Wolf Bride (15 page)

After a long, hard look at me, he sighed in apparent resignation. “What do you want to eat? I’ll go put our order in.”

“I don’t know. Just get me whatever you’re having.”

He palmed my head and shook it slowly as he got up. While he was at the bar telling the bartender what to get the kitchen started on, my attention drifted like a leaf in the wind back to Luke.

Slowly but surely he was making his way to our table, but the whores weren’t making it easy. One wore his cowboy hat with a flirtatious grin shining up at him, another had both arms looped around his elbow and talked as if they were taking an afternoon stroll, and the last was running her painted claws up his thigh suggestively.

Was that what I looked like when I was trying desperately to get a paying customer? I scrunched up my face. I didn’t think so. My clients had come to me willingly enough. The only time I went after someone was if I knew he was kind, or tipped well, or on a rare occasion, was an excellent lover.

Hmm. My oh my, Luke Dawson was becoming more intriguing by the minute.

“Ladies,” he said. “I’d like you to meet my wife. Or soon enough she’ll be my wife. Kristina, meet the only three whores left in town after old Bucyrus over there shipped off the other two on account of them getting the pox.”

The ladies went silent. “Wait,” the redheaded one said with a drawl of disbelief in her voice. “Luke, are you settling down on us?”

“Sure am.”

Blondie shot daggers at me with her eyes and I smiled happily back. “Nice to meet you, and thank you for keeping my husband happy in my absence.”

“Minny, it’s okay,” the short, dark-headed one said. “Luke can still come by and visit after he’s married. Lots of men do it.”

Luke pried his arms out of Minny’s grip and shook his head in what I fervently hoped was
mock
sadness. “Sorry girls. Dawsons take marriage vows seriously. Kristina will be enough for me.”

Minny snorted unbecomingly. “That’s what you all say in front of your wives.”

“Do men bring their wives in here often?” I asked out of rampant curiosity. I’d never seen it once in my year at the brothel, but maybe Colorado Springs was a different sort of place.

“Well, no, actually,” the little dark-haired woman said. “I think you’re a first.”

Luke sat, but Minny followed and wrapped her arms around his neck as she floated into his lap. The red and black lace corset did little to shield her ample cleavage from Luke’s line of sight, but she was just being territorial. She was probably losing her nicest customer. I’d always hated when that happened.

The bright red of her lipstick matched perfectly the color of her dress, and her blonde ringlets hung down over Luke’s chest. The oddest sensation stirred inside me, watching that strange woman lay across my fiancé like an ornament. Even as he was trying to gently pry her from his lap, a little knife blade cut at my understanding and released something seething and red to match the woman’s dress. I kept my face perfectly placid but even a returning Jeremiah had a sense that something was wrong, because he took one look at me and shot a warning glance at Luke.

Minny never took her eyes from my face as she snuggled against Luke with a tiny groan of pleasure.

“Don’t,” I warned casually.

“Okay, Minny,” Luke said in a stern tone. “You had your fun.” He grabbed her arms and gently pushed.

The crimson smile that spread across her face was nothing short of wicked as she clutched his jaw with both hands and kissed him soundly.

Well, I’d warned her. The tiny red smoke trail that opened with the first feelings of jealousy burned into a bonfire in an instant as I rocketed across the table and yanked her hair back.

Her scream was angry as her fingers flew to try and pull my hands from her tresses, but the lack of pain in her voice said my instincts were right. I gave another stout yank, and Minny’s wig came right off.

Luke was already in the midst of pushing her upright and out of his lap and the low curse that Jeremiah uttered behind me was downright amused if I had to guess.

Bucyrus held three plates of food across his arms and was in the process of setting them down on the table. “Hey! Careful with her now. She’s my best whore!”

I threw the wig in Minny’s infuriated face and leaned back comfortably. “Well, now
she’s
your best whore,” I said, pointing to the redhead. “And your smartest.”

Red Hair smiled boldly like she’d actually just got a promotion. Minny stood with her tiny fists clenched and her netted, short, brown hair for all to see for a moment more before she snatched her wig and disappeared with a wild animal shriek up the stairs.

I took a bite of fried potatoes and gave my very happiest grin. “Sorry for the inconvenience ladies, but Luke’s off the table now. I’ll take good care of him for you, I swear.”

“Well,” Jeremiah drawled. “That’ll teach you to bring her into a saloon.”

Maybe he was right. Perhaps too much of me had changed for the better and this wasn’t my scene anymore. Luke stared at me like I’d lost my mind, but by the time half of my food was devoured, he was restraining a smile.

It really was quite difficult to feel guilty about my actions when my man found them so amusing.

Kristina

“Did you kill that man, Luke Dawson?” I asked

Rosy answered the pressure of my knees and moved beside his horse at a trot. Jeremiah seemed happy to stay right where he was—in the back.

“Well, did you?” I asked again.

“No, I didn’t kill him. We were right in the middle of town. Where’d you think I stashed his body? I was only there a minute.”

“What did you do?”

“I put the fear of God into the man. He wet his pants and then told me what I wanted to know.”

Irritating silence followed until I took the bait. “Okay, and what did you want to know?”

“If Evelynn French sent him, which she did. How many she’d sent this time. Two. The other man was across the street watching. And lastly, what they’d been sent to do. They weren’t here on a kill mission. Just to scout and keep you scared. Evelynn wanted to make sure you weren’t skipping town.” The leather in the saddle creaked as he turned to me. “She’s going to have to be stopped eventually. You know that, right?”

“I know. I was kind of hoping she’d end up out here to finish the job herself and give me a shot at her. I couldn’t touch her in Chicago.”

His dark eyebrows shot up as if he were surprised. “You want a shot at her?”

“If it comes to that, yes.”

“Huh. You’re a violent little creature, aren’t you?” The way his eyes raked across my collar bones and neck said he didn’t mind that trait so much. “Circuit preacher will arrive on the morning coach tomorrow. You sure about going through with this?”

“You sure about giving up your whores?”

He pulled his horse closer until his leg brushed mine. “Well, I ain’t givin’ up all my whores, now am I?”

“You’re a wicked man,” I said as his horse danced out of my swatting range.

His laugh was booming and deep and my heart locked away the sound to cherish. The trail narrowed and Luke pulled back to let Rosy go first. Lurching forward, I cried out as she reacted at once to some unknown threat and bucked in panic. Unready, I was tossed from the saddle and landed on my side as she ran off at a frightened gallop. I groaned in soreness and as I glanced up, saw a viper curled on the trail, not a foot from my face. The sharp gasp that filled the clearing was my own as the snake reared up and stared at me with its flicking tongue tasting the air around me. I was going to die just a day before I married Luke, and the unfairness washed over me in the second it took to accept my doom.

“Don’t move,” Luke breathed. In his voice was something I’d never heard before. The confidence had washed away, and in its place, the tremble of fear immersed itself in his tone.

A sharp hissing sound came from the small serpent and just as it was about to strike, I held my breath in the last few moments of pain free life. Luke, in a move faster than my eyes could comprehend, whipped the snake out from in front of me just as he pressed forward to strike. He came so close, the wind from the poisonous little creature’s movement brushed across my cheeks and a tiny drop of venom landed on my nose. Luke launched it far into the brush and fell onto his backside with the force of it.

It was as if everything played in slow motion. He sat there leaned back against his hands in the dirt with a look of absolute petrifying fear. His green eyes were wide and his mouth slack. Something about his expression made me feel empty. It was as if something important about my life was changing for the worse in this moment, and I was helpless to change the outcome.

“Luke,” I whispered. Even I could hear the pleading in it and I didn’t even know what it meant.

And then I blinked and he was gone. My rescuer was already up on his horse and running like the wind before I could even sit up in the grass.

“What’s happened?” I whispered breathlessly as Jeremiah lifted me by the arms.

“Nothing good.” He wiped the drop of poisonous moisture from the tip of my nose.

Standing here, looking up at Jeremiah’s stoic face, I could see the worry in his midnight eyes as he watched his brother ride away.

****

Luke

The wind whipped me and sang a mournful song as if it could convince me to go back to her, but I kicked my horse again in defiance. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sink any deeper into quicksand with Kristina than I already had. The wolf inside of me howled in fury at my fears, but they’d always been the same. Nothing had changed from the moment before I met the woman until now.

Giving a woman’s love to a creature like me would destroy everything. I’d bring hell to earth to protect her, and I’d known her less than two weeks. What would happen when I knew her a year? When I shared her bed and her sadness over our childless home? What would happen when I bound my wolf completely to her protection and she died on me, like all fragile humans did in our violent world?

I’d drown in flames of agony, that’s what would happen.

My wolf would be broken like Jeremiah’s. I’d be tormented for years until I convinced myself I needed another woman to love, just like my brother was doing in a horrible, vicious cycle that would bring nothing but suffering.

I’d be the death of that perfect, beautiful woman. Only the most selfish creature on earth would put her in the crosshairs of this life and when she was gone, I’d have to live with a pain worse than dying.

One snake bite was all it took for her life to be over.

It was dangerous in the untamed wilds of Colorado and not a place for a woman like her. It wasn’t a place for a woman at all. Only men made of gristle and bone and too tough for this life to chew up and spit out.

We’d be the death of each other, and I had to save us both.

Nothing changed since I met her.

Nothing but my blinding love that would burn us both up like the sun.

****

Kristina

No way was I going to lie down while Luke talked himself out of marrying me. Not when we’d come this far and were this close. Rosy could run, he’d been right about that. Her speed was a breathless ride that bordered elating and terrifying all at once. She was sure footed and quick as lightning, and gave me more when I asked for it. My grip on the saddle horn was relentless as I steered her pounding hooves down the road that led home.

Home
. My home and I’d be damned if Luke messed that up for us.

Jeremiah yelled from behind me but I couldn’t understand what he was saying, nor did I really care. I couldn’t tell the sound of my heart from the rhythmic force that was my Indian pony’s hooves. She reared with a scream when I pulled her to a sudden stop in front of the barn, but I was ready. I held on until all four of her hooves brushed the earth again.

He’d be putting his horse away and he’d be cornered in that old, rickety building. Luke wouldn’t be able to escape the tidal wave of pleading emotion that was about to barrel down on him. I’d beg for his love if I had to.

“Kristina, don’t!” Jeremiah yelled from the clearing but I ran for the door and threw it open.

“Luke!” I spun when I couldn’t find him. “Luke, where are you?”

His horse was loose and came running with a terrified sound for the door. I pushed out of the way and clutched onto the nearest stall. He had to be in here. He wouldn’t leave his horse out and saddled. Jeremiah was getting closer and he’d keep me from degrading myself—from begging his brother to keep me.

My panting breath was deafening as I searched each stall, every corner, every dark hiding place he could be. A soft noise came from the back of the barn and I ran, lifting my skirts as I rushed for him. In a back stall, one dilapidated with a lack of use and care, Luke’s crumpled body lay bent and broken.

I slid into the musty hay beside him and waved my hands over his skin helplessly.

“Get out,” he growled around a leather strip of hide he held clenched in his teeth.

“I can’t leave you like this. Did you fall from the horse?”

An inhuman bellow burst from his throat as his neck snapped backward with a deafening crack.

“What’s happening? What do I do?” I chanted, like the incantation would give me an answer somehow.

His face elongated with a crunching of bones and sharp teeth grew from his opened mouth. Hair sprouted through his smooth skin in a burst, and the blood in my veins turned to ice.

He wasn’t dying. He was changing into a monster.

In a fit of self-preservation, I backed as far as I could against the next stall. Unable to take my eyes from the horrific event unfolding just feet away from me, I watched as the Luke I loved melted into the beast that’d tried to kill me the first night.

The panicked sounds, I came to realize, were mine. As his transformation into the wolf of my nightmares was completed, the fear loosed its hold on me just enough to let me run. I tripped on my skirts in the afternoon sunlight and fell with a tremendous crash outside the barn. The wolf was on my heels and when I turned, the snarling beast was on me.

His teeth shone white, and his crystalline blue eyes were so light, they were almost the color of bleached bone left out in the sun too long. I screamed in terror as he lunged. With his paws on either side of my body, his lips lowered over his teeth in a look of uncertainty. His eyes grew serious and clear.

I’d never seen heartbreak in an animal before now.

And then he was gone. He was just the back of a wolf running for the woods, leaving me to lie in the dirt, gasping and crying.

I lay there a long time. It wasn’t an option to convince myself I’d imagined it. For the rest of my life I’d never get the vision of his breaking body out of my memories. I slammed the back of my head into the dirt and tried to get a handle on my breathing. Tiny stars dotted the edges of my vision and, blinking hard, I swore not to pass out in the yard. I stood and stumbled toward the house.

Jeremiah sat on the porch steps with his hands clasped under his chin. The saddest look I’ve ever seen danced in the depths of his dark eyes.

“Are you like him too? Do you turn into a wolf?” My voice sounded very small and had a tremor to it.

“Yes. And so does my other brother, and so does my father, and so has every man in our family tree since the beginning of humans.”

My knees would buckle beneath me if I didn’t sit, so I climbed past him and collapsed into the old wooden rocking chair. “What about your mother?”

“Human.”

“Have you brought me here to kill me?”

“No. I brought you here to marry me. To soothe my wolf after losing his mate. I haven’t lied about that part.”

Nodding slowly, I said, “Not that part, just everything else.” I touched my lips. “Luke kissed me. Will I catch it?”

“No, it isn’t catching. If he bit you as a wolf, you’d die a slow and painful death though.”

Jerking my head toward him I said, “Are you trying to frighten me?”

“No, Kristina. It wasn’t ever our intention to scare you.”

“Then why,” I yelled, “did Luke attack me that first night? If it wasn’t to scare me, then why’d he do it? Was he going to bite me and kill me? Was he that determined not to marry me?”

Jeremiah’s patient voice was strained and loud. “Luke was a damned fool that night. He thought if he scared you, you’d stay out of the yard after dark and inside where you’d be safe. In his own way, he was trying to protect you.”

“I’ve dreamt about the wolf and the fear I felt almost every night. How could that be protecting me? What am I supposed to do with this, Jeremiah?”

“It seems to me you have a choice. You can accept him, all of him, or you can pack your bags and leave knowing if you ever say a word about what we are, we’ll be killed. Our futures are in your hands now. You have to decide your real feelings about Luke and if they’re enough to overlook the nights he has to change into an animal.”

****

That night, I cried until I had no more tears left to shed.

Somewhere, deep in the stillness of dark, a wolf howled.
My
wolf howled. The subtle shift in my way of thinking had me searching for him out my tiny window. The yard was still and shrouded in the midnight blue that accompanied an eyelash moon.

I fell asleep with my back against the wall, waiting for my wolf’s song to touch my ears again.