“Are you doing this to punish me because I came up here to kill you?” she asked suspiciously.
He grinned at that. “Maybe. Consider it payback for the sheer terror I’ve lived in ever since I heard you were coming my way.”
“Yeah, I can only imagine how much sleep you’ve lost.” She scowled at him.
“All right, then. Since I’ve given you a work assignment, you’re under my pack’s protection, until and unless you find a pack to join. Oh, and don’t worry, we’ll have security assigned to the schoolhouse,” he added.
“Why, are the kids that bad?” she joked.
“Only some of them. Including your nieces and nephews.”
He was serious. Yikes. This just got better and better.
“But mostly it’s because the territory’s like the Wild West out here. Warring packs, and then the humans keep sending in the worst of the worst shifters so we’ll all fight it out and there’ll be a lot less of us left alive at the end.”
“And even knowing what the humans are trying to do to you, you’re staying here?” she blurted out.
He stared at her. “Of course. Once in a lifetime opportunity to get some of the biggest territory of any pack in the country? New land, new life? Sooner or later, the rogue shifters will get the message. The message being, make trouble in my territory and you’re dead before morning.”
Before he could continue, Naomi ran up to them. She was carrying a big stick that she waved like a club.
She marched up to the three men. “Are you Miles?” she demanded of Miles’s Omega, Baldwin.
“Who wants to know?” He raised an eyebrow at her.
“Death-challenge my friend, will you?” she shouted, and ran right up to Baldwin and whacked him as hard as she could across the chest with the stick.
Chapter Six
Before Dakota could say anything, Macy ran up too, along with several other women from the shuttle bus. “Death-challenge a woman, will you? Well, how do you likethis?” Macy yelled, and shifted into fox form. She latched onto Baldwin’s work boot and gnawed it savagely.
A couple of the other women looked around for weapons and, failing to find any, picked up pine cones off the ground and began pelting him.
“Bully!” Naomi yelled.
Miles and Baldwin and Anders just stood there, staring at the women in astonishment.
Naomi kept hitting Baldwin with the stick. He was about six foot five. He looked to weigh about two hundred and eighty pounds of solid muscle. Naomi was tall, but she was as skinny as a beanpole. She probably weighed a hundred and ten pounds if she’d eaten a big breakfast. But she still kept hitting him.
Baldwin glanced at Miles. It took a lot to rattle him, but he did look mildly peeved at the moment. “Help,” he said in an annoyed tone. “I am very afraid. I’m not ready to die. I’m too young and pretty.”
Naomi smacked him on the shoulder with her stick. “You vile, woman-murdering pig! We won’t let you get away with it!”
“Wolf shifter,” Baldwin said. “Nothing against pig shifters, mind you. Wait, who did I murder?”
Miles glanced at Anders, who was howling with laughter and pointing at Baldwin.
“Oh shit, look at his face,” Anders gasped.
“Quit laughing.” Miles tried to look annoyed, but one corner of his mouth kept tugging up like he wanted to laugh too. “It’s not a full moon for two more weeks, right?”
Whack.
“No sir, it isn’t.” Anders put his hands over his mouth, but he was laughing so hard that his shoulders were shaking and his eyes were filled with tears.
Whack.
Baldwin idly reached up to block Naomi as she tried to land a blow to his head. He swatted the stick away, but didn’t bother trying to take it from her.
