Running Wild

camouflage.
Chapter Seven
    They decided hitchhiking was the best way to get back to the farm. The tent was a few miles off from a main road so they walked there. Ri wanted to stay human, and besides, Seamus balked at the idea of riding Black. Not only because he’d sworn he never would again and there was a certain lack of control in getting on a horse shifter. Mostly, it didn’t feel right knowing Black was Ri. Once they got to the road, he told Ri he could meet him at the farm, if he’d prefer, but Ri shook his head and Seamus didn’t argue further. He’d rather Ri stayed with him anyway, given his penchant for sudden disappearances.
    By the time they reached the farm—after a ride with a local who’d been keen to talk Seamus’s ear off about how reclusive Zachariah had been—Ri had gone quiet. The entire ride, Ri had sat in the backseat and not ventured into the conversation. Now he looked a bit like he was preparing to meet his doom.
“When were you last in Winnipeg?” Seamus asked.
    Ri heaved a sigh. “Twenty years ago maybe. I don’t remember too much about it. Lots of houses and cars and people.”
Twenty years ago you would have been a child. Seamus didn’t say that. “We’ll start by going to my parents’. They’re in a quiet suburb.”
Ri nodded, looking not the least bit reassured. He cleared his throat. “You know, if I take off, don’t worry about me.”
Seamus felt his eyebrows rise. “I think I may worry if you disappear in the city. Do you know your way around? Could you get back here?”
“Of course.” Ri offered a small smile. “I have an excellent sense of direction.”
Seamus assumed this was some kind of homing instinct that he didn’t have. Nevertheless, the idea of losing Ri in the city made him uneasy. “Let’s stick together. Like we did hitchhiking. Okay?”
“Okay,” Ri acquiesced.
Seamus almost began to feel bad that he was pushing this. Except staying out here while Ri decided everyone was in terrible danger didn’t strike him as the way to go either. He wanted Ri to learn Pete wasn’t a threat. He wanted Ri… What did Seamus want? He supposed Zachariah’s last request, given his will, was to make sure Ri didn’t remain alone, that Ri socialize to some extent. If Ri got the idea of werewolves out of his head at the same time, that would be a great help.
As they headed out the door, it became clear they were both thinking about Zachariah because Ri said, “Grandfather did say you were a very nice young man.”
That description brought Seamus up short. “What does that mean?”
Ri sent him an apologetic look and his face flushed. “Like I told you earlier, he was trying to play matchmaker, in his way. Sorry about that.” He rushed on. “We’ll get you back to your city and you should stay away from the farm in case more wolves come and…”
Ri trailed off as Seamus stared at him. “We are not going to the city to put me in a safe place. We are going to the city so that you can learn your fears are, in this case, misplaced. Pete is fine.”
But Ri gave another one of his nods, making it evident that while they were willing to do the same thing, namely drive to the city, they had quite different agendas.
Oh well, Seamus would work hard on his, and hopefully Ri’s would get changed.
“You don’t mind being in a car?” Seamus’s elbow rested at the window’s edge while he drove with one broad hand. His hands were different than Ri’s, which were long and thin. Seamus’s were sturdy, strong fingered.
Ri wrenched his gaze off that hand and got caught briefly by Seamus’s gray eyes that saw too much. This attraction was uncomfortable and getting worse by the minute. It made him feel like he was on a road where he couldn’t get off, even if he wanted to.
And he didn’t. He wanted to be with Seamus. He recognized that he had captured Seamus’s interest, not for romantic reasons, but because he was Zachariah’s strange grandson, and then because he was a horse shifter.
He’d paused too long in answering a question. Again. It came of spending so much time by oneself.
Forcing his tongue to loosen, he said, “I don’t mind cars. My grandfather taught me how to drive. I drove him to appointments at the end.” He didn’t add that his fears of being stopped by the police with no license to show—since he owned no ID—had made some of those drives stomach-churning. He was trying to present himself as capable of normality.
“That was good of