by Pat Cunningham, Savanna Kougar, Rebecca Gillan, Solara Gordon, Serena Shay
Cochrane studied the Mayor’s hard eyes, then those of Dante, just beyond his shoulder. The Scottish contingent had clumped together and watched the hunter warily. The two old bastards went on grinning, like they couldn’t wait to get their mitts on another bucket of paint.
“How can you do this?” he muttered at the Mayor. “You know what these things are.”
“Better than you can imagine,” the Mayor growled back. “I was born human, Mr. Cochrane. We have more in common with ‘these things’ than you believe. I’ll take their kind over yours any day.” He smiled thinly. “Thanks again. Have a nice day.”
The Mayor, with Dante and the Scots as backup, escorted Cochrane to his car. He got in without a word and drove out of Talbot’s Peak. And that was that.
For now. In spite of everything that had happened, the basic threat posed by a town full of shapeshifters remained. As soon as he replenished his weapons stash, he’d be back.
One final tribute awaited him as he drove down Route 15. The Turkle clan had gathered at the side of the road. As Cochrane motored past they raised various weapons in salute. A grinning Abram Turkle hefted his newly-arrived bazooka.
Cochrane slowed and saluted. When he returned to clean up the town, he would spare this bunch. He would never hunt turkeys again. They were true Americans.
Chapter Fifty-two:
Wrapup
By Pat Cunningham
“They’re all gone?” Maureen said worriedly. “You’re sure?”
“As can be,” Ewan assured her. “Shaggy and Agent Mulderâ��I guess that’s Barry and Lowensteinâ��got run out of town days ago. Jumbo Dumbo’s been sent to a place he won’t be coming back from. Cochrane won’t be back if he knows what’s good for him. Your friend Pete, or whatever he is now, was seen headed for the tiger compound. They’ll deal with him, one way or the other. Zhere Ghan likes to keep a low profile. I think that’s everybody.”
Finally. Now maybe he could stow all this save-the-day scat and get down to the important business of courting his lady. Starting with this romantic breakfast at the Bighorn Diner. The place was packed as usual, but somehow a table for two had materialized when they’d come in. The perks of being a hero.
“Not quite,” Maureen said, still worried. “I wish I knew what happened toâ��”
“You two ready to order?”
“Ted?” Maureen leaped out of her seat and threw her arms as far as she could reach around the massive bulk of Comic Book Guy. “You’re still here? You’re okay?”
“Yep. Still here and better than okay. Atcheson dumped me here in town, so I figured screw it and went to breakfast. Best decision I ever made. The food here is incredible. And they have all you can eat days. I didn’t want to leave. So the owner, Miss Elly, gave me a job. I work here through lunch, then help out at her husband’s place for a couple hours.” He nodded toward the window, and the Grease ‘n’ Grill visible across the square. “Shifters have been better to me than humans ever were. I’ll be damned if I’ll hunt ‘em any more. I’m out of the cryptozoologist biz. You better be okay with that.”
“Hey, me too.” Maureen returned to her seat. She looked at him critically. “Have you lost weight?”
“Ten pounds,” Ted said proudly. “Miss Elly’s got me on a veggie diet. That’s the only downside. Her boys want me to start working out, and they’re relentless. She’s even got her husband in on it. I’m not allowed to eat over there.” He gazed longingly out the window toward the other diner and its enticing greasy odors. “Vern says he wants me to drop at least a hundred pounds because the way I am now, it’d take a pack to pull me down. He’s joking, right?”
“Oh yeah,” Ewan said. “That’s us. Born comedians.” Except for wolves, who had no sense of humor. No reason for Ted to know that. “We’ll have two specials. Blueberry for me, strawberry for the lady.”
“You betcha. Anything to drink?”
****
Eons in the past, in what would one day be Lapland, the mutant creature that had once been Wesley Atcheson surveyed his vast domain. He liked this place. It had the abundant food his mutated metabolism required, plenty of land to roam in, and puny little hairy hominids several hundreds of thousands of years away from inventing the gun. Their arrows and spears couldn’t penetrate his hide. He could stomp them with impunity. And gleefully did, as often as opportunity presented itself.
Best of all, this land was home to a herd of woolly mammoths. They also posed no threat to him, as he was clearly the largest, most powerful male in the territory�a fact not lost on the females. Within weeks he acquired an entourage of cows. Life was good indeed.
Roughly a year from the present day a team of Swedish paleontologists will discover the remains of a monster mammoth preserved in the frozen earth. Their findings throw the world of science into chaos. The human elements in the mammoth’s DNA are attributed to contamination in the lab. The wolf genes aren’t so easily explained. At least one scientist’s career ends in disgrace. The remains are locked away in the hopes they’ll be forgotten.
Reading about the debacle in a scientific journal, Morloxian ponders the discovery, then shakes his head. “Naw. Couldn’t be.”
****
“Lord Ghan.” The head of the Tiger Yakuza knelt on the floor before Zhere Ghan’s desk. “We have captured aâ�¦creature attempting to enter the compound. It appears to be one of the hated Hancock’s mutant werewolves, but it speaks. It says it is your servant.”
“Indeed?” Ghan’s brain sifted information. He could think of only one “servant” with even a tenuous connection to Hancock’s mutant werewolves. “Where is this creature?”
“Outside. Shall we kill it, Lord?”
“No.” Ghan stood. “Show it to me.”
The mutant werewolf had been bound with ropes and whips. It was ringed by Tiger Yakuza, many with guns. Yet when Ghan approached it, it turned its attention to him and him alone. It bowed as well as it was able. “Lorrrrrrd Ghan.” The Yakuza muttered.
Zhere Ghan stood before the beast. “What is your name?”
“Rrrrrranjeet, Lorrrrrd.”
Ghan considered this. “Leave us,” he told his Yakuza.
The mutters grew in intensity, but Zhere Ghan’s word was law. The Yakuza agents withdrew. Ghan himself removed the werewolf’s bindings. “Report.”
“This one was unsuccessful in securing Dr. Morloxian,” the werewolf growled in Urdu. “I attempted to bring you the mutant mammoth, but I was overcome and the beast was destroyed. I have failed in my mission, lord. I failed you. I offer you my life, and this, my mutant body, as compensation.” Ranjeet bent his head, awaiting execution.
Instead Zhere Ghan rested his hand on the werewolf-creature’s shoulder. “You’re a loyal servant, Ranjeet. I’m sure you did your best. You are to be rewarded. You are now a member of my Tiger Yakuza. The grounds and the forest beyond are yours. You will patrol them and keep us all safe from intruders. Any creature you catch, you may kill. But not eat, unless it’s a true beast. Drive off any shifters you come across, without too much violence if you can. We don’t want any unnecessary problems. Not unless I order it.”
Ranjeet quivered all over like an excited dog. He even dared to lick his master’s hand. “I live to serve you, Lord Ghan.”
“Then get to work. You’ve a territory to guard. You’d best get acquainted with it.”
The wolf-creature bounded off happily. Zhere Ghan smiled, watching him go. Such loyalty. You couldn’t even buy devotion so strong these days.
So he didn’t have Morloxian. Neither did Hancock. That counted as a victory in Ghan’s ledger. Those idiots in town never would have let him keep the mammoth anyway. This was better. He had his own mutant werewolf now, loyal only to him. And soon
He opened his hand and regarded the long, loose wolf hairs resting in his palm. He bankrolled his own set of Indian scientists, well-schooled in both science and respect to the ancient tiger lords. They’d assured him they were ma
king incredible strides in cloning.
Chapter Fifty-three:
HEA
By Pat Cunningham
Two wolves ran through the forest beneath the fading light of the setting full moon. One was a lovely gray and black she-wolf with brown eyes and a fine thick brush of a tail. The other had a coyote’s tall ears and pointed muzzle. They had come to hunt, but spent the night more in play than tracking. Tonight their hungers ran in other directions.
Moonset caught the gray wolf in the middle of a leap. She changed in midair and landed awkwardly in a pile of dry leaves. Maureen sat up and brushed off forest detritus. “Poop.”
The coyote shifted into Ewan. “One of the drawbacks of true werewolfism. You’ve gotta have the right lighting. You okay?”
“I’m fine.” She squinted at a smudge on her forearm. “Double poop. My eyes are back to normal too. You’ll have to lead me out of the woods. It’s so much easier as a wolf. I see so much better with my nose.”
Ewan plopped his bare ass down on the ground beside her. “Then you’re gonna go for it?”
“I don’t know.” She plucked a leaf out of her hair. “It’s pretty intense. I keep getting urges to rip things apart with my mouth. Living things. I wasn’t counting on that part. It makes me think about those monsters that wacko was creating. How he wanted to turn me into one.” She shuddered.
Ewan put his arm around her. “It’s not like that all the time. Being a werewolf’s easier than being a shifter. You know when you’re going to change. You can eat a full meal beforehand. Then you’ll just want to run around and chase things. Or sleep. Eat a moderate meal beforehand. Anyway, it’s only for three days a month.”
Maureen made a pouty face. “That isn’t much.”
“Better than no days a month. You’ve got plenty of time to decide. Marissa’s spell won’t wear off for another couple weeks. If you decide to go for it, she’s already agreed to use Gil’s curse spell on you. We just have to get you the right fur so you don’t turn into a squirrel.”
“Squirrel, huh? Let me think about that. I used to like climbing trees. I could throw nuts at people.”
Ewan spread his legs wide. “You don’t need to be a squirrel for that.”
Maureen giggled. “Darn astigmatism. I can barely see. You’ll have to bring them closer.”
He eased her onto her back and climbed on top on her. “Done and done.”
****
Did Maureen decide to go for her dream and become an actual werewolf? No one in Talbot’s Peak will say. But a lot of howls were heard in the woods around Ewan’s place, and not just on the nights of a full moon, either.
Maureen’s knowledge of xenomorphs served her well when Dante added her to his payroll as their cryptozoology expert. The Peak had many different kinds of enemies, and Cochrane and his team had hunted almost all of them. If a threat had a weakness, she’d find it.
Working for Dante meant they got a discount at the Pleasure Club. A lot of howls were heard down there as well, and not just from the harem room. Maureen refused to have anything to do with goats. Why, she never said.
And that about wraps it up. People would never imagine a flighty, irresponsible coyote would turn out to be a devoted, faithful lover. Ewan always kept quiet about that part. He had a reputation to maintain, for the sake of all coyotekind. “It’s those scatted wolf genes,” he’d grouse to Maureen, who’d pat his hair and say, “Amen.” After which they’d head for the bedroom.
And they lived happily ever after.
THE END … for now…
Here’s the link-addy for a bonus chapter:
http://shapeshifterseductions.blogspot.com/2014/08/bonus-post-final-fate-of-abel-cochrane.html
~~~~~~
The ShapeShifter Seductions Authors
http://shapeshifterseductions.blogspot.com
Our Available Books
~~~~~~
Serena Shay
serenashay.com
Blurbs:
The Submission
Two is better than one. Most would agree with that statement, but not fullblooded shifter LeAnn Turone. To accept her need for multiple partners means facing a lifetime in a one-sided triad. She’s better off denying her heritage even if that means walking away from two of the most delectable alpha males she’s ever met.
Rick Taylor and Trent Warren each think they’ve found their mate in LeAnn, but a midnight meeting deep in the woods proves them wrong. Not only do they both long to connect to the sexy, but skittish, female they also find themselves attracted to one another.
Each member of this triad must free themselves from the fear of the future and submit to the greater power of love.
~~~
The Challenge
Marina Jamison is a mystery. As a half-breed shapeshifter, she lives on the fringe of were-jaguar society. Though her love for pride leader Bastian LaRue is forbidden, she finds herself tied to him by a bond stronger than their individual wills, a psychic link born from their one-night stand. When her secret is revealed, she is scorned and excluded. Neither Bastian nor the pride can accept a half-breed queen.
~~~
A Magical Return
Conleth “Cole” Douglas, warlock and vessel, needs a miracle. A destructive force has taken hold of his town and it will take more than just he and his magical Other, Cole, to eradicate the Evil. When an attempt to open his lover, Emterra, to her destiny fails, Conleth and Cole are forced to stop the Evil the only other way they know how; by taking it, and themselves, to another realm.
Emterra “Irene” Azzurra, untapped witch and vessel, has lived the life everyone else thought she should. Devastated by the loss of her long time love, Conleth, she’s given up on a happy-ever-after and faced her continuing time on earth, moment by moment.
When Conleth miraculously returns, opening her heart to him again seems to be too great a task for one middle-aged mayor of a dying town. Especially when he looks to be the same young Goth he was when he left and he’s trying to convince her she’s sharing skin with a magical being.
Can Conleth prove his claims of magic and the Others to be true? Can Emterra allow herself to believe in love and his wild claims? Or will the returning Evil finally be able to swallow this town and all its inhabitants into the deepest realms of hell.
Ebooks available at LIQUID SILVER BOOKS liquidsilverbooks.com
~~~~~~
Savanna Kougar
savannakougar.com
OtherWorlds~OtherRealms~OtherTimeLines
My two previous ebook releases:
Sun Rocket and Draxen invite you to read their love story…
Red Lioness Tamed
Adventures of Sun Rocket, Book 1
Blurb ~
What does a lioness shifter do
when she’s suddenly trapped in an unknown space cruiser’s cargo hold?
Then, despite her ability to savagely defend herself,
she’s trapped beneath the swashbuckling but human Captain.
And next, cat-scratching ridiculously, she finds herself carnal-trapped,
and meow yowl! bound by leather straps in his bed?
Answer: She fights tooth and claw.
Problem: The loner Captain is nova-hot at seducing her.
[Sci Fi Erotic Romance, Futuristic Space Adventure]
Novella ~ Ebook
~~~
Sherilyn, Zance, and Dontoya
invite you to read their love story…
Her Midnight Stardust Cowboys
A ShapeShifter Seductions Novel
Blurb ~
A woman desperate to save herself and her prize horses.
Two shapeshifter cowboys who want her as their woman.
When Zance, a timber wolf shifter,
and Dontoya, a black cougar shifter,
find Sherilyn dying due to a reckless driver,
there is only one way to bring her back to life.
But, that’s only the beginning…
~~~
&nbs
p; Listed from the first to last published:
Lady Sheridan and Baron Zaggry
invite you to read their love story…
All Shades of Blue Paradise
[World of the Blue Pearl Moon, Book 1]
In an aristocratic world of fiercest passion,
destiny and love can be denied for only so long.
Despite his past betrayal, Sheridan becomes the
Baron�s slave lover to save her brother.
[Erotic Fantasy Romance, Aristocratic Intrigue]
Novella ~ Ebook
~~~
Sedona and Volcano
invite you to read their love story…
When a Good Angel Falls
[Winter Solstice 2012, Book 1]
Where angels fear to tread, 2012 Earth.
Is a stranger on a superspeed motorcycle
her savior from the brutal endtimes?
[OtherTimeLine, Angelic Erotic Romance, Action Suspense]
Novel ~ Ebook and In Print
~~~
Kalypso and Zryphus
invite you to read their love story…
Murder by Hair Spray in Gardenia, New Atlantis
[New Atlantis, Book 1]
One hundred years old,
Sheriff Kalypso despises relationships.
Zryphus has found his one woman.
The Battle of the Sexes begins.
[Futuristic Paranormal Erotic Romance, Action Suspense]
Novel ~ Ebook and In Print
~~~
Wendy and the Dark Brothers:
Zavier, Zent, Zion, and Zotorro
invite you to read their love story…
Her Insatiable Dark Heroes
[Chrontropolis, Book 1]
How many Superheroes does it take to satisfy
the one woman who dances like a fire goddess?
Answer: the four Dark Valorous Brothers of Chrontropolis.