Dare the Wolf: A Bully Boys Novel of Paranormal Romance

by Cassandra Moore

  Holly perched on a stool at the kitchen counter. Jagged tears gaped in her jeans. Blood spatters added gruesome spots of color to what had begun the day as a plain T-shirt. Yet she looked mostly unharmed to Jake, and by the casual way she looked over a stack of paperwork in her hands, she seemed unworried.

  Angry, but unworried. As they came inside, she looked up and brandished the papers at them. “I don’t think my homeowners insurance covers glass! That shit is expensive!”

  Rigo glanced at Jake, lips quirked up in amusement. “They’re cheap bastards,” the scout said.

  “I know, right? What the hell do I pay them for?” Still grumbling, she tossed the packet on the counter. “There were two Ferals. You saw where they got in. They waited in the bedroom to ambush me.”

  “You’re lucky you didn’t walk in on that,” Jake said.

  Holly snorted. “Luck had nothing to do with it. They stunk. They hid in my bedroom, but they didn’t use my shower, so they didn’t smell like fresh pomegranates. At that means they didn’t ruin my damn loofah. I caught their reek the moment I opened the front door and ambushed them instead.”

  That figured. The nose knew, and Holly’s nose was damn near psychic. “They still in there?”

  “Yep. I called you two so you could help me drag them out. Friends help you move, real friends help you move bodies…” She rolled her hand in an and-so-on gesture.

  Rigo leaned with easy grace against the kitchen counter. “What is it you are not saying?”

  Holly’s lips flattened into an annoyed line. “Rigo-”

  “You cannot fool me, compañera. I know you too well. They spooked you, didn’t they. More than they did by showing up in your house.”

  “One of them said my name, all right?” Her defiant tone belied the unease she must have felt. “Before I killed him. He looked up at me, he smiled, and he said my name.”

  A cold chill ran through Jake’s veins. “How the hell would he know your name? Or fuck, how the hell did he know where you lived?”

  Holly’s sharp green eyes met his. “Isn’t that the million dollar question. Especially since talking Ferals hit your place last night, too.”

  Rigo frowned. “Were you going to leave this information out?”

  “No.” Holly shifted her weight. “I was going to mention it later. When I stopped feeling creeped out by it. I’ve killed hundreds of Ferals, but I’ve never heard anything like that.”

  Silence. It stretched on for several seconds before Rigo cleared his throat. “More and more, I think our theory is right, Jake. We need to take it to Shane tomorrow.”

  “Think we do,” Jake said.

  Holly looked between them. “Wait, what theory?”

  Rigo answered. “Remember the Feral bodies we found at the bottom of the ravine? We think they were killed in a change of leadership. A takeover by a smarter leader.”

  Holly wrinkled her nose. “The hunting patterns changed after that break in sightings. That would make sense. Well, shit. Can’t say I like that any more than I’d like a case of herpes.”

  “We’ll tell the Ferals you don’t approve,” Jake said with a chuckle. “Though I wonder if we ought to wake Shane up and tell him tonight. More of the pack might be in danger.”

  Rigo exhaled a long, tense breath. “I will send out a text, si? Everyone watches their back. Tomorrow, we meet as a pack, and we talk this through. Shane may see the message and call us in sooner. We have the usual sweeps out tonight anyway. It should be safe enough.”

  Jake’s leg vibrated. He pulled his phone out far enough to see “Unknown” on the display, then hit the button to send it to voicemail and shoved it back in his pocket. Last time he’d answered a call from an unidentified number, Lou had threatened him and started a shitstorm. “You don’t think this is enough to wake him up for?”

  Holly piped up. “It might be. I hate to do it, though. Shane likes to think he’s invincible where the rest of us are concerned. There’s not much more we can do tonight. Let him sleep, then we can decide how to approach it tomorrow.”

  The phone in Jake’s pocket buzzed again. “Unknown” once more. He sent it to voicemail. “That sounds like him. Wants to do right by the pack, and never remembers to take care of himself while he’s doing it. But, Holly, there were Ferals in your house.”

  “They probably followed me home from your place the other night.” Already, Holly had found a way to rationalize the experience to lessen the fear.

  Jake had to admit the explanation made sense, even if it brought him back around to wondering why they’d showed up on the road to his trailer to start with. “Could be.”

  “Speaking of, we’ve arrived at the ‘real friends help you move bodies’ portion of the evening. You two are my real friends, aren’t you? Don’t answer that. Rigo, send your message while Jake helps me out. No stalling on the phone to get out of the work.” Holly hopped off her barstool. “Do we know any flooring people? I’m probably going to have to rip out my carpet. Blah blah stains, blah blah potential biohazard of infectious bodily fluids…”

  Jake’s phone buzzed again. Irritated, he pulled it out of his pocket. “Pretty sure someone’s got a wrong number,” he muttered. Then he touched the screen to answer. “Hello?”

  “Jake? Please don’t hang up.”

  The frantic voice, half swallowed by engine and road noise froze him in his tracks. “Anita?”

  “Yes. Listen to me. You have to warn Shane. I tried to call him, but he’s not answering. He’s in terrible danger.”

  Jake looked sharply at Rigo and Holly, who had stopped to watch Jake with his conversation. With his free hand, he mimed a phone call, and mouthed the words, Call Shane now.

  Rigo pulled out his own phone and hit a button.

  “Anita, what’s going on? Are you on your way out of town?” Jake said, eyes still on Rigo.

  “No. I grew a pair and realized I didn’t want to leave you. We have to talk about this later, Jake. You need to call Shane.”

  “Rigo’s doing it right now. Hang on, Anita.”

  Rigo pulled the phone away from his ear to stare at the screen. His lips flattened as he disconnected the call, then hit the button to try again. He gave Jake a little shake of the head. Not answering, he mouthed.

  Jake frowned. “Shane’s not answering. What kind of danger are we talking about?”

  “A pack of Ferals. Intelligent Ferals. Jake, the Ferals have some kind of bigass leader. A smart one. He was here, making plans. I got a video of it from where I was hiding.”

  Rigo shook his head again. Jake jerked his head toward the door, then strode that way himself. “Where’s ‘here’?”

  “The garage. Lou sold Shane out. Hell, Lou sold everyone out. Shane, the Bully Boys, and Coyote Trail.”

  9

  The Bonds Tied by Secrets

  After two long days away, the doublewide didn’t look like home anymore. It looked more like what Anita imagined Purgatory must seem like to the fretful dead. A place at the edge of existence, where you could go to Heaven or Hell but were pretty sure you’d end up in the latter. The righteous went straight to paradise, after all, not the waiting room for a shitty existence you’d created with every choice you made.

  Good girls went to Heaven. She went to a prefabricated dwelling at the edge of a tiny desert town, then drove on to Phoenix, which was Hell by every measure.

  She didn’t see Lou’s car in the front. Her truck sat in its usual spot, where Lou had presumably parked it after his dominant temper tantrum. Not much of a surprise. Lou had been busy the last couple days. Harassing the Bully Boys, spreading rumors, fucking his friend’s girlfriend, possibly committing arson… When could he have found time to do something dickish with the car he had taken from her so she had to walk through a Feral-infested desert? Bitterness soured on her tongue as she climbed out of her rental car. Soon enough, she wouldn’t have to deal with any of it. She just had to get her heirlooms and go.

  That’s all I want. Get my g
randma’s plates and leave. Can’t wait. She’d tried to look forward to it. Tried to scrape up excitement, or peace of mind, or even a hint of relief for the end of the ordeal. All she’d found was a nauseous churn in the pit of her gut and the heavy weight of dread to carry around.

  Lou hadn’t left her with enough money to get out of town. All her friends in the area were Lou’s friends, too, so she couldn’t ask them for a loan to run on. Except Jake. Jake, who would have given her money if she’d asked, money and soulful eyes and a plea not to leave at all, despite his burned trailer and broken heart. Guilt squeezed her chest until it ached. She reckoned she deserved that pain.

  Out of luck, out of hope, beaten down until she had no dignity left anyway, she’d called her mother. The years hadn’t improved the woman at all. She’d gloated about how she’d told Anita that Lou was no good. Gloated that she’d told Anita she was making a mistake by marrying that greasy, good-for-nothing wetback. Reminded Anita that she’d always been a stupid girl. Stupid to get married. Stupid to leave home and run away from her parents. Now Anita was calling her old, widowed mother for money, after decades of getting in touch on holidays only. It would serve her right if her mother left Anita in the mess she’d made, but no, her mother would always be there for her, unlike Anita, who hadn’t been there for her family at all…

  She tried not to hear the waspish voice replay in her head as she walked up to the door to let herself in. Lou hadn’t changed the locks yet. Maybe he wouldn’t at all. Either he’d know she’d left town with her tail between her legs, or he’d wait for her to crawl back home to his abuse, certain she couldn’t do without him. Never. I don’t need Lou to make me miserable. My mother can do that instead. More inspiration to get a job and move out of her place.

  Fast food wrappers littered the coffee table, next to empty cans of beer and soda. Two days without her, and Lou had reverted to his sloppy ways. She stepped over a dirty pair of work pants on her way to the bedroom. God, you’re a slob. She kicked the pants aside so she wouldn’t trip on them as she carried her stuff out. On a whim, she stopped, and crouched down to sniff the air around them. No gasoline odor. Just grease and sweat and the start of a bachelor pad funk.

  An envelope hung halfway out of a pocket in the dirty pants. She had started to stand when she noticed the name displayed through the clear plastic address window. “Anita Calderon”. From the Mojave County Treasurer’s Office, regarding property taxes.

  Her brow furrowed. I don’t own any property anymore. Not since Lou transferred the garage into his name. Curious, she pulled the envelope out of the pants. Lou hadn’t opened it yet. Knowing him, he had crammed it in his pocket when it arrived at the garage. She tore it open to pull out the contents.

  Black letters on the official country treasurer’s letterhead told a fascinating truth. The garage was still in her name. Not only that, but Lou hadn’t paid the taxes on it at the start of the year. And in a rush of realization, Lou’s attitude about their marriage, and about her decision to divorce, became clear.

  Before their wedding, Anita had used her inheritance money to buy Lou a garage so he could start his dream business. She had offered the money itself, but he had convinced her to buy the property in her name instead. A way to prevent his legal problems from threatening his workplace. Once he’d cleared those up, or said he had, she’d offered to sign the property deed over to him so he had sole ownership of the business he’d worked so hard to grow.

  He’d stalled. Dragged his feet. She’d wondered if he’d cleared up those legal problems at all. After more than a year of her trying to give him his property, he’d relented. She had signed the papers for him to file through “an old friend of his” and considered the matter closed. By that point, she never wanted to hear about the matter of the garage’s ownership again.

  The garage belonged to her before they had signed their marriage license. If she left, she took the garage with her. He could only keep it if he kept her, too. Or killed her before she divorced him.

  One paper had enough power to lever the weight off her shoulders – if she were brave enough to use it.

  If I sold the garage, I wouldn’t have to live with my mother. I could pay for a place with the money, get another car… No need to put up with the vinegary old hag. Anita could start over with a decent roof over her head and a nest egg to tide her over until she found work. Lou would likely pay her cash, no haggling over whatever price she set. No contest for her divorce. He would get what he wanted, she would get what she wanted, and she would never have to deal with him again. She would be safe, and done with him forever.

  Or I could stay here. The thought emerged, tentative and unbidden, from the back of her mind. Not a safe thought. Not an easy thought. But there it sat, demanding she examine it. The words on the paper blurred as her eyes unfocused in consideration. I could kick Lou out of the shop. Run it myself. Hire a new mechanic, one who could fix the Bullies’ bikes the right way. Then they wouldn’t have to drive their rides all the way to Nevada for repairs. Lou would get the lesson he deserves.

  Doubts crept in. But he might take all the local business with him. All his lies have poisoned the well around here. He’ll be angry, and fuck knows what he’d do in revenge.

  But if she ran the shop, she could stay in Coyote Trail. With Jake.

  Not just stay with him. She could improve his life. Return to him with more to offer than apologies and the willingness to make him scrambled eggs. He had never asked more of her than love, never would, but she’d seen Shane and Nicole together. He had done everything for her, and she had never once tried to live as his equal. She’d never joined his life as a partner.

  She had never been his mate. And Anita had told Jake she would be his.

  Maybe it’s time to stop running. Her stomach disagreed. It roiled with the anxiety she’d carried all her life. You ran away from your mother by marrying Lou. You ran away from the problems in Phoenix by moving to Coyote Trail. Are you going to run away from the one chance you’ve had to get something right?

  She had thought she’d loved Lou enough to leave the place she knew behind to follow him anywhere else. Standing here among the ruins of the life she’d tried to build, she knew, without any doubt, she loved Jake enough to stay in the place she knew. Coyote Trail was home, for all its flaws and annoyances, and her mate lived here. No one would take it away.

  No one bullied the Bully Boys, or their mates.

  One overdue tax bill didn’t provide her enough proof of ownership for a lawyer to act on. Sending away for a copy of the deed required time she didn’t want to spend. She wanted to have her hands on her proof of ownership for the property before the sun rose, because she had already waited long enough to take control of her life. When a search of the house didn’t turn it up, she decided Lou must keep his documentation at the garage itself.

  Lou would stay at the garage until suppertime. He always did. Then he left to answer the call of his empty belly, because heaven forbid a man like him go hungry. As she waited for Lou’s internal dinner bell to ring, Anita got herself in order. All her important, irreplaceable belongings got loaded into her rental car, along with changes of clothes and her lockbox of personal papers. She’d need that faded marriage license to start divorce proceedings, she imagined.

  If she didn’t, then it would make a perfect starter for a bonfire party.

  Next, she hit up a cell phone store to get a new line. A burner phone would have worked, but she wanted a more permanent number for her endeavors. When the woman ran Anita’s information, however, the computer returned a demand for a hefty deposit. Too many credit accounts open already. Anita argued the point, because she had neither credit accounts nor the money for excessive deposits, but the cell phone woman wouldn’t budge. Eventually, Anita dipped into the money her mother had wired for the trip to pay the deposit. Anita’s dignity protested.

  The cell phone woman generously offered to copy over Anita’s old contacts and data to the new phone. An
ita thought it was good customer service, until the employee used it as a jumping-off point for a conversation about Anita’s relationship issues. Anita generously offered not to tell the girl’s regional manager if they could end the conversation right there. Blasted small towns.

  Long shadows thrown by orange and crimson sunset light stretched over the scorched earth as Anita eased her car down the road to Lou’s garage. To her garage, she reminded herself, in an effort to exterminate the infestation of butterflies in her stomach. But she didn’t see Lou’s car, nor did she see any of the mechanics’ cars, either. A couple vehicles remained in the spaces the shop used for client car storage, but that was all.

  She eased her rental into one of those spaces. Very basic camouflage for her presence, but a smart measure all the same on the off chance someone came back to the garage that night. Lou had never taken back his spare key to the place, the one she kept in case his got lost or broken, so she let herself in to the silent shop and hoped she’d gauged the quiet and empty lot right.

  No one remained in the garage. She walked through the maintenance bays, the lobby, and the back office to confirm it before she started her hunt for the property deed. Not in the desk, though she did find condoms in one of the drawers. I’m sure he’d tell me they’re for his fuel injectors. If he was cheating, at least he was safe about it. The condoms had an expiration date from six years previous, so she had to wonder how many women he’d gone through before he opted for his friend’s significant other.

  The tall filing cabinet didn’t have what she needed inside it. Behind it hid a wall safe, locked tight against intrusion. Lou fancied himself a sneaky, devious bastard, one who could outwit any great mind pitted against him. He also forgot passwords on the regular. Anita flipped over the office computer’s keyboard to find the safe combination taped beneath it. Lou Calderon, the very paragon of security.

  Jackpot. Among the important items Lou kept secure in the safe, she found the property deed in there, along with the paperwork she’d filled out to transfer ownership to Lou. He had never even signed it, just taken it from her and tucked it away where she would never find it. Had he kept his dick in his pants, or even kept his affairs secret, she would never have known he hadn’t claimed his property.