Wolver's Reward (39 page)

She put her hand to his chest, gently over
his heart.

"Is this normal, then?"

"Normal?"

She nodded her head, the movement so slight
her fine white hair barely moved. "You know. Is this what a normal
guy says to a normal girl instead of saying goodbye? Because that's
what I asked for isn't it? A normal guy who would treat me like a
normal girl." Her lips started to quiver and she pressed them
together. A single tear leaked from the corner of her eye. "Only
you turned out to be anything but normal. You turned out to be
special."

She didn't wipe away the tear and it took all
River's self-control not to run the pad of his thumb across the
soft skin of her chin where it lingered.

"No Babe, not special. I'm only me, the
wolver who came to get his stolen truck and stayed on as a
temporary boyfriend and Champion to the Alpha. It was a paid gig
and it's over now."

"It isn't over. Not for me. It'll never be
over for me. I love you, River. My wolf does, too."

"It isn't love," he said angrily. "It's a
rebellion. You'll get over it. So will your wolf."

"No," she argued, her tears falling freely.
"You can't get away with that. I won't let you. You can't use anger
to cover the hurt. I love you, River. I know. In here." She tapped
his chest with her delicately boned fingers. "And you do, too. This
isn't me acting out. This isn't my little rebellion. This is me
saying I'm an adult. I know my own mind and I make my own choices.
I told you that before, remember? I choose you. You're everything I
want. I knew that from the beginning, but I was afraid to say it.
My wolf knew it, too."

"I can't be what you need me to be."

"You already are, River. Remember? You're
kind, and brave, and handsome."

He wasn't being kind. He certainly wasn't
brave, and he sure as hell wasn't handsome. He backed away from her
touch.

"That's all in your mind, Babe. It's fantasy.
You'll see. The real thing will come along. He'll be a great Alpha,
and you'll be one helluva Mate."

He turned from her and left, back stiff and
shoulders straight. Though the door was closed behind him, he heard
her parting words clearly.

"I love you, River Goodman. I always will.
Remember that, when you remember me."

As if he could ever forget.

Chapter 30

River drove. He stopped for food when he was
hungry. He stopped and slept in rest areas for a few hours when he
was tired. He washed and changed his clothes there, too. He went
through the motions, did what needed to be done.

He'd expected more argument from his wolf.
The creature had given one long keening howl as he'd walked away
from Reb. It was the same howl River heard all those years ago at
the deaths of Skeeter and Crow. The wolf had remained silent ever
since.

He drove, radio blaring, and tried not to
think. He had no destination in mind. There was no place he wanted
to be. He had no plan except to drive until his money ran out. Then
he'd find a job, any job, until he had enough money to drive some
more.

Sooner or later, he'd get used to the
loneliness. Sooner or later, he'd get used to the feeling of being
lost. Sooner or later he'd stop dreaming of the faces he'd left
behind; Roland, Margaret, Darla, Scar, and the others. He'd never
stop dreaming of Reb. Hers was the one face that still made him
smile. His worst moments came when he awakened to find she was only
a dream. He would get used to that, too.

It wasn't his intent to retrace the route the
pack had taken to their new home. He went where the truck took him
and it wasn't until he saw the Paradise Motel that he realized what
he'd done. He drove past the pink flamingoes, resisting the
temptation to stop and rent a room with ugly hula girls dancing
beneath a glaring sun.

He was back on the highway when he saw the
car, a forty year old Cadillac Fleetwood pulled off onto the
shoulder of the highway headed in the opposite direction. The car
was in mint condition; no rust, no dents, and chrome that shone
like mirrors. It was perfect; no black and foul smelling smoke
pouring out from the exhaust, he noted. For the first time in days,
River smiled.

The little old lady was standing by the open
trunk, hands on hips and staring at the flat tire on the car.

River drove on until he found a spot in the
grassy median shallow enough to make an illegal U-turn. She was
struggling to pull the spare tire out when he reached her.

"Need some help with that?"

The red lipsticked mouth spread into a grin.
"Well look who's here. Paul always said every good deed gets repaid
in one way or another and I could sure use one now. I took your
advice, you know. Got a new engine put in, a re-built they called
it. Runs like a charm."

"Looks like you could use a couple of new
tires, too."

He pulled the spare out and leaned it against
the bumper while he set up the jack.

There was nothing wrong with the old lady's
memory. "That the truck you were looking to get back? You ever find
that girl? What about your motorcycle, your pride, you called it.
You get that back, too?"

He'd gotten a lot more than his pride. "Long
story," he told her. "You wouldn't be interested."

She laughed and then sputtered the cough of a
longtime smoker. "I guess you forgot. At my age, the only
adventures I have left belong to other people. Come on, tell me
about it," she urged. "What else do you have to do while you're
changing that tire and I'm standing here twiddling my thumbs."

So he told her. He was only going to give her
the bare bones of it, but once he started, he couldn't stop. He
carefully worked his way around the parts he couldn't tell and put
some of the story in terms a human would understand. He needed to
tell someone and there was no one else to tell.

The tire was changed, the jack back in place,
and the trunk closed long before his tale was done. They sat side
by side on the bumper while he finished. The old lady oohed and
aahed, and nodded her head. She smiled and frowned in all the right
places until the end.

"You're a damn fool," she said when he
finished.

He'd expected some sympathy. "Excuse me?"

She ground out her sixth cigarette and
pointed her finger angrily at his nose. "You keep saying Fate had a
hand in this. You keep saying all this was meant to be; those folks
finding a place where they'd be happy, that man being healthy
enough to lead his flock, getting rid of the bad guy, all of it was
meant to be. Not once did you stop to think all this wasn't meant
to be for them. Fate, as you call it, meant it for you. I know,"
she said with a firm nod of her head.

"I was meant to be driving along that road
all those years ago. My Paul was meant to be hitchhiking, too. We
were meant to find each other in the most unlikely place. He stuck
it out and in his way, he fought for me, knowing we were meant to
be. You, mister, were meant to find that girl sitting on that
bumper. You were meant to get rid of your ghosts and see all the
love you've been given to share. That girl was meant to love you
and don't hand me that baloney about her getting over you. She'll
mourn you the same way I mourn my Paul. She'll hang on to the most
important thing you gave her. You were given it all, and you, you
damn fool, tossed it all away. You didn't fight for what was meant
to be. All you've got is your pride and how much is that worth now?
Nothing," she answered her own question. "Pride isn't worth
anything unless it's connected to love.

"I've been thinking a lot about you and how I
wanted to give you a piece of advice, but didn't. That was about
pride, but now I've got another piece and I'm going to say it. You
get off of that high horse of yours. It's taking you in the wrong
direction. You get back in that truck. You go back to where you
came from and fight for that girl. You tell her parents, and her
people, and that fella they set her up to marry, but most of all
you tell that girl all this was meant to be and you've got a
lifetime to convince her of it. Fate handed you a gold mine, son.
Don't throw it away."

River stared at the old woman. He wanted to
tell her how wrong she was, how she didn't know what she was
talking about. He was putting the words together in his mind, but
when he opened his mouth, the stupidest thing fell out.

"Can I kiss you?"

"Like any woman my age would turn down an
offer like that from a young man as handsome as you."

She offered her cheek, but River picked her
up and whirled her around before he set her on her feet and gave
her a smacker right on the lips.

"Thank you," she laughed, "And for changing
my tire, too."

"No, thank you, ma'am, and get yourself
another tire. That spare doesn't look much better than the one I
took off."

"You're good at taking care of people, aren't
you?"

"I am," he said and then he laughed. "It's
what I was meant to do."

He held the door for her and made sure she
had her seatbelt set before he closed it. He waited until she
started up and drove away before putting the truck in gear. He was
careful of his speed. He had a lot of miles to cover and he had no
time to waste being pulled over by a cop.

He was going home. Where he was meant to
be.

~*~

Reb wasn't very good at hiding what she felt.
She tried, but all the women knew. Most of the men did, too. Gossip
travelled fast in a pack. Her mother tried to talk to her, but Reb
refused.

"You warned me, Mother. I knew the
consequences and now I'll have to suffer them. I don't want to talk
about it. I won't talk about it. I'll be all right. Just give me
time."

Her friends surrounded her with sympathy and
comfort. She didn't want that, either. Celia tried a different
tactic to console her. She attacked River's character. Reb snapped
at her.

"Don't. Don't you dare. He's none of those
things. None, do you hear me? And don't you ever repeat those
things outside this room. River is a good man, a good wolver. You
know it. You saw it. I loved him and now he's gone. That's the end
of it. I'll be all right. Just give me time."

She hadn't slept well since he left. She
awakened every time she felt him in the dark, every time her hand
slid across the empty sheet and he wasn't there. She heard him in
the bathroom when no one was there. Sometimes she thought she heard
him shout. She saw him trotting across the compound. He never
walked. But he wasn't really there.

She was empty, and she was lost without the
feel of him, the sight of him, the sound of him. She would not be
all right. More time would only make it possible for her to learn
how to hide what she felt. It would never go away. Her wolf would
never sing again. She knew that, too.

The animal was curled inside of her,
unmoving. Only its occasional whine of lonely despair told her it
was still alive.

The days passed and she did what needed to be
done. She took on extra work since she had no need of free time.
She smiled when she needed to and did her best to cover the pain
she kept locked in her heart.

She would take a page from River's book. She
would survive. She would do what needed to be done.

She fingered the tiny heart on the bracelet
he'd left for her. The picture was so small she had to borrow the
onyx handled magnifying glass that sat with the matching letter
opener on her father's desk to make out its subject. Four small
cubs sat smiling for the camera. Behind them stood a much younger
River, not smiling at all. She'd made him smile, and the very fact
that he'd left this for her said he loved her, too. The marble and
the duck, she wasn't sure about, though she thought she knew. These
things were precious to him and he'd given them to her. He trusted
her with their safekeeping.

He wanted her to remember.

He loved her. So why did he leave? It was a
question she would ask herself for the next hundred years.

She heard the commotion out in the compound,
but she ignored it. The noise wasn't fearful or panicked. She
continued folding the sheets that were hung early that morning to
dry.

"Where is she, damn it? Where the fuck is
she?"

Reb stopped folding. She'd almost convinced
herself it was another hallucination when the shouting
continued.

"Darla, you get the fuck out of my way or I
will rip you apart. Don't threaten me. Tell me where she is, damn
it. Babe. Babe!" That was no hallucination.

Clean sheets tumbled to the floor and tangled
about her feet. She kicked and struggled free, and then she was
running, running, running, through the shed where they did the
wash, around the two cabins that stood in her way, and into the
clearing at the center of the compound, and he was there. He was
real.

She stopped twenty feet away.

River. Kind and brave and handsome. The sun
caught the red in his hair and made it shine. The tight tee shirt
molded to the broad chest she knew so well. His jeans were worn at
the knee and he wore his leather jacket along with those ugly black
boots. He was beautiful.

"Babe, we were meant to be," he said.

And then she was running again. She leapt. He
caught her. She wrapped her legs around his waist.

"We were meant to be, Babe," he said again
and then he kissed her.

It was the best kiss ever. It was everything
she'd dreamed of alone in her bed. It said this was all he needed,
all he would ever need, all she would ever need. The kiss went on
and on and on, and as far as she was concerned, it could go on
forever.

Her wolf started to sing. It howled its joy
to the sky and the moon hiding behind the sun. And wonder of
wonders, yet no wonder at all, another wolf's voice joined in.