Bargains and Betrayals (34 page)

Outside, Amy swept her auburn hair up and into a ponytail, pulling a hat firmly down on her head. We plodded forward, soles slapping the road as we ran.

A few blocks down we turned onto Main Street, hopping onto the sidewalk and out of the sparse Junction traffic. Running in the shade cast by the old department stores, houses, restaurants, and cafés that crowded the street, we shivered as the first flakes of snow peppered down.

A cat burst out of an alleyway and Amy jumped in surprise, stumbling and cursing.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said, obviously spooked. A couple months back she would have seen the cat, hopped over it, and stroked its back with her trailing foot. But now? She was shaken.

I wondered what she was thinking, this best friend of mine who’d grown up rich enough—in ways most people never counted—in a trailer park until her parents started fighting. She’d had everything she wanted for a while. But things changed. Her brother escaped by enlisting—finding that some battlefields were easier to understand than others. Her mother left, and her dad lost his job.

She found Marvin.

Her prince turned rapist.

She lengthened her stride, and I pushed to keep up, as we reached the east end of Main, the spot where the redbrick heart of town became punctured with postage-stamp lawns and the street stretched into an abbreviated suburbia.

Up toward the colleges we went, feet pounding blacktop as we climbed the hill. Amy could have eased up—gone more gently with a slow jog—but she had reasons to run. And nothing would stop her today, so I fought to keep pace.

Like the friend I should have been all along.

“You know there’s something different about Max,” I puffed.

“Yes,” she said. “He’s uncomplicated. I like him because of that.”

Oh boy.

“Marvin lied from the beginning. He—my dad would have called it—
sold me a bill of goods
.”

“So you like Max?” I pressed her, knowing her answer.

Something moved in the shadows and Amy hopped to the side, jostling against me, eyes wide. Recovering, she said, “So much it hurts. But…”

“But what?”

“Everything’s changed. So fast. I don’t know what to do.”

“Trust me. Trust
Max
,” I urged.

Off the blacktop and onto packed dirt we went. Everything was colder here: the ground, the air … Winter was already moving in, so cold it burned in my throat and lungs. This park wasn’t as well-kept as the one by the river, but its crisp wildness felt right.

Amy slowed, watching me. “Max wants to talk,” she said.

“Yeah.”

She shook out her feet and legs, clapping her hands together. “Guys
never
want to talk—not unless they’re breaking up with you.”

“You think…”

“I do have a little more experience with this relationship stuff,” she pointed out. “I just didn’t expect the
it’s not you, it’s me
speech so soon.”

“What if that’s not it?”

“Of course that’s it. And who can blame him after—”

I grabbed her arms and shook her. “No,” I insisted. “Who can blame
you?
Why are
you
blaming you?”

“I had this friend,” she began, “who lost her mom. She blamed herself for it. But it wasn’t her fault.”

“Sounds like a stupid friend.” I kicked a pebble. “I know it wasn’t my fault. Rationally speaking.”

“Yeah,” she agreed. “I know what Marvin did wasn’t my fault either—
rationally speaking
.”

“So what do you want, Amy, from Max?”

“One minute all I want is for Max to hold me, kiss me—wipe out everything I remember about Marvin, and then…” She bent over, sucking down a ragged breath. “… the idea of him touching me like Marvin did…”

“He’ll never touch you like Marvin did,” I whispered, pulling her up and into a hug. “It’s Max. He’s an oaf, but he’s a wonderful oaf.”

She jumped. Something rustled in the brush not far from where we stood. Something large.

“Seriously,” I assured. “He’s just a wonderful oaf who needs you as much as you need him.”

“There’s something special about him…,” she agreed, but she was listening to the disturbance near the path’s edge.

“Oh, he’s special, all right.…”

“Did you hear that?” she asked.

I nodded, knowing.

“Hello?” she called.

“There’s something you have to know, though.…”

“Not now, Jessie.” She waved her hand, listening for movement in the thicket.

“Yes, now,” I insisted, stepping back.

A crunch, a crash, and Max, in his wolfskin, shoved through the brambles.

I took Amy’s hand, watching her as she processed what stood before us, imagining what she saw through her eyes: a wolf. Huge, brown, broad-shouldered, and long of body, it peered at her with eyes not quite canine—somehow human. Except in color. They glowed a grim crimson. In its mouth hung …

Amy blinked, whispering, “Jeans?”

It stepped forward and her hand tightened on mine.

The wolf stopped, dropping the jeans at Amy’s feet.

Amy turned and looked at me, eyes wide. The only monsters she’d ever known were human ones, so a large wolf …

I could almost see the wheels in her head turning as she watched him through narrowed eyes.

He drew back rubbery lips to reveal teeth curving in a hungry grin, and his eyes turned to me.

I nodded, and Amy jumped when the wolf fell to the ground and changed … fur became flesh and hair, paws lengthened into hands and feet.

Amy gasped. I let go of her hand. She grabbed mine again.

The fur disappeared, leaving smooth human flesh.

She reached toward his broad back—the tattoo, she recognized. A saber marking his shoulder. She stared at me. But only for a moment.

Head down, body still bent, he slipped into the jeans and stood slowly up, pushing raucous curls back from dramatic eyebrows and out of his sparkling eyes.

Nearly nose-to-nose with her, Max smiled, saying, “We need to talk.”

Amy screamed and I dropped her hand so Max could take them both and tenderly, carefully, kiss her quiet.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Jessie

Brighter than we often gave him credit for being, Max had brought the car. We piled in, Amy still in shock, and headed back to the Queen Anne as Max tried to pour out in words everything Amy needed to know.

And probably a good bit more. It seemed Dad and I weren’t the only ones who rambled when worried. And Max was most definitely worried. At least he was doing something about it.

Back inside the house, I said, “I need to check on Dad and Wanda. We need to get everyone home.”

Pietr stood behind me, arms draping around my shoulders.

Annabelle Lee called from the kitchen. “They’re fine,” she assured us. “They want
us
to come home.”

“Now?” I whispered, looking around the sitting room. In such a very short time this had
become
home.

“First things first, Jessie,” Alexi apologized, reaching for me. “We need some blood.”

Cat looked at me, her eyes saying what she didn’t with words: She hadn’t told Alexi the cure didn’t hold. That she’d changed when Derek had her bleeding in the dirt with no hope.

I looked at Mother, curled on the floor, chin propped on her fists. She looked human enough, but her body language showed just how strong a grip the wolf had. “What if it’s not enough?” I murmured, peeling myself away from Pietr.

“It has to be.”

“What if…” I searched for words, but came up empty.

“We don’t know enough,” Alexi admitted. “She’s so advanced in the stages of this thing, what if…”

“What if your grandfather was so efficient in making us that nothing can save her now?” Max hissed.

“Shut up.” Mother stood, rubbing at her eyes. I noticed they never lost their red glow now, the wolf taunting her from within. “I will not tolerate my family bickering.” She swayed on her feet and both Alexi and Max grabbed her to steady her.

They paused, looking at each other, each holding their mother, one the adopted son with no blood ties, the other a full-blooded mama’s boy when he wasn’t a full-blooded player. But in this, they saw eye-to-eye.

“What is the worst that could happen?” She flung up a hand to silence me before the words fell out. “I’m dying already. How much time do I have? A week? A day? You risked enough to free me. This is
my
risk. My choice. None of you will take my choice from me. Prepare the cure. I will drink tonight and see what tomorrow brings.”

We nodded and Alexi led me away to give the only thing I could other than my hope everything would be okay: I gave my blood.

Jessie

We were readying to take everyone home when Pietr caught me in the foyer. “I’m sorry.”

“I understand,” he said, his jaw tight. “Go home. You’ve done more than your part.”

“Do you think leaving you is easy?” I wondered, horrified.

“You have a chance to know her. But you’re going home.”

“She’s taking the cure. I’ll have more time to know her.” But my heart stuttered and raced like I was lying.

“Kiss me, Pietr,” I whispered as everyone skirted us, heading for the door. “I’ll come back as soon as I can.”

He leaned over and kissed me, his lips hard and tight.

“Pietr…”

“Do what you have to do,” he said, pulling out of my grip. He turned on his heel and walked away.

I sank into the seat beside Amy, who’d insisted she’d ride along. From the car’s front seat Sarah fiddled with the radio as Alexi backed down the drive.

“Okay,” I said to Alexi, “Sarah first.”

“My parents are still in Aruba,” she complained. “I doubt the maid even noticed I was gone.”

I reached forward and grabbed her arm. “At least you won’t have to explain anything. It’ll be fine.”

“How do you know that?” Amy interjected.

“Because—”

“No,” Sarah agreed. “She’s right. Add that to the list of things I didn’t think I’d ever say,” she muttered. “I don’t know if I—if any of us—will be okay. I mean, what exactly did Derek do to us?”

Amy turned and looked at me in question as Sarah continued. “I get the feeling he shoved a whole file folder worth of crap into my head, but—”

Sophia picked up. “I don’t want to open it.”

Sarah nodded and my stomach tightened. They’d put words to the same sensation I’d noticed. Something crawling in my head, like a snake slowly coiling, readying to strike.

Alexi looked into the rearview mirror, concern clear in his eyes. “You need to keep me in the loop about this. If you start having any weird…” He shook his head. “Let me know if you notice any changes in yourselves—or each other.”

We pulled into Sarah’s driveway. “Well, that’s it for me.”

A gardener looked up from where he was trimming the hedges. “Morning, Miss Luxom.”

Sarah nodded. “See? No welcome wagon.”

Amy shrugged. “At least your dad’s not sleeping off a hangover in some bar. Mine probably hasn’t noticed I’m gone.”

Sarah paused at the open door. “Do you truly think my father’s any different except when it comes to his fashion choices and income?” She glanced over her shoulder. “He’s probably sleeping it off in a hammock on a beach. No clue about me.” With a flip of her hair, she headed toward her house.

Worlds apart, it wasn’t a long drive between Sarah’s and Sophia’s. The moment Sophie stepped out of the car, the front door of the house swung open and her mother came screaming out of it, tears streaking down her face. “I was so scared—”

“Can we go now?” I asked, but Alexi was already backing up.

I was glad someone had missed Sophia. Glad she had a mother who cared enough to greet her in curlers and a terry cloth nightgown, not caring how the neighbors would talk.

I missed that. I was jealous I no longer had that.

But sitting beside Amy I felt guilty for feeling that way. I at least still had Dad and Annabelle Lee (a blessing and a curse). But Amy … her dad seldom made it home from the bar anymore. And when he was home, it wasn’t like he knew if she was or not. He was mired so deep in self-pity he couldn’t appreciate the gift he had.

His daughter.

When we pulled up our long gravel driveway, I looked around, spotting Rio, dancing on nimble hooves in the paddock. Dad and Annabelle Lee had really worked with her in my absence. Hunter and Maggie rushed the car, Maggie springing up in her bizarre black Lab way and nearly hovering in midair, ears flapping out on the downdraft. Hunter whined, wanting a pat on the head. Or snacks.

Annabelle Lee climbed out first.

Do what you have to
, Pietr had said—the same thing I’d texted him from the asylum. The reason he’d captained up and risked himself for his mother. He’d done what he’d had to.

So would I.

“Wait,” I said to Alexi.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.” Heading for the house at a sprint, hands out to pat canine heads, I pulled the front door open. “Dad!”

He was there in a moment, picking me up, twirling me around so my sneakers brushed the wall. “God, Jessie, we were so worried.…” He set me down and grabbed Annabelle Lee. “Anna, Anna, Anna,” he crooned, so happy his voice cracked.

“Dad.” I put a hand on his arm.

He glanced out the screen in the door, spotting the car. “You’re not running off again,” he protested.

Leaning against the entry to the kitchen, Wanda’s eyes were soft. “Jessie. Can’t you stay? Things are settling down.”

“They just got their mother back and…” I swallowed. “They may not have much time. Pietr needs me.”

“Anna?”

“I’m here to stay,” she assured.

Jessie

Seated at his mother’s feet with Cat and Max, Pietr looked up at me, surprised when I entered the house behind Alexi and Amy. For a moment his expression was unreadable. I wondered if it would have been easier if I’d stayed home and given him time to build up some wall.

Mother nudged him with her foot. “Go,” she commanded. “You will not be able to concentrate until you do.”

Cowed, he stood and walked over to me, taking my hand and leading me into the kitchen so we could be alone.