little bit of money that she'd stashed away from coins and bills she'd found around the Updike mansion. It hadn't really been stealing, she was just picking up lost clutter that nobody cared about. During that time, she'd managed to save over a thousand dollars. She could buy a bus ticket into the city if she could make it back to Fate Mountain Village.

If she shifted into fox form, she'd get there faster. But then she would have to leave her things. That wasn't an option. She was starting over from nothing. She couldn't leave her purse, her phone, her wallet and all her clothes.

Dana growled and slammed her fist into the steering wheel. She had the worst luck in the world and it was starting to tick her off. She flicked on her phone with the intention of finding a tow truck. She hadn't looked at her updates all night in her nervous preparation for her escape. When she flicked her finger over the start button, she noticed something on the screen that took her breath away.

The text said, "Congratulations, we found your fated mate."

Dana had signed up for Mate.com three years ago, before she had come to live with the Updikes. In all that time, her mate had never been found. It was odd for a female shifter to go mateless for so long. Since there were five times as many male shifters as females, females often had the easiest time finding someone to settle down with. No such luck for Dana.

But now, her luck seemed to be changing. She clicked on the screen as quickly as her fingers could smash against the glass and brought up the link to Mate.com. The profile of her mate opened on the screen, and she almost dropped her phone. The man's profile name was Mechanic Bear, and he was the cutest guy she'd ever seen in her life. Something about him seemed so familiar. She couldn't quite place it.

Even if she had met her mate before, the mating bite that Brandon Updike had given her would have masked the pheromones and the intuitive attraction that fated mates felt for each other. She was so angry she wanted to scream.

Her mate was handsome, tall and athletic. Blue eyes and blond hair, with broad shoulders that tapered into a narrow waist. A tattoo of a firebird stretched across his bare chest and the cutest little smirk she'd ever seen lit up his face. The man looked like something out of a Hollywood movie, and she knew she had to meet him.

She clicked the “chat now” button on the Mate.com app and brought up the text screen. She bit her lip and thought about what to say. His profile said he lived on Fate Mountain and worked as a mechanic. His favorite hobby was motocross. If her mate lived on Fate Mountain, she would never be able to get away from the Updikes. They would find her, hunt her down, and force her back into their mansion as their servant. She would never let that happen.

Mechanic Bear was a grizzly shifter and she knew a grizzly could take out ten or more hyenas in shifted form. Maybe he could protect her. It did seem a lot to ask. Her problem with the hyenas was her own, and she didn't want to bring her mate into it. It was a lot of baggage to expect a new mate to deal with. But her curiosity and her need for love won out. She began to type in the text bar.

"Hi, Mechanic Bear," she typed. "I think I'm in need of your skill set. My car is broken down on Highway 99, headed west into Portland. Could you come help me?"

She pressed send and sat back. It was very early morning and she didn't expect him to be up and about yet. She groaned at herself for even trying. It was so inappropriate, she didn't even know what to think. Maybe she should just get out of the car and hitchhike into town.

As a fox shifter, she wasn't strong like a grizzly, but she still had sharp pointy teeth. She wasn't afraid of hitchhiking with a human, or anything else for that matter. After living with the Updikes for two years, her standards had changed quite a bit from when she was a teenager. Nothing could bother her, and practically nothing could scare her.

She climbed out of the car, feeling like an idiot. She slung her purse over her shoulder, grabbed her suitcase, and stood in front of her car with her thumb out. There were few cars on the road this early in the morning and nobody had even passed since she had broken down.

She stood on the side of the road looking from east to west and back again, wondering if anyone would even drive by. Maybe this hitchhiking idea wasn’t a very good one. She was about to give up and roll her suitcase back to Fate Mountain Village when a tow truck came driving down the highway toward her. Her luck was definitely changing. If she could flag this tow truck down, then maybe she could get the car towed and take a bus into the city.

When the tow truck pulled up beside her car and stopped, she realized that she was even luckier than she had thought. The door swung open and out stepped Mechanic Bear, his sky-blue eyes shining and his face unreadable. He crossed the distance between them and stood before her. Neither of them spoke as a car zoomed by, heading east. The wind ruffled through her hair and blew around her shoulders.

Mechanic Bear cleared his throat and reached out to offer his hand. As soon as she touched him, a spark of desire and recognition ignited between them. The mask over her instincts, that Brandon's bite had caused, evaporated, and she knew that she was staring at her mate.

"I'm Jessie Kincaid," he said in a low, growling voice.

She bit her lip, unsure of how to respond. Then she gulped and remembered herself. "I'm Dana Myers," she said. "It's so nice to meet you. I think we've met before."

"How could we have met before?" Jessie asked. “And not know we were fated?”

"Brandon Updike gave me a mating bite. It messed up my instincts and kept me attached to the Updike family, until today."

Jessie squeezed her hand as his eyes glowed yellow and his grizzly canines extended in his mouth. He growled and let go of her hand.

"I can't imagine a shifter doing that to another shifter. I will end him.”

"I need to get off the road and out of sight,” Dana said, changing the subject.

"Why were you with the Updikes?"

"I've been serving as their domestic servant for the last two years. My fox pack traded me for a debt that they owed the hyena clan.”

"The Updikes are a scourge on the shifter world. I want nothing more than to see them brought down," Jessie said.

“I’d have to agree with you on that,” Dana said.

“I remember you now. You wore that French maid uniform," he said, recognition sparking in his eyes.

"That's me." He was a Kincaid. She felt a flash of recognition. "Now I remember when I saw you. You came out to the mansion two years ago when I first started working there."

"That must've been it.”

“Do you think you can fix my car?" she asked.

"Of course. Forgive my distraction. It's not every day that I meet my fated mate… for the second time."

"Perfectly understandable,” she said, looking around nervously.

She knew they needed to get out of here as fast as possible. She was driving a stolen car from the hyena pack who claimed to own her. Standing on the side of the road, this close to their mansion, was not a good idea. Even though Jessie was now here and knew that he was her mate, the possibility of them coming back for her was still high. She also didn't want Jessie to get involved with the Updikes any more than he had to.

"I'll hitch the car up to the tow truck and you can ride back to the Timber Bear Ranch with me. I have a shop there. I can fix it.”

"Great," she said, not sure if that was really a good idea.

At least the car would be off the side of the road, and she would be out of sight. She had planned to go down the mountain into Portland and start a new life. But going to the Timber Bear Ranch was as good a solution as any, for now. Plus, she would get to spend time with her fated mate.

Dana had wanted a mate for as long as she could remember. She had always loved babies and had always wanted a family more than anything.

When she’d lost her parents at ten, something important had died with them. A sense of safety and belonging and acceptance that she'd never felt anywhere else. She wanted to get that back and she wondered if she could with Jessie. He was panty-meltingly gorgeous, built like an athlete, smart, and from what she understood about the Kincaids, rich. For some reason, he just didn't seem that into her. She couldn't quite place it, and it made her feel bad.

She stood back and watched him as he attached her stolen car to the tow truck. His deft hands and strong arms made quick work of the project, and she was impressed. She'd never found mechanics as sexy as she did in that moment.

He opened the passenger side of his truck and she climbed inside. After getting behind the wheel, he found a place to turn around and head toward Fate Mountain Village. Before he reached town, he took a turn off the highway and drove up a gravel driveway.

Jessie parked in front of a large machine shop positioned between several houses. Dana hopped out of the truck and looked around, inspecting the property.

The Updikes talked about how much they hated the Kincaids all the time. Brandon and Chuck were pissed as hell that the Kincaids had found the goldmine on their property. The Updikes were always looking for easy money like that, and they’d wanted to buy the Timber Bear Ranch at a government auction. They knew about the goldmine from before Hank Kincaid had passed away. They’d come out to prospect the place for repayment of Hank’s gambling debt. But Leland had found the mine, by chance, and now the Kincaids were swimming in gold.

Dana had never been a greedy woman. All she wanted was to love and be loved, but the Timber Bear Ranch seemed like a lovely place to live. Jessie unhitched her stolen car and put it into the machine shop. She watched him carefully pop the hood of the car. Then he looked up at her with embarrassment in his eyes.

“Why don't I take you inside. You can relax while I work on the car," he said.

"That sounds great," she said. “I would love to see where you live.”

He guided her to the front door of a small log cabin. Inside was decorated in a rustic and masculine fashion. She had been living with the Updikes for the last two years and they had the worst taste she had ever seen. But Jessie’s simple decorating, in the two-bedroom bachelor pad, suited him just right. There was a line of motocross trophies across the mantle and she walked to the fireplace to inspect them.

“Are you a professional motocross racer?" she asked.

"I was for a while. But I keep it part-time now. To be pro I'd have to travel and that would mean leaving the Timber Bear Ranch and my family."

"You're very loyal," she observed.

"Being loyal to your family is more important than anything," Jessie said.

Dana thought about that for a minute. She had been loyal to her family. Even though they had sold her down the river. But now that her great uncle was gone, she didn't feel any of that loyalty anymore. She felt loyalty to her parents, even though they had been gone for twelve years. She would never forget them.

"Can I get you something to drink?" Jessie asked.

"Yes, please," Dana said.

Dana watched Jessie over the counter as he swung open the refrigerator and looked inside.

"Would you like soda or bottled water?" he asked.

"Do you have any coffee?" she asked.