by J. K Harper
Huge, beautiful flakes of snow drifted down from the sky to add yet another layer of snow to the already covered street outside Connor Lowe's office window. For a long moment, he stared out at the pretty scene, which showed early holiday shoppers walking along the storefronts, well bundled against the weather. Colorful lights twinkled in many of the stores and giant Christmas tree ornaments decorated the lampposts. It was the quintessential small town winter scene, postcard perfect.
He saw not a single bit of it.
Instead, his mind was picturing a cool, tall blonde with the longest legs imaginable, gorgeous gray eyes that had the depths of the sky in them, the sharpest mind he knew, and a huge yet rare smile that never failed to delight him. His wolf rumbled with approval as he pictured his mate. A strong note of worry underlaid it, though, and his tail wavered at half mast.
“Yeah,” Connor muttered. “Yeah.”
A short knock on his door snapped his attention back to where he really was. “Hey, doc,” said Trevor, his fellow doctor, poking his head around the door with a frazzled look. Trevor also doubled as his main clinic assistant on days like today when their receptionist had called in absent because she had a sick kid. “Your two o'clock just got here, your one-thirty is still waiting to be seen, and we also just had three new walk-ins. One of them's a three-month-old with a really bad cough and a high temp,” he added with a concerned frown. “I'm pretty sure you need to see that one first. It's the Jenkins' kid.”
Connor sighed, then stood up and stretched mightily. The Jenkins were regulars at the low-income clinic Connor ran. He'd taken them under his wing, since the poor kids were barely into their twenties and already had two older kids, useless drunks and jailbirds as their own parents, and only the worst kind of minimum wage jobs to support them all. They tried hard to be good parents, but they lacked far more skills than they possessed.
Soft heart, his wolf rumbled. Mate like a lion, he added, picturing Lia's shake of her head as Connor yet again offered free medical services to the very neediest of his clients. Lia was a very good person, but she would never let her own company run as deeply into the red as Connor's struggling but very necessary little clinic was. She believed in charging for what one was worth.
You'll never get ahead like that, Connor, she often told him, although the words were always spoken as gently as she could. We'll never be able to leave town if you keep letting your patients get away with not paying. The bills are killing us as it is.
He didn't let his patients get away with just anything. He simply saw them in need and could not let them suffer the consequences of the country's half-useless medical insurance system. He also didn't want to leave Durango. This was his home, his pack's home, and besides, he could never abandon these patients. He and this clinic were the only things standing between some of them and utter financial ruin due to outrageous medical bills—or even needless death from conditions that he could and would treat for free as long as the money held out.
Which it was not going to do for much longer. Like, maybe a month or two longer.
“Connor?” Trevor's voice was firm. “It's already almost two-thirty. We've got to get moving out there.” He gestured to the small, overcrowded waiting room where all their patients waited.
“Let's do it. Jenkins baby first,” Connor said decisively, grabbing his clipboard and heading out with a briskness he didn't really feel. “No charge.”
He pictured Lia's wry expression at those words and tried as hard as he could to push her to the back of his mind for the moment, despite the heavy feeling in his stomach.
This place was the reason Lia was leaving. He was part of the reason she was finally leaving to chase her dream. And letting his heart and soul walk away was probably going to kill him, but there was nothing he could or would ever do to stop her. He'd never stand in the way of his mate's dreams, even if those dreams were about to take her so far from him he honestly wasn't sure their relationship would survive, mates or no.
His wolf growled faintly, turning his back on Connor. Sighing again, Connor headed to meet his patients and focus on his own dream.
* * *
Lia's eyes narrowed as she stared at her prey with the laser precision of the lethal hunter she was.
“We would like to call the next witness to the stand, your honor,” she said in cool, confident tones, although her gaze was fixed on the nervous man sitting in the witness stand. Her heart beat strong and sure beneath the fancy courtroom suit that had cost her a small fortune, especially on the small salary she got from the tiny law firm that had employed her for the past four years. Her palms were dry, as were her armpits too, thank god, and she knew not a single strand had escaped the severe chignon she'd wrestled her hair back into that morning. Her entire demeanor came across as utterly self-possessed and entirely ruthless.
Well, she wasn't known as Lia the Wolf for nothing. Her full first name, Accalia, meant she-wolf in Latin. It was a standing joke within the Black Mesa Wolf Pack that the humans who'd given her that nickname had no idea how close they were to the truth. A truth they'd never know.
Arching a single eyebrow at the slime ball seated in the stand, who she wanted to see get put away for a long time, she waited for the judge to indicate she could go on. At his nod, she lowered her voice dramatically and timed her words just right into the spellbound silence of the very full court. “We call...Christina Wilson to the stand.”
As she'd predicted, the entire room burst into shocked gasps and cries. The accused, the one sitting in the witness stand currently, turned white at the sound of his own wife's name. His supposedly deceased wife, on whose supposed deadness his entire case rested. Then he buried his face in one hand, rubbing the back of his neck with the other. His attorney immediately began shouting dramatic protests and asking the judge for a recess to consider this utterly astounding new turn of events.
Although she maintained her bland expression, mentally Lia was counting up the number of years in prison the slimy defendant was going to get handed to him. She'd pulled out the card up her sleeve, and it had worked like a charm.
Charm? Her wolf pictured a shiny object to play with. Lia snorted inside, though she kept her expression carefully controlled. Her wolf really wanted to get outside and play. Human law interested Lia's human side. Her wolf, not so much, although her predatory instincts were a huge asset in this line of work, especially since wolf shifters could literally sniff out lies and read a person's character much more easily and quickly than any human ever could. But Lia had always been careful to balance her two sides, especially as a wolf who'd grown up in the big city. Luckily, Denver had nearby mountains to run and hunt in, so she'd easily managed to assuage the needs of her two selves.
Here in Durango, the little mountain town nestled into the very southwestern corner of Colorado that she now called home, her wolf was thrilled with the constant, immediate access to the wilderness spreading in all directions. It provided more than ample room for running and howling and just being a wolf. But Lia's human side had grown tired of the too-small town after five years, no matter how darned cute it was. She loved Connor with all her heart, but never in her life had she imagined she'd give up her dreams for a man.
Not even the one and only mate of her heart, body, and soul.
The judge called a recess, but they all knew it was over. Lia was going to slam dunk this case, just like she did with all her cases. The defending attorney gave her a weak grin, to which she simply responded with her famous half-smile. The one that said, Nice try but no dice. I killed this and we both know it.
“Lia!” came a very satisfied voice. “Superb job. Leaving this town with a bang people will remember. Well done!”
She turned to greet her boss, Joe—former boss, she reminded herself with a giddy thrill, although the slightest touch of melancholy whispered beneath it—as he reached out to shake her hand. He'd known from the day she walked in the door she was going to help pull up his law firm's stature in town to
be regarded as one of the best, and he'd been right. He'd also known she wouldn't stay forever. She knew that because he'd often mentioned it over the years. Lia the Wolf was far too ambitious for this town and she would outgrow it. The fact he'd managed to snag her for nearly five years was something he counted as a blessing.
Lia had indeed outgrown this place, darling and homey as it was. She was a big city wolf to her bones. This was her last case before she left for her slick new job. The coveted job every up and coming young legal eagle in the country had vied for. The one she had gotten, out of over four hundred very qualified applicants. The one at the infamous political DC law firm that would shoot her star into the stratosphere, give her experience to die for, and save her and Connor from the deep financial pit they were in because of his beloved yet money-sucking little clinic. She greatly admired Connor's generosity of heart and spirit and his desire to help people. But if it came at the price of putting them in the poorhouse also.... Well, at that she balked. Hard. So now she had this new, amazing, very well-paid job.
The one on the other side of the country, two thousand miles away from this small town. Two thousand miles away from Connor and his smile that lit up a room, his poor dance skills that always managed to get her laughing when they cut it up on their living room floor some weekend nights, his sweet determination to save the world, one desperate patient at a time.
Connor, the love of her life, the only one who ever truly got her. His hazel eyes, crinkled up from his perpetual smile, gazed at her proudly in her mind, although she also pictured them with the sadness he was trying so damned hard to mask for her sake.
Her wolf heaved an enormous sigh and flopped down in a corner of Lia's mind, turning her back and settling her head on her paws in a show of massive irritation with her human.
Lia stood straight and kept the smile on her face. This was what she'd wanted. What she'd always wanted. Somehow, she and Connor would make it work. Somehow, she'd manage to keep her sanity as both woman and wolf working 100-hour weeks in the bustling heart of the nation.
“Thank you, sir,” she replied to her old boss, looking him straight in the eye with her trademark fearless gaze. “I look forward to arriving in DC with a bang, as well. They've already sent me a case file to start working on before I head out there.” An enormous case file that would eat up all her free time before she left in just over a month, as soon as the holidays were over.
“As they should,” he said. “Smart people to get you going already. You'll be missed here, Lia,” he said abruptly, giving her a kind smile. Joe was nowhere near retirement yet, at barely a decade older than she was, but he'd acted as a wise mentor to her for the duration of her job with him. His confidence in her filled her with gratitude.
“And not just by the firm,” he added, almost reluctantly.
Lia kept her cool expression, although she knew what he was about to say. Joe had known Connor for years. They all skied together, and Joe and Connor both enjoyed fly fishing during the summer months. She was sure they shared a lot of man-talk, whatever that might be, although of course Joe had no idea about Connor's true nature. No humans knew about shifters.
But all Joe said was, “This just means I'll have to be the one who keeps whupping his ass on the slopes now. Since you're the best skier of the three of us.” He tipped his head in appreciation of that fact.
She couldn't help but let a small yet more genuine smile of her own slip through. So she was kind of competitive. Okay, very competitive. Yes, she was a better skier than either her soon-to-be-former boss or her mate, even though they'd both grown up here and skied at the expert-only resort in the even more remote town of Silverton. But Lia liked to be the best at everything.
Should be no best between mates. Should be only together, her wolf murmured, lifting her head briefly to raise a slightly curled lip. Then she put her head down again, back still firmly to Lia.
Struggling to keep the upbeat expression on her face, she said to Joe, “I'll be back to visit as often as I can, you know. So I'll be sure to keep you both on your toes at least a few times this winter.”
Joe snorted. “When you visit here, missy, you and Connor will be so wrapped up in each other you won't have time for the slopes. Can't believe you guys have been married for five years already. Still act like newlyweds.”
Lia swallowed past the sudden little lump in her throat. Joe had no way of knowing, of course, that there'd been a marked chill in that department between her and Connor for the past month or so.
“Well,” she said in brisk tones, glancing around the courtroom for an escape hatch. Thank god, there was one. “I need to catch defending counsel before he leaves. See you back at the office?”
“You know it, kid,” Joe said affectionately, making her sputter a tiny laugh despite herself. Their personal joke over the years was that he called her “kid” all the time, even though anyone else in the local legal world who dared to do something like that would likely get their head snapped off and served to them for dinner.
“Thanks.” She gave him a half smile good-bye and quickly veered off to finish up her job for the day.
She wanted her new job. Badly. Nothing was going to change her mind. Not a really cool boss who had turned into a friend, not the mountains her wolf loved to run in, and not even the one person in the world who had the power to break her like no one else could.
No, not even Connor could change her mind.
Inside, her wolf let out the smallest, quietest howl she could, ears drooping. Lia clamped down hard on the inside of her cheek, shushed her wolf as sternly as she could, and kept moving forward.
* * *
Connor stopped at the store on the way home. His wolf curled his nose in disdain as they passed the packaged meat aisle—why humans resorted to such bland, boring meals when one could be hunting down a fresh kill instead completely mystified his wolf—but Connor just chuckled to himself. It was an old back and forth between his sides. He wasn't here for meat, anyway. He needed a few sundry items.
Most importantly, he needed flowers. Sure, it might be a little cheesy to pick them up at the grocery store, but the flowers here were actually really nice, not to mention the few florists in town all had closed a few hours ago. Connor glanced at his watch.
“Damn,” he muttered, walking faster and trying to dodge shopping carts. It was a quarter till eight. He and Lia were well accustomed to one another's long, irregular hours, but he wanted to hear about her day and spend some good time with her this evening. This had been a big day for her last case in Durango, he knew. Joe had texted him earlier that his pet wolf—a joke that hit a little close to home, but Joe would never know that, so Connor and Lia always played along—had nailed it as usual, but Connor loved hearing about Lia's trials straight from her.
Mate, his wolf thought, thinking longingly of Lia in her wolf form, all sleek blonde like the golden color of her human hair. All power and grace and unstoppable focus, just like her human side.
All his. For a little while longer, at least.
Feeling a bit uplifted as he thought of her, Connor picked out a sumptuous bouquet of lilies with petals streaked soft orange and creamy white, her favorites. Hmm. Maybe he'd even get a bottle of champagne to celebrate her good day in court. They really hadn't seen much of one another lately, and time was running out.
His lips pressed together at that thought. No. Not the time to go there. They had one month left together. He planned to make the most of it. Well, what he could with his schedule. His wolf gave him a tail flick at that idea, and Connor ruefully nodded to himself. The clinic had begun to eat so much of his time he hadn't even gone on a run as his wolf in weeks.
Lia hadn't gone on a run in over a month. Worse, nor had they done more than share a quick kiss some mornings or late in the evenings, depending on who was coming or going. It was no way for a man to live with his wife. Or a wolf to live with his mate.
Tonight, we'll change that, he thought, firming his resolve to
not be too exhausted to make love to his own mate. His wolf perked up at the thought, urging him to move faster and get home to her.
Connor was almost to his car, feeling lighter than he had all day as he carefully picked his way through the icy lot, when his phone warbled at him from his pocket. He had to juggle the flowers and the bag he held before he could get to it and swipe the screen with his finger. He smiled when he saw Lia's gorgeous face grinning up from next to her text message, but then the words flattened him.
Staying at office late to keep going over new case file. Trial was great today! Kicked them hard. Don't wait up. Love you.
Something cold and heavy slipped over Connor. His wolf grumbled something about needing to see his mate, now, but Connor ignored it. Lia would be so consumed in her file that she wouldn't be too excited to see him if he decided to swing by her office. Not when she had so much riding on this new job.
“We both do,” he said aloud, thinking about the rapidly growing pile of bills sitting on his office desk. The knowledge that his mate was going to carry the burden of those bills weighed just as heavily on him, adding to the overall stress of the entire damned situation. Connor was a thoroughly modern guy, but the thought of his mate bailing him out because he was a softy when it came to his patients rankled. He'd applied for all the grants he could, and the latest rejection had arrived just yesterday. Even so, he couldn't start to turn away those who couldn't pay. Not even if it meant Lia not only was leaving to pursue her own goals, she would be funding his dream as well.
Damn it to hell, this was supposed to be the festive season. The season of parties, laughter, tinkling sleigh bells and all that. Not a season of bleak sadness about everything in his life. Even his mate. Especially his mate.
His wolf whined insistently in his head, blasting Connor's mind with happy images of Lia. Lia laughing, Lia playing, Lia hunting with him. Just Lia. His sexy, strong, amazing Lia.
