The Lonely Wolf (2 page)

A suspicious flurry of activity from the grounds below grabbed his attention as he was about to angle his right wing and make a sharp turn. From above, he recognized the structure of the vampire Claudius’s palace. The small Renaissance fortress overlooking the hills and lake housed one of the most powerful vampire nests in all of Europe, and in recent years had been at the center of a few interspecies accidents. Amongst kidnapping and homicide charges, Claudius had fled and was still at large. As a result, Ludwig had become acquainted with the place, even though he didn’t like dealing with Claudius’s cohort.

As he swept the terracotta tiles of the roof, a most unpleasant scene came into view. Two werewolves were dragging a vampire out of the safety of the porch and into the sun-drenched maze-gardens behind the house. The vampire fought back, but the daily lethargy made him weak. A row of centennial weeping willows shielded the path between the tree and the maze from the morning sunrays, and the vampire threw himself under their shadows.

Aiming at the trio, Ludwig dove toward the ground, but, between the willows and the high walls of the maze greenery, there wasn’t enough clearance for him to land. His snowy-white wings, his only pride and joy, had a span of twelve meters and were a hindrance in narrow spaces. Unable to reach the ground, hovering over the werewolves’ heads, he flapped his wings and created a whirlwind that shoved the two to the side.

“Don’t you even think about running!” Ludwig bellowed from midair, but it was soon clear he had to make a decision, take the vampire to safety or catch the werewolves.

Sunrays hit the edge of the maze walls, and the vampire whimpered in pain. His skin sizzled and soon it would be too late to save him.

Maintaining a horizontal trajectory with his body parallel to the ground, Ludwig circled over the vampire and trailed his arm down as low as he could. “Grab my hand.” Brushing the maze wall foliage, he had to try the maneuver twice more before the trembling vampire managed to get hold of his fingers. He then hauled the man up and over the maze, and cradled the simpering body in his arms, keeping him shielded from the sun with his own body and wings.

With a powerful push of his shoulder blades, Ludwig set toward the roof and a skylight he had noticed earlier. A blink of an eye later, he crashed the glass of the window with his heel and threw the now comatose vampire down the skylight. Then he covered the opening with his body to give the vampire time to reach safety. When he heard hurried steps and whispering, he knew the wounded man was being taken care of and left the roof.

As expected, the werewolves had disappeared into the maze and they were probably already out of the property, but, following protocol, Ludwig still flew over the gardens. When he came back to the corner where the willows bordered the maze, he noticed something shiny sticking out of the bush and reached down. Stretching his fingers, he grabbed a button-sized pin and almost dropped it when he pricked his fingertips with the sharp point.

He fumbled with the disk for a moment before closing his hand around the hard edges and securing it in his hold. When he pried his fingers open and saw a familiar logo on the round surface, Ludwig blanched and closed his fingers over it once again.

Quintilius’s stylized wolf head and laurels were etched on the pin.

Once he reached his bike, Lupo ran away from Castel Gandolfo without looking back once. He would have to explain what had happened to a furious Tancredi, but even the alpha’s ire was preferable to killing a man.

He had thought it wouldn’t matter that his target was a bloodsucker. But it had. While trying to keep the man down, waiting for the sunrays to burn him, he had looked at Antonio, the big brother he had been paired with for the job. A veteran of killing Reds’ enemies, Antonio’s face was expressionless when the man’s skin started smoking and the acrid stench of burnt vampire flesh filled the air.

Then, as if Lupo’s silent prayers had been answered, the sound of flapping wings had distracted Antonio and Lupo had pushed the vampire into the shadow. The greenery wall bordering the outer edge of the maze had been tall enough to stave off the sun from barbecuing the man. A sudden vortex had thrown both Lupo and Antonio a few meters away from their victim, and as a majestic angel rescued the vampire, they had scampered farther along the path.

The forty-five minute ride to Eur neighborhood and the Reds’ building shaped liked a big sail made of glass and steel was enough time for Lupo to ponder upon the events of the last month. His mind went to the chilly night that had changed his life forever, and he shivered even though he wasn’t cold.

****

After vandalizing Cradle and Bites, as soon as he stopped vomiting, Lupo drove to
Casolare del Lupo
with every intention to confront the alpha.

When he reached the wrought iron gate sporting wolf heads and laurels, Lupo wondered what he would say to the man. The uncertainty didn’t last long. High on adrenaline, he rang the bell until the intercom went off with a buzz.

“Who is it?” a male voice barked.

“I’m here to speak to Quintilius.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

Lupo grabbed the gate with both hands. “No. I don’t, but—”

“The alpha doesn’t receive visitors without an appointment.”

“I need to talk to him.”

A soft click announced the communication had been interrupted. Lupo shook the gate railings and swore. But he wasn’t going back to his room without asking his questions, so he buzzed the intercom once again.

“Security is on its way to remove you from the premises,” the man said, not without a hint of amusement.

At a distance, Lupo could see a car driving along the asphalted path and heading toward the exit and him.

He didn’t move. “It’s important I speak with the alpha.”

“Listen, boy—”

“I am Quintilius’s son,” Lupo blurted out, his heart beating fast in his chest.

“That’s funny—”

Lupo heard steps and muffled voices coming from the other end of the speaker, then, “Surveillance will escort you inside.”

The statement surprised Lupo, but he didn’t have time to think about the man’s sudden change of heart. The car had almost arrived at the gate, when it opened with a well-oiled whoosh. The first pangs of doubt hit Lupo, but he waited for the car to stop before him.

A man in his early forties, with a close cropped haircut and looking very much ex-army, gave him a disgruntled look from the driver’s seat. “Get in.” He tilted his head over his shoulder to indicate the rear of the car.

When Lupo hesitated, the man lowered his hand to the shift stick and backed away from the gate that had started closing. Lupo hurried inside and ran after the car. “Wait.”

The man hit the brakes but only slowed the car. Lupo reached for the passenger’s door handle and jumped inside the still moving vehicle. While driving in reverse, the man kept his eyes on Lupo instead of looking at the street.

When they reached a widening in the path, the man made a U-turn, then drove toward a secondary road that rounded the big manor towering over manicured gardens. Lupo hadn’t expected to be welcomed with a red carpet and a fanfare, but when the silent driver—who kept staring at him with unwavering eyes from the rearview mirror—swerved yet again, and entered a smaller road that led into a thick copse of woods, he began to worry.

The ride finally came to an end before a small cottage ensconced at the very heart of the woods.

“Get out,” the man commanded, yanking Lupo’s door open.

Lupo raised his hands when the man made to grab him by the elbow and exited the car before being thrown into the gravel path. The dark, wooden door on the rock and plaster façade of the cottage opened, and yet another man with the same ex-army look stood sentinel at the entry.

“Go inside,” the sentinel said, looking over his shoulder and pointing at the room behind him.

Another order Lupo was fast in obeying, hoping the weirdness was only due to Quintilius’s very public persona.
The alpha must receive threats every day, and all the surveillance is necessary
, he thought, entering the cottage as the sentinel stepped to the side.

“So, you are Quintilius’s son.” A woman in her late forties, slim and stern-looking, stood in the middle of a room that in any other circumstance might have been considered cozy. A large fireplace dominated the opposite wall, but it wasn’t lit. The two gray couches facing the fireplace were covered with white pillows. The woman was dressed all in black, from her austere glasses to her heels, and looked out of place there. “What’s your name, pup?”

The woman studied him with cold eyes, but he refused to be intimidated. “Lupo Solis.”

At his name, she stepped back and bumped the couch behind her. A moment passed, then she tilted her head and a calculating smile tugged at her lips. “Why are you here?”

Mirroring her gestures and attitude, Lupo answered, “Why do you think I’m here?”

The woman’s smile faltered. “Don’t try my patience, pup.” She made a sign for the sentinel to come closer.

“I want to talk with the alpha.”

“About what?”

“About the fact that I am his son and he never claimed me as his.” Rage surfaced from under the thin layer of politeness Lupo was trying to maintain.

With a shrug and a small chuckle, the woman said, “And what makes you think he’s interested in seeing you again?”

The woman’s last word left Lupo speechless.

“That’s right. Do you think he doesn’t know about you?” She laughed. “Do you think he cares?”

Lupo’s wolf whined in pain, but he didn’t let him out. He would have never given that spiteful woman the satisfaction to see him out of control.

“Your mother didn’t want you either. Did you know that?” She stepped forward, closing the distance between them. “She left you at the orphanage then fled Italy.”

“How do you know that?” Lupo’s hands were shaking and he fisted them.

“Because she asked me to deliver you to Cradle and Bites, soon after she had you. You are the byproduct of a night of lust between the alpha and one of the kitchen servants. Not exactly something to be proud of, don’t you think? So Quintilius told me to pay the pregnant maid and get rid of her. She got enough money to start a new life somewhere else and didn’t want to be burdened with a bastard.”

Rage possessed Lupo at the woman’s statement, but the sentinel was at his side before he could lash out.

“Anything else?” The woman ran her hands down her pencil skirt, a satisfied expression on her stark face.

Unable to utter a word that wasn’t an insult, he turned on his heels and stormed out of the cottage.

The driver opened the car door for him. He climbed in, and they left.

His thoughts spread in every direction, Lupo was wounded and heartbroken, and someone had to pay for it. So, when he was deposited outside of Quintilius’s property, he drove back to the Reds’ at breakneck speed and went directly to the gym, looking forward to a cage fight or two. He ended up fighting five different matches that night, and Guts, the Reds’ tattooist and doctor, had to patch him up with several stitches on his face and head.

The morning after, he asked Rock, who was also the house manager, if he could add tasks to his roster.

“Sure, what would you like to do?” Rock asked.

“Anything to prove I’m ready to be a Red.” Lupo was a recruit, and although he had demonstrated he could handle more dangerous gigs, so far Rock had only given him low risk jobs. As a patched recruit, he was already delivering V, but it wasn’t enough to get Tancredi’s attention. He wanted to become a Red and have a big brother who would look after him. He wanted to belong.

The morning after a party was always difficult for Quintilius to get his bearings. Not because he drank too much, he seldom imbibed to the point of drunkenness anymore. After one awful awakening too many, he decided an alpha should have known better than to drown his sorrow in the bottle. Nowadays, he liked to set an example for his pack, and no one in his entourage was ever to conduct themselves in a disgraceful manner. But there was an inherent sadness at seeing the house empty of the partygoers. The night before, all the rooms of his
casolare
had been filled to the brim, and now it was just him and his loyal employees.

A family man through and through, life had dealt one of those cruel blows to Quintilius that would seem ironic if it weren’t so painful to ponder upon. Even though his greatest wish was to have a big patriarchal family with cubs running around everywhere, he had never married.

When the melancholia struck, Quintilius consoled himself with the notion he had his whole pack and Camelia by his side. He could have ended up without her.

Paolo had just brought him his first espresso of the day, when his cell phone went off. He looked at the caller ID and worried. “Ludwig?”

If it wasn’t for some trouble, the angel would have never called back so soon after what had happened the night before. His angel had come to his party after all. Even though the notion was bitter-sweet, it still made him happy. Quintilius’s skin tingled where Ludwig had almost touched him. Longing for his capricious lover’s touch, he wished Ludwig had taken him in his arms and spirited him away. They had gone too long without savoring each other, and Quintilius’s body ached for the yearning.

“I found one of your clan’s pins on an attempted murder scene,” Ludwig said.

Quintilius placed the empty coffee cup onto the saucer. “Where?”

“Claudius’s premises, of all places. Can you be in Santa Severa in, let’s say, less than an hour?”

Although he knew Ludwig hadn’t meant anything more than what he had said, the idea of meeting him at the apartment he owned inside the medieval castle overlooking the Mediterranean Sea made his heart beat faster. “Give me forty-five minutes.”

After telling Camelia he would be out of reach the whole morning, he left in his black Jaguar. Eager to see the angel and uncaring for the scenic drive along the marine coast, it took him half an hour of fast driving on the Aurelia speedway to reach the castle, but once there he didn’t have to wait. Ludwig had already arrived and was standing beside the castle’s portcullis.

Leaning against a column, wearing a dark suit, white shirt, and a charcoal-gray tie, Ludwig was breathtaking. Even with his stately white wings hidden, he couldn’t be confused with anything else but an angel. He wasn’t a cherub though. No blond curls and sky-blue eyes for Ludwig. No, he was the embodiment of manhood, all hard angles, stormy-gray eyes, and dark-red hair cropped close to the scalp.

“Hi,” Quintilius said, wishing they were there for pleasure and not for work.

But in the last decade or so, while Ludwig pretended to be an immortal, their relationship had greatly suffered because of the angel’s devotion to the cause of overthrowing Arariel.

Then Ludwig would do something like the night before, and Quintilius’s heart would break all over again.

Ludwig passed one hand over the reddish stubble on his unshaven jaw, his eyes stormier than usual. “I’ll be brief—”

“At least have coffee with me.” Quintilius didn’t give the angel an option. He strolled past him and entered the castle, passing under the large arched entry. “So, what’s happened exactly?” he asked when Ludwig fell in step with him.

“I was flying over Castel Gandolfo, when I noticed a scuffle on the grounds of Claudius’s nest. Two werewolves were trying to kill a vampire—”

“Two werewolves?”

“Yes, and I saved the vampire. But after, when I went looking for the two wolves, I found this—” he opened his palm, revealing a metal disk “—pin.”

Reaching for the pin, Quintilius brushed Ludwig’s palm and heard the angel’s hissed intake of breath. “This is mine.”

“That’s why I removed it from the scene.” Ludwig stopped at one of the openings in the medieval walls. The big, rectangular, glassless window with its iron railings framed a portion of the beach below, and salty sprays were driven into the castle by the ever-present gust from the ocean.

“You did that for me—” Quintilius filled his eyes with the sight of his beloved.

Ludwig faced the window, his massive figure all in dark, cutting a stark contrast with the pastel shades of the stone walls and the white and light-blue of the sand and the sea beyond. “You sound surprised.” Slowly, he turned.

With a tilt of his head, Quintilius closed his hand over the pin, then brought it to his heart. “I know you love me.”

Ludwig nodded, a small smile gracing his lips. “More than I can even explain. And yet, I shouldn’t have done so. I tampered with a crime scene without thinking of the consequences. My heart overruled my brain.”

“Why are we having this conversation?” Quintilius stepped closer to the railings dividing the opening in smaller squares. He pressed his forehead against the cold and wet iron and breathed in the salty sprays.

“Last night—” Ludwig started, then joined Quintilius at the window, mirroring his pose. “How did you know I was there? My scent is masked when I’m invisible.”

Quintilius slightly angled his head to look at Ludwig’s chiseled profile. “You are a part of me. When we are away from each other, I miss you. Only when we are close, I feel whole again.”

“I wanted to kiss you so much it hurt.” Looking at the sea, Ludwig smiled. “I wanted to take you here and make love to you until morning.”

“You should have.”

“You know I can’t.”

“I know, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it or that I can’t dream.” Quintilius moved out of the window and resumed his stroll.

For several minutes, they kept silent. Quintilius led the way toward one of the internal courtyards and to his apartment on the second floor of the biggest building in the square.

At the narrow steps leading up to a small wooden door, Ludwig hesitated.

Quintilius’s heart bled a little. “It’s just coffee.” He climbed the stairs and opened the apartment, then when Ludwig hunched under the small opening and crowded the entry room, he said, “This place always reminds me of you.”

The flat in Santa Severa Castle was their love nest. Quintilius had bought the space in the mid-fifteen hundreds from an herbalist who used it to store his medicines. Built over the apothecary’s store, the one bedroom dwelling had been renovated throughout the years and was now a modern flat with an antique flair. The ancient stone walls were proudly displayed over the fawn slabs of the flooring, worn by centuries of use. Currently, the apartment sported a few pieces of white furniture and black, metal light fixtures, complementing the white boxes framing the recessed windows. Quintilius and Ludwig had met there for years, and Quintilius never went to the flat by himself. Too many memories.

“Quin…” Ludwig slammed the door and walked to Quintilius, and, without another word, pushed him against the wall and kissed him hard and fast. Quintilius’s hands went to the angel’s shirt and started unbuttoning it.

“No.” Ludwig raised his mouth from Quintilius’s and stepped back until he was on the other side of the room, panting and disheveled. His wings were tucked behind him, lightly glowing. A look of despair on his face, Ludwig blinked, and the radiance dimmed fast until it was gone.

“You can’t do this to me.” And yet, every time they met it happened. One of the two would forget about the rules of their relationship, that they couldn’t have one.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s happening to me lately.” Ludwig brought both hands to his face and shook his head.

“I’m tired of this—” For so long, Quintilius had dreaded the moment he would say those words, yet they left his mouth before he could stop them. “I can’t take it any longer and I need to learn how to live without you.”

“You don’t mean it.” Ludwig’s stormy eyes became the color of the darkest night, and one moment later he was facing Quintilius, towering over him once again, crowding his space with his scent and his warmth.

It was an unfair move from the angel, knowing how the wolf in Quintilius would be stirred by his nearness, clouding Quintilius’s resolve.

“I might not mean it, but it will happen nonetheless.” Quintilius pressed a palm over Ludwig’s chest. “If we can’t be together, so be it. Two thousand years of pining after you is too long, even for an immortal.”

“I am the archangel now.”

“I congratulated you a year ago—”

“You know I didn’t want the position. I want anything but being the archangel. My life is now under scrutiny 24/7 and I won’t ever be free to do what I like or be with you.”

“My love, you’ve had two millennia where you weren’t the archangel, yet our situation never changed. So—”

“That’s low.”

“Is it?” Quintilius couldn’t help but raise one hand to Ludwig’s jaw, as if he wanted to caress his face, but he let it hover without making contact. “Thank you for the pin. I’ll look into it. I would like to say none of my wolves would ever be involved in murdering vampires, but I can’t be sure.” His treacherous wolf whined, but he ignored him.

“I know this is all my fault, but we should talk.” Ludwig stepped closer, his eyes locked on Quintilius, making it hard for him to breathe or think.

“We’ve talked. Seeing you like this, secretly, as if we should be ashamed of our feelings, isn’t for me anymore.” As Quintilius talked, the urge to grab Ludwig and march him to the bedroom was so strong he had to step to the side and walk away. At the door, he turned for one last glance at the man he loved, and for a moment his resolve faltered, but he grimaced and before exiting said, “Stay as long as you like, but I would appreciate it if you would give me your keys back at your earliest convenience.”

****

The door closed behind Quintilius, and to Ludwig it felt like a metaphor for their relationship. They quarreled and downright fought, but even when they had smashed furniture or broken walls, he had never thought they had reached the point where there was no going back.

He slid to the floor, holding his head between his hands. His lover had just left, and it had felt like a farewell. They would meet again, but they would be the archangel and the alpha, not Quin and Ludwig anymore. It hurt. They had spent months, sometimes years, without seeing each other, but lately fate had thrown them together more than once, and he had cherished those stolen moments immensely. Even though he had known since the beginning that there was no future for them, he had courted Quintilius and had not relented until the wolf had said yes and spent their first night together under the stars.

That first illicit tryst had become an on-and-off affair that had lasted two thousand years. And now Quintilius had made a decision, and it sounded definitive. Ludwig couldn’t reproach anything to the werewolf. He had been stringing Quintilius along since the beginning, and it had been mainly him dictating how and when they would meet next.

His work cell phone rang, and his first reaction was to throw it against the opposite wall. But he thought better of it when he saw the call was from Peter, the renegade controller. The demon was related to Quintilius through Ophelia, and if there ever was an example that interspecies romance worked they were it. If only it was that simple for Ludwig and Quintilius.

“Peter.”

“Good morning, archangel. Someone called me and left a description for a minor named Lupo Solis, one of the renegade kids on my radar, and he was seen around the first lights of dawn near Claudius’s nest. I was told there was an attempted murder on the nest’s premises earlier this morning and that you were on the scene—”

“Is your renegade a werewolf?”

“Yes. Did you see him?”

“I saw two werewolves. The younger of the two is big and tall, short dark hair, blue eyes—” Now that he thought about it, there was something regarding the boy that puzzled him but the notion was too elusive.

Peter swore, then said, “That’s him. I hoped it was just a coincidence. The kid’s in enough trouble as it is, he doesn’t need attempted murder charges on top of his already long list of misdemeanors.” He swore again. “Did you notice anything else? Was he there against his will, maybe?”

“No, I’m sorry. The kid wasn’t shackled or under drugs. But I noticed the two werewolves wore similar jackets—” Ludwig called forth the memories of the two. “Yes, they were wearing the same jacket, but inside-out.”

“They belong to a gang then.” Peter paused for a long moment, then added, “This is terrible news.”

“It gets worse.” Ludwig knew the demon was not only trustworthy, but also loyal to Quintilius and would share his concern to keep the alpha untouched by the shit storm brewing over his head.

“Did the vampire die?”

“No, he’s alive, but I found Quintilius’s clan pin on the premises.”

Peter swore. “Does Quintilius know already?”

“I informed him, and—” Ludwig couldn’t help but shake his head at what he was about to say, the wrongness of what he had done starting to weight down on him. “No one else knows.”

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t report it.”

“Archangel—”

“Drop the archangel already. I liked you better when you called me Ludwig.”

“May I ask why you didn’t report it?”

“No.”

“Okay.” The demon sighed out loud. “Then why tell me at all?”

“Because that renegade kid you’re tracking might know something about that pin.”

“Maybe it was planted there.”

“That’s a possibility. Find that boy and bring him to me before he talks to anyone else.”

“I must follow protocol—”

“I order you not to.”

After a long silence, Peter cleared his throat, then answered, “I’ll see what I can do.”

A few minutes after the phone call had ended, Ludwig stood and left the apartment, but not before a last look at the only place where he had known happiness on Earth.