Desert Wolf

by Linda Thomas-Sundstrom

  *

  Grant ran, skimming the ground with a burst of speed.

  In his mind, he had connected with Paxton’s vision of what this intruder was, and that picture left a bitter taste in his mouth. This creature she had mistaken for a bear was a werewolf, all right. He’d pegged that early on. What he had not foreseen was the immensity of power connected to that wolf and the sheer force of the creature’s oncoming presence.

  Grant felt as though he’d been hit with a battering ram square in the chest as Paxton’s haunting howl rang from the town behind him. She was in need of help, but she hadn’t followed him. Paxton hadn’t moved from the spot where she crouched to duck the fear coming at her from an awareness of that unseen creature’s approach.

  The air again was filled with the odor of damp fur, nearly missed because Paxton’s sweet scent still filled his lungs, taking his mind off business.

  Sour odors grew stronger near the fence. Ben was there, watching, waiting, with another pack member, equally alert. Neither of those Weres would be tuned in to this. Their wolves were tucked away and buried deep for one more day.

  Lycan to Lycan was how this would happen, with Paxton included in that scenario. She had noticed the scent. She bore the mark of her Lycan lineage, however unfortunate that might have turned out to be. Her transformation without a full moon kept the puzzle of her existence foremost in his mind.

  Ben nodded a silent greeting. As soon as Grant cleared the gates, he took off running.

  When he reached the small rise of earth and sand he had stood on the month before, Grant stopped. The foreign pressure was growing stronger by the minute. Edgy, and with his nerves charged, Grant’s silent internal alarms tripped. How much harm was this beast hoping to inflict? It was here again, so soon.

  “This gets tedious. Where the hell are you, beast?”

  The desert was the same unusual quiet that didn’t bode well in terms of surprises. Claws ready, Grant dragged in a raw, ragged breath and widened his stance. Time seemed suspended as he flexed his muscles and rolled his shoulders.

  From a pool of darkness no longer blessed by moonlight, the damn beast finally showed up in the flesh.

  Chapter 24

  Paxton was a kid again and reliving the past.

  She had never been afraid of the ghost town that had been her special place, at least in secret. Back then, each moment spent on her own in the town had been stolen and short-lived. Just her and her pony, breaking rules.

  Rarely had she been allowed here after dusk, even with others around. Never alone. Never when it was dark. That rule had been at the top of her father’s long list and set in stone. Her father’s rules were to be obeyed.

  But she had always been a rebel, even at an early age.

  Now, a certain familiar scent had triggered an uncanny resonance with the past. The buildings around her began to shift the way Grant had, growing, darkening, wavering, until their shadows stretched to find her…as if reaching out to the shirtless freak with a new face whose hands were decorated, not with rings, but with the markings of an animal.

  Paxton shook off a bout of lightheadedness and concentrated hard, realizing that something unusual had been here then, too…breathing, hiding, watching. Kid senses had perceived the anomaly and filed it away because to a six-year-old, not much in the gray area registered as either good or bad.

  Desperado was the gray area, she now knew, and always had been.

  More shards came, sharper, slightly out of reach, as Paxton thought back.

  There had been sounds in the afternoons beyond her pony’s hoofbeats on the packed dirt road. Whispers. Chatter that mimicked the wind passing through cracks in the old boards. She was bothered by a similar kind of chatter now, in the present, and this anomaly served to temporarily link both time frames.

  Her ability to stay in the past was disturbed by Grant calling to her in his thoughts. He hadn’t really told her what he wanted from her. There hadn’t been time. What, then, would happen if she pursued her objective to sell off this town, now that she was one of the creatures Desperado housed?

  Impossible had become her key word of the day.

  In the span of a few hours, everything had changed. She had changed, literally. Desperado not only held Grant’s secrets, it held some of hers, if she could only find them.

  Grant was regretting his hasty departure and needed her to know that. But other whispers returned to tug at her thoughts with more remembrances of older days, as though those old secrets were just out of reach. Inside those memories, it seemed to her now, someone other than Grant had spoken her name with determination—not out loud, but as a thought sent directly to her mind, similar to the way Grant sometimes communicated with her.

  Those two worlds Grant had spoken of were merging with a dizzying display of overlapping sights and noises. Underneath it all, the ringing in her ears signaled a possible imminent loss of consciousness that she wasn’t going to allow. Not now. No way.

  “Paxton?” a voice called out.

  She couldn’t decide if this voice was real or imagined. In the present or from her past.

  “Paxton, can you hear me? I think you can. It’s Shirleen. We’ve got to move out of the street. Take cover.”

  Shirleen was interrupting her search for the missing part of her past Paxton was determined to find. She had to know what had been hiding here back then and what she hadn’t seen.

  “Can you change back, the way he does?” Shirleen asked, strain evident in her tone.

  Paxton had no idea if that was possible.

  “The rest of us are strong and mostly human tonight. In Grant’s absence, we’re charged with your safety and the safety of this town,” Shirleen said. “You, like this, standing in the middle of the street, doesn’t help the cause.”

  Paxton got that with the force of a sucker punch to the gut. Desperado was being threatened and Grant supposed she was part of that.

  Four-letter curses stuck in her throat. Her palms were bleeding from fisting her claws. Without Grant there, the agony of her shape-shift felt far worse, and she had to survive when that, too, seemed impossible.

  Her father had set a strange series of events into motion with that damn will. She wished she could give him a piece of her mind right now.

  Shirleen stood ramrod straight, waiting with the patience of a saint for Paxton to move. Paxton wasn’t sure she could move. Grant’s pull on her wasn’t only physical. Despite his warnings, every fiber of Paxton’s being clamored to go after him, as if he had taken part of her with him.

  The street scene was clearer now that her vision had sharpened. Incredibly, every board and nail stood out on Desperado’s exterior walls. She noted that the dirt road she stood on had a waffled appearance from too many shoes recently trampling it down, and that the old wood on the buildings had a decadently aged odor that threatened to again toss her back in time.

  Shirleen wasn’t going to allow that. “It’s important,” she warned.

  Thawing from their former numbness, Paxton’s arms felt heavy and foreign. Her legs ached. Yet she was sure she could have run faster than she ever had, if given the chance.

  Any minute now, I will wake up.

  In the event this wasn’t a nightmare, she had to deal.

  “Can’t leave,” she sent to Shirleen.

  “It isn’t safe in the open, Paxton.”

  “A memory is here that I have to find.”

  “Can’t you find it later?”

  It was too late to find out anything from the past. The elusive whispers had gone, chased away by Shirleen’s insistence that they get going.

  Paxton offered Shirleen a dangerous glance that resulted in silence. But that silence lasted mere seconds before Shirleen jerked to attention and two more strangers came running.

  *

  “You have found me.”

  The beast, trespasser, Lycan rogue, stepped into Grant’s sightline in human form, dressed in dark clothes and a hood that hid his face. He w
as so tall, his presence alone made him formidable.

  Grant fielded a thought about whether to shift back so he could speak, and whether that might put him at a higher risk. He decided to wait.

  “Don’t bother,” the other Lycan agreed, attuned to Grant’s dilemma. “I can hear you perfectly well, either way.”

  “Why have you returned? Have you changed your mind about coming in?”

  “I have no intention of submitting myself to closer scrutiny. Surely you know this by now?”

  “You’re a wanted beast.”

  “And you’re lucky I’m here.”

  Grant failed to appreciate that remark.

  “Anxiousness is an emotional state that broadcasts over quite a distance. Yours is particularly strong,” the Lycan warned.

  “Where do you come from and what do you want here?” Grant tossed back, hoping to get a glimpse of the Were’s face.

  “I want what you want,” the Lycan said.

  “Is that a joke?”

  “Like you and the others you watch over, I need to be free. I must not be caught. That is imperative for all of us. You must stop looking.”

  “It’s too late for anonymity. If not us, the ranchers will find you.”

  “They won’t find me, no matter how hard or long they try.”

  “We know about the cave,” Grant said.

  Silence, then “Yes. There is a cave. Several of them actually.”

  Grant refrained from taking a harsh breath as he adjusted to that news.

  “Who are you?” he repeated sternly.

  “Need to know basis only,” the Lycan replied.

  “What do you want with Desperado? Why come here now?” Grant asked.

  “The town contains something dear to me.”

  Grant rolled his shoulders. “Dear to you? What could that possibly be if you have never set boot or claw there?”

  The Lycan facing him didn’t bother to answer that question.

  “I believe you said I was missing something, earlier tonight,” Grant said. “Maybe you can explain now that we’re face-to-face.”

  “What I meant was that there is danger all around, wolf, and it’s not what you’re expecting.”

  “That’s supposed to be a surprise, when you’re central to that danger?”

  “I was right. You know nothing.”

  Grant sensed the frustration mounting in this creature. The air had changed again, thickening more, carrying the scent of anger and another hint of blood.

  The Lycan had turned, so that only his silhouette was visible. He was looking to the west, as if he also smelled the blood.

  “Perhaps you can enlighten me,” Grant suggested. “After leading us a merry chase, I’m assuming you wanted me to find you tonight for a reason. Am I supposed to be your next meal? Is that what you’re thinking? Get rid of the competition, knowing I’ll use all resources at my disposal to find you?”

  “Honestly, I’m not thinking anything of the sort. I came to warn you about what’s coming, and that’s the only reason for allowing this conversation.”

  “What is coming? More of your wicked antics?”

  The Lycan brushed that remark off with a wave of his hand. “What’s coming is the worst thing you can imagine. Maybe even worse than that.”

  “Presently, you hold that honor.”

  “If I did, you and your pack would have been dead long ago. As you know, none of you are.”

  That, Grant thought, was an odd thing for a challenger to admit. As taunts went, it was pretty benign and a complete mystery. He was having a hard time wrapping his mind around the possibility of this creature not wanting to harm the pack. Honestly, he still wasn’t sure what was going on. This meeting with the Lycan wasn’t going the way he had anticipated it might. There had been no attack or move in Grant’s direction.

  “Besides you, what else is coming?” Grant asked, expecting another cryptic remark that wouldn’t lead anywhere. Strangely though, the Lycan answered.

  “Old enemies have come back, multiplying too fast for me to keep up or stay hidden.”

  “Are you talking about humans?” Grant asked.

  “Not humans,” the Lycan replied in a thoughtful, civilized manner that went against the rogue cattle rustler image Grant had pictured. Also, the scent of the blood he had detected couldn’t have been due to anything this sucker had done, since the Lycan was in his presence at the moment.

  What wasn’t he getting?

  Perhaps the bastard was trying to throw him off-balance.

  When another rustle came from the bushes, Grant readied his claws in case the Lycan had an accomplice. That could have been the terrible thing this guy was alluding to. Not one rogue, but two. Three. A dozen.

  “What’s left if you’re not talking about humans?” Grant demanded. “If you know about the nearby pack and have no bad intentions toward us, what have you got to lose by accompanying me back there?”

  “Maybe I would prefer to be my own master.”

  “What is coming?”

  “Old enemies,” the Lycan repeated, turning his head, interested in whatever he had perceived in the wind.

  “How much longer do you think you can avoid those rifles and search parties? This desert isn’t as large as you might think. Both ranchers and a wolf pack are on the hunt, and they’ll find you eventually. You’ve been a wild card inflicting too much damage, bringing too much notoriety.”

  “Yes, I’ve inflicted some damage, as you say, though I doubt if it’s the kind of damage you’re assigning to me.”

  “Cattle. Maybe a hiker or two. Bones in a cave. Months of hide-and-seek. I can smell the blood now, Lycan,” Grant said with an edge to his tone.

  He could have been wrong, had to be wrong, but Grant thought he detected the same kind of weariness in the hooded Lycan’s voice that he had heard earlier.

  “Blood is the key, the direction,” the creature said. “If you follow the trail, you won’t find me as the cause.”

  With that bit of questionable insight, Grant sensed he had again been left alone and that the mysterious Lycan, with all his cryptic secrets, had gone.

  Grant charged into the brush after the rogue. Pulse racing, he searched for footprints and scents, utilizing the full scope of his supernatural senses.

  He turned into the wind to soak up the iron-rich odor he had perceived. Blood is the key.

  The key to what? To where to find that sucker? Follow the scent and this rogue will be waiting? The rogue whose voice had not reflected the complete derangement everyone had expected?

  What could be worse than an intelligent opponent?

  More sounds filled in the quiet. Among them, Grant picked out the faint swish of boots in the sand. Growling, he glanced behind him, where the lights of Desperado’s gates held a welcoming glow and Paxton Hall’s wolf called to him in a language he understood on so many levels.

  But he had to see this through. A man had placed his trust and property in Grant’s hands for the sole purpose of keeping Desperado and its inhabitants safe. His pack trusted his decisions. A new she-wolf needed him. And now there were two anomalies to face. Paxton was one of them. The other was a Lycan he had to continue to hunt. He had to either bring this rogue in, or take him down. “I’m sorry,” he sent to Paxton. “Hang on, lover. I don’t know what I’d do if you…”

  Unable to finish that sentiment, and with the nebulous warning the Lycan had given him about what was coming ringing in his ears, Grant took off, doing exactly what that Lycan had suggested by allowing the scent of blood to guide him toward whatever awaited him in the dark.

  Chapter 25

  Paxton smelled what the others had caught a whiff of. That scent permeated the air.

  Her strength returned with a rush of adrenaline as she took a step toward the darkness beyond Desperado’s buildings. Aware of Shirleen and two others behind her, Paxton swiped at the air with her claws to warn them back.

  Claws.

  Blood was rushing through
her arteries, ramping up her blood pressure, skyrocketing her pulse. Her heartbeat echoed loudly inside her head, leaving scant chance of hearing much else. But the onset of an enhanced sense of smell was another matter altogether, and Paxton was familiar with the iron tang of blood, just as every nurse was. The blood wasn’t hers and had not originated from the Weres behind her. So, whose blood was it?

  Grant’s?

  Although she was already filled with dread, another persistent idea needled. She knew Grant’s scent, so this couldn’t be his blood she smelled.

  When she closed her eyes, she could almost see an image of him, upright, half wolf, perfectly all right. It seemed to her that some of her racing heartbeats stemmed from their strangely attuned connection and had to do with Grant’s current state of agitation.

  There was no way to call him. Trying to further their unique and uncanny bond might distract him from his objective of seeking out a madman. Shirleen had warned her against being a distraction.

  Shirleen and the two other Desperado inhabitants were maintaining several feet of separation from the new werewolf in town. Their wariness over what was happening to her tonight, without that damn full moon, radiated off them.

  Paxton swallowed the urge to scream.

  According to Grant, everyone here was a werewolf, and this was his pack, so she couldn’t help wondering where that left her. Her world had radically changed with a terrifying turn of direction. If this wasn’t a dream—or, hell, if it was—she could fall down and whimper over the hand she had been dealt or get on with it. If she was dreaming, she would eventually wake up. If she was dreaming, she couldn’t really be hurt by anything she did.

  With a cursory glance at the others, Paxton strode forward, as Grant had done, getting better at balance with each step as she headed out of town. Once Desperado was behind her and darkness filled the empty spaces, she willed her new body to run.

  That wasn’t so easy with new muscle and sinew. Stumbling often at first, Paxton shored up her determination to find Grant and get the hang of her new body, a feat made more difficult by the way her eyes processed the dark. Even without extra light, she easily saw where she was going. Everything around her took on a dull red outline, like something in the infrared spectrum. There was also a subtle layering of scent, vision and awareness that told her exactly which path Grant had taken.