Knox rolled his head to the side as he watched the woman leave, watched her slender form swim in and out of sharpness. She was heading for a bright blue blob that stood out against the greens and browns of the woods.

It looked like a magic bubble, pulsing in the early morning light, expanding and contracting as though it were a giant heart beating.

A giant blue heart?

He dismissed that idea, then glommed onto another. What if it was an alien spaceship? And she was from another planet. Only she wasn’t a little green man. She was a very good-looking woman with pale skin, sable hair, and—he thought—blue eyes. Maybe he was wrong about the eye color.

He knew he had loved looking into them. For a moment, he let himself think about their beauty—and the breasts bobbing under her sweatshirt. If the aliens wanted to get his confidence, they’d send someone who wasn’t threatening, right? Someone sexy and appealing.

He watched her walking back to the bubble, watched her disappear inside.

Poof. Magic. Not werewolf magic. Something much more dangerous. She had claimed she wanted to help him. But he had seen the gun tucked into the back of her pants as soon as she’d turned around.

A Sig, he thought. Would an alien have a Sig? Or could they make a blaster look like an earth weapon?

How could he trust her? In his current condition, how could he trust anyone?

That thought lodged in his mind as he saw blue flames licking at the bubble, spreading across the dry leaves, crawling toward him.

He gasped, knowing he had to get away before they burned him to a blue crisp.

He had run all night. On a leg that would have collapsed under an ordinary man. But he wasn’t ordinary. He was a wolf.

The wolf had gotten him away from the bastards making the drugs. It could get him away from the alien woman. But first he had to get farther from the fire and the strange bubble that was growing in size every second.

He pushed himself up, fighting a stab of pain as he wavered on unsteady feet. He could hide in the woods and change. Then?

He couldn’t plan any further than escape.

To his horror, while he’d struggled to his feet, the otherworldly flames had sneaked up on him. They were already lapping at his skin, burning his flesh. He wanted to scream, but he kept any sound locked in his throat as he tried to get away from the fire without warning the woman that he was on to her game.

It took a tremendous effort to make his legs work. They felt like blocks of wood as he stamped into the woods. But the exertion paid off. When he turned around, he saw the blue tide was now ten feet away. And as he watched, it fell back.

He kept his gaze on it for several moments, willing it to keep receding. When he was sure the ground was safe, he pressed his back against a tree trunk and lowered himself to a sitting position, dragging in gulps of air.

###

Maggie clenched her hands into fists as she stared at the spot where the wounded man had been lying. She hadn’t imagined him. The vegetation was crushed down from the weight of his body. He had been here, and he needed help.

She didn’t even know his name to call out to him. But maybe raising her voice would be a mistake.

What if the shooter had tracked him?

With a shudder, she scanned the woods. Of course, this was private property. But there weren’t exactly any boundary markers warning people to stay out.

Hurrying to the place where he’d been, she crouched and inspected the ground. Was there a faint trail moving away from the location? With no better idea, she followed it deeper into the woods—and found him, This time he was sitting with his back propped against a tree, and it sounded like he was speaking—no chanting—in a foreign language.

Something about the strange words and the way he said them made the hairs on the back of her neck prickle.

“What?” she called out as she rushed toward him.

The chanting cut off abruptly, and he raised his head, facing in her direction. Only it looked like he wasn’t seeing her at all. She’d heard the expression “thousand-mile stare,” and she’d always wondered what it meant. Now she knew.

She spotted confusion in his eyes. Or was it madness?

“What happened to the blue flames?” he gasped.

“What?”

“Blue flames,” he choked out. “From that blue bubble.” Panic filled his voice. “Is it a spaceship? Are you from the planet Zoron?”

Oh Christ. He had lost his mind. Then she remembered what he had said at the beginning. He might be dangerous. He might have a flashback. Or at least not be able to recognize reality when he was seeing it.

“I’m not from any planet but this one. Everything’s okay,” she murmured.

“Is it?”

At least he seemed willing to listen.

She wanted to rush toward him. Instead she moved slowly.

“It’s okay,” she repeated. “My name is Maggie Leland. I’m going to help you.”

“What about the blue flames?” he pressed, then shook his head, “Oh shit. That was a hallucination, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus. I thought you were a space alien. And your tent was a spaceship. Or a magic bubble.”

“But not now?” she asked, watching him carefully.

His lips curled in self-derision. “No.”

Still, she kept her pace cautious as she approached. When he didn’t lunge toward her, she came down on the ground beside him. First she held up the oversized tee shirt that she’d brought from the tent. “Let’s get this on you.”

He let her pull the shirt over his head, then slipped his arms through the sleeves. The shirt reached below his waist.

When the top half of him was covered, she turned to the wound on his calf.

“I’m going to clean it with soap and water, then put on antiseptic and a bandage.”

“Okay.”

As she opened the medical kit, she started to talk.

“I told you my name is Maggie Leland. What’s yours?”

“Knox Marshall.”

“Knox? That’s unusual.”

He winced as she washed the wound with medicated soap and bottled water.

“Yeah. My parents liked making sure their kids would stand out.” He laughed.

“Why is that funny?”

“Private joke.”

When he didn’t share it, she asked, “What were you doing out here?”

“Enjoying the woods. Like you, I assume.”

“Yes. Where’s your camp?”

“I packed everything up and put it in the car. God knows where that is.”

She finished bandaging the wound, then helped him pull on the sweatpants. They were high-waters, but they did the job of covering his midsection. “Can you stand?”

“I made it this far.”

She helped him up, slinging her arm around his waist and taking part of his weight as they made their slow way back to the tent.

“The blue bubble,” he murmured as he stared at the ordinary piece of camping equipment.

“It’s a standard tent. I got it online.”

She pulled the flaps back as far as they’d go. He grimaced as he crawled inside and flopped onto one side of the sleeping bag.

He lay with his eyes closed, breathing hard, as she got water and an antibiotic tablet, then helped prop him up so he could swallow the pill.

“Get some sleep,” she said when she turned back from stowing the medical kit, but she saw he had already closed his eyes.

Outside, she pulled out her cell phone. But the damn thing was out of power. Her fault. She must have left a bunch of apps open. In D. C. that didn’t matter so much. Out here, it could be a fatal mistake.

But maybe calling wasn’t such a good idea—until she understood what she was dealing with. Weirdly, she liked the guy—maybe because at the beginning he’d told her he could be dangerous. How many wounded men would be in such bad shape and still be thinking of someone else?

She looked back toward the tent. He was peacefully sleeping, but she couldn’t count on his not wigging out again.

She got out a power bar and ate it for breakfast. She’d carried in some plastic bottles of water, but not enough to supply herself for the whole trip. Picking up a small bucket, she took it to the nearby stream. After adding a purifier tablet, she transferred some of the water to a plastic pitcher and mixed it with the fruit juice concentrate she’d brought. It wasn’t great, but it disguised the taste of the purifier. She left the rest of the water in the bucket—to use for cooking.

###

Back at headquarters in Beltsville, Frank Decorah called Cole Marshall into his office.

When the younger man entered, Frank gestured toward one of the guest chairs across from his desk.

Cole sat, his expression troubled.

“You haven’t gotten a line on Knox?” Frank asked as he picked up the gold eagle coin on his desk and turned it in his hand. Playing with it was one of the habits he’d acquired over years of working as a P.I.

“Still no answer from his mobile, so we checked the GPS. The phone is now untraceable.”

“And your conclusion?”

“He could have deliberately cut off communications, but I don’t think he’d do that,” Cole added quickly.

“Agreed. Which leaves—he ran into something bad in Western Maryland, and his phone got destroyed.”

“It could have been an accident.”

Cole nodded.

“But after my conversation with Jonah last night, I’m sorry I didn’t send a team up there.”

“Last night, we couldn’t be sure the distress call was from Knox. We still can’t be sure. Plus finding him would have been almost impossible in the dark. Has Jonah had any other contacts with whoever called?”

“No. The signal was only for a short time.”

“And it was specifically to Jonah?”

“He wasn’t sure.”

Cole considered the three known facts. His cousin was missing. Somebody had sent out a telepathic distress call. And Knox knew about Jonah’s telepathic abilities.

“Knox is new on the team. He wouldn’t do something to get us worried—unless he was really in trouble.”

“I hear a bit of reservation in your voice,” Frank said.

Cole dragged in a breath and let it out. “Okay, Knox has been wanting a solo assignment. What if he stumbled into something hinky up there and wanted to handle it on his own?”

Frank cursed under his breath. “I thought I was bringing him along at the right speed.”

“This isn’t your fault,” Cole said quickly. “But I think our next step is to go to his last known location and see if we can find out what happened to him.”

“How many men do you want to send up there?”

“Three,” Cole answered. “Me, Brand and Zack.”

“You’re only taking werewolves?”

“You think I should bring Jonah?”

“Since he may already be involved—yes. Also, his talents are extraordinary.”

Cole nodded.

“How soon can you leave?”

“I hope within the hour.”

“Okay. Keep me posted. And good luck.”

“Thanks.”