Chapter 1
Maybe Bigfoot is watching me.
Abby Winchell had loved imagining that from the time she’d been old enough to wander alone on her grandfather’s property about thirty miles outside Portland. As she trudged through the early-morning mist, damp leaves squished under her hiking boots and the evergreens dripped in a steady, familiar rhythm. Otherwise the forest was quiet, but she kept her hand on the camera tucked inside her jacket pocket, just in case she saw something big and furry.
Ten days ago, after a lifetime of fruitless searching, Grandpa Earl Dooley had seen not one but
two
big furry creatures. A Bigfoot mated pair! But his evidence was maddeningly inconclusive. His single grainy shot could easily be a picture of two very tall hikers wearing hooded sweatshirts. Two exceedingly smelly hikers. Grandpa Earl claimed the stench had been overpowering, even from a hundred yards away.
While Earl had struggled to attach his zoom lens, the creatures had loped off. Earl’s arthritis had kept him from giving chase, and a heavy rain had washed out any footprints. That left Earl with only one bad picture to corroborate his story.
It had been enough for the Bigfoot faithful. Earl had made the trip to town and told everyone down at his favorite bar, Flannigan’s. News had spread quickly among the cryptozoology crowd. As happy as he’d been about finally realizing his dream of a Bigfoot sighting, Grandpa Earl hadn’t been all that pleased with the consequences.
With the exception of Abby, his family down in Arizona thought he was losing his marbles. Curiosity seekers had trespassed on his property. And his wealthy neighbors, the Gentrys, had flown in some big-deal NYU professor to label the sighting bogus. Having Dr. Roarke Wallace challenge Earl’s claim had cut down on the trespassers, but Abby’s grandfather smarted under the insinuation that he was either gullible or a nutcase.
Abby had volunteered to take a week off from her job as an insurance claims adjuster in Phoenix to check on Grandpa Earl. She’d promised the rest of the family that she’d convince him to sell the land and the general store with its attached living quarters so he could move to the desert, where his loved ones could keep an eye on him. He might have agreed to do it, too, now that he’d seen Bigfoot and possibly Bigfoot’s mate.
But that damned professor had gotten her grandfather’s back up and he wanted to prove the stuffed shirt wrong. Grandpa Earl was also convinced the Gentrys were smearing his reputation on purpose because they hoped he’d leave and then they could buy his land. He didn’t want to give them the satisfaction.
Abby didn’t blame him. The Gentrys had been trying to buy out the Dooleys for at least seventy years. Both pieces of property backed up to a wilderness area, so if the Gentrys got Grandpa Earl’s land, they’d be sitting on one of the most secluded private estates around.
And the Gentrys loved their seclusion. She could imagine how horrified those high-brows must have been to hear about the Bigfoot sighting. Flying in a PhD from some Eastern school fit the Gentry mentality. No doubt the guy was a condescending jerk.
The Gentrys were like royalty in Portland, and as a kid Abby had often climbed a rocky promontory on Dooley land because it provided a view of the obnoxiously huge Gentry mansion. She decided to do that again this morning for old-time’s sake. The estate was off-limits to all but a select few, so spying on them had always appealed to her sense of mischief.
Other than this view from the promontory, the heavily wooded estate couldn’t be seen except from the air. A tall iron gate at the main road barred anyone from driving up to the mansion unannounced, and a sheer rock wall dropped fifty feet below the promontory. The steep cliff continued along the property line for about half a mile, neatly dividing Gentry land from Dooley land.
Grandpa Earl’s property ended at a rushing stream that tumbled over the cliff in a beautiful waterfall. The far side of the stream marked the beginning of the wilderness area. That’s where Grandpa Earl had spotted the Bigfoot pair.
Abby was puffing by the time she reached the top of the outcropping, which meant she’d spent too much time sitting at a desk lately. Looking across to Gentry land, she noticed lazy curls of smoke rising from two of the Gentry mansion’s six chimneys. Trees hid a good part of the building, giving it an air of mystery.
Abby trained her camera on the mansion and zoomed in to admire the stonework and the massive bulk of the place. Surely a family this powerful wouldn’t sabotage some old guy’s reputation in order to get what they wanted. They already had plenty of holdings in the Portland area.
Standing on the rocky outcropping looking down at the mansion, she wondered why the Dooley land was so important to the Gentrys. Maybe they knew something Grandpa Earl didn’t, like the presence of mineral deposits. Or what if the prize was this very spot? What if they hated the idea that someone could watch them from here?
Fascinated by that thought, Abby began scanning with her zoom to evaluate how much she could see of the place. A cherry-red Corvette convertible sat in the circular cobblestone drive, but no people were around. Slowly she panned toward the back of the house, with its formal gardens, neatly trimmed hedges, and a large collection of marble statuary. As she did, she caught movement in the trees.
Focusing on that spot strained the limits of her little camera, but she managed to identify what looked like a large dog. It behaved more like a wild animal than a domestic dog, though, as it glided through the trees. A coyote, maybe? No, it was too big, and its coat was an unusual pale blond.
The body shape reminded her of a wolf, but that was impossible. There were no wolves on the west coast of Oregon, and even if one had somehow migrated over here, it wouldn’t be this color. She’d heard of white wolves, but not blond ones. Knowing the Gentrys, the animal could be some sort of exotic hybrid.
Grandpa Earl wouldn’t be happy if the Gentrys had decided to keep dogs on their property. Her grandfather and great-grandfather had always avoided adopting any because they didn’t want dogs around to scare off Bigfoot. In all her visits to her grandfather’s place, she’d never heard the sound of barking dogs coming from the Gentry estate, either.
She snapped a couple of pictures, even though she knew they wouldn’t be very clear. Grandpa Earl would want to know about this. Maybe the wolf-dog was another tactic to annoy him.
As she considered that, she deleted the pictures. No sense in stirring up her grandfather even more. That wouldn’t fit with the plan that was gradually forming in her mind.
Much as she’d love her grandfather to stick it to the Gentrys and stay on the land for another ten or fifteen years, that wasn’t in his best interest. His arthritis wouldn’t bother him nearly as much in Arizona and she sensed that Grandma Olive’s death a year ago had left him lonelier than he’d admit.
Therefore she needed to contact the stuffed-shirt anthropology professor and convince him to change his tactics. If the professor would support Earl’s belief in Bigfoot instead of challenging it, everyone might get what they wanted. Grandpa Earl would relax, sell his land, and move to Arizona, and the Gentrys would get her grandfather’s property. Grandpa Earl said the professor was staying with the Gentrys. But Abby didn’t relish driving up to the gate in Grandpa Earl’s ancient pickup with the battered camper shell on the back and asking for admittance to the estate. Too demeaning. But she was a member of Rotary Club International, so she could attend their meeting today at a hotel in Portland, where the guest speaker just happened to be Dr. Roarke Wallace.
Taking one last look through her camera’s viewfinder, she was startled to notice that the blond animal was staring at her. Then he wheeled and ran into the trees, moving with a fluid grace that looked far more wild and wolflike than doglike.
What in hell had she seen down there?
Damn it.
Roarke hadn’t seen her until the last minute, but he was positive she’d seen him. Seeking thicker cover, he prayed he hadn’t caused a problem. At home in upstate New York he could roam the isolated property without fear of discovery and he’d made the mistake of thinking he could do the same here. No wonder Cameron Gentry wanted the Dooley property with its rocky overlook of the Gentry estate.
Irving Gentry, the alpha who’d bought this land in the early 1900s, obviously hadn’t been the brightest bulb in the chandelier. There was some evidence that Irving had enjoyed his whiskey a little too much. That might explain why he’d purchased this low-lying acreage with a vantage point right next door.
The woman standing on the rocks hadn’t been worried about being seen. Anyone with hair that red would have to wear a stocking cap if she expected to sneak around. He didn’t think she was into sneaking. With luck she was a tourist trespassing on Dooley land in an attempt to find Bigfoot, and a canine creature wouldn’t interest her.
Roarke made sure the woman was gone before he loped back through the formal gardens and headed for the tunnel entrance into the mansion. Whoever had devised this entrance had been a werewolf genius. A fake piece of granite swiveled at the touch of a paw, allowing Roarke to enter a tunnel.
Once inside the tunnel, Roarke took the branch that led to a stone stairway. Bounding up those steps, he nudged open a revolving panel and was standing in his guest room. All the bedrooms had the same arrangement, which allowed Weres to enter and leave without having to navigate doors and locks.
Stretching out on the bedroom’s antique Aubusson rug, Roarke shifted to human form before hitting the shower. In moments he was downstairs for the breakfast being served buffet-style in the immense dining hall.
Cameron, the pack alpha, was the only member of the Gentry family sitting at the table. A slim man who was beginning to gray at the temples, he looked every inch the aristocrat. As a wolf, though, he had more trouble looking noble. Most Weres were powerfully built with luxurious coats, but Cameron shifted into a scrawny wolf with dull gray fur and a furtive look in his brown eyes.
Come to think of it, he had a furtive look as a human, too. The way he lingered over his coffee and darted glances at Roarke suggested he’d stayed in the dining room in order to give his guest the third degree. Roarke wished Cameron good morning and headed for the sideboard loaded with food. He was starving.
“The surveillance cameras picked you up this morning,” Cameron said. “Find anything?”
“Unfortunately, no.” Roarke considered telling Cameron about the woman and decided against it. Cameron was already paranoid about the overlook and seemed willing to do almost anything to get his hands on that property and eliminate the potential security risk.
That was one of the reasons Roarke was here—to make Earl Dooley look like a fool in hopes that he’d decide to sell out and leave town. In the Were community, Roarke was an expert on megafauna cryptids such as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster, but in his university career he was known as a prominent myth buster. The good people of Portland would take his word that Earl’s sighting was bogus.
It hadn’t been, of course, and Roarke had also agreed to quietly track down the Sasquatch mated pair and relocate them out of Were territory. Gentry didn’t fancy having Bigfoot seekers tramping around the countryside anywhere near his estate. More people increased the likelihood that someone would accidentally learn that werewolves lived here.
Roarke hadn’t warmed to Cameron, unfortunately. The Were had a ruthless streak, a dangerous trait in a pack alpha. But he was now the guy in charge, having taken over from his father, Gerald. Gerald and his mate, Tabitha, had moved up to Alaska, where Gerald could indulge in his fishing hobby.
Roarke thought Gerald would have been a whole lot easier to deal with than Cameron. Now that Roarke understood his host’s lack of empathy, he planned to make sure that the Sasquatch pair was relocated far away from Cameron Gentry.
Roarke respected the Sasquatch tribe and wanted these two moved to safety without incident. He was afraid Cameron just wanted them gone and would choose the most expedient method. Roarke wasn’t about to have Sasquatch blood on his conscience.
Cameron drained his coffee cup and stood, shoving back his chair. It moved smoothly on the polished oak floor. “You’re at the Rotary Club today, right?”
“Right.” Roarke found the lectures increasingly difficult to give. When Cameron had called asking for his help, he’d thought busting the myth of Bigfoot wouldn’t bother him even though he knew damned well the creatures existed. If a werewolf pack was in danger of being discovered by Bigfoot-happy trespassers, Roarke was happy to fly to the rescue.
But he was a teacher at heart, and dispensing false information, even to keep people from discovering that a werewolf pack owned half of Portland, was distasteful. Because of his degrees and his position at NYU, his audiences tended to believe everything that came out of his mouth. He deliberately enhanced his scholarly image by wearing plaid vests, a bow tie, and corduroy jackets with elbow patches.
The outfit was an Indiana Jones kind of cliché, but it inspired confidence in his scholarly opinions. Dressed in his professorial duds, he looked less like a college quarterback—which he’d been ten years ago—and more like a man with multiple degrees.