Once A Wolf (50 page)

had killed my father years before my mother learned of it, but I did not tell her. I failed in my

vow. I did not seek vengeance. I went to the East to avoid the burden of retribution. Because of

my cowardice, I returned to find that the MacLeans had destroyed my home, and that my

mother had died in taking the role I was meant to play. At last I went after the man who had

done it, intending to kill."

"But you didn't," Rowena said. "You couldn't. It wasn't in you, to kill like an animal—"

"You thought you'd killed, when you came back to find my father dead," Weylin said.

"Yes. And that was when I knew I was to be the last of the Randalls, that I did not have the

strength of will and the blood to avenge my parents and my name. I could not kill again. I could

only survive what Cole MacLean did to me, and find other ways to make him remember my

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father and mother. I became El Lobo for that purpose alone. With the money and horses and

cattle I stole from him, I set others to watch him; I saw him grow in power, here and in New

York.

I saw the weak and less ruthless fall before him, while I was but a straw in the wind. I harried

and taunted him; whatever I did, it made no difference. And then I learned of his betrothal to

you, Rowena. I went to England to observe for myself the woman he would marry. I saw you,

and I—" He glanced at the sky. "Mo importa. I thought that at last I could steal something he

valued more than his other possessions. I thought at last that he would acknowledge that one

Randall remained in the world."

"And you wanted… to die," Esperanza said.

Rowena heard Tomás's and Esperanza's words with a sickness and fury that turned upon those,

living and dead, who had set this tragic and senseless scene: Fergus Randall, Frank MacLean, all

their ancestors who had begun and nurtured the feud; Cole, who'd used it and killed to further

his own ambitions, and Weylin, who'd followed his brother's path so blindly… and Tomás.

Tomás, who'd given up on life and existed only as a shadow, grasping at shallow pleasures and

diversions when they fell in his chosen path of self-destructive revenge.

Diversions like Lady Rowena Forster.

Tomás would not meet her gaze. Esperanza came to her, swaying with exhaustion, and grasped

her arm as if Rowena were the one in need of support. But it was to Tomás that the girl spoke.

"You tried to do as your father expected of you, because you loved him," she said. "And you did

penance for the murder you thought you had committed, by helping those who suffered at the

hands of men like Cole MacLean. You let the world believe you were the murderous outlaw

MacLean called you. Still it was not punishment enough for your failures. There was only one

way to end the feud and fulfill your vow: to kill the last of the Randalls. Yourself."

He stared at her, unprotesting, wordless.

Rowena turned her face away from him. "I never believed you a coward," she said. She found

that her voice held a humiliating tremor, but her growing anger and sadness made such

trivialities unimportant. "You deceived me. You deceived everyone. You pretended to love life,

to help others, knowing all the while that you sought death with every reckless act. And called

me afraid because I wouldn't face the beast within myself."

She felt profound pity for him, for the empty life he'd led, and ached with the pain he'd

endured. At the same time, righteous anger simmered to a boil in her veins, her muscles, her

nerves, rising and rising to crowd her head like fireworks ready to explode.

"You are a fraud, Tomás Alejandro Randall. But I owe you thanks for two things. You showed

me what Cole was, and prevented me from making a dreadful mistake. You taught me not to

fear my own life, my own heart, even if it was all just one more diversion before dying."

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Tomás let out a shuddering sigh. "Then I have not totally failed," he said. "Thank you, my lady."

Rowena closed her eyes, fighting to hold back tears. Esperanza leaned her cheek against

Rowena's shoulder. Weylin and Tomás were lost in their own thoughts. None of them were

prepared when Cole made his move.

He lashed out with his legs in a violent thrust, kicking Weylin's feet out from under him. The gun

went flying. Tomás whirled and crouched; Rowena turned in time to see Cole fling himself after

the fallen pistol and clutch it in his single hand. He rolled at the same instant and swung the

revolver up to fix on Tomás's chest.

"You want to die, Randall? I'll grant your wish."

Time could literally stand still. Rowena felt it happen as she made the crucial and agonizing

decision, gathered her will and all the rage boiling in her body, and prepared to stop Cole

MacLean.

She let the Change take her, painless and so simple that she wanted to laugh for the sheer relief

of it. She kicked off her shoes; her ragged dress split along its much-mended seams as she tore

it from her body. Naked and triumphant, she flung back her head in a cry that made Cole's men

scatter in terror. Mist the color of gold-shot ice enveloped her like an ethereal cocoon.

She had made herself forget, but the knowledge of wolf-being was as natural to her as

breathing. She tore through the mist like lightning on four legs. Her senses exploded in a

thousand colors and scents and sounds unknown to man. She shook a lush coat thick enough to

turn aside bullets and snapped keen jaws against the air; sleek muscles obeyed her every

thought, and a powerful heart pumped blood through a body designed for adversity.

A body she'd hated all her life. The body of the beast that would save her mate.

Cole! she cried, and the word was a howl of promise and fury. She gathered her legs beneath

her, preparing to spring. Cole's pistol swung toward her.

Tomás lunged, shouting Rowena's name. The sound of gunfire blasted Rowena's sensitive ears.

Tomás fell, and Cole turned to her again. She roared, oblivious to the certainty of her own

death.

Suddenly Esperanza threw herself between wolf and man, ready to take the bullet. Gunfire

cracked from behind Rowena, and the revolver flew from Cole's bloodied hand. A mounted

man at the edge of the crowd raised his own weapon in salute, wheeled his horse, and set off at

a gallop.

Sim Kavanagh, gone as mysteriously as he'd arrived.

In that moment of confusion and dodging outlaws, Weylin retrieved his gun and aimed it at

Cole's head.

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Rowena ran to Tomás and Changed again, heedless of her nudity. She saw the blood soaking his

sleeve and frantically tore at his clothing.

Cole's bullet had clipped his arm, producing an injury that must have hurt like the devil but was

far from fatal. Rowena gasped out her relief and stretched herself over Tomás, avoiding his

wounded arm.

"How… very pleasant," Tomás quipped raggedly. "What a pity that the moment is not more

opportune for—"

His words were overwhelmed by an inhuman cry. Rowena crouched across Tomás to face the

threat, and saw…

Cole. Cole stripping, Changing, wrapped in mist streaked with black and purple, emerging as a

creature of hate incarnate. A three-legged wolf, awkward and stumbling, finding his balance,

baring teeth in a rictus of insanity. Bending back on his haunches, tensing muscle, gleaming

eyes fixed on Rowena with the unmistakable intent to kill.

He leaped. Weylin shot him as he stretched suspended in air. He fell, forepaws mere inches

from Tomás and Rowena.

Weylin threw down his gun and ran to his brother's side.

The bullet had taken Cole through the center of his body. Rowena helped Tomás to his knees.

Esperanza stood apart, tears falling unregarded from her cheeks.

"Cole," Weylin whispered. He lifted the great wolf's head in his arms. "Cole—"

Dark mist returned, and a naked man replaced the wolf. He gasped each laborious breath, and

each came more slowly than the last.

"Cole," Weylin said. "You shouldn't have Changed. You could have healed—"

"No." Cole coughed so hard that his whole body convulsed. "I wouldn't die… as a beast." He

smiled. "I was wrong about you, little brother. You weren't so weak after all." He strained to

turn his head toward Rowena and Tomás. "The feud is over, Randall. And you, Rowena—you

can live out your life as an animal in perfect freedom. I hope you are happy." He closed his eyes.

"The MacLeans are dead." He let out a last, long breath, and his body went still.

Weylin knelt with Cole's head in his arms. Esperanza gazed back the way Sim Kavanagh had

ridden off, and then walked to Weylin's side.

"Lo siento," she said gently.

He looked at her blankly. "I killed my own brother." He bent his head to Cole's. Esperanza

slipped her arms about his shoulders. Tomás took Rowena's hand in his and led her away from

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Weylin's silent grief. He eased out of his shirt, tore off the bloodied sleeve, and draped the rest

of it over Rowena's bare shoulders.

Already the flow of blood was beginning to ease. Tomás was unaware of the pain when so

much greater suffering was all around him. For the first time in many minutes he looked toward

the hanging tree and the men who'd watched the drama unfold. Every last one of them had

ridden off.

It would all pass into legend, of course—the legend of El Lobo, perhaps, or of the MacLeans. No

one would believe any tales those men chose to tell. If they dared to speak at all.

Rowena was shivering. He drew her close, to share his warmth and what little comfort she

might accept. She shook him off. In the fire of her gaze and the proud lift of her head he saw

what she had become: the fierce she-wolf that had always lain dormant within her—the Lady of

Fire he'd been so eager to liberate for his own pleasure.

She was sure of her own strength, now; she had seen her men betray her, and still she stood

firm and unshaken. No one would ever dominate Lady Rowena Forster again.

He was proud of her, beyond any pride he'd known. And he mourned. It is impossible; it was

always impossible. She was right. If there were degrees of impossibility, they had gone far

beyond the last.

He looked at Weylin, grieving so stoically for a brother who'd despised him. El Lobo and Weylin

had become brothers in all but blood. Both were the last of their family. Both faced the end of

what had driven them for years, and a future stripped of purpose.

The future opened up before Tomás, a future he'd never imagined in his ardent courting of

death. It terrified him. He must face the years stretching ahead, unknowable, demanding some

ambition other than vengeance. He had chosen life. And he must live it without the woman he

loved, for her sake.

"It's true, then," Rowena said.

He met her gaze. "What truth, my lady?"

"You captured me just so that you could force Cole to come after you and kill you. I was a tool,

but not in the way I thought at first. It wasn't really even about revenge. It was about you, and

your guilt. You turned my life upside down with no… no interest in what it might do to me, or to

the others you pretended to care for."

He bowed his head. "I cannot dispute it. Or ask your forgiveness."

She caught her breath. "When we… when we lay together, that was your farewell to life, wasn't

it? A last, desperate attempt to—to—" She broke off and turned away. "Are you still

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determined to die, Tomás Alejandro Randall? Will you go about your robbing ways and find

some new enemy to hunt you down?"

He tried to laugh, and failed. "No," he said. "The strange thing is that you cured me of that

desire, dulzura. I thought I was ready to die when I let Weylin capture me so he could bring me

to Cole. I thought I'd save you by killing Cole, and end it all in one moment. You see, I had come

to care for you. I did not wish to see you hurt any more, and I thought that if you were free of

Cole, you could find your own life."

"While destroying your own," she said harshly.

" But then I saw you come to defend me. I saw you Change, when I knew it was the one thing

you dreaded above all else, and it was as if you reached into my soul and burned out the thing

that wanted me to die."

She turned back, her face as naked to him as her body. "Because I Changed?"

"You changed us both. I knew then that I wanted to live, to make something better of my life.

But I do not know where or how. I have much to atone for."

"The people—the children in the canyon?"

"It is a place to start. I have enough money hidden away to give them a good life, in the cañon