The Wolf and the Rose: Howls Romance

  Marianne Morea

  Coventry Press Limited

  Coventry Press Ltd.

  Somers, New York

  http://www.coventrypressltd.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2020 Marianne Morea

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions of thereof in any form whatsoever without written permission.

  ASIN:

  First Edition: Coventry Press Ltd. 2020

  Printed in the USA

  “But he who dare not grasp the thorns

  should never crave the rose.”

  ~Anne Bronte

  Chapter One

  “Come on, Kyle! Stop whining…it’ll be fun,” Delia DeRosa called down the stairs of the subway. Laughing, she held out her hand. “Think of it as an adventure.”

  Trudging up the last few steps out onto the street, his face read he’d rather be anywhere else. “That’s what you always say when you’re dragging me from flea market to flea market. It’s not an adventure, Delia, it’s a job.”

  “I’m not dragging you anywhere. Besides, it’s antiquing. A very in thing to do these days, or haven’t you heard?”

  Kyle rolled his eyes. “Right, like I plan my life around what the NY Times Arts and Leisure section says. Antiquing involves quaint little towns, with barns full of junk, and the occasional find thrown in, just to keep it sweet. Tandem booths arranged around a cordoned-off parking lot in the middle of Gotham doesn’t quite cut it.”

  Grabbing the reluctant man’s hand, Delia wrapped her arm into his elbow. “Kyle Myers, YOU are a killjoy! Next time I promise we’ll rent a car and head north toward New England. Can’t you at least pretend you’re happy to do this with me today?”

  Leaning into him, she squeezed his arm. “Who knows, maybe you’ll find something terrific, like that pocket watch I found last month. Remember how much we sold it for on eBay?”

  With an unenthusiastic sigh he slid his arm from hers and wrapped it around her shoulders. “Fine. But treasure hunting, or whatever it is you think this is, isn’t my first choice of things to do on a warm Sunday afternoon.”

  Delia glanced across her shoulder at him, the autumn sun making his frown all the more irritating. Typical. Why was it always a hassle whenever plans involved something he’d rather not do?

  Reaching up, she lifted his arm from her shoulder. “Just grab a cup of coffee then, and I’ll meet you later. Maybe the Starbucks on 6th Avenue has a pre-game playing. We wouldn’t want you to go a whole Sunday without football, now would we?”

  “Delia, don’t be like that. This isn’t my thing, and you know it.”

  “That’s the point, Kyle. This is just one of many things, that isn’t your thing. Things I enjoy. Go. I’ll have a better time by myself. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  Turning into the throng already gathered at the 25th Street Flea Market, she didn’t bother to wait for his reply.

  ***

  Delia wandered around. She loved the crowds. Loved meandering through the brightly colored tables displaying everything from antique Persian carpets to garage sale knickknacks.

  The fine art of haggling was in full force all around her, and she couldn’t help but smile. Closing her eyes, she let the energy of Sunday in the City fill her core.

  The place was alive. As vibrant and diverse as the wares sold. People brushed past. All sizes, colors, and manner of dress. Speaking languages as sundry as New York itself. Here, she didn’t feel so alone.

  Delia inhaled, imagining the ancient bazaars of the East, or the market squares of old Europe. She held her breath for a moment, picturing what it would have been like—the people, the sights, and smells of another time.

  “You look a little lost,” a voice asked to her right.

  Startled, Delia’s eyes snapped open. Embarrassed, she looked at the old woman smiling at her from behind a table covered with bolts of exquisite, handmade fabrics. “Not lost. Just daydreaming.”

  “Ah. So you’re a dreamer, eh? Well, cara mia, I hate to break it to you, but dreamers aren’t as prized these days as they once were. In my time, dreamers were the ones responsible for bringing the world its magic. Sadly, only shadows remain. Only myth and illusion.”

  Delia’s lips curled into an indulgent smile. “I think there’s magic still around. You have to know where to look.”

  “My own sentiments exactly.” The woman smiled, her pale blue eyes all but disappearing between wrinkled folds and creases. “Have you found much magic in your travels so far?”

  Chuckling, Delia fingered the edge of a brightly colored silk damask. “Not lately, but I’d like to believe it’s out there waiting for me. Somewhere.”

  “Indeed.” She cocked her head slightly. “That’s a beautiful pendant you’re wearing. Is it rose quartz?”

  Delia glanced at the delicate carved rose twined with a silver wolf, hanging around her neck. “Yes. My great grandfather gave it to my great grandmother a long time ago. Eventually, it came to me when I was very young.

  “He was a master mason, or so I was told, but his passion was working with stones. Carving them. Creating beautiful pieces like this one.”

  Lifting the delicate pendant into her palm, Delia smiled, remembering. “My father told me stories. How his grandfather said each stone held hidden treasure deep within. Something beautiful, just waiting to be found. Regardless of how rough or grimy the stone appeared on the outside.”

  The old woman pushed herself up from her camp chair. Leaning heavily on the table, she slipped on a pair of rhinestone, cat-eye-framed glasses. Delia bit back a chuckle. Between their magnification, and the retro fifties-style frames, the woman looked like something out of a cartoon comic book.

  The woman took the necklace in her hand, resting it against the inside of her palm. She ran her thin fingers over the tiny, perfectly formed petals and the curve of the wolf’s head, closing her eyes like she could feel their softness. She stood completely still. Trance-like.

  Self-conscious at being bent over the table for that long, Delia shifted her feet. “Um—”

  The old lady was tiny compared to Delia, barely reaching her shoulder. Although the woman was probably a harmless eccentric, something about the way she stood transfixed had Delia’s adrenaline spiking.

  “Okay, then. I’m glad you like my necklace, but I’ve really got to finish my shopping.”

  The woman opened her eyes and let go of the pendant, but she kept Delia’s hand. “Finalmente,” she whispered.

  “Finally? What’s final about my pendant?” Standing up straight, Delia pulled her hand back.

  “So you understand the Language of the Rose?”

  “I’m not sure what you mean by ‘Language of the Rose,’ but if you mean Italian, then yes, I understand a bit. My family heritage is from Italy.”

  “Would your family name happen to be DeRosa?” The old woman’s eyes met Delia’s and held.

  “Yes, but how do you know that? Do you know my family?” Delia’s brows knit in a frown.

  The woman’s face was suddenly serious. “Yes,” she whispered. “But not for centuries.” Nodding absently, she reached into the pocket of her long skirt and drew out a small, beautifully embroidered bag.

  Delia took a step back from the table. Centuries? Okay, this had gone beyond everyday New York City eccentric to just plain weird.

  Despite the raised hairs on the back of her ne
ck, she was curious. She wanted to know what this was about, regardless of her mother’s echo reminding her curiosity killed the cat.

  The woman opened the bag and pulled out a large gold signet ring. The crest was a medieval rose wrapped around a wolf’s head. The same emblem she’d stared at above her parent’s fireplace her entire life. The same crest gathering dust with the rest their belongings in a storage facility since their deaths the previous year.

  As if in a trance, Delia took the ring from the old woman’s fingers. The gold felt cool to the touch. It was old and ornate, and identical to her grandfather’s ring.

  Her fingers brushed the edges of the embossed rose, and a shiver passed through her body. Slipping the ring onto her finger, it warmed immediately, spreading an odd, pulsating sensation through her hand and arm.

  Mesmerized, she toyed with the heavy, too large ring, spinning it clockwise around her finger. On the third spin, her hearing went thick, and her eyesight narrowed.

  “No! Not yet!” the old woman yelled, but her warning was no more than a distant echo.

  Heat swirled in Delia’s belly, spreading out toward her limbs. Sweat formed between her breasts and her knees buckled. The table in front of her and the crowd around her tilted and whirled as a wave of vertigo washed past. This was no swoon. She was falling, and there was no ground beneath her feet.

  With an audible whoomph, Delia landed, but not on terra firma. Motion sickness roiled, and she took a ragged breath. She found herself staring up at a face that looked as if it belonged on the cover of a magazine.

  Dark eyes fixed on her, and her own baffled expression was mirrored in them. Well-muscled arms locked tightly around her waist. His black hair was tied at the nape of his neck, with loose edges framing high cheekbones and a wide, full mouth with sexy dimples.

  “Il mio bel fiore.” My beautiful flower.

  Blinking, Delia tried to clear her head. Her hearing was no longer muffled, because his deep, resonant voice sent the same heat through her body as the ring.

  Delia opened her mouth to speak, but his mouth crushed down on hers, leaving her speechless in more ways than one.

  As quickly as he took her lips, was as quickly as he broke his kiss. “The old one is right, it’s not yet time.”

  His fingers traced the edges of her lips, still tingling from the force of his kiss. Trailing lower, he traced the line of her throat, but stopped at the carved piece of rose quartz.

  Mesmerized, Delia’s head swam. His fingers brushed the rose quartz, and in that moment a dull pain bit into her gut. It twisted, growing stronger until she hunched into herself with a cry.

  His grip tightened, holding her fast. “Abbia fiducia nel suo cuore, piccola rosa,” he whispered.

  Everything blurred, and the world twisted and whirled again, until she woke with a thud on the pavement.

  “Oh my God! Lady, are you, all right? Can you hear me?” someone yelled, rushing to kneel beside her as the crowd gathered to rubberneck.

  “Someone call an ambulance!” another shouted, shoving a rolled-up jacket under her head.

  Delia tried to sit up, but another wave of vertigo forced her back to the ground. “Don’t move, honey, the paramedics are on their way.”

  “I’m okay, please, someone just help me up. I need to speak to the old lady at the table with the handmade silks.”

  At their confused faces, she struggled to sit up. “The table right there—” her voice trailed off. The table was gone and so was the old woman.

  Chapter Two

  “Abbia fiducia nel suo cuore, piccola rosa,” she mumbled, climbing the last set of stairs to her sixth-floor walkup. She jammed the key in the lock and opened the apartment door. “What the hell?”

  Her Italian was rusty, and to be honest, she never much paid attention when her grandfather tried to teach her, but she knew enough to figure out what the fantasy hottie meant. Trust your heart, little rose.

  “Fantasy hottie.” She snorted, yanking a bottle of Borolo from her wine rack. It wasn’t expensive, so she cracked the top and grabbed the biggest wine glass she had. The kind of glass her mother and father used to call problem glasses.

  Filling it to the top, she took a healthy gulp and then sat on the edge of her couch. It was all she could do to convince the people who rushed to help, that she didn’t need an ambulance.

  She blamed it on low blood sugar, and let the Good Samaritans get her a lemonade. It was pure sugar, and to be honest, it helped. A lot.

  Still, it didn’t explain what happened or where the old lady with the silks went. If she or that fantasy hottie existed at all.

  Fantasy hottie.

  Try hallucination.

  Maybe there was a vendor with a table of homemade silk. Maybe that vendor was in another row at the flea market. One she browsed, but had already walked away from when she collapsed.

  Yeah. That made more sense.

  Delia finished her wine, and got up to put the glass in the sink. One more, and she’d be drunk when Kyle finally got here. He didn’t seem at all put off when she called to say she was going straight home from the flea market. In fact, the background noise in the bar was so loud from the game, he barely acknowledged her when she called.

  Typical. Again.

  She rinsed the glass and put it in the drain board. Leaning on the edge of the sink, she looked around her small apartment. Everywhere there were memories of her parents and grandfather.

  From the map of Italy above her desk, to the painting of their little island in the Adriatic. Her grandfather was so proud of their heritage. “Like everything in nature, we come from nothing and everything, picha mia. Magic is ours to hold and ours to keep.”

  She never understood what he meant, and he died when she was eleven years old, so she didn’t get a chance to ask. Was it his way of saying ashes to ashes and dust to dust? Then again, the isle of Istria Osero had its own ways for a lot of things.

  She smiled to herself. “Picha mia.” My little one.

  It wasn’t textbook Italian. It was dialect from the north. Her family’s dialect. Just the sound of the words filled her with warmth and loneliness. After her parents’ car crash, she was all that remained of her family. Maybe that was why she hung on to Kyle, though she knew he wasn’t the right fit.

  With a deep breath, she pushed herself away from the sink and went to sit at the table. She needed to eat or that giant glass of wine would knock her on her ass.

  “Lightweight.” She chuckled, but sat at her dinette with a day-old everything-bagel, regardless. She slathered sweet cream butter on both halves, breaking off pieces to eat as her mind replayed what happened at the flea market.

  Polishing off the first half, she pulled her cell from her back pocket and texted Kyle.

  Hey. Not feeling so great. Raincheck?

  She hit send, and surprisingly, he texted right back.

  Sure. You okay?

  Yep. Gonna take a nap.

  KK. Call me if u need me.

  Well, at least he asked if she was okay. Delia wrapped up the rest of the bagel and put it in the breadbox. She wasn’t really hungry. To be honest, she wasn’t really anything. Listless, more than anything else. Maybe a nap wasn’t such a bad idea.

  She took an open box of biscotti from the top of the toaster, and then her rinsed wine glass, before grabbing the bottle of Barolo and pivoting for the living room couch.

  “Kyle’s having pretzels with his beer, so I’m gonna do mine Italian-style, with biscotti and red.”

  She settled on one end of the sofa, putting the cookies and wine on the coffee table. Picking up the remote, she clicked on Netflix.

  “P.S. I Love You.” She chewed on her lip. “Nope. Love the movie, but definitely the wrong vibe for today.” She channel-surfed, finally settling on a documentary about the African savannah.

  Putting the remote down, she filled her glass halfway. She sat back, sipping her wine as the narration droned on. Her body finally relaxed, sinking into the couch
cushions.

  She stirred enough to put the glass on the coffee table before stretching out fully. Her eyes drooped, and Barolo-induced sleep took over.

  ***

  The sea crashed against pale rocks. Delia watched from a soft slope, green with tufts of grass. The wind blew her dark hair back from her shoulders, molding her long, cotton dress to her body.

  Strange. Boho wasn’t usually her style, and this dress was like something out of Robinhood. Then again, dreams rarely followed logic. Still, the gown was soft and light, with a square neckline and drop waist that did wonders for her full hips. Not to mention the gorgeous embroidery.

  “Delia!”

  A woman’s voice called to her, and she turned, shielding her eyes from the sun. She was dressed in a similar gown, and stood in the doorway of a cottage. Whitewashed stone, with a full garden to one side, and laundry fluttering on a line on the other.

  The woman’s face was a blur, but waved in acknowledgment anyway.

  “It’s time, picha. You must go.”

  The woman’s dialect was like her grandfather’s but not. Still, she understood her words.

  “Go where? Why?”

  Stunned that she answered in the same dialect, she laughed a little. The words flowed as naturally as breathing. This was one hell of a lucid dream.

  Still, it didn’t matter. Contentment flooded her body and mind, even if it wasn’t real. That kind of peace was in short supply these days, so she’d take what she could get. Even if it was courtesy of the Barolo.

  “He’s coming, belleza. You must leave.”

  He? If her oversexed imagination and undersexed reality had anything to do with it, this was gearing up to be some dream.

  “Milady, please!”

  Her father used to call her Lady Jane, so why not?

  Delia turned from the woman’s appeal to watch the white caps on the water. The sea below rivaled the water in the Caribbean. Indigo and crystal clear, spreading into inky darkness the farther out she looked. Her father taught her how to read a sea, and this one said a storm brewed. That and the clouds gathering in the distance.