Outside, darkness had descended, shrouding the street in mystery. Erin scrutinized the world beyond her front door, scouring the shadows for anything unusual but nothing appeared out of place. There was a still calmness to the night, which reassured her.
Certain that the house was locked up tight, Erin headed upstairs to bed. Jack was already sleeping soundly in his travel crib, which she had placed directly beside her own bed. She wanted her son to be close by throughout the night, and she didn’t dare leave him in a room on his own.
As Erin entered her bedroom and shut the door behind her, she thought briefly of the wolf that had come crashing in to the room. The outside of the door still bore deep scratch marks. Sean had mended the wood as best he could, holding it all together with duct tape but it was still a far cry from the secure structure it should have been.
Erin sighed sadly as she looked over the tape. The door, like the window downstairs, had been repaired to the best of Sean’s abilities and while they now were functional, they looked broken. Erin herself felt broken inside. While she could perform basic functions, she felt like something was profoundly wrong with her, that she too needed fixing.
Try as she might, she couldn’t push Sean’s warnings out of her mind. She kept thinking about the body that had been in her shed. As darkness fell, she heard muffled voices and footsteps in her yard and knew exactly who they belonged to. The illusive pack members Sean referenced had come to help him dispose of the body, and she wanted no part in it. None of it felt right, yet Erin was tainted by it all, implicated in a murder, touched by death.
It wasn’t the wolves Erin necessarily feared, but more the legal implications of what had taken place at her home. Sean was right to say that her home was potentially unsafe but only because of the dark secrets that were being harbored there.
Darkness. Erin pulled the bedroom door shut in frustration at the thought of darkness. It rattled uneasily in its hinges, reminding her that it was only held together with tape now.
To Erin it seemed that her mother had perhaps been right all along. Darkness had found her, encroaching its way into her home, stealing up her staircase and committing murder in the dead of the night. It was again seeming plausible that Sean was responsible for the spate of murders locally. Was the body in her shed just another of his victims? The thought sickened her.
Before climbing into bed, Erin hung over the crib and looked down on Jack. His fresh little face looked so perfectly innocent as he slept, oblivious to the madness around him. To him, the world was a simple place. Erin almost envied his outlook. Leaning down, she gently stroked his forehead and he gurgled contentedly as she did so.
“Goodnight, little man,” she whispered fondly. “Sleep tight.”
Resting her head upon her own pillow, Erin wished herself to sleep. She wanted the respite it would give her. She wanted to cease being tormented by her own anxieties and fears. Once more she had cast Sean away from her life, once more she was alone in her home feeling afraid and vulnerable.
On the cusp of sleep, Erin reassured herself that Sean was completely crazy. The curse he spoke of was a complete fabrication of his mind, part of his paranoid delusions. And the pack he talked of wanting revenge were probably drug dealers to whom he owed money. Satisfied with her explanation of events, Erin drifted off to sleep, letting her mind wander away from her home and the darkness that enshrouded it.
***
Erin jolted awake with a start. As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, her heart started to hammer madly within her chest, her body become electrified with adrenalin. Something had made her wake very suddenly.
As her senses began to return, Erin tried to make sense of what had disturbed her. It took only a few seconds for the piercing sound to reach her ears. Initially she was gripped with terror when she heard it, but as she listened, she realized what she was hearing and her fear gave way to maternal purpose.
Jack was crying. Lying within his crib, he was screeching manically in to the night, demanding attention.
“Hey, baby boy,” Erin said as she cooed over him, lifting him up in to her arms. “What’s the matter?”
She was relieved that the sound that had awoken her was such a natural one. It was perfectly normal for babies to cry. It wasn’t a sound which should alarm her, merely one that demanded her attention.
Rocking Jack in her arms, she sat down on the edge of her bed and began to feed him. He greedily accepted her milk.
“Typical guy, always hungry.” Erin smiled warmly to her babe in arms.
As Jack fed, she glanced nervously around the room. She was still very much on edge. She glanced at her bed. Now re-made with crisp clean sheets, it was as though a battle had never been fought upon it. Sean had been meticulous in his cleanup efforts; there wasn’t even the smallest splatter of blood in sight.
But he’s had experience, Erin thought coldly. He’s killed before and therefore he’s a dab hand at disposing of bodies.
A shiver ran along her spine at the thought of it. She tried to stop thinking about Sean and focus just on Jack, who was still contentedly suckling.
“Good boy,” Erin whispered to him.
Sitting there, she felt content being alone with her son. She had almost relaxed into the moment when a new sound alerted her.
This time her heart didn’t settle upon learning the sound’s origins. Instead, her blood immediately ran cold. Outside, just beneath her window was the unmistakable sound of a dog or wolf howling.
Erin tightened her arms around Jack, who continued to feed, blissfully unaware of the sound. It was a long, mournful howl and it seemed to belong to a sole voice. Tentatively, Erin stood up, carrying Jack, and tiptoed toward her window. As always, the world outside looked perfectly normal.
But the howling wasn’t normal. Erin remembered how the howling had proceeded the attack upon her home. She looked down at Jack. He was so helpless in her arms, so fragile. She didn’t want to contemplate what would happen if some savage wolf got close to him.
“Just go away,” Erin pleaded with the howling, but she knew it wouldn’t. The call would be emitted until dawn crept over the horizon and bathed the street in its warming glow. The night, it seemed, belonged to whatever was howling beneath her window. Was the howl for her benefit? She wasn’t even sure. She wasn’t sure of anything anymore.
The taped together door was a painful reminder of what could happen if whatever was howling decided to make its presence more known to her. Frozen by indecision, Erin tried to weigh up her options.
She could stay within her home and hope against hope that nothing broke in again, or she could risk fleeing her house but that meant going outside to her car and whatever was howling was already outside.
Not for the first time, Erin regretted sending Sean away. In her more vulnerable moments, she always longed for his strong, calming presence. He had a knack for making her feel safe. But then she couldn’t deal with everything else; with his paranoia and his madness.
“You can’t have it all,” Erin told herself aloud, rocking Jack as her arms as he pulled away from her, full and sleepy once more.
As she rocked him back and forth, she glanced nervously between her bedroom window and bedroom door. The howling continued but it didn’t intensify in pitch. It was almost as if the caller just wanted to alert Erin to their presence, nothing more. She dismissed this idea, as it was surely nonsense. There was no way any animal could be trying to communicate with her; it was a crazy notion to even entertain.
“Back to bed now,” Erin whispered to Jack as she lay him back down in his crib. He was asleep before she’d even placed his blue blanket back over him.
Climbing back into her own bed, Erin didn’t share her son’s ability to fall straight back into slumber. Instead she lay awake, her senses sharpened and alert. She listened to the howling, desperately trying to discern it but her efforts were in vain. Erin could no more interpret the howling than she could predict the future.
Resigned
to staying in her home with the howling as a macabre lullaby by her window, Erin rolled over and locked her eyes upon her son’s crib. She hoped that everything would brighten the next morning within the light of day.
***
In his wolf form, Sean stalked the home where his lover and son slept. Beneath the cover of darkness, he had felt comfortable enough to turn, but not before taking care of the body within Erin’s shed. His pack had been eager to assist him. The blood feud with the rival pack ran deep in all their lives and they hailed Sean for his heroism. In killing one of them, he had helped his own heir live.
Sean wasn’t quite so proud of his actions. He’d seen his behavior reflected in Erin’s eyes and to her, he was nothing short of a monster. It pained him to have her perceive him that way, especially when all he cared about was keeping both her and Jack safe.
A cat leaping from a garbage can caught Sean’s attention. His sharp canine senses immediately turned in the direction of the sound, his ears high and alert. He knew that the rival pack would be hungry for vengeance but they wouldn’t find it at Erin’s home. All that awaited them there was death, Sean would make certain of it.
Members of his own pack were deployed along the street as lookouts. Invisible to the untrained eye, they lurked silently in the shadows, waiting on their cue to pounce and attack. But that cue wouldn’t come, at least not that night.
All appeared clear. Beneath Erin’s window, Sean leaned his head back and released a long, low howl to alert his pack to the lack of action. He also wanted Erin to hear him, to know that he was close. She still didn’t realize that only those who are of wolf blood can hear the howls.
Atop a flowerbed, Sean kept howling. He sensed his son close by, could feel that their bond was already strong.
Sean wished that Erin could accept both him and his pack. He hoped that in time she would come to understand what it meant to be part were. But for the time being, all he could do was guard her home and ensure her safety. If she wouldn’t join the pack, then the pack would come to her, but there were only so many nights they could maintain their vigil. The ranch also needed protecting, the ranch where the entire pack lived.
But Sean’s place was by Erin’s side. He just needed to make her see sense before his pack refused to help protect her anymore.
His plaintive howl pierced the night, heard only by those who were children of the moon.
***
Erin needed to get out of her house. The paranoia that had taken hold in her brain like a rot made the four walls feel as though they were steadily encroaching in on her. She tried to diminish all negative thoughts from her mind, but they refused to leave. The previous night she had heard howling, definitive howling, beneath her window. What if Sean was right, what if she were in danger?
She needed to think and to do that Erin needed to leave her house. She bundled Jack up in to his new baby carriage and left the house, certain that a brisk walk in the morning sunshine would help clear her mind.
It was a bright morning; the sun was already shining but Erin still felt cool. The sun’s warming rays were unable to penetrate through the veil of doubt that Erin had shrouded herself in.
Walking Jack through the familiar streets of her neighborhood felt strangely liberating. She recognized all the houses, knew most of the families who lived inside them. This place was Erin’s home and it soothed her to realize just how connected she actually felt to her community. Even though she existed on the periphery, keeping herself to herself, she still managed to feel a part of it all. If she left now and went to live at Sean’s ranch, she would lose that sense of connection and be left feeling completely alienated.
Erin had grown up feeling alienated from both her family and her peers. She was always an outcast, an outsider; the girl with potential who kept getting in trouble. Other girls kept their distance for fear of being dragged down with her, as did the good guys. It was only the dark, troubled guys who were drawn to Erin, and she was in turn inexplicably drawn to them.
It was, of course, the darkness of which her mother spoke. Erin shuddered at the thought of it. She was determined to banish darkness out of her life once and for all, for Jack’s sake. Moving to the ranch felt like embracing the darkness and letting it dictate her life and she refused to do that.
As Erin paced a couple more blocks, she solidified some plans in her mind. Firstly, she would make her home more secure. She’d buy more dead bolts and a security alarm. That would help her to sleep at night. Secondly, she’d dip her toe back in to the dating pool. If there was another man in her life, Sean would surely have to back off, and having a man around at night would also help Erin feel more secure.
She hated to admit that she needed a man around but she could certainly use the extra protection. She’d even considered keeping a gun by her bed. She knew how to shoot. One of her more daring ex-boyfriends had once insisted on teaching her the basics. But with Jack, she was concerned about having a firearm about. She’d heard horror stories of children picking up a loaded gun and mistaking it for a toy. The consequences of children playing with guns were always dire.
Erin was so consumed with her thoughts that she didn’t notice the two dogs pressed up against the gate of a house just ahead of her. Her mind was such a jumble of concerns that she didn’t originally hear the low, foreboding growl they emitted.
As Erin drew closer, the growl developed in to a frantic, menacing bark. The sound was rapid and both dogs, Alsatians, were baring their teeth and foaming at the mouth.
Turning her head sharply, Erin finally spotted the dogs. With a feeling of panic, she remembered coming this route when she’d go out jogging and how the Alsatians at this particularly house always went absolutely crazy when they saw her. Back then, she could run away from them, but now she had Jack to consider.
Feeling uneasy, Erin quickened her pace as Jack awoke and sensed the menacing dogs close by and began to wail.
“It’s okay,” Erin told him briskly, hurrying to get past the house and the frantic dogs. “We’ll be away from them soon, sweetie.”
With the dogs behind her, Erin breathed a little easier but she could still hear them desperately throwing their ample weight at the metal gate that kept them concealed in their yard.
“It’s fine, they can’t get out,” Erin told herself, though she maintained her fast pace.
Suddenly, as if flaunting her comment, she heard the sound of metal come crashing to the ground, followed immediately by fast, frantic steps. Erin didn’t dare turn around. She knew exactly what had happened. She steeled herself and tightened her grip on the handles to Jack’s baby carriage before sprinting away as fast as she could.
She could hear the Alsatians catching up to her, barking and snapping as they ran. Adrenalin pumped madly round Erin’s body, making a throbbing sound within her ears. She had to get away but with the added weight of Jack’s baby carriage, coupled with her body still recovering from giving birth, she wasn’t sure she would be able to keep running for much longer.
If the dogs caught up with her, there was no telling what they would do. She had terrible visions of them tearing both her and Jack to shreds. Erin was completely terrified as she darted across a street without even taking a moment to check for traffic. Her terror had blinded her, making her desperate to get back home.
A man appeared just ahead of her, stepping on to the street as if he’d just appeared out of thin air. He had jet black hair and shockingly pale skin and when he regarded Erin she noticed that his eyes were just as black as his hair. He smiled slightly at her and then turned his attention to the approaching Alsatians. She had no idea how he did it, but the dogs stopped abruptly in their tracks and began whimpering. Then they turned, tail between their legs, and scampered back to their home.
Erin looked first at the departing dogs and then at the black-haired man. Even though she was relieved, she still felt tense and distrusting of this stranger. In his carriage, Jack continued to cry.
“How did you
do that?” Erin asked the stranger as she scooped down and picked up her son. As soon as he was in her arms, he settled down considerably.
The man shrugged modestly.
“Well, thank you,” Erin said politely.
“Anytime.” The man smiled courteously and then turned and began walking away from Erin and Jack. Bemused, she watched him go, wondering if he were a member of Sean’s elusive pack. Were they watching over her, protecting her from harm? It was crazy but if the black-haired guy hadn’t turned up, Erin didn’t doubt that she and Jack would now be in the hospital, fighting for their lives or worse. The Alsatians had been intent on attacking her, just as the wolf that broke in to her home had been.
Danger, it seemed, was lurking on every corner for Erin. She was now even risking attack in broad daylight. Nothing and nowhere seemed safe.
Trembling slightly, Erin continued her route home, returning Jack to his carriage. The little boy was now content and quickly fell back asleep.
Erin kept looking back over her shoulder, expecting to see either the black-haired man or the Alsatians’ unwelcome return but the streets remained clear. Eventually she was back at her house, grateful to be able to shut the door behind her.
But then the memories of the wolf attack came scrambling in to her thoughts. Even her home was unsafe and had been the scene of an attack.
Feeling uneasy, she settled a sleeping Jack in his travel crib in the living room as she wandered aimlessly through her house. She went in to the laundry room and surveyed the broken window. It had been sealed up with wood, making the small room seem unnaturally dark. Beyond the window was her small yard, within which was the shed that had housed a human body.
Phases of Passions II (Trilogy Bundle) (Werewolf Romance - Paranormal Romance) Page 5