Logan would have made a good alpha, but in addition to not begging Zelda to play master, he had no interest in being one himself. Of course, the fact that he wasn’t a Raymore refugee that she’d nursed back to health separated him from the others. He didn’t join them at church either.
It took two cups of coffee before Zelda found the nerve to make the call.
Logan answered on the first ring. “What’s wrong?”
“What? Nothing,” Zelda sputtered. “I mean, something, but it’s not an emergency.” She frowned at the receiver. “What makes you think something is wrong?”
“You never call me on Sunday.” He sounded amused.
Zelda snorted. “Are you busy? I need to talk to you, but I don’t know that it should be done over the phone.”
“Something is wrong.”
“How soon can you be here?” she asked.
“Give me ten minutes.” He hung up without saying goodbye.
Zelda’s stomach churned. She hadn’t expected him to come so soon. She crossed her room to glance in the oval mirror above her vanity. She never knew how to present herself to Logan. If she looked too nice, she was afraid he would take it as an invitation. But if she remained unpolished, she feared becoming too approachable.
It was a gamble either way. Letting Logan break through her defenses would be the end of her. She was sure of it.
Zelda went downstairs to the kitchen. Meeting with Logan in her apartment felt too personal. Too intimate. Besides, the injured boy and Marla were still snoozing across the hall in the guest rooms, and they both looked like they needed all the rest they could get.
The bloody rags from the night before were gone, and the kitchen was spotless. A box of fresh donuts rested on the old oak table, along with a scrawled note from Violet. The girl made a habit of bearing gifts any time the wolves did something without Zelda. Not that they hadn’t invited her to join them at church.
Zelda touched the necklace around her throat. She didn’t have any business in a church. There was no god out there that could forgive her sins.
A sharp rap at the back door made her jump. She rounded the oak table and peered through the curtained window before unlocking the deadbolt to let Logan in.
He filled the doorway, the enticing aroma of his aftershave and earthy musk slipping past the threshold as he waited for her to beckon him inside. His hair was short and dark, almost a military cut, and Zelda wondered if it would curl if he let it grow. Caramel skin hinted that he might have Latino roots, though he was as tight-lipped about his past as she was about her own.
When she waved him inside and quickly closed the door, he smiled at her, his bright green eyes sparkling with mischief. “Where’s the fire?”
Zelda’s knees trembled, and she prayed he wouldn’t notice. “Upstairs.”
“In your bedroom?” He lifted a thick brow. “What are we waiting for?”
Zelda felt her cheeks warm. “Devin Raymore’s mate is sleeping in one of the guest rooms.”
“What?” The teasing humor drained from his face.
“I know, I know,” she snapped. “Violet’s already given me the third degree.”
“She can’t stay,” Logan snarled. He took a step toward the back stairs.
Zelda cut him off, defiance twisting up her face. “This is my place, and I’ll decide who stays and who goes. Got it?”
Logan relaxed into a more guarded expression, though his eyes still smoldered. “I’ve never met the guy, but I still know this is not a good idea, Zee.”
Zee. It made Zelda’s heart skip when he used the nickname. Everyone else called her Doc. She dismissed the flutter in her stomach and stood firmly in his path.
“Why do you think I asked you to come?” She folded her arms, instantly regretting it when Logan glanced down and grinned at the goosebumps spreading across her skin.
“If you’re asking for my advice—”
“I’m asking for a favor.”
Zelda took a cautious step back when his eyes locked on hers again. It wasn’t a nice look.
“No. You want me to ask for a favor.” He folded his arms to mirror her and leaned against the door behind him. “What makes you think my sister will give a shit about one of the pack rejects you’re harboring?”
Zelda bristled at his prejudice. She knew the only reason Selena Chase had allowed her baby brother to work at the pub was so that he could keep an eye on the riffraff Zelda welcomed into their precious town.
Spero Heights was precious though. It hadn’t taken Zelda long to figure that out. There was scarcely a normal human soul living for miles around. And the supernatural citizens weren’t exactly normal by paranormal standards either. The entire town was one big sanctuary for broken monsters. It was the reason Zelda had settled there after a year of aimless wandering. She felt right at home.
Zelda lifted her chin to meet Logan’s harsh gaze. “This girl is not a pack reject. She barely escaped with her life, and the lives of her unborn children.”
Logan blanched and dropped his arms. “Have you lost your mind? You can’t house that crazy alpha’s pregnant bitch. What are you thinking?”
“Don’t call her that.” Zelda crinkled her nose at him.
Logan thrust a finger at the stairs. “That’s what she is,” he growled.
“I don’t care,” Zelda hissed. “Unless you work out something with your sister, she stays. I won’t be throwing out a battered, pregnant girl.”
Logan clenched his teeth and his jaw flexed. “You’re impossible.” He held Zelda’s stare a moment longer, challenging her dominance like they were in an alpha showdown. When she refused to look away, he sighed and ran a hand over his face. “Fine. I’ll see what I can do—but I’m not making any promises.”
Zelda relaxed and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it,” he grumbled, though most of the hostility had slipped from his voice. He glanced down at her hand, still touching his arm, and caught it before Zelda could pull away. “We could still go check your bedroom for fires, if you want.”
Zelda’s breath hitched. Logan’s sudden mood shift had caught her off guard, and now the electricity of his skin against hers blurred her thoughts.
Logan pulled her in closer and dipped his face down to playfully brush a stray dreadlock back with his nose, whispering his warm breath along her temple. “Or maybe we could find a fire right here in the kitchen.”
Zelda’s knees buckled again, and this time she was sure Logan noticed, with one knee deviously slipping between hers. Her heart picked up speed as he closed the distance between them.
“Theo,” she whispered, instantly flushing from her error. Her heart froze in her chest as her mind reeled from the memory of her last lover.
Logan stiffened, and not in the way Zelda had been anticipating. “Who the hell is Theo?”
“No one,” she said, immediately biting her tongue. “Someone.”
Logan’s anger dissolved into bitter amusement. “Well, which is it?”
“An old flame.” The words stung as she spoke them, and even though they were true, they tasted like a lie. Theo was so much more than that.
Logan pulled away from her, raking a hand through his short hair as he cleared his throat. “How old, Zee?”
Her throat tightened. “Two years ago.”
“That’s an awfully long time to be hung up on someone.” The thrill of the hunt seemed to have escaped him for the time being.
“I’m not hung up on him. It was an honest mistake. I haven’t been with anyone since, and the mood just threw me back in time.” Zelda hugged herself and blinked stiffly, willing her eyes dry.
“You’ve been alone for two years? He must have been quite the fellow.”
She nodded. “He was.”
“Then why did he leave you?” Logan was slowly recovering and slipping back into his flirtatious mood. He might have even had another shot, if he had managed to steer the conversation away fro
m Theo.
“He didn’t leave me,” she said softly.
“So you left him?” he asked.
Zelda turned and took a step away before he caught her arm.
“Zee?”
She bowed her head, refusing to look back. “He died.”
Chapter Four
Logan’s beat up Dodge barreled down the mile long gravel drive leading back to Chase Farms. A dust storm followed him, lapping up the sides of the rusty truck and slowly making its way inside the cab. He hardly noticed as he muttered to himself.
He was a fool. Of course Zelda hadn’t invited him over for a secret tryst, while the Raymore rejects were off praying she’d sprout fur and let them call her mama. Of course she didn’t need his help. And now here he was, playing messenger boy—with a message that was all too likely to get him shot. He almost hoped it would. Someone needed to put him out of his misery.
The notion that Zelda was grieving over a lost lover crawled under his skin. All this time, he’d thought she was playing hard to get. The revelation had been a tough one to swallow. He felt like a tool for how strong he had come on, and then like an even bigger tool when he felt a spark of jealousy over the dead man. He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to look at Zelda again without being reminded of his complete and utter failure to read her.
He parked his blue beast in front of a barn, next to a shiny, black Ford. The slam of his door evoked a chorus of disgruntled moos, and somewhere from inside the barn, a very unladylike voice echoed out to greet him.
“Hey, asshole! I hope you’re not wearing fancy shit-kickers today. I need a hand.”
For Selena Chase, that was as close to affection as it got.
Logan was, in fact, wearing fancy shit-kickers. But luckily, he kept a pair of BFRBs tucked between the cab and bed of his truck. Even though he’d been at the pub for nearly a year now, Selena put him to work any time she could.
He didn’t mind. The farm was home. He had a two-bedroom apartment in town, but he ate more meals with his sister at the farmhouse than he did alone, and he still had a room on the second floor. He stayed there during the full moon, preferring to run in the woods behind the pasture than with Zelda’s wolves in the rocky tangle of brush on the opposite side of town.
Logan pulled on his rubber boots and found Selena on the far end of the barn, hunched behind a bloated cow standing in a calving pen. The cow bobbed its head over her shoulder and mooed out a pitiful plea as he approached.
“Should I go get the calving jack?” he asked, taking in the thick set of hooves sticking out from under the poor creature’s tail.
Selena grunted and tossed back her mess of short, dark red curls. “Pussy.”
The sleeves of her flannel shirt were bunched up to her elbows, and streaks of blood tinted the web of tattoos crawling up her forearms and disappearing beneath the plaid fabric.
Logan rolled his eyes and snorted as he peeled off his jacket and tossed it over a stall. Then he ducked down and easily slipped through the rails of the pen. His boots crunched on the thick hay as he came to stand behind the cow next to his sister.
Selena nodded her thanks, and they each wrapped their hands around a hoof and pulled.
The calf was a fat little thing, slippery with blood and mucus. It flopped on the hay and rolled against Logan’s pant leg as he knelt down, smearing his jeans with fresh gore.
Selena barked out a hearty laugh and rubbed the calf’s belly with one hand while she cleared its nostrils of mucus with the other. It wriggled around and pulled itself up on shaky legs, wobbling as its mother licked its sticky face.
When it began nursing, Selena stood and wiped her hands down the legs of her jeans. Logan stood too, and together they left the pen and headed back down the length of the barn.
“So,” Selena shouted over the mooing that echoed around them. “What brings you out this way?” She paused to check a feeder.
Logan took too long to answer and was met with a sour expression. He swallowed and tried once again to find his voice.
Finally he managed. “Shit’s about to hit the fan.”
Chapter Five
Zelda let Marla and the injured boy sleep until almost eleven. Then she fried up two pounds of bacon and a dozen eggs. Wolves required a lot of food, and healing wolves required even more. She served them breakfast in bed, since the boy was still on the mend, and also because she didn’t want her staff to see Marla if they came in early.
Violet was right. They would smell her the second they stepped foot in the pub, but Zelda was hoping Logan would come through before the afternoon shift arrived.
She’d just brought the dirty dishes down to the kitchen when someone pounded at the back door. Her pulse quickened at the thought of Logan, and she rushed to set the greasy plates in the sink, grabbing a hand towel before hurrying to the window.
Instead of Logan, she found Selena Chase stewing on the back patio, her mouth stretched into an unrestrained scowl. If Zelda hadn’t been so sure that Selena noticed her through the parted curtains, she would have considered not answering. The woman was badly in need of some Zoloft.
Zelda took a deep breath and pasted on a tight smile as she opened the door. “Good afternoon, Councilor Chase.”
“Where is she?” Selena didn’t do pleasantries. She was abrasive and patronizing, but Zelda did her best to remain diplomatic.
“Upstairs, taking a shower.” She opened the door further. “Would you like to come in?”
Selena’s nose crinkled in disgust, tugging one side of her mouth up to expose a sharp canine. “I’ll be in the truck. Send her out when she’s ready.”
“Are you hungry? I could fix you a bite to eat,” Zelda tried again.
Selena ignored her and turned to head back to her truck. How she had come to be one of Spero Heights’ esteemed council members was beyond Zelda. Maybe the others were too afraid to ask her to resign. Maybe they feared she would uproot her dairy farm and move, leaving the cheese factory, Spero Heights’ primary source of jobs and revenue, in a bind.
Zelda wanted to take her time out of spite, but the sooner Selena Chase was off her property, the better. She hurried upstairs and found Marla sitting on the edge of the guest bed, drying her hair with a towel.
The sweatpants she’d loaned the girl stretched under her swollen belly, and a thin line of skin peeked out from under an oversized Janis Joplin tee shirt. The bruise on her face had turned an ugly yellow-brown, but at least she could open both eyes now.
Zelda went to the closet and rummaged around the top shelf until she found a duffle bag. She stuffed a handful of shirts and another pair of sweatpants in, along with the new set of travel toiletries lined up along the sink in the bathroom. Selena probably bathed in battery acid and testosterone—and she didn’t seem like the sharing kind.
Marla watched with wide eyes. “Did I do somethin’ wrong? Are you kickin’ me out?”
“It’s not like that.” Zelda zipped up the duffle bag and plopped down on the bed beside her. “I have wolves in and out of here all the time. They’re gonna sniff you out. You’ll be safer outside of town. Selena Chase has agreed to take you in for now. She has a farm—”
“I know who she is,” Marla said flatly. “My cousin is one of her farmhands. That’s why I came to you. They know about him.”
Zelda pressed her lips together. “You’d still be safer there. The cattle will help mask your scent, and Selena will be able to keep a better eye out, since she gets far less traffic.” Because she hates everyone.
Marla took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay. You’re probably right. It’d been nice to see Cal, too.”
Zelda led her down to the kitchen and unzipped the duffle bag again at the pantry, stuffing in a box of granola bars and a bag of trail mix. “You give me a call if Selena doesn’t feed you right. I’ll send Logan out with some goodies.”
Marla’s bottom lip trembled, but she nodded. “Thank you, again.”
“Don’t sweat it, sugar. Th
is is just what I do.” Zelda gave her the duffle bag and rubbed a hand over her back, steering her toward the door just as Selena’s truck roared to life, urging them to hurry along.
Marla hesitated when Zelda opened the door, like she was leaving a mystic sanctuary to venture out into the unknown. It was the way her wolves treated the place, with such awe and familiarity. The girl squeezed the duffle bag to her chest and swallowed.
“When things settle down—after I have the babies—would it be okay if I came back? For a job maybe? I’d make a good waitress,” she said, lowering her eyes in a show of submission.
Zelda flushed. The alpha treatment always unnerved her. “We’ll see, honey. We’ll see.” She offered Marla a smile and pointed her over to Selena’s truck, giving the councilor a quick wave that the vile woman did not return.
Chapter Six
Zelda washed the bedding from Marla’s room twice. She ran the vacuum over the rugs and scrubbed out the shower before emptying the bathroom trash into the dumpster. Then she put out fresh lavender candles in all the table centerpieces around the pub.
It wasn’t enough.
The bell above the door jingled and laughter spilled inside as Violet, Grant, and Kerri arrived for the Sunday afternoon shift. Zelda tried not to look too suspicious as she helped Violet set up the bar and fill the ice cooler.
Grant, a wolf who had truly tested Zelda’s medical skills when he joined their motley crew, had a scar in place of one eyebrow. It was hardly noticeable under his shaggy surfer locks, but even when he pulled his hair back on a hot day, it was damn-near passable. His boyish good looks were safe in Zelda’s hands.
While Kerri tied on an apron, Grant dropped a ten dollar bill in the jukebox and punched in every Tom Petty song the clunker knew. When he was done, he pulled up a stool and folded his arms over the bar.
“I saw the boy last night, but who’s the new girl?” he asked, flipping up two coasters and making a tent with them.
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