Page 68 of Wind Valley

Had Pinky’s hoarding tendencies saved the day?

By the time they’d carted all the boxes back to the house, Maura was exhausted. It had been such an insanely long day that she could barely remember where she’d woken up this morning.

“Is this everything?” she asked Pinky as she brushed snow off the cardboard. Each box was tightly taped and labelled “Private Property.”

Pinky screwed up his face. “Might be a few other odds and ends. Things that looked useful, you know. Like if I ever get a TV, I already got a remote. Anyways, Newman’s ready for bed and so am I. Leave those boxes be until morning.”

Reluctantly, Maura agreed. She was already yawning, and it would be much easier to sort through the contents in the daylight. As she led Lachlan to her bedroom, she shot a quick glance over her shoulder and saw Pinky staring at the boxes, muttering to himself.

Once the bedroom door was closed behind them, Lachlan surveyed the room with its missing sheetrock and mattress on the floor. She’d done her best to spruce it up by hanging fabric on the walls and repainting the dresser with bright tropical flowers. She’d even crafted a lampshade for the bare bulb using an origami technique she remembered from summer camp.

When he was done with his inspection, he gave her the sweetest smile in the world and said in a tender voice, “You are a wonder.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’ve taken a shitty situation and transformed it.”

“Don’t let Pinky hear you call this room shitty.”

He came closer to her and cupped her face in his hands. “You know I’m not talking about the room. I’m talking about everything. I once heard someone say that the real definition of security is the ability to adapt to change. You should give yourself some credit.”

She couldn’t speak. He was looking right into her, right to her core, making her feel something she’d never felt before—seen. His eyes were so beautiful, not just because of their soft sea-green, but because of the heart and soul behind them. And just like that, she felt herself tip over the edge into an irreversible slide toward…could it be…love?

36

The blizzard lasted all night long. As he dipped in and out of sleep, Lachlan listened to the wind battering Pinky’s house and roaring through the spruce trees. With Maura tucked in his arms in her makeshift bed, which barely fit the two of them, he knew there was no place else he’d rather be. Bring on the storms, bring on the wolves, we’ve got this.

He dreamed of those wolves running wild through the forest. Yellow eyes flashing between branches. The woman who chose to become a wolf. Blood dripping in the snow. One image flashing to another, like a slideshow.

He woke up shuddering, knowing that something in his dream was a message. Often his mind had a way of working things out during a dream, especially if he’d been working on a tough project. If he was lucky, he’d remember it when he woke up.

He gazed up at the bare beams of the ceiling, replaying the images that had made up his dream. There was something strange about that dream, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

Maura was still asleep, her mouth partly open, soft breaths warming his neck. Pale pearly daylight was filtering into the room, and from the sliver of the window he could see from the bed, it was still snowing.

The yellow eyes of a wolf.

The dream image came back to him. There was something important about the eyes. He thought about the eyes of the wolf who had attacked his window. Unlike in his dream, that wolf’s eyes were a deeper amber color. If he had to choose an adjective for their expression, it would be…confused.

As if the wolf itself didn’t know what he was doing there or how he’d gotten there. And the way he’d suddenly abandoned his attack and wandered back into the woods. Not as if he had a destination, but as if he didn’t know what else to do.

Wolves hunted. They defended their territory. They were social animals devoted to their packs. That was why the indigenous tribes felt such respect for them—their purpose on this earth wasn’t much different from that of humans.

But what if a wolf forgot its purpose? What if something disrupted its memory? Did a wolf’s memory even matter, or were those imperatives hard-wired into their brains on such a primitive level that they never failed?

Again he thought of his dream, of the snapshot nature of the images, how there was no flow from one thing to another. No story. No link from one moment to the next. That was odd, wasn’t it? Didn’t dreams usually tell a story, even if it was a surreal one that made no sense? What would life be like if there were no story, no narrative? Humans would be lost without a sense that life had a shape to it, a beginning, a middle, and an end. A purpose.

Wolves probably had another kind of existence, one it would be impossible for a human to enter into—except for Qisaruatsiaq, of course, the woman who became a wolf. But they had memories. They knew where their territory began and ended. They knew which wolves were in their packs and which weren’t. They remembered that humans were dangerous. They didn’t live moment to moment, in snapshots, although they probably didn’t retain the complicated storylines that human beings did.

Maura stretched next to him, her bare skin warm against his chest. Before he could even say a word, she draped a leg over his hip and tugged him closer. He felt his erection rise, though truth to tell, he’d been half-aroused ever since he’d woken up. So far, he hadn’t mastered the ability to sleep in the same bed with Maura without wanting her.

She rolled on top of him, her full breasts nearly blinding him with desire. He reached for her, like a child going for candy. They filled his palms with their soft weight, their rising nipples. He reached between her legs and found her damp and warm, already slick.

She must have had a very different dream than he had, he thought with amusement.

Wordlessly, mindful that they weren’t alone in the house, they fitted their bodies together. With her thighs spread on either side of his hips, she rose up and angled his cock so his tip rested against her heat.

Condom.

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