Red and the Wolf

by Cindy C. Bennett

  Red and the Wolf

  Title Page

  Part I: Homecoming

  Part II: The Wolf

  Part III: Into the Woods

  Part V: In the End

  Red and the Wolf

  by

  Cindy C Bennett

  Copyright 2012 Cindy C Bennett

  USA All Rights Reserved

  Smashwords Edition

  Cover Design: Cindy C Bennett

  Cover Photo Copyrighted: Sergii Shalimov | Dreamstime.com

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  Red and the Wolf

  Part I: Homecoming

  “Hey, Red, wait up.”

  Ruby stopped, teeth and fists clenched at the voice. Taking a breath and forcing a pleasant look on her face, she turned toward the speaker.

  “Hey, Lowell, what’s up?”

  Lowell continued jogging toward her. Ruby wouldn’t deny it: Lowell was gorgeous. Tall, dark hair, dark eyes, strong jaw, full lips, just enough stubble to exude a sexy aura . . . buff in all the right places. Even covered in jeans and a jacket in the chill air, his strength was obvious. Most girls in their tiny mountain burg of Piera would give anything for Lowell to turn his gaze their way. And he had, on many of them, leaving a string of broken hearts. Not that it stopped those same girls from continuing to pursue him.

  “Just chasing down the elusive fox,” he said, bestowing on her the grin used for melting girls’ hearts. Didn’t work with Ruby. She rolled her eyes and continued walking. If it wasn’t for her lifelong friendship with Lowell’s family, she wouldn’t give the guy the time of day. “Come on, Red, I’m just teasing you.”

  Ruby stopped again in frustration. Lowell, hurrying to catch up to her, continued past at her abrupt stop and turned back to her.

  “Lowell, I’ve told you how much I hate being called Red. Why do you insist?”

  He shrugged, completely unrepentant. “It’s your name, right?”

  “No, my name is Ruby.” There was one person who could call her Red and get away with it. And she didn’t need any reminders of him.

  “Which means red. And if that weren’t enough, well . . .” He lifted a strand of her long, curly hair.

  She cursed her parents yet again for thinking they were so clever naming their red-headed child Ruby.

  She sighed. “You’re so . . .”

  “Charming? Sweet?” Lowell’s fingers lightly pinched his chin. “Incredibly good looking?” He tipped his head comically side to side. Ruby couldn’t help it, she laughed. “See? I knew you liked me,” he said.

  “Incorrigible,” she said. “You are utterly incorrigible.”

  Lowell placed a hand dramatically over his heart. “Why do you wound me?”

  “I’m in a hurry, Lowell,” she said with a grimace, and began walking again. “Is there a purpose to this torment?”

  Lowell stuffed his hands into his pants pockets. As she walked away, he said somberly, “Thought you might be interested to know that my baby bro is coming home.”

  Ruby’s feet practically skidded to a halt. Her mouth dropped. She raised a hand to her chest as if she could still her pounding heart. She calmed her breathing into a normal pattern, snapped her gaping jaw shut, and said, “Rafe’s coming home?” When Lowell didn’t answer, she glanced back at him. He nodded. “When?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  Ruby turned away from Lowell again. Tomorrow? Hurt threaded through her heart, and she forced nonchalance into her voice. “Good. That’s good. It’ll be good to see him again. Tell him to stop by the shop and say hi.”

  Without looking at Lowell again, she walked away. She heard his muttered, “You’re not fooling anyone,” but ignored him, not in the mood to spar with him. Not about this.

  Rafe.

  Coming home.

  * * * * *

  “Those will fly off the shelves with their attractiveness.”

  Ruby shook herself from her reverie and smiled at Marina. She glanced at the cupcakes she’d been decorating and grimaced.

  “Ugh, sorry.”

  Marina walked over and picked up one of the cupcakes that had a very lopsided purple flower sagging across the top. “Might work for a stag party, right? Everyone so drunk that they’ll appear upright?”

  Ruby took it from her and scraped the frosting off the top into the trash can. “I’ll fix them. I’m so sorry.”

  Marina placed her hand on Ruby’s arm and lowered her hand to the table. Ruby released the cupcake as her head dropped.

  “Wanna talk about it?” Marina asked.

  Ruby glanced at her boss—who also happened to be her best friend. Marina was older than Ruby by six years. She hadn’t been her friend during high school and so hadn’t been part of the story of Rafe and Ruby—and Ruby’s heartbreak when Rafe left her. But Marina knew anyway. Everyone in Piera did.

  “Rafe’s coming home,” Ruby said, angrily wiping away the single tear that fell.

  “Oh, sweetie,” Marina sympathized, taking Ruby’s hand and leading her into her office. She pulled Ruby onto the small couch next to her. “Okay. Tell me.”

  Ruby took a shuddering breath, eyes on her wringing hands in her lap. “I don’t want to be that girl.”

  “What girl?”

  “The girl who pines over lost love. If it can even be called lost love.” Ruby shuddered again. “I loved Rafe, not just as a friend, but . . . well, you know. He was my best friend growing up.”

  Then she’d fallen in love with him. She thought he felt the same when, a week after graduation, he kissed her. The kiss was more amazing than Ruby had dreamed. Her entire world had shifted when he kissed her. And then he left. Without saying goodbye.

  “I wrote to him so many times,” she told Marina. “I didn’t tell him I loved him. I didn’t beg him to come home or ask him why he’d left or if he was seeing anyone. I talked to him like I always did.”

  “He didn’t write back?” Marina asked.

  “Yeah, he did. At first. Then he quit writing at all. Everything I knew about him I knew because of Lowell. Now, he’s coming home. Without warning, without telling me. Why? Why now?”

  Marina pulled one of Ruby’s hands into hers and squeezed it. “Well, he’s done with school for the year, right? I mean, it’s springtime. Classes are over.”

  Ruby closed her eyes. “He’s been gone three years. He hasn’t come home any other summer.”

  “So?”

  “So, why now?” Ruby said, agitated. She stood and paced. “There’s nothing for him here, anymore. If he’s coming home, there’s probably only one reason.”

  “And that would be?”

  “A girl, right? He’s bringing a girl home to meet his family.”

  “He is?” Surprise shone in Marina’s eyes.

  “Well, I don’t know,” Ruby admitted. “I just can’t imagine any other reason he’d be coming.”

  Marina smiled, but quickly dropped it before Ruby could comment. “C’mon, Ruby. There’re a lot of reasons. Maybe he wants to see his brother.” Ruby shot her a look. Marina held up a hand. “You never know. Maybe they’ve made amends over the years. His parents are here also, you know. And he has friends here. Maybe he just misses home. Or my cupcakes.” Ruby sank back onto the couch, burying her face in her hands in frustration. Marina put a hand on her back. “Maybe he misses you.”

  Ruby shuddered at her words. “If he missed me, Ma
rina, he’d have called or written. How am I supposed to deal with him?”

  Marina placed a hand under Ruby’s chin and urged it upright. “The same as you always have, like the strong, confident, amazing woman you are.”

  “You mean not like the sniveling idiot I’m being right now?” She smiled tremulously.

  “If there’s one thing you’re not, it’s an idiot. I wouldn’t hire an idiot to help me create my world famous creations.”

  Marina joked, but she spoke the truth. Her cakes and cupcakes were shipped all over the world, and paid premium for. Only here in Piera did she sell them for the almost free price of a buck a cupcake, an entire cake for eight dollars, or wedding cakes that were always given away as Marina’s gift to the couple.

  “I am a complete idiot when it comes to Rafe,” Ruby said. She spoke as much truth as Marina.

  * * * * *

  Word of Rafe’s homecoming spread quickly. Excitement spread throughout Piera. Rafe had been well loved before leaving. In the past six months, the only thing noteworthy in Piera was the sudden rise in wolf attacks on animals. Wild claims of an oversized wolf spotted had sent the citizens into panic, to the point that people rarely went out after dark now, keeping pets locked up inside their homes or barns. Not that the barns stopped the wolf who was more intelligent than some of the locks people used.

  For some reason, people assumed Ruby had insight into Rafe’s return. How could they know she hadn’t spoken to him in over a year? Still, each time someone asked her about his return, her stomach knotted and her heart twisted.

  Ruby was placing some pale green cupcakes in the window that looked like ice cream cones when Lowell’s car stopped in front of the shop. She froze with a cake in her hand. She wanted to run and hide, but couldn’t move if her life depended on it. She knew exactly who was in the car with Lowell.

  Lowell stepped out the driver’s side, but Ruby’s eyes were glued to the opposite side of the car. The door opened and Rafe stepped out, facing the opposite way. The sun glinted off his short, dark blonde hair. He turned and Ruby’s heart stopped. It would have been too much to hope he’d turned into an ogre during his time away, she supposed. Instead, he looked better than ever.

  Sunglasses hid his eyes, but she knew exactly what they looked like. As if she could forget. Darker brown than even Lowell’s, fringed with long, dark lashes. Eyes that laughed. His jaw put even Lowell’s to shame, ending in a chin with the slightest cleft. Shoulders strong and broad, even more so than his brother, with muscled arms that gave proof of his upbringing on the farm. Her eyes dropped to his lips that—she quickly forced her thoughts away from that. He and Lowell looked similar, it was easy enough to tell they were brothers, but Rafe was like Lowell to the tenth degree as far as she was concerned. He looked toward the shop, took one step forward—and froze. He pulled his sunglasses off and his gaze locked on hers through the window. Long moments passed while Ruby tried to remember how to breathe.

  Then a smile broke across his face, and it was like the sun breaking through months of darkness. Her expression matched his and the spell was broken. She turned away and rushed to the front door. He pulled the door open just as she went to push, and she threw herself into his arms. Rafe crushed her against him, lifting her with his thick arms. She clung to him like a woman clinging to a buoy in a raging sea.

  “Okay, you two, you’re blocking the doorway,” Lowell grumbled.

  Rafe released her, keeping his hands on her waist, grinning happily at her. “I’ve missed you, Red.”

  A flash of hurt ran through Ruby. “I’ve missed you, too,” she said. What she really wanted to say was, If you missed me so much, why didn’t you answer my letters? Why didn’t you call?

  Rafe blinked as if he’d read her thoughts. “You look good . . . really good.”

  “Yeah, well, you look like the gargoyle I knew you’d turn into in New York.”

  Rafe laughed as his gaze was drawn beyond her. “Marina!” he said, moving to hug the diminutive woman. Ruby turned to watch jealously as his attention was stolen.

  “Sure, he calls you ‘Red’ and you say nothing,” Lowell said, though she caught a note of bitterness beneath the teasing.

  Ruby didn’t answer. She moved into the shop, following Rafe as he walked over to admire the display behind the glass counter. Marina moved behind the counter.

  “Pick as many as you want,” she said. “It’s the best way I know to welcome you home.”

  “It’s the best way to be welcomed home,” he said as his eyes scanned the contents. “How am I supposed to decide?”

  “We have something new,” Marina said. “Wanna give it a try?”

  Rafe nodded, his glance cutting toward Ruby and away almost as quickly. Marina plated a red velvet and cheesecake marbled cupcake covered in dark blue dots of cream cheese frosting. Rafe took a big bite and moaned.

  “That’s fantastic, Marina,” he mumbled around the mouthful. He swallowed. “I think you’ve outdone yourself with this one. Seriously.” He took another big bite.

  “Ruby made those,” Marina told him. “It’s her recipe.”

  Rafe’s eyes went to Ruby and she shuffled self-consciously. “Marina lets me try some new things,” she said.

  “You might have some competition, Marina,” Rafe said, though his gaze remained on Ruby. She grinned.

  “Why do you think I keep her working here?” Marina asked. She turned to Lowell. “Since you brought the prodigal son in, you get your choice as well.”

  Lowell, who’d been watching the whole exchange with tightness around his eyes, smiled charmingly at Marina. “How can I resist? I’d like to try one of Ruby’s magical creations as well.”

  Marina placed another one on a plate and handed it to Lowell. He took a bite. “My baby bro is right, Red. You’ve got something great here.”

  Rafe’s eyes snapped to Lowell when he used Rafe’s pet name for Ruby. She felt a little thrill. Was he jealous? No, of course not. Probably just surprised. Lowell hadn’t started calling her Red until Rafe had gone. Well, if you discounted when she was young and Lowell would call her ‘red’ in a degrading way after he’d first heard Rafe use the nickname. He’d quit when she hit her teens, and began again after Rafe left, using it in a completely different way.

  “Thanks,” Ruby said, watching Rafe. His eyes came back to her and he winked. Ruby cursed her weakness at what that simple wink did to her knees. Really, he’d winked at Ruby her whole life. It meant nothing . . . to him.

  “Wanna come to our place for dinner?” Rafe asked her.

  She wanted to. How she wanted to. Instead, she said, “No, thanks. I’m sure your family would like to have you all to their self.”

  “Are you kidding?” Lowell interjected, stepping closer to Ruby, placing a hand on her shoulder. Ruby was sure she imagined it, but she would have sworn Rafe’s jaw clenched as his eyes followed the gesture. “Mom and dad love you as much as they do this loser.” Lowell punched Rafe lightly on the shoulder. “You should come.”

  “Yes, Red, you should definitely come,” Rafe echoed. Ruby opened her mouth to refuse again. How could she sit there with his family and not cry over what she perceived as her loss? “Please,” he murmured, and she was undone. She nodded.

  * * * * *

  Ruby stood outside the Wolfe farmstead. The nights were chilly in spite of the warmer days. Even in the summer when it would reach ninety degrees in the afternoon, the nights would still be cool enough to need a jacket. She held a box of cupcakes—the ones Rafe and Lowell had tried today. She knew it wasn’t a big deal, all she had to do was raise her hand and knock on the wood door.

  She stood, rooted in place.

  Rafe leaving three years ago had nearly killed her. The intense rejection and subsequent agony of trying to forget him still vividly clung to her as if it had happened last week. He wasn’t here to stay. He was only visiting, wasn’t he? Opening this particular can of worms seemed like a really bad idea.

  The door
suddenly opened, startling her. Lowell caught her by the arms as she stumbled back to avoid a collision.

  “Whoa, Red, sorry about that. Didn’t see you there.”

  Ruby smiled, embarrassed. “That’s okay.” She couldn’t admit she’d been standing there for who knew how long. “Saved the cupcakes, anyway.” She lifted the box.

  Lowell’s eyes dropped to the box and he grinned. “You brought me cupcakes? Awesome.” He took them from her, scooping an arm around her shoulder and dragging her into the house before she could protest.

  “Hey, everyone, look what I found on the porch.”