The Mane Squeeze. Shelly Laurenston

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      Like all the Van Holtz males, Ric was tall, well-built with a slightly overdeveloped diver’s body, and handsome. Yet handsome was only the first stop on the beauty train for Ric, who managed to head all the way into the station for The Land of Gorgeous. With his sculpted cheekbones, Grecian nose, square jaw, and that always freshly tousled dark blond hair, it still surprised her he’d never done any modeling.

      “And pregnant, too,” he teased. “My, those Smith males move quite fast.”

      “Don’t start.” Jess stepped away from him, but kept a grip on his hand.

      Knowing she was short on time once Smitty realized she’d sneaked out—would she have to endure his Smith protective streak through every damn pregnancy?—Jess asked, “I got your text, handsome, what’s up?”

      “Lachlan MacRyrie went out for salmon and a nap, but came back covered in bruises and in full boar-rage. Any idea why?”

      Jess briefly covered her mouth with her hand, a small gasp escaping before she said, “Oh, my God! That was Lock?” When Bren had muttered something to Smitty about an “annoying, fat-ass, stubby-tailed bear,” she’d assumed it was one of the local bears. Not her Lock! And the last thing that man had was a fat ass, but that was a treacherous un-mate-like thought for another day. “Is he okay?”

      “Physically he’s fine. But he’s rarely this pissed off. I’d love to know why, so I can avoid any maulings this evening.”

      “Well, the men aren’t telling me anything, so I brought Blayne along to fill in the holes. She was there with Bren’s sister, Gwen. Right, Blayne?” Jess looked around, wondering where the wolfdog she’d dragged along with her had gone off to. “Blayne?”

      Ric picked up a pair of shorts from off the ground. “She’s disappeared.”

      No. She hadn’t. But she had found a squirrel. Jess and Ric watched as a shifted Blayne chased the squirrel, caught the squirrel, toyed with the squirrel, let the squirrel go, only to go chasing after it again. Until she was distracted by the crow that she tried to catch in her mouth.

      “So…when are you due?”

      Jess winced at Ric’s question as Blayne ran into a tree, backed up, and went after the bird again. “Mid-March.”

      “And you’re having a—”

      “Yes. Yes, I’m having a wolfdog.”

      “Huh.”

      Blayne was turning in circles now, trying to catch her tail.

      “Blayne,” Jess called out. “Blayne!”

      The wolfdog immediately stopped and started to walk over to Jess and Ric. Too bad the dizziness got the best of her, though, because she stumbled sideways into another tree and slid down, panting.

      Picking up Blayne’s clothes, Jess walked over to her. Blayne had an interesting look to her as wolfdog. Built like a wolf, with a heavy coat and muscular body, she still had the giant ears and tiny paws of the wild dog along with the coloring that included big splotches of white, brown, blond, black, and red all over her shaggy coat. Not surprisingly, Blayne dyed her human hair one solid color, like most wild dogs. They were the only shifters forced to do so if they hoped to fit in among full-humans.

      “I don’t have all day,” Jess said, wondering how hard it would be to raise the one wolfdog she was currently pregnant with, much less the seven girls Smitty believed they were going to eventually have because his “prem’nitions” told him so.

      “Sorry,” Blayne said after shifting. She stood and quickly pulled her clothes on. “Got distracted.”

      Jess didn’t mention that Blayne seemed to get distracted often.

      “Blayne, this is Ric. Ric, Blayne.”

      They shook hands and then Ric asked, “So what happened?”

      “Well—”

      “Don’t ramble,” Jess said quickly, which got her a harsh glare. In answer, Jess tapped her wrist, where her favorite watch usually was, but it had been taken by Smitty and hidden for the weekend. “I’m on a tight schedule here, sweetie.”

      “More like a tight leash with a hillbilly at the other end of it.”

      Jess gasped in outrage and Ric quickly placed his hand on Jess’s shoulder. “So what happened?” he asked Blayne again.

      “It was a hate crime.”

      Jess looked at Ric and back at Blayne. “You mean they attacked you because you’re bl—”

      “A hybrid. Exactly!”

      “Oh.” Jess rubbed her forehead. “All right then.”

      “You and your friend are both hybrids?” Ric carefully asked.

      “Yup. I’m wolfdog, Gwenie’s tigon. They jumped me, Gwen jumped in, we took off running, Gwen woke up the bear, they went over the mountain. There. That quick enough for ya, Jess?”

      Ric’s back snapped straight. “I’m sorry. Um…they went over…wait…what?”

      “Not at first. At first, Lock was slapping those wolves around. Then they were going over the mountain.”

      “Over the mountain?” Jess shook her head. “Do you mean they rolled down a hill?” She’d lived in Tennessee for two years, she was used to hills.

      “Nope. Over the mountain, into the river, down the river.”

      “You mean they fell into Macon River from one of the falls?” Ric demanded.

      “It was more of a cliff than a fall, but…yeah. I met up with Bren and Ronnie about a mile away. Together we ran down to the mouth of the riverbed, and that’s where we caught up with Lock. He was trying to take Gwen to the medical center, but she was putting up a fight because of the organ thieves.”

      Ric stepped back. “The what?”

      Jess held her hand up to halt Ric, wanting Blayne to finish before she killed her. “Then what?”

      “Then Bren fought the bear, I fought Gwen—”

      “Why were you fighting Gwen? Because of the organ thieves?” Wait. Did I just say that out loud?

      “Because she wouldn’t tell Bren that the bear helped her and Bren thought the bear was attacking her when he wasn’t.”

      “Why wouldn’t she tell Brendon that?”

      “Because she was torturing me.”

      “All right then.” Jess was done. “This was fun but—”

      “No, no, no.” Blayne clutched her hands together nervously or excitedly…to be honest, it was hard to tell. “There’s something else.”

      “You know the Pack СКАЧАТЬ