Bride of the Wolf

“Rachel,” she said, trying to smile. “It was a very long time ago.”

“I was also an orphan,” he said. “When my father died, Jedediah took me in and raised me as his own son.” He laid his hand over hers. “We have something in common, Rachel. I think we’ll be good friends.”

His words were too bold, and she drew her hand away. “I hope you will feel more welcome here when Jedediah returns.”

He leaned back again. “I hope you’ll speak to my uncle on my behalf. I have no doubt he’ll listen to you.” He hesitated. “I also hope you’ll take my advice, Rachel, and remain alert to any attempts Renshaw may make to undermine your position here. He will no doubt attempt to frighten you away.”

“I am Jedediah’s wife,” Rachel said. “Even if he were to dare attempt it, I assure you that I will not allow him to intimidate me.”

“I believe you. I don’t believe he will resort to physical means, but he is by nature a violent man. Be wary.” He rose abruptly. “I’ve taken too much of your time. If you should need an advocate, I won’t be far away. I’m staying with the Blackwells and hope to have employment with them very soon. Send a hand with a message to Blackwater anytime.”

It seemed a gallant offer, though Rachel could not quite shake the feeling that Sean expected greater intimacy than she was prepared to give. She rose to see him to the door. “Thank you for coming, Sean,” she said. “You have made me feel very welcome.”

“The least I can do for kin.” He tipped his hat. “I hope to see you again soon, Rachel.”

As soon as he had gone, she went back to the bedroom. The baby was just beginning to stir. He opened his blue eyes and smiled.

She knelt beside the bed. “What am I to think, little one?” she asked him, tracing his cheek with a fingertip. “I ought to trust Jedediah’s nephew. He is the closest thing I have to kin here, and he has been kind.”

So few people had ever been truly kind to her. Yet she couldn’t feel entirely easy with Sean or the things he had said, and upon reflection she began to understand why. He had admitted to a certain weakness of character in his unwillingness to stand up to Jedediah’s foreman in his uncle’s absence. He had suggested that Renshaw had attempted to bribe her in Javelina, yet he had not confronted the foreman with his suspicions. He had clearly suggested that she might find it difficult at Dog Creek while Jedediah was gone—that Holden Renshaw could be a threat to her, even capable of violence—yet he was leaving nevertheless. His offer to be her advocate seemed little more than empty words.

And there were other questions. Was she to believe that Jedediah possessed such poor judgment that he would listen to unjustified criticism of his own nephew by his foreman? Was Holden Renshaw so consumed by jealousy and greed that he would scheme to undermine Sean at every turn? Had he given the baby into her care while simultaneously intending to drive her away? How could he hope to make her leave when he had accepted her as Jedediah’s wife? She could make no sense of it.

He ain’t as mean as he looks, Joey had said. The boy seemed to look up to Holden Renshaw as an older brother, perhaps even a father. His account, brief as it was, could not be more thoroughly opposed to Sean’s.

But that only meant she must be even more wary. She knew that if she reported Sean’s visit to Holden Renshaw, or confronted him openly with what Sean had told her, she would get no closer to the truth. Guilty or not, Renshaw would simply deny Sean’s accusations and doubtless fling a few of his own.

That Renshaw could be dangerous she did not doubt; she had determined as much from the very beginning. She did not like him in the least. But those considerations could not possibly illustrate the full truth of his character. Had she not recognized even before Sean’s visit that her first impressions might be wrong?

Eyes like brooding thunderstorms, gliding muscle and a panther’s grace …

Kicking vigorously against the blankets, the baby gurgled. Rachel shivered and kissed his silky forehead, relieved to turn her thoughts to something less perilous. It was already clear that the child would recover from whatever had ailed him. He would live, and thrive, and grow.

“We shall do very well together, you and I,” she said.

For as long as she was permitted to keep him. She would have given a great deal to do so, though her feelings seemed dangerously impulsive. If his parents were never found … if Jed were willing to accept him …

It was too soon to hope. She would go on as she always had, minute by minute, hour by hour, taking each day as it came.

She lay down beside the baby and listened for Holden Renshaw long into the night.

THE UNSEASONABLY hot morning sun had robbed Javelina of life. Anyone with sense was indoors at the saloon next to the general store, in the livery stable or in the few houses that lined the single dusty road through town.

Heath stopped in front of the saloon, helped Lucia Gonzales to dismount from her mule and secured the animal’s lead to the hitching post. It had been a long and dirty ride from the Gonzales place at the far western border of the ranch, but Heath had found what he needed.

He’d expected the pay he’d offered would be enough to convince Lucia to leave the tiny farm her husband and sons struggled to keep alive. There had been an argument between the señora and her man, but it hadn’t lasted very long. Lucia was to live at Dog Creek with her own baby for as long as she was needed, and Luis and their three nearly grown sons would just have to get along without her.

As much as Heath hated to admit it, Lucia was as close to a truly decent woman as he’d ever met. She had made him welcome, insisting he stay overnight in their tiny casa so that she and Heath could start fresh in the morning. And she hadn’t complained once during the ride. She was so quiet he barely knew she was there at all.

Just the opposite of Rachel Lyndon.

Hell. He needed a drink. “We’ll go in for a spell,” he said, giving Bess a command to stay put. “The saloon has a dining room that caters to the stage trade. They’ll have somethin’ for you there.”

Lucia smiled at him. “Gracias, señor.”

He didn’t like being thanked any more than he liked being beholden. He gestured for her to precede him, and they walked through the side door that led into the dining room with its two small tables. It was empty except for two of the three women who lived in Javelina. Neither one of them offered a greeting as Heath showed Lucia to the other table.

“You wait here,” Heath told Lucia. He walked into the saloon and leaned on the bar, catching the bartender’s eye.

“One lemonade,” he said. “And a whiskey. Straight.”

Riley gave him a startled, curious look and went after the drinks. The handful of men at the bar and tables—drifters and unemployed cowhands, mostly—looked up at Heath and went straight back to their drinks. Heath ignored them and picked up the whiskey Riley brought him. The stuff almost always made him feel a little sick; the smell and taste were too strong for his loup-garou senses. He drank it anyway.

The bartender plunked the lemonade on the bar and set him up for another drink. “Heard Jed’s still not back from Kansas,” he said, wiping a glass with a stained towel.

Heath downed the second drink without answering.

“Heard about Jed’s missus,” Riley said.

Heath ordered a third whiskey and nursed it, turning the glass around in his hands.

“They say you found a baby, too,” Riley persisted.

“That’s right.”

It was obvious that Riley wanted to hear a lot more, but he didn’t ask. Heath finished his drink, threw down his money and returned to the dining room with the lemonade. He gave it to Lucia and walked over to the store.

Sonntag greeted him with his merchant’s smile, hovering expectantly. “You found the lady?” he asked.

Heath nodded briefly. Sonntag was one of the few folk in the county who never seemed wary of him. He picked up a roll of cheap cotton and a few other things he thought Mrs. McCarrick might need before Maurice came to town with the wagon. Sonntag called his attention to a fancy painted cradle he claimed he’d just gotten in from San Antonio.

“The best money can buy,” the storekeeper said in his thick German accent. “Where did you find the baby, Herr Renshaw?”

Heath straightened from his inspection and gave Sonntag a steady look. “Be best if people kept more to themselves and worried less about other people’s business.”

Sonntag stood his ground. “You have done a good thing, Mr. Renshaw.”

Heath nudged the cradle with the toe of his boot. “Ain’t got much call for somethin’ like this in Javelina.”

The storekeeper’s eyes gleamed. “For you, Herr Renshaw, and for the new bride, I would offer an excellent bargain.” He pushed up his spectacles. “How is Mrs. McCarrick?”

“Fine,” Heath said through gritted teeth. He strode to the counter and removed a few coins from his money pouch. “You get any more of that jam in?”

“One jar.” Sonntag cocked his head. “No cradle today, Herr Renshaw?”

“I’ll think about it.” Except he wouldn’t be thinking about it at all, because he wouldn’t be making any more personal stops in Javelina if he could help it. Sonntag hadn’t had any ideas about helping Joey find work somewhere else, and Heath didn’t figure anything new would crop up in the next few days. He went out for his saddlebags, dropped them on the counter and left Sonntag to pack his purchases while he looked over the patch of wall the town used for announcements and the rare advertisement.

When he saw the poster, it was like looking in a cracked mirror. The face in the drawing was almost completely covered with a full black beard, mustache and long, unkempt hair. The eyes were the same, but the artist had the nose wrong. The scar across the wanted man’s neck was knotted and ugly. Heath Renier, accused of murder, rustling and armed robbery, had last been seen near Dallas four years ago.

“Quite a villain,” Sonntag said, coming up behind him. “I would not wish to meet him in a dark place.”

Heath let out his breath very slowly. “When did this come in?”

“From San Antonio, with my new goods yesterday. It is a great deal of money, nicht wahr? Ach, what I could do with such money!” Sonntag shrugged. “But men like that are not easily found. His appearance may be nothing like this picture after so many years.”

Heath returned to the counter and grabbed the saddlebags. “Maurice will be along for more later.”

“Very well, Herr Renshaw.” Heath could feel Sonntag’s stare as he left the store, weighing him, wondering. He touched the neckerchief around his throat.

If Sonntag or anyone else had recognized Holden Renshaw as Heath Renier, he would have been arrested by now. But it was a bad sign that they were putting out posters this far south and west. It meant the law was still on his trail and getting closer.

The kid had to get well soon, though Heath would be safe a while longer if he was careful. Coming into Javelina all normal-like, after everything that had happened, probably even worked in his favor.

Just as he put Lucia up on the mule, he heard hoofbeats behind him, coming fast.

He turned around. Amy Blackwell’s bay mare pulled up hard, raising dust hip high.

“Holden Renshaw,” she said, her pretty face twisted with anger. “I hope they hang you for what you’ve done.”

Heath’s heart slammed a dozen times before he got it under control. He touched the brim of his hat.

“Afternoon, Miss Blackwell,” he said. “Reckon they have some hangin’ rope at Sonntag’s. You mind tellin’ me what I’ve done first?”

“You know perfectly well,” she said, tossing back the blond hair she always wore loose around her shoulders. “Sean came to us as soon as you ran him off.”

The tension went out of Heath’s body. He’d never doubted that that was where Sean would have headed first. He’d been in good with the Blackwells for some time, playing up his education at some fancy school back East and the highfalutin manners Jed had paid so much for. Sean had hankered after Amy, too.

Looked like he was getting her.

“Sean tell you why?” he asked. “Or did he just howl like a burnt coyote?”

Her gloved hands tightened on the reins as she shifted on her sidesaddle. “Must there be a reason when a gentleman is run off his own ranch by a jealous cowhand?”

Heath let her see the edges of his teeth. “It ain’t his ranch yet, Miss Blackwell. If he promised to sell you Dog Creek, he’s layin’ you a false scent.”

Amy edged her mount a few steps back and flung up her head like a rebellious filly. “You may be interested to know that we intend to employ Mr. McCarrick at Blackwater. He is not without friends.”

“You want Sean for a friend, Miss Blackwell, that’s your lookout. But he’ll use you, just like he uses anyone he thinks he can string along.”

Amy swung her arm up, and for a split second it looked as if she might try to hit him with her quirt. She didn’t. She just stared at him, hate and confusion in her eyes.

“When Sean’s uncle returns, he will hear about this,” she snapped.

“It’s Sean who should be scared of that, ma’am.”

With a sharp, angry cry, Amy jerked her mare around and kicked it into a run.

“The señorita is very angry,” Lucia said solemnly.

“Yeah.”

“When will Señor McCarrick return?”

“Soon.” Heath took the mule’s lead. “Let’s get on home.”

It was near evening when Heath and Lucia reached Dog Creek. He smelled something wrong as soon as they got near the house.

Joey was waiting for him in the yard, his wiry body vibrating with tension. “Holden!”

Heath dismounted and helped Lucia dismount. “What is it?”

“The hands! They all up ‘n left …’ ceptin’ me ‘n Maurice. They rode in from the range a few hours ago. Didn’t say a word, just lit out again right away.”

Heath pulled off his hat and raked his hand through his hair. “Where the hell’d they go?”

“Don’t know. But—” He bit his lip. “Maurice says Sean was here talkin’ to El and Gus last night.”

Sean. Heath hadn’t seen this coming, and he should have. The son of a bitch would have made the most of Heath being gone. He had a way of making people follow him. People like Amy, too blind or stupid to see through his lies.

The force of his own anger pulled him up short. Why was he so mad? It wasn’t as if he had to worry about problems like this much longer.

“This here’s Señora Gonzales,” he said to Joey. “You show her into the house.”

“But, Holden, we ain’t done brandin’! What are we gonna do?”

“We would have let most of the hands go in a couple of weeks, anyway. Now git.”

Joey didn’t like it, but he did as he was told. He touched his hat to Lucia and led her to the house. When he returned, Heath set him to unsaddling the mule.

“How’d it go with Lucia?” he asked.

“Mrs. McCarrick was sure happy to see her. They showed each other their babies like they was prize bulls.”

Heath was in no mood for laughing. He saw to Bess, shouldered the saddlebags and headed for the house, aware that he stank of sweat and horse and needed a bath.

And he needed a run. A good, hard run to clear his mind and remind himself that he was almost free.

He entered the house without knocking. The whole place smelled of warm human bodies, strong coffee and something good cooking in the kitchen. Rachel was sitting at the table, the baby in her arms. Lucia sat beside them with her own kid, and Heath could see that he’d interrupted their talk. The dim light made Rachel seem different somehow. Not sharp and skinny, with a tongue like a knife, but gentle, like Lucia. It gave him a strange, unsettled feeling in his chest.

Especially because she didn’t look scared now, or suspicious, or angry. She almost looked happy, as if she’d just been given some pretty ribbon or one of those shiny copper pots he’d seen at Sonntag’s.

She almost looked glad to see him.

“I have been speaking with Lucia,” she said with a smile that gave a sparkle to her eyes. “I am grateful that she is willing to help us.”

Grateful. He hated that word; it bothered him worse than her smile. He didn’t want to hear in Rachel’s voice or see it in her eyes, or care if she was glad to see him or not. None of it was real.

He’d planned to do whatever she told him, treat her right so she would stay as long as he needed her. But now that he saw her again, all “grateful” as she was, the old bitterness was rearing up, stronger than reason or sense. Rachel Lyndon troubled him too much, and a day and night away hadn’t eased that feeling. Every time he was around her, it only got worse.

Lucia didn’t make him feel that way. She was quiet. She hadn’t tried to argue or order him around. And she would never betray him, because she would never know any more about him than she knew now.

If Lucia took over the baby’s care, Heath might never have to speak to Rachel again.

“You mind leavin’ us alone, señora?” he said to Lucia.

She gathered up her baby, nodded to Rachel and went into the hall.

“That wasn’t necessary,” Rachel said, some of the light going out of her eyes.

“How’s the kid?” he asked.

“Much better than when you brought him. He will be better still when he has …” She hesitated, getting a little red in the face. “When he has the nourishment he needs.”

Heath didn’t let his relief lead him off track. “Now that Lucia’s here,” he said, “you won’t have to look after the kid no more.”

She blinked and clutched the baby a little tighter. “I beg your pardon?”

“You heard what I said.”

“Perhaps you misunderstood my request for a nurse. Mrs. Gonzales has a family of her own. I would not impose upon her any more than necessary. And I certainly have no plans to surrender the baby’s care to anyone else.”

Confusion wasn’t a feeling Heath suffered often, but this woman had him balancing on a broken fence rail with prickly pear thick on either side. She couldn’t really care as much as she pretended. She was acting on some female instinct, the way any animal did, the same way the wolf in him knew how to be a wolf without ever being taught.

Animals could turn on their own get, and so could human females. They could throw their young away if they got too troublesome, turn from love to hate in an instant. And Rachel Lyndon wasn’t even the kid’s real mother.

Rachel looked up then, and Heath saw that her eyes were wet. She was afraid again, but not in the same way as before.

She was afraid he would take the baby away.

You’re crazy. But somehow he knew he was right. She wanted to keep the baby, even though she didn’t know the first thing about what he was.

Because she didn’t know what he was.

Easing down into a chair, Heath looked at his callused hands. Loups-garous healed fast, and a Change could erase most all the damage that could be done to a man by wind and weather, knife and gun. But if you pushed your body hard enough, even a hundred Changes couldn’t erase all the marks left by a lifetime of hard living.

He almost reached up to touch his neck again, that one wound so bad it had almost killed him. The scar he’d never lose. He remembered that wanted poster in the general store. How did he think he could ever take care of the baby, even when it was old and strong enough to do without the things only a female could provide? What kind of life could he make for a child?

Better than the life he’d had. The kid would never know what it was like to …

He shook off the memories and looked at his son. The boy seemed to be holding Rachel as hard as she was holding him, his little fists clenched in the shawl around her shoulders and his head snuggled under her chin. He turned in her arms just enough so he could look back at Heath.

There wasn’t any way the kid could understand what Heath had said, but his little round eyes spoke just the same.

I need her.

Hellfire.

“I ain’t interferin’ between you and Lucia,” he said, looking away from both of them. “You do what you think is right.”

A little at a time, Rachel’s shoulders relaxed. She rested her cheek against the baby’s, looking just like a picture of the Madonna Heath had seen once in a church. Benevolent, distant, untouchable.

“You must be very tired, Mr. Renshaw,” she said, her voice a lot easier than his thoughts. “Lucia will rest in my room. If you will hold the baby, I’ll make biscuits and coffee.”

A Madonna who wanted to cook for him. And wanted him to hold the baby.

“I don’t expect nothin’ like that from you, Mrs. McCarrick,” he said gruffly. “We got Maurice.”

“I’m sure he is an excellent cook.”

“Good enough for us, I reckon. Maybe not what a lady is accustomed to.”

The word lady came out sharper and angrier than he’d meant. He only had to see the new stiffness in her body to know she was back to old Rachel again.

“You cannot possibly have any idea what I am accustomed to,” she snapped.

“The way you talk says plenty,” he snapped back.

“Because I have an education? How is that proof of prosperity, Mr. Renshaw? In fact, I have known what it is to—”

She clamped her lips together and blushed. He saw pain in the hollows under her eyes and in her pinched lips. Pain he had noticed before but didn’t want to see.

Who in hell was she? And what exactly had she “known”?

“Mr. Renshaw,” she said suddenly, the way someone does when they want to change the subject in a hurry. “There is another issue we must discuss. Where do you propose to sleep tonight?”

The question caught him by surprise. She must have noticed the other bedroom and realized it was his. It made sense that she would want him out of the house right away.

But there was that sense of something hidden that Heath had felt before; it was in her voice and in her eyes, crouching behind her propriety, clawing its way closer to the surface and shredding what was left of the Madonna’s mask. An unexpected wildness in the brown eyes that glanced at him and quickly away.

He flared his nostrils to take in her scent, so subtle under the stronger smells—laundered cotton, the lingering fragrance of soap, a hint of perspiration. And another he knew as well as he did every bend and twist of Dog Creek.

The truth caught his body before his mind. His cock hardened, straining against his britches, and his breath came short.

Rachel was aware of him. Not just as Jed’s foreman, someone she didn’t like or trust, but as a man. Male to her female. Her scent gave her away sure as the smell of bluebonnets announced the coming of spring. She was thinking about things no married woman should. Things he had decided a prim-and-proper lady like her would probably never think about at all.

And he was thinking the same, even though she wasn’t pretty, couldn’t be trusted and thought he was beneath her.

When she ought to be beneath him, her legs wrapped around his waist …

Heath cursed under his breath. Didn’t matter who or what she was. He couldn’t stop his body from reacting. He’d never been inclined to fight what it needed, even when he wanted nothing as much as to stay far away from anything with tits.

Once, years ago, he’d make the mistake of touching a woman like her. Her kind always denied that kind of wanting because it went against what they wanted to believe. Females like Frankie expected nothing but money from a man. They were as honest as any woman could be; they knew what they were and didn’t try to pretend any different. He could leave their beds and never have to look at them again.

If he ever got into Rachel’s bed …

Heath didn’t want to think about that. He didn’t want to feel anything for Rachel Lyndon. Not even mindless animal lust.