Her inner wolf, that two years ago had driven her in a mating frenzy to almost mate with Sam, the wrong brother, was now calm. Like all dreamwalkers’ wolves, no one could see her wolf unless they ran with her in the dreamscape. It didn’t matter that dreamwalker’s wolves didn’t manifest physically. The wolf was still there, still rippled under her skin. Still drove her like any one of the furries in the pack, even if she would never run as a wolf shifter anywhere besides the dreamscape.
Lana hurried into the room, her face lit up with pleasure. “You’re here!” She pulled her into a quick hard hug.
“I said I’d come.”
“I know, but I wasn’t sure. With Sam here...” The normally composed woman’s smile wavered.
“I can deal with Sam.” She and Lana exchanged looks. She’d found out what she needed to. She’d known Sam hadn’t been the real deal when she’d chosen Gabe, but still, she’d had that niggling question in the back of her mind that maybe, just maybe, she’d chosen the wrong twin. Now it was put to rest forever. “Tell me about the patient.”
Serena compartmentalized, pushed her emotional concerns back, and listened to Lana’s summary of the woman’s mental and physical health. She was a dreamwalker and she had a job to do. A woman to save. Maybe even a new wolf to save, depending on how the virus adapted to the woman’s DNA. Dreamwalker, wolf shifter, spelltalker, or dormant—if she had the genes. If not, well, the council hadn’t gotten that far in their decision process. There hadn’t been time for the DNA tests and they didn’t want to risk alerting the CDC in any way, but they didn’t need them. The virus would show them what they needed to know. Regardless, she and her wolf were here for business. And Sam, despite his vulnerabilities, would just have to cope.
***
Glenna oozed into a bleary state of consciousness. Peering through eyes heavy from the last round of narcotics, she tried to make out the shadowy figure on the chair. It spoke in the low, well modulated, feminine voice of a therapist.
“Are you awake?”
“No.” She wasn’t awake, could barely think through the haze of drugs.
“My name is Serena, and I’m here to help you get off this medication faster.”
Glenna had to think hard. Why was she on these drugs anyway? Hazy recollections started to come back. A quiet keen rose in her throat.
“Stop,” the voice said. “Just stop. I can help you. All you have to do is give me permission to talk to you in your dreams.”
Glenna would have smiled if she could have found the facial muscles to do so. Talk in her dreams? Ridiculous.
“Do I have your permission?” The voice had that water dripping on stone quality that told Glenna she didn’t have a choice.
“Sure. Not like it matters anyway.” Nothing mattered except hiding from the shapes that stalked her memories. And the drugs helped her do that.
The woman walked into the ring of light from the small bedside lamp. She was tall with long black hair and movie star grace. She pricked the IV fluid with a needle. Glenna heard her say, in a voice that shrank as the drug took effect and the world faded to black, “It matters. Every member of our pack matters. Now let’s see what’s going on in your head.”
Chapter Five
Glenna ran through the world of her nightmares. They were almost on her. Their slavering breath was hot on her neck. She risked a quick glance back, nearly running into the white wolf that sat in the middle of the trail. She darted around it and kept running. Maybe the wolf would slow them down.
No such luck. Instead of staying behind, the wolf caught up to her, easily keeping pace on her mad dash through the blackened trees and mist.
“Why are you running?” The calm curious voice rang in her head. She looked left, then right, then down at the loping wolf. It came up to her waist, its fur so white and clean it almost glowed in the dark.
“I can’t stop. They’ll catch up.” She pushed the words from her wheezing lungs, and then doubled her efforts. They were too close.
“Who are you running from?”
“Can’t you see them?” She shot the wolf an incredulous glance. “They’re right behind me. They’re almost here.”
The wolf looked casually over her shoulder. “Oh, now I see them.”
Glenna didn’t know how she could’ve missed them. Huge black shapes, a mix of fur and skin and teeth. Flashing fangs and lolling tongues. A dreadful conglomeration of human and beast, pieces of each mashed together in a horrific hodgepodge of flesh and bone.
And they laughed as they ran. Laughed because they knew she was tired. Laughed because they knew they would catch her.
“I see them now. I couldn’t before. Why are you running away from them?”
“Are you insane? If they catch me...” She couldn’t finish. “If you aren’t going to help me, stop talking to me. I need my breath.”
“I can give you a breather.”
Glenna stumbled with relief. “Really?”
“Yes.” The wolf blurred. In its place ran a tall woman with long black hair and even longer legs. She reached into a small pouch at her belt and pulled out a closed fist, stopped, turned, and opened her hand, keeping it flat. She blew on her palm and a the puff of sparkly dust flew out, growing into a huge cloud. It spread out, enveloping the beasts and stopping them in their tracks.
Glenna bent over at the waist and tried to catch her breath.
“Now we have time. Where are you running to?” The woman’s eyes were kind and serious. Glenna decided to waste some of her air on an answer.
“There.” She pointed.
Up ahead, through the forest she could see where she’d been heading. A doorway set in the woods, wide open, with bright light streaming through. A light so bright that it obscured the figures she knew were inside.
“Oh. Are you sure you want to go there? Once you go in, you can’t come back.”
“I can’t stay here. They’ll catch me.” A deep ripple of fear shuddered through her. “And once I’m there, they can help me, heal me.” She didn’t know how she knew, but she was sure that if she just could make it to the door, to the white light, everything would be wonderful.
“What if I made them go away?”
“Can you?” She glanced back at the cloud of dust, suspended as if frozen in time.
“For awhile. Long enough that you’ll be able to heal that.” The woman gestured to Glenna’s chest where blood oozed and a fist-sized hole gaped.
“I don’t think I can heal this.” She knew she couldn’t. She knew, deep in her bones, this wound would stay with her forever.
“You’d be surprised what you can do, once you aren’t running away. Give me a chance.”
Glenna evaluated the sincerity in the wolf-woman’s eyes. And for the first time, she felt a glimmer of hope.
Chapter Six
Afternoon sunlight streamed in through the high basement window, dancing off the glass of the Mason jar on the table by Glenna’s bedside. Ellen had brought new flowers down this morning, when she’d bullied Glenna out of her hospital gown, into the shower, and into real clothes. Real clothes, if you could call yoga pants, a huge t-shirt, and fuzzy socks real, they still felt like pajamas to her. But they didn’t matter. Little else mattered besides the fact that she was going upstairs for the first time in what they told her had been weeks.
And now it was afternoon and it was time to go upstairs and outside, where the sun was shining and there were birds and flowers—and the real world.
Sick for too long, even showering had left her shaky, she was damned if she would stay down here one minute longer. Still, she sat on the bed, somehow reluctant now that the time was here to actually go up the cellar stairs and meet people she didn’t know.
“You’ll be fine. It’s past time you were walking about.” The petite Dr. Lana’s hard look told Glenna there would be no reprieve. “You’ve showered, you’re dressed, now it’s time to go up.”
“I’m not sure...”
“Glenna—
” Lana reached for her hand where it picked at the covers on the hospital bed “—I know you’ve been through a lot, but you’ve been in this basement sickroom for two weeks. You need some sun, you need to get out.” The doctor was dressed in regular clothes too, not the scrubs she typically had worn in Glenna’s blurry moments. Now she wore pressed slacks and a fluttery top with a subtle pattern of Japanese flowers scattered across the front. Everything was different and despite the need to get out and to find out what was going on, it made Glenna only want to burrow back into bed.
“I know. It’s just...meeting new people.” She was afraid and she had no idea why. And that unknown fear had her sounding like some whiny kid. Not Glenna, the no-nonsense accountant from the nineteenth floor. Not Glenna, who had taken charge of her little sister, Sarah, at ten years old when they’d moved into their grandmother’s huge house with way too many rooms and way too many rules. She’d always faced things head on and now her heart was pounding like she’d just run a marathon at facing a room full of strangers.
“There’s just Sam and me here. Ellen’s gone home to her family for the weekend. You need to get out.” Lana squeezed Glenna’s hand before dropping it and heading for the door. She turned back and raised one eyebrow. “Now, I’m giving you two minutes to make it up by yourself and then I’m sending Sam down to carry you up the stairs. That sun’s going to go down soon and I want you out while there’s still some left.”
A shiver of nerves had her shaking. “Who’s Sam?”
But Lana’s receding footsteps tap-tapping up the stairs were the only answer she received. Lana wasn’t answering Glenna’s question, hadn’t answered any of her questions since she’d woken up two days ago, exhausted and weak.
She searched her memory for any reason she should be so squeamish at meeting this Sam, but came up with nothing but blanks where the last few weeks should have been. Ten deep breaths in, ten out. “Okay, Glenna, this isn’t like you.” She forced her feet to move and carry her out into the hall. No way was she going to let these unreasonable fears keep her from the last of the day’s sun.
It took her longer than the two minutes, more crawling than walking, hanging onto the sturdy banister, but she made it up the wooden stairs and out of the basement.
She pushed open the door at the top, blinking at the bright sunlight filling the cozy kitchen. A large sturdy oak table that looked like it had seen better days surrounded by a harem of mismatched chairs took up center stage. The pale yellow walls were lined with standard cabinets painted a sage green. But what really caught her eye was the man sitting at the table, eating an enormous sandwich and drinking a soda.
He looked hard, like someone her grandmother wouldn’t have near her house, even to do yard work. It wasn’t one thing, it was the whole package. The inch of dark hair growing out from under sun-kissed blonde locks. The worn jeans. The gritty stubble on his cheeks, like an edgy drummer in a rocker band. It was the way his tight black t-shirt that read “Do it in the dirt” hugged the rippling tattoos on the muscles of his arms. And finally, the evaluating look in his bright blue eyes as he checked her out, slowly moving from the top of her head...all the way to bottom.
Her fear disappeared in a rush of annoyance.
Men in her grandmother’s world, and in fact in her own world, had business hair and button-down shirts, and they didn’t drink soda from a can. They didn’t even know soda came from a can—it came in a glass on a tray. And men in the refinement of her grandmother’s world of too much inherited money and formality never dared to look at her like that, like she was theirs to take...
Or not.
She swallowed and let the door swing closed behind her.
“So, Lana is letting you out.” His rough, low-timbered voice jangled her nerves. She hung onto the door frame, caught her breath, and endeavored to look relaxed.
“Oh, good.” Lana glanced up from a pile of papers. “You made it. Sam, this is Glenna. Glenna, Sam.” Lana darted a meaningful look at her companion. “Sam is, um, here to provide security.”
The man whom her sister would have called either “biker dude” or “commando guy” choked on his drink, swallowed, and nodded at her.
“Hi.” She could be polite. Even to a man who looked like he should be providing security for drug dealers. She made her slow progression from the door frame to rickety ladder-backed chair, his bright blue eyes watching her every move cynically, as if expecting sudden collapse.
“Hi yourself.” Head tilted to the side, he gave her a critical look. “Lana, haven’t you been feeding her?”
Heat scorched her skin and Glenna bristled.
One quick glance in the small mirror downstairs had been enough to stop her from doing much more than noticing that her too bright red hair had begun the process of reasserting itself out from under the dark auburn low-lighting job. And without the makeup to cover them, her stubborn freckles were taking over in her too-pale face.
“I know, I know. She’s too skinny and white.” Lana rolled her eyes. Lana herself was a gorgeous shade of toasted almond and looked like her skin soaked up every bit of sun it could get. “She started out thin but the weeks on the IV have stripped everything else off her.”
“Too skinny?” Glenna echoed. She couldn’t remember anyone ever saying that to her. Ever. Too skinny? Well finally! Her grandmother and fiancé Roger watched every morsel she put in her mouth. With a wedding coming up, she didn’t need extra pounds.
Her chin lifted at the thought of the wedding.
Lana had avoided all her demands to call home. If she was well enough to be here, facing commando guy, then she was well enough to use the phone. She surreptitiously checked out the old-fashioned phone hanging by the door, its long twisted cord a dirty seventies yellow. Excellent. She just hoped it worked.
“Too skinny, for sure. But we can fatten you up.” Sam leaned back in his chair and crossed his massive arms over his chest.
“Listen here—” She took enough criticism from her family, she didn’t need some blowhard telling her what she should do.
“We have some lasagna left,” Lana interrupted. “Why don’t I heat it up for you? The sun is out and the deck is warm.” Her voice took on a lilting tone. “You can eat outside and get some color.”
Glenna looked out the wide window at the snow-topped peaks, much closer than she ever saw in Denver. They looked cold, but the sunny valley outside looked green and warm. It was still fall, wasn’t it? Her head ached at her loss of time.
“Where are we?”
Lana moved rapidly around the kitchen.
“Aren’t you going to answer her?” Sam asked.
“We’re at my cabin.” Lana kept her head turned away, focusing on pulling plastic containers out of the refrigerator. Something flickered across Sam’s face and Glenna’s well-honed skills at reading what others didn’t want her to know, kicked in.
She looked at the old phone, the green painted cabinets and old linoleum. Something wasn’t right. There was no way the exacting Dr. Lana, with her perfect French manicure and exquisitely plucked eyebrows, had a house that looked like it hadn’t been updated in twenty years. No way.
“Sam, why don’t you help Glenna outside. I’ll bring this out in a minute.”
Sam rose and walked over to stand next to her, his body suddenly filling the space next to her. Heat radiated from his body and her skin flushed in reaction as he reached for her. She ducked his arm and pushed herself to standing. He towered over her five-foot-eight frame and suddenly she felt overwhelmed. Damn few men did that—he must be close to six-five. A man she could wear heels with. She smothered the irrelevant thought. All her high heels were gathering dust in the back of her closet because they made Roger feel short.
“Need a hand, sugar?” Sam offered his arm in a courtly gesture that jarred with his rebel hair and kick-ass muscles.
“I’m fine.” She leaned away. She didn’t want him touching her. He was too tall, too big, too masculine, and the heat radiat
ing from his body drew her like a lodestone. His easy stance, his assessing eyes. It all reminded her of things she shouldn’t want. Like a man who saw more in her than her social status.
She shook off comparisons to her fiancé and moved for the door.
“Okay, whatever the lady wants.” The quiet amusement in his voice didn’t faze her as she held on to first chair backs and then the door frame on her way outside. She made it all by herself and collapsed on the first lounger in the sun she could reach with as much grace as she could muster. Which wasn’t much.
Pretending to be oblivious to his scrutiny, she shaded her eyes with her hand and concentrated instead on the incredible early fall view of snowy peaks, stubborn late-season wildflowers, and some sort of raptor flying high in the sky. The only buildings in sight were a gazebo at the far edge of the property, near the edge of the pine and aspen forest, and a large storage shed.
Lana’s cabin. Sure. Why was she here and not in a hospital? She’d been too drugged, and too weak to force any answers, but she was up and about now. And it was time.
Lana came out with the food.
“Thanks.” Glenna took the plate, the aroma of the lasagna pulling her in. She inhaled and her head swam. It smelled like heaven, luscious and rich and full of fat. Her mouth watered. She was hungry, ravenous in fact, but if she’d lost weight she’d need to keep it off for the wedding so she could look good in the photos for the media. Lasagna was the last thing she should be eating. She forced herself to put the plate on her lap, the heat of the lasagna seeping into her legs. “So, this is your cabin? Where did you say it was?”
“Yep, it’s mine.” Lana dragged a small table over next to Glenna and placed a tall glass of water on it. “Fluids. Drink up.”
Sam kicked back in his own lounge chair—hands folded behind his head, dirty running shoes crossed, pointedly not looking like he was listening. She decided she didn’t care.
Blood Enforcer (Wolf Enforcers Book 2) Page 3
