by Lisa Kessler
“Yeah.” Wow. Blast from the past. When had I seen her last? Maybe elementary school. “She’s my cousin. My mom was the baby of the family behind her brothers Burt and Mitch, and Piper’s mom was the eldest. She died when we were little, but her dad stayed connected with our family for a little while. I guess we all lost touch. We met at a reunion once. Why?”
“She’s a vet and works at Cole’s vet clinic. She’s in our pack.”
“Piper lives in Sedona?” My family was more tangled up with shifters than I realized. I knew Cole from his visits to the office to see Asher. I didn’t know he was a werewolf, though.
Gage took out another photo from the file and laid it on top. I vaguely recognized the man in the grainy photo. “He looks familiar.”
“This is Piper’s dad. He’s the one who stumbled onto classified research files that showed men shifting into wolves. They were being used for experiments and tortured. I’ve never seen the footage, only heard stories, but if it ever became public through the Freedom of Information Act, everyone in the world will be terrified of us.” His gaze lifted to my face. “Her dad is dead now, but we never found the files. They may have been destroyed, but we don’t know for sure. Either way, he’s the one who founded the Transparency Collective. His brother-in-law, your uncle Burt, was the money behind the operation in the beginning.”
I rested my hand on the counter to steady myself. “This is unbelievable. You think my uncle Mitch is trying to expose werewolves?”
He’d told me they were going to be exterminated. This couldn’t be happening.
“Yeah, looks like it.” He nodded slowly. “That’s why General Sloan was tailing you. He thinks you’re spying on the Sedona Pack for your uncle.”
“But I’m not.” I searched his eyes. “You know that, right?”
When he didn’t speak right away, I took a step back. “Oh my god. You’re not sure.” I shook my head, pain twisting like a knife in my gut. “You know what, screw you.”
I spun on my heel, but he caught my elbow. “Becca, wait.”
I faced him again, narrowing my eyes. “Let go of me.”
He did as I asked, although parts of me already mourned the loss of his touch. He shook his head. “Let me explain. Please?”
I crossed my arms, not trusting my treacherous hands not to seek comfort from this guy who obviously didn’t trust me.
He pushed a fancy wrought iron stool out for me from under the kitchen bar. I grudgingly took a seat while he leaned on the bar with his forearms on full display. I was going to need to sit on my hands.
“I don’t think you knowingly spied on the pack at all, and I told General Sloan as much. But I do think your uncle found out Caldwell was biting humans, and he might have discovered that Caldwell took over Asher’s business for a time. You probably talked to him about it at some point. Then Asher came back, and Mitch could’ve connected the dots that Asher was the new Alpha of this pack…”
“And I was already on the inside.” Dread rolled through me like a tidal wave as my brain whirled through years of conversations with my uncle.
“Exactly. I just told Sloan you’re protected by the pack. He’ll leave you alone.” His hand clenched into a fist, making his bicep contract, straining his t-shirt. “Or I won’t hesitate to beat his ass. He’s not my commanding officer anymore.”
My head was spinning as more pieces began to fall into place. “It’s like the universe wove all of us into this supernatural fabric without our consent.”
“You’re right.” He looked over at me. “When I was in the Air Force, I didn’t know General Sloan was born a werewolf. I didn’t know shifters even existed, but Sloan was knee-deep in negotiating top-secret government defense contracts with the Nero Organization at the time.”
“Do you think the general mentioned you to the old Alpha? Was that why you were bitten?”
“I’ll probably never know for sure.” Gage shrugged, looking straight ahead again. “Seems possible to me. And when your uncle found out you were working with Asher, he decided to keep tabs on us through you.”
I massaged my temples. “Do you think he knows what happened to Samantha?”
Henry’s and Hawk’s faces filled my head. They had Samantha’s eyes. Was my uncle so poisoned against shifters that he would hurt his own grandchildren?
“I don’t know. You said he knows she went missing in Sedona.” He glanced over at me. “Maybe the shooters weren’t coming to take my kids to a lab for experiments at all.”
I stood up and went to his side. “You think they were going to take them to their grandfather.”
“Makes sense.” He turned to face me. “This is all so fucked up, and those little guys never asked to be a part of any of it.” Pain lined his face. “How can I protect them from all this?”
I wrapped my arms around him, instinctively needing to ease his burden. He held me tight, molding my body to his, and unlike my earlier hug from Asher, this one had my heart racing.
We clung to each other in a stranger’s massive kitchen, and I suddenly felt like we were the only people left in the world. He drew back just enough to see my face. His gaze locked on mine, desperation in his eyes, not to mention unspoken questions. But I didn’t have the answers. All I could offer was myself.
I rose on my toes and kissed him. It was clumsy at first, but his grip on me strengthened as he parted my lips. He explored my mouth as our tongues tangled together with an urgency that made my knees weak. He walked me backward until we hit the cupboards. My fingernails raked down the back of his shirt and a growl rumbled in his chest. Fire burned low in my belly until my thighs pressed together, my body aching for his attention.
His fingers tightened in my ponytail, tugging my head back as he deepened the kiss. This was a hunger I’d never known in my life, and if I could’ve gotten him naked, I would’ve been having sex in some stranger’s kitchen. This need for him consumed me.
Dex called Gage from the other room.
He stumbled away from me, and my legs almost gave out as we stared at each other. With his heated gaze locked on mine, he slowly ran the back of his hand across his wet lips, and I practically had an orgasm right where I stood. The desire in his eyes almost physically burned me.
No one had ever looked at me like that before.
My entire body tingled. Arousal didn’t seem big enough to describe the yearning he’d kindled in me with just one kiss.
“Be right there,” Gage called without ever taking his eyes off me. He came closer and whispered in my ear, “I’m starving, but not for the chicken on the table.”
He straightened up and walked out of the room. I struggled to catch my breath. Holy shit. I went to the table to unpack the bag of food. My legs were rubbery, and my mind was buzzing with images of Gage with far fewer clothes on.
I set the take-out plates on the table and took out a box of fries and a bag of biscuits. When Gage came back in the room, all the air sucked out of my lungs.
Sadly, he wasn’t alone. Dex smiled at me. “Hey, Becca.”
I’d met Dex a few times. His twin brother was the quieter one of the two brothers, but I didn’t really know either of them. Neither one had kids so we didn’t have much reason to interact, and now that I knew Asher had built some kind of imaginary wall around me, I guess it made more sense that they rarely spoke to me.
“Hi, Dex.” I kept my attention on him for fear if I so much as looked at Gage I’d go up in flames. “I hope I got enough chicken for everyone.”
He shook his head. “Deacon took General Sloan back into town, and he’s bringing lunch for us. I just wanted to say welcome, I guess…” He shrugged as he looked over at Gage.
He must’ve told Dex I knew. I raised my eyebrows. “I’m not a werewolf.”
Dex chuckled with a nod. “I know. I just meant…it’s nice to have you around without secrets.”
Gage took his plate and came to my side of the table, putting himself between me and Dex. His voice was deep, h
is tone short. “I’ll get to the tile after I eat.”
I stared at Gage’s back. His shoulders seemed tense, and his feet were set wide apart, ready for a fight. Was he jealous? I blinked. What was happening here?
Dex glanced at Gage and nodded. “Yeah. Sounds good.” He peered over at me and smiled again. “See you soon, Becca.”
“Okay.”
He left the room, and Gage turned to face me. His shirt stuck to his chest in a couple places, feeding the fantasies playing through my head of how ripped his torso must be.
His gaze softened. “Maybe we can eat outside where we’ll have some…privacy.”
The way he said the final word clued me in. Dex was a werewolf like Gage. He must be able to hear everything we said, like Gage and Asher did when I was on the phone with my uncle.
“Okay.” I picked up my plate and filled it with a drumstick, a thigh, a handful of fries, and a biscuit. I grabbed a packet of honey, too, then looked up at Gage. “Lead the way.”
I followed him through the open floor plan. Much of the house was covered in plastic tarps and drywall dust. The heels of my flats clicked across the bare cement floors as we crossed to a wall of sliding glass doors. He led me out onto a back patio that had a gorgeous view of Cathedral Rock in the distance. We sat under one of the two old gnarled oak trees the patio space had been built around.
I took a bite into the chicken and stared at the valley. Spring in Sedona was beautiful. Perfect temperatures and clear days that gave way to chilly nights. A hawk circled, making his way lower in a silent descent.
Gage coughed, keeping his eyes on the house. “Are we going to pretend that didn’t happen in there?”
I glanced his way and shrugged. “I don’t know. I started it, but you definitely finished strong.”
The corners of his lips curved as he popped a fry into his mouth. “Oh, I was far from finished.”
Then my thighs were pressing together again as I shifted in my seat on the concrete bench. This high level of flirting and double entendres were out of my league.
I chuckled, meeting his eyes. “If that was just warming up, then I might be in trouble.”
He grabbed a napkin, wiping his hands and then reached for mine. His grin went from wolfish to warm, melting me in a whole new way. “You are always safe with me, okay? If I come on too strong, say something. I swear I’ll back the fuck off in a heartbeat.”
“You’re making me want to kiss you all over again,” I admitted.
He raised a brow. “Is that a promise?”
I laughed and leaned over, kissing him slowly. Funny, even though this was new between us, it didn’t feel awkward. It felt right and natural. He cupped my face in his large hand, his lips brushing mine over and over, and instead of the urgent hunger we’d unleashed in the kitchen, this time we savored the tender kisses.
He rested his forehead on mine. “You taste so sweet.”
I dangled the half-empty honey packet in my other hand.
He grinned, shaking his head. “This isn’t honey. It’s all you, Bec.”
My given name was Rebecca, but only my family used it. I’d been Becca to everyone else my entire life. But something about hearing him shorten it to Bec seemed intimate. Only for him. And I liked it.
Something shattered inside the house followed by a loud. “Fuck!”
Gage chuckled. “I better get in there before the Stewart brothers ruin the whole shipment of custom tiles.”
“Okay.” My voice was thready and unfamiliar to my ears. I wet my lips. “I guess I’ll talk to you later?”
He tilted his head a little, and as impossible as it seemed, he was even more handsome. “I was thinking maybe I’d see if the boys can have a sleepover with Bart and Ben tonight.”
We’d be alone. All night. I swallowed the lump in my throat. “This is moving at lightning speed for me. I think I need a little time to process all this.”
Hurt flashed in his eyes, but he shut it down so fast I almost thought maybe I imagined it. He nodded slowly. “Maybe tomorrow night?”
I chuckled. “I’ll check my calendar. We could watch a movie or something.”
“Great.” His eyes wandered over my face. “I don’t have any expectations, okay? I want to know your favorite color, what makes you laugh, and maybe what you like to drink.”
I raised a brow. “So you won’t be disappointed if we don’t end up naked?”
“After what happened in the kitchen, I’m pretty sure you already know where I stand with wanting you naked.” He shook his head as he lifted a hand to caress my cheek. The gentle touch sent tingles all the way down to my toes. “But I don’t have an agenda. I’d wait a hundred years for you if that’s what it takes. We have time, Bec.”
My heart wanted to leap out of my chest, but my head kept issuing warnings about werewolves and government research and my uncle being part of a collective trying to kill werewolves.
Instead of driving myself crazy, I gathered up all the trash and then leaned in to kiss his cheek as I whispered, “I guess I’ll talk to you tonight?”
His crooked smile had my heart doing backflips. “For sure.”
I was already looking forward to it.
CHAPTER 9
Gage
Laying tile in general was backbreaking work, and add in multiple sizes of tiles in specialized patterns that added geometry into the mix, and it left me mentally and physically exhausted. I sat back on my heels, surveying all the progress I’d made as I wiped the sweat off my brow.
Dex came out of one of the bathrooms, sliding his rubber mallet back into a loop on his tool belt. “Looks good, Gage.”
“Thanks.” I got to my feet, my joints popping all the way up. I didn’t want to imagine how much more I would hurt right now if I were still human. I glanced at the bathroom. “How’s it going in there?”
Dex followed my gaze. “It’s coming together. I got the new fixtures installed. Tomorrow I can grout the tile and paint.” He focused on me. “So does Asher know about you and Becca?”
Just hearing another man say her name had my wolf growling deep in the shadows of my soul. “He doesn’t want her to get hurt.”
“Doesn’t really answer my question.” Dex’s ice-blue eyes locked on mine. “Is she your mate?”
Fuck. I hadn’t even told Becca yet. But I needed to tell someone. The secret was killing me. I rubbed a hand down my face. “She is.”
“Damn.” He shook his head. “That file Sloan showed us about her family and the Transparency Collective…”
“I know. I saw it.” I stared out the sliding glass doors. “A jaguar shifter shot at us at my place last night, and she had her first tail by General Sloan today. Then add that I dumped werewolves on her, too…” I looked at Dex again. “No one would blame her if she ran away from Sedona without ever looking back.”
Saying the words out loud had my wolf on edge. I rolled my shoulders back, wishing I could shrug off the dread. “I think her uncle was using her to stay close to the pack and track our movements, but she wasn’t in on it. I’d bet my life on that.”
Dex patted my shoulder. “Hope you’re right. The pack needs to be your first priority.”
Easy for him to say. He didn’t understand how overwhelming it was the moment my wolf had come alive and recognized the other half of our soul. Before I had brushed my hand against her skin, the wolf and I were like two separate entities sharing one spirit. I was in complete control until the full moon, and after the shift, the wolf took over that one night a month.
But when we found Becca, something had integrated. The wolf was no longer a dormant part of me. We were one entity united in our devotion to our mate. The instinct to protect her, to just be near her, was all-consuming. If Becca had been purposefully spying for her uncle, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to fight the pull to defend her, even if it was from my own pack.
From the first second I had touched her, a web had started forming between us, and it was pulling tighter with eve
ry minute we were together. For all I knew, she didn’t feel a thing, but there was no way I could escape it.
And that kiss had me shaken.
I would’ve taken her standing up in the kitchen if Dex hadn’t interrupted. The wolf wanted to claim our mate, and he didn’t care about where or when, let alone dating or courtship. She was our one light in the darkness. He didn’t understand that I barely knew her or that she wasn’t a werewolf with the same instincts. He recognized her spirit, and he would love only her for life.
It was terrifying and thrilling all at once.
I wanted a partner I could adore and a family for my boys. And here she was.
If she was willing and I could keep her family from killing both of us.
Fuck.
I bumped Dex with my shoulder. “Someday you’ll find your mate and you’ll understand the power struggle between your pack and your mate.”
He chuffed, hooking his thumb on his tool belt. “I’m not holding my breath.” He met my eyes. “I envy you, though. When I told Caldwell I didn’t want him to assign me a mate, I never said anything about not wanting a family.” A sad smile curved his lips. “Now I may never have, either.”
I respected Dex and Deacon for standing up to Caldwell when he had started pairing up pack members with bitten females. Their parents had been true mates, and the Stewart brothers had held out for the same. It was easy to understand why Dex might be having some regrets now that he was looking at the downhill slide toward forty with no mate on the horizon.
“She’s out there.” I looked at my boots and back to Dex’s face. “When I think about all these coincidences here—like how I served under General Sloan, a werewolf, and he probably gave Caldwell the tip to have me turned, and now here’s Becca who worked with Asher since before he was bitten, and then it turns out her family is involved with the Transparency Collective…” I searched for the right words. “Doesn’t it feel like we were all woven into this somehow? Like we’re part of a supernatural sweater, and it keeps getting tighter as the knit comes together.” I shook my head. “I bet your mate is here. Maybe closer than you think.”