Page 49 of Wounded Christmas Wolf
Jace grinned. “You know, he took me out in the pasture a few days ago. I thought for a minute that it was going to be a shovel talk with actual shovels.”
“Oh no.” Holly covered her face with her hands. “Dad.”
“No, it was all right. He—shifted. He’s one heck of a big bear.”
“I know. We all used to ride him when we were kids, you know.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, it was great. Like the best piggyback ride ever. We all understood that we couldn’t talk about it, but the other kids would’ve been so jealous if they knew we had a bear to ride?—”
She jumped again as something clanged outside, this time on the porch, and buried her face in her hands.
A warm, strong hand settled on her shoulder. She shivered a little and couldn’t resist leaning into it.
“Are you all right?” Jace asked gently.
“I’m just so stupidly jumpy. I’m sorry.” She moved so thathis hand slid slowly off her shoulder, and then got to her feet, causing the dogs to raise their heads. “I think I’m going to make some hot cocoa or something.”
Jace rose too. “Want me to look around outside?”
“No need. I know I’m just jumping at the wind.”
“Your fears don’t have to be rooted in reality to be meaningful,” he said quietly, his gaze steady and calm on hers. “Believe me, I know. Tell you what, why don’t we both walk around outside? It might help, and I could use a walk.”
Holly hesitated. Then she put out a hand and placed her hand in his. A shiver of anticipation rolled through her as his fingers closed gently around hers.
“Yes,” she said. “I’d love to.”
JACE
They puton their outside clothes in the entryway. Jace whistled softly to the dogs. Rocket was there in an instant. Cupcake remained on the couch, squeaky bacon and all.
“It’s probably too cold for poor Cupcake out there, even with his coat,” Holly said.
“You mean his sock.”
“Whatever. Brrr!” The wind tried to snatch the door out of her mittened hands. “It might be too cold for me.”
The snowy afternoon had turned into a sharply cold night. Overhead, clouds were scudding away to reveal glimpses of dark sky spangled with stars and a half-full moon. The wind skipped over the snow, raising whorls and loose riffles.
“We might have drifts in the morning,” Holly remarked. She closed the door carefully behind them. Rocket trotted down the steps and looked back, plainly curious what the humans were up to.
Jace paused to pick up a bucket that had blown over and rolled across the porch, evidently the cause of the mostrecent noise. He tucked it beside the porch swing to keep it in place and followed the dog down to the yard.
He still couldn’t get over the silence. The only sound was the wind, rising now and then to rattle things all over the house. Blowing through the branches of the Christmas tree pine forest, it sounded like low, distant surf. Then it faded, and the sound of their boots swishing through the snow was the loudest thing around. There was no traffic on the road this late. When they walked under the power lines to the barn, Jace thought he could hear their faint hum.
“What was it like living here when you were a kid?” Jace asked. “After your folks moved out here, I mean.” He felt his wolf’s heart yearning for this serene solitude, compared to the endless noise, disruption, and churn of the group home.
“It was ... a lot of things,” Holly said.
She was looking up the hill in the moonlight, so Jace looked too. The lights on the Christmas houses glimmered through the night, a wash of bright colors that reflected on the snow.
“It seems like it would have been incredibly peaceful.”
Holly grinned. “You clearly haven’t encountered the chaos of five girls getting ready for school in a house with one bathroom. The upstairs bathroom was a later remodel just to stop all of us from tripping on each other and having endless fights.”
Jace’s chest ached, but it was a distant, softer feeling now, wistfulness rather than jealous regret. “It sounds like a great way to grow up.”
