by Elle Boon
Sarah waved her hand. “We won’t need you, but thanks just the same. Have a good life and best of luck in finding your one, Arynn.”
Wyck guided him out of the hospital. Without the other man’s firm hold, Arynn wasn’t sure he’d have made it as his legs felt like limp noodles, and his heart didn’t seem to be beating anymore. No, his heart felt shredded and a large piece was left behind as they hit the highway and headed back home. For eight months, he’d waited for the emails with updates, wanting to know how his child was doing inside the womb of the woman he’d accidentally gotten pregnant. Now, it was as if fate were telling him to go and fuck off by making sure the baby wasn’t part wolf, therefore leaving him no option, but to allow her to be raised by her human family, while he had to figure out a way to go on living with part of his heart and soul missing.
“I’m not sure how I can go on, Wyck,” he whispered.
The truck swerved to the side of the road, coming to a rocking stop. Hell, Arynn loved older model pickups and his F100 Classic 1965 truck was his oldest. He’d normally yell at Wyck for not being gentler with one of his precious vehicles. But as the engine quieted and the only sound was he and the other man’s heartbeats inside the vehicle, he didn’t care. Whether it was the 1979 F250 he’d painstakingly redone or the Classic 1965 it had taken him years to put together. Nothing seemed to matter to him in the moments since leaving the hospital.
“You want to know how you go on? You open your damn eyes, grab your balls, and be a godamn man instead of a pussyassbitch. That’s how you go on. Your little girl was probably one of the prettiest little things I’ve ever seen, but she was human. Yes, you and I could’ve taken her out of there, or did as you were thinking and come down here every other weekend. Then what? You gonna hide your shifter side from her and that family? I don’t know about you, but there was something fucked about that mother, and that cun...Sarah,” he shuddered. “Man, I don’t even know how you got it up long enough to fuck her. Shit, she was aroused when you walked in, and it wasn’t from anyone but you. How the fuck is that possible? She just had a baby. Aren’t women, human women like in pain and shit down there after they’ve pushed a kid out of their vaginas?” He gestured at his groin.
He laughed, unable to stop himself. “Yeah, I smelled that, too. Fuck, I don’t know. I just...my heart...it’s like a part of it is gone, and the rest is shredded.” He rubbed his knuckles over his chest, sure the thing was going to quit working.
Wyck stared straight ahead, one hand draped over the steering wheel. “One day, things will come full circle, and it’ll work itself out.”
Arynn saw a tremor in the other man’s hands that travelled the rest of his big frame. “You alright, man?”
A deep inhale was his answer, but Wyck didn’t say a word for another minute. Time stretched, setting Arynn’s Omega instincts on alert. He opened the gates, allowing that part of him to feel what the other man was, astounded to feel happiness flowing through Wyck. The sensation eased some of the tension from Arynn. He didn’t understand how Wyck could feel such joy, when all he felt was pain, but took that little bit of peace inside himself, then shut the door to his abilities. As the Omega, Arynn knew what his duties were and usually only dealt with those in pain, those like himself. The healing energy he just took from Wyck sealed the cracks around his heart. No, sealed wasn’t right, but at least they were being crusted over, no longer quite as painful thanks to Wyck.
“Thank you, my friend.”
Wyck turned to face him with white eyes, the brown completely gone. “What’re you thanking me for?”
Arynn jerked back, stunned at the eyes of his packmate. “Yo, Wyck, you alright?”
Wyck blinked twice, his normal brown eyes replaced the white, now staring back at Arynn. “I’m fine, man. You level?”
“You don’t even realize what you just did, do you? Did you just focus on something good?”
His friend shrugged and looked away. “It felt right but wrong.”
He put his hand on the tense shoulder of one of his best friends. “No, you just helped me get through something that would normally take years, if not more. Being that you’re not an Omega, it’s a miracle, man. By the way, I got my balls firmly in hand. Let’s go home and try to treat my truck with a little more respect.” The memory of Wyck’s strange eyes and his happy energy stayed with him throughout the drive. When they returned to the clubhouse, Kellen and Xan stood outside, both men had their arms crossed over their chests and appeared ready to stay there for eternity. “Fuck, we gotta do this, huh?”
Wyck nodded. “Yep. Only the we is you. I’m out. Got a woman to find and fuck.”
Once the truck was parked, he got out, catching his keys and putting them in his pocket before he faced his alpha and the second of the Iron Wolves. Shit, he hadn’t shut them out; he’d just shut down.
“You need the cage to settle you or what?” Kellen asked.
The cage was at the back of the club. A place where they’d go to beat the shit out of each other for sport. Xan was pretty much the top dog of the cage, yet Arynn felt the need to bleed or make someone bleed. He cracked his knuckles. “I think I do.”
“FuckinA, let’s go. You want to see who’s fighting or you want to challenge someone?” Xan asked, his happiness at the prospect had Arynn’s wolf rising.
“I’m up for anything. You choose, only no kinky shit,” he said nudging the other man with his shoulder.
“You take all the fun out of everything,” Xan joked.
Chapter Two
Sheila wrung her hands after she hung up. God, she did it. “What have I done?”
“Did you call him, mom?”
A gasp left her as she realized Romie had come into the room. “Honey, when did you get home?” She sat the phone on the counter and looked around for Rebel. The two were near inseparable.
“If you’re looking for Rebel, she’s out back playing with Gizmo. How did she ever come up with that name for him?” Romie put her hands on her slim hips. “Now that you know where she is, and we’ve done the social niceties, answer my question, mother.”
Lord, she loved her daughters more than life, but they were definitely stubborn as the day was long. “Romie, I need you to be a sweetheart and just pretend like—everything is normal. Okay?”
A loud snort interrupted them. “Oh, sure. Let me know how well that works out for you, mom. You know, Romie, why don’t you chop off all your hair and join the marines while you’re at it?”
“Bite your tongue, missy. You know as well as I do, you both are too young for the military still. Besides, didn’t you two already get warned to stay out of government buildings?” Sheila still cringed at the phone call she’d received after a school trip when the girls had nearly broken into a secured area of the FBI building in downtown Kansas City. Nope, not a memory she wanted to revisit. Having two beautiful and brilliant girls was enough to make any thirty-one year old woman turn prematurely grey.
“Mom, you’re not going grey,” Rebel said, slapping her hand over her mouth at the last second. “Shoot, you used your inside voice, didn’t you?”
Romie laughed. “Yep, total inside voice, sister.”
“What am I going to do with you two?” Sheila held her arms open, knowing her girls would come in for a group hug. A bump to her side had her groaning. “Gizmo, you’re getting too big to be shoving at us like that.” She reached down and gave the huge animal a loving scratch between his ears, watching his tongue loll out as a bit of drool hung from his jaws.
“David said he thought Gizmo was a bit touched. Mom, that means he thinks our dog is...” She twirled her finger near her head. “When I told him he was the one that was touched, he offered to touch me. You might be getting a phone call,” Rebel finished quickly.
Sheila closed her eyes, anticipating the calls, plural, that were sure to come. Rebel wasn’t only headstrong, but she was really dang physically strong for a girl who was tiny compared to others her age, and she packe
d quite the punch. “Tell me, did you hit him, knee him, or knock him down?” As her youngest began to answer, she raised her hand. “Or, did you do a combo of all of them?”
The dark head bent, but she could see her cheeks lift in a grin before she raised her eyes, eyes which were a startling blue, back up. “He so deserved it. You don’t even know the things he was thinking. Plus, he was older than me by three years. You’d think he could’ve handled himself a little better.”
Both Romie and Rebel had moved up a grade, so instead of being with kids their age, they were now with high school kids. Dang, she hated the restructuring of schools. “Rebel, we’ve had this discussion before. I don’t want to have to move you to another school again.” God, she needed a glass or ten of wine. They lived in a small town that seemed to be getting smaller. To move them schools, she’d have to take them outside of their district altogether.
Rebel patted her hand. “It’ll be fine. I mean, he walked away—sort of. Now, let’s focus on dinner. You know how you get when your sugar gets low. Right, Romie?”
“Oh, right. Besides, David’s like twice Rebel’s size. It wouldn’t surprise me if he doesn’t report it to anyone. I mean, hello, big jock gets his ass, I mean booty whipped by a little bitty girl. Nah, I bet he’s home licking his wounds.” Romie high fived Rebel.
Rebel coughed, her words sounding suspiciously like David couldn’t lick his eyes, or his balls. “Rebel, did you punch the kid in the face and knee him in the groin?” she asked her youngest.
“I don’t remember exactly, but I think it was more my foot connected with his nose, which might have caused him to be a real bleeder. He sure did curse a lot, and the words that came out of his mouth—” Rebel shook her head. “Well, I’d have left it at that, but then he made some not so nice comments about his nether regions, and I kinda saw red. And before you ask, no it wasn’t his blood, which there was a lot of. Did I mention he was a bleeder? Jeez, he really should carry a couple tampons on him for emergencies.”
“Rebel Brianne Barnes,” she whispered as she pinched the bridge of her nose. “Did you at least make sure he was alive when you left him?”
Her sweet angelic girl Romie, snorted. “He ran away like a little girl. Oh wait, we don’t run. He ran like a—well, like a wussy. Yep, that’s what he did. After he punched Rebel in the stomach, she let his nuts meet her Chucks.” Romie punched the air with her fists flying and did a couple kicks that would make her martial arts teacher proud.
“I need a drink,” moaned Sheila.
“It’s not good to drink on an empty stomach, Sheila dear,” Rebel mimicked how their grandmother would speak, making Sheila shudder. Susan Barnes was one complication she hoped to avoid. However, having called the one man who was sure to send her mother’s ire up about ten notches, since it was the biker who had knocked her precious daughter up. Her mother’s words. Lord, one would think Sarah had been an only child.
“How does pasta with a garlic cream sauce sound?” She changed the subject, learning early there was no use crying over spilled milk. Or in this case, spilled teenage boy blood. The little shit deserved it from what she’d heard, and she could tell from both of her girls’ tones, they weren’t telling her everything. A quick check at the time and she figured she could have a quick meal whipped up before Arynn arrived. Her body lit up at the thought of finally meeting the man who’d starred in more than one of her fantasies. She wasn’t sure how she’d handle meeting him face-to-face after only communicating via text and emails and that one call all those years ago.
“Do you need help?” Romie asked, startling her.
“Have you any homework?” she questioned both Romie and Rebel.
Rebel snorted. “Like we ever do. Come on, tell us what we can do to help you.”
Chancing a glance at the tanned hand laying on the counter, she saw the slight swelling on the knuckles of both the right and left hand. Rebel saw what she was staring at and bit her lip. “He had a hard head and a stupid belt buckle.”
Romie giggled. “Mom, seriously, he totally deserved it. Besides, I’ll post the video on YouTube. I can guarantee you, he’ll never show his face at school again without fear of being called names worse than he called us.” She covered her mouth with both hands. “I mean, he—Yeah, what can we do for you?”
Sheila held her finger up. “First, don’t you dare post a video of your sister kicking some boy, no matter how big a jerk he is, online. Second, if that boy bothers either of you again, I want you to walk away. Third, Rebel, are you hurt?”
Her daughters both walked up, wrapping their thin arms around her. Her entire world was perfect in that moment, having the two most precious people so close, hugging her as if they’d never let go. “I’m fine. Look,” Rebel held her hand up, showing the slight swelling was even less than it had been.
Sheila wondered how much worse it had been even an hour earlier. A bark had them looking at Gizmo, his huge head nudged the empty dog bowl. “I’ll feed Gizzy while you start on your gourmet meal.” Rebel squeezed her tightly then let go.
The giant pit bull’s tail wagged as he saw his dish being picked up. At almost one hundred and seventy-five pounds, the animal was almost as big as the largest pit, his sire who was a trained protection dog, which was why she’d gotten the beloved pet. Gizmo, who should’ve been called Hulk Jr. had a head that was twenty-seven and three quarters inches wide, and he was still technically a pup. If he was anything like his dad, he could top out at close to two hundred pounds. He adored the girls and was the best protector she could’ve asked for. Plus, her mother hated the big beast and wouldn’t come over to their home. Sheila called that winning.
“Who’s a good boy, Gizzy?” Rebel cooed as Romie filled the water tank. When she’d brought him home, they’d both agreed to take care of him, and neither had wavered.
“Make sure you take him out and pick up his number twos before coming back inside. I don’t want to accidentally walk on a landmine.” The dual groans had her smiling. She began the process of making one of the few meals she could safely make without burning the house down.
Arynn looked at the map on the navigation system. His Escalade, in matte black, ate up the miles to where his baby girl and her family lived. Shit, he felt a cold sweat trickle down his back, wondering what she’d think of him once she saw him for the first time. Sure, he’d sent her cards and a few presents in the beginning, but they’d all been returned unopened. He’d never stopped writing to her, but they were in a box in his closet. For each holiday, he bought another card and poured his heart out on one of those stupid Hallmark bank breakers, sealed the damn thing up, and placed it with the others. On her birthday, the same thing, only he actually sat down and wrote her a letter for those special days, wanting to express how much she meant to him. Now, the thought of meeting her, seeing the hatred she was sure to feel toward the man who’d abandoned her, had him clenching the wheel tighter. The speedometer showed he was doing twenty-two miles over the posted limit. “Slow your shit down, or you’ll end up getting pulled over and more than likely, end up in some fucking jail in one of these Podunk towns.”
He'd left the interstate an hour back, listening to the bitch in the box, or the navigation system as most called it, wondering if he was being tricked by some trickster god. He’d reach out to Jenna the Fey Queen, but she’d only recently mated with her wolpires. The Cordell twins were men he was glad to have on their side, but damn, right about now, he could sure use the crazy Fey.
Taking a deep breath, he double checked his phone and did a quick MapQuest on the little device, needing to make sure he wasn’t in bumfucked Egypt. When the directions on both screens matched, he relaxed, turned up the radio and let Breaking Benjamin soothe his nerves. A little metal always made him calmer. His playlist kicked on the next song, Nightmare by Avenge Sevenfold blared through the speakers, making his head nod up and down to the beat automatically. He kept his left hand over the wheel while he rested his right on the console betwe
en the seats, tapping along to the beat. He passed a sign that showed the next town was his destination. Only eight more miles and he’d be within minutes of Rebel. He wouldn’t admit it to the bitch who’d birthed her, but he loved his daughter’s name. If he’d been asked, it was exactly what he’d have picked from the list he’d sent to Sheila. Of course, nobody asked him. Hell, he’d barely been allowed to see or hold her the one time. Luckily, the faceless Sheila kept him in the loop with emails and pictures.
The town boasted twelve thousand residents. The low fuel light dinged. If he waited to get gas after seeing Rebel, he worried he’d mess up and end up on the long stretch of road on an empty tank. With a sigh, he pulled into the gas station that boasted they carried fresh pizza. Maybe on his way out, he’d stop in for a slice. His stomach rumbled, but he shut his hunger down. At the pump, he thought of using his card, but an internal instinct had him locking his rig and walking the short distance inside. After passing the young kid three twenty dollar bills, since it was prepay or credit only, he walked back out. The pimple faced boy hadn’t even looked at him. Instead, he’d looked at the cash, then back at his phone. The youth today were in for a rude awakening if the world went dark, that was for sure.
He felt exposed as he filled the tank, the sixty dollars not giving him a full tank, but damned if he wasn’t ready to get the hell back in his rig and out of the town. “Shit, if people start spilling out of the street with pitchforks, I’m getting furry on their asses,” he swore.
Shaking off the wild thoughts, he got back into the Escalade, making sure his music wasn’t blaring in case they were one of those towns that had a noise ordinance. “Should’ve asked Sheila about her hometown a little more.” He passed what looked to be the town square and a sign that pointed toward the high school. The fact his daughter was already attending the upper levels freaked him out. She was too young, wasn’t she? He promised himself he wouldn’t be too judgmental. Sheila had called him down because she needed him. Whatever they needed, he’d do. No questions asked.