Part 4
Luke found three more traps before dark.
All were unmarked. Two had been placed along narrow animal trails near the den, and another sat beside a drainage where the wolves had likely gone for water. The legal trapping season had ended months earlier.
By the next morning, wildlife officers had closed the area and begun checking access roads. Luke warned Ethan not to touch anything if he found more equipment near the cabin.
“So somebody knew the wolves were there,” Ethan said.
“Maybe. Or they were setting for anything that used those trails.”
“Does that distinction matter?”
“It’ll matter in court. It doesn’t matter much to the animal.”
No arrest came that day, or the next. There were tire impressions, partial boot prints and several people with legal access to nearby private land. Luke did not pretend the investigation would move quickly.
The wolf’s condition worsened faster.
Maya called on the third morning.
“The swelling increased overnight,” she said. “Her temperature is up, and the wound isn’t draining the way I want.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’m taking her back into surgery.”
Ethan stood at the cabin sink, looking through the window toward the trees. Rain had stopped, but low clouds still hid the upper ridge.
“Are you asking me to come?”
“No.”
“Do you want me to?”
Maya exhaled. “I thought you’d rather hear it from me than from a message.”
He arrived at the center an hour before surgery.
The waiting area contained four plastic chairs, a coffee machine and photographs of rehabilitated wildlife mounted along the walls. Most showed animals at release, already turning away from the camera.
Ethan sat with the red field bag between his boots.
Maya came through the doors wearing surgical scrubs. “You understand this may not end with release.”
He nodded.
“If infection reaches the bone, or if the paw loses function, we may have to remove part of the leg. A wild wolf missing a front limb is unlikely to hunt well enough to support four pups.”
“What happens to them?”
“We’d evaluate the mother separately. The pups would be raised with minimal contact and placed with an experienced adult if one became available. But the odds change.”
“You mean they might never go back.”
“I mean I can’t promise they will.”
Ethan looked through the narrow window in the treatment door. He could see only part of the room: stainless steel, a hanging fluid bag and the corner of the table.
“Do what you have to do.”
“That was already the plan.”
“I know.”
Maya started toward the door, then glanced at his bag. “Was Rachel your wife?”
Ethan looked at the faded tape on the front pocket.
“Yes.”
“She kept your supplies organized?”
“She tried.”
“What happened?”
He almost gave the answer he used with strangers: She got sick. It was easier than explaining twelve months of appointments, cautious hope and the final week when Rachel had slept more than she had spoken.
“Cancer,” he said. “Eighteen months ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
Ethan nodded once.
Maya did not offer advice or tell him Rachel would have been proud. She went into surgery and let the door close.
His phone showed eleven unheard messages from Nora.
Some were weeks old. The newest had arrived that morning.
Ethan put in one earbud and pressed play.
His daughter’s voice filled the silence.
“Dad, it’s me. I know you can see that. I’m not calling to ask about the cabin, and I’m not calling to tell you where to live. I just want you to call me back and say you’re okay. You don’t have to sound okay. Just… call.”
The message ended.
Ethan sat with the phone in his hand.
Rachel’s death had not caused one dramatic argument between him and Nora. It had produced dozens of small ones—about whether he was eating, whether he should sell the cabin, whether he could spend winter alone, whether Rachel’s clothes should stay in the closet. Nora’s questions had felt like accusations because Ethan was already accusing himself of surviving.
Eventually he stopped answering.
He called her.
She picked up before the first ring had finished.
“Dad?”
“Hi, Nora.”
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Are you at a hospital?”
“Not for me.”
There was a pause. “What does that mean?”
“I found a wolf.”
“You found a what?”
He told her about the logging road, the trap and the pups. He did not make himself sound braver than he had been. When he described the smallest pup lying in the runoff, Nora became quiet.
“Of course you crawled into a flooded wolf den,” she said.
“It wasn’t flooded yet.”
“That is not the reassuring correction you think it is.”
A laugh escaped him before he could stop it. The sound felt unfamiliar.
Nora heard it.
Neither of them spoke for several seconds.
Then she said, “Can I come up this weekend?”
Ethan looked toward the treatment-room doors. “I’d like that.”
“All right.”
“There’s a leak above the back bedroom.”
“There has always been a leak above the back bedroom.”
“I fixed it once.”
“You moved the bucket.”
He smiled. “Drive carefully.”
After the call, waiting became no easier, but it changed shape. Ethan bought two coffees from the machine and forgot which one was his. He watched afternoon light travel across the floor and listened whenever footsteps approached the door.
Nearly three hours passed before Maya came out.
Her mask hung loose beneath her chin. She looked tired.
“The infection had spread deeper than we hoped,” she said.
Ethan stood. “Did you take the leg?”
“No. We removed damaged tissue and restored blood flow as well as we could.”
“So she keeps it?”
“For now.”
Maya rubbed a hand across the back of her neck. “The next forty-eight hours matter. Swelling can return, and there may be nerve damage.”
“Can she put weight on it?”
“We won’t know until she wakes fully.”
The wolf regained consciousness late that evening. Through the observation monitor, Ethan watched her lift her head and find the pups sleeping in a pile beside her.
She shifted her body.
The bandaged paw remained where it was.
Maya enlarged the camera image and watched closely as the mother tried again. Her shoulder moved, then the upper leg, but the paw dragged across the bedding without resistance.
“Maybe she’s still too sedated,” Ethan said.
“Maybe.”
The wolf tried a third time. Her toes did not move…
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