The Shifter Romances The Writer (Nocturne Falls Book 6)

by Kristen Painter

  She sipped her wine, then sighed a long, slow breath that fogged the glass in front of her. She wiped it away with the heel of her palm, clearing the spot in time to see Alex appear in her backyard.

  She blinked. It had looked like he’d jumped over the fence, but that wasn’t physically possible. He must have pulled a ladder up to his side and jumped from there. That’s all she’d seen.

  He strode toward her door, shoes on this time, and a duffel bag in one hand. The litheness of his movement was fascinating.

  A little anticipatory shiver ran through her. Deputy Hotness was sleeping on her couch tonight. If that wasn’t romance novel inspiration, she didn’t know what was.

  She unlocked the slider and pulled it back, careful not to spill her wine. “That was fast.” Actually it had seemed like forever.

  “All quiet?” He walked into the house.

  She raised her glass. “All quiet. You want a glass? C’mon, have a drink with me.”

  He hesitated. “I probably shouldn’t, but I guess one small one couldn’t hurt.”

  She smiled, happy that he was joining her. “One it is.” Then she frowned as she got a second glass and filled it with wine. “It’s okay that I drink, right?”

  “It’s fine. If it helps you relax, even better.” He took the glass, touching it to hers before lifting it. “I don’t want you stressing about this anymore than you already have. I’m going to do everything I can to make this problem go away.”

  His wording made her eyes widen. “You’re not going to…kill him, are you?”

  He choked on air. “No. Why on earth would you think that?”

  She shrugged. “I’m a writer. Worst-case scenario is kind of my wheelhouse.”

  “Okay, well, great, but no one is killing anybody. All we want to do is catch him in the act of trespassing or something else that’s an arrest-able offense. Once we get him in front of a judge, it’ll be a lot easier to nip this behavior in the bud. Are we clear on that?” He drank the wine while watching her.

  “Yep. Totally clear.” She set her glass on the counter. “Let me go get you a pillow and blanket while I’m thinking about it. Be right back.”

  She left him in the kitchen and went down the hall to the linen closet next to the guest bath. The wine was kicking in a little. She could feel it. But it was also taking the edge off her nerves. She resolved right then not to let alcohol influence her evening with Alex.

  Which wasn’t really an evening or a date or anything. It was just him watching over her in case Thomas tried something else. Just a friend taking care of another friend.

  She pulled out a blanket and pillow, hugged them to her chest and smiled. She’d never really had a friend like that before. Not in New Jersey anyway. Now she had Alex. And Delaney, who she was sure would have gotten her husband to do whatever Roxy had needed, if Roxy had asked.

  Despite the nonsense Thomas was putting her through, Roxy had never felt safer. Or more cared for.

  Moving to Nocturne Falls had definitely been the right decision.

  Alex was closing the front blinds when she walked out to the living room. She set the blanket and pillow on the chair next to the sofa. “So what’s the game plan? You said you were going to do some investigating?”

  He shut the last set of blinds. “Yes, but not until after dark, so it’ll be a few hours.”

  She glanced at the clock on the cable box. It wasn’t even five o’clock yet. “We could…watch a movie. Or something.”

  “Don’t let me interrupt your day. If you need to write or work in your office, go for it. I don’t need to be entertained.”

  That might be, but right now, having a real live man in her house was a lot more interesting than the made-up one waiting for her in the book she was supposed to be writing. “Okay. Hey, you want to see my fish tank?”

  He smiled. “Sure.”

  “It’s in my office.”

  He followed her back. The moment he laid eyes on it, he let out a soft, “Wow. When you said fish tank, I was thinking something a lot smaller. That’s your whole wall.”

  She grinned. “Cool, right?”

  “Definitely.” His gaze trailed the wrasses. “Very cool.” He took a few steps closer, his eyes never leaving the tank.

  She pulled her desk chair around. “Sit.”

  He did, staring into the tank like it held the wonders of the universe. She knew the feeling. She sat on the edge of the desk, enjoying his rapt attention and feeling like he’d just become a kindred spirit. “I love fish.”

  He nodded slowly. “Me, too.”

  “Very peaceful.”

  More nodding. He leaned forward in the chair. “Um-hmm.”

  She shifted her gaze to the tank then and focused on his handsome reflection. A trick of the water playing behind his image made it seem like gold light gleamed in his eyes. She’d seen that before. In the hot tub. Maybe it wasn’t a trick of the water. She glanced at him. The light was still there.

  He caught her looking at him and blinked. The light was gone. He stood up. “That’s some tank. Can’t wait to see it when it’s fully stocked.”

  She stared at him. Was it possible that a person’s eyes could reflect light like an animal’s? Sure. If she was hallucinating again, anything was possible. She looked away. Was this what it had been like for her mother when she’d first begun her descent into madness? “I’ll, uh, let you know.”

  His butt made a buzzing sound. He reached back and pulled his phone out of his pocket and checked the screen. “I need to take this. I’ll leave you alone so you can write.”

  She just nodded.

  He walked back to the living room. “What did you find out?”

  She closed her office door and wheeled her chair back in front of her desk, then sat down. She’d been stressed before. Like the time the wrong file had gotten uploaded and her readers were almost sent the keynote speech she’d written for a writers’ conference instead of book three in the Blood Moon Brotherhood series. Or the time her first editor had quit the business a week before Roxy had expected her to get edits from the woman.

  But she’d never had hallucinations before. Never. And if she was really honest and stopped pretending she didn’t know what she was seeing, well, then, the truth was she felt like her writing world and her real world were melting into each other.

  How else could she explain seeing fangs and gills and gleaming eyes on people?

  This wasn’t stress. It was stage one of her losing her mind. She’d never considered herself anywhere close to being like any of the great creative geniuses of the world, but it wasn’t unheard of for people in the arts to go mad.

  Or people with a history of mental illness in their families.

  And Roxy was both.

  Her writing career would be over. Medications might take the edge off her storytelling abilities. She could lose her creative edge. Or her drive to write. If there were even drugs that could help. After all, nothing had made her mother better.

  What if she lost the ability to write altogether?

  She pressed a hand to her head and wondered if maybe the favor she needed to ask of Delaney and her husband was to recommend a really good therapist.

  Her laptop was open on her desk. She swiped her finger over the touch pad, bringing the screen to life.

  Her Word document appeared before her. There wasn’t much choice now, it seemed, except to finish the book as quickly as she could and wrap up the series so that her fans would have the closure they needed before she got carted off to an institution.

  Like mother, like daughter.

  Then her gaze moved to the closed office door and her thoughts turned to the man beyond that door. She couldn’t tell him about this, could she?

  No, that would be a new level of weird. At least at this stage in their friendship. But she would tell him eventually. As for tonight, maybe…maybe she should forget work for the day and enjoy one last sane evening while that was still possible.

  She
stood, staring at the closed door, trying to make a decision. Alex or work?

  She almost laughed.

  That wasn’t really a hard choice to make at all. She needed to live now, before her life was nothing more than four padded walls and a locked door.

  Alex looked up from his seat on the couch as Roxy walked out from her office. He’d just hung up with Jenna who’d given him her report and Birdie’s, who’d turned out to be as good a resource as he’d hoped, even if he hadn’t gotten the answer he’d expected. “You’re not going to believe this.”

  “You’d be surprised what I’d believe.”

  Her response caught him off-guard for a moment, then he shook it off. “The only record your ex has is a couple of tickets. And none of my sources have been able to track him down in town. And they were very thorough.”

  She put her hands on the back of the couch and leaned against it as she took the news in. “So what does that mean?”

  “It means a few things. He’s either staying here under an assumed name, or staying outside of town. Both are possibilities, so we’re working those angles to see what we come up with. But we also have to consider that he could be paying someone to do his dirty work. Or that it might not be Thomas at all.”

  “Who’s we exactly?”

  He lifted his phone. “I have some help at the department.”

  “That’s very nice of them.” She sighed. “If it’s not Thomas, I don’t know who it is. And if it is Thomas, then he’s probably using a fake name and thinks he’s being all sly and smart.”

  “Any idea what that name might be?”

  “He’s a big Jets fan. Maybe he’d use the name of one of the players? I don’t know.”

  Alex nodded. “That’s a good place to start.” He sent that info in a quick text to Jenna. “Maybe that’ll turn something up.”

  “I hope so.”

  He put his phone on the coffee table. “Aren’t you supposed to be working?”

  “Yes.” She smiled. “But my head’s not in it.”

  Something did seem a little odd with her, but if Thomas had done something else, she’d have told him. “So what do you want to do?”

  “I’m going to fix an early dinner, then maybe you want to watch a movie with me? You’ve got time before it gets dark, and I’m so behind on new releases that I’d be happy to watch just about anything. You game?”

  To spend more time with her? Absolutely. “Sure. But I didn’t intend to distract you from your work or for you to have to feed me.”

  “You’re not distracting me.” She laughed as she headed for the kitchen. “And I love how you think that dinner’s for you.”

  He grinned at her teasing. “Hey, if you don’t want to share, that’s fine. I’ll just keep the flan to myself.”

  She stopped and turned around to look at him. “What flan?”

  “The flan I made a couple days ago. I brought it over in my bag and stuck it in your fridge. Shame to let it go to waste.”

  She went in and opened the fridge. “Wow, you really did bring flan.” She glanced over at him. “You made this?”

  “What? You think a guy can’t cook?”

  She pulled a few things out, then shut the fridge door. “Cook, sure, but flan is sort of…I don’t know, that’s not beginner stuff.”

  He got off the couch and joined her in the kitchen. “My mother wanted my brother and me to know how to feed ourselves. I took to it more than he did.”

  “Clearly.”

  He leaned on the counter. “So what’s for dinner?”

  “Shrimp scampi. You cool with that?”

  “Oh, yeah. I love seafood. Can I help?”

  She hesitated. “Yeah?”

  He nodded. “Yeah.”

  A few minutes later he had a chef’s knife in his hand and tasks assigned. He started chopping the garlic and shallots first, reserving the parsley for last since it was more of a garnish. He loved cooking, he loved hanging out with Roxy and he couldn’t think of a time he’d been happier. If not for the shadow of her ex hanging over them, the evening would have been perfect. “You sure you don’t want me to devein the shrimp too?”

  “Nope.” She filled a big pot with water for the pasta. “I have to do something or you’ll basically be making dinner by yourself.”

  He smiled as he worked. “I’d be okay with that. You could go get some writing done if you want. I can call you when it’s ready.”

  She put the pot on the stove, then sidled up to him. Her hip against his. “Are you trying to kick me out of my own kitchen?”

  He let the knife rest to answer her. “Not at all. Just trying to give you some time to work if you want it.” The urge to kiss her rose up within him. She was only inches away. He could just lean down and—he took a breath and forced the thought away. “I mean, my mother is waiting for that book.”

  She laughed.

  Then he quickly added. “But I also think she could learn some patience. So…stay.”

  Her smile softened and the look in her eyes went oddly unreadable. She pivoted away, leaving him to wonder what he’d said that had changed the mood so suddenly. “I should make a salad.”

  “Only if you want it.”

  “Yeah, I remember. The Cruz men don’t eat salad.”

  He turned as she went back to the fridge. He couldn’t let go of the thought that he’d upset her. “What just happened? We were having a nice moment, then I asked you to stay. Was that too forward of me? Tell me, because I don’t understand it and I want to.”

  She straightened, a head of lettuce in her hands, but she didn’t look at him. “I like you, Alex. A lot. You’re so different from what I’ve been used to for so long. I had no idea how much that difference could mean to me. But…”

  She shut the fridge, walked to the counter next to him and put the lettuce down. She stared at it for a long time without saying anything.

  He went back to chopping shallots, slowly this time, letting her have all the space she needed. Something was obviously weighing on her thoughts. Whether she shared what it was or not was up to her.

  “I think I’m losing my mind,” she whispered.

  He almost laughed, thinking she was making a joke, but the seriousness of her tone stopped him. He quit chopping. “What makes you think that?”

  She laughed nervously and started unwrapping the lettuce. “Creative types are prone to mental stress more than most people, I think. Depression especially. And my mom had some issues with schizophrenia. And I guess that’s what’s starting to happen to me. I’m just…losing my grip on reality a bit.”

  “But what, specifically, makes you think that?”

  “I’ve been seeing some things—”

  He released the knife to cup her face and gaze into her eyes. He hoped the truth of what he couldn’t say came through. “You are not losing your mind, Roxy. I swear you’re not. Trust me on this.”

  His heart ached for what she was going through. She must have stopped drinking the town water and was getting glimpses of the local supernaturals again. He wished he could tell her the truth, but he’d promised Delaney he wouldn’t. Damn it. He needed to tell Delaney that the time for keeping secrets was over, no matter what she thought Roxy could or couldn’t handle.

  “How can you be so sure?” she asked. “You barely know me.”

  He dropped his hands from her face. “I do know you. You’re not crazy. I just… I wish there was something I could do to help.”

  “Just listening is good.” The lettuce sat between Roxy’s hands, which were now flat on the counter. “And I wasn’t going to tell you, but I like you and I sort of had an epiphany while I was in my office earlier that I shouldn’t say no to something that might not be available to me in the future. Carpe diem and all that.”

  He leaned on the counter. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying? I hate to sound full of myself, but is this about me?”

  She finally looked at him. “Yes. Well, it’s about us.” She closed her
eyes for a moment and took a breath, like she was steeling herself to say something difficult. “I am so attracted to you that just thinking about you makes parts of me ache. I love your company. You make me happy, as silly as that sounds considering we’ve only known each other a few days.”

  Her cheeks went the most adorable shade of pink. “I have never said anything like that to a man. Ever. But if I’m going crazy, I want to enjoy all the sane days I have left. With you. If you’re willing. Or interested. Or not afraid to catch whatever crazy I have.”

  A shot of hot, pure electricity zipped through Alex, filling him with the unquestionable sensation that this woman was absolutely, one hundred percent meant for him. His soul mate. It was that fast and that complete. He just knew. Shifter or not, she was his.

  “It’s not silly and you’re not crazy.” He wiped his hands on his jeans, then threaded his fingers through her hair and kissed her. Hard.

  She seemed to exhale into him. As if all the tension that had built up inside of her while she was spilling her heart was now gone, released by his response. Then she kissed him back.

  For the next few moments, they were lost to that heated contact, their need for each other overriding all else. Until the pot on the stove boiled over and pulled them apart.

  She turned the burner down, then looked at him, her chest rising and falling with the intensity of the kiss they’d just shared. Her eyes were full of light and happiness. “That was a yes, right?”

  “That was a hell yes. But you have to know something about me.”

  “What?”

  “I’m sensing that you want—or expect—a temporary kind of arrangement. Something with an expiration date. That’s not happening. I’m not that kind of guy. Either we do this with the full understanding that it could be forever or we don’t do it at all.”

  “But I could be in an institution next month.”

  “Well, that sounds like a wild exaggeration, but as long as I know the address and what visiting hours are, I’m in.”