Brotherhood of the Wild 1
A Riptide MC Romance
Date Published: January 2, 2026
Publisher: Changeling Press
Ryland -- I was tailing a gang of poachers, certain they’d lead me straight to their kingpin, when a stray arrow from a crossbow slammed into me. Pain lanced through me and everything faded to black. In that blur of unconsciousness, I could have sworn a pure white bear stood over me, calm as can be. When I opened my eyes again, a woman -- curvy and impossibly beautiful -- was watching me with the cutest look of mixed concern and distrust on her face.
Kimberly -- I thought I was alone on a tiny island off the coast of British Columbia until an arrow from a crossbow barely missed skewering me. With my dog Diego at my heels, I ran to hide in a maze of caves, my heart pounding. Crouched down in the dark, I listened in terror as voices and footsteps floated to me from outside. I prayed the shooters wouldn’t find the spirit bear that inhabited this place. When I finally crept back out into the daylight, I found I wasn’t the only target -- but the unconscious man lying in a pool of his own blood wasn’t talking. Victim or one of them?
Ryland
A sudden squawk of alarm sounded directly in front of me. The quiet morning exploded into sound as a covey of startled pheasants took flight.
Damn! I was hiding in the thick brush off the side of the path, out of sight of my quarry, but right behind the fucking birds. One of the poachers turned, aiming a crossbow straight at the panicked birds. Straight at me.
Double damn.
I ducked low to the ground, hoping to avoid detection. My handgun was nestled in its shoulder holster, and a couple of my favorite throwing knives were strapped to my thighs but there were six poachers and one of me. Not sure why they were using crossbows instead of firearms. Maybe they wanted to avoid making any noise that might bring attention to their presence, but I couldn’t imagine who they thought might hear them on this deserted piece of dirt off the coast of British Columbia.
Even without guns, though, the odds were against me. I braced myself as the arrow arced its way toward me.
Moving to avoid the projectile wasn’t an option. I couldn’t afford to let the poachers detect my presence. My mission depended on them not knowing they’d been made.
The shooter had already turned back to catch up with the rest of the group when the sharp tip of the projectile sliced through the meaty outer part of my upper arm. I gritted my teeth as blood spurted from the wound.
Son of a bitch, that hurt.
Still, it was a lucky shot -- a flesh wound, even if a painful one. I’d had worse. Just one foot to the left and it would have gone straight through my heart. A broadhead arrow could prove fatal under the right circumstances.
The flapping of the pheasants’ wings made so much racket that it drowned out any noise I made as I lowered myself to the ground, grimacing at the red stain spreading on my sleeve. I needed to staunch the bleeding. Like it or not, the chase was over for today.
I glanced down at my watch. I was cutting it close. I needed to get back to my boat and report in. If William didn’t hear from me on schedule, he’d send the troops storming in to find me and that would blow any chance we had of learning what these guys were up to.
I leaned back against a moss-covered tree stump in the center of the bushes. The sound of the poachers joking amongst themselves as they retreated let me know my presence hadn’t been detected.
Well, at least that was a positive.
I’d been tailing these jerks for almost a week now, ever since an anonymous tip-off to the Operations Center had clued William in on their activity in this neck of the woods. When they’d landed on this island though, I was baffled. What could there possibly be here that would interest an international ring of poachers? If they’d been farther north or on the mainland, I would have assumed they were going after bears for their saleable parts, a lucrative business these days. Bear gall was in high demand in the traditional Chinese medicine markets for its supposed healing properties. Bears were territorial creatures, though. On an island this small, the chances of finding more than one were slim, assuming you even found one. Hardly worth the effort of getting here.
Wincing, I shifted my weight slightly to take the pressure off my injured arm. I didn’t dare leave my hiding spot, not yet. I needed to be sure the poachers didn’t circle back. They were a nasty bunch, not above killing someone if they thought they could get away with it.
I closed my eyes, gritting my teeth against the pain lancing through my arm. The slow drip of water hitting the rocks beside me had a mesmerizing effect. Or was it the blood from the wound?
I pivoted my head to look at my injured arm. Despite the copious amounts of blood staining my shirt and the ground beneath me, the wound didn’t appear serious. The flow of the blood would have cleaned out any foreign debris, and the arrow had missed hitting the artery.
Yup, I’d definitely had worse.
Using my good arm, I pulled a knife out of the sheath strapped to my thigh and sliced a large swath of fabric from the front of my shirt to use as a makeshift bandage. A tight compress would staunch the bleeding long enough for me to make my way back to the mainland and get it taken care of properly.
I struggled to remove my belt, the worn leather creaking and groaning in protest as I pulled it loose.
It should not have taken that much effort. Maybe I’d lost more blood than I thought. Didn’t matter. I wasn’t dying, and the mission took precedence over a little discomfort.
The reason we had decided to investigate this group was the anomalies. This was one loaded group of badass poachers. Normally poachers were a solitary bunch, untrusting and cynical in the extreme. Finding two or three teamed together to go after larger prey wasn’t uncommon but teaming up like these guys were doing was totally out of character.
I’d been following them since they’d arrived from Hong Kong and met up with a local guide of questionable repute. It was evident that the meeting had been scheduled ahead of time. Prior to heading north, the five stayed at the Vancouver Airport Hotel for the night. That meant they had money behind them. They’d rented a Jeep and driven to their staging area, where they parked the Jeep in a forestry site lot on the coast. A fully stocked boat, complete with captain, was waiting for them, and they motored straight to this little island.
That was a considerable amount of effort just to reach this deserted piece of land in the Pacific Ocean. If not for the bug I’d managed to plant on one of the poachers at the airport, I would have lost contact with them. It was impossible to track a boat on the open ocean without visual sightings, so stealth required electronic solutions.
It would take someone with local knowledge to even find the island. It certainly didn’t show on international maps, and as far as I knew it wasn’t big enough to have a formal name, just a number on the navigation grid. That still didn’t explain what the attraction was, though. Given the people involved, there had to be some tie-in to the illegal poaching running rampant in this part of Canada. I just needed to figure out what it was.
I’d heard rumors one of the protected spirit bears inhabiting one of the small islands in this area. I knew they were extremely rare, but no one had been able to verify the story, and I put it down to a myth the locals used to lure tourists to the area. A quick Google search confirmed that the small population of spirit bears in this part of the world lived farther north, around Haida Gwaii.
Surely a group of international thieves would know better than to get taken in by such a blatant tourist-trapping lie? The parts from such a creature would be worth a devil’s ransom, but it would be difficult to harvest salable items from a myth. More likely, they were after something else, something valuable. But what?
I folded the soft strip of flannel from my shirt and placed it over the wound on my arm. The bleeding had slowed, a good sign. Gritting my teeth, I wrapped the belt around the makeshift bandage and pulled it tight.
A searing bolt of pain sliced through the raw wound, and colored dots danced before my eyes. I concentrated on my breathing as I waited for the throbbing to subside.
Looked like the wound was worse than I’d thought.
I’d left my medi-kit on the boat, but I’d seen a birch tree a few lengths back. My grandfather had been a bit of a survivalist and had shown me how to make a traditional wound dressing from birch bark. That would serve to dull the pain until I retrieved the medi-kit and the heavy-duty painkillers in it. I’d outgrown that macho, I-can-take-the-pain stage a long time ago.
I got to my feet, using the massive tree stump to steady myself. For a moment, the world swam in front of my eyes. Great, just what I needed.
I closed them, waiting for the forest to stop moving. When it did, I pushed off from the stump, trekking slowly in the direction of the beachhead where I’d left my boat.
One foot in front of the other. Easy as that. I could do this.
My arm throbbed, and I glanced down. No fresh blood. Good.
I stopped by the birch tree, dropping to one knee. Using a sharp-bladed hunting knife to slice off a few lengths of bark, I shredded it into fibers and formed them into a compress. Sucking in a deep breath, I gently placed the birch bark poultice over the raw flesh and reapplied the dressing, securing it with the belt.
Resting for a bit to let the pain ease up, I rose to my feet and continued in the direction of the boat.
Seconds later, I stumbled over a surface root, thudding heavily to my knees. The loss of blood must have weakened me more than I’d realized, and it took a long moment before I managed to get back up. I picked up a broken tree limb, leaning on it for balance.
My focus narrowed. I needed to get to the boat. Keeping my hold on the makeshift walking stick, I took a step. Better, much better.
The birch bark compress supplied some relief from the pain in my arm. I’d had worse injuries back in my military days. I could do this.
Concentrate. The boat.
Need to get to boat.
Need to report back in.
Whatever these guys were after, the Brotherhood of the Wild would put a stop to it. We had the advantage of operating internationally, bypassing local bureaucracy. And we had money. Money could open doors and make officials look the other way.
Boat. Need to get to the boat.
I stumbled again, pausing to lean on a tree until my vision cleared.
Clenching my jaw, I pushed myself upright and took one step. Then another.
Leaning heavily on the walking stick, I steadied myself. The notion of balance seemed to have deserted my brain entirely, and I compromised with a slow shuffling gait that kept me on my feet and heading in the right direction. That was really all I needed.
I felt myself start to fall again and reached out for the closest tree. Had I even made it twenty feet since the last time I’d had to reach for a tree? Maybe. But not much farther.
I took a deep breath and tried to clear my head. Nope. Wasn’t going to work this time. Never mind. I just needed to keep moving in the direction of the boat. That was all.
Just keep moving.
About the Author
Anne Kane lives in the beautiful Okanagan Valley with a bouncy little rescue dog whose breed defies description, a cantankerous Himalayan cat, and too many fish to count. She spent many years trying to fit in and act normal, but finally gave up the effort. She started writing romance in 2008, and her fate was sealed when she won a publishing contract with Red Sage Publishing and just a month later Changeling Press accepted her first submission. Since then she has published more than thirty stories in a variety of sub-genres, all with a happily ever after.
She has two handsome sons and six adorable grandchildren and enjoys spending time with them whenever she can. Her hobbies, when she’s not playing with the characters in her head, include kayaking, hiking, swimming, playing guitar, singing and of course, reading.
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