SEAL Wolf In Too Deep(63)
“No. At least no one I know does. Humans get a lot more enjoyment out of the act. For wolves, there’s a courtship phase and they are protective of each other, but it’s just not the same with them when it comes to mating. It has more to do with the procreation of the species. They’re innately wired that way, and only the alpha pair will have pups. That’s to ensure the whole wolf pack has enough to eat and the rest of the wolves help to take care of the pups. Too many pups and yearlings would spell disaster for the whole pack. As humans, we have the human perspective. We have a mix of alphas and betas in a pack. Most of us end up pairing up with a mate and mating for life. We have our own kids, but all the pack members are eager to look after them.”
“How will I know who is in the pack?”
“We’ll provide you with a list. Also, when you meet them, you’ll now be able to smell their wolf scent and know they’re one of us. Of course, if you worked with wolves at a wolf center, you could smell like one, but it wouldn’t mean that you were one. Out here, yeah.”
Then she thought of the earlier rescue they’d made and how she had thought Allan’s request so odd, and now she wondered…
She frowned at him. “When we rescued Franny and her baby, you told me to cancel the one ambulance and call for another. I couldn’t understand because it could have meant precious minutes were wasted. Then they took her to the clinic where Tara and I were seen. Don’t tell me that she and her baby are werewolves?”
“Yeah. She was so disoriented, I was afraid she was going to strip out of her clothes right then and there and turn into her wolf. Instinctively, she would have known her wolf coat would give her more protection from the cold. But she wasn’t really thinking clearly because you would have seen her do it. Well, and you were cradling her baby, and babies shift when their mother does—”
“She would have suddenly turned into a wolf pup? I would have had a heart attack.”
“Yeah, that was another reason to keep Franny from turning.”
“So what about Franny and the red Camaro she said caused her accident? Was it Otis? Or just a really bizarre coincidence? Then again, if he killed Sarah, did he know that Franny was also a wolf?”
“I’m thinking there’s got to be a common denominator,” Allan said. “We need to have Franny come up here to speak with us.” He couldn’t have been more pleased that Debbie was focusing on the case and not completely on her werewolf issues now. She had made a valid point—something they needed to learn more about.
Debbie frowned. “Oh. My. God. The report I read about Sarah’s autopsy—she had bitten her attacker. I was thinking with her human teeth, naturally, because his blood was on her teeth and mouth, and we never saw his bite marks. If she had bitten him as a wolf…has he been turned?”
“Possibly. Which may be why he disappeared for so long—he’s been unable to control the shifting.”
“And they said wolf fur had been caught on the trap. They believed that he had caught a wolf first and the fur was just stuck to it. But it had to have been Sarah’s fur.” Her mouth gaped. “I called Rowdy’s office about the red Camaro when I found it in conjunction with Otis shooting Tara. What if he or any of his men had seen Tara shift?”
“That’s a concern we always have to face. It’s a real danger for us. Luckily, she arrived at the clinic well before Rowdy checked on the two of you and she had shifted back to her human self.”
Debbie’s thoughts were jumping from one scenario she’d witnessed to the next, realizing now how so much made sense. “And when the ambulance picked up Franny, I did hear a bark when she and her baby were inside.”
“You asked if I heard a dog bark. I said no. Technically, she’d shifted into a wolf.”
Debbie took a deep breath, thinking about what had happened to her, Tara, and Sarah. “I…I want to help bring the shooter down, Allan. I know it’s going to be harder for me with the problem of shifting, but I want to help. I don’t want to be left out of the loop. It’s not a case of revenge either. I think of Lori and Rose and them being pregnant, well, now with Rose having her triplets, and their mates losing them and…well, maybe if I can still do this, I won’t feel so…discombobulated. If Otis did try to kill Franny and her baby, we need to stop him before he hurts anyone else.”
“I understand. You’re staying on the case. We’ll just be more careful about when we go out to search for clues.”
“Was I too rough on you last night?” She felt a mix of emotions about that. Satisfaction that she had scared him a little, but she did worry he’d believe she was untamable and a danger to everyone. She couldn’t imagine anything worse than being confined to his cabin for months on end without visitation rights.
“You were having a rough time of it. Nothing I couldn’t handle. And you might not think so yourself, but you’re a beautiful wolf.”
She gave him an annoyed look. She couldn’t help it. She appreciated that he thought she was a beautiful woman. But a wolf?
His phone rang and she suspected it was Paul, as close as they were and as much as she assumed Paul was dying to learn how it went with her last night. Now she realized it didn’t all have to do with having been raised as brothers either. He was Allan’s pack leader. And hers now too? She groaned.