Wolf Bride (6 page)

Kristina

Cotton’s was a boisterous eatery with long tables filled with town folks enjoying their meals. The smell of the place was a mixture of beef, gravy, and heaven. My stomach growled loudly, but I doubted anyone heard it over the noise. Luke pulled me over to a couple of empty seats on the far end of the room and we sat amongst a raucous group of arguing men, and a husband and wife with their six young children spread between them. I smiled at the woman but she was too preoccupied with her family of picky eaters to smile back. Or so I told myself.

A feminine voice with a thick southern accent sounded from behind me. “What can I do you for?”

The woman was young, around my own age, and thanks to the Emancipation, was a newly minted freedwoman. Her caramel colored skin was smooth and rich and her dark hair was pulled back out of her face. She might’ve very well been the prettiest lady I’d ever seen.

“What’s the special,” Luke asked.

“Trout’s been selling like hot cakes today, Mr. Luke.”

“Sold,” he said with an easy smile.

“And for you?” she asked me.

I wasn’t much of a fish eater. “I need something that’ll stick to my ribs. What’s your favorite?”

“My beef stew’s so thick you can eat it with a fork.”

“That sounds exactly right. I’ll have that.”

She hurried away and swished through the kitchen doors and that was when I noticed her dress. It was a fine looking garment with puff sleeves, and white eyelet lace accents. The fabric was floral and the fit looked lovely on her slim body. Moody Marta wouldn’t likely be making the woman’s dresses if she was opposed to working with a saloon girl, so where’d she get it?

“Are there a lot of freedmen around here?” I asked Luke.

“Trudy’s the only one that I know of around these parts.”

The gray-haired man sitting directly across from me spat on the floor. “And it’s a good thing too. One of them’s one too many around here, if you ask me.”

“Well, nobody asked you,” I gritted out.

Trudy returned and set metal plates overflowing with food in front of Luke and I, and the man sneered at her. “In fact, if I had my way, we’d be running this one out of town.”

“Shut your gaping pie hole or you’ll catch flies,” I spat. “I
said
nobody asked for your rotten opinion, and I meant it, sir.”

The man stood so fast his chair fell with a glorious crash behind him, and the room went deathly still. In his eyes burned the hellfire of hatred and it was aimed directly at me. A bone chilling sound I’d never heard in my entire nineteen years ripped from Luke as he stood in a motion so fast he blurred. And with a great shuddering thunk, he stabbed his hunting knife so deeply into the table, it could likely be seen from underneath. The gleaming blade landed just a hair away from the tender skin between the man’s pointer and middle finger. The air around Luke grew thicker by the moment until it was hard to breathe.

My breath caught somewhere in my throat and the fine hairs on my arms rose as something just below the senses filled the room.

“Advance another centimeter on my woman, and I’ll slit you from adam’s apple to cock,” Luke growled into the man’s face.

The man’s skin went pallid and the whites of his eyes shown all around the tired gray color of his irises. His pupils had all but disappeared and a fine sweat sprang up on his forehead. “My apologies,” he whispered.

Luke’s voice was as deep as it was quiet. “To her.”

The man cleared his throat and nodded his head to me. “My apologies, ma’am.”

At some point in the exchange, Trudy had placed her hand on my arm. “You two been disturbing everyone’s dinner and now you’re coming with me.” She picked up our plates and swished back toward the kitchen. “The rest of ya’ll get back to eating.”

Desperate for an escape and a bite of that beef stew, I followed before Luke even pulled his knife from the table. Something about having him at my back put a chill up my neck though, so I scuttled sideways and waited for him to catch up.

“Leslie,” Trudy said to a fair haired lady finishing up a plate of food. “I’m taking my break. You get on out there and let me know if they get too rowdy for you.”

The girl smiled shyly at me as she passed to put her plate in a deep bellied sink before she headed out to handle the crowd. Another woman worked tirelessly over a couple of stoves on the other side of the room and Trudy set our plates on the table Leslie had been eating at.

Luke ate in earnest like he hadn’t almost stabbed a man, and I put a bite in my mouth tentatively with one eye on him and one on Trudy.

“I know what you are, Mr. Luke. And if you keep carrying on the way you did in there, the whole town’s going to know what you are too.”

He looked up slowly from his meal and the expression on his face made my blood go cold.

“What do you mean?” I asked her.

Trudy’s dark eyes studied my face for a long time before she sighed. “I just mean a man with a temper is all. You’d do best to not trifle with a temper like his. Wouldn’t want to see you get hurt.”

“I’d never hurt her,” he said quietly.

“And I’d like to believe it, but I’ve been around and I’ve seen your kind say the same thing just before their poor girl goes missing.”

Luke went back to eating. “That ain’t me.”

“I’ve said my piece and now I’ll leave you alone. Thank you kindly for what you did in there, Ms.—”

“Kristina. You can just call me Kristina,” I offered.

“Kristina. Now it was mighty sweet of you to defend me, but it’s pointless. They’ll say what they want and then come in here tomorrow and say it again. You can’t change their stubborn minds about anything.”

“Where’d you get your dress?” I blurted out. She was the first woman to talk to me civilly since I’d been here and I didn’t want her to leave.

Her smile was a surprised one. “I made it myself. I was a house servant and did a lot of sewing and cooking. I picked up the same habits after the war, but the difference is now I get paid for the work.

“Will you make one for me? I tried to sew one yesterday but it turned out awful, and I can’t just keep going around town in a whore’s dress when I’m not one anymore and Ms. Marta…well—”

Trudy raised her hand and stopped my ramblings. “Enough said. I’ll work on your dress and charge you less than that snooty old windbag would anyhow.”

“No, we’ll pay you the same,” Luke said, tossing a napkin over his empty plate. “I insist.”

“That’s not what I usually charge,” Trudy argued.

“Well,” Luke said through a sly grin. “You ain’t seen what she’s done to that poor dress yet.”

I slapped him on the arm but it only made his obnoxious grin bigger.

****

Luke

Trudy was lying. She didn’t mean I was just a man with a temper. She knew the truth and it was written all over her face when she talked to me. I’d have to corner her and find out how she knew about me. She’d obviously rubbed elbows with wolves before and I was itching to see if I knew them or not. I knew most of the families from here to Texas, but that wasn’t too hard. There were very few packs left. If what she said was true and a girl disappeared…the thought of man-eaters made my stomach lurch. I wouldn’t ever hurt a hair on Kristina’s head, no matter how hard she pissed me off. I wouldn’t let myself, but no amount of convincing was going to comfort Trudy. Over time, I’d just have to prove I wasn’t a danger.

Trudy’s knowledge of our dark secret put us all at risk, and if she took a fancy to protecting Kristina from a threat she imagined, and decided to share that information with the town? Well, me and Jeremiah would be hanging by a noose with our boots on fire at dawn.

Trudy led us down the street to the tiny house she shared with her man. She needed Kristina’s measurements before she went to work trying to save that tattered dress. A little shiver of excitement lit me up. You could tell a lot about the quality of a person by their reaction to unexpected situations, and so far Kristina had been entertaining to watch. She’d stood right up for Trudy in Cotton’s, and even if it was none of our business, pride had filled me when she popped off to that jack-wagon, Ray Ellerby. He’d been asking for it for years, and it was tiny, pretty, spirited little Kristina who gave him the walloping he deserved. Maybe I’d gone too far with the knife, but the animal inside was happy with the way I’d defended my mate, so it was pretty hard to stay mad at myself.

Trudy opened the front door to her home and I watched Kristina’s face as she introduced her man.

Elias Jones was tall, good-looking, easy smiling, and unquestionably white. Kristina’s eyes went wide with surprise just before she burst out into a grin bright as the sun when he shook her hand. I swear, I was going to get more enjoyment out of watching her animated expressions than I’d ever know what to do with.

Kristina’s hair was right pretty all done up in pins, and her face was clear and glowing without all that powder. Her lips were full and a shade of pink I’d only seen on wildflowers. A delicate nose and fine eyebrows just a shade darker than her sandy colored hair graced the feminine shape of her face. I wanted her and even the meanest, most stubborn bits of me had been taken with her and given up without a fight. I made a pathetic monster.

I had trouble paying attention to my conversation with Elias because Trudy was delicately wrapping Kristina’s chest with a flimsy measuring tape. I wouldn’t miss other men’s eyes on her cleavage, but I’d miss the dress for my own pleasures. Maybe we’d better keep it for fun later on.

Fifteen minutes later, Kristina came out of the back room wearing a fine dress of pinstripe navy with cream details. It fit her everywhere but the chest and the women laughed as Trudy let the stitches out a bit to better fit her shape. I was proud to have her on my arm in her whore get-up, but now I’d be dragging her to town every chance I got.

Damn, she was a pretty woman.

“I’ll charge you half price for this one, and then you’ll have two to wear,” Trudy said.

“Do you like it?” Kristina asked me with the most appealing look of hope in her eyes.

I’d like it better on the floor of my bedroom, but she probably wouldn’t appreciate the compliment. Instead, I smiled easily and said, “That’s a fine dress for you.”

She lit up like the North Star.

Trudy bit one last knot and stood back to admire her handiwork. “I’ll have the other one done in a couple of days if you want to stop by and pick it up.”

“What do we owe you?” I asked.

“Does one-fifty for the dress I’m re-sewing and two dollars for the new one sound fair?”

I hadn’t a guess on what women’s fashion cost, but it likely would’ve been a pretty penny more at Marta’s. I handed the money to Elias while the girls said their goodbyes.

Trudy wrapped up the old whoring dress and walked back as far as Cotton’s to take her turn feeding the masses again. After she waved us off, Kristina put her delicate hand in the crook of my arm as she hummed a song I’d never heard before. Did she feel safe with me? The answer meant more than I ever thought it could.

Lifting her over the muddy street was something I didn’t mind one bit. She was so light and her body so warm where her clothes touched mine. “We’re going to have to get you a horse sooner than later,” I said. “And you’ll need to learn to drive the wagon in case you ever need to get to town without me or Jeremiah.”

Her arms wrapped slowly around the back of my neck as I walked. “Horses are terrifying.”

“I don’t imagine you’re afraid of much, Ms. Yeaton. You’ll do just fine on a horse. The mare you saw the other night would be the best one for you, but she’s got a foal on her now and won’t be ready to separate for a while.” I lifted her into the seat of the wagon and leaned against it until it groaned against my weight. From this position, we were almost eye level. The blue of her eyes rivaled a clear summer sky.

A beautiful challenge swam in her expression and her elegant nostrils flared slightly. “I saw a polka dotted horse one time. When you find me a polka dotted horse, then I’ll ride.”

Dropping my gaze to her lips, I matched her smile. I liked a challenge too. “A polka dotted horse it’ll be then. Wait here while I load up our order from last week. Do you need anything from the general store?”

She fidgeted. “I have enough money left from my travels to buy an apron if you get a cheap one.”

I nodded slowly. “An apron would probably do you good. Save your dresses in the kitchen and keep you from burning your hands. You can keep your money if you want to though, Kristina. I don’t mind getting you the things you need.”

“I’ve always taken care of myself, and while I appreciate you buying the dresses, I truly do, I need to buy my apron.”

Her hand stretched out with a small coin purse and it jangled softy as it hit mine. Our fingers touched for just a moment before she pulled away. Her hands were soft and smooth—a woman’s tender skin—and I would’ve given anything I owned to feel her fingertips on me again.

Turning abruptly, I made my escape before I said something that would really scare her off. I looked back once and she was watching me with the most confounding expression. Worry and intrigue all wrapped into one.