Heart of the Winter Wolf

by Heart of the Winter Wolf (pdf) (lit)

  The wolf howled once, short and sharp, a hunting call to panic the men further. The urge to give chase was powerful. But another instinct was stronger, drawing the wolf away from its quarry. The woman needed help and quickly. And so the white wolf went to her.

  Still dreaming, James struggled deep within the wolf, seeking a path to the surface, to awareness within the dream. He recognized now that this dream was a window to the past, knew his only hope of understanding his situation was to somehow see this vision as a man. He wrestled with his wolf nature but could not subdue it completely. Instead, with a sudden rush of clarity, he became both wolf and man at the same time, saw Jillian through eyes that were now both animal and human. And as he watched, the present slipped away and his dual nature became fully immersed in the past.

  Her blonde hair was long and matted with blood. The fine angles of her faery face had been battered by ruthless fists. Her features were swollen and bruised. His heart twisted at the sight even as fury glowed white-hot within him. Until her eyes opened. Green. Sea green. And infinitely sad as she waited to be killed by the wolf. As she grieved not for what had been done to her, but for being alone. That had jolted him, temporarily doused his rage. He could hear her thoughts. James suddenly felt himself struggling for words. It had been so long, so very long, since he had used any.

  Not alone. Here with you. Carefully, tenderly, he lapped the blood and tears from her face, listened to the outpouring of grief and pain in her mind and heart. Learned that her name was Jillian. Sent her calming, soothing thoughts and laid his powerful body close beside her broken one, radiated Changeling heat to warm and to heal. Yet instinct told him it wasn't enough. Finally, as the sky blushed with dawn, he gave her of his own life energy. A transference from aura to aura. To save her.

  Hours passed before the morning sun was high enough to give her its own warmth. It was then that his wolf hearing detected a small truck laboring up the trail. Only then did he leave the girl's side. He watched with narrowed eyes from the nearby cover of bushes as the park maintenance workers found her, as they covered her with their coats, called for help on their radio. And as the wolf kept careful watch, James talked to her in her mind, reassured and comforted her until an ambulance came and took her away.

  The white wolf slipped away when the police began to search the trail. He didn't go far. He didn't have to. With so much cover it was easy to keep from being discovered by humans, and no dog would willingly follow a Changeling's scent. And when they left the area after dark, he began to hunt. Not elk this time but human prey--the brutal men who had raped and beaten Jillian. The wolf had memorized each and every scent from her damaged body. The five would have gone to ground by now, hidden themselves in the concrete warrens of the human city, but it would not be enough to elude nature's swift justice.

  * * * *

  It was Sunday. Wonderful, glorious Sunday. Jillian rolled over and slapped off the alarm, snuggled back into the deliciously soft quilts. She was still on call. But the clinic was closed today, and she had a second chance to laze in bed until someone phoned her with a problem. And that could be hours from now. Maybe not at all. Instead of falling back asleep, however, Jillian found herself staring up at the white ceiling and recalling yesterday's visit to Pine Point Ranch.

  Werewolf. That was the term Douglas' father had used. Good grief. The poor man was obviously not in his right mind, but he'd spoken of a big white devil with blue demon eyes. What else could it be but her wolf? Birkie had said it only made sense that Jillian wasn't the only person to encounter it. Although that thought caused a tiny finger of disappointment to poke at her. After all, she was used to thinking of it as her wolf. Her imaginary friend and real-life hero. Logically, though, she had to agree with Birkie. And if Harrison Senior had seen the wolf somewhere, maybe werewolf seemed a reasonable explanation to him for the existence of such an enormous and unusual creature. After all, she'd been trying to define the wolf herself, even started reading lupine myths and legends. Who was she to say that werewolf sounded weird?

  She'd recognized her cue to leave and driven away from the ranch, but not before seeing something in Douglas' face as he struggled with his father. Fear. Was he afraid for his father, afraid of what she might think, or was he afraid of something else altogether? Come to think of it, he had looked pretty spooked on the trail when she asked him about the white wolf ... but that was before she knew what he was dealing with at home. Maybe he had always thought his dad was imagining the white wolf, and it was scary to hear it from someone who didn't have Alzheimer's. Although she had probably come across as a complete loon at the time.

  Jillian yawned and stretched. Last night she'd nursed a single beer over a giant plate of nachos and chili, then said goodbye to Birkie about nine. She loved the older woman's company, but Jillian simply had to lie down. It had been a very long week. And to her surprise she not only fell asleep right away, she stayed asleep. Of course, it might have been due to the bump on the back of her head. She reached around to feel it and winced at the touch.

  What was it with James, anyway? Every encounter she'd had with him seemed like something out of a TV show, but she couldn't decide if it was a drama or a sitcom. She'd been scared spitless to find him in her apartment. He'd surprised her in the loft--and that had been scary, too--and then he'd run over her in the hallway. At least she hadn't been afraid that time. It had happened too fast.

  What would it be like to just meet him on the street like a normal person, or better yet, why couldn't he have shown up in the Jersey Pub last night and asked if he could buy her a beer, sat and talked with her, maybe asked her to dance?

  A slow dance. That painted a delicious picture in her mind. In the loft, she'd been held captive by James' powerful arms, had felt his rock-hard body pinning her. But in the clinic hallway she'd felt those same muscles held carefully in check, those hands filled with a heart-melting gentleness. It had mesmerized her in spite of herself. In fact, she could still feel James' hands on her waist, and it wasn't hard to imagine being surrounded by his tempered strength on the dance floor.

  Mmmmm. Jillian half-closed her eyes and smiled, held out her arms as if holding a partner. She'd only circled the room twice, enjoying the fantasy in spite of feeling a little foolish, when a brand new thought struck, one that doused her passions more thoroughly than a bucket of ice water could have. She lowered her arms, her uneasiness laced with prickles of fear.

  James was a real man. A little on the strange side maybe, but living, breathing real. He had admitted to being in her apartment. But up till then she'd concluded that whole first episode was a dream because she had seen the white wolf on the couch. How could I have been awake to see James and then suddenly asleep to dream the wolf? No, that made no sense at all to her. For heaven's sake, she'd been throwing out drawers in search of a knife to defend herself with. Surely no one could fall asleep after that.

  Had she fainted out of some bizarre sense of relief when she saw James was gone? Had she gotten the sequence of events mixed up? Maybe she passed out and then saw the wolf on the couch. "Okay, maybe. I don't like it, but maybe." Jillian didn't really think she was the fainting type--but she had awakened on the floor the next day. So, as strange as it made her feel, it was a given that she must have been asleep or passed out. She knew why James had been there, or at least why he said he'd been there. So there were plenty of explanations for everything--except for why a giant wolf was hanging around in her apartment.

  Maybe she had been hallucinating? Maybe she needed to feel safe, so her mind obligingly produced the white wolf, just like Marjorie had said all along. Wait a minute. I can't suddenly go along with her theory now. I met the wolf, and he's as real as James is. Of course, just because the wolf was real didn't mean she'd stopped dreaming about him. For that matter she'd had some pretty explicit dreams about James. She swore in frustration as a tingle ran through her body as if on cue. She gritted her teeth and focused. It had to have been a dream, because a real wo
lf couldn't get into her apartment. But James wasn't supposed to be there either. Had he left a door open somewhere, inadvertently let the wolf in? Was that possible? And even if it was, why on earth would a wolf be waiting outside, looking for an opportunity to get in? The prickling feeling on the back of her neck made her shiver. And pushed her to walk to the couch on the far side of the room. Gingerly she picked up the newspapers she'd tossed there from the past few days. The opened mail. Books. Like peeling back the layers of an onion, she removed everything that hadn't been there before that night.

  Suddenly her blood chilled, and she had to struggle to draw a breath. There were white hairs, many white hairs, clinging to the worn fabric of the couch.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Jillian sealed white hairs into sample bags. It had taken an hour, with gloves and tweezers, to gather enough--labs preferred to have at least fifty strands to work with--and to make sure they were of decent quality. She'd had to view the strands under the microscope in the lab to make certain there were roots attached to the hairs so that DNA could be extracted.

  It looked like ordinary dog hair, ordinary everyday white dog hair. Which it probably was, she told herself, probably fell off her clothing. After all, a collie had been boarding in the clinic kennel that was mostly white except for the black patches over its eyes and ears. A snowy Samoyed had come in to have its teeth cleaned. There was no lack of sources for white canine hair at the clinic, no lack of possible explanations for its presence in her apartment. But not in such quantities and not on her damn couch. She seldom sat on the couch, and although she was hard-pressed to keep it from becoming a catchall for books and papers, she seldom tossed her clothes there.

  Thorough by nature, Jillian had already gone through the books from the library, studied everything they contained on wolf legend and lore. She probably would have skipped the parts about werewolves--after all, some things were just too farfetched--but thanks to that little incident at the Pine Point Ranch, she read those, too. She didn't believe anything she read, yet she felt a need to cover all bases.

  Now, however, it was time to get serious and let science have its say. She had a few--very few--facts to work with, but they were rock-solid. One was her firsthand knowledge that the white wolf was a real animal (hence the hair). However, she also believed that it wasn't an ordinary wolf. There were too many obvious physical and behavioral differences. It had occurred to her that perhaps it was a brand new subspecies--and wouldn't it be exciting to be its discoverer?

  Of course, there were other, more mundane, possibilities. Because dogs and wolves could interbreed, her wolf could be either an accidental or deliberate hybrid. Canis Lupus meets Canis Familiaris. Jillian figured it might be possible to combine, say, the heavily muscled body and white coloration of a Great Pyrenees with the lush coat and blue eyes of an Alaskan Malamute, then mix them with a large breed of wolf. It might even explain the creature's curiously benevolent attitude, its unusual desire to protect humans. Or at least one human, anyway.

  She reminded herself of the white wolf's apparent benevolence frequently. Jillian was grateful that the massive animal had saved her life years ago, was glad to have met up with the wolf again and know that it wasn't just a dream. But now she was, well, nervous. "It's all fun and games until you find a wolf in your apartment," she muttered.

  So here she was, packaging bagged samples into an envelope. Wolves and dogs were so closely related that there was less than a one per cent difference in their genetic material--but there was a difference. And if the animal was a hybrid, tests existed that would show genetic input from a wolf, although not how much or when it had occurred in the animal's family tree.

  Jillian stripped off her gloves and prepared a mailing label. The samples would go out by priority mail the next day to a lab owned by her genetics instructor from veterinary college, Ian Craddock. She'd told Craddock that the animal had turned up in her practice, and that she was naturally curious due to her interest in wolves. Plausible. Sane. At least saner than saying she had found it in her apartment.

  The DNA tests would take about six weeks to complete. And the price of the testing would take most of her next paycheck. As much as she needed the money for other things--and her hopes of that really nice digital camera had just fizzled--it was well worth it if a state-of-the-art laboratory could help her solve this puzzle. Besides, if she was going to be a lunatic, then she was at least going to do it up right.

  For now, maybe she needed a change of scenery. Birkie was planting some of her outdoor garden today--maybe she could use an extra hand. Jillian knew she'd feel a lot better just being around someone.

  Immediately her thoughts jumped to James. After the mid-hallway collision yesterday, she'd noticed that he had finally changed his clothes. That blue denim shirt looked great on him, even if it wasn't done up. Okay, maybe especially since it wasn't done up.

  Where had he been going last night? Why such a hurry? And why so damn rude? It was hard to conjure much indignation, however. She was too busy wondering what might have happened if they'd stood there, together, another moment or two. Because she had the oddest feeling he'd been about to kiss her.

  Something inside her did a flip-flop at the thought of kissing James. Down, girl, she chided herself. It was just plain old-fashioned physical attraction and nothing more. "He doesn't even know me. I don't know him. We don't have a relationship, just a very bizarre hit-and-run acquaintanceship." And still she wondered what it would be like to kiss him.

  "That's enough!" Jillian pulled at her hair with both hands. "I'm not hanging around here with my raging hormones. I'm going to dig in the dirt at Birkie's." And if that didn't cool her thoughts about James Macleod, she could always throw herself into Birkie's fishpond.

  * * * *

  The dream had long since faded, but James couldn't seem to wake up. Instead, he drifted slowly towards full consciousness like a diver rising in measured stages from some dark ocean depths. The wolf was there, too, with him and part of him at the same time. Despite the strange duality, James knew he wasn't dreaming anymore. And he found himself able to ponder the meaning of the dream. Memory. It wasn't a dream, it was a memory. And if it was a memory, that meant he had killed Jillian's attackers. Even though he had never taken human life before, even though it was forbidden to do so by Changeling law, he had no regrets. Not only was he certain the men would have preyed on others if left alive, the protection of another Changeling or a pack member was a higher law. Protection of a mate superseded all.

  A mate. Why had that crossed his mind?

  The wolf stirred within. Mate. Mine. Ours.

  Not that again. Look, hanging around with Jillian is going to put her in danger--

  Protect her. Mate. Ours.

  Stop saying that. We need to leave her alone, do you hear me?

  Alone, danger. Together, safe. Mate. Ours.

  Goddamn it, since when do you know how to talk? I can't believe I'm arguing with--

  James woke at last, but the wolf was gone. At least his awareness of the wolf was gone. He could no longer be certain that the damn wolf had ever really left. Exasperated, he rolled over and opened his eyes--and froze as he realized two things simultaneously. One, he was in the hayloft at the animal clinic again. And two, he was human.

  He sat straight up, ran his hands over his face, his fingers through his hair. Human. No mistake. He must have Changed in his goddamn sleep, because he certainly hadn't done it on purpose. Had the dream brought it on somehow, or had the wolf called the Change? And just how the hell had he managed to get all the way back to the North Star Animal Hospital?

  James struggled to his feet, feeling disoriented and strange, needing to get to the window and determine time of day--of whatever the hell day it was--by the angle of the sun. He leaned a hand on the window frame to steady himself.

  It was early morning, maybe six o'clock or so at this time of year. And considering just how far he'd run as a wolf when he'd left this place, he'd
lost at least one day, maybe two. But that was a minor concern compared to other things. James gulped in the fresh dew-moistened air and took stock of his impossible situation.

  Connor didn't seem to think that wolf and human personas could separate, but for James, the evidence was indisputable. And if Birkie was correct--and he had no doubt now that she was--then his wolf side had indeed recognized Jillian, sensed her, and come to her aid in the past. And now the wolf was trying to maneuver James into complying with its current plan for survival, a plan that centered around Jillian.

  James was dead set against the idea, yet there appeared to be limits to his choices. He could control his human side. The wolf, however, had become a wild card and was becoming bolder in its determination to take the lead. If James had no control over his wolfen side, could not order it to stay away from her, then Jillian was already in danger. Sooner or later the presence of a white wolf would interfere with her life in any number of ways. And such a large creature couldn't stay hidden forever. Eventually it would attract the attention of her fellow humans, and from there it was only a matter of time before someone either figured out the secret or sensed it. Birkie could discern a Changeling as surely as she could sense rain approaching. She couldn't be the only person with that gift.

  Mate. Mine, the wolf had declared. But Jillian was a human woman, with human needs and wants. What if she went out on a date? What if she fell in love? What if she wanted to make a life with a human male? The thought rankled, brought a deep growl to James' throat even though he was in human form. He feared to think of what the wolf might do in the face of direct competition.