beast had worked together, gloried in it together, and her heated desire had been like melting wax. With complete abandon, she,d received him, moaning as spontaneously as he had moaned, thrusting against him hard, and then stiffening in ecstasy beneath him.
There was something about her fearlessness that was beyond trusting.
She,d slept beside him in childlike comfort.
But he hadn,t dared to sleep. He,d lain there thinking, reflecting, calling man and beast to account, and yet feeling a kind of muted bliss, bliss in her arms as the beast that she,d welcomed.
If he hadn,t feared to wake her, he would have gotten up and looked around - maybe sat in the large wooden rocking chair she had, maybe looked more closely at the framed photographs on her bedside table. From where he lay he could see a picture of her in hiking gear, with a backpack and a staff, smiling for the camera. There was another picture of her with two small blond-haired boys.
How different she looked in that picture - with coiffed hair and pearls around her neck.
There were books on the table, old and new, all having to do with the forest, the wildlife, or the plants native to Muir Woods and to the mountain.
Not surprising.
Who else would live in such an unguarded place except a woman for whom the forest was the world, he figured. And what a gentle child of that world she seemed. But oh so foolishly trusting. Way too trusting.
He felt powerfully drawn to her, bound to her by the secret of this, that she,d welcomed him into her bed as he was. And then there was the heat of it. He looked down at her, wondering who or what she was, what she was dreaming.
But he had to leave now.
He was just beginning to feel tired.
If he didn,t move fast through the forest, the change might come way too far from the car he,d left hidden on the bluff high above the kidnap scene.
He kissed her now with this lipless mouth, feeling his own fangs pressing against her.
Her eyes snapped open, large, alert, glistening.
"You,ll welcome me again?" he asked, a low husky voice, soft as he could make it.
"Yes," she whispered.
It was almost too much. He wanted to take her again. But there simply wasn,t time. He wanted to know her, and he wanted - yes, wanted her to know him. Oh, the greed of it, he thought. But he was overcome again by the realization that she hadn,t run from him in fear, that she,d nestled with him here in the fragrant warmth of this bed for hours.
He lifted her hand and kissed it and kissed her again.
"Good-bye then for a little while, beautiful one."
"Laura," she said. "My name is Laura."
"I wish I had a name," he answered. "I,d gladly give it to you."
He was up and out of the house without another word.
He moved fast through the treetops, back through Muir Woods, and southeast, seldom if ever touching down until he had emerged from the park itself and was roaming the wooded thickets of Mill Valley.
He found the Porsche without ever consciously thinking about it, right where he,d left it, safe under the shelter of a grove of scrub oaks.
The rain had slacked off finally to a drizzle.
The voices rustled and whistled in the shadows.
Far below he could hear the radios of the police who still swarmed over the "kidnap scene."
He sat down beside the car, hunched over, and tried to induce the transformation.
Within seconds it began, the wolf-hair melting away, as paralytic waves of pleasure gripped him.
The sky was growing light.
He was weak to fainting.
He dressed in the loose baggy clothes, all he,d brought with him. But where was he to go? He couldn,t make it to Nideck Point. That was out of the question. Even the short journey home seemed out of the question. He couldn,t be at home, not now.
He forced himself to get on the road. He could hardly keep his eyes open. Chances were the reporters had booked the Mill Valley Inn, and every other motel or hotel for miles. He headed south for the Golden Gate, struggling again and again to stay awake as the sunrise broke through the fog with a steely heartless light.
The rain had begun again as he entered the city.
As soon as he saw a big commercial motel on Lombard Street, he pulled off, and got a room. What had caught him were the individual balconies of the top floor, right under the