by Paige Tyler
She nodded. “You did.”
“It’s just a nickname we have for the team.” He shoved the fries in his mouth, then wiped his hands on his napkin before undoing a few buttons on his shirt and tugging it to the side to reveal a tattoo of a wolf head on one side of his muscular chest. As far tattoos went, it was amazing. And as far as chests went, it was spectacular. “We all have this same tattoo, so we call ourselves a pack. Goofy, I know.”
Samantha laughed, telling herself that made complete sense. But if that was the case, why did she still think it was total BS?
They ate in comfortable silence for a while before curiosity got the better of her. She was tempted to dig a little more on the pack thing but decided against it. After the quick answer he’d had to her first question, he’d probably be prepared and already have a logical answer to whatever other questions she asked about his team.
“How did you end up in SWAT?” She nibbled on another cheesy fry. “Did you go straight into that when you became a cop, or did you do something else for a while first?”
“Actually, when I first moved to Dallas, I worked as a paramedic.” He picked up his bottle of beer. “I was a combat medic in the army for almost six years and was sure that’s what I wanted to do for a living after getting out.”
She’d known he was in the army before becoming a cop because that had been in the personnel record she’d been able to put together on him. But she hadn’t known he was a paramedic. “What changed your mind?”
He fell quiet for a moment, the crease in his brow making her think maybe she’d brought up something he didn’t like to talk about.
“I found out that just because you can do something, it doesn’t mean you want to,” he said softly. “Hell, at one point, I thought I’d make a career of the army. In fact, I was only a few weeks from reenlisting when things changed.”
She sipped her iced tea, not wanting to push. While she wanted to know everything she could about Trey, forcing him to talk about something that obviously upset him didn’t sit well with her.
“I was in a firefight in Afghanistan,” he murmured, pausing to slowly eat another fry before continuing. “I was hurt bad and my best friend was injured even worse, but somehow, we both made it out. The army wouldn’t have let me re-up even if I’d wanted to—they had concerns about internal damage if I ever tried to do another airborne jump—so I got out and joined Dallas Fire and Rescue. The first time I showed up at the scene of a major car accident, every injury and death I saw in combat came back to me, and I realized I’d made a mistake. I left DFR the next day, but I still wanted to be able to help people, so I joined the DPD. I did about a year in patrol before my SWAT commander suggested I join the team.”
Samantha didn’t say anything as the server placed their plates of food before them. Part of her wanted to know what had happened to Trey in Afghanistan, but the other part didn’t. The thought of him being hurt made it hard to breathe.
Not trusting herself to speak right then, she concentrated on biting into her burger. It was juicy and perfectly grilled with the perfect ratio of cheese to beef.
“I can understand why you wouldn’t want to be a paramedic anymore, but I heard somewhere that you’re one of the SWAT medics.” She glanced at him as she dunked her cheeseburger in a pile of ketchup. “That means you treat your teammates’ injuries, right?”
Trey looked confused for a moment and Samantha hoped she hadn’t slipped up and said something she shouldn’t have. “I read in the paper that you’ve received several commendations for using your paramedic skills to treat your teammates’ injuries,” she added.
He shrugged. “It’s different when it’s my teammates. Time has helped blur some of those old memories, too. It’s not as bad as it used to be.”
“I’m glad.”
Samantha had never known anyone who’d been in the military, but she could imagine the atrocities Trey had seen in the army. No one should have to experience that stuff.
“You were right about this place,” she added, hoping to lighten the mood. “These burgers are awesome.”
As they ate, Trey talked about what it was like to be part of SWAT. While she didn’t learn any deep, dark secret that might explain any of the weird crap that had gone on around the team, she learned enough to know Trey did some really dangerous stuff, he adored his job, and he loved his teammates.
His pack.
She didn’t realize they’d been talking for hours until she looked around and realized that it was almost closing time. The burgers and cheddar fries were gone down to the last little nibble. Heck, there wasn’t even any cheese left on the plate to scrape up. A warm sensation swirled inside as it dawned on her that she’d never been on a relaxed, effortless date in her life. And even though she’d eaten more than her share of cheese fries to go along with her burger, when Trey asked if she wanted to go for ice cream, she didn’t even consider saying no.
There was an ice cream shop just a few blocks away that made fancy desserts using liquid nitrogen. The place looked like a lab, complete with billowing steam coming out of the high-tech mixers. There were so many flavors on the menu and toppings to go with them that it was difficult to choose, but she and Trey finally decided on double scoop waffles cones with cheesecake-flavored ice cream mixed with pieces of Oreo cookies.
As they sat on a bench in front of the shop, eating ice cream, Trey told her about his family and growing up on a soybean farm in North Dakota. From the warmth in his voice, it was obvious he loved the wide-open spaces and working the farm with his family, but he admitted the idea of becoming a farmer like his parents, brothers, and sisters hadn’t been something he wanted to do.
“That’s why I joined the army,” he added. “I wanted to see some more of the world, and once I did, there was no way I could go back. I mean, I go back to visit my family on the holidays, and they’ve come down here to visit me a few times. But it’s hard for them to get away from the farm for long, so I mostly make the trek to see them.”
She smiled. It was nice to hear he was close with his family. “I can understand not wanting to move back to North Dakota after traveling around the world for six years in the army, but what brought you to Dallas? Were you stationed in Texas when you got out of the military?”
Trey didn’t answer and when the silence continued to stretch out, Samantha got the feeling he wasn’t comfortable discussing it. Maybe it was too personal. Or maybe he’d finally caught on to the fact that they had spent the whole night talking about him. She hadn’t necessarily intended to do that, but whenever he’d posed a question about her background, she found herself steering the conversation back to him.
“You don’t have to tell me why you settled in Dallas if you don’t want to,” she said softly, finishing up her cone and realizing that his was long gone. “I get that some things are too personal to talk about on a first date.”
“Yeah, I guess they are.” His mouth curved into a small smile. “Is that your way of asking me out on another date? You must be eager to use up your second favor.”
Samantha laughed, relieved she hadn’t messed anything up beyond repair. “Do I need to use a favor to go out with you again?”
She hoped that wasn’t the case. And not merely because she still wanted to learn whatever it was he was hiding from her. The truth was, there was something special about this man. Something that attracted her to him like the proverbial moth to a flame. And she desperately wanted to know why that was.
“No, you don’t need to use another favor to get a second date,” he murmured, his gaze becoming more heated by the second. “You just need to say yes.”
“Yes,” she said without hesitation.
Then Trey was slipping a hand into her hair and tugging her closer on the bench, his very warm mouth coming down on hers. The kiss stayed casual and chaste for all of two seconds before his tongue slipped between her lips
. She couldn’t stop the moan that came out. He tasted delectable. And it had nothing to do with ice cream or what they’d had for dinner. There was simply something there she couldn’t seem to do without.
He deepened the kiss with a groan, nipping and biting lightly on the tip of her tongue and her lower hip, tugging and teasing until she had to wonder if lip-gasms were a real thing.
She had no idea her fingers were in his hair, yanking and pulling him exactly where she wanted. Not until she heard him growling. Crap, he was growling. A deep, rumbling sound that vibrated up through his chest and right into her soul.
No. Actually, those vibrations settled between her legs—right there where all good vibrations belonged.
Samantha was damn close to climbing into his lap right there, on a busy street in front of the ice cream shop, when Trey suddenly pulled back. He was breathing as hard as she was, his eyes reflecting the yellow glow of the nearby streetlamps. It only made him that much more mesmerizing.
“Tomorrow night…five o’clock?” he whispered, his warm breath tantalizing against the sensitive skin of her lips. “I’ll pick you up at your place again?”
It took a few moments for her rattled mind to figure out what he was even talking about, but when she did, all she could do was nod. He wanted to see her again tomorrow night. Yes, that was exactly what she wanted, too.
Taking her hand, Trey stood, taking her with him, and they walked back to his Jeep. As he helped her into the passenger seat, then walked around to the driver’s side, Samantha realized Crystal lad been right. She was being absolutely stupid to risk the chance of being with Trey simply to learn a few secrets that probably didn’t matter anyway.
Chapter 5
“You going to fill us in on how the date went last night, or did you think we’d let you slide without telling us anything?” Connor asked from the far side of the tables they’d shoved together in the training room.
Trey looked up from the STAT file he’d been reading for the past few minutes to see Connor, Trevor, and Hale sitting in front of file folders of their own, scribble-filled notepads near at hand. Tuffie, the team’s resident pit-bull-mix mascot, sat off to one side, while Kat perched on the table beside Connor, looking over his arm like she was actually reading the documents Alyssa had left them. Which, considering this particular cat, was a distinct possibility.
The four of them had come to the SWAT compound early that morning to go through Alyssa’s files on the three dead victims, hoping to find some kind of connection between them. Trey didn’t know about the others, but so far, nothing obvious was jumping out at him.
“The date was amazing,” Trey said, unable to keep the smile off his face.
“What’d you guys do?” Trevor asked.
“We went out for burgers and then ice cream.”
His buddies regarded him expectantly, clearly waiting for more details. But there was no way he was going to tell them about the kiss on the bench in front of the ice cream shop. No, that memory—of the most perfect kiss he’d ever had in his life—was for him alone. He still had a hard time believing it had been real, even if it had left him lying awake all night reliving it. Even now, all he could think about were Samantha’s pillow-soft lips and the way her skin had smelled like cherry blossoms and spring air after a light rain.
Of course, he had no idea how to explain the fact that, in all the time he and Samantha had been around each other over the past two years, the moment on that metal bench had been the first time he’d picked up that scent. Considering the way everyone else in the Pack who’d found their soul mate had made such a big deal about picking up their unique scents right away, he didn’t quite know what to make of his experience.
“Sounds like the perfect date,” Hale observed.
“It was perfect,” Trey said, what he knew was a dopey smile slipping across his face again. “Oh, who am I kidding? It was better than that. I haven’t been able to think about much of anything but her since dropping her off at her place last night.”
Connor exchanged looks with the other guys before leaning forward. “Do you think Samantha is The One for you?”
“Dude, they’ve been on a grand total of one date,” Trevor pointed out. “How is he supposed to know if she’s his soul mate yet?”
“Because he’s been crushing on her since the first day he saw her,” Connor said, as if that should explain everything. Then he looked over at Trey again. “So is she?”
Trey almost laughed at the eager expressions on his pack mates’ faces. He should have known the question was coming. Over the past two years, more than half of the Pack had found their soul mates—aka that one person who could love a werewolf in spite of what they were. Every time he or any of the other single guys went out with someone, everyone automatically assumed they’d found The One. That was the way it seemed to work lately. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t been wondering the same thing when he’d knocked on Samantha’s door last night.
There was just one problem.
“I wish I could tell you definitively that she is,” he said, shocked at how true that statement really was. He hadn’t realized until then exactly how much he wanted what most of the other members of his Pack had already found: a future of more than merely searching and hoping.
“But?” Hale prompted.
“But I think Samantha might be playing me.”
Trey sighed, something twisting in his gut at the notion of thinking something like that, much less saying it out loud. He hadn’t gone to bed with these doubts floating around in his head, but they’d relentlessly started popping up as the morning dragged on and he began to overanalyze every single minute of last night’s date.
“I can’t shake the horrible feeling that the only reason Samantha wanted to go out with me is because she’s looking for dirt on the Pack,” he continued. “You know she’s been sniffing around our crime scenes for years. And after all the crap that got swept under the rug with that delirium case, I have no doubt she knows we’re hiding something.”
His pack mates looked at him dubiously.
“You think she knows we’re werewolves?” Trevor asked.
Trey shrugged. “I don’t know. I hope not, but you have to admit, the timing of all of this is strange. The two of us have been flirting with each other forever, and then out of the blue she asks me out? You don’t find that at least a little curious?”
“Not really, no,” Hale said. “Is it so shocking that Samantha got tired of waiting for you to ask her and decided to take things into her own hands? This is the twenty-first century, you know. Women are completely comfortable going after what they want.”
“Maybe,” Trey admitted. “But you weren’t the one sitting across from her as she asked me question after question.”
Trevor laughed. “I may not be the greatest at the whole social thing, but isn’t asking each other personal questions what people normally do on a date?”
“Yeah, personal questions I get,” Trey answered. “But almost all Samantha’s questions were about how I got into SWAT, what kind of work we do, how tight I am with you guys, and how well I know all of you. And every time I tried to steer the conversation in her direction, she turned it right back around on me. After a while, it was like she was grilling me for information.”
His friends were quiet for a while, considering that.
“So what are you going to do?” Connor asked.
“What can I do?” Trey ran his hand through his hair exasperation. “If I’m right, and the only reason Samantha is going out with me is to dig up dirt, then every minute I spend with her puts the Pack at risk. If I walk away now, and it turns out I was wrong about her, then I’d be giving up my chance at a soul mate.”
“You can’t do that,” Hale said firmly. “Walking away from a shot at finding The One would be insane. Nobody in the Pack would expect you to do that.”
As they sat around, the files in front of them untouched, they talked about how much Samantha might already know, in between his buddies giving him suggestions on where he should take her on their second date. Connor was of the opinion that if things went well enough, maybe Samantha would give up her snooping and realize she was his soul mate. Trey thought that might be a little optimistic, but he couldn’t stop himself from hoping his pack mate was right.
It was Trevor who finally pointed out they’d been talking about Trey’s love life for the past hour, instead of finding clues on who was murdering men and leaving mummified remains at the city dumps.
“Never let it be said that I’m the adult in the room,” he added. “But maybe we should actually get back to looking at these files, especially if STAT is right about the MO and there’s a good chance the killer is going to strike again this weekend.”
Trey couldn’t argue with that logic. Pulling his pad full of notes a little closer, he flipped through the pages of scribbles he’d written. “I don’t know about you guys, but I haven’t found anything earth-shattering yet. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find something STAT missed.”
“STAT has an army of intelligence analysts on this, not to mention criminal profilers, data-mining and predictive analytic software tools, and loads of experts with experience dealing with supernatural killers,” Hale pointed out. “You honestly think we’re going to find something they missed?”
“We don’t need a miracle here,” Trey said. “Just something that will give us a place to start looking.”
With that, Trey and his teammates spread out the papers from the three folders. Well, actually, two of the folders. Trevor was still sitting there holding one in his hand, his expression thoughtful.
“There’s not much on the body found in the McCommas Bluff landfill. We know from his bone structure that the guy was approximately thirty years old. STAT says he was likely killed last Saturday or Sunday,” Trevor said, holding up a piece of paper. “But they haven’t IDed the body yet.”