My sleep-clouded eyes slowly adjusted to the blue-tinged gloom inside my tent. “Shit,” I whispered. “Dawn already?”

I already missed my dream lover so much it hurt with a low, dull ache deep in my chest. The last thing I remembered was lying next to him on the grass, my head in the hollow of his neck, our fingers laced together over his chest as I told him...something. Something boring and trivial about the Nature article, if my foggy early-morning memory could be trusted. And of course, my dream lover was listening like he actually cared, and asking questions, and interrupting me with little kisses across my neck and shoulders.

I groaned and tried to stretch in the tight sleeping bag. My entire body felt worn out and sore. Sitting up in the sleeping bag, I slipped my hand between my legs. Damn. My underwear was drenched. It was enough to make me think I really had spent all night fucking someone.

“Get a grip, Karen,” I muttered. “You haven’t gotten laid in half a decade.”

I ran my fingers through my hair before unzipping the tent door. Nothing stirred in the campsite, so I grabbed the pots and pans and started banging them around outside Zeke and Colin’s tents. Colin emerged with a smile on his face, and Zeke eventually stuck his head through the door, scowling under the wool hat pulled low on his forehead. At least his black eye looked a little better after a night’s sleep.

“So,” I said, trying to keep the breakfast discussions quick and professional, “our original goal is to monitor the Leopold pack. If we can, we want to tranquilize and radio-collar at least one of the new pups.”

Colin smiled at me over his second mug of instant coffee. “But there’s a new wolf in town,” he said.

“Right.” I smiled too. “If we do see the lone black male, he becomes our first priority. If we could get an intact DNA sample from him, we might be able to determine his origins. And that would be— Well, I don’t need to tell you that would be huge.”

“Roger that, Boss Lady,” said Zeke. He’d just finished a four-serving packet of freeze-dried scrambled eggs. By himself.

“Okay,” I said, coming to my feet. “We’ll triangulate around the valley. Let’s get moving.”

After half an hour of hiking, I paused to unscrew my water bottle and glassed the far side of the Lamar valley one more time. Nothing. I pressed the button on my walkie-talkie.

“Colin? Zeke? You boys see anything?”

Static crackled as Colin’s soft voice came over the line. “Negative. Nothing on my end.”

Zeke’s voice boomed through a second later. “Not a thing, Boss. I’ll keep moving my ass.”

I shook my head, stretched, and took a few deep gulps from my water bottle. After another twenty minutes of trudging through the sagebrush, my walkie-talkie crackled to life and Zeke’s voice roared from the receiver. Singing. It sounded like Freebird, but it was so loud and pathetically off key I couldn’t be certain. I jumped as a snowshoe hare shot out from under a fallen tree, startled by the noise. There was a moment of silence before the walkie-talkie exploded with Colin’s laughter.

“Boys, boys,” I said, pressing the TRANSMIT button. “I’m not sure singing Lynyrd Skynyrd is the best use of our grant-funded research equipment.”

“Roger that, Boss Lady,” Zeke said. The line fell silent, and then his voice crackled again. “Do you think the National Science Foundation would prefer Guns N’ Roses?”

I snorted a laugh as Colin’s voice came over the line, clipped and urgent. “Karen,” he said. “Get the tranq gun. Headed your way, north-northwest.”

My fingers trembled as I pulled the tranquilizer gun off my shoulders and loaded a dart. I couldn’t see anything yet, so I grabbed my binoculars.

It was the black male.

Something must have startled him; probably Zeke, from the direction he was running. I took a deep breath and brought the gun to my shoulder. I was raised hunting; I could make this shot. I held my breath as the black male wolf zig-zagged through the sagebrush and across the low grass. I led him just a touch with the barrel of the tranquilizer gun, waited until he was close enough to make out the golden glint of his irises, and then squeezed the trigger.

The wolf yipped in alarm. A wave of guilt curled my stomach when I saw the bright red dart sticking out of his flank. He took off again, running away from me this time, although it took no more than a minute for his steps to falter. He disappeared from my sight along the creek as the walkie-talkie erupted with cheering.

“Hell of a shot, Boss Lady!” Zeke called over the walkie-talkie.

“I saw him go down,” said Colin. “In the willows by the creek. Headed over now.”

“Me too,” I said.

I jogged across the flats. The wind picked up against my back, and it smelled like rain. A quick glance toward Druid Peak revealed churning, dark cumulus clouds, promising an afternoon thunderstorm. We’d have to work fast; the tranquilizer only subdued the animal for about twenty minutes. Where did this wolf come from? Canada was the most likely option, although that would be one heck of a long walk, all the way across Montana—

I was almost to the tall willows lining the creek when I saw Colin. His face was bizarrely pale, and my heart started racing as I sprinted the last few feet to reach him.

“Colin?” I panted.

“You’d better see this,” he said.

He took my hand and led me around the willow bushes.

There, on the soft, green grass next to the river, was the body of a naked man. A bright red tranquilizer dart stuck out of his left thigh.