Page 8 of Handcuffed to the Bear

One thing Avery knew for sure: if Jack believed Fallon was about to make a move toward the next person on his hit list, he wouldn’t merely have stood by and let it happen. Even if he couldn’t call for backup, Jack would’ve gone in anyway. He was exactly that sort of reckless hero type.

But he was also more than capable of handling himself in the field. If thingshadgone wrong, there was no more capable person to be out there. Not to mention that Jack could shift into a big damn grizzly bear. One-on-one, at least, he was capable of taking on the biggest lion in Fallon’s pride, and winning.

But part of Jack’s strategy would be contingent upon knowing that his team was out there, trying to get to him.So let’s make sure we don’t let him down.

“First we need to figure out where that boat is,” Avery decided. “Rosen, contact the Coast Guard and explain the situation. We’re not going to move on the boat yet—we can’t, without blowing all our work so far, but we can at least narrow down our efforts.”

Rosen nodded and reached for a headset.

“I should get out there,” Cho said. She was practically vibrating in place with eagerness to get back in the field again.

Or maybe that was the caffeine.

“Not yet. If we have to get up the coast in a hurry, we’ll need fast transportation. Helicopters. See what you can get hold of; they’re probably all out in Idaho, but I think the DEA owes us a favor. I,” he sighed, “am going to call Division Chief Stiers and let her know we seem to have lost her best field agent.”

Stiers, it turned out, was already up. She was a night owl—literally. A great horned owl, to be specific. She’d adapted to working the day shift since getting her promotion from field agent to chief of the Bureau’s Pacific Northwest division, but Avery had very rarely managed to catch her asleep. Rumor around the office was that she didn’t sleep at all. He’d also heard that she liked to drop in at night to see if she could catch new techs napping on the job.

Tonight, though, she was nowhere near the office. “Glad you caught me,” Stiers said, answering on the first ring. “I’m still in Boise, working on our cougar problem, but I’ve got a flight back to Seattle in the morning. How much of an emergency would you say this is?”

“Depends on whether we hear from Jack in the next few hours,” Avery said. He dug a thumb into his temple. Cho’s caffeine-and-sugar bomb had done the trick as far as jolting him awake, but it had left him with a throbbing headache that the aspirin didn’t seem to be cutting. It didn’t help that his wolf instincts were driven half mad by inactivity while a pack member was in danger. He itched under his skin, restless, wanting to move.

With the habits of long practice, he forced himself to stillness, soothing his wolfish side back to relative calm. “Don’t bump up your flight. Just take care of what you need to there. We’ve got the situation in hand and we’ll brief you when you arrive.”

After he hung up, he sat for a moment with his forehead resting on the heel of his hand. The question was whetherJackhad it in hand, and there was no way to know until they either heard from the reckless bear-shifting bastard or found him.

Something clunked heavily near his elbow. He raised his head to find that Cho had refilled his cup. “Figured this was the sort of night that called for two Cho specials,” she said. “It’ll cure what ails ya.”

“Oh, God,” Avery groaned, but he took a sip anyway, wincing as the powerful combination of too much coffee and even more sugar blasted his taste buds. It’d either clear out his headache or leave him unable to sleep for a week. “You’re a menace, you know that?”

“I strive to be menacing,” Cho said. She sat on the edge of his desk, swinging her legs and looking about asunmenacing as it was possible to be, especially in her oversized sweater and jeans. Avery wasn’t a big guy, but she madehimfeel large. Her straight dark hair fell in two graceful wings on either side of her narrow face.

She nudged him with her foot. “Hey. He’ll be okay, Hollen. We’ll find him.”

“I’m confident Jack can take care of himself,” Avery said. “I just wish we could do more to make sure he doesn’t have to. We’re supposed to be his backup, damn it.”

Cho punched him lightly in the shoulder. “We’ll get him back, Avery.”

“Weren’t you getting us a helicopter?”

“On it, Agent Wolf-Shiftersir,” she said, with a fake (and very sloppy) salute.

Avery snorted and drank some more of the sticky goop in the cup. Jack hadbetterhave the situation under control, or Avery would use his one good leg—or three good wolf legs—to kick his ass.

CHAPTER4

Casey followedher companion through the dark woods, trying not to trip over anything else. She didn’t want to admit to Jack that her foot still throbbed where she’d stubbed her toe, and she was pretty sure she’d picked up a thorn in her heel. Also, she was surprised by how much her feet and legs ached. She’d never realized that walking barefoot for a long period of time was a lot moreworkthan walking in shoes. Her feet had to flex in whole new ways, and her hips swung differently because of the way her feet came down.

It didn’t help that Jack was a very frustrating person to be handcuffed to. He moved in an erratic and unpredictable start-stop pattern, alternately yanking on the handcuffs and causing her to bump into him.

Into thevery nakedbackside of him, to be specific. Which was not something she really had a problem with, but it was very distracting under the circumstances.

And she did wish circumstances were otherwise. Even in the dim light, she could tell that Jack was an absolutely gorgeous hunk of guy. He moved with a smooth natural grace, his muscles sliding under the skin, all controlled strength and power. When he stopped to listen to the dark forest, cocking his head to one side, she found herself looking at the sharp plane of his jawline, his high sculpted cheekbones.

In spite of the scars and tattoos sending clearkeep awaysignals, and the unmistakable air of danger about him, there was something warm and approachable in his eyes that she hadn’t expected. And his unavoidable proximity reminded her how long it had been since she’d been this close to anyone.

Especially someone this hot.

Hey, it was a distraction.

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