The Shadows of Christmas Past

door and looked around. The numerous buildings of Piper Ranch were perched on the crest of a hill. The land stretched out below in a long, barren slope down to the flat valley of a little river that was dry this time of year. She couldn't see any movement. The man must have bolted as soon as she'd left to answer the phone, and was long gone. She had a lot of dogs, so if he was snooping around the place, there'd be an unholy racket of barking to warn her.
    Now both the man and the wolf were gone. She supposed she better call the sheriff and—
    Her train of thought was derailed as the ringing phone startled her once again, and she swore silently all the way to her office.
    "What?" Marj demanded when she picked up the phone.
    "Did we get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?"
    It was her friend Alice.
    "I've barely been in bed," Marj answered.
    "Oh?" The small word held a very loaded question. "Veterinary emergency? Or did you and Pat—"
    "The Reverend Muller is a gentleman."
    "I know, I talked to him this morning. But I have hopes for you two."
    Don't . Marj looked at her watch. "What do you mean, you've already talked to him? Do you know how early it is?"
    "He called me. He said he was worried about you being alone with a wolf. Are you alone with a wolf, when I set you up with a perfectly nice minister?"
    Marj laughed. "Not that kind of wolf." An image of the hard-muscled stranger flashed through her mind and warmed her all over.

    She pushed her erotic reactions aside as Alice continued, "You have no business being alone with a dangerous animal. Are you going to be okay? How did you end up with a wolf?"
    "Didn't Pat tell you?"
    "Something about men in a van and tranquilizer darts, and you acting really strange. Marj, you've got the man thinking you're Dr. Doolittle."
    She'd heard the comparison before. She tried to be careful, tried not to give any evidence of being a crazy woman who talked to the animals. It wasn't so much that she talked to them, but that they talked to her. And it wasn't even really talking, but a kind of emotional communication.
    Except the wolf. The oddest thing was, the wolf had actually spoken to her. That had to be her imagination.
    "Promise me you won't tell anyone about the wolf, okay?"
    "Why not?"
    "Because—" Marj started to explain that it had escaped, but quickly thought better of it.
    People had a lot of misconceptions about wolves. The chances were quite good that the locals would mount a hunt for the animal if the news that it was roaming free got out.
    A wolf was a predator, and there was genuine reason for concern for livestock, but only if the wolf was desperate and starving. A wolf without a pack would be far more likely to go after prey like rodents than attack someone's cattle.
    But her neighbors weren't going to listen to an educational campaign when it was easier to get out their rifles. Better safe than sorry, they'd say.
    Better cautious, than a dead wolf on my conscience. Marj didn't know what had happened to the animal, or how the naked stranger was involved. She figured she'd better find out, and quickly, and keep quiet about it while she did.
    "I have to go," she told Alice. "Mrs. Braem is threatening to drown some kittens. You'd think a widowed retired schoolteacher would take in a basket of adorable kittens, but will our Mrs.
    Braem succumb to the cat lady stereotype? No."
    People could be so cruel to animals. Marj saw it all the time, and it soured her on her fellow human beings.
    Alice knew this, but Alice was an optimist. "Bring the kittens to the Holiday Fete," she suggested. "Bring a bunch of your critters."
    "Why?"
    "You could set up an adoption booth, and you can auction them off or something. People are bound to want pets as Christmas presents."

    Marj wasn't sure she liked the idea, but Alice was a force of nature not to be argued with. "I'll think about it. But right now I have to get over to Mrs. Braem's."
    Then spend the rest of the day wolf- and naked-man hunting , she added to herself.

chapter 3
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    Kennedyville's small grocery store smelled strongly of fresh paint and sawdust. Marj nearly coughed when she stepped in out of the crisp winter air.
    "Don't make a face like that, Marjorie Piper," Sam Murphy called from behind the counter directly across from the door. "I know it stinks, but it's a clean stink. Remember what the place was like a few months ago."
    A wildfire had roared through during the summer, but the resilient people