“Can’t tell,” Angus said, looking down, trying to follow the boot tracks. “The snow’s trampled and dry. Didn’t make any good prints. But whoever was here avoided the traps, just like my dogs,” he said, pointing to where the hybrid tracks came down out of the woods, breaking the glistening white plane.
“When did you leave?” Grebs asked.
“Soon as everybody else did. I set the traps, careful about it. Then I waited awhile, maybe another half hour. Took off right around sunset.”
“So it was getting dark when you left?” Grebs asked.
“Just about. I wanted to make the edge of the Woods right before dark, so I could see to unlock the chain.”
Grebs thought about it. “Clayton,” he guessed. He looked back toward the house and saw their tracks come away from the back door. “If it was him he tried to get inside.”
Angus peered down at the trail leading toward the barn. “There were at least two of ’em,” he said. “And judging by what I can see of the track, I’d say one was a woman.”
“Diane Talbott,” Grebs guessed. He looked toward the barn. “Just what we fuckin‘ needed.”
Angus turned closer to the door, listening.
“You sure they’re in there?” Gunderson asked.
Angus heard movement the other side of the door. “Only one way to know for sure.”
“What in the hell are we supposed to do now?” Gunderson asked.
“Get ’em,” Angus said. “Teach ’em a goddamn lesson.” He turned to the door, worked the latch out of its frozen lock, and slid the door open, only inches. A bar of sunlight fell into the barn, just enough for Angus to see a hybrid’s paw. There was a low growl, like distant thunder. And then the paw vanished. “Yeah,” he said. “They’re in there. Couple nights in the woods ’n they got attitude.”
“Sounded wild to me,” Hank said, a little worried.
“We need to think about this,” Grebs commented. He paused for a minute, looking back to the house. “This could work. Somebody came out to the farm. Found wolves in the barn. Locked ’em in.”
“Probably Clayton,” Angus guessed.
“Probably,” Grebs agreed. “Which is even better. Whoever was here saw wolves. You said so yourself, Angus. Nothing different about them. They’re wolves.”
“Look like it, anyway,” he agreed.
“Damn right. More evidence. When we came out to help clean up the mess,” he considered, still thinking... “Is there another entrance to this barn?”
“Old grain chute, back side,” Angus said.
“Perfect. We came out to help clean up the mess, saw they’d been here. But this time they busted out the old grain chute.”
Gunderson saw the reasoning, thought it was a good idea. “Went back to the woods, where wolves would go,” he added. “And whoever came out was trespassin’!”
“Whoever came out better have one hell of a good reason, or they’ll keep their mouths shut. That’d be something in our favor. The refusal of someone to come forward.”
Angus turned back to the door, getting ready to open it. Grebs held him back. “Goddamn it, Angus. Would you wait a minute?”
“Wait for them to come back and get my dogs? We need to get ’em outta there.”
“Nobody’s gonna‘ get ’em, because they’re wolves,” Grebs said. “You’re right about working fast. But caging them isn’t the thing.” He thought for a moment, rubbing his chin. “At least we got lucky in one respect. It’s early. If they think the wolves are caught we probably got a little time.”
Gunderson and Angus watched Grebs examine the snow.
He turned and said, “open it up a bit and let’s see how they’re doing.”
Angus reached over to pull the door open.
“Careful, Angus. They’ve been out in the woods awhile. They might not be ready for your kind of affection.”
“They’ll mind,” he said.
He slid the door open a few inches. From inside the barn he heard rustling, then another growl.
“Nothin‘ a hard hand won’t cure,” Angus commented.
Grebs looked down at the snow. Tracks were heaviest between the house and the barn’s entrance. The rest of the barn was surrounded by an unbroken plain of white. “Looks like they didn’t know about the chute. If they did, they didn’t check it out. You sure that grain chute is big enough for wolves to get through?”
Angus nodded. “They could get through it.”
“Then we open it enough to let them run.”
“What?” Angus didn’t like the idea of letting his dogs run wild a second time. He didn’t think they’d return. “We let ’em go again they could be gone for good.”
“Good ’n gone’s what we want, now that I think of it. What if someone came while we were cagin ’em, or they even see those cages in the back of your truck, or those pens behind your place?”
“They’re my dogs,” Angus protested, not wanting to free them. It had taken a lot of hard work to build his breeding stock.
“Think about your share,” Grebs reminded him, sensing Moon’s disappointment. “Share like that be plenty to get you started with whole new stock. Hell, redo your whole outfit.”
Angus considered it. Grebs was right. But he didn’t like it, giving up the dogs he’d bred since birth, all of them a damn good mix of dog and wolf, mostly wolf.
“Seems to me they’re just about wild enough already,” Hank observed.
“Grain chute opens from the inside,” Angus remembered.
Grebs looked at Gunderson. That meant one of them would have to enter the barn and open it. “Shit,” he finally growled, rubbing his chin. He looked over at Angus. “Got any ideas?”
“Go in and open it,” Angus said.
“You think those dogs’ll let you?”
Angus stared back at Grebs. “They’ll let me,” he said.
“Maybe you forgot recent history,” Gunderson commented. “You just starved them and then sent them killing on their own.”
Angus paused, looking at the barn wall in front of him. “I admit they got a taste for it. But they try anything they’ll get a steel toed boot, somethin‘ they already know.”
“I hope to hell they haven’t forgotten.”
“They’re dogs,” Angus reassured.
The three men looked at each other.
“Then let’s get it done,” Grebs finally said. “Before anyone comes and finds us, or sees those cages in the back of your truck. Set ’em free and get the hell out.” He looked up over the road but it was still early and the morning was quiet as a graveyard.
Angus started for the door, matter of fact, as though entering it was without risk.
Gunderson stepped back.
Grebs called out behind Moon, “Keep in mind those dogs been runnin‘ for the last two days, after two days starving. And they did a damn good job killin‘. Be careful how you open that door.”
Angus turned. “Hell, I made ’em, didn’t I?”
Angus opened the door wide enough to sandwich through a narrow gap. He pulled it shut behind him, leaving a narrow crack to let in light, and then stepped to one side. His eyes gradually grew accustomed to the dark. A narrow swath of sunlight bisected the barn. In the partial illumination Angus saw carcasses and bloodied humps. From his right there was movement, and then a flash across the light beam, like a shadow flicker in candlelight. Deeper in darkness he heard rustling and then another low growl.
“What’s that?” he said, belligerent. He had a cruel, familiar way of handling dogs. He never let them forget he was their unchallenged alpha. Always had been. Always would be. But they had never all been out of their cages at the same time, on their own.
One of the animals answered with another low growl, slightly more pronounced.
“That you, Arctic?” Angus knew him. H
e was the black haired one and the biggest. “You’d best be smart and stay out of my way.”
There was an eerie stillness in the barn, as though the dogs were considering his offer. He could feel their eyes. Angus had been a predator his entire life. The top of the food chain, the unchallenged king of the wild and everything in it. Now from darkness he sensed the yellow wolf eyes staring at him, watching carefully for weakness, measuring him.
Suddenly there was rustling from one of the calf stalls, followed with a low whine. Angus peered into the darkness. He thought he saw one or two animals shift among the carnage. The barn still reeked of it. He could see their shadows in the barn’s darkest reaches, positioning, considering.
“Keep away!”
He spit a long brown spasm of tobacco juice onto the floor. He knew they’d smell it... remember what it meant. There was quiet again, and then a long, rumbling growl picked up by another growl. Two of them were defiant.
“Alright,” Angus growled himself. “You had a little taste of wild and you want to keep it! And for now I’m going to give it to you.”
He peered ahead, unable to see more than a few feet beyond the doorway’s ambient light. He shuffled his boots forward, feeling his way across the floor’s carnage. He entered the darkness, progressing slowly toward the grain chute. Twice he felt heavy objects and stepped to avoid them. There was more growling from the back of the barn, higher pitched and coming from two other positions, as though they were surrounding him. He could feel their intensity, their keen observation.
In the decade he’d been working with hybrids he had only been attacked once. He’d had a good bitch he’d used for four years. He’d taken her ice fishing, thinking she could use the exercise and the fish, providing he got lucky. Dragging his sled and supplies across the ice, he’d slipped and fallen flat. The bitch didn’t miss the opportunity. She pounced on the fallen alpha, her wolf instinct returning, her natural inclination for dominance seeing opportunity. She opened her jaws and enveloped Angus Moon’s head. Wolf jaws are powerful enough to snap a moose’s thighbone and suck out the marrow. In this case, the act was dominance. Angus was part of her pack. She wasn’t going to kill him, just let him know she saw weakness and was vying for dominance. He rolled, fought her off, and then beat her until she cowered like the dog Moon reminded her she was.
In the dark interior of the barn he remembered the slip and fall. He would have to be careful.
“You bastards keep outta my way!” he yelled. He didn’t care for the growling, but it was the two he wasn’t hearing that worried him most.
“For Christ’s sake,” Grebs called from the other side of the door. “Who in the hell are you talking to? Just get it open, Angus. We got to get those dogs out, clean up this fuckin‘ mess and get the hell out of here!”
“Blacker than pitch in here!” He thought he heard movement to his right.
“Hug the wall and feel your way over,” Grebs suggested. “Hank’s on the other side. He can help from the outside when you get close.”
Angus thought about telling Grebs to go fuck himself, but his attention was interrupted by another sound from his right, more growling behind it. He was disoriented in the dark. He wasn’t certain the dog had moved, but it sounded closer. Maybe it was just louder. He turned to listen and said, “here now!” taking a step without feeling.
His foot came up against something solid and he lost his balance, started falling. He put his hand out and it slid across gristle and bone, bringing the center of his diaphragm down hard. Air rushed out of him like a bellows. His disorientation was brief but long enough. The animal was on top of him. He raised his arm to protect himself, kicked and rolled to his right, feeling a carcass in the small of his back. The animal grabbed hold of his arm, trying to pull him, shaking its massive jaws, growling in the dark. Angus brought his free hand in front of him, striking hard at its head. He struck three more times before it finally let go and retreated. But it wouldn’t go far. Angus was still in the dark on the floor. He had to get up in a hurry.
“What was that?” Grebs yelled.
Angus was on his feet, breathing hard. “Get the fuck out of my way!” he roared. “Goddamnit!” he spit, stricken. He made his way along the wall, struggling to catch his breath. He slid and managed to step over another carcass and found himself at the chute’s door. “You fuckin‘ bastards!”
“What?!” Grebs yelled from outside, but Angus wasn’t listening.
“Angus,” Gunderson said, just the other side of the wall. “The door’s right here,” he said, banging on it. Angus reached up, felt for the familiar latch, pulled on it and the square fell open. Sunlight streamed into the barn. Angus squinted in the light and behind him the animals cowered back into the barn’s shadows.
“Christ,” Gunderson said, looking down at him. Moon’s arm was torn and ragged, blood starting to ooze around the holes in his sleeve. “What the hell happened?”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
February 1st, morning—Defiance and Diane Talbott’s cabin
By the time Sam Rivers stirred it was well after daybreak. He was still half asleep and disoriented. He wasn’t in Yellow Rock. There was a feeling of pressure, atmospheric, a dense cold pushing from everywhere but this warm bed, like being inside the shell of an egg. The room was lightly shaded. His eyes fluttered, and there was faint illumination, like the kind along north-facing windows toward the end of the day. Shallow half-light without warmth.
They’d been at the farmhouse, he and Diane. They watched the shadowy creatures come out of the woods, noses in the wind, surreptitious about their return. They howled in the middle of the night, reclaiming their kill. Gradually he began to recollect it, including the message left for Svegman by the time they re-entered cell phone range. But Svegman hadn’t returned his call, had he?
And there was the smell. Witch hazel. Ripe. Like autumn woods with an underlying sweetness. The akvavit they drank when they returned hadn’t dulled his senses. He remembered every naked inch of the woman beside him. Now he lay perfectly still, thinking about what part of her he wanted to touch first.
Sam Rivers smiled. On the long drive from Yellow Rock he’d had plenty of thinking time. He was 37 and single again, still smarting from the long bad last year of his marriage. It had taken him six months and the ritualistic burial of his wedding ring to help him start feeling better.
Kay Magdalen told him the time it takes to get over a divorce is equal to the half-life of the marriage. All things considered it sounded like a reasonable formula. That would mean three years, for Sam. Five, if you counted the four years they were together before they married. At first, five years sounded like a prison sentence. But on his way over from Yellow Rock he reconsidered it. From 37 to 42, if Kay’s formula was right, could be the best goddamn five years of his life. If he abided by the formula, that would mean he would run away from any chance of marriage, at least for the next five years, no matter how attracted he was to a woman. Was that possible? Moreover, if he was candid about his refusal to marry and his need to experiment by ‘dating around,’ would any woman even bother to date him more than once? For now, it was too much to think about. So he decided to leave it at this could be the best goddamn five years of my life.
His evening with Diane was about as unexpected as a January thaw. In his childhood bedroom, she’d felt good. Better than good. Later, during small talk on the return to her place, he wished he would have finished it, because he thought he knew where this was headed, but was still so surprised by that sudden kiss he wasn’t sure. Carpe Diem. It should be Carpe Momento (seize the moment), because he wished he would have seized Diane. Back there. When the moment was hot.
But then they returned and each had three glasses of akvavit while they sat on the couch, continuing to unwind. Until Diane stood up, reached out her hand, and led him to her bedroom.
“Diane,” he started, following her.
“Don’t talk.”
Jesus, he thought, remembering what happened when they came into her bedroom. Rushed, more like it. Shedding and pulling off clothes on their way to her bed. Pulling at each other and themselves. If their limbs had been tinder they would have set fire to the place. Hell, their limbs were tinder.
He had to get up. He was remembering too much and it was too goddamn visceral and he was starting to think about waking her up. But now there was too goddamn much to do. They would have time to revisit this bed.
She was heavy beside him, weighted in deep sleep, if he was any judge of her breathing. He turned out of bed, carefully so as not to awaken her, and picked up his clothes on his way out of the room.
Diane’s bathroom was at the end of the hall. He paced into it, meditative, took a toothbrush out of his kit, added toothpaste and stuck it into his tired mouth, starting to brush. He sat down and pissed, still brushing. The seat was cold. He finished, stood up to look at himself. The Iron Range was starting to have an effect on him. Black whiskers covered his face, disheveled coal black hair creased his head with a greasy sheen, and there was what appeared to be more salt at his temples. Truth is he looked like one of those movie star bad boys. Felt like it, too. His eyes were intense, he thought. If the Range had sullied his features, it had done something else entirely to his perspective. For the first time in a long while he was starting to feel good again.
He walked out of the bathroom, passing Diane’s door. He had the sudden urge to re-enter. He remembered her lips and the contour of her face in the moonlight. She was a damn fine-looking woman. Clearly they’d been appreciative of each other.
He returned to the couch and made the call. First to Svegman, but got his voicemail a second time. When he pressed zero it rolled over to an assistant’s voicemail. He finally redialed and left another message for Svegman.
Then he dialed the Sheriff. The on-duty deputy patched him over.
“Dean Goddard.”
“Sam Rivers, Sheriff. You work every Saturday?”
“Every Saturday. Beats Belinda’s church services,” he said. “She’s gone at the crack of dawn and doesn’t come home until after supper.”
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