Wolf at the Door (Wolf Winter #3) - T.A. Moore Page 0,116
more time. Jack reached for the Wild and… asked. The Wild knew Bron better than he did, so it would know what she needed better than him.
He tasted fresh blood on the back of his tongue and the sharp bite of that first gulp of cold water after a run. When he took a breath, he could smell Danny, all sweet sweat and musk, and a flush of self-consciousness made him pull away.
That was his, not even the Wild’s for sharing.
“Oh,” Bron said in a small voice. Her body relaxed, muscles loose and shoulders lowered, but she fought it. She forced her eyes open wide and grabbed Jack’s hand. “Where’s Danny? Is he okay?”
The Wild probably didn’t have the ability to be smug, but Jack imagined it would try in response to his hubris. It hadn’t conjured Danny for him, from him. That had been for Bron, because Danny had been her brother long before Jack ever noticed that the lanky, stubborn dog was beautiful.
Not everything was about him, he supposed. Danny had probably told him that sometime. It sounded like him.
“He’s not hurt,” he said as he focused on his injured wolf. “Nobody touched Danny.”
Bron looked at him like he was stupid. “I know that. I was there,” she said. This time when she blinked, it lasted longer. She had to fight to open her eyes again and only made it to half mast, her eyes hazy with sleep. “He’s stupid, and he never remembers he’s a dog. Never. You made him come back. Y’gotta take care of him. Make sure he doesn’t get hurt.”
The protest that he hadn’t made Danny come back caught on the back of Jack’s tongue. He hadn’t—he didn’t think he had—but if Danny hadn’t come around? It wasn’t as though Jack would have given up and left him back in Durham.
“I’ll take care of him,” he said.
“Promise?” Bron insisted.
“I love him,” Jack said. He felt the weight lift off his shoulders as he made the admission out loud. It settled again as he realized it was only to people who already knew or, in Hector’s case, would never repeat it. “I won’t let anyone hurt Danny, not even himself.”
“You always loved him,” Bron said. “Never changed anything, did it? Never did, never will. Promise.”
The air tasted like blood and birth, even if it hadn’t been willing, and it scratched on the back of Jack’s throat as he swallowed.
“I swear,” he said. “On my da. On Danny.”
She sighed and closed her eyes. That was apparently enough. The ragged hitch of her breathing evened out, and the hard lines around her mouth softened.
“I always thought she hated him,” Jack said.
Gregor shrugged as he retrieved his hand from Bron’s lax fingers. “Not everyone is lucky enough to have an uncomplicated relationship like us.”
“Still?” Jack asked.
It took a second before Gregor answered, and then it was just a grunt as he stood up. From Gregor, that was a concession of… something. Jack was too tired to care what.
He wiped blood on borrowed jeans. “I should have killed Lachlan the first time he hurt Danny,” he said bitterly. “Been done with it then.”
“Da would have been thrilled,” Gregor said dryly. “Me too.”
Jack shrugged and tried not to think what would have been different if he’d just… left with Danny back then. Not that Danny had asked him, but… even the Wild didn’t really let you travel back in time.
“I guess we just have to do it now,” he said. “Call it practice for Rose.”
Nick taped the makeshift dressing over Bron’s stomach with a last strip of duct tape. He smoothed it down over her hip and then scrambled unsteadily to his feet. He lost his balance and Gregor grabbed him before Nick staggered into the wall.
“Later,” Gregor promised roughly as he steadied Nick. “And I know.”
After a brief exchange of looks, Nick accepted the promise with a brief dip of his chin. Then he turned his head to look at Jack.
“If you’re looking for prophets,” he said, “we know where to find them. Some of them, at least. They’re up in the hills, near the Run-Away Man. Gran likes to keep all her monsters close.”
DEATH WASN’T complicated when you were a wolf.
A hole to bury the body and a howl to see the spirit through to the Wild. That was all the dead needed or the living wanted. The Pack had thought the Old Man sentimental when he put a marker on the twins’ ma’s grave.