She glared at the trees, and that helped a little. But the feeling that something was watching her kept growing. Her nose told her there was nothing-but it hadn't told her about the wolf that had knocked her and Charles off their feet, either. Now that the wolf had skedaddled, her alarm system was in full swing.
How useful.
But thinking about the wolf reminded her of that odd feeling she'd had just a few moments ago, as if she could see through the strange werewolf's skin and into his soul, feel his torment, his need. She'd stretched out her hand and asked him who he was, part of her certain that he would come to her and answer.
When he'd run instead, it had torn her from the strange awareness. She couldn't put her finger on most of what she'd sensed from the wolf; she felt like a blind man seeing colors for the first time. But she would swear that he'd attacked to protect her-and that he'd done his best not to hurt Charles.
Something watched her. She sniffed, taking in the scent of the air, but smelled only the usual woodland scents.
She walked the perimeter of the clearing, but detected nothing with her eyes, ears, or nose. She walked it again anyway, with the same results. Looking a third time wasn't going to help matters. She needed to calm down, or she was going to go chasing after Charles in full panic. Yeah, that would impress him a whole lot.
Not that she'd ever done anything that might impress him.
She folded her arms over her stomach, which had started to ache with some emotion she couldn't name, wouldn't name. It might have been rage.
For three years she'd endured because, as bad as it was, she needed the pack. They were a visceral requirement her wolf could not do without. So she'd let them rob her of her pride, let Leo take control of her body and pass her around like a whore that he owned.
For a moment, she could smell Justin's breath in her face, feel his body holding hers down, the ache in her wrists and the pressure on her nose where he'd broken it with a carefully controlled, open-handed blow.
Blood dripped down her lip and down her new coat to splatter in the snow. Startled, she put her hand to her nose, but there was nothing wrong with it, though a moment ago she'd felt it swelling as it had the night Justin hit it.
But the blood was still there.
She bent down and took a handful of snow and pressed it against her nose until it burned uncomfortably. She put her hand to her nose and it came away clean this time, so it wasn't still bleeding. The question was, why had it started bleeding in the first place? And why had she suddenly started thinking about Justin?
Maybe the nosebleed had something to do with the altitude, she thought. Charles would know. She got clean snow and wiped her face with that, then a scrap of backpack that was nearby. She touched her nose, and her fingers came away clean. Whatever the cause, it had stopped. She scrubbed at the bloodstains on her jacket and succeeded only in smearing the blood around.
With a sigh, she looked for somewhere to put the bloody piece of fabric. She'd taken off her pack when she'd done her earlier reconnoitering. It sat in unharmed glory amidst foil-covered meals scattered in fanciful patterns with bits and pieces of Charles's backpack.
Typical man, she thought with experimental exasperation, leaving the woman to clean up the mess.
She gathered Charles's clothes and shook them free of snow. She stuffed them into her pack and then started putting the foil-clad meals on top. With a little organization, she was able to put most of the undamaged food in her backpack, but there was no way she would be able to stuff anything more into it. She gave the remains of Charles's backpack, sleeping bag, and snowshoes a frustrated look.
It wouldn't have bothered her so much, except this was a wilderness area and they weren't supposed to leave anything behind. She looked closely at Charles's backpack, but it had been ripped to shreds. The gun had taken damage, too. She didn't know much about rifles, but she suspected that they needed a straight barrel to work right.
She hit the jackpot, though, when one of the pieces of backpack turned out to be the ground cloth they'd slept on last night.
She smelled something as she knelt to spread the tough fabric out. She tried not to react to the scent, collecting all the leftover bits and throwing them in the center of the cloth. Everything except the gun. Even though it was bent, it was still reassuringly solid.
Whoever it was stayed very still, watching her-a human, not a werewolf.
Tied together, the cloth made a tidy bundle that they could carry out. As Anna moved the makeshift pack next to her backpack, she heard her watcher move out of the trees behind her.
"Looks like you had a mess on your hands," said a friendly voice. "Did you run into a bear?"
She sounded friendly enough. Anna turned to look at the woman who'd come out of the trees after watching her for too long to be entirely trustworthy.
Like Anna, she was wearing snowshoes, but she had ski poles in each of her hands. Deep brown eyes peered out from under her hat, but the rest of her face was covered in a woolen scarf. Underneath her gray hat, dark brown curls fell to her shoulders.
Anna took a deep breath, but all her nose told her was that the woman was human. Would a human's hearing be poor enough that all the noise of the fight might have been made by a bear rather than a pair of werewolves? Darned if she knew.
"A bear. Yes." Anna gave her a smile she hoped would cover up the amount of time it had taken her to reply. "Sorry, I'm still a little off. I'm a city girl, and I'm not used to Mother Nature in all her glory. Yes, a bear. We scared it off, then discovered it had one of our-" What would they need so badly that a human man would have to go chasing after a bear? "-small packs. The one with the lighter in it."
The other woman threw back her head and laughed. "Isn't that the way it always works? I'm Mary Alvarado. What are you doing out here in the middle of winter if you're not used to the wild country?"
"I'm Anna...Cornick." Somehow it seemed right to use Charles's name. Anna gave Mary Alvarado another wry smile. "We haven't been married long. I'm not used to a new last name. You must be out looking for the hunter, too. We were told that no one else was going to be this far out. I may be green as grass, but my husband knows his way around."
"Search and Rescue, that's me," said Mary.
"Isn't everyone supposed to go by twos?" Anna asked. She wasn't about it, but it only seemed sensible. Heather and Jack had been hunting together.
Mary shrugged. "I have a partner around here somewhere. We had an argument, and she took off in a huff. But she'll get over it soon and let me catch up." She grinned conspiratorially. "She's pretty hot-tempered."