She observed him from her chosen cover, as she'd done twice
before. The first two times he'd been chopping wood, but
today, after a heavy snowfall appropriate for the third week
of December, he was shoveling the sidewalk. Today was the
day she'd take him.
Heart in her mouth, she watched as he cleared the snow with
carefully controlled violence. Every movement was exactly
the same as the one before. Each slide of the shovel was
strictly parallel to previous marks. And in his fierce
control, she saw his rage, tamped and contained by will
alone—like a pipe bomb.
Flattening herself and breathing lightly so he wouldn't see
her, she considered how she would do it. From behind, she
thought, as fast as possible, to give him no time to react.
One quick movement and it would all be over—if she didn't
lose her courage, as she had the first two times.
Something told her that it had to be today, that she
wouldn't get a fourth opportunity. He was wary and
disciplined—and if he weren't so angry, surely his senses,
werewolf sharp, would have discovered her hiding place in
the snow beneath the fir trees lining his front yard.
She shook with the stress of what she planned. Ambush. Weak
and cowardly, but it was the only way she could take him.
And it needed to be done, because it was only a matter of
time before he lost the control that kept him shoveling to a
steady beat while the wolf raged inside him. And when his
control failed, people would die.
Dangerous. He could be so fast. If she screwed this up, he
could kill her. She had to trust that her own werewolf
reflexes were up to this. It needed to be done.Resolution
gave her strength. It would be today.
#
Charles heard the SUV, but he didn't look up.
He'd turned off his cell and continued to ignore the cool
voice of his father in his head until it went away. There
was no one who lived near him on the snow-packed mountain
road—so the SUV was just the next step in his father's
determination to make him toe the line.
"Hey, Chief."
It was a new wolf, Robert, sent here to the Aspen Creek Pack
by his own Alpha because of his lack of control. Sometimes
the Marrok could help; other times he just had to clean up
the mess. If Robert couldn't learn discipline, it would
probably be Charles's job to dispose of him. If Robert
didn't learn manners, the disposal job wouldn't bother
Charles as much as it should.
That Bran had sent Robert to deliver his message told
Charles just how furious his da was.
"Chief!" The man didn't even bother getting out of the car.
There weren't many people Charles extended the privilege of
calling him anything but his given name, and this pup wasn't
one of them.
Charles stopped shoveling and looked at the other wolf, let
him see just what he was messing with. The man lost his
grin, paled, and dropped his eyes instantly, his heart
making the big blood vessel in his neck throb with sudden fear.
Charles felt petty. And he resented it, resented his
pettiness and the roiling anger that caused it. Inside him
Brother Wolf smelled Robert's weakness and liked it. The
stress of defying the Marrok, his Alpha, had left Brother
Wolf wanting blood. Robert's would do.
"I . . . ah."
Charles didn't say anything. Let the fool work for it. He
lowered his eyelids and watched the man squirm some more.
The scent of his fear pleased Brother Wolf—and made Charles
feel a little sick at the same time. Usually, he and Brother
Wolf were in better harmony—or maybe the real problem was
that he wanted to kill someone, too.
"The Marrok wants to see you."
Charles waited a full minute, knowing how long that time
would seem to his father's message boy. "That's it?"
"Yes, sir."
That "sir" was a far cry from "Hey, Chief."
"Tell him I'll come after my walk is cleared." And he went
back to work.
After a few scrapes of his shovel, he heard the SUV turn
around in the narrow road. The vehicle spun out, then
grabbed traction and headed back to the Marrok's,
fishtailing with Robert's urgent desire to get away. Brother
Wolf was smugly satisfied; Charles tried not to be. Charles
knew he shouldn't bait his father by defying his
orders—especially not in front of a wolf who needed guidance
as Robert did. But Charles needed the time.
He had to be in better control of himself before he faced
the Marrok again. He needed real control that would allow
him to lay out his argument logically and explain why the
Marrok was wrongheaded—instead of simply bashing heads with
him the way they had the last four times Charles had spoken
to him. Not for the first time, he wished for a more facile
tongue. His brother could sometimes change the Marrok's
mind—but he never had. This time, Charles knew his father
was wrong.
And now he'd worked himself up into a fine mood.
He focused on the snow and took a deep breath of cold
air—and something heavy landed on his shoulders, dropping
him facedown in the snow. Sharp teeth and a warm mouth
touched his neck and were gone as quickly as the weight that
had dropped him.
Without moving, he opened his eyes to slits, and from the
corner of his eye, he glanced at the sky-eyed black wolf
facing him warily . . . with a tail that waved tentatively
and paws that danced in the snow, claws extending and
retracting like a cat's with nervous excitement.
And it was as though something clicked inside Brother Wolf,
turning off the roiling anger that had been churning in
Charles's gut for the past couple of weeks. The relief of
that was enough to drop his head back into the snow. Only
with her, only ever with her, did Brother Wolf settle down
wholly. And a few weeks were not enough time to get used to
the miracle of it—or to keep him from being too stupid to
ask for her help.
Which was why she'd planned this ambush, of course.
When he was up to it, he'd explain to her how dangerous it
was for her to attack him without warning. Though Brother
Wolf had apparently known exactly who it was who'd attacked:
he'd let them be taken down in the snow.
The cold felt good against his face.
The frozen stuff squeaked under her paws, and she made an
anxious sound, proof that she hadn't noticed when he'd
looked at her. Her nose was cold as it touched his ear and
he steeled himself not to react. Playing dead with his face
buried in the snow, his smile was free to grow.
The cold nose retreated, and he waited for it to come back
within reach, his body limp and lifeless. She pawed at him,
and he let his body rock—but when she nipped his backside,
he couldn't help but jerk away with a sharp sound.
Faking dead was useless after that, so he rolled over and
rose to a crouch.
She got out of reach quickly and turned back to look at him.
He knew that she couldn't read anything in his face. He knew
it. He had too much practice controlling all of his expressions.
But she saw something that had her dropping her front half
down to a crouch and loosening her lower jaw in a wolfish
grin—a universal invitation to play. He rolled forward, and
she took off with a yip of excitement.
They wrestled all over the front yard—making a mess of
his carefully tended walk and turning the pristine snow into
a battleground of foot-and-body prints. He stayed human to
even the odds, because Brother Wolf outweighed her by sixty
or eighty pounds and his human form was almost her weight.
She didn't use her claws or teeth against his vulnerable skin.
He laughed at her mock growls when she got him down and went
for his stomach—then laughed again at the icy nose she
shoved under his coat and shirt, more ticklish than any
fingers in the sensitive spots on the sides of his belly.
He was careful never to pin her down, never to hurt her,
even by accident. That she'd risk this was a statement of
trust that warmed him immensely—but he never let
Brother Wolf forget that she didn't know them well and had
more reason than most to fear him and what he was: male
and dominant and wolf.
He heard the car drive up. He could have stopped their play,
but Brother Wolf had no desire to take up a real battle yet.
So he grabbed her hind foot and tugged it as he rolled out
of reach of gleaming fangs.
And he ignored the rich scent of his father's anger—a
scent that faded abruptly.
Anna was oblivious to his father's presence. Bran could do
that, fade into the shadows as if he were just another man
and not the Marrok. All of her attention was on
Charles—and it made Brother Wolf preen that even the
Marrok was second to them in her attentions. It worried the
man because, untrained to use her wolf senses, someday she
might not notice some danger that would get her killed.
Brother Wolf was sure that they could protect her and shook
off Charles's worry, dragging him back into the joy of play.
He heard his father sigh and strip out of his clothing as
Anna made a run for it and Charles chased her all the way
around the house. She used the trees in the back as barriers
to keep him at bay when he got too close. Her four clawed
feet gave her more traction than his boots did, and she
could get around the trees faster.
At last he chased her out of the trees, and she bolted back
around the house with him hot on her trail. She rounded the
corner to the front yard and froze at the sight of his
father in wolf shape, waiting for them.
It was all Charles could do to not keep going through her
like a running back. As it was, he took her legs right out
from under her as he changed his run into a slide.
Before he could check to see if she was okay, a silver
missile was on him and the whole fight changed abruptly.
Charles had been mostly in control of the action when it was
just he and Anna, but with the addition of his father, he
was forced to an earnest application of muscle, speed, and
brain to keep the two wolves, black and silver, from making
him eat snow.
At last he lay flat on his back, with Anna on his legs and
his father's fangs touching the sides of his throat in mock
threat.
"Okay," he said, relaxing his body in surrender. "Okay. I
give up."
The words were more than just an end to play. He'd tried.
But in the end, the Alpha's word was law. Whatever followed
would follow. So he submitted as easily as any pup in the
pack to his father's dominance.
The Marrok lifted his head and removed himself from
Charles's chest. He sneezed and shook off snow as Charles
sat up and pulled his legs out from under Anna.
"Thanks," he told her, and she gave him a happy grin. He
gathered up the clothes from the hood of his father's car
and opened the door to the house. Anna bounced into the
living room and trotted down the hall to the bedroom. He
tossed his father's clothes into the bathroom, and when his
father followed them, shut the door behind the white-tipped
tail.
He had hot chocolate and soup ready when his father emerged,
his face flushed with the effort of the change, his eyes
hazel and human once more.
He and his da didn't look much alike. Charles took after his
Salish mother and Bran was Welsh through and through, with
sandy hair and prominent features that usually wore a
deceptively earnest expression, which was currently nowhere
in evidence. Despite the play, Bran didn't look particularly
happy.
Charles didn't bother trying to talk. He had nothing to say
anyway. His grandfather had told him once that he tried too
hard to move trees when a wiser man would walk around them.
His grandfather had been a medicine man and talked like that
sometimes. And he was usually right.
He handed his da a cup of hot chocolate.
"Your wife called me last night." Bran's voice was gruff.
"Ah." He hadn't known that. Anna must have done it while
he'd been out trying to outrun his frustrations.
"She told me I wasn't hearing what you were saying," Da
said. "I told her that I heard you tell me quite clearly
that I was an idiot for going to Seattle to meet with the
European delegation—as did most of the rest of the pack."
Tactful, that's me, thought Charles, who decided sipping his
cocoa was better than opening his mouth.
"And I asked him if you were in the habit of arguing with
him without a good reason," said Anna breezily as she
slipped by his father and brushed against Charles. She was
wearing his favorite brown sweater. On her it hung halfway
down her thighs and buried her shape in cocoa-colored wool.
Brother Wolf liked it when she wore his clothes.
She should have looked like a refugee, but somehow she
didn't. The color turned her skin to porcelain and brought
out rich highlights in her light brown hair. It also
emphasized her freckles—which he adored.
She hopped up on the counter and purred happily as she
snagged the cocoa he'd made for her.
"And then she hung up," said his father in disgruntled tones.
"Mmm," said Anna. Charles couldn't tell if she was
responding to the hot chocolate or his father.
"And she refused to pick up the phone when I called back."
His father wasn't pleased.
Not so comfortable having someone around who doesn't
instantly obey you, old man? Charles thought—just as
his father met his eye.
Bran's sudden laugh told Charles that his da wasn't really
upset.
"Frustrating," Charles ventured.
"He yelled at me," Anna said serenely, tapping her forehead.
The Marrok could speak to any of his wolves mind to mind,
though he couldn't read their thoughts no matter how much it
felt like that was what he was doing. He was just damnably
good at reading people. "I ignored him, and he went away
eventually."
"No fun fighting someone who doesn't fight back," Charles said.
"Without someone to argue with, I knew he'd have to think
about what I said," Anna told them smugly. "If only to come
up with the right words to squelch me the next time he
talked to me."
She hadn't reached even a quarter of a century yet, they
hadn't been mated a full month—and she was already
arranging them all to suit herself. Brother Wolf was pleased
with the mate he'd found for them.
Charles set down his cup and folded his arms over his chest.
He knew he looked intimidating, that was his intention. But
when Anna leaned away from him, just a little, he dropped
his arms and hooked his thumbs in his jeans and made his
shoulders relax.And his voice was gentler than he'd meant it
to be. "Manipulating Bran has a tendency to backfire," he
told her. "I'd recommend against it."
But his father rubbed his mouth and sighed loudly. "So,"
said his father. "Why is it that you think it would be
disastrous for me to go to Seattle?"
Charles rounded on his father, his resolve to quit fighting
Bran on his decision to go to Seattle all but forgotten.
"The Beast is coming, and you ask me that?"
"Who?" Anna asked.
"Jean Chastel, the Beast of Gévaudan," Charles told
her. "He likes to eat his prey—and his prey is mostly
human."
"He stopped that," Bran said coolly.
"Please," Charles snapped, "don't mouth something you don't
believe to me—It smells perilously close to a lie. The
Beast was forced to stop killing openly, but a tiger doesn't
change his stripes. He's still doing it. You know it as well
as I do." He could have pointed out other things—Jean
had a taste for human flesh, the younger the better. But
Anna had already experienced what happened when a wolf
turned monstrous. He didn't want to be the one to tell her
that there were worse beasts out there than her former Alpha
and his mate. His father knew what Jean Chastel was.
Bran conceded the point. "Yes. Almost certainly he is. But
I'm not a helpless human, he won't kill me." He looked at
Charles narrowly. "Which you know. So why do you think it
will be dangerous?"
He was right. Take the Beast out of the picture, and it
still made him ill to think of his father going. The Beast
was the most obvious, provable danger.
"I just know," Charles said, finally. "But it is your
decision to make." His gut clenched in anticipation of just
how bad it was going to be.
"You still don't have a logical reason."
"No." Charles forced his body to accept his defeat and kept
his eyes on the floor.
His da looked out the little window where the mountains lay
draped in winter white.
"Your mother did that," he said. "She'd make a statement
without any real support at all, and I was supposed to just
take her word for it."
Anna was looking at his da with bright expectancy.
Bran smiled at her, then raised his cup toward the
mountains. "I learned the hard way that she was usually
right. Frustrating doesn't come close to covering it."
"So," he said, turning his attention back to Charles. "They
are on their way already, I can't cancel it now—and it
needs to be done. Announcing to the real world that there
are werewolves among them will affect the European wolves as
much, if not more, than it does us. They deserve their
chance to be heard and told why we are doing it. It should
come from me, but you would be an acceptable substitute. It
will cause some offense, though, and you will have to deal
with that."
Relief flooded Charles with an abruptness that had him
leaning against the countertop in sudden weakness, as the
all-consuming sense of absolute and utter disaster slid away
and left him whole. Charles looked at his mate.
"My grandfather would have loved to have met you," he told
her huskily. "He would have called you 'She Moves Trees Out
of His Path.'"
She looked lost, but his Da laughed. He'd known the old man,
too.
"He called me 'He Who Must Run into Trees,'" Charles
explained, and in a spirit of honesty, a need for his mate
to know who he was, he continued, "Or sometimes 'Running
Eagle.'"
"'Running Eagle'?" Anna puzzled it over, frowning at him.
"What's wrong with that?"
"Too stupid to fly," murmured his father with a little
smile. "That old man had a wicked tongue—wicked and
clever, so it stuck until he dinged you with your next
offense." He tilted his head at Charles. "But you were a lot
younger then—and I am not so solid an object as a
tree. You feel better if you—"
Anna cleared her throat pointedly.
His da smiled at her. "If you and Anna go instead?"
"Yes." Charles paused because there was something more, but
the house was too busy with modern things for the spirits to
talk to him clearly. Usually that was a good thing. When
they got too demanding, he sometimes retreated to his
office, where the computers and electronics kept them out
entirely. Still, there was something in him that breathed
easier now that his father had agreed not to go. "Not safe,
but better. When do you want us in Seattle?"