Chapter 22: The Line in the Yard

Behind me, on the steel table, Mirabel made a small sound and went still.

"Stay with her," I told Lucille.

"Gen."

"Stay with her. And put that book somewhere he won't think of."

Lucille took the ledger out of the handbag and shoved it down the front of her robe.

"He won't think of here," she said.

I walked out into the yard.

Stellan walked beside me.

He wasn't Alpha anymore.

He didn't walk any differently.

We stopped halfway between the barn and the line of trucks.

The wind was cold and smelled of hay and diesel and twelve strange wolves.

Boyd stood in front of his Ford with his thumbs hooked in his belt, beside the big silver buckle.

"Doc," he said warmly. "Stellan. You're looking well, son."

"You'd know," Stellan said. "You've had a good look at my chest."

Boyd laughed.

"My girl's been poorly," he said. "Some kind of stomach bug. She's not in her right mind. Wandered off in the night with no coat."

"She walked a mile on a county road in the dark," I said. "In silk. Because she was afraid to be in your house."

"Women get notions when they're sick."

"She's my patient."

"She's my daughter."

"She's twenty-eight. She walked in here and asked for help. She stays till I discharge her."

Boyd's smile stayed exactly where it was.

His eyes didn't.

"You're out of the valley, Doc. Exiled. You don't get to discharge anybody."

"This isn't the valley," Stellan said. "It's my land. Bought with my own money, a mile past your line."

He lifted his chin at the six rifles.

"Your Council doesn't reach this yard. Neither does your law. Neither do those."

"Funny," Boyd said. "Looks like they reach just fine from here."

One of his wolves worked the bolt on his rifle.

The sound went across the yard.

Behind me, the farmhouse door opened.

The old trucker came out first.

He came down the porch steps in his undershirt and work boots and walked out into the yard and stood next to me.

He didn't say anything.

Then the two motel sisters came out, still in their bathrobes, and stood beside him.

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