Cole nodded and pulled his thick sweater over his head as Ian began to shuck his clothes. “Hurry,” he said in a strained voice as his neck snapped back.
“Shit,” Ian muttered as he rushed to undress. His bear would destroy his clothes ripping out of him, and he needed them to get back to the plane frostbite free.
Cole’s Change was instant, more proof of how in control his animal was. It should’ve taken minutes as each bone, tendon, and joint broke and reshaped, but Cole’s wolf exploded out of him and charged before Ian was ready. God, this was going to hurt.
He pushed his Change, but it was hard to focus with Cole’s teeth ripping into him. The snow in front of his face splattered with red. His red. Pain blurred his vision. The snapping of his bones was deafening, and Cole’s wolf was going at him in earnest now, tooth and claw. The law of Alaska was simple. Kill or be killed. His wolf knew why Ian was here, and apex predator shifters didn’t die easy, even if the human side of Cole saw the necessity.
Ian closed his eyes and pushed his Change harder than he ever had. A smattering of pops echoed across the clearing just before millions of stinging needles blasted through his skin and covered his body in a thick, winter coat. He roared his fury at the little, cheating shithead and shook his massive body, dislodging Cole’s teeth from the muscular hump over his shoulder blades. Even skinny and right out of hibernation, he was still ten times the size of the wolf.
Cole charged, but Ian was ready for him now and pissed as all get-out that he was so badly injured going into this. He batted him down and lunged. Engaging, they both snarled and snapped and bit and clawed, ripping into each other in a battle to the death.
It didn’t last long after that. Ian was quick—a skilled killer. Just the snap of his neck, and Cole was done. As Ian paced a tight circle around the body to make sure the wolf’s chest didn’t rise again, a deluge of emotion washed through him. Anger that Cole had talked so freely about hurting Elyse and the little girl. Pity that Cole had tried to save himself with love but had been unsalvageable. Regret that he was the one who had to end a life. Relief that it was done.
Ian forced himself back into his human skin. He wished he could explore these woods as a bear, but there was work to do. He had to bury the dead, or he couldn’t live with the lives he had to take. He had to break through still frozen ground to dig a grave, and he had to make it back to his plane before the wild wolves came out hunting for the night.
But before all of that, he had to make a couple of calls from the satellite phone he’d brought.
The first went to voicemail, as it always did, because his asshole brother, Tobias, didn’t ever bother to pick up his calls. He left a message—a short, sweet, to-the-point warning. Hopefully Tobias would check it at some point.
On the second call, his brother Jenner answered. “What?”
“Hey to you, too.” A soft, impatient rumble filled the line so Ian told him, “I just killed a McCall on order.”
“So?”
“So Miller made a threat against you and Tobias. Just thought I should warn you.”
Jenner made a single clicking sound across the line. “I’m offended you think Miller and his pack of pups is anything to warn us about.”
Looking down at the freely bleeding gashes that covered his ribcage, then the giant red smears in the snow near his feet, Ian huffed a quick breath of steam and nodded. “Stupid me. How is everything else”—the line went dead—“going?”
Fantastic. As always, a pleasurable experience talking with his brother.
Ian chucked the phone into his bag and hooked his hands on his hips as he looked down at the dead wolf. At least Cole’s brothers had cared enough to make a threat against him.
The McCalls were bat-shit crazy, but they were loyal.
At least Cole died knowing that someone in the world had his back.
Ian winced and dragged his gaze away from the limp gray and cream-colored wolf. He redressed slowly, careful of his gaping side. It would heal soon enough, but it hurt like hell right now, and sure as anything, the heavy iron scent of his blood would bring in the predators.
A little more effort, and this would be behind him. He could call Clayton, tell him it was done, and hope that was the last enforcer job he got this season.
The hunt was over, and now he could get back to his life.
Eat, sleep, fly, deliver, prepare for next winter, and above it all…forget about Elyse Abram.
Chapter Four
Elyse cocked her eyebrow at the seventy-five-year-old mountain man doing his best to convince her he would make the perfect homesteader husband. Even if she could ignore his foul odor, she couldn’t ignore the three pain pills he’d popped in the last fifteen minutes or the deep limp he blamed on a bum back.