Luck of the Wolf

by Susan Krinard

  Di Reinardus nodded with appreciation. “A brave attempt,” he said. “I will admit that we followed the wrong scent. I also made the mistake of believing that you would understand my warning. Those errors, however, will be quickly corrected.” He nodded for his men—now joined by much bigger and more threatening minions—to escort Babette out of hearing.

  “Let go of me,” she said, digging in her heels.

  “You had best cooperate, madame,” di Reinardus said. “I would not wish you to suffer…an indignity.”

  “Go!” Yuri said hoarsely.

  The duke’s men dragged her away. Di Reinardus gestured Yuri to another crate. “I see you have made your choice,” he said mildly. “It seems to have been the wrong one.”

  Yuri settled on the crate as if he had not a care in the world. “You mistake me, my dear duke,” he said. “I am done with Renier.”

  The duke smiled. “Do not pretend with me, my friend. Such blatant mendacity does not suit you.”

  There was no profit in suggesting that he had planned to come to the duke all along. “I agreed with Renier’s plan only so that Babette and I could leave San Francisco,” he said.

  “Leave? When I so politely asked you to stay until I required your services?”

  Yuri shrugged. “You never contacted me, so I assumed…”

  “Renier proved more troublesome than I expected.” Di Reinardus folded his hands behind his back. “Did you warn him, Yuri?”

  “No,” Yuri said. “I did not.”

  Di Reinardus nodded. “You appear to have kept some of your sense. A pity that you have underestimated me in so many other ways.”

  Yuri prayed that the duke’s keen hearing hadn’t detected how frantically his heart was beating. “I have never doubted your resolve,” he said. “But I must once again warn you not to underestimate Renier. He has powerful reasons for keeping the girl.”

  “The same reasons as yours.”

  “He wants more than money. He wants revenge against the New Orleans Reniers.”

  “Oh? Very interesting. Why did you not see fit to tell me this before?”

  “Do you wish to hear the story?”

  The duke waved for him to continue. When Yuri had finished, di Reinardus smiled.

  “How very intriguing. I had suspected he was not entirely a gentleman. A pity he is so stubborn. I might have offered him a chance to take his revenge without the fatal consequences of opposing me. You, however, may yet preserve your life.” Di Reinardus removed a cigarette from a gold case tucked in his coat and held it out to Yuri.

  Yuri took the cigarette with trembling fingers. “Perhaps I would prefer to die rather than serve you again.”

  Di Reinardus shook his head as if he were admonishing a recalcitrant child. “Are you so certain that your fair companion feels the same?”

  As desperate as the attempt might be, Yuri had to make it. “Why should I care how she feels?”

  “I believe you care a great deal, Baron. I was not unaware of your dealings with Babette Moreau in New Orleans.”

  “That was over long ago.”

  “And yet here she is.” The duke blew a smoke ring. “Allow me to make the decision easier for you.”

  He snapped his fingers, and one of his armed attendants left the room. The men who had taken Babette away returned, one keeping a firm hold on Babette’s right arm. No one would guess that she was frightened, but Yuri knew she was far too intelligent not to understand how badly things were going.

  The duke gestured for the men to bring her closer. He bowed to her with a click of his heels.

  “Madame,” he said. “Permit me to introduce myself. I am Duke Gunther di Reinardus.”

  Babette hid her surprise well. “How very interesting,” she said. “I had not realized we were to be honored by the attention of someone so distinguished.”

  Gunther’s face darkened. “If you have any influence with the baron, now might be an appropriate time to make use of it.”

  She met his gaze. “In what way, monsieur le duc?”

  “Persuade him to tell us where Renier and the girl have gone.”

  “I doubt he will listen to me, sir,” she said.

  “I doubt that Monsieur Chernikov would enjoy seeing that pretty face of yours marred because you failed to convince him to cooperate.”

  “Leave her alone!” Yuri snarled.

  “That is entirely up to you.” The duke drew an ivory-handled knife from inside his coat, unsheathed it and held it up as if to admire the finely etched blade. His men pushed Babette closer to him. She flinched but held her ground.

  It was more than Yuri could bear.

  “Very well,” he said, almost too sick to speak. “Let her leave, and I’ll do better than tell you what you want to know.”

  Di Reinardus stared at him for a moment and then nodded to his henchmen. “Take the lady outside, but keep careful watch on her.” He returned his attention to Yuri. “Do not waste my time, Baron. I am done with your games.”

  And so Yuri bargained as he had never bargained in his life.

  SACRAMENTO, ARIA THOUGHT, was not nearly as overwhelming as San Francisco. The streets were much wider, the buildings not nearly so tall and the crowds less daunting. It felt odd to be in such a flat place after the steep hills of the coastal city.

  She kept close to Cort as he checked them into the hotel, glad for the pretense that allowed her to hold his arm so tightly. While they were staying in the hotel, she would be Miss Anna Reynolds, his younger sister. He had not even considered two separate rooms; he had said he wouldn’t let her out of his sight until Babette and Yuri joined them.

  Still, they might as well have been miles apart. As soon as they entered the two-room suite, Cort set their bags in the corner of the sitting room, locked the door and went to the window. He stared out for a long time without speaking.

  “Is it all right?” Aria asked. “I didn’t smell anyone following us.”

  “Nor did I,” he said. “But we will not let down our guard until Yuri and Babette arrive.”

  And she could tell that he wasn’t going to let down his guard with her, either. She sat on the small sofa and yanked off her gloves. She had come so close to admitting on the train that she couldn’t possibly be Lucienne Renier. She had hoped he would tell her that it didn’t matter if she ever went to the Reniers, that he wouldn’t be upset or disappointed if she failed to become what he wanted.

  But he hadn’t said that. And once again she found that she couldn’t bear the thought of his anger when he learned how completely she had deceived him. He would see a backward, treacherous child who had turned on a man who had only been trying to help her at some cost to himself. He wouldn’t believe…

  Aria twisted her hands in her lap. He wouldn’t believe how much she cared about him. More than anything else in the world.

  “It’s late,” Cort said. “I will go down to the dining room while you prepare for bed.”

  Aria glanced toward the door to the other room. That was the bedroom, and Cort had already made clear that she would sleep there while he would stay in the sitting room.

  “You don’t have to go out,” she ventured. “I can get ready in the bedroom.”

  He didn’t look at her. “I’ll order dinner for us,” he said. “You haven’t eaten since morning.” He paused, frowning. “You’re not still worried about Babette?”

  She shook her head. “It’s only…I wish…”

  “What do you wish, Aria?” he asked, as if he were inquiring about her preference in tea.

  “I wish all this were over with.”

  “I’ve told you there is nothing to be afraid of. Everything is proceeding just as we planned.”

  Her frustration boiled over. “You can’t wait for me to go to the Reniers, can you?”

  “You know what I want for you.”

  “But what do you want, Cort? Not just for me. What do you want for yourself?”

  Cort strode to the door. “I’ll be
back soon,” he said. The door banged shut behind him.

  Aria leaned her forehead against the cool wood. She always seemed to say the wrong thing. Nearly everything she did made him angry, and then she ended up feeling just as angry with him. Or hurt, as she felt now.

  She had thought that Cort had been hurting when he’d spoken of his family, that he could feel lost and alone, too. But he seemed to be able to push those feelings aside in a way she couldn’t. He was always the one in charge, making decisions, deciding what her future was to be.

  Ignoring her and how she felt about him.

  What would it take to make him see her?

  Cort returned with dinner on a tray, set it down on the table and left her alone again. She picked at the food, ate what she could and pushed the rest aside. Cort didn’t even chide her. He went out again a little while later, ordering her to get ready for sleep, and didn’t come back until after she was tucked under the covers.

  She lay very still, listening to him pace back and forth in the sitting room. It was a long time before he stopped. Finally Aria drifted into sleep, but she woke many times that night, thinking about Babette and Yuri, and wondering what Cort was feeling.

  The next few days were exactly the same. Aria spent the long daylight hours in their room, reading the book she had brought with her and pretending nothing was wrong. Cort paced the sitting room every night, his soft tread drumming in her ears.

  On the fifth morning he informed her that they could wait no longer.

  “They must have been held up,” he said, gazing at the wall over her head as they sat opposite each other in the sitting room. “We’ll go on to the mountains. Yuri and Madame Martin will find us there.”

  His voice was expressionless and remote, but Aria could feel his worry almost as strongly as she felt her own. He’d been so certain that Brecht had given up, and now he was thinking he’d been wrong.

  Something bad might have happened to Yuri and Babette. And it would all be his fault.

  And hers.

  Aria hugged herself, and rocked back and forth in her chair. If he didn’t have to take care of her, she knew Cort would have rushed right back to San Francisco and searched for Yuri and Babette until he found them. If they were in trouble, he would have found a way to get them out of it.

  If it hadn’t been for her, none of this would have happened in the first place.

  “We should go back,” she blurted out.

  Slowly he met her gaze. “You know we cannot, Aria.”

  “I don’t care if it’s dangerous. I want Babette to be safe.”

  “As I do.” Cort leaned his elbows on his knees and put his head in his hands. Aria couldn’t bear it. She jumped up from the sofa, pushing her skirts out of the way, and put her arms around him.

  He was so stiff that he felt as if he might break apart, yet he didn’t try to get up. He simply sat there as she pressed her face into his shoulder.

  “It will be all right,” she whispered.

  Without a word he took her into his arms. It was just what she had wanted for so long, but she wasn’t thinking about herself now. She was only comforting and being comforted, sharing Cort’s sadness and guilt. When he found her lips with his, it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

  The kiss was nothing like what she’d expected. It was far more wonderful. His mouth was gentle, moving softly over hers. His fingers brushed her cheek as lightly as snowflakes. She followed his lead, stroking him as she would a kitten or a newborn lamb. The rigidity went out of his body. Her eyes filled up, and she had to stop to wipe them before Cort could see.

  He pulled away. “Tears?” he murmured. “Non, non, ma petite.” He stroked her cheek with his thumb and smiled. “We will wait one more day.”

  AS IT TURNED OUT, they didn’t have to wait even that long. The next morning, while Cort was down getting their breakfast and Aria was at the window, watching as always, she saw a familiar man and woman crossing the street. She ran to the door, barely able to contain her excitement.

  Five minutes was all it took. Cort nearly bounded into the room, grinning the way he used to when they’d first met.

  “They’re all right,” he said, closing the door behind him.

  “Where are they?”

  “They’ve checked into another hotel down the street.”

  “I want to see Babette right away!”

  “Not now, Aria. It would be better to let them rest a while.”

  “Did someone follow them?”

  “Yes. But their pursuers were only humans. They were not difficult to evade, but Yuri preferred to take no chances.” Cort frowned, and the light went out of his eyes. “If anything had happened…”

  “But it didn’t,” Aria said. She moved closer to him and touched his hand.

  He took a sideways step, stopping out of her reach. “It didn’t,” he agreed, his gaze fixed on something she couldn’t see. “There is no reason to delay any longer. I’ve hired a wagon to carry our supplies to the lodge. I’ll leave for the mountains before dawn tomorrow. You, Babette and Yuri will follow by train in two days’ time.”

  “You mean you’ll be going alone?”

  “There is no reason to subject the rest of you to an uncomfortable journey.”

  But she knew that wasn’t really what he was worried about at all. The way he had moved aside when she’d touched his hand told her the real reason. He wanted to pretend the kiss last night had never happened.

  But she wasn’t going to let him forget it.

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  “No,” he said with a brief, distracted glance in her direction. “Babette will be spending the next two days buying clothing and other necessities for you. You will almost certainly arrive at the lodge before I do, and that will give you and Babette a chance to settle in. It’s best this way.”

  Best because he didn’t want to be with her.

  “I stayed in your ugly city and did what you told me to do,” she said, “but this time I’m going to do what I want.”

  “Aria,” he said, very low, “it would not be wise.”

  “Because you don’t want to kiss me again?”

  His jaw tightened. “I don’t think it would be wise to yield to your animal instincts.”

  “You mean become a wolf. I know how much you hate it, and I know it wasn’t safe in San Francisco, but why can’t I do it when we’re far away from the city?”

  “You must get in the habit of restraining that part of yourself,” he said in a rough voice. “The New Orleans clan are not in the habit of frequent Changes, and they never do it casually. They know the danger as you do not.”

  “I’m not in New Orleans yet.”

  “Aria…” He sighed, his eyes going distant again. “If I take you with me,” he said, “will you promise to Change only when I give my permission and stay within my sight at all times?”

  It was almost an easy promise to make. Almost. “Yes,” she said. “I won’t Change unless you say it’s all right.”

  “We leave before dawn. Get your things ready.”

  That was the end of the conversation, and Cort left a short time later to take care of business. She hardly saw him for the rest of the evening. A few hours after midnight he returned, packed his own bag and took her downstairs.

  No one came out to see them off when they left the hotel and walked to the livery stable a few blocks up the street. The wagon was waiting in the yard behind the stable, loaded up with bags and crates of supplies.

  The horses tied up near the wagon snorted and bobbed their heads, curious and uneasy around two people who weren’t quite human. Cort quieted them with a few soft words and hitched them up with deft, practiced hands. He helped Aria onto the seat, climbed up beside her and clucked to the horses.

  The streets were not quite deserted in spite of the hour. Less than savory characters were out and about, looking for potential victims staggering out of the noisy saloons on the outskirts of town, and th
in, unhappy-looking women huddled under streetlamps, pulling shawls tight around bare shoulders. Cort’s eyes were constantly moving, missing nothing, but he drove them straight out of town without any sign of real concern.

  They continued well into the next morning before they stopped for breakfast. Aria had been near to jumping off the seat from the moment they had gone beyond the edge of town and into the farmlands east of the city. She stayed obediently in the wagon until Cort drew it to a halt beneath an enormous oak with gnarled branches that bent nearly to the ground and roots as wide as she was. Cattle grazed peacefully in a nearby field, and Aria could smell water on the other side of a low hill.

  “We’ll rest the horses for a few hours,” he said, “and continue slowly until evening. They have a long away to go.”

  Aria stared longingly at the silhouette of the distant mountains, seeming so close and yet still days away. The nearer they got to the foothills, the more she could feel the wolf blood stirring in her veins, longing for freedom.

  Soon, if Cort was reasonable, she would be able to run free again.

  Because soon, too soon, she would have to become someone she didn’t want to—and perhaps couldn’t—be.

  That knowledge preoccupied her for the rest of the evening. Cort kept his distance from her most of the time and spoke to her only when he gave instructions or commented on some aspect of the journey. Their meals were made up of bread, cheese and dried meat. Cort ate as if he hardly tasted the food.

  Aria didn’t mind the simple fare, even though the wolf inside was hungry for good, fresh meat. She’d survived on so much less. But when they stopped for the night, even she lost her appetite. Cort still wasn’t speaking to her, and she knew he was trying to avoid her. He spread her bedroll beside the rear wheel of the wagon and carried his own blankets to the front, where he sat staring into the darkness.

  Aria knew he was watching her in spite of his deliberate isolation. He probably thought her “animal instincts” would overcome her sense and send her flying off into the night. She would have welcomed a lecture from him now, even an outright scolding—anything but this awful wall he had put up between them.