Chapter Four

Sam was on the front porch when Ian pulled up three hours later. And there she was getting out of the car. Serena. Dreamwalker extraordinaire. Black hair, black eyes, and the long lean build of the Eastern Packs. Her scent hit him as she exited the car. He jerked back, his lip raised in a snarl. Underneath the tantalizing smell of Serena’s frangipani perfume her skin now reeked of another man. His brother.

As if he needed another reminder of his loss and shame.

She walked, just as smooth and confident as ever, up the grassy slope to the cabin, keeping a careful distance between them. He hadn’t expected her to jump up and hug him, but he had expected a smile.

“Serena.”

“Sam.”

She was as lovely as she’d been the first time he’d seen her. But then, her eyes had lit up, sparking at the sight of him. Now they sidled away from his in a leery dance. They’d been attracted to each other right from the beginning, a chemical thing that had crowded everything else out of his brain. But apparently the right chemicals were just in his DNA. And his brother had the same fucking DNA too. He’d never resented being a twin—until Serena.

He stood in the middle of the steps, every muscle tense, intent on forcing her to brush past him on her way into the house. Intent on seeing just how far he could push his self-control. They said he was cured. But he knew—he’d never erase the wild from his blood. Not now. And not within a mile of smelling the woman who’d sent him off the deep end.

She stopped two steps down—just close enough for him to smell that underneath his brother’s claim still ran the strong scent of Serena. Sweet, sexy Serena. She should have been his. Instead she was Gabe’s.

His wolf rose up, hot and fierce, and he fought to stay still.

“Sam.” Ian’s stressed voice and nervous scent, instead of calming him down, ratcheted his tension up another notch. Ian was charged with Serena’s protection, but Sam was dominant. Now the beta was an uneasy shock absorber, pushed in between his alpha and his responsibility.

Sam knew he should care, knew he had a responsibility to Ian, to the job. But right now, he didn’t give a flying fuck that his beta needed reassurance.

Serena’s lip curled. “Sam, I have to be here. If you can’t handle it, get out.”

His head dipped. She wasn’t his. She didn’t want to be his. He’d already fought—fought hard for her—and still he’d lost the battle.

And he’d nearly died the first time. Nearly ran so wild he’d been a wolf forever, lost to the world of human thought. He’d never go there again. He couldn’t.

He forced himself to move away and pressed back stiffly against the stair rail. Serena passed by, as far away as she could get. Up the stairs and inside without shooting him another glance, the wooden door banging hard behind her. Her scent lingering in the air long after she’d gone.

Sam’s hand clenched white around the wooden rail. Blood pounded in his ears. His wolf pushed at him, wanting out. He pushed back. He was a mature male, nearly thirty years old, and he’d been through the worst emotional hell a shifter could. And he’d survived.

He’d come out of it in shaky control of his wolf—though that was his secret—and he’d moved up in pack ranking. He was a career enforcer now, and a team leader. He guessed there was a tarnished brass lining after all.

Ian sidled past.

Sam’s hand snapped out, he grabbed Ian’s arm. “You’re on duty now, right?” He couldn’t control the low vibrating growl of his words—he was too close to the edge. He had to get better control.

He’d already had a run when he’d checked out the perimeter of the safe house earlier, but he needed one now. Needed to run without being responsible, without having to come back and report. Needed to just fucking run.

“I’m here for the night,” Ian said. “You go.”

Sam released Ian and watched the nervous beta move after Serena into the house, the screen door slamming behind him on its spring. He stood alone under the Rocky Mountain stars and rolled his head from side to side, cracking bones. The urge to get away crawled under his skin.

He moved, down the stairs and across the drive, forcing his stride to stay loose and casual as he walked down the slope and over to the gazebo on the edge of the woods. The trees and scrub of the large piece of property would keep him from spying eyes as he stripped, and the gazebo roof would hide him from satellites or helicopters. He should go into the house and change, use the God-damned doggy door to exit so he’d look like one of the house pets that they pretended to be. But he wasn’t going back in there. No way in hell.

His clothes fell to the gazebo floor and he shifted. He hit the forest floor running and didn’t look back.

***

Serena heard the door shut behind her and, for the first time since she’d gotten the call, she relaxed. It was just Ian.

“I’ll take your coat and bag. If you want.”

If she’d been a full shifter, she’d have been able to smell Ian’s anxiety over being torn between her and Sam. As it was, she could see it with her merely human eyes in the nervous way his hands jerked as he reached out and took her belongings and moved around the kitchen table, heading for the hall.

Ian’s worry over the conflict between fighting his alpha to protect her was moot. As was her worry that her bond with Gabe wasn’t strong or right. Sure, seeing Sam brought back memories—good, bad, horrible—but the one thing it hadn’t brought back was desire. What a relief to finally know that any passion for her husband’s twin was dead and buried.

Her inner wolf, that two years ago had driven her in a mating frenzy to almost mate with Sam, the wrong brother, was now calm. Like all dreamwalkers’ wolves, no one could see her wolf unless they ran with her in the dreamscape. It didn’t matter that dreamwalker’s wolves didn’t manifest physically. The wolf was still there, still rippled under her skin. Still drove her like any one of the furries in the pack, even if she would never run as a wolf shifter anywhere besides the dreamscape.

Lana hurried into the room, her face lit up with pleasure. “You’re here!” She pulled her into a quick hard hug.

“I said I’d come.”

“I know, but I wasn’t sure. With Sam here...” The normally composed woman’s smile wavered.

“I can deal with Sam.” She and Lana exchanged looks. She’d found out what she needed to. She’d known Sam hadn’t been the real deal when she’d chosen Gabe, but still, she’d had that niggling question in the back of her mind that maybe, just maybe, she’d chosen the wrong twin. Now it was put to rest forever. “Tell me about the patient.”

Serena compartmentalized, pushed her emotional concerns back, and listened to Lana’s summary of the woman’s mental and physical health. She was a dreamwalker and she had a job to do. A woman to save. Maybe even a new wolf to save, depending on how the virus adapted to the woman’s DNA. Dreamwalker, wolf shifter, spelltalker, or dormant—if she had the genes. If not, well, the council hadn’t gotten that far in their decision process. There hadn’t been time for the DNA tests and they didn’t want to risk alerting the CDC in any way, but they didn’t need them. The virus would show them what they needed to know. Regardless, she and her wolf were here for business. And Sam, despite his vulnerabilities, would just have to cope.

***

Glenna oozed into a bleary state of consciousness. Peering through eyes heavy from the last round of narcotics, she tried to make out the shadowy figure on the chair. It spoke in the low, well modulated, feminine voice of a therapist.

“Are you awake?”

“No.” She wasn’t awake, could barely think through the haze of drugs.

“My name is Serena, and I’m here to help you get off this medication faster.”

Glenna had to think hard. Why was she on these drugs anyway? Hazy recollections started to come back. A quiet keen rose in her throat.

“Stop,” the voice said. “Just stop. I can help you. All you have to do is give me permission to talk to you in your dreams.”

Glenna would have smiled if she could have found the facial muscles to do so. Talk in her dreams? Ridiculous.

“Do I have your permission?” The voice had that water dripping on stone quality that told Glenna she didn’t have a choice.

“Sure. Not like it matters anyway.” Nothing mattered except hiding from the shapes that stalked her memories. And the drugs helped her do that.

The woman walked into the ring of light from the small bedside lamp. She was tall with long black hair and movie star grace. She pricked the IV fluid with a needle. Glenna heard her say, in a voice that shrank as the drug took effect and the world faded to black, “It matters. Every member of our pack matters. Now let’s see what’s going on in your head.”