Sola started the morning off feeling great for reasons unknown, only to end it feeling more terrible than she ever had about anything she’d ever done.
She just couldn’t get the stricken look on Ivan’s face out of her head. It was like her confession hadn’t just hurt him, it had somehow cut him to his core. Just thinking about it made her feel guilty, which was crazy because he was the one holding her prisoner here. The one who’d locked up a feeble old man. The one who’d done nothing but sneer at her since she’d arrived.
Sneer. And save her from that wolf. And make her body tingle with just a few looks while she showed him how to make pancakes…
By the time night fell, she still had no idea what to do about the situation. She still couldn’t believe she’d actually walked into his room and done things with him. A lot of things, if his words and the extreme tenderness of her sex were any indication.
Scott never left me feeling like that, she couldn’t help but think…
Only to cut herself off with a shake of her head. A drink. That was what she needed. She couldn’t risk going into his room again tonight.
So at 8:00 PM, she did what she would have done the last six nights if she hadn’t been so scared of another wolf encounter. She pulled on her snow boots and grabbed a sharp poker from the fireplace. Then she headed down the hill to The Thirsty Wolf, on a mission to make sure this never, ever happened again.
However, her mission was abruptly cut short when a burly guy in a brown leather bomber jacket came to meet her at the door as soon as she set foot in the bar.
“Name’s Jed Wolfson,” he said, opening his jacket. “I’m the town sheriff.”
“Hi, nice to meet you, Sheriff Wolfson,” Sola answered carefully, wondering why he was suddenly introducing himself after a week of scanning her darkly from his usual table in the corner. She also couldn’t help but note he had the same last name as the one on the manor sign at the bottom of the hill.
“Heard you violated the full-moon curfew.”
Oh, so that was it.
“Yeah,” she admitted with an apologetic cringe. “I had a lot on my mind and completely forgot about it.”
“You forgot about it,” Sheriff Jed repeated, his tone flat.
“Yes, and I’m really sorry,” she said, keeping her tone contrite under the stern weight of his glare. “I really didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”
Sheriff Jed glanced down at the poker in Sola’s hand. “Yeah, well. The curfew is in place for a reason. I’m thinking it’ll be best for all parties involved if you stay at the kingdom house until the snow melts. No more coming down here after five o’clock.”
Sola blinked, barely able to believe her ears. “Wait, you’re saying I’m, like, grounded? I can’t come down here anymore?”
“Not after five o’clock.”
After a moment of standing there, stunned, she came back with, “Okay, well, I’m pretty sure what you’re doing here isn’t even legal. And I need a drink. Like I really need a drink. I’m well over twenty-one, so you can’t stop me.”
Jed looked down at the ground, considering her words. “No, I can’t,” he finally agreed.
“Thank you,” Sola said, moving to step around him.
However Sherriff Jed stepped in front of her again. “I can’t stop you. But Lorraine has the right to refuse service to anyone she wants. And from what I understand, you gave her quite a scare the other night. She’s probably not feeling all that inclined to serve you after you forgot about one of our town’s most important rules.”
“What? She wouldn’t refuse me service. Right, Lorraine?” Sola asked, looking past Sheriff Jed’s shoulder to the older woman behind the bar.
But Lorraine averted her eyes, taking a sudden interest in scrubbing the bar with a dishrag.
“He’s right, Sola,” she muttered without looking up. “It’s probably best that you stay with your man at the kingdom house. Less trouble for all of us.”
“He’s not my man,” Sola shot back.
“Really?” asked Jed, arching his eyebrow. “That’s not what my nose is telling me right now.”
What the …??? Sola looked around the bar helplessly. Was anyone else hearing the words coming out of this guy’s mouth? But all the other bar patrons simply stared back at her blankly, as though every word the sheriff said made complete sense.
So she turned her attention back to the only person who really mattered in this bar anyway. The one responsible for dispensing alcohol.
“I just need a drink,” she practically begged Lorraine. “I’ll even pay you for the bottle and take it with me. I just really need something to drink—please, Lorraine.”
But Lorraine refused to look up from pretending to wipe the bar down.
Meanwhile the sheriff snickered and said, “Sounds like you might have a bit of a problem there, Miss Sola. Kind that might need a meeting, if you know what I mean.”
A cackle went up from everyone in the bar but Lorraine.
“What? No!” Sola started to argue.
But then Lorraine cut her off. “Just come back tomorrow, Sola,” she wearily called out from the bar, refusing to look up from her dogged scrubbing. “I’ll sell you anything you want before five.”
“You best get on out of here before I have to interrupt my down time and issue you a trespassing violation,” the Sherriff told her, low and menacing. “You git on back up that hill and make sure you listen to Hannah and Gregory. That’ll keep you safe until the snow melts.”
It wasn’t a threat exactly, but it sure did feel like one. And she couldn’t help but notice everyone in the bar was regarding her with the same cold stare as the sheriff. A distinct shiver ran up her back as a disquieting feeling that there was something fundamentally different between her and the bar patrons—something that went beyond race or country—came over Sola.
But life wasn’t fair, she reminded herself. She knew this and she was ill-equipped to deal with these townsfolk and their strange customs after the day she’d just had. So she left without another word.
A new plan formed in her mind as she stormed back up the hill toward the manor. And why did the locals keep referring to it as the “kingdom house,” anyway? Sola shook her head. Whatever. She’d tear apart the “kingdom house.” Search every room until she found the nightcap she so obviously needed.
She only hoped Ivan wasn’t in his usual place when she returned. Parked in the foyer’s large armchair like a huge Russian statue, and halfway into an expensive bottle of vodka, waiting for her to come home.
But he was nowhere to be seen when she walked through the door. And the foyer was dark, indicating that no one had bothered to turn on any lights since she’d left the house.
Sola flipped them on now, and started opening doors along the long main hallway. Door after door, determined to find a room with a stray bottle of alcohol.
Her plan eventually worked. She found what she was looking for about five doors in. A study with huge, diamond-paned windows that looked out onto the manor’s snowy backyard. Inside was a large pine desk with images of wolves carved into each of its ginormous legs. It looked like a family heirloom, something that might have been passed down for decades, if not centuries.
Unfortunately, Ivan was sitting behind it.
Sola froze in the doorway.
And Ivan stared at her for a long, hard moment, before finally asking, “Da? What do you want?”
“Nothing,” she answered quickly.
“Nothing,” he repeated with a sneer. “Then why are you here?”
Sola fumbled, and could come up with nothing but the truth. “Well, I was looking for something to drink. Some alcohol. They wouldn’t serve me at the bar down the hill, and I don’t want a repeat of the last few nights for obvious reasons.”
“Yes, for obvious reasons,” he agreed in a somewhat mocking tone of voice. But then in a seeming reversal of his usual guest-repelling tendencies, he said, “If you do not like vodka, there are other things to drink over there.”
Her gaze followed the jut of his chin to a small, pot-bellied cabinet almost hidden in a dark corner of the study. It turned out to be a mini-wet bar. There were several bottles on top of its marbled surface, and most likely a few more hidden in its squat interior below.
“Oh, thank you,” she said, rushing over to it like an addict needing a fix.
Relief hit her like a welcome breeze when she saw the assortment of liquor bottles—not just vodka—lining the bar. She grabbed the first one she came to—rum—not her favorite drink but it would do in a pinch, especially if she mixed it with something from the kitchen.
But before she could walk away, Ivan said behind her, “You will drink it here. As my guest.”
An inner groan tore through her and Sola seriously had to fight the urge to run out of the room with the bottle. The last thing she wanted to do was share a drink with Ivan in his study. Not after what she’d done. What they’d done together.
But his voice was as cold as anything she’d ever heard, and she had no doubt he was faster than her—nor did she think she might be able to convince him to let her take the bottle back up to her room. Ivan didn’t strike her as the kind of guy who backpedaled on a command once it was issued.
So with shaking hands, Sola grabbed one of the glass tumblers at the edge of the bar and poured two fingers of rum into it. Then she chugged it, doggedly ignoring the way each tug of liquor burned her throat as it went down.
She slammed the glass down on the hard marble surface, filled it back up, and then immediately chugged two more fingers of rum. Done! Mission accomplished, she thought, as she turned towards the door with a mind to get out of there as quickly as possible…only to slam the back of her right shoulder into a wall.
A huge wall. Made mostly of muscle.
“Are you done with your drink, Sola?” the wall asked.