Susan Krinard - Come the Night

Until she’d asked him to run as a wolf beside her, and he’d had to tell her that he couldn’t do it, that his mother was human and his father only half-werewolf. He hadn’t noticed then how quiet she’d become. He’d been certain, in spite of what she’d said about the European devotion to werewolf purity, that it couldn’t possibly matter. They loved each other. And he wanted her to marry him.

There had been no explanations, no warning. Gillian simply never showed up at their next planned rendezvous. She’d left her work at the hospital and disappeared without a word. And in his shock, Ross had remembered what he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge: the look in her eyes when he’d told her he couldn’t Change.

The look of a princess who’d just been told that her knight in shining armor was nothing but a crippled beggar after all.

A sharp movement jostled Ross out of the past. The car had made another turn and was descending into a new tableau, this one depicting the Grand Canyon. He looked at Gillian; she was gazing at the diorama with her lips slightly parted and an almost childlike expression of wonder on her face, as if she’d completely forgotten that Ross was there.

“Why didn’t you remarry?” he asked.

She started and clutched at the car’s railing as if she expected to be pitched out onto the ground. “I…beg your pardon?”

“Delvaux died before Toby was born. Why didn’t you find Toby another father?”

It was a stupid thing to ask. Ross knew he wasn’t thinking clearly, hadn’t been since Gillian had stepped out of the limousine.

He dug the hole a little deeper. “There must have been other acceptable candidates, even after the War,” he said. “Or did you run out of all the pure-blooded types in your part of the world?”

She turned toward him, her hair bleached white by the harsh overhead lights. “I had no desire to marry again.”

“Delvaux was that great, huh? You just couldn’t let go of his memory?”

Damn and double-damn. Now he’d given her reason to think he could be jealous, when he felt nothing of the kind. But Gillian didn’t offer the cutting reply he’d expected. She sighed and leaned back in her seat, the wonders of the Dragon’s Gorge forgotten.

“My time with Jacques was short,” she said. “He would not have wished me to grieve unduly.”

Ross’s heart lurched and slowly resumed its regular rhythm. She didn’t love him. Not any more than she loved me.

“But you still didn’t think Toby needed a man in his life,” he said.

“What makes you think he didn’t have one?”

Touché. Just because Gillian hadn’t married again didn’t mean she couldn’t have had a whole string of lovers. Her coolness hadn’t kept plenty of wounded soldiers from falling in love with her, though she’d given none of them a second glance.

They’d all been human, of course. But she’d thought Ross was human up until the time they’d made love, and that hadn’t stopped her.

“Is it Warbrick?” he asked in a bored tone.

“What?”

“Toby said Warbrick wanted to marry you. Or was it something more casual?”

Gillian might have been an excellent actress, but her discomposure seemed genuine. “There is nothing between…Children, as you know, have vivid imaginations. Ethan has been a good friend to Toby.”

“That must be why he begged me not to let Warbrick find him.”

“Toby knew that what he’d done was wrong and was hoping to avoid the consequences.”

“Was Warbrick likely to punish him? Isn’t that your job?”

Gillian didn’t seem to hear the second part of his question. “He is a good man,” she said quietly.

“Sure. But he’s got one serious flaw. He can’t Change.”

ROSS KNEW HE’D gone too far, said out loud things he hadn’t meant to bring up in Gillian’s presence. But now it was done, and she had nothing to say. They rode on in silence until the car reentered the vast, openmouthed cave where the ride had begun and descended to the platform, where Toby was waiting for them.

“That was capital!” Toby exclaimed, his gaze darting from Gillian to Ross and back again. “You weren’t afraid, Mother?”

She managed a smile for him, excluding Ross. “Not in the least. I found it quite delightful.”

Toby gave Ross a pointed look, as if he were trying to convey some secret message. Ross found himself at a loss, and Toby turned away.

“May we try the Aerial Swing?” he asked.

They made their way to the Aerial Swing, which consisted of four large gondolas suspended from the ends of crossbeams projecting from a tall, narrow tower. The crossbeams rotated around the tower as they moved up and down, swinging the gondolas in a wide circle far above the earth.

This time Gillian maneuvered herself so that she and Toby shared the same seat and Ross was relegated to the one behind them, wedged in next to a portly gentleman with a very red face. The man giggled during the entire ride. Ross was deeply grateful when it was over.

Gillian was a little gray when she stepped out of the gondola, but she didn’t complain.

“I suggest we head for Steeplechase Park,” Ross said. “They opened the Thunderbolt roller coaster there two years ago. It’s the tallest one on Coney Island, famous all over the world.”

He half expected Gillian to balk, but she allowed him to usher her and Toby across the esplanade and through a knot of parkgoers clustered around the carousel. “We can grab one of the streetcars on Surf Avenue,” he said.

Gillian maintained her silence, absorbed in her own thoughts, as if she were pretending she was somewhere else. It wasn’t possible for Ross to talk to Toby privately once they were packed into the streetcar, but he kept the kid entertained by pointing out the various attractions along Surf Avenue as the vehicle carried them toward Steeplechase Park.

“You’ve been here lots of times,” Toby commented, a wistful note in his voice.

“Not when I was a kid. I lived too far away, and my family didn’t do much traveling.”

“Where did you live?”

Obviously that was something Gillian hadn’t written down in her diary. And why should she? “We had a ranch in southern Arizona, near the Castillo Mountains.”

“I know where Arizona is,” Toby said with a touch of pride. “Did you rope cattle and fight outlaws?”

“Lots of roping, but most of the outlaws and cattle rustlers were gone by the time I was born.”

“At least you had plenty of bad guys to fight in New York.” He kicked his heels against the bottom of the seat. “What made you decide to become a policeman?”

“It seemed like it might be something I’d be good at,” he said.

“Yes,” Toby said. “You could do all sorts of useful things, like smelling the criminals before they could see you coming, or just being a lot better at fighting.” He paused as if a thought had just popped into his head. “Are there lots of werewolves in New York, Father?”

It wasn’t an unexpected question, but Ross knew he had to tread carefully. “Maybe a hundred,” he said.

“Truly? We haven’t nearly so many in England. Are any of them policemen like you?”

“Not that I know of.”

“All the European werewolves Mother told me about live in big houses in the countryside, where they don’t have much to do with regular people. Is it the same in America?”

Ross realized that Toby had given him an opening to learn more about how Gillian lived. “I don’t know how it is other places in the States,” he said, “but in Manhattan, most werewolves belong to one pack.”

“A hundred in one pack?” Toby frowned. “It isn’t like that with us at all. We have families instead.”