Luck of the Wolf (9 page)

She hadn't dared to ask any more questions, and he'd gone on to tell her about the Palace and the “safe” place outside San Francisco to which they would soon be traveling. That was where her lessons would begin.

“It is in the mountains and will provide a change of scenery for you,” Cort had said. “In the meantime you'll have a taste of your future at the Palace.”

And now she was getting her taste. She gripped Cort's arm as they walked through the tall doors into a large room where people were milling about and many voices talked all at the same time. There were men and boys in clothes that all looked the same, rushing around with every kind of bag and trunk.

Cort pulled Aria along and stopped at a long table, where he spoke with one of the several men stationed there. He pulled out his wallet and gave the man money. The man gave him two keys in return, smiled at Aria and signaled to one of the uniformed boys. The boy took their two carpetbags, and soon they were walking across the big room, through another set of doors and into a hallway. Cort stopped before a grilled gate, and the boy slid it open.

Behind it was a tiny room, and at first Aria was afraid to go in. She had never liked small places. But Cort gave her a gentle push, and they joined another boy inside the box. The second boy pulled a lever. The floor lurched under Aria's feet. She gasped, and the first boy smiled apologetically.

“Many of our guests are surprised by our hydraulic elevator,” the boy said. “It was the first one installed in San Francisco. I assure you that it is perfectly safe.”

Aria glanced wildly at Cort as the “elevator” began to shake and vibrate, but he didn't look at all worried. She felt her legs turn rubbery, and the sense of motion became stronger. It seemed to take forever before the elevator stopped with a little bump, and the second boy slid open the grill. It opened onto another hallway, wide
enough for two people to walk abreast and decorated with more potted plants.

“Your floor, sir,” the boy with the lever said. Cort tossed him a coin and followed the first boy into the hall. They stopped again at another door, and when it opened, Aria could only stare.

“Anna,” Cort said, gesturing her ahead of him.

They had agreed to go on using that name in public. She was still convinced there must have been a reason that Franz had insisted she keep the name “Aria” hidden.

She walked into the room. The boy and Cort followed her, and the boy set their bags down on a low table between two chairs and a couch that was itself shaped like a very long chair. He waited while Cort gave him a coin, and then left with a bow.

“Well?” Cort asked.

He was asking how she felt, but she still didn't know. She wandered around the room, pausing to examine the couch and its heaps of velvet pillows, several tables holding vases with bunches of flowers and the intricately patterned carpet. A door led off from one side of the main room. Hesitantly, Aria opened it. A huge bed dominated the smaller room. A lacy canopy hung over it, white and delicate. The furniture, pretty as it was, looked as though it would break if she used it.

“This is your bedroom,” Cort said behind her.

“But it's much too big! I don't need—”

“Everything will be different from now on, Aria. It would be best if you accept that quickly.”

“Where are you going to sleep?”

“In the room next door, with Yuri.”

In a place like this, so strange and different from anything she'd ever known, that seemed very far away.

“I wish you would stay here,” she said softly.

His body went as stiff as a shepherd's crook. “That will not be possible. A lady does not share her accommodations with a man to whom she is not—”

“But we
did
share accommodations at the boardinghouse.”

“This is different.” Cort cleared his throat. “You are soon to rejoin your family, and they would not approve. There are certain rules.”

Rules. Always more rules. “I don't understand,” she said.

“When Madame Martin arrives, she can…”

Aria was fascinated to see the reddish color come up into his face.

“I'll ask her to explain,” he finished.

“Does it have something to do with what those other men would have done to me if they had won me instead?”

“Aria! You
know
—”

“I know that people mate the same way animals do. It looked as if the men enjoyed it, but it didn't look as if the women did.”

Cort grew redder still. “Where…where did you see this, Aria?”

“In the alleys away from the big streets, usually when it was dark. They were always in a hurry.”

Cort pulled at his collar. “That was not… Aria, what you saw—”

“Have
you
ever done it?”

It didn't seem possible that Cort could turn even redder than he already had, but he did. “Aria, this is not a fit conversation between us.”

“You wouldn't try to do those things to me if I didn't want to, would you?”

“No! Aria—”

“Then if you wouldn't hurt me, why should my family care?”

He pulled at his collar with such force that one of the little fastenings popped off. “This conversation is over, Aria.”

But the thought wouldn't go away. Cort might never try to do those things with
her,
or hurt anyone he
did
do them with, but if men enjoyed the act so much, he must have done it.

She had felt very good when he had held her in his arms. Would joining with him that way feel as nice?

Kissing the way she'd seen the villagers do would surely be very nice indeed. She looked into his eyes and stood up on her toes, breathing in his scent. His mouth was so close, his body so warm. If only…

Cort hopped back as if she had poured snow into his trousers. He raked his hand through his hair and went to the window, pushing the heavy curtains aside to look down at the street far below.

“Yuri will be arriving soon,” he said, his words coming quickly. “I'll be going out again. You do understand that you must stay in this room unless one of us escorts you?”

She could see he was going to pretend they hadn't spoken at all since they'd come into the room, and she began to wish she really had poured snow down his trousers.

“I understand,” she said. “I'm to be a prisoner again.”

C
ORT GLANCED IN
her direction and quickly looked away. “Must we have this discussion again?” he said.

“No. I understand.”

“
Bien.
And don't answer the door unless you're sure it's one of us.”

“I won't.” She tugged at a ribbon at the front of her bodice, nearly pulling it loose. “How long do we have to stay here?”

He let the curtain fall and leaned against the wall, arms crossed and brows drawn.

“Until Madame Martin arrives, as you very well know.” The set of his jaw made it clear that he would not be pushed any further. “As soon as Yuri returns, he'll have a meal sent up to you. Follow his instructions at all times.”

Cort was silent after that, and Aria couldn't get him to talk again. After a while Yuri came and Cort went out. Yuri ordered the promised meal, which she ignored.

While he thumbed through a book, no more interested in conversation than Cort had been, Aria engaged herself with the magazines Cort had bought on the way to the hotel.
The Delineator, Woman's Home Companion
and
Harper's Bazaar
were filled with color fashion drawings, which Aria examined with a skeptical eye. Nothing about the pictures, pretty as they were, made “modern” fashion seem any more attractive to her. There
were articles about cooking and cleaning and all sorts of other things “proper” women did that she couldn't bear to read, because they only confused her more. She didn't see how she could ever be like the ladies in those pages.

She threw down her magazine and glared at the pages sprawled open on the carpet. She could still change her mind, couldn't she? Forget her family and try to become what she wasn't?

After all Cort has done for you?
He'd bought her things, protected her, cared for her, and it seemed all
she'd
done was make it more difficult for him by complaining and questioning everything. He was so often irritated with her now, and yet he had never suggested that she find someone else to help her.

A strange, nagging little doubt nudged the back of her mind. He had said the very first day they'd met that “Any honorable man would feel bound to protect a woman in your position.”

But she knew not just any man, honorable or not, would have done what he had. Cort was different, not only because he was
loup-garou
. He cared about her, even if he didn't want to kiss her. He wanted her to be safe and happy. It should have been enough to know that, and not have to understand the reasons.

But it wasn't. Not anymore. She still knew almost nothing about Cort except that he came from Louisiana, played cards and didn't seem to want to talk about
his
family. She had no idea what he did when he wasn't with her, or what he wanted for
himself
.

Aria pressed her face into the back of the long sofa, breathing in the smell of the hundreds of bodies that had lain there before her. The future had always seemed a little unreal to her, but now it seemed to have turned
into a bottomless abyss. Why was she only now beginning to realize how little she knew about both Cort and herself?

Yuri had begun to snore, but Aria hardly heard him. She felt as if she were looking up at the sky through a pall of fog, trying desperately to see the stars. They seemed so close, and yet they remained invisible. A mystery.

There was only one thing she was certain of, one truth that left all her uncertainties behind. She wanted to be with Cort. Not only here, but wherever they went. Not just now, but as far into the uncertain future as she could see, and beyond.

She groaned into the musty fabric. Cort certainly hadn't behaved as if he wanted to stay with
her.
He wanted to give her away to someone else. The way he had talked, he didn't even plan to see her once they went to New Orleans.

With a sniff, Aria picked up the fallen magazine, smoothed it carefully and opened it to an article about the silly undergarment called a “corset.” When Cort returned, she would be ready. Just not in the way he expected her to be.

 

T
HE SALOON WAS
nearly empty of customers. Cort's first thought was that the patrons had heard rumors of a certain attack on Cortland Renier and anticipated trouble as a result.

Of course, that was unlikely. But those few patrons who hugged their drinks along the bar or at the tables took one look at him and quietly left the premises.

Cort walked up to the bar. “Where is Brecht?” he asked the barkeep in his softest voice.

The man picked up a glass from the bar and began to polish it. “Don't know anyone by that—”

The last word was cut off, neatly strangled at its source by Cort's fingers around the man's throat. A glass dropped from the barkeep's hand and shattered at his feet behind the counter.

“I think you do,” Cort said, pulling the human down across the bar. “I met him here yesterday. He bought some rather expensive wine. Does that refresh your memory?”

Rolling his eyes, the barkeep gurgled in protest. Cort tightened his grip.

“If you're afraid of Brecht,” he said, “you might consider the fact that
he
is not the one holding you by the throat. Your danger is more immediate now, I assure you.”

The man's chin bobbed. “I…” He swallowed, his face going red. “I'll tell you.”

Cort released him. The man hugged the counter with outspread arms as he sucked in several deep breaths. “Brecht…ain't here,” he rasped. “He left. Didn't say where he was going.”

Cort drummed his fingers on the scarred wood inches from the barkeep's flushed face. “You can do better than that,
mon ami
.”

Slowly the barkeep straightened, carefully avoiding Cort's stare. “I can't tell you no more.”

There was too much fear in the man's voice to suggest he was lying. “What about his hirelings?” Cort asked. “The men he sends to do his dirty work?”

This time the man didn't bother to pretend he didn't know what Cort was talking about. “There's some men in the back room,” he said. “I've seen 'em with Brecht. That's all I know.”'

“If it is not,” Cort said, “I shall certainly learn the truth soon enough.” He smiled at the barkeep, slapped down a few coins and walked away from the bar. He knew word of what he was about to do would be on the streets within hours.

He felt absurd satisfaction at the prospect. Ever since he'd left the hotel, he had been tossing in a storm of emotions, each and every one bringing him closer to the reefs.

Aria had asked him to stay with her. He'd been so sure she didn't know what she was saying—until she'd talked about mating, and what men and women did together in dark alleys, and then he'd known he'd grossly underestimated her knowledge of such intimate matters.

Oh, she still didn't understand the half of it, not in the sense an experienced woman would. She wasn't even sure a woman could enjoy the act of love. But the instinct was there, just as it had been when she'd almost let him kiss her. In fact, he would have sworn she'd been trying to kiss
him
after that very troubling conversation.

Both of them—she from ignorance, he from sheer lack of self-control—were in danger of giving way to something that could only end in disaster.

Cort knotted his fists and strode toward the back room. Just the thought of the fight ahead relieved his confusion. It was necessary, yes, but it would also be a pleasure.

He smelled the stench of hard liquor even before he caught the scent of the men themselves, an odor strong enough to dull any
loup-garou
's senses, and he knew his quarry wouldn't be prepared when he walked into the room.

Heads lifted and bleary eyes tried to focus on him
as he opened the door. He recognized two of the men at once, and after a moment of confusion they clearly recognized him. The
loup-garou
had healed his wounds when he'd Changed back to human form, but he looked no less alarmed than his human partner. Two other humans were with them, just sober enough to pull their knives before Cort had closed the door behind him.

“Gentlemen,” Cort said, “I do regret this interruption of your celebration, but I believe we have unfinished business.” He glanced at the two armed men. “I presume that you also work for Brecht?”

The taller of the humans, marked with an ugly scar from forehead to chin, waved his knife. “You made a mistake coming here, Renier.”

“I believe your associates would tell you that it is they who made the mistake in acting on Brecht's behalf. I wonder if your judgment is as poor as theirs.”

The
loup-garou
tried to stand, lost his balance and toppled over the table in front of him, spilling the contents of his glass. It wasn't often that werewolves could become so drunk; the man must have been going at it for hours. His partner had already begun to edge toward the back of the room and the door that led outside.

The other two humans, however, had decided that they would not be cowed by a single man, even though they undoubtedly knew that man was not human. The one who'd spoken tossed his knife from hand to hand. His companion didn't bother to show off. The two men separated, intent on making it more difficult for Cort to attack them both at once.

Cort didn't even try. He went straight for the drunken
loup-garou,
caught him by his frayed coat and threw him headfirst at the wall. The man slid to the floor
unconscious, blood spilling from a cut in his forehead. Not dead, but not about to get up anytime soon.

The man who'd been so eager to display his skill with a knife lunged at Cort's back. Cort spun and slammed his fist into the scarred face. The knife flew across the room. As the werewolf's partner slipped out the door, the other human attacked.

Cort finished with him quickly, leaving him bloodied and beaten but still alive. Alive enough to report exactly what had happened.

Cort bent over the man who'd threatened him. “I have a message for your employer,” he said. “I'll kill any man he sends after the girl.”

The thug groaned. “I…I can't give him no message. He's gone.”

“Gone where?”

“Left San—” The thug spat out a gob of blood. “He said…he didn't need us no more.”

Cort let him go. He couldn't be sure the man was telling the truth, but no matter how much Brecht offered in payment, few men would willingly put themselves in Cort's way after this little demonstration.

And if Brecht really was gone, it would solve all their problems completely.

A pair of young gentlemen were standing just outside the door when Cort returned to the main room. They stared at his bloody face, looked beyond him through the open door and quickly walked away. Another pair of eyes and ears to regale the Coast with tales of the carnage.

Cort lowered his head and stalked through the saloon, aware of eyes following his progress to the front door. He'd never wanted the kind of reputation he would have
now—or at least he hadn't before he'd let his anger and frustration overcome his sense.

An ability to fight like a common sailor would hardly lessen his reputation in the eyes of a large portion of the Coast's population, and it would certainly achieve what he intended, but
he
knew just how far he had sunk. No cool, dispassionate manner could alter the fact that he had fallen back into the pit.

But he need not fall any further. Not if he was careful. Not if he remembered why he'd spent so many years remaking himself. He'd gone after Brecht's men to protect Aria, but this was as far as it went. He'd come far too close to losing himself completely. From now on, he must focus solely on what he wanted and how he planned to achieve it. Nothing but cold, calculating resolve.

And just to prove he was capable of it, he wouldn't go out of his way to keep his distance from Aria or try to avoid touching her. He would test himself in the fire until he was well tempered and completely invulnerable.

He laughed at himself, and a sailor half-hidden behind a table cringed. Cort saluted him and walked out the door.

 

C
ORT RETURNED TO
Aria's room a few hours later. The first thing she noticed was that he had a few little spots of blood on one white cuff. The second was that he was most emphatically
not
in a good mood.

Yuri was certainly aware of his friend's ill humor. He looked Cort up and down without noticing the blood spots, shook his head and left without a word. Painfully conscious of all the bewildering thoughts that had been going through her mind in Cort's absence, Aria set down the book the Russian had given her.

“War and Peace,”
Cort said, reading the title from across the room. “It's in Cyrillic. You can understand it?”

This wasn't at all the way she'd wanted their next conversation to begin. She shrugged and closed the book. “I must have learned when I was a child,” she said.

His eyes were very sharp. “Odd that you remember languages when you have forgotten so much else.”

“Why should I forgot how to read?” She was angry, though she didn't know why. “Do you think I'm stupid?”

“Aria.” He sat down on the long sofa beside her and laid his hand on her shoulder. “I have never thought you stupid. You are an enigma, to be sure, but no one could doubt your intelligence.”

His hand was warm and firm on her shoulder. She bent her head to rest her cheek against his knuckles, rubbing her skin gently over his. He drew in a sharp breath and abruptly dropped his hand.

“You haven't eaten your supper,” he said.

“I'm not hungry,” she muttered.

“You will eat.”

“I will if you answer one question.”

He regarded her warily. “What is it?”