An indistinct thud from the direction of the car startled most of the assembled folks. Who was in the trunk of the car? A light bulb went off in Wyatt’s head.
“Are you still mad at me, Valene?” Wyatt asked in an elevated tone. Everyone looked at him.
Her brows narrowed. “Why would I be?”
Wyatt shrugged. “You just don’t seem like yourself, that’s all. Daphne Charlene lied to you if she insisted we were together in my kitchen. It’s not true.”
Daphne Charlene’s eyes widened. She looked ready to crack, but she held it together.
Valene’s unbending stance went even more rigid. “I’ve had a difficult time recently, as if you couldn’t tell.” Her gaze left his and landed on Daphne Charlene before she fixed her gaze back on Wyatt.
Wyatt nodded. “True. Still, I need to tell you something. I’m willing to move to Alpha-Prime.” He heard another thump from what sounded like the trunk of the car.
Valene tilted her head to one side. He’d never seen her do that before. “Won’t you miss your family?”
“Does a bear poop in the woods?”
Valene frowned. “What? Why isthatrelevant?”
Wyatt flipped his alien purple goo splatter gun up and shot Valene in the collarbone. Purple goo splattered down her chest and up her throat and chin, with a few healthy-sized spots landing on her cheeks.
She dropped to the ground, a stunned expression frozen in place. Diesel grabbed his rifle barrel, pointed it to the night sky and put a meaty hand around Wyatt’s arm. He gave Wyatt a withering look that said vengeance would be his next reality.
Before anyone could retaliate, Valene’s body began to writhe and change. Everyone stared as Valene morphed into…someone else. Daphne Charlene jumped away, but Bubba Thorne grabbed her and kept her from escaping. “He made me do it!” she screamed. “He made me help him. Now I get to have Wyatt.” Her arms reached for Wyatt, but he backed up a step. Diesel released him as he watched fake Valene. Wyatt’s gaze moved to the trunk of the car. Another thump came along with a muffled feminine screech of unhappiness. Wyatt’s feet were moving toward the car before his brain caught up. No one stopped him.
On the ground, Valene was no longer Valene, but a subdued Indigo Smith dressed as Valene.
“How did you know?” Diesel asked behind him. Wyatt didn’t have time to answer. He slung the rifle over his shoulder and reached inside the open passenger door to retrieve the key fob. He popped the trunk lock as he ran around to find the real Valene trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey.
Wyatt whipped out his pocketknife and cut the rope at her ankles and wrists, carefully pulling the tight handkerchief from between her lips. “There you are.” He helped her out of the trunk, hugging her tight the moment she was on her feet.
“How did you know it was Indigo and not me?” she asked, her voice muffled against his chest.
He drew back a little, but refused to let her get too far away. He grinned at her sweet face. She had that look again. The awe-inspired one. The one he loved without reason.
“Lots of things. I noticed you weren’t wearing my ring.”
Valene lifted her hand. “I still have it.”
Wyatt smiled with gratitude. “Also, right up front he had a sneering frown that I’ve never seen on you before, even after being kidnapped and everything. But the true test was when I asked him, ‘Does a bear poop in the woods?’” Even as bedraggled as she looked and after all she’d been through, Valene giggled.
“He didn’t giggle like you just did. He said, ‘What?’ and asked me whythatwas relevant. Youalwaysgiggle.” Wyatt hugged her tight. Best of all, she hugged him back. “So I shot him in the collarbone. If he’d been wearing his own face, I would have shot him in the teeth, but…” Wyatt shrugged. “I just couldn’t shoot yours.”
“That’s so sweet.”
Wyatt suddenly remembered something he needed her to know. “I swear to you that I didn’t do anything with Daphne Charlene in my kitchen that night.”
“I know. I’m sorry you saw me with Indigo Smith. He put a shackle sticker on me.”
Before he could comment, Diesel appeared at their side like magic. They parted, but Wyatt kept an arm around her shoulder.
“I thought you’d lost your mind for a minute there. Glad you figured it out when you did,” Diesel said to Wyatt with a sheepish look.
“Trust me, it was my pleasure to land a purple goo pellet on Indigo.”
Diesel pulled Valene away from Wyatt to give her a relieved brotherly hug. “I was worried about you.” He leaned back to look into her eyes. “I’ll bet you have quite a story to tell.”
“You got that right,” she said. “Indigo Smith is an Alpha shapeshifter.”
