Chapter
Thirteen
The wolf emerged from trees near the clinic at a
dead run. Its belly was low to the ground, its limbs reached long
and pistoned hard as it crossed the fields to the far forest, a
sleek white comet tinged with the gold of the fading
sun.
Nature had designed the wolf’s body for
running, and an ordinary wolf could cover sixty miles in a single
day, a Changeling, many more. James raced flat out for hours,
through narrow game trails in the dense forest, along the very tops
of the coulees high above the river, until amber twilight gave way
to deep velvet night. Still he ran, swift as white water through a
spillway, devouring the miles. The moon rose, its glow revealing a
silvery shape arrowing through forests, across fields. James ran on
until flecks of bloodied foam flew from his drawn lips, until his
throat nearly closed for want of water. And still he could not
outrun the pain in his heart, or the dilemma of his dual
nature.
Dawn was not far off when James slowed
at last and splashed into the river’s edge to drink, flanks
heaving, lungs burning for air. He stretched out on the bank,
heedless of the mud, and gave in to exhaustion and the blessed
oblivion it promised. The promise proved false, however, as
oblivion dissolved into a dream, the very same dream James had
begun in the loft.
Deep in the river valley that divided
the city, the air was thick with the metallic tang of human blood.
The white wolf discovered five men standing over the fallen figure
of a small blonde woman. One was raising a thick metal pipe over
his head.
A deep-throated growl was sufficient to
make the men turn, their prey forgotten. The sound vibrated along
their nerves, resonated in their bellies. Five pairs of eyes
gleamed wide as a monstrous nightmare stalked stiff-legged from the
cover of the trees. The moon touched its white coat, rimmed it with
unearthly silver. The creature’s lips were drawn back to expose
long deadly teeth; its eyes glowed with green fire. Suddenly there
was shouting, screaming, a mad scramble to escape. The man with the
metal pipe flung it at the giant wolf but the pipe fell wide of its
target as he fled down the trail.
The wolf howled once, short and sharp,
a hunting call to panic the men further. The urge to chase the men
was powerful. But another instinct was stronger, drawing the wolf
away from its quarry. The woman needed help and quickly. And so the
white wolf went to her.
Still dreaming, James struggled deep
within the wolf, seeking a path to the surface, to awareness within
the dream. He recognized now that this dream was a window to the
past, knew his only hope of understanding his situation was to
somehow see this vision as a man. He wrestled with his wolf nature
but could not subdue it completely. Instead, with a sudden rush of
clarity, he became both wolf and man at the same time, saw Jillian
through eyes that were now both animal and human. And as he
watched, the present slipped away and his dual nature became fully
immersed in the past.
Her blond hair was long and matted with
blood. The fine angles of her faery face had been battered by
ruthless fists; her features were swollen and bruised. His heart
twisted at the sight even as fury glowed white-hot within him.
Until her eyes opened. Green. Sea green. And infinitely sad as she
waited to be killed by the wolf. As she grieved not for what had
been done to her, but for being alone. That had jolted him,
temporarily doused his rage. He could hear her thoughts. James
suddenly felt himself struggling for words. It had been so long, so
very long, since he had used any.
Not alone. Here with
you. Carefully, tenderly, he lapped the blood and tears from
her face. There was little or no danger that his saliva would carry
the Change into her bloodstream, not with her wounds bleeding so
freely. Only a deep bite could accomplish that. He concentrated on
cleaning the abrasions as he listened to the outpouring of grief
and pain in her mind and heart. Learned that her name was Jillian.
Sent her calming, soothing thoughts and laid his powerful body
close beside her broken one, radiated Changeling heat to warm and
to heal. Yet instinct told him it wasn’t enough. Finally, as the
sky blushed with dawn, he gave her of his own life energy. A
transference from aura to aura. To save her.
Hours passed before the morning sun was
high enough to give her its own warmth. It was then that his wolf
hearing detected a small truck laboring up the trail. Only then did
he leave the girl’s side. He watched with narrowed eyes from the
nearby cover of bushes as the park maintenance workers found her,
as they covered her with their coats, called for help on their
radio. And as the wolf kept careful watch, James talked to her in
her mind, reassured and comforted her until an ambulance came and
took her away.
The white wolf slipped away when the
police began to search the trail. He didn’t go far—he didn’t have
to. With so much cover it was easy to keep from being discovered by
humans, and no dog would willingly follow a Changeling’s scent. And
when they left the area after dark, he began to hunt. Not elk this
time but human prey—the brutal men who had raped and beaten
Jillian. The wolf had memorized each and every scent from her
damaged body. The five would have gone to ground by now, hidden
themselves in the concrete warrens of the human city, but it would
not be enough to elude nature’s swift justice.
It was Sunday. Wonderful, glorious
Sunday. Jillian rolled over and slapped off the alarm, snuggled
back into the deliciously soft quilts. She was still on call. But
the clinic was closed today, and she had a second chance to laze in
bed until someone phoned her with a problem. And that could be
hours from now. Maybe not at all. Instead of falling back asleep,
however, Jillian found herself staring up at the white ceiling and
recalling yesterday’s visit to Pine Point Ranch.
Werewolf. That
was the term Douglas’s father had used. Good
grief. The poor man was obviously not in his right mind, but
he’d spoken of a big white devil with blue demon eyes. What else
could it be but her wolf? Birkie had said it only made sense that
Jillian wasn’t the only person to encounter it. Although that
thought caused a tiny finger of disappointment to poke at her.
After all, she was used to thinking of it as her wolf. Her imaginary friend and real-life hero.
Logically, though, she had to agree with Birkie. And if Harrison
Senior had seen the wolf somewhere, maybe werewolf seemed a reasonable explanation to him for the
existence of such an enormous and unusual creature. After all,
she’d been trying to define the wolf herself, even started reading
lupine myths and legends. Who was she to say that werewolf sounded weird?
She’d recognized her cue to leave and
driven away from the ranch, but not before seeing something in
Douglas’s face as he struggled with his father. Fear. It seemed out
of place on such a strong intelligent face, but it was there
nonetheless. Was he afraid for his father, afraid of what she might
think, or was he afraid of something else altogether? Come to think
of it, he had looked pretty spooked on the trail when she’d asked
him about the white wolf. . . but that was before she knew what he
was dealing with at home. Maybe he had always thought his dad was
imagining the white wolf, and it was scary to hear about it from
someone who didn’t have Alzheimer’s. Although she had probably come
across as a complete loon at the time.
Jillian yawned and stretched. Last
night she’d nursed a single beer over a giant plate of nachos and
chili, then said goodbye to Birkie at about nine. She loved the
older woman’s company, but Jillian simply had to lie down. It had
been a very long week. And to her surprise she not only fell asleep
right away, she stayed asleep. Of course, it might be due to the
bump on the back of her head. She reached around to feel it and
winced at the touch.
What was it with James, anyway? Every
encounter she’d had with him seemed like something out of a TV
show, but she couldn’t decide if it was a drama or a sitcom. She’d
been scared shitless to find him in her apartment, he’d surprised
her in the loft—and that had been scary too—and then he’d run over
her in the hallway. At least she hadn’t been afraid that time. It
had happened too fast.
What would it be like to just meet him
on the street like a normal person? Or better yet, why couldn’t he
have shown up in the Jersey Pub last night and asked if he could
buy her a beer, sat and talked with her, maybe asked her to
dance?
A slow dance. That painted a delicious
picture in her mind. In the loft, she’d been held captive by
James’s powerful arms, had felt his rock-hard body pinning her. But
in the clinic hallway she’d felt those same muscles held carefully
in check, those hands filled with a heart-melting gentleness. It
had mesmerized her in spite of herself. In fact, she could still
feel James’s hands on her waist, and it wasn’t hard to imagine
being surrounded by his tempered strength on the dance
floor.
Mmmmm. Jillian
half-closed her eyes and smiled, held out her arms as if holding a
partner. She’d only circled the room twice, enjoying the fantasy in
spite of feeling a little foolish, when a brand new thought struck,
one that doused her passions more thoroughly than a bucket of ice
water could have. She lowered her arms, her uneasiness laced with
prickles of fear.
James was a real man. A little on the
strange side maybe, but living, breathing real. He had admitted to
being in her apartment. But up till then she’d concluded that whole
first episode was a dream because she had seen the white wolf on
the couch. How could I have been awake to see James
and then suddenly asleep to dream of the wolf? No, that made
no sense at all to her. For heaven’s sake, she’d been throwing out
drawers in search of a knife to defend herself with. Surely no one
could fall asleep after that.
Had she fainted out of some bizarre
sense of relief when she saw James was gone? Had she gotten the
sequence of events mixed up? Maybe she passed out and then saw the wolf on the couch. Okay,
maybe. I don’t like it, but maybe. Jillian didn’t really
think she was the fainting type—but she had
awakened on the floor the next day. So, as wussy as it made her
feel, it was a given that she must have been asleep or passed out.
She knew why James had been there, or at least why he said he’d
been there. So there were plenty of explanations for
everything—except for why a giant wolf was hanging around in her
apartment.
Maybe she had been hallucinating? Maybe
she needed to feel safe, so her mind obligingly produced the white
wolf, just as Marjorie had said all along. Wait a
minute. I can’t suddenly go along with her theory
now. I met the wolf, and he’s as real as James
is. Of course, just because the wolf was real didn’t mean
she’d stopped dreaming about him. For that matter she’d had some
pretty explicit dreams about James. She swore in frustration as a
tingle ran through her body as if on cue. She gritted her teeth and
focused. It had to have been a dream, because a real wolf couldn’t
get into her apartment. But James wasn’t supposed to be there
either. Had he left a door open somewhere and inadvertently let in
the wolf? Was that possible? And even if it was, why on earth would
a wolf be waiting outside, looking for an opportunity to get in?
The prickling feeling on the back of her neck made her shiver. And
pushed her to walk to the couch on the far side of the room.
Gingerly she picked up the newspapers she’d tossed there from the
past few days. The opened mail. Books. Like peeling back the layers
of an onion, she removed everything that hadn’t been there before
that night.
Suddenly her blood chilled, and she had
to struggle to draw a breath. There were white hairs, many white
hairs, clinging to the worn fabric of the couch.