I remain crouched near the tracks, staring at the doubled-back pattern until my eyes start filling in movement that is not there. The forest is quiet, like it’s staged, like the animals have already decided not to be present.
Ciaran watches me for a beat longer than he needs to.
“You look like you want to run ahead,” he says.
“I want to solve it,” I reply, lifting my gaze.
His expression softens for half a second, then locks back into control. “That’s how people get killed out here.”
“I’m still alive,” I say.
“Barely,” Tomas mutters, then flushes slightly when Kelsey shoots him a look.
I stand slowly, dusting damp soil off my gloves. The cold seeps into my knees, and the cut on my shoulder pulls under the movement, but I keep my breathing steady. I can feel the pull ofanticipation in my chest, sharp and inconvenient, because Alden is on his way.
The last time I saw him, his proximity had felt like heat and warning mixed together.
I tell myself this is about the investigation. I tell myself that twice, because the first time does not stick.
We wait in a tight cluster near the tracks, all of us listening.
A branch snaps somewhere downhill. Then the forest goes quiet again, like it is holding its breath for the Alpha’s arrival. Another branch cracks somewhere downhill.
Every wolf in the patrol goes still at the same time, like someone pulled a wire tight through the group.
Ciaran’s head turns first, eyes narrowing toward the sound. Tomas shifts his stance, weight dropping slightly into the balls of his feet, while Kelsey’s hand drifts closer to the knife at her belt.
Then the forest changes.
It is not louder. It is not visibly different. But the air sharpens, charged in a way my body recognizes before my brain catches up.
Ciaran exhales once. “He’s close.”
The words barely leave his mouth before movement flashes through the trees.
Alden does not emerge so much as appear, stepping over a fallen log with the kind of controlled power that makes the rest of the patrol subtly reposition without being told. His dark hair is slightly wind-tossed, sleeves pushed to his forearms, eyes already locked on the disturbed ground near the tracks.
He does not look at me. Not even once.
Something small and unexpected twists low in my chest.
“Show me,” he says to Ciaran.
Ciaran steps aside immediately and gestures toward the doubled-back trail. “Fresh. She mapped the misdirection.”
Alden crouches without hesitation, fingers brushing the soil once before he goes very still. His focus is absolute, the rest of the world clearly irrelevant in that moment.
I tell myself the tight feeling in my ribs is irritation. It does not feel like irritation.
Without another word, Alden rises and moves several paces down the trail. Then he shifts.
The change is fast and violent and still somehow controlled. Bone and muscle realign in a blur of motion, and where the man stood seconds ago, a massive black wolf now dominates the narrow ridge. His coat catches the thin morning light in dark gloss, shoulders broad and powerful, every movement precise and deliberate.
My breath catches involuntarily.
He is bigger than the rogue tracks suggested. Bigger than he looked in the dim light of my cabin porch light. When he lowers his head to the ground, the line of his spine flexes with smooth, contained strength that pulls my attention in ways that have nothing to do with professional curiosity.
I force myself to swallow and focus on the terrain.
