Wolves among men (26 page)

“
Alright!” I called back
with a smile. I tossed the pillow to the side and sat up quickly.
The room had gone dark and I could hear the sounds of people
laughing in the courtyard just outside my window. I stood from my
bed and stretched as far as my body would allow, relishing in the
feel of my bones popping back into place.

“
Ethan, come on man,” Matt
groaned from the other side of the door.

“
I’m coming!” I barked
back as I made my way through the small room and pulled the door
open to greet him.

“
It’s about damn time.” He
smiled as I wormed my way around him and closed the door behind
me.

“
So what’s the emergency?”
I yawned as he stared down at me.

“
Food.” He smiled before
turning quickly and making his way down the hallway and out of
view. I grinned happily and followed him, my stomach growling as I
followed the sounds of laughter into the moonlit garden, nearly
forgetting about my nightmare as I stepped out into the crisp night
air.

Chapter
Seventeen

The moment I stepped out into the
garden, every sense I had was set ablaze by the life this little
place had taken on while I was sleeping. The smell of food wafted
through the air making my stomach growl and my mouth water. The
sound of laughter and conversation surrounded me as I stepped past
the line of trees and out into the open.

I scanned the crowd of faces in an
attempt to get to know them as I leaned against a large apple tree
and smiled. A group of children ran screaming and laughing past me
and it was strange to see faces so young with the scent of wolves
all around them, just one of the many things that would take some
getting used to.

“
People watching?” I
turned to toward the voice that broke my trance. A dark haired man
stood next to me and smiled as he held out a red plastic cup. I
took it from him and nodded in thanks before turning back to the
crowd.

“
You’re with the new group
right? Ethan was it?” I nodded quickly.

“
Yeah, how did you
know?”

“
Grant told me.” I
chuckled lightly and nodded. “I’m Jason,” He smiled as he thrust
his hand toward me. I took it happily only to wince at the force
with which he gripped mine. “But everyone calls me
Mack.”

“
Hey, Mack.” I groaned as
he released my hand.

“
So Grant tells me you’re
looking for someone.”

He asked before I had the chance to
speak. I nodded slightly, a hollow feeling welling up in my stomach
at the memory of why we were here.

“
My sister,” I answered
him. “She was kidnapped, that’s why we came here.”

“
Shit man, that’s harsh.
Is she one of us?” I shook my head and took another sip from my
cup. “Well, don’t feel too bad about it, if he took her it was for
a reason so the odds are good he won’t kill her right away.” I
winced slightly at his attempt to comfort me. I didn’t really want
to hear things like that but he made a good point and whether I
liked it or not it was the truth. “Relax, man, I didn’t mean
anything by it. It’s just that that’s good for us, it means we have
time,” he explained. I looked at him quickly, a smile crossing over
my face.

“
We?” I asked
unsure.

“
Yeah, man.” He smiled.
“Unless you don’t want our help.” He added with a quick shrug as he
took a drink from his cup.

“
No, no I’d love all the
help I can get.” I chuckled into my glass. “I just didn’t expect
you guys to want to help or anything. I kind of figured this was
just a stopping point or something like that.” He eyed me quickly
before he broke out into loud peals of laughter.

“
You really are new aren’t
you?” He asked as his laughter died down.

“
New to what?”

“
New to everything.” He
smiled.

“
Am I missing something?”
I leaned back against the apple tree behind me and watched him
curiously.

“
We,” He smiled, pointing
between him and I. “Are creatures of myth, you know that.” I
nodded. “We stick together and we listen to whatever the hell our
leader says.”

“
No questioning
it?”

“
Oh sure we can question
all we want but what he decides,” he spoke pointing over to Grant
who was laughing with a small group of older looking gentleman
while working a large steel grill. “We follow. That’s just the way
it works.”

“
Really?”

“
Have you ever seen your
leader, Sam, give an order?” I nodded. There were many times I had
seen Matt and Logan jump at her command and without question. “And
her boys followed it to a T am I right?”

“
Yeah, actually it’s kind
of strange to see Matt taking orders from someone half his
size.”

“
That’s what I mean.” He
laughed lightly. “It’s not really something we can even control its
just instinct. You’ll see, one of these days she’ll tell you to do
something and you won’t even think twice about it.” He smiled and
took a long drink from his cup as I thought about what he
said.

“
So, how does someone
become a pack leader?” I asked quickly. He shrugged and leaned
against a large tree that towered next to him.

“
A few different ways
actually, sometimes it’s as simple as one person in the pack is
stronger than the rest and fights his way to the top, sometimes a
wolf will turn others to gain their loyalty and support. It all
really depends on the clan and the wolf in charge.” He explained
quickly, I was sure that there were at least a thousand ways to
gain control of a pack and his little lesson only served to drive
my curiosity about the world that I had been thrust
into.

“
So what about Grant?” I
asked pointing toward him. Mack look behind him and then quickly
back to me. “How did he make it to the top?”

“
Oh that’s easy, he takes
care of us.” I shot him a questioning glance, hoping to get a
better explanation than that. “He started a long time ago with his
own little pack.” Mack stood straight and smiled as his explanation
became very animated. “He was a doctor back in world war two, went
over to serve and all that jazz but what it boils down to was if a
patient came in to his tent that was too far gone he would offer to
save them.” He glanced over me quickly and shot me a knowing look.
“I’m sure you understand that.”

“
Better than you know.” I
smirked.

“
Oh yeah?”

“
Sam.” I nodded toward
her. “She saved my life.”

“
Wow, you don’t hear that
much anymore.”

“
Really?”

“
No, man, most other
wolves would have just left you there.” I turned my eyes back to
him and shrugged. “You got lucky.” A moment of silence passed as I
looked back to Sam and smiled.

“
It wasn’t just
me.”

“
Huh?” I turned back to
him and took a sip from my cup.

“
It wasn’t just me. She
saved Matt too, took in Logan and James when they had no one.” He
nodded.

“
She’s a special girl.
Sam’s always kind of done her own thing.”

“
You knew her?”

“
Yeah for a while.” He
grinned. “I’ll get to that, so anyway back to Grant’s story.” I
chuckled as he placed his cup down at his feet and continued with a
kind of animated enthusiasm I had only ever seen in children.
“There was like six or seven guys he ended up saving overseas and
they followed him back to the U.S after the war was over. They
lived like hippies, traveling from commune to commune and then
Malik started stirring up shit all over the place kind of like he’s
doing now.” He bent down and took a quick and what I imagined was a
much needed drink from his glass before placing it once again at
his feet and returning to his story.

“
So they all went looking
for Malik, not really knowing who or what he was at the time,” his
voice got a little quieter as he continued his story. “They walked
into a slaughterhouse, only Grant and like five others got out of
there when about thirty of them went in.”

“
Jesus,” I exclaimed as he
nodded at me.

“
I know. So anyway Grant
goes off with the rest of the survivors and they moved around from
place to place for a while until the treaty was made with Malik.
After that Grant settled down here and since then he’s just been
collecting wolves so to speak. They show up from all over and he
takes them in as though they’re family.”

“
Then you just become
family.” He nodded and bent down to pick up his cup, groaning as he
realized it was empty. “He and Sam have a lot in common then.” He
looked over at me slightly confused as he tossed his cup in the
garbage can behind him. “The saving people and taking people in
thing.” He nodded.

“
Oh she used to be part of
the pack, I was gonna tell you about that,” he began.

“
What are we talking about
now?” Sam asked almost as if on cue. She walked over to us happily
and threw her arm around my waist. I smiled and blushed slightly as
she pulled me tight and leaned against me.

“
Just talking about you.”
I smiled down at her.

“
I really hope you’re not
getting into it with this guy.” She nodded toward Mack.

“
What’s wrong with him?” I
asked quickly. She shook her head and shrugged.

“
Nothing, great guy.” She
looked toward him, a sly expression crossing her face. “Never shuts
up.”

“
Oh now that’s not fair.”
He smiled.

“
Fair or not it’s true.”
She shrugged before turning her attention back to me. “Ethan, can
we go somewhere for a moment, I need to talk to you.” She smiled.
Mack groaned in protest and leaned against his tree once
again.

“
Come on, Sam, we were
just getting to know each other,” he grumbled as she pulled herself
away from me.

“
Just for a minute, Mack,
and I’ll have him right back to you,” he grumbled and shooed us
away as Sam grabbed my arm and led me out of the courtyard and back
down the short stretch of hallway toward her room.

I grew nervous as she closed the door
behind me and invited me deeper into the confines of her bedroom.
Old books cluttered her long dark wooden dresser, piles of clothes
littered the floor and as I followed her in, I couldn’t help but
smile. For the first time since we had met she wasn’t just the
woman who made me, who guided me and lectured me but in that moment
I saw her as a friend, an ordinary girl thrown into an
extraordinary situation, something I could more than relate
to.

She sat down on the edge of her bed
and began tying her hair up in a ponytail as she smiled up at me.
“You can sit, Ethan. I’m not gonna bite,” she spoke sweetly. I
couldn’t help but chuckle as I moved closer to her.

“
I don’t know.” I smirked.
“Considering what happened the first time we met that seems kind of
like an empty promise.” She smiled and rolled her eyes, letting out
a soft laugh as I sat on the bed next to her.

“
You would bring that up,”
her voice was thick with sarcasm.

“
I didn’t mean
anything-”

“
No its okay.” She turned
to me and offered me a warm smile. “I just wanted to know how
you’re holding up.”

“
What do you mean?” I
asked quickly, not sure what it was she really wanted to know. She
shrugged lightly as her eyes locked with mine.

“
It can’t be easy, what
you’re going through.”

“
Do I have any choice?” I
answered her sincerely.

“
No I guess not,” she
spoke quietly. “Look, Ethan.” She looked up at me, remorse filling
her eyes. “I’m sorry, about all of this.”

“
Why are you apologizing?
It wasn’t your-”

“
Yes it was, Ethan.” I was
taken aback by her sharp interruption. “It was,” she looked into my
eyes and repeated herself as if I had missed the point. “I spoke to
Grant and believe me when I say I got an earful about what I did to
you and he was right.”

“
Sam, don’t do
this.”

“
No, Ethan, let me
finish.” I sat quietly and waited as she sucked in a sharp breath
and closed her eyes. “What I did to you was wrong,” she began,
struggling with each word as it came out. “You asked me to save you
so I did but I never should have left you on your own like that.”
She took a deep breath and held her head in her hands. “I should
have gone back for you, I should have done something but I was
afraid and I abandoned you and I’m sorry,” her voice was quivering,
bordering on tears as she spoke.