“Hey buddy. I’m here to help. You just need to hang tight while I think of who to call. Okay?”
He whined again but this time it wasn’t so much in pain but acceptance.
So Sadie was out. There was always Tyson but she didn’t have his number. Owen would have his number.
“Owen,” she whispered. Duh, he was a freakin’ vet. He’d help. He had to help.
Mira didn’t have Owen’s number but she did know he had a practice in town. She typed in Andora Veterinarian into her internet app on her phone and was pleased when the Neanderthal’s face popped up next to a link.
“Thank you for calling Adirondack Veterinary Clinic. This is Wendy-” a sweet, older woman started but Mira didn’t have time for pleasantries.
“I need to talk to Owen,” she cut in.
“Dr. Purcell is with a client right now. Can I assist you?”
Could she? Mira thought about it but something told her that she needed Owen. “No. I need to talk to Owen. Please. You need to tell him Mira James is on the phone and it is an emergency.” Mira looked over at the wolf who had stopped whining and was watching her. She put a hand over the receiver and told him, “It’s going to be fine, buddy. Just try not to move so much.”
The familiar, deep rumblings of Owen Purcell greeted her ears. “Mira, are you ok?”
“Ah! Good. I am in the woods and there is this wolf and he-”
“Stay back from the wolf, Mira,” he cut in. His order zinging up her spine. “Why are you in the woods? What does the wolf look like? Are you hurt? How bad?”
“Owen,” she said trying to jump in to his endless questions. “Owen!” She heard the jingle of car keys. “Owen just shut up! I am fine. It’s the wolf. He is stuck in a trap.”
She heard a whispered curse on his lips but wasn’t sure if it was out of relief for her or fear for the wolf. “Ok,” he took a breath. “Ok, I want you to stay put. Don’t go near the wolf. He’s injured and won’t be thinking straight. What trail are you on?” The rumble of an engine started up and her nerves relaxed a fraction. He was coming. He was going to help.
“The one off lamp post lane with the green markers. I was running for an hour before I found him.”
“That won’t be a problem I have an ATV, I’ll be there soon, okay?” He was quiet for a moment and then asked, “Rabbit?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t go near that wolf.”
*****
When he had gotten the call, Wendy hadn’t had a chance to tell him anything more than who was on the phone before he was picking it up. Mira had called him and his curiosity was rolling. Then she uttered the words that just about stopped his heart. Woods. Wolf. Hurt. He had been out the door before he let her get another word in. He needed to call Sadie and Tyson. They would need to know and possibly meet him to help. He would get Lee on call and prepped. He wasn’t sure how bad she was hurt and they needed to be ready for anything. Depending on where she was, he could send a scout from the house to do some triage till he got there.
“Owen just shut up! I am fine. It’s the wolf. He is stuck in a trap.”
He shouldn’t have felt relief at that. He should have still been in a frenzy but the fact that she was unharmed had been such a profound relief, he had to stop himself and reign in the flood of emotion.
Now she just had to stay that way.
He told her to not help, to stay away from hurt wolf. There were a few in the pack who might let her help without snapping at her but then there were those that would use her as a snack till he got there. His Little Rabbit was no one’s snack. He was proud of her and a little bit smug that she had called him for help. She could have turned to Sadie, or even Tyson, but she picked him. And that just put a fucking pep in his step.
He pulled in beside her Jeep. No one else’s car was there so the unknown wolf could still be anyone from his pack or a visiting one. He grabbed the med-kit he kept in his truck and walked over to the shed that held his ATV. Every trail that they ran on was marked with a different color paw print. He had a station at the beginning of each of these trails with first-aid, extra clothes, and an ATV. His father, the Alpha before him, had liked to be prepared. Owen even more so.
She said she had been at it for an hour before finding the trapped wolf. He knew that trail like the lines on his hand. As he should since he was the one who created it. Owen would bypass the majority of it by cutting straight through the forest. It should only take him twenty minutes. It had taken him ten to get there so thirty minutes after she called before he would reach her. He hoped that was not long enough for her to do something stupid.
He met up with the trail and turned off the engine. Her scent was sweaty and natural. It complimented those of the forest. He followed it up the path a ways till it made a sharp left into the brush. Right away he knew which of his wolves he was dealing with and wasn’t surprised at all. Owen hiked the med-kit over his shoulder and began his way to them following the scent of blood, fear and Mira.
He purposefully made a lot of noise. Scaring her any further was not his intent. When he was a few yards away he called out a hello. She was standing when he found her. Standing with only a sports bra and rolled up cotton shorts on. Her hands were perched on her hips giving him a very nice silhouette. Her hair had been pulled back and braided which opened up her face, one he couldn’t stop staring at. Goddammit, she was beautiful. Those green eyes of her matched the moss around them. It was like looking into a forest only he knew of. A sassy, snarky, forest.
“That was fast.”
He didn’t say anything, couldn’t. His speech had been lost somewhere between his ATV and her. Mira smirked knowing exactly what he was hung up on. The woman’s confidence was sexy as hell.
“Is there a problem?” she asked, the smirk deepening.
He cleared his throat and had to pull his eyes away from her to something less compelling. “No. Uh, no. Where’s the wolf?”
Mira, still smirking, stepped aside. Cobie was standing on all four legs behind her, his front left paw wrapped in a shirt and spotted with blood and dirt. He looked around and found the trap a few feet away, pried open and rusted from years of neglect. Owen looked back to Mira, this time not in lust but with the anger of an Alpha disobeyed.
“I thought I told you to stay away from him until I got here?”
The smirk dropped away. Playtime was over. “You did but he was in a lot of pain.”
“Come here,” he motioned her forward. Mira hesitated. “Rabbit. Come. Here.”
Owen held out his hand and after a moment she walked forward and took it. He was mad, but more so at Cobie for disobeying his orders, once again. Mira had acted foolishly, but she was only trying to help. Owen looked over her hands first. He turned them over in his own looking for any bites or blood that was hers. They were small within his. He could engulf her whole fist inside his if he wanted. So small. So fragile. Her wrists were like little twigs. It would have only taken a small amount of pressure for them to snap. These gentle, beautiful hands could have been in tatters. Owen struck a glance over to Cobie who had sat down. His head hung low, practically lying on the ground and his eyes were so low they were almost closed. He knew what he had done and the danger he could have been to Mira and himself.
Owen ignored the wolf for now. At the moment, Mira was his concern. He moved up to her face, tilting her chin from side to side, wiping his thumb on a spot of dirt on her cheek. She looked whole and unhurt. Her wide green eyes watched him with interest. It was hard to read her at times. Was she scared? Exhilarated? Angry? Curious?
Over her shoulder Cobie shuffled from foot to foot. He was in pain and trying his hardest not to show it. The wolf, for being a foolish pup, had some strength in him if he wasn’t whining yet. Owen focused back on Mira. He lifted the hand he still held and kissed her knuckles.
“I’m going to check on him. Stay here, please.” The please he added as an afterthought. “I’ll take you back then.”
Mir
a looked back at the wolf who gave her a goofy grin and then nodded. “He’ll be ok?”
“I think so. Wandered off from his mom it seems. She will punish him as needed. I’m sure she is looking for him now so I better work quickly before she finds us.”
Cobie heard and understood what he said. However, the punishment would also come from him. Twice now he disobeyed an order. Once full grown, his dominance would place him high in the pack. He’d be a handful, a good one to have once he found his control, but a handful none the less.
He walked over to the wolf and knelt down in front of him. “We will talk about this later. Go home first to your mother and then to the pack house. Lee is waiting for you. If you take any kind of detour, your hide will grace the spot in front of my fireplace. Do you understand?”
Cobie snorted.
Owen unwrapped Mira’s shirt, now stained and ruined. The wound would need stitches and a tetanus shot but he would keep the paw. He wrapped it tightly but quickly in bandages and sent him running. Lee would handle it from there, as long as Cobie did as he said. If the pup waited too long it could get infected and he might just lose it. Wouldn’t that be a lesson for him?
“You are very good at that.”
Still crouched on the ground, Owen turned toward Mira. “Thank you. I’ve worked with the pack of wolves around here before. They know my scent and typically don’t give me a hard time.”
Awkwardly she moved her arms trying to cover the bare flesh of her stomach. As much as he enjoyed the view, Owen knew she was uncomfortable. From his backpack he pulled out a t-shirt and tossed it at her. She looked surprised but relieved.
“Thank you.”
“No problem. I always come prepared.”
She pulled it on over her head and it landed passed her shorts giving the illusion of wearing nothing underneath. “Such a boy scout.”
He sure wasn’t having Boy Scout thoughts right about now. “Let’s get you home,” he managed to get out in a grunt.
Mira took pity on him and rolled and knotted the shirt to a shorter length. “Yes, please.”
Chapter Five
He was ready. He had the whole damn thing figured out. Mitch had been sitting at the bar since five o’clock. He didn’t want to miss Mira coming to dinner and he wasn’t sure how early she ate. So he got there early and snagged the best table in the bar. From his vantage he could see the front door, the whole bar and most of the tables and the stairwell to go upstairs. He didn’t think she was upstairs but there was a small chance she could have slipped in before he sat down. A package had been delivered to him at the post office from one of the investigators he worked. The guy owed him a favor and he had called it in last night. Mitch had to leave for twenty minutes, at which point she could have come back. He had listened very carefully in his room and hadn’t heard any footsteps above him. Taking a chance he had also gone up to her room and checked the hallway out. There wasn’t a sound from either room.
Mitch flipped through the papers again. He had gotten a full background on Miranda Lynn James. Everything was there: official high school and college transcripts, credit history, finances and medical history. He knew how many cavities she had and what her grandma had given her for her eighteenth birthday. There was nothing that stood out to him.
But he wasn’t interested in who she was on paper. He wasn’t really interested in her at all. But Mitch had to pretend to be interested in her. He had to know stupid things like what clubs she was in during high school so he could find some common ground with her, build a bond. Mitch wanted Mira to see him as a friend, one close enough to share her secrets with. Once she was comfortable speaking with him openly, he could get her to talk about Sadie and what happened with Peter. All he needed was some little fact that could tear apart Sadie’s case.
Peter had told him that Sadie was his girlfriend. He had talked about her none stop for months. There were pictures for god’s sake! The few times they all tried to meet up, she had to work or just blatantly stood them up. Mitch had never liked her. Peter saw something in her that he loved but without ever meeting her, there was no way he would ever approve of her.
Then the call came in that changed his life. Peter was dead. Sadie, his girlfriend, had shot him and yelled self-defense, which was a fucking pile of crap. Peter was a gentle man. He didn’t get angry or violent. Her recount of the incident—such a cold word, so unfeeling and distant—made Peter out to be someone else, someone who he was not. The judge ate it up too. Their family was now tarnished, his credibility questioned. His cases since the trial ended have not gone well. The gossip had followed him into the courtroom.
It had to stop.
He had to prove that Sadie had been lying.
Mira would help him do that.
So he’d wait. He’d wait in his booth and when he saw he come in, he’d wave her down. He’d invite her to share his table and they would talk, get to know one another. Every day he would find some way to see her, speak to her. He would become part of her every day. All he had to do was be patient.
*****
Her entire body vibrated but she wasn’t sure if it was because she was on the back of an ATV or if it was because she was pressed up against Owen Purcell’s body. He was so…hard. Big, brutish and hard. It was clear to anyone with eyes that the man was fit. And he didn’t have a soft spot on him.
She knew.
She had checked.
Her hands had slipped from his waist a few times on some of the more rugged bumps they hit. They had slipped and she took advantage to feel her way around. Over the growl of the engine Mira couldn’t hear much but she was pretty sure he had laughed a few of the times her hands had “slipped.” In fact, she thought he was purposefully finding the bumps and dips to keep her hands wandering.
She felt it was only fair since he had gotten a good eye full of her without a shirt.
Owen kept surprising her. After last night and how she acted towards him, he shouldn’t have been so nice to her. This morning’s breakfast was unexpected and the rescue was remarkable. Maybe she had become cynical over the last year, but men like Owen, people like Owen didn’t happen often.
It was too bad that she had just gotten out of a relationship. He’d be a great rebound but he deserved to be more than just a rebound. He deserved more than what Mira could give. The landscape passed in daze. She allowed herself to unfocus and just be. It was something she did from time to time to clear her head when it became muddled. Doing it on the back of a vehicle was a first though.
Mira let her head rest on Owen’s back. It was awkward with the helmet he insisted she wear but she wasn’t complaining and neither was he. His hand left the handle bars for a moment to cover the one she had wound around his waist. She relaxed into this man with the hard body who called her Rabbit and rescued people and animals alike. It was the first time in days she relaxed, felt like she could relax. Owen had this. He seemed capable to get her to her car so why not shut down for a while and let someone take care of her? Ok, that was a stretch. He wasn’t “taking care of her,” he was giving her a ride. The sentiment was still the same though.
When Trixie came into view she lifted her head and sighed. Back to life. Back to wandering. Back to no direction. Life really was unfair sometimes; she thought as she swung her leg off the side of the ATV and took her helmet off. Here was this tall—God he was tall—man with stunning eyes, deep dimples and a chin that would make Apollo weep, and she was not in the right place to act on it.
Aren’t you? It doesn’t seem like you are having an issue with the whole break up thing. And let’s be honest here, you haven’t even cried about it.
She hadn’t. Mira hadn’t shed a tear. Sophia and Mira had dated for years…years. This hadn’t been a few week or even a few month fling. This was planning a life together kind of relationship. You’d think that there would have been some emotion tumbling around inside of her but there was nothing. No anger, not really. No animosity. No devastation. When she confronte
d Sophia about the strange phone call left on their answering machine, all she had felt was disappointment. But even there she wasn’t sure who she was disappointed in. Sophia had betrayed her, had betrayed what they had, but she wasn’t the only one to blame. Mira hadn’t fought for them. She had let their relationship go bland and hadn’t bothered to try any harder.
“You sure are thinking hard over there.”
Startled, Mira turned her head to Owen who had been watching her.
“Anything you want to talk about?”
She opened her mouth and closed it. Was there? This was the kind of thing she needed her sister for. But Sadie was…unavailable. Mira felt like there was so much in her head and that she needed to lay it all out, figure out what she was feeling. Could she do that with him? Mira was pretty sure that it was against girl code to talk out her lesbian breakup with the guy who was into her.
“Never mind,” he said disappointed with her lack of response. He drew the padlock out of his jeans pocket and locked the ATV away in the shed. He had begun towards his car when her voice, although she didn’t remember making up her mind one way or another, had shouted out for him to stop. He turned, looking like he was trying to hide his dueling disappointment and hope.
“Um, I actually could use someone to vent to.” Mira sounded awkward, felt awkward. All signs pointed that she looked awkward as she stumbled over a way to ask him to stick around. “See, I just got out of a relationship. That’s actually why I’m here. I needed Sadie. But she…well, that’s not important. Do you want to grab a drink?”
He looked all too pleased with himself. In fact, the smug smile was just enough for her to turn her coat. “Jesus, never mind. If you are going to be that cocky about it then you can just forget all of that.”
He had let her get to her car before speaking up. She had gathered up the little pride she had left and stomped her way over to Trixie. But he had stopped her with just one word.
“Rabbit,” he said in only a way a man can. It was an eye-roll and a head shake all wrapped around a silent scoffing of “women.”
Fault Lines Page 5
