Jie’s arms came up around her as she sagged.
“Meg!”
The voice that said her name in distress wasn’t Jie’s, but Danny’s. She stared blankly at his face, furrowed in concern as he rushed toward her. When he reached them, Jie released Meg and held one of her arms, letting Danny take her other one.
“Come, sweetheart, sit down,” Jie said softly. He and Danny guided her over to the table. He lowered her into a chair, smoothing back her hair with a gentle hand before kneeling in front of her, his hands on her thighs.
When she was seated, Danny went over to the urn and poured a cup of tea, which he brought to the table and set in front of her. With his hands on the table, he leaned over, being noticeably careful not to crowd her. “Meg?” The deep concern in his gentle tenor voice began to reel her back in from the horrifying fear she’d experienced in the previous moments.
Jie’s hands on her knees, his strong presence, and Danny’s comforting friendship nearby began to ease her shock. For the first time in minutes, she was able to look up at Danny and give him some of the smile she usually gave when she saw her dear friend. “Hi, Danny.”
He heaved a sigh of relief. “Meg, I’ve never seen you like that.”
She nodded.
Jie reached for the teacup and lifted it. “Can you take a sip?”
“I think so.” She took the small white cup from him and let a small swallow of tea slide into her mouth. The liquid was warm and soothing, something she’d drunk everyday since childhood. She took one more sip before setting the cup down.
She looked up at Danny again. “I’m sorry, Danny. I so much wanted you and Jie to meet, but not like this.”
Danny came around the table to her side and put his arms around her. “It’s all right.” When he released her, she gestured to the man she’d fallen in love with. “Danny, this is Jie. Jie, Danny, my best friend.” She looked up and saw Dave standing at the windows, his body tensed, obviously scanning the street outside for their two visitors.
Jie offered his hand to Danny and they shook hands. “I’m very pleased to meet you, Danny.”
“And that’s Dave over there.”
At the mention of his name, Dave turned and walked over to them, his expression showing he was still thinking about the two strangers. He held out his hand to Jie. “Dave Pearce.”
“Jie Sing.”
“Pleased to meet you.” He looked at Meg. “Perhaps you want to lock the front doors for a while?”
Meg blinked, unable to make any kind of decision. She looked at Jie who shook his head. “No. We mustn’t do that. We must not appear to the outside as if anything out of the ordinary is going on.” Gently he clasped her shoulder. “You should go sit in the office for a few minutes. I’ll watch things out here, okay?”
“I’ll go with her,” Danny said.
“And I’ll stay out here and watch the street,” Dave added.
Jie nodded and gave her shoulder a soft squeeze. His mere touch infused her with enough strength to rise from her chair. “Meg, you have very good friends.”
She managed a weak smile. “Yes, I know. I’m very lucky.” She looked directly into Jie’s eyes so that he’d realize she also referred to him.
The light that infused his solemn expression showed her that he had.
She picked up her teacup and headed toward the back of the store where the little office was. She opened the door and Danny followed her in, leaving the door slightly ajar. She sank into the desk chair, and Danny sat down in the second chair across from her.
He looked at her for a minute and she felt him studying her, whenever he wasn’t sure exactly what to say. “Are you all right, Meggie?” The same concern weighed in his voice.
She managed a brief nod even though she wasn’t sure she was all right. “I am. I know it’s only been since Thursday night that I saw you, but so much has happened since then. My entire life has changed. In just a few hours!”
Danny nodded. “Yes, I know how that goes.” He looked at her. “Are you and this man ... you know ... involved?”
A flush of warmth suddenly caused her skin to tingle, and she smiled in spite of how shaken she still was. “Yes. You remember that friend of Grandfather’s, the one he used to say told him his destiny was to come to America?”
“The astrologer? The man in the photograph, right?”
“Yes. Li. Jie is his godson.”
Danny raised his eyebrows. “Wow, that’s amazing! Did he come looking for your grandfather?”
“I thought he had. But it turns out he was looking for me. Li told him his destiny was here.” She leaned forward. “Danny, he came all the way from China to find me! Can you believe it?” She shook her head, the implications hitting her as if she hadn’t realized them before. “I could never have imagined such a thing.”
Danny’s eyes widened and reached over and covered Meg’s hand with his own. “Meggie, why wouldn’t someone travel so far for you? You’re the best.”
She looked down at the surface of the desk, the blotter of which she’d scribbled all kinds of notes in Chinese about shipments and class schedules and doodly pictures of Mei. She couldn’t help smiling. “I still can’t believe it. He certainly is wonderful.” She smiled sheepishly. “And gorgeous.”
“I noticed.” Danny squeezed her hand. “Meg, I’m so happy for you. All those times we talked about finding our soul mates, and now it’s happened.”
Before she realized what was happening, hot tears pooled in her eyes. She blinked them back. She ached for the situation to be that simple, that gloriously sweet. After all the pain in her life, after losing Lao ye, how wonderful it would have been simply to take comfort in the love and sensuality her life had just presented to her. She heaved a deep sigh. “Yes, he is my soul-mate, and I’m grateful.”
“I think I hear a but in there somewhere.”
She nodded. This was where it got dicey. How could she possibly tell Danny that Jie was a ... werewolf? The task seemed undoable, and yet, considering the situation, it was probably better for her friend’s safety if he understood the truth. “Yes. There is a big but, no pun intended.” She paused and leaned forward. “Danny, I have to tell you something and you have to swear, as my friend, that you’ll believe me and not think I’m crazy. Will you swear?”
Danny looked at her, his large brown eyes concerned, but he nodded. “Of course, Meggie. I love you. I know you’re not crazy.”
She took a deep breath and told him the story of Jie’s experience as he’d related it to her himself. When she finished, she watched Danny’s face carefully for his reaction. During her recitation, the expression on his smooth features and in his dark eyes went from astonishment to menacing darkness when she reached the part about the dangerous lang ren who was searching for her.
“Danny, you don’t think I’m crazy or that Jie is crazy, do you?” She hated the mere thought that he might. She needed her friend’s support so very badly.
To her great relief, he shook his head without hesitation. “Of course not. In fact, Dave saw one once.”
She stared at him. “You mean ... a ... lang ren?”
“Yes. I didn’t tell you before because, well, you didn’t know him that well yet, and it’s not exactly something you just drop on someone by the way, you know?”
She nodded. “I understand. Did he tell you the details?”
“Yes. Well you know how after his first partner John died and Dave left the force?”
Meg nodded. Dave had told her his heartbreaking story about his first lover. “Yes, I remember.”
“Well, during that long trip out west that he took, he was camping in Colorado and met a woman. She was the only other person in the whole campground, so they decided to share a site and do the cooking together and just keep each other company. Well, in the middle of the night, something woke him up in his sleep. He poked his head out of his tent and saw her standing in the middle of the campsite, pulling off her clothing. He thought it was r
eally weird, and then as he watched, she changed, right there in front of his eyes. She was human one minute, and the next, she looked like a wolf.”
Meg gasped. “Did she hurt him?”
“No. She just went running off into the night, disappearing in the woods.”
“What did Dave do?”
Danny grinned in spite of the gravity of the situation. “He broke camp, packed up his gear, threw it in the car and took off. He didn’t even put his clothes on.”
She found herself grinning also. “Poor guy. That must have been frightening.”
Danny looked down, his smile fading. “Yeah, to say the least. He was terrified.”
His tension filled the office and her grin also went away. “I’m scared, Danny.”
He looked back up at her. “I’m here for you, Meggie. So’s Dave. He’s grown to love you, too.”
Her tears pooled again. This time, she was unable to repress them. Her fear was for Jie as much as for herself. He’d basically told her he was going to fight the other lang ren to the death. “Jie has sworn to protect me, but I don’t see how ...” She trailed off, not wanting to think about it.
“We’ll do whatever we can to help.”
Danny’s quiet assurance gave her some comfort. But she knew she wouldn’t have a moment’s peace until this was all over, and Jie was still alive.
Chapter Twelve
“I would rather maim than kill
Hurt than maim
Intimidate than hurt
Avoid than intimidate.”
-- Poem from a Shaolin Temple
Yelin seated himself at the corner table Schenko and Igor already occupied in the crowded restaurant. It was just getting to be lunchtime and the close atmosphere of the restaurant swarmed with tourists and those who were obviously residents of the neighborhood. Yelin’s canine sense of smell picked up the scent of human sweat mingled with the smells of cooking meat and the smoke of Schenko’s cigarette. The noises of conversation in Chinese, English, and other unidentifiable languages around them swarmed in his ears.
Yelin barely noticed any of it, concentrating his attention solely on Schenko’s tight features and the frenetic drags he took on his cigarette.
The cold slate blue eyes came to rest on him. “Well? We searched this shit hole all morning and nothing.”
Yelin returned his look, his already perspiring body flush with the satisfaction of victory. Let him squirm a bit longer. He drummed his fingers on the table and gave his order for Mongolian beef to the waiter who approached the table. When the waiter had gone, he made a show of pulling his own pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and leaning over to Yuri for a light. How wonderful it felt to have the upper hand with this murdering bastard! “I may have found her,” he said on an exhale of smoke sent in Schenko’s direction.
Schenko rose from his seat. “Are you playing some sort of game with me, you little prick?” His voice was a hoarse growl and his square jaw flexed with tension.
Yelin tapped out his ashes into an empty teacup. “Sit down, sir. I’m not playing any sort of game with you.” He took another leisurely drag, suppressing his grin. “I may have found her. But if I come in here all excited and send you running out there to check her out, you’ll only bring attention to yourself and cause trouble. We must go about this intelligently. Just because she is yours, technically speaking, doesn’t mean you can just grab her.” He grinned inwardly.
All along, he’d left the relevant details of the situation out of his narratives to Schenko, not the least of which was that the chart he’d done actually was his own chart, not Schenko’s. The woman in the prediction was actually for him, Yelin, and the fight was his own to endure. Truthfully, he would have much preferred mating with the Chinese bodark who’d gotten to the woman first. Incredibly handsome and strong, that one.
But in the end, he didn’t want sex with men or women. The Chinese bodark could have the girl for all he cared. All Yelin wanted was revenge.
His answer seemed to satisfy Schenko for the moment, and the large alpha lowered himself stiffly into his chair again. He looked at Yuri. “Did you see her?”
Yuri nodded in his usual perfunctory manner.
Schenko’s fist tightened and he was visibly restraining himself from pounding on the table. “Both of you are withholding from me. I want an answer now!”
Yelin took one more puff on his cigarette and poured himself some tea from the pot on the table. He was enjoying this too much to hurry it along. “She’s beautiful. But as I say, I am not certain it is she. We have not found the jade, ivory and golden silk, none of which was to be found in the store where she was.”
Schenko opened his mouth to speak, but Yelin held up a hand.
“However,” he went on in as condescending a tone as he could muster, “as you know, betas can see in color, and I can tell you now that golden silk could very well refer to her hair, blonde as it is. And her eyes, well, if they are not the color of deep jade, I don’t know what is.”
Schenko’s lip curled in a satisfied grin. “Well, comrade, you are more intelligent than I gave you credit for. Perhaps you will succeed with me after all.”
Yelin nodded, feeling more like a smug feline than a canine. Now was the time to put the screw to him. “One more thing, however, sir. There was a bodark in the store with her. The first one we’ve encountered since we arrived. I did not scent any more besides him, but he did seem protective of her, as if he’d been expecting us.”
Schenko’s skin darkened, the flush of anger visible even in the shadowy light of the restaurant. “I’ll take care of him,” he muttered. “I want to see her as soon as we leave here.”
Yelin took a swallow of tea and then another leisurely puff on his cigarette. “Of course. That was exactly my intention.”
* * * * *
Jie explained the situation to Danny and Dave. They, in turn, offered to watch the store for Meg so that Jie could take her into the studio where he could help her collect herself. She stood quietly where he’d left her in the middle of the room while he lowered the shades of the large windows.
In the quiet of the shadowy light, he went back over to her and stood in front of her. Her fear radiated through her body into his hands, and the scent of it filled the room. Her need called on that protective strength he’d found inside himself since he’d met her. In spite of the inner strength she possessed, he knew she found herself in a situation that was beyond anything she’d ever known about and did not yet have a way to meet it.
He squeezed her shoulders gently, feeling more tenderness toward her than he ever thought he could feel with any one human being, including his patients. “Meg,” he said softly.
She looked up at him. “What?”
“Come, do the Yang Short sequence with me. It will help keep you centered.” He brushed his thumbs across the silky white shirt covering her shoulders. “All right?”
“Yes.”
He smiled at her and lowered his face to hers for a brief kiss. Then he took a place at her side and they began the preparation step, breathing deeply and lowering their stance into the wu chi position.
Meg watched their reflections as they moved, their bodies flowing from one stance to the next like water. As Jie had said, focusing her attention on the moving meditation centered her and helped her feel a deeper strength beyond her fear, a well of strength that emanated from her being.
As soon as they’d finished and returned to the beginning stance, Meg looked up and saw Danny’s reflection in the mirror. He was standing in the doorway that led into the market, watching them. Something in his expression made her freeze. Rarely did the dusky gold tint of his skin ever look pale. Now it did. “Meg,” he said softly, “they’re back.”
Her blood ran cold and she looked at Jie. His face had darkened and the muscle in his jaw was working. He reached for her hand and squeezed it.
“I should hide,” she whispered.
“There’s no use in that, Meg. If he is ab
le to detect your scent as I do, then he already knows you’re here. Nothing will happen to you while I’m at your side. I promise.”
Chapter Thirteen
The handbook of the strategist has said:
“Do not invite the fight, accept it instead,
Better a foot behind than an inch too far ahead,”
Which means:
Look a man straight in the face and make no move,
Roll up your sleeve and clench no fist,
Open your hand and show no weapon,
Bare your breast and find no foe.
But as long as there be a foe, value him,
Respect him, measure him, be humble toward him;
Let him not strip from you, however strong he be,
Compassion, the one wealth which can afford him.
-- Lao Tzu
The words of the sage rose in Jie’s mind as he put his arm across Megan’s shoulders and walked toward the doorway where Danny stood. The lang ren were back, and it was obvious to everyone involved that Meg was the woman they were looking for. From the moment they’d walked in earlier, the tension of knowledge ran in an invisible undercurrent between them. The elusive words of deep jade, smooth ivory and golden silk had taken on their precise meaning once they’d picked up his scent. They knew he was one of them, and they knew he’d reached her first.
Finally, after all these years, he understood. In one moment, everything Li had been trying to teach him, pushing him to make sure he performed his meditation each day, that he absorbed the meaning of the Tao into his very blood, made sense.
Since Jie’s boyhood, Li had urged him to retain his humanity in the face of violence and hatred. Like seeds that had been planted inside him, the knowledge rose like an abundant harvest in the moment he needed it the most. He bowed deeply to Li inside his heart, praying he would see his dear friend and godfather soon and thank him in person.
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