The Last Lone Wolf

by Maureen Child

  “Except for the working aspect,” he said dryly.

  “Right.” She nodded and then continued talking. “Anyway, I woke up early and decided to look around a little. I didn’t actually get to see much yesterday and—” She broke off, looked up at him and added, “But I didn’t see anyone else so I thought I was the only one up.”

  He laughed shortly, shoved his hands into the pockets of a battered, brown leather bomber jacket and said, “Trust me, everyone’s up.” He turned and pointed across the wide compound at a smaller log version of the main house. “Sam and the guys live there and they’ve got a small kitchen outfitted so they can make coffee or whatever. You won’t see them much in the mornings, but come lunchtime and at dinner, they’ll be crowding around the table like they’re starving.”

  “Good,” she said, looking up at him with a determined smile. “I like cooking for people who like to eat.”

  “They do,” he told her. “As for right now, they’re all just busy doing the daily chores.”

  “Right. Of course.” Foolish, she supposed, to have assumed she’d had the place to herself. But yesterday, all she’d seen was the main house and the barn. She’d never noticed the other building set back against the trees. Now she at least knew why the house had been so empty when she and Nikki had gotten up.

  As if the thought of her had conjured the dog from thin air, Nikki barreled across the lawn, charging Jericho with a ferocity belying her size. Her low growl erupted from her tiny chest and when she reached them, she stood in front of Daisy as if daring the big man to hurt her.

  Shaking his head at the dog, Jericho said, “You know that’s just coyote bait.”

  She gasped, bent down and snatched up her dog. Cradling her close, Daisy stroked a hand down Nikki’s back and shot a nervous glance around her at the surrounding trees. “Don’t say that.”

  “Dogs like that don’t belong here,” he told her and his blue eyes were cold and remote. “Hell, it’s small enough it could get carried away by a hawk.”

  “Great,” she muttered, looking up. “Now I have to check the skies, too?”

  “Wouldn’t be a bad idea,” he said, shooting the still growling dog a look of mutual dislike. Then he shifted his glance to Daisy. “Why are you really here?”

  “I told you.”

  “Yeah, but you could work anywhere. You’re a good cook.”

  “Thanks!” She smiled at him and accepted the casually delivered compliment as if he’d delivered it with a speech and a glass of celebratory champagne.

  “So why here?”

  Daisy thought about that for a long minute. Wasn’t as if she could tell him why…not exactly, anyway. So she did the best she could and walked a wide circle around the absolute truth. Setting Nikki down on the grass, she stood up and said, “I told you that I wanted a change…”

  “Yeah, but this seems like a radical jump to make.”

  “Maybe,” she admitted, taking another look at the fantasy lodge draped in sunlight, “but what’s the point in making a change if it’s a safe one? If I just move from one apartment in the city to another? From one restaurant to another? That’s not change. That’s just…ch.”

  “What?”

  “You know,” she explained, “not a whole change, just a partial one, so a ch.”

  He shook his head again and rolled his eyes. “Why here, though?”

  “Because you knew my brother,” she blurted, giving him at least that much of the absolute truth. “And because Brant wrote to me about you. He admired you. A lot.”

  His features froze up and his eyes went glacial. Daisy had to wonder why.

  “He was a good kid,” Jericho said after a long moment or two of silence.

  “Yeah,” she agreed, “he was.”

  She’d come a long way in the past year. Used to be that thoughts of Brant would have tears filling her eyes and her throat closing up on a knot of emotion. Now, though, she could remember him and smile. She drew on all of the happy memories she had of him to comfort her and the tears were coming fewer and further between these days.

  Still, when she spoke about him, her voice went a little wistful. “He was several years younger than me, you know. Our parents died when he was very small, so I practically raised him. Always felt more like his mom than his sister.”

  “He told me about you.”

  “He did?” An eager smile curved her mouth. Oh, this was what she’d wanted. What she’d hungered for. Someone else who had known Brant. Who could remember him with her and keep his memory fresh and meaningful. Plus, Jericho King had known him at the end of Brant’s life and those were pieces that Daisy needed. She wanted to know everything. “What did he say about me? No, wait.” She stopped and held up one hand. “If he was complaining about me, maybe I don’t want to know.”

  His features relaxed enough that one corner of his mouth lifted. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “Brant only had good things to say about you. Used to tell his buddies all about your secret sauce for hamburgers. Talked about it so much he had the other guys begging him to shut up because he was torturing them.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad.” Her eyes welled with unexpected tears and a too-familiar ache settled around her heart. “Thank you for telling me. It’s hard for me, you know, not knowing what his life was like before he died. I mean, some of his friends wrote to me after…but it’s really good to hear you talk about him. To know you knew him. And liked him. I— Damn it.”

  “Hey, don’t cry.” His eyes flashed and his voice was sharp. “Seriously. Don’t.”

  She sniffed and huffed out a laugh. “I’m not going to. Oh, trust me, when I got word that Brant had died, I cried for days. Weeks.”

  Turning, she started walking because she just couldn’t stand still a moment longer. Nikki was right on her heels as she moved across the lawn and Jericho was just a step behind the dog.

  “It felt sometimes that I’d never stop crying. The slightest thing set me off. His favorite song playing on the radio. Finding his old first baseman’s glove on the floor of his closet. Even Nikki made me cry.”

  “That I understand,” he muttered.

  Daisy laughed and was grateful for it. He was such a guy. “I meant, Brant gave her to me for my birthday just before he shipped out. So she was my last link to him and when he was gone—” Shaking her head a little, she sighed, looked down at the tiny dog and smiled. “But I realized after a while that Nikki was a blessing. With her, I wasn’t completely alone, you know? I still had something from Brant with me.”

  “Yeah, I get that,” he said softly.

  She looked up at him, her gaze locking with his. “I appreciated the letter you wrote me.”

  His jaw worked as if he were chewing on words to taste them before allowing them to escape. “And I’m sorry I had to write it.”

  “Oh,” she said, giving him a tremulous smile as she reached out to lay one hand on his arm, “so am I. I wish with all my heart that Brant was still here. But he isn’t. And I wanted you to know that it helped hearing from you. That reading about his friends and how much he meant to all of you gave me some comfort. You know, in case you were wondering.”

  He looked mortally uncomfortable and Daisy asked herself again, Why? Surely it would be a good thing for him to know that what he’d done had helped her get through a truly hideous slice of life.

  “He was a good Marine,” he said after a long moment of silence.

  “High praise indeed, coming from you,” she said, remembering all the letters Brant had written to her. “My brother talked about you all the time in his letters to me. About how he admired you. How he tried to emulate you. Learn from you.”

  Clearly unhappy with the conversation, Jericho bent down, snatched up a fallen twig from the grass and sent it sailing toward the tree line. “He did fine. Would have made a hell of a career Marine.”

  She knew that was exactly what Brant had wanted. Knew that her little brother had wanted to serve his country and test himsel
f alongside other Marines. It had been important to him. So important that he’d given his life for his beliefs. And though her heart hurt still at his absence, being around Jericho—a man that had known and served with Brant—made it almost seem as if she hadn’t lost him completely.

  That was only one of the reasons she’d come here to get pregnant, she reminded herself. Jericho had known and liked Brant. But he was also a part of the very military that had taken the last of her family from her. Wasn’t it only right that he now give her a family?

  She winced at the direction of her own thoughts. She wasn’t a woman used to lying or manipulating. And a part of her wasn’t happy with what she was doing. After all, she was planning on tricking a man into making a child with her. Things didn’t get much more devious than that.

  But what choice did she have, really? She wanted a family again. Wanted to love again. And if she came right out and asked, she was sure Jericho wouldn’t say, Sure, let’s get right on that!

  No, this was the only way. The only way to fill the hole in her heart left by Brant’s death.

  “You know,” she said thoughtfully, “I almost met you before.”

  “When?”

  “At Camp Pendleton. I went to see Brant before he shipped out and while he was showing me around the base, he spotted you.” She smiled at the memory. Her brother had been so excited, so proud. He’d introduced Daisy to most of his friends and taken her to his favorite spots on base. “You were coming out of some building and Brant was dragging me over to meet you when a colonel walked up to join you. When the two of you left together, Brant was disappointed.”

  She also recalled clearly just how good Jericho King had looked in uniform. Tall and built and, even from a distance, clearly gorgeous. She’d been a little disappointed at not meeting him herself. Yet, here she stood now, more than a year later, at his home. Life took you on some pretty strange journeys, she thought.

  “He was a good Marine,” Jericho said again, as if struggling to give her whatever it was she needed to hear. “He had a lot of friends in the unit.”

  “He was always like that,” Daisy answered with a wisp of sorrow in her voice for days gone past. “People liked being around him.”

  He nodded but didn’t say anything. As they came to the edge of the lawn, the rising sun began to clear the treetops, spilling what looked like gold dust across the tips of the pines. “I liked your brother,” he finally said, staring off down the mountain as if searching for signs of an invading army. “Because of that, I’m going to tell you something you need to hear whether you want to or not.”

  “Sounds ominous.”

  He tore his gaze from the distance and looked down at her. “You don’t belong here, Daisy.”

  “What?”

  She hadn’t expected that, but looking at him now she couldn’t imagine why not. Harsh shadows cast by sunlight sliding through the trees lay across his face, darkening his eyes and making him look even more formidable than usual. His mouth was a grim, straight line as he said, “You don’t belong here, on the mountain. This is not your kind of place, Daisy.”

  Worry gnawed at her insides for a few uncomfortable moments, then that sensation gave way to aggravation. Was he going to change his mind? Toss her out before he’d even given her a chance to prove herself? He didn’t know her. Didn’t know what she might be capable of or not. How dare he think he could decide what she could and couldn’t do.

  “It’s my kind of place if I say it is,” she told him.

  He blew out a breath and his mouth tightened even further until she could see that muscle in his jaw twitch again. “It’s not that easy. Besides, I don’t think your brother would want you here.”

  She blinked at him. Using her brother to get rid of her? “Excuse me?”

  “You think Brant would be crazy about the idea of you living on a remote mountain top with a bunch of ex-Marines? Living with a bunch of guys isn’t easy.”

  Former Marines? All of them? She shook that thought away and stayed focused on the conversation.

  “Brant was a Marine. He’d probably love the fact that I’m here. He’d consider me to be perfectly safe surrounded by the kind of men he trusted.”

  “You’re making this harder than it has to be,” he muttered.

  “No,” she told him flatly. “You’re the one doing that. All I did was apply for a job. Which I got. You’ve already tasted my cooking and loved it. So the only complaint you’ve got against me is that I don’t belong here? Not good enough.”

  She stared up into pale blue eyes that seemed to be boring directly into hers as if he were trying to read her thoughts before she could say them. “Now, I’ll remind you that Brant was my younger brother. He didn’t make decisions for me, and it would be really difficult for him to start doing it now.”

  Jericho King’s scowl was an impressive thing. She imagined it had once frightened young recruits into jumping to attention and springing into whatever action Jericho had expected from them. She refused to be intimidated by it.

  “I knew him,” he pointed out. “I think I can figure out you being here wouldn’t thrill your brother.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, “you did know Brant and I’m glad to have that connection. Somehow,” she added, “it makes his memory come more alive when I’m around other people who remember him. But I knew him better, I think, than you did. And even if he were here to cast a vote on all of this, it wouldn’t be up to him. This is my decision.”

  “And mine,” he reminded her.

  His face looked hard and his eyes were as cold as twin blocks of ice. The rising sun spilled more light and created darker shadows all at the same time. She watched Jericho’s face, hoping to spot a chink in his armor. But she found nothing. There was no give on his features, no soft understanding or kind consideration. This was the face of a warrior. A man tested in battle and honed down to a fine edge. If she expected to hold her own with him, she’d need every ounce of her own strength and self-confidence. If she let him know she was worried in the slightest, that would give him far too much of an advantage in this little test of wills.

  She took a breath, blew it out again and said, “Okay, yeah. It’s your decision, too. But you promised me a chance. And I’m holding you to it.”

  He blew out an impatient breath. “You’ve got to be the most stubborn woman I’ve ever met.”

  “If you think I’m insulted by that, you’re wrong.” Daisy bent down, scooped up Nikki and held her close. “Maybe I’ve never been on a battlefield, but I’ve had to work hard for everything I’ve ever had.”

  “That’s not—”

  “I know what it’s like to push yourself.” She cut him off neatly and poked him in the chest with the tip of her index finger. “I’ve been on my own a long time. I raised my brother by myself with no one to help. I know what it is to be so tired all you want to do is lie down and not get up for a year. And I know what it’s like to ignore that urge because you’ve just got way too many things to do.” She lifted her chin and fixed her gaze on his. “I’m not afraid. I’ll do whatever’s necessary to get what I want.”

  He nodded abruptly. “You know what? Fine. You don’t want to listen to reason, that’s your choice. You want to do this, we’ll do it. Be ready at dawn tomorrow. We’ll head up the mountain and then we’ll see just how badly you want this stupid job.”

  He had to be out of his mind. That was the only explanation for any of this. In the soft, hazy light just before dawn, Jericho checked the sky, hitched his backpack higher and glared at the house. As if firing dirty looks at the place would make Daisy Saxon appear.

  “It ain’t dawn yet,” Sam said as he walked up quietly.

  No, it wasn’t. So she wasn’t late yet. “Close enough.”

  “Uh-huh.” The older man shoved one hand through thinning gray hair. “So what’s the plan, JK? You taking her out on the mountain just to submarine her?”

  He shot one wary glance at his friend. Was he that easy to read
? Would Daisy figure out that he was going to see to it that she failed her survival test? Besides, it wasn’t as if he were going to deliberately sabotage her. He just wouldn’t be offering her any extra help. And left to her own pitiful devices, he had no doubt she’d be finished before the day was out.

  “What do you care?” he asked, neither confirming nor denying the man’s suspicions.

  Sam gave him a look Jericho hadn’t seen since the older man had been his drill instructor when he first joined the Corps. When he was through with boot camp, Jericho and Sam had become friends and had kept in touch through all of their separate postings over the years. Sam had been a Marine for twenty years when he mustered out and coming here to King Mountain had seemed the logical choice.

  The older man had been restless—too young to retire and too old to stay in the Corps—so he’d come here and become a part of King Adventure. He’d had as much a part in making the camp successful as Jericho had and they got along fine usually, two men with like minds, though they were separated by nearly two decades in age.

  They were family, Jericho realized. But then, so were all of the guys who worked for him. Misfits mostly—men with no families, nowhere to go. Some had seen combat and didn’t feel comfortable around lots of people. Some had simply yearned for wide-open spaces and a job with fewer restrictions than the nine-to-five route. Whatever their reasons, they’d all come here looking for work and wound up finding a place to call home.

  And until this very moment, he and Sam hadn’t butted heads over anything important in years.

  “She seems like a nice kid, is all,” he was saying. “And I don’t want to think you’re taking her on the mountain just to break her spirit.”

  Jericho felt a rush of irritation swamp him as he looked at one of his oldest friends. The fact that guilt was riding right under that irritation was only more frustrating. Did the man have to read him so well? “Damn it, Sam, I would have thought you’d not only understand but agree with me on this. Did you get a good look at her? You can see for yourself she doesn’t belong here.”