Arielle and the Three Wolves (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour)

by Dani April

  “You better go ahead and eat,” she told him. She felt slightly angry with the wolf. She knew that emotion made no sense when applied to an animal. “Go on and eat. That’s all I have, and that’s all you’re getting until I can bring you some more home tomorrow night.”

  He looked down at the food she had presented to him in the cereal bowl. He cocked his ears and then resumed his stare at her again.

  “Stop that!” She raised her voice slightly too loud. She knew she had better be careful. The wolf might only have three good legs at the moment, but still it wouldn’t be a good idea to make him upset. “I’m sorry, but it isn’t polite to keep staring at someone like that. Now eat your food.”

  The wolf gave a low growl. She sat back farther on the bed. It didn’t seem like it was angry, only as if it had put her in her place. She stared back at it with frightened eyes. The wolf was in charge here, she realized.

  She looked away from it and down to her toenails. She tried to clear her mind. It had been too crazy of a day. When she was brave enough to glance back up at him, he had already eaten his food and neatly shoved the cereal bowl away from his blanket on the floor.

  “Oh, so that’s how it is,” she said to the wolf in a quiet voice. “You can watch me take a shower but I can’t even look at you when you eat.”

  The wolf growled at her again, and she crawled to the far side of her bed. She still made sure to modestly cover herself. “I’ve always laughed at people who talked to animals,” she told herself. “Now I’m doing it myself. Oh, God, I have been living alone for too long.”

  She reached down to the blankets on her bed and brought them up. She covered her body and reached behind her to fluff her pillows. Vaguely she knew she wasn’t too safe to fall asleep in a room with a wolf at the side of her bed. She didn’t really care. If it wanted to eat her in the night, it would just have to do so.

  She was too tired to even watch TV. The bedside table was only a few inches away, and she reached over and turned off the light. She curled into a fetal position and turned her back on the wolf. This didn’t help stop the sensation of its eyes on her in the dark, but she was too tired to be afraid anymore. Soon she fell asleep.

  * * * *

  The odd dreams returned to her that night. They were erotic. This was strange because never before did she have sleep-induced fantasies of this nature. The handsome naked man was back. This time he touched her. Her body tensed under him. She tried to fight against it, last out under his ministration. Then she gave up. An orgasm went through her body, and she woke up. Her knees were clenched to her chest and every muscle in her body felt sore. It was a surprise that this was actually a good sensation. She felt refreshed from the orgasm.

  She opened her eyes and saw the dark bedroom. The digital clock on the table read 3:25 a.m. Her breath came hard, but more relaxed now that the muscle spasm had passed. For a long while she didn’t move. Nothing like this had happened to her before. She just allowed the comfortable impression to hang over her for a while.

  Totally relaxed and at peace with the world, she rolled over onto her back. That was when she became aware that something was wrong. It was dark and she couldn’t see well, but she could feel a weight in bed with her. When she reached across, she felt something lying next to her. She wasn’t alone in the bed.

  The wolf lay next to her. It had laid its head across her body. When she rolled over it adjusted its position. It was awake and stared at her. With supreme embarrassment, she brought her hands out from under her T-shirt. They had been between her thighs.

  “Oh, shit,” she whispered in the dark.

  The wolf laid its head back down on top of her. This time when it rested, it lay against her breasts beneath the thin fabric of the T-shirt. Out of the corner of its eye, it gave her one last smart look as if it told her to go back to sleep. Then it closed its eyes. She could hardly move with the great weight on her and was too afraid to even breathe.

  Slowly she reached out a hand to the wolf. She stroked its soft fur and felt the hard muscles underneath. She couldn’t believe it. She was actually sleeping with a wolf. A beam of moonlight shined inside the bedroom window and threw sparse illumination across the room, along with the shadow of the dresser and nightstand.

  Arielle yawned, too tired to argue with this wild animal anymore. After a while she drifted off to sleep. For once she didn’t feel alone and felt totally safe.

  The next week passed in a blur, as it usually did. Arielle kept busy with her clinic and spent ten to twelve hours a day in Wolf Creek and away from her house. The rest of the time she spent at home with the wolf. There was no longer any question of whether she should be afraid of the animal. He meant her no harm. Of course he was an animal and couldn’t speak, but he seemed smarter than most people she knew and far better company.

  She learned that the wolf had altered her lifestyle in certain ways. She had to keep the bathroom door closed whenever she showered. The wolf liked to come and watch her with those big lusty eyes, and it freaked her out to see that look come from an animal. She also did not watch TV or read as much. Instead she talked with the wolf. He seemed to listen, and what was more, in her imagination, she thought he understood every word she told him.

  At first she had tried to get him off the bed with her. But there was only so much one could do to stop a two-hundred-pound wolf. It was the boss and got its own way with her. Whenever it didn’t get what it wanted, it would growl at her. At first the deep, angry growls had scared her. Then they had made her mad, but in the end, no matter what her mood, she always yielded. This wolf was the strongest animal she had ever seen. So after the first couple of nights, she gave up and let him share the bed with her. Every night she ended by petting him until she fell asleep and surprisingly seemed to sleep better with the wolf in bed with her.

  When Sunday rolled around, her one day off from the clinic, she found she actually looked forward to it. In the past it had been just another day. She had little to do unless the weather was nice and she could work in her garden out back. Now when this Sunday came up, she found she anticipated with relish a day she would not have to leave home and could just have her freedom.

  “What do you want to do today, guy?” she asked her wolf on Sunday morning. She sat at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, and he had limped out to check on her. As always, he stared at her with a smart look on his face. She had halfway started to expect him to speak to her. “It looks like it’s going to be a beautiful day out. I was thinking of taking a walk in the woods today. If you feel like it, I’ll let you come along with me.”

  The wolf raised its head. She took this as a sign of assent. She would never have told anyone else how she talked to this animal. It was embarrassing, and it probably said more about her condition in life than it did about the wolf. But she really believed it could understand her.

  The wolf limped down the back steps of her house, and they started across the yard on the way to the trail behind the lot that led for miles off into the woods. Briefly she considered if this was a good idea. He was still in no condition to return to the wild. If he bolted from her at the scent of a rabbit or squirrel and ran off, he might still die alone in the wilderness. When he was better, she fully intended to return him back to where he had come from, but that time was not here yet.

  The wolf looked across the yard at her as if he tried to determine what she thought. She decided she didn’t have to worry. This wolf was too smart to run off before it got better. Anyway, she felt there was a connection between the two of them, and she didn’t think he would leave her.

  The day was gorgeous. The sun shined down on them as they walked under the cathedral of the open forest. The walk was rough in a couple of spots where lightning had felled a great pine across the path. In another location a brook overflowed in front of them. They had to get their feet wet as they crossed.

  Everything was quiet and peaceful. Arielle didn’t remember ever enjoying nature as much as she had that day. The
weather was perfect. An occasional breeze ruffled the overhead branches, and the wild canopy of pine and fir trees provided plenty of shade.

  At one point a startled chipmunk ran out across their path. It was not five feet from the huge jaws of the wolf. The wolf only looked at it. He had no interest. Then he returned his stare to Arielle.

  “You are really a strange creature,” she told him. “Any other wolf, or even a dog, would have gone for that little guy. Yet here you are still at my side. What’s wrong with you?”

  The wolf gave a low growl. She had learned to ignore these.

  They continued their walk. “You know I think I like talking to you so well because you don’t have any opinions and you can’t talk back. But I suppose that’s just another sign I’m becoming a full-fledged hermit like my kid sister is always telling me.”

  The wolf looked at her. It growled again. She imagined that it had something it wanted to say to her. It limped along at her side and kept the pace. Overhead the sound of the branches rustling in the breeze soothed her.

  “You remember those two guys who came to see me last week?” she asked the wolf. “Somehow I keep thinking about them. It’s too bad they were such jerks. Otherwise they would have definitely been cute. Now that’s something I couldn’t admit to anyone but you because I know you’re not going to tell anyone.” She laughed at her own banter with the animal. “I guess maybe they were just so worried about finding their brother that they weren’t on their best behavior. They seemed to really care about him. At least that’s what I’d like to think. Then again maybe they were crazy psychopaths that had escaped from somewhere. In this time we’re living in, it’s hard to say about people.”

  She stepped off the trail and motioned to the wolf. “Come on, this way. I know a really good spot back here, and I’ve never shared it with anyone before. You’re going to be the first.”

  The wolf hopped over a log on three legs. Never one to follow her, he led the way ahead into the dark forest. She had to swipe numerous branches out of her way as she walked across the undulating ground. After about a ten-minute walk, they emerged from out of the overhang of the woods.

  Before them was a drop into a canyon about a hundred feet down. From here one could see for miles. The mountains and the big sky in the distance towered above the roof of the forest beneath. If one raised their voice here, it would cause an echo. Arielle had often come to this spot over the past eighteen months since she had lived here. She thought it was the most beautiful spot in the world. She had always hoped to share it with someone, but never trusted anyone enough to bring them up here with her. What if they ruined the moment or sullied the majesty of the spot by some inane comment? No, this was her spot to be alone.

  She never thought a wolf would be the first she would share this with.

  He hobbled over and stood quietly at her side. She reached down and petted his fur. He licked her hand.

  Their eyes met. No longer was she afraid to look the wild animal directly in the eye. “You know something, you crazy wolf. I think I love you.” Her voice was hushed. She had known many people to fall in love with their dogs before and treat them like a member of the family, but loving a wolf was just insane.

  But Arielle loved this wolf.

  Chapter Four

  Three additional weeks passed. Arielle and the wolf settled into a routine. She saw no more of the two large men. She doubted she would ever see them again. Her life was normal, except that she no longer thought about a move from Wolf Creek back to St. Louis. When she thought about it, another year spent out in the wild didn’t seem so terrible.

  It was Saturday night. Tomorrow was Sunday, and she would be off from the clinic. The new movie of the week was on HBO, one that had just been in the theaters last year, but of course Arielle never went to the theater. Instead she paid for movie channels at home and waited for their arrival on that venue.

  She was alone with the wolf as she always was now. She made popcorn. The wolf ate with her. More cereal bowls came in handy for this. Half of the popcorn she shared with the wolf in the bowl because he would never eat from her hand. Anyway, she didn’t really want him to eat from her hand. He was too proud for that.

  She curled up on the sofa and watched the movie in her living room. The wolf got up on the couch with her. This was another thing that he always got his own way about. The floor was not where he liked to be. He was either in bed or up on the furniture. Normally when she was in bed he was in it with her. She had stopped any attempt to break him of the bad habit and had come to accept it.

  They each ate out of their respective popcorn bowls. She turned off the lamp in the living room, and they watched the movie in the dark. She petted him idly as the movie played upon the thirty-six inches of the screen, tucked her legs beneath her, and curled up against the arm of the couch.

  The wolf seemed to be agitated. She thought his leg might be sore. Before the movie went off, he left her on the couch and went over to the small bookshelf. He used the wall next to it to jump up and lean against. He reached over with his snout and knocked a dictionary and a set of encyclopedias off the shelf. They went crashing to the floor.

  “What are you doing?” she asked him. He had never once disrupted her house before. The movie was almost over, so she decided to let him have fun. As the last scene played, she watched him out of the corner of her eye. It looked as if he flipped pages with his nose and almost as if he read the print.

  When the credits of the movie started to scroll, she reached for the remote on the coffee table and turned off the television. She was tired. Though it had been Saturday, she had spent a twelve-hour day at the clinic. She was ready to crawl under the covers in her bedroom and go to sleep.

  She got up off the couch to see what the wolf had done and try and set its mess in order. She dropped to her knees on the carpet with it and gave it a playful rub behind the ears. “What in the world got into you tonight, wolf?”

  The wolf didn’t pay her any attention. She started to put the toppled encyclopedias back up on the shelves. Then she reached for the dictionary.

  The wolf put his paw on it and wouldn’t let her have it. She looked at him. He looked at her. She thought something was wrong. He gave her a low growl and forced her to look down. His paw was held over a word, but of course it was just random.

  “I don’t understand what you’re doing, wolf.”

  Then it lowered its nose and seemed to point at the same word. Arielle cleared her throat and looked down.

  Tonight.

  She looked at the single word at the top of the left page for a couple of seconds. “Tonight.” She spoke it aloud. Then she looked back up into the eyes of the wolf. “What’s going to happen tonight, wolf?” Sometimes she almost expected him to answer her. “Look, wolf, nothing is going to happen tonight other than I’m exhausted and I’m going to bed. You’re welcome to join me if you want to, unless you want to stay out here and read the dictionary all night.”

  She gave it a last pat on the head and got up off the floor. A low growl from the wolf followed her as she walked down the hallway. “Maybe you’re feeling a little pain from that leg now. Tomorrow I’ll give you a full examination and see about changing the splint. We can make that more comfortable for you. But tonight I’m too tired. I performed eye surgery on a cat today. I’m beat. Don’t bother me until the morning.”

  The wolf came after her and was inside the bedroom door before she was. She shut the door behind them and headed to the bed. After she had the covers turned back and had gone beneath them, she turned around and expected the wolf to leap after her. It remained on the floor. Apparently it wouldn’t join her tonight. This was a first.

  She yawned and turned out the bedside light. “I think that’s a good idea,” she told the wolf. “The bed is too small for both of us. Good night. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She rolled over onto her side, hiked up her knees and closed her eyes. She was asleep in ten minutes.

&nbs
p; * * * *

  When she awoke before sunrise the next morning she turned around and was in a man’s arms.

  He opened his eyes and looked at her in the dark.

  Arielle screamed. She struggled against him. His naked chest was hard and would not yield to her. Engulfed in his arms, she tried to squirm out of his grasp, but he held her like iron. Her fists balled, and she pummeled him. Every effort she made was like a twig snapped against the side of a mountain. She couldn’t get away from him.

  Finally he must have seen the terror written on her face, and he let her go. Immediately she flew back out the side of the bed and fell to the floor. She was naked. In her panic she could find nothing to reach for to cover her body.

  Tears flooded her eyes, and she scooted away from the bed across the carpet. He just peered over the side of the bed at her as if annoyed by her behavior. The discarded T-shirt lay a foot away from her. When she saw it, she made a grab for it and held it over her front. Now with a paltry cover she felt like she could get to her feet. Her knees were shaky as she rose off the floor.

  “Who are you?” she asked the man in her bed.

  “You know me, Arielle.”

  “I’ve never seen you before in my life.” Frantically she looked around the room for the wolf. He might be able to come to her rescue in this situation. He might be able to save her, but she didn’t see him anywhere in the room.

  “Don’t be afraid of me, Arielle.” His voice was calm when he spoke, deep and with command.

  “What are you doing in here?” She knew her voice was hysterical when she spoke. She couldn’t help it. Her worst fears had come true.

  “Now calm down, Arielle. I think it’s time we talked.”

  He made no attempt to go to her or restrain her. He just calmly watched her from under the covers of her own bed. Her fear mixed with anger. She nudged her way over to the dresser. She reached behind her, but never took her eyes off the man. She felt blindly into the top drawer until she felt the cold metal touch her fingers. Then she grasped it in her palm and brought it out before her.