One Night With a Billionaire - By VickiLewis Thompson Page 0,45

dedicate himself to protecting the Were legacy. Because he believed that Were-human mating threatened that legacy, he had been opposed to it ever since.

Unfortunately, prominent werewolves had already mated with humans. Worse yet, two of them were from the historic Wallace pack. So far those humans had not revealed the existence of werewolves, but some Weres believed the time had come to end the secrecy. Jake viewed that as a recipe for disaster.

During last fall’s WereCon2012 in Denver, a newly formed governing body called the Worldwide Organization of Werewolves, or WOW, had tackled the issue. To Jake’s disappointment, they’d left it open to interpretation by individual Weres. Although Jake had been an elected WOW board member, the group’s liberal stance had forced him to resign. He’d founded WARM and had cut back on his wilderness guiding while he rallied support for his cause.

Meanwhile, Rachel Miller’s career had skyrocketed, and her trademark was the wolf. Not just any wolf, either. Her name had become synonymous with carvings of a particular wolf—one that looked just like his carving. One that looked almost exactly like Jake when he shifted.

Any Were who’d seen him in wolf form and also knew Rachel’s work had remarked on the similarities. She’d captured the shape of the eyes and the faint diamond pattern on his forehead, created by a soft mixture of gray and black. Humans might think that all wolves looked alike, but Weres recognized even subtle distinctions. Rachel’s wolves all resembled Jake.

He’d seen the speculation in the eyes of his fellow Weres. No doubt they wondered if he’d been careless enough to accidentally let Rachel photograph him in wolf form, or, even more damning, if she knew him this well because he’d had a relationship with her. No one had accused him of anything . . . yet.

If and when they did, he could honestly say Rachel’s wolf wasn’t him. At first he’d thought it was, too. But after the initial shock, he’d examined the carving more closely. True, it looked very much like him, but it looked even more like his father.

No doubt Rachel had worked from a picture of Benjamin Hunter in wolf form. She wouldn’t have had to try very hard to get the photo, either. During his parents’ summer trips to Alaska from Idaho, his father had chafed against the midnight sun, which robbed him of concealing darkness. He’d taken his nightly runs in defiance of Jake’s warnings, gallivanting through the forest surrounding Polecat Lake as if discovery didn’t matter.

It mattered a lot. Alaska’s native wolves weren’t nearly as large and magnificent as those found in a Were pack. Sightings of unusually large wolves might arouse the interest of wildlife experts, and if they ever managed to capture and tag a werewolf . . . Jake didn’t even want to think about that. But Benjamin Hunter had been a headstrong Were determined to get his exercise.

On the day Jake had bought the carving, he hadn’t been able to lecture his father about his carelessness because Benjamin and Daphne had been killed in an avalanche during a skiing trip the previous winter. As their only offspring, Jake had inherited all their considerable wealth. He was prepared to spend most of it in support of WARM.

He’d hoped his dedication to that cause would sidetrack his interest in Rachel, and to some extent it had. Traveling to gather support kept him away from Polecat Lake for long stretches of time. It also brought him into contact with eligible Were females, and theoretically that should have helped, too. Instead he still yearned for Rachel.

Fortunately she was gone a lot, as well. Ted had mentioned that she preferred to meet with clients on their turf rather than bringing them to Polecat. Jake admired her desire to preserve her privacy and that of her neighbors. There wasn’t much he didn’t like about Rachel.

Summer nights like this, when they both happened to be home, severely tested his resolve to avoid her. The everlasting twilight meant he could easily see her place from any back window, and he could hear her working into the night, especially when she used the bench saw.

To keep himself from going crazy, he’d developed a routine. If the urge to be near her became overpowering, he’d shift into wolf form. Carefully navigating the perimeter of the lake, he’d creep close enough to breathe in her intoxicating scent, a mix of almond lotion and human female. He’d count the visit a success if he caught a