A Cross to Bear (13 page)

After a half hour of trudging through the woods, she came to the forest edge behind the lodge. It sat in the shadow of a tall mountain among the pines. The lawns were impeccably manicured, with a variety of ponds and streams running through lush gardens that boasted arched bridges and man-made waterfalls. There were armed guards on the many balconies of the lodge and others walking the grounds as well.

Gabby gulped. There was no way she was going to get anywhere near the lodge with so many watching the place. She settled in among the bushes and made herself comfortable. If she couldn’t get in, she could at least watch. From her pack, she took her high-powered binoculars and spied the lodge. The forest was growing dark at her back. She ignored it as best she could.

The sun’s setting rays gave way to the first stars of the night. Within the hour, the horizon began to glow with the coming of the full moon. Not much was going on in the lodge. No one was yet outside, but she could see figures walk by the many glowing windows every once in a while.

A variety of sounds came from the forest around her—a strange cry that she hoped belonged to an owl, the creaking of tree branches rubbing together, and the scurry and chatter of chipmunks. She felt a hundred eyes on her and shivered.

It was going to be a long night.

Be brave, Gabs. You are a powerful goddess.
Maggy’s words echoed in her head and gave her courage, though she wouldn’t have minded having her pistol right about now.

Just then, the big glass doors at the back of the lodge opened, and people began to pour out.

People wearing long black robes.

A chill passed through her spine, and she hunched lower, feeling suddenly exposed. Her heart hammered in her chest as she studied the group members, who were slowly making their way across the grounds down a stone path that eventually led to the woods behind the lodge.

Gabby knew that Michael Steele must be among the hooded figures, but she could make out no details in the darkness from so far away. There were at least fifty figures in all by the time the last of them had come out of the lodge, and the glass doors were closed. They slowly made their way single file to the tree line and beyond.

I need to get the hell out of here,
Gabby thought.

Darb had been right. There was some weird shit going on with this group. But Gabby was curious. She hadn’t come all this way just to puss out now. She crept from her hiding place and moved through the woods toward the trail that the people were following. Her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and she made her way as quickly and quietly as possible.

She moved adjacent to the trail, careful to stay many yards behind the group. After about a quarter mile, the group came to a clearing with a pile of wood at its center standing about ten feet high and ten feet wide. Gabby found a good hiding place behind a large fallen tree and watched, enthralled and slightly terrified.

A burning torch was tossed on the pile of wood. It must have been doused with oil or gas because it went up with a resounding
whoosh
and illuminated the clearing brightly. Gabby crouched down farther and peeked out over the tree. The group gathered in a circle before the fire, and all at once they dropped their robes.

To Gabby’s shock and amazement, they were all naked—men and women alike. She focused in with the binoculars and took a quick breath when she found Michael Steele standing at the center of the group. His chiseled body was covered in a thin sheen of sweat that seemed to glow in the firelight. Gabby found herself unable to take her eyes off him. All the others were similarly toned, and Gabby suddenly felt self-conscious of her own imperfect form. These people looked like Greek gods.

Michael was saying something, but Gabby caught only bits and pieces of it from her distance. She was about two hundred yards away, which was still a bit too close for comfort. She considered leaving once more, knowing that nothing good was going to come out of this. But she found herself mesmerized.

Three people joined Michael at the center of the group and dropped to their knees. He laid a hand on each of their heads in turn and looked at the moon with the others, speaking words that Gabby could not understand. She turned to regard the moon as well, which had just begun to crest the distant treetops.

The group cheered and howled, then whooped and clapped.

“Let the hunt begin!” Michael yelled, loud enough for Gabby to hear.

Hunt?

Gabby was suddenly petrified. What did he mean by hunt? She was about to make a run for it, when many of the members of the group suddenly came together in throws of passion. Men mounted women from behind, and women straddled men. Some of the men even mounted each other. The women likewise began exploring each other’s bodies with lustful cries and moans. She zoomed in on Michael Steele, who was holding up a gyrating woman with his gleaming, muscled arms. He stood at the center of an ocean of writhing bodies, thrusting into the thrashing beauty.

Gabby’s mouth was suddenly dry. She stared at the spectacle with growing excitement.

Get ahold of yourself, Gabs
.

The woman straddling Michael tossed back her head and cried out in ecstasy. He too tensed and gave a lustful groan. Gabby found herself unable to look away. She had never seen something so raw, so wild, and so erotic in all her life.

Michael’s groan of passion became the howl of a beast. Gabby jumped, startled by the unnatural sound coming from the thrusting man. Many others took up the cry and reached up to the moon that had finally crested the trees.

Gabby covered her ears against the terrible sound and watched, horrified, as the people began to twist and gyrate in strange ways. To her horror, they began to change before her eyes.

With shaking hands, she watched through the binoculars as Michael Steele and the woman he held sprouted long hair. Their ears grew long and pointed, and their faces elongated until they grew long teeth and snouts.

Petrified and unbelieving of what she saw, Gabby watched as the group turned into wolves of all shapes and sizes.

She dropped the binoculars and ran for her life.

All around her, the sounds of baying wolves echoed in the night. Trees slapped her face as she ran, and she tripped more than once. She was crying now and mumbling to herself, terrified. She dared not look back, knowing that the wolves were pursuing her. She came out of the woods into a clearing leading to a tall hill. The howls came from all directions. Shadows flew through the woods in her peripheral vision, and Gabby cried out. She fell again, skinning her knee badly on a jagged rock. In her terrified state, she felt no pain but continued on as fast as she could and ran up the hill.

A snarl came from directly behind her, and she instinctively turned and cried out. A wolf was bearing down on her fast. She turned and raised a hand as the beast leaped at her with gleaming claws leading the way.

“No!” Gabby cried.

To her amazement, the wolf changed form in midflight and turned into a naked man. He landed at her feet on all fours and snarled at her.

“Get away from me!” she screamed.

The naked man backed away from her warily, glancing down at his human hands with a look of confusion and shock. More wolves were coming out of the woods. They stopped when they saw the one who had turned into a human in the light of the full moon.

Gabby wasted no time considering her luck and ran as fast as she could up the hill.

“Gabriella Cross, stop!” Michael’s voice rose up over the howls.

Gabby could hardly see through her tears. She didn’t dare look back, knowing that she would find death closing in on her. She reached the top of the hill and ran across the flat expanse of rocky earth.

“Gabriella!” came the voice again.

The wolves were gaining on her.

She darted between two pines blocking her way, receiving many scrapes on her face and arms. Half-blinded by tears and slapping branches, she stumbled out from between the trees and suddenly came to a steep cliff. She tried to stop, but her momentum was too great. With a terrified cry, she fell forward over the cliff.

She frantically thrashed her arms as she fell. Above, on the ledge, a mournful wolf cried out. The ground was coming up fast to crush her, and Gabby closed her eyes, not wanting to see her death.

Then, suddenly, she was weightless.

Strong arms held her firmly. She opened her eyes to find a winged beast staring back at her.

Gabby passed out.

The waking world came slowly to Gabby. Through a fog of colors and distant voices, she swam for many hours, trying to find her way. Her thoughts were muddled, her dreams terrible. In them, she fled from a ravenous pack of wolves hell-bent on devouring her. Michael Steele called out her name over and over, and each time it became more primal, more bestial.

“It’s all right, Gabriella. You’re safe now.”

She slowly opened her eyes and focused on the person bending over her. When Victor’s face came into view, she smiled. “I had the most terrible dream. There was this weird orgy and werewolves and . . . you had wings.”

Gabby opened her eyes wide as the realization struck her. She shot up in bed, clutching the sheets to her chest.

Victor smiled kindly on her. “How are you feeling?”

“Where? What? How? Victor, where are we? What happened?”

“We are at one of my houses. We are safe. Here, drink this.” He handed her a glass of water, and she drank greedily, searching the room with her eyes.

The room was lavishly decorated with scenic nighttime paintings, antique-looking furniture, burning candelabras, large bookcases, and coats of arms crossed by swords and axes. A full suit of armor stood beside the door. It was black as night and smooth-edged—unlike any armor she had seen in movies of museums.

Victor got up from the four-poster bed and looked to the large window through which the moon and ocean could be seen. “You must be famished. I will send my servants in to attend to you. Once you are refreshed, you will meet me for dinner. All will be explained then.”

With that, he turned and headed for the door.

“Wait! What the hell is going on? I want to know now!” said Gabby.

He ignored her demands and gracefully disappeared through the door, which closed behind him quickly.

Gabby leaped out of bed and stumbled. To her surprise, she found that she was quite naked. Her cuts and scrapes had been cleaned and bandaged.

The door opened, and she yelped, thinking that it was Victor. Two dark-haired Chinese women entered the room. They wore flowing flower-pattern kimonos and walked with the grace of swans. Without a word, they began dressing her. One of them draped a robe over her, and the other tied it at the front. They then led her silently out of the room.

“Where are you bringing me?”

Neither woman answered her.

The “house,” as Victor had put it, was more like a castle. From her room, she was led to the balcony of an open-aired hall overlooking the main receiving room. The second-floor balcony wound around the entirety of the room, and she saw there were other doors along the walls similar to her own.

The two silent women led her three doors down to a bathing room with a large claw-foot bathtub at the center, which was ready and steaming. She allowed herself to be bathed with exotic soaps and oils, all the while puzzling over what might have really happened. It was night outside, but which night? How long had she been out? Through the window in her room she had seen a coastline, which meant that she was quite a long distance from Wyoming. How had she gotten here?

The memories of the strange orgy and shifting humans were fresh in her mind. They hadn’t been a dream. Somehow, as impossible as it seemed, it had all been real. She thought of Victor and the winged beast that had saved her from her deadly fall. Could they be one and the same?

Gabby remembered the wooden stakes and silver bullets in the armory. Had Maggy been some kind of supernatural hunter?

After her bath, she was dressed in a flowing white gown, and her hair was combed and braided in a tight French braid. Her nails and toenails were manicured and painted, and light makeup was applied as well. They even slid silver slippers on her feet. When the women were done, they led Gabby back out onto the balcony and down the stairs, where Victor was waiting for her at the head of a long table in the dining room.

“You look beautiful. Please, join me for dinner,” said Victor when she entered, rising from the table and extending his hand. He wore an expensive-looking suit, which made him look older than he had previously seemed.

She took his hand and was guided into the chair to his right where a place had been set.

“Lilly, Orchid, that will be all for now,” he said to the women.

They bowed in unison and left the two alone.

Gabby wanted answers, but she wanted to eat as well. The spread on the table was impressive. There were roasted chicken thighs, steamed carrots, potatoes, and beans, along with bread, cheese, wine, and a tall bottle of sparkling water.

“Please, you look famished,” said Victor, gesturing to the food.

Gabby took a little bit of everything and accepted a glass of both water and wine. Victor ate nothing but drank from his wineglass, watching her with a faint smile.

When she had eaten enough to sate her hunger pangs, she squared on him. “All right, I’ve met you for dinner, now tell me why the hell I’m in a castle next to the ocean.”

Victor laughed faintly. “I apologize for all the mystery, but I wanted you to be lucid when we spoke.”

“Great. Here I am, lucid as ever.”

“Where to begin,” said Victor, looking to the chandelier hanging above the table. “Why don’t you just ask me what is on your mind?”

“Where are we?”

“The coast of northern California.”

“How did we get here?”

“Jet plane.”

“Is Michael Steele a werewolf?”

“Yes,” he said bluntly.

Gabby was surprised to hear the truth so plainly spoken by the man. She thought of the winged beast.