“Nothing,” I said. I couldn’t exactly explain that I’d been talking to the ghost and not the wolf. But what was I going to say about the wolf?
I considered denying its existence. Telling him he’d been dreaming or imagining things, but I couldn’t. My lying had improved, but I’d never enjoyed it. And I liked him, which was going to be more trouble than he was probably worth. Although, after that kiss earlier, he might be worth just about anything.
Still, I couldn’t tell him he was crazy when he wasn’t. I’d been there, and it sucked.
“I couldn’t sleep,” I blurted.
He tilted his head. “So you decided to take a walk on the wild side?”
“Yes. I mean … What?” I was so thrown by his seeing Pru, I couldn’t seem to focus, and I needed to. The more holes I dug, the harder it would be to avoid falling into one.
“You often stroll through the wilderness when you can’t sleep?”
“This isn’t the wilderness. This is my yard.”
He cast what I could only call a nervous glance at the trees. I guess, after he’d seen a huge, black wolf melt into them, I could understand that. If I’d thought Pru had been anything other than ethereal, I might have been more nervous myself.
“No wolves in New Orleans?” I asked.
“Depends on who you talk to.” He let out a short, sharp breath at my frown. “Wolves have been absent from Louisiana for about a century, but that doesn’t mean folks don’t see them. It’s New Orleans. During Mardi Gras people see dragons.”
“Like Oktoberfest.”
“I doubt it.”
“Lots of alcohol, tons of people, more weird shit than the cops can handle.”
“Okay, maybe it is like Oktoberfest,” he admitted. “You don’t seem concerned that there was a wolf on your property.”
“I don’t have any small animals to worry about.” At his blank expression I continued. “A wolf might run off with a cat or a yippy dog, maybe a lamb or a chicken or a new calf. But not a person.”
“You’ve seen wolves before?”
I’d seen Pru before. As I wasn’t sure how to phrase that, I went with a general statement that sounded like an answer. “There are wolves in Wisconsin. A lot of them.”
“They don’t usually come near people, unless they’re rabid.”
“You seem to know an awful lot about wolves for someone from a place that doesn’t have any.”
“I surf the Web a lot.” Which smelled like a statement that wasn’t an answer too. “Did that wolf seem wrong to you?”
More wrong than I could say, but I wasn’t going to. He was right. Lone wolves that hung around populated areas were usually rabid. If he called the Department of Natural Resources, they would come and shoot her, and that I couldn’t allow, even if I wasn’t quite certain that shooting Pru by usual methods would even draw blood.
“There was nothing wrong with her that I could see.”
“Her?”
“I can tell the difference between him and her.”
“You were close enough.”
“I was in the yard. She happened by. We startled each other. I spoke calmly and quietly.” I’d been a kindergarten teacher for years and I’d learned straight off that with wild beasts … sometimes it helps. “You came. She left. End of story.”
He stared at me a while. “I doubt that’s the end of the story.”
Unfortunately, so did I.
Chapter 10
Raye was lying about the wolf. But why?
“Why did you come out here?” she asked.
Bobby wasn’t sure. After talking to Sullivan, he should have gone to bed. But he’d been restless. Unable to sit, let alone lie down.
“I had to move and my room isn’t exactly huge. Not to mention that your father’s is right below mine and pacing probably wasn’t any better of an idea than—” He broke off. Probably best not to mention other ideas. He was the one who’d walked away from them.
This house, this town, those trees made him twitchy. He’d thought because everything here was so different from home. But, really, a lot of things were the same. For instance, that constant feeling that he wasn’t alone, even when he was, remained.
“Listen, Raye…” he began, moving closer, meaning to share at least a little of his past. Perhaps it was too soon, but she deserved to know how very fucked up he was before he lost his mind and kissed her again.
She held up a hand—to stop him from talking, or keep him from touching—he didn’t know, then scooted by him and disappeared inside.
Bobby stayed on the porch for a few moments longer, staring into the darkness, fingers on his gun. He doubted the wolf would come back. Until Raye had said she’d seen it too, he’d doubted the thing had been there in the first place. When he realized it had, that she’d been talking to it and not herself, he was both concerned and intrigued. But there was little about Raye Larsen that didn’t intrigue him.
She was different from anyone he’d ever known—both sweet and sexy, funny and serious, down to earth and a little mysterious. He was captivated as he hadn’t been since …
He rubbed a hand over his face.