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Shanna touched her shoulder. "You're afraid he'll hurt you. That he'll lose control and . . ."
Elsa nodded.
Shanna squeezed her shoulder. "There was a time when I was afraid Roman would lose control and attack me. But I love him, and I've been blessed with a wonderful marriage and two beautiful children. Roman loves me, and he would never hurt me."
Elsa's eyes grew misty with tears. "You think I can trust Howard."
"I know you can. He's a dear, sweet man, who would never hurt you."
Elsa nodded. She'd always felt deep down inside that she could trust him. And in her heart, she wanted to love him. She wanted to grab on to his love and never let go.
"I know it's hard," Shanna whispered. "But with love, sometimes you have to take a leap of faith."
A tear ran down Elsa's cheek. "He said he loves me."
"Then you can believe it. You can trust him."
Elsa nodded. "I'll try." When Howard returned from Alaska, she'd continue to see him. Even though he was a were-bear. Even though it meant she would fall deeper in love with him.
Howard paced across the hotel room as if he could escape reality if he kept moving. Stuck in airports and on planes for the last several hours, he'd thought he would go crazy. His mind had raced, imagining a hundred different scenarios till he'd found one that kept him momentarily sane.
Harry was a smart guy. He would have known about the bomb. And he would have let it explode in order to fake his own death so he could continue the mission in secret. Any minute now, he would contact Howard. They would meet and have a beer like old times, laughing at the way they had fooled Rhett.
Harry hadn't called.
And Howard was the fool. All his damned strategies he'd thought were so clever: they had gotten his best friend killed.
He clenched his fists. The bear inside him wanted to rip the hotel room to shreds. His body shimmered, demanding to shift. For the first time, he understood the power of the berserker blood that flowed through his veins. How easy it would be, how tempting it was, to let himself go berserk and destroy everything in sight.
His hands turned into bear paws with long, lethal claws. What was he doing here? Why stay in Anchorage to attend Harry's memorial service when he should be driving to Rhett's house so he could slaughter every werewolf he could find.
When his cell phone rang, the grating noise jerked him back to his senses. He wasn't a berserker who went on murderous rampages. That was Elsa's greatest fear. He couldn't prove her right. He seized control and forced his hands back into human form.
Meanwhile, the phone had stopped ringing, so he checked the missed call. Dragon Nest Academy. He tossed the phone onto one of the beds and resumed his pacing.
After arriving in Anchorage, he had headed first to the office of Northern Lights Sound Bites. Harry's friends there were devastated. They were holding a public memorial service for Harry the next afternoon. Howard suspected it would be a media circus, that the owner of the small tabloid newspaper was using Harry's death to publicize the paper.
A small group was traveling from the Bear Claw Islands to attend the memorial service and collect the small wooden box containing what they believed to be Harry's ashes. Howard had booked them rooms at the hotel where he was staying. And he had called the school to make sure Phil had arrived to take over his duties.
Ian MacPhie, the Vamp in charge of nighttime security, had answered, and when he'd started expressing his sympathy, Howard had hung up. He didn't deserve sympathy. He deserved a severe beating for getting Harry involved in his stupid plan for revenge. He'd wanted to drive Rhett crazy. He'd driven him to murder.
"Idiot," he called himself. He'd rushed off to Alaska, as if getting here quickly would somehow change the facts and make Harry still alive.
His cell phone rang again. Dragon Nest Academy. "What?" he growled into the phone.
" 'Tis dark there now, aye?" Ian asked.
"I don't want any damned sympathy!" Howard heard his voice echo. They'd put him on a speaker phone. "Dammit, I don't want any company." He started to push the button to finish the call.
"Howard!" Shanna's voice shouted. "Don't hang up!"
"Don't you dare come - " He groaned when two forms materialized. Dougal and Phil.
Then Ian appeared, holding a tote bag and two duffel bags. "All right, ye can hang up now."
Howard grunted and pocketed his phone. "Go away. I didn't invite you here."
"I met Harry," Phil growled. "I'm attending the memorial service."
"I'd like to go, too," Dougal added.
"It's in the afternoon," Howard grumbled.
Dougal sighed. "Verra well." He looked around the hotel room. "Is there a safe place here where I can do my death-sleep?"
Howard snorted. "In the bathtub, but the maid will freak out and call an ambulance."
"Then I'll teleport to yer grandfather's basement," Dougal said. "And take Ian with me."
With a groan, Howard dragged a hand through his hair. "You don't have to stick around."
"Aye, we do," Ian said. "We're part of yer family. Just be grateful the entire school dinna come. They all wanted to." He dropped the duffel bags on the floor. "We packed you some clothes."
"I went through your closet and found a suit," Phil added.
Howard swallowed hard. They were being too damned nice to him, and he didn't deserve it.
Ian opened the tote bag. "I brought some Bleer for Dougal and me."
"I'll take one." Dougal grabbed a bottle.
"And there's a six-pack in here for you and Phil." Ian set the regular beer on a dresser, and Phil opened a can.
"And Shanna packed this for you." Ian passed Howard a box from the bakery in Cranville. "They picked this up after their meeting with Elsa. Shanna reports it went well."
Did that mean Elsa had decided not to reject him? That should have lifted his spirit, but Howard felt strangely numb. He peeked inside the box. Fresh donuts and some cherry streusel. He set the box on the dresser.
"Here." Phil passed him a beer. "What time is the memorial service?"
Howard took a sip. "One."
"We're verra sorry - " Dougal began.
"I don't want to hear it!" Howard slammed his can onto the dresser and paced across the room. "I should have never involved him in my stupid scheme - "
"Bullshit," Phil grumbled.
Howard spun to face him. "I'm telling you it was my fault."
"And I say bullshit," Phil growled.
Howard growled back.
"Och, ye wee beasties," Ian said as he opened a bottle of Bleer. "Take it easy."
"Easy?" Howard shouted. "Harry is dead because of me!"
"Get over yourself," Phil hissed. "Harry was doing exactly what he wanted to do. I was there at the diner when we had lunch. You wanted to keep everything stealthy and secret, right?"
Howard shrugged. "So?"
"It was Harry who insisted on making it public in his paper," Phil insisted. "And you told him to keep it anonymous, but he started putting his name on the reports. He wanted Rhett to know it was him. That was his decision, not yours."
"Aye," Dougal agreed. "Ye canna blame yerself, Howard."
"From what I understand, Harry also had a good reason to hate Rhett," Ian added. "Dinna he lose his father, too?"
Howard raked a hand through his hair. The guys were clearly trying to relieve him of any blame, but he couldn't let himself off the hook. Harry was the one who had stayed in Alaska, while Howard had run off to a safe place. He'd thought his disappearance would keep his family safe, but he'd only succeeded in making Harry the main target of Rhett's vengeance.
"Harry was investigating your fathers' deaths, right?" Phil asked. "He thought Rhett's father killed them?"
"It looks that way." Howard related what Harry had found out.
"So the feud between yer families has been going on for a long time," Ian concluded.
"I guess." Howard drank some beer. "I was only four when my father died, so I don't know the details. It could have been as simple as Rhett wanting the land that my father and Harry's father owned."
Phil nodded. "For a Pack Master like Bleddyn, more land means a bigger pack, which means greater power."
