Moon Dance (39 page)

“
What?” Cole couldn’t
believe this. “How can you say something like that?”

“
I’m thinking about Piper,”
said Deedee. “You two are being selfish.”

He stalked into the kitchen.
“Go away, Deedee. Leave us alone. We don’t need you here
anymore.”

Deedee didn’t leave. She
came after him and stood in the doorway. “I don’t know when you’re
going to realize that you and that woman are bad for each
other.”

“
No, we’re not.” He rested
his hands on the counter and bowed his head. “She’s the best thing
that ever happened to me.”

“
That’s not true. She’s
broken your focus, made you weak and stupid, and put you in danger
time and time again. Plus, she doesn’t even care about
you.”

“
She
does
.”

“
She’s selfish. She’s
spoiled. She doesn’t understand what it is to be a
wolf.”

“
You don’t even know
her.”

Deedee came into the kitchen
and put her hand on Cole’s shoulder. “Look, I know that you’re
doing the best you can here, but you’re living in a
dreamworld.”

He turned to look at her.
“What are you talking about?”

“
You think this is a fairy
tale, Cole? You think you and your queen and your princess will go
riding off into the sunset on a white horse and everything will be
perfect? When have you and Dana ever even tried living
together?”

“
We’ve been together a
lot.”

“
You think you can raise a
child together just because you like to fuck each other? Because
let me tell you, there is a lot more to it than—”

“
What do you even know about
it?”

“
Plenty.” Her face twitched.
“Look, the real reason I left Enoch was because I was
pregnant.”

Cole furrowed his brow.
“What?”

“
He doesn’t know, and you
can’t tell him.”

“
I don’t expect to be
talking to him again pretty much ever, Deedee.”

“
Right,” she said. “Of
course. Well, the thing is, I found out and I… I knew it wouldn’t
be right. It wouldn’t be a good environment for a baby. You know
what it was like growing up the way we did, not having our father
be committed to only our mother? And Enoch… he’s not a bad man, but
he’s not exactly father material, and he moves around so much, all
over the place. Living in campers, all those men that he keeps
there. They’re hard, and they’re violent, and I didn’t want
it.”

“
So, you left to raise your
child.”

She pressed her lips
together, and for several seconds, she couldn’t speak. When she
did, her voice was quiet. “I realized it was better if
I
didn’t raise him
either. I had nothing to give him. I found a wonderful couple to
adopt him, and he has an amazing life. It was the right thing to
do, you know? And then when I found out what Enoch was planning to
do with the SF, I realized I could help the children that he was
displacing. And that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.”

Cole was floored. He didn’t
know how to react to her news. Part of him wanted to shake her and
ask her why she wasn’t appalled that Enoch was systematically
killing all the people that worked at the SF, but he knew that she
didn’t see it that way. Truly, Cole didn’t value the lives of the
SF workers enough either. In her own way, Deedee was trying to make
things better.

She took a shaky breath.
“When I tell you to give up Piper, I’m speaking from experience,
okay? I know what it’s like. But it’s the right thing to do. I
think deep down you know that.”

“
Deedee…” He didn’t know
where to start. “I’m sorry you felt you couldn’t keep your own
child, but just because you didn’t—”

“
Think about it, okay?” she
said. She left the kitchen.

He rubbed his face. He
leaned against his refrigerator, which hadn’t been used in years,
and he wondered what the hell he was going to do. Where was he
supposed to hide Dana and Piper, exactly?

They’d stayed clear of the
SF thus far, but their faces were still being broadcast all over
the television, and people were very frightened of werewolves. If
they were spotted, it would be all over. And then what would happen
to Piper?

He closed his eyes, and he stayed like
that, just leaning and worrying, for quite some time.

He only opened his eyes when he felt a
small tug on his clothes. He looked down to see Piper standing
beside him.

“
Hi,” she said.

“
Uh… hi,” he said. Wow, she
was amazingly small. Small and perfect.

“
I hungry,” she
said.

“
Oh,” he said. “Well, um,
that’s… that’s not good.” Jesus, maybe Deedee was right. Maybe he
was crazy to think this would work. After all, they’d gotten this
little girl here, and they hadn’t given much thought to food. He
and Dana had shifted into wolves and hunted in the woods near the
house earlier, but Piper couldn’t do that.

Cole opened up one of the
cabinets next to the refrigerator. There were several boxes of
cereal and a box of crackers—both horribly stale by now, no doubt.
But then he saw some cans. He turned them around, surveying them.
Beans. Corn. Soup.

“
Do you like soup,
Piper?”

“
What kind? Chicken
noodle?”

This can was tomato, but
next to it… “Yeah, I got chicken noodle.”

She grinned.
“Yummy.”

Okay. Okay, maybe this
wasn’t a disaster, after all. He got the can out of the cabinet and
set it on the counter. There was no electricity in the house, but
he had a gas stove. As long as the gas was still in the
tank…

He tried one of the burners.

Perfect.

The next hurdle was the saucepan, which
was covered in dust, and the water in the house was turned off as
well.

But he fixed that by using
some glass cleaner and a paper towel. He set the newly clean
saucepan on the stove and poured the soup into it.

“
Whatcha doin’?” said
Piper.

“
Making soup,” he said. “You
want to see?”

She nodded.

He picked her up and sat her
on the counter, right next to the stove. “You can help me if you
want. Just watch it and tell me when you see bubbles,
okay?”

“
Okay.” Piper started to
chew on one of her fingernails.

“
Don’t touch it,
though.”

“
No.” She shook her head
vigorously. “Hot.”

“
That’s right, it’s hot.” He
smiled at her. He might be a little bit biased, but he was fairly
sure she was the prettiest little girl that had ever
existed.

She peered down at the saucepan, a very
serious look on her face.

He got a bowl and a spoon
out, spraying and wiping them down as well. Out of one eye, he kept
an eye on Piper, who was swinging her legs and still watching the
saucepan.

Maybe he could do this. It
wasn’t as if he didn’t know how to take care of little kids. He’d
had enough brothers and sisters. And maybe he wasn’t broken. He
barely knew this little girl, but he already felt connected to her.
He knew he’d never let anything happen to her. She was small and
cute and sweet, and…
his
. He felt it. He liked
it.

“
Bubbles.” Piper pointed.
“Bubbles, there’s bubbles.”

“
Don’t touch it,” he said,
hurrying over. He turned off the stove, and stirred the soup with
the spoon before pouring it into the bowl.

“
Soup for me?” She
grinned.

“
Soup for you.” He whisked
her off the counter and over to a chair at the table. But once she
was sitting down, he realized another problem. She was too small,
and she couldn’t reach the table. She peered up over it, hopelessly
too small.

He held up a finger. “Don’t
move, Piper.”

“
Why?” she asked, wide
eyed.

He whisked out to the living
room where Deedee was scrolling through something on her phone. He
grabbed several pillows off the couch and then came back to the
kitchen. He piled the pillows onto one chair, and then moved Piper
over onto it.

She giggled. “Now, I
big.”

“
Yes, you are,” he said. He
got the soup and set it in front of her. “Your soup,
madame.”

She giggled more. “I not
that.”

He sat down with her. “No? I
think you are. Madame Piper.”

She giggled harder, the kind
of laughter that only small children are capable of, joy with
abandon. “You silly.”

He laughed too. “I don’t
think anyone’s ever said I was silly before.”

She picked up the spoon and thrust it
into the soup.

“
You got that?” he
asked.

“
Uh huh, uh huh. I do it
myself.”

Right. He settled back to watch
her.

* * *

Dana awoke to the sound of
laughter. Piper
’s laughter. She’d forgotten
how much she missed hearing it. She wandered out to find Cole and
Piper in the kitchen. Cole was pouring soup out of a bowl into a
coffee cup.

“
No soup in cup,” Piper
said, screaming with laughter.

“
How else are you going to
drink it?” Cole was saying.

Piper scrunched up her nose.
“Silly, silly, silly.”

Cole shrugged. “Well,
sometimes, silly things just have to be done, Piper.”

Dana made her way over to
the table. “Hey.”

Cole looked up at her. “Oh,
hi. She was hungry, and—”

“
No, you did good.” She
rubbed his head. “You’re doing fine.”

He laughed. “Am I? I’m not
really sure.” He scooted the coffee cup over to Piper. “All right,
drink it.”

“
You do it,” said
Piper.

“
Me?”

She nodded. Cole picked up
the cup and took a drink of the soup. Then he passed it back to
her. “Now you.”

Piper looked at Dana.
“Mommy, do I drink soup?”

Dana smiled. “You can.
Especially if you ate out all the noodles.”

“
I did.” Piper picked up the
coffee cup with both hands and put it to her mouth.

“
Are you having fun with
Cole?” said Dana.

Piper nodded. “Yeah. He
silly.”

Dana couldn’t help but
smile. The two of them were actually pretty cute together. But then
she leaned close to Cole and said in a low voice, “So, why is
Deedee still here?”

“
I don’t know,” said Cole.
“I think she’s convinced we’re going to change our minds and let
her take Piper back to that family who adopted her.”

“
What?” said Dana. “But
that’s insane.”

“
She thinks that we won’t be
able to keep her safe if we’re always on the run.”

“
Cole, you stayed hidden
from the SF for years,” said Dana. “It’s not going to be that
difficult.”

“
Well, that’s true.” But
Cole furrowed his brow.

“
What?”

“
Nothing,” he said. “It’s
just that I did that by staying in wolf form seventy-five percent
of the time, and we obviously can’t do that with Piper. She’s not
even going to start shifting for another ten years.”

Dana narrowed her eyes.
“Wait, what are you saying?”

“
Nothing. I’m not saying
anything. I just don’t have a plan yet.” He looked at Piper, who
was slurping her soup. “Don’t worry. We’re not letting her
go.”

She bit her lip. She
believed him, but he was right about their not having a plan. They
certainly couldn’t stay in this house forever. She sat back in her
chair, wracking her brain to try to think of a safe place that they
could go.

And then she heard a sound. Tires on
the gravel driveway outside. A car engine. She stood up.

Cole had heard it too and was on his
feet.

Together, they tore into the
living room.

Deedee held up both of her
hands. “Cole, I couldn’t let you guys leave it this way. You used
to be so close, and you need to work it out.”

What was she talking about? Dana ran
for the window.

“
What did you do?” Cole
growled.

Dana collided with a chair,
knocking over the backpack, spilling out clothing and the tranq
guns. She pushed past the chair and scrambled to the
window.

There was an RV in the driveway. As
Dana watched, Enoch got out and slammed the door.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE

Cole had never felt terror
like this, never once in his entire life. It
wasn
’t fear for himself. It was fear for
Dana and Piper, who he was realizing meant more to him than his own
safety. He felt frozen by this fear, unable to move or
speak.