The Complete Mackenzies Collection by Linda Howard
“I weigh twice what you do. Do you even weigh a hundred pounds?”
“Yes,” she said indignantly. She weighed a hundred and five.
“Not much more than that. I weigh two hundred, and I’m a foot taller than you. If I go to sleep on you, you’ll smother.”
He did sound drowsy. She ran her hand down the muscled ridges of his side. “I want to stay like this.”
He thrust gently against her. “Like this?”
“Yes.” She breathed the word.
He settled onto her, but shifted part of his weight to the side. “Is this okay?”
It was wonderful. She could breathe, but he was still close to her, still inside her. He quickly dozed off, as content as she with the position, and Mary smiled in the darkness as she held him.
The dark thoughts slowly intruded. Someone had deliberately tried to frame him, to put him back in prison. The thought of Wolf without his freedom was obscene and scary, because she knew enough about him to know he would never let himself be sent to prison again.
She wanted to keep him safe, to shield him in her arms, putting her own body between him and danger. Dear God, what had started it all? Things had been so quiet! What had been the trigger?
Then she knew, and horror almost stopped her breath. She had been the trigger.
While Wolf and Joe had been outcasts, punished for their heritage and Wolf’s past, everything had been calm. Then she had come to town, an Anglo woman, but instead of aligning herself with the townspeople, she had championed the Mackenzies. With her help, Joe had achieved an honor offered to very few. Other people had begun saying what a nice thing it was that the Mackenzie boy was going to the Academy. Cathy Teele had said that Wolf was the best-looking man in the county. The boundaries between the town and the Mackenzies had begun blurring. Someone, with a maggot of hate festering deep inside, had been unable to stand it.
And she had been the cause of it all. If anything happened to Wolf, it would be her fault.
Chapter Nine
She didn’t know what to do. The thought that she was the cause of all that had happened tormented her, disturbing her sleep. She moved restlessly, waking Wolf, and he sensed her distress though he attributed it to the wrong cause. He soothed her with whispers and pulled her more completely beneath him. She felt him harden inside her. His lovemaking was gentle this time, and when it was over she slept as effortlessly as a child until he awoke her again in the total darkness before dawn. She turned to him without question.
Joe drove up just as she and Wolf were preparing breakfast, and without a word Wolf broke more eggs into a bowl to be scrambled. Mary smiled at him, even though she was placing more bacon in the frying pan. “How do you know he’s hungry?”
“He’s awake, isn’t he? My kid eats like a horse.”
Joe came in the back door and headed for the coffee, which had already finished brewing. “Morning.”
“Good morning. Breakfast will be ready in about ten minutes.”
He grinned at her, and Mary smiled back. Wolf watched her, his gaze sharp. She looked frail this morning, her skin pale and even more translucent than usual, with faint mauve shadows under her eyes. She smiled readily, but he wondered what had made her look so delicate. Had he tired her with his lovemaking, or were memories of the attack disturbing her? He thought it must be the latter, because she had responded eagerly every time he’d reached for her. Knowing that she was still frightened made him even more determined to find whoever had attacked her. After Eli Baugh had delivered the horses and left, Wolf planned to do some tracking.
Joe was right behind Mary’s car on the way to the school, and he didn’t leave immediately, as she had expected. It was still too early for the students to begin arriving, so he walked with her into the empty building and even inspected the rooms. Then he leaned against the door-jamb and waited.
Mary sighed. “I’m perfectly safe here.”
“I’ll just wait until some other people show up.”
“Did Wolf tell you to do this?”
“Nope. He knew he didn’t have to.”
How did they communicate? By telepathy? Each seemed to know what the other was thinking. It was disconcerting. She just hoped they couldn’t read her thoughts, because she’d had some decidedly erotic ones lately.
What would everyone think of Joe’s presence? He was so obviously a watchdog. She wondered if it would trigger another act of violence, and she felt sick, because she knew it might. Instinct, sharpened by her fierce protectiveness for both Mackenzies, told her that her theory was correct. Just the possibility that they could become accepted had driven someone over the edge. It revealed so much hate that she shivered.
Sharon and Dottie entered the building and halted briefly when Joe turned his head and looked at them as they passed the open door. “Mrs. Wycliffe. Mrs. Lancaster,” he said in acknowledgment as he touched his fingertips to the brim of his hat in a brief salute.
“Joe,” Sharon murmured. “How are you?”
Dottie gave him a brief, almost frightened look and hurried to her classroom. Joe shrugged. “I’ve been doing a bit of studying,” he allowed.
“Just a bit?” Sharon asked wryly. She stepped past him to greet Mary, then said, “If you don’t feel like working today, Dottie and I can handle your classes. I never dreamed you’d be here today, anyway.”
“I was merely frightened,” Mary said firmly. “Clay prevented anything else from happening. Cathy is the one who needs sympathy, not I.”
“The whole town is in an uproar. Anyone who has freckles on his hands is getting the third degree.”
Mary didn’t want to talk about it. The image of that freckled hand made her feel nauseated, and she swallowed convulsively. Joe frowned and stepped forward. Mary put up her hand to keep him from throwing Sharon out of the classroom, but at that moment several students entered, and their chatter distracted everyone. The kids said, “Hi, Joe, howya been?” as they clustered around him. They all wanted to know about his plans for the Academy and how he’d gotten interested.
Sharon left to attend to her own classes, and Mary watched Joe with the kids. He was only sixteen, but he seemed older than even the seniors. Joe was young, but he wasn’t a kid, and that was the difference. She noticed that Pam Hearst was in the group. She wasn’t saying much, but she never took her eyes off Joe, looking at him with both longing and pain, though she tried to hide it. Several times Joe gave the girl a long look that made her fidget uncomfortably.
Then he checked his watch and left his former classmates to say to Mary, “Dad will be here to follow you home. Don’t go anywhere alone.”
She started to protest, then thought of the man out there who hated them enough to do what he’d done. She wasn’t the only one at risk. She reached out and caught his arm. “You and Wolf be careful. You could be the next targets.”
He frowned, as if that hadn’t occurred to him. The attacker was a rapist, so men wouldn’t consider themselves in danger. She wouldn’t have thought of it, either, if she hadn’t been convinced that the whole thing was intended to punish the Mackenzies. What greater punishment could there be than to kill them? At some point the madman might decide to take a rifle and dispense his own twisted brand of justice.
Clay showed up at lunch with the papers for her to read and sign. Aware of the kids watching them with acute interest, she walked with him out to the car. “I’m worried,” she admitted.
He propped his arm on top of the open door. “You’d be foolish if you weren’t worried.”
“Not for myself. I think Wolf and Joe are the real targets.”
He gave her a quick, sharp look. “How do you figure that?”
Heartened that he hadn’t immediately dismissed the idea, but was watching her with a troubled expression in his eyes, Mary told him her theory. “I think Cathy and I were specifically chosen as targets to punish Wolf. Don’t you see the link? She said she thought Wolf was handsome, and that she’d like to date Joe. Everyone k
“And you think he’ll attack again?”
“I’m certain he will, but I’m afraid he’ll go after one of them this time. I doubt he’d try to manhandle either of them, but what chance would they have against a bullet? How many men in this county have a rifle?”
“Every last mother’s son,” Clay replied grimly. “But what set this guy off?”
She paused, her face miserable. “I did.”
“What?”
“I did. Before I came here, Wolf was an outcast. Everyone was comfortable with that. Then I made friends with him and worked with Joe to get him into the Academy. A lot of people were a little proud of that and were friendlier. It was a crack in the wall, and whoever is doing this just couldn’t stand it.”
“You’re talking about a lot of hate, and it’s hard for me to see. People around here don’t get along with Wolf, but a lot of it is fear instead of hate. Fear and guilt. The people in this county sent him to prison for something he didn’t do, and his presence constantly reminds them of it. He isn’t a very forgiving person, is he?”
“Something like that would be a little hard to forgive,” Mary pointed out.
He had to agree with that and sighed wearily. “Still, I can’t think of anyone who seems to hate him to the point of attacking two women just because they were friendly to him. Hell, Cathy wasn’t even friendly. She just made a chance remark.”
“So you agree with me? That all of this is because of Wolf?”
“I don’t like it, but I guess I do. Nothing else makes sense, because there may be a few coincidences in life, but none in crime. Everything has a motive.”
“So what can we do?”
“We won’t do anything,” he said pointedly. “I will talk to the sheriff about it, but the fact is we can’t arrest anyone without evidence, and all we have is a theory. We don’t even have a suspect.”
Her jaw set in firm lines. “Then you’re passing up a marvelous chance.”
He looked suspicious. “To do what?”
“Set a trap, of course.”
“I don’t like this. I don’t know what you’re thinking, but I don’t like it.”
“It’s common sense. He failed in his—er, objective with me. Perhaps I could—”
“No. And before you get on your high horse, just think of what Wolf would say if you told him you were setting yourself up as bait. You might—might—be allowed out of his house by Christmas.”
That was true enough, but she saw a way around it. “Then I just won’t tell him.”
“There’s no way to keep it from him, unless it didn’t work. If it did work—I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be around when he found out, and something like that couldn’t be kept quiet.”
Mary considered all of Wolf’s possible reactions and didn’t like any of them. On the other hand, she was terrified that something might happen to him. “I’ll take the chance,” she said, making her decision.
“Not with my help, you won’t.”
Her chin lifted. “Then I’ll do it without your help.”
“If you get in the way of our investigations, I’ll put you in the pokey so fast your head will spin,” he threatened. When she didn’t appear impressed, he swore under his breath. “Hell, I’ll just tell Wolf and let him ride herd on you.”
She frowned and considered shaking her schoolteacher’s finger in his face. “You listen to me, Clay Armstrong. I’m the best chance you have of luring this guy out into the open. You don’t have any suspects now. What are you going to do, wait until he attacks some other woman and maybe kills her? Is that how you want to work it?”
“No, that isn’t how I want to work it! I want you and every other woman to stay alert and not go anywhere alone. I don’t want to risk you or anyone else. Have you thought that sometimes traps don’t work, that the animal gets the bait and still gets away? Do you really want to face the possibility of that?”
The thought made her sick to her stomach, and she swallowed to control the sudden rise of nausea. “No, but I’d do it anyway,” she said steadily.
“For the last time, no. I understand that you want to help, but I don’t like the idea. This guy is too unstable. He grabbed Cathy in her own driveway, and took you off of the town’s main street. The chances he took are crazy, and he probably is, too.”
With a sigh, Mary decided that Clay was simply too protective for him to be able to agree to use a woman as bait; it was totally against his basic nature. That didn’t mean, however, that she needed his agreement. All she needed was someone who could act as a guard. She hadn’t thought of any real plan yet, but obviously there had to be two people to make even the simplest trap work: the bait, and the one who kept the bait from being harmed.
Clay got in the car and closed the door, then leaned out the open window. “I don’t want to hear any more about it,” he warned.
“You won’t,” she promised. Not talking to him about it wasn’t the same as not doing it.
He gave her a suspicious look, but started the car and drove away. Mary returned to her classroom, her thoughts darting around as she tried to think of a solid plan for luring a rapist with a minimum of danger to herself.
Wolf arrived at the school ten minutes before classes were over. He propped his shoulder against the wall just outside her classroom door and listened to her clear voice instructing her students on how geography and history had combined to produce the current state of Middle East politics. He was certain that wasn’t in any of the textbooks, but Mary had a knack for giving her students a way of relating the present to their studies. It made the subjects both more interesting and more understandable. He had heard her doing the same thing with Joe, not that Joe needed encouragement to read. Her students responded easily to her; in such a small class, there was very little formality. They called her “Miss Potter,” but weren’t shy about asking questions, offering answers, even teasing.
Then she looked at her watch and released them, just as the doors to the other two classrooms opened. Wolf straightened from the wall and walked into her room, aware of how the kids’ chatter halted abruptly when they became aware of his presence. Mary looked up and smiled, a private smile meant only for him, and it made his pulse accelerate that she was so open about how she felt.
He removed his hat and shoved his fingers through his hair. “Your escort service has arrived, ma’am,” he said.
One of the girls giggled nervously, and Wolf slowly turned his head to look at the motionless teenagers. “Are you girls going home in pairs? Any of you boys making sure they get home all right?”
Christa Teele, Cathy’s younger sister, murmured that she and Pam Hearst were walking together. The other four girls said nothing. Wolf looked at the seven boys. “Go with them.” It was an order, one that the boys obeyed instantly. The kids left the room, automatically separating so that each girl had at least one male escort.
Mary nodded. “Very nicely done.”
“You’ll notice that they all had enough sense not to argue that they didn’t need an escort.”
She frowned at him, because she felt it hadn’t been necessary for him to make that point. “Wolf, really, I’m perfectly safe on the drive from my house to here. How could anything happen to me if I don’t stop?”
“What if you had a flat? What if a radiator hose blew again?”
It was obvious there was no way she could set her trap if Wolf or Joe was hovering over her every second. It was also obvious from the narrow look Wolf was giving her that he had no intention of changing his mind. Not that it mattered at the moment, as she hadn’t come up with a plan yet. But when she did, she would also have to come up with some scheme for slipping away from her watchdogs.
Wolf draped her sweater over her shoulders and picked up her purse and keys, then ushered her out the door. Dottie looked up from where she was locking her own classroom door and stood transfixed while Wolf locked Mary’s door, ratt
Dottie ducked her head and pretended to be having trouble with her key. Her face was flushed. It was the first time Wolf Mackenzie had ever spoken to her, and her hands shook as she dropped the key into her purse. Almost uncontrollable fear made her break out in a sweat. She didn’t know what she was going to do.
Wolf’s arm was solid around Mary’s waist as they walked to her car. Its weight made her heartbeat quicken. All he had to do was put his hands on her and her body began to ready itself for him. An exquisite shudder began deep inside, spreading outward in a warm tide.
He felt the sudden tension in her slender body as he opened the car door. She was breathing faster, too. He looked down at her, and his entire body tightened, because she was watching him with desire plain in her soft, slate-blue eyes. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips parted.
He stepped back. “I’ll be right behind you.” The words were guttural.
She drove sedately home, though her blood was thundering through her veins and pounding in her ears. Never had the isolated, bedraggled old house looked better. Woodrow was sunning on the steps, and Mary stepped over her to unlock the back door. Wolf was out of his truck and right behind her, just as he had promised, by the time she had the door open.
Without a word she took off her sweater, deposited her purse on a chair and walked up the stairs, acutely aware of the heavy tread of Wolf’s boots as he followed. They stepped into her bedroom.
He had her naked before she could gather her wits, though she wouldn’t have wanted to protest even if he’d given her time. He bore her down on the bed, his big body overwhelming her, his brawny arms cradling her. The hair on his chest rasped her sensitive nipples into hardened peaks, and with a low moan of excitement she rubbed her breasts against him to increase the sensation. He opened her thighs and settled himself between them. His voice was low and rough as he murmured in her ear an explicit explanation of what he was going to do.