The campfire smoke filled my nose and painted the air with reds and yellows. Embers rose on eddies of heat from the flames like burnt offerings to the stars overhead. The birds had quieted for the evening as the sun fell and the cool air began to settle over the firs and pines and mountain peaks of the High Rockies.

I lowered my red-furred wolf body to the forest floor, my belly brushing over the dirt and fallen pine needles as I slunk closer to the backs of the men circled around the curling and crackling flames.

“Man,” one of them said, “he should’ve been back by now. How long does it take to get more beer?”

“Don’t worry,” said another, “he will be. He just headed into Yellow Rose. Quit worrying so much, buddy.”

My nose caught a whiff of raw meat, thick cut steaks which had been salted and were ready to toss on the grill propped up over one dying end of the fire.

“Maybe he got lost?” suggested another of the guys.

“Come on, how could he get lost? He knows more about wilderness survival than any of us. He was Pararescue for Christ’s sake.”

Drool trickled down my jaw at the scent of the meat, soaking the heavy duffel bag straps I held in my teeth, a small whimper escaping my mouth at how delicious it smelled.

“There he is!” called Peter, his speech just barely slurred. He must have heard my little whine over the crackle of the fire. “Told you it wouldn’t take him long.”

“Come on, Matt,” Jake called from the other side of the fire, “that beer ain’t getting any colder.”

Crushed that they’d figured out I was there so quickly, I padded out of the shadows and dropped the duffel, beer bottles clinking together.

Three of the four guys seated around the campfire all rose to their feet. Peter Frost, our boss, was the only to remain seated.

“Thought I smelled something,” Richard, one of the grooms-to-be teased as he knelt down next to the duffel and unzipped the bag. He rummaged through it and began to distribute longnecks to all the guys. Beers given to everyone, he reached in and grabbed my clothes and draped them over my back. “We’ll have a cold one popped when you get back.”

“Yeah,” Frank, the other bachelor of this little party, replied, “thanks for rustling up the brews, pardner.”

“Owe you one,” Jake added, idly scratching his thick black beard as he took an offered beer from Richard.

Panting and nodding, I stepped back into the woods away from the fire and began to shift back to my human form.

I guess I could’ve just hoofed the two miles down to Peter’s old beat up Bronco on my own two feet, but the guys had been practically howling for more beer and getting there in wolf form was just so much easier when I had rough ground to cover. I moved like the wind when I shifted, and a couple miles was trivial, even when you added in the amount of time to pack and unpack the duffel bag or change forms.

My name is Matthew Jones, and I’m a shifter. A wolf shifter, to be exact. And the guys back at the campfire were my pack mates. The five of us made up the team at Frost Security. Our pack might have been small, but we were a tight-knit group.

As my body began to change, with my fur shrinking back into my skin, my legs lengthening and my arms shortening, I heard the guys continue to laugh and chug their beer.

We were out in the wild on a bachelor party for both Richard Murdoch and Frank O'Dwyer. They both met their true mates last year, and were already on their way to saying “I do.” Jake, too, had met Elise Moon, his own mate, just a few months ago and had just finished moving her up to Enchanted Rock, the town we called home.

As my teeth shrank and my muzzle shortened, I thought about being the odd man out on this one. Not that I really minded too much. Sure, the guys were happy. They were in love. But it wasn't any skin off my nose. I’d grown up as a lone wolf, adopted into a family of normal humans. I’d hid my abilities ever since I was a teenager, and this was my first real pack.

But there were benefits to not having a mate like the guys. For one, I didn't have to check with my mate, or anything like that, if I wanted to go do something, like go out to a bachelor party with the guys, head into Denver for a long weekend, or go camping by myself in the northern part of the state for a change of scenery.

Unlike the other three mated shifters at Frost Security, I still had my freedom, and my time was still my own. It just meant I could work more with the Enchanted Rock Volunteer Fire Department. Seeing as we were about to enter into the fire season, they needed all the help they could get.

Besides, I’d never been a one-woman kind of wolf. Even before I found out there were others of my kind out there, or all this true mate stuff, I’d just loved women. Getting to know them, spending time with them. One-night stands, even. This whole idea of meeting someone and knowing almost right off the bat that I wanted to spend my life with them just sounded crazy to me.

With my tail and fur entirely gone, I groaned as I pulled my underwear back on. There was nothing quite like being naked in the woods on a spring night, even if it did get a little chilly at this elevation. I scrambled into the rest of my clothes, silently reassuring myself that being single was a good thing. That I shouldn’t worry that was going to be alone forever.

Not that I needed to find the love of my life. Like I said, I was fine with not having anyone depending on me, looking to me for help or comfort or company every single day. Who needed a special someone to curl up with by a fire on a cold winter night? Or someone to cook dinner for? Not me, that was for damn sure. I could find a woman to do that most nights without needing special shifter mojo to guide my decisions.

I sighed and slicked a hand back through my blonde hair, tussling it a little as I ran a hand over the reddish stubble on my cheeks. But, still, I had to admit: the guys seemed genuinely happy. Happier than I could even imagine. Having quiet, ecstatic joy rubbed in your face every day was pretty damned hard to ignore.

“Matt!” called Richard. “What’s taking so long? About to throw the steaks on, and your beer’s getting warm.”

“Coming!” I called back from where I was bent over, lacing my boots back up. I straightened up and tramped back to the fire, taking the offered beer from Richard. I glanced over at Peter, who looked about as distant as I felt.

I figured that our boss had it even worse than me. He’d found his mate, back when he was younger, but he’d lost her. Hadn’t even been there for the funeral, because he’d been serving overseas.

Peter Frost could maybe find another woman someday, even a shifter woman. But they wouldn’t be his true mate like the other guys had found, or he once had before. He could love her, marry her even, and spend the rest of his life at her side. But he would never feel the true bond with her like the other three felt with their partners. It boggled my mind to even think about the position he’d been in. After all, I’d joined the service right out of school, same as most of the other guys. But I hadn’t found my mate, then, unlike Peter, who left his behind to travel halfway across the world to serve.

Whoever had coined that old adage about loving and losing being better than nothing at all had clearly never seen the look Peter had on his face when he thought no one was paying him any attention.

Personally, I’d have taken the “never have loved at all” part.

But, still, he soldiered on. Even when Jake pulled out the bottle of bourbon from his own duffel after we’d pulled the steaks from the grill and dug the aluminum foiled potatoes from the coals.

“Just one,” Peter said, before taking a drink from his nearly full beer. “I got a few years on you boys, and I can’t put ‘em away like I used to.”

“Come on, Cap,” Jake said, passing the bottle over to him. “It’ll put some hair on your chest.”

“One of the benefits of being older,” Peter replied as he took the bottle from his subordinate’s hand, “is that I’ve already got plenty of hair on my chest. Get any more and you’ll never be able to tell if I’m a wolf or a man.” Still, he tipped the bottle back and gulped down a mouthful of fiery liquid, and passed the bottle over to me.

I made a face as I took the bottle from him. I’ve always been more of a gin and tequila kind of guy, not so much for the bourbons or scotches. “Man, I fuckin’ hate whiskey.”

“Still your turn, Matt,” Peter said, clapping me on the shoulder. “Bottom’s up.”

I rolled my eyes as I tipped the bottle back, the amber liquid burning my mouth and throat like a forest fire during a drought as I swallowed it down. The firewater left nothing but scorched tissue behind, heating me all the way through my chest and into my belly. I gasped as I pulled the bottle away, coughing slightly. I slammed half my beer down as a chaser and the guys roared with laughter, Richard clapping me on the back from other side for the amount I’d drank.

“Alright, men,” Peter said as he went to rise from his camping chair, “on that note, I’m going to call it a night.”

There was a chorus of disappointed calls from the guys, myself included. We liked our boss, and didn’t get much of a chance to pal around with him without his adopted seventeen-year-old daughter around. Not that we didn’t like the little shifter, Mary, but we still wanted to be able to cut loose with him every so often. Running and hunting as a pack was good fun, but it was hard to hold a beer when all you had were four paws. Hell, I think the last time we even hung out with him outside the office was at a dinner for her seventeenth birthday when we had some meal they’d been practicing cooking for months beforehand.

He shook his head, dismissing us. “Someone needs to get breakfast ready in the morning for you layabouts, and make sure we can still get the office opened up in the afternoon.”

Because of all our differing schedules and wrapping up of cases, we hadn’t been able to properly schedule this little bachelor party. Jake and Peter had been out of town on some top-secret project of theirs that they couldn’t let us in on yet, and Richard had been in Denver doing a deposition for a case. That had left just me and Frank to watch the shop. And, even though Frank was one of the guys getting married this coming weekend at their joint ceremony, two guys out in the woods together didn’t exactly make a stag party.

Peter bustled off to his tent, which he’d set up a ways from the campfire spot when we’d first arrived. He stopped about fifteen feet away from the ring of shifters assembled around the fire, though. “Matthew, can I talk to you for a minute?”

I perked up, looking in his direction. “Yeah, Peter, sure.” I climbed up from my chair as the others continued to pass the bottle around and egg each other on to do shots. I wasn’t sure what exactly he wanted to talk about, but figured it was somewhere along the lines of not getting so drunk that the fire didn’t get out of control and burn down the whole forest. I approached him in the darkness, the fire behind me casting a yellow glow onto just half his face.

“What’s up, boss?” I asked as I got close to him.

“Take a walk with me real quick,” he said, before lifting his now half-empty beer to his lips. “A short one.”

He didn’t need to cajole me, though. He was the boss, and my pack leader. My alpha. If he’d told me to walk into a hail of bullets or throw myself on a grenade, I would’ve done it in a heartbeat.

“What’s up?” I asked as we strolled out into the thick cluster of pines, firs, and spruce all around us, the needles and branches of the trees quickly muffling the other guys’ laughter and hooting until it was just a dull roar.

“Listen, I know you’re probably feeling a bit like shit, what with the guys pairing off and all. Just wanted to tell you to be patient. It’ll happen for you, too, someday.”

I shook my head. “What makes you say that?”

He gave me a look. “Matt, come on.”

I just shrugged. “Seriously, I’m fine. I’m okay with what I’ve got. You know I’m fine with the ladies. Might not have found a true mate, or anything, but I don’t exactly sleep in a cold bed every night.”

Peter looked at me long and hard, his eyes searching my face for some hint. Could he have been worried about me leaving the pack over this? Is that why he felt like he needed to give me some kind of encouragement or pep talk?

“Seriously,” I repeated, laughing a little. “I’m fine, Peter. Can’t miss what you never had.”

He winced a little, but nodded.

I immediately regretted my choice of words. “Sorry, Cap. That was a dick thing to say.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not planning on leaving or anything,” I said, trying to recover. “I like my job, and I love you guys. You’re closer than family to me.”

He just nodded, his eyes trained on mine. “Alright, Jones.” He clapped me on the shoulder again and gave me a shake. “Gonna hold you to that. You got it?”

“Got it, boss. I’m good to go.”

He gave me one more shake before letting me go. “One more thing. I don’t wanna see any empties when I wake up in the morning. You hear me? Make sure those boys are hurting tomorrow.” He gave me a ghost of a smile.

I snapped him an Air Force salute, trying to keep a straight face. “Yes, sir, Captain.”

He winked and turned away from me, then disappeared in the dark, blending into the inky shadows that seemed to be the only things populating the nighttime forest. Besides, of course, a squad of big, bad wolves.

The guys were still laughing and hollering, the bottle making its rounds, when I emerged from the darkness and took my seat by the fire. Another ember crackled and popped from the fire, traveling up like a reverse shooting star to join all its friends.

“Matt,” Frank called as he slapped the bourbon into my hand, “have a drink, man. It’s your turn.”

“My turn for what?”

“What’s the stupidest thing a commanding officer ever told you? Jake already told us about the section leader who wanted him to move his platoon out of bunkers right after a bombardment had stopped. Your turn.”

“Not necessarily a commanding officer,” I said with a grin, before taking a small swig of whiskey. “But I have a good one about a pilot who’d gotten stuck in a tree on the way down.”

We spent the rest of the night just like old times, kicking back beers, talking about our time in the service. We might not have all been in the same branch or met one another before the joining Frost Security a couple years ago, but we were brothers in everything but blood.

Sure, the upcoming weddings were going to change things. And, sure, the guys all had their mates. But, I reminded myself, that just meant the pack was growing. Growth was good.

All I had to do was learn to grow with it.

And, I reminded myself, you can’t miss what you never had. That was something to be thankful for.