Karly's Wolf (Hollow Hills Book 1) (5 page)

“N-no.” She didn’t understand it, but Colton was nowhere in sight. Gabe had to have been on his radio after all. There was simply no other explanation.

She looked at him even more warily than before.

“Here,” Gabe said, skirting around the back of the car to come and help her with the dog food. “Let me get that for you.”

“I’ve got it.” She ducked his outstretched hands and quickly wrenched open the back door to put her groceries on the seat.

Gabe slipped his hands into his back pockets and tried to affect a more harmless demeanor. “Nice looking dog you’ve got.”

The knots in her stomach tightened. “Thanks.” Realizing he might know Puppy wasn’t hers and not wanting anyone to think she’d stolen him, she added, “Is he yours?”

“No, ma’am. These old woods are full of strays. What surprises me is how a wild boy like this would let you handle him.”

“Puppy’s very sweet,” she said defensively.

From the passenger seat, Puppy groaned. Arching both eyebrows, Gabe suddenly tossed back his head with another barking laugh. “Puppy? You named him Puppy?”

Wondering why she was being singled out, even more defensively, Karly asked, “What’s so funny?”

A low, ominous growl rumbled from the car, and Gabe responded instantly, raising his hands in placating surrender. He also dropped his laughing brown gaze and backed from the car.

“Not a thing, ma’am,” he said, trying to get his mirth under control. “I just would have thought a big boy like this would be more of a Capone or a Cujo, or something. But big boys can be puppies too, can’t they? Especially where pretty women are involved.”

Uncomfortable, Karly shut the back of the car and approached the driver’s door instead. Not wanting to look like she was running, she didn’t get in right away. “Am I in violation of something?”

A flicker of surprise moved over Gabe’s face. He looked at the car, his smile softening slightly before he added, “Not that I’m aware of. I’m just being friendly, that’s all.”

Karly wasn’t ready for friendly. Not from strange men, and definitely not from strange policemen. “Then I can go?”

“Sure.” Gabe took another backwards step, easing away from her car as if giving her plenty of room to flee.

Not that she was fleeing, Karly told herself. She was just going home.

“You take care,” Gabe said as she got in behind the wheel. She clutched it with both hands so he would not see how badly she was shaking when he bent down, giving her another of his unassuming smiles through the driver’s window. “Mama Margo said to tell you hello.”

She didn’t look at him. She was being rude and she knew it, but Karly was nervous and she couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t even make herself tell him to bid Margo thank you for the basket and that would have been completely normal. But no, she shoved the key in the ignition instead and quickly rolled up all the windows. She drove away slowly, but she probably looked like she was running anyway. Gabe watched her until she lost track of him in the rearview mirror. She was back on Old Bueller and halfway home before she remembered the newspaper she forgot to pick up.

“Damn it!”

She thought about going back to town, but she didn’t think she could handle another run in with either Colton or Gabe. It was likely neither meant her any harm. Margo knew them and she didn’t think Margo would send people who would hurt her to bring her sandwiches or to keep checking on her, but her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Her stomach felt so tangled and tight, she thought she might actually throw up, and when her cellphone rang, the sharp tones startled her so badly that she jumped half out of her skin.

“I forgot the newspaper,” she said, without bothering to check the number. “What should I do? Should I go back and get one? I’m so scared, Beth. The local cops keep talking to me and—”

“You’re fucked,” Dan growled into her ear, his voice as cold and as sharp as knives.

Karly’s throat seized so hard she choked. The next thing she knew, the car was fishtailing to a stop in the middle of the narrow dirt road. Without realizing it, she had slammed the brake pedal all the way down to the floor mat.

She sat behind the steering wheel, shaking hard, staring straight ahead without seeing anything.

“You want to run from me, baby? Fine, but there’s no place in the world you can hide that I won’t find you. You think you’re scared now? Wait until we’re face-to-face. Serve me fucking divorce papers? No, ma’am. ‘Til death do us part. That’s what you promised, and that’s what I’ll have. In every nuance and meaning of the word now, you…are…fucked.”

Karly didn’t have to hang up. The connection went dead in her trembling hand.

Seconds bled into minutes.

She couldn’t move. She couldn’t see. She couldn’t even breathe.

She vaguely heard Puppy growl a half second before two hard knuckles tapped the glass right by her head.

Karly knew she was freaking out even while she did it, screaming and grabbing at the steering wheel. She even dropped her phone. If it weren’t for the seatbelt, she’d have thrown herself into the passenger seat on top of Puppy, grabbing at him for security. Her eyes as huge as dinner plates, she stared at the very powerfully built man bending down to peer in through the window at her. His dark hair was shoulder length; his mustache, neatly trimmed. Tattoos wound up his arm all the way into his short sleeves. His hands were dirty, stained with engine oil. So was his bright orange t-shirt, which sported twin rifles crisscrossing one another and black, jagged letters that read, ‘If you can read this, you’re in range.’

He was a McQueen. He had to be. Her heart beat so hard, it hurt her ribs and still, when he tapped the window again and pointed ground-ward, she obeyed him, rolling the glass down just a crack.

Leaning his forearm along the roof of her car, McQueen looked at her. He looked at Puppy, dipped his head slightly to spit on the ground, and then looked back at her again when Puppy rumbled out another rolling growl.

“You lost?” he asked.

Karly shivered. Her wild glance darted from him to the dilapidated shacks sitting back from the road, nestled in amongst the shade trees. Two other men were sitting together on the front porch; another leaned against a support post with the long barrel of a rifle slung across his shoulders. Oh God, of all places to stop, she had stopped in front of their house.

Karly quickly shook her head. “No.”

“You’re the one moved into Margo’s up the road, that right?”

Puppy bristled, loosing another low growl.

McQueen looked at him, unfazed. “I heard you, and I’m not talking to you.” He stared at Karly again, then patted the top of her car twice. “Get on then.” He gave a jerk of his head. “My driveway’s not your parking lot.”

Karly didn’t need to be told twice. He was letting her go and she went, fairly flying the rest of the way home, driving much faster than she should have, much faster than was safe. She managed to stave off tears right up until her small cabin came into view, and then she lost it.

She couldn’t remember turning the car off and she didn’t get out. She just sat there, bawling and clinging first to the steering wheel and then to Puppy, who nosed his way into her arms and then sat stiff and still in the passenger seat while she leaned into him and gripped him like he was her lifeline. Her tears soaked his fur. Her panicked fingers pulled at his hair. But through it all, he made no move to break away and stayed with her until the storm of panic had subsided and the well of her tears ran dry. Her ragged breaths evened. She came back to herself enough to feel stupid and foolish.

“Sorry,” she whispered, feeling even more foolish for apologizing to a dog, who couldn’t understand her anyway.

As she pushed away from him, Puppy leaned over and nuzzled her cheek. The warm rasp of his tongue washed away a lingering tear. He offered no censure. He simply got out of the car when she did and followed her back into the house.

CHAPTER FIVE

Karly had lost her cellphone. How she could live in a cabin this small with so few belongings, and still lose something as vital as her phone?

She remembered snapping two quick pictures of her black eye and sending them to her lawyer. She thought she remembered plugging it into its charger on the kitchen counter afterward, but a few hours later as she came to the fridge to grab a quick bite for lunch, she noticed it wasn’t there. Turning in a slow circle, she eyed the counter, the bar that separated the tiny kitchen from the equally tiny living room, and the table. She searched the floor the same way. She even got down on her hands and knees and looked under first the stove and then the fridge.

Karly tore the house apart, searching everywhere—under the front porch, under the bed, in the yard. Though she hadn’t gone anywhere since she’d used it, she even searched her car, but the phone was gone.

She began to panic. How could she have lost it like this unless someone had…had what? Snuck into her house and swiped it, with all the doors and windows locked and both her and Puppy never hearing a sound? That was paranoia, pure and simple. The phone was here. Somewhere. It just had to be.

She got out of the car, slamming the door behind her, and ran back into the cabin. She tore through it all over again—ripping the sheets off the bed and shaking them out, sticking her hand down the into the toilet pipe, dragging everything out from under both the kitchen and the bathroom sinks—only to find her phone midway into a full-blown panic attack, stuck between the sofa cushions, exactly where she knew she’d already searched at least twice before. How could she have missed it? Dropping to the floor with relief, she hugged it to her chest as if she were drowning and it were her only lifeline.

The heat of a warm body sat down beside her. She wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his fur. She felt so foolish. “I’m such an idiot.”

He took her hug stoically, but she felt it when his head turned, ears swiveling toward the door. Then she heard it too, footsteps crunching up the gravel walk toward her front porch.

Everything inside of her froze. That same icy panic that had seized her back when she thought her phone had been taken swelled inside her a hundred times stronger than it had before and every bit as irrational. She should have left Dan years ago. She never should have married him at all. She hated this frightened rabbit of a person that she had become because of him.

“Hello, the house!” a woman called, her thumping footsteps already climbing the porch steps. She was halfway to the door before Karly recognized the voice. Not Dan; not Colton; not some stranger. Just Mama Margo, the very nice old woman who had sent her a food basket because the power was out and she was new.

Karly pushed up off the floor and went to meet her. “Afternoon.” She pushed open the door to allow the old woman inside. “Where’s your car? You didn’t walk here all the way from town, did you?”

“Walking’s good for you.” Stopping just over the threshold, Margo locked eyes with Puppy and frowned, her fists knuckling into her hips. Her frown deepened and her eyes narrowed the longer Puppy pretended not to notice her standing there, then she looked at Karly. “What have you done to yourself? You look awful.”

“Thanks,” Karly dead-panned. “You should have seen me this morning. Did you come for your basket?”

The old woman made a rude sound, waving that off with a careless hand. “Keep it. I’ve got hundreds of the damn things—every Mother’s Day, just like clockwork, I’m inundated: chocolates, fruit, sausage and cheese, with those fancy-ass little cracker things. What the hell’s wrong with Triscuits, I ask you? Tried and true, my girl, stick with what works and leave the fancy-ass things alone.” Drawing her diminutive frame upright, she knuckled her fists into her plump hips and glared at Karly. “I need a ride.”

Now Puppy looked at her.

So did Karly. She opened her mouth, only just catching herself before her question regarding the benefits of walking could be mistaken for sarcasm. “Uh, okay.” Giving herself a slight shake, she turned to get her purse. “Where do you want to go?”

“North Ridge,” Margo said. “It’s the Hunt Festival this week. Whole town’s attending. And you did not just growl at me, you arrogant, insolent pup!” she snapped, turning to glare directly at Puppy. That Karly became instantly alarmed was no small thing. Neither was Puppy’s abrupt silence. He froze where he was. His big wolfish body didn’t exactly drop into a submitting posture, but it did droop, his head lowering, his tail…not quite tucking, but definitely down. Karly tried to step in between Margo and Puppy, but the old woman leaned around her and continued to berate the now tense and silent dog. “We’ve got folks coming in from as far away as Texas and even Colorado. We have an
obligation
to put in an appearance, whether we want to or not!”

“Why are you yelling at my dog?” Karly stared at her. If she weren’t seeing this now with her own eyes, she never would have guessed her to be this insane.

“Because we’ve got responsibilities! We’re
hosting
!” Margo stopped yelling at Puppy and turned back to her. “The guests began arriving and no one was there to greet them. Get your coat. Looks like rain.”

“You want me to greet your guests.” Pulling back, Karly shook her head. “I-I’ve got no problem driving you, Margo, but I’m a guest here myself. I don’t think I should—”

“You live here now, that means you represent us and have every bit as much a right to attend the town festivals as anyone else. Besides, folks won’t cotton to people they don’t see.” The old woman headed back down off the porch. “Put your sunglasses on. No one will notice your eye.”

The bruise was larger than the lens on her sunglasses so Karly knew that was a lie. But for all that she wanted to keep arguing, in the end, she dug her glasses out of her purse and reluctantly put them on. She also dug out her keys and, bracing herself to endure a long afternoon of being stared at and whispered about, she patted her leg. “Come on, Puppy.”

“Leave him,” Margo said gruffly. “He can’t do his job and shadow you too.” Having just reached the passenger side of Karly’s car, the old woman turned and pointed back, not at Karly, but at the rather-chastened massive black dog who had followed only as far as the front door. “Whatever he has to, that’s what Alphas do—they get the job done regardless of personal feelings! You stepped into that job, my boy. No one forced you. So shape up!”

Mama Margo either wasn’t in her right mind or she wasn’t a dog person, Karly couldn’t tell which. But those concerns must have shown on her face because, glancing up from Puppy to her, Mama Margo rolled her eyes. She rolled her hand too, gesturing in the general direction of the cabin. “And, of course, they…protect the house…or something.”

Karly shut Puppy inside the cabin. She eyed the old woman cautiously, following her out to her car despite the scratch and whine she heard at the door. Glimpsing movement at the window curtains, she glanced back just as Puppy jumped onto the back of the couch, nosing the curtains apart to watch her go. He put one paw on the glass, as if in farewell.

She waved back, wishing she could bring him along. She would have felt safer with him along (how silly, she thought, it’s not like you’re going into a war zone), but neither did she want to agitate Mama Margo further.

“Day’s wasting,” Margo called.

Folks won’t cotton to someone they don’t see
.

Karly didn’t think she needed the people of Hollow Hills to “cotton” to her, but neither did she want to be ostracized by an entire town. Not even a small one, especially since she didn’t know how long she was going to have to hide here. Still, she wasn’t looking forward to spending the afternoon as the focus of a lot of whispering and gossip. Just the idea of it made her stomach twist so hard she thought she might be sick.

“Don’t you let him win, girl,” Mama Margo growled, her weathered face as hard as time and hard-scrabble living could make a woman. The old woman looked pointedly at her eye. “Don’t you dare. He might have taken a woman and turned her into a rabbit, but you’ve still got a choice: Hide here in your warren, or grow your gumption back and fight on.”

Her keys were cutting into her palm, Karly squeezed them so hard. “I don’t think I have any gumption anymore.”

A touch of sympathy flittered through Mama Margo’s dark eyes and then was gone again. She came back to Karly. “Of course you do. I’ll bet you can even feel it if you try. It’s right here—” She lay her hand over Karly’s stomach and held it there, as if waiting for the moth-fluttering movement of an unborn child. “—burning and churning inside you, eager to get out again. And it’s here, too.” She tapped two wrinkled, arthritic fingers to Karly’s chest, and then again, higher up at her temple. “And here. I’ve eaten enough rabbit in my life to know it when I see one.” Backing up a step, the old woman shook both her head and her finger. “You…you’re no rabbit, in spite of what he’s done. And call me Mama Margo. Everybody does.”

Karly stood captured in her unblinking stare until, wisdom imparted, Mama Margo gave a satisfied nod and returned to stand by the car. With one hand on the handle, she stared out over the roof and waited to be let in.

The keys trembling in her hand, wondering why Mama Margo’s odd assurance should leave her feeling so…relieved, Karly unlocked the passenger door first before heading around to the other side of the car.

“Don’t worry,” Mama Margo said with a sniff. “I’ve already told everyone to expect you. Even the out-of-towners will behave themselves.”

Karly glanced longingly back at the cabin, but she couldn’t see Puppy in the window any more. Her shoulders drooped. She really wished he were coming with her. Biting back a sigh, she unlocked the car and got in behind the wheel.

* * * * *

The minute Karly’s car left the driveway, disappearing down the road behind a curtain of old oaks and towering evergreens, Colton had the back door open and was running just as fast as he could for North Ridge. He pushed hard, leaping over runnels and rocks, ascending the steep hills toward the Hunt grounds. The wolf in him reveled in the run, in the wind that whipped his fur and the heavy forest smells that assaulted his senses. The exertion felt good, though he pushed—faster and faster—until it became a punishing hurt. The shadow-cooled dirt under his paws felt good. Doing what he knew he had to, even that felt good in an odd way, though he knew this could very well end up being the worst mistake of his own, personal life.

Alphas didn’t have personal lives. Alphas lived for the good of the pack, the good of his people and his town. Mama Margo was right. He had responsibilities that could not be pushed aside, not for anyone. Not even for Karly. He wished he knew what it was about her that pulled at him so strongly. All he did know, was that he felt
something
…a connection, maybe…between them. It gnawed at him every time he looked at that bruise on her face, every time a strange sound made her jump, every time she clutched at him for strength while she trembled from a lack of it.

Who had been on the other end of that phone call? He’d taken her phone wanting to find out, but he hadn’t anticipated how quickly she’d notice it missing or how frantic she’d become trying to find it again. Fortunately, the call that had distressed her had been the last received. He’d had to memorize the number, but as soon as he could, he was going to run it. Then he’d know exactly who, where and what she was so afraid of.

Colton ran harder, faster, hoping Mama Margo had the sense to let Karly drive her up the scenic route. He had to get to the North Ridge first. Again, he didn’t know why. It was instinctive, a driving need to disassociate himself from “Puppy” and see her with his human eyes, to speak and interact with her on two legs instead of four.

What would she do, he wondered, when there was no door for her to hold between them?

He burst from the woods into a clearing filled with cars and trucks of every imaginable make, model and color. They were parked in tight and close in order to accommodate as many as possible, but a long line of cars still extended down the winding road that led from the interstate to the North Ridge parking lot. Glinting metal and windshields shone in the sunlight, lining the blacktop as far as he could see before the trees swallowed them from sight.

The smell of excitement was everywhere. Brightly colored pennants snapped in the breeze, signaling which roped off areas were for what game. Men were grunting and shouting, women were calling and laughing, pups were squealing in play, some were crying—the mated females and elderly would be tending them and he knew they had a long list of activities planned to keep the little ones both entertained and safe.

Colton stopped in the midst of that ocean of vehicles, tail and ears both up, listening, quivering, letting the excitement wash over him before he began to wind his way through the parking lot. He found his truck parked under the partial shade of a flowering dogwood. Gabe was there, sitting in the back of the truck, checking his watch and sipping on a Coke. He straightened when he noticed Colton wending through the densely parked cars, and set his drink aside. Hopping down to fish the truck keys out of his pocket, he did a startled double-take just as Colton began to change—arching as he shifted, the sting of metamorphosis heightening the near sensual sensation of lupine lines growing, rippling and stretching into the bigger, heavier form of a man.