by J. K Harper
After all, he was making it as much for her as for himself.
* * *
Jordyn Lowe was barely aware of her partner's presence, head buried in making shift notes in her online log book, until Sean said something. "Damn, there he goes again. Acting just like the lone wolf he is.”
Jordyn snapped up her head, shock whispering through her. Following Sean's gaze, she saw one of the soot-marked members of Durango's Station 89 Firehouse peeling off his yellow jacket to check the perimeter of the burn. Tanner. Her heart jolted at the sight of him, as always. Casually, side-eyeing her partner, she said, "Lone wolf?" Inside, her heart took a couple of extra beats, setting her wolf to even more focused attention.
"Yeah, look at him." Sean's voice took on a disapproving tone. "He's always doing that kind of stuff. Don't get me wrong, Tanner's an awesome guy. He can shoot some mean hoops and play a good hand of poker. But that's about it. No one really knows anything about him, you know? He just hangs out on his own all the time." Sean shrugged, as if the term should be obvious. "He's a lone wolf."
Jordyn and her wolf both relaxed. Of course Sean hadn't meant it literally. He was human. He had no idea that shifters not only walked the world's population, but that Tanner was one of them. Or that Jordyn was. "Lone wolf, huh? He and Zach are friends," she pointed out. "Since they were kids."
"Yeah, but Tanner hasn't lived here since he was a kid. I'd say they're not that close anymore. He's pretty buttoned up about most things."
Shrugging a shoulder, looking back down at the paperwork on her tablet still to be filled out, Jordyn let that go. Sean definitely did not need to know about the existence of the local wolf pack. But his next words had her hackles rising again.
"Unless, of course, he shares things with you." Sean elbowed her teasingly in the ribs. "Pillow talk. Spilling all his deep, dark secrets to his lady love." He ended his words on a singsong note.
Jordyn rolled her eyes as both annoyance and that usual sizzling tingle when she thought of Tanner flashed through her. "I'm hardly his lady love. We just like to hang out together sometimes is all." As she said that, her wolf whined in her mind. Frowning, Jordyn shoved away the images of zipping through the woods with Tanner, both of them in wolf form. The images of talking with him, laughing, and plenty of quality "hanging out" time in bed together. With a small sigh, her wolf lay down, resting her chin on her paws. Even so, she still sent a last quick barrage of images at Jordyn: Tanner smiling up at Jordyn in bed, running with her as his wolf in the hills and desert to the west of town, and kissing her so soundly it shortened her breath and scrambled her thoughts.
Taking a long breath in, Jordyn firmly thought at her wolf, No. That sort of closeness doesn't work for me, and you know it. She squashed a sudden flash of pain at the memory of the worst moment of her life. Then she pointedly raised her eyebrows at the tablet in Sean's hands. "Hurry up and finish that, would you? I'd like to get out of here sooner rather than later."
Not to be fazed, Sean lightly retorted, "And why would that be, huh? Got a hot date tonight with Mr. Lone Wolf? Aroooo!" he howled, dissolving into stitches.
"Seriously, Sean," Jordyn snapped, "you have the maturity of a second-grader. It's amazing that you have advanced medical training and can keep a cool head in life or death situations."
Still chuckling, Sean threw up his hands. "Hell, woman, you know a sense of humor is the only way to stay sane in our line of work." Teasing grin still on his face, he bent his head back to his own tablet to finish filling out his notes from their call to the fire.
Jordyn responded only with a muttered "Hmph" as she turned her attention back to her own shift notes. He was right. Every day on the job, they were faced with the presence of death when they raced their ambulance to respond to 911 calls. Everyone in the medical profession knew that sometimes humor was indeed the only way to stay sane and still manage to live a somewhat normal life when dealing with the tremendous pressures of their everyday work life.
Unlike Sean, Jordyn had the advantage of being a shifter. Her genes insured a long lifespan, quick healing, and a natural immunity to most illness. It kept her somewhat removed from the realities of dealing with human trauma on a regular basis.
Deep inside her, her wolf murmured, Humans important. Good to care.
Quirking up an eyebrow and wrinkling her mouth into another slight frown, Jordyn thought back, Of course I care. But distance is required for this job. At that, her wolf lifted her lip to bare her canines, huffed at Jordyn with irritation, and padded toward a back corner of her mind. When Jordyn was in wolf form, she let her wolf lead the way. But she was in human form now. Her human mind was in charge.
She and Sean sat in silence for several minutes, filling out their reports. Luckily, there hadn't been a single real injury on this call. Mild smoke inhalation and some scrapes from where a neighbor had tripped over a garden hose while trying to douse the initial flames. But the homeowners had all escaped with their lives and their pets. It was not one of the heartbreaking calls.
A sudden rap at the window on her side made her jump. Turning her head, her heart stampeded again. Tanner stood there, helmet tucked under his arm, face covered in soot and sweat, dark hair plastered to his head.
No matter what work had done to him, he was the most gorgeous man on the planet as far as Jordyn was concerned. Her wolf leapt back into the forefront of her mind, interested and intensely present again. Tanner motioned for Jordyn to roll down her window. The engine was off, so she just opened her door instead.
“Hey, Jordyn. Do you have a second to step out? Need to talk to you real quick. Alone,” he added, giving Sean a severe look.
Sean shrugged, smiling, still working on his tablet. “I'm paying no attention,” he said cheerfully.
“Whatever,” Jordyn muttered, cuffing her partner on the shoulder, though her voice was affectionate now. Even if he was a pain in the ass sometimes, Sean had her back and she knew it. Sliding out, she closed the door with a deliberate thunk, then walked around to the back of the vehicle.
Every part of her body felt aware of Tanner's presence as he followed her. The dark, brooding intensity he carried around with him was always there as well. That, and the way he could just arouse her like crazy without even touching her.
Mine, her wolf whispered at her.
She shoved the word away. She'd had “mine” before, and it had ended almost before it began in horrible, painful disaster. “Mine” wasn't something she ever wanted again.
Mine, her wolf thought again, this time more urgently. Truly mine. Her tone was almost angry. Jordyn focused on steady breathing. Her wolf was behaving like a boy-crazy schoolgirl—a sharp tail lash against her mind actually stung—and that was not something Jordyn could have. She had to stay calm and collected. It was the only way to stay safe in her own skin, dammit.
The tail lashed again. Mine, her wolf insisted, soft but unrelenting. Mine.
Biting the inside of her cheek in an effort to stay steady, Jordyn went behind the ambulance, which was tucked into the nighttime shadows on one end of the cul-de-sac. Turning around, she began to ask what it was he needed. But Tanner had already stepped up to her, pulling her into his arms and pressing her against his long, hard body. "Just needed to taste you, babe," he murmured before his lips crashed down on hers.
Startled only briefly, she relaxed and wrapped her arms around him. Opening her lips to his was as natural as breathing. She welcomed his questing tongue and even the smoky, salty taste of him. The efforts of the past hours he'd spent fighting the fire trembled through him as he kissed her, the tension and stress making his mouth shake on hers, his arms hard bars as he leaned into her, pressing her back against the ambulance's bay doors.
She didn't mind in the slightest. Jordyn always needed what Tanner offered her. The hardness, even sometimes a harshness. The wild, occasionally even rough sex they both reveled in and demanded from one another. He didn't see death on the job as often as she did, but the demons of
his own past haunted him every time he got called out to a bad fire. Especially the ones that ended in brutal tragedy. They both offered one another release and relief. She gave to him as eagerly as he took from her, then flipped it around and took from him what she needed as well. Even though this one had been a clean call, no loss of life although the property loss was total, she knew every fire reminded him. She understood. Every time she went out on a call, even though she kept herself at a remove from the emotions of the victims, the adrenaline always spiked through her. Always.
For being nothing more than bed buddies, she and Tanner were damn well matched.
Is more than that. The low but forceful voice of her wolf unfurled like a snapping pennant through her mind. Need him. He is mine.
Losing herself in the wild edges of Tanner's kiss, Jordyn let her wolf's thoughts go in the moment, chalking them up to the need for physical release. Her wolf muttered something else at her, but Jordyn pushed it away, letting her body stay pliant and eager against Tanner's under the cover of the night that sheltered them from prying eyes.
Long moments later, the hardness of his cock pressing against her with a deep need she wanted to answer right then, he reluctantly backed away from the kiss. Her lips felt swollen. Tender. As always, with him, she wanted more.
"That was a nice surprise," she said, barely managing to keep her voice cool and steady. Yes, Tanner was awesome, but she'd gotten a good enough sense of him and his natural restlessness in the past ten months that she was wary of feeling anything more for him. Experiencing heartbreak again wasn't part of her life plan. Once was more than enough.
He nodded against her head, the scratchy roughness of his bristling cheek and chin scraping against her face with the deliciousness that always made her shiver in aroused response.
She expected him to make his usual offer next. To meet at her apartment in town after both their shifts were over for a long night of pleasure and the oblivion they both craved. The words he said instead startled her, causing her to drop back and look at him in the darkness with her wolf-enhanced sight.
"I need to fight tonight. Come with me?" He sounded tentative for a second. "You know I always fight a lot better if I know you're watching me," he added in a low, almost off-handed growl.
Jordyn's wolf paced and whined throughout her mind, worry and a funny little sense of protectiveness emanating from her. Jordyn stared at Tanner for a long moment, trying to read his face. But he'd reverted back to being just as contained as she was. She rarely saw what was really going on with him play across his expression. Only when they were in bed together.
Then a wicked smile slashed his mouth into a lascivious grin. "I'll make it worth your while afterward, you sexy thing, you."
Despite herself, Jordyn laughed, shaking her head. "You're incorrigible. Of course I'll be there. Why tonight? It's not your usual m.o. after a fire." Tanner usually worked off his steam at fires, needing only the sensuous bubble of the two of them wrapped together afterward rather than a fight.
He stepped back. Glancing down, he took a breath before looking right back at her with his stunning mahogany brown eyes, clearly visible to her despite the darkness. She felt herself melting all over again.
Until his next words.
"Jordyn, I'm leaving.”
It was like a physical punch to her gut. Her wolf sat up and howled in her mind. Jordyn knew her wolf looked out of her eyes, which likely glowed from the surge of emotion.
Tanner exhaled, hard, keeping his eyes locked on hers. She could see his wolf in them as well. “I just gave the chief my notice. It's time for me to move on.” She heard a ragged beat in his tone as he added, “So I really need to beat the crap out of someone tonight. Then I just want to lose myself in you afterward.”
Long self-protective habit made her nod coolly, despite her wolf's agitated whirling around in her mind. Despite her own sudden whirling around in her mind. “Okay. Okay. Yeah. Sure.” She sounded like a mindless automaton. Smoothing out her words, she added, “I understand, Tanner. We knew this was coming.”
He paused for a long moment, still gazing at her with his fathomless eyes. The sheer strength of his presence flooded over her. He finally nodded. “Yeah. We did know.”
She had to take a moment herself to be sure her words would come out lightly. “Where are you heading? Did you get a new job?”
He half shrugged, wiping away a trickle of sweat tracing down along the hard, gorgeous planes of his face. “Seattle.”
Her heart thudded hard. Seattle. That was a long way from Durango, Colorado.
“I spent about a month there last year. One of the guys on the crew, he's a shifter, too, he told me there'll be an opening soon. Just talked to him the other day about it.” Tanner shrugged again, his eyes still studying her. “Chief rode my ass again one time too many. I'm just not a good fit here, Jordyn. It's not working out for me.” His voice was low.
She tilted her chin up at him. Even though they'd both known the score when they first began hooking up, they both acknowledged that their—friendship—her wolf snorted very inelegantly in her mind—went beyond just casual. She felt comfortable enough to challenge him somewhat. “Tanner, this is your home. Of course you fit here. You—you do belong here.” Her voice cracked on those last words in an uncharacteristic lapse of her usually tight control. No. No, no, no. No losing control. She swallowed hard and went quiet.
Silence wrapped around them again. His eyes lightened a little more. It was a sure sign of his wolf pushing at him. Staring at him, Jordyn thought about the last time he'd left this place. Left Durango, left the Black Mesa pack that had taken him in when he was still a pup. She'd been a pup herself when he and his sister came to live with her native pack, and neither Tanner nor his sister tried very hard to make new friends. They stuck together, a tiny tribe of two against a world that must have seemed horrifically brutal and unfair to them. Once Jordyn understood why they were that way, so insular and skittish of others, she left them to their own devices, as did the other pups in the pack. Well, except Zach, who had sensed that Tanner needed a friend even though he tried to rebuff everyone. No, Jordyn never had gotten close to Tanner back then—but she still remembered the aura of dark anger and defensiveness that surrounded him every day.
These days, he didn't wear his pain as openly as he had back then. But she knew without a doubt that it was still there.
Tanner slowly shook his head. “Once, yes. I did belong here. But this isn't the place for me anymore.” His voice see-sawed between soft and firm. Unsure, yet certain.
The weight of his ugly history, the tragedy that still haunted him, dropped heavily between them. Keeping herself breathing evenly, willing her heart to stop thudding out of whack and her wolf to settle down, Jordyn finally just nodded back. It wasn't an argument open for more discussion. They were both better off on their own. Tanner wasn't the only lone wolf around here.
“So,” he went on more briskly. He didn't quite look at her, even though he was only inches away. “Tonight's fight. See you there later? About an hour?”
“Yes.” She nodded firmly, clenching her fingers together in the dark to keep any emotion from flooding her voice.
He gave her one last hard kiss before turning to stride off back around the ambulance. Then he paused, looked back at her, and said a gruff, "Thanks, Jordyn," before disappearing back around the corner of the vehicle.
She locked a sigh inside her throat. That was Tanner. That was the most she could expect from him. And she'd known it from the start. It was all, she harshly reminded herself, she was capable of anymore, either. Resolute, ignoring the chills running down her skin despite the remaining heat of the smoldering ashes, ignoring her wolf's soft, anxious whines, she turned to go back into the cab of the ambulance and finish her notes.
Maybe after sexy, surprisingly complex Tanner of the guarded heart shed some shifter blood tonight, and they spent some of their favorite sort of “quality time” together—and at that th
ought, a genuine smile ghosted across her face—she'd get back to her own equilibrium. She'd find her balance again, and be able to move forward just like she always did. Strong, and on her own.
Or, she thought as she felt the restless pace of her deeply upset wolf in her mind and the sorrowful howls beating against her skull, maybe not.
2
Around the other side of the ring, lumbering alongside the ropes like the giant pile of bumbling bruin he was, the huge grizzly shifter stared at Tanner with what was pretty much a crazy-ass grin on his face. Behind the bear, throngs of amped-up shifters growled, howled, shouted and chanted their support. This particular fighter was well known for being slightly unhinged. Simply known as Crazy Bear, he had a legion of fans. Tonight, he also had bloodlust in his eyes that promised he wanted to do some serious damage to his opponent.
On the other side of the ring in his own corner, Tanner smiled to himself, although he kept his face outwardly expressionless. He was itching for one hell of a throw down, and this psycho dude was just the one to bring it.
Behind Tanner, another section of the crowd whooped and hollered their encouragement for him. The shifter fight rings were underground only as far as humans were concerned. In the shifter world, these fights were sanctioned, legal, and extremely popular. They offered an outlet for many shifters who needed to release their wild side in a way that was challenging to do in the modern world. These fights were also extremely lucrative. Encouraged and regulated, betting was the second highlight of the fights, after the violence. Tanner knew full well plenty of money would be exchanging hands this evening.
He let a cold smile cracked across his otherwise granite expression. Crazy Bear saw it. He roared back his trademark rebel yell, some sort of mangled war whoop that was half human, half grizzly, and all crazy.