Sleeping With the Wolf (10 page)

Taye smoothed a hand over her hair. “You can let me go now,” he whispered. “I’ve decided not to attack.”

Carla wasn’t sure if he were joking or not. She narrowed her eyes at him. “You better not,” she said very quietly in his ear, “or I swear, you’ll be sleeping on the couch.”

A couple of the wolves coughed to cover laughter. She turned her head to glare at them, too. They ducked their heads to hide their grins. “What?” she snapped at them.

They all tilted their heads back to show their throats. She sighed and dropped one arm from Taye’s waist.

The two visitors were moving slowly and deliberately as they lifted cases from the floor to put them on the table. Black, oddly shaped … Guitar cases! Carla’s heart bounded, suddenly longing profoundly for a guitar to play. She glanced up at Taye and he was smiling at her.

The older Mr. Gray opened the first case, and the younger Mr. Gray opened the second. “Both of these guitars are from the Times Before,” said the elder, “and each is in good condition. Would you like to try them, Mrs. Wolfe, before choosing which you would like?”

“Me?” Carla gasped. She turned her head to look at Taye. “For me?”

“Of course, for you.” The growl was gone from his voice, replaced by tenderness.

“You miss your music.” His broad shoulders rippled in an almost shrug. “I thought you would like it.”

Carla hated crying in public. She tightened her arm around his waist. “I love it.

Thank you.”

His smile said that he heard all the grateful joy she’d tried to suppress. He nudged her forward. “Go ahead, try them out.”

As she came forward the Grays stepped back. Carla took over twenty minutes to play each of the guitars, tightening strings and plucking them to tune the instruments and then playing a song or two. She didn’t see the pride brimming in Taye, or the fascination of the other wolves, or the faint look of nostalgia in the elder Mr. Gray.

When she finally selected the guitar she wanted, old Mr. Gray smiled. “That’s a good choice. That guitar belonged to my wife.”

“Oh,” Carla drew back. “I can’t take that one.”

“I wish you would. None of my grandchildren have any interest in playing. That guitar should be played by someone who loves music. It came from Omaha with my wife. She loved your music. She would be glad to know you had it.”

Carla’s stomach fell to her feet. “Your wife … You were alive then. In the Times Before, I mean.”

“Yes. I was twenty-two years old when the world ended. I hiked west from Illinois and when I got to Omaha I met my Kylie. I worked for her father about a year. We married, and we came out here with our stuff loaded in a wheelbarrow. We took turns carrying that guitar for two hundred miles. She played it every night of that journey, singing love songs. I never was a country music fan until she started playing for me.”

Carla held the guitar out. “I can’t take this.”

“It would have thrilled her to know you survived and that you had her guitar.”

Carla stroked the frets. “Where is she?”

“Dead. She died over twenty years ago.”

“I’m so sorry.” Carla swallowed. “I would be honored to play her guitar.”

Taye reached to catch the tear that slipped down her face with a callused forefinger.

“What is your price?”

“I’d like to say it’s a gift,” the old man said, “but you wouldn’t accept that, I suppose.”

“Yes,” said Carla firmly. “We will accept it as a gift. You can’t put a price on precious memories. But we will give you a gift too. Tell me your wife’s favorite songs, and I’ll play them for you.”

Taye opened his mouth, and Carla gave him a hard stare. Taye met it for a moment before bowing his head. “That is a good trade,” he said almost meekly.

“I would like that very much,” Mr. Gray said, with obvious gratitude. “My whole family would enjoy that. Could you come to us? With an escort, of course,” he added to Taye. “The library is neutral territory, and we could fit the whole family there.”

Taye thought about it. Carla gave him a look that was equal parts pleading and demanding. He nodded. “Next Sunday afternoon, after the midday meal.”

“Done!” said the old man with delight. “Now, anything you want to play would be just fine. Kylie was especially fond of the songs on your CD. She liked the old stuff too, like Dolly Parton and Emmy Lou Harris, and new stuff like Lady Antebellum and Miranda Lambert. Well, it was new in 2014. It will be a real lift to hear that music on that guitar again.”

Carla nodded and hugged the guitar to keep from hugging him. Taye had gone wild over a handshake. A hug would probably make him homicidal. She had a gig! “I’ll be looking forward to it.”

Mr. Gray looked over at Taye. “With your permission, I’ll invite Eddie and Lisa Madison to come too. I think Lisa would enjoy it.”

Carla nodded enthusiastically. “Do you know Lisa? Have you met her? How is she?”

“I have. I met her yesterday at the library, and dropped by the Madison House this morning to see how she and Eddie were. They seem to be doing … well. When she heard I was coming here she asked me to say hello to you.” He looked again at Taye for his consent.

Taye inclined his head. “The Madison family can come.”

“That sounds real good. Mrs. Wolfe, there are a few extra strings here in this pocket.

You might want to put the word out so the next trader to come through can have some for you.”

Right. Carla doubted there were any music stores in this new world and no online stores to order from. “Thanks, I’ll do that. Will you join us for lunch?”

The wolves went still, and Doug Gray dropped back another step. Carla knew she had done something wrong again. What? Invite a couple guys to stay for lunch? Was that worse than offering to shake hands with an old man?

“No, thank you,” Mr. Gray said easily. “Me and Doug are headed out to Dane Overdahl’s settlement. His brother Neal is taken with my granddaughter Ellie. She’s my youngest daughter’s only child. We’re going to see if we can make a match for them.”

“How nice,” Carla said blankly. Matchmaking? Arranged marriages? What a screwed-up world. The remark had seemed to be pointed in Taye’s direction, but why?

Taye was already married.

Taye had stiffened slightly. “Ellie’s father is Mart Burnett.”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Gray, still pleasant. “Mart died three weeks ago. Ellie’s moved into my place now, and she’s my responsibility. She’ll be glad to meet you on Sunday.”

Carla was startled by Taye’s hand on her waist squeezing tight and the bitterness in his voice. “Will she?”

It was Doug Gray who answered. “Ellie’s not like her father. She pestered us to bring her today so she could meet you. Heck, she even thought about coming here to live after her father died, but … That was before Mrs. Wolfe came. A seventeen-year-old human girl with an all-male wolf pack … I don’t think it would have been proper.”

Taye’s hand relaxed. “Probably not. I would have liked for you to bring her today.”

Old Mr. Gray shook his head gently. “I would have liked to, but traveling with a young woman would have required a larger escort than just two men, especially when one is an old man like me. We couldn’t take a crowd to Dane’s, and besides, it’s not appropriate to bring the bride-to-be to the marriage negotiations.”

“Next time you could send me word, and I’ll send some of the pack to guard her. She could stay here and visit my mate while you go on to Dane’s.” Carla thought Taye’s voice was strange. Deep and rough and a bit uneven.

“Sounds like a plan,” Mr. Gray agreed. “We’ll do that next time.”

“Good. You’re welcome to stay for lunch.”

“That’s an honor. We appreciate the invitation, but we’re hoping to make it to Dane’s before supper. Maybe when we bring Ellie up this way we could join you?”

Taye nodded. “Anytime. It’s an open invitation.”

Carla watched and listened with a hundred thoughts and questions whirling through her mind. Taye walked the visitors out to the yard. The Grays nodded to her on the way out without offering to shake hands. She held her new guitar while the pack drifted around her, stripping off their pants and shorts and leaving them on the floor. She roused herself from her confusing thoughts to point accusingly.

“Are you just going to leave your clothes on the floor?” she demanded. “How will you tell whose is whose?”

They looked at her and shrugged. It was the teenager, Sky, who said, “Who cares?

What fits one of us will fit the others just as well. We just share them.”

Well, yes, Carla realized, they all had the same lean, muscular build. Still. “Well, don’t leave them out here. Go put them away.”

“Yes, Lupa.”

Amazing. Werewolves obeyed her.

Taye came in and wrapped his arms gently around her. “Sweetheart,” he said into her hair. His voice was shaky.

“You okay?”

“Yes.” He lifted his head and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Just … happy. I have a beautiful mate who is pleased with my gift. And I have a cousin who wants to know me.”

“That’s great. I love the guitar. Thank you so much for thinking of it.” Carla peeked around and saw some of the other wolves watching them and decided against kissing Taye. She put her arms around his waist and squeezed gently instead. “I guess you haven’t met Ellie? Don’t you have other cousins?”

“Many, with the Clan on the plains. My father had three brothers and they all had sons. No daughters. But it’s different with my mother’s kin. Let’s go to our room, and I’ll tell you of my mother and father.”

He sounded serious and sad. Carla put the guitar in its case and left it on the table.

Taye sounded like this would be a serious conversation. She walked with him down the hall with one arm around his waist. In their room Carla sat on the couch and Taye sprawled on the cushions with his head in her lap. He held her hand and rubbed it against his cheek.

“My mother was the daughter of a human. Her name was Naomi Burnett. She grew up in Odessa, the same farming settlement you found just southwest of town. My father was hunting with friends when they came to Odessa. My mother was working in the fields and as soon as he saw her, his wolf chose her to be his mate. He went to talk to her, but she was scared when he turned from wolf to human in front of her. She tried to run away. It’s not good to run away from a wolf, especially a young one without enough experience to have learned self control. Carla, never run away from a wolf. Promise me.”

A feeling of dread trickled over her. “Okay. So what happened? Did your dad hurt her?”

Taye was rubbing the back of her hand back and forth over his lips. “He chased her.

Wolves run fast even when they’re human. When he caught her he threw her down and marked her. He bit her here.” His fingers brushed over the place where her neck joined her shoulder. “Hard enough to draw blood. Wolves sometimes do that when they are agitated and unsure of their mate’s acceptance. He had been hunting in his fur, and when he changed to human to talk to her he was naked. My mother was terrified. She thought he would hurt her.” He fell silent, a troubled frown on his face. “No wolf would intentionally hurt his mate, but my father was young, only sixteen—”

“Sixteen?” gasped Carla.

“—and my mother was fighting.”

“Oh, God, he raped her?”

“No. He might have, but when he saw that she was crying and smelled her fear, he let her go. She ran back to her settlement and he didn’t stop her. Instead, he thought he would try to court her the human way. Do you understand about wolves choosing a mate?

Human men can marry where they like or where their families decide, but wolves don’t have that choice. Our wolves choose a mate for us. Some men give up on waiting for their wolves to choose a mate. They just marry a woman the human way. But a wife’s not fully accepted by the Pack the way mate is. Once a mate has been chosen, we can never have another woman.”

“Your wolf chose me. I remember you saying that. But how did you know?”

His shoulders moved in a shrug. “I just did. My father knew the same way. It’s like the wolf whispers in our hearts, ‘That’s the one I want.’ He went back a few days later, wearing his best clothes, with a string of horses to give her family for her bride price. Her brother, Mart Burnett, tried to kill him before he was even inside the gates. So my father ran away. He came back later with friends and watched the settlement for days for his chance to take his mate. My mother and some other girls and men came out to work in the fields again, and my father’s friends attacked them. He stole my mother and took her to the Clan.”

“Your poor mother,” Carla said. The Bride Fight didn’t seem quite so scary compared to that. Since Taye had been born his parents had obviously been intimate. Had it been rape? Had his mother submitted passively to his father out of fear? Or had she fallen in love with her kidnapper? “How old was she?”

“A little older. About nineteen, I think. She had been promised to a neighbor, and she had loved him until he rejected her for being pawed by a ‘filthy wolf.’” Taye smiled a crooked smile. “My father spent three years courting her while she lived with the Clan’s grandmother. He was successful. I remember how much they loved each other. But she missed her human family. About a year after I was born they went to her family to try to reconcile. Her family wouldn’t even see them. It broke my mother’s heart, and anything that hurt her hurt my father.”

Carla combed her fingers through his soft short hair. “Where are your parents now?”

“They’re both dead. My father died when I was fourteen. My mother wanted to be with humans so she brought me here. Some of the clan came with us, because they didn’t want us to be alone. She worked hard to make this place a good home. The rugs and the quilts are some of the things she made for me. She went to Odessa every year on her birthday to beg her brother to accept us back into her family, but he was cruel. I think he liked hurting her. She died three years ago, and she made me promise to never harm her family.” His voice sank to a growl. “Otherwise he would have died sooner.”

“Oh, how awful for your mother. How could her brother have done that? What an evil man.”