by J. K Harper
If one thing in this world was certain, it was that Caleb Bardou was always up for a fight. Always. Backing down from battle meant losing. Losing wasn't an option. Losing was what beaten-down wolves did. Wolves like the rogues who'd been spilling across Black Mesa land recently.
Rogues. His wolf's hackles raised. Laced with menace and disgust, the word smacked itself around Caleb's mind. His stride lengthened, feet pounding along, face dropping into a scowl. He was barely aware of the sudden wide berth a small group of weekend revelers gave him as he charged down the street.
He'd never stop fighting the rogues. They were definitely a menace, a blight on the shifter community, a plague of lawless jackals who deserved to die out on their lonesome, lacking pack and structure and basic respect for the world the way it was.
The rogues under the protection of the Black Mesa Wolf Pack are not to be harmed. Dammit. His father's edict, passed on with implacable firmness, echoed in his mind. In a somewhat sulky corner of his mind, his wolf growled with frustration and resigned acceptance. He would never defy the Alpha of the Black Mesa Wolves.
Barely under his breath, Caleb growled, too. If only he could be allowed to fight the rogue leader, just once. He could hardly bring himself to use the guy's name, Luke, in forced civil conversation. In the privacy of his own mind, there were more colorful names to assign. The guy seemed to be toeing the line, but after the attack on Caleb's brother, Rafe, and Rafe's mate, Sara, a few months ago, Caleb had been itching to wipe that cocky smile off that bastard's face. Luke knew something about the attack, no matter how many times he claimed he didn't. He was a rogue. Rogues lied. End of story.
A rogue with a pack, though. Caleb's own Alpha had made that decree, allowing Luke to form a new pack as a sort of satellite pack to Black Mesa. Luke, the rogue bastard, would be an alpha himself. Supported by Caleb's own Alpha and father. Allowed all the perks of having a sanctioned pack, rather than the miserable life he should have had as a rogue.
Rankled beyond belief like he was every time he thought about it, Caleb growled again, his boots storming along the sidewalk. His left fist curled as he imagined smashing it into the rogue's face, wiping away any hint of satisfaction. Yeah, he thought with the savage lurch inside that indicated his wolf paced his mind, filled with just as much aggression. That would do it just fine. He savored the image as he strode along, almost totally unaware of his surroundings.
Half a second later, he body slammed into something small, warm, and definitely not rogue-ish. A startled squeak filled his ears. Automatically reaching out, Caleb found himself holding handfuls of a soft female body.
“I'm sorry!” The words left his mouth as automatically as his hands had reached out to steady her. Sharp awareness of where he was abruptly returned. No rogues, no fight, no bloodshed imminent. Except perhaps his. An outraged female glare pinned him to the spot.
Sudden recognition flooded him as her scent reached him and he got a good look at her face. At the same moment, the small figure with narrowed eyes said, “Could you please remove your hands from me?”
Caleb's large hands still held her in places he normally didn't hold girls unless he was about to spend some up close, very personal time with them.
“Right! Sorry.” Hastily, he did as she asked. More tentatively, he added, “Rielle.”
A tight-lipped smile on the pretty face was all he got in return.
Inwardly, Caleb sighed. His wolf did, too, lying down with head on paws. Trust him to run—literally—into the one wolf in the entire pack who pretty much thought he was nothing more than a throwback to caveman times. Maybe the rest of the evening wasn't going to be as simple as he'd hoped.
* * *
Rielle's heart still thumped out of step as she tried to settle her pulse. All she'd wanted was a quiet night to herself, a simple walk home from her little store and a few hours settled in with her new book and a glass of wine.
But no. She had to get run over by the biggest, most bumbling wolf in the entire pack. Just when she thought downtown Durango was safe.
Caleb Bardou let go of her, stepping back a few paces from where he'd almost mowed her down just outside High Peaks Couture, the upscale store Rielle managed and loved with all her heart. Her sanctuary, her place outside the pack where she felt most at home, and he had to show up? Really?
“Rielle,” he said again. His voice graveled on her ear like a truck rumbling down the street, deep and growly and filled with very masculine power. Like those smash 'em up car shows on TV, the kind where guys roared into one another driving huge vehicles designed to get banged up and crashed and destroyed. Caleb Bardou so belonged on a show like that. All muscle and no mindfulness.
Honestly, she didn't understand any of it.
“Ah, I'm really sorry.” He did sound apologetic. Even a little sheepish. “I wasn't looking where I was going.”
Well, that had been clear enough. But he did sound sincerely abashed. She felt the tight muscles in her face relax just a smidge as she still glared at him. Despite herself, she had to admit Caleb was one good-looking guy, with that tousled gold-cinnamon hair flopping over his flat-out sexy face. Looking adorably chagrined as he did right now, she could imagine girls fawning all over him.
Staring up at him—way, way up at him, since he towered over her by at least a foot—Rielle also thought about where his hands had touched her. She sort of...tingled...in those places. Yes, she could understand the attraction.
Deep inside her, very faintly, her wolf whined. Rielle stiffened against the almost lonesome sound and pushed it away.
She forced herself to concentrate. Caleb had almost flattened her like the uncouth barbarian he was. Right. Typical. “Clearly, you're sorry.” She used her best snappish tone.
He narrowed his eyes at her.
“I said I was sorry, didn't I?” His voice sounded defensive. “I had a lot on my mind. Besides,” he suddenly changed tack, “you stepped out like you owned the sidewalk. It's not really my fault I ran into you. You put yourself in the way.”
Triumphantly, he crossed his arms over his broad chest and looked at her as if daring her to refute it. A street light haloed his hair around his face, giving him a celestial air.
“Whatever!” How was it possible he could make her feel like a tiny pixie, helplessly shouting up at him? He was so...big. “I was minding my own business, just locking up for the night to go home, and I get plowed down by some wolf who can't control his own space.” Her voice rose. She felt like stamping her foot, too, but had to admit she was a little too old for that.
His heavy eyebrows raised as well and his mouth dropped a bit. He was an open book for her to read. Right now, he was on the page of looming thunder. Seriously, every time she ever ran into Caleb Bardou, he sort of rumbled around her. Not to mention invaded her space. The big ox had some sort of conspiracy against her.
Leaning forward, Caleb spoke with precise inflection.
“Look here, princess.”
“Princess!” Now her own jaw fell open. But she barely had time for the indignant yelp before he charged on.
“You heard me. Ree, you're my Packmate and I totally respect that,” he said in that deep, grinding voice. Complete testosterone overload. His face belied his words, but she was too busy feeling offended to point it out.
“But seriously, you're down here, playing around in your store—”
No, he did not.
“Playing around! This is my job! It's important!”
“Important! Important?”
Rielle's nostrils flared just the slightest bit. Her primal side, rising closer to the surface and scenting the area for danger in reaction to her elevated emotions. There was no danger, though. Not unless she considered a six foot, four inch guy she'd seen casually naked a thousand times over her lifetime, one who could shift into a huge, strapping wolf in the flicker of an eye, filled to the brim with all his studly pheromones, all brawn and no brains, towering over her in some sort of ridiculous battle of
wills as a threat. His own nostrils were flaring back at her in near comical fashion.
To her surprise, she almost giggled. Almost.
Caleb took a step closer. Considering he was still almost on top of her, that now put him about three inches away from her. If Rielle hadn't known him her entire life, she might have felt nervous about the big, pissed off guy practically yelling at her. Too bad for Caleb she was the Pack historian. She probably knew more about him than he knew about himself. He hardly scared her.
He could, though, the thought raced across her mind, accompanied by a sudden image of him sprawled naked on a bed, smooth skin rippling over his ripped physique, gazing at her with burning intensity in his eyes. Rielle's breathed hitched for half a second.
What is that about?
Of course, Caleb the barbarian didn't notice her strange reaction. He just plowed on. “What's important is our Pack, Rielle!”
“Shh!” She finally found the presence of mind to hiss at him. Glancing across the street, she noticed a small gaggle of college kids strolling along the sidewalk, openly watching their dramatic little outburst. “People will hear you.”
Keeping humans in the dark about the existence of shifters was a paramount mandate drummed into each wolf from birth. With obvious effort, Caleb caught himself up. He whipped his head around to pin a glare on their audience. Rielle could smell the sudden stink of fear as they quickened their pace away. Otherwise, their section of the street was deserted. She was trapped with an overbearing wolf who liked to steamroll through every situation just because he could.
“Ree,” he said more quietly, although his voice still held force, “our Pack has way more important things to worry you right now. We've got rogues crawling out of the rocks, and you're thinking about dresses?” Derision trimmed his voice, making her twitch. “That's not very sensical, you know.”
Rielle was the farthest thing from a cruel wolf one could get. But that comment about dresses cut deep. She let a short burst of not-very-nice laughter escape.
“What?” His voice sounded a bit aggrieved, yet it had dropped an octave lower. Clearly his wolf paced just below the surface.
Rielle's own small, dark wolf flashed through her mind, unhappy yet oddly intrigued, before Rielle dispelled it. The faintest edge of guilt made her voice whip out, sharp rather than sorry. “There's no such word as 'sensical.' It's 'nonsensical,'” she said. “Or maybe you meant 'sensible.'”
One look at his face as soon as she loosed those tiny, mean barbs, and she wanted to crawl into the deepest, darkest, nastiest pit on earth, where she obviously belonged.
2
Caleb knew every single thought in his brain ticked over his face in a nanosecond. He was a hell of a card player, but he'd never once been able to maintain a poker face around cute little Rielle Amoux. Something about her always made him feel sort of...exposed. It sure was a good thing he hardly ever saw her. She never came to the den. For a shifter, Ree didn't seem to want to hang out with her own kind all that much.
Right now, that suited him fine. From her widened eyes and paling face, he was pretty sure she wanted to stuff her own words back into her mouth. Whatever. They were just words. The only thing that could really hurt were claws, jaws, and lethal paws. His private mantra boosted him back to a level where he thought he could speak without something in his voice betraying him. Growling in assent, his wolf lashed an irate tail.
There was a note of confusion in there as well, though. Caleb thought he sensed searching. His wolf searching for Rielle's wolf? But she was right there. Ignoring his wolf's doubt, he plunged forward like he usually did. Keep it light, and slightly off point so as to confuse the enemy.
Rielle is not enemy, his wolf thought. She is Pack.
Caleb ignored that and shook himself. Smile, bluff, repeat. It always worked.
“No hard feelings, Rielle, okay?” He worked hard to keep his voice bland. “I know your store is special to you.”
Despite the upset still written all over her, she wrinkled her brow a little. Good. She was confused at his swift, tactical change of attitude.
“I just meant that with the rogues showing up and attacking Black Mesa Wolves”—he could feel the thundercloud darken his face as he thought of his own brother, almost killed by the rogues now twiddling their useless thumbs in the holding cells in the den's basement—“we've got a lot to worry about. And if you're focused so much on your store, you might not be paying attention to rogues who want to drag you off for who knows what reasons. That's all I was trying to say.”
She was kind of adorable when she was alarmed. It set off his protective instincts so strongly he had to shove his wolf down. Even so, he knew that wild edge lit up his eyes. Besides, that was wrong to think that way. Right? He didn't want her to be alarmed so he could feel protective about her. He didn't want her to be—anything.
His wolf whined.
Now he was confusing not only Rielle, but himself. Time to pull out the big guns and get this conversation back on track. Despite being a honed fighting machine, Caleb knew a thing or two about the ladies: When in doubt, grovel.
“Or, you know.” He grinned his best grin at her, the one that usually made girls smile. “Thinking about your store all the time means you wouldn't be paying attention to big doofuses who run you over right in the middle of the sidewalk.”
Bingo. A shadow of a smile tugged at the corners of her lips. It was small, but he'd take it.
“I'm sorry,” she began. He cut her off with a casual wave of his hand. He noticed he was barely inches away from her. Was that really good spicy-sweet smell coming from her?
Yes, pig. It's her shampoo. Never notice a sweet-smelling girl before?
Pig? His wolf gave a long-suffering growl.
Caleb gave Rielle a long look. Run a girl over, really see her for the first time ever. Huh. Her wavy dark hair curled and bounced around her cheeks, cascaded down her neck, swung just above her—breasts. Not that he was looking at a packmate's breasts. Although his non-look assured him they were perky, not too big but not tiny, either. And it wasn't like he hadn't seen her naked before. Every shifter in the pack had no worries about nudity around one another. Shifting demanded shedding clothes, and it was something they'd all done since cubs. But still. Rielle had breasts. He'd never really thought about them before. Now, he had to force his eyes to stay focused on her face.
She wore a little dress thing, all soft and wafty, in a pretty light orange color that set off her skin really well. Guess she did know a thing or two about clothes. And those heels—how girls could attempt to wear high heels, let alone stand around at work all day in them, was beyond him. But they did make her legs look long and really feminine.
His wolf snorted a small whuffle. Rielle is nice. Small, like a little snack. Maybe she's tasty, too.
Caleb thought hard about poker while he tried to shut up the wolfish laughter from what his sister, Lily, would call his barbarian brain. Whoa. Redirect! he sternly warned himself.
“You're right,” he went on in a casual but apologetic tone. Those dainty eyebrows over Rielle's soft russet eyes rose again at his admission. “I was thinking about something else and not watching where I was going.”
She shifted on her feet, and his gaze dropped for just an instant to her hips. Rielle really was pretty. He'd always known that, of course, he wasn't a total idiot. But she was really pretty tonight. He usually didn't think about it. Something was special tonight, though.
Realization dawned.
“Oh, shit,” he said. She winced a bit at the word. Right. Rielle was sort of prim. He'd forgotten that. Fine, add must watch language around Rielle to his huge list of things to remember on a daily basis. “I mean, damn. Sorry. You have a date, right? That's why you're dressed like that.”
Rielle's pretty pink lips opened, then closed, then opened again. Fascinated despite his best intentions, Caleb stared at the plush, soft things. Whoa. Clearly, he hadn't been getting out enough lately, what with t
raining to thump rogue ass and all. Girls were always around, and he usually found them easy enough to call in, enjoy, then set loose.
But he usually didn't spend this much time admiring their gorgeous, luscious lips.
Or wondering what those particular lips might feel like as they touched his body.
* * *
Rielle's heart rabbited in her chest. Caleb thought she had a date? Reflexively, she looked down at her outfit. Fairly typical for a day in the store, it was a dress from a new designer who'd sent it special to Rielle as an enticement to carry her line. It was a cute dress, but she wore clothes like this every day.
Oh. But she didn't see Caleb every day. Right. Because he was never in town, and he certainly never came into her store. Obviously, he didn't have a girlfriend for whom he needed to buy gifts.
For some reason, the thought of Caleb having a girlfriend made her flush a bit. Well, if he did have a girlfriend, she would pity the poor woman who had to put up with his ways. Not like she was one to talk. Dating wasn't something Rielle did. Like, ever. But she wanted to. Really, really wanted to. Sometimes she forgot how much she wanted that. Right now, being reminded of her dateless status really stung.
“I don't have a date.” Which was such a brilliant way to tell him she had no life. She kept her voice slightly cool. “This is how I dress for work. If customers see me wearing the clothes we carry in the store, it helps sell them. Simple advertising.”
Caleb's wolf still lurked in his eyes. She'd seen it flash there earlier—probably when she'd insulted him with that horrible comment about his diction. She still could hardly believe she'd said that. Rielle was never mean or rude. Her parents had always emphasized good manners, and in general she didn't have the stomach for cruelty.
It was probably just Caleb's natural barbarian nature that brought it out in her. Case in point, she was thinking about him in unflattering terms. He was a little barbaric, though, with those huge muscles and that little scar on his chin. He must have gotten raked hard in the face by a claw, then not shifted soon or often enough right afterward to let it heal over. In fact, he probably did it on purpose, so he'd have that bad boy look forever to remind others how tough he was.