AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You’d be sentencing her to life in prison,” Ryder said, sorrowfully. “She’d rather die, Benny. Do you think I haven’t thought about it? That Dad hasn’t? Probably even Titus here has. She’s a very special woman. But she’s human. She’s Colville. And that’s all she wants to be. We can’t take that from her. It’s selfish to think of it. It would be cruel.”
Benny stared at them. He took a deep breath and nodded. “You’re right,” he managed to say. “But it’s hard.”
“It’s the life she’s built and the life she wants,” Ryder responded. “And to take that from her says those things don’t matter. They do matter. They’re important. She went on to counsel students for another 30 years after that conversation, Benny! Think of all the people she mattered to, who wouldn’t have had her. Think of all the projects she’s managed, the flowers she’s grown even. She’s had a full life, made just to her liking.”
Benny could see tears in Ryder’s eyes, but he wasn’t backing down. Naomi had a right to the life she’d chosen, to the life she’d built for herself. She had a right to the sense of accomplishment for all the things she’d done — and to snatch her out of that was to say none of it was worth anything.
That’s what they had done to the women in the serum project, he realized, appalled. Stefan had searched for women who didn’t have strong family ties — although he’d blown even that on a number of women, especially in the last cohort —women he thought wouldn’t be missed, arrogantly dismissing all of their accomplishments, all of the lives they’d built. Dismissing all of that as if it was no account, compared to what he needed — subjects for a research project. He dismissed all that they had, and figured if they lived, they’d have health and long life as compensation.
But how many of the women were like Naomi? Women who did have lives that they loved. Women like Olivia and her books. Or Karen Shumate and her family construction business. Stefan — all of them — had callously said none of those things were worth anything.
And damn it, Benny was no better. He’d dismissed their lives as if they didn’t really matter. A blind spot he’d carried into Margarite’s house, he admitted painfully. Had he really understood what Chen had taken from those women?
“You’re right,” he mumbled at Ryder. “Hard as it is, I know you are.” He tried a smile, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “I need to get on my way. Catch you on the next trip down I-5?”
“You know it,” Ryder replied, but his expression was shrewd. He knew, Benny thought. He knows what I’ve done.
Benny grabbed his pack and attached it to the bike. Titus walked out with him. “You sure you’re OK to go?” Titus asked.
Benny nodded. “If I don’t leave, it will be dark in the pass, and that’s never good. All those damn drivers who can’t drive in the snow.”
Titus snorted. He patted Benny on the back, and pulled him forward, bringing his head to his chest. It was comforting, Benny acknowledged, a kind of embrace his father did when Benny was young. It established dominance, and said I’ve got you —messages Benny had needed when he was young, raging against his father for bringing him to this place.
Maybe he was a transplant that didn’t move well either, he thought. No, by that metaphor, he was a plant that had been moved too many times and never allowed to put down roots. He smiled gratefully at the old man who had been a second father in many ways to both he and his brother. Pack, his wolf said.
Pack, Benny agreed.
“Take care of them for me,” Benny said with difficulty.
“Count on it,” Titus promised. “Come back and see us.” He went to his pickup with a wave at the two sitting on the front steps still.
Benny nodded, but he didn’t see that happening. How could they even want to have him around? Didn’t they realize he’d done that same thing they’d just labeled cruel to dozens of women?
He got on the bike and headed down the highway toward Wenatchee.
What had he done?
***
Ryder stared at hisbrother’s hunched shoulders as he headed away from the cabin. “That wasn’t good,” he said finally.
“No,” Jessie said. “It hit that sore spot —I don’t know what. But the same thing that’s been bugging him for a while now. It worries me, no lie. He’s not in a good place.”
Ryder chewed on his lip. “You know any way to reach Alpha Stafford?” he asked.
Jessie pulled out her phone. “I’ve got my great-grandfather’s phone number. He’s assistant chief of security,” she said. “He’ll know.”
Geoff Nickerson listened to her stammered story. “Benny hasn’t been in a good place for a while,” he said. “Longer than you’ve known him. Let me have the Alpha call you back.”
She’d barely ended the call, when her phone rang again from an unknown number. “Hello, she said, cautiously.
“It’s Abby,” a female voice said. “What’s going on? You’re worried about Benny?”
Jessie handed the phone to Ryder, and just giggled when he glared at her. She was better with words —why was she making him talk? But he managed to tell her what had happened.
“I see,” she said. And he thought she did. Probably better than Benny did. “I’ll reach out to him. Thanks for letting me know. Benny is special to me — to all of us.”
Ryder thanked her, wondering what she meant by reach out to him, but he didn’t ask. Instead he handed Jessie her phone back and smiled. “All we can do,” he said simply. All they could do. Godspeed, brother, he wished Benny, looking down the road where he had ridden off. Then Ryder’s smile widened into a full grin. “We’re alone,” he pointed out.
