Noelle rocked back and pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes. Shoot. The stress of the night and morning and raising a shifter had gotten to her. Cursing and getting angry at the girl wasn’t going to solve anything. Giving in to those rough and raw annoyances just made Noelle feel guilty.
The truth was, she didn’t know what she was doing. She was human and utterly out of her depth, the same as she’d been the night she walked into Big Bear Saloon. Redwater always had a reputation for being a little... weird. She’d just wanted to dance with some danger and forget her hurts. The unexpected surprise a month later turned into an even greater shock after Sienna was born. Noelle had gone to check on her little bundle of joy and found a ball of fur instead.
Talk about the surprise of the century. Shifters weren’t out in the open, then. She’d thought she’d gone crazy until her mother rushed into the room and confirmed her eyes weren’t wrong.
“Sienna, sweetie, please,” Noelle tried again. She couldn’t quite hide the shaking in her voice.
Close. Much too close.
The threat was always there. Tiny teeth would turn her into a wolf, though that information had been hard to shake loose from the tight-lipped townsfolk. Maybe she’d make it through the change, maybe she wouldn’t. She’d definitely be out of sorts until she learned how to control the inner animal, just like her increasingly wild little wolf.
Sienna’s shifts were coming faster and lasting longer. The wolf didn’t like to listen. The girl didn’t, either. Noelle knew it was only a matter of time before the wild pup changed their lives forever.
For the millionth time, Noelle wished she had roots in the community. Or knew how to find Sienna’s father. One night, one name, one child, those were what he’d left her with. The little girl needed more than her human mother could offer. Noelle didn’t know where to turn. And that felt like failing her daughter.
With a sigh, she pushed to her feet and trailed back through the home she’d been lucky enough to buy from her parents when they retired. That hadn’t been in the plans, either, but with a child to support, she needed somewhere to stay.
Noelle shut herself behind her cracked bedroom door and made a dreaded phone call.
“Principal McKenzie,” Adora answered.
Noelle winced. She’d hoped for the school secretary. “It’s Noelle Campbell. I need to put in for a day off.”
The silence on the other end was staggering in its disapproval. “Another?” Adora whipped out.
The disgust stung Noelle’s ears. “I’m sorry. It’s Sienna. She’s sick again.”
Sick. Euphemism for wild and out of control. She couldn’t let that wild wolf into a classroom with other children she might bite. It was one thing to risk herself, and another to risk anyone else.
“I’ve tried to be understanding,” Adora began, zero understanding in her voice, “but you’ve blown through your sick and vacation days for the year. For next year, too, if we’re being honest.”
“I know,” Noelle answered. Every missed day was marked out on her calendar and her bank account. Heck, she thought the kids in her first-grade class saw a substitute more than they saw her.
Noelle had hoped the days would get easier when Sienna transitioned from home daycare to kindergarten classroom. That maybe structure and friends would keep her little mind focused on two feet instead of four. She’d been utterly wrong. Sienna wasn’t any more willing to behave with Noelle in the classroom next door. And her meltdowns were getting more ferocious, according to her teacher.
“You need to find a solution, Ms. Campbell.”
Ooh, the judgment was there, too. Those final letters sounded like harsh, buzzing Zs. No man, no father, no one to help when she needed it.
“I am working on it. It’s just taking some time.”
“Time you don’t have,” Adora chided. She sighed, and Noelle could practically see her shake her head. Not a single strand of hair would dare fall out of place.
“Perhaps…”
Noelle stiffened. For the first time ever, Adora McKenzie sounded uncertain.
“Perhaps there’s someone you can ask for help.”
Noelle brought the phone from her face and stared. She was responsible for Sienna and she didn’t know what to do. She needed help. She just didn’t know where to go.
“I wish it were that easy,” Noelle said weakly.
Her family? They’d shied from the child once her tantrums grew more volatile.
The townsfolk of Redwater? Noelle was certain more than half were shifters, but they wouldn’t talk to her. Not before they were outed, and definitely not after.
Sienna’s father was a mystery lost long ago.
Maybe it was time to send up the flags and signal someone in the Supernatural Enforcement Agency. Or place a help ad in the newspaper of one of those enclaves where shifters had lived hidden from the world for years. Someone, somewhere, had the answers she desperately needed.
“There must be someone,” Adora tutted. Her voice dropped slightly. “I’ve heard the social club at the Moonlight Saloon will sometimes offer help to those in need.”
Noelle froze. Had Adora just…?
She knew the men there by reputation. Everyone in town knew them. Heck, she remembered them riding into town when she was four months pregnant and wrecking the place.
Only, they’d never left. And everyone gave them a wide berth.
Shifters, likely. And they kept a tight rein on the rest of Redwater from the bar they claimed and renamed.
But if she could convince them to give her help, or let someone else in the town talk to her...
“I’ll have to check that out,” Noelle answered in a measured tone. “Thank you for the suggestion.”
“I expect you here tomorrow, and through the rest of the school year.” Adora didn’t wait for a response before hanging up the phone.
The bedroom door creaked open and small feet padded across the carpet. Noelle wiped at the frustration welling in the corners of her eyes as tiny arms wrapped around her neck and squeezed tightly.
“I’m sorry, Mommy,” Sienna whispered.
“It’s okay, baby. It’s okay.” Noelle swallowed back her emotions. Sienna didn’t deserve them. A child wasn’t responsible for an adult. “Mommy shouldn’t have yelled at you. What do we say?”
“It’s okay to be angry. It’s not okay to hurt someone when we’re mad.” Dark waves bounced with her nods on every word. She’d even donned the dreaded leggings instead of the tutu. Gold eyes still shined on her face instead of her father’s hazel, but the lack of fur was promising.
“That’s right, smart girl.” Noelle pasted on a positive face. Another missed day of work, another meltdown, but she had to believe in improvement. Sienna was her daughter, her beautiful girl. She wouldn’t give up on her.
“Why don’t you find your coloring books?” Workbooks, but Sienna didn’t need to hear the difference. She might not be in a classroom, but Noelle wasn’t going to waste the day. “Let’s do a few pages, then go to the park before dinner.”
“The park?” Sienna clasped her hands under her chin. “Can I run?”
They had the backyard, but the little wolf pup ran rings around the fence line. She needed space, and that meant heading out of town. Luckily not many outsiders strayed close to the small town right on the border of Yellowstone. The isolation was perfect for a runaway wolf pup. “If you’re good today. I don’t want you snapping anymore, understand?”
Sienna nodded emphatically. “I’ll be good, I promise!”
Noelle didn’t doubt she’d try.
Keeping that promise was something else entirely.
Chapter 3
Jensen shot a glance to the Vagabond enforcer edging closer in his side mirror. He lifted a lip in a snarl of warning, and Bryce backed off.
No. Part of that wasn’t right. None of them were Vagabonds anymore. They’d left those allegiances behind days ago. Pack politics and the steadiness of knowing where a man
belonged in the world were tossed out as they circled the drain. Who rode up front and who sucked down exhaust was up for debate, just like every fucking other thing.
His wolf clawed at his insides. He was sick of the questions. Sick of everything else, too.
Just plain sick of life.
The look of apprehension on Nora’s face welled into his consciousness. He’d hated to see her bruised and battered, and hated the stink of her fear even more. Viho hadn’t deserved a mate in his best years.
Fucking prick. He’d squandered a gift in the later ones.
Jensen hated himself for forcing the wolf pack to break, but he’d have hated himself more if he’d let that girl suffer.
“Run free,” he’d told her. She’d flinched when his fingers touched her skin. No other way to remove her bonds, though.
Jensen shook his head to clear his thoughts. He hoped she’d listened. He hoped Viho got cut to pieces after Ellis dragged him away from the fight. Too many packs had descended on them. They’d cut and run to survive.
Engine roars echoed off the mountain peaks all around him, seeming even louder in the twilight hours. He needed a place for the night. Not a place to call home, despite his wolf’s insistent growl in the back of his head. The furry bastard could crawl away and die, for all Jensen cared. Never did him a lick of good. He wanted to drown himself a bottle of cheap whiskey and never resurface.
His wolf growled. His mind was getting away from him again. That was happening too often since the split from Viho.
Jensen focused on the road ahead. If he kept the horizon in sight, he wouldn’t feel the queasy sickness in his middle.
Bond sick. Pack bonds weren’t meant to be broken. Mate bonds, either, but he’d deny that one just as hard if one ever took hold. He didn’t have a pack, and he didn’t deserve a mate.
Bryce rode up on him again and Jensen snarled. At the other man, and himself. What the fuck had he dragged all of them into? The Vagabonds were cracking long before he took action, but he was the one that swung a hammer and shattered them like an egg. He deserved death. He’d have carried out the sentence himself, once.
Traitor. Betrayer. Those words described him now. He’d run with just the clothes on his back and the gas left in his ride, taking the remnants of the Vagabonds with him. The loyal enforcer amounted to nothing, just like his old man predicted long ago.
Big shoulders crowded his mirror. His wolf scratched at his insides again before he saw it wasn’t Bryce trying to steal the lead. Ellis. Good man. Strong man. Should have been born a bear with his tank of a body. Ellis gestured toward a sign and offered a noncommittal shrug.
Jensen squinted at the words. Redwater, one mile.
Fuck. He hadn’t even realized where he turned the pack of outcasts and misfits. Their fault for following him. He wasn’t an alpha. He wasn’t their leader. He’d simply had enough of Viho’s bullshit and called the asshole out.
Still, he flew toward the exit. The pack had stopped there before. Small town, shitty bar. Just what his mood called for.
His wolf howled a mournful song.
The stink of shifter hung heavy in the air as the open road turned to sparsely populated countryside. He’d wondered before if the town was some lost enclave like Bearden and Wolfden and who knew what others were out and proud these days. Idiots, all of them. He knew they weren’t responsible for outing the supes of the world, but damn. They could have taken one for the team and let the rest live on in obscurity.
His wolf snapped at him to focus. Jensen shrugged it off.
Something scratched at him, though. Even more than the broken bonds making him sick and crazy. He was almost to the end of the main drag before he put a finger on what bothered him.
The town was quiet. Not many people walked the streets, even at the early hour. Humans were scarce, too, and clumped together where they were present. Human and shifter alike ducked his eyes as the group rode through town, and every last one of them looked haunted.
The fuck had happened since he’d last been there?
The wolf shoved a sending at him. Gorgeous woman on her knees, big eyes staring up at him.
Jensen locked the beast deep in his head and threw away the fucking key.
On the other side of town, but still close enough to spit and hit, stood a building apart from anything else. Motorcycles leaned in a perfect little row outside the front door.
Jensen didn’t think twice before turning into the parking lot. The rest followed and killed their engines next to him.
“Why did you bring us here?” Wyatt grumbled.
Because he wanted a drink. Because he wanted a fight. Because he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing.
Jensen met Wyatt’s eyes as he settled his bike on the kickstand. The wild panic he found written across the other man’s features stilled his tongue. A quick inhale scented varying degrees of the acrid odor on all the others.
They needed someone to steady them.
They shouldn’t have followed him.
He shifted his gaze to the sign hanging above the bar’s door. A piece of broken plywood hung crookedly over half of the previous name. The Big Bear Saloon was now the Moonlight Saloon.
Staying silent, he swung off his bike and made his way to the door. The beefy wolf standing guard let him pass with barely a nod of his head.
Lax security. He’d never have let just anyone pass through the doors of whatever bar the Vagabonds called their clubhouse that night.
Jensen’s eyes quickly adjusted to the low light inside as he bounced his gaze over the scene. Fifteen, that he could see. Perhaps more taking a leak. They outnumbered his six making their way to the bar. Numbers made for a fair fight on a good day.
Dreaded silence cut through the noise. Jensen almost expected the music to stop with a sudden scratch.
“Look what the cat dragged in,” a voice boomed from the back of the bar.
Figures shuffled aside as the man prowled forward.
Jugg, as in Juggernaut. Or Jughead, as Jensen called him. President and alpha of the Moonlight Slayers. They’d been small-time nothings when the Vagabonds last rode through Redwater. Maybe five, total, and all as dumb as bricks. Jughead was the biggest and meanest of the bunch, and the years didn’t look to have tamed him in the least.
He’d laughed when Viho called him up to fight in his war against the Ashford clan. Jensen hated him a fraction less.
“Crowd’s looking a little thin these days.” Jughead made a show of glancing over his shoulder and through the dirty windows. “The rest running late?”
“Not looking for any trouble. Just want a drink and a place for the night,” Jensen announced.
“Now, that’s just too bad. Me and the guys were hoping for some entertainment. Been a slow day.” Jughead shot glances to those nearest to him.
Leather creaked throughout the bar. Fists tightened, shoulders rolled. The scent of fur and dominance clouded the air. Inside Jensen’s head, his wolf threw himself at the bars of the mental cage again and again.
Jensen blinked slowly. He tugged on his inner wolf just a bit, letting gold bleed into his eyes. “Just so happens, we’re dying for a few games.”
“Pool wasn’t what we had in mind, traitor,” Jughead growled. “You think Viho doesn’t have a price on your heads?”
Big, mean, and still dumb as a brick. Skies above, he looked forward to cracking the shit out of the man’s skull for a second time.
“Jensen?”
The soft voice forced him to turn, knocking the air from his lungs. His eyes landed on a woman standing just inside the door. Beams of late daylight filtered through her dark hair and made her look like a fucking angel. His nostrils flared and his wolf howled in recognition.
Human. Alone.
No.
Not alone.
A shy face peeked out from behind the woman’s legs.
The woman gasped. “It is you!”
Chapter 4
Noelle. At least, that
was the name she gave him years ago. She hadn’t smelled of a lie, but he hadn’t been interested in her life story. She’d swayed her hips through the bar doors and, fuck, he’d been caught up in those big, innocent eyes the moment she’d focused on him. Good girl looking for a bad time, and he aimed to please.
His wolf scratched at him again. Paced and panted and howled for her.
“I never thought I’d see you again,” she said quietly.
She smelled like almonds and vanilla. He knew because he’d once spent the better part of an hour in the soap and shampoo aisle trying to track down the scent that haunted his dreams, sneaking up on him like a ghost in the middle of the night.
He’d always hoped she got what she needed from their little tryst and went on to live a good life.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth. Her body trembled like she wanted to run, but she held her ground. In the middle of a brawl, a storm about to break, she stayed utterly focused on him.
His wolf pranced, taking high steps like a damn show pony.
Noelle dropped her hand and let it rest on the tiny head behind her. Her fingers twitched, smoothing down dark waves where she could reach. “I—Well—” Her green eyes swept over the room and uncertainty dumped into her scent. “I think we need to talk.”
He dropped his own gaze to the little girl still huddling behind Noelle. His fists tightened of their own accord. His wolf reared up, growl rattling away in possessive jealousy at the idea of her submitting to any of the assholes behind him. She was too good for the likes of them, too pure.
But no. She looked too... classy to be a biker’s old lady. Her jeans were nice and tight over her curvy thighs and hips, but they didn’t have a single rip nor did she have an ounce of leather on her.
And damn, if those weren’t his eyes peeking back at him from her small pup’s face. She smelled like a wolf, too.
Oh, hell no.
Realization hit him in the chest with the force of a runaway train.
He was not a father. Not to this young pup.
Whiskey and Wolves: Book One: Shifters and Sins Page 2