by Scarlett Ray
Miguel’s attack started a whole flurry of rumors in town. A lot of it plain didn’t make sense. How he’d gotten into the off-limits area of the preserve, for instance, I had no idea. The wolves never came out of there; people only saw them from a distance, from the hills and cliffs in the visitors’ area. And we’d never had a single report of them being aggressive in the slightest. I couldn’t understand how it had happened, but there was no arguing with his injuries. They were definitely caused by jaws and claws.
The whole thing had everyone in town spooked, and lots of people were calling for a full-fledged investigation, meaning jackbooted police or government wildlife officials traipsing through habitats that were supposed to be untouched. Maybe even exterminating the wolves. The idea broke my heart, and I fought against it with everything I had. Some people said I was wrong to be protecting the wolves over my neighbors, said I cared more about “my” preserve than I did about their lives. Oddly enough, the Wrights didn’t have much to say on the topic.
Over the next month, there was a sharp drop in visitation to the preserve. Sure, August marked the end of summer, so fewer families came by for vacations, but usually they were replaced by school field trips and nature studies. Apparently the schools felt like the preserve was “unsafe” now, after one freak accident. Miguel had mostly recovered by that point and insisted he was the one who had caused it by sneaking into the restricted part of the preserve, that we shouldn’t be blaming the wolves. No one listened.
“Sugar, we’re gonna need to do something about this,” Maggie told me, pacing around my office, looking over our barren tour schedules. “If it keeps up, it could really cause us some trouble. We’re getting cancellation calls from schools we’ve worked with for years!”
“I know,” I sighed, head in my hands. “But I don’t know what to do! I’m not going to go after those wolves, but no one’s going to believe the preserve is safe unless I do.”
“Well, lucky for us, we have an event coming up that’s sure to get us some press.”
“An event…?” I asked, momentarily bewildered - but only for a moment. My stomach dropped when I realized what she meant. “Oh, God. I completely forgot about that. Do I have to go?”
“Dani, the gala is our biggest fundraising opportunity all year. We’re a hot topic right now, good or bad, so there’s sure to be a good turnout. And it’s a chance for you to defend us! This is exactly what we need.”
I was starting to get a headache just thinking about it. For the past ten years, my parents had been holding an annual “gala,” basically a big fancy dinner party where rich people would buy tickets to support our cute little small-town project. Maggie was right: it provided a ton of revenue for the preserve, and it got us way more press than we normally received. In a lot of ways, it was a godsend for our current situation. Only there was one problem.
“I don’t know how to act around those people! Look at me, Maggie. Look at these boots. Listen to me talk. I’ll offend those city folks just by being there.” I had only been to one of those galas, the very first one, and I was so uncomfortable the whole time that I refused to go back. Blunt, stubborn, graceless cowgirls don’t belong in high society. My mom never had that problem; she grew up on her family’s big-business money in Denver, so she knew how to deal with rich people—real rich people, not Palo Verde-rich like me. She was always around to soften Dad’s rough edges. But my edges were still as rough as they come.
“It’s not until the end of September, so we’ve got three weeks to get you ready,” Maggie argued. “You need to do this, sugar. No one else can. I know you’re worried about messing up, but if you don’t try at all, things are bound to just keep getting worse.”
No pressure.
“I guess I don’t have much choice, then,” I grumbled.
“You’re gonna be fine. I’ll be right there with you the whole time,” she squeezed my shoulder, then headed for the door. “I’m going to get started planning, all right? I’ll let you know when I need your help.”
Once she was gone, I pressed my fingertips harder into my temples and shut my eyes tight. Why couldn’t anything, any one thing, be easy? And it wasn’t even the kind of hard work I’d gotten good at. I was completely out of my element.
A knock at my office door brought me out of my brooding. “What?” I snapped impatiently.
“I can come back if this is a bad time,” said a familiar voice, and I looked up to find Will standing in my doorway.
“Will!” I jumped up and went to greet him with a kiss. “What are you doing here? I thought you were still at home.”
He’d had to leave for Detroit not long after the whole incident with Miguel. He apologized a million times for leaving when I obviously needed support, but he said his dad—his boss—was insisting he come back to work. I couldn’t blame him for that. And we had still been talking while he was gone, texting or calling nearly every day.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t more invested in my relationship with him since my falling out with Noah, but my feelings for him were still genuine. He was sweet and made no efforts to hide how he felt about me. No secrets. No “complications.”
“I wanted to see you,” he said simply, his arms hooked around my waist to keep me close.
“So you just up and drove, what, twenty hours down here?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
“Closer to thirty.”
“I guess phone calls weren’t cutting it anymore?”
“I can’t kiss you through the phone,” he murmured, sliding one hand up to the small of my back, he leaned down and kissed me again, sending shivers up and down me. “Besides, I’m planning to stay for a while; I brought work with me this time. It just seemed like you were under a lot of pressure, and it’s only been getting worse. Call me arrogant, but I’m hoping my being here will help a little.”
“It’s not arrogant. I appreciate the thought.” He came to support me without being asked. He was concerned about me, so he went out of his way to help. How could I not appreciate that? “And I just got a brand new subject to stress out about, so this is great timing.”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
“I have to go to a party,” I said with a sigh, pulling away from him and going to sit at my desk again. He followed and took the chair by the window where Maggie usually sat.
“Oh. That’s…terrible?”
“It’s not the party itself so much as the guest list that’s worrying me,” I explained. “It’s this fundraising event my parents used to do, and it’s basically a night of hobnobbing with a bunch of snooty rich people who—” I paused as I realized something, something that should’ve occurred to me earlier. “Wait, you’re one of those people.”
“Am I?” he frowned.
“No, I just mean you’re from that background. You deal with people like that everyday. Hell, you’ve probably been to some parties like this.” The wheels in my head were turning, trying to figure out how his experience could help me.
“It sounds like a charity gala. I have been to a few of those,” Will agreed.
“Exactly! So maybe…would you want to come?”
With a smug smirk, he asked, “Are you asking me to be your date, Dani?”
“Mm. I guess I am,” I admitted. Besides, I certainly wasn’t going to bring anyone else as a date. Will knew how to act around the kind of people that would come to a gala. He could let me know if I was saying or doing something “inappropriate.” I wasn’t normally much for pretending to be something I wasn’t or letting somebody else tell me how to act. But this was a special circumstance. I didn’t have much of a choice. “So what do you think?”
“I think I’d love to. When and where is it happening?”
“They usually did it in Phoenix, I think. During the last week of September.”
“Oh, that’s plenty of time. In fact, it’s probably enough time for you to learn how to be one of ‘those people'. If you’re interested.”
I
frowned at that thought, “I don’t want to be one of them. I just want to be civil with them.”
“I hate to say it, but if these are the sort of people I think they are, the best way to earn their respect is by making them think you’re like them. They aren’t likely to acknowledge anyone they think is ‘lower’ than them,” he said, shaking his head.
“See, that’s exactly the reason I need you to be there,” I said with a dry laugh, “because if someone else suggested that I was ‘lower’ than them, I’d probably want to knock their teeth out and you’d need to hold me back.”
“Yeah, fistfights are one of the quickest ways to kill a party.”
“Not where I’m from.”
“Seriously, Dani,” he said, making a face like I was being childish. “These people are sharks. If they smell blood, if they sense any kind of insecurity on your part, they’ll tear you to pieces.”
“Well, hell,” I muttered, “thanks for the pep-talk.”
“No, I’m saying that’s why I want to help,” he insisted. “I don’t want you to end up in a position like that. It’s just for one night, and then you can go back to being your usual, perfect, honest self.”
“All right, all right,” I said, fighting a smile. “It’s to help the preserve, so I’ll put up with it.”
“Okay, sugar, we need to start talking about your—” Maggie stopped short when she stepped into my office and saw Will there. “Oh. I didn’t realize you were coming back.”
“It was supposed to be a surprise,” he answered, “but I’ll get out of your hair for now. Let me know when you’re free, okay?” He stole another quick kiss and smiled at Maggie on his way out. She watched him leave.
“I didn’t realize he was coming back,” she repeated, not sounding pleased to see him.
“You know we’ve been talking. He came back to help me deal with all this,” I said, gesturing around the office and toward the preserve behind me. “If I didn’t know any better, I might think he was getting attached to me.”
Maggie responded with a tight smile, “We should talk about how you’re planning to defend the preserve at the gala. I’m sure you’ll get plenty of questions about it, so you have to have an answer ready.”
“I think that might be something Will can help me with.”
She blinked, confused, “Will? What does he know about it?”
“Those people are the kind he works with all the time, Maggie. He knows how to deal with them. He said he’d go with me and help me navigate,” I explained.
“Don’t you think that’s something you should learn how to do on your own?”
“There are lots of things I can do on my own,” I said, trying to fight the bitterness sneaking into my voice. “Can’t I ask for help with one?”
“You’ve just never been the kind of girl who waits for instructions instead of taking the reins yourself. And to tell you true, I…” she took a deep breath and said firmly, “I don’t trust that boy.”
“Why? Because he’s not Noah?”
“What? I didn’t say—”
“Don’t act like you aren’t against me seeing Will. And that’s why. Because you want me and Noah to be together, you’ve always wanted it, and you just can’t stand the idea that it’s not happening,” I felt my voice rising; I was getting angrier than I expected. What right did she think she had to judge who I chose to spend my time with? She hardly knew anything about Will. So the only reason she had not to trust him was that he was new and different.
“Do not take that tone of voice with me,” she said sternly. “All I’m trying to do is to keep you safe. Regardless of whatever’s going on with you and Noah or how I might feel about it, I still don’t think that other boy is good for you!”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion or your protection. You’re not my mother,” I snapped. Maggie’s eyes went wide, and I could see them starting to shine with tears. Shit. “I…that wasn’t…”
“No. I understand. You’re a big girl; you can make your own decisions. I’ll keep my opinions to myself from now on,” she turned on her heel and left my office with her head high, but I could hear the tremble in her voice.
What the hell was wrong with me? Sure, we’d had our spats here and there over the years, but I’d never been so cold to her before. I wanted to go to her office, to apologize, but I almost felt like I had no right.
* * *
I spent a lot of time with Will over the next few weeks, learning what to expect at the gala and how I should respond. A lot of his training ran completely counter to my instincts, but I kept telling myself it was for the good of the preserve, for the good of the town. Just one night. I can do this for one night.
When we got to the subject of the preserve’s safety, he seemed a little conflicted. “I want to agree with you,” he said, spending another night next to me on the couch, going over my options, “especially since no one has ever been attacked before. But you can’t pretend it didn’t happen, and as long as the wolves are out there, you have no way of knowing it won’t happen again. That’s a difficult thing to spin in a positive way.”
“So what? I’m just supposed to say ‘no comment’?” I demanded, sitting back, arms crossed. “You want me to agree with them when they say my preserve isn’t safe?”
“Calm down,” he rubbed my back as he said it. But, hearing that just made my temper spike even higher. Will continued, “I’m not the one you’re fighting, sweetheart. I’m just telling you how difficult this subject is to approach.”
“Then what do you suggest?” I asked through gritted teeth.
“You have to acknowledge every part of it. It did happen, and no, you can’t guarantee that it won’t happen again. But the entire point of a nature preserve is for nature to be untamed. These are wolves we’re talking about, wild animals, and unfortunately sometimes wild animals are dangerous. Maybe…” his eyes narrowed, and he looked at me cautiously, like he was planning to say something he knew I wouldn’t like. “Maybe it’s better not to have people inside the park.”
“What? But entrance fees and camping ground rentals make up a huge part of our income,” I argued. “You’re saying we should just close the whole thing off?”
“Not necessarily, but maybe make it a little more exclusive. Raise the fees on tours a little in exchange for providing guards. Have more surveillance, more rangers, that sort of thing. Extra security measures.”
“It’s not a prison,” I grumbled, curling my legs up to my chest. Everything he was saying seemed so wrong to me. Guards? Higher fees? “Exclusive”? What I loved about the preserve was that it gave everyone access to the sort of wildlife you couldn’t find many other places. Shouldn’t everyone have the right to be a part of that?
“No, but if people are calling for some sort of action, you’re going to have to give it to them,” Will argued. “It’s business, Dani. You can either change things or you can let your consumers go elsewhere. That’s the long and short of it.”
I stayed silent. He did know more about running a business than I did. Even after months of doing this job, I apparently hadn’t gotten any better at it. If I was left to my own devices, I would probably run the place into the ground; this was the first crisis I’d gone through, and we were already in danger.
“Yeah,” I agreed quietly. “I guess you’re right.”
“It’s still your preserve,” Will moved a little closer on the couch and pulled me into his arms. “Even if some things have to change, it will always be the place you know and love.”
I wanted to believe that. But I wasn’t sure I did.
* * *
On the morning I had to leave for the gala, Nicky was a miserable, pouting mess. He hardly ate anything at breakfast, which was definitely unusual for him, and then he sulked all morning while I finished up my packing.
“Why can’t I go?” he whined, standing in my doorway and watching me gather up all the accessories I would have to wear to the party.
“I told you,
baby, it’s a party for grown-ups,” I explained for the umpteenth time. He’d asked me a hundred times over the past few weeks, and I’d told him the same thing again and again. He just really didn’t want to accept it. “It’s gonna go way past your bedtime, and you wouldn’t have any fun. Heck, I’m not gonna have any fun, either.”
“Then why are you going?”
“Because I have to,” with a sigh, I sat down on the corner of the bed and opened my arms to him. Slowly, grudgingly, he came over and let me pull him into my lap. “I’m going to help the preserve. I’m real worried about it, and the people at the party are supposed to help us. We’re going to make some new friends, that’s all.”
“Why does he have to go?” Nicky mumbled. It still wasn’t clear to me exactly why he disliked Will so much, but boy, he sure did. Enough to give Noah a run for his money. Maybe it really was something in their blood.
“Will knows some of the people who are going to be there, and he’s going to help me talk to them. He’s going to make me feel better if I get scared.” And I was very likely to wind up getting scared. Hell, I was scared already, and he’d been helping me deal with it all month long. It really felt like I had no choice but to be grateful to him, after he’d put so much time and effort into helping me get ready for this stupid gala.
“Can I stay with Noah while you’re gone?”
Another question I’d answered already.
“No, honey. We don’t need to bother Noah. Aunt Maggie’s going to come watch you tonight, and then I’ll be back tomorrow morning. It’s not that long. You’ll be okay. You’re my tough boy, aren’t you?” Despite his sniffling, he nodded, and I planted a kiss in his hair. It was starting to get a little long, but I loved his curls too much to cut them short. When the doorbell rang downstairs, I told him, “I bet that’s Aunt Maggie now. Why don’t you go let her in?”
He did as I said, but his slumped posture and slow, ambling walk said he was still upset. We hadn’t been able to spend much time together lately with all the gala preparation, and I’d seen a definite dip in his mood because of it. I would have to make some time for just the two of us once this whole thing was over.
