For the Hope of a Crow

by T. S. Joyce

  She’d wanted to ask in town about the Alpha of Red Dead Mayhem but had changed her mind because she wanted to figure him out for herself and form her own unbiased opinion about her new mate. Plus, the only thing she needed to know was already checked off—he was a crow, and crows were loyal. Ramsey would be good enough.

  “Are you lost?” one of the bikers yelled none-too-politely from under an awning near a garage.

  “No,” she called, blinking hard as raindrops pelted her face. “I’m just…gathering my courage.”

  “For what? This ain’t no public bar. Piss off.”

  Horrid, horrid manners. She should Change and stomp him into oblivion. Feeling quite offended, Vina marched toward the door, threw it open with relish, and then froze in the entryway to the Red Dead Mayhem clubhouse. There was a bar across the room where three men sat staring at her over their shoulders. One dark-haired bartender with tattoos all over his neck and arms had his mouth hanging open. One couple, who must have been truly in love, were going at it like rabbits against a pool table, while a couple other men watched casually as though this behavior happened all the time.

  Monsters.

  Maybe she’d been wrong about the crows.

  No, no, no, give them a chance. They are loyal, and that’s why you’re here.

  Well, no matter what, Ramsey wasn’t going to be banging her against a pool table. They would have sex. Normal sex. Missionary style with the lights dimmed, and she would possibly give him a BJ on his birthdays and major holidays. She’d written a list of rules for this pairing, and that one was number three. The sex would be…normal. Because normal equaled healthy.

  What if he wasn’t her type?

  “You came?” said the man behind the bar.

  “That’s what she said,” gritted out the man slamming into the girl on the pool table. She was moaning now.

  Geez, this was so weird and awful! “Uh, yes, I’m here,” Vina said to the bartender lamely. She studied the man. He was covered in tattoos, weighed twice as much as her in muscle, and had a knife on his belt. The giant looked truly rough around the edges, but his black hair was clean and spiked up like a hotboy, and his eyes were a soft brown and clear. He had straight white teeth, full lips under a perfectly trimmed beard, and though she’d never been attracted to gym rats, he filled his gray Harley Davidson tank top out nicely.

  “Are you Ramsey?” she asked, failing to keep the hope from her voice. He was cute.

  “You look like a suburban housewife,” said one of the fellas who was openly watching the couple in their act of debauchery. He had a huge beard that came down past his nipples. “What are you wearing on your feet?”

  Vina scoffed. “They are Converses. They are cool!”

  The men laughed, even the one slamming into the groaning woman.

  Nipple Beard asked, “What the fuck do you want with Ramsey?”

  Okay, Vina was having trouble keeping her eyes off the screwing couple since they were both panting. The man had his jeans down to the middle of his thighs as he pummeled her from behind, his butt-cheeks flexing with the effort. Did crows only mate from behind? Aaaand now the guy was yelling out, twitching into the girl, and this was the most uncomfortable, embarrassing moment of her life.

  “The show ain’t free,” Nipple Beard said. “This place is club members only, and you haven’t answered my question. What do you want with Ramsey?”

  “Oh…uuuuuuh…”

  “She’s good,” the bartender said, sauntering around the bar. “I’m Rike,” he said, introducing himself with a firm handshake.

  Disappointment swirled in her chest. So this one was not her mate. Ramsey could still be that older, beer-gutted, rude gentleman on the wall.

  “This way,” Rike said, making his way toward a stairwell. Okay, relief. At least Ramsey wasn’t one of the depraved guys down here.

  At the end of a long hallway, Rike stopped and gave the last door a soft knock.

  “Fuck off,” came the muffled answer.

  Rike gave her a sympathetic smile and said, “Good luck.” Then he turned on his heel and was back to the stairs in the time it took her to blink once. Crows were fast.

  “What am I supposed to do?” she called out.

  “Talk to your mate!” Rike yelled as he disappeared.

  Vina huffed in irritation. She was going to give Sarah a very mediocre review.

  She lifted her closed fist, hesitated for the span of two seconds to pump herself up, then knocked out the drum beat for “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana. She continued knocking until the door yanked open, and there stood one very angry, very muscular, very tattooed man with sleep-mussed hair and wearing a pair of black sweats. His eyes matched the color, which was equal parts terrifying and intriguing. There was no white in his eyes, only the color of coal.

  “What. Do. You. Want?” he snarled.

  “Uh…”

  “It’s a simple question.”

  “Well, I haven’t been asked that before! What do I want?” Then she repeated it in a whisper, really thinking about it. “I guess I want a happy life, a stable one, with someone who will buy me ice cream when I’m on my period, and people to care about my birthday parties, or just me in general, pizza parties on Fridays and more time off work would be nice. Vacations wouldn’t be horrible either. I also have this thing where I make origami swans when I’m stressed out, so maybe a gift card to the paper shop in town?”

  Ramsey slow blinked and then arched an eyebrow. “Lady, I’m drunk, and you look like a soccer mom. I’m real confused on why you are standing in my clubhouse knocking ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ on my door at fucking six in the morning.”

  “It’s ten.”

  “What?”

  “Ten-ten, actually,” she said, frowning at her phone. “I was right on time when I came here.”

  “Do we have a meeting or something? Are you an insurance sales…person?” He dropped his black eyes to her feet. “You ain’t a Crow Chaser, that’s for damn sure.”

  “Seriously? Are you insulting my shoes, too? I bought these especially for today. To meet you. And you’re staring at them like they are bugs. And not cute bugs, like caterpillars or ladybugs, but one of those gross bugs with a hundred-million legs.” Vina hugged the folder to her chest like a shield. “I’m Vina. Vina Fiona Marsh.”

  “Lady. I don’t care.” Ramsey was scrubbing his hand up and down his face as he swayed on his feet. “Did you say it’s ten?”

  “It’s ten-eleven now.”

  “Shit. It was weird to meet you. Don’t get stabbed on your way out.” Ramsey turned slowly, gripping the doorframe as if he was struggling to keep his balance, and then stepped gingerly toward a bathroom on the other side of the room.

  “Um, we were supposed to meet at ten. Sarah set this up?”

  “Don’t know a Sarah.”

  Wait, what? Vina hovered on the other side of the open doorway, so uncertain about everything. About every single step that had gotten her here. This didn’t feel right, but she had to make sure before she left. Had to figure out what was going on.

  “You’re Ramsey Hunt, right?” she called, stepping through the doorway and over a guitar on the floor. The room was a wreck. It looked like someone had broken in and destroyed the place looking for something. “Were you robbed?”

  “No.” He hadn’t bothered shutting the bathroom door, so she could clearly see him splashing water on his face.

  Okay, so Ramsey Hunt was just a slob then. There were two empty bottles of whiskey on a small end table by a chair in the corner. The sheets on the bed were disheveled, and the floor was covered with papers and clothes. There was a backpack and a baseball bat that had seen some serious damage. A laptop sat open on the floor next to a broken lamp, and almost every pillow from the bed was scattered around the room. One was ripped up…or…no. Vina squinted her eyes at the handle sticking out of it. Oh good, he’d stabbed his pillow.

  “I think there has been some sort of mistake,�
�� she murmured, her heart sinking to her toes.

  “Lady—”

  “Vina. Please.”

  Ramsey sighed an irritated sound and locked his arms against the sink, stared at her through the mirror, water dripping from his jaw. “Vina. My whole life is a mistake. You’re going to have to be really fuckin’ specific today. What do you want from me?”

  “I think my answer is nothing.”

  Ramsey frowned in the mirror and then turned around, leaned his butt against the sink, and crossed his arms over his defined chest. Lookey at all those tattoos and flexed-up muscle. His hair was gold-blond, shaved on the sides and longer up top, and his eyes had lightened from pure black to bright blue. He might be a stabby psychopath, but he was a hot stabby psychopath. He canted his head and dragged his focus up and down her body. And ooooh, she didn’t know how he did it, but she felt as if he had touched her with his gaze. She took two steps back, and her breath sped up.

  “Then what are you doing here?”

  “I…” Vina cleared her throat and dropped her eyes to the floor. “I’m your mate.”

  There were thirty seconds of complete silence. It had stretched on for so long she finally found the courage to look back up at him.

  The second they locked eyes, he said, “Have all the women in this world lost their goddamn minds?”

  “I haven’t lost my mind! I came here to meet you, as set up by Sarah, our matchmaker!”

  “Are you trying to get fucked, too?” Ramsey asked. “Seriously? This is the game?”

  “Get fucked, too? That doesn’t sound like a game at all. That sounds horrible. I would only make love, not get fucked. I’ve read articles on how, if you call it fucking, it negates any intimacy you could have. You could kill the healthy parts of our relationship with destructive words like that.”

  “Of our relationship?” he barked. His eyes were so wide, and he was looking at her like she really had lost her mind, but he was the one with the problem.

  “Why did you fill out an application for the shifter matchmaker if you just want to play a game?”

  “I didn’t fill out any application for matchmaking whatever!”

  “Yes, you did!” She flipped the folder open and yanked out his application, then marched herself right into the small bathroom with him and shoved it in front of his face.

  “Ramsey Nathaniel Hunt,” he read aloud. “Age thirty-three, crow shifter. No family, Alpha of a crow shifter Clan, bad boy, good man.”

  Vina cut in primly, “And we can talk about that bad boy answer because that isn’t for me. I like steady men.”

  Ramsey’s mouth moved while he read silently, and then he yelled, “Is a B-minus in the bedroom and likes missionary style only? This isn’t even my writing, and no self-respecting man would admit his shitty fucking skills.”

  “You cuss a lot.”

  “Did you not hear the part where I said this isn’t my writing? It’s Rike’s. Sorry, lady, you’ve been lead on a wild goose chase, but this wild goose ain’t interested. You’ll have to suck someone else’s dick for protection.”

  “For protection?” Vina asked, baffled by everything he was saying.

  “Yeah, that’s why you’re doing this right? You look like a nice lady. A little vanilla maybe. You probably have a Suburban and live in a nice house on a nice street. You drink expensive coffee, have a few kids, and a divorce has left you bored of drinking wine alone at nights so you’re looking for a fling with a mess of a man. You don’t like feeling alone so you want someone around to make you feel safe from the world. Well it ain’t gonna be me.”

  Vina’s lip quivered and her eyes filled with warm tears, but she would not waste them on this awful man. With the flick of her wrist, she tossed the folder with her application on the bed. Fury fueled every word she uttered to Ramsey, “Maybe I’m vanilla, compared to you with your knives and your whiskey and your friends screwing on pool tables, but I’m still a person. I drive an old black Explorer that is on its last legs, and I have to dump half my income into it just to keep it running. My coffee is cheap. I make it myself every morning. I have no kids because I didn’t find my person to start a family with. I don’t drink wine. I drink margaritas. I’m not looking for a fling. I’ve been waiting for a crow to apply for the matchmaking service for three years. I didn’t really care who the crow was, just that it was a crow I got paired with. I came in here fully prepared to give you every chance, but you aren’t even polite.

  “I’m leaving here feeling awful, and if I’d wanted that, I would’ve said yes to any of the other shifters Sarah found that matched my application. Congrats. You’re anything but vanilla. That’s not a compliment. Good luck with your drinking and stabbing, Ramsey. I’m gonna go back to waiting because I’ve gotten really freaking good at it. And someday, one of your crows will apply for the matchmaker, and I’ll make them happy because I’m good at that. I’m confident that I can make someone happy if they pick me. If they really pick me. And you’re going to look back on this moment and kick yourself because I’m not half bad despite my shoes.”

  Ramsey narrowed his eyes and parted his full lips to say something, but she didn’t want to hear it. Pursing her lips against a sob that bubbled up her throat, she bolted from the room.

  She wiped her eyes as she headed for the stairs. Stupid, stupid man, and even stupider her. She’d really thought this would work. She’d just had this feeling that Ramsey was the one who was going to change her stars, who was going to turn it around for her. But he’d turned out to be a monster.

  “Wait,” Ramsey said, blurring past her and planting his feet right in front of her.

  Vina lurched to a stop, barely avoiding running straight into him. “Move,” she gritted out.

  “Why a crow?”

  She tried to sidle around him, but he moved in front of her again, blocking her path to the stairs…blocking her escape from him.

  “Why a crow?” he repeated in a low, gritty voice. His eyes were the color of pitch again.

  Vina crossed her arms over her chest and looked at the wall so he wouldn’t see the stupid tears building up. “Because crows mate for life, and every boy I’ve ever been with has left me for someone else.”

  Ramsey asked, “What kind of shifter are you?”

  “None of your business.”

  “I’ll read it on your application. I’d rather you tell me, though.”

  “Sarah said we would be a good match because of what you said on your application.”

  “Like I said, Rike filled that out.” He bit the bottom of his lip and shook his head with a sigh. “What did Rike say I needed?”

  “Loyalty. And someone who wants a family and is protective. And a shifter who is a good future parent, and my animal…well…she will be exceptional at that.”

  “What’s your animal?”

  Vina stepped around him and stomped down the stairs. Over her shoulder she called, “I’m a moose.”

  Chapter Three

  Ramsey watched the woman stomp down the stairs. He’d always appreciated feisty. He was in a piss mood, and good on her for telling him off. Now, if one of his boys had done that, he would’ve blasted them in the face and given them a few hell-recovery days to remind them who was Alpha every time they looked in the mirror, but with Vina, all her anger had done was make him look at her a little harder.

  She was cute, for a moose. Had he ever met a moose shifter? There weren’t many of them in the world, and how the fuck did this one end up in the microscopic town of Corvallis? And she wanted a crow? Huh. He’d never thought about his need to mate for life as a plus for some women. Tenlee had hated it.

  Tenlee. Shit. His stomach curdled, and he sauntered back into his room to shower. He was going to be late to the meeting if he didn’t rush. There was the folder she’d thrown on his bed. He tried to ignore it by righting a lamp, stalling. He didn’t need that woman’s baggage, and the hideous pink folder was probably full of it.

  He picked his way around
the room, tidying it quickly. He’d flipped out after that Crow Chaser left his room. She’d only frustrated him more. He needed the girls to stay away from him right now, at least until he figured out how to recover from this broken mating bond to Tenlee. But that moose…calling herself his mate… It was the most confusing thing he’d ever heard, but there had been a second, a single moment, when she was telling him he was enough just because he was a crow, that he’d felt something he hadn’t felt for a long time. It was a moment of relief. A moment where his whole body didn’t hurt. It was a pain-free moment where his head wasn’t screaming that he was a failure.

  How fucked up was that? What a mess Tenlee had left behind. He was the mess.

  And that girl…that Vina…that moose? She was a total mess, too.

  Brave girl, though, coming through the clubhouse. It was club members only, and no doubt she’d taken shit from the boys downstairs. Yet she’d knocked. A Nirvana song. Ha. Points for her. Too bad he would never see her again.

  A wave of pain racked his body, and he doubled over with it. He barely caught the edge of the bed with one locked arm, and then he was face-to-face with that fucking sparkly neon folder. She had a hideous taste in colors. Black was the only color he didn’t hate.

  Cold sweat broke out on his body, and his arms shook as he grunted with the burning in his veins. His body hated him. Broken bonds were poison, and his had been so strong for Tenlee. Stupid crow. He couldn’t even see when she had cringed away from him every time he tried to touch her. His animal only knew she was his and didn’t care about anything else.