She eyed him suspiciously but his face seemed sincere enough. “I care about animals,” she said, hesitating.
Oh, what the hell.
“Okay, so I love animals. I’ve been crazy about animals since I was a kid. But I respect them too. I like being around them and learning all that I can about them and from them.” Her voice was clear and steady now. “I want to make things better for them whenever I can.”
James nodded. “So wasn’t that at the root of your argument with Charmaine? You didn’t argue with her over her choice of hair color or her political persuasion. You wanted to make things better for that worn-out little dog.”
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess that’s what it boiled down to, but I probably just pissed off Charmaine.”
“You sure did. Birkie says the woman’ll have a terrific time telling the story to everyone she knows.”
Jillian winced and put a hand to her forehead. “Great. Just great. She’ll never come back, never take that poor dog to a vet again.”
“It’s not all bad. She’s going to rehearse everything you said over and over to herself and everyone who’ll listen. So some of it might sink in eventually. And out of everyone she tells, there’s probably plenty of people who will agree with you, enough to sprinkle a little doubt in her mind.”
“Plus she’s one hell of a drama queen.” Zoey Macleod was standing in the doorway. “If you knew Charmaine, you’d know she’s addicted to drama, especially if it involves her. So she’ll definitely continue to take Pinky to an animal clinic. Wanna guess which one?”
She hesitated, trying to read the answer in Zoey’s freckled face. “Here?” she ventured.
“Without a single doubt. She couldn’t resist the possibility of another scene. Know how I know that?”
Jillian studied her until the truth dawned on her. “Connor!
Connor
told her off?”
“Oh, you bet he did. Raised his voice on more than one occasion too. Ask Birkie about it sometime. And there’ve been a few other clients who have managed to push his buttons too. The point is that you can’t care about animals and always keep your professional detachment in place. I’m not saying you shouldn’t try—you don’t want to start abusing clients—but there’s always going to be a few who drive you absolutely crazy.” She rolled her eyes. “Trust me on that. I had old Mick Kuchabsky in my office for an hour today, complaining and cussing about everything from the last week’s editorial to the size of the print.”
“Did you yell at him?”
“Eventually, but he’s ninety-six and deaf as a post so it didn’t faze him. I felt a little better though.” Zoey winked and checked her watch. “Just stopped by to collect Connor—he should be cleaned up by now. We’ve got dinner at the Watsons’ tonight, so I’ll see you folks later.”
“Thanks. Thanks a lot.” The relief was like cool rain on a hot summer day. Jillian closed her eyes and just breathed it in for a long moment. Opened her eyes to see James looking at her with decided amusement in those impossibly blue eyes. It rankled for a moment, but then she reminded herself that he had been kind. Which was more than she had been the last time she’d seen him. “Guess I should say thanks to you too. I know you were trying to make me feel better.”
“Don’t know if I succeeded. You look pretty tired.”
“It’s been a long day. I just need a nap and I’ll be fine.” And sex, she needed sex too. Lots of sex. At this time of day she’d usually think only
food, shower, sleep
, but having James nearby was making her hormones hum. It was a shame his shirt was buttoned today. “I gave those papers to Birkie.”
“I know, thanks for signing them. I just picked up the order from her.”
He seemed to be looking at her very intently. Her own gaze traveled over his strong features and rested on his lips. She knew just what they tasted like, and a shiver raced down her spine. She wanted to taste them again.
I’ve got to get out of here.
“Good. Um, that’s good. Glad I could help. See you.” She had no choice but to be abrupt, not when she had to order her eyeballs to quit staring at the man, force her body to get up, and command her legs to carry her out of the room.
Her hormones protested loudly all the way to the livestock wing. She hung her stethoscope on the cattle stanchion, stripped off the lab coat and ran through several
hyungs
in her scrubs.
Right, left, hook, turn. Rhythm, power, control, balance.
Finally, drenched in sweat, she had to admit defeat. She had not achieved the calm she sought, hadn’t even managed to vent much of her frustration. Sighing heavily, she trudged to her apartment and stood under the shower. Continued to stand there long after the hot water ran out.
Chapter Eighteen
E
venings were going to be the hardest, he knew that now. James could see the thumbnail shell of the moon sailing high and bright in the star-studded sky. The breeze whispered and called to him as he sat on the front steps of the cabin. The tendrils of air, ripe with forest scents, enticed him to give in, to leap away from his two-legged self and be one with the night. It was like entreating a parched man in a desert to leap into a cool oasis pool.
He gritted his teeth and turned away, determined to stay his set course and remain completely human. His wolf side was just too unpredictable. But God, it was hard to resist Changing and running free. Almost physically painful.
I wonder if addicts feel like this? Needing that one thing that gets them through another day, another hour.
James shoved those thoughts aside and tried to focus on something else.
Like his family. His brothers and sister had entered the yard as wolves, but they’d acted more like big dogs, leaping on him joyfully and knocking him flat. When they’d finally Changed, they’d hugged the breath out of him, couldn’t stop touching and patting him all night as if to reassure themselves he was real. They talked all night too—or rather, his brothers and sister had talked. James found himself with very little to say. After all, what had he done over the past three decades that was worth talking about? His baby sister, Kenzie, had two doctorates. Two, for God’s sake. Devlin was a published author. Culley ran a successful business.
And then Connor’s wife had come in. Zoey. She was beautiful, he’d known that, he’d noticed her from a distance in her human form as she came and went from the farm, watched her with the Pack in her wolfen form too. But as a wolf himself, he’d never approached her, never talked to her, never known how smart or funny or kind she was, or how devoted to his brother. Connor had found his true mate, and they were as happy now as they appeared in the wedding photos on the living room wall.
Photos that included every member of the family but James Macleod. Not only had he not known about the wedding, he couldn’t even remember what part of the country he’d been wandering at the time.
Rip Van Winkle.
That was what Culley had called James. After the man in the old folk tale who went to sleep for many years, and awakened to find that life had gone on without him. Culley had meant it as a joke, and James had smiled at the time but inside, he was horrified by all that he’d missed.
Not only his family but the world itself had advanced in ways he hadn’t expected. Culley’s business was a prime example. It was
online
and he had tried to show it to James in Connor’s home office. The computer hadn’t remotely resembled the last one James had seen. And it was mind-boggling to learn that most people had one—or two or more—in their home as a matter of course. Devlin had one in his pocket for God’s sake. There was no doubt that James had some real catching up to do in order to fit into the human world. He’d felt seriously overwhelmed, emotionally and mentally, by the time everyone went to bed near dawn.
Small wonder he’d chosen to sleep outside for a few hours, claiming he was too hot to remain in the house. Whether his siblings bought that excuse or not, James didn’t know, but it was an immense relief to be out in the night air, away from all the little technological marvels that marked this new century. He’d rather have Changed, curled up in the nearby woods, but if he was going to be human, he had to learn to make do. The porch swings didn’t look overly comfortable, but he found an old hammock between a couple of trees behind the house. And so he let himself be lulled into exhausted sleep by the soft susurrus of the breeze in the aspen leaves.
At least Connor had waited a couple days before springing his big idea on James. “I know you’re still trying to adjust, bro, but you’ve got to have a reason to get up in the morning. You used to have your own ranch, used to enjoy it. Hell, you were damn good at it. I’ve never seen anyone with a gift like yours, and heaven knows my land could use that gift. The ground’s just lying there fallow and wasted when it could be producing, but we both know that I’m never going to have time for it. Zoey loves the place but she’s a city gal and running the newspaper keeps her busy enough.” Connor waved his arm at the buildings, the fences. “Look at it, it’s a mess. But it doesn’t have to be. There’s no reason the farm can’t belong to both of us. Zoey and I talked about it and we’re proposing a partnership. We’ll put up the money and give you signing authority on all the farm accounts, if you’ll just get this place whipped into shape.”
In the end James had agreed to it, even though his gut was tight with fear, as if the whole thing was a monstrous trap, a ploy to keep him human, keep him here. It was an emotional reaction, he knew. He’d already made his decision to walk on two legs. But in truth, he hadn’t given a thought to what he was going to do with his time. Protecting Jillian wasn’t working out to a full-time job, especially since she didn’t want him to defend her. Connor was right—again, which was getting just a little irritating—and so James found himself suddenly in charge of a very large, very rundown farm.
At his brother’s invitation, James had taken up residence in an empty farmhouse. It had begun its life as a cabin for the hired man but had been added to over the years until now it was more like a sprawling lodge. The last person to live there had been his brother’s late friend, Jim Neely. Old Jim had loved Connor’s animals as if they were his own children, and there was nothing but good energy in and around the house. Good location too. Tucked back away into the trees on the opposite side of the farmyard from Connor’s place, the house was invisible from every direction until you were almost standing in front of it.
But God, that first night indoors, in a bed . . . James had been disoriented, frightened in some primal way, like a child afraid of the dark. He didn’t tell Connor, but that first night he had ended up sleeping outside on the porch. And the next night as well. No blankets, no pillow, just curled on the weathered boards like—
Like an animal.
James made a disgusted sound.
Jesus, it’s just a bed. I’ll sleep in the damn thing.
In less than an hour, James was back on the porch, sweating. He swore viciously, half at himself and half at the bed that terrified him, and waited for his head to clear and his heart rate to slow to normal. He tried to think rationally when what he really wanted to do was tear the offending piece of furniture into tiny shreds with his teeth. And wasn’t
that
just another sign of his animal nature? Would his first impulses always be those of a wolf? “Okay, okay. Small steps then. Maybe I can’t sleep in the goddamn bed just yet, but I don’t have to sleep on the porch either.”
He got up and went inside, just stood in the living room. So far, so good. Maybe he could sleep on the couch. Even a wolf would probably like sleeping on a couch. He remembered sprawling on Jillian’s couch, wondered if it had been a good idea to startle her like that. Hell, that whole night hadn’t been a good idea. Look what it had brought him to. Warring with his wolf side, trying to sleep indoors like a human being . . .
To be human or not to be human, that is the question.
Culley had once paraphrased Hamlet when a wild game of four-legged rough-and-tumble gave the young Macleod boys a tough decision to make. Should they tell their mother about accidentally collapsing her line of clean laundry or stay in wolf form and run for the hills? It was over a century and a half ago, and they had laughed over that line many times since.
It didn’t strike James as funny now. He no longer had the luxury of contemplating that question because Connor had been right. James couldn’t just pop back into his family’s lives, decide it wasn’t working out, and vanish again. It would be cruel, and he was not a cruel man. He was only beginning to understand how much he had hurt his loved ones by disappearing the first time. He could never bring himself to do that to them again. Add to that the instinctive imperative to protect Jillian—if only from himself and his wolf nature—and James felt there was no other choice for him. He had to resume a human life.
Doesn’t mean I have to like it.
James stalked into the bedroom, kicked the offending bed, and grabbed a pillow and blanket. It had been simple to be human once, even enjoyable. He didn’t remember having to struggle so damn much, didn’t recall experiencing this level of frustration. And if it was simple once, it could be again.
He stretched out on the couch in the front room but couldn’t relax. His eyes simply refused to close. His body wanted to curl up in a ball. He’d opened all the windows, but the room still felt stifling, even claustrophobic. At the clinic he’d managed to sleep in the loft, but it was wide open to the elements at one end, and the ceiling rafters were high above him. Burrowing into a pile of straw had been a whole lot more organic, more natural, than trying to get comfortable with a blanket and pillow. He thought wistfully of the hammock behind Connor’s house. Maybe he should put up one of those in the yard.
Yeah, that’ll work real well in the winter.
And the thought that he would still be human months from now was somehow depressing.
Jillian’s probably sound asleep.
An image popped into his head, and he let it linger: the small blond woman curled in her bed, her short hair sticking up in every direction, her delicate faery features, the pajamas with the silly frogs on them . . . He hoped she was sleeping better than he was. The last time he’d spoken to her at the clinic, she’d looked ready to drop, but then, she’d fought more than one battle that day.
That whole scene with Mountney, for instance. Jillian’s body language had shown no fear as she faced down the arrogant bastard and traded verbal blows. There was passion in her voice, in her face, as she stood up for a neglected animal, a passion her body didn’t seem big enough to hold. It lit her up like a prairie wildfire, leapt out and scorched her adversary. And the glorious blaze of her pulled at something in James as he watched. Pulled him now just remembering.
He had successfully resisted the powerful urge to charge in and protect her. He’d learned enough about her to know that Jillian didn’t want to be defended, even though Mountney was doing his best to bully her with threats. In fact, she seemed to think an offer of help was some sort of statement on her abilities. So James accorded her the respect he would give another Changeling and allowed her to fight her own battle. But his wolf nature hadn’t made it easy. A low growl had crept into his throat, and his control seemed balanced on a high, thin wire in a strong wind. James knew then,
knew
, that if anything in the highly charged scene shifted even slightly—if Jillian showed a moment’s uncertainty, if Mountney lifted a hand to strike her—the wolf would have been at the man’s throat in a heartbeat.
None of that had happened, thank God. James had partially appeased the wolf by standing, simply standing behind Jillian and glaring over the top of her head at her assailant as only a Changeling could glare. The guy had backed down and left in a hurry, but Jillian definitely hadn’t appreciated what James had done. And she had no way of appreciating what he
hadn’t
done.
Later when she went head to head with that Forrester woman, James was again fascinated by Jillian’s passion. She cared. She cared about the animals, she cared about her ideals, and she even cared about him to a degree. The incident in the loft had shown him that. Not every woman would risk asking a half-naked man if he needed anything, especially after he’d just grabbed her and scared her almost to death.
A warrior spirit and a compassionate heart.
Small wonder he was mesmerized by her.
Which meant he’d have to be a hell of a lot more careful.
In the past, Jillian Descharme had left an impression on him, even as a wolf, that he couldn’t shake. A connection he didn’t understand but couldn’t deny. But he had to stay in control, had to find a way to watch over her and keep his distance at the same time. It would be too easy, much too easy, to become involved with her, to encourage a relationship that would only place her in further jeopardy. His job was to protect her, even from himself.
Some protector I am.
He couldn’t even win a battle with a stupid bed, of all things. And he didn’t seem to be gaining any ground with the damn couch either. In the end, James slept on the bare floor just inside the open door. It was a start.
Connor didn’t see his older brother for days. The work around the farm was done as if by ghosts. The animals were fed and cared for, the tool shed tidied up, bales stacked and grain moved. Connor caught a rare glimpse of James as he was walking the far fields at sunup, kneeling now and again to run his hands through the soil.
Maybe I pushed him too hard about taking on the farm. Maybe it’s too much too soon and he needs more time.
Then one night he came home to a very different farm than he had left that morning. There were construction crews on the roofs of the buildings. Flatbed trucks of materials filled the lane. Heavy equipment vied for position in the corrals and smoke rose from burning piles of discarded fencing. The peace and quiet of the country had been replaced with a cacophony of power tools. He found a place to park his truck and walked into the heart of the chaos until he found James giving detailed instructions to a crew of electricians. Connor was intrigued. He waited until his brother finished, then tapped him on the shoulder. “Who are you and what have you done with my farm?”