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“So you could meet people?  So you could start to live a little?  Well, darling, you can start with Luc tomorrow.  You’re not marrying the guy, you’re just going on a tour of New York City with him.  You haven’t seen most of the sights yourself and I’ll be with you so there’s nothing to worry about, right?”
    Laurie wasn’t so sure she could agree with Julie’s assessment. 
    Enrique watched as the two women got up and walked toward the nightclub’s entrance, finally disappearing into the crowd.
    “She’ s the one, Enrique,” Luzaro said as he, too, watched the women leave.  He wanted to take her now, to make her his own.  He didn’t like having to wait.  “Make arrangements for us to leave for home next week.  She’ll be going with us.”

C hapte r S even
     
     
    T here is nothing sadder than to see an entire family wading across the river, small children perched on the shoulders of the adult men, as they struggle across the Rio Grande in their search of a better life.
                  Jake Wolfe cursed as he watched the family struggle to get across the river, led by a coyote that he knew and loathed.  He’d been waiting for a chance to confront and dispose of this particular monster.  His only regret was that it was going to be done in front of the children in this family.  Life was hard enough for the crossers and Jake had already determined that he wouldn’t turn this group over to the Border Control authorities.  He’d make sure they turned back toward Mexico, even though he knew they would most likely try the crossing again.  He only hoped that the next crossing wouldn’t cost this family their lives.
                  Arturo Mendoza sniffed the air for danger like the coyote he was.  He’d heard tales of a wolf pack that roamed the area but had never encountered any of them.  He considered himself lucky as they were said to dispose of his kind in a rather ruthless manner. 
    Arturo was slim and wiry, his skin deeply tanned and leathery from years of exposure to the harsh desert climate.  He was known to be cunning and ruthless, leading many of the immigrants into the desert and leaving them there to die.  He often laughed at the naivety of the crossers and their lack of knowledge of American geography.  He could lead them as little as five miles north of the border and they believed that the I-8 was just ahead. 
    You’ve led your last group of crossers .   Jake snarled from his vantage point overlooking the river.  Painlessly the change took him over, stretching his limbs, feeling the wolf’s power in his arms and legs.  His face elongated into a muzzle and his canines lengthened until they became razor sharp deadly weapons.  A double coat of unrelieved black pelt spread over his skin until he stood a predator in tune with the fierceness of the desert and the rolling grasslands he called home.  Jake watched his adversary, his stone cold blue eyes unwavering in their intensity as the coyote strode through the shallow water near shore, fifty feet ahead of the family struggling through the deeper water behind him. 
    Jake was by himself tonight Taggert being down with a cold and Rand checking the northern boundaries of the Altar Valley for a group of crossers he’d heard had been abandoned in that area.  Being alone mattered little to Jake as he watched the coyote’s stealthy approach.  He knew that Taggert would rouse himself to help if need be, cold or no cold and that the helicopter would be available to Jake if he was wounded and couldn’t make it back to the ranch under his own power.
    Jake ’s wolf sniffed the air and looked toward the Altar Valley, searching for the smell of the one who would be his mate.  He didn’t catch her scent on the wind yet but he felt her danger and knew she was getting closer.  Where the hell are you? 
    His wolf raged at the frustration he felt deep inside and turned to direct that frustration and rage