Chapter
Twenty-six
Douglas didn’t know what to make of his father’s
sudden improvement, but he was grateful for it. The morning after
the episode with the lady vet, Roderick Harrison had awakened in
his right mind—and stayed there. He hadn’t had an episode since. No
dementia, no loss of memory, no cognitive lapses. Nothing. The
doctors were extremely impressed, although baffled. Some chalked it
up to the new medication. The Alzheimer’s seemed to be in some kind
of remission, so much so that other doctors questioned the original
diagnosis. No one looking at the old man would guess that the mere
month before he had mistaken his only son for a hired
hand.
Roderick slid easily back into the
routine of overseeing the ranch. He spent increasing amounts of
time with old Varley Smith, the ranch manager, which wasn’t
surprising—they’d been friends for as long as Douglas could
remember. His father even went to a cattle auction, winning a
good-looking group of replacement heifers. He celebrated by joining
Varley and a few of the hands at the Shamrock Bar, a place he
hadn’t gone into in years. Not since the Alzheimer’s had begun to
take hold. “I’ll look out for him,” Varley had whispered to Douglas
before they drove off. And he had, as Douglas knew he would. They’d
returned after midnight with Roderick only pleasantly drunk. The
next day, he was in a sterling mood, eating a full breakfast with
gusto and hurrying out to take delivery of the heifers he’d
bought.
Normal. Ordinary. Everything just as it
had always been before Roderick’s mind had begun to play tricks on
him. The full moon came and went, and the wild episodes that so
often accompanied it failed to materialize. Roderick remained
himself. Douglas didn’t know how long this would last, but he was
grateful for the respite. Especially since the mental frenzy that
once so frequently gripped his father seemed to have migrated into
his own brain. Even Jack Daniels hadn’t been able to keep it at
bay. White wolves chased Douglas in his dreams, stalked him from
behind hay bales and outbuildings during the day. He’d nearly
screamed aloud yesterday afternoon when he caught a glimpse of
something white moving behind the house. Turned out to be just
sheets on the clothesline, put there by the housekeeper. Douglas
had been so unnerved, he’d spent the rest of the day drinking
himself into a stupor in his room. Slept like the
dead.
There was sunlight streaming in his
window when he finally woke, and the clock on the nightstand said
8:39. His father would have something to say about that, no doubt.
Roderick would have been up, dressed, had his coffee and checked
the livestock by six. Still, Douglas didn’t particularly care. His
brain felt somewhat fuzzy but he wasn’t on edge. Was relaxed for
the first time in days. He drank a tumbler of Jack Daniels before
he got out of bed to make sure he stayed in that mellow frame of
mind. By the time he had a shower and dressed, he felt so bombproof
that if a dozen wolves suddenly parachuted into the front yard, he
doubted he’d be able to raise an eyebrow. He negotiated the route
to the kitchen, just as Varley burst in the back door.
“Rod’s gone.”
“What?” No, no, he was feeling too good
for this. Much too good. “Gone where?”
“I don’t know. He took my
pickup.”
“Well, maybe he just felt like going
for a ride. He was okay this morning, right?” He willed Varley to
say yes.
“Well, yeah.” Varley seemed to relax a
little. “Yeah, he was just fine when I saw him earlier. Sorry to
panic, Dougie. I guess I’m not used to him driving, not since we
had to take the keys away from him last year. He’s probably just
headed into town.”
It made sense. His father used to like
to drive into Spirit River a couple times a week just to get the
mail if nothing else. “Maybe you could take my vehicle and check.
If I go, he’ll just think I’m nursemaiding him and get all pissy. I
really hate to spoil it if he’s enjoying himself.” Douglas was
pleased with that last little brainwave. In reality, he didn’t feel
up to facing the bright sunlight out there, never mind his
father.
“Good point, good point. I’ll see if I
can catch up to him, maybe talk him into going to the Diamond for
coffee and pie. We used to go there a lot, give the waitresses a
hard time.” Varley winked. “Don’t worry, Dougie, I’ll find him and
ride herd on him without him knowing it. Let you know how it
goes.”
Douglas was relieved when the ranch
manager left, more relieved when he squinted through the window and
saw his own pickup heading down the lane to the highway. He
wondered if he should have another drink or just go back to bed.
Maybe both. With his father in Spirit River, and Varley looking
after him, Douglas could count on having the rest of the day to
relax. He felt his mood lift at the prospect, and suddenly he felt
like making some eggs, no, an omelet. A Spanish omelet, by God,
with a steak on the side. He whistled as he searched the fridge for
ingredients.
Roderick Harrison had often used his
pickup truck as a blind. If a hunter was patient enough, waited
long enough, his quarry would come to regard the vehicle as part of
the landscape and ignore it. He’d shot many a coyote, sometimes a
deer, from the open window while parked downwind near the edge of
the timber that covered the northern section of his ranch. The
method would earn him a hefty fine anywhere else, but it was
perfectly legal on his own land.
The blind principle worked equally well
when he wasn’t hunting, just wanting to observe. It was a good way
to watch testy mother cows with new calves, or get a count of the
elk herd that sometimes wandered into the south quarter to steal
hay.
He wasn’t observing cattle or elk this
time. Roderick had angled Varley’s truck to give himself a clear
view of his target, just a few hundred yards away. In addition,
he’d parked the pickup between two rusted-out trucks in the shade
of an abandoned building, a near-perfect location for
reconnaissance. He had a sleeping bag with him and enough food for
two days, but he wasn’t going to need it. Within the first couple
of hours, Roderick was able to confirm what he had suspected since
Dr. Descharme’s visit to his ranch.
There was a werewolf at the North Star
Animal Hospital.
“The auras give them away every damn
time,” he murmured as he watched a tall dark-haired man leave the
building again. There were other people in the parking lot, but
their auras were thin and pale, almost watery by comparison. Light
yellow mostly, misty white or green. One old farmer would probably
have been horrified to learn his aura was pastel pink. But the tall
man’s aura was that vivid blue found at the heart of a lightning
bolt. It radiated from him, pulsed with energy like a live thing.
Dr. Connor Macleod was definitely a werewolf. But to Roderick’s
amazement, the veterinarian wasn’t the only one. By the end of the
day, five more werewolves had come and gone, two females and three
males.
The old man had seen enough. He was
just reaching for the ignition key when another arrival caught his
eye. A big man, tall like the vet, but more powerfully built. And
blond. Roderick stared, focusing and refocusing the lenses of his
binoculars, his bowels turning to ice water. “It can’t be. Jesus
God, it just can’t be.”
James Macleod had come back from the
dead.
The lab tests said wolf.
Jillian stared at the papers in her
hand and let the rest of the mail slide to the floor. The DNA
results on the white hair samples revealed pure, unadulterated
wolf. Jillian’s theories of a wolf-dog hybrid vanished like a soap
bubble, and she was left with the uncomfortable knowledge that a
genuine Canis Lupus had somehow found its
way into her apartment.
Maybe she shouldn’t have been so
insistent about leaving Birkie’s house.
She reread the letter that Ian Craddock
had enclosed with the results. He complimented her on the quality
of samples she had sent for testing. Yet, although the DNA was
unquestionably one hundred percent wolf, his lab had been
completely unable to determine which sub-species it belonged to.
Despite its pure white coloration, which would seem to indicate
perhaps an arctic wolf, the genetic material most closely matched
the gray wolf. But not completely. Craddock
said he had given her a hefty discount on the large bill because of
this, although she suspected it was actually because she had been a
favored student. But whatever her former teacher’s reasoning for
the reduction, she was too distracted to enjoy the economic good
news.
She’d met a wild wolf. But why would it
approach her, why would it be so affectionate—and protective? She
supposed it could have been raised by humans, might have learned to
look at humans as pack members. But if she saw it again, she’d have
to remind herself that it was wild, and wild things always reverted
to their true nature. Didn’t they? Animal handlers the world over
concurred that to assume a wild animal was tame was not only
disrespectful of the animal but also downright
dangerous.
But it was her
wolf, her friend. The one who had saved her. When she thought of
the attack now, it wasn’t the pain and terror she remembered most.
It was the shining white shape that emerged from the darkness and
chased the men away. A massive wolf, its snowy fur stroked by
starlight, a creature so beautiful that she was certain she was
dreaming. Until it licked her face.
The wolf had lain beside her and kept
her warm. She had thought she was going to die and was so grateful
not to be alone. She remembered that she had started crying then,
and the wolf had lapped away her tears. It had whined in its
throat, and there was near-human expression in its vivid blue eyes.
It was sad for me. It cared, I know that it cared
about me. The results from a DNA test, or any other test,
wouldn’t change her certainty of that.
I guess that’s my
answer. I’ve never been afraid of the wolf before, and I’m not
going to start now. Maybe I won’t run outside looking for it, and
maybe I’d prefer it didn’t visit me in my apartment, but if I see
it again, I’m not going to be afraid.
So far, though, the wolf hadn’t
returned. Not inside the clinic, and nowhere else that Jillian was
aware of. But the creature knew where she lived. Did it wander
around outside at night? Had it watched over her as she came and
went on farm calls and errands, when she came home late from
visiting with Birkie? Or had it gone on its way—wherever that was?
Maybe it had. After all, it hadn’t shown up when she had the
accident. Had James scared it off?
The last time she’d seen the wolf, it
was lying on her couch, and what it was doing there remained a
mystery. It was the same night that James surprised her in her
apartment, and she could only conclude that he must have left a
door open somewhere. Jillian couldn’t imagine any other way that
the great white wolf had gained entry to the building. And how had
it gotten out?
“I feel like I’m missing something.”
Did James know about the white wolf? Had he seen it? Come to think
of it, the wolf had reentered her life at roughly the same time
she’d met James. Was that coincidence—or connection? She really
should ask James about it, see what he knew, but that could be
difficult when she didn’t want to talk to the man, didn’t want to
see him ever again.
The phone rang as if on
cue.
“Jillian, we need to talk,” James
began.
“Whatever happened to ‘hi, how are
you?’”
“You keep hanging up, so now I’m
cutting to the chase. Look, I have things to say to
you.”
If she was honest with herself, she
wanted to hear them. She really did. But she didn’t dare. “We
already had this conversation, James. I don’t think it’s a good
idea to repeat it.”
“I think it’s—”
“Goodnight, James.” She put the
receiver down. It was simple self-defense, she reasoned with
herself. So why did she feel so guilty? Suddenly she banged her
fist on the phone. “Damn it!” She hadn’t asked him about the
wolf.
Annoyed, she picked up the mail from
the floor. It had taken her three days to get around to looking at
it. She had barely opened half the envelopes, but she’d had enough
for one day. She piled it back on the table next to a stack of
overdue wolf mythology books. She sighed. She hated to ask Birkie
or Zoey to take them to the library—her friends already did so much
for her—maybe she could ask Caroline instead? The young veterinary
assistant often stopped by to ask if there was anything Jillian
needed.
“Energy. What I really need is energy.
Isn’t there someplace I can order some? Have it delivered like
pizza?” Sudden fatigue had Jillian sliding into a chair, feeling
like the gravity in the room had increased fourfold. It was
frustrating, but she was learning to relax and wait for her energy
to return, to have faith that it would return. It might take a few
minutes or a few hours, but after a little rest, her energy would
come back. If nothing else, having a concussion was a lesson in
patience. Whether she wanted more patience or not. Jillian sighed,
pulled a book from the stack and began turning pages. An hour
later, she was still there, engrossed in werewolf legends from
France and Spain.
When she finally looked up, dusk had
given way to night. She stood and stretched—very slowly and
carefully—then made her way to the fridge where a quick check of
the freezer revealed an appalling lack of ice cream. No problem.
There was some in the staff lunchroom, and maybe some pudding or
custard as well. Her stomach was touchy these days, favoring bland
and easy-to-eat items. The ongoing nausea had frightened her at
first. But the doctors had been thorough in their follow-up exams,
determining that the queasy stomach was linked to the dizziness she
could naturally expect as she recovered, not to something scary
like a blood clot on the brain.
Jillian pulled her comfy old bathrobe
around her shoulders and headed down the hallway. It had been a hot
day and the shadows on the tile floor were deep and cool. Easy on
the eyes, too. She could imagine the headlines: Mole woman subsists on ice cream. Gains 500 pounds in the
dark. Well maybe not. She’d noticed the past couple of days
that her jeans were loose around the middle. Mole
woman discovers new wonder diet—concussion and ice
cream.
Just as she neared the kitchen, there
was movement at the end of the dark hall. She blinked and held her
breath as a large pale object resolved itself into a canine shape.
An enormous canine shape, but no dog moved with such supple grace.
It was the white wolf—and it was heading in the opposite direction.
She held her breath as she watched, and even at this distance, even
in the shadows, she could see the orchestrated movement of muscle
under the snowy coat. Omigod. How long had
the wolf been here? Although it surely must have been lingering
outside her door, it seemed unaware that she was now in the
hallway. She took a step forward in spite of herself as the animal
disappeared around a corner. It was in the livestock
wing.
Jillian hesitated only a moment. Then
she was hurrying—gingerly, and with a hand trailing the wall to
steady herself—down the hall as fast as her condition would permit.
She rounded the corner and regained sight of the wolf just as it
bounded silently to the top of the bales she’d stacked against the
far wall. It leapt across an impossible distance to land neatly
inside the loft door. Sheer surprise kept her frozen for an entire
second. And then she was running for the ladder. At least she
intended to run. The best she could manage was an embarrassing sort
of rapid shuffle. Breathing hard, she clambered awkwardly up the
ladder, favoring the arm with the cast on it and trying to be quiet
all at the same time.
Dizzy from the effort, Jillian topped
the rungs and peered into the loft. It was easy to spot the wolf,
even in the dark. It would have no trouble spotting her either, but
luckily it wasn’t looking in her direction. She was trying to catch
her breath and decide what to do next when she became aware of a
fine vibration running through the metal ladder rungs under her
hands, her feet. Her eyebrows rose as she began to feel it in her
teeth too. The vibration was subtle, not an earth tremor but finer,
as if the ladder was being bombarded with sound. But there was no
sound. . . .
She glanced up to see if the wolf had
also noticed, and was astonished to see the massive animal begin to
shimmer like a mirage. Its snowy fur gleamed with strange bluish
light. A breeze picked up, swirling bits of straw and dust into a
lazy vortex around the creature. Jillian could feel the cool, dry
air on her face now, and with it came the tang of ozone. Her skin
tingled, the hairs lifted on the back of her neck. Through it all,
the wolf stood perfectly still, even when blue sparks danced in the
air around it. Suddenly the animal vanished completely. In its
place stood a tall, powerful man. The breeze stopped, as did the
vibration. The last of the sparks sizzled into the straw and winked
out. And Jillian stared, open-mouthed, as James Macleod shook
himself, stretched, then walked over to the window at the far end
of the loft.
She struggled in vain to make sense of
what her eyes were telling her. Then backed slowly down the ladder,
praying James would not hear her. If it was
James. When she reached the floor, she half-stumbled, looking over
her shoulder as she walked. Thank God that she was still in her
slippers—while her footfalls were clumsy, they were at least
silent. She hoped. Which was more than she could say for her heart.
It was pounding loudly in her chest, so loud that she could hear it
herself. Jillian drew air in great shaky gulps that threatened to
become hiccups until she was forced to stuff the sleeve of her
bathrobe over her mouth to suppress the sound. Nausea and dizziness
from the exertion nearly overwhelmed her. She paused to lean on the
wall frequently for support as she made her unsteady way back to
her apartment.