His to Seduce (7 page)

“
W
hat the hell is that
?” She left him standing behind her, ignoring the question on his lips, in his eyes. She needed space from him in order to think. She’d been clouded.
Way
too clouded. Luke had a way of getting up into her senses and distracting her from everything she needed to focus on.

No more.

Especially now.

Chloe picked her way across the slick stones in the stream and climbed up the bank into the woods to investigate what had caught her eye.

It hadn’t looked like much from the stream. But it had looked as if it might not belong in the forest. Chloe didn’t want it to be anything. She hoped it was nothing, but the closer she got to the flash of color that had caught her eye, the clearer it became that it was indeed something.

Something that was definitely not going to be a good thing for Grizzly Ridge or Luke and his brothers.

She kicked at the piece of green plastic that stuck out from the branches. Where it had been obviously covered up. And not well. Chloe grabbed a stick and used it to uncover the rest.

Her heart skipped, and not in the good, heart fluttering way it had skipped earlier when she’d been in Luke’s arms. This was more of a
crap-this-is going-to-change-everything and not in a good way
type of flutter.

“What the hell is that?” She didn’t turn around, but could feel Luke’s strong presence directly behind her. She hated to admit it, but her body thrilled with the proximity.

She forced herself to focus. “It looks like garbage to me, Luke. An unlawful dumping ground if I ever saw one.” She pushed herself up, careful not to bump into Luke, who was still so close, and walked farther into the woods, following the trail that clearly looked as if it led to more garbage.

“This is bullshit.” Luke followed her, kicking at the ground as he went. “This isn’t ours. We didn’t put it here.”

Chloe ignored him and pulled her camera out of her side bag.

“Don’t take pictures.” She dodged to the side as Luke lunged for her camera. “This is bullshit. I told you we didn’t put it here.”

“Luke, I have to.” Chloe forced herself to stay calm in the face of Luke’s growing anger. “It’s my job.”

“No.” His face was twisted in a snarl. “Your job is to investigate the truth.”

She stood her ground, her chin lifted in the air, her hands firmly on her camera, her heart throbbing with loss.

“Luke.” She spoke slowly but decisively so there would be no confusion. “The truth is, there is garbage here and it’s your land. My job is to investigate that connection.”

“There’s no goddamn connection, Chloe. We didn’t put it here. It’s not ours.” His words were a snarl, and it wasn’t hard to see his animal was only just barely contained. She had plenty of experience with alpha types before, and Chloe knew enough to tread lightly. The only problem was knowing and doing were two very different things.

“We’ll have to see,” she said.

It was the wrong thing to say. Luke let out a roar that shook the trees around them and vibrated in her chest.

Resolutely, she ignored him and once again pointed her camera at the evidence. She snapped a few pictures before he could try to grab her camera again and tucked it back in her bag. Chloe could hear him grumble and curse behind her, but she still didn’t turn to look at him. Nothing about what she was seeing made sense. Everything she’d already seen at Grizzly Ridge and with the Jackson brothers spoke to environmental consciousness of the highest level, but she couldn’t ignore what she was seeing. She just couldn’t. It was her job to investigate, and that meant that whatever she felt for Luke had to be put aside. Especially considering she wasn’t even sure what she felt for Luke.

First things first.
Chloe crouched down in front of one of the mounds. Using her stick, she poked through the pile.

“There’s nothing to
see
, Chloe.”

She ignored him again.

“Chloe.”

Her heart ached as his voice twisted her name. It was only moments before he’d said her name with something akin to love in his voice. That was gone.

She swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, Luke. I am. But—”

“Then you’re on your own.”

She turned around then, just in time to see him stalk off toward where they’d parked the Jeep. Her first instinct was to run after him. To stop him from leaving her in the forest. But there was no point. He needed space. He was clearly upset and she couldn’t blame him. She was just as upset, but she still had a job to do. And the reality was, Chloe knew all too well what could happen if she didn’t do it properly.

“
A
xel
!” The heavy wooden door hit the wall behind it and Luke stormed into the Den. He should care about their guests hearing him. He should care about maintaining a sense of decorum. He should care about Chloe stranded in the woods.

He didn’t.

All he cared about was finding out who the hell was responsible for the garbage in the woods. In
his
woods.

“Axel?” He bellowed again, and when the two ladies on the couch in front of the fireplace jumped up, Luke didn’t even flinch. His brother was either in his office or in the kitchen; either way, he’d better make his presence known, and soon.

“Axel, where the hell—”

The swinging door to the kitchen flew open; Kade stood there, a small white apron around his waist and a towel in his hand. “Luke? Why don’t you come in here?” He bit off each word as if it were jerky, leaving no room for question.

Luke stalked past him into the kitchen. The moment the door shut behind him, he turned. “Where the hell is Axel? We need to talk. Now.”

“What’s going on?”

Luke whirled to see Axel and Harper walk into the kitchen through the back door. They looked happy and glowing in that way they always seemed to be lately. That way that screamed of new love, or mated love, or whatever it was that Axel insisted it was. The fact that less than an hour ago Luke felt the exact same way about Chloe didn’t register. He had bigger things to worry about and maybe if Axel hadn’t been so damn preoccupied with a female, he wouldn’t have to be bringing it to his attention now. When it was probably too late.

Luke flashed back to the image of Chloe crouched down in front of a pile of garbage on his land. By his favorite fishing hole, no less. The look on her face. The utter disgust that he could be part of something so dirty.

He wasn’t.

But someone was.

He looked at both his brothers in turn. “Who dumped garbage by the stream?”

“What?” Kade choked as he took a sip from a water bottle. He wiped his mouth with the back of his arm and put the bottle down. “What are you talking about?”

“Garbage,” Luke said again. He looked to Axel this time, who watched Luke very carefully. He didn’t say a word to either confirm or deny anything, but his eyes narrowed as Luke continued. “Chloe and I were walking out by the ridge today. I took her by the stream. Showed her where I was going to lead some fishing groups and we—”

“Chloe?”

“Of course Chloe,” Luke spat at Harper. He immediately felt guilty, but he didn’t apologize. “She needed to see the land in order to complete her—”

“Where is she now?”

Harper glared at him and crossed her arms over her chest. She was definitely not a female to be messed with. She’d never accepted his attitude, and he couldn’t imagine she was about to start now.

“Luke?” Axel said carefully. “Harper asked you where Chloe was.”

He looked carefully between his brothers and Harper, meeting each of their eyes in turn. They clearly knew something was up, but they were missing the point completely. “She’s fine. You guys need to focus.” He tried to bring them back to the issue at hand. “There’s garbage on the ridge and I need to know who put it there.”

“Right,” Axel said. “And since you’re not saying anything, I assume that’s where Chloe is.”

“Dammit, Luke.” With a hard yank, Kade tugged his apron off and tossed it on the counter. “I’ll go get her.”

“She’s fine.” The words came out as a growl. Both protective and threatening at the same time. The combination only confused him further. He was so angry with his mate for not believing him, for not giving him the benefit of the doubt, but at the end of the day, she was still that.
His mate.

“It’s going to get dark soon,” Axel said calmly and tossed Kade some keys. “Take the truck. It sounds like she’ll have something to bring back.”

He wanted to stop his little brother, but even through his rage, Luke could see it was the right thing to do and let him go. He shouldn’t have left her there. And he wouldn’t have if he hadn’t known she’d be fine on her own. She was a bear, for God’s sake; the woman knew just as well as him how to survive on her own. And if anyone tried to sneak up on her or harm her, well…he felt sorry for whoever was stupid enough to do that. Especially because when Chloe was done with them, he’d have a turn as well. The fierce protectiveness reared up in him again. It was completely at odds with everything he felt for her and he shoved it aside to focus on the real issue.

“I found garbage up by Cooper’s Creek. The hole where the bull trout are. Who put it there?”

“Garbage?”

“Garbage.” Luke’s patience was being stretched like a stale rubber band. If he didn’t get some answers soon it wasn’t going to be pretty. “It looked to be more than one pile, too. Like it had been dumped for a while.” Even as he explained it, something about it didn’t ring true.

“Luke.” Harper stepped between the two brothers. “What makes you think for a second that we would know anything about any garbage anywhere on the ridge? Let alone by the creek? You can’t seriously be standing here thinking we know something about it?”

He looked to his brother.
No.
Axel loved the ridge just as much as he did. Maybe more. And despite all his attitude lately, Kade did too. It wasn’t them. There was no way. But someone knew something. Someone was responsible for the garbage. And more importantly, someone was responsible for the way Chloe had looked at him. His eyes locked on Harper.

She immediately recoiled at his glare and Axel wrapped his arm around her. No doubt less to defend her and more to protect Luke. “You can’t be serious?” She shook her head, not in anger but almost in pity, likely for the complete and total disaster of emotions he’d become in less than a week. “You know better, Luke.” She waited a beat. “You
know
better.”

He shrugged and muttered an apology. He
did
know better.

“Alright.” Axel moved across the large kitchen to the fridge and grabbed two beers from their private stock. He threw one to Luke, but before cracking his own, he quickly prepped a tray with a bottle of wine and a few glasses and handed it to Harper, who already seemed to know what his intentions were.

“I’ll go make sure the guests weren’t too rattled by Luke’s outburst.” She shot Luke a look but softened it by blowing him a kiss before she pushed out into the main room to tend to their guests. The second she was gone, Axel started in on him.

“Are you kidding me, Luke? What the hell was that all about? You really think you can stand here and accuse Harper or any of us, for that matter, of dumping garbage by the stream? Are you crazy? Or drunk? Or…never mind.”

“What?” Luke took a deep drink of his beer. “What were you going to say?”

Axel shook his head as if his little brother wasn’t worth whatever comment he was going to make, but Luke wasn’t stupid; he knew exactly what he was going to say. It was the exact same thing he would have, and in fact, did say, to him not all that long ago when Axel’s head was muddled by the presence of his mate before he claimed her.
His instincts were clouded because of Chloe.
He knew it and it made him crazy. But there wasn’t anything he could do about that particular problem. At least not for now. He needed to focus.

One thing at a time.

And right now, the most important thing was to figure out who’d put the garbage on their land. Before Chloe did.

“You know what? It doesn’t matter.” Luke waved away whatever Axel was going to say and finished the rest of his beer in one big swallow. “Right now there’s only one thing that matters. Who would have done this?”

“It has to be someone with access to the ridge. If it’s by Cooper’s Creek, that’s not an easy place to get to, but—”

“It’s a place that would be—”

“Discovered.”

They locked eyes and nodded. “Exactly,” Luke said. “But who would have a reason to—”

“The wolves.”

“Blackwood.”

The brothers spoke at the same time. “Dammit.” Luke’s fist came down hard on the countertop, rattling the dishes. “I should have known. I should have known from the moment Chloe showed up here talking about
environmental impact
and all that bullshit. She’s working for the wolves.”

“Whoa.” Axel got in front of him and placed both hands on his chest, stopping his pacing. “You don’t know that.”

“I
do
know that. She said she was hired by an outside party. A
concerned
party. Who would that be? Who would really be so concerned about our business except for the only group who might have something to lose by it?”

“The wolves don’t have a damn thing to lose by us being here. We’ve done nothing but work together with them. Our weakness is their strength and vice versa.”

“Do they see it that way?” Luke’s eyes challenged his brother and he held them until finally he saw the flicker of doubt reflected back at him. “Right,” he said. “I think it’s time to find out.”

C
hloe should have been furious
. She should have been out for blood. She should have been a lot of things when it came to Luke Jackson and the way he’d just abandoned her in the middle of the forest. But all she really was was sad.

Sure, she’d been fighting their attraction. But fighting it or not, she wasn’t blind. She wasn’t completely ignorant to the way her body thrilled when he was near. The way her bear came alive. The way everything suddenly felt so damn right.

But none of that mattered anymore. She could not ignore what she’d seen in the forest. She had to investigate whether Luke liked it or not, and judging by his reaction earlier, he wasn’t going to like it. Not at all.

It didn’t matter. It couldn’t matter. Something was going on at the ridge. Something that shouldn’t be.

It couldn’t be Luke
.

The little voice in her head, the same little voice that had made itself known since she’d discovered the trash, spoke up again. It would not be quieted. Chloe shook her head, ignoring it.
One thing at a time.
The first thing she needed to do was sift through the garbage and see whether she could find some sort of indication of where it came from.

Kade had set her up in a sheltered picnic area behind the Den. It was open on one side, but the walls should protect from any breeze that might come up and the weather was forecasted to be okay for next few days. It wasn’t ideal, but it would do.

Of course, as well as setting her up in the shed, Kade had also done quite a bit of apologizing for his brother abandoning her in the middle of the forest as he drove her back to the main building. She’d only shrugged and tried to pretend it didn’t bother her. But it did. Not because she couldn’t figure out how to get back; she was a bear, for God’s sake—of course she could figure out how to get back to the Den.
No.
It bothered her on a much deeper level.

He’d left her. Just when she was starting to believe that maybe, just maybe she could actually believe in the whole mated for life thing—and more importantly, that she could make it work, that she
wanted
to make it work—he went and left her. And didn’t that just affirm everything?

She’d definitely have to be more guarded from now on. If he was the type of man who would throw her aside because she had to do her job, Luke Jackson was definitely not the right man for her. Assuming she wanted a man at all.

She groaned out loud and wiped her hair off her forehead with the back of her gloved hand. “Focus, Chloe. The only thing you need to do right now is focus on this job. It’s important.”

“Is it?”

Chloe whirled around at the voice and scattered some of the garbage off the table. She left it for the moment because she couldn’t take her eyes off Luke’s. He looked pained, haunted, and something else. Something much more frightening.

“What?” Chloe stumbled over the word, unsure of what she was even asking.

Luke took a step closer to her. He didn’t look at the piles of garbage, the evidence that only hours ago had him roaring in anger. Instead, he kept his eyes locked on hers. Intense. Focused. A shiver ran through her, and she locked her arms around herself and squeezed to keep from trembling.

“Is it important?” he asked again as he took another step. “Is it really?”

She nodded and kept her chin set high.
She would not let him get to her. She would not let him distract her from her job.
“It is. It’s very important. Anytime the environment is threatened, we need to take it very seriously. It’s my job.”

“I understand that.” He was close now.
Really close. Too close.
“What I meant was, is it the garbage that’s really important or finding out who put it there what really matters?”

“Both.” Chloe took a step back and to the side, focusing on the pile in front of her. It was the perfect distraction from Luke and more specifically, how his presence made her entire body come alive. It was definitely best to put a table of trash between them. “By looking through the evidence, it should be pretty clear who dumped it and then from there we can move forward to discovering things like why and when. And once we’ve determined that…charges.”

“Charges?”

Chloe looked up. “Of course. There will definitely be charges laid. And they’re serious ones. People need to be held accountable for this type of behavior. The fines are steep and sometimes result in jail time, or at the very least will make a strong financial impact on the guilty party.”

“You make it sound serious.”

Her eyes narrowed and she had to bite back a response. She’d dealt with this type of attitude before. People didn’t think of environmental impact as serious. But it was. And monitoring it, and when necessary, stopping the damage could sometimes even be life-or-death. Jordan’s face flashed in her mind the way it always did when she was working a case. She may have let him down, but never again.

“Dumping is illegal,” she continued. “And while it looks like this particular site was fairly contained, it’s usually indicative of another site nearby. Typically, it’s not a one-time thing. Another site may have more toxicity or pollutants that could potentially damage the ecosystem further and in some cases, the water supply or the health of the residents.”