The Lonely Wolf (20 page)

“I miss you.” Quintilius bumped his forehead against Ludwig’s.

Through the open windows, voices echoed from the
casolare
, and Ludwig opened his arms to let Quintilius go. “Do you want me to accompany you in?”

Quintilius’s eyes went to the brick wall of his house, then back to Ludwig, sadness showing in his gaze as he stepped away from his embrace. “It’s clan business.”

Several members of the staff erupted from the door, in haste to meet their master. When they saw he wasn’t alone, they remained on the landing with grim expressions and nervous stances.

Ludwig understood their silent request for him to leave and waved at the staff, while he said, “I am one call away if you need me.”

With a nod, Quintilius walked away from him, toward the marble stairs leading up to the door. The conversation started at once, and he disappeared inside the house.

Ludwig looked up. The sun was at its zenith, warming up the ground, and the few clouds traveling fast in the sky were white and ever-changing. The day wasn’t shaping up to be pleasant, but the weather was perfect for flying at high speed over Rome. His body hummed with energy he couldn’t spend, and he decided he could use a diversion after all, flying over to Dana’s for a courtesy visit.

The elf had left two messages on his cell phone, both times proclaiming in his boisterous lingo he had news and would deliver solid proof of the bloodsuckers’ illicit dealings.

Stretching his flying speed to its limits, Ludwig covered the whole length of Rome, from the Appian Way to the Aurelian Way in a handful of seconds. Dana lived in one of the oldest suburbs, the neighborhood built with tuff bricks and red-clay tiles amidst a sea of Mediterranean pine trees.

A pleasant smell of pine wafted up when Ludwig crushed green needles under his boots, the sound as satisfying as the resin scent. His stomping activated the magik wards protecting the elf’s street from unwanted visitors. Announced by a bell only his hypersensitive ears could detect, he entered the small courtyard where anachronistic chimney smoke filled the air. A bakery had its doors open to the irregular square, and fresh baked breads were displayed in baskets behind the window. A man dressed in Renaissance clothes leaned over one of the baskets, arranging breaded loaves in a circle.

“Dana.” Ludwig rapped his knuckles on the window, startling the elf whose hand hit the basket, scattering the bread all over the floor.

“Archangel—” Dana eyed him nervously, then bent to retrieve the spoiled goodies. “I’ll be right with you.”

After moving a terracotta vase filled with geraniums, Ludwig sat on the brick bench jutting from the bakery’s wall. The sunrays warmed his skin and the light breeze cooled it. Closing his eyes, he set to analyze the events that had happened in the last days, but the elf’s shadow obscured the sun before he could finish his first thought. He glared at Dana, his boot tapping the side of the elf’s leg. “You said you have proof.”

Dana’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as his eyes darted around. “Not so loud.”

“Spit it out.” Ludwig didn’t lower his voice.

“Please, I could lose my job.” Dana’s eyes darted to the corner of the building, where an arch opened into a narrow alley.

Besides an orange cat sleeping on the short, truncated column guarding the arch, nobody else was present. Ludwig didn’t detect paranormals skulking around and gave Dana a shrug. “Talk.”

The elf licked his lips. “This is big—” Rocking on the balls of his feet, he scanned the surroundings again.

Even sitting, Ludwig was taller than the standing elf, so he stared down at him without saying a word.

“Archangel, I’d rather be paid now.” Dana pushed his hands inside his apron’s central pocket.

Ludwig raised an eyebrow.

“Okay, I’ll talk, but I need money to lay low for a while.” At Ludwig’s nod, Dana let out a breath, then leaned on the wall, bent his knee, and pressed the sole of his sneaker against the bricks, while he lit a cigarette. “Claudius is doing some belated spring cleanup.”

Outwardly, Ludwig and the elf gave the impression of two friends taking a break from work. Ludwig reinforced the image by stretching his legs in front of him and crossing them at the ankles as he folded his arms over his chest. His prolonged silence unnerved the elf who started biting his nails in between puffs of smoke.

“He’s using werewolves to do his bidding,” Dana said.

Ludwig placed his hands at his sides, palms down, and made to stand.

“One clan’s name came up—”

At Dana’s hesitation, Ludwig had enough and pushed himself up.

“It’s Quintilius’s clan that is involved,” Dana blurted.

“Not possible.” Ludwig spoke before thinking. “How do you know? Who told you this?”

“You know I can’t give you names.” The elf raised one hand to placate Ludwig’s ire. “But I told you I’d give you proof.” He fished his cell phone from inside the apron’s central pocket, unlocked the screen, then scrolled down until he found what he was looking for. “Here it is.”

Heart beating too fast and anger mounting, Ludwig peered down at the picture of a check. “It can’t be right.”

Black on white, Quintilius’s masculine penmanship had signed an exuberant amount of money to a Shifter Washer for dry-cleaning.

“Who’s this?” Ludwig pointed at the name of the company.

“I don’t know, but their listed address matches a vampire nest in Fiumicino.”

The whole situation was getting muddier instead of clearer, and Ludwig, who could not feel physical discomfort, experienced a painful tightening in his chest. “What else did you find?”

“Just a rumor—” Again, the elf hesitated, enraging Ludwig who took a step forward, prompting Dana to say, “I’m sure it isn’t true, but…” Chest heaving and eyes pleading, he shook his head. “They say an angel is involved.”

“Who?”

Dana let out a breath though his nose in a smoke filled snort. “Nobody would be so stupid to reveal an angel’s name.”

Ludwig had heard enough. He took a picture of the image on Dana’s cell phone, then transferred money to the elf’s account, shielded himself, opened his arms to the side, and took off with a whoosh of his powerful wings. Like a projectile, he shot upward and reached the atmosphere mere minutes later.

With a mood that was darkening by the minute, he reached his office to make his own enquiries on the dry-cleaning company. If he hurried, he would be done before Quintilius called him.

****

“Master, we aren’t sure at what time Iris disappeared.” Quintilius’s majordomo, Paolo, lowered his chin, his shoulders sagging low.

After being debriefed by his staff, Quintilius had asked Paolo to accompany him to Iris’s cottage. During the short walk, Quintilius asked the questions he hadn’t wanted to enquire before the rest of his household, but he didn’t want to upset the majordomo any longer. “Not your fault this happened.” He patted the man’s arm, then opened his senses to track any foreign scent on the trail. A few meters from the cottage’s entrance, he caught a whiff of vampire mixed with werewolf.

Outside, the quaint building of bricks and terracotta tiles appeared unscathed. The hedgerow bordering the perimeter had been recently pruned—which reminded Quintilius of the loss of his gardener and of the fact there had not been time to properly commemorate his memory.

Upon entering the main room, a struggle was evident. Furniture and decor lay overturned and clothing dotted the floor, displaying Iris’s personal belongings for everyone to see.

“I can’t believe something so barbaric happened here, in our home,” The majordomo walked to one of the windows and opened the curtains to let the sun in.

Quintilius heard the possessive tone in his majordomo’s voice and couldn’t help but rejoice—if even for the briefest of moments—amidst so much sorrow and upheaval in his life. At least, he had created an environment where his employees cared for his property as if it were their own.

In complete disrespect of possibly contaminating a crime scene, Paolo moved from one upside down coffee table to a torn couch, fretting over the state of furniture in hushed tones.

Quintilius didn’t have the heart to stop the majordomo to do what the man considered his vocation more than a job. Instead, he closed his eyes and let his nose tell him what had happened.

Nostrils flared, he followed a few scents around the living room, then into Iris’s bedroom. There, he opened his eyes and saw how careless fangs had shredded to pieces the mattress on her bed. Delicate porcelain figurines had been either decapitated or hurled against the walls. The armoire’s doors had been ripped from the hinges, and its shelves were empty of the clothes that were everywhere but in the closet.

“Let me open those windows for you.” Paolo hurried to unlatch the Venetian blinds.

Once the late morning light inundated the bedroom and the adjacent bathroom, Quintilius’s nostrils flared in recognition of a long forgotten evil. Following his nose, he found what remained of a small glass bottle smashed near the nightstand and swore under his breath.

Supported on either side by Samuel and Quintilius, Lupo entered the courtroom.

The lawyer who had agreed to represent him, Martina Colonna, a vampire who was the fallen’s fiancé, was waiting for him in the front.

Despite his life as a gang member, Lupo had never set foot in a courtroom before. His first impression of the dimly-lit room paneled in dark wood was that it looked both scary and depressing. After a day spent awake in bed, with Samuel, who pep-talked and instructed him on how the night would proceed, he wanted nothing else but for the whole charade to be over.

“Hi, Lupo, my name is Martina, and I am your defense attorney.” The woman, a small athletic brunette, took his hand for a vigorous shake. “I promise I’ll fight for you to have a fair process.”

From some far away recess in his mind, Lupo translated her neatly arranged words to their basic meaning. He didn’t have a chance to leave the court free, but she would work hard to lessen his sentence.

“It’s okay,” he said to her, plopping down on the seat reserved for him. The change of clothes the archangel had brought him was not only his size, but also comfortable. But he didn’t want comfortable. He wanted to experience misery.

Raphael, who was part of his group, sat one row behind and leaned forward to squeeze his arm. He didn’t say anything, but gave him a nod.

Ravenna del Sarto, Alexander Drako, the Controller and his companion had come too, and they took a seat alongside Raphael, while Quintilius remained standing until Ludwig Barnes arrived. After a brief exchange of whispered words, the archangel grabbed the chair on the other side of Raphael, and Quintilius joined the rest of his friends.

When Jasmine’s family entered the room accompanied by their lawyers, Lupo’s heart broke all over again. The somber group regally walked through the whole length of the central aisle with their chins up and their backs straight. Both the men, wearing dark, custom-made suits, and the women, clad in those horrid black chitons, exuded pain and suffering, and their animals’ mournful wails reached Lupo’s wolf. He took in their hurt, welcoming the punishment, hoping he would faint from it.

A few minutes after the Purists sat behind their lawyers on the other side of the aisle from Lupo, the court chancellor stood and asked the audience to follow him. A moment later, the judge walked in from a door behind the stand.

Distracted by the nearness of Jasmine’s family with their scents similar to hers and those ugly feminine clothes that would forever remind him of her, and unable to concentrate on what was said, Lupo’s mind wandered to Jasmine, as it had done the whole day.

“Lupo Solis, you are asked to testify,” the chancellor announced.

Samuel had explained to him in lengthy details what would happen and when, during the hearing. But the moment arrived for Lupo to face the audience, and he wasn’t ready to tell his side of the story.

“Lupo, go ahead.” Martina Colonna gave him an encouraging smile.

“Don’t worry, son. Just tell the truth,” Quintilius whispered from behind, both his hands on Lupo’s shoulders.

“It’s going to be okay,” Ludwig said.

The chancellor gave Lupo a menacing glance, and he pushed his chair away from the table as he stood on shaky legs. He hadn’t eaten anything, not for lack of trying from everyone living in Drako’s household, but because he had refused food every time they offered. With only water sloshing in his stomach, nausea hit him, and he lurched forward.

Be strong, my wolf.

Jasmine’s words echoed in his head, giving Lupo the strength to walk toward the deposition stand. It didn’t matter to him that her voice was a construct of his mind.

Guided by the chancellor, Lupo took his place behind the stand and swore to tell the truth. His eyes went to the army in black facing him. Jasmine’s family breathed and moved as one, their collective gaze full of hate trained at him, as if they were aiming to shoot at a target.

Martina Colonna stood, walked a few steps toward the stand, and asked, “Lupo, tell us how you met Jasmine Cannalis Corte.”

Memories flooded Lupo’s mind and he spoke, slow at first, his voice choking.

“I made a delivery in the same building she lives…” He blinked away the tears. “Where she lived.”

“Can you state for the court what kind of product you delivered at the Cannalis Corte’s?”

“It was V.”

His statement was received with a low rumble from the Purists’ corner. Lupo’s lawyer ignored them. “Are you a freelancer?”

“I belonged to a gang.”

“Which one?”

“The Reds.” Lupo wondered why his lawyer was following that line of inquiry.

The low rumble became a growl.

“Are you still a member of the gang?”

“I haven’t had any time to cut my ties with them, but I would’ve. For Jasmine.”

“Are you under the impression the gang would let you go?”

“No, I don’t think so, but my intention was to start a new life with Jasmine far away from here. Somewhere where she could have been safe.”

Jasmine’s family reacted strongly to his statement and a few disparaging words were whispered.

“Let’s get back to the beginning of your story.” Martina Colonna waited for the disturbance to quiet down. “How was your courtship conducted?”

“Jasmine’s panther and my wolf decided for us. They called each other and influenced our decisions. One afternoon, I found myself in a bit of a situation, and Jasmine came to my rescue.” With renewed ache, he realized the afternoon that now seemed so far away in time had happened not even a week ago. “She sneaked me into her apartment and—”

One of the Purist women jumped up. “Liar!”

From that one word spat like a curse, Lupo recognized Jasmine’s mother’s voice.

The two men sitting at either side of the woman gently pulled her down to the chair, and she started sobbing. The man to her right passed an arm over her shoulder, drawing her closer to him. His black eyes were full of unshed tears, and the resemblance with Jasmine’s uncanny.

Neither the chancellor nor the judge intervened. The entire court remained silent and still until the woman stopped crying.

Only then did the judge say to Lupo, “Continue.”

“We…” Lupo’s throat was dry, and his eyes kept wandering toward Jasmine’s mother. “We spent a few hours together, getting to know each other, and she told me how she could read my mind—”

Jasmine’s mother gasped, “It’s not possible,” while the man hugging her—who had to be Jasmine’s father—brought his free hand to his mouth to cover his swearing.

Again, both the chancellor and the judge didn’t say anything, but let the moment pass, then Lupo was ordered to resume his deposition.

“I was in the bathroom when Jasmine’s mother came to tell Jasmine she must hurry for the date with her fiancé.” Lupo gazed at the woman, and the shock on her face was such that for a moment hate was replaced by surprise. “When I heard my soulmate was promised to another man, my instincts took over and I acted upon them.”

“Explain what happened,” Martina Colonna asked.

Lupo told them how he had stolen a car to leave the city, and that they spent a day and a half at the reserve. When he reached the part of the accident, he stopped a few times, tears obfuscating his thoughts.

“You called the enforcers to ensure Jasmine would be attended by paranormals, is that right?” His lawyer regarded him with compassion in her eyes.

Lupo nodded, then said, “Yes, I did. She wasn’t… she was still and I feared she would—” He took his face in his hands and couldn’t stop from crying before the whole court.

“You exchanged your freedom to save Jasmine,” Martina Colonna said.

“She’s—” Lupo wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Jasmine is the love of my life. Without her, I can’t go on living.” He shook his head. “Had I known she would die as a result of my decision, I would’ve stepped aside and let her marry her betrothed.” With his chest heaving from the effort to keep him from sobbing louder, Lupo looked straight at the two parents. “I am sorry, and I’m ready to take full responsibility for Jasmine’s death.”

“That would be all for me, your honor.” Martina Colonna went back to her chair. Her heels hit the marble floor with a loud staccato that echoed in the silence that followed.

When the judge asked Jasmine’s family lawyers if they wanted to interrogate Lupo, one of them stood and approached him with the same accusing expression the family sported on their faces.

“You just confessed to killing Jasmine Cannalis Conte,” the man started, his voice as cold as his eyes.

During the next three hours, with the help of his colleagues, the Purist lawyer attacked Lupo from several fronts. They asked intimate questions and probed into his past, but they didn’t mention the Reds except in passing. His relationship with Quintilius was torn to pieces. Yet, he didn’t react to the constant bait.

“You thought that being the son of the alpha made you untouchable,” the lawyer said, after a few inflammatory statements that didn’t provoke any response in Lupo.

“When I spirited Jasmine away from her house, I had nothing else in mind but her. The mating call is impossible to ignore, and in our case, her Purist genes added an extra pull. She marked me in her apartment, and from that moment onward, I was a slave of my senses. My brain stopped working altogether. My blood ties forgotten. I only wanted to live with her, away from Rome.” Several memories assaulted him, and Lupo blinked.

The man didn’t give him time to breathe, ready to attack again. “So you are saying that taking her away from her family, violating her, and acting so recklessly that she was eventually killed should all be excused because you were in the throes of a mating call?”

Lupo gave the audience a sad smile. “I don’t want to be excused.”

A final volley of questions followed, and Lupo answered each one of them, hoping he could fade away, but the sight of Jasmine’s parents kept him anchored to the present. Their pain reached for him and fueled his own, his heart bleeding from invisible cuts.

When he was sent back, and Martina was called to make her closing argument, he shut his mind and let her words soothe him into a state of suspended consciousness. Words reached him, but he couldn’t assign them any meaning. He sat still, watching first his lawyer then the Purists’ talk to the judge, and only came around when Ludwig patted his arm and said, “Pay attention.”

The Purists’ lawyer was at the end of his speech, and he paced back and forth, his hands moving before him. Then he stopped, took a moment, and in a much quieter voice said, “Given the nature of the perpetrator’s crime, we ask for the maximum penalty, death.”

Behind Lupo, his group murmured their dissent, but Martina turned and said, “I’ve got it, don’t worry.” Then she nodded to Ludwig and raised a hand to get the judge’s attention. “Permission to approach the bench, your honor.”

The judge made a come-hither gesture, and she walked to the dais where she leaned toward the judge and spoke to him in hushed tones.

Although Lupo wasn’t interested in the conversation and didn’t make an effort to listen in on them, his ears could detect the softest of whispers, and he heard bits and pieces.

“I don’t want to drag the family into a scandal, but if my client is convicted of murder, we will appeal, and his criminal activities will be closely investigated,” Martina whispered.

“Where are you going with this?” the Purist lawyer hissed.

“Lupo delivered drugs to the Cannalis’s building—”

“You—” The Purist stepped closer to Martina, towering over her in a menacing stance.

“Enough!” the judge said, his countenance changing from perplexed to annoyed. He asked the two lawyers several questions, then when the Purist’s temper rose, he sent them both back to their sides of the courtroom and announced he would retire to make a decision.

When the judge and the chancellor left, Lupo’s group gathered around him.

“Everything will be okay. Don’t worry,” Martina said, as the rest whispered words of encouragement.

Lupo thanked her because she had been nothing but nice to him, then he slumped into his chair, his hands on his lap, his eyes staring at the faces in front of him but seeing nothing.

Raphael dropped to his haunches and waved a hand before Lupo’s face. “Earth to Lupo.”

“What?” Lupo let out a long breath.

“I can’t even imagine the pain you’re in, but, brother, you must react. Jasmine would’ve wanted you to live,” Raphael said.

“She marked me so I wouldn’t look at another woman.” Lupo couldn’t help but smile at the memory. “So, I’m not sure about the extent of living she wanted me to have in her absence.”

Raphael chuckled back. “Still, I wouldn’t want Luisa to lose any interest in living because I wasn’t around.” He placed a hand on Lupo’s shoulder and applied a light pressure. “Please, don’t waste away. Even if you think you have no reasons left to go on, remember that you are loved.” Tilting his chin over his shoulder, he pointed at Quintilius who was looking at Lupo. “And you have a friend in me.”

“Thanks.” Again the word came out of Lupo’s mouth by rote.

Both Peter and Ravenna talked to him, and Lupo listened and nodded, but didn’t contribute to the conversation.

A step away from the rest of the crowd, Quintilius watched Lupo, as if he was guarding over him, a solid wall of a man shielding him from the angry family a few meters from them.

The door behind the stand opened, the chancellor entered and asked everyone to take their place beside their chairs, then to stand for the judge, who appeared a moment later.

After a few more formalities, the judge said, “Lupo Solis, stand up.”

Lupo obeyed the order, but his legs didn’t want to cooperate and he pressed both hands down on the narrow table before him. The vertigo passed, and he straightened himself up.

“After considering all the facts presented to me by both sides, I’ve reached a verdict.” The judge paused, his eyes roamed from Lupo to the Purists. “Taking into consideration the age of the accused, and the exceptional circumstances that led to Jasmine Cannalis Conte’s death, I declare Mr. Solis not culpable of the crimes of kidnapping and manslaughter.”