Page 1 of Hunted Mate (Stalked Mates #1)

C alista

“They’re real. They’re real and I’m going to prove it.”

I mutter to myself. I have in my arms the evidence I need to put together the final pieces of my exposé on a subject that is going to blow the minds of every person in the world. Aliens are nothing on what I know to be true.

Hart Press

I carry a stack of boxes under the red sign that has been there for well over a hundred years. I am the last in a long line of newspaper men and women, the sole heir of the Hart fortune.

Some people think that makes me lucky. It doesn’t. Others think it makes me rich. They’re right about that. I technically own this paper, and a whole lot more besides, but I don’t run it, and most people forget I matter at all.

That’s how I like it. I am not trying to draw attention to myself.

I grew up getting more than enough of that.

These days, I focus on my research. My mission.

I have known something that the rest of the world thinks is a story for years now.

I have seen things that people simply refuse to believe when I tell them.

But I’m going to prove once and for all that were?—

“Argh!”

My foot hits something I didn’t see behind the big stack of stuff I was attempting to get into the building. I trip forward, file boxes flying out of my hands as my papers fly up in a cascade of evidence and chaos, filling the air with a torrent of intel.

“Easy, tiger!” Before I can hit the floor along with the rest of my things, I am caught in the strong arms of Gray Walkirk. He’s thirty-five years old, has thick, dark curling hair. deep blue eyes, and a broad smile that makes every woman’s heart flutter.

He’s the editor of Hart Press. I was on the committee that hired him a year ago.

I assume he’s been doing a good job since then.

Print is a hard business, and journalism is curling up on itself like a dead spider.

But Gray has managed to keep the lights on.

Now he’s managed to save me from smashing my face into the polished concrete floor, too. What a versatile hire.

He smiles at me with laughing eyes. I blink the tears of humiliation I reflexively feel out of mine.

It’s one thing to embarrass myself dropping things and having to scrabble around picking them up.

It’s something even worse to cry like a toddler who fell over as well.

I remind myself that Harts are strong, and the urge to whimper evaporates.

“You’ve got to be careful, Ms. Hart,” he says.

“Call me Calista,” I say, flustered. He’s handsome, and more than ten years older than me.

“Calista,” he says, straightening my blazer for me, giving it a quick shrug down my front. “Are you okay? Nothing twisted?”

“No. Please, could you help me pick up these papers?”

He crouches down with me and helps me collect my documents. I stuff as many as possible into the boxes that are on the floor and I hope that not everything is out of order.

“Still doing your unicorn research, Calista?” Gray asks me the question indulgently, almost like he’s talking to a little girl. I think he’s doing it on purpose. Everybody knows about my pet project. Most of them have the grace to not mock me directly to my face.

I look into his eyes and see a teasing smile on his face. He is messing with me, and he’s looking hot as hell doing it. He has dimples on prominent display as he gives me that charming grin.

“It’s not unicorns. It’s werewolves,” I say quite seriously.

I know he thinks it’s a joke, but it isn’t.

I have to be serious about this, so other people take me seriously.

“There are people who have a genetic mutation that allows them to take animal forms. Wolves, specifically. It’s a story that’s been told thousands of times over thousands of years, in hundreds of cultures.

I know it sounds crazy, but it’s actually crazier to not pay attention, if you think about it. ”

Gray smiles at me in a way I can only describe as indulgent.

He doesn’t interrupt me, or roll his eyes.

He thinks I’m crazy, I know. Or eccentric.

You get to be eccentric when your parents die when you’re thirteen and leave you an inheritance that includes multiple companies and bank accounts with more zeroes than most people will see in a lifetime.

“I’m sure you know what you’re doing,” he says. He glances down at his watch. He’s still wears a watch. That’s old-fashioned as hell. “I’m sorry, Ms. Hart. I have to get to a meeting.”

He hands me a sheaf of paper. “Here you go. Be careful going down those stairs, okay?”

I think he’s chuckling to himself and shaking his head as he walks away.

For a minute there, I thought maybe there was a crackle of chemistry between us.

He’s devastatingly handsome. And he is smart.

There’s just something about him, even in his tidy suits…

it’s a kind of animal intensity that makes me feel drawn to him.

Or maybe it’s just the way his biceps are clearly visible under his suit jacket.

It’s just a stupid crush, I tell myself. He’s not interested in me. Men like Gray have everybody from the tea lady to newsreaders lusting after them. He’s spoiled for choice, and I’m just the mousy, bookish little heiress with the weird fixation on imaginary creatures.

When men are rich, women chase them. When women are rich, most men feel inadequate. Except for the obviously predatory ones and I’m smart enough to stay clear of guys who want to date for financial reasons. That means I don’t date anyone.

Blushing, and entirely embarrassed, I get all my stuff together and make my exit. Most people head for the elevators and go up to their offices. I take the stairs at the side that most people wouldn’t even notice, and I go down to the basement.

It’s better this way.

Though yes, my mom was the paper’s editor before me, and yes, my name on the building carries weight, I haven’t kept up the vibes expected of a Hart.

I should be wearing a power suit of some kind.

Shoulder pads, maybe. My mom always wore shoulder pads, long after they went out of any kind of fashion.

She toned them down, but she kept the style.

I have a memory of her smiling, her hair blowing in her face as we hot-air ballooned over the Mojave. My parents were always taking me on the most adventurous vacations. When I was small, I used to think they were invincible. Actually, I thought we were all invincible. Life has taught me otherwise.

If I came in here, dressed up, made up, looking like a force of intellectual nature, I’d feel like I was a little kid in my mom’s shoes.

She was the heiress to the Hart fortune before me, and she did so much good in the world.

My father was always by her side, protecting her, looking after her, making sure she ate.

Making sure we both ate, actually. Since I lost them, I’ve been okay, but not really good.

I tell myself that the basement is better than any other location in the building.

I could have the big top floor office if I wanted, but that’s for the boss, and I’m not one for running things.

I like the freedom to make my own choices, and you can’t do that when you’re in a giant fishbowl.

Gray can keep his office. I have my den.

I push down the first flight of stairs, then through another door that leads to my area specifically. The big office at the top of the building has nothing on the spaciousness I’ve got underground. There is so much room for activities.

I have boxes and boxes of files stacked all around the room.

A lot of them come from other people who were looking into stories about werewolves and who gave up, or were shamed into doing so.

I am well aware that trying to prove the existence of wolf-shifting people puts me in the same camp as people looking for Bigfoot or wanting to have sex with Moth Man.

Both respectable points of view as far as I’m concerned.

Just because something is weird doesn’t mean it is wrong.

My shoulder twinges under the weight of the boxes I’m carrying down to join their kin.

I’m not really supposed to lift heavy weights.

No more than fifty pounds, the physiotherapist says.

I’ve been doing my exercises religiously for years, but the injury that weakened my shoulder never seems to heal internally.

She used to think I was lying when I told her I was doing my rehab exercises.

Maybe she still does. Ultrasounds reveal I have deep tissue damage that just doesn’t want to heal.

This might make it worse for a few days, but it’s worth it.

I am assembling a true mountain of evidence to prove that there really are wolf shifters in this world.

They’re not legends, they’re not stories made up by drunk people, they’re not part of some made-up mythology.

They’re as real as every other unavoidable thing in this world, like microwaves and taxes.

It sounds crazy, but when you really look into it, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that there really are wolf shifters, which has all kinds of implications.

An entire society of people who are also animals, who must entertain the instincts and impulses of beasts while still somehow fitting into human society—or not.

It is my theory, backed by my research, that wolf shifters used to live in remote tribal areas, but over time, as habitat loss affected all species, many of them have made their way into mainstream society.

I put the boxes down and pick up the files on the top.

These are clippings and eyewitness testimonies from a whole slew of people who are certain they’ve interacted with wolf shifters in the last five years.

It would be better to make contact with an actual shifter.

My research indicates I’ve probably done so several times and not had any idea.