TO CATCH A WOLF By Susan Krinard

A few hours before dawn, he found his quarry. Niall crouched in the partial shelter of a fallen tree, his coat drawn up over his head. There was no sign of his mount. Morgan smelled the ash where he had tried to start a fire, but no flame could survive this gale.

Morgan stalked closer, ears flat to his head. He heard the ragged sound of Niall’s breathing, felt the warmth of body heat—alive, then. He shook off savage regret and drew closer.

Niall’s head jerked up. His brows were frosted with rime, his skin nearly blue. He tried to move, feeling in his pocket.

Morgan dashed in and seized Niall’s wrist between his teeth, tasting leather and sheepskin. Munroe’s smell was rank with fear and exhaustion. He met Morgan’s gaze, and the last spark of fight went out of him.

He had one more shock to face. Morgan released him and backed way, shaking the foul scents from his coat. It was almost a relief to Change and find his senses dulled, as they always were in human shape.

Munroe exhaled a great cloud of steam and tried to sit up. “You,” he said hoarsely.

“Yes.” Morgan crouched on his heels. “I’ve come to take you back to the ranch.”

Munroe laughed. “You have come to… save me?”

“I would just as soon let you die here. But there are two who care for you, and it is for their sakes that I came tonight.”

“Two?” He shivered and tried to adjust his collar with frozen fingers.

“Your sister, and Caitlin.”

“Caitlin.” He shifted again and fell back. “Is she all right?”

“She and the others are safe.”

Niall closed his eyes. “You found them?”

“Yes. Your men said that you went out to look for them after the storm began. That earns you the right to live.”

“The right to live,” he echoed. “And what gives you the right to judge me, Holt? You, who murdered your own father?”

Morgan felt no surprise. He’d lived too long among men to keep such secrets indefinitely, and no one had better motive to uncover those secrets than Niall Munroe.

But Munroe’s accusation did not touch him. It was as if

Athena’s brother spoke of another man, summoned memories of another life.

“You do not deny it,” Munroe said. He sat up, emboldened by Morgan’s silence. “Not that it would do you any good. I blame myself for not having discovered it long ago. The only thing I don’t understand is why you were not hanged.”

“Then there is something about me you don’t know.”

“That you claim justification for patricide?” He laughed again, teeth chattering. “A man capable of that could do anything. But you are not a man, are you? You’re a beast that thinks nothing of killing.”

“A beast like your sister.”

“No!” Munroe scrambled to his feet and leaned on the fallen tree. “My sister cannot help what she is. I will not let her give in to the monstrous heritage her mother imposed upon her.” His eyes glazed. “I knew she was evil the first time I saw her in my father’s bed.”

Morgan became aware of his body again. “She?”

“Gwenyth Desbois. The bitch who seduced my father and stole his love for my mother.” Munroe’s teeth flashed white in the rigid oval of his face. “I saw her Change long before Athena learned how to twist her body into an animal’s. And my father knew. He knew what she was, and wanted her anyway. He forced my mother to raise Athena as her own—”

“And you hate Athena for that. You’ve hated her since she was born.”

“Shut up! You know nothing about it, what it was like to know what she was. I would have kept it from her, let her live an ordinary life. But our father told her everything when he thought she was old enough to understand. He ruined her.” He slammed his fist against the tree, shaking snow from the dead branches. “And you—you will destroy her completely. That’s why I must stop you just as I stopped her mother.”

Morgan cocked his head. “What happened to Athena’s mother?” he asked softly.