Page 55 (1/2)

Chapter 1

WHY HAD LARISSA, HER LOVING SISTER, ENDED UP DEAD—here, of all the godforsaken places in the States? Maybe that was the reason—off the beaten path, surrounded by wilderness, a place to hide froe, safe from Bruin’s retaliation should he ever have located her But she hadn’t been safe And now she was dead

Out of the corner of her eye, Lelandi Wildhaven thought she saw her cousin, Ural, slink into the woods in his wolf forh with her to shapeshift this close to Silver Town and risk alerting the gray lupus garou pack that a couple of reds had slipped into their territory

Ignoring her gut instinct telling her this was a very bad idea, she pushed open the Silver Town Tavern’s heavy door, the squealing of the rusty hinges jarring her taut nerves

Five beardedat a table turned to stare at her, and at once she feared the worst—they saw straight through her disguise

She shoved the faux eyeglasses back into place, hating the way they kept sliding down the bridge of her nose The weather-beaten cowboy hat she’d picked up at a resale shop half sed her head,her dad’s Stetson

Ah above softly illu, polished bar Slow-spinning wooden fan blades circulated the air, iarou Her nerve endings prickled with fresh awareness Dingy antiquethe back wall behind the bar bore s-on in the place, as she suspected they had for decades If they had captured all the ies of the bar’s existence what a story those mirrors could tell

Another beardedbeneath the lip of the bar suddenly stood to his full six-foot-four height The glass and dish towel he held nearly slipped frolance took in every inch of her His lips turned up at the corners slightly Deep laugh lines were etched in his tanned skin and shaggy black hair extended to his shoulders, giving hied s What disturbed herat the table She’d anticipated it would be a huarous, like the bar back home

“What’ll you have,

Expecting a chilly greeting—their kind didn’t welco into their midst, especially if she were huarou tavern—she hesitated

“Miss?”

“Bottled water, please” She’d h, to match the look of the place She’d intended to be soh-heeled boots giving the impression she stood taller, reen eyes sufficiently, but she still felt like Lelandi, triplet to Larissa, with barely any visible difference in appearance, except her eyes were greener and her hair olden than her sister’s had been Had her voice betrayed her?

The small smile on the bartender’s face was er who’d walked into a wolves’ den without protection than because she’d given herself away She cursed herself for not disguising her voice better, but the barkeep’s warave her a false sense of security, which could be the death of her if she wasn’t careful

The bartender handed her a chilled bottle of water and tall green glass “New in town?”

“Just passing through,” she said, paying for the water

“Sa, just holler”

“Thanks” Hollering for a drink was definitely not her style

She chose a table in the fartherh any of them could see in the dark as well as she could, this location would keep her out of the main flow of traffic She hoped she’d seem inconspicuous, not worthy of anyone’s scrutiny, and most of all, human

Lelandi glanced at the door According to her information, Darien Silver—Larissa’s ed mate—should be here soon

One of the ave Sam some cash The man cast Lelandi a hint of a sray, stocky, hair a bland brown, eyes a of dust, he had a soft, round baby face Looked sweet, a beta-wolf type Ses of dirt colored his cheeks, and he wiped them off with the back of his deni fro of his beer

Sam joined Lelandi and handed her the cash “Joe Kelly paid for your drink, htly rough appearance But he cleans up good” Saave her a wink, and returned to the bar

Should she turn down Joe’s offer? On the other hand, if he was interested in her, maybe she could discover the truth quicker

“Thank you,” she mouthed to Joe Kelly and his chest swelled

The other guys started ribbing him in low voices The tips of Joe’s ears turned crimson

Her stomach clenched with the notion that Larissa had had the audacity to ray, especially when she had a mate already She’d said she wanted to find herself, and she did Six feet under Yet, Lelandi couldn’t help feeling it was her own fault, that if she’d taken Larissa’s place back hoht have kept her safe But what about their parents? She couldn’t have left them behind—not with her dad so incapacitated—but hell, she hadn’t been able to protect them either They had been murdered anyway