In the Shadow of the Wolf 3 - Splintered Lies (9 page)

The water was hot. Probably too hot. It felt good as it pounded Joe's shoulders but stung his reddened skin, sensitive from scrubbing it with the rough sponge he'd found in the shower. He didn't feel clean no matter how hard he rubbed and finally gave up, just standing under the hot stream of water. He'd thrown up twice and used half a tube of toothpaste to get the taste of blood out of his mouth. Human blood, thick and rich from deep inside the body, the taste of blood no sane wolf should ever know. Nick might die, would probably die, and Joe had behaved as a rabid killer. Life as he knew it was finished.

"Joe?" Rob rapped on the glass door and scared the ever-living shit out of him.
He had been so wrapped up in his thoughts about Nick and the consequences of their actions that he hadn't realized someone had come into the bathroom let alone got close enough to talk to him.
"You ready to go in ten?"
Ten minutes? Was that enough time to prepare himself to be there for Nick? Joe had lost it that night. Lost control of his wolf and ripped the senator's guts from him, and another man's throat out. He had gloried in the blood and the taste and texture of flesh shredding apart from bone and muscle. That Senator Vaughn-Hayden had been responsible for Mara's death, killed a girl right in front of Joe, threatened the most important people in his life, had made Joe's control a fragile thing. When Nick went down gasping in a pool of his own blood it had been too much. Joe knew what would happen next. The police department would conduct a hearing. Men who didn't understand the basic instinct of a wolf to protect his own would tell him how he should have reacted. They would judge him a killer and a danger to everyone around him. They would send him away, there were places for wolves like him, who'd lost control and killed people. Not exactly prisons, but wolves that went in never knew freedom again. Groaning, Joe bowed his head. The point would be moot if Nick died, there wouldn't be a hearing. Somehow, some way, Joe would end it all. A knife to an artery, a gun in his throat, he could think of any one of a dozen ways to stop his pain. Joe knew he couldn't stand beside another grave and watch cold earth take a loved one.
Rob rapped at the glass once more. "Joe? You okay in there? Ten minutes."
"Ten," Joe answered briefly.
All he had to do was tamp down the blood rushing through his veins like a million fireflies just below the surface, get dressed, and pretend to act like human being.
Easy.

A hospital waiting room wasn't anything new to Joe. Hell, the time he had spent there as person after person offered condolences to him after Mara died had stretched into a molasses-slow run-on of painful hours. The same hospital waiting room he sat in now, smelling of worry and death. Joe hated hospitals.

"He's due out of surgery in an hour or so." Joe heard the nurse update Rob. Hope trembled within Joe's chest at the knowledge Nick had made it this far.

His boss was the one asking all the right questions, while Joe nodded politely and sat as still as stone struggling not to shift and run through the hospital in search of Nick. Jamie arrived a little while later, then Doug and Sam with Mark in tow. Mark stared at Joe with hostile eyes that said what happened to Nick was all his fault. Joe hung his head unable to meet the younger wolf's eyes. He had no defense. The small, closely knit group of Nick's friends and those he considered family waited together in silence. Joe wondered about the baby but couldn't find the energy to ask. He knew they were there for Nick, but each one watched closely for the moment Detective Joe Christie finally cracked. Joe looked down at his fingers curled loosely in his lap. His nails were clean, but he remembered the blood there and the need to scratch and claw to the bone. The unbridled desire to kill.

"They said what you did you bought him the extra time he needed," Jamie was saying. "Did you hear that, Joe?"

Joe looked up. The men sharing the waiting room with him stared at Joe expectantly.
"Sorry?" he asked carefully. He knew he needed to at least sound coherent enough to communicate when he tried.
"The nurse said the paramedics told them the extra time you gave Nick with that bag trick was enough to save his life." Jamie was evidently repeating what he had just said. He added a smile to punctuate the words.
Joe heard the words and understood enough that where death had cheated him of his wife he had somehow cheated death of a new recruit.
Where did that thought come from? I'm seriously losing it.
"That's great," he finally said, injecting as much enthusiasm as he could. He lowered his gaze. They were talking again. Probably about him and Nick: most definitely worrying, and plotting, and planning ways to help. He didn't want any of it. The itch of his wolf pacing inside him was enough to send him to his knees howling.
I can't do that in a hospital. There are rules of behavior. I need to hide my other half underneath civility. Right?
Integration. He'd believed in it, built his life around it but not until he lost Mara and now found himself a second time sitting in a human waiting room, forced to observe human rules for acceptable behavior, that he realized how much wolves were sacrificing to make interaction a possibility. Don't scare the humans, don't make them uncomfortable, and above all never remind them wolves could kill them faster than they could blink. Joe needed the freedom to shift between his forms, to pace, to run to cry and howl. He ached for an emotional release forbidden by the laws he'd helped set in place. Unable to express himself, Joe clung to his human shape and wondered what madness had led them to that point.
The ring of a cell phone echoed in the high ceilinged room and Rob checked the screen then answered the call.
"I'll be right there. Okay." Rob ended the call. "I'm needed back at the scene. They found bodies in the utility room and in shallow graves. At least sixteen, maybe more. Dan is there but they want me on site." Rob crouched in front of Joe and looked up at him. "I'll return as soon as I can," he said and Joe managed a nod of understanding. "I'll send Dan back here to support you. Will you wait for him? Will you stay?" Rob added gently, "Joe, will you promise me not to run?"
Joe looked down at the only man in the room who could really stop him from leaving the hospital. That Rob was alpha of their odd modern pack said a lot about how things had changed. If Rob left there would be nothing holding him here and as much as Joe wished otherwise he couldn't promise he'd stay, that he'd regained control and his wolf was at peace. If Dan got there in time then maybe he could talk him down. He had almost as much experience with wolves as Rob did and his connection to Joe as friend and partner might supply the anchor Joe would need with his alpha absent.
"I'll try," he said, the best he could do. Rob nodded, and Joe knew Rob understood what was going on under his skin and that only the man had promised not to run. Rob left with final instructions for someone, anyone, to contact him as soon as there was any news.
Joe watched him leave, his guilt over having torn apart the senator eased with the news of what they'd found. He wasn't surprised that there were bodies at the house. The senator had liked his messes cleared up with a horrific finality. Joe wondered how many had died. Sixteen bodies, girls and babies? Or had the babies been sent away for further desecration?
Jamie brought Joe coffee, but he didn't take his first sip until it was stone cold. The death grip he had on the cup left prints and his fingers ached. The small amount of coffee he swallowed clogged in his throat and he coughed at the cold mess of it as it threatened to push its way back up immediately. Dan hadn't arrived as promised, and everything seemed so slow. Someone took the coffee away and later one of them called the doctor.
"He's in shock and shouldn't be here. Take him home, keep him hydrated, warm, and his feet up."
Joe refused to leave. He found himself reminded how little had been accomplished with the efforts to integrate wolves and humans. Even doctors who were alleged experts in human/wolf anatomy and medicine knew little about wolf psychology, unless they were wolves themselves. Joe wasn't fighting simple shock; he struggled desperately for his wolf to remain sedate. If Joe shifted, at his current level of internal panic his wolf would go feral and run. Doug understood—hell, he even tried some of the alpha shit he used on his pack of rescued wolves. It worked for them, and no one could deny Doug was definitely an alpha, but Joe's wolf was beyond responding to any alpha but his own.
Joe needed distance from the smell of death. He needed the feel of freedom under his paws and the forest around him. He needed to be alone. The wolf inside howled for it. Humans couldn't understand. He was not a wolf and a man. Those they conveniently labeled shifters were a single entity with two forms. Separating one from the other was impossible and the effort threatened to drive Joe over the edge.
"Good news," someone announced.
Joe looked up at the man in the doorway. How many hours had passed? How long had he sat here as his wolf took over? He could scent the wolf inside the doc and the smell of Nick all over him as well. Joe's wolf snarled nastily but Joe forced him aside. Before he went, before he ran, he needed one last thing. He needed to know that Nick was going to be okay.
"Your friend has remained stable during surgery and is now in ICU. He's unconscious and it is early days, but I am cautiously optimistic. Of course only time will tell."
Jamie stepped forward to deal with the doctor. He handed out thank yous like candy to the man who smelled of Nick's coppery blood. The rage and sorrow threatened to consume Joe, burning hot inside him. He felt little relief from his emotions at the news Nick would recover. Joe wasn't human and he'd fought back his full nature for too long. Doug placed himself between Joe and the doctor. He knew what was happening inside Joe. Joe didn't calm, but he maintained the outward illusion. He knew if worse came to worst Doug could take him down. He counted down from one hundred, desperate for the doctor to leave. He didn't want to hurt anyone, especially the wolf who'd saved Nick's life.
"Doc's gone," Doug said as he turned to face Joe. He caught Joe's shoulders in his hands, fingers digging deep, forcing Joe to acknowledge him. When their eyes met Doug nodded once, his eyes understanding. "You can go." He moved to the side so the doorway wasn't blocked.
"No. What?" Jamie rushed over to block Joe from the door. Joe struggled to keep control to maintain his human shape.
"Joe, you can't go. Please don't go. You told Rob you wouldn't," Jamie reminded him, eyes pleading. Jamie was so young, too young to understand. His soft words meant nothing to Joe, but he wouldn't hurt the pup and remained frozen in place.
"He can't stay, Jamie," Doug said.
Sam came and stood by Jamie, supporting him, urging him away from the door.
"Why?" Jamie asked.
"He's close to losing control," Sam explained.
"Then he needs help to get control. I don't understand. What is happening? Was he hurt at the house?" Jamie was peering around Doug who had placed himself as a barrier between Sam, Jamie, and Joe.
"Joe. Do you need help to get out of the hospital?" Doug asked. He sounded wary, understanding that any wolf Joe encountered at that point might instigate a confrontation.
Joe shook his head. He didn't want anyone else involved; the call of the open sky was too much now. He had to get out. Pulling out his cell, his wallet, and his weapon, he placed them carefully on the seat. Words caught in his throat and he couldn't speak them. He had so much he wanted to say but his need to shift and get away stopped him from being able to verbalize how he felt.
When Rob left, the only person in Joe's life who could exert the influence needed to keep him in his form had gone. Without him Joe had no hope of controlling his change.
"Tell Nick—sorry." And he ran.
The scent of anger and death and sorrow permeated every inch of the hospital and he shifted as soon as he reached fresh air. Clothes left in a heap, he lifted a snout to the sky and howled. Joe knew where he wanted to go and headed there at an easy lope. He felt less frantic and more in control. He had no idea when he'd be able to face changing back to a man. He couldn't make himself care. At least everyone around him would be safe.

Nick pushed against the floor with one foot to keep the old rocking chair moving. A tiny baby lay cradled in one arm, the other hand held a copy of the journal written by the man who'd almost stolen Nick's life. Frowning at the pages covered in closely written lines, Nick closed the amateurish cardboard binding, and laid it aside. He didn't like how difficult hate became when knowledge and understanding were added into the situation. Hate was simple and more satisfactory. Cuddling the baby against his chest Nick leaned his head against the tall back of the rocker and dozed.

When Sam appeared a short time later and eased the baby out of Nick's arms he didn't protest. Placing a gentle kiss on her brow, Nick surrendered her into Sam's care. She was a sweet little girl, generous with her toothless grins, and rarely cried. Golden hair curled around her cherub face and big blue eyes watched Nick's every move with utter devotion. Of all her caregivers she appeared to love him best.

"You need to eat," Sam admonished Nick. Giving a slight half shrug Nick didn't argue. He did need to eat but lack of appetite made doing so a bland affair at best. Except for the time he spent with baby Kristi, and a few stolen moments a day watching Mark play and work under Sam's direction with the wolves, Nick's very existence had become lackluster. His disinterest in reclaiming his life after being released from the hospital, enduring rehab, and an extended recovery time at Rob's had landed him on Doug and Sam's doorstep. Nick knew his friends were disappointed at this lack of progress, but even with the weeks spent healing and working toward regaining his health, getting his life back seemed like a waste without Joe.

"I'll eat." Nick stood and accompanied Sam to the door of the room. "Kristi finished her bottle but she'll be ready for dinner soon." He reached around Sam's shoulder to brush a finger over downy curls.

Sam lingered in the door way, blocking Nick's escape, though he looked at the baby in his arms and not the wolf behind him. "You should go for a run. You haven't gone out in days, and you know what Jamie says about spending time as a wolf. Internal balance and all that crap. Catch a rabbit or something; all this moping around the house is bad for you."