Josef had told her many times that he couldn’t feel her energy when she used her art on objects, but still, she held her breath, afraid this very savvy Lycan would pick it up.
“You can’t be very old; why would your parents allow you to come to such a remote area where it’s so dangerous?” His concern was genuine.
Skyler smiled again, this time more naturally. “I just look very young. I’m actually twenty-five. I’ve got my degree and am working toward my master’s. I volunteer at the various wildlife research centers as a way to travel. I mean, I’m genuinely interested in the work, but I’ve gotten to go to so many countries and see many amazing places, as well as meet some very cool people.”
Zev raised his eyebrow. “In a million years I wouldn’t have guessed your age. If anything, I thought maybe fourteen or fifteen.”
Skyler shrugged. “I get that all the time. At least I’ve reached the fourteen or fifteen mark instead of the ten or twelve.”
He laughed, suddenly relaxing. The tension completely eased from his body and he sank down into the grass beside her while she bathed her swollen ankle in the icy stream.
“That must be annoying, having everyone tell you you look so young.”
“In some ways. Especially when I’m traveling. There are a lot of creeps in the world and having some man who preys on children . . .” She trailed off, realizing genuine anger had crept into her voice.
Zev was quick. She saw knowledge in his eyes and knew she’d given away too much information. Cursing silently to herself, she idly picked up a pebble and tossed it downstream.
“The forest is oppressive at times, isn’t it?” she asked. “I find it so beautiful, all the colors, but sometimes it’s hard to breathe when you’re deep in the middle of it.”
His eyes focused on her, all that piercing intelligence. She had to fight to stay relaxed. He looked as if he could see right into her soul. “You’re very sensitive.”
“That’s what my mother always says,” Skyler said. That much was true. Francesca said it all the time. She indicated his hand. Let him fish around for something plausible. “What happened to you?”
Zev didn’t so much as flinch. He lifted his wrist for her inspection. “I was working and got a little careless. I tore my wrist on a nail. It’s not a big deal but it was deep enough to bleed a lot. I put this cloth around it and it stopped.”
“There’s a first-aid kit at the camp. When we get there, I could put some antibiotic cream on it so the laceration doesn’t get infected.”
He nodded. “If we don’t run out of time. We should get moving soon or night will fall. Here in the forest it tends to get dark fast.”
She was happy to get moving. The faster they made camp, the faster she could heal her ankle and set out to follow the Lycan back to Dimitri.
“Do you live close by?”
“I’m camping with some friends a few kilometers from here,” Zev explained. “Although I’ve been coming to these woods since I was a boy, so I’m very familiar with them.”
She frowned at him as she pulled her throbbing foot from the stream. Her wince was very genuine. She was going to have to throttle Josef for making her injury so real. “You don’t hunt here, do you? The wolves are protected in this preserve.” She managed her most schoolmarmish voice, the one that always made Josef sit up and take notice—or topple over in gales of laughter.
“Sometimes with a camera, although when we were kids, we hunted for food. Not wolves, but other creatures, mostly wild fowl, partridge, things we could manage when we were pretty small. If we killed it, we had to carry it.”
He was telling the absolute truth, which was why he was so good at intrigue. He mixed truth with implication—not outright lies. She tried to pull her boot back over her swollen ankle. It hurt like hell.
“I’ll carry you.”
“You will not,” Skyler said. “I can walk. Just give me a minute to get my boot back on.” Who knew what a Lycan might discern that close? “How far away is the camp? Have I been walking in circles? Sometimes I was pretty certain I’d been to the same place more than once.”
“I thought all you researchers always carried a GPS with you.”
She called on her mad nonexistent acting skills to blush, her long lashes sweeping down deliberately. “We’re supposed to. It’s my first time with this group and my partners are both . . .” She trailed off, doing her best to look ashamed and guilty.
“Men,” he finished for her. Zev took the boot from her hands and gently eased it over her ankle.
“I know I don’t have anything to prove, and this isn’t going to get me off to a good start, but I guess I wanted to look good. I got up early and set up the cameras. In my haste to be helpful, I completely forgot the GPS. It’s probably still clipped to my hammock.”
He stood up and reached down to lift her easily into his arms, ignoring her protest. “I’m sorry, young Skyler, but it’s getting late. I need to be somewhere and I’ve got to get you back to your camp.”
She had no choice but to be gracious. In any case, she hadn’t been looking forward to walking on her swollen ankle. “Thanks, Zev, I appreciate it, although I feel a little silly.”
“Walking around alone in these woods is silly,” he said sternly.
Skyler was used to being around physically strong men. Gabriel, her adopted father, was extremely strong, being Carpathian. Dimitri certainly was. Even Josef, as young as he was, had the Carpathian strength, but Zev was amazing. He moved through the forest absolutely sure-footed. He was graceful even. He didn’t breathe hard and he never once acted as if he needed a rest. He was born and bred for the forest, and he was every bit as strong as a Carpathian.
She closed her eyes and breathed evenly, opening her mind a little at a time to try to take in, to absorb the feel of a Lycan through every sense she had. She recognized the way he moved from what Mother Earth had revealed to her earlier. He barely made a sound, a soft whisper, no more, as his clothing occasionally brushed against leaves. He was so quiet they startled wildlife they came upon.
She felt the mechanics of him, the steel-like but flexible framework and the muscles moving beneath his civilized clothing. She even began to absorb the field around him that protected his energy from leaking out and giving him away in a hunt—or battle.
He was a good man. She got that much from him, but he was lethal and wouldn’t hesitate to kill if necessary. She wouldn’t want him coming after her. That thought was frightening and she couldn’t help the little shiver that went down her spine. Of course he noticed instantly.