by D. M. Turner
He half-expected (hoped, to be totally honest) Sophia to follow him to the kitchen at some point, but he prepared and ate his meal alone. He’d done so almost every night since Colin had moved out two years earlier. It had never felt so… wrong. He ate quickly, went to the garage for a few things to restock the freezer in the kitchen, and returned to the living room.
Sophia hadn’t moved.
“I’m ready to call it quits. What about you?”
She slowly got to her feet then stood there, not looking at him, head down.
“You plan to sleep in wolf form?”
One small dip of her nose. Yes.
“Then, why don’t we get you out of that robe? If we don’t, you’ll overheat during the night.”
Sophia padded toward him, stumbling a couple of times on a dragging edge of the garment. Then, standing with her head low, she let him maneuver her front legs out of the sleeves. Free of it, she shook, ears flapping against her skull.
Ian picked up the blanket by his chair, draped it over his arm along with the robe, and headed for his room. He glanced back.
Sophia stood where he’d left her. Head up, she watched him walk away, looking so sad and lost that it made his heart hurt.
“If you don’t want to sleep alone tonight, you’re welcome to join me. I’ve got a king-size bed, so there’s more than enough room.” He gave her a teasing smile and held up both hands. “No shenanigans, I swear. I’ll be a perfect gentleman.”
The sorrow in her gaze didn’t abate even a fraction. She sighed and joined him.
He led her into the bedroom then debated about the door. If she lost control of the wolf again, she could pose a threat to anyone who came to the house. The likelihood of anyone showing up in the night and him not noticing was miniscule, but still a very slim possibility. So he closed the door, tossed the blanket on the bed, and went to the bathroom. Robe hung on the back of the bathroom door and his nighttime routine taken care of, he returned to the bedroom.
Sophia had pulled the blanket onto the floor, shoved it into a pile on the rug next to the bed, and was curled up on top of it, her nose tucked under her tail.
“You can have part of the bed if you want.”
Amber eyes followed him, but she didn’t move.
“Okay. Well, if you change your mind, the offer stands. Goodnight.” He climbed into bed, pulled the cover sheet and a quilt over him, and willed himself to sleep.
Chapter 12
Sunday, April 15, 2018
Ian rolled over in bed and looked down at his silent companion on the floor. He’d expected her to have nightmares, but so far, nothing but silence. No wonder. She was gone. He sat up and glanced at the bathroom door. It was open, the bathroom dark. The bedroom door stood open, too. Had she retreated to the guestroom?
Just after two in the morning. He should check on her, make sure she was alright.
Tossing aside the cover sheet and quilt, he got out of bed then padded on bare feet into the living room.
No moon, so the room was almost pitch-black. Too dark even for a wolf’s eyes.
He flipped the switch on the wall to turn on the lamps on the end tables and halted a couple of steps into the room.
Huddled in a corner of the couch, in human form, Sophia jumped when the light came on, and her breath caught. She’d put on some of her own pajamas. At least, he assumed they were hers since he’d never seen them before. She hugged both knees to her chest as she stared at the dark fireplace. The afghan lay across her shoulders, and tears stained her face.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He pointed to the fireplace. “Want me to light a fire?”
She shrugged. “I’m not all that cold.”
All that cold. Was that the same as warm? Doubtful.
Ian knelt in front of the fireplace and soon had a fire going. The air in the room had a nip to it. The fire would take the edge off. He approached her slowly then lowered his frame into the chair closest to her, focused on the fire.
A predator who’s patient has far more success hunting. He settled deeper into the chair and forced his body to relax. If he was calm, perhaps it would make her confident enough to share with him. The new moon would rise come morning. Who knows what that will do to her?
“All those men you killed in Germany….”
He turned his gaze on her, but her eyes were downcast. “What about them?”
“Did you eat parts of any of them?”
“No. If I’d been a wolf much longer, I might have. My humanity was slipping away by the time Brett got me back. The wolf is a predator, first and foremost, no matter how domesticated we want to pretend we are. It’s easy to forget that.”
Sophia nodded without looking up.
Silence fell for several long minutes. Then she put a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob he barely heard. After a few moments, her hand fell into her lap.
“He showed up at the cabin one day”—her voice wavered as though tears weren’t far off—“with this charming smile and outgoing personality, but there was something in his eyes….” She shook her head. “I guess one predator recognizes another. I saw behind the smile.”
“What did you see?”
“Malevolence. Hunger.” She shuddered and wrapped her arms more tightly around her legs. “I told him to be on his way, that I didn’t want company. He left.”
“Just that easy?” He raised his brows.
“Yeah.” She huffed a short, humorless laugh and shook her head. “And I was gullible enough to fall for it. Until he hit me upside the head with something. I didn’t even hear him come up behind me as I was going back into the cabin.”
“I doubt he hurt and killed as many women as he apparently did without learning how to be sneaky.” Serials killers were predators, like werewolves but with fewer morals. Well, some wolves anyway. Other wolves were no better than serial killers. Both needed to be put down.
“When I woke up, he’d stripped me to the waist and handcuffed me. I’m not even sure how it happened, but I wasn’t afraid. I was so angry. Furious, really.” Confusion colored her expression. “He was trying to get my jeans off. I immediately Shifted. The handcuffs fell off, and it took me only a couple of seconds to shed the jeans and underwear. By then, he’d opened the door and bolted.”
Sophia’s gaze turned to the fire, distant and introspective. “I spent hours chasing him, herding him, toying with him. I wanted him to know fear. The smell of it was….” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, as though she could smell it even then.
Ian’s wolf stirred, thrilled at the thought of what she relived, remembering that delicious scent from his own kills decades before, even as Ian’s stomach turned. Human and wolf seldom agreed about such matters.
“I finally killed him because I bored of the game.” Sophia opened her eyes and met his gaze, despair and guilt burning bright in amber-rimmed green eyes. “That’s how I viewed it. A game. And I didn’t just kill him. I disabled him and then I ripped him open and started eating his liver while he was still alive. I wanted him to feel pain for what he tried to do to me. After he was dead, I tore him apart. There were pieces everywhere.”
Hunger and remorse warred within Ian. He knew the rage she spoke of. Empowering. Destructive.
“I didn’t learn his name until that day in September. Brett was right about a news report setting off the wolf again.”
“You remember that now, too?”
Sophia nodded. “He was there all over again. I had to tear him apart, stop him from hurting me. It was like I forgot he was dead. I saw his face on the TV, and the rage took over again.”
“Same in October?”
Another nod. Tears filled her eyes. “Ian, if I hadn’t experienced it for myself, I would’ve sworn it wasn’t me, but it was. Somehow, it was me who did those things.” She covered her mouth with one hand and swallowed hard.
“The wolf took over, and the human mind was suppressed. At least, that’s what happened here. You weren’t
in control. The wolf was, and the wolf is a predator. She was threatened with bodily harm, and she defended herself. You defended yourself.”
“I toyed with him. Ate part of him. Tore him apart. How do I justify any of that?”
“We can’t.” Ian shook his head and sighed. “We’re werewolves. We can’t change that, and we can’t change the fact we’re predators living in a human world. Wolves toy with prey to tire it, make it safer and easier to kill. We’ll chase an elk for hours to wear it down. We eat what we kill if the human side doesn’t stop us, and the liver is choice meat.” I probably shouldn’t have added that last bit.
She grimaced. Despair remained in her expression.
“I wish I could tell you it was okay. You and I both know that would be a lie. The wolf must be controlled. I’ve never quite been able to convince the others of that, but most of them are much younger than I am and have never been pushed to the point of losing control. You understand how vital control is. I don’t know anyone else, besides Brett maybe, who truly grasps that.”
“How am I any different than him? Sedgwick, I mean.”
“You carry remorse.” He half smiled. “I can assure you, he didn’t. Predators like him have no conscience. They feel no remorse. I’ve dealt with enough like him in my life. Granted, they were wolves I had to put down.” He scooted forward in the chair and rested his elbows on his knees. “You will always carry some degree of guilt over this. Just as I do over Germany. But, like me, you’ll learn to live with it and not let Satan use it to destroy what God is trying to build within you and in your life.”
“What is God trying to build?” Tears filled her eyes again. “I can’t see a purpose in this. I can’t.”
“I know.” He nodded and covered her arms with one hand. “I know how lost you feel. I’ve been there. For decades actually.” He cocked his head with a smile. “I’d prefer you not wander for so long seeking purpose and the belonging you spoke of before.”
“Like you, you mean.”
He nodded. “My purpose has become clearer as the years have passed, and Brett and I joining the pack here gave us both a contented sense of belonging. We all innately need those things.”
“What’s the purpose?”
“For me, to stand in the gap.”
Sophia frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“The Bible talks about a need for those who will stand in the gap to protect others. I’ve chosen to do that. To stand between humans and those like us who would prey on them.” As best he could, anyway, given his own weakness. He frowned but kept that thought to himself.
She sighed, and her gaze fell to her lap. “I’m not a warrior or a soldier like you.”
“Sure you are. You stopped a predator that preyed on innocent humans. He may have been human, but he was no less a predator than the members of my pack have stopped.”
“It’s not my place to be judge, jury, and executioner,” she muttered, her gaze locked on his. The hint of challenge there intrigued him.
“Sometimes circumstances leave us with no choice.” Ian cocked his head. “Would you have preferred to let a serial rapist and murderer go to harm someone else?”
“Of course not.”
“Then what choice did you have but to kill him?” He half-grinned. “Perhaps you could’ve taken control, convinced the wolf not to kill the scumbag, and hauled him to the police.”
Sophia scowled. “You know as well as I do that wasn’t possible. I don’t appreciate sarcasm.”
“I’m merely making a point. The wolf saw a very real and imminent threat. She destroyed it. How she went about it was a matter of instinct since the human wasn’t in control.” Ian frowned. “To be perfectly honest, when the wolf is in control like that, I’m not sure we wouldn’t kill our best friends or family, if they ticked us off. So, anyone else would be fair game. No pun intended. That’s part of the reason there’s a twenty-foot wall around this place. Even the strongest of us can’t jump that. If one of us loses control, or a new wolf does, that wall keeps the humans beyond it safe.”
“And the wolf who attacked me in Seattle?”
“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “That could’ve been another innocent bystander who had been Turned and lost control at the first Shift, couldn’t find his way back to human form, and was driven mad by the wolf. It could’ve been a werewolf intentionally hunting a woman to Turn her. You, in this case. Or it might’ve been a wolf hunting under the cover of night that was interrupted before he could kill and eat you. Regardless, there should’ve been more attacks than just you. Were there?”
“I don’t think so.” She shrugged. “At least, I didn’t hear of any.”
“Then, it’s likely you were targeted. Why he didn’t come for you at the full moon, I don’t know. You’d think if he went to the trouble of Turning you, he’d’ve stuck around for your first Shift. See if you survived.”
“Maybe he was afraid to admit his crime, thinking I’d rip his throat out.”
“Or eat his liver.” Ian half-grinned.
“Not funny.” A smile pulled at her lips, and she bit into her lower lip.
He chuckled softly then let humor slide away. “There’s also the possibility he was killed somehow after he attacked you. We can die in car accidents and such just like humans. We’re harder to kill, but definitely not impossible.”
“So, he could still be out there somewhere.”
“Yes. I hate to think he might be out killing or Turning people still, but it’s possible.” Perhaps he’d been waiting for something…. The she-wolf who had Turned Jeremy had come looking for him a year earlier, ten years after Turning him. What if the wolf who’d Turned Sophia showed up to claim her at some point? What if he found her when she didn’t have the protection of the pack? If she returned to Seattle, or moved somewhere else, and chose to remain a lone wolf, she’d be unprotected.
The wolf inside stirred, wanting to face the threat and destroy it. His teeth clenched tight, Ian suppressed the growl that built inside his chest.
“Why do you smell so angry?”
Sophia’s soft voice jarred him. He looked into green eyes that studied him without flinching. “You still plan to leave here.”
“Yes.”
Had he heard hesitation? He narrowed his eyes. “If he comes for you and you’re out there alone, you won’t have the protection of the pack. What will you do?”
A faint grin emerged. “Eat his liver.”
He half-grinned, unable to prevent himself from responding to the humor in her green eyes. “Cute, but I’m serious. He’s a werewolf. You won’t have an advantage like you did with Sedgwick, and if the wolf takes over, he’ll have an even greater advantage. Without the protection of a pack, you’ll be on your own to face him.”
Sophia’s eyes narrowed. “Is this your round-about way of asking me to stay? So you and the pack can keep me safe if he comes looking for me?”
“No, but it’s worth considering.” He had to be out of his ever-loving mind. If she stayed, his life had only begun to get far too complicated.
“And I’d have to take a mate.”
“We have a few males who are unmated.” Good thing he was in human form, or the ridge of hair on the wolf’s back would be rising. The idea of her with Carlos, Peter, or Max made his hackles prickle. The wolf wanted to kill all three of them. Mine, it whispered.
“All lower ranking than Brett?”
“With the exception of me, yes.” He chuckled. “I can guarantee none of them will boss you around.”
She scowled. “I don’t find that amusing in the least.”
“I thought you might appreciate it, since you don’t like bossy males.”
“How many of them could look me in the eye?”
“Well… none of them. They’re not dominant enough.” He avoided the urge to rotate his tense neck and shoulders, trying to keep his body language relaxed and the wolf well contained. “But any one of them would die defending you.”
“I can’t marry a man who can’t look me in the eye or argue with me when needed.” She shook her head.
Ian laughed. He couldn’t help it. The wolf settled in an instant. She wouldn’t accept any of the three unmated wolves.
“What’s so blasted funny?”
“I guess dominant males aren’t the only ones who like the opposite sex to stand up to them.”
Even with her eyes narrowed, the amber rim around green pupils was readily visible.
He stared back, allowing amusement to show on his entire face. “Go ahead. Deny it, if you can. Tell me you don’t like a man who’ll argue with you.”
She stared at him for a moment, then the amber faded to green, and her gaze moved to the fireplace.
Ha! “So, how do you feel now about the Sedgwick situation?”
Sophia sighed. “Ambiguous. On the one hand, I know you’re right. He had to be stopped, and he would’ve killed me if I hadn’t killed him first.”
“And on the other?”
“I wish there’d been a way to turn him over to the police. I wish I hadn’t toyed with him or eaten his liver.” She grimaced. “The wolf inside is pleased with what she did and relishes the memory. The human wants to throw up and find a corner to curl up in and cry.” Then her gaze met his, tears visible in green eyes. “I guess you understand that dichotomy.”
Ian nodded. “Yes, I do. I wish I could say that you’ll eventually reconcile it, but I refuse to lie to you.”
Laying her head on the high arm of the couch, she hugged her knees tighter and stared into the fire. “So, how bad exactly are the rest of your stories?”
Caught off guard by the change in subject, he raised a brow. “The next two after Germany aren’t bad at all. If you’re like Brett, you’ll find them amusing.” If anyone else in the pack had, they hadn’t the courage to say so to his face. “The one after that is good and bad. The final one… well… I had to bring in Brett to tell part of it because I can’t remember some of it clearly.”