she stood a little taller, and in a calmer voice than she'd thought she could muster, she asked, "could you... give me your phone number? i've got to talk to my girlfriend. i'll have to confirm that we don't have any other plans."

even though she wasn't an undercover-spy kind of girl, what if she could get into his house and learn something? maybe he'd reveal something that he wouldn't tell anyone else.

she was trying to keep this professional without turning him off or getting in over her head, so she hoped her attempt would work.

"drinks?" the woman said shrilly, her scowl growing even more rabid. it really wasn't becoming. "with her?"

sal ignored the woman, fished a business card out of a gold card holder, and wrote on the back. his private number, shelley thought.

duncan would give her hell for even speaking with the man, she figured. and even more for taking sal's business card instead of immediately saying she wasn't interested. but she had called duncan, and he hadn't answered his phone. so what was she supposed to do?

sal must have assumed she'd throw aside any plans she'd had because he said, "i'll have a limo pick you up at seven tonight."

"if you'll give me the address, i'll drop by... if i can make it. but i'll let you know one way or another."

he seemed more amused than perturbed at her reluctance to fall at his feet. he had to know that had to do with her being a wolf. he might even be considering that shelley wouldn't like his girlfriend tagging along.

he confirmed that when he said, "lola will be going out for the night."

lola glowered at him, her lips parted in shock. before she could say a word, he bowed his head a little to shelley, a gentlemanly wolf's way of bidding her good-bye, and then quickly pulled lola past shelley before the woman started spitting fire.

"what do you mean i'm going out for the night? you didn't even ask what her name was. did you know her? what if i don't want to go out for the night? you can't do this to me!"

he could and he would. that's the kind of man he was. loyal only to himself, shelley thought.

"be quiet," he snapped at lola under his breath. the threat in his tone said that if lola didn't obey him, she'd be out on her ear, flying home at the earliest convenience.

the woman didn't say another word, apparently getting the message loud and clear, and shelley wondered if sal had given her an ultimatum before. girlfriends were replaceable.

shelley was still thoroughly rattled, partly because she'd met the monster duncan wanted to take down, but also because sal wanted to get to know her better. she couldn't think about plants or writing notes or taking pictures as she stared at the path where sal had disappeared with the woman who appeared to be closer to a daughter's age than a girlfriend's.

when shelley's phone rang, she stifled a cry of surprise. she pulled out the phone and looked at the caller id. duncan. what if sal had heard her phone ringing? could hear everything she said?

she hurried away in the opposite direction from the one sal and his girlfriend had taken toward the trailhead. she didn't hear them any longer, but she still was worried that sal might be watching and listening to her conversation while he made lola stand silently with him in the forest.

"hello," shelley said to duncan, her voice quieter than it would have been normally, but she knew duncan could hear her anyway. she just hoped sal couldn't.

"shelley, what kind of cryptic message was that?" duncan asked, sounding somewhat perturbed. "i told you i don't know anything about plants, and..."

"this one you'd want to see. but it's too late. don't come to pick me up now. i've got more work to do." what else could she say? his target was here? come now? by the time he got here, sal would be gone.

"i wasn't scheduled to pick you up for another hour and a half." duncan sounded slightly incredulous.

she wasn't getting through to him, but she didn't want to blurt out that salisbury silverman was here. particularly since she shouldn't have known his last name, and he might be listening down the path.

"oh, the dinner cruise," she said, as if duncan had just told her he was taking her on one, and she'd forgotten all about it. she knew that was not going to go over well with duncan, who wouldn't know what the hell she was talking about. but she had to have a cover if sal was within hearing distance.

"what dinner cruise?" duncan sounded thoroughly confused and a little cross.

play along, damn it.

shelley sighed. "i thought we were going tomorrow night. i guess i got my nights mixed up. okay, let me know if you can reschedule for tomorrow night. if not, i'll just have to say no to having drinks at the estate of..." she paused, reading the back of the business card with sal's name and a personal phone number scrawled on it and then flipping it over to the front to see a firm's name, address, website, and phone number in expensive gold lettering. "salisbury silverton of malicon investments."

she didn't know if that was a faux name for the guy's business or not, since warrants were out for his arrest and surely he wouldn't pass out cards like that to just anyone. maybe he hadn't had time to make new business cards that would conceal his beleaguered investment firm and figured she'd be too clueless to know he was a bad guy. that would have been the case if duncan hadn't told her about him. she hadn't heard of the name of the man's investment company, and he might use several as fronts for his scheming.

dead silence filled the air waves. that's when she assumed that duncan recognized the name of the firm or the other name sal was using.

"i'm coming to get you." duncan's voice was so dark that she envisioned him wearing a kilt and with a claymore at his back as he rushed to the reserve.

this couldn't be good.

"no! i'm not through cataloging plants!" she couldn't allow duncan to run into the man right here in the reserve, even though at first she'd thought it might be a good idea. now she was thinking it might be better if they somehow strung the guy along and duncan could see him alone, instead of with a human woman clinging to his arm who could serve as a witness to anything that might occur between duncan and sal.

"is he still there, damn it?" duncan was so angry that she figured he was barely thinking straight.

"most likely. pick me up later like we had planned. i still have tons of work to do. all right?"

she just hoped she could get her mind back on her work. she doubted she could. she'd wanted to relish every delectable moment of describing every detail and taking pictures of every new specimen of plant, hoping she might discover one to test and learn if it could have an effect on werewolves' ability to shape-shift. but instead, she was going to be thinking of duncan and how angry he was. she envisioned him pacing across the villa, ready to kill sal for even speaking with her.

"all right?" she repeated, having to get his agreement.

shelley could just see the two men running into each other, ditching their clothes, and shifting. she assumed duncan would win because he was a warrior at heart. sal was a businessman who destroyed lives through investment fraud, but physically he couldn't beat duncan. and sal's girlfriend? well, hell, shelley would have to take care of lola once she saw the two men shift into wolves.

humans who saw a werewolf shift had only two choices-death or joining the werewolves. in good conscience, she couldn't add a woman like that to their ranks. the woman could easily give their kind away if she was turned. and the fake boobs would have to go. genetically when the werewolf kind shifted, they became all wolf or all human. but if a human had fake components like implants, shelley was certain the silicon wouldn't dissolve with the change. a wolf with silicon implants was sure to cause a stir.

not that killing a woman was anything shelley wanted to do, either. that's what she was hoping to avoid.

"all right?" she said again, not wanting to say duncan's name out loud in case sal was listening. if she could, she would have said his name in a firm and commanding way, wanting to shake him out of his angry haze. if he had a middle name, she would have used it, too.

"i'll call you as soon as i get there." then he hung up on her.

her mouth open, she stared at the phone and swore under her breath. he did not just hang up on her.

okay, so she knew he was the kind of man who set his own rules, but she thought the plan she'd devised made sense. he should have listened to her. he was so angry that he wasn't thinking clearly.

trying to overcome her own discomfiture and feeling as though sal was lurking behind every massive, ancient tree, she began taking pictures and documenting the plants again, her heart in her throat as she made her way to a huge, yellow mastic tree with roots stretching across the path.

she tried to pretend the world couldn't come crashing down around her ears if the two men tangled as wolves.

shelley had thought duncan would be trouble if he stayed with her?

hell, how had this happened? he'd been checking out silverman's house again, discovering four doberman guard dogs and two men roaming the place along with a couple of gardeners. all of the men were human, which was a blessing. they couldn't spot him in the dark of night, and they couldn't smell him if the breeze blew in his favor. his survey of the staff seemed to confirm that silverman surrounded himself with humans. probably because wolves would have known how risky stealing fortunes from wealthy families would be.

this time, duncan had joined others at the beach near silverman's house, swimming with several people of different ages-older men and women, teens, and children-so he looked like one of the tourists. many were walking along the beach and looking at the large estates. he was walking with some of them when he checked his phone messages and realized shelley must have called while he was swimming.