Page 2 of Mating Season

I took a deep breath, pushing my wolf senses out further to get a feel of the area. The terrain was unfamiliar. It felt stagnant in a way that was foreign to me. I couldn’t figure out why until I realized nothing was moving. No birds in the trees. No noise from small game scurrying. I was in woods that seemed devoid of life.

Which wasn’t good.

I started laughing.

This was not my month.

Don’t lose it on me now.My wolf sighed.

I patted down my body, stopping when my hand reached my neck. Whatever drugs Molly injected me with already burned through my system. Faster most likely because of the impromptu workout of trying to escape my nest.

I was going to kill that bitch.

My head swam when I thought back through all our interactions. Iknewwhat I’d been blind tobefore. Molly was behind everything. Opal. The drugged drink. Every plot twist and turn. It didn’t make sense at first because I didn’t think I was that important.

But it wasn’t about me.

I’d bet every meager penny in my bank account that I was just a tool to get to Ranger. He was the hotshot Alpha. Highlighting him in the show would increase ratings. Once they knew what we were to each other, I could be used to make him act. I didn’t have proof yet, but I would find it.

Just as soon as I figured out where I was.

I quickly checked the rest of my body, finding my clothes and limbs intact. The bloody cuts on my sides were already healing and the rip in my jeans didn’t leave any parts hanging out.

Once I was satisfied I’d live, I pushed myself to my elbows and shook out the leaves from my hair. My body ached all over and not only from squeezing it through a too-small hole. Muscles quivered in my back and my lower half throbbed.

Despite the breeze drifting through the quiet forest and the shade from the trees overhead, it was unseasonably warm.

Is it too early for our heat?

Not exactly.My wolf didn’t elaborate and that worried me a bit.Don’t stress. Ranger is coming.

I wasn’t sure how she knew that, but my attention caught on the tree directly in front of theshed. The sun reflected strangely off a small lens. A red pinpoint light blinked on, recording.

Hidden in the leaves was a trail cam meant for wild game pointed straight at my nest.

I scanned the trees, spotting two more.

All the way out here–wherever here was–the cameras were still filming.

2

Ranger

They played us for fools.

Broken glass crunched under my boots as I walked through the darkened bar. The staff cut the power and water to the resort when they fled on helicopters, taking the females with them, and leaving behind a team of buzzing drones that whipped in and out of the chaos like overgrown mechanical mosquitos. The electronic guts of one device were still plastered against the wall where it met its fate after connecting with my fist.

Killing the cameras was a poor substitute.

I want the producers’ blood.

The bumbling idiots outside who were raging without direction wanted it too. Bloodlust from the earlier fights still coursed through their veins, no doubt messing with the timing of the coming rut as their hormones surged. We were going to descend into madness. Kill each other on live television with no way to track the females’ scents and ease the biological pull. It was exactly what the humans were counting on. Anything to increase ratings.

But they hadn’t thought of everything.

I rubbed the ache in my chest feeling the foreign sensation buried there. When Aspen wasclose, I hadn’t felt it this strongly. If I had any doubts before, they were erased now.

She was my soul mate.