The Wolf Princess: The Wolf PrincessOne Eye Open (The Pack) Page 6

  And then there was the single anomaly. Both her parents had blond hair and blue eyes, as did her two sisters and one brother. From what he’d read, Alisa was a brunette, with green eyes. Though not common, this was not impossible. Still he had to wonder how her genetic makeup differed from the rest of her family.

  “None of your siblings can do what you can do.” He spoke his thoughts out loud.

  “No. But still—”

  “Then your lineage is irrelevant.”

  Her audible gasp made him smile.

  “Insulting me isn’t going to help,” she said.

  “I wasn’t insulting you. I said irrelevant, not unremarkable. Don’t confuse the two terms.”

  After a second, she laughed. “Thank you for clearing that up. By the way, you should do that more often.”

  Confused, he cocked his head. “Do what more often? Clear things up for you?”

  “No.” She laughed again, the husky sound sending a second shiver through him. “Smile. It becomes you.”

  “Oh.” Unsure how to take her words, he returned his attention to fiddling with the microphone, even though his wolf had gone completely and utterly still at the compliment.

  Compliment. Hmmph. Pushing away the rush of warmth, he willed himself to concentrate. Nothing but the science and his work mattered. Nothing. Least of all his insane and inappropriate attraction to a spoiled princess.

  “Excuse me, Dr. Streib?” Her voice brought him right back to where he didn’t want to be—the present. “You keep zoning out on me while I’m talking. Are you all right?”

  “Zoning?” He raised a brow. Sometimes he thought she sounded more like she was from Boulder than he did. “That’s a very American term.”

  “True. But then, I went to school with a bunch of American kids.”

  “School? You went to an international high school?”

  This time her laugh sounded a bit forced. “Not high school. College.”

  “You went to college?” He didn’t know why he was so surprised. “Where?”

  “California,” she shot back. “And you don’t have to sound so surprised. Many royal families send their children abroad to universities.”

  “True, but I thought most of them went to Cambridge or Princeton or Yale.”

  “Harvard, MIT, Stanford and John Hopkins were all good schools, but University of California at Berkeley was fifth ranked.”

  “In what?”

  “Initially, I went for molecular biology.”

  “What?” He dropped the microphone. Facing her, he realized his mouth hung open and closed it. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  “No.” The smile in her voice spoke volumes. “I’m not kidding. And yes, I graduated. I received both my bachelor’s and my master’s degrees. I have to decide whether to go back in the fall to finish working on my doctorate.”

  “In molecular biology?”

  She sighed. Loudly. “Yes. Now you see why I wanted explanations about the tests.”

  Dumbfounded, he tried to process this information. Obviously, the brief bit of research he’d been given was inadequate. Seriously lacking. He made a mental note to fire that particular research assistant when he got back in the States.

  “No offense, Dr. Streib,” she continued, “but time is wasting. We need to move things along here. I do have other duties besides working with you.”

  “Call me Braden,” he said without thinking, still feeling a bit foolish.

  “Then you can call me Alisa,” she graciously granted. “Now, let’s get started.”

  “All right.” He forced himself to focus as she took a seat in his chair. Readying the needle to prick her finger, he considered. Doing such things was difficult while blind, but not completely impossible, as long as he wore gloves and took care not to contaminate the sample. Still, this was too important to take the risk.

  “One moment,” he told Alisa, then pressed the button on his console that would summon his assistant.

  A moment later, Katya arrived. “Yes, Doctor?”

  Explaining what he wanted, he waited while she took the blood samples. When she’d finished, he directed her to place the slides under the multi-faceted microscope for his machine to view and analyze. Though Katya didn’t know, along with Alisa’s were the samples he’d taken of his own blood earlier, for comparison purposes.

  Katya did as he directed and pushed the button for the machine to begin to analyze. This process would take several minutes.

  “Will there be anything else?” Katya asked.

  “That will be it for now,” he told her.

  Murmuring something about calling her if he needed her again, Katya left the room, leaving him alone again with Alisa.

  As he turned to face her, he braced himself for more questions. He wasn’t wrong.

  “Tell me about your work. I’m very curious how you are a neurosurgeon when you cannot see,” she mused. “Or, was that something you only did before the explosion?”

  No tiptoeing around for her. This time, her bluntness didn’t surprise him. In fact, after months of colleagues avoiding the issue, he actually welcomed talking about it. And of course, he’d lost the capacity to be wounded shortly after he woke up in a Denver burn unit with his head wrapped in bandages, unable to see.

  “I was a surgeon,” he said, careful to keep all traces of bitterness from his voice. “Past tense. Before the explosion, I was an excellent neurosurgeon, working in Denver. One of the top ones, at least among the Pack. Three days a week, I’d operate on someone’s brain, or spine, or peripheral nerves. I also taught medical students and gave some lectures to residents. In my spare time, I did research for the Pack.”

  “Spare time? That sounds like you didn’t have much.”

  He shrugged. “I did what I could when I could. I was happy. I made good money, so my wife was happy as well.”

  “Wife?” A certain watchful stillness came over her voice. “I didn’t know you were married.”

  Chapter 5

  He forced a smile, trying to swallow. Again he had that awful taste in his mouth, like copper. This happened more and more frequently whenever he tried to relive the past. “Again, past tense. I was married. I’m not now. She left me immediately after the accident, and filed for divorce before the week was over.”

  If she had comments on what kind of woman would do such a thing, she didn’t voice them. He supposed he shouldn’t be disappointed.

  “I’m sorry,” she said instead, the warmth in her voice making his wolf nudge him playfully.

  A simple, heartfelt response. He welcomed it, glad she didn’t ask him a thousand follow-up questions that he had no desire to answer.

  Yet. He waited, and still she said nothing else.

  Despite that, or maybe because of it, he found himself continuing. “I met Camille—my ex-wife—when I was in residency. She was a nurse, a newly minted RN. Looking back, I think she loved the idea of being married to a doctor. I’m not sure she ever entirely loved me for who I am rather than what I was.”

  And when he’d been unable to be her status symbol, when his hope of resuming his career as a top neurosurgeon had disappeared, so had Camille. In reflection, he hadn’t even really been surprised.

  When Alisa squeezed his shoulder, he realized how tense he’d gotten and tried to force himself to relax.

  “Was your ex Pack, too? Or human?”

  “Oh, she was Pack. She was a full-blooded shifter, not a Halfling like me.” And later, when the divorce was under way and he’d dared disagree with something she’d wanted, she’d thrown that up against him, as if his bloodline was something to be ashamed of.

  For all he knew, most full-blooded shifters secretly looked down on Halflings. He had no way of knowing.

  Raising his head, he debated asking. But Alisa was not only a full-blood, but a princess. Definitely not the right person to answer. And really, what did it matter now? He was what he was. That part of himself he couldn’t change. He had much more press
ing issues to worry about.

  While lost in his thoughts, to his shock, Alisa got out of her chair and hugged him, letting him know without words that her spirit was nothing like Camille’s. Either that, he thought wryly, or he really was a sap.

  He allowed himself a few seconds to fully appreciate her efforts, before firmly taking her shoulders and moving her back. “Thanks,” he managed, wondering when his machine would be finished analyzing so he could return his attention to the business at hand.

  The chair creaked as Alisa resumed her seat. “A brain surgeon,” Alisa mused. “Odd, but you look nothing like how I would picture a neurosurgeon to look.”

  This amused him. He could imagine what she thought. Pocket protectors, glasses and bad haircuts. One out of three wasn’t bad. “You actually pictured a neurosurgeon?”

  He wondered if she blushed. “You know what I mean,” she said.

  Strangely enough, he did. “Better or worse?” He hated himself for asking, and then realized with no small measure of amazement that he actually was flirting with her. Something he’d never quite gotten the nuances of.

  Flirting. As she’d tried to do the day before.

  “Oh, definitely better.” Not appearing to notice, she cleared her throat, as if embarrassed.

  Though it shouldn’t have, her comment pleased him.

  His machine chose that moment to beep, signaling that the analysis was complete.

  “All right. We should get back to work,” he said with no small measure of relief, aware of his wolf, watching with silent amusement.

  “Are there more tests?”

  “Yes,” he told her. “Though first, I want to listen to these results.”

  “After that, what would you like to do to me first?”

  Her innocent question brought about such vivid carnal images that he had to grip the counter to keep from staggering. What the hell was wrong with him?

  Again he began to try to analyze. Possibly the fact that he hadn’t been with a woman since months before his ex-wife walked out on him. Yeah. Between that and the length of time he’d gone without shifting into wolf, he was an explosion waiting to happen. That had to be the reason for his bizarre behavior.

  He breathed deeply, willing his heartbeat to slow. Now that he knew why, he could deal with the issue. Logic always triumphed in the end.

  “Let’s listen to the results first, then we’ll decide what other tests to run,” he said, managing to sound normal.

  As the robotic voice droned on, Braden grimaced. Nothing. Of course, he hadn’t truly expected this to be easy.

  Since he couldn’t glance at his watch—a former bad habit of his that had taken his blindness to break—he touched the little audible timepiece he wore on his wrist and grimaced as it announced the time.

  Three o’clock. Cursing himself, he wondered how he’d managed to completely overlook the time. He’d have to make apologies to her and scratch the rest of this day off as a lost opportunity.

  If he made it that far. The familiar fatigue had begun creeping up, and he knew from past experience that soon he’d have no control over what happened.

  “Since it’s rather late in the day,” he said, infusing his voice with a sort of resigned cheerfulness. “Let’s plan to try again tomorrow. In the morning this time? As in eight o’clock.”

  “I have the rest of today free,” she insisted. “Why waste time?”

  “Not today,” he said shortly. “We’ll meet back here at 8:00 a.m. sharp.”

  “I’m really not a morning person,” she told him. “Why can’t we start in the afternoon? Let’s keep going.”

  She had him there. Of course she had no way to know about the weariness that overtook him in the afternoon, the debilitating exhaustion that forced him to take a nap for an hour or two every single day. That is, if he wanted to be able to function at dinnertime.

  Since he was rapidly fading, she was about to find out.

  “It’s my nap time. You know, siesta?” he said helpfully, battling back both the tiredness and his ever-vigilant wolf.

  The way she sighed told him she was no doubt rolling her eyes. “Wrong country, Dr. Streib. You could at least learn our native language since obviously you plan to be here awhile.”

  As he fumbled for a response, exhaustion charged through his body like a storm surge in a hurricane. Dizzy, he fumbled to find the stool near his makeshift work space and dropped onto it.

  “Are you all right?” Now she sounded concerned.

  Wearily, he nodded. “Yes. No. I will be, once I get some rest.”

  “Did you not sleep last night?”

  “Yes, I did. It’s not that. Ever since the explosion, this happens every afternoon around the same time.”

  “This?”

  “Yes, this.” His gesture encompassed both him and the entire room. “It’s like I simply shut down. I have no control over my own body.”

  “Why? What’s wrong with you?”

  He swallowed, wondering how much to tell her. Since they were going to work together for the foreseeable future, he decided to go with the truth. After all, she clearly already believed him weird. What could one more bizarre bit of information hurt?

  “There’s nothing wrong with me, according to the numerous medical specialists that I consulted, including the non-medical Healer.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Like my blindness, she said it was all in my head.” Hearing the bitterness in his voice, he tried to gather his scattered thoughts. But he lacked the focus or the energy to do so. He took a halting step forward, swaying.

  Alisa grabbed his arm, steadying him. “Are you all right?”

  Swallowing hard as another wave of dizziness swamped him, he fought a wave of nausea. “No. I’m not.”

  “You look terrible. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

  Though he hated to ask, his rapid disappearing energy left him no choice. “Will you help me to my room?”

  “Of course. Do you have your cane?” Then, without waiting for an answer, she leaned across him, her full breasts brushing his chest. Despite his human exhaustion, his wolf blazed to life, eager and ferocious and willing to fight for freedom.

  Braden wasn’t sure he had the strength left to keep the beast contained. But he had to. He had to. What a horrible, unforgivable breach of etiquette changing inside the palace would be. A wolf running amok inside a giant, lavishly appointed cage could do a lot of damage.

  From deep inside his inner core, he pulled forth strength and wrestled the wolf back into furious submission.

  But doing so used up his last reserve of energy.

  He swallowed, stifling a groan as his wolf readied himself for another attack. If he spent too much time with her in his weakened state, he didn’t know how much longer he could hold the beast at bay.

  “Stop that.” Her sharp voice felt like a whip as she moved away. “If you’re so tired, why are you exhibiting signs of getting ready to change?”

  “My wolf wants out,” he told her simply, knowing she might not understand. The instant he finished speaking, a wave of severe dizziness swamped him, so strong he stumbled, nearly falling to his knees.

  Instantly, she was beside him, sliding under his arm. “Here’s your cane,” she said in her dulcet voice, so close her breath tickled his cheek. She helped him move forward. This time he was ready for his wolf’s instant reaction, and he kept himself under better control, even though his legs felt as though they might give up on him.

  “Lean on me,” she said. “Let me help you get to your room. We’re nearly there.”

  Nearly being the operative word. Not good enough, as he knew he was losing the battle. He could no longer walk. Even breathing became too much of an effort.

  “I’d better call the royal physician.” She gasped as he stumbled, nearly taking her down with him.

  “No.” Summoning strength from some inner reserve, he straightened so he no longer leaned on her, using his cane instead. “
This happens every day. I’ll make it.”

  But after he’d taken three steps, he realized even that was doubtful.

  Inside, his wolf waited, watching for any opportunity. The animal part of him didn’t understand or care about complicated things like human frailties. The second he let his guard down, the beast would attack.

  A disaster waiting to happen. “How. Much. Farther?”

  “Not far,” she said, this time taking his elbow, more to direct him with than anything else.

  He tried to nod, which turned out to be a colossal mistake. As he dipped his chin down, the entire floor shifted, as if a giant earthquake had rendered the castle foundation unstable.

  His legs gave way and he crumpled. With his last bit of strength, he tried to direct himself away from her, not wanting to harm her or pin her beneath him as he fell.

  He never knew if he succeeded or not.

  * * *

  When Dr. Streib—Braden—collapsed beside her, Alisa didn’t stand a chance of holding him up. The best she could do was to direct his fall so he didn’t hurt himself, or her.

  She only partially succeeded. He’d tried to twist himself away from her as he went down, but since he appeared to have lost the use of his limbs, he didn’t quite make it. Instead, he knocked her sideways.

  She hit the carpet hard, rolling so that her side took the brunt of his body. The fall knocked the breath from her.

  While she sucked in air, trying to breathe, she took stock of the situation. Completely unconscious, Braden lay on top of her, his torso on top of her hips, completely pinning her to the marble floor. She had no idea how much he weighed, but by twisting and pushing at the same time, she was able to move him maybe three centimeters. Not good. Her legs were already feeling a bit numb.

  Worse, she’d left her cell phone in her purse on her dresser. She hadn’t thought she’d need it while working with Braden. Now, she wished she had the blasted thing. At least she could call a few of her family’s brawny bodyguards for assistance.

  As things stood, it looked like she was on her own.

  Bit by bit, she wiggled herself free. Finally, after what seemed like forever but was probably only a few minutes, she managed to scoot out from under him. Legs numb and aching, she climbed to her feet. Braden still lay unmoving on the floor, his disheveled black hair in violent disarray, his limbs at odd angles.