Wolf Tracker (9 page)

A chorus of dogs’ growls and snarls from the hallway outside the room cut through the women’s shocked silence. Tami drank again. She remembered a lot of big dogs inside the gate when she’d ridden in. They’d looked untamed enough she was surprised they were allowed inside. They probably made great guard dogs but lousy lapdogs. A giggle tried to escape. She smiled fondly at her glass until she realized it was empty. Time for a refill.

The talk flowed around her. Carla and Glory were saying how lucky they had been. Hard to believe though it was, Carla seemed to be honestly happy with Taye. Maybe he was different from Leach and his cronies. Tami had seen the tenderness on his face when he looked at his wife, the gentle way he touched her. He had told Tami she was welcome with them for as long as she wanted to stay, and no one would bother her. Staying here for a while would be okay. She had a room to herself, at least, with a door that locked. She was pretty sure Taye could be trusted.

The teenager was sprawled on her back on one of the beds, snorting cute little ladylike snores. Tami tipped her glass to her lips and realized suddenly she had polished off most of one bottle herself. She was going to regret this in the morning. She knew it. But right now she didn’t care. She stood up carefully, blissfully dizzy and relaxed.

“Good, everyone,” she said. “I mean, good night, everyone. Which is my room again?”

Carla stood up. “I’ll walk you down.”

“Thanks.”

Carla took one of the oil lamps. Glory, Marissa, and Renee got up, too. They all said good night and went out into the hall where the blobs of lamplight glow reflected in dogs’ sleepy eyes. Tami was glad to see the dogs. There were two of them. She couldn’t see them very well in the dark, but she could tell they were big. Good watch dogs. She patted one on the head as she passed. Marissa let out an inebriated giggle that sounded almost shocked. The dogs got up and stretched before following her to her room.

Tami gestured them in, but Carla said firmly, “They aren’t allowed in the rooms.”

The dogs must be well trained. They planted their butts outside her door. Tami smiled at them with blurry affection, took the lantern Carla handed her, and stepped into her room. “Good night.”

Carla said, “Good night. Sleep well.”

Tami was pretty sure she would sleep well tonight. She was tired and her nerves were nicely fuzzed from the booze, and she felt satisfaction from hearing the lock fall into place. Her room was a bit chilly. She set the lantern down on a table and went to the wood-burning stove to toss a little wood in it. She wondered where the wood came from. Nebraska didn’t have a lot of forests, so it must be brought in from elsewhere. Maybe they’d be burning buffalo dung when the wood ran out, like the settlers in the old west had done. Tami used the bathroom, pulled off her pants, snuffed the lamp, and crawled under the heavy covers, prepared for the best sleep of her life.

She did sleep well for an hour. Then she was woken by a faraway woman’s voice screaming, “Help me! Stop! Help, somebody!”

At the same moment she realized
she
was the screaming woman, her door burst open, splintered wood flying everywhere, and naked men poured into her room. Then she started screaming in earnest.

* * * *

Taye closed the door to his room and smiled at his mate cocooned under the bedclothes. In the dark, a human wouldn’t be able to make out her face, so precious and dear to him, but his wolf-born sight could see her mouth held a seriousness even the soft blur of alcohol couldn’t hide. He kicked off his pants and slid under the covers. The feel of her bare skin against his made him happy. He pressed close to inhale her delicious scent.

“Tami’s okay. Just a nightmare,” he whispered against her throat.

Something warm and salty slid down her cheek to touch his lips. Her tears always made him want to kill something. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

Her fingers clutched hard on his shoulders. “What those men did to Tami is awful, Taye. It makes me so angry I just want to find them and hurt them. And it could have happened to me.”

The wolf inside him growled his rage at the thought of any man hurting their mate, but he kept his fingers gentle in her hair. “No one will ever hurt you, sweetheart. I’ll keep you safe.”

Carla pressed a hand to the edge of his jaw. “I know you will, but what are we going to do about those men? They need to be punished.”

Dan was on it already. “They will be.”

“And we need to do something for Tami. She needs professional help.” His mate shook her head. “I don’t know how she’s going to survive what those men did to her without seeing someone.”

His hand froze in her hair. “She’s hurt? She needs a doctor?” Dan would have seen to that. Unless her injury was a personal, female injury she didn’t let him see. “Where’s she hurt?”

“Not like that. It’s emotional. Her spirit is hurt. You heard her scream. She needs to see a counselor.”

Tami was a newcomer to his den, but she belonged to his cousin and that made her kin. The smell of the terror Tami tried to conceal had riled his wolf. She needed to see a counselor? Taye ran the unfamiliar word through his mind, searching for a meaning. “What’s a counselor?”

“You know, a therapist.”

He didn’t.

“It’s someone who can help a person understand and deal with bad things.” Carla wiped at the tears on her cheeks. “It’s a doctor for the mind, instead of the body.”

He kissed her eyelids, tasting the lingering dampness of her tears on his lips. “I don’t think we have any of those hereabouts, sweetheart.”

“Yes, we do. In town. Two of the women from the plane are counselors, and this is exactly what they did back in the Times Before. They worked at a Women’s Rape and Abuse Crisis Center. It’s a place where women and children can go to be safe from bad men and get help.”

Taye growled at the thought such a place would ever be needed. But he was glad there were counselors in Kearney. If his cousin’s mate needed a spirit doctor she would have one. “I’ll send some of the boys into town to escort them here.”

Carla turned her head to avoid his lips. “No, Taye, I think Tami should go there and stay with them.”

It was instinctive to want to keep his family safe under his eye, but Taye made himself answer calmly. “I promised Dan we would keep Tami safe with us here.”

“She’ll be safe in town, and she’ll feel a lot better being in a house with all women.”

“I told Dan we’d keep his mate here,” he insisted.

Carla’s face was uncertain. “I thought Dan didn’t have a wolf. So how can Tami be his mate?”

It was a good question. The other men in the Clan who didn’t have wolves within them didn’t have mates. Some of them had married wives, like his cousin Jimmy White Elk, but it wasn’t the same as what he had with Carla. He remembered how he felt when he’d first seen her at Ray Madison’s house. His wolf had almost forced a change in his fierce desire to protect her and take her home. The look in his normally stoic cousin’s eyes had been exactly what he himself had felt when his wolf chose Carla to be his mate. His uncle Kills Bears had said more than once even the Clan men who had never shifted could have a wolf, one who was content to stay inside. Dan flatly denied he had a wolf at all, but Taye wondered if he weren’t one of those whose wolves were content to stay hidden.

“I don’t know, sweetheart. It just feels like they’re mates. Even if they’re not mates, I promised Dan I’d keep Tami safe.”

“So send some of the Pack to stay there, too. I really think it’s the best thing. That way, when Dan comes back Tami won’t be so scared anymore. If she doesn’t get some help, she might not ever be able to be with anyone again.”

Taye nuzzled his face into her hair. “Be with anyone?”

His mate’s hands glided down his back and then around to his front to caress his erection. “Be with anyone,” she confirmed. “Like this.” She kissed him and caressed his tongue with hers. “And like this.” Her thighs shifted for his hand, inviting him to test her hot depths. “Or like that.”

“Oh.” His mate’s body was as familiar to him as his own now, and he knew just how to touch her to make her moan. Dan would probably appreciate a mate whose moans at his touch would be made from desire, not fear. “Okay. We’ll send Tami to town with a couple of wolves. Kiss me again, sweetheart.”

Chapter Ten

Tami felt embarrassed when she went down the hall to breakfast the next morning. She made it a point to say good morning and smile at the two heavily muscled men she passed in the hall, even though her heart galloped with fear at the sight of them, tall and shirtless. They all probably thought she was a nutcase after the way she’d acted last night.

Carla and her husband were still at the top table in the nearly empty dining room, and Carla gestured her to come and sit with them. Tami went to collect her food and before she even reached the counter that separated the dining room from the kitchen, that boy from last night was already there, helpfully serving her oatmeal, ham, scrambled eggs, and fried potatoes. He even carried it to Carla’s table for her and gave her a happy smile when she thanked him. He at least was safe, she was sure.

Taye was bare-chested as he lounged in the chair opposite her. She was freezing, and he was only half dressed. In fact, all the men here went around without shirts. She had to make an effort to keep her eyes on her breakfast. Carla’s husband had a physique an underwear model would envy. Maybe that’s why Carla had fallen for him so quickly? But she saw the way his fingers gently brushed over Carla’s cheek and the way he looked at her, as if she was the most precious thing he’d ever seen. That was more than just sex. Tami could almost see the physical attraction humming between them, but the way they looked at each other was also tender and sweet. Was that true love? Tami felt a twinge of jealousy. Even in the early years of their marriage Brad hadn’t looked at her like that. Tracker had told her Taye and Carla loved each other, but she hadn’t believed it. Now she conceded it was possible.

She appreciated their lack of small talk while she ate. The ham was perfect, the potatoes crisp, the eggs light and fluffy. It was the best breakfast she’d had in months. The only thing lacking was coffee. This herbal tea just wasn’t the same. She set her fork down at last and sat back in her chair feeling pleasantly full. The pleasant feeling soured a bit when Taye leaned forward and spoke.

“My mate has convinced me to allow you to go live with the Plane Women while you see the mind doctors. The counselors.”

Carla must have sensed her reaction because she leaned forward too and spoke earnestly. “Two of the women who were on the plane worked as counselors for a Rape and Abuse Crisis Center.”

Tami ignored that. “Allow?” she said, her voice rising in disbelief. “You will
allow
me to go somewhere?”

Taye wasn’t stupid. One of his eyebrows arched at her tone, but he replied mildly, “I promised Dan I would keep you safe here, but if you’d like to see the counselors, I’ll send you into town to stay with them.”

Nerves skittered through Tami. “Who’s Dan?” she asked sharply.

“My cousin,” Taye answered, still mild. “Dan Stensrud. He brought you here.”

“Oh.” So Tracker really did have another name. He didn’t look like a Dan Stensrud to her. Maybe if he cut his hair and wore jeans and a polo shirt he would look like a Dan Stensrud? No. He was too hard and feral to fit such a boring name. He was Tracker.

Carla tipped her face away from her husband’s caressing fingers and leaned back against her chair, as if giving Tami as much room as possible. “You don’t have to go, you know. It’s your choice. But it seems like a good idea. There are a couple dozen women who live in a big old apartment building in Kearney. There are only two men who live there, and they live in the basement. So you would have a chance to rest.”

Tami scraped the oatmeal bowl with her spoon, not because she was hungry for the last bit of oatmeal, but to give herself a reason to not look at them. “I’m sorry I fell apart like that last night,” she muttered. “I’m not usually like that.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Carla waved a hand. “Do you want to go?”

Tami thought about it. She didn’t like asking for help. But a survivalist knew there were times when the best way to survive in the wilderness was to accept help when it was offered. The nightmares were getting worse. Every time she saw a man, she cringed. Just sitting this close to Taye was making her anxious. She didn’t want to spend the rest of her life screaming through the night. She knew she needed help.

Besides, getting away from all these reeking-with-testosterone half-naked men would be a relief. She looked up and nodded at Carla. “Yes.”

Taye stood up and stretched his impressively muscled arms and chest. “Good. I’ll send one of the boys in with a message so they can expect you. We leave in an hour, if that’s not too soon for you.”

* * * *

When Taye decided to do something, it got done with no muss, no fuss, and no delay. Tami admired that. She thought the twelve-man escort he assembled for the three-mile walk to town was ridiculous until she saw the interest she, Marissa, and Renee got from the men they passed. Dozens of men stopped what they were doing to stare at them as they walked by. More hurried out of houses to gape. They seemed more interested in her than the other two women, perhaps because Marissa and Renee went into town several times a week. The avid interest on their faces made Tami want to cower, so she tilted her chin and looked calmly back at them. The protection of the twelve men and half a dozen dogs from the motel was actually kind of comforting. But they eyed those men like they really wished one of them would come a little too close, like they’d welcome an excuse to throw a few punches. Taye’s friends might be outnumbered, but they looked like they could handle anything. Maybe they weren’t just friends. They called Taye “Chief” and acted like his word was law. There also seemed to be a chain of command. Taye was like a company captain, and the guy named Des was his lieutenant. Taye had put Des in charge of this escort, and they acted more like a military unit than a bunch of friends hanging out, walking somewhere together. It reminded her a little of her days in the army, except she wasn’t one of them. She was the VIP whose safety they were in charge of.