Dreaming of the Wolf

Page 48

“She’s sick,” Jake said.
“Pregnant with triplets,” Detective Connelly said urgently, looking as though he was afraid she’d expire on the spot.
Sanderson looked at him as if the guy couldn’t be that naive.
“If she were to miscarry,” Jake said with dark promise, “every media source would hear about it.”
For the longest time, Jake and Sanderson measured each other with steely gazes in a showdown of wills. Then Sanderson said, “All right. Get your lawyer. You’ve got twenty-four hours. Just let us know where you’re staying until then.”
Jake took Alicia’s arm and started to lead her to the door.
“Who’s her doctor, by the way?” Detective Sanderson asked. “Just in case we need to get in touch with him.” He gave a sardonic smile.
“Dr. Weber can fax you a copy of her pregnancy test, if you need it,” Jake said sharply, then walked her out the door as Tom and Peter followed close behind.
“What’s wrong, Alicia?” Jake asked, as he took her out of the building and toward the SUV.
“The smells in there were overwhelming. And the memories. I’m so sorry, but I had to get away. The wolf senses felt as though they were crushing me. I just couldn’t think straight.”
“Sanderson’s a real bastard,” Tom said. “I could smell that Massaro had died on that couch where he was sitting, the location where he had motioned for you to sit initially.”
“Same ploy I would have used as a detective,” Peter said. “Rattle the witness. Secure any kind of statement that would help me to solve my case.”
Alicia cast him an annoyed look, but as green around the gills as she felt, she doubted her look was as annoyed as she wished to appear. “I don’t believe you could be that mean.”
He gave her a small smile. “Only with a nonwolf type who was involved up to her hairline. In your case, no, I wouldn’t have stooped so low. But then, I wouldn’t have needed to.”
She raised her brows at him in question.
“I’m not out to solve this crime for the city of Denver, but to solve this crime so we can go after the killers themselves and stop them from getting to you.”
She sighed and reached over to squeeze his arm. “Thanks, Peter. I didn’t mean to say you were like Sanderson. You’ve been nothing but kind to me.”
“It’s been my pleasure, ma’am.”
“What do we do now?” Tom asked. “We have no idea who might be a wolf lawyer who could represent us the way we need him to.”
Alicia noted that Jake was awfully quiet as he opened the SUV door for her. He cleared his throat. “I know a lawyer.”
Both Tom and Peter looked surprised. Alicia wondered if the man didn’t like newly turned wolves. Why else would Jake seem so reluctant to mention him?
“Who?” Tom asked.
“Sherry Slate.”
The only reason he could be reluctant about mentioning the woman was because she’d meant something to Jake. An awkward silence stretched between them.
Finally, Jake closed the door and looked at Tom, who was staring at him with incredulity. Alicia guessed Jake must have been seeing some women without his family knowing it. Peter looked just as surprised.
When he got in the SUV, Jake said to Tom, “Take us to Hill and Sanders. It’s a law firm.”
Peter set the GPS, and they were off.
Everything was so quiet in the vehicle that Alicia could hear everyone’s heartbeats. She finally took Jake’s arm and draped it over her, snuggling close to him as he tightened his arm around her. If she understood the ways of the werewolves, she knew he couldn’t have been seriously involved with Sherry. They didn’t have any sexual intimacy unless they planned to mate for life. Still, maybe this Sherry had expected something more of the relationship. And now instead of being Alicia’s advocate, Sherry could seal her fate.
But she couldn’t, could she? As werewolves, wouldn’t doing something like that hurt all of their kind?
She relaxed a little as Jake’s hand caressed her shoulder. She didn’t question him about the woman, figuring he didn’t want to talk about her in front of Tom and Peter. But then he must have decided it was more important to get this out in the open before they met with the woman.
“We’ve seen each other a couple of times. Lelandi had talked me into coming here first to drop off some of my photographs at one of the art galleries, as you recall.” He was speaking to Tom and Peter. “Sherry collects modern art. I was here alone, not knowing anyone. She was a wolf.” Jake shrugged. “We had lunch. Took in a movie.”
“Drive-in?” Alicia asked, hating that she sounded so suspicious.
He chuckled. “No. Nothing happened between us. She’s very much in charge and loves her job, her life here in the city, and her pack. She wouldn’t have ever considered moving to a small place like Silver Town. There was never any spark between us. It was just a mutual friendship.”
So why had Jake been reluctant to mention her to anyone?
“She thought it was more than that?” Alicia asked.
“Let’s say she wanted more than that. But her fascination with me was more that I was someone new, an alpha, a challenge. I let her know I wasn’t interested in anything more than friendship. She didn’t like being turned down. I felt it was akin to her losing a case.”
“You don’t happen to know any male attorneys who could help me out, do you?” Alicia asked wistfully.
“She knows her role in our society. Protect the wolf kind. She won’t do anything to get you into any kind of trouble.”
At least not more than Alicia was already. Wait until Sherry Slate learned Alicia was pregnant with Jake’s triplets!
***
As soon as Jake called Sherry, she cleared her schedule for the afternoon, but when he told her what it was about, he could tell she was ready to rethink her afternoon plans.
“She needs your help,” Jake said, pleading. Hell, Sherry was a professional. He wanted to tell her to act like it. “Unless you know another lawyer in the Denver area that might be able to help her.” Like one of Sherry’s partners, if any were werewolf types and had the time.
He swore he could hear Sherry’s spine stiffening. He imagined she did not easily give up difficult cases.
“I’ll speak with her.” Sherry’s tone was clipped.
Jake was afraid Alicia was in for an even rougher time of it. But they didn’t have a whole lot of choice.
When they arrived at the office, Jake assumed from the waiting room that the law firm was doing well. The luxurious seating was on leather couches and chairs, much more ostentatious than at the law offices in Silver Town. A pretty receptionist sat at the counter, with blond hair in curls down to her shoulders and bright green eyes. She smiled at Jake and Tom, raised her brow at Peter, undoubtedly because he was wearing his uniform, and gave a cursory glance in Alicia’s direction.
The first thing Jake noticed about her was her feminine wolf smell. Plus a number of wolf scents had been left in the reception area. Just the place Alicia needed to be, among their own kind where they would protect her with whatever they could.
“You’re here to see Ms. Slate? She’ll be out in just a moment. If you’d like to take a seat…” The receptionist motioned to the chairs.
Jake sat with Alicia on one of the couches while Peter and Tom took seats in nearby chairs. And then they waited. And waited. And waited.
After half an hour, Jake rose and walked over to the counter. “Maybe there’s someone else who has more time and could see us?”
The woman glanced back at the door that led to the offices down the hall. “Let me check with Ms. Slate and see if that’s acceptable.” She punched in some numbers and said, “Ms. Slate, Mr. Jake Silver was asking if it would be much longer.”
He was amused the receptionist didn’t tell Sherry that he would seek another lawyer in her place if she didn’t get her butt in gear.
“I’ll be there,” Sherry snapped over the phone.
Jake was afraid the animosity in her voice spelled more trouble for Alicia.
After a few more minutes, Sherry walked into the reception area, looking professional and long-legged and wearing an expensive-looking black skirt and jacket and black high-heeled shoes. A smile was pasted on her face for Jake. She took hold of his hand and held on as if momentarily claiming him and said, “So good of you to see me again.” Then she glanced at Tom and her smile broadened.
Someone new to switch her attention to?
Her gaze slid to Peter, her smile never changing, and then she shifted her attention to the object of her annoyance, no doubt.
“Miss Greiston, I presume,” Sherry said with chilly politeness, her smile instantly fading. She looked Alicia over as if trying to figure out why Jake had picked her over herself. “Come on back to my office, if you would.”
Jake took Alicia’s ice-cold hand and followed Sherry, who he swore swayed her hips more than she’d done the last couple of times he’d seen her. In fact, his impression of her had always been one of professional detachment, as if she was trying to maintain a businesswoman’s appearance no matter where she was or what she was doing.
In sharp contrast, Alicia wore a robin’s egg blue skirt that softly swirled below her knees with her every step and a matching top of some kind of silky fabric that he enjoyed touching and sliding his fingers over. She wore heels, but not as high as Sherry’s, and they were strappy, sexy, and much more appealing. And while Sherry’s hair was pulled back in a severe twist of curls at the back of her head, Alicia’s softly caressed her shoulders in an inviting way. Sherry was elegant in a professional way, while Alicia was enticing in a feminine way.
When they reached Sherry’s office, she motioned to a chair in front of her desk and Alicia took the seat as Jake sat beside her.
“Well, as you probably know, Jake filled me in on your story. Quite a tale,” Sherry said, with a biting edge to her words as she took a seat behind her desk.