Mate Claimed (Shifters Unbound #4)(51)
Author: Jennifer Ashley

“Good thinking. Where did the bus come from?”

“We were driving around the area, like you said, and I just happened to see it pull out of an unmarked dirt road and onto the highway. Another few minutes, and we’d have missed it.”

“The Lupines are all there?”

“Think so,” Brody said. “I guess McNeil will know.”

“Thanks, Brody. You did great.”

Brody did his best to look modest, but grizzlies were bad at not looking smug. Eric patted his shoulder and went to the bus.

The human driver was still in his seat, looking terrified. Nell sat behind him, thankfully minus her shotgun, and she was twirling a set of keys that likely had come out of the ignition.

Xavier sat on a jump seat next to the driver, armed with a Glock, but the gun was holstered. Eric wondered whether the driver realized that Xavier was protecting him from the Shifters.

Xav nodded to Eric as Eric climbed past him. Shifter women and kids slumped in the seats, most of them asleep, others glassy-eyed and staring. Graham was halfway down the aisle, and an older Shifter woman in the seat he bent over was clinging to his arm and crying. The woman looked groggy, her face flushed as though she’d just woken.

“Everyone accounted for?” Eric asked Graham, moving past him.

“Not sure yet.” Graham’s voice was gentler than Eric had ever heard it. The man was trying to be calm, reassuring, so his Lupines wouldn’t panic.

Eric walked on through the long bus, the same size as a tour bus, and checked all the seats. Women, fast asleep, had arms protectively around their cubs. A few males were there, sitting alone, all sleeping or half-awake, staring unseeing as Eric went by.

In the back, he found two cubs, alone. The two wolves were very young, and in wolf form. Curled up around each other, they were all ears, big paws, and long tails, with noses too large for their little faces.

Eric, as a Feline, had an instinctive dislike for Lupines, but these two cubs were just so darned cute. He found himself smiling as he leaned over them, but at the same time, he felt a chill. They were alone—where was their mother?

“Hey, little guys,” he said. Their faces didn’t tell him their gender, but their scent did.

One of the wolf cubs opened his eyes. He stared at Eric in a puzzled way, then he growled. It was a tiny growl, the little body rumbling. His brother woke and blinked at Eric as well.

Their confused frowns only made the wolf cubs cuter. Eric was careful not to reach for them though, as much as he wanted to. They were waking up to a strange Feline, and if Eric put a hand toward them, he’d soon have a hand shredded by tiny claws and teeth.

“That’s Kyle and Matt,” Graham said, a note of relief in his voice. “Youngest in my Shiftertown. Thank the Goddess.”

The cubs, recognizing Graham, their alpha, went crazy with glee. Their tails wagged so hard their little bodies moved, and when Graham reached down and scooped up the two cubs, they began climbing him enthusiastically. Graham stayed very still while the cubs scampered up his tattooed arms, one perching on his shoulder, the other climbing to the top of his head.

The belligerent, angry Graham looked very different with a fuzzy little wolf on his head, Graham keeping his movements slow so as not to startle them.

“Where’s their mother?” Eric asked, looking back down the bus’s aisle.

“Lost her,” Graham said. “When they were born. Their dad before, in a car accident.”

Eric didn’t like hearing that. “Goddess go with them.”

“Yeah, it sucked. They’re being fostered. The foster mom made it to Shiftertown, and is about crazy with worry.”

“Are all the missing here?” Eric asked.

Kyle or Matt—the one on his shoulder—busily licked Graham’s ear. “All twenty,” Graham said. “The question is, why?”

“Let’s go ask someone who might know.”

Graham agreed. He steadied the cubs with his big hands as Eric led the way back down the aisle.

Nell was speaking to the driver. Her voice was pitched too low for Eric to hear the words, but whatever she was saying, the driver looked terrified.

When Eric and Graham stopped to tower over him, the guy said, “Please, don’t let her touch me.”

Nell sat back, an innocent look on her face. Then her expression changed, and she reached for one of the wolf cubs. “Aw, now, who’s a sweetie-pie?”

The cub held back a little, smelling bear, but when Nell’s strong hands closed around him, the cub recognized the maternal touch and relaxed against her. The second cub clung to Graham’s head and made little growling noises.

Xavier leaned back in the jump seat and looked at the driver. “Now how could you do bad things to these adorable little guys?” he asked.

“I didn’t do anything to them.” The driver had reddish curly hair cut short at his neck, reddish razor stubble, and wide blue eyes lined with pale lashes. “I swear to God. I was told to drive them to Shiftertown in Las Vegas. That’s it.”

“Who told you?” Eric crouched next to the driver’s seat, which put his head lower than the driver’s. There was something about looking up with full confidence at a person you wanted to interrogate. Height wasn’t always an advantage.

“My boss. He called me early this morning, told me to come in, get my bus, pick up a bunch of Shifters, and take them to the Shiftertown.”

“Where did you pick up these Shifters?”

“At a place out in the middle of the desert. I don’t know what it was—a military outpost or temporary housing, or something. I drove out, the people there loaded the Shifters on, and I drove away.”

“Early this morning.” Graham grunted, choosing to tower over his victim. “It’s after ten now. What took you so long?”

“Finding the place, first,” the driver said. “It took for-fucking-ever to drive out there—there’s no good roads, and this bus isn’t high clearance. I thought I was going to get stuck lots of times. Then it took a long time for them to get the Shifters in here, because they were all like that.” He jabbed his thumb at the back, where most of the wolves were still slumped in sleep.

“Tranqed,” Eric said. “Then what?”

“I drove back out. I finally made it to the highway, thank God, but then I was surrounded by bikers. I see some of them wearing Collars, and I know they’re Shifters. I thought they were going to kill me.” He looked at Xavier. “You’re human.”