by C. D. Gorri
Charley was domestic. She loved to cook and had a knack for interior decorating. She was in the process of reordering linens and bathroom décor for most of the house.
Cat was just grateful she didn’t have to do it anymore. For a few years now she had been given that job though she often told her brother it was sexist of him.
She had chosen simple white towels and plain curtains and rugs. High quality, but plain, nondescript. Charley said it had a certain hotel like charm, but Cat knew she was just being nice.
She reassured her that she was not insulted in the least if Charley went ahead and redecorated. As a thank you Charley had tackled Cat’s bathroom first. She loved the new tangerine and cream motif.
Especially the cute octopus shaped towel rack. Yup, she was glad in more ways than one that Rafe had found and managed to keep Charley.
She was bright and spunky too, and her temper could rival that of any Wolf! Hot damn! Cat walked in on the two newlyweds having an argument last week and just as Rafe got a little too sarcastic, his lovely wife upended an entire pitcher of iced tea on top of his shaggy black head. Cat couldn’t breathe she laughed so hard.
And that feline of hers! Oh man, Buttercup was quite the prince of the Manor. Imagine a Pack of Werewolves brought to their knees by a fluffball!
Cat even noticed some of the guys buying him toys and treats, even Randall. She could take the beast or leave him, especially since he loved snoozing on Cat’s uniform whenever she left it in the laundry room for more than day. Feline fur was hell on a Werewolf’s nose.
“Okay, listen Cat, come to my office later tonight and we’ll talk,” Rafe’s voice brought her back to the present.
“You sure? We can talk now, the boys don’t mind. I’m pretty sure Liam is in a meatball coma?”
“What? Me? Meatballs? More? Where?”
Cat laughed at Seff’s younger brother and threw a meatball his way. The incorrigible pup caught it in his mouth.
“You pig!”
“Who me? No way, Kit-Cat, I eat pigs! Whole! I can show you sometime,” he waggled his eyebrows and she threw a spoon at him, hitting him right in the forehead.
“Ouch! Dang it, you silly feline named Werewolf, I was still chewing!”
“You deserved it, Liam,” Seff chided him for his disrespectful remarks. Cat just laughed. She didn’t mind, it was all in fun.
“Cat, Rafe and I are just a tiny bit worried, there’s some stuff we need to run by you, okay?”
“Like what?”
“Uh, just stop by his office tonight after dinner. Oh, and it’s your turn to load the dishwasher,” Charley winked and Cat sighed.
Ugh! It was her turn and she would do it. Just as soon as she finished her salad. And maybe one more scoop of pasta. Yum! That was probably her second favorite thing about being a Werewolf. The food.
Like other Werewolves, Cat’s metabolism was supernaturally fast. That was because they tended to run hotter and faster than normals.
Especially during the full moon. The Change from human to Wolf was not an easy thing. In fact, her first Change took almost forty minutes and hurt like hell.
Afterwards she was starving. She took down three rabbits that night. Rafe was the one who stayed with her. Well, Rafe and Tate.
She had almost forgotten about that. The two black Wolves had kept guard over the smaller buff colored female that was Cat.
They showed her how to keep control, where to hunt, and when it was safe to rest. Nowadays she managed to Change in under ten minutes. That was something of a feat for Werewolves though Rafe managed his Change in under three.
It was a job sometimes, keeping up with her appetite. But she managed just fine. After all, it was a necessary part of being a Werewolf.
Of course, eating healthy was important. It wasn’t all potato chips and cupcakes, but still Cat was able to eat way more than any of the normals she knew.
In fact, she often snuck protein bars and shakes on the job. She could get snappy when she was hungry. And she was always careful to keep out of sight.
People could get pretty annoying with the same old “where do you put it” questions. Especially civilians. Officers tended to think she just liked to workout.
Cat wasn’t the only Werewolf on the force. There was one other. He was much older than she was. A New jersey native, like her.
She sort of remembered him from way back when. He came around the house sometimes when she was just a kid. Pack business, she guessed, but at the time she wasn’t privy to any of that.
Zev Maccon was a cold man and an equally cold Alpha. He didn’t treat his Wolves with the same kind of respect Rafe did. Besides Lieutenant Matt Larentia tended to ignore Cat on a daily basis.
She didn’t take it personally. She figured he preferred to work alone. Besides, she was only an officer and had no reason to interact with him.
He spoke to her only once that she could recall. She remembered that day. He had surprised her when he cornered her in the breakroom. He looked just the same as she remembered. His blonde hair showed little signs of graying and his muscular body was the envy of men on the force half his age.
It was when she first went on the job at the Maccon City Sheriff’s Department. Lt. Larentia had stopped her and asked about her schedule. His voice was gruff and impersonal.
“Keep the night of the full moon free each month,” he had advised, “Otherwise things could get a little hairy.”
Those were his exact words.
She had to refrain from rolling her eyes and saying something sarcastic. Still, she took his advice.
Other than Lt. Larentia the entire department was full of normals. Cat didn’t mind. It was the same as college. She did her best to fit in, to be useful, and to serve and protect.
It was difficult maintaining friendships and personal relationships when you had to keep such a huge secret. She usually didn’t bother.
She was just happy to be doing what she always wanted. Making a life of her own, on her own terms, and not stuck in a job or house because her father said so. She cringed as memories of old Zev crept into her mind.
“Earth to Cat!” Liam’s voice was close enough that she knew if she reached out she’d wind of smacking him. So she did.
“Ow! I just want the garlic bread!”
“Here, you bottomless pit!,” she shook off her melancholy and tossed him a piece.
The jovial sounds of everyone eating around her put a stop to those pesky memories. Pack. Family. This is all I need.
Besides, Charley’s food was much too good to bother thinking about her childhood. She sighed and dug in.
“Want me to stay and help you clear the table?,” Charley asked from her place next to Rafe. But the look in her brother’s eye told Cat that he had other plans for his wife.
“No way, you cooked, I clean. Them’s the rules,” she winked and smiled as Rafe stood up and pulled his new bride to her feet.
They exited hand in hand as Cat stood and began piling dishes. It was quick work getting everything to the kitchen. That was where the real work happened, but in all seriousness she couldn’t complain.
Loading the dishwasher was a piece of cake compared to scrubbing pots and pans by hand with nothing but steel wool and baking soda. She grimaced as the smell of metal on metal came back to her.
Cat shook her head. Nope, don’t think about it. She pushed her memories to the back of her mind for what seemed like the millionth time that night. What was up with her? She needed a nice long, quiet vacation. Somewhere she could just sit in peace and waste away the minutes doing nothing except maybe reading or sipping tea. Mmmm.
But for now she was home and stuck with kitchen duty. Cat wasn’t going to make a fuss about cleaning up. That would be ridiculous, and she hated silly crap like that.
It was her turn and fair was fair. Besides, the upgraded kitchen rocked. Just another of Rafe’s awesome improvements to the house.
The entire room was state of the art. New appl
iances, stone tiles, accent lighting, gleaming countertops. And besides, he hired help for the really tough jobs since everyone else had other things to do. It was a dream, truly.
She still hated the smell of wet metal, but the lemon scented detergent filled her nostrils as she flipped opened the cap and she went to work.
Ten minutes into it Cat stopped stacking the dishes and pans and pulled out her cell phone. If she was going to be stuck in there for who knew how long, she might as well listen to some music.
She plugged her phone into the wall dock, complete with charging station and speakers that Rafe also had installed in almost every room. She so loved her brother!
She smiled as she looked at her new smart phone. Her brother had insisted everyone in his Wolf Guard had one. Of course they were full of top secret apps made for Pack business by Randall Graves. He was the resident tech genius.
Randall was in charge of pretty much all their security, and anything having to do with a computer. The new smart phones were a way for Rafe to have real time access to his elite detail. It was also a way for them to stay in contact with the Pack as a whole.
Cat was pleasantly surprised when he handed her the brand new, hooked up cell in its pink armored case. She smiled at the memory. She may not be a Wolf Guard yet, but this was definitely a start.
She clicked the button that started her playlist. A little rock and roll and Cat was ready to tackle the mess. Cooking for Werewolves left more than one dirty pot.
Boy, was that the truth! She huffed out a breath then shook her head and danced around on bare feet across the chilly stone floor. After packing away the leftovers, she scraped the dishes into the trash can and began loading them into one of the high efficiency dish washers. They had two.
The monotony of the work was soothing after the day she had. Cat bobbed her head as she wiped and stacked. She joined Gene Simmons for a few verses, belting out lyrics and dancing around in her bare feet across the tiled floor.
Cat wasn’t afraid to let her hair down, especially when she was alone. Besides, a little bump and grind was just what she needed. She was having a ball too, that is until she heard the scrape of one of the high stools that surrounded the kitchen island. And then she smelled him.
Oh crap! Cat turned around to discover the one person in the world she wouldn’t be caught dead letting her hair down around. Tate Nighthawk.
He stood watching her with a half grin on his usually stern face. To see that smile on his lips was enough to make her almost drop a plate. Almost.
“Do you mind? I was watching that,” his deep voice cut through the rock and roll making Cat’s pulse speed up.
“Yeah right,” she walked to the phone and quickly stopped her playlist, throwing them into a tense silence.
No way was she going to act like a fool in front of him. Not again anyway. Been there, done that.
“I just packed up dinner. It’s in the fridge if you’re hungry.”
“No, I’m good.”
“Okay, so why are you in the kitchen then?”
“I love Kiss.”
“Oh.”
“So,” he pulled out the stool and sat down. His muscles strained against the black t-shirt he wore as he rolled his neck and arms in an effort to get comfortable.
“How was work? Sheriff’s Department treating you okay?”
“Yup. Fine,” she cringed at her one word answers. When would she stop acting like an imbecile around this man?
“I think we can do better than that, Catriona, don’t you?”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Sorry, I forgot.”
“Like hell you did.”
“What? It’s a pretty name.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I remember when you were eight and I mispronounced your name after reading it off your homework, I called you Ca-tree-oh-na instead of Ca-tree-na, and you called me stupid.”
“I did not!,” Cat’s cheeks burned. She was a difficult child, always on the defensive, but she couldn’t believe she had said that!
“Yes, yes, you did! You called me a stupid jerk-faced boy and said I couldn’t even read.”
“Oh geez, look I’m sorry-”
“Nah, you don’t have to say sorry. It’s funny, you know, cause I couldn’t. Read that is. Not well anyway. My mother was sort of absentee. Hardly noticed when she swallowed those bottles of pills. And my dad, well, he was hardly, a father. I don’t blame them, understand, they did the best they could with what they had. It wasn’t until I lived here that I learned anything about anything.”
“Tate, I-” Cat’s heart hurt for him. She felt a sort of controlled emotion emanate from him. Sadness, solitude, heartache. But mostly loneliness. She wanted to do something, comfort him, hold him, but she remained where she stood.
She knew his mother had committed suicide. Another Werewolf driven to madness and grief for missing her Wolf. She even remembered the day her father brought him into their house.
He was older than her of course, closer to Rafe’s age. He was thin and scared with chin length black hair and the darkest pair of eyes she had ever seen. His shoulders were hunched, his clothes old, but clean, his expression grim, and the chip on his shoulder as big as a mountain.
“No apologies necessary, Cat. We were just kids.”
“Yeah. It was a long time ago,” she watched him as she resumed scraping dishes and placing them into the washer.
“Well, you’re certainly not a kid now. You weren’t one the last time we were alone together either. You remember that night, don’t you?”
“Look I don’t-”
“Not one day has gone by in the last seven years that I haven’t thought about it,” his whispered confession hit her as if he had shouted it. She wasn’t ready to hear whatever this was from him. Before she had a chance to speak he continued.
“God, I have pictured you, standing there with the surf crashing just a few feet away. I can still taste the salt that clung to your skin, looking for all the world like a sea nymph. Soft and glowing in the moonlight, designed by the gods to make a man crazy from wanting you.”
Cat froze. This time the dish did slip right out of her trembling hands. Luckily it landed on the counter top where wobbled noisily until coming to a standstill. It was the only noise in the room after Tate’s astounding revelation.
Had he really pictured her? Did he think about that night?
Cat had denied herself permission to dwell on the night of her senior prom long ago. She had been determined to get on with her life.
Getting away from the strict rules and brutal chores of her father had been step one. Getting herself a college degree had been step two. And putting Tate Nighthawk as far form her mind as she could get had been step three.
Of course that last part was difficult when she came home to live, but she worked long shifts. He seemed to do the same. They hardly interacted.
And on the rare occasion when they were home at the same time Tate usually ignored her. She hid her grief and embarrassment with humor and sarcasm.
Cat swore she wouldn’t moon over him. She promised herself a long time ago that she was done with men. She would never again put herself in a position where she needed to try to please someone with either her looks or actions.
After her father died and Rafe put off his rise to Alpha she had thrown herself into her studies. She knew her brother would eventually fulfill his destiny, but it gave her time to make her own. She didn’t believe in luck. She believed in hard work.
She would never be a homemaker or happy housewife. It just wasn’t in her. Cat had missed the opportunity to impress upon her father just how useful and strong a female Wolf could be outside of the home, but she wouldn’t fail with Rafe.
The first time she had approached her brother with the idea of becoming one of his Wolf Guard, he refused. The second time he seemed to have pause before stating that it was not a woman’s place. After that she worked even harder. The third time, she
told herself, the third time he would not be able to say no.
Cat had very little else filling her time. She was forever training. She had a rigorous work out routine, she went regularly to target practice and used weapons such as assault rifles, handguns, crossbows, and knife training, and she recently got certified as an EMT. Cat had all the makings of a Wolf Guard and more. She just had to make Rafe see it.
The one thing she didn’t have was a personal life. She hardly dated anymore. She just didn’t have the time. Besides she was a fast study and if she was rejected once for baring her soul, there was no way she was going to do that again.
Anger, pain, and confusion took turns bubbling up inside of her. It was all she could do to not scream at him after all the things he had just claimed.
“What is all this, Tate?”
CHAPTER 3
Tate stood up and turned around his shoulders tense and his jaw clenched. Suddenly the room felt small to him.
What the hell was he doing? That night was best left buried where it was, in the past. Why was he bringing it up now? In the kitchen for God’s sake!
He exhaled. His own scent advertised his frustration. He ran his fingers over the to of his head.
He cut his hair short nowadays, but there were times he missed the old length of it.
He should leave as quickly as possible. Just walk away, man. But she looked so damn good. And after what he had just seen he needed to be near something good, and warm, and alive. Cat was all those things. And more.
He took a deep breath and under the regular kitchen smells he got a whiff of her. She was feeling something in that moment, concern, sympathy maybe?
He lowered his head. He didn’t deserve it. Not after the day he had had.
Sometimes he just plain hated his job. As Wolf Guard it was his duty to not simply protect his Alpha, but to go where Rafe needed him.
Today that had meant a ride to one of the wealthier suburbs of South Jersey. The home in Little Silver was gorgeous. From the outside Tate took in the newly renovated colonial and saw what everyone must see.
A happy home. Upper middle class. The family clearly had money what with the sparkling BMW that sat in the driveway. A Christmas gift for the wife maybe?