Chapter 3
T he storm was getting ready to roll in. I felt the sharpness in the air. The sky was pure white, showing off every spindly branch of the forest against it. I would have to head home soon. I was already pushing it, but I always felt so at peace out here. Nature was funny like that. It wasn’t really peaceful, with the daily fight for survival, but when I stood out here in the silence of snow, I could trick myself into thinking it was.
I sipped some water from the pack on my back beneath my jacket, the only way to keep a water supply liquid out here. I’d been out here for four days already, checking the edges of the property, making sure the trails were relatively clear and had no signs of poachers. There were always some, and more than once I had chased them off after confiscating their rifles, but they kept trying. We had acres and acres of protected land out here. The only ones who’re permitted to hunt were us and the people we took out who got licensed.
Being tucked in the mountain valleys meant we were a corridor for wildlife, a good portion of which kept us fed. A lot of folks from the Rez came out to hunt with us and we sent them home with plenty of food. It was a few hours away in good weather, but Kit and I had committed to keeping the opportunity available when we bought this land with Ryder and Maverick from an old mountaineer. A week ago we’d hosted a few dozen people from the Rez where Kit had grown up. I’d lived in a town nearby and not on the Rez itself. Mom and I’d visited constantly to see our family. I loved having the squad of cousins out, but I always needed some time to breathe out here on my own afterward.
Pumpkin raced past me, her nose to the ground, her brown fur making her stand out against the snow.
I let out a sharp whistle, but Pumpkin ignored me, digging through the snow. What the hell had she found now? My beautiful Chesapeake Bay Retriever was always digging up some sort of nonsense when I took her on these trips. With a sigh, I marched over in my snowshoes.
Coming over the ridge in the trail exposed a fuchsia snowsuit.
Shit.
I ran over as best I could and kicked off the snowshoes so I could kneel next to the body.
Please don’t be dead.
Pumpkin barked her head off, pawing at the prone form. I patted her head in reassurance, praying whoever this was still clung to a thread of life. I rolled them over, revealing a heavily freckled face set against red hair. Pulling the scarf down let me feel her warm breath against my cheek.
Thank god.
My hunting cabin was only an hour’s walk from here. I could get her there and hopefully she’d survive the trip. Pumpkin dug at ropes that were tied to the woman. Why was she out here alone? This was private land, not public hiking trails, but that certainly didn’t stop people from using it as they pleased.
I followed the ropes, uncovering a shallow sled full of gear hidden beneath the recent snowfall. At least I didn’t have to think too hard about how I was going to transport her. I freed her from the ropes and dumped the contents of her sled, taking a quick look through it to see if I could find anything essential that needed to come with us before transferring her into it and hooking it up to myself.
I clapped the wrists of my mittens together, the metal discs making a sharp sound that got Pumpkin’s attention. My voice wasn’t reliable, and I didn’t always want to take them off to whistle for her, so we’d come up with this alternative. Pumpkin bounded over and I got her lying down on our mystery woman to provide some warmth while I set off through the woods.
If she was a poacher, we would deal with that later. I hadn’t seen a rifle in her kit, but she might have a pistol or something smaller tucked away. It belonged to the forest now anyway. I had everything we would need for survival back at the cabin and I wasn’t going to haul whatever she had along with us.
Her supplies made no sense. No shelter, no fuel, no food, and nothing for communication. Why had she come out here with nothing useful to survive?
Every time I looked back at Pumpkin and the woman, Pumpkin was sniff-testing, probably as concerned as I was that our passenger would perish on the journey. When she woke, I would have to ask her what the hell she was doing out here, but other things were of greater concern right now.
Pumpkin whined.
That was never a good sign.
I stopped the trek to check on the woman. I needed to get her warmed up but we were still half an hour away from the cabin.
“It’s okay,” I whispered to Pumpkin. I opened up the front of my jacket and unzipped the front of her snowsuit, dragging her into my arms to press her against me. She didn’t quite fit inside my coat, but it was close. I sat down for a few minutes with her in my lap, letting my body heat bring up her core temperature a little. She groaned softly against me, but didn’t wake.
When I was convinced I had drawn her back from the brink of death, I laid her back in the sled, getting Pumpkin to lie on top of her before stripping off my coat to cover both of them. Better to be a little cold than to work up too much of a sweat.
Relief washed through me when my tiny hunting cabin came into view. It was little more than wood planks, but it worked well enough. We had replaced the woodstove not too long ago so I’d be able to keep the space relatively warm, and a few supplies were always on hand in bear-proof containers.
I unhitched the sled and got the door open before returning for the woman, scooping her up and the layers wrapped around her. I made a clicking sound and Pumpkin hopped up onto the bed, lying down to watch me expectantly. Once the woman was stretched out on it, Pumpkin snuggled against her and I closed the door to get the fire going. Enough wood to last the night was stacked inside, but I would definitely have to chop some more before I left so it wasn’t depleted the next time I came out here.
The woman broke into shivers, instantly rerouting my plan. I shoved a couple of logs into the stove with kindling, getting it going before I stripped down to my underwear. Goosebumps broke over my skin, but she would need to get warmed up quickly and safely, and that fire wasn’t going to heat the cabin immediately.
“Sorry about this,” I whispered, though I wasn’t certain she was conscious enough to hear me. I tugged her out of her snowsuit and outermost layers. She was sturdy and curvy, with enough plushness to her I hoped her body would be strong enough to heal. Muscle didn’t keep a person nearly so warm as fat did, but I had enough for both of us to keep her cozy.
I had been a scrawny child, and my friends always said I had grown into my name. Bear. While it had taken me a while to develop into my full alpha body, now I was taller and stockier than the rest of my pack.
The cabin had no shortage of wool blankets stored away and I dragged them all over us, letting the warmth of my skin press against her. She shuddered, rooting closer.
Pumpkin was happy as hell burrowed under the blankets with us, almost immediately snoring. I pulled the blankets overhead, carefully touching the icy skin of the woman until it returned to a less concerning temperature. She probably had mild frostbite on her face, but I was relieved when her cheek warmed to my touch. Each time she shifted and pressed some new frozen bit of herself against me, I jolted.
How long had she been out there?
I purred softly, relieved more than usual that my spasmodic dysphonia didn’t impact that ability. It made talking more difficult, but a few sounds were easy: whispers, laughs, growls, and purrs. Once in a while yelling was possible, but it wasn’t consistent, so mostly I didn’t bother. I got by fine without it.
I sighed, cuddling closer. We needed to get back to the lodge. This cabin might have the basics of survival, but someone coming out of a medical event needed more than that. The others were as trained as I was to deal with a crisis out in the bush, but I would feel much better if I could get her back there. The lodge was rarely cold, and we had a massive stockpile of food, plus fuel and generators for how often we lost power. Here I had only the woodstove and a few rations.
The woman murmured something I didn’t quite catch and I pulled her closer. She still wasn’t warm enough, but the others always joked I was basically a space heater, so eventually my body would do the job.
I drifted in and out. I couldn’t sleep for too long or the fire would run out. At least by then our little blanket cocoon would be warm enough to sustain her, and Pumpkin would be able to take over for me. The woman squirmed, rotating until her back was to my chest and she could curl herself into a little ball, almost launching Pumpkin off the bed.
Chuckling to myself, I nudged her knees down and pulled Pumpkin closer so she could wedge herself in on the other side. That seemed to settle both of them, the woman wrapping her arms around Pumpkin.
As her body warmed, her scent slowly revealed itself to be maple syrup and rich black tea.
Omega .
Her scent snuck into the depths of me, hooking into my bones and settling in my chest. She smelled like winter mornings when you were safely tucked inside, watching the snow come down. She smelled like mine .
The thought rocketed through me.
Mine?
Impossible.
I burrowed my head beneath the blankets, breathing in the complex sweetness, my body acknowledging with a shudder that this omega was the person I’d been waiting for.
“Don’t die,” I whispered against her skin. Surely fate wouldn’t be so cruel as to literally drop my scent-matched omega in my path and then snatch her away right as I realized who she was.
She had to survive.
We had to make it home.
If she was mine, odds were good she was a match for the rest of my pack. Fate was funny that way. Sometimes we forgot we were as fated for one another as we were for our mate. Often fate tied alphas together into a neat package to receive their omega, and sometimes it was the omega who drew us all together, but this time we were ready and waiting for her.
Not that the others would admit it. Ryder and Maverick were far more business-oriented and probably would never openly tell her they had been waiting. Kit would. We had both been waiting.
Dating options were slim where we lived, so we had agreed to leave it to fate. Mostly our plan had been to hope our fated mate booked one of our hunting tours, but I suppose finding her collapsed on a trail worked just as well.
I shook my head, curling more tightly around her. I had to protect her until we could get home. It was a long walk back to the lodge and she was in no condition to make that trip. I would get her there one way or the other. Fate might think it was funny, but it hadn’t butted up against my determination yet. If I had to crawl the whole way with her on my back, we were going to make it.