Amber's Ace Read Online Free Page A

and reds.
    She did not have to explain anything to anyone out by the creek. She did not have to answer the concerned looks, the constant repetitions of “How ya doing today?” or the initially hushed silences followed by exuberant conversation when she first walked by a cluster of tenderhearted wolves. Here, the spray from the tumbling falls lightly misted her skin, and the thick walls of granite and ponderosa pine shielded her from view.
    She did not need to recoil from anyone’s inadvertent touch.
    She remained free to wonder what had become of the hunky baseball player who’d captured her soul moments before falling to the ground with a horrifying, grievous injury. She thought of him with longing, liquid heat stealing over her body as she imagined the erotic things they’d do together. If he were hers. And if she were his. Her hot feelings for him, so much at odds with the way she flinched away from the real people who populated her new life, made her realize she was alive.
    She sighed. Only her sister Garnet kept her company here on occasion, words unnecessary between the twins Magnum had imprisoned together. They’d formed such a tight bond few finished sentences ever passed between them. On occasion, each had spoken to Dr. Liv Dunn, the psychologist mated to Xan. They’d learned they both suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. But only Garnet really understood her. And vice versa.
    Amber stared into the creek at her reflection. In the seven months of plentiful nourishment since she and her twin had been rescued from the madman Magnum’s secret compound, her cheeks had lost some of their gaunt and hollow look, and the sun on her hair made it gleam light and bright in the rippling current. Although reunited with her family, she still had not completely lost the haunted shadows in her eyes.
    She drifted her fingers through the icy, crystal water, capturing several smooth stones. She loved the rocks. They didn’t badger her with questions and demand answers, or stare with hurt and puzzled eyes if she shied from their embrace. Yet, they spoke to her nevertheless, and she found she had an affinity for them, able to correctly read the powers and properties captured within them.
    Polished by the rapids, the pebbles she’d harvested glistened in the center of her palm: a chunk of rose quartz, a clump of glittering golden pyrite, a striated red-black-and-tan Fairborn agate, and, her prize, a nugget of watermelon tourmaline with a pink center ringed by its “rind” of bright green.
    Minerals abounded in the Black Hills. Out of necessity, she and Garnet had learned to be handy and crafty during their years at the compound, fabricating objects they needed from broken parts and tinkering with cast-off appliances, such as the hot plate they’d constructed from a deteriorating toaster.
    Since then, they’d discovered their creative streaks could be artistic, as well, devising unusual jewelry from the colorful polished rocks they found in the creek bed or on its banks, with thin bits and twists of fine wire to set the stones in place. Their brother, Brick, helped.
    Not only alive and well, Brick thrived mated to Summer, his half-cougar, half-skinwalker love, and the mother of his twins—the tiny kitten cub and adorable chocolate wolf she and Garnet had so feared for when they’d been brought to the prison compound. Remarkable how much things had changed in Los Lobos with the demise of the evil Magnum and ascension of his more open-minded son, Drew Tao, as the new alpha. No-nonsense as Drew was, he also had a good heart and cared for the well-being of the pack. Brick’s story amazed her. Happy and content, he’d come into his own and doted on his young family. Once an outcast in his pack, these days he served as one of the pack’s protectors.
    An artisan and master carver, Brick encouraged his twin sisters in their fledgling jewelry enterprise, helping them with the tools and supplies they needed. He also helped