by Susan Firtik
He broke away breathing heavily. Still smiling.
"That’s a good thing, right?”
Between gasping for breath and trembling, as he held her at almost arm’s length, she could only nod and smile from ear to ear! When she finally caught her breath and could stand somewhat without toppling, she looked him direct in the eye.
"I am so glad I did that. Cuz I knew I’d never sleep if I didn’t find out...what I might have missed. Good-night, Mr. Wolfe."
She turned and went up the steps into the house weaving, only just a little, on the top step.
****
He’d never understood the expression jaw dropping, until now. He stood there watching her walk away with his mouth open, and a surprised and angry look on his face. Little minx! He adjusted his throbbing cock and thought about chasing after her. Yeah, he would have liked that. He was Alpha male. He was wolf. He felt a primal need to chase her down. And even as he took a step in her direction, stopped, clenching his fists, eyes ablaze, his next thought was a shock, and yet a huge relief.
Mine!
CHAPTER TWO
Keaton took a few minutes to settle down, straighten his clothes, and run his hand through his hair. He needed to walk it off. Breathe! He’d been so ready for Lina, he’d almost lost it like a wolf cub. He was so sure she was his wolf-mate, he had difficulty walking away. She would take time. She was worth it. But it would have to come later, much later, when he was done, if he survived. Now, though, knowing she was near, gave him a reason to live.
Keaton walked around the house to check on progress of the veterinary clinic and talk to the guys working on the house. He’d grown up with some of them and a few were distant relatives.
"Hey slackers…get to work!”
The work gang all turned in one move and boo’d him. Several chuckled and went back to their lunch.
"It’s chow time buddy!" Jason, the dark eyed, muscle-bound carpenter answered him. "And we deserve it. Been working since sunrise trying to beat this rain.”
Jason was one of his second or third cousins, he’d lost count, but they’d grown up together near Keaton's home in the Rocky Mountains and he was sure glad to see he would be around. Keaton had an uneasy feeling the moment he’d stepped foot on the property. The hair stood up on the back of his neck even now, feeling as if someone—somewhere out of sight—was watching. He motioned to Jason who looked up and instantly knew Keaton was trying to warn him. Something was not quite right.
"Keep your eyes open. Watch your back.” Keaton’s eyes conveyed. Jason nodded.
****
Lina watched the men interacting out back from the safety of the shadows in the kitchen. They were a good bunch of guys, except maybe that one man. He was tall and thin with the dark hair. He was...odd. She didn’t remember seeing him around before yesterday. He wore his hair long, parted down the middle, almost old fashioned. He never seemed to join in the chatter or sit with the other men. And come to think of it, she hadn’t seen him working at all. Maybe he was waiting until the other crew finished their tasks. Like how the plumber had to wait for the carpenter or maybe he was the proverbial “foreman” who just told everyone else what to do. No matter, because if he didn’t start pulling his weight she’d have to say something. She couldn’t afford to pay people to stand around doing nothing.
Feeling proud of herself for knowing even that small amount of construction information she smiled. Out the window, she watched Keaton casually sit on the stack of lumber, looking totally at ease and totally hot! Sigh. She knew she wasn’t his type, no matter what his pants had indicated. Most guys would jump any girl if she gave the slightest hint and if she was handy and she was both. Her low self-esteem was bubbling to the surface and she started listing the things she wasn’t, instead of her good points.
She was totally unaware of her beauty, inside or out. She was tall, graceful—usually—and everyone she met became a friend, she never “met a stranger”. Most people described her as friendly and outgoing, and nurturing to a fault, always taking in the unloved and always the champion of the underdog. In her mind she was just plain and sometimes nice. So, she wasn’t the homecoming queen, she did have Keaton's kiss to remember.
“Oh well, pity party’s over. Get back to the things at hand,” she muttered and jumped into her work. She began tearing wallpaper off the opposite wall and taking down some of the cabinet doors. It wasn't rocket science and she knew the more labor she did herself, the less money she’d have to shell out for the contractor and his subcontractors.
Plus she had some rad power tools! One of the younger workers had announced the collection she had was knarly and rad, and although those descriptive words were out of fashion, she grinned like a fool and thanked him. Seems she was desperate enough for any male attention, she’d even take power-tool admiration from a teenager.
"Sad, really.” She went back to the wallpaper with a vengeance born of sexual frustration.
Keaton sat with the guys for a few minutes more, before leaving them to their work. Jason asked if he’d met the boss-lady. The other young men woo-hoo’d and waggled their eyebrows, while elbowing each other with “she’s hot!” or “she will pass you by boy once she gets a load of me,” or “I’d fuck her and her ugly sister!” Although this was typical work-crew banter, Keaton felt his jaw tighten and his hands fisted.
"That’ll be enough, guys." His deep voice, an almost inaudible whisper caught the attention of all of them immediately. They stopped the banter, all but one smart ass, Pete Warren, who had a reputation as a troublemaker anyway. He just had to comment, "I'd bet you a hundred bucks, that if Mr. Keaton here spent the next week around boss-lady, he’d screw her up against a tree and she wouldn’t mind. And if he won’t try for it, by damn, I sure will!"
Lina gasped when she heard that last bit. They were taking bets on her and who would fuck her first? And Keaton was right there with them! She came to the sad conclusion she always did...men were only after one thing. She had thought Keaton might be one of the good guys. Well this just confirmed what she’d been told. All men were dogs! No, that’s insulting to the dogs. "Men are...they’re all just...MEN!” She spit out through clenched teeth. That being the best she could come up with, she pivoted on her toes and left the kitchen stirring up a little dust cloud in her wake. She was shaking with anger and now wished she could growl!
****
Keaton’s eyes started to glow and if Jason hadn’t been there to calm him, he might have beaten Pete to a bloody pulp. Jason had a questioning look in his eye.
"What’s the deal K? You feeling alright?"
"Not sure...I'm not sure what that was about...‘cept you don’t talk about a lady like that.” He had calmed, but his hard voice with its quiet undertones brooked no questions.
"Pete, you ever go talkin’ like that about Ms. Maddox again, you’ll answer to me! Do you understand?"
Pete looked like he would argue, but wisely he nodded and silently stood up from his lunch, and walked away. He tossed his trash into the burn barrel as he walked past, muttering.
"If you wasn’t around, I’d have her any way I wanted and I know fer a fact, she’d like it.”
"What was that, Pete?"
He stopped dead in his tracks. Keaton had heard him from that distance?
"Nuthin.” He stomped off to his truck for his soda. They all knew it was probably vodka or gin, but he was dependable and a good worker so folks who hired him for odd jobs looked the other way and just let him be.
Keaton asked Jason to keep an eye on him. Jason nodded, knowing he would have done it without the request. He liked Lina and had never trusted Pete more than spitting distance. He sure never turned his back on him.
****
The kitchen forgotten for now, Lina concentrated on the front of the house. The farther away from the men the better she felt. Sweeping eons of dust off shelving, carrying truckloads of damaged lumber, wallboard, brick, and other trash out to the dumpster was tiring but rewardi
ng. After three hours of such labor, the front rooms actually looked like rooms rather than dumping grounds.
Finally, after she had spent some of her frustration and anger on her work, she took time to have a lunch of creamy tomato soup, and thick slices of bread, fresh from her soon-to-be-replaced oven, thank God! It was almost an antique, but wasn’t in good enough shape to sell. It was just a piece of junk. After a huge tumbler of iced sweet tea she was refreshed and ready to get back at it. Amazing what you can do, when it has to be done, and you are the only one there to do it. The cabinets in the kitchen came down with no trouble. She broke them down into smaller pieces of lumber so they’d be easier to burn later.
Lina knew she’d overdone it when her lower back complained and her hands were covered in scratches and bruises, although she’d worn gloves for most of the teardown. There were a couple of deep cuts she would have to bandage, and then and only then, she could get some sleep!
Later, as Lina climbed the curved staircase to the second floor for at least the millionth time, she finally let her tiredness take control. She wasn’t walking, so much as shuffling, to the small bathroom down the hall from her room. She showered with her clothes on. They were filthy and by morning they’d be dry enough to wear again need be. She wasn’t crazy enough to dirty up all her clothes. She didn’t have that many anyway.
“Never was much for clothes other than that they be functional and comfortable,” she mumbled to herself. That little inner voice inside whispered, you could dress like a girl once in a while. But she was convinced she didn’t have to wear silk and lace to be a woman.
She ended up with sweats and baggy t-shirts most of the year. But that was when she lived in Colorado, which seemed like years ago, but in reality had only been three months. The heat and humidity here necessitated a wardrobe change. She now wore shorts and tanks, or long, loose, flowing, shapeless sun dresses. And in the middle of a demo what was she supposed to wear, a ball gown? She was practical and too much of a tomboy.
A tomboy even as a young girl, she thought maybe she should have been born a boy. Her mom had taken her to the old mining towns in the mountains west of Denver. These were their only affordable vacations, as they never had any extra money. They could, however, afford to visit the ghost towns being just a short drive from home. The quaint little villages that had developed around some of the old mines were kinda touristy, but Lina loved the clean air, wide-open spaces, and the ghosts. Yeah, she saw ghosts.
Ghosts were her friends. Sometimes it was just a sense of them nearby, but she was seldom really alone. She was never afraid though, even as a child. She remembered all their names fondly, as most of them were nice ghosts, and only wanted their living kin-folk to know they were happy. Some wanted their left behind spouses to continue on, to not mourn them and to be happy. Some had minor property arguments to settle between themselves, over gold mine claims or who owned what piece of land. That seemed odd to her, since they were ghosts. Could they own land? Possibly their heirs would?
Anyway, she did her best to keep the peace, pass along messages and help the left-behinds find wills, important papers, and in one case a large amount of money. When the recipients were accepting of her gift, it made them happy to find closure or peace, and it made her feel good too. When the family wasn’t open to her gift, things could get unfriendly, to say the least.
Ye, she continued to help when she could. Kids at school had called her a freak, a witch, cursed by the devil and those were the polite names. She didn't need human friends anyway. She had her friends, the ghosts, at her home in Denver. She helped her friends in the ghost towns and old mines. They’d been left behind after death, for whatever reason and since she could communicate with them, she felt she had to help. There were times it became a bit dicey, but her friends didn’t have corporeal bodies, so they couldn’t really hurt anyone. Right?
As she grew up, she saw them less and less as she developed real friendships and stopped visiting the mining towns. Regular life, work, bills, and just stuff got in the way of traveling. Her mother, Susan, had always been a strong woman even after recently breaking a hip, but lately she’d been showing signs of memory loss and depression. Lina didn’t want to leave her alone for long, so she gave up most of her travel and worked at home, transcribing medical notes, and selling a few things for friends on eBay.
She tended bar at a small pub nearby, but only after 9 p.m. when Susan was drugged, asleep safe in bed. The owner of the pub was an old family friend and didn’t mind that Lina was barely twenty years old. Lina thought the bar owner had a crush on Susan, but she kept quiet to keep her job and because she and her mom were private individuals.
Then one day Mom was just gone. Physically she remained, but she’d left everyone else behind, including Lina, for a world of her own making. She talked to someone not there. Telling him how she loved him and wished he hadn’t left her so alone. She spoke of how she understood his leaving them but missed him so badly at times, unsure she could go on without him.
Lina patiently got her Mom to talk about him, and after a few months, she figured out the “he” was her dad. She also gathered that once Susan was pregnant, he had left them totally alone. He deserted them! Mom defended him, saying he couldn’t stay, that he’d had very important things to do but Lina didn’t buy it. They’d been deserted and no matter how important “things” were, your family should be number one. Lina didn’t know if she was hurt, angry, or both.
She couldn’t do anything about either, since she still didn’t know his name, his age, or what he might have done for a living. It was as if he didn’t exist except in her mother’s memories. She didn’t know how to trace a ghost. She made herself laugh at that one, since she kinda could trace them. But...would she? Should she?
After another month or two of prompting her mom to talk, Lina discovered he’d been from Morris, just one town east of Cypress Woods. She found out he might have been related to one of the owners of the mansion and he had dark hair. Not much to go on but it was better than nothing. For weeks she was like that, in and out of her mind on trips to relive the past with him, shutting out everything and everyone. One day, she scared the shit out of Lina when Susan bolted upright from her recliner and said:
"You have to find them, Evangelina Green.
Listen!! Listen!!
They’re out there—together is best.
You have two, you need the rest.
Fill the space, defend our race.
Color spells—Keep evil in hell!"
What the... Then Susan relaxed back into her chair, totally unaware of her outburst. She slept quietly for a while. Lina went to bed that night with a feeling of impending doom. She hardly slept at all that night and never found out how Susan unlocked four-key deadbolts, without a key and down three flights of stairs while in a body cast with a broken hip. And yet that next day, in the early morning, her mom walked from the apartment building, stepped directly in front of a city bus and died instantly.
Those sad thoughts reminded her she was more tired than she thought. Lina turned off the water, twisted the water out of her clothes and draped them over the drying rod in the shower/tub combination. She brushed her teeth, pulled on a clean pair of boy-short undies and a white tank, her usual sleep wear, then shuffled the short distance to her room.
She heard an owl hooting nearby and felt a sense of peace. She’d always been good with animals but since returning to the mansion, that had increased to more than just sensing their emotions or being able to calm an animal. She now had a sensation or a feeling. She couldn’t describe it, but it was like she felt what they felt.
The owl was looking for a mate. She knew it without knowing how she knew. He wasn’t hungry or claiming his territory. He was lonely. That just made Lina feel lonely and as tired as she was, she felt her eyes watering and knew the tears would follow her into sleep. She wasn’t wrong. However, her sleep was uneasy and her dreams full of symbols and signs she didn’t understand.
Then she heard the howls.
She sat straight up and was wide-awake. Coyotes? This close to the house? A shiver ran down her spine as she slowly slid out of her bed over to the open window to scope it out. The moon was full and high in the sky, as it was almost midnight. She could almost make out some movement out beyond the old garden, making a mental note to clean out the weeds and replant the vegetables and the flowers her Grams had always loved. Once that was done she could re-fence the entire yard and maybe feel a bit safer. Maybe.
Another howl and she shivered because it seemed closer. She’d been woolgathering and making those damn mental lists.
"Oh yeah, I need to get some post-it notes for the kitchen. Damnit, there I go again.”
She almost missed the flash of white that sprinted past the far gate to the garden. She sensed the animal’s loneliness, a sadness that was laced with hopelessness. It felt odd. She also knew without a doubt that it wasn’t a coyote. The proud, almost arrogant thoughts portrayed none other than the noble wolf. In Arkansas?
She had to guess it was possible. Even after the authorities had spouted for years there were no bobcats here, she had proved them wrong. She felt proud of her connection with the animals and that had gotten her the notice she'd needed to be heard. It didn’t hurt that she had video of two mated cats with kittens. She smiled at the thought. She’d never divulged the location for fear they’d be hunted, killed, or worse...caged. She'd known the latter would most assuredly kill them, just a much slower and a less humane death than a bullet.
Her eye caught the flash of dark movement heading for the porch below her window. Her heart began pounding.