Pack 11 - Wolf Whisperer

by Karen Whiddon

  “I’ve always wanted to drive one of these things,” he said. “I assume since you said we are going to Texas, that we’re still heading south?”

  “Yes.” She sat back in her seat, willing herself to be calm as he exited the hotel parking lot, then took the ramp up onto the interstate.

  “Are you nervous?” He glanced at her hand and she realized she’d been drumming it on the dashboard.

  “A little,” she confessed. “I never realized I was so much of a control freak.”

  He laughed and, after a second, she found herself joining in.

  “Let’s see what kind of music they have out here.” She began fiddling with the radio, more to keep her thoughts occupied. She needed to keep her mind off driving more than any real desire to hear a few tunes.

  An old Patsy Cline song came on.

  “I love that song,” they both said, almost simultaneously. Feeling self-conscious, she reached for the dial and turned the volume up.

  Still, the truth she’d left unsaid hung in the air like day-old smoke in a bar.

  She knew she’d have to tell him sooner or later, but quite frankly, she found the entire situation humiliating. True, she’d been alone for the past twelve years and had never had a serious boyfriend, but to go binding herself to the first attractive male she met? And worse, he was not a Tearlach.

  Seriously stupid. Despite the strong pull she felt toward him, she’d been raised to know better than that. And, now that they were traveling to the family meeting, everyone that mattered to her would know about what she’d done. She’d be outlawed, exactly like Maggie had been.

  She could imagine what her mother would say. Thinking that, she felt a flash of anger. Her mother had sent her away at the tender age of sixteen to fend for herself. She ought to count herself lucky that Kelly hadn’t ended up pregnant.

  Put into this perspective, her rash impulsiveness with Mac didn’t look half-bad. Shaking her head at her odd method of rationalization, she wondered what the rest of her family would say. Oddly enough, their reaction didn’t worry her as much as she’d thought it would.

  A sideways glance at him while he drove distracted her, the tug of him pulling at her. He had that power over her, though she thought she did a pretty good job of keeping that little fact hidden. For a moment she got lost admiring him. His bare arm, tanned and covered with fine brown hair. The compelling blue of his eyes, his rugged, masculine features, his arrogant confidence and seriously dangerous smile. One look and she felt like she could melt.

  But it was more than his physical appearance, though she truly loved that. His essence, so rugged, so vital, attracted her. And, despite his pain and his determination to regain his missing children, she saw kindness in his smile. Even toward her, a Tearlach, a member of the family who’d taken his kids. He was a good man, this Mac Lamonda. And an honorable one, judging by his behavior since he’d given her his word. A walking set of contradictions. Bad for her since she’d never been able to resist solving a puzzle, any puzzle.

  She truly liked him. She who had few friends, and with the ones she had she carried her loyalty to a fault, would call him friend. If he offered. And the fact that she wanted so much more than friendship would be tucked away, out of sight, buried deep.

  Squaring her shoulders, she looked away before he remarked on her scrutiny. So she liked him. Big deal. It wasn’t like she loved him or anything. Hounds, she barely knew the man.

  Shifters, like their wild counterparts, mated for life. Mac Lamonda was now, for better or worse, her mate. Only, he didn’t know it yet.

  Though she’d bet he’d figure it out soon. On her end the binding grew stronger and Mac grew more and more appealing the longer she spent with him. If she’d found him attractive before, now he appeared downright irresistible to her. She yearned to experience more of his kisses, his touch, all the rituals of being in love that she’d been, by virtue of her solitude, denied.

  If she’d been more experienced in the ways of men and women, she supposed she could have seduced him, made him desire her as much as she did him. But she had no idea how, just as she didn’t know how she was going to tell him the truth.

  The route they took, down I-25 through Colorado, was both unfamiliar and beautiful. Snow-capped mountains gave way to city, and the traffic snarls in Denver had Mac fuming with frustration.

  Studying the map, she saw they’d go through Colorado, down to New Mexico, breaking off on Highway 87 at Raton, to make their way to Dalhart, Texas. Then they’d pick up 287 to Amarillo, through Childress, Vernon, and Wichita Falls.

  She’d never been to Texas. They had a long day of driving ahead of them. Traveling south in Colorado, she leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes. Might as well take a nap. Feeling remarkably secure with Mac driving her Hummer and with the sun warming her, she fell asleep.

  In New Mexico, they stopped in Raton and had lunch at a tiny Mexican café. With her sitting across the small tiled table that tilted so badly he had to take several sugar packets and stick them under one of the legs, he felt oddly comfortable, like they were a couple. Gazing around the tiny, half-full restaurant, he saw other couples, both young and old, and two entire families, three generations all eating together. Surrounded by chatter, some of it in Spanish, and laughter, he felt a longing for this kind of life, the kind he’d had once, before his wife had been killed and his children stolen from him.

  The life he would have again, he vowed. And Kelly was going to help him get it back, whether she liked it or not.

  When the waiter came, Mac ordered a cold Corona with lime. He drank it slowly, eschewing a glass so he could tilt the cool, sweating bottle to his mouth. Kelly had iced tea, unsweetened and freshly brewed.

  “It’s flavored with mint,” she said with surprise, clearly pleased.

  By the time the food came, they were both starving. As the waiter unloaded his tray on their table, from the looks of the huge platters of piping-hot food, the wait had been worth it. The burritos were huge and full of ground beef, seasoned with onion, green chilis and fresh cilantro, with a drizzle of cheese, salsa and guacamole on top.

  The first bite brought an explosion of flavor and he tried to chew slowly, in order to savor it, but his hunger overrode that desire, and he ate with gusto, happily devouring the food.

  Kelly could eat only half of hers, and Mac barely was able to stuff the last few bites of his into his mouth.

  Satisfied, he leaned back in his chair. “Now it’s time for a nap,” he joked.

  Closing her eyes, she nodded and groaned. “I’m stuffed, but in a good way.”

  The oddest thought—that he could get used to this—came and went. His former life had nothing to do with her and neither did the life he wanted in the future. Glancing around the room, he watched a young mother feeding her toddler in a high chair. Thinking of his children, he felt that familiar ache in his chest. How he missed them.

  Not for long. Not for long. He shook his head and signaled for the check. While he waited, he glanced at Kelly. “Now what? On to Texas, I assume?”

  Slowly, she nodded. “Do you still want to drive?”

  “Of course.” Surprised that she even had to ask, he glanced outside at the Hummer parked across the street. The distance and the grimy window made the vehicle appear even more menacing and tanklike.

  He liked that.

  Together they walked outside. As they were about to cross the street, a beat-up old pickup came careening around the corner. Mac reacted instinctively, one arm shoving Kelly back into the brick building. He fell backward, and the truck went past, spraying them with dust and Latin music at the same time.

  Wide-eyed, Kelly helped Mac up. “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “Fine.” He had the oddest urge to crush her to him and hold her. Squashing that, he studied her instead. “What about you?”

  She shrugged. “I’m okay.” Looking beyond him, she glared into the distance. “What the heck was wrong with that guy?”

/>   “Who knows?” He allowed himself to take her arm, and they crossed to the Hummer. “I’m just glad it wasn’t another attack.”

  Once they’d left Raton behind, they took Highway 87 east, heading toward Clayton. This meant they lost the highway and had long stretches of only two lanes, many with no-passing stripes.

  Of course they got stuck behind a motor home, seven cars ahead. By the time Mac was able to pass it, he was thoroughly irritated.

  The monotony of their surroundings didn’t help. The unbroken horizon and the scenery—if you could call it that—stretched on for mile after mile. Wave after wave of pastures and fields, broken up here and there by clumps of gnarled, scraggly trees, all framed by the cloudless, bright blue skies. Occasionally, they saw a group of white-tailed deer grazing alongside cattle. As pieces and piles of volcanic rock began to appear next to the pavement, in the distance he could see the domelike mound of Capulin Volcano.

  As she’d been doing periodically since leaving Raton, Kelly turned in her seat. “Still nothing,” she said. “There’s a couple of cars way back there, but none are close enough for me to think they’re following us.”

  “Good.” He didn’t tell her that he’d been watching the rearview mirror ever since they’d left Raton. But her words reassured him somehow. Maybe it was the confirmation that nothing stood out and there were no repeat vehicles, but he finally began to relax.

  He pointed out the volcano. “The last time it erupted was between 58,000 to 62,000 years ago.”

  “So that’s why the roadside is littered with volcanic rock,” she said.

  “This entire area is part of the Raton-Clayton volcanic field. I’ve actually hiked up the volcano to the rim. Up there, you can see four states—New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma and Colorado.”

  “I remember when Maggie did a travel blog under her assumed name about that trip.” She gave him an uncomfortable look. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to bring that up.”

  “That’s all right,” he said, and to his surprise, it was. It used to be he couldn’t even hear his dead wife’s name without feeling pain. “I didn’t even know she had a blog.”

  “That was before the twins were even born.” She gave him a sideways glance. “There were pictures of you with a beard and long hair. I wouldn’t even recognize you now.

  “Speaking of Texas, how much farther to the Texas border?” she asked.

  “About an hour and a half, give or take a few minutes. It depends on how fast we go.”

  “Okay, then.” She gave him a sweet smile. “Then if you don’t mind, I think I’ll go back to sleep.”

  He laughed, oddly charmed. “Go right ahead. You need to be rested up so you can take your turn at the wheel.”

  On 287 out of Amarillo, they were able to pick up the pace. Mac thankfully accelerated, glad once again to have a four-lane highway. Beside him, Kelly still slept.

  He took the opportunity to study her. Without her guard up, her classical beauty softened. Her perfect skin, so silky smooth, made him long to caress her. When he’d first met her, her startling beauty had surprised him, but she seemed to grow even more lovely each day he spent with her. If he let himself dwell on it, he knew he could easily become obsessed with her.

  Family relationship aside, Kelly bore absolutely no resemblance to his deceased wife, Maggie. He should know—after all, he’d spent an inordinate amount of time looking for some tiny similarity. Whether chin or eyes, or skin or hair, the two women were nothing alike.

  The disparity didn’t end at appearance. Maggie had been boisterous and loud, impetuous and impatient. A whirlwind of energy, she never seemed to sit still. Laughter had come easily to her and when she’d flown into a passionate rage, her rants had been legendary.

  In contrast, Kelly exuded a sense of quiet serenity, which seemed to be at odds with the raw sensuality he sensed in her. Whereas Maggie had blown into his life and taken him by storm, the more time he spent with Kelly, he realized she appealed to him for the opposite reason. She seemed to be growing on him, endearing herself to him by a steady sort of stealth.

  He supposed that was a blessing. He’d sure hate to be stuck in a car for days with a woman he couldn’t stand.

  Now if he could just get this tug of sexual attraction under control, things would be pretty darn perfect.

  At one point, he caught himself humming along to the radio. He’d been keeping an eye on the road, changing lanes frequently and varying his speed, all the while watching to make sure they didn’t have a tail.

  The sunlight shone brightly, reflecting off the vehicles in front of him and hurting his eyes. The monotony of the scenery made him feel restless, but all in all he had a good feeling. Unless a helicopter appeared in the sky, he figured they were safe for a good many miles. Maybe even all the way to wherever they were going.

  Beside him, Kelly stared out the window, dozing off and on. She seemed relaxed, more relaxed than he’d seen her since she’d slept the night before. An entire day stuck in a car will do that to you.

  The red car seemed to come from nowhere. He hadn’t noticed it before, and a car like that begged to be noticed.

  As the bright red Camaro hugged his bumper, Mac braced himself for something worse. True to his prediction, the sports car swerved as if to pass them, despite the no-passing stripes, and pulled up alongside him on the left, on the wrong side of the road.

  As he registered this, the Camaro’s passenger window came down. Mac saw the glint of the pistol and slammed on his brakes, a split second before the attacker fired.

  Chapter 8

  The huge Hummer shuddered and tried to skid right, but he was able to correct it easily.

  Kelly came awake with a small gasp. “What’s happening?”

  “We’ve been followed somehow. They’re shooting. Hang on.” Pulling off the road, he stomped on it, kicking up clouds of dust. “We’re going off-road.”

  Ahead of them on the blacktop, the Camaro braked also, fifty feet or so ahead, and went into a spin. The driver overcorrected and the shiny new sports car hit the cement barrier, traveling at least seventy miles per hour.

  With a horrible crunch of mangled metal, the red car went up and over and rolled, traveling across the northbound lanes of traffic, narrowly missing a large semi and a minivan, before coming to rest on its roof.

  “Look out,” Mac muttered, jamming his foot down hard on the accelerator and sending them shooting past, still on the dirt and hitting every rut and hole with teeth-jarring intensity.

  Expression anguished, Kelly turned in her seat to watch behind them. “I think it’s on fire. Should we go back to help?”

  “Hell, no. Someone on the northbound side will stop and call 911. We need to get out of here. Now.”

  She said nothing, which he took for agreement.

  Once they were far enough past the now-fiery wreck, Mac drove up the embankment back on the pavement. Now that the original surge of adrenaline had left him, he felt the beginnings of anger setting in. “Truth time, Kelly. I need to know what’s going on.”

  Staring back at him, her expression impassive, she gave a slow shake of her head. “I don’t know any more than you do.”

  “Why don’t I believe you? Everything you’ve said has been incredibly vague. I think you know more than you’re telling me.”

  Unaccountably, her beautiful green eyes glistened with unshed tears. He steeled himself, aware that a woman crying to deflect a man’s anger was the oldest trick in the book. Maggie had been particularly good at that.

  He waited. Twenty seconds, thirty, then forty-five. When she still didn’t speak, he heaved a sigh. “Fine, you win. At least tell me where we’re going.”

  “Fort Worth,” she said clearly. “The Stockyards.”

  “The Stockyards?” He swore. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” She gave him a curious glance. “You don’t sound happy. Why? You don’t like cattle or something?”

  He made a rude sound. “You know as well as I do
that cattle are skittish around us. But the Fort Worth Stockyards really don’t have cattle, unless you count the exhibition cattle drive they do every day for tourists.”

  “I’ve never been there. If it’s not a real stockyard, then what is it?”

  “Kind of a touristy place. The Cowboy Hall of Fame is there, as well as Billy Bob’s and several other bars. There’s shopping and restaurants and it’s generally packed with people. Human people.”

  “Then that makes sense. From what you’re saying, our kind generally avoid the place, right? Therefore, it sounds like a perfect area to have the big meeting.”

  “Convoluted logic.”

  “But good. You know they’ll never check there.”

  He had to admit she was right. “Fine. Let’s see how many horses and cows we can spook.”

  “I thought you said there were no—”

  Touching her arm, he grinned. “Kidding, Kelly. Just kidding.”

  The sun had dropped below the horizon by the time they pulled into Fort Worth. Traffic was steady, congested but not too bad.

  “We’re staying at the Omni Hotel.” She sounded nervous. “Close to someplace called Sundance Square.”

  Though he groaned mentally, because Sundance Square was yet another area jam-packed with people, he said nothing.

  When they reached the hotel, he pulled into the circular drive.

  “Let the valet park it,” she said. “We won’t be needing to drive anywhere tonight.”

  Which meant what? That the meeting was tomorrow?

  As the valet drove off in the Hummer, he followed Kelly to the check-in desk. When she asked for one room, his heart skipped a beat. He didn’t know if he could torture himself like that again.

  As she took her room key from the desk clerk, she turned to Mac with a smile. “Hopefully, we’ll both get a good night’s sleep without any more of those random dreams.”

  Just her mentioning the dream immediately sent his libido into overdrive. Of course.

  Watching her cute little backside as she walked to the elevator, he reflected he’d have to use all his willpower to ensure that he didn’t climb into bed with her in the middle of the night.