Midnight Wolf (Shifters Unbound #11)(86)

He saw a streak of red-orange, a small one, and he cursed. At the same time, a man who’d nearly reached a ring of pickups yelped and jumped high. The red streak zoomed away from him and went to attack the kneecaps of the next man.

Angus chose another and leapt for him. This man brought a rifle to bear, but Angus knocked it out of his hands before he could fire. Angus kicked the gun aside, sinking his teeth into a blue-jeaned leg as the man tried to run away.

Out of the corner of his eye, Angus saw Zander quietly disrobing, no frantic ripping out of his clothes. He didn’t tarry but didn’t hurry, to the confusion of two men who’d stopped in amazement to watch him.

Zander dropped his shirt, the last thing he’d taken off, gazed at the two men with his black-dark eyes, and started to smile. “How you doing, boys?” And he became a polar bear.

Zander’s roar rattled the trees, and he rose high, bulking bigger even than Tiger. The men staring at him must have had no ammunition, or else they forgot what their weapons were for, because they threw down the rifles and bolted, Zander charging after them.

The ground shook under Zander’s stride, and then Tiger’s. The red furry thing that zigged and zagged and couldn’t be caught wreaked havoc. Men were screaming and dancing, trying to hit it, but the fox was never in one place more than a millisecond. Angus imagined Tamsin laughing maniacally as she dashed about.

Angus couldn’t see Ben, but he might still be using his glam. The man could take care of himself, so Angus continued knocking over the thieves and stamping on them until they stayed down.

He heard the barking scream of a fox and swung to see Tamsin hanging on to a man’s arm while he swung her through the air. She bit down, and he yelled, blood spurting.

The man gave an extra hard yank, and Tamsin came loose, or else she let go, and landed on her feet. The man tried to kick her, but she was gone, racing to the next goon.

A pickup truck started. Damn. Men sprinted toward it, diving in as it pulled away. Some who were down crawled to the trees, running when they gained their feet. Angus heard motorcycles roaring to life.

The last man dashed desperately from Angus, though Tiger swerved to cut him off. A pickup careened between Tiger and the man, and one of the man’s friends reached down and pulled him on board.

Tiger gave chase, but even he had to give up as the pickup slid around the wet earth, hit the road, and tore out, droplets of mud flying in its wake.

Tiger growled, sitting down on his haunches as though waiting to see if they’d return. Finally he huffed, stood up, and walked slowly to the trailer, his feet leaving giant prints in the mud. He shifted to human as he walked, and as soon as he was upright, began picking up the scattered weapons.

Zander’s polar bear charged back from the woods. He took a few seconds to shift, then growled, “Fuck. Didn’t get any of them. They knew these woods. Guessing they’re locals, stumbling on a lucky find.”

Angus shifted, breathing hard as he climbed to his human feet. “If they’re local boys, probably Ben and then us coming in and out of here tipped them off. Even if they didn’t want the weapons to use themselves, they could sell them for a hefty price. Did we get all the guns back?”

Zander shrugged. “How many were there?”

“I don’t know,” Angus had to say. “We didn’t take an inventory. Tamsin might know . . . Where the hell is she? Tamsin!”

Angus cupped his hands around his mouth as he shouted for her, his heart banging in sudden fear. Had one of those guys grabbed her? Was she racing off Goddess knew where? Or had they injured her, and she was in the woods, her life slipping away?

No, no. She wasn’t gone, and she wasn’t dead. Angus would know. The mate bond told him she was alive, well, and nearby.

The mate bond . . .

When Tamsin, still a fox, trotted easily back into the clearing, Angus’s knees went weak. He wanted to make his way to her, lift her in his arms, kiss her funny fox face, hold her close. He wanted her to shift back to human while he held her, and kiss her lips. Then he’d tell his friends to go the hell away, and take her in the tall grass.

The fact that the local lads might be back, or report that Shifters guarding a stash of weapons had attacked them, didn’t interest him. Angus wanted to be with Tamsin—the rest of the world didn’t matter.

The mate bond wrapped around his heart, an invisible tether between him and Tamsin that had seeded and grown in the last weeks.

The mate bond didn’t always manifest. Angus hadn’t formed it with April. Though a Shifter male might make a mate-claim and he and the female have a sun and moon ceremony, they might never experience the mystical bond that all Shifters sought. It was believed that the mate bond was a gift from the Goddess, and Shifters prayed for it.

As Angus stood frozen in the realization that he and Tamsin were mate bonded, Tamsin, who must have wiped the blood from her fur, sauntered past Zander. Zander put his hands on his hips and grinned down at her.

“Aren’t you cute?” Zander said. “Aw, you sweet little thing. All right, all right, don’t bite me.”

Tamsin sat down on her haunches looking smug, lifting her red and white muzzle. She eyed Zander for a moment, then continued to Angus and twined her body around his legs, hugging him with her tail.

The mate bond throbbed, squeezing Angus’s heart until he couldn’t breathe.

Ben appeared out of a shadow, something glittering in his hand.