Yearnings: A Paranormal Romance Box Set (98 page)

Nick sensed it, too? Grant narrowed his eyes on the man. Everything in him shouted a warning. “Check on Beatrice and Leigh.”

Nick leapt to his feet and left. The roar of the train hushed when Nick slammed the door behind him. Eerie stillness filled the train car. No, not inside the car. Inside of him. A dark, cold silence warned of something coming. Duchy growled low in her chest. Was she growling at Grant? The hairs on his arms stood on end under his crisp white shirt.

Animal instinct climbed to life inside him. Grant did all he could to repress it and clutch at his self-control. “Duchy,” he whispered. But the dog wouldn’t look at him. She growled again, her eyes watching the air.

The feel of a hand brushing his back spun him around. What the hell was that? He widened his stance, clenched his fists, and automatically raised them, despite part of him realizing how useless two meaty fists would be on the unseen force that had joined him in this room.

“
Show yourself,” he said and felt it again—an energy sweeping past him. Grant spun around again, reaching an arm out as if he could catch the cold air, but it was gone. Duchy barked. What little hair she had on her back rose. Grant’s back shivered, where, as a wolf, his hackles would rise. In his imagination, the hackles had risen. Except, the wolf in him wasn’t trying to take over so much as...join him. If anything, his animal instincts, while wary and suspicious, seemed to need to reassure him.

The air in front of him chilled. Again, Grant sensed energy moving past him. Something hit him in the shoulder, sending him back. Grant balanced and swung. His punch met thin air, but something about it changed. It blurred, like heat rising from the pavement on a rare cloudless day down by Fisherman’s Wharf.

He opened his hand, fingering the blur. The movement created little threads in the air. Color. Browns and grays painted the air. Grant stared, transfixed. The energy retreated. Deep sorrow rang through his chest, longing for more. It was as though the wolf inside him howled in emotional pain over the sudden loss. Grant stumbled forward, both hands out, feeling the air for the cool energy. Whatever fear he had had of it gave way to the sorrow and longing. Where? Where was it? He? Where was he?

A soul? A ghost? The wolf howled within him. Sharp pains stabbed his stomach, bending him. Grant forced his body upright. Again, he made a sweep of the room, feeling the air. “Who are you?” he said. Duchy’s stump thumped the cushion. Each little
thwap!
sent a new level of disappointment through him. If she wasn’t growling anymore, the presence must be gone. “Damn it!”

He slumped into a chair. The pain in his gut receded. The wolf slunk back into the abyss, sadness in its wake. Such deep sadness. None of it made any sense. First, the wolf with the blackouts that becoming a wild animal created, and then the souls. Murder. Justified or not. He committed outright murder. Now this? What was it?

Wouldn’t he see a glow of some sort if a soul was what it was? Why would the wolf want that presence near, and then be so utterly crushed by its loss? He raked his hands over his face and through his hair. Why him? Why did he have to live in this hell of confusion and hope? Tristan deserved better. Somehow, the wolf inside him was meant for Tristan. To save him. But how could an animal ever save a boy when the man housing it kept failing?

Tristan.

Grant’s heart ripped open again along the same old seams, raw along scars that only time could create. Duchy came to sit at his feet, and pawed his knee. Releasing a ragged sigh, Grant swiped at the wetness leaking out of each eye. Crying would never help find Tristan. Or undo the past. Stupid mistakes of youth. A dumb gambling debt to the wrong Chinese tong.

No. Wrong.

Grant froze. He could swear that he heard a whisper. The air changed again. Duchy’s ears went down. She showed her teeth and scampered back to the window bench seat. She growled. He didn’t want to screw up and send the presence away again. He kept very still, and when the wolf sprang to the fore, he let it.

He braced himself for his bones breaking apart, his muscle tearing back to give way to the animal’s form. Instead, the soul inside him crept impossibly close to the surface, then hesitated. His chest welled with hot pressure, but the wolf stayed back. Unmoving.

Pulse drumming in his veins, Grant waited.

The same blur as before warbled the green lines of the drapes and the carved edge of the window bench seat. Duchy growled. Grant swallowed. He thought of the whisper, certain now that he had, in fact heard it. “Wrong?”

Wrong.

What was he wrong about? He racked his brain for an answer. Nothing came. The presence’s arrival had wiped his mind clear. His chest ached with the wolf, mournful, hopeful. Seemingly needing answers, too. They needed Leigh. She had real gifts. She could help.

No.

Grant frowned. “No?” He didn’t expect a direct answer. But his neck hairs stood on end, and Duchy still growled. “No to what?”

Leigh
.

Every other hair on Grant’s body stood on end. The wolf in him whined. The presence knew Leigh? It didn’t want her here. Why? “What are you?” he whispered, his mouth was so dry that he was surprised he could move it at all.

Jacob
.

Grant sucked in a breath. Memories flashed of Leigh touching his face, murmuring that name. The wolf pressed at his chest. It wanted out. Grant refused to let it. He was amazed that he had enough resolve to keep it at bay. Before this week, he had no control over it whatsoever. Why did he appear to now? Unless it wasn’t him in control at all. It must be the wolf cooperating with him. Guiding him. The stress at his chest eased back. The wolf took hold, not fully, but giving him eyes. His vision changed, color muted to sepia, and the blur sharpened into focus.

A man stood in front of him, between him and Duchy. His heart skipped a beat. Grant recognized this man. He’d seen him on the ship. No, not Grant. The wolf had seen him. “Jacob, I presume?”

A lock of dark hair fell over the man’s forehead as he nodded. The only things solid about him were his very dark eyes, which stared right down into Grant’s soul. He shifted under the uncomfortable weight. “What do you want from me?”

The ghost slowly crouched so that they were eye at level, unsettling Grant even more. “I want the souls,” Jacob said.

The wolf howled in agreement and before Grant could protest, it took over. Pain screamed through his body. His skin and muscle peeled back. His limbs contorted. Snapping, breaking, and forcing into something new—something instinctive and deadly. But this time, Grant resisted the inky blackness welling up around him. He would not be forced off. He would stay. If the wolf could linger in his human form, then he would hang onto some semblance of himself, too.

His vision cleared. The pain receded. The sepia gave way to full black and white. Duchy eyed him, getting to her feet and tucking in her tail. He went to her, nosed her face, reassuring her. He wouldn’t hurt her. A pat on his chest brought him around. The wolf distrusted humans but this human, the wolf knew. He was no human, though, Grant remembered. This man was a ghost.

His shirt tangled up his feet. The wolf pawed out of the clothing.

The man was Jacob, and the wolf knew him. The wolf had been hunting for him all along. It had been waiting for Jacob all these years. Confused by these solid sensations of information, Grant struggled to grasp details, but none came. The wolf didn’t think in details—only in singular emotional surges.

Found.

Souls.

Find.

Jacob was speaking to him, tentatively stroking his fur, something in his brown eyes showing deep respect for the animal. Grant sensed the man wouldn’t push the wolf back, and wouldn’t force it to act out of instinct and fear to avoid him. Instead, he murmured soft words. Grant tried to grasp the words, but all he could feel was the emotion behind them. Resolution.

A hunt.

He salivated. Grant pawed at the far door, wary of the movement under his feet. The man opened the door, revealing the ground speeding past. A platform he could leap to. Grant’s haunches flexed, ready to spring over. Something the man said held him back.

Not yet.

He couldn’t go yet. Soon. The hunt would be this way. Very soon. Grant retreated from the door. The man crouched and brought his face near the wolf’s.
Soon
. The wolf emitted a low warning growl, an assertion of power and dominance. The man grinned. A thousand white lights swam into Grant’s vision. Nausea sloshed up his guts. Heat flashed over his body. Chills. The pain began. Changing. Again.

Too quickly. Somewhere in his consciousness, he worried. This change back to human form hit too close on the heels of becoming the wolf. He needed the wolf. Finally, he realized it. But the wolf only whined at the pain and retreated, suspicious, acting on pure instincts that Grant couldn’t influence, no matter how hard he tried.

The wolf didn’t care about living or dying. It only cared about...Grant could feel the word, but didn’t see the letters. The wolf slunk back. Grant mentally reached out. What mattered so much? He needed to know.

The thief.

The soul thief.

Grant opened his eyes to Duchy licking his cheek, familiar pain stabbing his temples and joints. Just beyond the dog’s wet eyes, two black shoes filled his vision.

“
Never a dull moment with you, is there?”

Rolling to his side, hair sliding off his back and arms, he peered up, half expecting Jacob to be standing there. Seeing Nick’s mocking gaze instead, disappointment keened through him. He took Nick’s proffered hand, and eased up off the floor. “How long were you gone?”

“
No more than an hour, I’d say. How about you?”

Grant retrieved his clothes and sloughed the wolf hair from his arms. The wolf was getting better at wriggling free of the clothes. Only one tear this time. “As soon as you left, it took over.”

Nick’s sardonic grin disappeared. “You’re bleeding.”

“
Yeah, it tends to be a bit of a gory process, Nick.” Grateful that Nick didn’t press him with a lot of questions, Grant moved past him so he could sit as he dressed. Duchy followed, worry in her eyes. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to clean up and try to feel human again.”

“
Have it your way, friend. The ladies would like us to join them for dinner.” Nick headed to the door. “One quick question, though, Connel. How do you suppose
that
got carved into your chest?”

Grant looked down to where Nick had pointed. Blood dripped from short, deep slashes in a strange, yet familiar, pattern—“
放
.”
He wiped the blood with his shirt to be sure of what he saw. His mind spun back to the night he lost Tristan, and then jumped forward to the paper in Beatrice’s hand at the Sacré Couer. Lijuan would know what this meant. Yes, he knew t
he symbol translated as “free.”

Yet he felt more imprisoned than ever.

~~~

Chapter Seventeen

Beatrice’s fork scraped the plate, grating Leigh’s nerves almost as much as chasing down the last five peas on her own plate did. The train jiggled everything just enough to irritate her. The peas moved, the butter dish vibrated, even the sunlight pouring in from the window seemed to shiver over the room. Grant was watching her. She could feel it. She’d never been so uncomfortable at a meal. The man’s presence filled the small car, making him impossible to ignore. She didn’t even need to look his way to feel him there, close, watching her. As if he were waiting for her to turn his way and answer a question.

Except, he hadn’t asked a question. Nope. He hadn’t even spoken. Not one word. Did Beatrice remark upon it, or scold her brother? Not at all. Did Nick try to engage the man in conversation? Of course not. Instead, they all sat and ate in silence after two or three weak exchanges between Nick and Beatrice. Leigh was tired of pretending there was no elephant in the room.

They’d be in San Francisco in a matter of days, yet they had made no progress whatsoever. Beatrice had demanded that she prove she wasn’t lying. Leigh was at a complete loss as to how to do so. She’d told Bea as much when she’d demanded Leigh ‘prove it’, then the woman had shut down tighter than a drum. Where had the easy-going woman from the three days in New York gone? Or the concerned friend from the ship? She seemed to be punishing Leigh with silence. All of them seemed to be. Well, except for Nick. He tried to talk to her intermittently, when he wasn’t poring over his notes on Tristan’s disappearance. At one point, Leigh even tried to help Nick with his notes. Then Grant strode into the car, and it was all Leigh could do to think straight.

How could the man have such an effect on her? The way he watched her sent heat coursing through her—the wrong kind of heat. Warmth that tingled her belly and traveled down her pelvis, up her thighs. Even now, sitting there eating dinner, chasing peas around her plate, all she could think of were his eyes watching her. Images filled her imagination. His heavy-lidded, icy blue eyes turning smoky gray with passion. She’d caught a glimpse of his hands as he reached for the bread basket, and a new surge of heat crept over her body.