Wolf at Law by Heather Long (8 page)

“I’m not kidding you.” Settling a hand on her hip, he considered her questions. “I live in Willow Bend, though I travel a great deal for my work. I have private clients and one corporation that I represent. I do a lot of corporate and real estate work, primarily. I’m in Chicago negotiating with a man named Bruno Heller.”

“He’s a friend of…”

Ryan held up his hand. “If it has anything to do with Taglioni, don’t tell me. In this instance, I want to use no information from you that could benefit me so you don’t think that’s why I’m seeing you.”

From her wince, he knew he’d guessed correctly. Heller and Taglioni were very familiar with each other. He’d already garnered that morsel of information at the club. Still, it didn’t matter. What was between him and Tiffany had nothing to do with pack business or Taglioni’s interests.

“You should know that Giles is not a kind man in business either. I know he kept a lot of it from me, but I saw some of his meetings. A lot of people are afraid of him.” She chewed her lower lip. He hated the sign of indecision and worry on her face.

“You let me worry about him.” Not that he was. If Giles came after him, it gave Ryan all the rope he needed to hang the bastard.

“The last thing I want is for you to be hurt because of me.”

“No one’s going to hurt me, Tiffany.” Time to nudge her away from the topic. “As for my family, my mother lives in Willow Bend, and she is going to love you.”

Her pupils dilated, and her breath hitched.

The sexual response was definitely a distraction and off the earlier topic, but maybe too far off. She wasn’t ready yet. His body protested and he ignored it.  “You don’t have to meet her until you’re ready…”

“Ryan?” Her voice gained strength. “Are you planning a future for us?”

Yes, but she wasn’t ready to hear that yet. Then again, she’d asked the question. “I want to, very much.” Honesty. She deserved it. “I want to know everything about you, and I want to share everything about me. I want to see you smile, and I want the privilege of taking care of you and Alexis both. But I don’t think you’re ready for that yet…” His wolf protested at the out, but the man ignored the beast. “For now, I would like to ask you to dinner.”

“What if we go out, and he finds us?” No sooner did she ask the question, than she said, “Maybe he doesn’t know yet. He could go weeks without coming home.”

“He knows,” Ryan told her. When she jerked, he tightened his arms around her and gave her hip a gentle squeeze. “He knows, and you are safe. More importantly, your daughter is safe. He knows you left, but he doesn’t know when or where.”

“I would never forgive myself if he came after you. Maybe I should take Alexis…I have enough for a bus fair and we can—”

Letting her continue down that path wasn’t acceptable. “You go nowhere without me unless you truly don’t choose me. I don’t think we’re there yet, but if that is what you want. I will make it happen.” His wolf rebelled, and he felt his eyes begin to shift. “The last place I want you is away from me. You can have all the time you need, but here, where I can keep an eye on you, or in Willow Bend. Taglioni will not lay a finger on you for as long as there is breath in my body.”

He blinked, forcing the animal down. Tiffany cupped his chin. With her gentle urging, he met her gaze again.

“Your eyes,” Tiffany said slowly. “They go so gold when you’re intense.”

“Yes,” he admitted, refusing to duck the accusation. “They do.”

“I’ve never seen anything like that before.” Wonder, not fear, populated her voice.

Telling her was important.
Tell her. Show her
. Revealing their nature to humans outside the pack was forbidden, but she was the one for him. His wolf was set on her. If he were honest, so was the man. “There are some things you need to know.”

“Maybe so,” she said. Then she surprised him when she touched her nose to his before kissing him gently. The sweetness in the kiss satisfied the wolf’s aggravation. When he would have deepened the kiss, she withdrew. His whole body went taut with need. “You can tell me your secrets when you’re ready to. Crazy as it sounds, I trust you. I do. You don’t lie to me.”

He should object to that display of faith, but he really didn’t want to. Not when he and the wolf basked under her touch. “I will tell you.” He promised. “When you’re ready to know.”

With a deeper smile, she stroked his cheek. “Will you tell me one thing? Or maybe promise me one thing?”

“Anything.” And he meant that.

“Promise me you won’t break my heart. I don’t know how I survived him. I don’t even know if I have really survived him. I won’t survive losing you.”

He wouldn’t, that was certain. “I promise.” Awareness of her sweet ass tucked against his leg burned through him. “May I take you out to dinner, pretty lady? Will you take pity on me?”

“I don’t know.” She leaned away slightly and toyed with his hair. The faint scrape of her nails against his scalp warmed him to his soul. “I think you need to convince me.”

“Oh?” He perked up to the challenge. “Convince you?”

“Yes.” She didn’t look away from him as she licked her lips. He zeroed in on the action. “How would you like to convince me?”

He’d have had to be a saint to ignore such a blatant invitation, but an image of mother and daughter romping and playing flooded his mind. He swooped in and stole a kiss before flipping her onto her back. With as gentle a touch as he could manage, he began tickling her.

The roar of her laughter melted away the worried stiffness in his spine. He would make this work. Secure the land for the pack, take care of Margo for Will, and make Tiffany his.

He could do this.

“Mrs. Taglioni…” The judge studied the petition in front of her. If Ryan hadn’t been sitting steadfast at her side, Tiffany would have left. She’d thought having a woman judge would make all the difference, but the sixty-year-old woman seated across from her at the desk scared the hell out of her. From the moment she’d taken a seat in the office, she’d wanted to flee. Ryan had brushed her leg with his and it helped. Not as much as she wished, but the panic swelling within seemed to quiet.

At least until the judge focused on her. “This is a private session. There’s only you, your attorney and me.”

I guess the court reporter doesn’t count.
Keeping that thought to herself, she nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

“You understand your daughter is also included in this Order of Protection.”

Why couldn’t she stop shaking? “Yes, ma’am.”

“I also see you stated your husband—Mr. Taglioni—never struck your daughter. You have those words here in your statement.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The judge nodded and wrote something down. “Has she ever witnessed the alleged abuse?”

Ryan nudged her leg, a light rub, a reminder of his presence. Clasping her hands together, Tiffany fought her dry throat to speak. “I don’t think she has. I pray she hasn’t. I’ve done my damnedest to try and keep her from seeing it.”

“Yet now, after what looks like six years of varying abuse where you charge mental, emotional and physical cruelty, you’ve decided to take action. Why is that?”

“Your Honor,” Ryan began, but the judge held up a hand.

“No, Mr. Huston. Your briefs have been very thorough, as were both of your petitions. I know exactly what you have stated, but I want to hear it from Mrs. Taglioni.”

The standoff between the two bought her a few seconds. She had two choices here—go with the testimony she and Ryan had discussed, or be brutally honest. “You want the truth?”

“I would prefer it, yes.” The judge studied her, waiting.

“It’s not pretty, and it’s not eloquent. I’ve learned a lot about myself over the last few days. I’m not just uneducated, I’m ignorant and I’ve let myself be ignorant.” She didn’t look at Ryan at all. The man deserved so much better than her. “Because it was easier to be ignorant and pretend I didn’t understand how ugly my situation was than it is to stand up and try and demand something better for myself. If it were just me…well, I’d probably be in my kitchen in my apartment, making dinner and setting the table just so, waiting with the food and trying to keep it the right temperature so it was warm and perfect if Giles decided to walk through that door. If he wasn’t there by ten or eleven, chances were good he wouldn’t be home and I could go ahead and eat.”

Digging her nails into her palms, she pulled her feet back and withdrew from any contact. She had to get this out. Clearing her throat, she said. “If I were lucky, he wouldn’t come home at all. Sometimes he would come in late, and sometimes very early in the morning. I always had to be ready because he wanted everything the way he wanted it. If I made him wait or inconvenienced him in any way, it would end badly. So, yes if not for Alexis, I would still be there. Because…” She blinked rapidly, determined to get through her confession without tears. “Because I didn’t deserve any better. I never finished high school, and I never went to college. I don’t have education.”

Ryan was so smart. He knew everything. Smart. Kind. Considerate. So smooth and urbane. What the hell did she have to offer a man like that?

Focusing on the wall of books behind the judge, Tiffany plunged forward blindly. “But I was worried that she was going to see it one night. That she would wake up and hear my crying or see the blood before I could clean it up. Whenever she is sick or upset or has a bad dream, she’s not allowed to come into our room. I can’t sleep with her and be there for her if she needs me. My daughter deserves better. She deserves more than an ignorant mother. I grew up with one, and look where I ended up.”

After a long pause, the judge reached for a box of Kleenex and passed it across the desk. “Mrs. Taglioni, has your daughter ever seen her father hit you?”

Dabbing at her eyes, she nodded. “Two weeks ago. It was late, and I wasn’t fast enough with getting dinner on the table. Alexis and I had been practicing her letters, and she hadn’t felt well after dinner, so I gave her a bath and got her ready for bed. I’d tucked her in, and I didn’t hear him come in.” She didn’t look at Ryan.  She hadn’t told him this.

Voice shaking, she tried to distance herself and recount only the facts. Raw terror punched through her gut when she’d stepped into the darkened kitchen and heard him at the table.

“He wanted to know where his dinner was, why wasn’t I waiting for him. He didn’t give me a chance to answer. Just—just hauled back and punched me. I fell and I broke a glass…that was when he kicked me.” She could barely see the books through the sheen of tears. “Alexis came into a kitchen a minute later and asked for water. I tried to pretend it hadn’t happened…”

“But she saw.” The judge stated. Tiffany nodded.

“Yeah, I think she did and it didn’t matter. He’d never touched her, never hit her. But he was so cold. One of these days, he could lose his temper and maybe he would hit her. I just—I decided that night it was time. I spent the next few days meeting attorneys.”

“All right. I am going to need to speak to her, but based on the medical records, your testimony, and the three police reports Mr. Huston managed to unearth, I am leaning toward granting the restraining order.” She transferred her attention to Ryan. “When will you be filing the petition for divorce and emergency custody order, Mr. Huston?”

“Both are waiting to be submitted, pending this judgment. Tiffany needs peace of mind, Your Honor.” Ryan was so smooth, he didn’t miss a beat in his argument. Hell, even Tiffany believed him. She used the tissue to try and mop up her tears. Sobbing wasn’t her, she didn’t let herself lose it. Alexis needed her to keep it together.

“Good. Mrs. Taglioni, are you going to have a problem with me speaking to your daughter?”

That worked to dry up her eyes. “No, but I don’t want her frightened. What kind of questions are you going to ask her?”

“Good answer, Mom.” The judge smiled with approval. “You can be present, but it might easier for you and your daughter if you step out. I want to ask her about her routine, some general questions, nothing invasive.”

Torn, Tiffany glanced from Ryan to the judge and back again. His normal determination had been replaced by a quiet ferocity. It warmed her, left her tingling from head to toe. God, what he must think of her? “Can Ryan stay while Alexis speaks to you?” Would he mind that she’d just volunteered him for this position? If she was certain of nothing else, Ryan was a dream where her daughter was concerned. He talked to her, played with her, and he disciplined with a quiet, pervasive personality that didn’t require him raising his voice or acting in a manner that terrified her.

He was so perfect—and deserved far better than her. Tearing her gaze away, she looked to the judge.

“Absolutely. I have no problems with your attorney being present. Mrs. Taglioni, off the record…” The minute she said that the court reporter stopped the clicking away on her recorder. “Bravo to you for standing up for your daughter. You deserve to stand up for yourself. Don’t lose your nerve.”

Surprised didn’t cover her reaction. “Thank you.”

 Ryan walked her to the door and gave her a moment to clean up from her tears. He brushed her cheek with his knuckles, a faint caress. “You did good.”

Wanting to believe him, she fought for a smile. “Take care of my little girl.”

“I promise.” He opened the door, and she found Alexis waiting in the hall with Zane and a woman she didn’t recognize. Collin was watching their suites. The constant surveillance had seemed like overkill, but Tiffany had to admit she found it comforting knowing he was there and that no way would Giles be waiting for her.

Watching Alexis dance into the judge’s chambers hand-in-hand with Ryan was difficult as hell. Harder still to see the door close and leave her on the other side. She should be in there with them, shielding her daughter.

God, her daughter shouldn’t even have to do this.

Pacing away from the door before she did something stupid, she looked at the chairs where Zane and the strange woman waited. “Tiffany,” Zane said in his gruff, rough voice. “This is Rory. We thought you and Alexis might find a woman’s presence more comforting after this morning.”