The Werewolf's Wife

He flashed her a glance, but couldn’t find a joking smirk on her face. “I thought you were centuries old.”

“I was born in 1550.”

“So shouldn’t you know more? Like how one lone wolf and a trigger-happy witch could never stand against an entire pack. Especially if they are holding the blood sport. You have to know how the wolves get worked up during a match. The scent of vampire blood excites them and jacks up their adrenaline. They think with their beast brain as opposed to their were minds. They will tear any outsider limb from limb.”

He slowed and Abigail leaned over to check the speedometer. “What are you doing? We’re on the clock!”

“We need to think this through more. A plan is in order. I’m going to take the next exit.”

“No! We don’t have time to think. Forty-eight hours, Ridge. More like forty-six now with this damned traffic. My son is in danger.”

“Did the caller indicate he was in danger?”

“He’s been kidnapped. What part of kidnapped does not entail danger to you?”

“You said they were keeping him in protective custody. Sounds kind of … protective to me.”

“I can’t believe you’re being this stupid.”

Yeah, him, either. The boy was in danger if some unknown had taken him from his mother’s care. But he needed facts, information—more than a wild goose chase—to better understand the situation and come up with a plan. He did not like reacting.

“Tell me about him.” He resumed speed, catching up with traffic, thinking if he could get more information from her, she may begin to trust him more, and then he could talk her out of this insane mission, at least until a workable plan had been solidified. “I didn’t know you had a son.”

“His name is Ryan and he attends boarding school in Switzerland. That’s all you need to know.”

“Fine.”

Boarding school? He’d never understood a mother who could send her child away for months at a time. It was wrong. Children needed parents to thrive. And for protection. But who was he to judge? His opinion had no bearing right now. Abigail was a lioness out to protect her stolen cub. He should not stand in her way.

“Does the Council know you have a kid?”

He caught her gaze and she quickly looked out the window. Well hell, he couldn’t prevent curiosity. She was known to have a wicked reputation. Motherly and protective were the last two words that came to his mind.

“I think Ravin Crosse—one of the witches on the Council—is aware,” she offered, “but no one else knows. It’s no one’s business but my own. If I want to protect my family by keeping it a secret, that’s my right. You know it isn’t easy surviving in a world meant more for mortals than us.”

“Is he a witch?”

“It’s rare that magic is passed on to a son. That’s something I won’t know until he hits puberty.”

“Which is when?”

She huffed and gave him her silence.

“Sorry. I won’t ask about him again. Kids are miracles. You’re lucky to be a mother.”

It changed his mind a bit about Abigail to know she was a mother, and further, to know she so fiercely protected her own. He’d heard the rumors about her, that she was quick to judgment and the first in line to administer punishment at the Council’s beckon. Rumor told she’d had a crazy love thing going with a vampire once, too, but he wasn’t clear on that. What mattered was now she was clearly putting her child’s interests in front of her own.

He’d do the same in her position. If he had a son, and someone threatened him, Ridge would show no mercy and take no prisoners. Forget the plan, he’d react without remorse. Let the bloody kidnappers beware his paternal wrath.

“So I’m surprised you didn’t come to me sooner,” she suddenly said. The cool darkness of the truck was intermittently lit from the glow of red taillights passing by. “It’s been a long time. Figured you’d had a blackout and totally erased all memory of Vegas from your brain.”

“Close.” But he had never forgotten her sweet coconut scent or the softness of her skin. Never.

“So why now? It’s been over a decade. You haven’t found someone you wanted to marry until now?”

“What makes you think there’s someone I want to marry?”

“Why else would you bother with a divorce from a marriage you’d forgotten, and so quickly?”

“Just want to clear away a past indiscretion and smooth the path for when the time does arrive that I want to marry. And I’ve never forgotten this marriage, just … tucked it away into a dark little corner of my mind.”

“Yeah, a dark place,” she said absently. Then, seeming to lift from the mysterious dark place, she asked, “So you don’t have a girlfriend?”

“Not at the moment.”

“You’ll marry a werewolf,” she stated.

He clenched his fingers about the steering wheel. She had the aggravating manner of assuming her opinion was right.

He wasn’t sure who or what breed he’d marry. Just because he was a wolf didn’t mean he had to marry one. Though, a female wolf would be his ultimate match. Only a wolf could understand another wolf. There weren’t a lot of females in the area, due to rampant hunting of werewolves by vampires in the mid-twentieth century, but their numbers were slowly increasing thanks to the packs’ fierce protection of the valued females. Yet still, to find a female wolf and fall in love was like laying claim to a treasure that must be hoarded and prized. Lottery odds, that. He’d dated a werewolf once—unsuccessfully.

Last year when Amandus Masterson had still been the pack principal, he’d offered his daughter Blu’s hand to Ridge in marriage as a means to forgo her marrying the vampire Creed Saint-Pierre. Ridge had been honored for but the moment it had taken him to hate the principal even more. He’d been shocked the father could so easily pawn off his daughter on the first wolf he’d hoped would serve to his advantage. Ridge had refused, and Amandus had then offered Blu to the next wolf to walk near him, an idiot underling.

Fortunately Blu, at the Council’s insistence, had married Creed, and the match had surprisingly turned into the proverbial heaven-made pairing. The werewolf princess and the ancient warrior vampire, Creed Saint-Pierre, had quickly fallen in love, and Ridge could see the glow of love on Blu’s face every time she visited the compound.

He was glad Blu still visited. He regarded her as a friend, and she him. It had been difficult for her, growing up in the pack compound without her mother. Persia Masterson had suffered greatly at her husband’s hand. Blu had always believed her mother had run away when she was young, never to be seen again.

Ridge had done his best to protect Persia, but he’d been young as well, and a wolf could take only so many beatings. Blu knew it had been his talon that had murdered her father, and she did not hold him responsible for committing an act she had later told him was just and necessary.

There were days he blamed himself. It was your fault. At the time, he’d taken out the one man who had meant to bring down the pack by continuing to partake in the blood sport and wage war against the local vampires. But if he’d been more sensible, probably he could have found a less violent way to take care of Amandus Masterson.

Probably not. The old wolf had possessed a mean streak a mile deep. No one knew that better than his deceased wife, Persia. Masterson had treated her worse than a dog, and he’d tormented Ridge all his life. And he’d thought nothing of creating the largest blood sport complex in the state. The old man had been bad to the bone.

“You’re suddenly quiet,” Abigail commented. “Thinking about the werewolf you hope to someday marry?”

If only his thoughts could touch something so light and hopeful.

“I will marry for love, not because she’s my breed.”

“So you would marry a mortal?”

“I didn’t say that.”

A mortal and a werewolf presented a sticky situation. Because the only way to bond with his mate involved him having sex with her under the full moon—in werewolf form—and mortals generally freaked whenever he wolfed out and proudly wore fur, talons and a toothy maw.

“Severo and Belladonna are making it work,” she commented.

“Yes, but she wasn’t mortal for long. She’s vampire now.”