by Stone, Wendy
“No, we didn’t sleep together,” she said softly, a chuckle to her voice. “You did try, but my father had his guards around me. They wouldn’t have let you get within two feet.”
“Back then, I’m not sure that would have stopped me.”
“You don’t know my father’s guards. It’s the only way I could get him to let me go to college at all. He doesn’t believe in a woman leaving the clan until they are mated.”
“Mated? Do you mean married?”
“There’s a bit of difference in the ceremony, but yes.” She waved a hand in front of her face. “But this is not why I am here. And it doesn’t tell you what you want to know. I stopped you from exposing your magic in front of the wrong people. They would have hauled you away, dissected you after years of studying you in a cage; all in the name of science.”
It was Brady’s turn to laugh. “You sound like a friend of mine,” he said shaking his head. “He’s constantly telling me I’m going to end up in a cage.”
“I’ve been in one, Brady. It’s not something to laugh about.” She pushed up the sleeves of her dress, exposing her wrists and scars that surrounded her arms. “They took blood, chaining me when I refused to do as they wished. They performed experiments on me, poking and prodding until I escaped one night. Since then I’ve been in hiding. I can’t go home to my people. I can’t see my parents or sleep in my own bed. I’ve put them all in danger just by still being alive.”
“Why would they put you in a cage, Molly? That doesn’t make sense. I mean, yes, you have power, but...”
“Those powers come from my mother, Brady. She is a powerful white witch, powerful enough to become the alpha female in my clan even though she isn’t one of them. My... my father has his own kind of powers.” She took a deep breath, staring down at her hands before blowing it out audibly. “My father is a werewolf. He is the alpha male of our clan.” She lifted her head, meeting his eyes with her own.
“Your father is a... a werewolf? You mean claws, tail, a snout?”
“Pigs have snouts,” she said disgustedly.
“So if he’s... then you...”
“Yes, I’m part wolf.”
Brady sat back in his chair, eyeing her for a moment. The first burst of laughter hit him hard and he couldn’t control it, coughing into his hand to try to cover it up. “Oh come on. I don’t know who you are or why you’ve come in here, but I think you’re late for your latest dose of medication.”
He missed seeing her rise, wiping his eyes as the bout of laughter had made them water. But he couldn’t miss the sound of his name on her lips.
“Brady!” she growled, her voice huskier than normal.
“I-I’m sorry,” he stuttered as he tried to get himself under control. He wiped his eyes once more, looking up. “What the...”
She was pulling her dress up and over her head before dropping it to the floor. Tearing off her rings, she dropped them on top of her dress and then pulled off her bracelets. Two quick jerks yanked her earrings out of her ears, to also be dumped on the dress.
Then she was naked, standing in front of him wearing nothing but a single necklace, a pendant in the shape of a pentagram. “My God,” he whispered, staring at her. “You are beautiful.”
“Shut up and watch,” she growled. Tipping her head back, she closed her eyes. A crackle like the sound of creaking bones filled the air.
Brady watched in horror as her body changed in front of his eyes. She bent and twisted, her bones shifting, muscles changing and growing. Her face contorted, her ears moving to the top of her head, turning pointed, her lips thinning and turning black. A muzzle formed, fangs gleaming under curled lips. Red fur grew over her body; a long thick tail grew from the base of her spine.
She snarled once as the final stages of the change took effect, than stood, shaking her body, the long red fur thick and full. Sitting on her haunches, she turned her finely shaped head his way, glaring at him with piercing green eyes, eyes that seemed to ask if he believed her now.
He rose slowly to his feet, coming around from the other side of the desk to stand in front of her, reaching out slowly to touch her ear. She allowed it for a moment, than turned her head, snapping her jaws around his hand, though she didn’t touch him with her teeth. “Holy shit!”
She stood, still holding his hand and took him back to his desk, placing him so he was standing with his back to her clothing. When she let go, she yipped at him.
“Okay, okay I won’t look, but jeez, I’ve seen it before just a minute ago.”
She growled, low in her throat, in warning, and then stepped away.
Brady heard the cracking and creaking and a whine, then the sound of her clothing rustling and the clink of her bracelets.
“You can turn,” she said, her voice a little hoarse.
“Okay, I believe you.” He sat down at his desk, feeling as if his knees were about to give out.
“It’s about time.” She sank down on her chair, fixing her rings and refusing to look at him for a moment. “Now will you agree to help me?”
“I don’t know, Molly. I’ve never dealt with anything like... this,” he said, waving his hand at the floor where she’d changed. “I didn’t even believe in it. I don’t know if I believe in it yet. It’s all pretty Bram Stoker.”
She sighed. “You just watched me change and you still don’t believe I am who I say I am? What do I have to do? Eat some chickens? Chase my tail? Howl at the damn moon?”
* * * *
Molly grabbed her jacket off the hat tree in the receptionist area of Brady’s office, pulling it on with angry hands. She was shaking, she was so upset. How could a man with the power that Brady Knight has not be a believer in the other paranormal species in this world?
She’d grown up believing in the things that go bump in the night. Hell, she was one of them. She gathered the huge mass of her hair into her hands, than pulled the hood of her jacket over it, tucking in the stray curls until the only thing that was visible was the tip of her nose. She couldn’t afford to be seen, not if she wanted to stay out of that cage.
A shiver of fear shook her slender body as she remembered the atrocities those men had committed, all in the name of science. How anyone could condone those kinds of things was beyond her. She reached for the door handle. She had enough money to stay one more night at the halfway house. After that...
“Wait a minute,” Brady said from the door of his office. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
Molly turned and glared at him from under the hood, giving him a look of disbelief. “You called me a liar and you don’t mean to offend me? What did you expect it to do, give me a happy?”
“Come on, Molly. You have to admit that it is a little strange to have a woman seduce me in my office and then strip and turn into a wolf. Don’t you think it would take a little time for the shock of that to wear off? Especially on something as simple and dim witted as a man?” he added, probably trying to make her laugh.
“If you were simple and dim witted, I wouldn’t be here talking to you. You’re my last hope, Brady. I don’t know what to do next. I have nowhere to turn.”
“Why can’t you go to your family?” he asked, slowly coming forward until he could reach and push her hood off.
She shook out her hair, letting it fall in fiery waves behind her. “No, that’s what they’re waiting for. If I go to my parents, they’ll round up as many of us as they can. It’ll be my fault. Mine!” A tear trickled from her eye and she angrily brushed it away.
“Who is looking for you?”
“I can’t tell you,” she said softly. “It’s not your problem. You’ve made your position quite clear.” Another tear fell but before she could brush it away, he wiped it away with his fingertips.
“Come back into my office, Molly. Let’s talk about this a bit more. Tell me what you can and I’ll see what I can do,” he insisted.
“You just hate to see a woman cry,” Molly joked, letting him take her arm and turn
her back toward the office.
“Yeah, you got me. It brings out my knight in shining armor side. It also gets me into a hell of a lot of trouble.”
He sat her in the same seat, going back and closing the door. Then he picked up the phone. “I’m starving and since I’m working this is a tax deduction, so what would you say about Italian from the little restaurant down on the corner? They make the best manicotti in town.”
Her stomach rumbled its answer, making him smile. She’d been on the run so long it was hard to remember what real food was like. But she still had one more thing to tell him before she could relax. “Brady,” she began, hesitation in her tone. “I-I don’t know quite how to tell you this.”
“Tell me what?” he said, dialing the number to the restaurant. “Oh, hi,” he said, holding his finger up at her.
She sighed in disgust, hearing him ordering dinner for the two that even included dessert. Calculating what money she had in her purse, she realized she’d never be able to pay for her dinner and stay in the motel tonight. “No, wait...” she began, just as he hung up the phone. “Call them back and cancel mine.”
“Cancel? But I could hear your stomach grumble from here. You sound as hungry as I feel.” He looked at her in confusion. Then it was as if a light went on in his head. “You’re on the run. You don’t have any money.”
It was an accusation and all she could do was nod and try to maintain her dignity by not allowing the tears to fall again. She rose from the chair. “You don’t need to say anything more, I can see your answer in you eyes.” She turned, pride forcing her shoulders to square and her back to straighten. She was reaching for the door handle when he caught up with her.
“That wasn’t an accusation, Molly. That was disgust with myself for not realizing that if you needed my help so badly you were willing to show me your secret, then you must be on the run. Come back. Dinner is my treat. I’ll just get a receipt and add it to my deductions this year.”
He drew her back in, taking her hand and pulling gently when she balked. When they were both seated, he couldn’t help but tease her. “Any other deep dark secrets you need to tell me? Did you kill anyone?” he joked.
Her face went white. She could feel the color rushing out, leaving her light-headed and sick to her stomach. Her hands shook. “Yes,” she said quietly, “I did.”
Chapter Three
“No, Renee, I’m really exhausted. I had a late meeting with a client and I just want to go home, take a shower and go to sleep.” He paused, listening to the woman on his cell phone, glancing over at the beautiful girl who sat next to him in his car. “No, I’ve had dinner, sweetheart. I’m fine, really. You go ahead and have fun. Tell them hi for me.”
Molly flinched and he knew without asking that she was feeling guilty for taking him away from whatever plans he’d had with Renee. “Yes, me too,” he said into the phone, his eyes flitting from the traffic over to the pale redhead sitting next to him.
When he’d said good-bye, he flipped the phone closed, tucking it back into his pocket. “Don’t worry, Renee’s father is in government and they’re having one of the many dinners so the man can schmooze for money from people to run his campaign. He won’t even realize I’m not there.”
“You don’t need to stay with me,” Molly said quietly. “I don’t plan on running if you plan on calling the cops.”
“Molly, stop it. I’m not going to call the cops, I just think you need to tell me more of what’s going on. I can’t help you unless I know the details. All of them. So let’s start with how they knew what you are.”
“My father owns a huge estate in Colorado and another in Montana. He runs horses and cattle off the one in Montana. The other is a walled and guarded wildlife preserve. It’s where I grew up, well, actually traveling between the two.” She smiled at the memories, a quick gamine-type grin that was gone as fast as it came.
“Let me guess, someone got curious about the wall and decided to see what was on the other side?”
“No.” She shook her head, her fiery curls bouncing. “I was at the ranch. We’d been having trouble with rustlers and someone had killed the new bull my father had bought to give life to our herds. By killed, I mean mauled, half eaten and dumped by the side of the road. I went out to try and scent what kind of animal had done such a thing.”
“By yourself? Shouldn’t you have had someone with you?”
Molly rolled her eyes at him. “I’m a big girl, Brady.”
“Yes, but even big boys can get taken out by guns. Unless…” he paused before adding hesitantly, “Can you be killed by regular bullets?”
Her laughter rolled through the car, full-bodied and rich. Brady couldn’t help but smile.
“What, do you mean silver?” Another stream of laughter poured from her. “No,” she said when she’d caught her breath. “A regular bullet can hurt us, but unless our hearts or brains are completely destroyed, we’re pretty hard to kill.”
“Have you...?”
“Been shot? Yes, four... no wait, five times since I was born. The first time I was but a pup and deserved what I got.”
Brady stared over at the beautiful girl. Hearing her call herself a pup was disturbing in ways too deep to be considered after the day he’d had. Instead, he decided to press on. “So you were out looking for whoever killed the bull your father had bought... What happened next?”
“I’d driven to the site. I could have run there from the house, but it would have wasted precious time. I know I thoroughly checked the area before changing but I guess I must have missed something. Next thing I knew, I had government cars running me down and a tranquilizer dart in my... in my rear end. When I woke, they had me in a cage, a collar locked around my neck and chains holding me in place. I tried to change back so that I could talk to them but...” She stopped talking, turning her face toward the passenger window and staring at the buildings that they were passing.
“But? They hurt you, didn’t they, Molly?” he asked gently, reaching out and taking her hand in his. He felt that same thrill of pleasure, that same connection he’d had when she’d beguiled his mind in his office. “It’s okay, you’re safe. You can tell me.”
“Cattle prods,” she ground out. “They carried cattle prods and the minute I stepped out of line, they zapped me.” She turned around to look at him. “But I got even. There was one man, he was in charge. He liked to use the prod no matter if I deserved it or not. He would smile when I screamed. When I got loose, I took it away from him and shoved it up his ass!” She spoke quickly, forcibly, as if she relished the memory.
Brady flinched at the thought of what a cattle prod up the ass would feel like. “He deserved it, Molly. I don’t blame you.”
“But I killed him, and now they’ll kill me if they find me. And probably anyone who’s helping me. While I was locked in that cage, I remembered seeing you at the college. I remembered the ease with which you did that petty little bit of magic. I had to come and see you, to see if you could help me. You have so much power, Brady. Power and goodness, I can feel it in you. You’re the Magic Man. Will you help me? Please.”
Brady’s jaw moved under his skin as he ground down on his teeth. “I don’t know,” he said slowly.
“Please, God, Brady. They still have my sister. They could be torturing her right now!” A huge tear slipped over her cheek, followed quickly by another and then another. She wiped them away angrily.
“Your sister? You didn’t tell me there was anyone else there.” He slowed to a stop at a red light, twisting in his seat to stare at her.
“In total, if I’m right, there are fifteen others there. I couldn’t see them all, but I could scent them. I would know Tallie’s scent anywhere.” She wiped more tears away, sniffling as she tried to control her emotions. “I don’t know how they got her. She was supposed to be in college.”
“Can you take me back to the place you were being held?” he asked, reaching out and taking her hand. He turned back to the road as
the light changed, but kept her hand in his.
“Yes, I can,” she said, sitting up excitedly. “Does that mean you’ll help?”
“Yeah,” Brady said, shrugging. “We’ll go after you get a good night’s sleep and some real food in your system. Do you have things you need to get from someplace?”
“What you see is what you get,” she said.
Brady tried to dismiss the vision of her standing naked in front of him, naked skin gleaming in the light from his desk lamp. It wasn’t easy. Especially when she looked at him this way, her lovely green eyes full of hope.
A horn blared behind him and he realized he was barely idling, the car creeping down the street. He tried to concentrate on traffic, for both their safety and his sanity.
“I’m going to call a friend when we get back to my place. He’ll be able to help, Molly.”
“No,” she said quickly, shaking her head. “The more people who know where I am, the more people who can tell where I am. I can’t go back to that place.”
“Molly, you’ve got to trust me. If anyone can keep a secret, my friend can.”
She pulled her hand away. “Please,” she whispered. “I’ve never begged, not even when they...” she waved away the memory and the words. “But I’ll beg if that’s what you want. I’ll do whatever you want.”
Brady could almost taste her terror. It was sour, like a shock of lemon on his tongue. “Settle down, Molly. We’ll keep it at just you and me... for now.” She relaxed against the leather seat of his car. “I need to know more about the people who held you. Did you hear any names, maybe a phone call? See any kind of badges that might give me a clue if it was an agency that held you?”
“They were government people, Brady. It was a government-run facility. They had badges and white lab coats and came in with their trays and their needles. I swear, they got off on hurting us.”
Brady pulled into an underground parking structure, using a small remote to open the large gate. He heard her voice quaver and stop as he pulled into his parking space.