Hair of the Dog (11 page)

“God damned bears,” Jack said. He disappeared into the
night.

“Oh. My. God.” Ivy covered her mouth with her fingertips.
“What just happened?”

Grant suspected their assaulter was Adam Griswold. The
driver could have been any one of the bear clan. He’d set the sheriff on them
tomorrow. Now, he wanted to tend to Ivy. The last thing she needed was to be
interviewed by law enforcement. She trembled near the porch.

“I have no idea,” he said.

“W-who’d want to hurt you?”

Grant turned slowly to her. She just didn’t get it. Ivy was
the target. They hadn’t counted on him being with her. “No one.” His words sunk
in, the revelation changing the landscape of her face. “I think I’d better come
in, Ivy.”

She nodded. If she hadn’t been in a state of shock before,
she certainly was now.
Definitely shock
. He’d never seen her so quiet.
Or pale. Her shoulders slumped, eyes drooped, distress painting her face in
tragedy.

Inside, he ran her a warm bath with no objection from her.
He undressed her like a child while she clutched herself and shuddered. Leaving
her to soak, Grant made her a cup of hot tea. For himself he poured a stiff
drink, resting his sore knuckles against the ice-filled glass.

He dragged a dining room chair into the bathroom. “Do you
have a first aid kit?”

She pointed to the mirror above the sink. While she sipped
her tea, he sat and cleaned the cat scratch. She winced in pain, relaxing once
he placed a bandage over the wound.

“What’s in this?” she asked.

“Tea. With a little honey and a splash of whiskey,” he
replied.

She merely nodded.

Wet tendrils of brown hair clung to the back of her neck.
Her nipples peeked out of the cloudy water to tempt him. Despite his complete
sexual satisfaction, seeing her naked got his blood simmering again. Licking
her dry appealed to him immensely. Grant ran his thumb along the red mark he’d
caused on her shoulder. She’d have a nasty bruise tomorrow. He should know
better. Behave better.

“You said we should talk,” she finally said. “Let’s talk.”

“Are you sure?” To him she seemed so fragile, near the
emotional breaking point. And who could blame her, with an attempted abduction
on the heels of the things she’d witnessed at the dance?

“No, Grant,” she said sarcastically. “Let’s just forget
tonight ever happened. Start fresh. No questions asked.”

Aaaand she’s back
. He didn’t know where to begin,
even though he’d rehearsed a story. No, not a story. The story. “Colton Barber
is a shifter.” He paused to let her process the information.

“As are you all,” she said vacantly before lifting the cup
to her lips.

“Y-yes.” That went far easier than he’d anticipated. Grant
expected her to laugh in his face or scream bloody murder. But she’d seen it
firsthand.

He launched into a history lesson filled with persecuted,
misunderstood manimals trying to coexist with humans in a superstitious era.
The same simple, heart-wrenching story filled with intrigue he fed to Mrs.
Beaver’s first grade class every year around Founder’s Day. He found her face
was as unreadable as the first graders’ faces usually were, but he pressed on
with the story.

Finding Mystic Springs should have been the happy ending for
his ancestors. They’d found acceptance with the Native Americans who’d kept
watch over the enchanted spring, some of them shifters themselves. Many of
their mythologies paralleled one another. The Native Americans had anticipated
the arrival of the shifters the same way the shifters had anticipated the
return of Ivy. The same way they’d expected Ivy’s mother before her. It was all
foretold by those few who saw the future.

Together the shifters and the Native Americans formed a
community, integrating their beliefs and customs, going so far as mingling
their languages and mixing their bloodlines. He recounted the lore of an
enchantress coming to save the spring. He held nothing back.

Ivy stared straight ahead. Listening. Quiet. Sipping.
Trembling.

Grant lifted her pruning fingers to his lips. “I don’t want
to alarm you, Ivy.” She didn’t cringe or snatch her hand away, which he found
encouraging.

She scoffed. “You don’t want to alarm me?”

“There’s more to the story.” He released her hand and slid
his chair a couple inches farther away. Why, he wasn’t sure. “Your mother
wandered into town some thirty years ago.”

Her attention slowly turned his direction.

“She’d hitched a ride from wherever it was she was from,” he
continued.

“Wyoming,” she whispered.

“Wyoming. Right.” He cleared his throat. “Like many people,
she was drawn to the spring by a force beyond her control.”

Ivy wrapped her arms protectively around her legs. “Like in
Close
Encounters of the Third Kind
?”

“Exactly. To this day, I remember her. We were all as drawn
to her, as she was to Mystic Springs.” He paused, choosing his words carefully.
“The same way we’re drawn to you. She belonged and thrived. Same as you belong
and thrive.” He didn’t know what had ripped Ivy’s mother from her destiny.
Those in the know had kept the reason hush-hush. Probably something along the
lines of what had just happened to Ivy tonight.

“You lured me here,” she said. “Tricked me. Lied to me.”

“Yes, but you’re doing an excellent job at the resort,”
Grant was quick to say.

Looking straight ahead, avoiding his eyes, she said, “Damn
straight I am.”

He leaned in and took her mug, which dangled precariously
from her fingers. “Do you want more tea?”

Her head slowly swiveled back and forth. “Something
stronger.”

Acknowledging her request with a nod, Grant ventured into
the kitchen for a stiff drink himself and one for her. He didn’t mind the
respite. They each needed a break. Staring out the window into the darkness,
all appeared calm. Jack was out there waiting, watching and guarding unseen.
Perhaps his wolf Brothers were having them both watched. Followed. Grant
quickly downed a shot. The liquid burned a path down his throat to his stomach.

“Do you think my father is here in Mystic Springs?” she
asked from the doorway. Ivy wore nothing but a towel she clutched to her
breasts when he turned to face her.

“Yes. I do.” He knew it. Or counted on it. She had to have
shifter blood running through her veins or their efforts were for naught. The
way her emotions determined the elemental makeup of the spring from day to day
proved her power to him without a doubt. “I wish you’d get dressed before you
catch a cold.”
And before I drag you off to bed again
.

Taking one step closer, she asked, “Do you know who he is?”
Her wide eyes, so hopeful, blinked several times.

“No. I don’t. I’m sorry,” he replied.

There were a few potentials. He doubted she’d want to hear
him utter Dirk Fallon as a potential sperm donor. Plenty of men and beasts
claimed they’d bedded Ivy’s magical mother. Who wouldn’t want to go down in
Mystic Spring’s history as the man to spawn the enchantress destined to save
the spring? Unless she couldn’t fulfill her destiny. Then she’d be the bastard
child of a woman passing through town so long ago. Part of him wanted her to be
the town’s savior. Part of him simply wanted her to be a woman like any other
woman. A woman who could stay in Mystic and accept him for what he was.

Ivy turned and wandered off to the bedroom. Grant trailed
slowly after her. Her calmness shot a ripple of unease through him, as if she
might suddenly do herself harm with the business end of a knitting needle. Not
that he’d seen one lying around.

Leaning against her bedroom doorframe, he said, “You’re
awfully calm about this.”

Her towel dropped to the floor at her feet. His body reacted
with a flash of heat. Grant took in several deep breaths until the fire inside
died down to a controlled burn.

“That’s because I know it’s true.” Ivy pulled an oversized
T-shirt over her head. “You ever see one of those hidden image puzzles?”

Puzzled himself by her question, he replied, “Yeah.”

“You could look at it every day for years and never see the
hidden picture. Once you finally see it, usually because some A-hole points it
out to you, you can’t miss it and you wonder how you didn’t see the damn thing
before.” She crawled into the safety and security of her bed, pulling her knees
to her chin and the covers up around her ears. He’d wanted to be her safe
place. Instead he was the A-hole. Staring at a blank wall, she mumbled, “The
dreams. The blackouts.” Turning to him, she asked, “What are you?”

“What?” Grant pushed away from the doorframe. “Oh. I…uh…a
wolf.” Always proud of his heritage, suddenly he wished like hell he were just
a man like any other. For her. For them.

“The wolf.” Her voice cracked.

He cast his eyes to the floor for a moment. “Yes.”

“At the pool and again at the hot spring.” She looked away.
“I should have known.”

He took a step closer, but thought better of closing the gap
between them. He should leave that to her. “How could you have?” he asked.

“I felt safe and protected and…and loved,” she said
vacantly.

Crossing the room in two strides, Grant eased onto the foot
of the bed. “I do love you, Ivy.”

“Because you think I can piss in your spring or something
and bring it back to life.” Her words were heated. She’d felt accepted by the
community. Now she felt used, he guessed by the tone of her voice and the drawn
appearance of her face. How could he make her see what she meant to him? What
she meant to them all, but mostly him.

“No.” He reached out his hand, palm up, waiting for her to
reciprocate with a touch or a declaration of her feelings for him. She didn’t.
He decided not to push the subject. She’d been through a lot. Maybe too much.
“I love
you
. Magic or no. Wolf or not. I love you.”

“I can’t romp through the woods with you like Molly did.”
Her voice cracked with emotion. “She did, didn’t she?”

Without confirming or denying, he said, “What you and I have
together is not what Molly and I had. Not better or worse, just different.”

Hunkering down beneath her blankets, she turned her back on
him. “I’m tired.”

“Of course you are.” The question was, would sleep make her
come to her senses? And which senses would she come to? With her wits about
her, Ivy might pack her bags and bum a ride back to the bus. “Do you mind if I
sack out on your couch? I’m worried about you.”

He expected her to accuse him of holding her hostage, but
she shrugged and said, “Suit yourself.”

Ivy sat cross-legged in a chair close to the couch where
Grant lay softly snoring, just like her childhood dog Mr. Rags used to do. She
shook the image from her mind. Yes, she’d loved Mr. Rags. Not the same way she
loved Grant.

I love Grant.

She’d already scampered around the cottage making coffee and
noise. But he slept on. They’d had sort of a late night. A weird night. She’d
placed a mug of coffee on the end table hoping the smell would wake him. When
it didn’t, she fanned the coffee scent in his direction.

He sighed and moaned and stirred. Everything but waking up.

Ivy cleared her throat.

His eyes blinked open.

“I thought your kind had keen hearing,” she said. And a
heightened sense of smell. At least that’s what Little Red Riding Hood led her
to think.
Can’t believe everything you read
.

If so, she’d believe he meant to eat her. Well, he had
actually eaten her, thoroughly. Her insides warmed at the memory. What she
meant was if fables were based on fact, she’d be led to believe Grant meant to
harm her. She wondered about others in town. Clearly Bobby Joe was a buck.
Everything about her date with him came together easily like a puzzle with one
missing piece finally found. What was Adam? And Josie. And Jack.

“We do.” He stretched. “I’ve been listening to you bang
around the house for twenty minutes. How did you sleep?”

Raising one eyebrow at him, she said, “Not as well as you,
apparently.”

“I’m sorry if I gave you the impression I slept much at
all.” Grant yawned and stretched and scratched an itch behind his ear. Same as
Mr. Rags.

Leaning close, she said, “I’ve got questions.”
And I want
answers.
She did not want evasion, distractions and double-talk.

He lifted the blanket and patted the couch. “Ask away.”

Without hesitation Ivy nestled into the crook he’d created
against his body as he tucked the blanket around her. “Will…will I turn into a
cat because that little brat scratched me?”

He grinned, but didn’t dare go so far as full-blown
laughter. “No. That’s a myth. I was concerned about an infection. Hence the
antiseptic and antibacterial cream.”

“Dirty little booger picker,” she muttered.

He swept her hair away from her face. “What else,
sweetheart?”

“Is there any possibility that while we’re…you know…doing
it
…I
mean if we ever do
it
again in this lifetime, that you’d…” She swallowed
a lump in her throat. “You know…shift?”

“No.”

“But your eyes last night,” she said. The eyes of a wolf.

Sharp teeth had scraped her skin. A ripple of desire surged
through her at the possibility of his teeth penetrating her skin. A growl not
of this world had rumbled through him last night. His thrusts had pounded her
with superhuman power. But she was not prepared to close her eyes one night in
the heat of desire and open them to find a wolf ravaging her.

“I wouldn’t.” He rubbed her arm tenderly. “I won’t, Ivy. I
promise. Trust me.”

She grimaced. “I’m sorry. That’s a deal breaker.”

His lids closed slowly over his eyes, nodding. “I know.”

Concentrating on her hands twisting in her lap, she asked,
“But you did with her?”Even after his assurances, Ivy worried about living up
to the memory of his first love.

“That’s different.” He tried to reassure and console her
with a gentle caress. But she didn’t want to be placated. Ivy wanted the facts.
“Molly was like me. You can’t compare yourself to her. Please don’t judge what
we
have with what I had with my wife.”

“Because I won’t measure up?” A lump of emotion and
self-doubt welled up in Ivy’s chest.

“Because it’s like trying to measure a tornado with a yard
stick or the entire universe with an eyedropper. It just doesn’t compute, Ivy.”

Taking a deep breath, she began, “Let’s say you accidentally
knocked me up…”

“No, you wouldn’t have a litter of pups.” He laughed and she
joined in.

“How does this work?” She tucked her hair behind her ear.
“How would I go about healing the spring?” She’d spent several sleepless hours
wondering what might be involved.

Grant pushed himself up to sitting. “I’ve been thinking.
After last night, maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea if you did leave town.
Just for a while. I’ll tell everyone you had a family emergency.”

She shook her head. “I’m not going to be run out of town.”

“It’ll just be for a few days, a week at the most,” he said.

“The sooner we fix this thing, the safer I’ll be. Agreed?”
Without giving him a chance to answer, she said, “So what do we do?”

“I think everyone just thought it would heal with you being
here, being near. We all hoped you’d know what to do on instinct or a happy
accident.” He dragged his fingers through his hair. “You came, you saw and you
swam. Not much has changed, though there’ve been temporary fluctuations. I’m no
expert, but we can ask around. Every shifter subculture has their own legend.”

She placed her hand on his bare chest over his heart. “Well,
somebody’s right and somebody’s wrong.” She didn’t want to do the wrong thing.

Covering her hand with his, he said, “They might all be
nothing more than old wives’ tales.”

“I need to tell you something, Grant.”

Squeezing her hand, he said, “Anything.”

“Remember the story about the dart and the map?” The words
tumbled quickly out of her mouth before she could stop them. “The story I told
you the day we met.”

“Sure. It’s called fate.” Grant cupped her cheek with his
free hand. “You were always meant to be here in Mystic. Maybe you were never
supposed to leave at all.”

“What I didn’t tell you was after college I wanted to take
some time off before joining the work force.” She tried to swallow that lump in
her throat.

He laced his fingers with her. “I think I know what happens
next.”

“I threw a dart at a map.” Emotion clogged her throat. She
had to tell the story, whether he knew the ending or not. “A different map. A
different dart. Same result.” Ivy had never before told the story to another
living soul. “The dart landed smack-dab on Mystic Springs.”

He brought her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles.
“All roads lead home, Ivy.”

* * * * *

“That Adam Griswold is officially on my shit list,” Ivy said
with disdain.

Amen to that
. “What did he do now?” Grant asked.
To
know him is to be annoyed by him.
He’d never divulged to Ivy that he
thought it was Adam who’d tried to abduct or kill her. Grant wasn’t sure what
his goal had been.

Together he and Ivy sat around Grant’s dining table, which
resembled a college cram session. A half-eaten pizza rested in the center,
flanked by empty soda cans. Books and papers from the library, along with
copies of statements from elders littered the area. His laptop was on and open,
sending and receiving e-mails regarding any and all fables, myths and folklore.
It was literally going to take a village to solve their dilemma.

“Their legend calls me an evil witch. A witch, of all
things, and they want to defile me and eat my flesh,” she said. “
Defile
me. Eat my flesh.” She tossed the papers in a pile with some others. “That’s a
no-go.”

“I agree.” He flipped through more papers. “The beavers want
to create a totem in your image.”

“Ahhhhhh.” Ivy tilted her head. “That’s nice.”

“They also want to make sweet love to you,” he added.
“Beaver love.” That seemed to be the consensus. Call them all a bunch of horny
manimals, but most shifters wanted to lay her down in or near the spring and stick
it to her in some manner not of her choosing.

“Like who doesn’t?” Ivy rolled her eyes. “Listen to this.
Those deer want to battle it out for me among their strongest bucks, and then
the winner gets to—yuk!”

“What?” he asked ever so hesitantly. Grant wasn’t going to
like the answer. He knew every man in town coveted her, but wasn’t keen on
hearing details.

“Take me in animal form. Gross!” She tossed it on the pile
with the other rejected ideas.

“If we knew who your father was, that might help.” He slapped
the book shut. “We’d let his lore guide us.”

“Unless it involves eating my flesh in a bad way rather than
a good way, bondage or rape,” she read from the pro and con list they were
compiling. “Oh and those fucking fish people can kiss my ass.”

Grant tapped the eraser end of his pencil against his skull.
“You think your mother might tell you who fathered you if you asked her?”
If
she knew.
It was the eighties, after all.

“She never has before.” Ivy drew her knees to her chest and
hugged them to her body. “Of course, who’d believe her if she said she’d
copulated with an eagle or a cougar?”

“Hey, now.” Grant wagged his pencil at her. “Have you
forgotten? You’ve joined the ranks of animal lover.” Even though they hadn’t
made love since the desk incident and she hadn’t said she loved him. Yet. He
sensed she still needed time and space in order to come to terms with the
limitations and demands of loving him. Loving her was easy. Loving him would
challenge everything she believed to be true.

“Right. Right,” she muttered. “People who live in glass
houses.” Ivy took a deep breath and closed her eyes. “Mom did say he was an ass
or jackass. Often. I believe she called him an animal on one occasion and not
in a good way.” Letting out the breath, she added, “Stubborn…pig-headed…”

Her words drowned away as his mind wandered. A part of
Grant’s life would not include Ivy. The part where he ran wild. Ivy would
always be an outsider, although held in a certain amount of esteem. She’d be a
goddess if she could somehow manage to resurrect the spring. But even goddesses
don’t fit in with regular folk. If you could rank the population of Mystic
Springs in with regular folk, that is.

“Arrogant…conceited…know-it-all.” Her shoulders slumped.
“Any of this sounding familiar?”

Yes, actually. Sounded like a few men in town.
He
shook his head. Grant considered every middle-aged man in Mystic, starting with
that dirtbag Dirk Fallon. Atwood. He’d heard Principal Hoag over at the high
school was quite the ladies man in his day. The sheriff. The fire chief. City
Councilman Katz. The possibilities were staggering.

She bolted out of her seat and paced the length of the room.
“Full moon, blue moon, eclipse. Jeez. It’s impossible to know what’s the
magical combination.”

“I know. Summer solstice. All Hallow’s Eve. New Year’s Eve.
We’d be fucking twenty-four-seven, which is fine with me.” He grinned
mischievously and she tossed a pizza crust at him.

Ivy sighed her resignation. “I’ll call my mother. Give it a
shot. I haven’t actually spoken to her since the Christmas fiasco when I swore
I’d never speak to her again as long as she lived.” Holding up her hand, she
said, “Don’t ask. So inquiring about my birth father should be a nice follow-up
to that.”

He sighed. “I’m sorry to put you through this, Ivy.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Rummaging through her purse, she
found her cell phone and flipped it open. “No signal. Big surprise. Mind if I
make a long-distance phone call?”

“No.” He pointed her in the direction of his phone. The
interrupting phone she knew all too well. “Go ahead.”

Grant scanned more research while she made her call. He
hadn’t studied so hard since college. But he had the best study buddy ever. Ivy
even made research fun. Grant eased back into his chair and skimmed some fable
from the dark ages as recalled by an old doe whose grandmother had told her the
story as a bedtime ritual. All the stories were running together in his mind.
He had to keep in mind these were the same stories that often sanctioned the
drinking of blood, eating of hearts and ravaging of enchanted virgins. Most of
that stuff was—well—not going to happen, no matter what.

All he knew was that Ivy was the key element in the
equation. But he’d pack her up and leave Mystic forever before he’d put her in
danger at the hands of some backward-thinking townspeople. Yes, the spring
fluctuated with her moods, but not enough. Her highs weren’t high enough or
long enough to make a difference.

Ivy returned with a sour look on her face. “No answer. I
left a message.”

He waved her over. “No matter the outcome, it’s good you’re
starting a dialogue with your mother.”

Coming closer, she said, “I suppose.” Ivy placed the phone
in the cradle, not stopping until she’d wrapped herself in his embrace.

Grant pulled her to his lap. “Let’s just do it.”

“It? Here?” Her voice hitched with each inquiry. “Now?”

* * * * *

They packed a picnic of cheese, fruit and wine. Legend and
lore be damned. Ivy wasn’t going to stand for a bunch of woodland critters
dancing and chanting and who knew what else on or around her naked person. She
was a human being, after all. Mostly. With a little bit of fairy or enchantress
or witch, if those damn bears were to be believed. The point was, Ivy had
feelings. Some of those feelings involved modesty.

The magical spring had been on her mind and in her dreams
for so long. She wanted to experience the effects of the waters with Grant—as a
human—not as a wolf.

They spread a blanket by the spring. They ate and drank and
tried to forget the pressure of saving the town from an unknown fate. She’d be
more committed to the endeavor if the fate were a bit more concrete, like if
there’d be a meteor strike or volcanic eruption. She wanted to battle the
forces of pure evil and win without messing up her hair or breaking a nail,
which, by the way, had looked fabulous without benefit of a manicure since she
had gotten to town.

Dipping her hand in the water, she asked, “What makes the
water warm?”