Desert Hunt

by Anna Lowe

  Stupid man! Stupid tracker! Stupid… Then the memories kicked in. Sexy man. Sexy tracker. Sensitive lover…

  Enough! The hunter in her roared and concentrated on the chase. She could hear Zack tearing through the brush behind her; no reason for stealth now. Her ears flicked forward, concentrating on the pronghorn. She had to get it!

  The pronghorn was fast but foolish in its panic. It crashed through the thicker scrub along the creek bank while Rae pounded a parallel path in the clearer ground above. She stretched her muzzle forward, lengthening her stride to keep pace with this fleet-footed doe.

  The chase stretched on, over rocks, gullies, and hills. Rae lost herself in the sensations: the desperate hoofbeats over dry earth, the rhythm of her pounding heart, the sound of her fellow wolf close behind.

  At first she’d been annoyed. What was Zack thinking, coming after her like this? But having him involved in the hunt added to the thrill. She’d done all her hunting alone, and while she’d never felt lonely, she’d also never felt so connected to her own kind.

  In the old days… her wolf started.

  Yes, she’d heard about the old days, when wolves hunted in packs and tended their territories as one. They kept the herds strong by culling the weak, the old, and the sick. In return, the herds kept the wolves fed. It was an ageless, symbiotic relationship that ensured balance and survival of both species—and a responsibility still honored by hunters like her.

  Rae ran as she’d never run before, tuned in to both her quarry and to Zack. To share the thrill of the hunt… There was a certain rightness to it.

  Her mind spun as her limbs continued the chase. If the hunt was once a pack affair, then…

  Her ears flicked back to Zack. Did he know anything about her kind of hunting? Would he know how to work in tandem to bring down their prey—not to kill it, but to send it on a better path?

  She flipped through a hundred possible scenarios. Could she trust him?

  In an instant, her decision was made. All or nothing. She cut sharply to the right, up the hillside. Could she trust Zack?

  There was only one way to find out.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Jesus, but the she-wolf could run. That pronghorn, too.

  Zack panted and searched for another gear to throw his four feet into, but he was already going flat out. He ought to feel guilty for scaring off her prey, but hell, he’d still been half asleep when he came across them. And anyway, Rae was the one who’d walked out on him in the middle of the night.

  A night he’d thought was perfect, until he woke up alone.

  He couldn’t believe it at first. A couple of rounds of intense sex, a quick cuddle, and Rae had made tracks.

  Well, maybe she was smart to do so. After all, a man like him couldn’t offer much: just a shack on the edge of the ranch, a crazy job, and an uncertain pedigree. The only thing he could really offer was his heart, and that was worn as thin as an overused couch.

  Still, it hurt. Bad. That feeling of being left behind was an old one, and the pain went further back than a couple of hours. It went back years. Lots of them.

  One night, his father would be home, the warm bass of his voice filling the house. The next, a motorcycle engine would roar to life, carrying an impatient man out of a young boy’s life. Every couple of months, his dad would drop in, looking clean, repentant, and deceptively sincere—a state that would last just long enough for Zack to save up a little hope. Long enough for it to sting when the man disappeared again. In and out, in and out, with little Zack hiding beneath his patchwork quilt, afraid to fall asleep for fear of who might come—or worse, who might go. Wondering what it might be like to hear an engine coming instead of going.

  He’d pushed the memories away for so long that when they came back, they came back with a bang.

  At first, he’d sat slumped on the bed, kneading his brow and wondering at when his subconscious had decided that things could be different. Where had the wild ideas come from? Ideas like sleeping long, solid, and off guard, knowing that he’d have a person he loved for more than one night.

  He caught himself there. He wasn’t a kid any more, and as for love—no, he didn’t love Rae. More like…liked her. And he’d had his fun, so what more did he want?

  More, his wolf whimpered, morose. Mate. Keep.

  Forever, the coyote added.

  He shook his head. He couldn’t love Rae. It was forbidden. This whole night had been a mistake.

  Coyote and wolf voices roared in his head. No mistake!

  He’d been planning to feel sorry for himself a while longer, but his nose had started twitching. There was something was in the air, and not just the scent of regret. Some nocturnal event; something exciting. His hands fisted in the sheets. Was Rae in danger? Was Jed back?

  He leaped to his feet, flung the door open, and shifted to canine form, senses on full alert while scents and sounds assaulted him.

  The new moon. The desert, caught between two breaths. Something was happening out there.

  He paced on the porch, sniffing. Where was Rae?

  Like needles on a thousand tiny compasses, every sensor in him swung north. There. She was there. Somehow, he just knew. He took off at a punishing pace, tracking her fresh scent through the night. It wasn’t long before anger and pain gave way to the thrill of the chase. There was a high in it, running through the cool night air. His legs were strong and sure as they carried him over the hill, around a mesa, up over a rise—

  Where two heads had popped up in surprise. He let out an inner curse. Shit.

  One was the slender face of a pronghorn—a doe with wide eyes, erect ears, and inward curving horns. The other was a she-wolf with a silky brownish-gold coat, long legs, and an aristocratic tilt to her chin.

  Rae yipped her displeasure at the noise he made then shot off after the pronghorn.

  The promise of a double chase pushed away any instinct Zack had to hang his head in shame. The pronghorn was taking off, Rae was taking off, and dammit—he was off, too. He would not be left behind!

  So there he was, running with his paws on fire, his teeth clenched in resolve. But damn if the two females weren’t giving him a run for his money. He caught glances of the pronghorn’s thin legs pistoning up and down, its flag of a tail flicking as it ran in great leaps and bounds. The doe was running on high-octane fuel: fear for her life.

  Rae, on the other hand, ran on the wings of some desert spirit. There was an aura about her, a glow. Her coat shouldn’t shimmer quite so much on a moonless night, but there it was, flashing over the landscape like a golden fish in murky water. He’d never seen a wolf move like that: a tight package of grace, determination, passion, and pure feminine power.

  Oh, but you have seen that, his coyote hummed. And not too long ago.

  He nearly stumbled when the image jumped into his mind: Rae, tugging him toward the bed between flashes of lightning. Rae, lying back and inviting him to explore. Rae, writhing in pleasure as he thrust into her, again and again.

  His inner thermometer jumped by twenty degrees. OK, so the two of them had been on fire. But that was only sex, right?

  His coyote snorted. Who else ever lit you on fire? Who else ever made you feel so alive?

  He thought long and hard but came up empty. Worse, he was lagging behind. He pushed the thoughts out of his mind, determined not to lose contact with the chase.

  But there was determination, and there was sheer inborn speed. His tongue lolled sideways out of his mouth while the females showed no signs of tiring. If anything, they were inching away. The pronghorn had two hundred yards on Rae, who had half that distance on him. And Christ, he wasn’t sure he could catch them, not even at a full-out sprint.

  Then his she-wolf suddenly cut off at an angle and hammered upslope, away from the pronghorn. He slowed, torn in two different directions. What was Rae doing?

  His ears flicked, picking up a whisper in the night. By the time it wound its way into his mind, though, it was more imag
e than sound. If he stayed behind the pronghorn, then drove it right…

  An entire scene played out in his mind. If he edged left, the doe would veer right. And if Rae was fast enough, she could cut over the hilltop and cut the pronghorn off on the other side.

  We hunt as a pack, the whisper told him. Like the old days.

  Zack wasn’t sure what those old days were, but he grinned and shot off after the pronghorn.

  Clever, his human side decided.

  Insulting, his wolf huffed. She wants us to play sheepdog?

  Cunning, the coyote smiled. She does her part, we do ours.

  It was two against one, because the man in him was with the coyote: smitten with the challenge. And hell, he’d never been on a hunt like this before. Tracking was in his blood, but that was slow and steady, his nose testing every inch of earth before moving on. This was a high-speed chase with whipping branches, crashing hoofbeats, and pounding hearts. This was thrilling, instinctual. The only times he’d been out on this kind of hunt had been frivolous, opportunistic chases of a wayward deer or boar. A pronghorn was in a totally different class, especially one as fleet as this.

  Rae was in a totally different class, too. She carried her nose straight as an arrow, her tail proud as a banner.

  His wolf wasn’t sure he liked the arrangement, though.

  Aren’t men supposed to lead and women to follow? Shouldn’t an alpha fight from the front and force victory with raw power?

  The coyote laughed the notion aside. Hate to point it out to you, but we’re bringing up the rear. And the view ain’t half bad.

  He watched Rae disappear into the scrub from the corner of his eye as he followed the pronghorn. Maybe there were other ways to achieve a goal. Maybe a smart alpha knew when to lead and when to follow.

  His eyelid twitched, the wolf in him uneasy. Me, a sheepdog?

  His coyote snorted. Pompous fucking wolf.

  He swung left, decision made. If Rae wanted a sheepdog, he’d give her one. He took a deep breath, lifted his muzzle, and let out a howl as he raced along. A good howl that rumbled and threatened a thousand bloody deaths. Of course, running at full tilt like that, it was more hot air than anything else. A wolf would never fall for that bullshit, but a pronghorn…

  Sure enough, the doe skittered right, just where he wanted her to go.

  Zack bayed and yipped, putting on a show that filled him with childish pleasure, just like the kind he got from revving his Harley at a red light.

  And it worked. The doe went wide-eyed in panic and drifted right, still a good hundred yards ahead. It was a gap his burning lungs would never close. But it didn’t matter, because there was a flash of gold and a grunt on his right. Rae came flying through the air like a Valkyrie straight out of hell. She pounced, and wolf and antelope went rolling in a flurry of flailing hooves, wild grunts, and gleaming teeth.

  Zack’s heart seized. One lucky kick and the pronghorn could crush Rae’s ribs, smash her head, or put out an eye. There was nothing certain about a hunt. Shifters healed quickly, but they weren’t immune to pain. Besides, a lucky kick would let the pronghorn escape, and something about Rae’s urgency told him that couldn’t happen tonight.

  When he was two steps away, the tussle came to an abrupt stop, and he skidded to a halt. What the hell was going on?

  Rae had the pronghorn pinned as sure as any cowboy threw a steer. Her jaws were clamped around its neck, her body forcing the doe down. She huffed through her teeth, ordering her quarry to submit. He could see the panicked whites of the pronghorn’s eyes roll, its striped flanks heave in terror.

  But there was no death bite, no gush of blood. Rae wasn’t killing the doe; she was holding it. There was a grunt and a wiggle and then silence as the pronghorn’s eyes registered something else. It ceased the struggle and just…listened.

  Zack listened, too, tilting his head. There was a whisper in the air, faint as filtered starlight from a thousand light-years away. A whisper that carried images, not words, and a scene formed in his mind.

  There was a brokeback mountain, a crooked stream, and a wide, green valley swimming in grass. Somewhere up north. Not that he’d ever been there; he just knew. Next, he saw a rocky outcrop, an irregular hillside, and a flash of white: the tail of another pronghorn. A big male, by the look of it.

  There, the image seemed to be telling the doe. That is where you must go.

  Rae loomed over her prey, forcing it to listen to that whisper that rose out of the ground. Then the images rushed into a blur in a bird’s-eye flyover of the route to that special place.

  Zack sat down abruptly, hitting rocky ground with a jolt of realization.

  Holy shit.

  He’d heard the legends, of course, but never imagined they were true. Legends of a great huntress with speed and stamina to match any prey. A huntress who guarded the creatures roaming her territory, keeping the herds—and by extension, her pack—healthy. The kind of hunter who tended the earth and maintained a natural balance thrown badly off-kilter in modern times.

  The pronghorn struggled to its feet, wobbled a few steps, and dropped its head in exhaustion. There wasn’t a drop of blood on its pelt; Rae had been careful. Then the doe gave a clicking kind of grunt and trotted off into the night, heading for the green valley in the north where she would find her mate.

  Mate, came a faint echo from his wolf.

  His eyes settled on Rae, who had eased into a sitting position and was studiously licking her paw. Most shifter packs—wolf and coyote—had master hunters. But a master huntress… His mind fumbled for the term he’d heard whispered, long ago. Mistress…Mistress of the Hunt. She who tended the herds as a servant of Mother Earth.

  It had been generations since a true huntress had walked the earth. So long that the Mistress of the Hunt had fallen into the realm of legend.

  But it wasn’t a legend. It was true.

  It was Rae.

  He lowered his head slowly with a reverent huff.

  Rae. His Rae. Mistress of the Hunt.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Rae watched the pronghorn disappear into the night.

  Godspeed, my friend. Good luck. She pushed the thought, loud and clear, from her mind to the doe’s, then dropped her chin. The usual post-hunt high washed over her like a drug: she felt weary, yet triumphant. Humble, yet all-powerful. So much of her life was lived at the whim of an alpha’s command; this was her chance to run free, to sing her song.

  A rare chance, too. Soon, this magical night would be over, and she’d be back to just plain Rae, hiding her secret, fretting about her future.

  At least it had been a successful hunt. Rewarding, too: that pronghorn was on its way to a safer place and one of her own kind. If Fate smiled on the doe, she would find her mate, breed, and add another generation to a long, beautiful line.

  Rae was one in a long and even rarer line. She sensed the connection during every hunt: a link to her grandmother, great-grandmother, and so many others, so long ago. They’d come to the New World in centuries past to tend once-plentiful herds: bison, antelope, elk. But even the great huntresses couldn’t hold back the relentless onslaught of pioneers and trophy hunters. All they could do was guide the last survivors to safe havens where they might hide and persevere.

  Part of her itched to give chase to the pronghorn once more, while another part was glad to see it run free. Hope rang in its footsteps, and who knew? Maybe there was hope for Rae, too.

  She sighed and bent her head to lick a paw trampled in the fight. Zack was watching, but she wasn’t quite ready to face him. Having him join the hunt had given her a thrill that a hundred brass horns couldn’t provide. The thrill of leading others on a hunt, just like her grandmother had said.

  A little like the old days. Her wolf smiled.

  Well, it was a long way from the old days, but she’d take what she could get. If only she could hunt openly with a pack that appreciated her gift. Unfortunately, such packs were few and far between. Roric’s Wes
tend pack couldn’t give a damn about balance; their souls were sold to the casinos. Other packs might value a huntress like her, but there was a danger in that, too. The wrong kind of pack would rein her in, tie her down. She needed to range wide and far in search of worthy prey, something packs today with their splintered territories would hardly support. If the wrong pack claimed her, she would be reduced to hunting sheep or javelina when her blood called for the rarest of the rare—bighorn, pronghorn, and other species toeing the thin line between survival and extinction.

  And now, Zack knew her secret. What if he gave her away?

  Rae growled, pushing her human anxieties away. Tonight—what there was left of it—was for celebrating small triumphs: a successful hunt, and a single doe on her way to safe territory and a mate.

  Mate.

  On cue, her wolf turned to Zack. His green eyes were deep and honest. Wolf, coyote, or human: a trio in one, who looked at her in wonder and surprise, then dipped his head in respect.

  Something primal in Rae stirred, and she wanted it again: that feeling of being worshiped—not as a Mistress of the Hunt, but as an ordinary woman who couldn’t deny her attraction to this man.

  Mine. Mate. Her wolf growled as she stepped toward Zack. He would make a worthy mate. Honest and true. A friend. Who could understand her better than a tracker?

  He kept his head low as she circled him.

  This hunt is finished, she wanted to say.

  But we’re not, her wolf grinned, grinding her shoulder against his.

  His eyes shone as if he still couldn’t believe what he’d seen, so she butted him lightly with her hip. But this time, the contact slowed and stretched until it was a full-body rub along his side. Long, sleek, and close, she slid along the length of his coat. The coyote coloring made him appear smaller from a distance, but he loomed over her now, big as a wolf. Bigger, in fact, than most. She rubbed all the way around him and down the other side, sending up sparks.

  When Zack turned his head and his eyes met hers, they said everything. That he was done with the hunt, but only getting started with her.