The Wolf Gift (The Wolf Gift Chronicles 1)

He felt comfortable in his lupine form, sitting there. He felt as comfortable as he ever had in his old skin. He could hear the chirping and singing of the birds outside in the oak trees, hear the prowling things of the deep brush. But he felt no urge to join these creatures, or join their savage realm, to kill or to feast.

They talked only a little, speculating that Reuben had the things that Felix wanted, and that Felix, known far and wide as a gentleman, had not seen it as his prerogative to come into the house and take these things in stealth.

"The meeting means he has good intentions," Laura said, "I,m sure of it. If he meant to raid this house he could have done it before now. If he meant to kill us, well, he could do that anytime."

"Yes, perhaps anytime," said Reuben. "Unless we can defeat him just as we defeated Marrok," he said.

"Defeating one of them is one thing. Defeating all of them is another, isn,t it?"

"We don,t know that they,re all here in one place. We don,t know that they,re all even still alive."

"The letter," Laura said, "the letter belonging to Marrok. You must remember to take that with you."

He nodded. Yes, he would take the letter. He would take the watch. But he mustn,t rehearse what he meant to say in this meeting.

Everything depended on Felix, what Felix said, what Felix did.

The more he thought about it, the more eager he was for the meeting, the more his hopes were now being built upon it, and the more he felt bold and even a little elated that it had come to this.

Desire was building in him now that the night was waning, not desire for the wild, but for the wild within this room.

At last, he came to her, kissing the back of her head, her neck, her shoulders. He wrapped his arms around her and felt her body melt.

"And so you will be my wild man of the forest again as we make love," she said, smiling, her eyes on the fire. He kissed her cheeks, the plumping flesh from her smile. "Will I ever make love to the smooth-faced Reuben Golding, Sunshine Boy, Baby Boy, Little Boy, Boy Wonder - of the world?"

"Hmm, now why would you want him?" he asked. "When you can have me?"

"Here,s my answer to that," she said, opening her mouth to his kisses, to his tongue, to the press of his teeth.

When it was over, he carried her upstairs, which he liked to do, and set her down on the bed.

He stood at the window, because somehow it seemed appropriate to hide his face from her, as he tensed and spoke to the power, and inhaled slowly as if swallowing water from a clear stream. At once the change began.

A thousand fingers were stroking him, plucking ever so softly at every slithering hair on his head, his face, the backs of his arms.

He held up his paws, watching them in the faint light of the night sky as they changed, claws shrinking, vanishing, soft padded flesh turning back into palms.

He flexed his fingers and his toes. The light had dimmed slightly. The forest songs faded to a sweet whispering hum.

Ah, this had been a sweet accomplishment, the power serving him, at his command.

But how often could he make the change? Could it get away from him under the right provocation? Could it fail him utterly, even when he was in extreme danger? How could he know?

Tomorrow, surely, he would confront a man who knew the answers to those questions and countless others. But what exactly would happen at this meeting? What did this man want?

And even more to the point, what was the man willing to give?

Chapter Twenty-Eight

SIMON OLIVER,S OFFICES were on California Street, on the sixth floor of a building with a dazzling view of the surrounding office towers, and the bright blue waters of San Francisco Bay.

Reuben, dressed in a white cashmere turtleneck sweater and his favorite Brooks Brothers double-breasted blazer, was shown into the conference room where the meeting with Felix,s illegitimate son would soon take place.

It was typical of the firm, this room, with its long oval mahogany table and robust Chippendale Cupid,s-bow chairs. He and Simon were seated on one flank of the table, opposite a large uninspired multicolored abstract painting that seemed no more than a glorified decoration for the wall.

Laura was in a small comfortable room nearby with coffee and the morning papers, and a television turned to the news.

Of course Simon went over and over his advice to Reuben. This could well be a fishing expedition on the part of this man, who might at any time offer a DNA test to prove his claim of paternity, and mount a full-scale legal assault on the estate.

"And I must say," said Oliver, "I,ve never much cared for men who wear their hair long, but you do look pretty good with it, Reuben, all things considered. Is this bushy hair some sort of new rustic style? You must drive the young women insane."

Reuben laughed. "I don,t know. I just stopped cutting it," he answered. He knew that his hair was shining clean and thoroughly groomed, so nobody had a right to complain about it. Didn,t matter to him that it was getting pretty long on the back of his neck. He wished the meeting would start.

It seemed an eternity of listening to Simon,s most paranoid speculations until Arthur Hammermill entered and said that Felix had just stopped at the washroom and would be right along.

Hammermill was as old as Simon Oliver, maybe seventy-five. They were both white-haired and gray-suited men, the former a little heavyset with bushy eyebrows, and the latter, a thin man who was beginning to go bald.

Hammermill was gracious to Reuben, warmly clasping his hand.

"It was so kind of you to agree to this meeting," he said with obviously carefully chosen words. He sat down opposite Simon, which left the chair directly opposite Reuben for the mysterious potential heir.

Reuben asked how they,d enjoyed the performance of Don Giovanni, which was an opera he truly loved. He mentioned the Joseph Losey film of it, which he,d seen many times over the years. Arthur was immediately enthusiastic about that and then volunteered how much he,d been enjoying Felix,s company, and that he,d be sad when Felix left again for Europe, which was his intention, this very night. He said those last words with a pointed glance at Simon, who merely studied him gravely without a response.

At last the door opened and Felix Nideck came into the room.

If Reuben had had any lingering doubt that this was Marchent,s uncle - and not his illegitimate son - that doubt was immediately dispelled.

This was the impressive man of the photograph on the library wall - the smiling man amid friends in the tropical jungle; the agreeable mentor of the family from the portrait above Marchent,s desk.

The living breathing Felix Nideck, looking no older than he had twenty years ago. No son could have so perfectly embodied the form and features of the father. And there was about him an unconscious authority and subtle vivacity that marked him off from the other men in the room.