Chance woke the next morning next to Summer’s sleeping form. He turned to her and wrapped his arm around her waist, sinking his nose into her neck. The smell of her skin invigorated his senses. She’d wanted him the night before. She’d wanted all of him. Could he tell her she was his mate? Would she accept him?

Summer began to stir and turned to him. She smiled, her eyes still closed. He rained kisses down on her forehead and cheeks. Feeling himself grow hard, just from the sight of her smile. “Good morning,” he whispered in her ear.

“Morning,” she said, stretching. She opened her eyes, and looked into his. It sent a thrill through him to see the light in her caramel-colored eyes. Summer was unbelievably beautiful. Everything about her made his heart sing. If he could, he would ask her to be his wife, right here and now. But he knew that it wouldn’t be appropriate to move so fast with a human. She didn’t know what it was like for shifters, knowing exactly who you belonged with by instinct.

“Want to go out for breakfast?” he asked her.

“Maybe some coffee,” she said, blinking. She sat up and looked around. “That man, last night. He was one of the miners who were fighting the first day we went here. I was kind of tipsy last night. God. Did we have sex without protection?”

“Yes. You wanted…”

She rubbed her forehead. “I know. It was my idea. I’ll deal with it later. Anyway. That man. I’m beginning to think that maybe he had something to do with the poisonings. He was so threatening to me. What do you think?”

“What did he say to you?”

“He told me to stop poking around where I didn’t belong. Then he tried to drag me into an alley.”

“I know that man. Randy Wade.”

“He was harassing a shifter in the breakroom the first time we went to the mine. Remember?”

“I do remember. I’m going to make a few calls. We need more evidence, but I think this is a good lead.”

Summer stood and went to the shower while Chance made some phone calls to the sheriff’s department and to the mine. He learned more about Randy Wade. Chance needed to bring him in and close this case. No more shifter families would be poisoned on his watch.

When Summer came out of the shower, she looked fresh and clean, but her face was drawn into a frown. “Chance, I need to go back to Missoula,” she said.

“What?” he said, standing abruptly. His heart sank, and he felt he could barely breathe. Finally, he had a decent lead on this case, Summer had returned his affection, and now she was going to leave.

“I got a call from my department head. I have to get back to the university. Environmental oversight found that the mine is clean, and I’m running out of money. I’ve been wrong all this time about the mine. That drunk jerk from last night is probably behind all the poisoning. He worked at the mine. He would have had access to arsenic. I feel like an idiot, but I do have to get back to my job.”

“But you’re a consultant on the case,” he protested.

“Sure. About the mine. But the sheriff’s department isn’t paying me. My job is done. I’ve got to go home.”

“Summer…” He wanted to tell her that she was his one true mate. He wanted to tell her how much he loved and adored her. But all that came out was, “Please stay.”

She walked toward him and lifted up on her tiptoes, planting a soft, sad kiss on his cheek. “I can’t, Chance. I wish things could be different. I’ve developed…feelings for you. But we’re from different worlds. I work three hundred miles away from here. You could never live in the city. We can’t do some long distance thing. It wouldn’t work for either of us. Best just to cut it off and try to forget it ever happened.”

“You can stay,” he said, reaching out to take her hand. “I’m sure there’s something you could do here.”

“No. There’s no work for an environmental biologist in this town. I have to go home. I’m sorry. There’s no other way. I could never be happy if I didn’t have my work.”

She began packing her things as tears slid down her face. Chance couldn’t stand the sight of her sadness. It only accentuated his own. He couldn’t lose her. Life without her would be an empty shell.

But he had to go put a stop to Randy’s murdering hatred of shifters. No more kids would be harmed because of him. Chance stood at the door, not wanting to walk away, but he knew he had to go do his job. He gripped the knob and gave her one last look. Torn between love and duty, Chance felt his heart breaking in two. A tear welled in the corner of his eye as he opened the door and walked out.

“Goodbye, Summer,” he said. She looked up at him with shining, tear-filled eyes. “Until we meet again.” She shuddered as tears fell down her cheeks. He closed the door behind him.

Out in the cool mountain air, he trudged down to his truck. He had a murderer to stop and had to focus on the task at hand. The vision of Tim’s little daughter’s sunken face flitted through his mind. No matter how much he wanted to go back to Summer and beg her to stay, he had an important mission to attend to.

He got in his truck and drove across town to where Randy lived. He’d told deputy Hurly that he would be doing an incognito search at Randy’s house. If Chance found evidence, they’d draw up a search warrant and make the arrest. Everyone was ready to move as soon as he gave the word.

With Summer leaving, Chance could barely concentrate on what he needed to do. But he knew he had to pull himself together. Summer was his mate. That would never change. Right now, what mattered was protecting children from the evil men who hated them for their shifter nature.

Chance parked his truck off the road on the back end of Randy’s property. His bear shifter senses could detect things his human senses could not. It was a cold day, so Chance undressed in the car and left his things on the passenger seat of his truck. With a roar, he shifted, his body contorting from the form of a tall man into an angry bear.

Chance’s bear growled and roared to go back to Summer. The animal in him almost refused to move and tried relentlessly to gallop up the road and back to his mate. But Chance’s human mind directed the grizzly onward, through the forest. Even the bear wanted to protect the community and the shifter children.

Trotting through the pine forest, he came to the edge of Randy’s land. He’d made sure that the man would be at work that day and expected the place to be abandoned. Randy wasn’t married anymore, as his ex-wife had left him several years before and had gone to live in Billings near her sister.

Chance opened his bear senses as he approached the house. The scent of pine and car oil bit his nose as he came in range of the garage. Randy had an old house in need of repair, but his massive shop looked as if it had been built within the last ten years.

Tasting the air on his tongue, Chance made out the distinct scent of almonds coming from the shop. It didn’t seem right. Why would Randy have so many almonds on his property? Chance came to the entrance of the shop and sniffed at the door. The smell of almonds became even stronger.

After shifting back to human form, he gripped the doorknob. It turned easily. Chance had to roll his eyes. Randy was so confident that no one would figure it out that he didn’t even bother locking the door.

Inside, Chance found the regular evidence of shop projects. A band saw, a project car smelling of oil, some guns, a pile of antlers. Hmm? As a game warden, he could use them as a legal excuse for being in here. He sniffed out the scent of almonds until he found a metal barrel sitting in the corner.

He crouched down and read the label. Industrial arsenic. Criminal mastermind, Randy was not. Chance heard the sound of crunching gravel outside as a truck came to a stop in the driveway. Shit. He couldn’t make an arrest naked. He quietly slipped out the back door, shifted, and ran into the forest. As he trotted away, a gunshot blared through the air, the bullet buzzing past his ear.

Chance ran faster. With a gun, even an idiot like Randy could take him down, in human or animal form. While shifters recovered fast from illness and injury, a bullet could still kill. He made it back to his truck, threw his clothes on and called in to deputy Hurly.

The sheriff and the deputy were ready to move in with a warrant for Randy’s arrest. Now there was enough evidence to prosecute him for the murder and poisoning of shifters in his community.

He drove quickly around the other side of the property and met the sheriff’s cars speeding into Randy’s driveway. They had their guns out, pointed at Randy, who had a gun pointed at them.

Chance skidded to a stop and jumped out of the truck with his rifle at the ready. Ducking down behind the sheriffs’ vehicles, he joined deputy Hurly. “He’s raving about shifters,” Hurly said. “This guy needs to be stopped.”

Another shot buzzed through the air. Randy ducked back behind the shop, shouting that he’d rather die than see shifters get equal rights.

“Let me disable him,” Chance said, aiming his rifle at the corner of the shop.

The next time Randy pointed his pistol around the building, Chance aimed and fired at the man’s hand, knocking the gun from his grip. Randy screamed, and the gun went flying. The sheriff gave the order.

Everyone moved in at the same time. The sheriff pushed Randy to the ground, reading him is rights as he handcuffed him.

After Randy was shoved into the sheriff’s car, they all made their way back to the sheriff’s department to book him. A feeling of pride swelled in Chance’s chest, and he wanted nothing more than to tell Summer about what had happened. Then it hit him all at once that she was gone.