Awakened by the Wolf (6 page)

Chapter 7

B
rice hurried down the hall and slipped inside his grandmother's room. A woman lay motionless on the bed. Wires peeked out from the neckline of her gown, and IV tubes sprouted from her arms. The faint line of an oxygen tube rested beneath her nose. The old lady appeared so feeble that she couldn't possibly be his grandmother. He backed up, hoping not to disturb her.

“Is someone there?” The woman's weak voice stopped him.

Brice's mouth went dry, and his body felt as if it had been packed with sand. “It's me, Granny.” He scratched his throat, though the itch seemed to spring from his voice rather than his skin.

“Oh, my boy.” She lifted her tethered arms. “Come give me a hug.”

Obediently Brice trudged to her bedside, bowed over her and offered a timid embrace.

“You call that a hug?” Granny squeezed his neck, then rubbed and patted his back. When he eased away, her celestial-blue eyes scrutinized his hospital garb. “Changed professions, did you?”

Brice snatched the flimsy green cap from his head and sifted his fingers through his hair. “I don't want Dad to know I'm home. I came to see you, not him.”

Granny tsked. “You have to face him sometime.”

Brice doubted that he did.

“End the quarrel, Brice. If not for your sake, do it for mine.” Granny's plea tightened around his heart until he struggled to breathe.

“Dad has to make an effort, too.” Brice limped to the window. “I'm not a priority for him.”

Never had been.

All Gavin Walker's love and attention had gone to his firstborn, the Alpha-in-Waiting. Brice learned at a young age that his father held little regard for him, treating his second son as if he was lower than a pack Omega. Ironic, considering the Walker's Run pack didn't subscribe to the ancient social order for its members. Everyone had their place and purpose, but no hierarchy existed aside from the succession of the Alpha family, which the pack continued to endorse.

“Talk to him,” Granny urged. “You'll be surprised at what he has to say.”

Nothing Gavin Walker said interested Brice. Too many hurts had hardened Brice's heart and mind to listen.

He wiggled the locking mechanism on the window until it loosened. After hoisting the pane up and down several times, Brice returned to Granny's bedside.

Ignoring her one raised eyebrow and one-sided frown, he pulled the chair closer to the bed and sat down. The heat of her silent chastisement forced him out of the lab coat. Guilt ate at him for not giving her what she wanted. Still, Brice wouldn't agree to something that he had no intention of doing. “Tell me what happened last night.”

“The pain started after supper. I told Cassie that I had indigestion.” A mischievous sparkle lit Granny's tired eyes. “She's such a sweet girl. I think you'll like her.”

Oh, he liked her, all right.

“About last night?” Brice fidgeted to find a comfortable position for his leg.

“Cassie dialed 911, gave me an aspirin and then called Gavin. If she hadn't been there, I probably would've gone to bed.”

Brice's heart registered another tally in Cassie's favor. Casually he rubbed his shirtsleeve across his face. A hint of her scent lingered in the fabric. Anticipation tickled his nose and spread to his groin. He couldn't wait to snuffle her sweet spot again.

“I worried that Adam wouldn't tell you.” Granny held out her knobby hand, and Brice gently sandwiched her fingers between his palms.

“He didn't have a chance. I left Atlanta on Thursday as a wolf. He has no idea where I am. No one knows.”

One of the monitors beeped louder, faster. “Brice Walker! What if something had happened to you?”

“Easy, Granny.” He stroked her arm. “I can take care of myself.”

“Doesn't give you the right to be reckless. For goodness sakes, you are the Alpha-in-Waiting.”

“No, I'm the fucking screwup who got the real one killed.”

Granny's dry lips puckered. “I'm not too sick to scrub your tongue with soap, young man, so watch your language.”

“Yes, ma'am.” Brice dropped his gaze and bowed his head.

“You must let go of the past. Grief is eating your soul. Death is a part of life. Whether peaceful or violent, how we die is less important than how we live.” Granny's fingers scrunched the hair at the back of his neck. “You aren't the only one who suffered loss, my boy. Neither is your sorrow any greater than ours. You lost your brother, but the rest of us lost you both.” She lifted his chin until their eyes met. “Mason can't come back, but you can.”

“Dad won't allow it.” Brice said the words as if he didn't care.

“Is that what you believe?” Granny's penetrating stare splintered his thin veil of indifference. Shame, humiliation and a deep-seated hurt forced Brice to turn away.

“Good heavens, it is,” Granny gasped. “What has Adam done to you?”

“He gave me a place to belong.” Brice squeezed the bridge of his nose to curtail the migraine building behind his eyes. He didn't want to waste their time arguing.

“Where you belong is in Walker's Run.” Granny's words held the conviction of a red-faced minister preaching hellfire and brimstone at a camp meeting revival. Brice wanted to believe. He truly did. Walker's Run was his home.

Had
been his home, a lifetime ago. Soon the path he chose would ensure he never called Walker's Run home again.

The door swooshed open and closed. “The nurses are starting rounds.”

“Who's that?” Granny turned her head toward the woman in the shadows.

“Cassie.” Brice noticed how her presence de-escalated his tension.

“So you've met.” A curious smile lifted Granny's voice.

“I found her asleep in my bed.” The possessive thump in his chest wanted to erase the drop-dead smirk on Cassie's face. Resisting her would be quite a challenge.

He couldn't wait.

“Oh, dear.” Granny's grin ruined any worry her tone might have carried.

“We had a rough introduction, but I think she likes me.” Brice winked at Cassie. “Especially naked.”

“Don't bet on that,
Benji
,” she countered, though her eyes held an unmistakable spark.

Brice chuckled, and the mirthful sound surprised him.

“Oh, this does my heart good.” Granny rubbed her chest. “Cassie, my girl, come give Granny a hug.”

Cassie's stone face said that she didn't want a hug. So did her ramrod-straight back.

“Come, come. Don't be shy. I don't bite.” Granny smiled. Without her dentures, she looked as harmless as a toothless infant.

“Don't worry, Cas.” Brice walked her to his grandmother's bedside. “Granny is human.”

* * *

Careful to avoid the IV lines and monitor wires, Cassie leaned in for one of Margaret Walker's famous hugs. A hard tremble rocked Cassie's body.

“It's all right.” Margaret rubbed Cassie's back. “Granny's just a plain old granny. No need to be frightened.”

Cassie had no fear of Margaret, though learning the woman didn't sprout fur and bay at the moon came as a relief.

Pure and simple, Cassie hated hospitals. They were cold and impersonal and rank. No amount of disinfectant or deodorizers could expunge the smell of suffering.

Her mother had spent years in and out of hospital rooms. It had been horrible. The false hope. The rally, the decline. The numbing acceptance that while miracles did happen, they didn't happen for everyone.

“How are you feeling, Mrs. Walker?” Cassie crossed her arms to hold on to the warmth of Margaret's hug.

“Fit as a Hardanger fiddle now that my two favorite people are here.” Margaret poked Cassie's elbow with an arthritic finger. “And I've told you to call me Granny.”

The simple term of endearment struck a raw nerve. Cassie wanted to say it, but she couldn't push the word from her lips. She couldn't risk bonding with Margaret, or anyone else, if she expected to leave Maico with no regrets.

“Yes, ma'am” was the most Cassie could offer.

Margaret rested her eyes. A sweet sigh quivered her lips, and her features no longer held the harried look Cassie had seen so often in recent years. Now the old woman looked peaceful, content. Not what Cassie expected from someone who'd suffered a heart attack.

Brice palmed Cassie's back, and she leaned into him for support. Yes, it was a moment of weakness. The stress of the past few days had left her bone-tired. What harm could come from siphoning a little of Brice's strength?

“Granny, what did Doc say about your condition?” Brice's somber voice clashed with Margaret's serene expression.

“Oh, there's nothing to worry about,” Margaret said. “I'll be good as new in no time.”

A brittle smile formed on Cassie's lips. Imogene had said that, too.

Chapter 8

“I
am not sleeping with you.” Pillow and comforter in hand, Cassie attempted to navigate the formidable obstacle blocking the door.

Although they were both adults, as Brice readily pointed out, sharing the bed was an unreasonable demand. Hadn't she done enough for him already?

“This isn't a negotiation.” From the strong set of Brice's jaw, she could tell he meant it.

“Glad you agree. Now move.”

Brice waved toward the mattress. “This is a perfectly good bed.”

“And you're the one sleeping in it, unless you changed your mind about your grandmother's room.” Cassie hugged her bedding to her chest.

“A Wahya male doesn't sleep in a female relative's bed. It's just wrong.”

“Well, I'm not sleeping in Margaret's room, either.” Heaven forbid if something went missing. People would blame Cassie even if Margaret didn't.

“Then it's settled.” Brice's hard expression softened.

Cassie stood tall. Well, as tall as her five-foot-two figure could against a mountain. “I'll take the couch.”

“You aren't sleeping anywhere except next to me.” Brice snatched the pillow and comforter from her clutches. “Got it?”

“If I had known that you were so bossy, I would've run faster.” She grabbed the bedding he'd confiscated. “I'll sleep on the floor.”

“Cassidy Albright, get your ass in that bed before I pick you up and drop you in it.” Brice delivered a growl so low and menacing that chills bungeed down Cassie's spine.

She jumped into bed. “You've had your shots, right? Distemper, parvo.” She paused to fluff her pillow and straighten the comforter over the sheet. “Rabies?”

Brice snickered. He probably thought she was kidding.

The lights went out. Followed by a rustle of clothes. A second later, the mattress moved beneath his weight.

“Stay on your side of the bed.” Turning her back to him, Cassie scooted toward the edge of the mattress. She tucked her hand beneath her pillow and tried to ignore the jitters of sleeping next to a man—a naked man, at that—for the first time. “And don't hog the covers. I hate waking up cold.”

Brice shoved his side of the comforter at her.

She tensed, waiting for him to move closer to sniff her. He lay so still, so quiet, Cassie decided he'd fallen asleep until she heard the soft catch in his breathing.

“What's wrong?”

“My leg hurts,” he snapped, and then groaned. “It's nothing. Go to sleep.”

She reached to turn on the nightstand lamp and remembered that she had smashed it on the floor.

“Where are you going?” The brush of Brice's fingers down her back caused an electric current to course through her body. Cassie wished she wouldn't react to him the way she did. She prided herself on keeping her emotions in check, particularly around men.

Then again, Brice was a different breed altogether.

“Don't worry. I'm not running away.” She flipped on the overhead light.

Brice's right leg stuck out from beneath the sheet. The calf had swollen to almost twice the normal size, the skin a reddish-purple, the scar almost black. He crooked an arm over his eyes.

“How did it get this bad?” she shrieked.

“Well, let's see.” He ticked the count on his fingers as he recapped the night's adventures. “Now that I think about it, the last half hour standing and debating you is what did me in.” The acerbic bite in his voice bounced off Cassie's thick skin.

“Don't blame me for your pigheadedness. If you had let me sleep in the living room, you'd be fast asleep by now.”

“I doubt it.” He moved his arm away from his face. Pain, sadness and a certain wistfulness that Cassie recognized as loneliness churned in his gaze.

Alienated from his family and his pack, and worried about his grandmother, Brice sought companionship. That's why he'd forced her to go to the hospital. Why he insisted they share a bed. He didn't want to be alone.

Cassie empathized, though sleeping together was going a bit overboard.

“Come back to bed.” Brice started to get up. “I'll watch TV in the living room.”

“Stay put.” She used a pillow to elevate his leg. “I'll get some aspirin.”

“I took some before we went to the hospital. They didn't help.”

“I'll fix you something,” she said, leaving the room.

“Nothing ever works,” he moaned.

Cassie grabbed three clean bath towels and headed to the kitchen. Heating a large stockpot of water until it boiled, she added a healthy dose of dried rosemary, then turned off the burner. Next she swirled a towel in the hot water, placed a lid on the pot and left it to steep.

Brice opened one eye when she lifted his leg to place one of the two remaining clean towels over the pillow. She poured a little olive oil into her hands and drizzled some over his leg.

“Closet cannibal or kinky fetishist?” The lackluster gleam in his eyes muted his cocky grin.

“This might hurt at first, but you'll feel better when I'm done.” At least, she hoped he would. She could almost feel his agony throbbing in her own body as she kneaded the muscles above his knee.

“Ooh, S and M.” Brice's fingers touched his lips. “Miss Albright, I'm shocked.”

Cassie was, too, as heat flooded her body. Ignoring his tease would've been easier if Brice wasn't flat on his back with a thin sheet accentuating every angle and line of his naked body. Her attention gravitated to the tent over his groin, and just that quickly, her common sense evaporated, leaving her defenseless and vulnerable.

She need to proceed carefully. Brice Walker had the power to turn her stupid. To make her want things she couldn't have. Things that would wreck her life if she stopped to pursue them.

His keen, smoldering gaze caressed her face and feathered down her chest to cup her breasts. If she hadn't seen his hands—one stashed behind his head, the other draped across his stomach—she would've sworn on her mother's urn that his fingers pinched her nipples. Exquisitely sensitive, the tight buds stung from straining against her shirt.

His charged gaze continued its downward journey and settled at the juncture between her legs. Cassie wore a T-shirt and jersey shorts, so he couldn't see anything. Still, a wicked smile shaped his mouth, and she knew he was picturing her naked.

He'd be disappointed. She wasn't generously endowed or overly curvy. Her breasts were small and slightly flared hips gave her a feminine silhouette, but she'd never be the willowy ingenue men seemed to crave. She was simply too short, too pale, and her tangled mop of red hair had earned her the nickname Raggedy Cassie in kindergarten. She doubted grown men thought any differently. After all, didn't they all prefer blondes?

Brice's eyes lifted to the spiral curls that had fallen over her shoulder. His gaze slid leisurely along the strands and landed back on her crotch. His brow lowered a little in a contemplative stare.

If she were a betting woman, she'd wager that Brice wondered if the carpet matched the curtains.

It did, to the exact shade, and Cassie pondered if he also speculated if the
carpet
was silky or coarse. Not that it mattered. Just because she saw his didn't mean she'd show him hers.

Because if she did, she'd want him to do more than look. For starters, if he stroked her nub with the thumb he'd brushed across her cheek...well, she wasn't quite sure what it might do to her, but thinking about it caused heat to flash in her core and dangerous thoughts to cross her mind.

A naked man lay in her bed. A man she was inexplicably attracted to, against all reason. She would be a fool to fling herself at her employers' son and her landlady's grandson. She would be out of her mind to have sex with a man who wasn't human.

Somehow, that last part wasn't the deterrent it should've been.

She didn't know much about wolves, but if they were anything like dogs, the males would jump any female in heat in order to impregnate her.

Cassie wanted to avoid that scenario at all costs. She wasn't on birth control because, frankly, she had no intention of having sexual relations with a man for a long time. She had goals to meet and dreams to achieve before she could give herself to a man.

Celibacy had been a no-brainer choice until he showed up, naked!

And touched her, and held her, and inspired all sorts of wicked ideas about things she shouldn't think about but her body now insisted on investigating.

“Damn. That feels good.” Brice's voice yanked Cassie out of her reverie. His eyes closed in near-sleep, his body relaxed. Hers, however, had become a frazzle of nerves and need. Evidenced by damp panties and the urge to crawl up Brice's body and hump him to oblivion.

She scowled at him. After all, her predicament was all his fault.

She waited until her irritation and horniness mellowed before working her fingers over his knee and down his swollen calf.

Brice yanked his leg from her hands. “Goddamn, that hurts!”

“The massage will increase circulation and reduce the swelling,” Cassie said. “Trust me. You will feel much better when I'm done.”

“How do you know?” Brice propped on his elbow, his mouth scrunched in a suspicious grimace.

“It always helped my mom.” Cassie coaxed his leg back onto the towel-covered pillow. Starting again, she rubbed slow, methodical circles over his rock-solid muscles. Of their own accord, her eyes followed the line of his thighs beneath the sheets, the swirls of dark hair and scars across his rippled abs and taut chest, the square cut of his chin, the fullness of his masculine lips, the perfectly proportioned nose, and once again locked onto the heart-stopping intensity of his breathtaking eyes.

A rebellious thrill zipped through her body. She saw his mouth move. Unfortunately, the “weeeeeee” ringing in her head drowned out his words. “I'm sorry. What did you say?”

An understated smile wavered on his lips. “What happened to your mother?”

“Oh.” Just what Cassie needed—a reality check to keep her curly red head squarely on her sensible shoulders. “She died four years ago from end-stage liver disease.”

“It must have been difficult,” Brice said softly.

“I managed.” Caring for an alcoholic parent for most of her young life had been the difficult part. Imogene's death had broken Cassie's heart. It also came as a relief, because it gave Cassie a chance at a new life.

“If I had known you then, I would've helped. If you need anything now, let me know.”

Cassie found his sincerity disturbing. “Thanks, but I can take care of myself. I always have.”

Soon Brice's calf muscles relaxed beneath her practiced fingers, and she worked her way down to the sole of his foot, which garnered a contented sigh from him. “Don't move,” she told him. “I'm not finished.”

In the kitchen, Cassie soaped her hands, wishing the hot water could wash away the ridiculous tingle that coursed through her whenever she met Brice's gaze. She wanted to put duct tape over his stellar smile.

She fanned herself to ward off the shameless desire to learn what being a woman meant. After all, there was a naked man in her bed.

Oh, no. Not going there.

She could barely handle a fantasy. The real thing just might end her.

“Cas? Is everything okay in there?”

Only if spontaneous combustion was a normal reaction to his presence.

“Uh, yeah! I'll be there in a minute.” She splashed cold water on her face.
I am not my hormones!

She toted the rosemary-infused towel into the bedroom. Every move Cassie made wrapping his leg, Brice's sizzling gaze followed. Climbing into the freezer suddenly seemed a logical thing to do.

“Thanks, Cas.” The huskiness in his voice electrified nerves in parts of her body that only he had managed to activate. “For everything.”

“You're welcome.” She didn't dare look at him. His smile might be devastating, but his eyes could outright slay her.

* * *

A wet heat worked its way through Brice's leg muscles and seeped into the bones. With Cassie's scent to soothe him and the pain in his leg melting away, maybe he'd finally succumb to a decent night's rest.

She tucked a dry towel over the hot, damp one around his calf. Her hands stilled, except for her thumbs worrying the edge of the pillow propped beneath his leg. Her eyes lifted to his face. “I should take the couch. I don't want to bump you during the night.”

“Fine,” he answered, challenging her with his gaze.

She rolled her bottom lip between two front teeth spaced a tiny bit farther apart than the others. He counted on that little bit of uncertainty to accomplish what he wanted. Her in bed, next to him.

“Oh, all right.” The lights went out, and Cassie eased beneath the covers.

God, he could hardly resist touching her. Stripping her bare. Inhaling every inch of her skin. Burying his face between her thighs to imprint not only her scent in his nose but also her taste on his tongue.

He'd noticed how hot and bothered she became while massaging his leg. He'd almost yanked the sheet off himself so she could stalk up the mattress to ride him hard, fast and into tomorrow.

He didn't because of the conflicting emotions that marred her pretty little face. She probably thought boinking her employers' son would get her in trouble.

Likely it would, but not for the reason she suspected.

Her scent captivated him, and her spunk titillated him on a different level than any other female ever had. Every wolfan instinct buzzed with inherently misguided expectation. Until Brice gained better control, he couldn't risk coupling with Cassie, or he might make the mistake of claiming her and ruin the rest of their lives.

The dire consequence wasn't enough to curb his desire, but he respectfully appreciated the challenge.