The broken she-wolf - Healed by innocence

The last she had

A small warning to grab some tissue for those tears ?

*Blaise*

Following the she-wolf as she walks past the house, I admire more than the gentle sway of her hips. I admire the courage that allows her to put her fears and ugly memories aside to come to my aid last night.

More than that, she has overlooked what she knows of my past. I haven’t received such a fine gift in a good while. Little wonder I wept in her bed. She possesses a heart that is as pure as the gold of her eyes.

Hell, once I find the man who has stolen five years of my life, maybe I will search for the man who killed her family and see him brought to justice.

She comes to a halt and flings her arm toward the garden. “Your chore.”

The chore turns out to be no chore at all: plucking red ripe strawberries from her garden and placing them gently in the bucket so they won’t bruise. She has told me that she can’t abide the fruit when it's bruised. Based on the fact that she has devoted over half her garden to growing strawberries, I figure she has a fondness for them.

Near dusk, she sets a quilt beneath a tree and brings out two large bowls. One is filled with washed strawberries. The other with sugar.

She plops onto the quilt, takes a strawberry out of the bowl, rolls it around in the sugar, and pops it into her mouth. She closes her eyes and releases a low throaty moan that makes me want to groan.

Against my better judgment, I stretch out on the quilt beside her and raise up on an elbow. She opens her eyes and smiles at me. “There is nothing finer than the first strawberry in spring.”

I disagree. I could name a hundred things: her smile, her sun-kissed cheeks, the strands of her hair that have escaped her braid and framed her face like the petals of a dandelion. As a boy, I had often taken a deep breath before blasting the dandelion petals onto the breeze. Right now, I want to blow softly, gently, my breath as quiet as a whisper while it fans across the nape of her neck.

Digger barrels around the corner of the house. Lillian grabs a strawberry and tosses it into the air. The dog leaps up, his jaws clamping around the ripe fruit. The animal hits the ground and rolls over. Lillian laughs joyfully, reminding me of the first time I had placed a bow on the strings of a violin. The music had sounded just as sweet because it had been unexpected: something I had created. I find myself wishing I’d been the one to make Lillian laugh. Not the silly dog.

“Help yourself to the strawberries,” she says as she tosses another one to the dog before taking one for herself.

I bring a strawberry to my lips and bite into the succulent fruit. The sweetness fills my mouth. It doesn’t need sugar. It amuses me to watch Lillian carefully coat each strawberry with sugar before she eats it. I grow warm as her tongue darts out to slowly, meticulously capture each errant grain of sugar that clings to her lips. I imagine her kiss would taste of strawberries and sugar.

I have been too long without a she-wolf, and I'm having one hell of a time taming my thoughts. Watching the wind whip strands of her hair around her face, I want to play with it as well. I want to touch her rounded cheeks with my fingers and the upturned tip of her nose with my lips. I have known too few she-wolves in my life, and even though one tore out my heart and shredded it to pieces, I can’t bring myself to hate she-wolves.

I figure she-wolves are like men. Some good. Some bad. Some fickle. I latched onto a fickle one the first time and it cost me dearly. But in spite of the steep price I have paid, I can’t see myself spending my remaining days without the comfort of a she-wolf. Once I ha e cleared my name, I will take a mate. I want what my older brothers have. Neither gained their mates without paying a price.

The comforting silence eases in around us as the shadows lengthen. The dog lopes to the edge of the clearing, barks, and races back to catch another strawberry. I'm beginning to doubt the dog’s ability to protect Lillian. Other than last evening when the dog growled at me, I have seen no signs of aggressiveness. The dog reminds me of an overgrown puppy.

“Why are you out here, Miss Greenmedow?” I ask.

She jerks her head around to stare at me. “I like watching the sunset, I enjoy eating strawberries.”

“No. I mean why do you live out here alone? Why not move into town? I can’t see that this is a working farm. What keeps you here?” I ask.

“Memories. We were happy here. I guess I feel that if I left, I would be abandoning my family.” She says softly.

In the distance, I see a white picket fence surrounding three granite headstones. “How old were you?”

“Seventeen. How old were you when you went to prison?” She asks.

“Twenty-one.” I mumble.

She gives me a sad smile. “That sounds so young.”

“Not as young as seventeen.” I point out.

She digs another strawberry into the sugar. “You mentioned a brother . . .”

I nod. "Wade, my father wanted to name him Houston but mom put her foot down."

Her eyes widen as she bites into the strawberry. She laughs as the red juice dribbles down her chin. I clench my hands to stop my fingers from gathering the juice and carrying it back to her lips, or better yet to my own. She wipes her face with her apron. "Another town?"

"Yep. My parents lived there for a while." I explain.

"Have you been to Houston?" She asks.

I shake my head, "Nah, they lived there before I was born."

She sighs wistfully and gazes toward the trees. "I used to dream of traveling the world and looking at the stars from different cities." She shifts her gaze to me. "Do you think the stars look different on the other side of the world?"

"I don’t know. Never thought about it. Never dreamed that big." I admit.

"What did you dream of?" She asks.

Marrying Olivia. Raising a family. But before that... a distant memory flickers at the back of my mind of standing at the edge of a gorge, yelling out my dream... and listening as the echo carried it back to me. Then the memory dies like a flame snuffed out because there wasn’t enough air to keep it burning. "I don’t recall."

"My father used to tell me that I had to put my heart into my dream if I wanted it to come true. How do you put your heart into something?"

I haven’t a clue. I have watched my brothers pour their hearts into the she-wolves they love, I thought I had done the same with Olivia, but if I had, she would have waited for me. I'm convinced of that. Whatever our love had been, it hadn’t been strong enough to endure separation, and I can’t help but wonder what else it might not have endured.

The dog comes charging back from the edge of twilight, drops low to the ground, and growls, baring his teeth. Worry etches over her face, Lillian rises to her knees. "Digger, what is it?"

The dog barks and bounds back for the trees, disappearing in the brush. A high-pitched shriek rents the air.

"Bobcat!" Lillian cries as she jumps to her feet. "Digger!"

The dog barks and the ear-splitting feline cry comes again, followed by a yelp echoing pain.

"No!" Lillian yells as she begins running toward the trees.

I surge to my feet, run after her, and grab her arm, halting her frantic race to the trees. "Where's my rifle?"

"In the corner of the front room, by the hearth." She says.

"Come with me while I get it." I tell her.

She shakes her head vigorously. "I will wait here but hurry."

I don't trust her to stay, but I hear the dog's wounded cry, the cat's victorious screech, and know I have no time to argue. With my heart thundering, I race inside the house. I grab my rifle, load it, and shove a handful of bullets into my pocket. Then I tear back outside, round the corner, and stagger to a stop in the clearing.

The damned she-wolf is gone!

"Lillian!" Fear for her edges any rational thoughts aside. I stalk toward the trees where the dog had disappeared. "Lillian!"

I no longer hear the thrashing of battle. An eerie silence settles over the woods. I tread carefully between the trees, my heart hammering. When I find her, I plan to shake her every way but loose for scaring the holy hell out of me. How dare she risk her life for a silly dog.

I find her kneeling between two mighty oak trees, rocking back and forth, silent tears streaming down her cheeks, her arms wrapped around her dog. I kneel beside her. "Lillian?"

She opens her eyes, the golden depths revealing her ravaged grief. "He was all I had left," she whispers hoarsely. "He was just a dog, but I loved him."

"I know," I say quietly. "You take the rifle and I will carry him to the house."

"Let me hold him for just a minute... while he's still warm." She mumbles.

She buries her face in Digger's thick fur. I scan the trees, my ears alert. I don't like the thought of Lillian living out here alone with wild animals. The deer I don't mind, but a bobcat is another story.

Gently, I touch Lillian's shoulder. "We need to get back before it's too dark."

She lifts her head, sniffed, and nods. Blood has stained the front of her dress and panic surges through me. "You're hurt."

She glances down before lifting a vacant gaze to mine. "No, it's Digger's blood. The cat was gone by the time I got here."

"You should have stayed by the house like I told you." I tell her.

"I was worried about Digger. He never backs… backed away from a fight." She says.

I sigh, "Dear Goddess, your mother was right. You put a dog before yourself…"

"I would put anyone, anything I loved before myself. I don’t see that as a fault." She huffs.

I didn't mean to sound harsh, didn't want to lecture her, but the thought that she might have been the cat's next victim has me shaking clear down to my boots. "Take the rifle."

She grabs it, and I slip my arms beneath the dog. I ignore the pain shooting through my back as I strain to lift the heavy body. With the darkness closing in around us, we walk in silence to the house, my boots breaking dried twigs, her feet scattering the fragile leaves that had died last autumn.

"Will you bury him near the garden? That’s where he liked to dig," she says quietly as we near the house.

"Sure will. You got a shovel?" I ask.

She nods, "In the barn."

"I will get it. Why don't you go inside and wash up?" I tell her.

Nodding, she leans over and presses a kiss to the top of the dog's head. "Bye, Digger."

I watch her run to the front of the house, leaving me feeling useless. Giving comfort had never been my strong suit, was something I hadn't even known existed until Briony had come into our lives.

I lay the dog on the ground. I walk to the quilt where I had shared a few peaceful moments with Lillian.

In her rush to get to the dog, she had knocked over the bowl, spilling sugar over the quilt. Ants are having a picnic. I pick up the bowl and shake out the rest of the sugar, wishing I knew how to ease Lillian’s grief as easily.

Then I take the quilt, carefully wrapping the old dog in it, before laying him to rest.