Page 12 of Jacob

“Jacob,” Gal said with a smile.“Glad you could join us.”

“I’m happy to be here, but I’m still not sure why I am,” Jacob said cautiously.

Taylor was lounging in his chair as if he was at home, and he was.The man on the second chair was sitting with his back straight and a serious expression on his face, though.It was a stark contrast, even though the man was wearing a uniform, too.

Sheriff Tony Clark.

Jacob had heard of him.Taylor wouldn’t shut up about the man since they’d started working together.He sounded like a good person, but that didn’t explain why he was here.It also didn’t explain why Jacob couldn’t seem to look away from him.

He cleared his throat and hovered by the door since both chairs were taken.Forrest had gone back to the desk and was leaning against it with his arms crossed over his chest.Everyone was watching Jacob, and he didn’t like it.

“Sheriff Clark, this is Jacob, one of my pride members,” Gal said.“Jacob, this is Sheriff Clark.”

“Please, call me Tony,” the sheriff said.

Jacob nodded at him.He’d thought Taylor was exaggerating when he’d mentioned how handsome the new sheriff was, but he hadn’t been.Jacob couldn’t see all of Tony, but he could guess that the man was tall, and he looked good in his uniform.His skin was tanned, and his dark hair had just a few strands of silver at the temples.His dark eyes betrayed how intelligent he was, and Jacob couldn’t look away from the mole on the sheriff’s cheek, right next to his nose and so close to his lips.

Jacob forced himself to look at Gal.“You’re worrying me.”

“You shouldn’t be.I know you’ve been patrolling the area around the house because of something Drake told you,” Gal said

Jacob nodded.Gal made it sound like it was a legitimate thing for Jacob to do instead of like he was wasting time.“I am.”

“Can you tell us what happened?”

Did that mean there actuallywasa shifter walking around the property?Were they spying on the pride?Or maybe planning something nefarious?Jacob shouldn’t let his imagination get away from him, but it was hard when he’d been convinced something was going on for days and had no proof of it.

“Drake came over the other day.He told me he’d smelled a strange scent in town and here.He didn’t think anything of it when he was in town because the place is full of shifters, even though he said the scent was odd.”

“What do you mean by that?”the sheriff asked.

“You’ll have to ask Drake.I was unable to smell much of the person.I was worried because Drake mentioned that he’d smelled the same scent in the parking lot as he had in town.We went outside to check, and while we were both able to smell it, it wasn’t fresh enough for me to be able to identify it.I didn’t recognize it at all.”

“Where did the scent come from?”

“The forest.They came close to the pride, but they didn’t breach the property.I’ve been checking the CCTV, just in case, but I haven’t found anything yet.”

Tony was frowning slightly.It wasn’t rude for Jacob to stare at him, was it?

“We got several reports of a strange shifter or animal,” Tony explained.“Someone mentioned it could be a polar bear, which would mean that we’re dealing with a shifter.We’re not sure, which is why I’m here to talk to Gal.”

Jacob nodded.“I see.What do these reports say?”

“People saw something big that looked like a bear but wasn’t the correct color.A few of them said there was white in the bear’s fur, which is why it might be a polar bear.The shifters who made a report and got close enough said that the strange scent was like a bear’s, but not quite, which might point to the fact that this could be a polar bear since Taylor tells me that bear shifters have a different scent from polar bear shifters.I don’t think there are any polar bear shifters in town, so people wouldn’t be acquainted with the way they smell.”

Tony was talking about a strange scent, and it was getting hard for Jacob to ignore the one he could smell right now.It didn’t have anything to do with the shifter poking around the forest or this polar bear shifter.It came from inside the office.

The scent was warm and reminded Jacob of aged whiskey.He tried to take a deep breath, but he didn’t want people to notice something was up with him.He had no idea what it was.He’d been in Gal’s office before and hadn’t noticed anything.Maybe Forest or Gal had bought a new cologne?That didn’t sound right.They were shifters, so more often than not, they didn’t wear artificial scents.

Jacob sniffed again.Hereallyliked the scent, and his tiger was pushing him to find where it came from and to stay there.The tiger never wanted to stop smelling it.Jacob agreed, and he started moving before he could think about it.

Gal had been saying something, but he stopped when Jacob moved.Everyone turned toward him, and his step faltered, but he couldn’t stop.His tiger was pushing and growling, something that Jacob couldn’t remember ever happening before.

“Jacob?”Gal asked.

Jacob shook his head.He was being rude.“I didn’t mean to interrupt you.”

“It’s fine.What’s going on?”

---