by T. S. Joyce
Jaxon’s grip gentled in her hair as he slowed his pace, and then he stopped moving completely, other than to massage the back of her neck. His breath tickled her throat as he petted her, adored her. Encouraged by his open affection, she ran her nails lightly up and down the strong planes of his back until the growl in his throat died completely.
After minutes of silence, he murmured, “I didn’t like that.”
Annalise froze, her fingers mid-stroke on his shoulder blades. “Being with me?”
“No, woman. I mean, I didn’t like you being scared you would never see me again. It got me riled up and…well…I was going to try and take it slower with you.”
“Oh,” she said, filled with potent relief. “Well, I don’t know if you knew this, but I’m a floozy.”
“Stop,” he said, chuckling.
“It’s true. These granny panties attract a lot of flies to this honey pot.”
“Oh, my God,” he muttered, rolling off her. “That’s an awful visual.” He had pulled her with him, though, and tucked her right against his side. He rested his head on his free arm and stared up at the stars. “Texting you but never seeing you was really hard,” he admitted low. “Sometimes I would go crazy on those days we would rile each other up, when you would talk dirty, and I would want to touch you and be in you so fucking bad I couldn’t think about anything else. It wasn’t just that I wanted your body, Anna. You got me addicted to you. Seeing your messages first thing in the morning got me hooked on that feeling of waking up to you. And when I was having a shit day and you would send me a picture of what you were eating or doing, I would imagine I was with you, not dealing with the shit storm that was my life. I hated not being able to hear your voice, but I don’t have great control over my animal, and I knew I would give myself away.”
“Same here. I tried to convince myself you weren’t real and we weren’t going anywhere. I knew we were stagnant, but I was okay with that because my whole life was stagnant. It was all I could ask for. Jaxon, I’m sorry.”
He swallowed audibly in the dim moonlight. “Okay, tell me why.”
“For keeping my panther a secret, also for ending us like I did. I shouldn’t have told you I was moving in with someone else. I should’ve been woman enough to tell you what was really happening.”
“Don’t waste headspace on guilt, Anna. I lied right along with you. I’m sorry, too.”
“I have regrets, but my biggest one? Jax, I went crazy and dropped my phone in water to cut myself off from the temptation.”
“You can get a new phone.”
“Yeah, but I lost all of our text conversations.” Her voice broke on the last word and she hated how weak she sounded. “Those were my happy place. I liked re-reading old conversations when I was down. I needed a complete re-do if I was going to get some kind of normal life back, but cutting myself off from you hurt way worse than I expected it to. I don’t read books. I never have, but I would spend nights scrolling through our old texts and just smiling and laughing my head off. Our story is my favorite story.”
“Is that why you came to the Red Havoc Crew? To start over?”
She nodded once and propped her cheek on her palm, her elbow on the grass so she could see his face better when she tried to explain. “I know nothing, Jaxon. Like…She-Devil has lighter spots in her coat, like a leopard, where most of the other panthers here are solid black. I have no idea what that even means. I might be a freak. I don’t recognize myself anymore. There’s nothing left of the old me. I have no control and was locking myself in a cage-room when I felt like I would shift, just to protect the outside world from myself.”
“You call your animal She-Devil?” he asked softly, looking down at her.
She cuddled closer against his side and nodded. “She’s a beast. I think she needs a crew. Or at the very least people around who can stop me if I get out of control.”
“So, you’re putting yourself in another cage. Out here.”
She hadn’t thought of it that way, but yeah, kind of. “The crew might be the bars of my cage now, but at least it feels more like freedom.”
Jaxon sighed and rested his chin on top of her head. “You need Red Havoc?”
Heart aching, she nodded. “I think so.”
His heartbeat was racing under her hand as he whispered, “Then we’ll get you Red Havoc.” It sounded like an oath. Like a promise to keep her safe and secure, what she needed. But she knew that meant he wouldn’t be in the picture, and right now, that was unimaginable.
“Don’t leave,” she pleaded. “I need the cage, but I don’t want to be alone again.”
“You’ll have your crew—”
“You keep me steady. It’s different with Ben and the boys. Sometimes they make me feel worse. Like I have less control. And I’m so lonely, Jax. Please. Stay here, and we can sneak and see each other while I learn about this…this…thing that I am. Stay for a few days.”
“You want me to be your secret?” he asked. She didn’t miss the hurt that tainted his voice.
“Until Ben gets over whatever prejudice he has against outside shifters. I just…I don’t know what I’m doing, but when I’m touching you, I feel like everything is going to be okay somehow.”
“It will be okay,” he promised, his deep voice steady. Truth. He truly believed it. “I’ll stay in town and make sure you get settled here. And when I know you’re safe and happy, I’ll go.”
Her mind skittered away from the pain those last two words inflicted on her heart, so she decided to ignore that part. That was the boring part she was going to try to figure out a way to get rid of.
She didn’t know how yet, but she was going to shake things up in Red Havoc because Annalise needed both the panthers and Jaxon now. She needed moments like these where she was wrapped up with a man who made her feel whole and okay just the way she was, as well as the crew who would push her to become a better version of herself, and stronger.
So, okay. He could pretend he was going to leave. But already She-Devil had plans on sinking her claws in deeper to the man who had won her heart before she’d even heard his voice.
Chapter Five
Jaxon knelt at the edge of the tree line and watched Anna make her way carefully down the deer trail. Watching her leave made it hard for him to draw a breath, so he gripped his shirt over his chest and forced air into his lungs despite the ache. What had she done? Everything in him wanted to cross panther territory lines and drag her back to his truck, buckle her up inside, and drive her away from here.
If he was honest, he wanted to fucking kidnap her like a psychopath. She was a panther, and she belonged with a panther crew, but inside, his bear was roaring that she belonged with him, and fuck her people.
He could always kill them. The thought crossed his mind earlier today, and then again tonight when she’d admitted she had to stay here. The selfish monster inside of him wanted to cut off anyone who could take her from him.
But then she’d said she needed the cage Red Havoc could provide, and it had shifted something inside of him. He didn’t know what it was like for a bitten shifter, but if she was scared of herself, scared of the animal inside of her, well…he did understand that. And now he felt like he would sacrifice just about anything to make sure she got control of her animal. Because her voice had gone empty and hollow when she’d talked about the cage room, and about her old life. And he would be good-goddamned if he was going to let her ever feel that kind of loneliness again.
Pairing up with a woman wasn’t supposed to be like this.
He was selfish by nature and had been wanting a mate. A human mate so that he could fuck her, care about her well-being, but not bond to her like with a shifter female. He wanted to pretend he wasn’t this thing and live a normal human life with a human wife. He wanted to ignore the bear. He wanted to Change in the woods in private a few times a month and the rest of the time pretend he’d been born a normal man, not a Gray Back.
Annalise called herself Sh
e-Devil. Well, his bear was named Titan, something he wouldn’t admit too soon so she wouldn’t get scared. If she knew what kind of hellish revenge his inner grizzly was plotting on the entirety of the Red Havoc Crew, she would understand why he was rogue and run away from him screaming. And what had the crew done wrong? Not a goddamn thing. They only existed as a barrier between him and something Titan wanted—Annalise.
Her admitting she needed to be a part of this crew, without Jaxon, had done something incredible to his human side. It had made him want to help her, settle her here, and give her a good life. But it had also done something awful to the bear. It made him want to draw her in close and burn the world around them until she had nothing left but him.
He should leave.
She wants us to stay.
Jaxon shook his head and ran his hands through his hair roughly. Fucking Titan. Manipulative, like always.
Down the trail, Annalise turned and gave him a shy smile and a little wave. Beautiful. She was so much prettier than he’d imagined. She had dark brunette hair. He’d yanked her hair band out just to free her tresses and see them waving past her shoulders. Soft as silk, shiny in the moonlight. Even from here he could see the pretty gold in her panther eyes and her stark freckles she’d once told him she didn’t like. Crazy girl. Those little dots all over her face were so fucking cute he couldn’t stand it. Maybe that’s why she had spots in her coat.
He nodded to her just before she turned and disappeared down the trail. Already he missed her. God, he was losing his mind.
Bring her back.
Jaxon shook his head hard. Shut the fuck up, Titan. She belongs here.
A wave of nausea threatened to make him gag on that thought, and before he could stop Titan’s imaginings, a picture of them driving from town to town flashed through his mind. Endless road trips, her smiling from the passenger’s seat of his truck, and him fucking her relentlessly in cheap motels. But Titan had made a misstep with that image. What kind of life would that be for a girl like Annalise? She’d come here to settle. She wasn’t a nomad, and if she said her cat needed a crew, she sure as hell wasn’t a rogue.
Jaxon was stuck in an endless cycle of roaming and spending a few days with the Gray Backs. Roaming, Gray Backs, roaming, Gray Backs, times infinity. He couldn’t stop. He’d tried and failed a hundred times.
Titan would ruin Annalise. Her cat needed stability, and all he had to offer was chaos.
He muttered a curse and stood, made his way to his truck, shaking his head. When he looked up to grab the door handle, Ben stood there against the door of his ride, arms crossed, eyes blazing gold, lips curled back to expose teeth that were too sharp at the canines.
Jaxon startled hard and skidded to a stop. Damn cats could sneak up on anyone. It made him want to bleed the alpha. Typical Titan.
“Move,” he rumbled in warning.
To Jaxon’s utter surprise, Ben did. Immediately. Jaxon narrowed his eyes suspiciously and climbed into his truck, but Ben slid into the passenger’s seat and demanded, “Drive, Grizzly.”
Now Jaxon didn’t like being told what to do in general—that was the Gray Back in him—but he was pretty damn close to panther territory and Ben had control over Annalise’s future. Not bothering to hide the growl in his throat, Jaxon hit the gas and eased them onto the abandoned logging road he’d found earlier.
“I forbade her to see you, and you have her breaking my rules immediately.” Ben’s voice shook with fury.
“If you Change in my truck, we’re going to have a huge problem,” Jaxon warned him.
“What is it about her? What do you want with her?”
“She ain’t your cat yet.”
Ben slammed his open palm against the dashboard. “I lost two already! In a year, I’ve lost two, Grizzly. You are rogue. You aren’t an alpha, so you can’t understand what it does to a man like me to lose crew. I want her.”
Red rage boiled up through Jaxon’s chest, and he slammed on the brakes so hard the truck skidded sideways before it lurched to a stop. “What the fuck do you mean, you want her?”
“I’m paired up. Bonded. I have my family built. I don’t have a complete crew yet, though. My animal…I need more. I need Annalise under me.”
“Great. If that’s what she wants, I’m good with it. So why the fuck are you telling me this.”
“Because tonight I got a call from someone I haven’t spoken to in a lot of years, someone who changed my life when I was a cub. Someone who told me before I went into Apex, and before my panther got stripped from my body, that I would get my animal back someday. Someone who can see the future, gave me hope, and got me through that goddamned facility on the days when I just wanted to give up.”
“Beaston,” Jaxon murmured. Why was Beaston involved in this now?
“Yeah. Him. The seer from your crew called me and told me I have to let Annalise go. And when I asked him why? He said one word before he hung up.”
“What word?”
“Jaxon.”
“Jesus,” Jaxon uttered on a breath. So she was it then. Annalise was his. A mixture of relief and utter disappointment spun inside of him like a slow-moving tornado. Relief because she felt important, and if Beaston said she was his, then she was, and that was that. But nothing had changed over the past few hours. He was still a nomad, still a rogue, and would still hurt Annalise and She-Devil with the life he required to stay steady.
“Why couldn’t you have just left her alone?” Ben said quietly. He didn’t smell of rage anymore, and the raw waves of power weren’t pulsing from the alpha’s body any longer. He sounded defeated.
“How did you lose your cats?”
Ben twitched his head and made a ticking sound behind his teeth. “None of your business, Outsider.”
In this moment, Ben reminded Jaxon so much of the alpha he’d grown up under, Creed. He was strong, firm, but quiet with the hard stuff, and never let outsiders know about the inner workings of his crew. So he waited. Time was the only thing that had ever loosened up Creed, and the same worked here in the dark woods that bordered Red Havoc territory, in his truck, with the sound of the dinging seatbelt warning the only noise to break up the heavy silence.
At last, Ben murmured, “I had a female named Winter. I worked on her for three years to pledge, but she never attached. It was a failure. She fit here, and I couldn’t get her to commit. I had to let her go find a better life in Kane’s Blackwing Crew. It ripped my guts out to say goodbye, knowing I was really letting her go to another alpha. To a crew who weren’t panthers. I’ve had to put down cats before. It changes an alpha’s soul when you can’t fix one, when the only help you can offer is ending their suffering and protecting the world from the poisoned animal inside of them. Those kills are dark marks against your soul. And saying goodbye to Winter felt just as awful. I thought that was the worst it could get.”
“Who was the second cat?”
“A panther named Brody. He was the reason for Winter leaving, and then seven months back, he up and left his mate, right after she’d given him a cub. He left me. He left the crew. And then he did something terrible.”
Dread dumped into Jaxon as a sudden, horrifying instinct reared its head. “What kind of something terrible?”
Ben rolled his head against the headrest and leveled Jaxon with a dead-eyed stare. “Brody is a rare one. He’s a black leopard. He had spots in his coat.”
Now it was Jaxon who wanted to slam his hand on the dashboard. He almost didn’t want to hear the rest. He wanted to kick the alpha out and drive back down to Ben’s little Po-Dunk moonshine camp and load Annalise in his truck and take her far away from here. But he needed to know about the fucker he was about to start hunting. “What did he do?” he gritted out through clenched teeth as he strangled the steering wheel.
Ben inhaled deeply. “Brody Turned Annalise into a panther. She won’t talk to me about it. She refuses, so I know it was bad. Brody ruined that girl’s life. The blood he spilled, the pain he c
aused, and that wild animal constantly snarling to rip out of her skin? That’s on me because Brody was my crew, and I lost control of him.”
Realization slammed into Jaxon’s chest. “That’s why you really need her. Redemption.”
“You can’t be a part of my crew, Grizzly. Not ever. I won’t allow it.”
“I don’t want to be a member of your little kitty-squad, asshole.”
Ben scratched his jaw in an irritated gesture. “The Gray Backs have the best trackers in the world.”
“Yeah, including me.”
“You learned from Beaston? From Bash? From your dad?”
Jaxon dipped his chin once.
“I can’t find Brody,” Ben admitted quietly.
Jaxon huffed a pissed-off breath, slammed his head back against the headrest, and stared out into the woods illuminated by his headlights. “You won’t let me near Annalise, but you want to use me to avenge her. I don’t need a kill mission from you, Panther. I was already going after him.”
“Bring him to me alive, and we’ll talk about Annalise’s future.”
“No deal. She belongs with you. I’ll kill the fucker, slowly like my animal requires, and I’ll bring you proof. And then you let Annalise into your crew because she told me something tonight that put me out of the running.”
“What did she tell you?”
“That her animal needs something steady.”
“And that’s not you?”
Jaxon shook his head, wishing to God he was different. That he was better. That he was worthy of a woman like Annalise. “Not even close. Last name.”
“Brakeen.”
“Last place you tracked Brody Brakeen to?”
“South Dakota. Annalise lived in St. Louis, though. I think the bite happened there, but it was six months back. He could be anywhere.”
“What happened to his mate and cub?” Jaxon asked, feeling sick to his stomach.
Ben shoved the door open and got out. And right before he slammed it, he said, “Lynn is Red Havoc business.”