The Wolf Who Saved Me Makes Other Alphas Submit. I'm Human. novel · Chapter 2 of 48

Chapter 2: The Empty Bed

Anselm's file is gone and Hearthside says he was discharged, until Ronan walks in and a whole building of wolves goes silent.

I drove to Hearthside Lodge at ten that morning in a rental car the size of a lunchbox.

Joanne had told me not to go alone.

I told her I'd go as a caseworker with a badge and a clipboard, and the clipboard would be doing most of the work.

Hearthside was a long cedar building at the end of a gravel road, with rocking chairs on the porch.

A banner over the door said WE TREAT YOUR FAMILY LIKE OURS.

The black pickup was parked at the side of the lot.

Its left headlight was cracked in a star, and the glass was fresh.

I took a photo of it and then a photo of the plate.

The first four letters matched the ones I'd copied onto my phone.

Inside, the front desk had a bowl of butterscotch candies and a nurse who smiled too long when she saw my lanyard.

"I'm here to see Anselm Fry," I said.

"Oh, honey, he's gone. His family came for him on Saturday."

"His family."

"A nephew. Very sweet."

"Mr. Fry's records list no living relatives. I wrote them myself."

"I'm sure it's just a paperwork thing," the nurse said.

"Then I'll look at his room and the paperwork can catch up."

Dewitt came out of the office behind her before she could answer.

He had his hand out and his face full of regret.

"Mara. Thank God you're all right, I heard about the accident. Joanne called me Saturday. You should be in bed."

"I'm fine. I'd like to see Mr. Fry's room."

"Of course. Of course. I'll walk you down."

He walked me down the east hall with his hand hovering near my back, not touching it.

The room was clean and empty, with a stripped mattress and a window painted shut.

"I'm as upset as you are," Dewitt said. "He seemed like he was doing better. I thought a family placement might help."

"A nephew he didn't have."

"People find relatives, Mara."

I looked at the floor beside the bed.

There was a pale mark on the boards where something heavy had stood.

A ring of old stains circled it, and the brown was the brown of dried wolfsbane tonic.

We find it in every raid.

"Mr. Faulk," I said, "I'd like to see the east wing's locked rooms."

"We don't have locked rooms."

"The wing has a door at the far end with a keypad."

"That's a storeroom."

"Then open it."

"I'd love to, but it's a matter of liability, and my lawyer would have my hide."

He said it with a warm laugh, and not one single muscle in his face moved with it.

I felt, very plainly, that I had made a mistake in coming without Joanne.

A shadow crossed the doorway.

Then the whole building stopped.

The nurse's radio kept playing.

Down the hall a cart stopped rolling, and a spoon stopped clinking in a bowl.

Dewitt's smile came off his face.

I turned around.

Ronan stood in the doorway in a canvas coat, taller than the frame.

He had the scar through his eyebrow, and his green eyes went over the room once.

He wasn't looking at me.

"Faulk," he said.

It was a quiet voice.

Dewitt Faulk, the Alpha who owned the building, lowered his eyes to the floor.

Behind him the nurse took a step back and put her back to the wall.

I heard somebody in the next room whimper.

"Draycott," Dewitt said. He had to clear his throat to do it. "I didn't know you were coming. This is private business."

"It isn't."

"She's a human on a case, she doesn't understand the rules of your side of the valley."

"She understands them well enough," Ronan said. "She carries my blood."

Nobody had told me that.

Nobody had told me it was a thing you could carry.

I opened my mouth, and Ronan put out one hand, palm down, without turning his head.

"Mara," he said. "Not yet."

I wanted to tell him I'd answer to my own name when I felt like it.

I also, strangely, wanted to be quiet.

"I came for the old man," Ronan said to Dewitt. "Where is he?"

"He was discharged."

"To whom?"

"His family."

"Don't lie in my face," Ronan said. His voice didn't rise. "You'll regret it."

Dewitt's jaw worked. The skin on his neck had gone dark red.

Ronan took one step into the room, and every person in the building seemed to lean away from him except me.

I was standing in the middle of it with a clipboard.

"Open the east wing," I said.

I don't know why I said it right then.

Maybe because every single face in that hall was looking at the floor, and it made me angry.

"Open it. Now."

The nurse at the wall gave a little jerk.

Dewitt looked up, directly at me, and for one second he looked afraid.

Then he dropped his eyes again, to my shoes this time.

"Of course," he said, very softly. "Of course, Ms. Linwood."

It was the first time he'd ever used my last name.

Beside me, Ronan went completely still.

When I looked up at him, he was staring at me with an expression I couldn't read at all.

It wasn't pride, and it was nowhere near approval.

It was the face of a man who had just heard a floorboard crack under his own feet.

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