And Niall meant to take it from her. She did not doubt that he could. Cecily was enamored of him; if it came down to it, wouldn't Cecily choose obedience to his will over friendship for Athena?
A small, cold hand gripped her heart. How had Niall known to come here? It was no accident. Athena had trusted Cecily to keep her secret, but she had expected to return to Denver before Niall did. If Niall had discovered his sister's absence and confronted Cecily, how would it benefit her to defy the man she wanted? And she had not promised to help. She had said she would "do all I can."
Niall knew exactly how to strike at his sister. All these years Athena had thought him oblivious to her work, but now she saw her error. Either he or someone else had been watching very carefully.
"Miss Hockensmith—Cecily—warned me months ago that you were taking on too much," Niall said. ''It is perfectly natural that you should be relieved of your burdens and given a chance to… recuperate in another city, perhaps with our cousins in New York. As for Holt—I meant what I said. If he comes near you again, I will kill him. Even creatures like him can be killed, one way or another."
The full weight of Niall's threats pushed Athena deep into the chair, paralyzing her will as the accident had stilled her legs. She could see no way out. If she defied Niall, she would lose everything—all she had worked for, the funding for her charities, the ball, her place in Denver… and Morgan's life as well.
"You think you would be happy with Holt," Niall said. "You must decide whether you'll be happier with him, living as a vagabond and an animal, or among civilized people in your family home, surrounded by your friends and equals and able to help the less fortunate to your heart's content."
He was silent after that. Athena could hear the ticking of a clock somewhere in the house, the creak of footfalls upstairs, whispered voices in the hall, but Morgan's voice was not among them.
She let out a shuddering breath. "I need time… time to think about what you have said," she whispered. "Niall, if you would only listen—"
"I've done enough of that. You lied to me, Athena, when you promised to remain in Denver if the circus came to the ranch. I can't trust you again. If you expect to keep anything of the life you made in Denver—if you have your friends' welfare at heart—you will have to submit yourself to me and do exactly as I tell you. Any deviation—" He shrugged. "I can impose punishment at any time."
Which meant that she would live with an impediment more sure than the one that had immobilized her legs for so many years. He could command her life completely, and she had no means of stopping him. Even if she found the courage to Change again, it would be at too great a cost.
"Now you can play the martyr with true sincerity," he said, driving the nails deeper. "Your wicked half brother will keep you prisoner in the dark castle. But you will still have everything you always did, Athena—and you'll be safe."
She had enough determination left to sit up straight and look him in the eye. "Let me be sure that we understand one another. In exchange for my… cooperation… you will allow the circus to remain for the winter, unmolested, only to depart when the passes clear in spring. You will not interfere, in any way, with my charities, and will continue to provide the funds I require to properly maintain them. You will leave Morgan alone."
"If you never contact him, and he stays away."
Why was it that Niall's betrayal struck most piercingly in that personal case, instead of in the matter of the charities and the circus quarters? Was she truly as selfish as he implied, to consider her happiness… this fragile new happiness she had hardly dared to imagine… over the welfare of others?
But she had presumed too much without consulting Morgan. Perhaps he would not regard this as a sacrifice at all. She had decided, in a moment of passion, that she loved Morgan Holt. But he, and his deepest desires, remained a mystery.
Niall assumed she wanted a life with Morgan. A life. What did that mean? What would Morgan say if she were to propose such a thing, out of the blue, without a single sensible plan? Would the future she envisioned have anything to do with the one he saw for himself?
Would you ever be brave enough to ask him? Would he ever ask you?
"I agree," she said, letting the words tear out of her in a rush before she could consider the damage they did. "I accept your conditions."
"I knew you had not lost all your sense, Athena, or your pride." Niall hesitated. "Did Holt… did he—"
"He did not ruin me, Niall. But it wouldn't matter if he did, because I will not be saving myself for anyone else, will I?"
He had no answer for her bitterness. Now that he had won, he almost seemed ashamed. But the moment passed. He got up from the desk.
"I'll have one of the maids see to your things. You will sleep in my room tonight, and I'll stay in the parlor. We will return to Denver as soon as possible." He left the room for a moment, doubtless to make sure the way was clear, and returned to lift her up again. She lay passively in his arms while he carried her back upstairs and left her on the plain, masculine bed in his room, locking the door behind him.
The day dragged by. A muffling snow fell outside, creating a womb of white that cast unreality on everything that had happened. Athena tried not to hear the sounds around the house, or listen for Morgan's voice. No one came to see her save a maid, with her bags and fresh linens and water. The maid helped her dress—a belated attempt to restore her dignity—and then Athena sat in the plain oak chair in a corner and let her mind go blank.
Night fell. The maid brought her dinner on a tray, and she ignored it. After ten, she heard the unmistakable wail of a wolf's howl within the ranch boundaries. Her heart clenched.
Morgan. Was he trying to speak to her? Thank heaven he hadn't come to her. Maybe she had been right. Maybe he was relieved at the separation, or the others had wisely talked him out of further confrontation.
She wished she had the ability to howl back with the eloquence of his powerful voice.
Stay away, Morgan. Please, stay away.
She drifted into a half sleep. Her chin bounced on her chest, and she woke with a start. Someone was outside the window. Her senses told her that it was after midnight.
Knowing what she would find, she gritted her teeth and planted her feet on the floor. Pain spiked from heel to knee. She hobbled to the window and pushed back the curtains.
A black wolf stood hock-deep in snow, gazing up at the window. Frosted breath rose in a cloud from his muzzle. She had seen him as a wolf twice before… when he had saved her, and in her dream… but now she realized the full measure of his magnificence. No ordinary wolf had ever been so big, so thick of coat, so brilliant of eye. Love became a knot in her chest, struggling to untwine.
He loped toward the wall. Athena lifted the sash on the window. She lost her balance, grabbed at the nearest furniture, and made her way to the chair. Even if her legs had been whole and strong, they would not have held her now.
Morgan made no sound as he scaled the wall. A silhouette darkened the gray square of moonlight. Athena felt a chill of memory, as if she were reliving the past a second time—the night that Morgan had come to her room in the Denver mansion. Once more he had found his way to her in spite of all obstacles.
And she had nothing to give him.
The window creaked as it opened wider, just big enough to admit a man. Morgan's dark, human head appeared in the room, framed by his mane of damp hair. He balanced on the sill and leaped to the floor.
It took her an instant to realize that he was naked. He straightened. She stared. She wished she had drunk some of the water the maid had brought, for her mouth was dry as cotton.
She had seen him naked before, in the big top, but not so close. Every proportion, every line of his body was perfect—not too large or muscle-bound, not too slight, but ideally suited for a life of running and hunting, jumping and adapting to the wild in all its harshness and beauty. Comparing him to a statue was far too inadequate. His chest was lightly dusted with da
rk hair that ran in an arrow to the base of his stomach. She dared not look there. Yet.
"How… how is Caitlin?" she asked.
"Resting." He shook his head, as if to cast off all outside distractions. "Did Niall hurt you?"
In his voice was a promise of what he would do if she answered in the affirmative. "He is my brother," she whispered. "He does… what he thinks is best for me."
"Do you still believe that?"
The clean, snow-kissed, masculine scent of him displaced all the air in the room. She could hear the sound of his pulse, just below the skin at the base of his neck where it met his broad shoulders. And below… all the way past the slender firmness of his waist and hips… he was vibrantly alive. Alive and wanting her.
"Niall is human," she said, listening to the sound of her voice as if it belonged to another woman. "How can he understand?"
"Understand what? That you cannot be collared like a dog? That he does not own you?"
His contempt might as well have been aimed at her. He expected her to spurn the world she had always known, pretend it didn't matter. In that she had failed. Failed his expectation, failed herself, and failed him.
She would have preferred any other way, any other time and place, to tell him. But there was no escaping it. He would stand there, naked to her eyes, his body fluent as his tongue was not, and hear her make her choice.
Feel nothing. Cut off your senses. Pretend you have no need, no wanting, no heart.
"Morgan," she said, "I am going with Niall, back to Denver. I will never see you again."
Morgan heard the words. They were clear, precise, dispassionate, as if Athena were reciting a lesson from the McGuffey's Reader Morgan remembered from childhood.
He heard the words, but they made no sense. The only thing that did was the clamoring of his body, the hot yearning for Athena, the need to finish what he had begun in her room. Finish it completely, and to hell with Niall Munroe and all the scruples of human society.
She sat there, so prim in her gown buttoned up to the neck, hands clasped in her lap. He might have been a supplicant before a queen, as he had once thought of the society women who fluttered about her chair.
But she had not been a queen when he had caressed her. She had been helpless with need, prepared to surrender everything… yes, even the maidenhood her kind valued so highly. If he had chosen to take it. But he had been undecided, torn between his desire and freedom, between the life he thought he wanted and the bonds her surrender would wind about his neck.
If he listened to his body now, the decision was simple. If Athena made a single welcoming gesture, gave him one sweet look of yearning…
"I am going with Niall," she had said. "I will never see you again."
Stupid words. Meaningless, born of habitual fear of her brother, the habit of obedience. And fear, too, of him and what he made her become.
Very well. He would decide, here and now. Every instant they had spent together, every memory of her when they were apart, led to this.
He held out his hand. "Come," he said. "We will leave now. Tonight. Your brother will never find us."
She stared at his hand. "What?"
"Put away your fear." He took a step toward her. "You are not a human. You will heal quickly, now that you know your injuries are in your mind and not your body. Soon you will be able to run. And before that—now—you can Change."
Stark terror crossed her face. "Change… I… No, Morgan. It's been too long—"
"Stop." He stared down at her, willing her all the courage he knew she had. "Stop believing what you can't do. Believe in what you are. Take off your clothes and come with me."
As quickly as it had come, her fear was gone. "Come where, Morgan?"
Her question sent ice trickling down the length of his spine. He had asked her to come with him. To become—yes, to become his mate, to remain with him until death. He had offered to another person the thing he had thought long dead in himself. And she asked "where."
"With me," he said. "Into the woods. The mountains. We'll run, you and I, as we did in dreams. We will hunt and breathe clean air and drink water that has never tasted the metal of man. You will be free, Athena."
"Free?" She dropped her head, and her shoulders rose and fell in a shudder. "What is freedom?"
He heard the tears in her voice and closed the space between them, reached for her, clasped her shoulder and felt it tense in his gentle grip.
"You created your own cage, and let your brother make the bars too strong to break," he said. "But I can break them. I will teach you everything you need to know. I will protect you until you can protect yourself. I will never leave your side."
He lifted her chin. Tears hung like stars on her cheeks. He bent and kissed them, one side and then the other, tasting the salt and Athena. Then he crouched, took her face between his hands, and kissed her lips.
She responded as she had in her room, passionately, with a new edge of violence that excited and almost frightened him. It was the she-wolf in her, coming alive at his touch, waiting for a final word to burst forth and make her all she was meant to be. Her fingers caught in his hair, pulled and wound about, crushing him against her.
Then she pushed him away and let her arms fall limp. "I cannot come with you."
He heard her this time, but he refused to believe. "Athena—"
"I can't, Morgan. I can't live in the way you want, in the wild, apart from people and society." There were no tears now, no passion. "I am not like you. I have become… used to my life. I have responsibilities. I try to help people, and if I were to vanish… who would help them in my place?"
He stepped back, searching her eyes. The she-wolf had disappeared. This was the haughty, closed-in woman he had first met on the circus lot, the one who had been so scrupulously fair and polite to her inferiors. To him.
"You think they need you," he said, cruel in his anger. "They need your money. How many others in your city have money to give?"
"You don't understand. Not everyone is generous—"
"As fine and generous as you?"
"No." She warded him away, turning her face. "But I have the time and the inclination to work. I have… a place, a role that others accept. Others who might not give if I were not there to ask."
"Even though you are no longer a cripple?"
"I am the same, inside. The things that mattered to me… before… they still matter now. My friends are still my friends."
"And Caitlin? Harry, Ulysses? They are not?"
She stared fixedly at the far wall. "I care for them. For… But they are part of a different world, as I am a part of mine. And yours is different from both. Too different, Morgan. Can't you see that… we are simply… too different?"
"That is not the reason," he said. He grasped the top of the chair and pulled it around, forcing her to look at him. "It's still your fear. You do not want to give up the fancy house and the fine clothes and the people who lick your jaw like hungry pups, because that is all you know how to be. You like the power of giving people what they need when they have nothing. Making them beg—"
"No. I have never made anyone beg, for anything."
"Haven't you? What do those poor folk see when they look at you with your fine ways, and know that you can give or take what they need? Do they hate you while they pretend to offer their throats? All those fine ladies who follow you—what do you give them, Athena? A reason to think they are fine and noble people because they help the poor crippled girl help the ones they never see?"
The stark pain in her eyes stopped him cold. He knew he had hurt her, that he had come very close to a truth he hardly fathomed himself.
"Athena," he groaned. "I do not want to… Damn you, listen to me. You have a chance to be strong, not to need anyone." He fumbled to put his confused feelings into words. "When you don't need, you can give freely. When you don't care what those others think of you, you can make your own place. Your real place. Don't you understand?"
&
nbsp; She stared at him, and he thought he saw the beginnings of comprehension before she shut him out again.
"Do you know your own place, Morgan?" she said. "Do you know what you want out of life? Have you ever thought beyond the next hour?" She smiled with weary resignation. "You can cast off all your ties. I can't. I can't. But—" She closed her eyes. "You… you could come with me."
He held very still. "With you?"
"To Denver. Not right away. After… after I've had time to make Niall understand, when he has overcome his anger."
She did not elaborate. She didn't have to. He saw what she meant in those few words, and terror clawed its way up from his belly to fill his mouth and his brain.
"Come with you?" he said in a mocking echo. "Join you in your cage? Live in your fine house and wear your fine clothes and become a lapdog for your ladies?"
"Isn't it what you asked me to do… give up everything?" She didn't look at him. He was cold, bitterly cold, though the winter wind should not have affected him at all. Athena was sucking all the heat from his body, all the tenuous hopes from his heart, all the foolish dreams from the future he had never considered.
Just like before. Just as it always was and would ever be.
He backed toward the window. "I ask you for nothing," he said. "I want nothing from you, or anyone."
She made no attempt to stop him as he reached the window and gathered his muscles to jump. The eagerness of his body had drowned in sorrow and rage and bewilderment; he could look at her and see a stranger, an enemy, and not the woman he had asked to become the mate of his life.
Let her look at him, one last time. Let her know what she had rejected. Let her feel what he felt.
"Go," he said. "Go with your brother. Cripple yourself again, and pray that all your fine things will make you forget what you have thrown away."
Her eyes met his, moist and expressionless. He leaped up and back, balanced on the sill, and let himself fall from the window.
TO CATCH A WOLF Page 23
