With Her Capture (17 page)

Magda stared at the owl. “Twenty-three
minutes, huh.”

“Obviously an approximation.”

“Obviously,” she grunted.

“Hunt well, female.” The owl walked away from
her.

Magda stood frozen staring after the male.
Hunt well? Ayden hadn’t told the owl about the message she’d left
on the cave floor, had he?

“Fucking tail,” she grumbled under her
breath. It was a common expression used among all species. She
needed to get a grip.

And she needed to start running. Twenty-three
minutes wasn’t a lot of time to get out of Banff.

Magda wasted most of the twenty-three minutes
walking the streets, hoping she headed the right way, and making
sure the smell of humans remained really strong. Earlier, she’d
used the humans’ public bus but it had quit running at midnight.
Now she relied on landmarks she’d spotted on the bus to help guide
her. How anyone might use their sense of smell while anywhere near
public transportation was beyond her.

At first she’d considered going to the bus
station and waiting for the bus that would take her out of town. If
Ayden didn’t find her at the human night club, the bus station
would probably be close to the top of his list of places he’d
search for her. She thought of putting some muscle into it and
running. The last thing she needed was to draw attention to
herself, though, so she walked.

Diverting from the sidewalk, Magda crossed a
small parking lot and headed into a busy convenience store.
Searching the walls, she found a clock. It was just after one AM.
Two hours until her bus left the bus station. All she had to do was
maintain a low profile until then.

Her stomach growled when she breathed in the
salty smell of bagged potato chips and peanuts that were on an end
display. Then the too sweet smell of what were probably pretty
stale donuts distracted her for a moment. Sugar would help boost
her metabolism and keep her wound up while she did her best to
remain surrounded by humans.

The bell over the glass doors of the store
rang and more people entered. Alcohol and body sweat were an even
mix on the customers. Magda looked away, not wishing to draw any
unnecessary attention to herself. A row of red packages hung on a
rack in a display directly in front of her. She almost salivated
from the spicy smell of beef jerky.

Magda groaned at the cost of the jerky.
“Seven dollars is ridiculous.” She shook the package, trying to see
how much meat was actually in there.

All the money she had to her name was stuffed
in the inside pocket of her coat. It had been money she’d split
three ways between her and her littermates in case they were
separated when they’d first run off their mountain. She hadn’t
needed cash while in her fur. Nor had there been a need for money
over the past two weeks in her cave. Nonetheless, she didn’t have a
lot to spend.

The bus ticket would take her to the border
and it was a pricey way to travel. Without a passport, it was as
far as she would go on it. After getting across the border in her
fur, she’d worry about how to get to Colorado.

She endured waiting in line to pay for her
jerky, then headed for the sign that said bathroom. Turning into a
short hallway, she stopped short at the line of women standing
there.

“End of the line is right there,” a human
wearing so much make up it wasn’t clear what color her eyes were,
informed Magda.

Magda decided her eyes were red, bloodshot
from whatever she’d put in her system that night. “I see that,” she
said, fighting the urge to curl her lip and growl.

It might get rid of the line for her.

Sometimes keeping a low profile really
sucked.

“She sees that,” the human female standing
next to the one who had spoken first said to her companion.

Both females, who were probably close to
Magda’s age, found their exchange hilarious and fell into each
other laughing. An older woman standing just outside the bathroom
door, glanced at them before turning her back and facing the door.
She disappeared inside quickly when it opened. A lady with a
toddler exited the restroom without making eye contact with the
other humans or with Magda. Humans dominated the planet yet lived
in a world where they ignored each other. It was something she’d
never quite understood. They feared each other as much as they did
other species.

Waiting for the bathroom killed ten minutes.
The females in front of her went in together and were inside long
enough that Magda actually did have to use the facilities by the
time it was her turn.

As many times as she had urinated outside,
Magda decided each of those occasions was more sanitary than where
she found herself now. Locking the door until it clicked, she tore
open her jerky and downed the first slice, barely tasting it. She
tried savoring the second piece more. It was slightly stale and the
plastic it had been wrapped in had left a residual taste on the
meat.

“Waste of money,” she complained, but then
ripped another bite with her teeth as she glanced in the mirror
that was level with her face. “Fucking tail,” she moaned at the
sight of herself.

After finishing the second piece of jerky,
she slid the remaining pieces, still in the packaging, into her
coat pocket. It was an old Army jacket, and kept her warm in her
human form. When she changed into her fur, it was bulky enough to
wrap her clothes in and tie around her waist. At the moment though,
she thought she resembled a human transient.

Her hair hung in strings from how she’d
managed to put it up before entering the night club. The blouse—one
that Ayden had given her—was almost off one shoulder from the
weight of the jacket. The jeans and boots she wore were
comfortable, and didn’t make her stand out. Werewolves seldom went
clubbing the way humans did. There were much better ways to have
fun. When it came to sniffing out members of the opposite sex,
nothing beat a group run through the wilderness. That club had
provided a camouflage. She had thought it almost impossible for
anyone to sniff her out amongst the smell of humans, their perfume
and colognes, and the never-ending smell of alcohol.

In truth, she was grateful to the owl for
finding her. It had been more enjoyable hiding in a cave than in
that repugnant night club. Magda finished messing with her hair. It
wasn’t as if she needed to impress humans with her appearance.

Unless she was primping because she believed
Ayden might still sniff her out. She left the bathroom. Of course
now there was no line. After glancing at the clock on the wall, and
noticing her bathroom adventure had killed another fifteen minutes,
Magda headed out into the night air. If only breathing it in
revitalized her. The smell of car exhaust was as strong as the
smell of humans.

Two human males, one pumping gas into a fiery
red sports car and the other one looking out the rolled-down
passenger window, both gave her a noticeable once-over. Maybe she
should just put herself in a position where Ayden would find her.
Magda turned away from them and adjusted her coat as she pulled it
tight around her.

“A pretty girl like you shouldn’t be walking
alone at night,” one of them called out.

Human females might believe it was dangerous
to take walks alone during the night. Magda rather relished the
idea. Ignoring the humans, she walked to the side of the
convenience store building and sat, pressing her back against the
brick wall.

Granted, if she were part of a pack, they
wouldn’t permit her to leave her den at night since she was a
single female. More than likely, those packs knew a single female
could kick ass as well as any male. It was done to protect the
honor of the female.

“Which is a crock of shit,” she mumbled under
her breath. No one seemed to care about the honor of the male.

It was a morose line of thinking. The chances
of her ever being part of a pack were slim. In fact, the only pack
she had the slightest chance of joining was the Malta werewolf pack
in Colorado. There were howlings about packs not being quite so
concerned about Malta werewolves in the states as they were in
Canada. American werewolves were all mostly mutts anyway. Breeding,
or maintaining a species’ pedigree, wasn’t something they cared
about. Hopefully, if even a bit of what she’d heard howled was
accurate, she’d make it to Colorado. Then, if she were lucky,
they’d take her in.

Suddenly her mood plummeted. Her life, so
terribly interrupted, had ripped her out of the only world she’d
known and loved. Magda barely remembered her last group run.
Furthermore, she wasn’t sure when she’d last given thought to
attending one. Since leaving her mountain, the only thing on her
mind had been survival.

That was until she met Ayden. Magda pulled
her knees to her chin and wrapped her arms around her legs. Living
like this seriously sucked.

What was worse, prior to meeting Ayden, she
hadn’t given a lot of thought to how terrible running and hiding
day in and out actually was. However, two weeks in a cave with the
male and her entire perspective on life had changed.

“It’s true,” she muttered to herself, staring
blankly at broken concrete in front of her boots.

Ayden had given her hope. Living in a cave
had seemed unacceptable until she had run from it. Now, trying to
decide which way to run, and hoping she sniffed out the safest
neighborhoods in a town she didn’t know, definitely wasn’t better.
Would it be better enduring this human obstacle course with Ayden.
She sighed, and cringed at how pathetic she suddenly smelled.

“I already miss him,” she whimpered and
turned her head to rest her cheek on her knees while hugging
herself and letting the pity party flow.

If she had met Ayden on her mountain, things
would have been so different. If her sire and mother hadn’t been
murdered they would have loved him. Magda imagined their responses
to her smelling seriously mated so soon after meeting him. Her
mother would smell concerned, but a hint of happiness and pride
would be there, too. She’d make a fuss, insist he spent time in
their den, and demand to know about his sire and mother.

Magda’s sire, on the other paw, would be
outraged. He would puff out his chest and interrogate Ayden until
it exhausted all of them. Then, because he’d find no fault in him,
and since Ayden would be at their den all the time, her sire would
start insisting Ayden do work around the place.

Letting her imagination get the best of her,
Magda pictured Ayden chopping firewood for her den. Her sire would
let him do it, in spite of his being able to break logs down into
firewood with his gift. That would be one rule he would insist
on—no one in her litter would mention anything about Malta
werewolves.

Of course, Ayden would see that her sire was
full-blooded Malta werewolf. Magda repeated the words in her head
that Ayden had already said to her. She believed he didn’t care
what species she was.

The image of him glistening with sweat as he
swung an ax faded in her mind. A tear irritated her skin when it
slipped down her cheek. He had been nothing but honest with her.
From the moment he’d first seen her, when she’d run from the
leopards, he hadn’t smelled disgusted by what she was. Not once had
he implied her being part Malta werewolf bothered him in the least.
She sucked in a staggered breath and smelled him on her. Would his
scent ever fade?

She wouldn’t deny the truth to herself. She
wanted him. The male did things to her that she’d never experienced
before. Like turn her insides upside-down, making her question if
she were doing the right thing. When of course she was doing the
right thing. If Ayden didn’t see how being with her would destroy
his life, he wasn’t smelling things clearly.

“Does he love me?” Did she love him?

The pain that instantly imploded on her heart
seemed answer enough. But she was doing the right thing running
from him. Wasn’t she?

Obviously Ayden didn’t think so. Not only had
he run after her, when he’d been unable to hold on to her scent
he’d paid an owl to track her for him. That must mean he really
wanted her back.

Maybe he had a right to know. She should
contact one of those owls and have them send a message to Ayden for
her.

“I care about you so much that I’m willing to
leave so that you might live,” she said out loud and lifted her
head to rub her eyes.

No. The honorable thing to do was to find
Ayden and tell him herself. He deserved that much.

“You deserve so much more,” she whispered,
and her eyes burned so that for a moment her vision blurred. “Don’t
you dare start crying like a pup,” she scolded herself.

As she stood, something swooped to the ground
in front of her. She leapt to the side, instantly snarling over the
invasion of her space. It wasn’t a something; it was a someone. She
curled her lip at the large owl who landed on the asphalt not more
than a few feet away from her. Magda swore she smelled amusement
and wanted to strike out at those large, round eyes embedded in a
face of feathers.

The owl dropped something it had been holding
in its talons. It cluttered to the ground in front of her. She
ducked instinctively when it spread its large wings and took to
flight. The air stirred up around her when the large bird of prey
flew into the night sky and Magda’s hair flew in loose strands
around her face.

“Rude,” she snarled, glaring at the location
in the sky where the bird disappeared.

She didn’t know a lot about their species,
other than they were a lot more emotional in their feathers than
their human form. She almost yelled for it to come back if it
wanted a fight. Her emotions were strung too tight and letting
loose, violently, might help put them back in order.

Then she remembered that the bird had dropped
something in front of her. Magda looked down at a cell phone.