WithHerHunger (5 page)

“The hell with both of you,” Luther grumbled, and turned
toward the truck.

Jarvis grabbed his arm. Luther glared at his cousin’s
fingers wrapped around his forearm before looking at his face. Instead of
angry, Jarvis smelled concerned.

“You smell of that little female,” Jarvis whispered.

“Worry about your own tail.”

Jarvis raised one eyebrow but then shrugged. Loose blond
curls tousled around his pensive gaze. “I’ll worry about yours too.”

“We about ready?” Sam yelled, heading to his small truck
parked in front of the work truck. “This will be the last load. Johann will be
around, I’m sure, before the day is out to see how the dens look.”

“There are at least six litters howling over who will be
moving into the five that are done right now.” Jarvis smelled all business when
he walked away from Luther toward the older
lunewulf
.

Luther shoved his emotions deep enough inside him so they
wouldn’t smell. He squinted at the sun. “Three more will be done before
sundown,” he promised.

Jaeger followed Luther to the truck. In spite of any inner
turmoil the three of them ever had with each other, all of them were able to
prevent outsiders from smelling their business. It was a survivor instinct
they’d mastered at early ages. As well, it wasn’t the first time he and his
cousins had built dens under pressure. It was the first time they weren’t
building them for Cariboo though. Thankfully Sam didn’t know that, and living
out on Toubec’s ranch gave him and his cousins freedom to run through Prince
George without anyone sniffing their direction as if they shouldn’t be there.

Luther was riding over to the site where the new dens were
being built with Sam. Jaeger and Jarvis rode in the truck loaded with the wood.
Luther strolled around Sam’s truck and glanced at the road as hairs prickled up
his spine to his neck. An overwhelming sensation, smelling dangerously close to
aggressive protectiveness, damn near stopped him in his tracks.

A small, nondescript four-door drove down the street. It
wasn’t the only car on the road. Luther didn’t notice any other car. He focused
only on the blue-gray four-door and the two females in the front seat. With the
passenger window down, and the young female
lunewulf’s
hair streaming in
the breeze, her scent wrapped around him.

She sensed him as he did her. There was no doubt in Luther’s
mind. The four-door drove by and she turned her head, holding his gaze until it
wasn’t possible for her to do so any longer. Luther grabbed the door handle and
hopped into the truck next to Sam. If the older male didn’t pick up on the odd
mixture of scents wrapped around Luther, then the male was a lost cause. Luther
almost shook from the aggressive urge to sniff her out right now. Soon, damn
soon, he would claim her in her flesh. If he didn’t, he would go mad with need
for her.

They ended up working past sundown. At least twenty males
helped finish the last two dens scheduled to be made this week. A row of eight
wooden dens lined the quiet, heavily wooded area part of Prince George, four on
each side of the narrow road. They were spread out, allowing each litter who
would live there privacy and room for cubs to run.

Luther stood on the street staring at the four-door his
little female had been in earlier. It was parked off the road, facing the first
den on the road. He now knew exactly where she was. Luther started walking away
from the males before he’d sniffed out how rational his actions were at the
moment. Twenty
lunewulf
stood behind him and wouldn’t be too thrilled
with a Cariboo entering a single female
lunewulf
’s den. With the
pressure building inside him, Luther might be able to take all of them on if
they tried to stop him.

A pale blue Suburban turned the corner and passed the parked
four-door. It slowed on the quiet road and stopped across from Luther. A male
lunewulf
got out and Luther stopped walking. The male walked up to Luther, smelling as
if he’d recently showered. Luther doubted he smelled half as good, not that he
cared.

“I’m Johann Rousseau.” The
lunewulf
male was a couple
inches shorter than Luther but didn’t bother sizing Luther up the way most
males did when they first met him.

Luther looked down the street, as did Rousseau, when Jarvis
and Jaeger walked up to join them.

“You’re the three Cariboo staying out at Toubec’s ranch.”
Rousseau didn’t make it a question.

This was the pack leader of Prince George. The male smelled
confident, relaxed and didn’t smell a bit cautious, nervous or overly
righteous, standing among Cariboo
lunewulf
the way so many
lunewulf
did. For that, Luther respected him. That and the male ran a large pack during
times of turmoil and welcomed more
lunewulf
and Cariboo.

Rousseau glanced up the quiet street, nodding when Sam and a
few of the other
lunewulf
joined them. “Sam,” he said, nodding to the
older
lunewulf.
“I’m impressed as hell with these dens you’ve built in
such little time.”

“We had a good group of males doing the job.” The older
lunewulf
puffed out his chest and nodded at the males around him.

Rousseau remained solemn. His scent was barely noticeable
when he returned his attention to Luther, Jarvis and Jaeger.

“You three now have permanent dens out at Toubec’s, and from
the looks of these dens you’ve helped built here, the howling will be in your
favor. I’m sure you’ll have steady work in Prince George.” Rousseau had just
accepted them into his pack.

Luther made eye contact with the pack leader, acknowledging
the honor just given to all three of them. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m Luther
Alger and these are my cousins Jarvis and Jaeger Alger.”

“Welcome to the pack. My mate and I would like to have the
three of you join us tonight for our evening kill. Come over in about an hour.”
He nodded to Sam and the other
lunewulf.
“Everyone is welcome.”

* * * * *

Luther left his cousins at Toubec’s ranch with the two of
them howling over who would find a female first that night. Toubec had quite a
few Cariboo and
lunewulf
living and working on his huge spread. It
wasn’t hard to find a ride into Prince George. Luther walked the blocks through
town to the new dens. In the dark, he still saw the small structure he’d put
his sweat and muscle into building. His little female
lunewulf
was
inside that den. Luther smelled her even as he reached the front door and
knocked.

Mariah jumped at the sound of someone knocking. She smelled
the male as she entered the living room and hesitated before reaching for the
doorknob. Fucking tail, had she made the right choice after all?

The den she and her cousin now shared was small with two
bedrooms down the narrow hallway off the living room. Marcy had already left,
taking off to run with other
lunewulf,
under the chaperone of two mated
couples. Later they would meet at their new pack leader’s den for the evening
kill.

Marcy had wanted Mariah to run with her. The others had
tried encouraging her to come. The thought of running under chaperone, being
allowed to sniff around unmated males, then later arriving at their pack
leader’s den so he could approve of them and any mild flirting he might smell,
didn’t appeal to Mariah at all. It was stupid. She should have gone. But Mariah
knew sniffing out a Cariboo wouldn’t meet with the pack leader’s approval.

Mariah had enjoyed being alone in their new den. There were
curtains hanging over the windows she’d closed once it was completely dark.
Before that, she had stood outside on their small front porch, staring into the
growing darkness, sniffing the cold night air. The smells would soon become
familiar to her, the smell of the trees, the dens around her and the litters
who would occupy them. For now though, Mariah focused on the smell of the fresh
wood used for her den and the lingering scent of the males who had built it.

Was it her imagination or did one of the smells fading as
the breeze blew around her when she had stood outside smell of the Cariboo
she’d fucked back in the mountains?

Mariah remembered the Cariboo at the lumberyard. As she and
the pack leader’s mate drove back from a furniture store on the edge of town,
she had spotted him. He had been standing in the lumberyard, looking ready to
spar with another Cariboo. Without knowing how, Mariah was positive which one
was her Cariboo. She’d never seen him in his flesh before.

There was only a moment to take him in before they drove by
the yard. The male stood taller than any
lunewulf
male. The older
lunewulf
male nearby was proof of that, standing a good several inches shorter than
her Cariboo. Mariah took in his broad muscular shoulders, the well-worn faded
jeans that hugged long, powerful-looking legs, and fought not to smell aroused
while sitting in the car. The Cariboo’s blond hair had slight red streaks. His
hair was long, almost falling to his shoulders. Its tousled look only added to
his wild appearance that she knew would match his personality.

An overwhelming possessiveness had filled her. She’d
suddenly felt a tightening deep inside her gut. It wasn’t the change taking
over, as it sometimes had when she’d been an early teen and had still yet
learned how to control her body. This had been something deeper, a quickening
she hadn’t been able to explain. At the same time, tiny sensations had crawled
up her spine, raising the small hairs there and on the back of her neck. Mariah
had forced herself to look away, terrified of the pack leader’s mate response
once she sniffed out these sudden strong emotions.

She had to look again, and quickly, before they drove by and
he was gone. When she had looked across the street once again, the Cariboo
lunewulf
male had been standing in the lumberyard, watching her. He had held her gaze
captive until they had driven too far down the road for her to keep looking
without completely turning around in her seat. Mariah hadn’t been able to pick
up his scent, but somehow she knew.

Now it all made sense. The times up in the mountain, in the
meadow, when they had first arrived and she’d had uncanny sensations of being
watched, Mariah had sworn her Cariboo male was nearby. When the group of
lunewulf
had complained about someone being near their kill, and when she and Marcy
had run off on their own to sleep undisturbed the previous night, all those
times he’d been watching. Now he had seen her in her human form. And Mariah had
seen him. Her Cariboo was gorgeous as hell.

In all her years, Mariah never would have believed she would
pant over a Cariboo male. Her litter ran with honor. They had always held their
heads high and had never given anyone in their litter reason to run with their
tail between their legs. She was a proud
lunewulf
. Would it shun her
cousin’s honor in this new pack if Mariah were suddenly to run publicly with a
Cariboo
lunewulf
?

Now, staring at her front door, Mariah’s hand trembled
before she forced herself to wrap her fingers around the doorknob. Her cousin
wasn’t here. Mariah was a grown female. Who she allowed to enter her own den
was her own damn business.

Nonetheless, her heart raced a mile a minute. She couldn’t
slow her breathing. Mariah couldn’t take in a breath that wasn’t full of the
male’s scent standing just on the other side of that door.

“I can smell you, my little
lunewulf
female,” came a
low growl.

She didn’t jump at the sound of his voice, but Mariah tried
swallowing and wasn’t able to perform the simple task. Her mouth was too dry.
At the sound of his rich, masculine growl, the quickening she’d experienced
earlier in the day returned. This time it swelled between her legs.

Just lovely. The last thing Mariah wanted was to open the
door smelling of lustful desire.

“Just a minute,” she said, and was grateful her voice at
least sounded normal.

Mariah turned and paced the length of her small living room.
She had placed the small wooden coffee table the furniture store had donated in
front of the couch she had purchased with her debit card from her bank up in
Whitehorse. It was all the furniture in her new living room. Not that she cared
at the moment how presentable the den was. Mariah needed to get herself in
order.

Finally, managing at least to swallow and breathe normally,
she pulled the door open.

The next breath she took into her lungs was full of the
male’s scent. Her Cariboo male! Except now he stood before her, larger than
life, in his human form. His faded blue jeans hugged thick, muscular legs. The
boots he wore weren’t to give him height but probably more for practicality.
And his T-shirt, a plain, pale blue shirt with nothing written on it, stretched
over an incredibly muscular chest and arms so ripped they were each as thick as
small trees. Mariah lifted her gaze and stared up into the eyes of the large
Cariboo
lunewulf
filling her doorway.

“Hello,” she murmured, hating how she suddenly smelled in
awe, as if she were a drooling, lust-filled female thrilled this male would
give her a moment of his attention.

“Tell me your name,” he said in a low, gruff baritone.

Even though his eyes had been silver before, the intense
blue orbs devouring her now were so familiar it was as if she’d stared into
them every day for the past two weeks. Which in a way she had—in her dreams
every night as she’d enjoyed different ways she might make love to this male in
her flesh.

“Mariah Engel,” she told him, her voice barely a whisper.

“I’m Luther Alger.”

“Luther,” she whispered, voicing out loud the name of her
Cariboo before he walked into her space.