Death of a Wandering Wolf by Julia Buckley

Author:Julia Buckley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2020-06-29T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

Erik Wolf wasn’t a particularly good dancer, nor was I, but we had fun on the dance floor, jumping around to some Beatles covers done by the live band. When they finished their Beatles trio with “And I Love Her,” I was relieved to tuck against Erik’s chest and move barely at all, just sort of shifting my weight from foot to foot.

“Any more feelings since dinner?” he murmured in my ear.

“No. I don’t know what that was. It was weird, I’ll tell you that. And it was real. But I can’t trace it to anything.”

“Greg is going to come by later, just sort of circle the building a few times. I want to have eyes outside.”

“Okay. Nobody inside looks particularly threatening.”

“No.” His chin had been resting on my head, but now he lifted it and glanced around. I looked with him: some tipsy people, laughing in one corner. A huge cluster of bodies on the dance floor, and another crowd milling around the silent auction tables. Some people still at their tables, chatting or eating or looking at their phones. Many of the dancers were edging toward the gazebo.

“Before we leave, we have to dance in there,” I said, tipping my head toward the gazebo.

“Oh? Why?”

“Because it’s dimly lit and full of starlight, and it makes people fall in love.”

“That was poetic, Hana. But I don’t need the starlight room. I’m already in love with you.”

I tripped and stepped on his toe, and he said, “Ow.”

I stared up at him, reading his face.

“Did I say that too soon?” he said.

The band moved on to Elvis and a raucous “Jailhouse Rock.”

Katie and Eduardo practically crashed into us. “Hey!” Katie said. “We just bid one hundred dollars on a weekend at a Colorado time-share. If we win, you guys are going with us.”

I said, “That sounds great,” and gave a thumbs-up, drowned out by the music.

Erik’s phone must have buzzed in his pocket. He looked at it now with some concern, and then he put his mouth by my ear. “Greg’s outside. I’ll be right back.”

He left the room and I floated back to our table, where Domo was clearly trying to scandalize Margie with whatever he was whispering to her. She was blushing and smiling like an innocent.

I sat down at the table and Domo said, “Hey, there’s Ms. Derrien. Let me grab her.” He jumped up and returned with my high school English teacher, who still looked pretty “hot” in a long black dress with a sequined bodice. She was probably in her mid-forties now, but she was one of those women who looked youthful and probably would do so well into old age.

“Hello, Hana,” she said, reaching out to shake my hand. “How’s my Shakespeare lover doing these days?”

“Not bad,” I said. “I still love Shakespeare, and I still annoy people by quoting him to them.”

She smiled, sitting down in the empty chair beside me. “And what quote would suit this noble assemblage?” She waved an ironic hand at the undulating dancers.

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