Wolf Tracker (20 page)

“Excuse me,” she said politely. “Could you tell me if anyone has seen Dick Dickinson?”

Taye shook his head. “No sign of him yet. We’re watching, though.”

“Well, I was thinking. If he gives up on me, he might go back to Connie Mondale. Des, if you’re going into Kearney to get Faron Paulson, maybe you should give Connie a heads-up.”

Des’s eyes took on a flinty look. “I’ll do that.” He jerked his head at Taye. “I’m off. I’ll be back in the morning with company.”

Tami said good night to the men and slid past them to her room. Though it wasn’t very late, she went to bed. With no electricity to provide light or television programs, people in 2064 tended to follow the sun, going to bed not long after sunset and getting up at sunrise. Tami found it a relief in a way; she didn’t want to run into Tracker right now. But her subconscious must have been focused on him. That night she dreamt of him again, vividly erotic dreams, in startling and embarrassingly pleasurable detail. Her conscious mind might be nervous about their upcoming wedding night, but the rest of her wasn’t.

Chapter Twenty

The next morning, Tami came into the dining hall just as Tracker was leaving it. At the sight of him, she felt a rush of emotions tangle with each other in her stomach. Happiness was in the mix somewhere, and nervousness, too. But the strongest were embarrassment because of those dreams last night and sexual anticipation, also because of the dreams last night. She swallowed and smiled at him, trying to ignore the heat that rose to her cheeks and pooled between her thighs.

“Morning,” he said with the tiny smile he seemed to reserve just for her.

“Hi,” she said. It sounded embarrassingly breathy. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Hi. Have you already eaten?”

He nodded, a single dip of his head. “I’m going out to run patrol for Taye. I’ll be back before lunch.”

“Oh, good. See you then.”

His hand, laid over her wrist, stopped her from going into the dining hall. “I’d sure like to kiss you good morning. Can I?”

The gentle heat that had cooled between her thighs flared back to life. In a few hours they would be married. By midnight they would have made love. Having her body react like this was a relief. She wouldn’t be hurt by the dry, tearing pain she’d experienced with Leach and his friends.

She tilted her face up to him in invitation. “Kiss me, Tracker.”

The kiss started gentle and chaste, but Tami pressed closer to him, flattening her breasts against his chest and opening her mouth under his. His tongue gliding over hers in leisurely play, heated her blood even more and weakened her legs. It would be good with him tonight. She kissed him again, smoothing her hands up his biceps to his shoulders, delighting in the lean strength of him. He smelled of leather and pine trees and man.

His smile grew to be almost a real smile when he lifted his head. Tami found herself smiling back at him, and continued to smile as she went past him into the dining hall. The teenager Jelly was there to serve her, but he wasn’t smiling. He heaved a disgruntled sigh as he shoveled scrambled eggs and ham onto her plate.

“What’s wrong, Jelly?”

His taffy-colored brown eyes looked mournfully at her. “I got up real early to start heating water for baths, and I probably won’t get much sleep tonight.”

Tami took the thick slice of toasted bread he handed her and slathered butter over it. “Why won’t you sleep tonight? Do you have guard duty?”

“No, but it’s gonna be awful loud tonight.”

While Tami puzzled over that, Taye came up behind her. “No listening in the halls tonight,” he said sternly to the teen wolf.

“Who would want to?” Jelly said glumly. “Just a bunch of moaning and screaming and thumping. It was interesting the first few times, but it gets boring after a while.”

The light dawned. Tami clamped her lips together and held her breath to control her giggles. It made her face get red and tears come to her eyes. Jelly noticed and hurried to reassure her.

“It won’t be boring for you,” he told her earnestly. “The Lupa and Glory sure sound like they like it. Glory got really,
really
loud. And—”

Tami lost the battle against mirth. The giggles exploded from her like shrapnel. Renee came from the back of the kitchen, ladle in hand, to see what was so funny. Tami tried to tell her, choking on her laughter.

Jelly said indignantly, “It’s hard not to hear! The Lupa yells loud enough for even regular people to hear her.” He pitched his voice to a breathless falsetto. “Harder, Taye! Faster, Taye!”

Renee gave a half-shocked, half-amused crack of laughter, and made an obvious move of her head to keep from looking at the Alpha.

Taye spoke disapprovingly. “It’s not funny.”

Tami tried to stifle her giggles, but couldn’t, until she saw the coldly commanding glare Taye was directing at Jelly. The kid dropped his eyes and tilted his head to the side. Taye growled, then walked out of the dining hall radiating offended dignity while Jelly glared ferociously at the women. Renee held up her ladle in surrender and headed back to the kitchen. Jelly’s glare, nowhere as scary as Taye’s, brought back the laughter. Tami had to lean against the wall so she didn’t fall over. She wiped her eyes and stood up.

“That felt good. I haven’t laughed like that in ages.” She gave Jelly a placating, watery smile. “Sorry, I wasn’t laughing at you.”

“Hmph. Your bathwater will be ready in twenty minutes.”

Tami thanked him meekly and went to eat her breakfast, feeling much more cheerful than she had in several days.

* * * *

Shortly before noon, Des arrived back at the den with an entourage from the Plane Women’s House. Tami, showered and dressed in the green wool-flannel dress she hadn’t worn before, was sitting with the other women by the fire in the rec room. All of them were combing their freshly washed hair to dry it by the heat of the fire and chatting nervously about the weddings when the visitors came in. They were all so bundled up against the cold that at first Tami didn’t know who was who. Stag and the other wolves were wearing only light jackets, so she recognized them right away, and she knew Faron would be coming, so she identified his stocky figure. Sherry was revealed as Stag carefully set her feet on the floor and unwound scarves and blankets from her. But it took a few minutes to see who it was Des was unwrapping. The pale blond hair of the co-pilot, Connie Mondale, was revealed. Why had Des brought Connie with the group?

Sherry shook off Stag’s guiding hand and hobbled across the room to the fireplace with the help of the cane Stag handed to her. He let her go with a stony face. Des stood beside him by the frosted windows to watch Connie as she walked to the fireplace. The two men looked enough alike with their long black braids and identical stances of folded arms to be twins.

Carla and the Grandmother made room around the fire for the visitors. “Sit down,” Carla invited. “Snake! Bring some of that hot cider out.”

Melting snow steamed from Sherry’s straight black hair as she huddled close to the fire. Her dark gold skin was rosy with cold. Tami thought she had the most perfect skin she’d ever seen, the smooth color of mocha. Her eyes had a slight tilt. Tami wondered what her ethnic background was. African American and Chinese? Whatever her racial heritage, it had created a woman of stunning, delicate beauty. No wonder Stag was so in love with her.

It must have been a bitter walk from Kearney. Marissa jumped up to hug her son. She dragged him over to the fire, exclaiming about how cold his cheek was when she kissed it. Tami shifted over for Connie to join her.

“What are you doing here?” she asked the co-pilot.

Connie accepted the hot cider from Snake and sipped gratefully. “I’m here for a wedding.”

“I guessed that. It was nice of you, but it must have been a long cold walk to see the weddings of people you don’t know all that well.”

Connie’s smile was ironic. “It’s
my
wedding I’ve come for.”

“Yours?” Tami stared blankly. “Who are you marrying?”

“Des.”

Tami glanced over her shoulder at the Beta wolf talking softly with Stag. Connie had always said she wouldn’t marry anyone. “I thought you said you’d never marry. Why did you change your mind? None of my business,” she hastened to add.

Connie cradled her empty cup between her fingers, staring blindly at it. “Seems like the best thing to do.”

That didn’t really sound like an answer. “But where are you going to live? What about the restaurant?” Tami noticed just about everyone was listening. She mentally slapped herself. “Sorry. Again, none of my business.”

Connie’s lips tightened for a second. “The restaurant’s a go. We’ve worked the rest out.”

Tami swallowed the rest of her questions. “Well, congratulations.”

“You, too. I saw the way you cheered up when Dan came to visit while you were staying with us.”

Yes, Tami remembered how pleased she’d been to see Tracker. “He’s a great guy.”

Where was Tracker? Was he back from patrolling yet? None of the bridegrooms had been seen since breakfast. In fact, Des had already disappeared. The Grandmother had said something about a native purification ceremony the men would conduct in private, just for themselves. Des must have gone out to join them. Connie interrupted her thoughts with a low voice.

“Jodi and Dixie send their good wishes and gave me a message for you. They said to keep your mind in the present.”

Tami stared for a minute, then nodded. Yeah, tonight was about her and Tracker, not those rapists from Greasy Butte. She remembered the heat of this morning’s kiss and smiled. If Tracker hadn’t put a stop to the kiss, she might have lured him back to her room for a little more. Being with Tracker tonight would be good. Her body tingled in heated anticipation. It was going to be okay. Making love to Tracker would be easy.

But as it turned out, it wasn’t quite easy.

Chapter Twenty-One

The weddings took place around four in the afternoon. The bridegrooms, who had all disappeared together until after lunch, were lined up at the top of the room to one side of the fireplace, wearing clean jeans and button-up shirts, and those with long hair wore it loose instead of braided. Father John stood with them. The Grandmother was comfortably ensconced in a chair at the front where the fire would warm her, Rose and Sherry beside her. Other Pack members stood around, humming with excitement. The brides clustered inside the kitchen, nervously smoothing their hair and checking their clothes while the men who would give them away waited solemnly. Tami, standing back from the other brides, thought Jelly looked suddenly quite grown up.

“It’s time,” said Connie impatiently.

The women and the escorts lined up. Jelly puffed his chest out with pride and stuck his crooked arm out just like Carla had shown him. The Lupa kissed his cheek and tucked her hand into his bent elbow. Connie went next, clutching Stag’s arm so hard he asked her to loosen her grip. Faron Paulson looked like a proud and nervous father next to his youthful mother. Renee smiled distractedly as Jay held his arm out for her to take. Tami, last in line with Snake, thought Renee was probably thinking about their supper, willing it to not burn. It made Tami want to laugh. This was so different from her first wedding. Instead of parading up the endless aisle of the Basilica dressed in miles of white lace, she was walking across a hall into a big room with a fireplace and a simply decorated Christmas tree, dressed in a simple green wool dress. None of the brides had veils or flowers or bridesmaids. This wedding was infinitely better than her first one.

Tracker was unexpectedly beautiful. Tami had never thought of him as a pretty boy, and he wasn’t, but the long pale hair hanging loose over his shoulders softened the harsh planes of his face. His expression seemed a little less forbidding today. Not a smile, even the tiny one she was getting used to seeing, but more open. His eyes met hers and she smiled at him.

The ceremony itself was a confused blur of miscues. They hadn’t practiced, so no one was quite sure what to do when. The wolves giving the brides away did so at the wrong time and with exuberant howls which were answered by the guests, making the priest flinch. There was some hesitation when Father John asked if any of the women had husbands living. Renee’s divorce hadn’t been final when the plane took off, but after fifty years, her deadbeat husband must be dead. Tami was thinking of Brad, not the men in Greasy Butte, when Tracker squeezed her hand and growled, “No. They’re dead.” That news didn’t quite shock her, but she lost track of what was going on for a minute while she thought about it. Anything Tracker had done to them had been earned. She wasn’t going to waste a single tear on them.

There was some shuffling for position in front of the priest and Father John began leading the brides through their vows. Connie brought a brief halt to the proceedings when she jerked her hand out of Des’s to fold her arms stubbornly across her chest and flatly refused to promise to obey him. The Beta wolf protested.

Connie unfolded one arm to jab a forefinger into his chest. “This wedding was
your
idea. You want to be my husband? Then we’re leaving that ‘obey’ bit out of the vows.”

Des sighed and gave in, although he insisted on taking her hand back. Tami wondered how real their marriage was going to be? Would they have a real wedding night, or sleep in separate rooms? Going by Des’s subtle incline toward Connie and Connie’s less subtle efforts to keep some space between them, Tami doubted the night would go the way Des probably hoped it would. But, thought Tami, casting a heated glance at Tracker, she was looking forward to her wedding night. Tracker glanced back at her and seemed to read her expression. His lean cheeks flushed faintly and his warm fingers pressed her cool ones. The scent of sage rose from him. She liked it.

Father John had intended to have all the women speak their vows in unison but Connie had disrupted that plan until Taye growled that none of the women would have to promise to obey. Tami held hands with Tracker as she recited the vows to love him and cherish him all her life and to keep herself for him alone, and then the men all promised to love and cherish the women. Then, without the priest prompting them, they added an extra vow that made Tami blink back tears.