Quest (Shifter Island Book 4) (2 page)

She jabbed the elevator button impatiently, then stepped back to wait.

Partner by the time she turned 30—that was her goal. Her own loyal stable of clients.

There was no place in that formula for someone else.

Even though she ached to be able to walk through the front door of her home at the end of a long day and find someone waiting for her. Someone who was delighted to see her, and would greet her with warm, passionate kisses.

Someone who’d smile at her across the dinner table, snuggle with her on the couch to watch some TV, then sweep her into his arms and carry her off to bed.

Not only wasn’t there anyone waiting for her in the hotel room, it smelled a little of disinfectant, some lemon-scented, bleachy kind of thing—bathroom cleanser, no doubt.

Frowning, Allison pulled the curtains aside to see if she could open the window, but it was set in place. The room was already too cool for her to crank up the AC. For a moment she was tempted to break the window—to grab one of the uncomfortable-looking chairs and throw it through the glass, like she’d seen people do in the movies.

Then she had a vision of the chair bouncing off the window and smacking her in the head.

She’d have an enormous purple bruise to go along with that Not Pale Daffodil dress. Or maybe a concussion.

Swell.

Glad, at least, for the temporary peace and quiet, the respite from her friends’ giggling and squealing and fretting and big dime-sized tears, she hurried to take off her stiff, crisp (and now kind of wrinkled) outfit. She thought about the jeans and t-shirt, then went for the battered sweats she’d brought to sleep in if the room’s AC was too uncooperative.

They felt good against her skin, warm and soothing, so she was finally content and at ease when she sat down cross-legged on the bed and reached for her laptop.

Mostly content, anyway.

Now, there was a different sensation deep inside her, one that was both very strange… and somehow familiar.

It made her lift her head and look around.

Then she groaned at herself, squirmed a little to get more comfortable, and settled down to work.

Luca had only been in the city for a few minutes when he began to wish that it had rained—and not just a mild shower; he had in mind a cloudburst that would wash away all the bad smells that turned his stomach more and more the farther he walked. Exhaust from the many cars and trucks, rotting garbage, asphalt baking under the summer sun…

How these people could stand to live here, he had never understood. And this wasn’t even a particularly large city. There were many that were far bigger, far more crowded.

He tried to distract himself with bits of pleasure here and there. The window of a florist’s shop, full of blossoms of every possible color. The aroma of… yes, it was pizza, something he’d enjoyed very much during his time of Involvement.

A young woman in a pretty dress walking along with a pigtailed little girl who was fascinated by everything she saw.

Handsome dogs of many breeds.

The sky overhead.

A number of people turned to smile at him as he walked along in front of a row of shops, and some of them slowed down for a longer look. He’d forgotten how humans tended to do that—how they found him unusually attractive and tried to flirt with him even when he gave them no encouraging response. Even women well past mating age would watch him walk, or eat, or rest. A few men, too.

As a young wolf, here for a few months for his Involvement with the humans, he had basked in all that attention. He’d been interested in mating with only a few of the females who spent so much time gazing at him, but it had amused him to think he could collect a whole harem of admirers with very little effort.

Now?

None of these women was Allison.

He knew it was easy—most of the time—to locate someone with the help of a computer, provided you knew how to use one. He did not. During his few months here, he had wandered through an electronics store a couple of times, and had stood watching other people play games, tinker with photographs, listen to music, and read messages, but he had never actually put his hands on a computer. Such things were a lure, the elders (and his father) had told him. They drew wolves away from what was important.

Allison.

In this case, the computer would bring him closer to what was important. He could think of no other way to find her, other than going from door to door throughout the city, a process that might well take months, or even years. He couldn’t afford to take months to find her; the wolf inside him was struggling even now, desperate to find its mate. Luca had to find her quickly, before the animal became frantic enough to break free—something that might well get them both killed.

There.

Not Allison herself, but a library. There, he could find someone who would help him. Someone who knew how to use a computer and would show him where to find an old friend he’d lost contact with, a friend he hoped to see again.

It would be an older female, he hoped. The older females were always happy to help him.

He could see the question in the librarian’s eyes:
How is it that you don’t know how to use a computer?

But she didn’t ask.

He’d been fairly sure she wouldn’t, if he let his wolf lean a little closer to the surface. The animal knew how to lure females far better than Luca himself did—whether it was someone ripe for mating, or someone who could simply offer some help. He had only to demonstrate that he was strong and smart… and that he looked and smelled good.

“Over here,” the librarian said, her voice squeaking a little.

She was entranced, as the human females so often seemed to be. Eager to help him, just to keep him here.

He let her sit in front of the computer, then pulled a wooden chair up close and straddled it. It was an old chair with an open back, exactly the right kind. Four years ago, he’d learned by accident that females liked it very much when he sat this way, because it spread his legs and gave them an enticing view.

This female—Lynda, according to her nametag—was so enticed that for a moment she forgot to breathe.

Then she recovered herself and turned to the computer screen. Very quickly and ably, she opened a program that would search the residents of the city. “Not everyone is listed,” she explained. “You won’t find many students. Or people who rent and haven’t been in town very long. Or children. They need to be in some sort of database that the program can search.”

“She’s not a child,” Luca said.

“Oh. Well, that’s good.”

Now she was trying not to look at him. Her scent was becoming a little stronger, her pulse more rapid.

“Allison Hayes,” Luca said.

Dutifully, Lynda typed the name, and Luca watched it appear on the screen one letter at a time. Just letters, just symbols—but they made the picture of Allison that had been drifting through his mind for weeks become clearer and more vivid. He could almost see her standing in front of him, smiling.

“Is that the correct spelling?” Lynda asked.

Luca peered at it, trying to remember if he had ever seen Allison’s name written down. The wolves wrote down almost nothing; there was no need to. But here, among the humans, records were important—and standing out in a crowd even more so. There might be dozens of women named Allison Hayes, with that name spelled in dozens of different ways.

“Yes,” he guessed.

“Do you remember her address?”

He remembered the apartment, a collection of rooms Allison had shared with another girl, another student. It was close to the college campus, on the top floor of an old, rambling house surrounded by trees.

He remembered the stairs he’d had to climb to reach those rooms, and how it had sometimes gotten very warm up there. He remembered Allison’s old blue couch and how her refrigerator had always been full of bottles of spring water.

But an address?

“I don’t think she’d live there now,” he said. “She was in college then. I’m sure she’s not in college now.”

“Oh. I see.”

“She may not live in this city at all.”

And how many Allison Hayeses would there be (spelled in many different ways), if Lynda searched the entire country?

Hundreds? Thousands?

You never should have left,
he thought.
You should have made the sacrifice and remained here with her.

His hands were wrapped around the top rail of the back of the chair. Lynda patted one of them with a hand that was very warm and a little damp—then she pulled her hand back and returned it to the computer keyboard.

“Let’s see what we can find,” she said quickly.

There were three results: an Alyson Hays, an Alice Hayes Brown, and an Allison Hanes. Lynda checked each one, only to discover that their ages were wrong. In fact, Alice Hayes Brown had died two years ago at the age of 91. Alyson Hays was a high school student who had won a poetry contest. And Allison Hanes was married; Hanes was her husband’s name.

“She has red hair,” Luca said.

Long, soft red hair that fell in waves around her shoulders. Brown eyes. A sprinkling of freckles across her nose and cheeks.

“Let me try something else,” Lynda offered.

But nothing she tried produced any results. There were many, many Allison Hayeses (of many spellings) listed in what Lynda called “social media,” but none of the pictures she was able to bring onto the screen were of the right person.

Too young, too old, blonde, brunette…

The wolf had begun to huddle into a ball, crooning its disappointment.

It was time to eat, Luca told himself. Time to rest for a while and gather his thoughts. He remembered the city well enough to know there were several places he could rest for a few hours without being bothered, and some more where he could burrow in overnight.

Food, then sleep. Then he would decide what to do next.

“Thank you for trying,” he told Lynda, and began to stand up from the old chair, which wobbled a little as he took his weight away from it.

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”

She wasn’t flirting now. A part of Luca wished she would; that wild, simple part of him wouldn’t mind a swift, careless mating, and then several hours of sleep in a warm bed.

But that wouldn’t be fair to her. She wasn’t a wolf; wasn’t a young human who’d be interested in a quick coupling.

He had to go… somewhere that wasn’t here.

“Thank you,” he said again, then hurried out of the library.

Allison woke up feeling disoriented and a little dizzy. For a moment, she had no idea where she was—then that unpleasant bleachy smell got through to her brain and she thought,
Oh
.

She hadn’t meant to fall asleep, hadn’t even thought she was tired.

Still a little muzzy-headed, she crawled off the bed and padded into the bathroom. When her bare feet hit the cold tile floor, she wished she’d put on a pair of socks—heck, that she’d
brought
a pair of socks, or some slippers. But it’d been unusually warm at home, and she’d still been walking around barefoot inside the house.

That made her think of her little house, with its almost 360-degree view of the mountains. The hammock out back, the sun porch, the miles of hiking trails nearby. She’d been furnishing it carefully, one piece at a time, making it truly hers—a place where anywhere she looked, she’d find something that made her smile.

Unlike this ugly, too cold, bleachy-smelling, cookie-cutter room.

When she walked back toward the bed and spotted her phone lying on the duvet, she realized with a start that it was probably already dinnertime, if not later. The clock on the night table said it was only 4:32, but that didn’t seem right. She felt like she’d been asleep for hours.

Really, she felt like she’d been unconscious, like someone had hit her and knocked her out.

Shower.

That would help. It would ease her awake, freshen her up. And the hot water would feel good.

That the hotel had decent water pressure and enough hot water didn’t seem like a safe bet, so she was surprised when the spray came out strong and quickly got steamy. Grinning, she stripped out of her sweats and underwear, stepped into the tub and pulled the shower curtain closed.

Ahhhh.

Honestly, there was nothing better than a good hot shower. For a minute she simply stood there and let the water cascade down over her body, then dipped her head under the spray and slicked back her hair. The water felt like a caress, like the soothing hand of a gentle lover.

Over her shoulders, down her back.

Over her breasts. Tickling her sex.

Suddenly, every cell in her body seemed to cry out. Every inch of her wanted to be touched, stroked, explored. It’d been months since she’d been to bed with a man, since she’d had the kind of real release that came from being with someone who was both exciting and excited, someone who wanted to make love and not just get themselves off.

She thought fleetingly about Matt’s cousin—whether it would be awful to try to talk him into a quick roll in the hay. But God, no—he was Matt’s cousin. And while he seemed nice enough, he wasn’t exciting.

Another guest at the wedding, then?

Somebody she could find in the hotel bar?

God, Al. As if you do things like that.

Yes, she’d slept with people after only a couple of dates, but that sort of thing never ended well. Not that she felt guilty about it; she just felt… unfulfilled. Like sleeping with a guy who wasn’t Mr. Right was a waste of time and energy. Satisfying for a minute or two, then… not.

But good grief, she was horny.

There was a simple answer to that, but it didn’t seem like the right solution either.

Now feeling frustrated and a little annoyed, she quickly washed and rinsed her hair, scrubbed the rest of her body with one of the hotel’s puffy but bleachy-smelling washcloths, then stumbled out of the shower and grabbed a towel.

You need to go home. Get back to work.

If only. The wedding was still four days away. And she had to spend seven more nights in this awful hotel.

It’s not that bad,
she tried to tell herself.
You’re just stressed out. And there’s the dress, and the noise, and…

She’d seen a little girl at the airport that morning, obviously overwhelmed and exhausted. Three, maybe four years old, being tugged along by her parents when she clearly wanted to sit in one place until she got her equilibrium back. Even from a distance Allison had been able to see the little girl quivering with fear and frustration, and as she stepped closer she could see tears streaming down the girl’s cheeks.

The same way Julie had cried a while ago.

For a minute, Allison felt like crying that way herself—just giving in to her emotions, no matter how old she was. She was alone, after all. No one would see. No one would tease her about it later on.

No.

Just get some fresh air. Take a walk around campus. That’s one of the reasons you wanted to come back here—to see if everything looks the same. So, pull yourself together and get out of here for a while.

No crisp, stylish outfit this time. Forcing herself to smile, she put on those faded-out jeans with the little hole in the left knee, a comfortable bra, and her favorite striped t-shirt. She took a couple of minutes to dry her hair with the hotel room’s balky dryer, then pulled it into a loose ponytail.

When she was finished, she looked like the girl who’d lived in this town for four years as Julie’s roommate.

Allie the college student.

That felt good. That felt right.

She hadn’t expected her old neighborhood to look much different—and it didn’t. Most of the houses there had been built almost a century ago: big, rambling things with lots of bedrooms, tiny bathrooms, and almost no closet space. Most of them had been divided up into apartments for the college students back in the 1970s, when it became clear that that was where the money was.

A lot of her classmates had preferred the dorms on campus, but Allison had fallen in love with the charm of these old houses. She could look out her window and see trees, could take a book out to a lawn chair in the yard to study. She remembered falling asleep out there on more than one occasion, and waking up to see a bird or a squirrel watching her calmly.

She caught them watching her again now, from their perches up in the trees. Of course it wasn’t the same animals, but they still felt like old friends welcoming her back. That made her smile as she walked, and she could feel her tension bleed away more and more with each step.

Classes would start up again in a week or so, and she saw and heard signs that students were moving back in: a rental truck with its tailgate open, full of boxes and small pieces of furniture. Music blaring from an open window. Doors banging, voices calling out.

Caught by an urge to just soak up her surroundings, she sat down on a step at the foot of a walkway, certain that no one would object, or even ask her what she was doing there. A gray-haired man walking a limping beagle smiled at her as he passed by, and the dog nudged her shin, looking for a pat on the head. Allison was happy to oblige, sorry only that she didn’t have a treat to offer him.

She tried to remember who had lived in which house. Yes: her friends Chris, Donnie and John had lived over there, though the house had been painted blue then and it was now a pale gray. Donnie had been the cookout king of the neighborhood, hosting backyard parties at least once a week, even in the snow.

And over there? Kelly and Tracy.

And there, in the yellow house with the dark green trim: Chelle, Pats, and Kim. Next door to them, Dave and Tony.

Dave and Tony…

They’d had a commitment ceremony the week after graduation, and Allison had stayed in town long enough to attend. Home had been only an hour away, after all, and she’d used the extra time to sort out her belongings—a lot of them went to Donnie’s blowout yard sale—give the apartment a good final cleaning, and say goodbye to a lot of her friends. They had all promised to stay in touch, of course, but… well.

She’d said goodbye to this place with a wedding, and a wedding had brought her back.

Now, here she was, sitting in a neighborhood that had been her home for four years, and there wasn’t a single person left here that she knew. Okay, maybe Mr. Foley down the street still lived here—he’d only been in his early seventies when she left, and in good health. And maybe Cuz Whitney was still around the corner.

But, by and large, there were only strangers in this neighborhood now.

You can’t go home again. Right?

With a sigh she got to her feet and started walking again, thinking she might go as far as the edge of the college grounds. There wasn’t enough time to make a loop around campus; that would have taken another fifteen or twenty minutes, since she was ambling, not power-walking. And was there really anything there that she wanted to see? No; what she’d been interested in—even though she hadn’t decided that consciously until now—was these houses, the gardens with their sprawl of late-summer flowers, the beautiful old trees.

And her house. Hers and Julie’s.

Suddenly she felt incredibly old, as if she’d lived here decades ago and not just four years. Everything was the same, with just a few tiny exceptions (the color of Donnie’s house, the type of flowers in a couple of the gardens, a new fence in front of what had been Chelle’s place)—but it seemed as if a whole other person had lived here, someone with no actual connection to Allison Hayes the PR whiz except for a bunch of slightly hazy memories.

Come on,
she told herself.
Cheer up. You’re just tired.

Then she heard Julie’s voice as a whisper in the back of her mind.
I thought you’d be first.

He was so right for you.

Tears welled up so quickly she couldn’t stop them. A couple of them spilled down her cheeks, and she swiped them away with a rough hand, hoping no one had seen, even though no one was nearby.

You and him—that was huge.

He was so right for you.

There
were
people nearby, she told herself. That man walking the dog, whoever was unloading the rental truck, whoever was playing that music. People could be watching her from upstairs windows, wondering who she was and what had brought her here. She’d done that kind of idle snooping herself, on quiet Sunday mornings when she wasn’t quite awake yet: peering out the window at someone walking by, wondering where they were going.

Home,
she thought.
I should be going home.

Home…

It was there, half a block ahead—the house she and Julie had called home for most of their college years. Still the same colors: white, with dark blue trim. Though a tree was blocking her view of some of it, there was the window that had been at the head of her bed, the one from which she could see most of the street. The house number was still displayed on a handmade plaque shaped like a big sunflower—some kid’s wood shop project, she had always supposed.

And there…

Oh, God.

Standing in front of the house, gazing up at what had once been her window, the way he always used to do when he came to see her…

It couldn’t be.

But it was.

Luca.