Doctor Wolf (The Collegium Book 4) (12 page)

“Thank you for getting me out of there,” Liz said to Fay. The oaks in the parkland surrounding the house were already beginning to turn color, the green fading in welcome to autumn’s cooler weather. Fallen leaves whispered under foot as Liz led Fay along a shortcut to the main gate.

“No problem. Although I’ll consider it a favor owed.” A small, uncertain smile in Liz’s direction.

Liz made an effort to return the smile.

Unlike her, Fay had grown up isolated and very aware of others’ resentment and envy of her powerful magic. Since falling in love with Steve and their mate-bond establishing itself, Fay had become part of his family, and appeared both delighted and wary. Any attempt she made to relax and fit in deserved to be honored.

Plus, Liz genuinely liked her. “Collecting favors…okay, I’ll bite. What for?”

“I’d like you to be my bridesmaid.”

Liz stopped. “You want me to be your bridesmaid?”

“If you wouldn’t mind?” Fay’s smile wavered.

Liz hugged her excitedly. “I’d love to.”

Fay’s smiled widened as she survived Liz’s exuberant hug, and returned it. “I promise, no pink meringue dresses—unless your mom says so.”

“Mom wouldn’t do that!” Liz laughed. “Does she know that you’re asking me?”

“No. I asked Steve, though, if he thought you’d mind.”

“And my big brother said?

Fay grinned. “He said, Liz? Mind an excuse to dress up and flirt with all the single guys at the wedding? She’ll love it.”

Liz held onto her smile, although flirting reminded her of her problems with Brandon. Just two days ago she’d thought he was courting her, and how to turn him down gently had been her biggest worry. Today, he’d tried to kill her.

“I think Steve’s wrong or out of date,” Fay said, recalling Liz’s attention. “I think you’ll only flirt with one guy. I like Carson.”

Liz blushed. “I don’t know if the thing between us could be real. It’s been a crazy couple of days. We were pretending to be together—long story. Now, we’re not together, but we feel…I feel close to him.”

“He looks at you as if you’re important to him.” Fay started walking again. “When Steve looks at me like that, I melt.” She glanced away, shy at the personal confession. “I’m glad you’ll be my bridesmaid. You can help me make decisions. Steve’s no help, and your mom has a lot of ideas.”

“I’ll bet.” Liz smiled. “It’ll be fun.”

Fay shot her a humorously dubious look.

“I promise,” Liz said recklessly.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Fay said.

They couldn’t find Brandon. Liz watched her family turn feral with frustration.

As for Carson, he was silent: watching, listening, researching online and moving increasingly stiffly. His skin had paled, drawn taut over his cheekbones and his eyes were sunken.

Liz intervened, finally. She walked to where he sat painfully upright at a table in the sitting room, laptop open in front of him, fingers tapping slowly.
Tap, tap, pause
. “You need to sleep.” Twilight had faded into night, the cool, rain-soaked scent of it creeping in the window. “When they find him, someone will wake us.”

“Us?” He looked up at her with surprising alertness.

There was no one near them. Everyone had scattered, intent on their own pursuit of Brandon. Steve and Fay were out, somewhere in Essex. Michelle and David had driven to a friend’s house, needing a face-to-face meeting with the mundane financier to convince her to open her records for a search of Brandon’s hidden financial arrangements. John and Natalie were dealing with the pack members as they left and returned. Phil remained in the library, the coordination center for operations.

“Us,” Liz said quietly. Grandfather had assigned them separate rooms, but Liz needed to be held. Or, if not held, given Carson’s broken ribs, she craved his presence: the reassurance of his warmth, the sound of his breathing, the scent of him. “I don’t want to sleep alone, tonight.”

“You look exhausted.” He closed the laptop.

“Emotional rather than physical,” she said steadily, well aware of her own nature and what hurt her. Mostly the empathetic aspect of her omega nature was a strength, but it could also make emotionally painful times worse. “It’s so wrong to be hunting one of our own.”

“The police are chasing Brandon, too,” Carson reminded her as he stood carefully. Despite his cautious movements, he winced. “I’ve broken bones before and not felt this bad.”

“You need to sleep. You’re pushing on when you should be resting. As weres we heal faster than mundanes, but our bodies need food and sleep to fuel the process. You’re skimping on the sleep.”

They walked out of the sitting room and along the corridor. Carson limped, favoring his wrenched knee. “Could it be the gentian extract?” he asked quietly. “I took some twice.”

“You think it’s accelerating your healing even faster?” The notion intrigued her, and distracted her from the hunt for Brandon and all her worry.

“I’m wondering,” he said tightly. “Everything feels compressed, more intense.”

“It hurts,” she summed up bluntly. “I’ll get the painkillers you were prescribed. I expect Uncle Phil has some from when he broke his collarbone.”

“No. Thank you.” They reached his guest room and he closed the door behind them, shutting out the world; shutting her in with him. “I don’t know how pain pills will react with the gentian extract.”

She frowned. “The methodology of your impromptu experiment sucks.”

He grinned, tiredly. “I know. Help me get my shirt off?”

Just the touch of Liz’s hands on his skin helped. The pain still chewed on his ribs, but he felt soothed.

She helped him strip off his borrowed trousers as well, then flipped back the bed covers.

He hesitated. “Liz.”

“Are you rethinking the pain pills?” she asked hopefully.

“Actually, I’m thinking of a different pain relief. When you touch me…I feel better.”

Their gazes locked. His confession meant so much more than what the words said. Mates could help ease and heal each other. He and Liz didn’t have a mate-bond. Yet. It meant something that she wanted to share his bed rather than sleep alone, and that he craved her touch.

She trailed her fingers ever-so-lightly over his bruised side where the cracked ribs ached viciously.

He put his right hand around the nape of her neck, holding her lightly, needing the connection.

“This helps?” she asked huskily.

“Yes.”

Her caresses traced muscles and loosed some of their frustration and pain-fueled tightness. He breathed in her scent and listened to her breathing. He swayed towards her, into her touch.

“You should lie down,” she said. “Try to ease into sleep.”

“With you.”

She kicked off her shoes. “I’ll lie down first, then I won’t jostle your ribs getting in.”

Lying down was torture. He settled on his back and Liz was there, running her hand over his chest, soothing and petting. He put an arm around her.

“You’ll hurt yourself,” she warned.

“Hold you close,” he murmured.

She cuddled into him, stroking and healing him.

He had to do the same for her. The pain Brandon had inflicted on Liz was emotional more than physical, a betrayal that wounded her omega soul. That was why her family raged. More than a straight-out attempted murder, the pain of a pack member’s evil could scar her.

“Your instincts never trusted Brandon,” he reminded her gently. “A part of you sensed the evil in him, hidden though it was.”

“Carson, I don’t want to talk about it. You should sleep.”

“I don’t want you to have nightmares.”

She kissed his chest. “That’s why you’re here. To keep them away.”

His arm tightened reflexively around her, hard enough to hurt his ribs. He didn’t care about the physical pain. “Honey—”

“You don’t need to say anything, or worry about me, or do anything. Just being here is enough.”

“Stretch up,” he said.

“Pardon?”

“I want a kiss on the lips.”

He felt her smile against his mouth, the soft fervor, and welcomed it. “No nightmares,” he whispered the command.

“I promise.” She nestled back against him, her fingers caressing his chest gently. “With you, I’m safe.”

Carson woke and found he could breathe without pain. Liz lay curled against him, her hand over his heart. He moved carefully, experimentally, and stared at the ceiling in wonder and jubilation. In triumph. His ribs were healed. Even with accelerated were healing, it should have taken nearly a week for the fractures to seal.

Whole and happy, Carson concentrated on the woman in his bed: Liz, whom he’d tried to resist and totally fallen for. Last night, her touch had helped heal him.

Have I found my mate?
He ran a hand through her hair.

She murmured in her sleep and shifted closer. One leg tangled with his. She’d gone to sleep fully clothed.

He’d like to remedy that, but now was not the time. Nor was it the place, under her grandfather’s roof.

Outside, dawn lit the sky with the pearlescent gray of a misty London morning. Steve would have woken them if Brandon had been found. Which meant that somewhere out there, the bastard was still free.

Not for long
. Carson bared his teeth. He couldn’t remember ever feeling as savage as he had in the aftermath of the attack on Liz. Even now, the hunting, predatory drive in him surged.

Liz stirred. Her hand drifted across his chest and a fingertip flicked one of his flat nipples.

“You awake, honey?” he asked

“No,” she muttered into his throat.

He laughed, a rumble in his chest rather than vocalized. Hell, it felt good to be able to laugh and not have cracked ribs stab him. He ran a hand down her spine to rest on her hip.

She kissed his throat, adding a tiny lick.

He lifted her over him.

“Your ribs.” Even as she adjusted, straddling his waist, she was careful of his chest.

“Healed.”

“No!”

“Feel.” He guided her hands up along his rib cage. He knew she couldn’t really feel the healing, but he wanted her touch even if he no longer needed soothing.

“Truly healed?” She searched his expression. “No pain?”

“Healthy and whole.” He sucked in a deep breath, released it. “The gentian extract works, at least for weres.”

Her eyes widened. “Wow.”

He nodded, still guiding her hands up and down his chest, trailing them lower each time. “It’s promising for the rejuvenation aspect John hopes for with ageing mundanes.”

“His friends,” Liz said.

“Yes,” Carson agreed. John took his responsibilities seriously: to friends, family and pack. So did Carson. “Now that I’m healed, I need to join the hunt for Brandon.”

She scrambled off him and off the bed. “I need to shower and change. My grazes feel like they’ve healed. Then I’ll join you.”

“You don’t need to hunt.” He sat up.

“I’m a wolf, too, Carson. I need to be part of protecting myself. Yesterday, I think I was in shock. Today, I know I need to…” She pushed a hand through her hair and made a vexed sound when the strands snagged for an instant on her bandage. “It wasn’t just me Brandon hurt. There’s Daria, Albert in hospital, and if Brandon is involved in human trafficking he has to be stopped.”

“Plenty of people agree with you.” He caught her right hand and gently undid the bandage. She was right, the grazes had healed. “Leave it to people trained in the hunt, people like the marshals who serve the Suzerainty.”

“I need to be part of it,” she said stubbornly.

He set aside one bandage and unwound the other on her left hand. “You can help Phil in the library.” He thought it was a good compromise.

Liz didn’t. “Are you going out to hunt?” She didn’t wait for his answer. “I’m going with you.” She snatched up the bandages and left.

Liz showered, enjoying the freedom of healed palms and knees that meant she could luxuriate in the hot water. But she was conscious of time passing and had to keep the shower brief. If she wanted to go with Carson on the hunt, then she couldn’t let him sneak out. He wanted her to stay safely at home.

She dressed swiftly in a practical white t-shirt, gray sweater, jeans and boots, and caught up with Carson at the stairs.

Someone must have gone to his house for clothes since what he wore fitted perfectly and his jeans had a well-worn look.

“I forgot to mention earlier.” He bent his head to murmur against her ear. “Don’t tell anyone about the gentian extract.”

“They’ll notice you’re healed.”

“Let them think I’m on strong painkillers. No, no need to lie. They’ll make the assumption. Now, I’m starved and I smell bacon.” He put a hand to her lower back and nudged her into the dining room.

The room had a scattering of people. Some looked as if they’d been up all night. Others looked rested, alert and eager to get going.

Liz filled her plate with pancakes, maple syrup and cream, and sat beside her mom who had an empty plate in front of her, and a mug of coffee cradled in her hands. “Good morning. Did you sleep at all, Mom?”

“Good morning. A few hours.”

Three at the most, Liz guessed.

Her dad walked in, brisk and triumphant. There were dark circles under David’s eyes but grim satisfaction in the lines of his face.

Everyone stopped eating. At the buffet, Carson put down the plate he’d been loading with bacon and eggs.

“Steve has Brandon,” David said.

No one responded verbally. There was little to celebrate in hunting down one of their own. But there was a stir of energy that the hunt had concluded.

“The marshals are taking Brandon directly to the court.”

There was a buzz of exclamation at that since David meant the court of justice at the heart of the Suzerain’s fort in Alexandria. As Liz had guessed he would, Steve had apparently decided that the case against Brandon was serious enough for him to hear it as Suzerain and deliver judgement. Grandfather could have judged the attack of one pack member against another. However, Brandon was involved in human trafficking, and Steve had a special hatred for slavery of any kind.

David raised his voice, speaking over the murmurs. “Those who wish to attend the trial need to leave for the portal, now.”

Liz spared a regretful glance for her pancakes.

Chairs scraped as people stood.

Snatches of conversation indicated that while some of those present intended to travel to the court, most were content to know justice would be delivered. They had jobs to go to, families to care for, lives to live. As far as they were concerned, the situation was closed. Their wolf-natures helped them to live in the moment.

“Thank you, everyone,” Liz said. “For caring and being here.”

By the time she emerged from the crush of hugs, Carson had a bacon butty waiting for her and coffee in a travel mug.

“Let’s go,” he said.