Wolver's Reward (23 page)

"Stop it," he ordered. "That's what she is,
and there's nothing we can do," River said to both himself and his
wolf. "It's what she was born to be."

His wolf snarled again, but River didn't
bother telling it to stop. He didn't like the idea any better than
his wolf did.

Chapter 17

The pounding on the door startled them
both.

"Fuck," River growled.

"Fudge," Reb said in the same tone of
voice.

"Roland wants to see you," Darla called.

"Can't it wait?" Reb cried.

"He's the Alpha," Darla called back as if
that said it all.

Which, River supposed, it did. He grabbed a
pair of jeans from his bag along with his last clean shirt. "Gotta
do laundry," he muttered.

One leg clothed, he hopped toward the
bathroom door while jamming his other leg into the jeans. He
pushed, he shoved, he rammed his foot through. A pair of shorts and
two mismatched socks shot from the flopping pant leg. He picked
them up, ready to give them the sniff test and hoping they were
clean. He was confronted with two busty, lip puckering wolves.

"Shit," he muttered, tossing them in the pile
with the others.

"Shoot," Reb giggled behind him.

"I hate going commando," he complained.

As he entered the bathroom, he caught a
glimpse of Reb, pillow to her face, falling back on the bed.

Darla was in the room when he came out. Reb
had the covers pulled over her head.

The older woman looked from one to the other.
"Have fun?" she asked sourly.

River was about to tell her what she could do
with her question when Reb's head popped out from beneath the
covers.

"Yes," she said with a weak attempt to hide
her grin, and then hid under the covers again.

"Well at least one of us did," Darla groused.
"You ready?"

The door had barely closed behind them before
the woman started in. "Margaret says she made a deal with you."

River grunted a noncommittal response, but
Darla didn't need a verbal one.

"She gotcha, didn't she?" She sucked in her
cheeks when River's eyes flashed to hers. "Yep. She gotcha. That
pretty face, those fine manners." Stubby pinkie extended, Darla
arched her broad and muscled hand daintily in mimicry. "She's
good." She smirked and nudged him with her elbow. "Don't feel bad.
She's outsmarted wiser wolvers than you. And don't hold it against
her. She did what she thought she had to do."

"She could have asked," River groused.

"Maybe," she shrugged, "But you'd already
made it clear you were on your way. You just came to get your
truck. Remember? Wait up."

River stopped while Darla tied a shoe that
didn't need to be tied.

"Did she tell you why?" she asked.

"He's sick. She wants him protected from a
Challenge. The newbies make her nervous." The Mate never said it
was a secret and, he figured, accurately, there wasn't much Darla
didn't know about her Mate.

"That's part of it." She switched to the
other shoe and without looking up from the laces, said quietly,
"She thinks he's going to die and she wants him to see his dream
before he goes."

Well, shit. The Alpha smelled sick. There was
definitely something seriously wrong, but dying? River didn't think
so.

"What from?"

"She won't say, but it's got something to do
with that fall he took getting that stupid window." She
straightened the hem of her pant leg which was turned up in a cuff.
"There was this big old falling down house up the road from where
we lived. All the windows were broken out but one way up at the
roof peak. Margaret loved that window. She'd laugh and say someday
she'd have the house to go with it. She was so upset about having
to leave the valley, the Alpha thought he'd go get her that window
with the promise of building her a house to fit it." She rolled her
eyes.

"He got it all right, and then the floor gave
way and so did the one beneath it. He ended up in the cellar with a
broken leg. That window survived, but the Alpha might not." Darla
took in a breath that expanded her chest and slowly let it go.
"Margaret blames herself for making a fuss. I've been watching over
her since I was a cub. Came with her when she mated the Alpha.
Never saw her make a fuss before. Not likely to see her make one
again," she added. She sounded disappointed.

"When did this happen?"

"It's been over a week and before you say it,
yes, the leg should have healed. It didn't." They'd reached the
RV's door. Darla paused with her hand on the handle. "You be kind
to the Mate." It wasn't a request. "She can't take much more."

There were few signs of the fight that
occurred in the confines of the little house on wheels. Everything
had been straightened, thrown out, or put away. All the doors along
the narrow passageway were closed, their contents, and Reb's former
ammunition supply, hidden from view. Only one showed damage where a
hinge had been torn from its mooring. A cracked and useless carafe
was tucked into its place in the coffee maker on the counter. One
of the burner covers on the miniature gas stove had a corner
missing. Two chipped mugs were in the sink and a china teacup with
a matching teapot sat in the center of the table.

In the tiny sitting area across from the
door, the Mate was a picture of calm. Only the fine lines etched
across her forehead showed evidence of her stress. She returned
River's nod of greeting.

"The Alpha is in the bedroom," she said,
graciously indicating the narrow carpeted passageway with her hand
as if there might be some question of the direction. "Don't let him
keep you. He needs his rest. And River?" She leaned in close to
whisper. "He doesn't know about our arrangement."

She meant the money, though how she planned
to fork over a thousand dollars on the sly, River couldn't figure.
He didn't much care. It wasn't his business as long as he got paid.
He nodded again, but she stopped him with the same hand, touching
him lightly as he passed.

"You're angry with me, aren't you?"

River glanced at the husky female standing
behind the Mate before he shook his head. "No, ma'am, not anymore.
I get it."

He knew what it was like to feel responsible
for someone's death.

"I thought you might."

The Mate, too, glanced Darla's way and then
lowered her eyes to hide what was in them. "Thank you. Darla and I
will be outside."

"Ma'am," River called softly as she turned to
leave. "Why don't you go over to my room and sit with Reb. She
could use the company and you could get some rest. I'll come and
get you when we're finished."

For some reason, that made her smile.

~*~

The Alpha was dozing, but opened his eyes
when River came through the door. Upon seeing who it was, the old
wolver became fully alert. There was no greeting and he didn't
smile. He didn't look real good, either.

He wasn't exactly hale and hearty looking
before, but in the short time since his collapse, his skin had
turned a ghastly gray and his eyes had a glassy sheen. Neither was
a good sign.

"Margaret tells me you've volunteered to join
us on our journey. I will tell you that I do not approve." He
smoothed the light cotton blanket that covered him, though he
avoided the section over his injured leg. "I see no need for a
Champion. I have no fear of a Challenge. My pack is loyal. I would
know if they were not."

He was connected with his pack. He would feel
the discontent if it was there.

"What about the new lot? Are they coming
tonight? Tomorrow?"

"We will meet them on our way."

By the look the Alpha gave him, River knew
he'd scored a point. New members were always taken in under the
light of the full moon.

"That gives you a month of not knowing.
You've only met four. What about the others?"

With a flutter of his hand, Roland brushed
the question off, and then hastily balled the hand into a fist to
hide the tremor. "They're eager to start this new life. Dennis
assured me of it."

The Thug probably said the same thing about
his pack, but River didn't think it was a good time to point that
out. "Dennis isn't here, sir," he pointed out instead.

"I'm well aware of that," the Alpha snapped.
He pounded his fist on his thigh and winced, then said with some
disgust, "It's my leg that afflicts me, not my mind." After taking
a calming breath, he continued in a more reasonable tone. "Dennis's
unfortunate demise has engendered ramifications beyond our current
situation that I would not expect someone of your position to
understand."

When he paused, River jumped in, mostly
because coming from his 'position', it pissed him off. "You lost
the wolver who was supposed to take care of your pack and your
daughter when the time comes." He watched the Alpha's eyes widen in
curious surprise. River tried to keep the satisfaction from his
voice. "Yeah, I get it."

He hadn't seen it before, but he saw it now.
"This whole thing," he went on, spreading his hands to encompass it
all, "You think joining two packs that have nothing in common will
be good for them both. Males and females, strength and stability,
and the chance to start a new life together in a new place. Finding
Reb a wolver who would someday take over the pack was a bonus. I
get it, Alpha. Pack comes first. You want yours to survive and you
don't see anyone within your pack that can do the job." From what
River had seen, he wasn't even sure the current Alpha was up to
it.

Roland settled back against the headboard
where pillows were arranged to prop his shoulders. He folded his
arms across his chest. "And what is your role in all this? Of what
benefit is this position to you?"

River wondered what the old man would say if
River told him the truth. "A thousand smackers and a week with your
daughter." Instead, he tried a modified version of the truth. "My
Alpha thought it would be good for me to see some of the world
before I decide what I want to do with the rest my life." He
shrugged. "Travelling alone isn't all I thought it would be, so why
not do it with you? I'll earn my keep. Your pack is loyal, but they
won't hold up if it comes to a fight. You already know that. The
best way to avoid that is to make sure one doesn't start. From what
I've seen of Darla, she's probably a good Second. I got no call to
question that, but tough and loyal as she is, she's won't be strong
enough to stand in the way of a Challenge. I am. I may not be the
biggest," he added, thinking of Ben, "but I've been trained by the
best. Being your Champion gives me the authority to do it."

"I don't like the idea of a Champion. It
implies that I expect a Challenge for the mantle, which I do not.
The newcomers must be made to feel welcome, not viewed with
suspicion." The Alpha raised his brows as if expecting a
response.

River gave him one. "The newcomers need to
know that they're only welcome if they play by your rules and they
need to know your rules will be enforced. You don't like the word,
call me Security. That was my job at Wolf's Head. You need someone
to keep the peace until you're back on your feet and can do it
yourself."

River mentally shook his head in disgust, not
at the Alpha, but at himself. Why was he arguing for a job he'd
been conned into applying for? It wasn't his business. It wasn't
his fight.

His wolf chuffed in
amusement. "
Mate
," it said and River knew his wolf was right. It was Margaret
that started all this.

He raised his hands, palms outward. "With all
due respect, Alpha, I didn't apply for this job. The Mate offered
it to me, but you're the boss, and..."

"So you would think." For the first time, the
Alpha smiled. "My Margaret is a worrier. She sees things
differently than I and in some things, she is wiser than I. She
foresees problems where I do not and in this, I believe she is
wrong.

"Both packs are amenable to this merger," he
went on, "and I believe we are not so very different in our wants
and needs. We are all wolvers under the skin. We have the same
goals and we understand the implications of the failure to reach
those goals. Pack is everything and without it, we fall into chaos.
Every wolver knows this and feels it in his heart."

River could have let it go. He should have
let it go. It was obvious Roland was a good man and a good wolver.
River had no doubt the old wolf was a good professor, too, but
maybe that was the problem. He lived in books and not in the real
world. All wolvers were not the same and River found himself
re-entering the argument.

"Who's the wolver in the pink golf shirt who
walks around with a book under his nose?"

"Arnold, but I fail to see how his reading
habits are pertinent to the subject at hand."

"Can you picture him and Scar becoming best
buds? Because I can't. What do they have in common?"

"Scar?"

River traced the outline of on his face and
then another in a slanted six inch line along the side of his
neck.

Recognizing the nonverbal description, Roland
looked horrified. "Surely that can't be his name. No one would be
so cruel as to..."

"He earned that name," River interrupted.
"He's proud of it. Those scars are proof he fought and survived. He
fought a lot, and he didn't get those scars from good hearted
wolvers. That's the world you're trying to blend with yours,
Alpha." He held out his hands, palms up, and lifted each in turn.
"Books and bloody brawls. Maybe they do want a different life, but
that's the life they know and those scars run deep. That's
something I wouldn't expect your pack, with their... background...
to understand."

If Roland noticed River's lightly veiled
sarcasm, he didn't show it.