Laura's Wolf (Werewolf Marines) (17 page)

“What’s DJ’s last name?” she asked.

“Torres. Why?”

“The internet’s back up. I could get online and look him up, see if he’s back home. DJ stands for something, right?”

“No, it’s a nickname—he DJs at clubs. His full name is Dale Alejandro Torres. He’s lucky he didn’t get nicknamed something like ‘Who dat?’”

Laura took a cell phone from her pocket and extracted herself from Roy’s arms. “I’ll just step away…”

Roy watched glumly as she walked halfway across the hill and ducked behind a tree. He found it hard to imagine that he’d be affected by her checking the internet on her cell phone, so long as it didn’t ring and he didn’t stare directly at the screen, but he didn’t blame her for being cautious after the disaster this morning.

“Look me up too, will you?” Roy called. “Roy Farrell, USMC. Foxtrot Alpha Romeo Romeo Echo Lima Lima.”

There was a pause, then Laura yelled back, “Two Rs, two Ls?”

“That’s right.”

Another long pause. Then Laura returned, the cell phone shoved back in her pocket, looking wary.

“Don’t freak out,” she said.

“I don’t ‘freak out,’” Roy began, then remembered bolting out of the cabin less than an hour ago. What was wrong with him? He never panicked like that. “Hit me. Am I dead?”

“No, you’re missing in action.”

Roy shrugged. He’d expected that. “What did it say happened?”

“Part of it meshes with what you told me.” Laura was still eyeing him like he was a grenade with the pin out.

I must have really scared her this morning,
he thought guiltily.

“Your helicopter was shot down, and you and DJ were the only survivors,” she said. “Then it says that you were both critically wounded—”

“No, DJ wasn’t—”

“—and you both had to be transported immediately to the nearest shock trauma unit for stabilization before you could be sent stateside. Your transport was ambushed, and you and DJ are both missing.”

“What?” Roy jumped up and slammed his fist into the nearest tree, dislodging a shower of bark and snow. “Fuck! Those fucking Nazi shitstains must’ve gotten DJ too. And I didn’t even look for him. Those motherfuckers! I have to go back. Right now.”

Laura brushed snow off her hair. “Hang on. This could be a con—a trap. What if that article was written to lure you back in?”

“What if it wasn’t?”

“Yeah, what
if
it wasn’t?” Laura asked. “Here’s another scenario: what if DJ’s already escaped and is lying low, like you are? He wouldn’t have any idea where you are or any way to contact you.”

Roy wanted to believe it. But every particle of him was screaming,
Don’t abandon DJ in that prison for one second longer
and
Never leave anyone behind.

He scanned the forests, trying to get a sense of the land now that it was covered in snow. Roy had tried to keep mental track of the location of the lab, but it had taken him nearly a week of hiking through mountain county to get here. He knew exactly how difficult it was to find anything again under those conditions. But he could smell better now. He could sniff out his own tracks. If he couldn’t do it as a man, he’d do it as a wolf.

But finding the lab was one thing. Breaking in, and breaking DJ out, would be much harder. He only had the one cheap pistol. He needed weapons. He needed allies. He needed his pack.

He needed his pack…

Laura was standing in front of him, her lips moving. He had a vague sense that she’d been trying to get his attention for a while, but he couldn’t hear her. The pulse of his own blood roared in his ears like a fighter jet taking off.

DJ was in trouble, alone. Marco and Alec were probably still in Afghanistan. For all he knew, they were dead. His pack was gone. His pack didn’t exist. Roy was alone.

Someone grabbed at his wrist. With a snarl, he knocked the clutching hand away.

A woman let out a cry of pain.

Laura.

He’d hurt Laura.

The red cloud before his eyes faded away. Laura was backing away, wringing her hand.

“I’m sorry,” Roy said, knowing how completely inadequate apologies were. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean—How bad is it?”

Laura gingerly flexed her fingers. “I don’t think there’s any damage. I was startled, mostly.”

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, feeling sick. “I don’t know what got into me. I’ve never hit a woman in my life.”

“Yeah, I could see you weren’t really with me. I should have known better than to touch you.” Laura edged closer, looking more concerned than hurt. Concerned—about
him
! She ought to be concerned about herself. “Were you having a flashback?”

“I don’t get flashbacks. I don’t know what that was.” Roy stared out at the mountains, trying to recall what had been going on his head. “I know it won’t help DJ to tear off half-cocked, all by myself, with no plan and no info and no decent weapons. I’m not like that. I keep my head even if everyone around me is losing their shit.”

His heart felt like a lead weight in his chest. He’d hurt Laura. He’d gotten DJ captured. He’d left Alec and Marco to fight alone. He’d seriously considered becoming a wolf forever, which was a sort of suicide.

He’d hurt Laura…

“I’m not like that,” he repeated dully. “There’s something really wrong with me. I think I’m losing my mind.”

A crushing exhaustion bore down on him, overwhelming as a post-combat let-down. He sat on the ground and buried his head in his hands. Mud and snowmelt soaked into his jeans, but he barely felt the cold.

Laura crouched down in front of him. “Roy…”

“You shouldn’t get that close to me. It’s dangerous.”

“I’ll risk it,” she said drily.

“Seriously, don’t. I—I’m broken and crazy. I could snap and hurt you.”

“‘Broken and crazy?’” Laura repeated incredulously. “Roy, are you listening to yourself? If you were on patrol and some guy in your platoon sat down on the ground and started talking like that, what would you say to him?”

“This is me, not ‘some guy.’ I really fucked up. I
am
fucked up…”

“
What would you say?”
Laura demanded.

“‘Suck it up,’” he said automatically. “‘We’ve all been there. You’ve got a job to do and it’s not boo-hooing on my shoulder like a pussy.’”

He mentally replayed his words, and added, “Pardon my French.”

Unexpectedly, Laura giggled. “You’ve been watching your mouth around me, haven’t you?”

“Yeah,” he admitted. “I guess that lasted all of four days.”

“I can’t stand ‘pussy,’ but I’ve been known to use the f-word myself. Relax.” Moving slowly, so he could see her intent, she laid her hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t—” he began.

“If you don’t want me to touch you because you don’t want to be touched, I’ll take my hand away. But if you’re afraid you’ll knock it off, well, you can see that you haven’t.”

Her warm touch sank deep into his body, as if he was made of melting ice. Roy desperately wanted to take her in his arms, but now more than ever, he couldn’t get involved. He couldn’t raise her hopes.

He couldn’t raise
his
hopes.

Roy opened his mouth to say that he didn’t want to be touched, but instead blurted out, “Don’t take it away.”

“Okay.” Laura gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze. “By the way, when I asked you what you’d say, I didn’t mean you shouldn’t be upset or you shouldn’t talk about it. It just seemed like you were going into a bad place.”

“I was. Thanks for pulling me out.” Roy tipped his head back, looking up at the sky. It was a perfect clear blue, without a single cloud. Like it had been washed clean.

That blinding fog of desperation and loneliness and rage and despair had seeped away, leaving him drained but clear-headed. But he could sense that whatever madness had come over him was still inside him somewhere, a land mine waiting for a careless step.

He thought through his options, resolutely focusing only on DJ, not on Laura and not on himself, and definitely not on the nonexistent himself-and-Laura.

“I think the best thing to do about DJ is to stick with the original plan and drive down to see his family,” Roy said at last. “If he did escape, they’ll know it—he’d never leave his family in the dark. If he didn’t, maybe some of them can help me break him out or put me in touch with someone who can. The snow’s melting fast. We could leave at dawn tomorrow.”

And after Laura dropped him off, he’d probably never see her again.

“Good plan,” Laura said.

Roy wondered what she was thinking. It was obvious that she cared about him. Her hand was still resting on his shoulder, as if she couldn’t stand to let go of him. She’d said she wanted to be his friend. But she hadn’t protested when he’d said that having sex was a mistake and they shouldn’t do it again.

Laura was a realist, he supposed: too smart to bang her head against a brick wall of impossibility. She’d put her trauma behind her and turn her skills to better use, becoming a private investigator or maybe something else exciting that neither of them had even thought of yet. She’d wish him well and remember him fondly, but that was all. She was a free spirit, with too much sense to tie herself to a man who would only drag her down.

Though the sun shone bright, an icy wind rustled the leaves and blew back Laura’s brown-sugar curls. She was shivering.

“We should go back inside,” Roy said. “At least to get you a jacket.”

“Okay.” She stood up, her hand sliding from his shoulder. A pang of loss twisted his heart.

Suck it up,
he told himself.

“Aren’t you cold?” Laura asked.

Roy glanced down at himself. He wore a T-shirt and jeans, the latter now drenched in mud and water, with no more protection from the wind than Laura had. Less: he’d run out barefoot, and hadn’t even noticed till now. “No. Not since…”

“The werewolfing?” Laura suggested.

“Yeah. Apparently I have to lie down in the snow with a gunshot wound to the chest before cold starts bothering me.” Yet another way in which he’d been changed. At least this one was a benefit.

“Can I ask for a weird favor?”

“Go ahead.”

“Could I see you turn into a wolf again? It’s so cool, and I didn’t get to appreciate it the one time I saw it, since I was afraid for my life and all.” Her tone was half-embarrassed, half-excited.

Roy grinned. “Sure.”

He changed, and stood looking up at Laura with a wolf’s eyes. Her scent was stronger, more complex: not only lemons and sugar, but an animal warmth and a touch of bitterness.

That’s the lemon peel.
He laughed as a wolf laughs, mouth open and panting.

Laura offered him the back of her hand. He licked it playfully, tasting salt and the clean mineral taste of melted snow. He could smell a trace of his own scent on her, still lingering after they’d touched.

“Can I touch your fur?” she asked.

Nodding felt unnatural, so he butted his head up against her palm. She stroked the fur on his head, then buried her hands in the thick fur on his back.

“My own personal hand-warmer,” she remarked. “Everyone who lives out here should have a wolf.”

He nuzzled her, then spotted a snowdrift under a spreading oak tree, shadowed and un-melted. It rose high, deep enough to cover him. He leaped into it and rolled in the snow. It felt soft and cool, not wet; his coat was so thick that it didn’t penetrate to his skin.

When he stood up, Laura was smiling. “It’s fun to be a wolf, huh?”

He shook himself, sending snow flying in a tiny blizzard.

“Hey!” Laura was flecked with snow now. She went to the drift, scooped out a handful and packed it into a ball, and tossed it into the air. “Fetch!”

Roy leaped up and caught the snowball in his jaws. It dissolved in a crunch and burst of cold.

She tossed snowball after snowball to him, throwing them farther and farther, making him run and jump to catch them. A wild playfulness possessed him, making him determined to catch every one. His wolf body moved easily, powerfully, tireless. He felt as if he could do anything. Laura ran too, darting here and there, packing snow until her fingers and nose and cheeks were red.

One moment they were both tearing through the snow, panting, and the next they stumbled to a halt. Laura was shivering. The wound in Roy’s chest burned with cold, as if he’d been stabbed with an icicle.

He changed, and stood before her as a man. His shirt was dry, but only for an instant; the snow clinging to his skin melted from his body heat, leaving him drenched from head to toe. Laura too was damp with snow and sweat. Her blouse clung tight, giving Roy a terrific view of every luscious curve he would never touch again.

“That was fun,” she said, still breathing hard. “I’m freezing, though. Want to go back in?”

“Sure.” As they headed down the hill, Roy had to stop himself from putting his arm around her or taking her hand.

We’re buddies,
he told himself. Just
buddies.

“What’s it feel like?” she asked.

“To change?”

“To be a wolf. You told me how your senses are different, but beyond that…?”

It was difficult to put it into words, now that he was a man again, but he did his best. “It’s not just a different body. The longer I stay a wolf, the more I think the way a wolf thinks. I get more impulsive. It’s hard to think about the future. When I jump, I’m completely caught up in what it feels like to jump, and I’m not thinking about
anything
else. It’s like being in combat, but more so. I don’t think it’s possible for a human being to be that single-minded.”

“Does it feel strange?”

Roy shook his head. “It feels natural. Like I’d always been a wolf.”

“In a good way?”

“We don’t even have words to describe how amazing it feels.”

“I wish I could be a wolf, just once,” Laura said wistfully.

That brought Roy back down to earth. The idea of Laura undergoing the same pain he’d endured and having
her
life ruined made his stomach turn over. “It isn’t worth it.”

Laura touched his shoulder, just a quick brush of her fingers, but it felt reassuring. “I know.”