To Catch a Wolf (31 page)

considered her friends, why would she never dream of confiding in them as she did this

garrulous and good-hearted old man?

Because she trusted him—trusted Harry, and Caitlin, even Morgan more than she did

her own kind, the very people whom she regarded as her peers.

And she was not ashamed.

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"Tell me what you know of Morgan," she said in a rush. "Where he comes from, who his

people were. Please, Harry. I must know.”

"I have been waiting for you to ask that for quite some time, my dear. I will tell you what

I know, though in many ways Morgan is as much an enigma to me as to you.”

Athena hugged herself. "I know what he is. It doesn't shock me—”

"And that is why I find it so easy to love you.”

The lump in Athena's throat had doubled in size. She tried, and failed, to remember

when she had heard such tender words from anyone since Papa's death. "It is as if he

doesn't wish to speak of his past—not his family or what he wants from life. Why, Harry?

What happened to him?”

"No one knows. He came to us as a wolf pursued by hunters, and changed into a man

before our eyes. Our troupe has always been a home for those who have no place in

the outside world, so naturally we took him in. He felt he owed us a debt, and though he

did so reluctantly, he repaid us by becoming our 'Wolf-Man' act. He was so successful

in drawing audiences that he was almost entirely responsible for saving us from certain

ruin. He could have left us many times, and seemed to wish to—and yet he has

remained.”

"He cares about you.”

"Yes, though he will not willingly admit it.”

"How did he live before he came to you?”

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"That I know. He spent many years as a wolf, among the beasts—deliberately avoiding

the haunts of men. But his reasons I cannot tell you. There is great bitterness in him, a

desire to see only the worst in mankind.”

"And you always see the best.”

"I try." He studied his plump, interlaced fingers. "He will not speak of his family, except

to say that he lost his parents and sister before he fled to the woods. I suspect some

dark tragedy, and that he blames himself. They say there is a boy in every man, and the

boy that Morgan was came to manhood in sorrow." He gave her a sad smile. "Yet there

is something in him that allows one to forgive his rough nature. At heart, he is deeply

generous and protects those he considers friends, even though he would deny he has

any friends at all.”

"And you want to help him," Athena murmured. "You want to find out why he suffers,

and mend it somehow

”

"I am certain that there is only one person in the world who can bring about such

healing," Harry said quietly. "The one he does not believe exists.”

Athena was afraid to decipher his words. "He has never tried to talk to you, as I do

now?”

"Never. But in my heart of hearts, I dare to think that he sees me, just a little, as his

foster-father.”

"Thank you, Harry." Despite the brevity of their conversation, Athena felt both drained

and exhilarated. Harry loved Morgan. So did Caitlin. What she felt could not be so

unthinkable.

But what did she feel?

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"You must rest now, my dear," Harry said, rising to his feet. "I will find a maid to attend

you, and inform you as soon as Caitlin is awake." He cupped the side of her face.

"Sleep well, my child. And have faith.”

She covered his hand with hers. "Thank you, Harry.”

He opened the door and nearly tripped over the bags Morgan had left just outside. With

a brief shake of his head, he lifted them one by one and set them in the room.

The ache in Athena's chest continued long after he was gone. A maid arrived within the

hour to bring water for washing and help her unpack the bags. Mr. Durant, too, found

time to come to her, apologetic for having neglected her but clearly overwhelmed by his

additional responsibilities.

She absolved him of any need to personally look after her and arranged to have the

hired girl within calling distance. She remained on the bed rather than ask Durant or

some stranger to lift her in and out of her chair. Harry failed to return, and Morgan

stayed away. At last she grew too sleepy to wait. The maid helped her into her

nightdress, and she buried herself beneath the quilted coverlet.

Exhaustion overcame worry, and she closed her eyes. Out of the mist of half-sleep, she

woke to an intense pain in her legs, so sharp and sudden that she cried aloud.

Pain in her legs. She reached down to touch them, certain she must still be dreaming.

She closed her eyes again, willing herself back to sleep—but instead, she plunged into

another dream, this one even more fantastic.

For she was running. Running, not on two legs, but four—running as a wolf, jaws wide

to catch the falling snow. And at her side

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At her side was Morgan. Morgan as a magnificent black wolf, dwarfing her with his size

and power. Yet for all his strength, she matched his blistering pace; her paws were like

snowshoes, skimming over the soft quilt of fresh snow. The cold did not reach through

the lush density of her coat, and her nostrils were filled with smells as rich and subtle as

the colors on an artist's canvas.

They raced the wind itself, she and Morgan. And he looked sideways at her, yellow

eyes brilliant with pain, and laughed. With a burst of speed, he lunged ahead of her.

She faltered. For an instant, she knew that this could not be happening, that she had no

hope of catching up to him.

But Harry's gentle voice was there, inside her: "I am certain that there is only one

person in the world who can bring about such healing." And she understood that she

must help Morgan, though she did not know how or why; she must heal him, and heal

herself as well.

Heal myself? The sheer incongruity of the thought hurled her forward, and at the same

time she could feel the snowy world dissolving around her, replaced with hard-edged

shadows and woven carpet.

Carpet firm and warm beneath her feet. Two feet. She could see her toes in the

darkness, very white at the end of a long column of fabric. They wiggled at her.

Another cruel, intolerable jest at her expense. She looked for her bed, determined to

end it.

The bed was several feet away. She would have to walk to reach it. Walking meant

standing.

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She was standing. Her legs hurt, oh, they hurt most terribly, the way her hands felt

when they had been exposed to the cold and then held before a fire.

This was no dream.

She put her hands to her cheeks. Not a dream. Not the pain, and not the fact that her

muscles were far too weak to hold her up much longer.

Impossible, her heart told her as she turned carefully toward the bed. Impossible,

echoed her mind as she measured out the distance she must cover—the same distance

she had traveled unconsciously only moments ago.

She began to tremble. Not only her legs, overtaxed as they were, but her entire body. It

was joy. She gulped on laughter and tasted saltiness on her lips.

I can stand. I can walk. I am free.

It seemed only natural that Morgan should come then, to share her triumph. Completely

right that he should walk up to her—his feet bare, trousers half-buttoned and shirt open

at the neck—and kiss her.

This time

oh, yes. This time it was real.

Morgan had carried the memory of their one previous kiss for weeks, obsessed with an

impulsive act he should have dismissed a moment after it was done.

Now he knew why he had been unable to forget it. Her mouth opened under his so

sweetly, with such trust, that he knew she had been thinking of it, too. Wanting it as

much as he did.

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But it hadn't been mere desire that had driven him that final step. He had been

running

running as he always did when the company of others became unbearable.

Especially the company of this woman. He had found little peace in the outing, for he

had not been alone.

Somehow she had followed him. He had become aware of her presence as the first hint

of false dawn seared the edge of the sky, outlining the jagged, snow-topped profiles of

the mountains. The silence had been absolute. One minute he ran alone, and the next

he felt her by his side, a ghost-wolf, racing him as he raced his own fears.

He had known it was impossible. She was not really there. But her spirit had come to

him, as the Indians said sometimes happened in the night. She had challenged him on

his own ground, unafraid. And he had sensed that there was more to this vision than a

dream they both shared.

As the stars faded overhead, he doubled back on his tracks and loped to the ranch, not

knowing what he might find. No one stirred on the grounds or in the house when he

entered it. Up the stairs he had run, soundless, to the door of Athena's room.

And there she stood—stood, in the center of the carpet, on her two legs. Her face bore

the look of a startled deer. Then she began to shake, and Morgan felt the mingled fear

and triumph as if it were his own.

Triumph, and pride. Pride in her, in the achievement she had made against all the odds.

Deep and unexpected joy that she could be whole, and free.

He did not question. He went to her, took her in his arms, and kissed her.

This was a kiss as the other had not been—lingering, ardent, and shared with equal

fervor. In it Morgan poured all the desire he had kept so tightly sealed away, unfettered

by Athena's new strength.

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She could do more than stand. Her arms were strong and sure about his neck. The she-

wolf who had run beside him was present in full measure, and her teeth locked on his

lower lip with a ferocity for which he was unprepared.

The wolf in him cried out for conquest. He explored the velvet interior of her mouth with

flickers of his tongue, and then deeper thrusts. She seemed ready to devour him. If she

had never kissed a man before that night in her bedchamber, she learned very quickly.

It was as much the werewolf blood that sang in her heart as it did in his own. Powerful,

undeniable attraction. The wolf she could not be while bound to her chair had awakened

to all the possibilities of liberation.

He gathered her thick, loose hair in his fists and pulled her head back, kissing and

nipping her bared neck. She hissed with pleasure. A distant part of him wondered at so

vast a change in her, and cast the thought aside.

Take her, the wolf demanded. She wants you. You want her. Nothing else matters.

No one would see. No one need know. A single frenzied coupling, and he would be

gone again with none the wiser.

Gone? Did he think he could run from such a binding? Once it was done

As if they were truly of one mind, they drew apart at the same moment. Athena was

panting and flushed, her lips slightly swollen, her eyes vivid, more golden than green or

brown. She swayed. He caught her again and carried her to the bed.

She lay back without protest. He could see how her legs trembled, pushed to the very

edge of their strength. It was remarkable that they had supported her so long. Surely

they would not have done so had she been of pure human blood.

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"Morgan," she whispered. "I did it. I

stood up.”

Already the kiss was relegated to the back of her thoughts. He could not blame her. He

should be relieved, though his body ached and cursed him for his cowardice.

"Yes," he said. He considered the edge of the bed and chose to crouch beside it

instead. "How did it happen?”

"I don't know. One moment I was dreaming, and the next—" She ran her tongue over

her lower lip. Morgan winced. "I dreamed that I was running as a wolf. With you.”

"I felt it," he said. "I saw you, in my mind.”

"You did?" She smiled, as if she had just discovered that there was a joy greater than

recovering the use of her legs. "It wasn't only a dream?”

He began to understand. She had dreamed of running, of her wolf blood carrying her to

freedom, and her body had acted. It had defied the doctors and naysayers who had

declared that she would never walk again