Never Cry Wolf

by Patricia Rosemoor

  “So strong, especially in your convictions.”

  From beneath his hospital gown, lines from EKG electrodes ran to a monitor. And his face was slightly distorted by his oxygen nasal cannula. The allimportant drain seemed to be in place.

  “I know it couldn’t have worked between us, Raymond, but I couldn’t…”

  His mother’s emotion-filled voice trailed off. Damn! He’d thought she’d gotten over his father’s duplicity, but obviously the fact that he’d abandoned her—abandoned them—was still a source of pain. Donovan stepped closer to comfort her and saw his father’s eyes open.

  “Raymond? Raymond, can you hear me? Say something,” his mother pleaded.

  Slowly, without recognition of any kind, his eyes slid closed once more.

  And Donovan put a hand on his mother’s shoulder. “Mom?”

  She looked up at him and smiled. “Did you see? He opened his eyes. He’s coming back to us!”

  “Maybe.”

  At that moment, Donovan realized his mother felt more than pain for the man who’d betrayed her. For God’s sake, no matter what he’d done to her, no matter how badly he’d betrayed her, she still loved Raymond McKenna!

  “Your father’s going to be all right, Donny,” she was saying, a catch in her words. “He recognized my voice.”

  “It’s something to discuss with Dr. Graves,” he said, not committing himself one way or the other. “We’d better go look for him.”

  Where his father was concerned, Donovan refused to get his hopes up.

  The old man always had had a way of disappointing him.

  “WHY ARE YOU still here?” Aileen asked Laurel as she picked at her food. “Not that I’m objecting. I was just wondering. You do have a life, right? And a job?”

  “Yeah, I have a job. I also have personal days.”

  And sick days. And vacation days. Too responsible for her own good—as she’d been told more than once by co-workers—she rarely took the time due her. No doubt they’d be shocked when they learned she’d called in to take a few.

  “You’re feeling guilty, Laurel, but you shouldn’t. What happened to our father wasn’t your fault.”

  Laurel wondered how much the other woman knew about what was going on. Probably nothing more than the fact that her father had been attacked, and chances were it was by a wolf. She didn’t feel it was up to her to inform Aileen otherwise. And what could she say, really, that had any basis in fact, other than someone had it out for the recovery program?

  Remembering the trap in the bed, she suddenly realized Aileen was waiting for a response. Laurel gave her one that came from the heart.

  “I am to blame. If I hadn’t shown up on your father’s doorstep with my fantastical story—”

  Aileen cut in. “Are you saying that you lied?”

  “No! Just…I shouldn’t have been so gullible in the first place.”

  She felt a little odd discussing her naiveté with so many strangers around to overhear. But, as was true of every other hospital cafeteria she’d been in, the people around her were too involved with their own problems to be concerned with hers.

  A man and woman, hands clasped.

  A young mother with a tear-streaked face tending to her two young children.

  An elderly man, back bowed, staring into his mug.

  For a moment, she empathized with him. How many times had she sat alone waiting for word on her grandmother? Her throat closed up and her eyes began to sting…

  “Trust is a virtue not many people have,” Aileen was saying. “Take Donovan. He could use a dose.”

  Only one of his shortcomings, Laurel thought grumpily. But all she said was, “He thinks he has good reasons to be distrustful.”

  “He does,” Aileen admitted. “It was tough on him, you know, being the odd one out. And Skelly didn’t help.” She shook her head and muttered, “What a cretin he could be!”

  “You and Skelly don’t get along, either?”

  The other woman appeared taken aback at the idea. “There isn’t anything Skelly wouldn’t do for me,” she protested. “Or I for him. But there have been times I’ve wanted to shoot him, too. That’s the way real life is between siblings. Even half siblings. Ups and downs. Fighting, then sticking up for each other. Donovan just…didn’t get it.”

  “You really care for him.”

  “Are you kidding? I used to worship him. Whenever Dad brought Donovan for a visit, I followed him around and made a general nuisance of myself. He was so independent, so competent, so tough.”

  “Independent and tough describe him,” Laurel said with a sigh.

  After giving in to a tender moment, a connection she wanted to explore further, Donovan was acting like nothing at all had happened between them.

  “But he could also be amazingly gentle,” his sister added. “After he fixed my cat’s paw when she hurt it in the garden, he was my hero. No one could say any wrong about him, not even Skelly. I was five and I announced I was going to marry him to anyone who’d listen. Dad laughed and told me that would be the same as my marrying Skelly because they were both equally my brothers. I was heartbroken…at least for a couple of weeks.”

  Laurel laughed, but she didn’t miss the implication that the congressman had put Donovan in the same category as his older son.

  Surely Donovan hadn’t been too pigheaded to admit as much, she murmured, “I doubt he has a clue.”

  “Donovan never had a clue. He didn’t want to. He was determined not to like us from the first. I see that now, in retrospect It never occurred to me as a child that anyone should dislike me, so I ignored his attitude. Eventually, Donovan grew to…well, like me, I guess…if grudgingly.”

  “What about Skelly?”

  “He was a boy…and a typical male. Competitive. Belligerent. He was always trying to one-up Donovan.”

  “He’s a grown man now.”

  “Well…in most ways.”

  They laughed together and Laurel decided she liked Donovan’s sister. A lot.

  “Skelly should arrive somewhere around noon,” Aileen said. “I called right after this morning’s alarm. Too bad he and Donovan can’t find some common ground.”

  “They already have common ground. Your father.”

  Though Laurel wasn’t certain that Donovan would have stepped one foot back in this hospital if not for his mother.

  “You have a point. Maybe they can find each other in a time of crisis. Maybe this family can still be healed. If only for that, Dad has to recover,” Aileen said, obviously trying to convince herself. “It just can’t be too late.”

  Chapter Seven

  A Donovan-Skelly reunion would have to wait for another day. They left the hospital before the congressman’s firstborn arrived, purposely to avoid him, Laurel expected, though the excuse Donovan used was work. Both his and his mother’s. He had traps to check and she a café to open for the lunch crowd.

  By now the reporters had caught on to Donovan’s identity, however, and surrounded the three of them as they made their way to the Tracker.

  Followed by a newscam, a woman holding a microphone was the first to intercept him. “Mr. Wilde, can you update us on Congressman McKenna’s condition?”

  Donovan refused to so much as recognize her presence.

  A man danced backward as he asked, “How do you feel about one of your wolves attacking your father?”

  “And you, ma’am,” another said, aiming his question at Veronica, “how do you fit into this picture?”

  Glaring at the man, Donovan pushed him out of the way. Laurel wouldn’t have blamed him if he’d done worse.

  “Hey! Should I quote you on that?” the angry reporter demanded.

  Wrapping a protective arm around his mother until they reached the Tracker, Donovan helped her into the front passenger seat. Then he gave Laurel a hand into the rear.

  “Mr. Wilde, wait!” called the television news-woman.

  “I need a sound bite, please!” someone else yelled.
“From anyone!”

  A picturesque figure, a fearless Trapper Dan plowed through them all, unhesitating even as cameras flashed and the newscam light went on. Sliding behind the wheel, he started up the Tracker and drove it out as though the pavement were clear of people. As, indeed, it shortly was, Laurel noted. Reporters scattered in every direction to get out of his way.

  “Vultures.”

  Donovan’s low growl was the only thing said until they were halfway to Iron Lake.

  “I’m going back to the hospital tomorrow,” Veronica suddenly announced. “Raymond needs me.”

  “He has his children to take care of him,” Donovan told her, as if he weren’t one of them.

  His mother glared at him, but he didn’t break. Tension radiated all the way into the back seat. Laurel figured keeping her mouth shut was her smartest option.

  Finally, Veronica said, “He responded to my voice.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Dr. Graves said it was quite possible. And that his opening his eyes when I was speaking to him was a positive sign.”

  “So, he’ll open them again.”

  “I’ll make sure of it,” his mother vowed. “I’ll go every day until he’s himself.”

  Laurel had been there when Dr. Graves suggested that coma patients rarely snapped back all at once. And if, indeed, the congressman was coming around, then hearing a familiar voice would help him focus. Still, he would come back in stages, and it might possibly take several days before he was able to make the connection between the voice and the person speaking.

  “Do you really think you’re the only one who can save him?” Donovan demanded.

  “No. You could help. Think of how much it would mean to him. And to me.”

  Donovan retreated into a sullen silence. If Veronica had hopes of coercing him into driving her to the hospital again, Laurel expected she would be sorely disappointed.

  Upon arriving in Iron Lake, she volunteered to spend a few hours at Veronica’s Vittles to place some telephone calls. She was anxious to contact as many of the WRIN volunteers who gave the workshop as she could. Maybe one of them would be able to put a name to the imposter’s face.

  Besides which, another day on snowshoes might be enough to debilitate her for the foreseeable future. Laurel was feeling muscles she never knew she had.

  She wasn’t sorry to see Donovan drive off, either. Tension immediately dissipated and she could draw an easy breath.

  “I feel as though I’m getting time off for good behavior,” she joked, following Veronica inside.

  “I only wish Donny understood the concept of good behavior.”

  Having the sense to pass on that one, Laurel volunteered to help ready the café for the lunch crowd, since the hour was nearly upon them. Veronica seemed pleased to have her company.

  “You’re the first woman Donny ever brought to meet me.”

  Laurel nearly dropped the salt shaker she was refilling. Even as she said, “Uh, our relationship isn’t exactly personal,” she wondered exactly what it was.

  “But it could be. He likes you.”

  There might be a definite animal attraction going on between them…but Donovan like her? Laurel figured he considered her a royal pain in his solitary butt and couldn’t wait to be rid of her, the way he’d set her aside after kissing her being proof.

  “How can you tell?” she asked dryly.

  Veronica laughed. “Can I get away with, ‘A mother knows these things?’”

  Though she figured letting it go was her safest course, Laurel couldn’t help asking, “Heard any other good jokes lately?”

  The older woman laughed again. “Just for the record,” she said, “I like you, too. Anyone who refuses to let my son alone must be good for him.”

  A point on which Laurel wasn’t willing to dwell. She busied herself and was checking tables to make sure they were set up with all the amenities, when the first customer arrived.

  Veronica looked around from the grill. “Josh, you’re early today.”

  “And you’re late. I was worried, Ronnie,” he said, tone more angry than concerned. “Thought maybe you were under the weather this morning, but when I tried calling, you didn’t answer.”

  “I was at the hospital.”

  “Raymond.” He slapped his hat down on the counter and unzipped his jacket. “Should’ve known. You could have said something last night.”

  “I guess.”

  More tension.

  Laurel couldn’t miss it, not when Josh was acting so possessive and Veronica so defensive.

  “So…how’s the congressman doing?” Josh asked, not that he sounded as if he were rooting for a speedy recovery.

  “He opened his eyes for a few seconds. He’ll be his old self in no time.”

  Josh seemed to digest that for a moment. Laurel passed him to get behind the counter and noted that his face was schooled into a passive expression.

  Finally, he bluntly asked, “The doctor tell you he was gonna recover, or what?”

  “Well, not exactly,” Veronica admitted, “though I’m counting on it.”

  “Don’t get your hopes up, Ronnie. Anything can happen in a hospital.”

  Laurel stared at the man and wondered what he’d meant by the comment. But even if she were willing to stick her nose in their conversation and ask, she lost the opportunity when the outside door opened again, and half a dozen townspeople wandered in.

  “I thought I was gonna have to go hungry today!” one of the men complained good-naturedly.

  “If I didn’t feed you, Aaron Colby, you’d just go find yourself some widow to take my place.”

  Everyone laughed…except Josh.

  “Veronica, what can I do now?” Laurel asked.

  “Go make your calls. I can handle things.”

  More customers wandered in as Laurel pulled a chair over to the wall phone and made herself comfortable. From one pocket of her jacket, she pulled a coin purse. From another, a tablet and pen.

  Friends teased her about the stuff she carried in those myriad pockets, one of them suggesting she must have everything she owned in them, including the kitchen sink. At the moment, the jacket felt just about heavy enough, too. When she got home, she’d have to sort through everything and see if she couldn’t relieve her load.

  She started placing calls, hoping to speak to Jim Evans, the workshop leader who worked for the Department of Natural Resources.

  To pass the time while waiting for an answer, she checked out more of the pictures mounted on the wall around the phone. She especially enjoyed several of Donovan taken over the years—from boyhood to manhood—always too serious, always alone.

  Didn’t he even need friends? she wondered.

  Luckily, she found Jim in his office. Her luck held when he remembered her.

  “I’m trying to track down someone I met at the workshop,” she told him.

  “There should have been a list of attendees with addresses and phone numbers in your information packet.”

  “This particular man wasn’t registered with the workshop. He dropped by late Saturday afternoon to visit with one of the volunteers.” When she was met with silence at the other end, Laurel said, “Listen, Jim, this isn’t a whim. I can’t go into my reasons right now, but it’s really important I find this guy. I’d appreciate anything you could tell me about him. I don’t remember his name,” she said, not exactly lying, “but I can describe him.”

  But the description didn’t ring any bells.

  Jim was trusting enough, however, to give her the telephone numbers of some of the other WRIN members who’d participated in the workshop. Even so, a few more calls and her frustration mounted. No one was answering. She left detailed recorded messages.

  Ready to do the same when she dialed the last number on her list, she was amazed when she finally got an answer. Finally, a real live person.

  She went through her spiel again.

  Laurel shot up straight in her chair when
the woman, Deb, replied, “I think I know who you mean.”

  Now she was getting somewhere.

  “Tall, dark and handsome, small cleft in his chin?”

  “Right. That’s him.”

  “Do you know his name or how I can reach him?”

  “I don’t know anything about him, but Rebecca Kinder might be able to help you. I saw her speak to him.”

  “Rebecca,” Laurel echoed and checked her list.

  “Actually,” Deb continued, “I think they were disagreeing about something.”

  “I already left her a message, but if you talk to her, would you tell her this is really important?”

  “Will do.”

  As she hung up, Laurel prayed Rebecca would call back when Veronica was actually in the café and not too busy to get to the phone. She’d ask Donovan’s mother to be on the alert.

  Once again, staring at the photographs on the wall, she thought about Rebecca Kinder, an attractive young redhead. What connection did she have to the fake Donovan? An old girlfriend? A lover he’d fought with, then decided to make jealous by asking her for a drink?

  That made a certain amount of sense—a reason he’d know something about wolves and a reason for his being there—but why introduce himself as Donovan Wilde? Could he have pulled the name out of a hat—having heard it from Rebecca or having seen it while reading one of those professional journal articles he’d shown her?—then kept using the name rather than coming clean when he decided to see her again?

  But for almost three months?

  Now, that didn’t make sense.

  Something else hit Laurel that surprised her…the thought of his being with another woman didn’t disturb her as it rightly should. Could her attraction to Donovan have something to do with that?

  Gradually, the photograph before her eyes caught her attention. Set in the café, the shot was of Veronica and a young guy with a light growth of beard bussing the tables. She rose and was about to leave when impulse prompted her to take a closer look.

  And as she moved in, her eyes widened and her mouth went dry. It couldn’t be. She blinked and refocused, but doing so only made her more certain.