Read Mate Marked: Shifters of Silver Peak for Free Online Page A

she’d whacked with her purse the day before.
    “He’s the Alpha of a gypsy pack which is camping out on our territory. There’s a warrant for his arrest that’s been sent to us from a shifter territory in Colorado, for grand theft auto. You’ve got to serve the warrant, bring him in and personally take him to Colorado,” the mayor said to her shoes, since he couldn’t meet her eyes.
    So that hadn’t been a band poster the teenager had defaced. It had been a wanted poster. Awesome.
    “Aren’t they trespassing, if they’re on your territory?” she asked, looking at the poster with dismay. “Couldn’t you have them all forcibly evicted?”
    He sighed. “Technically, no. Gypsy packs can occupy land on any shifter territory for up to six months.”
    “What happened to the last Silver Peak sheriff?” she demanded ominously.
    A long, drawn-out pause and much foot-shuffling and fidgeting indicated that she really wasn’t going to like the answer.
    “Mayor Winkleman. While I’m still young, please.”
    “He tried to arrest Roman, and Roman broke his nose.”
    “What happened to the Silver Peak Alpha?” she continued, although she really didn’t want to know.
    “Roman knocked him unconscious, put a dunce cap on his head and left him on the town hall steps.”
    “And the beta?”
    “It had been raining a lot. Roman literally dragged him through the mud and ruined his clothing and sent him running back to town.”
    “Why did the last mayor quit?”
    “Roman came into town to go shopping and the mayor tried to tell him he couldn’t until he took care of the warrant and Roman gave him an atomic wedgie and hung him from a flagpole.”
    “And, you think I can arrest him.” She stared at him stonily.
    “I saw how you handled him with that kid!” he said. “And you’re female. I’ve never heard of him striking a woman. So you can probably arrest him without getting beaten up or killed. Maybe. Almost certainly.”
    Erika shot him a look of disgust.
    “Do not hit him again,” Chelsea said to Erika, who was balling her fists. “Can you go check on Pepper, please?”
    “Fine,” Erika sighed, and headed off to Chelsea’s office.
    “Has he killed anyone?” Chelsea asked the mayor.
    “Well, a few Death Matches here and there, plus someone who came in guns blazing to try to arrest him and shot and injured one of his pack members. But that idiot didn’t use a silver bullet, so of course he didn’t stand a chance against them. We can give you silver bullets. I was going to give you ’til tomorrow to get settled in and then stop by with an assortment of weapons for you to use.”
    “I don’t suppose you’ve called in the Council for Shifter Affairs on this?”
    The mayor grimaced in distaste. “Good God, no.”
    Not surprising. No shifter called in the council unless it was a last resort.
    In an instance of serious shifter versus human crime, or vice versa, the council would be called in, but when it came to shifters having problems with other shifters, that was left entirely to the respective tribes and packs and prides. A shifter had to obey the laws of whatever pack he or she belonged to, and if they visited another pack, they had to obey those laws.
    “The council’s already been out here enough recently,” he added, wincing in disgust.
    “So they know about Roman’s pack?” Chelsea asked.
    Mayor Winkleman shook his head. “No, no, it’s just that sheep have been disappearing from the Rodgers Ranch for the last few months, fences torn down, and there were wolf paw prints in the area. Our pack lands border the ranch. Mitch Rodgers, the ranch owner, has been lobbying to have a couple hundred acres of our property annexed, because he says that our pack members are the ones killing his sheep. He claims he needs the land as a buffer between his property and ours.”
    At her look of surprise, he added, “It’s odd. He’s never had problems with us before. I mean, we don’t associate with the