The ridge lay between this house and her parents’ farm and was the highest point for miles around.
“Try the porch first.” Owen jabbed his thumb toward the stairs that led to the bedrooms on the second level. The largest, his mother’s, had a flat, porchlike area that extended over the garage. The trees had been shorn away from the utility poles more than once in the past ten years and created a tiny avenue to the sky. “Higher might help.”
She started for the stairs. “If I can’t get through I’ll have to head to my folks’ and use their landline.”
He wanted to say he’d go with her, but the idea of climbing up one side of the ridge and down the other made his leg pulse.
“If you go, take Reggie.”
She paused. “Why?”
“That wolf is still out there.”
Becca glanced at the front door. “In the yard?”
“I didn’t see her, but—”
“Yeah, no,” she said.
“What do you mean, no?”
“Did I stutter? The last time your dog saw a wolf, he attacked her.”
“Exactly.”
“She wasn’t doing anything but protecting me.”
“And why was that?” he asked.
“Because you had a shovel and you appeared ready to use it. On my head.”
“I didn’t mean why did she protect you, but why did she protect anyone? She’s a wild animal. They don’t protect humans.”
“Wolves are different.”
A long, low, mournful howl rose toward the moon.
“That one sure is,” he muttered.
*
I escaped upstairs while Owen was distracted by the wolf howl.
He hadn’t looked so good. I suppose finding a pile of charred fur in your living room wasn’t the best welcome home, but it hadn’t been aimed at him. Had it?
No. No one could have known he’d be coming home. Could they?
I hadn’t lied when I said I hadn’t listened to scuttlebutt about him. I couldn’t bear it. I’d loved him so damn much. His leaving had been difficult, but I’d tried to understand.
I have nothing, Becca.
You have me.
I wasn’t enough. I’d tried not to let him know how much that hurt. I got up every morning hoping for his letter. When it came at last it was agony.
So why had I kissed him tonight like the foolish girl I’d once been—crazy in love with a boy who would only hurt me?
My father’s words. He couldn’t help it. He loved me.
He’d loved Owen too. But us together … Not so much.
In the end he’d been right. Owen had left me. I’d been so devastated my first year of college was still a blur. I’d managed not to flunk out, and at the University of Wisconsin that wasn’t easy. The school was hard and my major, zoology, not for sissies.
Considering our history and my heartbreak, why had I kissed him? Because he’d been sitting on the couch where we’d first touched? Because when he came near me all I could do was remember every single other time that he had?
Or had it been because the sight on that table had scared the shit out of me, and I’d needed to forget for an instant in the arms of the only man who’d ever made me feel strong, capable, and adult?
Hell, be honest, Owen was the only man who’d ever made me feel anything. The first brush of his mouth and I’d been lost.
I was twelve, and he was taking my hand, holding it tight during The Blair Witch Project. The movie had struck a little close to home. I had no idea why we’d watched it.
I was thirteen, and he was kissing me in that very room, tasting my tongue, his palm hot at my waist, his thumb almost brushing my breast.
We were fifteen, and they’d just taken away his mother for what would be the last time. Those damn voices had told her to kill him. Was it any wonder I’d never mentioned hearing voices of my own?
The expression on his face—confused, crushed, helpless. I’d held him in my arms; we’d both fallen asleep on the couch. My parents had found us. I’d begged them to give him a home, and they had. Soon after, I’d tried to give him me. To his credit, he’d refused.
For a few years more.
Memories tumbled through my mind as I ran up the steps, down the hall, through a room as trashed as those below. At least the windows weren’t busted, but the door leading onto the porch was warped, and I had to put my shoulder into it to get the thing open enough to slip outside. I was just glad I didn’t have to ask Owen for help. I needed some distance, and I needed it now. Damn him for bringing everything back. I hadn’t thought of Owen McAllister in …
Days.
I moved to the edge of the porch. There wasn’t even a railing to keep stupid people from tumbling off. Obviously not up to code—if Owen tried to sell the place, there was going to be a lot he’d have to add, subtract, and update first.
I stood there breathing for a minute—lovely fresh air that didn’t smell of blood and fire, flesh and mold. But mostly it didn’t smell of sun and grass, hay and midnight.
Of him.