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 WARRIOR LION

Lion Shifter Romance

Black Ops Mates Book 3

Ruby Knoxx

Copyright © 2020 by Ruby Knoxx.

All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of
the book only. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or
distributed in any printed or electronic form, including recording,
without prior written permission from the publisher, except for brief
quotations in a book review.
 Contents
Chapter 1 - Jax
Chapter 2 - Lori
Chapter 3 – Jax
Chapter 4 – Lori
Chapter 5 – Jax
Chapter 6 – Lori
Chapter 7 – Jax
Chapter 8 – Lori
Chapter 9 – Jax
Chapter 10 – Lori
Chapter 11 – Jax
Chapter 12 – Lori
Chapter 13 – Jax
Chapter 14 – Lori
Chapter 15 – Jax
Chapter 16 – Lori
About the Author
Books by Ruby Knoxx
 Chapter 1 - Jax

We watched Anchorage fade behind us as we left the city, on

our way toward a remote lodge in a remote forest, up a remote
mountain.
I would have been more than excited to get out into the
wilderness for a mission again if it weren’t for what the actual
mission was.
With Zane behind the wheel, Leon riding shotgun and
controlling the music while Neo napped next to me, I had nothing to
do but sit and think about how I would have rather been in LA
enjoying the sun than helping a tax-sucking, thin-skinned politician
feel safe.
“And we don’t know who this is?” I asked, for the hundredth
time since we were first told our mission.
“Only that it’s political,” Zane said, patiently suppressing his
sigh. He understood where I was coming from with my reluctance to
accept this mission. If there was anyone in our slowly shrinking team
of ops who got me and who I could one-hundred percent rely on, it
was Zane. We came from the same squad at the same time, and
both of us had joined the military to escape poverty and get out of
the towns we were from.
He was also the only one who knew and understood how
much I hated politicians.
“But not an actual politician?” I urged.
“It’s a politician, alright?” Leon said from the front seat. “Get
over it already.”
“Who do you think it is?” Neo asked, stretching and twisting a
wrist in front of me.
“Someone from out of state,” Leon said. “Definitely.”
 “Why?” Zane asked. “No one comes to Alaska during the
winter if they don’t have to.”
“If someone was getting death threats and needed a remote
place to be, I think this is the perfect place to go. Somewhere that
they can get snowed in or something.”
“No,” I said. “They can’t have any control this far outside of
their state. They need to be somewhere they can get out quickly, or
they need to be from Alaska.”
“Oo, maybe it’s that governor—that hot one,” Zane said.
“No way,” Neo said. “There’s no such thing as a hot governor.”
“I beg to differ,” Leon said. “I have seen many women who
are worth having a drink with who hold office. They just are more in
the MILF category.”
“Prove it,” Zane said, laughing.
“Hang on,” Leon said, pulling out his phone.
I was glad they could be entertained by this banter. I just
couldn’t. A politician was a politician, and that was enough of a mark
on a person to make them unattractive to me, no matter who they
were. What was that old saying? When you break up the word
politics, you get many ticks? I knew that wasn’t quite how the
ancient Greeks meant it when they came up with the system, but it
still seemed apt to me.
Leon found a website with all the women politicians listed, for
just such a disagreement, it seemed. He passed his phone back to
Neo.
“There are some solid 8s in there, and I would even wager a
10 or two,” he said.
I shook my head as Neo began scanning through the pictures.
“I’ll give it to the mid-west—they have some cute senators in their
mix,” he said, passing me the phone. “And I wouldn’t mind getting to
know the mayor of Rockport, Washington.”
 “You’re kidding,” I said, taking the phone. “There’s no way it
includes mayors as well. There’s a town that has a dog for a mayor,
you know.”
“This website doesn’t include female dogs,” Leon laughed.
“Just women in politics.”
The guys continued to laugh and make jokes as I did my own
scanning of the pictures. I wasn’t even sure why I was looking. I had
no interest at all.
“It’s a woman politician, isn’t it?” I said. “We’re protecting a
damsel in distress.”
“Jesus, Jax,” Zane said. “What century are you living in?
Women aren’t the only ones who need protection. And it’s been my
experience that women in high places can look after themselves.”
“I just don’t see why we’re wasting government money on
this mission,” I said. “I mean, they have enough protection as it is,
and I’m sure they can get local law enforcement to help them out, if
they don’t already have private bodyguards.”
“Oh my god, dude,” Neo said. “Just let it go. It’s a mission.
That’s our job. We are doing our job. It doesn’t matter what it is, we
go in.”
“Neo’s right,” Zane said. “You can be a part of this mission or
not.”
“You know that’s not what I’m saying,” I said.
“It sounds an awful lot like you’re complaining about an
assignment,” Leon said. “We have a job to do. We’re short two men
as it is, and it’s unlikely we’re going to get anyone qualified and
trained to replace them any time soon, if at all. This is an
experimental group, and I can’t see the higher-ups wanting to
replace black ops shifters that are unknown to all the other branches
of service any time soon. I don’t want to kick you out of this car, but
if you’re going to compromise the mission, then I will.”
I growled. I knew that assignments like this would come up.
So far, I had been lucky enough not to be put on any of them. Now
all four of us were called out, which put me on edge. I didn’t
understand why any one government official short of the president
or vice president was worth four highly and specially trained ops.
“We aren’t guarding the president, are we?” I asked.
“Look, Jax,” Neo growled. “None of us know who it is. We just
know where we have to be and when. As far as we know, we’re not
even meeting them there, alright? So just shut up about it.”
As if to accent the point, Leon turned up the music in the
front, drowning out any chance of further conversation between any
of us while Lynyrd Skynyrd played and he sang along to it, at full
volume. It was too bad he was born when he was. He would have
killed it in the 70s.
I looked out the window at the building mud-colored snow on
the road and the snow sifting through the tree branches in the
woods before returning to Leon’s phone which was still in my hand.
I scrolled through the photos of America’s women in politics,
seeing nothing but fake smiles for their sellable profile. None of it
was real. It was all just for show. Nothing they said was even
remotely accurate or true. They were just looking for their own gain
in their career, nothing more.
It was a pity. If I didn’t know any better, I would have
thought that they were all perfectly nice. There were only a few who
had a sour-puss face that looked untrustworthy. The majority of
them looked as though they were just trying to work for their
community, doing what they said they would do.
I was getting sick from looking at them, knowing that I was
falling for whatever many of them were selling. I could see how
people could easily get caught up in the trap. I was about to turn off
the phone when one image in particular caught my eye.
Senator Lori Adams.
My eyes fell on her, and I couldn’t stop looking at her. Her
smile was in the same place as all the rest, and her blond hair was
pulled back and out of her face in a modest and respectable braid,
like any of the other women. But she struck me as completely
different.
Her eyes sparkled. She wasn’t just posing for the camera.
There was depth behind those eyes, behind that smile. Her makeup
was light, and she wore no jewelry. I felt as though I knew
everything about her just from that picture, as if I had met her
before, as if we had spent some time together in a bar.
Hell, maybe we had. I had been known to sew my oats, as
the expression went. Though the more I looked at her, I thought
that I would remember her. She wasn’t someone I was likely to
forget. I knew that much. Then why did she seem so familiar to me?
I shook my head as I turned off the screen. She wasn’t
familiar to me. She was just a pretty face who caught my eye, and I
wanted to forget was a senator. Maybe I did know everything there
was to know about her, and that was because she made her living in
politics. That was enough. I didn’t need to know more about her,
even if she did have a pretty face.
I nudged Leon in the front seat with his phone, passing it off
to him, and made myself comfortable, leaning my head back against
my arm so I could get some shuteye before waking up in the wild
and white north.
The mission might not be too bad. From my understanding,
we were headed to a remote hunting lodge. If the entirety of our
mission was to protect some rich guy while he went around hunting,
then it might even be considered relaxing, even if it did mean that
we weren’t going to be hunting ourselves.
I tried to remain positive, not to let my bias get the better of
me. Zane was right. I was there for my country, and I would do
what my country asked me to. And right now, my country was
asking me to protect a politician. I didn’t know why this one in
particular was so important, but it didn’t matter. My country did think
they were important. Therefore, I needed to make absolutely certain
that I did what my country asked.
 I might have been black ops, part of an elite and secret
branch of the military, but at the end of the day, I was still a soldier.
 Chapter 2 - Lori

I checked the time on my phone again, without reading it,

before returning to bouncing my phone off the palm of my other
hand. I paced, listening to the light click of my heels on the wooden
floor, waiting for the next move.
I hated that I was in this position. I, in fact, made it very
clear that I did not want to be in this position. But it was bigger than
me, it would seem. I didn’t have a choice. I was selected, and that
meant that I needed to be protected at all costs, even if the threat
wasn’t worth the paper it was written on.
Or the moose skull, for that matter.
Still, it wasn’t anything to be taken seriously, even if the
person behind the threat had gone through a lot of trouble of
skinning the moose’s head only to carve into the bone their
intentions for me. I wasn’t sure which was uglier—the dried and
bloody skull or the words etched into it. Still, people who were that
crazy rarely, if ever, came up with plans that were cohesive enough
to be followed through with. Right?
That was what I told myself. I had to tell myself it in order to
carry on as usual. I needed to. There was too much at risk if I didn’t
go through with the meetings I had lined up. While it might have
started off as a personal interest, it had gained national attention,
and it was more than my career on the line if any of this fell
through.
“Are we absolutely certain that this needs special forces?” I
asked Kalvin, my head of security. “You have always been more than
enough.”
“My men weren’t able to stop that moose head from finding
its way into your bathroom, Senator, nor the more … dire set-ups
this individual has produced,” he said. “Which means this is beyond
our capabilities.”
 “Yeah, but it’s just some crazy guy who knows where my
house is. We’re not there, anymore. He’s not going to follow us up a
mountain,” I reasoned.
“Or he might,” Kalvin said, folding his hands in front of him.
That was his stance to let me know that he had no more to say in
the matter.
I shook my head and continued to pace. They might not show
up. The roads were getting slick out there, and while I, along with
most Alaskans knew how to handle the snow, I didn’t know that
whoever was driving would. Then again, if they were a special force,
it was likely they could handle most terrain.
At least, that was what the movies told me.
“And you’re sure they’re coming?” I asked.
“Unless an outside force stops them, yes.”
“An outside force?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t worry about it, Senator,” Kalvin said, a slight smirk
touching his lips, reminding me again that he was in fact human.
It was a fact that I knew better than most, at least, in his
professional life. We were a little more than employer and employee.
He had become a close friend of mine, and I often found comfort
being around him. He was one of the few people who I felt had a
genuine interest in my wellbeing because I was a human being, not
because of what I could do for other people.
“They’re late,” I said, glancing at the clock on the
mantelpiece, under the mounted and stuffed bear head. Some prize
trophy of another time. At least, I hoped it hadn’t been from anyone
I knew.
I didn’t like the lodge. I’d known it existed. When I was
officially in government, I was told about the lodge, that it was a
place where we could relax and get away from it all if we needed. I
didn’t expect it to be my hide-out.
 And now that I was stuck there, all I could think of was how
much I hated the place. It would serve its purpose: there was
enough space to work and equally to relax if my life weren’t
potentially on the line. But it was also riddled with hunting
momentums, guns, and photos of previous occupants that, as a
shifter, I couldn’t feel comfortable. I knew that my human side was
superior to my fox, but I didn’t need reminding of how man
conquered nature.
Especially when it was nature that I had in mind during my
career.
I averted my eyes from the bear head and focused on the
wooden floor under my clicking heels as I paced.
“They’ll arrive,” Kalvin said.
I grunted, unconvinced. Part of me wanted them there. Part
of me was unnerved by the threats. But the more knowledgeable
part of me, the part of me that understood the nature of my
objectives and the feathers that it would ruffle, knew that I didn’t
need the protection. It was just some nut who thought they could
throw their weight around and intimidate me.
Because of that, because I knew how crazy people could be
when they were in dire need of self-importance, I didn’t want to take
the threat seriously. It was more than what it would do for my
career if I let them. If I let myself become intimidated, it showed
that any meaningful change that was made and that upset people
could be disrupted. And my work was far too important for that.
I heard the soft engine of the Land Rover pull up as Kalvin
slipped out the door, wordlessly. A few more of his security detail
followed him out while two more stepped closer to me. I felt boxed
in. I did not like to feel boxed in.
I began to move toward the door before I heard a grunt.
“They’ll come to you, ma’am,” the guy on my left said.
“I’m perfectly capable of meeting these men like a civilized
hostess,” I responded, suppressing a growl.
 “This isn’t a social call,” he said.
They weren’t going to let me go out there, and I wasn’t going
to lose any footing trying to battle my way out the door. I crossed
my arms and stood, waiting to see who was going to be beside me
for the next—who knew how long.
The front door opened, Kalvin entering first, followed by the
four men who had been flown in especially for me. I felt
embarrassed at the thought that the government had put such high
priority on me. Well, it wasn’t the government per se …
I had to blink once. Twice. Three times to be sure that I was
seeing what I was actually seeing. These weren’t special agents.
These guys walking into the lodge were damn models. I had never
seen such beautiful men in all my life, and now there were four of
them filing into the house, in front of me, all with thick, black
turtleneck sweaters on and deliciously snug utility pants.
Then my breath caught in my throat.
As the last of these special ops came into the house, I was
stunned to the point where I had to cough to catch my breath. His
blond hair was buzz-cut short, his face chiseled as if it had been
made out of stone, and his eyes were ice blue.
A hand was on my back as my own patted my chest as I
struggled to catch my breath, trying to remember how to tell my
lungs to take in and expel air. I coughed until someone brought me
a glass of water, which I happily took, anything to show that I could
have some control over my own body.
“Are you alright, Senator?” Kalvin asked. It was his hand on
my back, rubbing it gently and protectively.
I gave a couple of weak coughs before I nodded my head and
straightened myself. “I’m fine.”
He gave me a look, one that said he wasn’t sure he believed
me. That was what I got for getting too close to the head of
security.
 “Alright,” he said, turning and opening an arm in the direction
of the newcomers. “These are your new heads of security. This is
Leon, Zane, Neo, and Jax.”
My eyes met Jax’s, and my heart started pounding. I nearly
dropped my glass of water. It was everything in me to force my gaze
away from him and to address them all. My fox was nudging me
inside of me, pulling me toward him.
I tried to brush her away. She was just excited because all
these guys were shifters. I could smell it as plain as day. There was
a large shifter population in Alaska. Many sought the wilderness and
freedom that the northernmost state held. However, it was very rare
that I actually met any of the other shifters in the state, as they
mostly liked to keep to themselves and business kept me within the
city.
“You come highly recommended,” I said. It was Kalvin who
had recommended them and insisted that they be there. “I expect
you won’t need to do much. There isn’t anything that needs to be
kept under control.”
“Senator,” Neo said, stepping forward, his hands held behind
his back and his feet apart. “Our directives were never clarified.
What we know at this moment is that this is where we need to be.”
“I have the rest of your directives,” Kalvin said. “Senator
Adams has been under threats that we believe are more than the
run-of-the-mill threats that many politicians receive. We believe
there is weight behind this. Your objective is to protect the senator
at all costs.”
“Why?” Jax asked.
The stark contrast of his tone to that of this colleague’s struck
me. It was harsh, challenging, and skeptical.
“Isn’t the fact that you have an order enough?” I asked,
eyeing him, trying to look beyond my internal draw toward him and
view him as someone who could be the difference between life and
death for me. If he was that skeptical of his direct order, then would
he risk his life to protect me? Wasn’t that what he was there for?
“It’s alright,” Kalvin said, sensing my skepsis. “I was getting to
that. It is a significant detail. We believe that it’s possible that the
threats aren’t coming from one person but from someone who
represents something more organized. While we don’t know if the
organization itself is behind the threats or simply the ideals behind
the organization, we know that this person or group of people is
worth taking seriously. It started with letters, which were harmless.
But soon those letters were backed with action—scare tactics. We
had the classic white powder mailed, bomb threats called in, all the
usual measures taken to disrupt ‘business as usual.’”
“It was the skinned moose head that did it,” I said. “That was
when we started taking it seriously.”
Jax scoffed. “Let me guess, you found it in your bed?”
“No,” I said. “The first one we found in my bathroom. It had a
message carved into the bone. Nothing out of the ordinary, saying
what the letters had already said. The next one was a little more
severe than that. We found it attached to a bomb in front of the
door to my house.”
“The head was placed on a detonator, so that when it was
released, there would be an explosion,” Kalvin continued. “The
Senator did the right thing in calling in security rather than try to
touch it. Had she tried to remove it herself, not only would the one
on her doorstep have been set off, but several others that were
found around her windows and doors would have gone off as well.”
I suppressed a shudder as I remembered that morning. I had
never been one to scare easily, but when I was locked in the house,
told not to move, and had to hide in the basement under the most
secure thing I could find, I was terrified. I agreed then to be moved.
“And they were all live?” Neo asked.
“Whoever is behind this has knowledge of explosives,” Kalvin
confirmed.
 “Why is there so much attention for a senator, though?” Jax
asked. “I mean, as far as politicians go, aren’t you pretty low in the
food chain? I mean, you’re about half a step higher than a mayor.”
“Jax,” the guy named Zane hissed at him.
“That’s of no importance,” Kalvin said. “You have an order.
You have an assignment. That’s what’s important.”
“It’s alright,” I said. “You can tell him.”
“I don’t think it’s wise …” Kalvin said quietly.
“If it will help him do his job better so I can do mine, then let
him know. I don’t doubt that he understands and respects that this
mission comes with complete discretion, do you, Jax?”
His lips pressed together, and he re-squared his stance,
folding his arms behind his back. He nodded once.
“Good,” I said. “I’m sure you all know that the primaries are
coming up, which mean I’m in for re-election. My party has been
urging me to run for president in six years. This is the time for me to
build my career and platform.”
“So, you’re a potential presidential candidate in half a dozen
years,” Jax said. “That’s it?”
“It’s why special operatives have been called in,” I said. “And
because my head of security insisted.”
“There’s more to it,” Kalvin interjected. “She’s in the process
of negotiating some very controversial legislation that would put a
halt to oil drilling in Alaska. This is a huge move, especially since
she’s doing it from a centrist’s perspective. There is a lot in the
balance here. If any part of these negotiations go wrong, it means
that she could lose thousands of jobs, instead of prompting paid
retraining and the development of hundreds of more jobs in the
state, and with a little luck, across the country.”
“You’re doing all that?” Neo asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Impressive.”
 “Well, I wouldn’t want anyone to think that I’m just twiddling
my thumbs up here in the wild north,” I said, aiming my comment at
Jax.
I could read him like a book. I knew men like him, and
women. Those who thought that there was nothing to politicians,
that all we did was take credit for other people’s work. I couldn’t
blame them. There were enough people in government who did do
that. But I was determined not to be one of them. I wanted not only
to build jobs and work toward a non-partisan cleaner future; I
wanted to give people hope and trust in their politicians again. I
wanted to set a standard.
I sighed inwardly. Jax might be nice to look at, and for
whatever reason, he was getting my fox all in a twist inside of me,
but he just wasn’t going to cut it as part of my security detail. If he
didn’t feel that elected officials were worth protecting, then he
wasn’t going to be good enough. That’s all there was to it.
I opened my mouth, readying myself to say that he was
dismissed, but I couldn’t make my voice work. I could make myself
tell them that no, he wasn’t invested enough in his duty.
“It’s admirable what you’re trying to do, Senator,” he said, his
eyes meeting mine. My heart began to pound harder as I felt myself
leaning toward the cool blue of them. “But I don’t see why
government money needs to be used on protecting someone who,
as you’ve said, is ‘up here in the wild north.’ Alaska isn’t on the
forefront of many people’s minds, and there are a lot of places you
can go where you’re safe. We are a highly trained, specialized group
who deal with some of the most complicated, delicate, and
dangerous situations in order to protect the United States of
America. Getting rid of oil rigs is great and all, but it does little in the
way of national security.”
I pressed my lips together. That did it. I cleared my throat. “I
think we’ve had enough discussion here, wouldn’t you say? Kalvin? A
word?”
 Kalvin stepped toward me, and we turned away from the
men. If I couldn’t make myself say that I wasn’t going to have Jax
on my detail, then Kalvin could.
“I don’t know who that man thinks he is, but he is not on this
assignment,” I said quietly. “He has no respect whatsoever, and if he
did, then he would know to put whatever personal feelings he has
behind him in order to focus on his directive.”
“Understood,” Kalvin said.
“I’m not having him working for me, or for you. He can’t be
anywhere near me.”
“Under normal circumstances, I would agree. Again, this
group comes highly recommended, and I personally have seen what
they can do during my own time in the military. We don’t have time
to replace him if he is to go.”
“Don’t you think that three highly specialized and trained men
are enough for one crazy person with a moose head?”
“With knowledge of and access to explosives, Lori,” Kalvin
said. He was usually good about not breaking formality in front of
other people, but in our huddle, he played the friend card. “This isn’t
something you mess around with.”
“Senator?” Jax said from behind us.
I rolled my eyes before I turned, trying to prepare myself for
those eyes again so that I at least had a chance to keep my head
about me. I set my jaw and tensed my neck, readying myself for
whatever fresh battle this man wanted to bestow upon me.
“I know I was out of line,” he said. “I am passionate about
this country, and I care about where the money is spent. I get so
caught up in that aspect that I sometimes forget that human lives
are at stake in our missions. I am sorry. It won’t happen again. I
want you to know that I take this mission very seriously, and I will
guard you like you were the constitution wrapped in the original
American flag itself.”
 My fox pawed inwardly, urging me toward him. If I weren’t so
dead set on disliking him, I would have literally swooned. I wanted
to step toward him and breathe him in and feel his heat against
mine.
Instead, I pushed my shoulders back and nodded my head. I
couldn’t not believe him if my life depended on it—and it did.
“Alright,” I said. “But this is the final warning. Step out of line
and that’s it for you and the rest of your men. Kalvin? Be sure to
have someone else ready to fill their shoes if this one missteps.”
“That won’t be necessary, Senator Adams,” Zane said,
stepping forward. “He will be in line. You have nothing to worry
about from the rest of us.”
I nodded before turning and leaving the men to Kalvin’s
instruction. From here, he would fill them in on my schedule, and
they would formulate the plan. I made my way out of the den, down
the hall and to my office. There was a fireplace in there, already lit
and making it toasty for me. If I hadn’t known that I was part fox, I
would think I was part lizard with how much heat I required. I would
swear that my hands, limbs, and mind worked at a half-pace at the
slightest hint of a chill.
I sat behind my wooden desk and wiggled my mouse to look
at my schedule for the rest of the day. There was so much to do and
so many things I needed to concentrate on from afar. Thankfully,
most of my meetings could be done through a video call, and the
rest could come to me.
I leaned my head on my hand, unable to keep Jax’s strong
jaw, broad chest, or pale eyes out of my mind. Working with him
was going to be such a pain in the neck, but the idea of not working
with him almost scared me.
I was thankful that he had stepped forward when he did, that
he had apologized. I didn’t know that I was going to be able to be
firm enough to make sure he left.
 What was that even about? I had never had a problem
handling anyone, which was why I was so good at what I did and
why I knew I could achieve my goals. I set them, and I got what I
wanted because I knew how to navigate my way around people. Jax
was something different entirely. I didn’t know that I would be able
to directly stand up to him. And if we were in a situation in which it
was only him and me, and he began to get unruly? I just didn’t
know what I would do.
All I knew was that if nothing else, he was a nice distraction
from the dangers this domestic terrorist provided.
 Chapter 3 – Jax

We were each shown to our rooms in a wing of the hunting

lodge. The fact that this place existed and that it was big enough to
have wings just floored me. Who funded all of this?
As I followed the guys and we were led to our “quarters,” I
felt as though I was floating. Lori Adams was more than I had
expected. I had seen her picture on the phone, but I hadn’t even
thought to look where her jurisdiction was. And what were the odds
that the one government official on that website that I had been
drawn to was the one that we were to be working with?
I was torn to say the least. My duty as a black ops member
was to protect the United States and to carry out the wishes and
needs that represented the flag. Part of our country was its
economy. Part of the economy was how tax dollars were spent.
The idea that someone, out in the middle of nowhere in
Alaska, could come out here to stay in a dream vacation lodge in the
woods, surrounded by snow, and would need protection baffled me.
I couldn’t even understand how it was that she was important
enough to need our level of protection. Sure, they had told us, but
just because she was a potential thought of a presidential candidate
didn’t mean that she was actually going to be her party’s top pick.
They were probably rounding up plenty of potential nominees, and
she wasn’t likely to make it any time soon, anyway.
She couldn’t even be old enough to become president in six
years, could she?
I didn’t know. What I did know was that the moment I met
her in person, my lion began to battle my human side, urging me
toward her while my human side knew what she was, knew what
she stood for. The pride in me couldn’t let myself go against my own
convictions. She was a politician, which meant she was only out for
herself.
 I took a moment to scope out my room, checking out the
window and what I could see from it before meeting up with the
guys in Leon’s room.
“Let’s keep this simple,” I said. “Two on, one on call, one off.”
“Is that enough?” Zane asked.
“The house already has security,” I reasoned. “They’re not
going anywhere just because we’re here. We keep one of us on her
at all time, another patrolling. So long as we’re in communications
with the security already present, then it’s enough.”
“I’m with Jax,” Neo said. “I know that he’s got whatever the
hell issue he has with the Senator, but I don’t see this as a big deal.
Just precaution. It’s doubtful that this guy’s going to make it out
here, anyway.”
“If the guy has access to and knowledge of explosives,” Leon
started, “then it’s not too much of a leap to assume that he knows
this place exists, that this would be where Senator Adams would
hide out and how to get here, despite the weather. If we’re to take
this job seriously, then we need to take the threat seriously and not
underestimate them.”
“What do you suggest, then?” I asked. He was right. I knew
he was right. We were there for a job, and I needed to remember
that.
“We have three on, one off. The one whose off is on call, we
keep one of us working directly with Adams, and the other two keep
a look out. You’re right, Jax, that we are working with security, but
that same security outfit let this threat get as close as it did to the
senator.”
“Besides,” Zane said, “we don’t even know how trustworthy
the security team is. I would assume that they’ve all been vetted,
but we know nothing.”
“Exactly,” Leon said. “Until we know otherwise, perceive
everyone as a possible threat.”
We nodded in agreement.
 “Alright,” I said. “Let’s lay down protocol. Same as usual? No
action until a threat is confirmed?”
“And if a threat is confirmed,” Zane said, “we have snow
mobiles at the ready.”
“I’m going to go to the library here and see what I can find
about the land out here,” Leon said. “I’ll find the best route for us to
take her if necessary. We all keep our tracking devices on us so we
know where we all are.”
“Send us the location when you have it,” I said.
“No,” Zane replied. “We cannot underestimate this guy. I don’t
want to risk that he can find out where we’re going. Leon, you’re our
point of contact if we have to take the senator anywhere, and you
guide us to our destination.”
“Roger,” Leon said. “Then if you don’t mind, I’ll take the first
on-call rotation so I can look through the local resources.”
“Jax,” Zane said, catching my eye. I knew that look. He was
warning me, reminding me that I had a duty, and our duty came
first. “You take the first shift working with Adams.”
I pressed my lips together to stop myself from protesting. My
lion rumbled inside of me in a low-key purr.
What the hell is up with him today? I wondered as I nodded.
I didn’t like the idea of working directly with her. I didn’t like
that my lion seemed to like her and wanted to be around her. That
meant that he was in a mood, and it wasn’t necessarily a mood that
was conducive to the duty I upheld. It was more carnal, something
that called to be crawling between the bedsheets.
I couldn’t blame him. She was an attractive woman, if I was
to put it mildly. I found her completely stunning, which might be
exactly my problem. I would need to do my best to forget the fact
that she was a politician so that I could focus on the mission. Part of
me worried that I might forget my mission altogether and see her as
a civilian. A very hot civilian who needed my protection.
 And then my lion might win. And I might let down my guard,
and then I would fail at the mission.
“Great,” Zane said. “We’ll work in six-hour rotations.”
* * *
“You know, I can look after myself,” Senator Adams said as I
bypassed her secretary out front and let myself into her office. “I
don’t need you blocking my daylight.”
“I’m not blocking any daylight, ma’am,” I said as I stood
beside her desk, holding my hands in front of me. “No need to stop
working on my account.”
“There’s plenty of reason,” she said. “I’m working on some
sensitive stuff here, and I can’t have you in here distracting me.”
“It’s none of my business what you’re working on,” I said,
staring at the door. “I am here whether you like it or not. This is my
assignment.”
“And you’ve proven enough that you don’t like it.”
“It doesn’t matter what I like or don’t like. I have a duty to
this country, and this is where my country wants me. You have my
complete focus, Senator.”
She grunted, and it was everything in me to suppress a smile
of amusement. I would probably feel the same way if I were in her
position. But then again, I would never be in a position where I
couldn’t protect myself.
Her fingers landed on her keyboard, and she typed for a
couple of minutes before she stopped.
“This is so unnecessary, you know,” she huffed, turning to me
exasperatedly. She looked back down to her desk, closing her eyes
and smiling as she shook her head. “This is ridiculous.”
“I agree,” I replied. “But here we are.” I glanced at her in time
to see her pull her hair down from its clip. Her chocolate-colored hair
tumbled down over her shoulders, and for a moment, all I could see
of her face was her eyelashes sticking out beyond her hair before
she pulled it back behind her ears.
I was about to add that at least she was beautiful, which
made the job easier. Then I stopped myself. That’s what my lion
wanted me to say. That was not at all professional nor appropriate.
Plus, she didn’t strike me as the type who wanted compliments while
she was at her desk unless they were about how smart she was. It
was everything in me to keep my mouth closed, to remember that I
was on an assignment, and that I couldn’t get involved with the
person I was trying to protect.
There was a reason why our group was shrinking. We were so
elite because our black ops team was comprised of shifters. We were
superior to any other black ops group out there simply because we
had superhuman abilities between our strength, endurance, and
heightened senses. And the fact that we could all morph into lions.
Our one downfall was that we were destined to find our
mates, and once that happened, we had to leave. We could no
longer give our missions our one-hundred percent attention because
our attention would always be divided somewhat between the
mission and our mates. It messed with our priorities.
That was why no one in a special elite military group, whether
shifter or not, should ever get involved on a romantic or carnal level
during a mission. It altered priorities, which was what I was
desperately trying to remember as I watched Lori Adams mess with
her hair to mask her discomfort at my presence.
“Will you just sit down, alright?” she asked, turning those
wide eyes of hers to me. “You’re making me nervous standing
there.”
“If that is your wish,” I said.
“It is. Just take that chair over there in the corner by the
window,” she directed, waving her hand. “You can keep an eye out
or do whatever it is you need to do from there.”
 I smirked as I sauntered over to the leather chair and sat
down. I, of course, couldn’t relax, but I could at least keep watching
her from this perspective. If anyone was going to get past the two
security guards outside her office door, I would hear them before
they even got close and be able to close the distance between me
and the senator quickly.
It was the windows that had me uneasy. However, I was able
to mostly see out of them while the few daylight hours lasted, before
a member of staff came in and closed the thick curtains against the
chill.
I remained there for the rest of the afternoon and into the
evening, watching several people enter and leave her office. Most of
the time they were just assistants relaying messages, carrying out
tasks, and reporting to her. The rest of them were scheduled
meetings.
I had to admire her. While I might not agree that lower-end
politicians were worth our time, she was doing what she claimed to
do: taking action. She worked patiently and diligently with each
person who came in, never letting on that anything was the matter.
She kept her game-face on, negotiated, listened to her opposition
during the meetings, fielded the argument, and worked her way
around to creative and agreeable solutions. It wasn’t hard to see
why she was a potential presidential candidate.
I shook my head at the thought. She wasn’t ever going to get
that far. She was good at what she did, but being president and
running a whole country was the difference between a pony show
and taming a wild bear. She needed more than just performative
authority.
Despite admiring her, I couldn’t understand her. She was
whisked out of the city so she could be stored out of the public eye
and be safe, and yet her entire staff, plus the security team, as well
as several other people who were joining her for these meetings,
were traveling all the way out there in the mounting snow. Not only
did it mean that they knew where she was, thus making her secure
location less secure with every passing second, but she was putting
them all at risk by making them drive the winding road out there.
It didn’t matter. All that mattered was my job and my mission
to keep her safe. It was simple, it was straightforward, and it was
something that I had every capability of doing.
Even if with every moment that passed I felt more and more
protective of her.
“Jax,” Neo said in my ear just as the last meeting was clearing
out of her office.
I pressed my finger to my ear, pressing the tiny button that
would click on Neo’s end, letting him know that he had my attention.
I watched the five men and women leave the office, each
with their own briefcases in tow, and the senator take her seat back
at her desk. I kept my eye on the lingering assistant to see what she
would do. He cleared away the used coffee cups from the coffee
table between two couches and left the room.
“We have movement in the woods.”
“Where?” I murmured.
Adams glanced up at me, and I shook my head, letting her
know I wasn’t talking to her. She gave me a single nod before
returning to her computer.
“About half a mile southeast,” he said.
“What do we know?” I asked.
The door to the office opened again, and the senator stood
up, smiling and walking around her desk. Her assistant guided in two
men in suits who Lori seemed to know.
Another meeting? I thought to myself, glancing at the clock.
It had just gone five. My rotation was nearly up, and she was still
bringing people in? She really was a busy woman.
“Not a lot. Just to be on alert. The subject has a gun but also
a high-visibility jacket on, so he might be a hunter.”
 “Roger,” I said.
The earpiece clicked off, and I put both of my hands on the
arms of the chair, waiting for my next direction as my heart began
hammering in my ears.
 Chapter 4 – Lori

“I recognize this is a hard sell for you,” I said, folding my

hands on my desk and leaning forward, giving the two men across
from me my best smile.
The threats couldn’t have come at a worse time, though I
supposed that was the point of them. This was a day of important
meetings. And this current one was the one where I found the
success or failure in my mission. At least, for the meantime. If I
could convince the two representatives from L&R Oil that their
efforts were better suited elsewhere, then I would have this goal in
the bag.
“You’re asking us to give up our life’s work as well as a
company that’s been front and center of American oil for years,” Mac
Wallace said.
He was the hard one to convince. I knew that much. His
associate, Pat Barnard was a pushover when he was on his own. He
didn’t know how to handle powerful women, and I used that to my
advantage. Mac, on the other hand, didn’t see gender, which was
just as much refreshing as it was a difficulty. It meant he wasn’t
afraid to play hardball with me.
But I had prepared for hardball.
At least, I was usually prepared for it. When I wasn’t
distracted by the insanely hot and insanely insubordinate man in the
corner watching over me. I had been trying all afternoon not to
think about him, but it was difficult, to say the least. It was like I
could feel his hotness radiating off me. And knowing that he was
there for me, that he was there to keep me safe, and thus, keeping
those hypnotic eyes on me—it only put every dirty thought in the
book into my mind’s eye.
Which made it difficult to focus on the meeting.
 “I understand and respect that,” I said, clearing my throat
and trying to get back to reality. “And the whole reason I’ve asked
you to come here is to settle an agreement regarding what I can do
to help you make this transition to cleaner energy.”
“It’s not that simple, Miss Adams,” Pat said.
“Senator Adams,” I corrected coolly. That was a tactic. A
reminder of who I was, that I was a woman, that the title before my
name put me in my place: unmarried and a woman. I hated it and
would never stand for it. Especially when the people elevated me
beyond that title when they voted me into office.
“Right,” he said, clearing his throat. “It’s not just packing up
all the oil rigs and putting out some wind turbines. There’s a great
deal of money that goes into disposing of our equipment, of
retraining our workers, of building these renewable resources.”
“And that’s if we wanted to make that transition at all,” Mac
interjected.
I ignored him. That would be a topic in a moment. One
subject at a time.
“That’s where subsidies come into play,” I said. “I am working
with both the state and members of the federal government to try
and support this transition. We know that there is a lot of money
that can be lost, but really, all you’d be doing is prolonging the
inevitable. Oil will run out. Fossil fuels are not sustainable because
they are finite. We all know that. And what we have in Alaska won’t
last forever. So why not make the transition now and get ahead of
the game rather than risking scrambling when the oil does dry up? If
you choose to make this transition, with government support and
help, then you are ahead of the game, and L&R can continue
forward instead of drying up just like the oil industry.”
“You’re making some large claims there, Senator,” Mac said.
“The science is all there,” I said, opening a desk drawer and
passing them two leather folders with decades of collected research
both on the diminishing fossil fuel industry as well as the perks of
renewable resources. “Feel free to take a few minutes to look
through the data.”
“With all due respect, Senator,” Mac said, not even glancing at
the folder. “But this isn’t exactly independently funded research, now
is it?”
“We took every piece of research we could find and combined
it into a tight report. All the sources are listed so you can look it up
for yourselves. This includes research from companies such as your
own as well as other companies whose interests are in diminishing
resources, those who are independent, and those who have other
interests. We wanted to create a whole picture.”
Skeptically, the men opened their folders and glanced
between me and the data, as if I was about to leap out and attack
them if they took their focus off me.
I caught Jax from the corner of my eye—did I see him
actually licking his lips?
No, I was seeing things. It had been a while since I had been
with anyone, and someone this devastatingly handsome was
spending all day in my office? I was bound to have a dirty thought or
two. And the thought of his tongue and what it could do sent a
shiver through me that I struggled to suppress. They were so
deliciously naughty, the thoughts going through my mind while he
watched me. Still, having them during this meeting was not optimal
timing.
I rolled my shoulders and my neck, trying to bring myself
back into the real, present world.
“I recognize this is generally a bipartisan issue,” I said. “And
my goal is to close that gap. I want to make sure that concerns on
all sides are heard, and I want people to realize this has nothing to
do with political parties but with necessary action that must be
taken.”
“I never took you for a liberal,” Mac muttered.
 “I’m not a liberal,” I said. “I’m a realist. I see the data, and I
respond to it. That’s what we need to be focused on.”
I leaned back as the men turned their full attentions to the
reports in front of them. They were beginning to warm up to me. I
just needed a little bit of give from them, and I would have
something I could work with. But the fact that they were looking
was a good sign. It had taken me a long time to get this research
together, and we were still adding to the data, being sure to take
from studies on both sides of the fence. I personally had read
through everything that went in there. I was not someone who liked
to go into a project as large as this with only a partial understanding
of what I was talking about. That was how you got blind-sided. That
was how you lost.
There was something satisfying about watching the men go
through the folders, knowing that I had at least gotten them this far.
I just needed the inch, and I could snatch that mile from them so
fast they wouldn’t know what hit them.
I was so focused on watching the men read through the
irrefutable data that I didn’t notice Jax beside me until he completely
blocked the nearby lamp.
I looked up at him, over his thick chest and into those eyes
that were looking down at me.
“We need to go,” he said, his voice so deep and low that I felt
that the only way I was actually able to hear it was because of my
shifter hearing.
I opened my mouth to protest, but before I could say
anything, his hands were under my arms, pulling me out of my desk
chair, lifting me to my feet. I briefly caught a glance of the men, who
were speechless as Jax marched me out of the office like a child.
Yet I felt powerless to stop him.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I demanded.
“Where is he taking her?” I heard Pat protest.
 Jax paid attention to neither Pat nor myself as he guided me
out of the office, away from my assistant and the rest of the security
detail and toward the kitchen at the other end of the lodge.
“Someone was spotted in the woods,” he said, keeping his
voice low.
“So?” I asked. “There are plenty of hunters out here.”
“Is that something you’re willing to gamble your life with?” he
asked, his grip on me loosening and his hand sliding to the small of
my back. I found it oddly comforting despite the situation. “There is
a man out there with a gun, within half a mile of your not-so-secret
safehouse. Are you sure enough that he is some clueless hunter and
not the maniac who sent you a skinned moose head that acted as a
detonator for the bombs around your house?”
“When you put it like that …” I said, the chill of fear that I had
been working so hard to keep at bey creeping around me like an icy
blanket.
I had a locked door in my mind, one that kept all the horrible
possibilities out of my thinking so I could focus on my job. It was
how I had managed to keep calm through all of this, and it had been
the reason why I didn’t want this specialty group of men to come to
my aid. I was terrified that their presence might be enough to let the
door fly open, allowing those thoughts to infiltrate my mind.
Now those doors were wide open. I wondered if Jax was
working for the maniac. I wondered if the guy with a shotgun was a
decoy and really there were already bombs around the lodge. I
wondered if somehow I had actually had a stroke and I was in a
coma and none of this was real. The latter would have been the
most comforting thought except that it meant that I wouldn’t be
able to fulfill the work that I was dedicated to.
What were my choices? My fox was urging me to go with Jax,
no matter where that was. I never really put faith in my animal, not
when I had logic on my side as a human. But in that moment, I
could hardly think straight. I had to rely on my fox.
 And if I was honest with myself, Jax was the only person in
the world I felt I was safe with. Despite his attitude, despite
whatever disdain he held for me or my position, some part of me
knew that he wouldn’t let anything happen to me. And I found
comfort in his closeness, even as he paused me by the kitchen door.
We weren’t alone at that back door. Rita, one of the house
staff, was already there with warm clothing in hand. Without a word
she began helping me into a long thick jacket and passed me heavy
woolen socks and my fur-lined gloves before gesturing to my boots
in front of me.
I didn’t know how she knew to be ready with all of these
items, but those were questions for another time.
“Is this necessary?” I asked, not pausing to wait for an
answer but already pulling on the warm wear. Jax had been right. I
wasn’t willing to gamble that the guy out there was just a hunter.
And while I would verbally protest, there was little anyone could do
to stop me from going with Jax and laying my life at his feet to look
after.
“We’re about to go out into the snow, and I can’t tell you for
how long,” Jax said, pulling on his own jacket and gloves. They
looked as though they were made from pure sheep skin and wool.
“And I don’t know where we’re going to land until we get there.
Leon is the only one who has the location, and he’s going to direct
me as we go.”
“Go?” I asked. “How?”
As soon as my jacket was buttoned up, the door was open,
and there was a snowmobile, running and waiting.
That was how.
Jax didn’t waste any time before he was on it and revving it.
He looked back.
“Get on, and hold on,” he said.
I didn’t dare disobey. At this point, I was so entrenched with
fear, my nerves standing on end, that I didn’t think I could think
logically if my life depended on it. And my life did depend on it. My
only choice was to trust Jax, and for that I was grateful.
I hopped on the back of the snowmobile, wrapping my arms
around Jax like it was the most natural thing to do. I tightened my
grip and felt his gloved hand over mine over his abdomen briefly, as
if checking to ensure I was there, before he took off.
The falling snow created a curtain of white, interrupted only
by black trees in the absent afternoon light. I closed my eyes against
the cold, against the world, terrified that the last thing I was going
to see was the flash of an explosion as we went over a planted
bomb. Or that I would hear the pop of a gun before I felt the burn
of metal in my flesh before I faded into nothingness.
I squeezed Jax tighter, feeling his warmth through our
clothing, and found comfort. If nothing else, I knew that Jax was
there. He would protect me. He would keep me safe. And thank god
for it.
 Chapter 5 – Jax

The only thing that was keeping me calm was the very same
thing that had me more terrified than I had ever been.
As soon as news of the threat came in, it was like someone
flipped a switch in me. I went into mission mode and found that
there was nothing in the world other than our assignment: keep
Senator Lori Adams safe from harm. There was nothing else more
important than that. Not my own feelings toward politicians. Not my
concerns about where taxpayer dollars were going. Not whether or
not this particular assignment was a waste of resources all around.
There was just Lori Adams and the need to keep her alive and
unharmed.
We tore away from the lodge, my sense of smell guiding me
more than my eyes which struggled against the sting of the cold air
as we raced through the trees. I had no idea where I was going,
only that I was still waiting for Leon to connect and give me
directions.
We were riding blind, and that terrified me. So long as I was
going in the opposite direction of the threat, then I knew I was at
least getting Lori away from danger.
In theory.
“Jax, you there?” Leon’s voice said in my ear. Good. It was
about time he clocked that I was on my way out with the senator.
“I’m here,” I called, pressing my gloved finger to the device in
my ear.
“Good, don’t say anything, just listen,” Leon directed. “Go
Northeast for half a mile and then you’re going to find a road. Head
north on the road for two miles. I’ll connect with you again when
you’re near that two-mile marker.”
I didn’t like the idea of taking Lori onto the road on a
snowmobile. It felt too open, and if we weren’t in a car, then we
were too recognizable. But I had to trust Leon. I didn’t have any
other option. That, and I had to hope that the road was covered in
snow, otherwise we were going to have to figure out how to ride
alongside it.
Lori squeezed me tighter around my middle, and my focus
cleared. She was what I needed to think about, and only her. I had
to get her to safety. I didn’t have any time for second-guessing Leon
or myself. I had a team that I needed to trust, and I would trust
them.
I reached down and pressed her hands against me, as an
attempt at reassurance. I didn’t want her to feel as afraid as I felt,
though I knew there was slim chance of that. I had more control of
the situation, while she was in the dark, along for the ride, hoping
that this stranger she had just dashed off with wasn’t some insane
maniac. There was no way that she was calmer than I was.
I found the road and turned left on it, heading due north to
the best of my abilities. I waited to hear from Leon to confirm I was
going in the right direction, but I heard nothing. The road didn’t look
to be in use, and if it was, it wasn’t enough that the snowplow made
it out there in any hurry. The only thing that gave away the fact that
it was a road was the sign indicating a turn in the road and the
arrow markers.
“Where are we going?” Lori yelled.
I shook my head, not wanting to draw more attention to us
with our voices. It was bad enough having the engine of the
snowmobile giving us away, and I didn’t want shouting to be added
to it.
That, and I didn’t know where we were going, only that I
hoped to be somewhere safe soon, before the two of us froze as I
sped along the road. As it was, I struggled to keep good visibility
between the snow and searching for possible turn-offs that Leon
might send us down. With the thick snow, it meant there was no
moonlight to help us, only quick action when called for.
 “You’re—” Leon’s voice said, cutting out. “—marker—left—
bend south—cabin—”
I heard a click before there was a slight buzz in my ear as the
connection cut off. I pressed my finger to the device, hearing a light
click as it tried to retain connection, but there was little else. I
repeated the process.
“Leon!” I growled, pressing the button so hard my ear hurt
and threatened to let the piece into my ear canal.
Nothing but audible fuzz.
“Damnit,” I swore, louder than I meant to. I pressed the
button in my ear. “Leon. Leon!”
Nothing.
We were on our own.
“What?” Lori asked. “What’s going on?”
Again, I didn’t answer her. I couldn’t answer her. I didn’t want
her to know that I had no idea where we were going and that I had
lost contact with my team. I hoped that I might be able to regain
contact, but for now, I didn’t know if that was a real possibility.
I saw what looked like it might be a large enough break in the
trees to take a left off the road. Within a few minutes I spotted a
river that curved south. That must have been what he was talking
about. The space in the trees sloped downward toward the river,
giving me a better view of where it went. The cabin must have been
off the river, which would make sense. I still didn’t know if we were
going somewhere abandoned or lived in, but I didn’t care. So long
as it was safe. And I trusted Leon that it was.
I followed the hill down, grateful for the concealment
provided by the trees. Of course, a fast-traveling light accompanying
the buzzing engine of a snowmobile was more than noticeable, but
at least the branches provided a little more protection than the open
road did. As it was, someone was meant to be following us and
covering up our tracks or at least confusing our tracks. That was the
goal, that they would meet us at the safe place, the cabin, and we
would decide what to do from there.
It was another twenty minutes before I spotted the clearing
as the terrain sloped downhill. The cabin was in fact next to the
river, just before the river cascaded into a waterfall. The house was
built at the edge of a cliff, with a wrap-around deck and a waning
clearing all around it. The windows were dark, and there was no sign
of recent traffic to or from the house.
Perfect.
I slowed the snowmobile to a stop and killed the engine.
“We’re here,” I said, relishing the still air.
Slowly, Lori let go of me, pulling herself back and climbing off
the snowmobile. “Is this someone’s house?” she asked.
“It’s abandoned, from my understanding,” I said. “Leon
directed me here. He’s the only one who had the escape route
plotted. He directed us here.”
“How do we get in?” she asked making her way to the porch.
“Good ol’ fashion breaking and entering,” I said, following her.
Just outside the front door was a wooden bin with a lid. I took a
quick look in there and grinned, seeing the dry wood ready and
waiting, covered in cobwebs. I didn’t know how comfortable Lori was
going to be in this place, but that wasn’t the objective. Safety was
the objective.
“We can’t do that,” she protested, crossing her arms and
shaking her head, as if I’d told her we were going to go for a swim
that evening. “No way. I’m an elected official. Do you know what
breaking and entering would do to my career?”
“And we are using that status to commandeer a safe hideout
for you until we can move on to the next place. Don’t worry, we’re
not damaging property, and if we do, I’ll personally come back and
fix it. Besides, no one is going to begrudge you trying to seek shelter
during danger. Regardless, breaking the law right now is not my top
concern.”
 I pulled my phone out of my pocket, finding without any
surprise that there was no signal at all. I wasn’t concerned. The
tracking device should have been strong enough that it didn’t need
normal cellphone towers or signal. Even without it, Leon knew where
we were heading and would be able to find us easily enough. It was
just a matter of time.
I turned on the flashlight of my phone and found, to my
surprise, that the door wasn’t even locked to begin with. No
breaking and entering necessary. Just entering.
I wondered what Leon knew of the place before he had
picked it, or if he just knew that there was an abandoned cabin in
the woods. I wondered if any of the staff at the lodge knew anything
about it or helped him in any way. I didn’t think that he would allow
them to for security reasons, but still, there was a considerable
possibility that Leon wasn’t the only one who knew where we were.
I looked around. Most of the cabin had an open plan, with a
large fireplace and what looked like a gas stove in the kitchen.
“Stay here,” I said, gesturing to the fireplace. “Try to stay low
and out of sight of the windows.”
“There’s a snowmobile outside,” Lori said flatly. “People are
going to know someone’s in here.”
“Someone, but not you. Stay low,” I repeated before
wandering from room to room, making sure the place was in fact
empty.
The cabin had two bedrooms, with bedframes and mattresses
still there, though no bedding. I wondered if this place was actually
abandoned or if it was just a vacation house. A quick nosy through
the cupboards allowed me to think that it was the former rather than
the latter. There were no provisions, extra blankets, or any survival
essentials that one might expect in a vacation house.
I returned to find Lori standing and dancing from one foot to
another as she rubbed her arms, trying to keep warm.
“What now?” she asked.
 “We wait for the next directive,” I said. “In the meantime, I’ll
make a fire and try to get this place a little more comfortable.”
“There’s wood in here,” she said, nodding at an indent in the
wall where stacks of kindling and logs were stored. Maybe it was a
vacation house after all.
I set to work lighting the fire. By the time it was lit, it was
almost completely dark outside, the snow lit up by patches of white
moon finding its way between the clouds and tree branches.
“I’m going to go see if I can find some way to turn the water
on or if there’s any gas outside to get the stove going. We might be
able to boil some snow at least and have some water then.”
“No, please,” Lori said, her eyes meeting me. She blushed in
the firelight and looked away. “I’m sorry, this is all a lot for me, and I
don’t think I can handle being left alone right now. Not in the dark.”
“You don’t strike me as the type to be afraid of the dark,” I
said, trying to lighten the mood.
“I’m not,” she said. “But I don’t usually have someone
possibly trying to kill me, either.”
I nodded. She wasn’t joking.
I pulled a dusty and cob-webbed couch closer to the fire.
“Come on,” I said, gesturing for her to sit down.
She glanced back, and I knew what she was thinking before
she even said it. She didn’t like the idea of nothing being behind her.
“Lori,” I said. “May I call you Lori?”
“At this point, I don’t see why not,” she said.
“Lori, remember that we’re shifters. If there’s anything around
us or behind us, we’re going to hear or smell them before they get
close enough to do any harm. Besides, I’m excellent at what I do.”
I sat down on the couch as a show of faith, hoping to let her
know that I felt safe enough there to have my back exposed to the
darkness of the cabin. Reluctantly, she took a seat next to me.
 “Why don’t you tell me about yourself,” I said, not only
wanting to keep her mind off things but genuinely wanting to know.
Seeing this tough-as-nails woman letting her fear trickle in struck
me. It’s unnerving when someone who seems fearless becomes
fearful. At the same time, I was grateful that I could be there for her,
to help ease that anxiety, and that I could do my best to comfort her.
“And I don’t want the party line, either.”
“Ha,” she said, smiling for the first time since before I pulled
her out of her meeting. “I don’t even think I know how to say
anything other than the party line. I’ve been to that many public
events.”
“I believe you,” I said. “Though I can’t imagine that your
political public face is all there is to you. For one, you’re a shifter,
and I know for a fact that isn’t a detail that’s been made public.
What’s that like, being in the public eye all the time and knowing
that you’re not quite human?”
“It’s fine,” she said, shivering a little.
I wrapped my arm around her and made a show of trying to
warm her up, As my arm curled around her, I wanted nothing more
than to hold her tight against me, to encapsulate her and keep her
safe. I wanted her to know that I would stop at nothing to make
sure she felt secure.
“Fine?” I asked. “You have people watching you all the time.
When do you have time to actually shift?”
“Surprisingly, I have quite a lot of time. I just don’t use it.”
That surprised me.
“Really?” I asked.
“I actually spend a lot of time out in the field, working with
biologists and climate scientists,” she said. “My time can either be
spent as a fox, getting nothing done but just letting my animal
stretch her legs, or I can be out gathering data and research for
what I’m trying to accomplish.”
 “That’s tragic,” I said. “Your animal is part of who you are.
You’re denying yourself.”
“What I’m doing is bigger than me, Jax,” she said, looking up
at me. “This isn’t about me or my needs. This is about the fate of
the world and the climate crisis. I don’t have much power right now,
but I have my little corner of Alaska.”
“You’re doing a lot more than senators generally do,” I said.
“Which is why I’m being eyeballed for the presidency in six
years,” she said. “I go big or go home. As president, I’ll be able to
do a lot more.”
“You’ll be eaten alive,” I said, before I could stop myself. “I
don’t mean that. I mean that if your whole talking point is the
climate crisis, then they’re just going to see you as a Green Party
hippie.”
She chuckled. “You’re clearly new to what I do. I unite the
sides. I’m not Green Party, and I know how to talk to the right and
the left. I have done more to unite the sides than anyone else in this
district. And that’s what’s catching people’s eyes. I know how to
listen and respond. I know how to speak the lingo. My goal is to
make the climate crisis a partisan issue, not a leftist issue or a right-
wing issue. And with the work that I’m doing up here in Alaska, I’m
demonstrating that I can do it. Once I win the primaries next month,
then I’ll show that not only can I do it, but I can hold my position
while doing it.”
“Impressive woman,” I said.
“Woman?”
“Impressive person,” I corrected, smiling. It was true. She
was impressive no matter who she was. “What got you into this to
begin with?”
“I’m originally from Hawaii,” she said. “And while I was there I
studied and got my master’s degree in biology, specifically in
ecology. A research project sent me up to the Arctic, and I saw the
difference between the pictures I’d studied as a grad student, which
were only a couple of years old, and what it was like when I went
up. I then relocated to Alaska to do research there, and I got
involved in local politics, and here I am. It was that initial shock of
seeing far less of the ice cap than I had expected that made me
realize that someone needs to do something. And Alaska seemed
like the best place to start.”
“But how?” I asked. “I mean, you’ve done so much, and there
is no way you’re even 30 yet.”
She giggled. I’d never heard her giggle or laugh. It was a
beautiful sound, and for me to hear it while I was holding her, trying
to keep her comfortable and safe made it all the more enchanting.
“I was kind of a smart cookie in school,” she said. “I
graduated two years early and took a lot of AP classes that helped
me jump ahead in college. As a result, I had my MA by the age of
22. And I’m almost 30. I’m 29.”
“Cutting it close for a presidential run, aren’t you?” I joked.
“There’s always the following term,” she said. “I’m getting in
early on the wheel. That gives me at least six cycles to try and get in
on. And I’m sure I’ll get bored of trying after the third cycle.”
Lori smiled, and I couldn’t help but smile back. She certainly
stirred something in me. There was no doubt about that.
“I never thought I’d like a politician,” I said. “But you seem to
know what you’re doing and have the right ideas moving you
forward. You’re not about it for the career, are you?”
“My chosen career was to be a researcher,” Lori said. “This is
something I have to do.”
“Exactly,” I said. “You’re doing it for the right reasons.”
“What’s your issue with politicians, anyway?” she asked,
pulling away from me a little. “Are you just one of those people who
thinks you have the system figured out and that we’re just fat cats,
or do you actually have a reason?”
Another random document with
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years’ service the Douglas was sold, through a third party, to the
Confederate agents.

The “Tynwald” (I.). Built 1846.

In a coat of grey paint, with her upper works altered, carrying two
or three guns, and rechristened the Margaret and Jessie, the trim
Manx boat became one of the most famous blockade-runners the
Southern States possessed. Her career was brief, but exciting. In
1863 she was sighted off Abaco by the Federal steamer Rhode
Island, which chased her to Eleuthera in the Bahamas and fired
upon her when she was only 250 yards off shore. Shot and shell
were rained at her by the gunboat, many of the missiles passing
beyond the fugitive and striking the shore. At length a shot
penetrated her boiler, and another struck her bows so that she had
to be beached. This is her last recorded exploit. Contradictory stories
are told of her. One states that she was patched up, refloated, and
became a peaceful trader among the islands; another, that she was
wrecked where she lay; yet another that she resumed her blockade-
running under another name, though this may be explained by the
fact that blockade-runners often changed their names and disguises,
and that one of them may have had a name somewhat similar; and a
fourth story is that she was turned into a sailing schooner and
ultimately became a coal-barge.
The next boat built by the company was the no less famous Ellan
Vannin, first named the Mona’s Isle. She was an iron vessel built in
1860. Her dimensions were: length 198 feet 6 inches, breadth 22
feet 2 inches, depth 10 feet 7 inches, with a gross tonnage of 380.
Her indicated horse-power was 600 and her nominal horse-power
100. She averaged about 12 knots. She was lost with all on board at
the mouth of the Mersey in the terrible gale of November 1909. She
was originally a paddle-boat, but was converted into a twin-screw
steamer in 1883, and was then renamed the Ellan Vannin. Her
regularity of passage and her immunity from accident were as
noteworthy under her new conditions as under the old, and until she
ended her career under circumstances which make her loss one of
the most remarkable mysteries of the shipping of the port of
Liverpool, she was looked upon as the mascot of the fleet.
Three years later the Snaefell was ordered; she was 326 feet in
length, by 26 feet beam, with a gross tonnage of 700, and was
propelled by engines of 240 nominal horse-power. She brought down
the passage from Douglas to Liverpool to 4 hours 21 minutes.
The Royal Netherlands Steamship Company, being in want of a
fast steamer for the conveyance of the mails between
Queenborough and Flushing, bought the Snaefell and afterwards
chartered the second Snaefell built in 1876, of rather larger
dimensions, and with a gross tonnage of 849, and engines of 540
nominal horse-power and 1700 indicated, capable of driving her at
an average speed of 15 knots. In 1871 the second King Orry was
built. She was 290 feet in length by 29 feet beam, with a depth of 14
feet 7 inches, and of 1104 gross tonnage, and was much the largest
steamer the company had possessed up to this time. Her engines
were of 622 nominal horse-power, and 4000 indicated, and her
speed was 17 knots. Her original length was 260 feet, and another
30 feet were added in 1888. The second Ben-my-Chree was built to
the order of the company in 1875, and was 310 feet in length, 1192
gross tonnage, and with a speed of 14 knots. She was the only
passenger vessel for some time in the British Isles to be fitted with
four funnels, two of which were carried before and two abaft the
paddle-boxes. From this peculiarity of her construction she was
known to her patrons and to the west of England shipping people as
the floating coach-and-four. What advantage was gained by the four
funnels is not known, for they held a lot of wind.
The second Mona, a much smaller vessel, followed in 1878 and
was the first of the company’s fleet to be fitted with a screw. Three
years later the Fenella, which in its general dimensions was almost a
sister ship to the second Mona, was built and was the first to be fitted
with twin screws. She was so successful that the conversion of the
Mona’s Isle into a twin-screw boat followed. The company returned
to paddle-wheels for their next vessel, the third Mona’s Isle, which
was the first to be built of steel, of which material all the company’s
subsequent boats have been constructed. The Mona’s Isle was 330
feet 7 inches between perpendiculars, 38 feet 1 inch beam, 15 feet 1
inch depth of hold, and of 1564 gross tonnage. Her engines were of
1983 nominal horse-power, and 4500 indicated, and her speed was
17¹⁄₂ knots. Two years later the little Peveril was launched, also
bearing a name of historical association in the island. She was the
company’s first steel twin-screw boat, and was lost in September
1899, not far from where the Ellan Vannin went down. The second
Mona’s Queen, only slightly smaller than the second Mona’s Isle,
followed in 1885, and in 1888 the sister vessels Prince of Wales and
Queen Victoria were added to the fleet.
 The “Mona’s Isle” (II.). Built 1860 as a Paddle Steamer.

They were each 330 feet between perpendiculars, 39 feet 1 inch

beam, 15 feet 2 inches depth of hold, with a gross tonnage of 1557.
The engines of each were of 925 nominal horse-power, and of 6500
indicated, and their average speed was 20¹⁄₂ knots. Both these were
paddle-vessels. The third Tynwald was launched in 1891, and is a
twin-screw ship. The Empress Queen, the biggest paddle-steamer
the company ever possessed, was ordered in 1896 from the Fairfield
Company. She is 360 feet 1 inch between perpendiculars, 42 feet 3
inches beam, and 17 feet depth of hold. Her gross tonnage is 2140;
her engines, of 1290 nominal horse-power and 10,000 indicated,
gave her then a speed of 21¹⁄₂ knots, which has since sometimes
been exceeded. The third Douglas and the third Mona call for no
special comment, except that the former was the Dora of the London
and South-Western Railway, from which the Manx Company
purchased her in 1901, and that the last-named steamer was the last
paddle-boat ordered by the company. The directors in 1905, finding
the need of newer and faster vessels, ordered the steamer Viking,
propelled by triple screws driven by turbine machinery, and so
successful was she that the third Ben-my-Chree was added in 1908.
 It may be questioned if any other of the coasting companies
presents in its vessels such an illustration of the development of
steam-ships and steam-engines, from the insignificant little tubs no
bigger than river barges to the latest examples of the shipbuilder’s
art.
The opposition which the Manx Company has had to fight has
been severe. Its first steamer, the Mona’s Isle, on her first voyage
found herself pitted against the Sophia Jane, the boat which
afterwards made the first steam voyage to Australia. It would be
more correct to say that in this case the Mona’s Isle was the
opposition boat, as the Sophia Jane, which belonged to the St.
George Company, was already on the service. The older boat got in
first by something less than two minutes. But new steamers seldom
attain their best speed at first, and the newcomer soon developed
such speed that the old boat was left behind on every voyage
afterwards in which they competed, and once came in after a rough
trip three and a half hours behind. The rivalry resulted in the usual
rate war, and the St. George Company brought its fares down to 6d.
single. But neither this step nor the placing of the splendid steamer
St. George on the service did the Manx Company any harm. The first
race between their vessels was remarkable for an ingenious piece of
seamanship on the part of the commander of the Mona’s Isle. The
little paddle-boats of those days usually felt a strong beam wind to
such an extent that the paddle on the windward side would be out of
the water half of the time, and that on the lee side half buried owing
to the boat heeling over. The captain, judging that the dirty weather
which then prevailed would continue next day, spent the night before
the race in shifting the cargo and coal on board his boat to the
windward side. When the two vessels left the Mersey in the morning
the St. George was in beautiful trim, and the Manx boat was leaning
over on one side in a fashion which caused those who did not
understand what had been done to laugh at her. When the open sea
was reached it was the St. George’s turn to heel over before the
gale, and the Mona’s Isle went along practically on an even keel,
using both her paddles to the best advantage, while the St. George
had one nearly buried and the other beating the air uselessly much
of the time. Of course the Mona’s Isle won. This incident is
interesting as it shows the daring nature of the expedients which the
captains of the little steamers of those times were prepared to adopt.

The “Ellan Vannin” (the foregoing altered to a Screw

Steamer and renamed, 1883).

This rivalry was destined to end in the wreck of the St. George.
The Manx captain, having probably a better knowledge of local
conditions than the commander of the St. George, foresaw that a
south-easterly gale was rising, which always blows inshore at
Douglas. As soon, therefore, as he landed his passengers he put to
sea again, but the St. George was anchored in the bay, and during
the night as the gale freshened she was blown on the Connister
Rocks and went to pieces. All on board were saved by the Douglas
lifeboat, whose captain was one of the founders of the Royal
Lifeboat Institution. The St. George Company maintained the
opposition for a little while longer, until another vessel, the William
the Fourth, was lost. They then retired from the service altogether.
The St. George Company was itself an opposition line at first to
that established by Messrs. Little and Co.; but the last-named firm
have maintained their steamship connection with the island until
within the last few years. It is little wonder that the Manx Company
was started to supersede the St. George Company, for the latter,
having no opposition during the winter months, used for that station
its slowest and smallest boats, which were devoid alike of adequate
comfort and shelter for the passengers.

Messrs. James Little and Co.

This firm, which was established as early as 1812, despatched in
1819 the first steamer which ever carried passengers from the Clyde
to Liverpool. This was the Robert Bruce, a small vessel of 98 feet in
length; she was soon followed by the Superb, and in 1820 by the
Majestic, and two years later by the City of Glasgow. The steamers
on the Liverpool and Glasgow service called at Port Patrick and
Douglas, and in 1828 Messrs. Little inaugurated their Glasgow and
Belfast service with a new vessel, the Frolic. It was for this service
also that some years later they ordered, from Messrs. Denny and
Co. of Dumbarton, the Waterwitch, which was the first screw
steamer built on the Clyde. Another of their most notable boats was
the Herald, a Clyde paddle-steamer, built in 1866 and placed by
them on the Barrow and Isle of Man service the following year. They
afterwards added those fine steamers Manx Queen, Duchess of
Devonshire, and Duchess of Buccleuch, which were so successful
that the rivalry between them and the Isle of Man Steam Packet
boats became very keen, the Barrow route to the Isle of Man being
shorter than the Liverpool.
The evident popularity of the Isle of Man services has proved a
sore temptation to speculators to start rival lines to those already in
existence. The Isle of Man Steam Packet Company had a virtual
monopoly of the Liverpool and Manx service for close on half a
century, but in 1887 two large and fast paddle-steamers, Queen
Victoria and Prince of Wales, each of 1657 tons, built by the Fairfield
Company for the Isle of Man, Liverpool, and Manchester Company,
were started in opposition. Both vessels are stated to have done the
journey in a trifle over three hours, and the Prince of Wales once
accomplished it in under the three hours. After another season’s
conflict the two boats were bought by the Manx Company. Another
opposition company tried its fortunes for a season with the
Lancashire Witch, a twin-screw steamer, which now, under the name
of the Coogee, belongs to the great Australian shipowning firm, the
Huddart Parker and Co. Proprietary, Ltd. There have been several
other attempts at opposition with boats neither so fast nor so
comfortable as those of the established company.
 “The Majestic.”

THE MAJESTIC,
Captain OMAN,
AND

THE CITY OF GLASGOW,

Captain CARLYLE,
Sail from GREENOCK every MONDAY,
WEDNESDAY, and FRIDAY, at One o’Clock in the
Afternoon, and from LIVERPOOL, every MONDAY,
WEDNESDAY, and FRIDAY, at Ten o’Clock in the
Forenoon, calling off PORT PATRICK, and at
DOUGLAS, ISLE OF MAN, both in going and
returning from LIVERPOOL.
 These Packets carry no Goods, being
expressly fitted up for the comfort and
accommodation of Passengers.
FARES.
For the First Cabin, including Provisions and Steward’s Fees.
To Port Patrick. To Isle of Man. To Liverpool. To Greenock.
From Greenock, £1 1 0 £1 10 0 £2 5 0 £0 0 0
Port Patrick, 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 11 0 1 1 0
Isle of Man, 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 17 0 1 10 6
Liverpool, 1 11 6 0 17 0 0 0 0 2 5 0
For the Second Cabin without Provisions.
To Port Patrick. To Isle of Man. To Liverpool. To Greenock.
From Greenock, £0 10 0 £0 10 0 £0 10 0 £0 0 0
Port Patrick, 0 0 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0
Isle of Man, 0 10 0 0 0 0 0 9 6 0 10 0
Liverpool, 0 10 6 0 9 6 0 0 0 0 10 0
Children under Twelve Years of Age Half Price.

ON DECK.
A Coach, £4 15 0 A Horse, £2 10 0
Dogs, per
A Chaise, 4 0 0 0 10 0
couple,
A Gio, 2 10 0

Parcels Forwarded to the Isle of Man and all Parts of England.

The Proprietors will not be accountable for the Delivery of any Parcel of the
Value of Two Pounds and upwards, unless entered, and paid for accordingly.
Passengers are put on Board and landed at Greenock, Douglas, and
Liverpool, free of expence.
The Passage between Greenock and Liverpool is generally made with Twenty-
five hours.
May 1, 1826.
JAMES LITTLE, Agent, Greenock,

The British and Irish Company, etc.

 In 1836 the British and Irish Steam Packet Company was
inaugurated. A copy of an old sailing bill of that year makes curious
reading. Its reference to the “legal quays” is also interesting as
reminding us of a condition of affairs which has now passed away.
The “legal quays” were those reserved by the Government for the
cross-channel mail steamers, and also those at which special
facilities were given to encourage subsidised lines.
This was not, however, by any means the first company to run
steamers between Dublin and London, the City of Dublin Company
having preceded it by several years, as also did the Cork Steamship
Company, and the St. George Company. The first steamers of the
British and Irish Company were the City of Limerick, Devonshire, and
Shannon, but it would appear from the bill just quoted that the
Devonshire and Shannon gave place to, or were supplemented by,
the Nottingham and Mermaid.
This bill, according to the company’s handbook, was issued in
1836. The Duke of Cornwall, added to the fleet in 1842, was, like the
others, a little wooden paddle-steamer, and schooner-rigged; she
was the last of the vessels of this type purchased by the company.
Three years later, by which time the superiority of the screw for sea-
going steamers had already compelled recognition, the company
showed its enterprise by placing two auxiliary screw steamers, the
Rose and Shamrock, on its London and Dublin service, each of them
proving an unqualified success. That decade will ever be memorable
for the introduction of iron vessels with screw propellers. In 1850 the
company purchased the Foyle, one of the finest iron steamers in
existence at the time, and in the summer of the next year established
its regular service between Liverpool and London, with calls both
ways at the intermediate south of England ports. It ran for a year a
service between London and Limerick with the screw steamer Rose,
which was disposed of the next year. Two fine steamers, the Nile
and the Lady Eglinton, were secured in 1852, and the chartering of
the latter vessel as a troop and storeship by the Government during
the Crimean War, and the wreck of the Nile off Cornwall, caused the
cessation of the company’s London and Liverpool service.
An interesting connection between the company and the
transatlantic service is found in the history of the invariably
unsuccessful attempts to inaugurate a service between Galway and
America.
The Lady Eglinton made two trips between the Irish port and the
St. Lawrence in 1858. This vessel was lengthened in 1865 by 30
feet. One of the company’s boats, a little paddle-steamer named the
Mars, which maintained a local service between Dublin and Wexford,
was a good sea-boat, and sufficiently speedy for her size to attract
the attention of the agents of the Confederate States of America,
who purchased her for use as a blockade-runner. In this she was
fairly successful for some little time, but accounts differ as to what
became of her. It is stated that a blockade-runner of that name was
wrecked on one of the keys off Florida in endeavouring to escape
from a Federal gunboat. Another version is that the Mars received a
hostile shell between wind and water, which exploded inside the ship
so that she went down. In 1865 the Lady Wodehouse was built for
the company at Dublin by the shipbuilding firm of Walpole, Webb and
Bewley, who four years afterwards built the Countess of Dublin. The
year 1870 was one of the most important in the history of the
company, for it bought the steamers of Messrs. Malcomson’s London
and Dublin Line, the Cymba and Avoca, and has since had a
monopoly of that service. The Lady Olive, of 1096 tons, acquired in
1879, was the last iron vessel the company had built; all the
succeeding vessels have been of steel.
 The “Lady Roberts”
(British and Irish Steam Packet Company).

The engines of the earliest boats were of the usual side-lever type.
These in time gave place to compound engines, and the modern
steel vessels have triple-expansion engines. The present fleet
consists of the Lady Olive and the Lady Martin, of 1365 tons gross,
the latter, built by Messrs. Workman and Clark at Belfast in 1888,
being the company’s first steel ship. The Lady Hudson-Kinahan, of
1375 tons, was built by the Ailsa Shipbuilding Company at Troon in
1891, and this company also constructed in 1897 the Lady Roberts,
of 1462 tons gross, while the Lady Wolseley was launched in 1894
by the Naval Construction Company at Barrow.

The Powell and Hough Lines

These, like nearly all of the older coastal lines that were
associated with the firm of H. Powell and Co., started with small
sailers between Liverpool and London, with calls at the various ports
on the south coast. The history of the line has been one of continued
progress, and it maintains at the present time a regular service of
fast steamers between London and Liverpool, calling at Falmouth,
Plymouth, Southampton, and Portsmouth. Its earlier steamers, as
was only natural in the then imperfect state of steam navigation,
were, compared with the present boats, small, but were fully up to
the average of the coasting fleet, and in many cases could not be
surpassed by any vessels trading on the coast, or even by some
making ocean voyages. The Augusta, built in 1856, with a gross
tonnage of 188, and 50 horse-power, was a screw steamer, and
carried three masts. On the foremast were square sails. The
company’s latest vessels are the Masterful and Powerful. The
Masterful is of 2600 tons and is built of steel throughout, and the
Powerful is of 2200 tons; the improvement in their accommodation
compared with that of the boats of fifty years ago is as noticeable as
is the increase in size. These vessels are two of the few in the
coasting trade fitted with submarine signalling apparatus. The Powell
Line also has cargo services between Liverpool and Bristol and a
number of ports on the south coast, and between Manchester and
Bristol Channel ports and certain south-coast ports.
Associated with this line are the steamers of Messrs. Samuel
Hough and Co., the vessels of the two companies sailing as a rule
alternately.

Alexander Laird and Co.

The St. George Company withdrew from the Clyde and Mersey
trade in 1822, and in 1823 Alexander Laird and Co. began the
Liverpool, Clyde, and Isle of Man service with the steamer Henry
Bell, built by Wilson of Liverpool. In 1824 Mr. Laird placed on the
Glasgow and Liverpool service the James Watt, which had been a
couple of years with the General Steam Navigation Company. She
was rigged as a three-masted schooner, and had the distinction of
being the first steamer entered at Lloyd’s. Laird’s service between
Glasgow and Inverness was started in 1825, and in the following
year the sailings were changed from fortnightly to weekly.
In 1827 Messrs. T. Cameron and Co. started a service of steamers
between Glasgow and the north and west of Ireland, but in 1867 it
was taken over entirely by Messrs. Laird and Co.

The “Augusta” (Powell Line, 1856).

The Northman (1847) and Irishman (1854) were among the

earliest iron steamers built; they belonged to the Glasgow and Dublin
Screw Steam Packet Company, under which name Messrs.
Cameron ran a service between those ports and were opposed by
the Sligo Steam Navigation Company until an arrangement was
made between Laird’s and the Sligo Company. The Irishman was the
last steamer to carry the white funnel with a black top which was the
distinguishing-mark of the old St. George Company. Other vessels of
increasing size and importance were added from time to time and
the Laird Company’s fleet now comprises twelve ships, of which the
latest is the Rowan, a beautiful steel vessel of about 1500 tons,
launched in 1909.
 CHAPTER IV
RAILWAY COMPANIES AND THEIR STEAM-SHIPS

he railway companies early saw the advantages to be

gained by the addition of steam-ship services to and
from the ports to which their lines ran. Steam-ship
owning by the railway companies was not permitted
by Parliament at one time, and the proposal,
whenever brought forward, was strongly opposed by
the private steam-ship owners. The first company to
enter the field was probably the North Lancashire Railways, which
were subsequently absorbed by the London and North-Western
Railway Company, and which, in conjunction with the City of Dublin
Steam Packet Company, instituted in 1844 a steam-ship service
between Fleetwood and Dublin, the Hibernia being the first steamer
employed for the purpose. The venture was a success and brought
to the Dublin Company such an immense increase in its trade
between England and Ireland that in the following year the directors
decided to add to their line three auxiliary screw schooners and five
paddle-steamers.
In 1839, the Government arranged that the mails should be
despatched every morning and evening from Liverpool to the Irish
capital, via Kingstown, on the arrival of the mail trains from London.
The morning service was by Admiralty steam packet and the evening
service by the boats of the Dublin Steam Packet Company. The
strong rivalry which immediately sprang up between the two services
was intensified by the agreement between the North Lancashire
Railways and the City of Dublin Company, and resulted in a vast
improvement being effected in the steamers employed. For ten years
this battle of the services was waged with unabated vigour on both
sides, but finally in 1850 the Admiralty withdrew their steamers and
left their rivals in full possession of the carriage of the Irish mail
service.
 The Dublin Company was not, however, long permitted to enjoy
the fruits of their well-earned victory over the Admiralty, but was
almost immediately involved in a similar conflict with the Chester and
Holyhead Railway Company, this time over the conveyance of the
mails from Holyhead to Dublin. Recognising the importance of
Holyhead as a port, the directors of the Dublin Company had not
only placed some of their vessels there, but had also put in a tender
for the Trans-Irish Channel mail service, which was accepted by the
Admiralty. The Chester and Holyhead Railway Company, who were
also steamship owners, were under the impression that no one could
compete with them, and believing that they could obtain their own
terms from the Admiralty neglected to tender. Prior, however, to the
ratification by the Government of the Admiralty’s acceptance of the
City of Dublin Company’s tender, the railway company, by some
means best known to itself, obtained information of what was going
on and used every means in its power to bring pressure on the
Government to prevent the conclusion of the contract. These efforts
were so far successful that fresh tenders were asked for by the
Admiralty. From the facts which have since been made public, it
would appear that the Dublin Company were not at all fairly treated
in the first instance, because the amount at which they tendered
having been allowed to leak out, the Chester and Holyhead Railway
Company was enabled to undercut them. Fearing that similar tactics
might be employed on the second contract, the Dublin Company, in
consideration of the importance of the issue involved, put in at a very
much lower figure than on the former occasion, secured the contract,
and without loss of time inaugurated their new service. Further
complications ensued owing to the persistent attempts made by the
Chester and Holyhead Railway Company to wrest the contract from
their opponents. They, however, were unsuccessful and the matter
was finally settled in favour of the Dublin Company by the
appointment of a Parliamentary Committee, which reported in favour
of the arrangements already made.
Before many of the railway companies became steam-ship owners
they made working arrangements with existing steam-ship lines. This
method of dealing with the passenger, coasting, and over-sea traffic
was due, not to any lack of initiative on the part of those responsible
for the management of the railways, but to the uncompromising
antagonism of the steam-ship companies, who objected to the
railway companies being permitted to own steamers. A Bill
empowering the Chester and Holyhead Railway Company to
purchase and work steamboats was brought before Parliament in
1848, but was strongly opposed by the steam-ship companies on the
ground that it would create undue competition and would interfere
with their existing rights, and further, that over-sea competition was
outside the legitimate sphere of a railway company’s operations. The
directors and large shareholders of the Chester and Holyhead
Company retaliated by forming themselves into a small independent
firm to run steamboats between Holyhead and Ireland. The
necessary capital was subscribed, and four new iron passenger
steamers, the Anglia, Cambria, Hibernia, and Scotia, were built.
They were each of 589 tons gross, and were 207 feet long, 26 feet
beam, and 14 feet in depth, having a draught of 8 feet 10 inches.
Each carried 535 passengers. Parliament was thus placed in a
difficult position, because even if the Bill were thrown out, the boats
were advertised to run on August 1, 1848, and as they belonged to a
private firm the Legislature and the opposition companies were
powerless to interfere. A month later, at the half-yearly meeting of
the Chester and Holyhead Railway Company, the directors reported
that their Bill had been successfully passed, and that the boats had
commenced running on the advertised date. These boats were able
to attain a speed of from 14 to 15 knots per hour. The opposition of
the steam-ship companies, although not entirely killed, was less
effective than formerly. The battle was won by the railway
companies, and steam-ship owning by railway companies is now
regarded as a matter of course.
The Turbine Steamer “Marylebone” (G.C. Railway).

The “Cambria” (L. & N.W. Railway).