A Wolf of Her Own

by Susanna Shore

  The redhead offered his hand and Kieran tensed when she shook it. "Nicholas Fortier. This here is Jasper Grayson. And yes, I like horses. Papa Bear, not so much."

  The other bloke shrugged. "I’m more into cars."

  "You said your sheep were killed too?" Nicholas asked.

  Gemma nodded. "Three of them. I can take you to the kill site if you want, although we already moved the carcasses."

  Kieran had no intentions of letting her go alone with the warriors, so he followed the vampires when they took off towards the back meadow, on foot this time. Their pace was brisk, but not overly so, yet he was beginning to feel lightheaded before they were halfway there. It took him a moment to identify the cause and then he cursed. He had shifted too many times today, each shift draining his Might reserves, affecting him in human form too. But he pushed the tiredness away. Gemma needed him.

  "So where’s Tom?"

  Gemma smiled. "He’s on his honeymoon."

  The vampire warriors both halted mid-step. Then they burst out laughing.

  The day had taken a turn from gruesome to bizarre. A far cry from the tedium, solitude, and repetitive manual labour Gemma had imagined her week would be filled with. The warriors now baffled her more than they frightened. Never in her life could she have imagined they would be so … normal. They were likeable even, once the male grandstanding had ended.

  The fight had shaken her. It had been brutal, but that hadn’t been the worst of it. Her Rider had found it exciting, and had goaded her to join in. Fear and the thrill of the fight had filled her system with adrenaline, making it difficult for her to resist its demands. So she had ended the fight, the only solution she had been able to come up with. Only after she had poured the water on the men did it occur to her that it hadn’t necessarily been the wisest action to take. It had worked, though, and it didn’t look like the men would resume hostilities.

  It didn’t mean they would lower their guards. Kieran was tense, his attention on the vampires. He walked between her and the vampires, a place he had assumed from the start, protecting her. Every time the uneven path made their formation fluctuate, forcing a row of four to turn into a line and back to a row again, she found herself being steered to one side of the path with the warriors on the other. It was like being herded by a helpful sheepdog.

  He reminded her of her wolf friend who had always strived to make her feel safe, but he was different as well. For one, Kieran was not a tame dog. If she hadn’t already known it, the fight would have made it clear. He would do anything to protect himself, his clan—and her.

  "So … how do you know Tom?" Ordinary vampires didn’t usually associate with the Circle.

  Nicholas shrugged. "We’ve seen each other around. At the races, mainly." Epsom hosted a race course and Tom had always loved going there, so it made sense.

  Kieran smiled. "Perhaps your notion of gambling debts is correct after all."

  "I wish." It would make all of this more understandable.

  "Tom isn’t exactly a gambling man," Nicholas noted. "And it wouldn’t explain why our sheep were killed as well. So, who is it he’s married then?"

  "I have no idea." It was starting to gall her she had to admit it.

  "Not very close, are you?"

  The question hurt, more so because it was true. But they had been close once, especially after their father died. They’d only had each other. "I live in London." It was as good an explanation as any.

  The kill site didn’t smell as horrible as it had now that the carcasses were gone. There was nothing much to see though, as tracks and footprints covered the traces. The warriors studied everything with keen eyes anyway. "You tracked the killers?" Jasper asked Kieran.

  "Yes. They headed north and got into a car at the Old Mill Road."

  "Fuck."

  The warriors walked farther away to get a better scent. When they returned, Kieran asked, "Are they the same wolves as at your place?"

  Jasper nodded. "Yes. And it seems they came to our farm first, then here, travelling in the wolf form."

  "All the way from Ewell?" Crimson Circle was technically a secret organisation, but all vampires knew where they were located.

  "No, it was on one of our smaller farms, less than five miles from here."

  "Why would strange wolves come here and target two farms owned by vampires?" Gemma asked.

  Kieran sneered and the anger that seemed to constantly simmer in him surfaced. "Isn’t it obvious? They want to cause ill will between us. And they succeeded."

  "Hey, we already apologised," Jasper said defensively.

  "But why would anyone want that?" This really didn’t make any sense to her.

  "There are people who would prefer the Circle’s attention to be otherwise engaged," Nicholas said.

  "Who?" Kieran demanded sharply.

  Jasper sneered. "You don’t need to know that."

  Kieran tensed, and without a thought Gemma placed a hand lightly on his arm, a reminder of his surroundings. He put his hand over hers, acknowledging it, and his anger subsided. "If someone is trying to implicate us, I’d like to know who it is," he reasoned. "I have my clan to protect."

  "They’re an old enemy of ours, and not something you can fight against. We couldn’t find a trace of them here, but it doesn’t mean they’re not behind this, pulling the strings."

  The vampires wouldn’t say more. Nicholas fished a calling card from the pocket of his leather jeans. "Here’s a contact number, should you find anything interesting." He offered it to Gemma and she accepted automatically, too used to the gesture to question why a Circle warrior would want her to call him. Surely he didn’t believe the killer wolves would return?

  Chapter Eight

  Kieran relaxed visibly after the warriors left and Gemma breathed more easily for it. "Do you want to come back for tea?"

  The meadow was closer to the Greenwood clan estate than her home, so she was sure he would refuse and head home, but he nodded. "I’d love some." Her smile held all the relief she felt.

  Kieran’s attention was on her during the walk back, not on imaginary threats. Having that intensity directed at her was baffling, but not unwelcome. He smiled and chatted with her about small things, his work as an architect in London and hers as a PA, as if the fierce wolf had never surfaced. She could get used to this man.

  They fetched Polly and Maura on their way past their meadow. The dogs attached themselves to Kieran, following his every move with keen eyes. He picked up a stick and threw it for them to fetch. They shot after it, squabbling over which one could pick it up, and returned it with a devout look on their faces.

  "I really thought dogs would be afraid of shifters," she noted.

  He smiled, throwing the stick again. "Most people do. Maybe it’s because we seldom have pets. Although I believe cats are very popular among feline shifters of all types."

  Gemma tried to picture a tiger-shifter she knew from work with a cat and failed. "Pets are often very wary of vampires."

  "I think it’s because of our different impacts on Might. The way shifters resonate with it makes animals more comfortable around us."

  "Or maybe it’s because we’re the ultimate predators?"

  He put a hand on his chest, as if wounded. "Ouch. Wolves like to think we’re the biggest bad there is." But he didn’t deny her words.

  Back at the house, Gemma let the dogs into their pen. Rissa greeted her offspring enthusiastically, like a young dog despite having trouble walking properly. Gemma studied her worriedly and wondered if she would have to call a vet for her.

  She filled their bowls with fresh water and then led Kieran into the house through the small porch at the back that opened to the kitchen. They took their muddy boots and coats off and she offered Kieran a pair of Tom’s slippers and donned her own as well. They would help ward off the coldness of the stone floor.

  She filled a kettle and put it on the stove to boil. Tom didn’t have an electric kettle, but at least they had a gas s
tove instead of the old coal burner from her childhood. Her father had got them one when he installed the electricity and running water in the 1940s. This wasn’t the same stove—Tom had replaced it at some point—but it was still old.

  Everything in the kitchen was old, like it had always been. The few modern additions stood out, like the brand new fridge and freezer. The previous units hadn’t been terribly old either, not by this kitchen’s standards, but they didn’t make them like they used to, as Tom had rued over the phone when he told her about the purchase.

  The surface of the limestone floor was worn soft after centuries of use. The walls were whitewashed, a new layer added over the old one periodically. A trestle table stood in the middle of the room, its surface polished white from age, with long benches on either side. Two placemats sat opposite to one another—the same two that Gemma had purchased before she moved away. The deep enamel sink was from the sixties, the plumbing redone in the seventies. Two freestanding cupboards from the time before her birth were filled with china she had chosen and purchased from a mail-order company in the eighties. She had got so fed up with the old set she had carried everything to the backyard and broken every piece one by one in a satisfying fit of anger.

  Tom didn’t speak to her for a week.

  The once cheerfully yellow curtains were those she had selected too, though she couldn’t remember when that had been. They had always been there.

  "This is a nice kitchen."

  "Hmph."

  He lifted an amused brow. "I take it you disagree?"

  "I just don’t understand the need Tom has to preserve everything. I know vampires have a tendency to be conservative and live in the past, but he’s worse than most." He took after Father, who had needed everything to be the way it had been before Mother died.

  "I was under the impression that vampires are experts in adjusting to changing times."

  Gemma had to think about it. "I guess we must be, at least outwardly, so that we don’t draw attention to ourselves. I know I’ve tried my best." An uphill struggle all the way.

  The kettle whistled and she got up to prepare the tea. She set the table for two with biscuits on a plate too, having found them in a jar on the side table. Like that was a surprise. That jar had always contained biscuits. The only surprise was that Tom had switched the brand.

  "I’ve been thinking about what the vampires told us," Kieran said, when she had poured them both a cup. She gave him a questioning look. "About their enemy being behind this. They must mean humans."

  "Why would humans want to start a war between vampires and shifters?"

  "Isn’t it self-evident? Humans have always hated us and there’s been a hardening of attitudes lately. Remember the demonstrations last autumn?"

  "But why would they come here? Humans don’t know about the Crimson Circle."

  He shrugged. "It’s an old organisation. Many people know about it."

  The idea that humans would deliberately cause ill-will between the two-natured made her uncomfortable. "Haven’t they learned anything from the last time?"

  Kieran sneered. "There is no last time from their point of view. They’re so short-lived that they don’t remember the Sentient War or how much damage it caused. It’s not like they teach that in human schools."

  "I guess it would serve extremists to get us fighting amongst ourselves. We’d do the dirty work for them."

  "Exactly. And I don’t think they’ll stop until they succeed."

  "Well, fudge."

  Kieran burst out laughing, easing the atmosphere. "No matter how many times I hear you say that, it still delights me."

  "What, fudge?"

  "It’s such a wonderful euphemism."

  Gemma shrugged. "Mother really abhorred foul language, and not only in women. I don’t think Tom swears much to this day. You’re the first one to mention it though."

  He smiled. "I’m not terribly foulmouthed, but I need to release steam every once in a while. A good swear word helps."

  "Yeah, well, with vampires it’s imperative not to let the steam build in the first place."

  "What, not at all? Didn’t feel like that earlier with the warriors."

  "They weren’t angry. You were." The warriors had been brutally effective, but barely affected by the fight.

  He paused. "That’s true. I guess it’s that same difference with our energies. Yours is cool and ours is hot." If only it were that simple. But she couldn’t tell him that without disclosing the best kept secret vampires had: the Rider. Few knew that their second nature wasn’t magic but a sentient being like with other two-natureds’, and vampires liked to keep things that way. "I wonder what excuse humans use."

  "Well, my two housemates have no compunctions about swearing. But at work everyone behaves civilised."

  "You share a house with humans?" He sounded astounded.

  "Yes. I wouldn’t want to live with other vampires, and shifters prefer to keep among themselves. What choice do I have? It’s frightfully expensive living in London."

  "Many people pay good money to live in Epsom so they don’t have to live in London," he noted, amused. "I commute."

  She shuddered. "I was stuck here for a century before I won the sun. That was enough of this place, thank you very much."

  "So what’s it like, living with humans?"

  "Easy. I don’t get sudden urges to drain them dry," she said, amused. "But it can get really exhausting, too, pretending to be human."

  He recoiled. "You’re in hiding?"

  His strong reaction to such an innocent remark baffled her. "Many two-natured are in hiding." Most of them were, in fact, at least to some people.

  "Only the cowards."

  "I am not a coward!"

  "Exactly."

  His assessment of her felt good, but she wasn’t about to give in. "Sometimes you have to keep things secret from humans. It’s for their own good."

  "You should think of what’s good for you."

  "This is good for me!" She was losing her temper, never a good thing, but especially perilous today when her Rider had been close to the surface the whole day. "And you’re the one to talk. You didn’t want to tell humans that wolves killed the sheep."

  He closed down so fast, his energy retreating, that she staggered for the loss. "I have my clan to protect."

  "Why would humans care if wolf-shifters kill vampires’ sheep?"

  "Tell that to my brother." His anger was mixed with grief now.

  "What happened to him?"

  "You mean you don’t know?" he asked, genuinely surprised.

  "How should I know about your brother? I’ve told you I’ve not associated with the clan much, apart from my wolf friend. And he went away when I was eight, so that’s 120 years ago."

  His face hardened. "Humans killed my brother, Colm. Shot him when he was in wolf form as vigilante justice after some sheep were killed."

  Her heart melted for him. "I’m so sorry to hear that." She reached over the table and put her hand on the fist he was squeezing tightly to ward off the grief. "When was it?"

  He sighed. Then he looked her directly in the eyes. "About 120 years ago."

  Shock made her bones go liquid. Her control slackened and the Rider surged to the surface, forcing her to shut down completely. She closed her eyes tightly, but not before she had a brief glimpse of the world through alien eyes.

  "I’m sorry, but you have to leave now."

  Kieran was back at the manor before he was suitably calmed down, the long walk almost not enough to let out his spleen. The day had been straining as it was, rubbing his emotions raw. He hadn’t thought of Colm this much in ages, but the memories and emotions his death caused were rushing back.

  He was sorry to have caused Gemma such a shock, but why had she driven him out? It was obvious Colm had been her wolf friend, and his death news for her, kept from a little girl on purpose no doubt. They could have grieved together. He wanted to be there for her, to console her. That she wouldn’t
allow him made him feel restless, like he had unfinished business to do.

  His grief for Colm had a bittersweet taste to it. It was wonderful that Colm had been her protector, but it upset him, too, that he had kept it a secret from his family. He would have wanted to know Gemma when they were children. He wished he could have been there for her. That he had been only ten at the time was irrelevant. He had an overwhelming need to keep her safe, the feeling more baffling because it felt so natural.

  He had always been protective, a trait he had learned or inherited from Colm. Older by decades than Kieran and Aidan, he had always kept them safe. In a way, losing the sense of safety his brother had brought to his life had affected him worse than knowing it had been humans who had killed him. But he had needed someone to blame.

  He had thought he was over his resentment. He worked with humans every day. But learning that Gemma was in hiding—closeted, humans would say—angered him. Such a strong, beautiful woman shouldn’t have to hide what she was from anyone. He had never hidden his true nature, having been too stubborn for it, hating humans too much to pretend to be one of them.

  But Gemma, too, had lost her protector when Colm died, and she’d had no one to replace him with. If Tom and her father had been there for her, she wouldn’t have needed Colm in the first place. She used to hide in the forest from her mother, so perhaps hiding was a natural reaction for her still. He shouldn’t judge too hard.

  He entered the manor through the kitchen door and was instantly met with Vincent, who shot up from the stairs where he had been sitting. "Where have you been the whole day?" the boy demanded with a hurt look on his speckled face. He was still wearing his school uniform, even though school had ended hours ago. "I’ve been waiting for you."

  Kieran’s heart warmed in delight. Vince was such a great boy. His brother was a lucky man to have a son like him. "Why?"

  "No one believes that I bested everyone by being clever."

  Kieran laughed. "And you need me to verify it. Very well. But we must get you home first." He headed back out, herding Vince before him.