“Someone help me,” she cried and then she saw the numbers printed neatly on an index card over the phone. Fire. Police. She dialed. Marshall would come.
“Marshall, oh god, Marshall, the horses are trapped,” she screamed into the phone, “There’s fire and wolves. Oh god, Marshall, there’s wolves.” She was sobbing, couldn’t make the words come out as she wanted them.
“Honey? Who are you? Where are you?” It was a woman’s voice.
“Where’s Marshall? He needs to come home!” Elizabeth was pacing back and forth. The adrenaline pulsing through her veins made her feel like she was going to explode.
“Honey, slow down. Where are you?” asked the voice again.
“I’m at Marshall Goodman’s house and there are wolves outside.”
“What are the wolves doing?” the woman asked reasonably.
“Other than trying to kill me? They look like they’re guarding the barn door. The barn is burning. The horses are screaming! Help me, please!”
The woman must have finally heard the panic and fear in her voice. “I’ll get someone out there as soon as I can. You sit tight.”
“Thanks.” She slammed the phone into its cradle. “For nothing.”
The horses. The poor horses. He said they were his babies and she was letting them die. She started searching the kitchen for something she could use as a weapon. Pots and pans were tossed to the side. A cast iron fry pan she thought might work was too heavy for her to swing. In a mudroom off the kitchen, she found what she needed. Not the baseball bat she was hoping for, but a shotgun. It rested on the shelf over a row of old coats hanging from pegs. She had to drag a chair in from the kitchen to reach the box of shells tucked into the corner. This was no time to worry about what her fellow members of Silverton Citizens Against Guns would think.
Elizabeth had never fired a gun before, but she’d read enough books about firearms and munitions to know which end was which. This was a single barrel pump action and she’d watched one being loaded at a hunting safety seminar at the library; something she’d adamantly protested at the time. She was so glad her protests had been ignored. She shakily loaded three shells into the magazine, pumped one into the chamber and loaded a fourth.
Without the robe, she had only a t-shirt of Marshall’s for clothes, so she grabbed a coat from the rack not to cover her nakedness so much as for protection and a place to carry more shells and then threw it aside when she realized the too long sleeves would get in her way. The sleeveless vest on the last peg would do the job. The quilted plaid fell mid-thigh and the armholes left her plenty of room to maneuver.
Armed and uniformed, she headed back to the front door. A glance at the mantle clock told her only seven minutes had passed since she picked up the phone. She hoped she wasn’t seven minutes too late.
Cautiously checking to the right and left, Elizabeth stepped out onto the porch. The purple robe lay muddied and torn at the foot of the stairs and she stepped over it carefully keeping her eyes on the barn. The window was now more orange than yellow and behind the horse’s screams she could hear the fire crackle.
All four wolves were pacing back and forth in front of the barn doors, snarling at each other as they passed and yipping pitifully at the doors. Elizabeth raised the gun to her shoulder with her finger on the trigger and moved closer. She couldn’t remember how far these things shot and she had to make this look real. She didn’t want to hurt them. They were a part of nature that should be preserved. She only wanted to scare them away.
The wolves were concentrating on the door and paid no attention to her. When she thought she was close enough, she took her stance, left foot slightly forward, butt snug against her shoulder seam. She aimed above the center of the pack and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened.
“Shit, shit, shit.” What did she do wrong? In the safety class… The safety! Her fingers scrambled over the trigger area until she found the button and pushed. She felt more than saw it poke out the other side.
The wolves must have heard her swear because now their heads swiveled from the door to her and back again as if they weren’t sure where their attention should lie. She thought she saw the barn door begin to open, but she clearly saw two of the wolves turn and take several steps in her direction.
With their wild eyes glaring and sharp pointy teeth jutting out from jaws large enough to make a snack out of her arm, she decided they were a part of nature she could do without. She swung the gun back to her shoulder, all thought of preserving life forgotten, and fired.
She had no time to appreciate the cries of the injured wolves. She was flying backward, the ground scraping the skin from her bare rear end. Her shoulder felt broken. She wanted to do what she always did when she was hurt; run around in circles yelling, “Ow! Ow! Ow!” until the pain went away, but the animals didn’t give her time. Two other wolves were coming at her and behind them a dark upright figure seemed to waver and fold in on itself in a strange play of firelight and shadow.
She pumped the gun, ejecting the spent shell and loaded another into the chamber. This time, she didn’t aim. She fired blindly. Pumped and fired again. Pumped and fired again.
A series of sharp howls behind her made her turn. Three more wolves charged directly at her from the curving drive in front of the house.
There wasn’t time to reload. There wasn’t time to scream. They were on her before she could draw breath. Elizabeth Reynolds raised her arms to cover her head and closed her eyes against the snarling faces of death.
Guardian's Joy #3 Page 36
