Moonlight Protector

Chapter One

It was a dark, cold, rainy night. The black and silver wolf ran through the woods, oblivious to the cold wind or the rain pelting his fur. The moon was full in the midnight sky, but there were just enough clouds to block out the stars. The wolf stopped and listened, hearing a faint noise. Cautiously, he approached.
Not far from the road, a car was over-turned. A woman was lying on the ground calling for help in a voice so soft human ears could not have heard it. Upon closer inspection, the wolf saw a gash on her head. The coppery smell of her blood was almost too much to bear. The scent was so strong that he knew there were other lacerations, ones he couldn’t see.
Lifting her head, Marin saw the wolf. She knew that she should be afraid, but she was cold and in pain. The wolf might be her only chance of getting help. It wouldn’t be long before Stefan returned to make sure she was dead or to drag her back to her prison. If she didn’t get away, there was no telling what he would do to her. The last time she had escaped, he had chained her to a wall for a few days and done unspeakable things to her. He hadn’t broken her spirit, but she knew her body couldn’t take much more.
Looking into the wolf’s eyes, Marin pleaded for help. “Please help me.” Before she could feel ridiculous for asking a wolf for help, the darkness overtook her. As her head slumped back to the ground, the wolf turned and headed back into the woods. Running as fast he could, he raced around trees, over fallen limbs, and headed for the clearing. As he broke through the last of the trees, he could see the old Victorian house standing on the hill. He bounded up the hill and ran up the back steps, pushing open the door with his paw he rushed into the house.
“Cole? What’s wrong?” Gabriel asked as he stepped out of the living room, a concerned look on his face.
For his brother to come hurrying through the house in his wolf form meant that something was terribly wrong. The brothers typically kept clothes stashed nearby and changed before coming back to the house. Their nearest neighbor was a block away so they never had to worry about people crying wolf, but it was better to be safe than sorry. Their home was the only one on this side of the street and their auto repair shop was the only thing across from the house, which made their home the ideal place for three werewolves to live. The only thing better would have been a house in the country, but this was their family home and selling it was unthinkable.
The wolf turned in a circle and backed towards the door. Gabriel grabbed his leather jacket and followed. His brother led him through the woods for what seemed like an eternity before they came to the crash site. Gabriel noticed the unconscious woman on the ground and knelt beside her. He checked her pulse, which was weak but steady.
“She’s still alive. Why don’t you go put some clothes on and bring your truck? We can lay her in the backseat and take her to the hospital,” Gabriel said, looking at his furry brother.
The wolf nodded and once more bounded off through the woods, arriving at the house in record time. Pushing open the door, he ran up the stairs to the third floor. Entering the first bedroom he came to, he shifted back into human form. In his wolf form, Cole was larger than your typical wolf. His eyes remained the same as they were in his human form, which were steel gray. As a human, he was six-foot one, well muscled with six-pack abs, and relatively short black hair that barely curled over the collar of his shirt.
Cole threw on a t-shirt and jeans. He put on his boots, grabbed his wallet and his keys and headed back down the stairs. Jumping in his black Ford truck, he drove to the highway and headed in the direction of the crash site. It didn’t take him long to locate the place where the woman’s car had gone through the railing and down the embankment. There were two sets of skid marks side by side, one belonged to her car and stopped at the railing, but the second set continued down the highway. Cole parked on the side of the road and put on his hazard lights. Climbing out of the truck, he jogged down the hill toward his brother and the unconscious woman.
“Is she doing okay?” Cole asked, as he approached them.
“She woke up for a minute while you were gone, just long enough to tell me she doesn’t want to go to the hospital. I have a feeling she’s running from something, or someone,” Gabriel responded with a worried look on his face.
Cole nodded as if he had expected as much. “I saw some skid marks on the road. I don’t think she ran off the highway by herself.”
Cole looked down at the woman lying on the ground. What kind of trouble could she be in? Her face was covered in blood from the gash on her forehead, but he had a feeling she was beautiful when she was cleaned up. She had long dark hair and a clear pale complexion. She couldn’t be more than five-foot two, if even that, and looked like she was in her late teens or early twenties.
Something stirred inside of him as he looked at the helpless woman, making him feel fiercely protective of her. Cole was a little shocked at his response to her. He wasn’t only attracted to her in a human way, but his inner wolf recognized her. The primitive side of him wanted to lay claim to her before either of his brothers could. He had always thought that only the alpha could detect their mates, but apparently he was able to sense his own when she was present. This was a rather startling realization and one he didn’t want to dwell on. Right now his top priority was making sure the woman was taken to safety and cared for.
Gabriel carefully picked her up. “Let’s get her in the truck. We can take her to the house and figure out what to do from there.”
Cole ran up the embankment ahead of Gabriel and opened the rear passenger door. Gabriel gently laid the woman on the backseat, drew a blanket over her, and closed the door. He climbed into the front passenger seat as Cole slid into the driver’s seat. The drive back to the house was silent as both brothers were deep in thought over their mysterious new house guest.
As they pulled around to the back of the house, Gabriel glanced at the woman in the backseat. She was still unconscious. It made him worry about her head wound, but at the same time it was probably a blessing. She had to be in a great deal of pain. Her car had been pretty battered from rolling down the embankment and it looked as if she had fallen out of it when she opened the door. For that matter, he was amazed she had been able to open it at all.
Cole and Gabriel got out and opened the rear passenger door. Gabriel once again gently lifted her into his arms. She didn’t weigh much. Then again, he was a werewolf; she could have weighed two hundred pounds and it would have been the same as lifting fifty pounds.
The two brothers got the woman into the house and made their way up to the second floor. They very seldom had company, but they always kept the first bedroom on this floor ready for guests. The home had once belonged to their parents, but had belonged to the brothers for several years now. The three of them had also inherited the auto shop across the street, which provided a decent income. Their parents had made sure they would be taken care of should anything ever happen to them. Sometimes it didn’t seem like it had been very long since they had passed away.
Gabriel was the oldest at thirty two years old, and the tallest at six-foot two inches tall. He was slightly broader than Cole and just as muscled. His eyes were a vibrant blue and his hair, which fell in waves to his shoulders, was an inky black. Cole and Michael were twins and fairly close to being identical. They were thirty years old and six-foot one. Michael was a little more muscular than Cole and had blue eyes like Gabriel. All three brothers still lived in the Victorian and none of them were married. They were also werewolves, the last of their family line. Once they found their mates and started a family, the line would continue… providing there was at least one boy born. The women in the family could pass the gene to their children, but could not change into a wolf themselves.
Gabriel laid the woman on the bed. He stepped into the adjoining bathroom to get a warm wet rag and hand towel before sending Cole to the kitchen for a bowl of warm water. Judging from the blood coming from her head and soaking her shirt, they were going to need quite a bit of water to clean the blood and grime from her. It would be a shame for her to survive the crash only to die from an infection.
When Cole returned, he left the bowl with Gabriel and went upstairs to get one of his black cotton t-shirts and a pair of boxer shorts. The young woman was going to need something to sleep in since her clothes were torn and bloody. If he were completely honest with himself, he’d admit that he just didn’t want to see her wearing something of Gabriel’s or Michael’s. When he had seen Gabriel pick her up to carry her to the truck, he had fought the urge to growl at his brother. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he jogged back down the stairs and went back into the guest room.
Gabriel had already cleaned her face and bandaged the cut on her head. He was about to unbutton her shirt when he stopped. While he knew she had to be cleaned, he was a little hesitant to undress the unconscious woman. If she woke up while they were tending to her, she might freak out. Quite frankly, he wouldn’t blame her.
Cole sensed his dilemma. “Want me to call Cassie and see if she’ll come over?”
“It’s ten o’clock at night and she’s seven months pregnant. Do you think she’s still up? Or that Matt will let her come?”
The brothers had met Cassie at Whispering Lake, North Carolina about six years ago. Her boyfriend, who it turned out had once been a ghost, had shown up in the middle of Cole and Cassie making out. To this day, Cole still wondered what would have happened if Matt hadn’t interrupted them at that moment. Matt and Cassie had been married for almost six years now and had two kids with another one on the way. She seemed happy so everything had turned out as it should.
Cole was glad that she had found her happily ever after, but it didn’t make him any less lonely. Out of the three brothers, Cole was the only one who’d wanted to find his mate. He’d been ready to start a family for quite some time now. He hoped that the pull he felt toward their guest was an indication that his wish was finally going to come true. Deep in his gut, he knew she was his … but he wasn’t sure if he would be able to claim her without Gabriel’s approval, since he was their alpha.
“I don’t know, but I don’t feel right undressing this woman. Even if it is for medical reasons, it still seems wrong,” Cole replied. Once again, he wasn’t being completely honest. He himself didn’t have as much of a problem undressing her, but he didn’t want Gabriel to see her unclothed. It was bad enough his brother was touching her and tending to her wounds.
Gabriel sighed. “I know. Go ahead and call Cassie.”
Cole pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and called Cassie. Matt answered on the third ring.
“Hello.”
“Hey Matt, it’s Cole. I know it’s late, but is Cassie still awake?”
“Yeah, I think she’s raiding the freezer for ice cream,” Matt said wryly.
Cole grinned. “That sounds like Cassie. Would you mind bringing her over here? We have an emergency that requires a woman.”
“What’s going on,” Matt asked, his curiosity peaked.
“We found a woman in the woods. Her car went off the embankment and she’s badly injured and unconscious. Before she slipped into oblivion, she told Gabriel not to take her to the hospital.” He paused a moment, “I think she may be in trouble,” Cole replied, giving him the condensed version.
“I’ll get Cassie and we’ll be there in about fifteen minutes. The kids can stay with her parents tonight. They love any excuse to have the grandkids over so I’m sure they will be only too happy to help.”
“Thanks. And tell Cassie I’m sorry we’re dragging her out so late,” Cole replied.
Cole hung up the phone and turned to Gabriel. “He said they’d be here in fifteen minutes.”
“Good.” The tension visibly left Gabriel’s shoulders.
While Cole was on the phone, Gabriel had been looking at the woman on the bed. She looked underfed and like she hadn’t slept in a while. Her skin was so pale it was almost translucent and she had dark smudges under her eyes. She had long dark eyelashes, a small button nose and full lips. Her hair was a really dark brown and hung half way down her back. At the moment, it was full of dirt, twigs and blood, but there was no way to wash it while she was sleeping. She didn’t have any jewelry on, but there were marks on her wrists. Something about them disturbed Gabriel. There was no doubt in his mind that she was running from someone, probably a man who had harmed her in some way.
While he had waited on Cole in the woods, Gabriel had searched the woman’s car for a purse or luggage, but he hadn’t found anything. He had carefully searched her pockets, hoping to find some form of ID. She had to have been going somewhere in a hurry to have left everything behind. Was the car even hers? All of the clues were pointing toward an abusive relationship. He hoped he was wrong. Not only did he not want to think of this poor creature being abused by someone she trusted, but he really didn’t want to deal with an irate boyfriend or husband.
“Isn’t it a little odd for someone to travel out of state without luggage,” Cole asked.
“Something is definitely going on, but we won’t know what it is until she wakes up. I couldn’t even find a purse in the car,” Gabriel replied, keeping his suspicions to himself for the moment. He knew that if Cole thought for one moment the woman had been abused that he would glue himself to her side. Out of the three brothers, Cole was the most sensitive when it came to women.