by Elle Thorne
Steam rose from the boiling pot, and Maisie could picture how her hair—which had seen better days, to begin with, after the walk in the heat—was now plastered to her scalp. “Yeah, that’s not his real name. It’s a nickname.”
“Come on!” Angie flailed her hand, indicating for Maisie to spill the tea, to give her the goods.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure I feel right about contacting his family.”
Angie closed the lid emphatically, picked up Cash, and held him tightly to her chest. “Look at him. Do it for him. He deserves a better life than you had. A better life than he’s got.” When she caught sight of Maisie’s expression, she came close, hugging her, then turning it into a three-way hug with Cash. “I’m sorry, honey, I’m not trying to say you’re not doing a good job. You’re doing the best you can. But the cards are stacked against you.”
Maisie nodded. She hadn’t taken offense. She knew life sucked for them, and it was because of her limitations.
“Do it for Cash,” Angie prompted. “Do it for him. Look at this face.” She held him by the chin. “How can you say no to this face?”
Doing it for Cash. “Fine. Beau MacIntosh.”
“Yesss.” She fist-pumped, put the baby back in the bouncer, handed him a fire truck, turned the radio on to some country music, and flipped the laptop open again. “B-E-A-U.” She spelled out loud, pecking on the keyboard like a hen going after a kernel of grain. “M-A-C?” She glanced up at Maisie. “M-A-C or M-C?”
“M-A-C.”
“Got it.” She proceeded to put the rest into the search engine, then, “Where’s he from, ‘zactly. Any idea?”
“He said Appalachians. Wait, no. Blue Ridge Mountains.”
“I think those are a part of the Appalachians.” Angie shrugged. “What do I know, right? I’m a Colorado girl who moved west. I don’t know anything about anything east of Colorado.”
“Seems he said Bitter Hollow was the name of the town.” She hoped she remembered correctly. It had been a long time since those pillow-talk days with Bruiser. And she’d sooner have forgotten about him and anything related to him.
“I found a MacIntosh, Paul. He’s in Bitter Hollow. Between Asheville and Roanoke. That’s North Carolina and Virginia, in case you didn’t know. Because I didn’t.”
“That’s it in the whole country?”
“Well, no, but it’s the only one with a son named Beau.”
That caught Maisie’s attention. “And he’s in Bitter Hollow?”
“Sure enough. Has an email address right here. Want me to—”
“No.” She poured the pasta and hot water into the strainer already in the sink, stepping back to keep the steam from burning her already too-heated face.
On the table next to Angie, their house line rang. “It’s Dink.” She picked it up. After a few “Uh-huhs,” and “Okays,” Angie hung up. “He’s working a double. I’m sorry, doll. I couldn’t tell him not to take it. We need the mon—well, I know you do, too.”
“It’s okay.” Maisie hugged her best friend/sitter/closest-thing-to-a-sister. It wouldn’t be okay—she knew that—but what else could she say?
“Can Cash have some spaghetti? I’m going to cut it up real small for him.” Angie picked him up, then pointed to the seat. “Sit down. Take a peek at that picture of Bruiser’s daddy. I’d say looks run in the family.”
Angie sat at the table, clicked to enlarge the article.
“I’d say Cash has his granddaddy’s jaw.” Angie juggled the baby, a plate, and utensils before plopping Cash into the highchair her own kids quit using long ago.
Speaking of… “Where’s Bodie and Belle?” Angie had two kids. A boy and a girl, both in their teens and rarely home.
“Clubs, practice, friends’ homes, you name it. Those two stay busy. Thank goodness I have Cash to keep me company when you’re at work. With my own gone and with Dink always sinking into one game or another on the TV, he’s all I have for company.” She tweaked Cash’s cheek, which brought forth a spasm of giggles. “Aren’t you?”
Cash hadn’t started talking yet. It made Maisie wonder if she should be concerned, but Angie had assured her that boys started later. She turned her attention to the article. Paul MacIntosh was a more polished, sophisticated version of Bruiser. And there was a definite resemblance to Cash.
She studied Paul MacIntosh’s face. He definitely did not look like a man to tangle with. She was glad she’d told Angie not to reach out to him.
Chapter Five
Now, there was a name Judd Walker hadn’t seen on his phone’s caller ID in ages. “Paul MacIntosh.” His former employer. Alpha of Bitter Hollow. And at five in the morning, no less. Though it wasn’t quite so early where Paul was.
“Judd.” Paul was a man of few words. The fewer, the better. When he spoke, what he said carried impact. And intent. “Are you still in Nevada?”
“Sure enough am.” Judd had been in Paul’s employ a few years back. Mostly as a bodyguard, occasionally as a heavy, sometimes acting in a bounty hunter position. So what could he want so far away from Blue Ridge Mountains?
“I need you to look into something. It’ll pay well.” It always did. “And I need your discretion. Full and complete discretion and absolute loyalty to me.”
Judd kicked back his heels and rested them on the log, careful not to twitch the fishing line. He’d marinated a sweet—which, in this case, meant putrid—batch of stinkbait from some chicken livers. And he was looking forward to having his own personal catfish fry. Afterward, he planned a shift into his wolf, to roam the forest and howl at the upcoming blood moon.
“Loyalty’s not a problem for me. You know that.” He studied the blue Nevada sky, the Virginia Range, the mountains in the near distance, the starkness of the land he was born in. “Neither is discretion.” Who would he talk to, anyway? Sure, he had his pack at Crooked Arrow, but Judd was a lone wolf kind of guy, a wolf shifter comfortable with his own company. He didn’t do much congregating with the pack unless he was needed, or one of his cousins wanted to put together a get-together. Or for his occasional attendance at the annual ShifterFest.
“I knew I could count on you. As I mentioned, it’ll pay well.”
“You always do.” True enough.
“You won’t even need to leave your state for this one.”
Now that piqued his interest. What kind of business did Paul MacIntosh have in Nevada? “What are the particulars?”
“I received an email that I might have a grandson near Reno.”
Judd started to reel the line in, pretty certain he’d be heading to Reno in short order.
“Sounds like I interrupted your fishing.” There was a smile in Paul’s voice.
Damned if shifters didn’t have the best hearing, even over cell phones. “Nothing I can’t pick up later. So, you were saying… Grandson?”
“Seems Beau might have sown some wild oats out there.”
“I didn’t know Beau was in town.” Would he have heard about a strange wolf shifter being in the area? He’d never personally met Beau. The wolf shifter had never been around Paul’s when he’d been there.
“Apparently, he went by Bruiser. I haven’t heard from him in more than a year.”
The fractured relationship between father and son wasn’t news to anyone, especially not Judd, but it still wasn’t something that was discussed, and certainly not by him.
“So, you want me to find Beau, too?”
“No. My errant son can find his way home at his own pace. But I have no doubt if he’s got a son out there, he’s got nothing to do him. And that’s my blood. My grandson should be at Bitter Hollow. Learning about his heritage. Reaping the benefits of my hard work.”
He’d never heard Paul speak so many words in one sitting. Clearly, this was a matter he was passionate about.
“I’ll find this grandchild, if it exists. How did you hear about him?”
“An email from a friend of the girl who had the baby. The friend mention
ed the girl didn’t want her to reach out to me, but she felt, under the circumstances, she should.”
Peculiar. “What circumstances?”
“Not sure. That’s all the email said. I have her name. The friend’s name. I had someone try to talk to her—”
Well, damn. He’d have rather had no attempts made that might taint his efforts. “How’d that go?”
“It didn’t.”
The tone in Paul’s voice made him nervous. Too damned nervous. “That’s it? It didn’t?”
“You’ll find out. Name’s Angie Roberts. Lives in a trailer park outside town. Texting you everything I got.”
Chapter Six
Cash was teething. Finally. Though Angie had said not to stress out over it, he’d hit his first birthday and had not a single tooth in his mouth. She’d have taken him to the pediatrician, but between Angie and Dr. Google, she’d worried about it a little less. Sooner or later, she’d need to take him in for a doctor’s visit, though. He’d need some kind of immunizations. Dr. Google said between 12 and 15 months. So, in the next three months.
But until then, she had this to deal with. Last night, after she’d returned from Angie’s, Cash had turned from an angel into a little demon. He kept screaming and growling at her. And now he was howling. No matter what she did, nothing worked. Pacifier. Chewie toy. Ice-cold washcloth on his gums. None of it.
He snapped. He snarled. She’d cuddled him, but by now, she was beat.
“Come on, little man. Don’t you want some sleep?” She nuzzled his cheek, burying her face against his neck. It was 3 a.m., and the light filtering through the open shutters had a reddish-orange cast to it. The clouds were a burnt-orange hue that she couldn’t help but stare at. She held him and paced in the dimness of the room, keeping the lights out so he would be lulled to sleep. Back and forth in the bedroom she shared with him, over and over.
Passing by the window, she noticed the clouds had moved on, revealing a wild-looking moon. More red than orange, it made a shudder travel the length of her body.
Cash turned around in her arms, stared at the moon. His eyes glowed, it seemed. She blinked the sleep away and gawked. No, they weren’t merely glowing. They were like liquid silver. It reminded her so much of the time Bruiser’s eyes had done the same.
Cash pointed to the moon, his face serious, then he threw his head back and released a howl that didn’t sound human.
Now, Maisie was no expert, and she didn’t know jack about babies and teething, but this seemed way different how it should be. “You’re going to wake the neighbors, Cash.” She put a finger over his lips. “Shhh.”
She moved away from the window, thinking maybe the freaky moon bothered him. It unsettled her as well, though she couldn’t understand why a one-year-old would be. She went into the completely dark room where they slept. The blackout curtains were in place because she waited tables until two in the morning and then had to stay until four, cleaning and doing side work. She needed not to be awakened by the sunrise.
Cash stopped howling, but he squirmed so much in her arms she was afraid he was going to wriggle himself right out of her hold and onto the floor. She took him to the bed, laid him down, then cuddled up next to him.
“Let’s get some sleep. Momma’s tired.”
His usual response was to coo and giggle. Not this time. A snarl so ferocious and animalistic made the hairs on her neck stand up.
Next, she heard some creaking and stretching sounds, like something being broken and pulled taut. Then came a whimper, a sound she’d never heard from Cash. Not ever. Her baby didn’t whimper.
She couldn’t have stopped what she did next—leaning over to the lamp sitting on the beat-up nightstand and flipping on the switch, flooding the room with glaring light.
Half-buried beneath the covers, Cash yelped.
She screamed.
There was a goddamned tail sticking out of the covers, right next to where her son was. Jesus, what sort of rodent had come in? She flung the covers back.
And screamed again. And again. And the more she screeched, the more her mind rejected what her eyes beheld.
Before her, on her very bed, was her baby boy, except he was in the middle of becoming something else.
Something furry.
Something cute.
Something scared. His eyes rolled and widened in fear.
He was—
She stared, not wanting to touch but at the same time, fighting the urge to snatch him up and hold him.
He finished transforming, and there before her—
A wolf pup! A little wolf pup?
She clamped her mouth shut when she heard knocking on the backdoor.
“Maisie!” It was Jimbo, her next-door neighbor. “Maiz, you alright in there, gal?”
“I’m fine,” she shouted at the top of her lungs. “Bad dream, Jim. That’s all.”
“Yeah, well, how do I know someone’s not in there with a knife to yer throat, makin’ you say that?”
“Oh for f—” She glanced down at the wolf pup who used to be her son. “For fudge’s sake.” Then she yelled, “Coming!”
Seconds later, she cracked the door while holding the pup. “See?”
He squinted at her. “Wider. I want to make sure no one’s behind the door.”
“You watch too much TV,” she said with a forced laugh. She opened it wide.
Cash-wolf-pup snarled at Jimbo.
Great. Not what she needed. “Easy, Ca—” Damn. She almost called the wolf pup Cash. “Cal,” she finished lamely. So lame.
“You got a pup? Where’s your boy?”
This garnered Jimbo more snarls. Cash had never warmed up to the older man.
“He’s not here. He’s—” He’s a damned wolf! Look at him! In an alternate reality, she’d say that. But in today’s reality, she finished with, “He’s at Angie’s.”
“Could be someone’s holding him in one of the bedrooms, knife to his throat, making sure you get rid of your nosy neighbor. I’m wise to a criminal’s ways, Maisie Malone. Wise to them, I say.”
“Jesus, there ain’t no one else here.”
He barged his way in. “I’ll see that for myself.”
That was when she noticed he had a pistol in his hand. “What’s that for?”
“The way you were hollering?” He kept walking, opening doors, peeking into closets, around corners. Finally, “Seems it’s all okay.”
He petted Cash-wolf-pup’s head as he passed. Cash-wolf-pup snapped at him, catching his finger.
“Damn. That’s a vicious little sucker you got there. He one of them part-dog, part-wolf hybrids?”
“That’s exactly what he is. Now, if you don’t mind, Jimbo, I’d like to get—”
“Gotcha. Gotcha.” He headed out, closed the door behind him.
She sat in the recliner that had more springs than cushion and held Cash-wolf-pup in her lap, studying the eyes with their swirl of silver in them. “What am I gonna do with you?”
That question was just the beginning of all the problems she could see in her future.
How would she get Cash-wolf-pup to become human again?
How could she leave him and go to work? What if he became a little boy again? Did she cage Cash-wolf-pup only to return and find her baby in the cage?
Then, as the full impact of what had happened sank in, she realized she didn’t have her baby anymore. And she didn’t have a clue how to process that.
Chapter Seven
It had been a full twenty-four hours since Paul MacIntosh called Judd in on the case. He was planted outside, down the block from the house that belonged to the woman who’d reached out to Paul. Angie Roberts. He’d been here for twenty-three of those hours, and not a single soul had left or come in. No lights went on or off. Something was up.
He noticed the wind picked up, and he was downwind of the house. He sniffed the air. Shifter. He took another long draw, letting the scent linger over his olfactory senses extra-long. Bear shift
er? Why would a bear shifter be sniffing around the area where a wolf shifter’s pup might be seen? Was it a territorial thing? Did the bear want to kill the pup?
Another scent hit him. One he knew only too well. Blood. A whole lot of it. And he was sitting straight downwind from it. Soon as the sun went down, he was going to break into that trailer and figure out the source of all that blood. Unfortunately, he didn’t like where his mind was taking him.
He’d done his share of research and recon on the family of Dink and Angie Roberts. They had two teenage kids. And if no one was coming or going, then…
That damned trailer park didn’t roll up its sidewalks early, that was for sure. Even though the sun had set, the place still hummed with activity. All except for three trailers. The Roberts family’s trailer, which was completely dark. Another trailer, also dark, catty-corner from where he was, a bright-yellow paint job, lattice skirting, and tons of hanging plants and a pair of Adirondack chairs. And a third trailer, lit up, dingy on the outside, aluminum skirting falling down on the job, and not a soul had come and gone.
The trailer park didn’t slow down until three in the morning. Still no sign of life in the three trailers that had no activity, though the third one had gone dark. So whoever was in there had finally gone to bed.
With the stealth of a creature accustomed to moving about at night, though he was in his human form, Judd made his way to the Roberts’s home and around to the back, because what half-decent break-in artist would want to use the front door? He stepped on the deck, which was in bad need of repair, what with rotting boards and peeling paint. He tried the back door, turning the handle slowly.