He was disgusted with himself and so was his wolf. The animal snarled and snapped. “Leave her alone.”
But he couldn’t. She needed him. And what the hell was up with that? When was the last time he even thought about someone needing him? The answer hovered over him for a second and he shook it away, back into the shadows where it belonged.
She was a job. No, she was only a skinny little link in the chain that led to the job and she would be gone as soon as he got what he wanted from her. This was part of the game plan. He’d winked, he’d nodded and now it was time to chat. Nobody said he couldn’t enjoy the game while it was being played.
She gave another little moan as he ran his fingers over her scalp in a second lathering of shampoo. It was a sweet little moan and if she was this responsive to a scalp massage, he could only imagine what her response would be when his fingers found their way...Damn it to hell!
“Ow.”
“Sh-shit, s-sorry.” He was stuttering like an untried cub. “I got carried away getting the last bit of crap off your scalp.”
Washing her was like scrubbing the mud and muck from a rock in the stream and finding a sparkling treasure beneath. He used to search for that kind of treasure when he was a pup.
That thought, too, was cast back into the shadows. Bull stepped away. The girl’s rounded back moved with him as if she missed the warmth of the contact.
“We’re done here. Can you hang on while I get my clothes on?” He drew the curtain back and stepped from the tub.
“Yeah,” she said, pushing away from the wall and turning her back to him. Her head was bowed and her face was hidden by her hair.
Bull smiled at the show of modesty, ironic when you considered he’d had his hands on every inch of it. He dried his body with the smaller towels in the stack and ran the last one over his hair, combed his fingers through it, shook his head, and let it fall into place. Shorts and jeans were next, but the shirt remained where he’d tossed it on the floor. The front of it was smeared with whatever she’d rolled in while in the dumpster.
“Come on, spitfire, let’s get you dried off and to bed.”
“Just pass me a towel. I’m all right now.”
He took one of the larger towels and held it to her back, sliding the ends under her arms. When she tucked it around her thin frame, he turned her and lifted her from the tub.
“Not taking any chances. Messy fixtures, remember?” He sat her in the middle of the bed and brought her the last two towels. “Now when you fall over, you won’t make a mess.”
Her sun starved skin was glowing from the scrub down he’d given her. The faint sheen of water left behind from the shower made it glisten in the light cast by the room’s only lamp. It was darker than his and he figured that when she was healthy, it would be a deep golden brown. She looked a helluva lot better than she did before, but no amount of scrubbing could erase the dark circles under her eyes, or the cracked lips that had lost all their color. A yellowing bruise stood out on her cheek. Now that she was clean, her big brown eyes looked even larger than before. It might have been a pretty face if it hadn’t looked so gaunt and abused.
He found a comb in the side pocket of his duffle and tossed it to her. Rummaging in the main section, he found the black tee he wanted, smelled it to be sure it was clean, and passed that to her, too.
“Can I have my sandwich now?” she asked as her head popped through the neck of the shirt. “It’s in the pocket of the pants. I’ll share it with you if you want some. You said you were hungry and at this hour, everything is closed. I lost the fries somewhere,” she added sadly.
She was starving, yet she was offering to share her two ounces of meat with him. Bull shook his head. She was a strange one all right.
He picked up the formerly black trousers that were now crusted with yellow and wrinkled his nose. Whatever had stained his tee shirt had soaked into the pants and burger, too. He held up the soggy mess now flattened to the size of a small pancake and showed it to her.
“You’re not eating this,” he said.
Her eyes followed the arc of burger to wastebasket, but she said nothing. It was when she closed those eyes and ran her tongue over her cracked lips in a clear plea for inner strength that something in Bull cracked. Even his wolf was moved by that look and echoed Bull’s gut response.
“Feed,” the wolf demanded.
“I’m on it,” Bull responded aloud. He grabbed his keys from the desk and looked back at the woman on the bed. “I’ll go find us something to eat.”
Her eyes lit with surprise and she nodded. “Oh, okay. I’ll wait right here.” She plucked at the tee shirt she wore. “Can’t run very far looking like this.”
He was at the exit of the parking lot before it hit him. She’d run before looking a whole lot worse. That smart assed little bitch! He didn’t bother turning the truck around. Lights out, he backed through the parking lot and into his spot. Key dangling from the knob, he threw open the door and almost laughed. With those big brown eyes, she looked more like a deer caught in the headlights than a cunning she-wolf.
She was kneeling over his duffle with a pair of socks in one hand, a pair of undershorts in the other, and a wad of his extra cash between her teeth.
“Need a hand?” he asked, holding his out under her chin.
She spit the cash out. “I would have paid it back,” she said.
“Yeah, because we’re such good friends and you know my address.”
Color rose in her cheeks, “Okay, so maybe I wouldn’t have.” She sighed. “Look, I’m grateful you helped me escape, but you have no right to keep me here. I know you’re not a bad man, but you’re not a good one, either. I don’t know who you are.”
“That works both ways. At least you know my name.”
She opened her mouth, but shut it again, holding back whatever she was about to say.
Bull flipped through the bills in his hand. “How far did you think you were going to get on thirty-eight dollars?” There was almost five hundred more in the duffle.
“Home.”
“Where’s home?”
She sat back on her heels and shook her bowed head.
“I could beat it out of you, you know.”
The corners of her mouth tilted up and then down. “No you couldn’t. You killed those men without batting an eye, but not once did you hurt me, even when you tried to be mean, you weren’t.”
“Don’t be too sure,” he said gruffly, but even he knew it sounded false.
The smile finally took over her mouth. “It’s the only thing in this whole mixed up mess I am sure of. I don’t know why I’m sure of it. It’s probably just part of the craziness that is me. Like not ever getting lost, you know?” The smile faded. “No, of course you don’t. You wouldn’t. You aren’t weird.”
Bull sucked in his cheeks to keep from snorting. He’d killed two men without batting an eye, but she considered him normal. Compared to her, he probably was. She was weird and he was temporarily stuck with it, so he might as well make the best of it.
“Are you still hungry?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I guess so. I don’t really feel it unless I smell the food.” She eyed the waste basket and the balled up wrapper.
“You didn’t,” he said, but she had.
“It was only the top bun. The meat and pickles were okay.”
“I was gone for what? Ninety seconds?”
“I could smell it,” she whined.
“Get back on the bed,” he ordered while he pulled his backpack from beneath it. “All the way back. Up by the pillows.”
He grabbed her wrist, snapped a handcuff on it and snapped the other end to the bed before she had the first word of protest formed. He pointed his finger at her nose.
“Now stay there and try not to eat the pillow.”
~*~
Tommie flipped up the middle finger of her free hand and showed it to the closing door. It was a stupid gesture, but when it came to the big guy, stupi
d was her middle name.
“Want an example?” she asked the woman on the TV screen who was hawking some kind of dust mop that would pick up fifty times the dirt your mother’s mop could. “I know you’re not a bad man, but you’re not a good one either,” she mimicked herself. “How’s that for stupid?”
“No answer, huh?” she asked the woman, “That’s what the drugs were supposed to do, but they only work for other people, normal people, and not for the weird ones like me.”
At one time or another, she’d taken every medication on the market. None of them worked. As the dosages got larger and her body became less responsive, the voice in her head got louder. She couldn’t put a coherent sentence together, but the thing inside her was loud and clear.
“Run. Find. Like us.”
As if she could find someone else like her. She was stupid, weird, and nuttier than a pecan tree and just her luck, when she’s at the lowest point in her stupid, weird and nutty life, she runs into a guy who shakes her insides up so badly, she didn’t know which way to turn.
He was big and strong, and when he carried her in his arms, she’d felt more closeness and warmth than she’d ever felt in her entire life. Even the voice inside her was quiet and content. For the little time she’d been held in his arms, she felt normal.
She was embarrassed to think about the shower. Bull was completely impersonal as he soaped and scrubbed and rinsed. Her head knew it. Her body didn’t. His hands, running the cloth over her arms and legs, back and breasts, made her body sing like no one else’s ever did. And when that cloth passed between her legs, it took every ounce of her willpower not to cry out, not to let go. One shower made her long for his touch. Two would turn it into a craving. Three, and the addiction would be complete. Another abnormal load to add to the ones she already carried.
When he’d stepped from the tub, she’d had to turn away. She was so afraid he would see in her face what she’d felt inside.
If the hallucination of the wolf on the wall didn’t prove she’d finally lost what little sanity she had, that shower certainly did. She’d known him for what? Seven or eight hours? That wasn’t long enough for Stockholm syndrome. Was it? Her doctors would probably call it a form of transference.
Whatever it was, Tommie knew it wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. Like the inner voice, the dreams, and the shadow on the wall, she knew this feeling she had was just another symptom of her growing mental illness and she had to get away before her humiliation was complete.
The thing inside her growled. It always objected to rational thought as if it viewed those thoughts as dangerous. It was happiest when she was at her craziest, that time in her younger days when she partied hardy, ran wild, and threw caution to the wind. Now, it mostly showed anger and disappointment as a reflection of her failure as a human being.
The woman on the TV screen was telling her that she could clean up the messiness of her life in an instant with the purchase of her super-duper dust mop. All she had to do was send in nineteen –ninety-five plus shipping and handling and her world would be a happier place.
“Shut up!” Tommie told both voice and TV woman. She threw herself back in frustration.
The headboard wobbled and banged against the wall. When Tommie pushed back a little more, the headboard bent back with her. The headboard wasn’t secured to the wall, but to the bed frame and not too securely at that. Tommie leaned over the bed for a closer inspection.
Bull had fastened the handcuff to the bedframe. With the headboard removed, she might be able to slide the cuff off the end of the frame. Only two bolts stood in her way.
The bed wasn’t secured to the wall, but the nightstand was. Working in such a cramped space with her left hand cuffed to the rail, made things difficult. Her right hand kept cramping up from the awkward angle, and her fingers kept slipping off the nut.
She was on her knees with her head under the bed. It was the most comfortable position to work. Wads of dust bunnies dangled from the ancient and exposed box spring and every time the bed moved a sprinkling of dust would fall. It made her sneeze, and the sneeze would make her head hit the springs, shaking loose more dirt. Her nose was running, her eyes watering. Her shoulders were aching. Still, she was making progress. One bolt was removed and the second was on its way.
Headlights shined through the flimsy curtains drawn across the front windows. The light didn’t pass like a car turning through the parking lot and Tommie knew her plan had failed again. But all was not lost. She left the nut and bolt where they lay to look like they’d worked themselves loose and withdrew from under the bed. A short hop would put her back on top where she’d look like she spent the whole time.
It was another good plan that failed. She couldn’t move without ripping the hair from her head. The tangles that Bull’s flimsy comb couldn’t remove were now tangled further in the springs of the bed.
The door to the room opened and there she was; head down and ass up. She’d never been suicidal, but the thought now crossed her mind.
“Just shoot me,” she muttered to the dust bunny under her nose.
“You sure don’t make it easy on yourself, do you, spitfire? What in hell are you doing now?”
“I’m stuck under the bed,” she said, stating what she considered the obvious. She heard him chuckle.
“You can’t be. You’re not big enough to get stuck under a bed.”
Tommie could hear him moving and paper rattling as he settled bags on the desk, and the smell. The aroma of hot food filled the room.
“Shows how much you know,” she grumbled. “Are you going to help me?” She tried to turn her head to see where he was. She hissed at the yank to her scalp.
“I don’t know,” he drawled lazily. “The view from up here looks pretty good. Tempting.”
“That’s not funny.”
Bull let out his breath in a long drawn out sigh. “Nope, not funny at all.” He got down on his knees to look beneath the bed. “Flatten out on your stomach.”
Easier said than done. Her left arm was still attached to the bed. Bull had to climb over, practically straddle her, before he could release the cuff on the bed. He then lifted the frame enough for her to flatten her body against the smelly carpet. A few seconds later, he was lying beside her on his back.
“Let’s take a look.” He didn’t bother to hide his laugh. Once he understood her predicament, he maneuvered his arm up and under her head.
“Rest your forehead on my arm,” he directed. “You pulling down puts too much tension on your hair. I need some play to get it loose.”
“And the weirdness continues,” Tommie thought to herself. Being stuck under the bed with her nose to his shoulder had just replaced shower number two. The scent of him underneath the faint layer of cheap motel soap filled her head with naughty thoughts. What normal person had thoughts like this when they were stuck under a bed?
“Thought you could slip the cuff off the frame, huh?” He laughed at her sigh as his fingers fiddled behind her head. “The cuff won’t fit over the plate at the end. If you’d asked, I could have told you it wouldn’t work. Are you sniffing me?”
“What? No! Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. Why would I be sniffing you? I felt a sneeze coming on. Just get my damn hair unstuck.” Please God, just get her hair unstuck. “And what do you mean you could have told me? Are you in the habit of handcuffing women to beds?”
“Nah, not women. Never had the need. It’s always men.” His fingers stopped. His body froze. “Wait a minute, that didn’t come out right”
“Which part?” she asked. If he was saying what she thought he was, it would go a long way in eliminating the funny business thoughts from her head. That should have made her feel better. It didn’t.
“I never found the need to cuff a woman. In my line of work, I deal with men.”
“Your line of work?” Good God, he couldn’t mean it. “Are you saying you’re a prostitute?” She knew she sounded incredulous and maybe just a little dis
appointed. She couldn’t picture the big guy selling his services in bathrooms and seedy motels, although that was exactly what this one was. “Holy shit!”
“Holy shit!” he said at the same time. “No. Hell no. I’m an investigator. That’s my business. My pleasures are strictly reserved for women.”
“Oh,” she squeaked. She felt the tugging at the back of her head relax.
“Done,” he said, “Ready for something to eat?”
“Yes.”
Anything would be better than lying here with her ear to his chest listening to his heartbeat. She needed food much more than she needed the strangely exciting scent of him beneath her nose. She nuzzled her face into him one more time and decided food could wait. Snuggling wasn’t going to give her the energy she needed to escape, but neither was a hamburger, and Bull’s hard chest beneath her and strong arm wrapped around her, was much more pleasurable. She bet he tasted better, too.
She settled a little more comfortably against him and for one long minute, he didn’t move either.
“Food’s going cold,” he finally whispered.
“Yes,” she said and this time, she reluctantly slid from beneath the bed. She wouldn’t want him to get the wrong idea.
Chapter 7
With the opening of the first plastic container from a local all-night truck stop, Tommie’s mouth began to water.
Bull started to explain the selection. “I didn’t know what you’d like, so I picked up a couple of different...”
Tommie, sitting cross legged on the bed, his tee shirt tucked modestly between her legs, grabbed the first box, not caring what it contained and began eating. She’d never had a cheese omelet that tasted so good and the bacon, sausage, and ham on the side were every bit as delicious.
“If you’d rather have meatloaf,” Bull tried again, “Or a roast beef sandwich? Chicken?”
Wolver's Rescue Page 6
