by Alex Kidwell
“If you love me, then you should stay,” Redford begged.
“It’s not that simple anymore, Fido.” Jed picked up his bag, Knievel’s cage, and made his weary way to the van. He threw his stuff inside, getting his cat settled in the front seat. “Tell the professor I’m sorry about stranding him.” Pausing, swallowing hard, Jed dared a look back over his shoulder. “Good-bye, Redford.”
“Jed,” Redford tried, but his voice broke off and it seemed like he couldn’t find any more words to say. His expression was just as effective as anything he could have said. Jed could read him like a goddamn book, and he only needed a glance to know what he was feeling. That frown was guilt, that crease at the corner of his eyes was upset, the way his eyes were wider than usual was hurt. Redford tried again. “Jed, please. Don’t leave me.”
Damn it.
It only took two steps to be there, to be cupping Redford’s cheek and to draw him in for a kiss. It was hard and desperate. Jed thought he could taste his own tears on Redford’s lips, or maybe those were Redford’s on his. It didn’t matter. He drew back, carefully neutral expression completely broken. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered, pressing his forehead to Redford’s for a moment. “I love you. God, Red, I love you so damn much.”
Which was why he had to go. Everything in Jed was fighting against it, but he wanted to do something good. To give Redford the chance he hadn’t before. So Jed turned and got in the van, refusing to look back. He started the engine and drove toward the gate. He couldn’t look back. If he did, if he caught one more sight of Redford looking so goddamn hurt, Jed didn’t know if he’d be strong enough to keep going.
There were a few wolves at the gate, part of the pack’s patrol. They let him through, and thank God no one commented on how wrecked Jed looked. He wasn’t in the mood to play nice.
The nearest town was nearly two hours out, which was enough of a drive for Jed to realize he needed alcohol. Lots and lots of fucking alcohol. He hadn’t gotten really blackout drunk since he’d met Redford, but now seemed like an excellent time to pick that habit back up. He found a little liquor store already open despite the early hour and stocked up. Jed didn’t want to start the drive back to his place just yet. The apartment was going to be covered in Redford’s things, was going to have his pillow on the bed, his clothes in the closet. Every inch of it would remind Jed that Redford was gone. So no, he was in no rush to get back there.
Instead he got himself a hotel room. It was tiny and shitty and it smelled like mold. He didn’t give a fuck. Jed locked the door, he did a sweep of the room, set up his weapons in easy to reach locations, and he started drinking.
He didn’t stop until he’d passed out, curled around an old shirt of Redford’s he’d accidentally packed with him, sobbing his damn eyes out.
Chapter 11
Redford
REDFORD RECALLED a movie that he had once seen wherein the protagonist, upon leaving home, had abandoned his dog. While driving away, the protagonist had watched in the rearview mirror as the dog grew farther and farther away, looking back at him with pitiful hope and growing disappointment. It had been as if the dog’s expectations of the protagonist returning had vanished with every inch of distance.
Redford felt like that dog. He was sure Jed would laugh at the comparison.
He waited for half an hour. And with every minute, his hope that Jed would turn the van around and come back quickly withered.
When he eventually looked at his watch and saw how much time had passed, Redford supposed he was forced to accept the fact that Jed wasn’t going to come back. Not right now, anyway. He still held out hope that Jed would return later. Surely Jed couldn’t actually leave him forever.
“What are you doing?” With a start, Redford looked over to find Edwin standing next to him, looking off in the same direction Redford had just been pensively staring. “What’s over there?”
Over Edwin’s shoulder, Redford could see the pack moving around in the camp with a greater sense of urgency than he’d previously seen—the Gray Lady had made a decision, it seemed. A few wolves were moving from cabin to cabin, and although Redford couldn’t hear what they were saying, the scent of alarm was evident.
Jed probably knew what that decision was. He just wasn’t here to tell Redford.
“Um. Nothing,” Redford said awkwardly, his words coming out slow, like he had to spend great effort to drag them from within himself. “Jed’s gone.”
Edwin didn’t seem to feel the need to comment on that. He continued staring where Jed’s van had disappeared around the corner, shoulder to shoulder with Redford, letting the silence envelop him. It was probably the longest Redford had ever seen Edwin be still. “Do you want to tell me why?” Edwin finally asked, glancing over at Redford, shaggy blond hair falling across his eyes.
No, actually, Redford didn’t particularly want to talk about it. But he bit back the upset and replied, “I lost control and bit him, and he left.” It was a concise enough summary, even if Edwin probably wouldn’t know the context.
“Well, that seems stupid.” Edwin didn’t seem to grasp the enormity of the situation. “He knows you’re a wolf, right? If Anthony left every time I bit something I wasn’t supposed to, he’d be halfway to China by now.”
“I’m not really a wolf,” Redford said softly. He dropped his gaze from the working wolves to the grass underneath his feet. “Not like all of you.”
Another long moment of quiet. This time, Edwin was squinting up at the sky, contemplating a flight of birds streaking past them. “I wonder if they all have different-colored feathers,” he mused. “I mean, they all look kind of alike to us, though, right? They’re just all birds. We don’t know if one of them learned how to fly late or if one has the ugliest beak or if all of them have different-colored feathers. They just are birds.”
“Or if one of them loses their mind every once in a while and attacks people?” Redford said wryly.
Edwin gave him a lopsided grin, totally unaffected. “Yeah. Or that.” He leaned in close to Redford—and however far Redford leaned back in startlement, Edwin leaned with him, getting in to nuzzle his nose under Redford’s ear, taking a deep breath. “You smell like wolf to me. So that other stuff, that’s just what you have to figure out. Doesn’t change that you’re one of us. You’re pack.”
It was both the most comforting thing anybody had ever said to him and the absolute last thing Redford wanted to hear.
“That’s kind of why Jed left,” Redford admitted. “He said… that I needed to be here to help myself, but he didn’t want to stay here with me.”
Edwin’s lips tugged downward into a frown, and he sighed sympathetically. “What do you think?” he prompted. “Do you think you need to be here?”
Honestly, with everything that had been happening lately, Redford hadn’t had the time to think about that. He could see why being with the pack could help him—it certainly seemed to have helped already, just being around people who were completely comfortable with the nature that Redford still feared inside himself. But as a permanent solution, he didn’t think he’d want to live with them.
He liked his apartment with Jed. It had been his idea to spend the full moons in the apartment, after Jed had convinced him that his grandmother’s basement wasn’t doing him any good. He liked spending his full moons with Jed.
But he had to admit, the latest one had been his favorite. There had been nothing but the woods and the dirt under his paws, and Jed beside him as much as he could manage. Redford had never felt so free.
“I think it’s probably been helping me more than my psychologist,” Redford said, giving a mental apology to Dr. Alona. Sitting in his office or speaking with him over the phone had certainly been informative, and Redford would be forever grateful to the doctor for at least helping him keep his mind together this long. But it didn’t compare to actually getting outside and feeling free.
Edwin crouched down, picking up a stick to poke at a line of ants walking
past. He let the insects march onto the wood, watching as they accepted the new obstacle and kept moving. “So do you want to stay?”
“If Jed was still here I’d say yes.” Redford crouched down next to Edwin, picking up a stick of his own and laying it across the path of the ants. If nothing else, it was certainly interesting to watch and a decent distraction. “I’ve never been good at being anywhere on my own, though.”
“You’re not alone,” Edwin pointed out practically. He was busy gathering bits of wood and small rocks, building a fortress around the anthill. “You have us, now.”
Redford didn’t want to say, that doesn’t count. He didn’t want to be rude about it. But with Jed gone, Redford once again felt like he didn’t fit here. The Lewises were nice, and they’d made every effort to make Redford feel at ease with them, but they weren’t his family. They weren’t his pack.
They weren’t Jed.
“I’m not sure I even know how to be in a pack,” Redford said honestly. “I… you and Anthony and Randall, you’ve been really nice, but I only met you a week ago. I don’t know if it’s true that wolves need packs. I’ve only ever needed Jed.”
Edwin just smiled at him, still as friendly as ever, like nothing really could be that wrong about anything Redford was saying. “He’s your mate,” Edwin surmised with a nod. “Even if he is human.”
“I think so,” Redford replied, tentative. “I didn’t really know what a mate was until this morning. Anthony explained it to Jed and me. It sounds right.”
“Well, you want to be with him, right?” Edwin was busy fashioning a tiny flag out of a twig and a leaf. “Like… not just kind of. You need it. When he’s not around, you get all achy, right here.” He rubbed a hand over his chest.
Redford couldn’t help a quick huff of a laugh. “Yeah,” he agreed. The voice that his instincts had made inside his head had once called Jed mate. Redford still did think it was a slightly silly word, though. “Exactly like that.”
“He’s not a good match, you know,” Edwin commented casually, propping his little flag on top of the barricade wall he’d made around three sides of the anthill. “I mean, I like Jed. But he’s human. And that gets tough. I get why he’d leave, a little. If I thought that Ant or Randall would be happier without me, I’d go too. Even if it’d hurt.”
That wasn’t exactly making Redford feel any better. What was he supposed to do, just accept that Jed had left? Condone it, even? He couldn’t do that. He could never be okay with the idea that Jed wouldn’t be in his life anymore.
“Why does it get tough if he’s human?” That notion, at least, was the one thing Edwin had said that didn’t make Redford feel horrible. “He’s always been even stronger than me.”
“That’s not true.” Edwin rocked back on his heels, nose twitching as he watched the ants make their way into their fortified home. “I mean, I don’t know, Jed looks like he could lift a lot of heavy things, but that’s not all that makes you strong.”
“I meant personality wise,” Redford said. “He’s confident and determined and smart. More than I am, in any of those things. Why does his being human change anything?”
“Still not what makes you strong,” Edwin said, voice a happy little hum as he laid his hand down for the ants to march across. “But humans are… tricky.” He looked up, a smile touching the corners of his lips. “Anthony and Randall are both better at this than I am. They’d probably get mad at me. I mean, Ant always told me that we’re all equal. But we’re kind of not too, you know? I’ve heard what some of the naturals have said, the half bloods and stuff, and I don’t know, some of it makes sense. Jed’s not going to live as long as you, for one. But you age slower too. So in twenty years, he’ll be old, and you’ll be not even in your prime. You’ll want kids. I mean, not every wolf does, but I bet you will. And Jed can’t really do what a pack needs to do. He can’t run with you on full moons, not like another wolf. He can’t hunt with you. And he doesn’t get your instincts.” Edwin’s attention returned to the ants. “It just seems like it’d be really hard.”
Redford couldn’t help but remember, back when he’d first met the Lewises, how Edwin had used none-too-kind language toward humans. He didn’t seem like he genuinely wanted all the humans gone, but he did possibly believe that they weren’t equal, and that the supernatural creatures came out on top of that equality argument.
He could kind of see where Edwin was coming from. Some of that was true—Redford would age slower, and Jed wouldn’t forever be able to keep up with him. But the rest of it, frankly, just sounded like personal issues. Jed was smart; he would get his instincts if they were properly explained. And the need for a pack? Redford had never felt it. He’d grown up alone, and while he’d longed for company, Jed fulfilled every single need for family and love.
“And what happens when one half of a mate pairing isn’t around anymore?” Redford asked glumly. “Anthony told us about his, um, well, what happened to him. He looked miserable.”
“He is.” There wasn’t a smile hovering around Edwin’s lips at that. He slowly drew his hand back, making sure the ants were all in place and undisturbed. “Sometimes I honestly think that if it hadn’t been for me and Randall, Ant would have just stopped. Or gone after him. Either way, he wouldn’t be here.” Edwin shrugged. “Maybe that’s why everyone says not to fall for a human. It’s too scary to think about them being gone.”
Redford couldn’t exactly go back in time and prevent himself from meeting Jed, and even if he could, he wouldn’t want to. Jed had made his life so much better. Nobody other than Jed had showed even the slightest interest in caring about him.
Jed hadn’t been the first person to visit Redford’s house after his grandmother had died. Distant family had turned up at his door, mailmen with packages delivered to the wrong address, repairmen, next-door neighbors. None of them had even looked at him twice. But Jed had. Jed had looked and had seen him, and Redford had fallen in love so quickly it had made his head spin.
And he couldn’t just simply make himself stop loving Jed, could he?
There wasn’t much he could say in reply to Edwin. Yes, it was scary to think about Jed being gone, but that wasn’t going to help Redford right now.
Instead, he twisted around to look back at the camp. The wolves were out in full force now: belongings were being carried to and from cabins; wolves were talking to one another in huddled groups. The whole place was beginning to smell like worry.
“In any case, I’m still going to stay and help with whatever decision the Gray Lady has made,” Redford said, trying to sound calm and collected. “Although without Jed, I’m not sure I’m really going to be much help.” Jed had taken the van, which meant he had every single scrap of equipment with him, other than what was left in the cabin. So that left Redford with a few guns, some maps of the area, his own bag, and the silver bullets they’d found. It wasn’t exactly the beginnings of Fort Knox.
“Do you really love him?” Edwin asked, curious. His hands were resting on his knees, and he was staring up at Redford, head cocked to the side. “Even though he’s human and it’s scary?”
“Yeah,” Redford murmured. “Everything that you and Anthony said about whatever a mate is, that’s Jed for me. The thought of life without him….”
He couldn’t bring himself to finish that sentence, because attempting to imagine it wasn’t something Redford wanted to do.
Edwin stood, brushing his hands off on the sides of his jeans. “Okay.” He tugged his shirt off, kicking his pants to the side next and shifting. The blond wolf nudged his head against Redford’s knees, barking up at him twice, tongue lolling out one side of his mouth.
Redford stared at him, uncomprehending. Okay? What was he supposed to take from that? He wasn’t sure if that was a dismissal or a real answer that he just hadn’t figured out the deeper meaning of yet. Did Edwin want him to run with him?
“What does ‘okay’ mean?” he asked.
Edwin chuffed, running hap
pily in little circles around Redford’s legs. He nudged his nose into Redford’s stomach, taking a deep sniff, backing up to bark once more. As if that was supposed to make it clearer. Before Redford could ask any more questions, however, Edwin took off running, a long, pale blur against the ground. He rounded the corner and disappeared into the woods, leaving Redford behind with the ant fort.
Redford still had no clue what any of that was supposed to mean. It would have been so beneficial for wolves to evolve telepathy or some form of communication that didn’t involve barking and random body movements. He hoped Edwin didn’t expect Redford to join him, because going for a run was the last thing on Redford’s mind right then.
He stood with a faint sigh, carefully brushing stray ants off the bottom of the jeans. He wanted to ask someone what was happening, but all of the wolves looked busy, and Redford wasn’t sure that the Gray Lady would appreciate a visit from him alone. He thought he could see Anthony and Randall in the distance, and Victor was bound to be around somewhere.
Redford just wanted Jed.
If he wanted to leave, he would have to make his way to the main road, well away from the camp, but that was doable. He could call a cab or find a bus station or something.
But then where would he go? If Jed didn’t want to be with him anymore, then Redford doubted he would be welcome in Jed’s apartment. They kept all their money in joint accounts, so at least he’d have funds. He hoped.
So. No home to go to. No Jed waiting for him.
It was enough to make Redford want to sit down and not move for a very long time. The panic that was starting to gather in his gut would be all too easy to give in to. But it wouldn’t help anything, and Redford had promised to be of use to this pack.