“Give her some time,” he counseled. “Let her see that the wolf is still you.”
If he’d listened, maybe his life would have been different, and so would Joseph’s. But he hadn’t listened; he’d left at a run, knowing that she’d be safe with Joseph. When he came back a year later, he had not been surprised to learn that Joseph and Maggie were married.
“Did you ever think about what might have happened if you hadn’t left that night?” said Joseph.
It didn’t surprise him that Joseph understood what Charles had been thinking about. Dying left a man very close to the whole spirit of the world, and odd things made it through. As long as he didn’t draw Joseph’s attention to it, Joseph wouldn’t even notice.
“Yes,” Charles said.
Joseph laughed. “You ever lie?”
“Not unless lives are on the line,” he told his old friend.
“Yeah, I remember a few of those times,” he agreed. “Now that you mention them.” There was a natural pause. “The stories I’ve heard about you and Anna—they tell me that you’ve learned to fight for what you want.”
Charles let that ride for a moment, trying to frame the truth. “I think I’ve learned what I wanted. Maggie could never have loved Brother Wolf the way we needed her to. In a stupid way, I think that’s why I wanted her so badly.”
“Man, that’s twisted,” said Joseph. “You loved her because she only loved your human half.” He thought a moment. “Is that, like, sibling rivalry? Does that mean you have a ménage à trois now, you old rogue, you?”
Charles found himself smiling. “Maybe à quatre, don’t you think? Anna has a wolf side, too.”
Joseph fell asleep as Charles drove up to the house. He slept while Charles carried him up to the door. Maggie opened it before he needed to worry about how to get through it without waking Joseph up. She followed him silently up to Joseph’s apartment and watched as he tucked Joseph in. The host of medical equipment had been pulled to the side of the room and stood like a grim, silent reminder that this chance to talk with his old friend was a finite thing.
“You don’t sleep in here?” he asked. Because this room was all Joseph.
“He sent me away,” Maggie told him. “Right after the cancer came back. Told me I needed my sleep.” She leaned against the wall and looked at Joseph. “He probably meant it. But the pain makes sleep very hard for him to find; mostly he dozes because he can’t really sleep. I move in my sleep, I always have. He can’t sleep with me in his bed.” She pushed off the wall and walked to the bed.
“You could sleep with him tonight,” he told her. “He’s exhausted, and the pain shouldn’t be too bad.”
“An effect of your magic?” she asked. “It’s good that something could stop the pain.” She looked at Charles. “I know it’s not permanent, but it is hard not to hate you for leaving him alone when you could have helped. He’s been in so much pain.”
He opened his mouth to tell her that it wasn’t his magic. That he had no idea why the spirits had decided to relieve Joseph of his burden for a while. That they probably wouldn’t have helped earlier. But he closed his mouth without speaking. She didn’t need truth. She needed someone to be angry at because anger was easier than pain. He could give her that.
She sat down on the bed and turned her attention to Joseph, who slept like a child.
“Silly old man,” she said, brushing his hair with her hand. “Think a little magic is going to turn back the years? So you can go out and break mustangs and women’s hearts again?”
It can, Charles thought. Because he’d lied to Kage. He could pull Joseph through the Change whether or not his old friend wanted him to. Chelsea had taught him how to do it.
In his heart, he ached more for this man than he ever had for Maggie, and his heart had ached plenty for her.
“What am I going to do with you?” Maggie asked her husband.
Joseph didn’t answer her, and neither did Charles.
“Go away,” she told him finally, her hand on Joseph’s cheek. Just as she had touched him once.
A long time ago.
He left, closing the door carefully, and pretended he didn’t know she was crying.
CHAPTER
6
After putting Joseph to bed, Charles checked in with Anna, who was sitting in the rocking chair in Chelsea’s room working on her current knitting project. Hosteen was in the room, too. Chelsea would need a dominant werewolf around for a while, until they were certain she could control her wolf. The most dangerous time would be when she woke up after the first deep sleep.
“Maggie needed to take a break,” Anna said, looking up at him. “She went up to check on Joseph.” She paused, but he thought it was because she’d done something wrong to her knitting while she was looking at him, because she pulled out a few stitches before continuing.
“She’s up there now,” he told Anna. “He’s sleeping. We tired him out.”
“I told her that he’d come down to the barn,” Anna said. “She wasn’t pleased. We sent Kage away, though. Chelsea’s been showing signs that she might be waking up. Have to get the fragile humans out of the room, just in case.”
“I told Anna that one person watching another sleep was plenty,” said Hosteen. “Maybe you can persuade her.”
“I’m just fine,” said Anna. “I have to get this knitted before Christmas, anyway.”
“It’s February,” said Hosteen.
“Yes, I know,” his Anna deadpanned. “I should have given myself a little more time. Now I have to speed up my knitting to compensate.”
She didn’t want to leave Hosteen alone with Chelsea, thought Charles. He saw Maggie’s touch in this, but Maggie knew Hosteen better than Charles did. If she thought it would be good not to leave the Salt River Alpha alone with Chelsea, she was probably right.
“I need to call Da, anyway,” Charles told Anna. “You stay here and knit. I’ll come back when I’m done.” He didn’t tell her to be careful. His da used her all the time to help wolves who were awaking from that first sleep. She knew the dangers, and she was better equipped, even than Charles or Hosteen, to deal with any trouble.
He kissed Anna on the cheek and headed up to their rooms. His father needed to know how closely Charles had walked the line of the law they all lived by.