Call of the Wild (20 page)

Aaron stepped out of the brush. He went into the clearing where the rest of his team was talking quietly to a few adults who’d been chaperoning the group of thirty or so children.

One of the adults turned his way. It was a tall woman with curly brown hair. She was cute in a girl next door kind of way.

“Aaron? Oh my Goddess, Aaron!” she said, before running over and throwing herself into his arms.

Marsha didn’t like it at all when the cute Lycan plastered herself all over her mate. Nope, she didn’t like it—at all! She growled low in her throat as she started across the clearing ready to pull the bitch, in every sense of the word, away from her man. She looked up at her mate’s face when she was halfway there.

She’d seen that face in anger and in passion. The look she saw now was new; she saw sadness and longing. She wasn’t close enough to hear his whisper. She stopped and stood stock still as he closed his eyes and pulled the woman into his arms and held her tight. Marsha’s heart hurt; she didn’t even notice that she was rubbing her chest as her world crumbled in before her eyes. Her mate was in love with another woman!

Then Aaron laughed and picked the woman up swinging her around like you would a child. When he put her down again, he looked around. When he saw Marsha, his smile turned into a frown. Letting go of the woman, he walked over to where Marsha still stood rooted to one spot.

“Marsha, what’s wrong? Are you hurt somewhere?” he asked her.

“You love her, don’t you?” she asked, not even aware of the tears in her eyes.

“Like a sister, the same as Laura. This is Kylie. You remember me telling you about Kylie, don’t you?” he asked softly, holding her face in his hands. He leaned down and brushed his lips over hers.

“Aaron, is this your mate?” Kylie asked.

Aaron nodded, though he didn’t take his attention off Marsha’s face. There was something wrong and he needed to fix it.

“Can you tell me what’s wrong, sweetheart?” he asked.

Marsha took a deep breath as she looked into Aaron’s eyes. She could breathe again. She saw love there in his eyes. Or at least an emotion she hoped was love. She knew he’d never told her he loved her, at least not in words. Still, she believed that was what she was seeing in his eyes at this moment and her heart healed. Closing her own eyes for just a moment, she took another deep breath. He was worried; she was going to have to confess to her jumping to a wrong conclusion. She didn’t want to; it was going to make her look jealous and insecure.

“For a moment there, I thought you didn’t want me anymore,” she whispered.

Aaron looked around, and saw that they were the center of everyone’s attention. Swinging Marsha up in his arms, he walked out of the clearing. They didn’t need an audience right now. Once they were far enough away to have some privacy, he put her down. Unfortunately, in the time it took him to get away, his concern had turned to anger.

“I’m not sure what idiot notion you’ve gotten into that head of yours, but I would hope that you’d trust me by now. I made a commitment to you. I went through the bonding ceremony with you. What the hell were you thinking?” he asked, practically shouting.

His temper spiked off Marsha’s; her tears were all dried up now. It was his fault for never giving her those three little words. She wouldn’t have been so insecure if she knew he felt more than lust for her. He was her soul mate damn it, why hadn’t he figured that out!

“I was thinking that you were laughing and hugging a female who wasn’t your mate. How was I to know it was your precious Kylie? For the record, you don’t get to put your hands on any females other than me,” she said, putting both hands on his chest to push him away.

Only he didn’t budge. He had his arms around her, and he wasn’t about to let her go, she had a habit of running away when she was upset with him. He
knew
her anger was all about insecurity. This wasn’t the first time he’d seen signs of it. He also knew that it was going to take time for Marsha to believe he wasn’t going to let her go. She needed reassurance and so he’d give it to her.

“Marsha, I think you’re the sexiest, most beautiful woman I’ve ever met. You’re the only one I want for the rest of my life. I’m not going to leave you,” he said.

He’d started with sexy, was that good or bad? Did it indicate love or only lust?

“As nice as that is, it’s not what I need to hear right now,” she told him, letting him know as clearly as she could, what she needed. She needed “The L Word”, yep, she needed him to tell her he loved her. And like every woman since Eve would say, if you had to spell it out, it didn’t mean a damn thing. It would only be words.

Like every man since Adam, Aaron didn’t get it. Aaron was shocked; he’d told her how much he wanted her, what maggoty idea was going through her brain at this moment? He let out a big sigh.

“What is it you need me to tell you?”

“Nothing,” she mumbled.

“Oh, no you don’t. If there’s one thing I
do
know, it’s that when a woman says
nothing,
what she really means is that her man is in deep shit and it’s definitely something. So spill it,” he said.

“If I have to tell you, then it’s like I’m putting words in your mouth.”

He started to speak again, but she quickly cut him off.

“We don’t have time for this right now. We have to get those children to safety.”

Sighing again, this time in agreement, he took her hand and walked back to the clearing. He also knew that no matter what he said, she wasn’t going to tell him what her problem was, not now. Tonight, when he was between her legs and deep inside her, then he’d get her to talk. For now, she was right; they needed to take care of the children.

Back in the clearing, his brother, Benji, had gotten everyone into groups. Two or three children to each adult, with older children ready to help the younger ones. He walked over to report.

“They’ve been up nearly all night and it’s already noon. The eastern route was the shortest and we thought the safest. It was completely blocked and they all had to double back, going around the towns. Instead of being clear by yesterday, they’re all still here. The little ones are really tired. We’re not going to be able to move very quickly. Plus, one of the adults says this is only the first group of children. They split them up for safety. If one group got caught, then the others still had a chance to get through. More will be arriving here throughout the day,” Benji said.

Aaron swore under his breath. He had eight people on his team plus the two adults who had brought them. He had wondered why only two adults accompanied them; now he knew why.

“I don’t like being out in the open like this. We’re too visible. Let’s move this group up the hill into the trees. Did they bring food?” Aaron asked.

“They’ve eaten it all. They hadn’t planned to have to turn around and come the other way. They should have been clear yesterday morning. They started out Monday afternoon. There have been multiple blocks they’ve had to get past,” Benji answered.

“Okay, we’ll give them each a protein bar from our packs. We can’t have a fire to cook anything we might catch in a snare or hunt; send out our best nose to find some nuts and berries. We’re going to have to make arrangements to be met. Then we’re going to have to work out the best path out. David says the new fuel piles we found are wired with explosives. That sound we heard a couple of hours ago was one of them. His team set it off by mistake.”

“Was anyone hurt?” Benji asked.

“He said his team was intact. They’re going to try to disarm the remaining ones. Obviously, The Society wasn’t planning on lighting them from up close and then taking out the firefighters. They have something else up their sleeve. Let’s go over the map and work out the safest route,” Aaron said.

It didn’t take long to see that there was a limited corridor from which to choose their path.

“I don’t like this,” said Marsha. “I feel like we’re being herded. Why would this one area be free of brush bombs? Would The Society really be that careless?”

Aaron swore again under his breath. He could see exactly the same thing Marsha. Then he got an idea. He clicked his mic two times, letting David know he needed to speak to him again, even though they’d spoken only a few minutes ago.

“Go ahead,” Aaron heard David say in his ear.

“Which target is down?” he asked.

“Target Delta down, target Epsilon in sight,” David said, letting them know that the brush pile closest to Dyer was the one they had eliminated and the most northerly one was next on their list.

“Roger that—Epsilon-Theta-Kappa?” Aaron asked so David would know in what order he needed them taken out.

“Doable in three to four,” David answered, letting his brother know how long it would take. They were trying to keep all radio communication as brief as possible. They didn’t want their enemies picking up the signals and figuring out either what they were doing or triangulating their positions.

“Roger and out,” said Aaron, giving him the go ahead to proceed with those three next. Unfortunately, there still might be others they hadn’t spotted.

Pointing to the map, Aaron showed them the new path. “We’ll head up the empty corridor to here. Then we’ll veer west for two miles before heading north again. Hopefully, we’ll avoid whatever trap they’ve got in place for us. Just in case we’re wrong, Benji and I will work on some surprises.”

“Okay. Do you want to wait until all of the children are here or take them out in groups?” Marsha asked.

“David thinks it will take him three to four hours to make sure all of the explosives in our path are deactivated. Benji can act as forward scout while we wait here for the others to arrive. They can eat and rest for a few hours. We’ll head out around three-thirty. The sun won’t set until nearly nine, so we’ll have plenty of light,” Aaron said. They had about a ten mile hike with an unknown number of children and adults. He didn’t want to take chances on safety so he was building extra time into their plans.

“What happens if some of the children haven’t arrived by then?” Marsha asked.

“Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it. Besides, it’ll give me time to think,” said Aaron.

The three of them spread out amongst the group, and slowly moved them under the tree cover while they explained the plan. More than one child fell asleep after eating one of the protein bars they were given. The rest sat down in small groups and talked quietly.

Kylie went over to where Marsha was handing out protein bars and other snacks. They were running out of food fast. Not expecting to share, they hadn’t been rationing their food.

“Hello—Marsha, isn’t it? Is everything alright?” she asked.

Marsha looked over at the woman who, as a young girl, had made such an impression on her mate. She knew Kylie was mated with four pups and had no designs on Aaron other than friendship. With a little effort, she was able to push her jealousy aside.

“Sorry I overreacted earlier. I didn’t know who you were, and Aaron and I are newly mated,” she said to explain her earlier behavior.

Kylie let out a small laugh. “Oh, honey, I know just how you feel. If I had thought first, I would have acted differently. It was such a shock to recognize his scent here. The last I heard, he was in Montana. I had been making arrangements for my family to come and visit when the evacuation orders came in. I wasn’t expecting him to put himself in danger for us. I guess I should have. The man isn’t too different from the boy he was back then.”

“No, in fact, I’d say he’s exactly the same, with ten times the amount of protective instincts and years of experience as a soldier too,” added Marsha.

“Oh my, well, then, I’m glad he’s here. My Tom stayed behind to help in town.”

Marsha looked sharply at Kylie and she could see the worry in her eyes. She was separated from her mate. While her Tom fought alongside his pack-mates, she was making sure their pups were safe.

“Are all of these children from your pack?” asked Marsha.

“Only about twenty of this group; the older ones are helping with the others. We couldn’t spare too many adults to bring them along. In fact, if you don’t need me here, I’d like to go back and check on the others,” Kylie said.

“Let’s check with Aaron. You may have some help with that. We don’t all need to be sitting around here on our asses for the next three hours,” Marsha said, happy there was something she could do.

Sitting around waiting didn’t suit her right now. She also needed some time away from her mate. Maybe if she weren’t right there all the time, he’d realize that he loved her, and the stupid man would get a clue and tell her so when she got back.

Aaron wasn’t happy with the plan, but he knew better than to suggest that he be the one to go marching off into the woods with Kylie. With Benji off scouting their planned course, he needed to stay here with the others. He did send one of the other team members with them. He knew it was sexist sending a man with the two women; they were both capable and lethal shifters when necessary. He sent Ben along anyway.

Marsha hadn’t even been gone fifteen minutes, and he was missing her and worried about her. Unfortunately, he was going to have to suck it up. To take his mind off his mate and whatever was bothering her, he pulled out the map. Finding a relatively flat rock to sit on, he put his pack down in front of him and used it as a table to go over their course again. This time he went over all of the notes they had taken about the terrain. It would be hard for these children to traverse some of the gullies and inclines they had seen.