Base Nature

by Sommer Marsden

  Liv managed one good scream before he shoved his palm across her lips. His angry face was inches from hers. His hand covered her mouth and part of her nose and he said, “Hi there, Livvie. Did you miss me? I missed you, baby. You ready to have some fun?”

  He pushed at her robe and Liv tried to scream but it was all lost behind a big, strong hand.

  Chapter Two

  Action

  Garrett set the shovel down. He raised his head, sniffed. A small sound had set his teeth on edge. His muscles went rigid and a cold kind of awareness flooded his system. He cocked his head, listening above the normal sounds of the traffic and the birds and the squirrels who were damn near berserk gathering acorns from his tree. He heard the tick-tock of the clock in the kitchen, the wheeze of the ancient sump pump in the crappy basement of his brand-new shiny fixer-upper. He heard the worms in the earth he had been weeding and he heard the couple next door having sex. What he did not hear was the sound that had made his blood sing.

  He inhaled again, deeply, catching the scent of flowers and shower and woman. The hot water smell carried a light scent of lavender and a woman who was not presently ovulating. “You’re being creepy,” he muttered to himself. If any of his new neighbors looked out to see him sniffing at the air like a hound dog on a suspect’s trail, they’d talk. It was better to be careful when away from the group. He had decided on a solitary life, so he needed to watch out for himself. He was now a pack of one.

  There it was again. A small and startled Mmph! that was gone before it registered. He sniffed again as subtly as possible and his nose picked up the strong burning hair smell of fear. He felt it again and tensed. The same feeling as this morning, the sensation right under his skin like mild electricity. This was who was coming. The person who had made that startled small sound.

  Garrett hopped the fence and followed his nose. If his neighbors saw, he’d have to deal with it later. He’d tell them all he’d run track in high school. Had been an expert at hurdles. That he was a super hero. He’d tell them anything at all but the truth.

  Across the street, his boot found the railing and he jumped to the roof above. He really hoped he was on the money with this or he had a lot of explaining to do. Garrett didn’t trust much in his life right now but he always trusted his instincts above anything else. He had heard what he had heard and smelled what he had smelled. “And here we are,” he said and dived head first through the window pane.

  Christ. He hoped he was right.

  The force carried him down to the hardwood floor and he grabbed the plaid shirt of the man who was holding down the woman he had smelled. The smell of fear was thick and sickening. Garrett heard himself yelling, he heard the growl and the danger in his tone and tried to tamp it down. He tossed and hustled and moved the big man, growling and yelling the entire time. All the while in the back of his mind he reminded himself not to change.

  Do not turn, man. Do not…do not. They’ll come for you if you do. If you’re visible. If you end up in the news.

  He didn’t turn but he quite literally chucked the big man down the flight of stairs and watched him tumble to the faded Oriental carpet below on the first floor. The intruder stood, rearing up with bravado and bluff.

  “Come back and I’ll kill you,” Garrett informed him.

  The man yelled a bunch of angry words that made no sense to Garrett because he could hear her crying. The girl who smelled like lavender and smelled like burnt hair. He turned his back on the man, unafraid of what he thought he could do to Garrett because Garrett knew that the man could really do nothing at all. And if he showed the stranger what he was, it would end right there.

  He walked softly so he wouldn’t startle her. But she still backpedaled on her hands and feet when he entered. Her big red robe tripped her clumsy crab-walk up and she fell on her butt with a small cry. “You’re…” she started. It was lost in sobbing. He could see her hands shaking, he could smell the muddy yellow stink of menace in the room. Maybe he wouldn’t have raped her but the smell in here was very close. Brutality, cruelty, masochism.

  “Sorry to barge in,” he laughed, trying to be funny. She frowned and Garrett found himself mimicking her expression.

  “Your eyes are silver,” she said in a small voice.

  “More grayish-blue on a cloudy day,” he joked, looking away quickly.

  “No. They’re silver. Like coins.”

  Damn. She wasn’t supposed to notice. It was rare for humans to notice. Very rare.

  “I think it’s the light. Maybe you need a stronger bulb.” He pointed to the ceiling fan and the one softly glowing bulb shaped like a tear drop.

  “No. They are. Silver like chrome. Silver like, well…silverware.”

  Garrett could smell blood and he frowned, moving forward to check her over. “Hey, I’m Garrett, your brand-new shiny neighbor. Are you hurt then?”

  “Shiny silver neighbor,” she said but more to herself than him. Then she sat up straight. “Kevin!”

  “Is that his name? He’s gone.”

  “Gone, how?” She narrowed her eyes at him and pulled her red robe tight.

  “I escorted him out. He’s left the building. Like Elvis only not as beloved.”

  She smiled for a split second and he took the chance to squat down and give her a visual once-over. A small trickle of blood at the corner of her mouth. The smell filled his head. Her blood, her warmth, the lavender, the innate femaleness of her entire being. He felt the cold unusual prickle from earlier turn to molten, malleable want.

  “See, they’re silver!” Before he could react, she stabbed him in the forearm with something sharp. Garrett threw his head back and roared.

  “Jesus Christ, woman! What was that for?” He hadn’t meant it to sound so harsh. Even with the bleeding and everything, he didn’t want to scare her. But she was scared, the smell of her fear was nearly choking him. “Hey, I’m sorry. Clearly you’re a bit…”

  “They’re blue now,” she said. But she crab-walked a little farther away from him. Out from under him really, as he’d been leaning over her. She backed up, tugging her robe from where it had snagged on his boot. He let her go as far as she wanted. Garrett had a feeling that was the point. She wanted to make sure that he wasn’t as dangerous as the asshole he’d just tossed out.

  “What are?” He was so confused. And bleeding. But the flow was slowing and soon the skin would begin to knit. Then she’d see. Garrett hurriedly pulled his shirt sleeve down over the wound.

  “Your eyes. They’re blue now. The silver is gone.”

  “Told you.” He smiled and stood, giving her the space he could tell she needed.

  “But they were silver. I know they were.” She frowned and started to stand. Her legs shook as did her hands. Garrett offered her his and after a moment’s hesitation, she took it. “Don’t you want a bandage?”

  “For what?”

  Garrett stared at her pale full lips. He would focus on helping her and the danger she had just been in. He would focus on who that big mean guy had been. He would focus on making her feel safe and in control. What he would not focus on was the mild warmth that seemed to course up his arm and the twitch of excitement in his belly. He certainly would not let himself consider the brief but explicit mental image of having her that flashed through his mind. He shook his head, plastering a smile on his face.

  “Well, I pretty much stabbed you so most people would require a bandage for that.” She pushed at his sleeve and he stilled her hand with his. Gently but he stilled it. His eyes found hers, big and dark and haunted. His cock wanted to come to life but he gritted his teeth and tried to think of things other than how he could feel her heartbeat banging through his fingertips from where they touched her pulse at her wrist. His eyes betrayed him, darting to where her robe had fallen open a bit. The blush-colored crescent of her right nipple visible. He cleared his throat and shook his head.

  She caught his eye and gathered her robe closed with one hand. It wasn’t shaking
as much, Garrett was happy to see.

  “It wasn’t as bad as you think. Just a scratch,” he lied.

  “Liv,” she said.

  He cocked his head, heard her pulse rate jack up from the small movement and tried not to smile. He could smell her attraction as clear as blooming roses, though it smelled more like the earthy smell of a garden to him. “Um…”

  “My name. My name is Liv. Short for Olivia. And thank you for, you know,” she glanced down, eyeing the shattered glass and the busted part of the wood window frame. “For saving me.”

  Garrett couldn’t help it. He barked laughter so hard his stomach cramped. What a fucking mess. “I’m Garrett. And I’m going to use your front door and leave. I’ll hop over to my house and grab a piece of plywood. We can cover this until tomorrow. I’ll get a new pane and all that jazz.”

  “Hey, better a broken window than…” she trailed off, going pale under the dark blonde hair that hung in wet tangles around her face. “The alternative.” She shrugged and he eyed the flutter and bang of her blood at her throat and temples.

  Garrett reached out but stopped himself when she cringed. “Why don’t you get dressed, Liv? I’ll check everything downstairs and go grab that stuff I need.”

  She nodded. Dark brown eyes swimming with tears she refused to shed. Garrett didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone look more haunted in his life. Or stubborn.

  Not unless you count the reflection in the mirror.

  “I will. Thank you and it’s nice to meet you, Garrett.”

  “I’d shake your hand but I’m afraid of what you’d do to me,” he joked.

  She smiled. “That’s funny.” She turned before he could see the tears start to fall but Garrett could smell the saltwater, ocean smell of them just the same.

  ———

  He was so big. Liv shoved her legs into her faded Levi’s. The ones that always made her feel sexy and pretty and sane. “He’s so big,” she said, standing in her walk-in closet. When had he moved in across the street? She had known that Peter and Sylvia had put the house on the market when they separated, she just hadn’t been aware that they had actually sold it.

  That showed how much she was focused inward instead of outward. The house sat directly across from hers and the yard was visible from her living room. The view provided her a clear glimpse of both the front and backyard. Or most of it anyway. “How did you miss him, Liv, he’s so big.”

  And he was big. Big and imposing but in an entirely different way from Kevin. Whereas Kevin seemed to suck up all the light and air in a room like a dark force, Garrett was a towering presence of calm. Even when she’d been stabbing him, he had radiated calm. “Now that’s some damn calm,” she sighed and pulled a long gray turtleneck on. No need to look enticing. Big and calm and sexy or not, she had no interest in men. Men only seemed to intimidate, crush and destroy. Not what she needed.

  “Hello?” He was back and her heart jumped erratically. She felt nauseous and giddy and happy all in one fell swoop. Because she was clearly insane.

  “I’m up here! Coming!” Liv stumbled out of the closet clutching her shoes. When she hit the hallway he was already halfway up the steps, carrying a large section of plywood and a tool box. “Thanks for doing this,” she started but he cut her off.

  “I was thinking, Liv. Don’t you think you should call the cops? Wouldn’t that be good? I didn’t get a great warm and fuzzy from that guy.” Liv watched him clench his jaw at that. The muscles bunched just below the crisp cut of his jaw. The motion forced his pale pink lips together in a tight line that was somehow enticing. Liv wondered what it would be like to kiss him. If she kissed him would his mouth loosen up a bit? Would he not look so aggressive? Because he did right then. He looked stolid and aggressive and some part of her mind piped up with great honor—protective. He looks protective.

  But that was crazy. That sealed the deal—she was a nut.

  “No. No cops. Cops don’t do much besides paperwork.”

  “Well that’s—”

  “My opinion. Let me help you with that,” she rushed on and grabbed the top of the plywood.

  He looked at her for a beat too long and her heart sort of twisted in her chest. She couldn’t quite breathe. And for the first time in her life a man said, “Whatever you want, Liv.”

  She thought she might cry right then and there. But more from shock than anything else.

  Chapter Three

  Watching

  Garrett sat in the chair beside the falling-down chain-link fence and watched her pace. Liv would pick up the phone, set it down. Pick it up, set it down. She had currently repeated this action more than a dozen times.

  He knew about fear and he knew about anger. It was what had landed him without his pack in a horribly crumbling fixer-upper in the first place. But with one glimmer of a smile, he realized it was also what had landed him across the street from who appeared to be the most indecisive woman on God’s green earth. But it wasn’t so much indecision as damage that had Liv McCoy—he’d read her mail on the entryway table—doing this nervous kind of dance.

  “She’s trying to decide whether or not to call the cops.” He said it aloud just to hear a voice, even if it was his. He had planted the seed in her mind to report that asshole. He hoped she would.

  Finally, she set the phone in its base and poured herself a glass of wine. Garrett could see her clearly through her double-hung front windows. He’d have to tell her in the future to draw her blinds. He watched her hit the lights and come out onto the huge front porch. She sat on the swing and rocked, sipping at the wine. He could smell despair coming off her even from here. Garrett sat far back in the shadows and camouflaging himself was second nature. He didn’t fear discovery as he raised his head and sniffed the air to pick up her scent.

  Yep, there it was. Despair and worry and something sweeter. Interest. Garrett smiled.

  The phone rang in the kitchen. He bolted for it, wondering who would be calling so late. And did he really want to talk to them? But he’d answer the call. He couldn’t sit outside and spy on his neighbors all night. He’d keep alert for any sign of trouble over at Liv’s place just to be safe.

  “Hello?”

  “Come back home, Garrett.”

  “And here I thought you’d try to woo me, Kelly.” He grinned despite himself. He could hear the slight squeak and sway of Liv on her porch swing. Even across the street and in the house he could smell the earthen lavender smell of her.

  “Come back to the pack.”

  “No can do. I’ve got my bachelor pad firmly established. I even have a female in my sights.” He was joking but as the words came out of his mouth he recognized the truth in what he was saying. Something in him sprang to life and something else ached.

  “A human, I presume?” Kelly asked. There was a smile and a frown in her voice all at once. He’d seen her pull off this complicated expression on many occasions. His love for Kelly was nearly overwhelming. It hurt him to hear the pain in her voice. Pain he had caused.

  “Why would you presume?”

  “Because I don’t know of any other of our kind recklessly living off on their own away from their kind. But that’s just me.”

  He heard the soft laughter in her voice but the comment still cut. “How’s Ches?” Kelly’s husband Chester was a father-figure to him. Kelly was, for all intents and purposes, Garrett’s mother, having raised him from three years old when his own mother died of leukemia. A rarity for wolves.

  “Chester is as demanding, cantankerous and wonderful as ever. He’s presently ripping down the old barn to build a pen for a new horse. His horse. Correction, his baby, Mathilde.”

  Garrett laughed. He heard the small, sharp protest of the swing springs across the street. Heard the soft snick and jingle of Liv going inside and shutting her door for the night. He’d get her a dog. He’d rescue a stray after some searching. Something with senses like his to live under the same roof with her. “It’s always good to have somethin
g to care for.”

  Garrett hadn’t meant it that way but there it was. All these last years wrapped up in a single sentence. He heard Kelly suck in a small breath and blow out a soft sigh. “Garrett… I know how badly you’ve been hurt. I know how angry you are with me. With us. All of us. But when it comes to these things, we have to consider—”

  “The pack. I know. But my loss should have been pack loss,” he growled.

  “It was.”

  “And there was no call for repercussions then? My future stolen from me by a single human and there could be no vindication? No justice?” His voice held so much anger that he wanted to simply hang up. He hated talking to Kelly with so much rage in his voice but Garrett knew that hanging up on her would hurt her more than his ire.

  “Garrett, we had young ones and we were on the radar. We couldn’t go around exacting vengeance. The surrounding neighbors might have taken note. And we can’t afford a showdown with a bunch of ignorant humans. Not that they’re all ignorant, mind you.” He could hear the smile but it did no good. His heart was twisting, bruised and bloodied, it couldn’t much handle this particular conversation with grace.

  “Not even for a wrongful death? Even for a death that could have—shit—should have been avoided. That man was a drunk and he had two hunting strikes on his record. Drunks should not be out during hunting season.”

  “Garrett—”

  “And they let it slide because he was kin to the sheriff. And what was the result?”

  “Eileen.”

  “My kin, Kelly. My kin. My future wife, the woman I loved, the woman who was to bear my young ones. How are we protecting the young ones if we raise them to be timid and weak? If we let the humans take out our own and do nothing, nothing at all, to send the message that it’s not okay. That is in fact wrong!” The last words came out in a great burning burst of air. His face was hot, his heart racing. He felt that silver tight wire of choice. He could change or he could get control of himself.

  “Garrett. Sweet boy,” Kelly said and he could tell she was crying.