The Wolf Came on Christmas (Johanna and Alexander) novel Chapter 90

Chapter 90-1

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His order sounded like a dreadful thunder, a mixture of roar and savage growl.

The truth? It scared me so badly that I started crying even harder, and I stepped aside so his frantic hands wouldn’t hurt me in the struggle to take Andre and rip him from my arms. It was too much for me, too much. I couldn’t stand the way he barked that order at me, not after everything that had just happened. I simply broke, frozen with terror. I know he regretted shouting like that immediately, because he began to whine like an injured puppy and draped his heavy arm over my shoulders. The sounds coming from his throat were inhuman, but they were not without feeling or unintelligible. It was impossible not to feel even more pity in that situation, with those canine pleas in my ear; so I let him touch me. Maybe I was already tired of fighting him, or afraid that my rejection would hurt him even more…

“I’m sorry, forgive me,” Alexander babbled, anguished, his deep voice a hoarse, very low growl. “Sorry, Johanna, I didn’t mean to do it, I truly regret it…”

He pulled me toward his body so that I could also hold Andre and warm him.

I accepted his apologies because his animal whimpers hurt me all the way to the soul.

“Where is Sasha?” he said, trying to control his tone.

“She’s safe. I promise you, she’s safe,” I answered, still trembling.

Even though I tried to stop crying, it was very difficult. I was freezing and the smell of wet wolf fur flooded my senses. I started rubbing the boy’s arms and legs again, the best I could.

Andre’s head rested on a bulging bicep covered in white, frost-coated wool, and his cheek was pressed against his father’s heart. He began to regain color, and when I touched his face. with my fingers, I noticed that his skin was slowly warming up and that the tremors were easing. That helped me recover hope, and at last I managed to stop crying. I knelt better beside Alexander, allowed him to hold me a little tighter (even though it hurt the wound on my arm, I didn’t care). I kept rubbing Andre’s body until a moan escaped his bluish lips.

Alexander stirred and sniffed his face insistently, his black, icy nose traveling from the hairline to the soft curve of the jaw; and what I saw at that moment, far from disgusting or horrifying me, seemed almost tender and was completely unexpected: he used his tongue, that rough canine tongue, to caress his son’s skin. With every gentle lick, he warmed the child’s pale cheeks.

The whimpers sounded again, in that peculiar way of affected sobs that was so his.

I stayed frozen watching him do it, it was so impressive to me that I couldn’t look away even

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Chapter 90-1

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though it was an extremely private moment for Alexander. Why didn’t I feel rejection toward such an inhuman gesture? Why couldn’t I see it as something horrible? Maybe that would have made it easier for me to stop thinking about the man who lived beneath all that thick, frost-stiffened fur. If I had been able to see him as a monster, the same way I saw Álvaro and his unknown-faced companion, everything would have been easier on many levels.

With another whimper, Andre barely opened his eyes and’sighed:

“… stop it, Dad, you’re drooling all over my face.”

Alexander whimpered again in his canine language and pressed his muzzle to his son’s cheek, exhaling at last the air trapped in his lungs in a cloud of vapor. It seemed to me that he had been holding his breath for an eternity, waiting for the child’s reaction.

“It’s okay, Andre, it’s okay, we’ve got you now,” I said, and I rubbed his arms again.

The little boy looked with glassy eyes at his father’s snout and brushed his frost-covered whiskers with his own nose, I imagine returning the caress.

“I’m tired, I want to sleep…” he said afterward.

“No! No, Andre, listen to me!” Alexander stirred. “You can’t fall asleep, do you hear me? You can’t fall asleep!”

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It was a song that would have put any child to sleep, perhaps. But not Andre, as it turned out.

I kept rubbing his arms until both voices fell silent, and Andre stayed quiet for a moment with his eyes open, his cheek pressed once more against his father’s woolly chest. His skin already had a healthier tone, and his lips were no longer purple. I think I also began to breathe with relief when I noticed that, and I even found myself smiling faintly when Alexander licked the boy’s cheek again in one of those gestures so typical of him and so affectionate.

“Are you still sleepy?” he asked, in a growling whisper.

“No, not now. You remembered the whole song.”

Now it was my turn to tremble with cold, and I hugged myself, trying not to make it too obvious that I lacked the coat I had given to Andre. But nothing escaped werewolf men, and Alexander pressed me a little closer so I could shelter against his fur. I didn’t want to reject his goodwill by telling him that leaning against his wet, matted, frost-covered wool made me colder, so I accepted it.

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Rex stood in front of us, the backpack hanging from his shoulder.

has anyone ever told you that you sing like shit, Lai?” the other one whispered mockingly.

“More times than my pride would like to admit. Especially Sasha. She prefers to cry rather than listen to me,” Alexander replied, in better spirits.

Then he looked at me and sniffed my face a little, I froze from the shock of that move. He smelled the blood from the cut on my forehead, I’m sure, and I know he hesitated. I assumed he was deciding whether to lick my wound or not, from the way he chewed his own saliva without opening his mouth for a few seconds. I think that if he had given me a lick to clean the blood, I wouldn’t have cared much anymore, everything was too strange to complain. But

he didn’t.

His human eyes, which once had caused me so much fear, watched me cautiously before he

said:

“You’re freezing, you need more warmth. What’s in that backpack?”

Quickly, Agent Aguilera handed me a thick jacket he picked up from the snow, from the base of the black trunk where Nika and I had hidden before. It was one I had picked up on my way looking for them, it had slipped from my hands when I ran to save Andre from the water. It was the jacket Rex himself had once worn; it was huge on me and carried his scent. I hurried to put it on, trying not to dwell on the strong aftershave cologne smell it gave off…