The Alpha Claims A Mate (13 page)

The sheriff dropped her off back at the office
. “I’m headed out to speak to Montgomery now,” he told Lola. “I’ll be back shortly.”

Jax
stood up from his desk. The sheriff turned to him and shook his head. “You’re not coming with me,” he said. “You are not to speak to any of the panthers until you learn some diplomacy.”

Jax
let out a low growl of displeasure. “We need to take a firm line with the panthers. They’re making us look weak.”

“
Following the law, and the boundaries of their nation, isn’t weakness.” The sheriff stood up straight, his eyes taking on a warning glow.  “It’s respect.”

“The species that deserves respect is the one that proves its strength,”
Jax snapped, his shoulders hunching up defensively.  “The only way to earn respect is by establishing who’s top dog.   You’re letting the panthers-“

“Enough!” Loch roared, and everyone in the room fell silent. “I am the Alpha. You do not argue with me. If you want to hold a Challenge, we can do it right here, right now.
Otherwise, you’re on desk duty. Permanently.  And if I hear of you challenging the panthers, or my word, again, you face expulsion from the pack.”

Jax’s
eyes blazed with fury, and his body shook with the effort of restraining his inner wolf.  His muscles swelled and rippled, and Ginger held her breath for what seemed like forever, before Jax finally nodded his ascent.

Clearly furious, he walked stiffly back to his desk, sat down, and turned his computer on.

“Do you want me to come with you to meet Montgomery?” Ginger asked.

Loch shook his head.

“No, it’s best if I go alone.   I know how to handle him.”

The sheriff came back an hour later,
his face was creased in a frown.

“I don’t kno
w what’s gotten into Montgomery,” he said to Ginger.  “He really wasn’t himself today.  He says we absolutely can not come on to panther nation territory. And he’s still claiming that there’s no sign of the professor on their land. That’s got to be a lie. By now, with all the hoopla around the professor’s disappearance, they would have searched the land thoroughly.  They would have followed the professor’s tracks to wherever they ended.”

“So what now?”

“We’re working on figuring out who the professor’s inside man was. We’ve got some leads, but I can’t discuss them yet.”

The Panther Shifter council were still considering the matter, and hadn’t given the sheriff an answer yet.  Loch confided to Ginger that he suspected they were going to stall for as long as they could. They were being placed in a difficult and politically uncomfortable position.
They were supposed to do what was best for the panthers, but what was best in this case?

Over-ruling Montgomery’s decision would be perceived as an attack on his authority – but the refusal of the Panther Nation to allow
anyone to look for the professor was hurting the reputation of all the panthers.

Towards the end of the day, Ginger’s phone rang. Her father was calling.

Worried, she quickly answered. These days, phone calls from home never seemed to bring good news.

“Ginger, what is happening down there?” he asked
, his voice shaking. “Reynaldo is talking about laying me off. Saying he can’t afford to have me associated with his firm, with the way my daughter’s behaving. What is going on?”

“What? Oh my God. I’m so sorry.” Her heart sank.
She could just picture her father, pacing in the living room.  He was a small, perpetually anxious man, with thinning red hair and worried little eyes peering out behind gold-rimmed spectacles.   He was the kind of man who lived for his family, who worried about their safety all the time, who tortured himself by calculating the statistical probability of every possible disaster that could happen to them, from getting salmonella from a bad tomato, to getting hit by a meteor.   He worked overtime so his daughters could do to private school and college.  The desk at his office was crowded with pictures of him, Ginger’s mother, and his four daughters.

She looked across the room, at Loch sitting in his office. 
He was so handsome, so perfect, so right for her…and she was going to have to say goodbye to him.

“Dad, I’ll fix this,” she promised. Her eyes burned with tears as she hung up the phone and walked over to Loch’s office.  Her stomach churning, she opened the door.

“Loch, we need to talk,” she said.

“You’ve got to stop her!”  Tallulah said, grabbing Ginger by the arm.

G
inger cursed under her breath. After what had happened yesterday, she was not in the best of moods.  She was trying to make her way to the dining room, but clearly she wasn’t going to get a chance to eat breakfast.  

Tallulah was standing there blocking her way. 

“What? Who am I stopping?”

“I mean, she’s a bitch and a whore, but I don’t want her to get herself killed,” Tallulah added.

“Oh. Brenda. What is she going to do?”

“She said she’s going on to the
Panther Nation territory to find him herself!”

Ginger rushed into the dining room to find Brenda in a heated argument with one of the other students. Brenda swung towards Ginger.  “You said that he’s still alive, right?”

“Yes. Most definitely.” 

“Then I’m going to find him,” Brenda said defiantly, and turned and strode towards the door.

“No, wait!” Ginger pleaded.  “The professor went on their property, and disappeared. What do you think they’ll do to you?”

“I don’t care.” Brenda’s chin quivered and her eyes swam with tears.
Her eyes were bloodshot and ringed with runny streaks of mascara and eyeliner. “None of you even care. None of you are doing anything to help him.”

That wasn’t true, but Ginger knew it was pointless to argue.

“Listen,” she said, “Let me go to the Panther Nation’s souvenir shop and talk to Tommy Deerkiller. Maybe he’ll listen to reason, or have some ideas on how to talk to Montgomery. He’s the one who stands to lose the most from this, because the disappearance is going to hurt the tourist industry.

“You promise you’ll talk to him today?”
Brenda sniffled, wiping at her cheeks with the back of her hand.

“I’ll go right after breakfast.”

After she ate, Ginger got the keys to the pickup truck and headed over to Tommy Deerkiller’s.  She had an uneasy feeling that this wouldn’t sit well with the sheriff, but she was trying to avoid him at the moment.

After the phone call from her father t
he day before, she’d told him that she needed to go back to New York right away. He’d begged and pleaded, and finally she’d told him that she’d give it a couple more days and think about it, but she’d asked for the day off from work to clear her head.

The truth was, s
he was trying to build up her resolve to leave town, but she couldn’t do that if she was working twenty feet away from Loch’s office. Her heart melted and her shirt wanted to unbutton itself every time she looked at him.

The souvenir shop was located on Rural Route 220, right near the entrance to the Panther Nation property.  It was a weather-beaten, one story wooden structure with a picture of a snarling panther on the billboard sign out front.
“Authentic Panther Nation Souveneers!!!” the misspelled but enthusiastic sign advertised.

There were necklaces of fangs and claws, painted pottery,  hand-made leather and wood drums, moccasins,  packages of venison jerky, and thousands of other knick-knacks and odds and ends cluttering the shelves inside. 
Tommy Deerkiller was stocking the shelves when she walked in. He lit up at the sight of her.

“Well, if it isn’t the beautiful red wolf,” he said. “How may I serve you today?”

“Actually, I came to talk to you about Montgomery,” she said. “I’m worried about what’s going to happen if he continues to refuse to allow us to investigate the professor’s disappearance.”

“I agree,” Tommy nodded, frustration creasing his forehead. “People will
be afraid to do business with us. Our sales are already down, because of it.”

“Is there any way that you could persuade him to reconsider? Sheriff Armstrong has always been very respectful of the panthers, from what I understand. Maybe if Sheriff Armstrong went on the property by himself?”

Tommy frowned.  “Normally, I’d say yes.  The problem is, ever since the professor’s disappeared, Montgomery has been acting…different. Not himself. There’s no talking to him or reasoning with him. Frankly, a number of us are concerned.”

“What’s he doing that has you concerned?” Ginger felt a ripple of unease shudder through her.

“A lot of things,” Tommy said vaguely. Clearly he was uncomfortable discussing it.

“So what could you do about it?”

“We’re debating that. But don’t say anything to anybody; challenging Montgomery or going over his head isn’t something that can be done lightly,” Tommy said, lowering his voice and glancing around fearfully. “If you could tell the sheriff that we’re working out how to address the matter, and ask him to be patient?”

“I could try.” If
Loch was speaking to her.

At the sound of a truck pulling up outside, they both glanced out the window. It was Montgomery’s pickup truck, and he
had two young women in the front seat with him.

“I better go,” Ginger said.  Tommy nodded, looking worried. “Not a word,” he said to her anxiously.

“Of course.”

As she walked out, Montgomery saw her and waved at her from the truck window.

She paused, waiting as he climbed out and walked over to speak to her.

“How are you doing, Ginger? Come to buy some souvenirs?” he asked cheerfully. It was as if he had no idea there was a potential war brewing and he was the cause of it. 

“I’m fine, thank you. How are things with you?”

“Can’t complain. So what brings you to our territory?”

She took a deep breath and thought fast. “I was looking for you, actually.”

“Really?” he looked delighted at the prospect. “Would you care to join me in a drink? We could go to the Panther Lodge, if you like.”

“On Panther territory?” she asked, startled.

“Certainly. I know you’ll be respectful of our property and our people. And I’d love to introduce you around.”
He glanced at her with a gleam in his eye and a curve to his lip, his gaze roving over her body.

Good heavens, he certainly acted differently when Loch was
n’t around, she thought. Should she go? Maybe it was a way to encourage friendlier relations with the Panther nation.

Then again, he was acting downright
flirtatious. Exactly how friendly did the panther leader want to get with her?

Ginger never had a chance to find out, because at that very moment, the sheriff pulled into the parking lot, and he did not look happy.

He glanced over at Montgomery, and nodded at him.

“You’re needed back at the office,” he told Ginger. “It’s urgent.”

She smiled apologetically at Montgomery. “Perhaps some other time,” she said.

“Any time at all.
You know where to find me.”

She climbed into the sheriff’s car,
baffled by the odd change in Montgomery’s demeanor.

As they pulled out of the parking lot, the sheriff snapped “What the hell was that? He was flirting with you!”

Ginger nodded, bewildered.  “He was, wasn’t he? That was a really strange encounter.”

“Why were you even talking to him?”

She related what had just happened that morning, and the sheriff shook his head angrily. “That was a terrible idea, Ginger. By the way, Tommy Deerkiller is the one that we suspect of being the professor’s inside man.”

“What?” Ginger gasped. “I had no idea!”

“I can’t tell you everything that’s happening with the investigation.  You shouldn’t have gone out there without consulting with me first.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry. I was worried that Brenda would go onto the panther’s territory and they’d kill her or kidnap her, like they did the professor.”

“I don’t think they would. The professor was deliberately antagonizing them, and he clearly went on their property to steal artifacts. That wouldn’t be the case with Brenda.” The sheriff sighed. “Not that it would be a good idea to have her go on their property when tensions are running so high.”

Ginger suddenly realized that they were driving down an unfamiliar road, headed for the driveway of a blue clapboard bungalow-style house.

“Where are we?” she asked.

The sheriff blinked in surprise. “Oh. I took you to my house. I wasn’t even thinking.”

He parked the car in front of his house and turned to her, exasperation on his face. He grabbed her hand, and at the touch of his skin she felt the familiar sizzle of attraction burning through her. “I just can’t think straight when I’m around you,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I barely slept last night.”

She swallowed hard.
“I’m sorry. I really am.  I’m just trying to protect my family, and keep the peace with my Alpha.”

“I’ll talk to him again,” Loch said, his hand closing around hers.
“I can’t let you go.  You’re what I’ve been looking for all of my life.  You’re like the puzzle piece that I didn’t realize was missing.”  His thumb moved across the back of her hand.  Ginger’s breathing quickened, and heat flared between her thighs.

S
he glanced at the house.

“So,” she said. “Here we are. At your house.  Just you and me.”

“I’d be rude if I didn’t offer you a guided tour,” he said.

“Yes, that would be very rude.”

“Just a quick tour,” he promised. She followed him into the house, cursing her complete lack of willpower. Loch was harder to resist than chocolate, and that was saying a lot.

The sheriff’s house was decorated with a spare, masculine style, with handmade wooden furniture and a deer’s skull with antlers over the
flagstone fireplace.  A floor to ceiling window looked out on a riot of tropical greenery, with red flowering hibiscus splashed in a blaze of color amidst orange trees and palmettos.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. 

“It could use a woman’s touch,” he said, bending to kiss her neck, and then nipping it gently. “Know any women who might be interested in helping me redecorate?”

She laughed. 
“I imagine there’s no shortage of volunteers.”

“I have very particular tastes. She’
d have to be a sexy redhead with a smart mouth and a good heart and a very voluptuous body. And a fondness for spankings.”

Loch
pulled Ginger up against him and hugged her, hard. “You were a very bad girl, going to the souvenir shop without asking me first,” he murmured in her ear.

“Yes, I was.” Ginger’s voice was husky with desire. “Are you going to punish me?”

“Walk over to the couch.” He released her and stepped away.

Legs trembling with anticipation, she walked over.

“Now bend over the arm.”