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“Where do you thinkyou’regoing? You’re supposed to stay with the vehicle. Especially after wrecking mine.”

“Are you going to charge me with hit and run? I’m on a mission, and it can’t wait.”

“An important mission? More imperative than getting out of here?”

“Yeah.” She trudged up to the road, opened her hatchback, took some items out, and brought them down to where he was sitting in the snow. She set the first aid kit on the snow beside him and wrapped an emergency blanket around his shoulders.

“You know how they say people walk for miles in a blizzard like this and are found frozen to death some days later.” He didn’t want her to try to reach civilization to get him help. It would be too dangerous.

Though she didn’t exactly tell him thatwasher mission.

“Okay, look, you know I’m FBI. What you don’t know is that I must reach a cabin located in a northerly direction from here, where a kidnapped woman might be held hostage. It’s only about four miles from here, and I’ll get there on foot.”

Now,thatrevelation shocked the hell out of him. “All right, find me a sturdy stick.”

“What? To use as a cane? To go with me? No way. You’ll slow me down.”

“How’s your shooting stance with one hand out of commission and your back hurting like crazy? This is non-negotiable. I’m your backup.”

She frowned at him every bit as much as he scowled at her.

There was no way he would let her do this by herself. “What about your fellow agents?”

“We’re spread so thin as it is, and then this storm hit. I was the closest one to the location.”

“Same with our troopers.”

“Exactly. Pierre said the kidnapper told him not to tell anyone or he would kill her.”

“Then why would he tell you?”

“Because I’ve saved kidnapped victims without getting them killed. Pierre knows me and heard about me being close by on another case I had just resolved. It was on the news.”

“I’ve been busy, so I haven’t seen the news.” Determined to make this work, he needed a walking stick to help support his weight on his injured ankle. “All right. Could you find me a stick? I’m going with you.”

She grunted and stomped through the woods nearby. “Finding a sturdy branch to help you walk will be impossible, as much as the snow has piled up. Fine,damn it.” She stripped off her clothes again.

Even though shifters were used to shifting in front of others, that was mostly if they’d grown up together. She irked him fiercely yet simultaneously ignited a fire in his loins.

The first time he’d met her, she’d been annoyed with him for offering to help her change her tire when she knew how to do it without any problem. Until she realized he was a fellow bear.

She was from Anchorage, which was the end of any real beginning of a relationship, though he’d sure been interested in seeing her further. Not to mention, she was dating some guy then, making him wonder if she still was.

Her human form blurred into a polar bear again so fast it was hard to capture the change with the human eye. She stood up on her hind legs and, with her left paw, swatted a branch so hard that she knocked it clean off the tree.

She grabbed the branch with her teeth, carried it to him, dropped it before him, and waited.

He suspected she wanted him to try it out before she shifted again and dressed in this cold weather, which was the only way to do this. He got to his knees and used the branch to help him stand, and it snapped in two. He wrenched his injured ankle, groaned, and dropped back to his knees.

She growled.

“Fine.I’llget a branch that works.” He was going with her no matter what, and he could knock off branches with his bear paw, just as she could. However, standing upright could be a problem.

She huffed, turned around, and headed for another tree.

While she was looking for a stronger branch, he struggled to get his boot off before it constricted the blood in his swollen ankle. He began wrapping his ankle with an ace bandage from the first aid kit. Then he found a plastic bag to secure around his foot, perfect for keeping it dry, but he needed something more to keep it warm when they hiked to the cabin.

Another branch snapped, and he glanced toward the sound, figuring Monica had knocked off another branch. Hopefully, it would be a much sturdier one.