12
“Good Lord, Archer, I had no idea the roads were so broken in this country!”
“That they are. Throughout most of the country you’ll find them like this, I can assure you. It’s not only down this way.”
“But why? Why don’t they do something about it?”
“Who do you mean by ‘they,’ Eloise?”
“I don’t know,” she answered crossly, aware of what a brat she was sounding like but apparently helpless to stop it. “Whoever it is that takes care of that sort of thing. I don’t know what they’re called. But somebody must have that job, mustn’t they?”
Archer responded with nothing but silence, a silence that was accompanied by the hitting of yet another atrocious pothole, punctuating Eloise’s point quite nicely, if she did say so herself. Not that she did say so. She didn’t say anything, only waited to see what kind of retort Archer would have to this latest question of hers.
It was possible that he would remain silent, in which case she would make her way to the back of the camper and do her best to take a nap, but it was also possible that he was biting his tongue until he could think of the best way to answer her. That was something she had a feeling he had been working on quite a lot these last several days.
Chances were good he hadn’t had any idea what kind of challenge he would be taking on when he decided to bring her along on his adventure of a life and he’d been forced to initiate himself in a crash course that wasn’t proving as useful as either one of them might hope it to be.
Eloise felt terrible for thinking about things in this way, or at least most of her did. There was another part of her, however, that had been feeling just a little bit spiteful as of late. It was entirely unfair and her rational mind knew it, but that didn’t do much to lessen the feelings being there, whether she liked it or not. Fortunately for the both of them, Eloise had been practicing biting her tongue as well, and so the two of them sat in silence together, each anticipating what the other might or might not do or say.
Eloise had been on the run with Archer and the rest of his clan for two weeks, and it had not been an easy two weeks at that. Part of it, she supposed, was just the idea of it; on the run. She was now on the run, a fugitive of sorts from a father who probably hated her guts now and might not even want her back, anyway. She had wanted to go with Archer, had wanted it desperately, but that hadn’t quite prepared her for what lay ahead. Quite simply, nothing had prepared her, and that was part of the problem.
It was very likely all of the problem, as little as she liked to admit it, and the reason things had been so terribly tense between her and Archer for most of the time they had been together. Eloise was accustomed to the finer things in life and although she had never for a moment doubted her ability to live on the road the way Archer and the rest of the werewolves did, she had quickly learned that the idea she’d had of what living on the road constituted and the reality of it were two entirely different things.
She wanted to be the sort of woman who was game for anything, who didn’t need anything but the pack on her back and her own ingenuity, but there were things she missed. There were creature comforts she’d never had to do without and getting used to not having them was far more difficult than she would ever have believed.
It was this sort of thing she most often brooded over while sitting beside Archer as he drove mile after endless mile, and it was what she was thinking about when he finally answered her question. He’d taken so long with it she’d almost forgotten that there was an answer to be had, but when she got it, it still managed to make her feel ashamed. That was another thing she’d had a lot of over the last two weeks; feelings of shame unlike any she’d previously had in her life.
“Things like fixing roads costs money, Eloise,” he answered in a tired voice that filled her with that dreaded emotion she had come to know all too well, “and that’s not something the vast majority have these days.”
“Yes,” she forged ahead uncertainly, willing her voice not to waver and doing a terrible job of it. “I understand that, but it’s not as if I’m saying you or I should pay for it all. But the city, or the state, or something. Somebody’s got to pay for it.”
“You’re right,” he went on in an infuriatingly calm voice that struck her with the somewhat shocking urge to just reach out and slap him. “But that money isn’t unlimited, either. It’s got to pay for a whole host of things and my guess is that fixing potholes isn’t at the top of the list. Not that I know for sure, mind you. You could always write your congressman, see what he has to say. As for me, I think I’ll just make do with the bumps in the road.”
She felt herself flushing furiously and was exceedingly grateful for the fact that Archer was driving and unwilling to take his eyes off of the road. She felt like she’d been taken to task, the same way she had when she had still been in grade school and was admonished for doing something improperly.
She felt foolish, very foolish indeed, and embarrassed by how little she actually knew about the way the world worked. On top of everything else, she felt terribly tired. The family had been traveling from sunup to sundown for almost the entire two weeks she had been with them and when they stopped it was in deserted campgrounds. Eloise had absolutely no experience with camping or anything vaguely related to it and being so out of her element all of the time was highly stressful. It was the kind of stress that led to exhaustion and the fact that all of her sleep had been had in Archers trailer didn’t help things any. Gone were the days of her massive king-sized bed and although she wouldn’t dream of saying it out loud, she missed it.
She didn’t miss it enough to try and go back home, God no, but she missed it and then she felt like a spoiled brat for missing it, which only made things worse. The whole situation was so vexing to her that now, even after the dressing down about the roads and how little money most people had these days, Eloise ventured to offer a hopeful suggestion that might provide her with some temporary relief.
“Archer?”
“Hm?”
“I was wondering.”
“I’m sure you would,” he responded in a musing voice that was mildly chiding but nowhere near unfriendly. “Is it more about the roads?”
“No,” she answered quickly, a little bit too quickly and almost enough to make Archer take his eyes off the road. “Nothing like that. It’s about something else.”
“Well come on, then, let’s have it. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to how many things you wonder about, Eloise.”
“Would you like me to stop?”
“No, I don’t mean to say that. It’s sweet, sort of, and it’s understandable given the way you grew up. It’s just new for me, that’s all. You must try to remember, I’ve spent a good while driving this camper on my own. It’s an adjustment, that’s all. And before you ask, no, it’s not a bad adjustment.”
“Oh. Well, that makes sense.”
“Good. Now let’s have it.”
“Have what?”
“Have what you were wondering. Or did you stop wondering while we were talking?”
“Oh! No, I haven’t stopped. I never stop wondering. That’s something you should know about me. And the thing I was wondering about this time was hotels.”
“Hotels? What about them?”
“They have them in this part of the country, don’t they?”
“They have them in almost every part of the country. What of it?”
“I was thinking maybe tonight we could stay in one. It could be like a little vacation, you know?”
“No.”
“It would, I promise. We would have a nice soft bed, maybe a pool to swim in. Room service even! It would be so much fun, really!”
“Right, I understand all of that. I didn’t mean no as in I didn’t understand the benefits of a hotel. I meant no as in we aren’t going to be staying in a hotel tonight.”
“No? Just, no?”
“That’s about the size of it, yes.”
“Not even a conversation? I would think we would talk about it at the very least. I didn’t realize you made all of the decisions for the both of us.”
“I don’t, but neither do you, and we don’t either one of us make the decisions for the whole family.”
“The whole family? What the hell does that have to do with anything? I’m not talking about everyone staying in a hotel, I’m talking about the two of us.”
“That’s not how things work with us. We don’t do that kind of thing. We stick together. It’s always been that way and nothing has changed. Not when it comes to that sort of thing. Besides, where would we be getting the money from? With us breaking ties with the carnival things are bound to be short for a while. Those are the times when we have to spend less, not more. And even if we were rolling in dollars, we wouldn’t stay in any hotel. We don’t do that sort of thing. We don’t care for the attention it draws.”
Eloise felt like she had been physically struck. She hadn’t really understood until Archer spoke those words how completely their behavior was tied to that of the rest of the tribe. She understood it now, however, and her heart sank. If the family wasn’t going to stay at a hotel, she and Archer weren’t going to do so either.
This sleeping in campers and cooking meals either in the trailer or around the campfire wasn’t a temporary means to an end. This was the way her life was to be from now on and the thought of it was sort of terrifying. Only she didn’t want to be terrified, didn’t want to hurt her chances of a good life. She was out from underneath her father’s thumb, and that was good.
She was sitting beside a man she couldn’t stop looking at, couldn’t stop touching, and that was very good. It was enough, had to be enough, and so instead of arguing Archer’s points she leaned over the console and kissed him on the corner of his mouth. Even a kiss as small and chaste as that made her skin prickle with heat and she heard Archer’s low growl rumbling in his rock-hard chest.
When she sat back in her seat, she was happier than she had any right to be under the circumstances. The fire between the two of them was undeniable and it was enough to overshadow a whole host of problems that might otherwise have felt unbearable. It was a good thing she had that to hold onto, too, she thought as she watched Archer lead the way into their latest campground, the front of the train of campers that held his large family of werewolves.
She steeled herself, preparing for whatever might come when she vacated the camper. Archer felt the tension flooding into her hand and after parking, he turned to look at her head on.
“It’s going to get better, Eloise.”
“Maybe.”
“They aren't trustful people by nature. The outsiders that have joined our family have been few and none of them have ever been like you.”
“Like me?”
“A lion shifter. The history between our two kinds is bleak and it won’t mend itself overnight.”
Because she didn’t trust herself to speak, she settled with nodding. His words didn’t alleviate her stress, though, and they didn’t remove the gnawing stress eating away at her insides. Maybe he was right and after some more time went by the rest of the troupe would come to accept her, but until that happened she felt completely frozen out. In short, they hated her.
They hated her and they did very little to hide it from her, instead giving her the impression that they took a grim sort of pleasure in making her well aware of just how unwanted she really was. For the most part they did this by simply ignoring her completely, treating her as if she mattered so little that her words and even her physical proximity didn’t warrant notice.
Before running away with Archer and his band of gypsies, Eloise would have thought that being ignored that way was horrible all on its own. But she had learned to hope for that kind of treatment.
She hoped for the silence because the alternative was much, much worse. The few members of the gypsy troupe that did interact with her did so in a way that made it clear they wanted her gone. Some of them only muttered insults under their breath, but some of them were downright antagonistic, calling her names, asking her where her rich daddy was and whether or not she was done slumming it with one of the gypsy trash.
They hadn’t been physically confrontational and for that Eloise counted herself lucky, but being around such open hatred was wearing, demoralizing. It made her feel raw and on edge, which she would later come to realize was probably at the root of the terrible thing that happened that evening after supper was through and the werewolves were dispersed across the campsite, playing and drinking and generally cutting up.
Eloise had made Archer agree to let her go out into the woods looking for firewood and kindling. They were making their way steadily up north and the air at night was reflecting that more and more with each passing day. On every other evening, Archer had been the one out of the two of them to collect the kindling but on this night, Eloise insisted so fiercely that she be allowed to go in his stead that he finally relented.
When he agreed to let her do it, Eloise felt a lightening of her heart and a momentary streak of giddiness she almost couldn’t contain. She felt this for reasons she couldn’t even fully understand, reasons that were all tangled up with each other. She wanted the time to herself, time to process everything that had changed since fleeing her father’s home. She also wanted to feel useful for once.
She wanted to prove that she could be useful, that she wasn’t just some spoiled little rich girl who couldn’t carry her own weight. Because she was so focused on these things, she never even heard the sound of approaching footsteps coming up behind her, nor did she smell the scent of someone new. She was as clueless as a new-born baby and as helpless, too, until the intruder behind her spoke.
“Well what do we have here? Little rich girl playing Cinderella. Aren’t you just the cutest thing?”
Eloise let out a gasp and whirled around to face the owner of this unwelcome voice, a jolt of fear hitting her so hard she felt like she might pass out. For one crazy, terrifying moment, she was sure it was her father come to take her away. It made no sense, especially considering the fact that the voice belonged to a female and not a male, but that was how on edge she’d been over the last two weeks.
It was enough for her to be ready to see her father anywhere and everywhere she looked. It took her a minute before she was able to fully understand that the person in front of her was one of the werewolves and not her own kind, and by the time she began to get the idea of what she was dealing with the woman in front of her was laughing meanly.
“What’s the matter, rich girl? Not used to being spoken to by a real woman?”
“I’d appreciate it if you stopped calling me that.”
“Would you now? That’s really too bad because as far as I’m concerned, it’s the only name you’re going to get.”
“Who are you?” Eloise responded in a tired, weary voice, eyeing the woman with increasing alarm. “What is it that you want from me?”
“I’m Vera. I belong to this tribe. I belong here, unlike you.”
“I’m not here to hurt anyone. I’m just—”
“Trying to keep Archer’s attention. I know. We all know. It’s pathetic. Do you really think a little cat like you will capture his heart for good? I’m sorry to be the one to break your heart, but you won’t.”
Eloise’s eyes narrowed. The lion inside of her had begun to prick up its ears when Vera referred to her as a little cat, and the more she spoke the more riled up it became. Perhaps it was the stress and fear that had been mounting inside of her, piling up on itself over the last two weeks that made her so sensitive to shifting.
Perhaps it was the fact that it was very obvious to her that Vera had more than a passing stake in who Archer decided to mate with. Either way, Eloise felt her lion go from completely dormant to on the verge of bursting out in the matter of mere moments.
Vera seemed to sense it, too, and her face broke open with a wide, sinister grin, her eyes taking on the golden light of a werewolf about to change. Eloise had heard about this happening, had heard that a werewolf was able to shift outside of the cycle of the full moon, but she had certainly never been anywhere close to seeing it with her own eyes.
It made her own shifting feel even closer to inevitable and she knew that she would not be able to control herself for very long. This woman, this Vera, was looking for a fight and Eloise did not believe that she would be able to be the bigger person for all that long. Her mind shot briefly back to conversations she’d had with her father, lectures where he told her how difficult it was to control her shifting in the real world.
She tried to push the thought away, desperate to get him out of her head, but she couldn’t quite manage it and it only served to make her even more agitated. Vera saw that, too, and let out a nasty laugh that raised the hairs on the back of Eloise’s neck.
“You really thought you had him, didn’t you? You thought you were going to waltz in here and capture his heart and the rest of ours along with it, just going to create your own family. The thing is, little cat, we don’t want you here. And Archer? He might have gotten his head turned by a new piece of snatch for a spell, but after a while he’ll come back to his own. We always do.”
“So that’s it, is it? You’re jealous.”
Vera’s face blanched. Eloise’s comment had thrown her off and although it was only for a moment, it was enough for Eloise to get a better look at her. She was very pretty, but in a way that was completely different than Eloise. In all of the ways that Eloise was light, Vera was dark. Black hair, eyes so dark they almost looked black as well. She was very close to beautiful, but her face was hard and mean, nothing like the sunny disposition Eloise was usually graced with.
She was also angry and growing angrier by the second. Eloise had been one hundred percent correct in her assessment of why Vera was making such a point of hassling her and they both knew it. At some point before Eloise had stumbled into the carnival, there had been something between Archer and Vera and Vera wasn’t pleased that it had come to an end.
She had decided to take that displeasure out on Eloise because doing so was easier than placing the blame on Archer himself, which was where it must belong. She wanted to fight and although Eloise knew the prudent thing to do was to extract herself from the situation, she couldn’t seem to make herself do it.
It was as if her feet were cemented to the earth beneath them. She could feel the shift beginning to take her over, and still she could not move. She was afraid of what was coming but the closer she got to shifting, the less pronounced that fear became. Because the lion inside of her wanted the fight. The lion inside of her had been itching for a fight for quite some time.
“Jealous?! Of you? Oh honey, you must be out of your mind.”
“Am I? Why else would you go to the trouble of trying to make me doubt something I know to be true?”
“And what truth would you be referring to?”
“The truth about Archer and me. You’re right, things have been different since I’ve come along with you, but the thing at the base of it all hasn’t changed one bit. We belong to each other now. Nothing is going to shake that, certainly not you.”
With a force so strong it was almost painful, Eloise realized how true those words really were. They did, they belonged to each other. There was the sexual connection and that was impossible to ignore, but it was more than that, something more that she didn’t have the tools to understand.
From the moment she had laid eyes on Archer Grant, she had belonged to him and she believed wholeheartedly that it was the same for him. There was something there that was stronger than it had any right to be and she wanted to ask him about it, only now there was no getting away. Her words had broken whatever frayed tether kept Vera in check and with a guttural snarl, she reared back.
Her back arched so acutely that it looked to Eloise like it might break and her head snapped back, eyes glowing and mouth open so wide it looked like it had come unhinged. Then, just as quickly, her whole body snapped forward again, hunching in on itself so that it looked contorted and nothing close to human. She was changing, that was what she was doing, she was changing into her wolf form and as soon as that change was complete, she would rip Eloise to shreds.
“No,” she whispered fiercely to herself, hands clenching into balls at her side. It was the last coherent word she got out before her own shift began and the rational side of her mind was pushed aside. She dropped to a crouching position, her neck straining with the work of changing so that all of the veins in her neck popped out like chords.
In only seconds, there were no longer two women facing off and having an argument about a man they were both interested in claiming. Instead there were two magnificent animals, one light and golden hued and one as dark as the night that had completely closed around them.
Without even taking a moment to size each other up, they two of them ran at each other, leaping into the air and crashing into each other before they hit the ground. Both of them were snarling and everything was teeth and claws. When they hit the earth, they landed such that Eloise (or the beast that had once been Eloise) was pinned beneath Vera’s muscular body at such an angle that she could feel the muscles in one side tearing apart like a piece of paper.
She let out a whine of pain, then bit down desperately on the first part of Vera she could get her mouth on. She tore into the wolf’s flesh and felt hot, metallic blood fill her mouth instantly. Vera yelped then twisted her body to get away, only just a fraction of a second too quick for Eloise to stop it from happening.
Her side was burning with a white-hot pain, her breathing coming in ragged gasps that hinted at some kind of real damage having been done. She struggled to her feet, almost incapable of understanding how she had become so badly injured in such a short amount of time, and faced off against Vera again.
The wolf’s fur was matted with blood behind her neck with more of it flowing freely as the seconds ticked by. Eloise lunged, then fell, the muscles around her ribs ripping even further. Vera seized the opportunity and lunged forward herself, taking Eloise’s throat into her mouth and bearing down.
Eloise found that she could not breathe and try as she might, she could not free herself. The world began to gray and she realized that this might really be the end of her, that she might be taken down by one of the werewolves she had chosen to link her life to. Her only consolation in that moment was that she knew she had injured Vera as well, and badly. This was the last thing she thought as she faded out completely. By the time the voices shouting out to stop reached the little part of the woods where she had been felled, she no longer retained any kind of consciousness at all.