The Trail Back (8 page)

“What do we do with the body?” Elliot said. He appeared oblivious to the anger emanating from Brayden.

“I’ll just check if he has a wallet or phone,” Brody said. “Then you can throw him off the gorge. I can’t sense any other vampires around here. We should get back and try and find out where Abbie ran off to.”

Shane saw the anger drain from Brayden and be replaced by fear as he turned to watch the demon search the vampire’s headless corpse. “She ran off? Why? Who’s going to protect her?”

Shane could guess why she’d run. “She’s in a strange place, around strange people, and all her mates up and left her.”

“No wallet, no phone.”

Brody stepped away from the body, and Elliot picked it up and tossed it off the gorge for the animals to dispose of.

“I imagine that’s exactly why she ran off, Shane. Poor thing was terrified.”

“Can you take us back please, Brody? I’d like to find her as soon as possible so she’s no longer alone and scared.”

“Of course.”

Brody stepped forward and clasped his and Josh’s arm. As they moved into the cold, Shane saw Brayden gaping at him. His eyes were no longer blazing with anger. Shane had a lot he needed to say to Brayden once he had Abbie safe in his arms. He just hoped his mate and his brother would listen, and perhaps be able to forgive him.

* * * *

Brody couldn’t keep the smile from his face when he came back to collect Brayden and Elliot a few minutes later. Landon had been furious when he’d appeared with the two naked wolves. Brody was used to the nudity that followed a shift as he’d lived with a wolf pack for sixty years, but he really enjoyed how territorial his mates could be. He’d never tell them that he liked it, but he did.

He’d spent so long being treated as dirt that he’d come to believe he didn’t matter. His mates were changing that, they made him feel special. Caleb and the whole pride treated him as a powerful and integral member. He loved it in Pine Falls. Nothing was going to hurt his town or his pride.

“Did they find Abbie?” Brayden asked. His short white hair looked a mess. Clumps of it were poking out from his head at odd angles. He’d obviously been running his hands through it in his distress.

“Aiden has found her. He hasn’t come back to the Outpost, but he told Kaitlyn he’d found her and was trying to calm her down.”

“I’ve never heard you speak to your brothers like that before,” Elliot said. He picked Brody up and held him against his big, warm chest. There was no censure in Elliot’s tone, and he was smiling at Brayden. “It’s about time someone did.”

“I’ve never heard Shane say the word
please
before,” Brayden said. “So I think you might be right.”

Brody reached down and patted Brayden’s shoulder. “It will work out. Love has a way of making everything work out.” He clasped the wolf’s shoulder as he took them back to the tavern. “You’re going to have to fight for it, though. These vampires are going to keep coming until we stop them.”

“I won’t let them have her,” Brayden said. “My brothers and I finally have a reason for living, and I will not let them take that reason away from us.”

Shane listened as Kaitlyn explained that Aiden was with Abbie out in the forest. Then he and Josh walked outside to his truck. They quickly put on some of the spare clothing they kept in a bag behind the driver’s seat.

“Are we going to wait for Aiden to bring her back?” Shane said. He looked longingly toward the tree line. He didn’t want to wait another second.

“Fuck no,” Josh said. “I can smell her from here, so she isn’t far away. I say we go get her.”

Thank God, for that.
Shane walked across the carpark and stopped Josh at the tree line with a hand to his arm. “I think we’ve been angry at those hunters long enough.”

Josh’s jaw clenched tight as he stared unseeing into the trees.

“I won’t let them ruin any more of my life. I’m finally fighting back.”

“Mom and Dad would’ve wanted us to do more than just survive,” Josh said softly. He strode into the trees with Shane following close behind him. The scent of their mate grew stronger in the air the closer they got to her. “They would’ve wanted us to live.”

“We haven’t done that in a long time,” Shane said. “Do you think we’re still capable of it?”

“I think if our mate can survive what she did and still be capable of crying over losing
us
, then we should at least find the strength to try.”

“I don’t want her to cry,” Shane said. His mate had cried when she’d thought he’d died. He’d been a coward and run away from life rather than face any more pain. He didn’t deserve her tears. “I don’t want to ever give her a reason to cry over me again.”

“I don’t know if we’ll ever be good enough for her,” Josh said.

“Then you better spend each and every day trying to be,
” Aiden said into Shane’s mind.

By the way Josh was scowling, Shane knew Aiden had spoken to both of them.

“Let’s go and collect our mate. It’s cold out here. I think she could use a nice hot bath and a warm bed to sleep in after all she’s been through.” Shane walked past Josh and into a small clearing. Aiden was leaning against a tree and staring down at a small wolf lying on the ground at his feet. A beautiful wolf. His beautiful wolf.

“I’ll leave you to it and get back to my own beautiful mate,” Aiden said. He moved away so quickly that it appeared as though he’d vanished.

“Thank you for protecting her, Aiden.” Shane found his voice was rough and gravelly as it moved over an unfamiliar lump in his throat.

“It will get easier, young wolf. Just open your heart, she’ll keep it safe for you,”
Aiden said.

As Shane looked at Josh squatting down next to Abbie and running a hand gently over her matted coat, he recognized the lump in his throat as an emotion. He was happy to see Abbie, to see her safe and unharmed. It had been a long, long time since he’d let himself feel happy.

* * * *

Abbie was shocked to see the two angry wolves approach her. She was even more shocked at the change in them. Their scent was different. The way they carried themselves had altered somehow. They even looked different. They were still scowling, but they looked younger. Their pale blue eyes looked brighter.

“We were just discussing taking you home for a hot bath and a warm bed,” Josh said. “Is that something you’d agree to?”

Abbie shuffled back away from the hand he’d been stroking over her coat. She didn’t like the way it felt when he touched her. It felt nice.

“I bet you’re hungry, too. Brayden makes a mean Spanish omelet,” Shane said.

Abbie didn’t like the sound of that at all. She loved the sound of it. But her wolf wasn’t happy with them. It was suspicious of the mates that not half an hour ago had run off to end their own lives. It made her wolf furious at the futility of staying alive for the length of her captivity only to have her mates kill her by giving up and choosing suicide.

“Your eyes are shining with anger, Abbie, and you have good reason to feel that way,” Shane said. “We have been angry our entire lives, and it turned us into self-centered assholes.”

“We’d like a chance to redeem ourselves,” Josh said.

“I’d like the chance to kick both of your butts for the way you hurt our mate,” Brayden said.

Abbie whined when Brayden strode into the clearing. She couldn’t help it. She was so happy to see him alive after witnessing him vanish. The vampire had said that the creature who took him was a friend, but vampires were not to be trusted, not even the pretty ones.

“I’m here, little wolf, and I’m fine. Apparently Brody helped these two boneheads kill the vampire who came after you.”

Brayden squatted next to Josh and opened his arms. Abbie didn’t even think. She jumped straight into the welcoming warmth and safety of her mate and burrowed her nose under his arm. He smelled of musk and man. He smelled of mate.

She nipped at his shirt, her wolf wanted to taste him. She’d been unable to shift while in the cage, and she was enjoying being back in her wolf form after so long. Her wolf was enjoying being surrounded by her big white wolf—one of them anyway. Her wolf didn’t trust Josh and Shane, and neither did the woman.

“We were just saying we should take Abbie home for a hot bath and some food,” Shane said.

“We should. The doctor said to call her if you need anything from her, Abbie.” Brayden held her to his chest as he stood and walked back through the trees to the carpark she’d run through.

“You can drive, Josh,” Brayden said.

He threw some keys to Josh and got into the back seat of a big black truck. There was a badge painted on the door showing the truck was the property of the Pine Falls Fire Department. So, one of her mates was a fireman.

The drive was short and silent. Abbie had questions for Brayden. Questions for all of them if she was honest, but she wasn’t ready to be naked around these men, so she stayed as her wolf and enjoyed being petted and held by Brayden.

Their home was large and old. It was neat and well cared for despite its obvious age. A few horses grazed peacefully in the fields close to the house. The mountains rose up steeply behind the house, the forest thick with trees. It was a beautiful place to call home. Her wolf could have been happy here.

Brayden carried her inside and straight through an open living room into a huge kitchen. The appliances were all new and gleaming. The big kitchen table was old and worn by contrast. It would have been the one belonging to their parents, maybe even their grandparents. It was lovely.

“I’ll put one of my clean shirts in the laundry room for you, you can change into that while I get you something to eat,” Brayden said.

“I’ll start a fire in the living room,” Josh said. “It will soon warm up the kitchen as well.”

Brayden placed a shirt on the bench by the washing machine and laid her on top of it. He closed the laundry door on his way out. “Just call out if you need me. I’ll just be in the kitchen. I’ll hear you.”

She waited to hear his footsteps retreating before she shifted back, then quickly pulled on the shirt. The same emblem was on the shirt pocket that had been on the door of the truck. The shirt smelled clean, but still carried Brayden’s scent.
So Brayden is the fireman.

Abbie found a large washroom off the back of the laundry, and after using the facilities she took the opportunity to wash her dirty hands and face. When she saw her reflection in the mirror over the sink she gasped. She hardly recognized herself. Gone was the fit, healthy woman who spent her days trekking through the Canadian woods. Her hair was long and dank, the deep red color lost to the dirt and grease covering every strand.

Her copper-colored eyes shone out of sunken sockets. Black-and-blue bruises covered her face in a mottled pattern. Her neck was a mass of red, puckered bite marks. She unbuttoned the shirt and found her body was the same as her face, bruised and covered in bite marks. She also had a long wound running across her stomach, just above her pubic hair.

“No wonder they didn’t want me as a mate.” She shuddered as she remembered the looks of anger on Shane and Josh’s faces. “I look like far too much work for anyone, let alone those two angry, tortured souls.”

Even though she was battered and bruised, she preferred to think of herself as a survivor not a victim. “But have I survived just to bring the vampires to this town? To have all these nice people put in danger?”

“You survived so that we could find each other, little wolf,” Brayden said from behind her.

She buttoned up the shirt before she turned to face him.

“Never forget that.”

* * * *

Brayden had heard what Abbie had said about herself. So had Josh and Shane. They may have lived wild for most of their lives, but that had only made their senses better than most shifters. He noticed they were both pale as he brought Abbie into the kitchen to join them.

“I’ll just finish the breakfast,” Brayden said.

He held out a chair for Abbie and she slowly sat down. Her wide-eyed gaze swept the kitchen for danger. Josh and Shane helped themselves to coffee and came to sit opposite Abbie at the big family table. It was the first time they’d sat there since their parents’ deaths. Brayden’s heart was racing. He didn’t know what to say or do to help Abbie or his brothers. This was new territory for him, and his hands shook as he stirred the scrambled eggs in the big skillet.

“You have a lovely home,” Abbie said softly.

She had her legs pulled up on the chair, and she hugged her knees with one arm as she sipped a glass of water. Brayden had denied her request for coffee until he was sure she could keep the water down. She hadn’t had much to eat in over a month.

“Brayden does all the upkeep,” Josh said.

“Brayden does everything,” Shane said.

“I see.” Abbie put her empty glass down on the table and put her head on her knees.

“This is going well,” Josh said. He cleared his throat before continuing. “How come no one looked for you when the vampires took you? Didn’t you have a boyfriend or family that was looking for you?”

Brayden put the big plate of toast and eggs on the table and filled a small plate for Abbie. She picked up a piece of buttered toast and nibbled at the corner as she stared at Josh.

“I guess my boss may be looking for me. I work as tour guide at Lake Louise in Canada. I lead hiking tours to Sentinel Pass, Bow Glacier, and all over the area. In the winter I run dogsled tours. I have my own team of huskies. God, I hope someone has been feeding them. Do you have a phone?”

“But you’re such a little thing,” Shane said. “What if you come across a bear?”

Abbie laughed and Brayden gasped. She was beautiful, just beautiful.

“Same thing as you would, probably. Leave it the hell alone and go the other way. I’m well trained. I’ve been doing the job for three years now and haven’t lost a single tourist.”