I balked at her answer. “I was just hoping he could help me get one.”
“Why would he help you get one?”
“Because he offered to help me the other day.” Before she could jump to any conclusions about her uncle’s reasons for aiding me, I added, “He pities me for being the only girl in my pack.”
Not my best lie ever, but it seemed to appease Sarah because her forehead uncrumpled. She raised a finger again, then set the headphones back on her ears and cued up the next song. The beats overlapped seamlessly, before the new song glided over the fading one.
She pushed the headphones down again, then sized me up. “You’re what, a four?”
I nodded.
“You can borrow one of mine. Come over to my place tomorrow.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.” She rolled her eyes. “Now, go dance. I need to concentrate on my set.”
I started to turn away when I remembered I had no clue where her place was. “I don’t know where you live.”
“Give me your phone.”
I entered my password and passed it over.
She typed in her contact information, then handed the phone back to me. “Don’t come before twelve! I’m dead to the world in the morning.”
“’Kay. Thanks.”
She fluttered her hand in a don’t-mention-it gesture, then stuck her headphones back on and bobbed her head.
I clambered down the stairs, past the bouncer, who’d lost interest in me after ascertaining I wasn’t some crazed fan. I zeroed in on Skylar and Emmy’s location at the bar and threaded myself through the mass of bodies.
The newest song Sarah was playing had people jumping and pumping their fists in the air. Twice, my feet got trampled. The first time, the person didn’t apologize—they probably hadn’t realized. The second time, though, the trampler caught my arm and leaned over to apologize. The boy’s breath reeked of beer and bad dental hygiene.
“It’s okay,” I said, shrugging him off.
His gaze skimmed over my face, then dipped to the V-shaped neckline of my dress. Subtle. “Can I buy you a drink?”
I was about to turn him down when someone beat me to it.
Liam loomed over the boy. “No. You can’t.”
The boy turned toward him before backing away faster than a spooked rabbit.
“Maybe I wanted a free drink,” I said.
Liam’s eyes flashed dangerously. “Then I’ll buy you a drink.”
Not the answer I was expecting. “Forget it. I don’t want anything to drink.”
“Did you come with Everest?”
I shook my head. “He’s out of town.”
Liam’s jaw tightened. “Of course he is.”
What was that supposed to mean?
“Did you come alone?”
“No! I came with two coworkers from the inn.”
Someone shoved into me, and I momentarily lost my balance. Liam shot out a hand and caught my elbow, steadying me. Once he’d established I could stand on my own two feet, he let go.
I rubbed the patch of skin he’d touched. “I should go find them.”
“Females or males?”
My forehead furrowed at his strange question.
“Your coworkers, are they women or men?”
“Women. Why?”
“Just asking.”
Uh-huh. Weirdo. “I should go find them.”
Heart pounding to the hectic rhythm of the bass spilling from the surround-sound speakers, I made my way toward Skylar and Emmy. They’d met up with another couple—Francine and Lark. Francine was petite and feminine. Lark was something else. In spite of the buzz cut and the baggy AC/DC t-shirt, Lark didn’t strike me as a man. But maybe he was.
They were all very nice and included me in every conversation, which was more than the pack did. At some point, I found myself looking upward at the mezzanine, right into Liam’s shadowy gaze. His forearms were propped on the metal guardrail. Matt stood next to him, and behind them sat the rest of their posse and their harem of girls.
When a thin, pale arm snaked around Liam’s midsection, crumpling his black V-neck, I looked away. Three days ago, he’d proclaimed he’d wanted to kiss me, that he didn’t care about Tamara, and yet here she was, wrapped around him like string around a birthday present.
His fickleness stung way more than it should.
Chapter Thirty-Six
I’d been standing for what felt like hours in the bathroom line, and it had barely shortened. What did women do in there?
I started tapping my foot to distract myself from the spasms in my bladder. When that didn’t help, I took out my phone. I wasn’t socially connected—no Facebook, no Instagram, no Twitter, no Snapchat—so I checked the news, especially what was happening overseas. Even though August had said little could kill a werewolf, I worried about his safety. What if a blood-thirsty rebel set fire to his camp?
I shuddered just thinking about it.
By the fifth article I read, I was two people closer to my destination. I contemplated the men’s room entrance that swung like a revolving door. Boys were in and out so fast I suspected they didn’t wash their hands. At this moment, I wished women would sacrifice hygiene for speed. Just as I had that thought, the boy’s bathroom door flapped again, and lo and behold, Liam Kolane stepped out.
I swung my gaze to the short ponytail of the girl in front of me, feigning great interest in her purple hair tie.
When her head swiveled and her mouth fell a little open, I momentarily shut my eyes. I could smell Liam next to me, feel the heat from his hulking body.
“What do girls do in there?” he asked.
I loosed a sigh, then opened my eyes. Why was he always there? Did he have some internal radar that displayed my location at all times?
Barely moving my lips, I mumbled, “Beats me.”
“Come.”
That made me look up. “Where?”
He nodded toward the guy’s bathroom.
“I can’t go in there.”
“We have toilets too.”
They also had urinals and probably a long line of boys doing their business. “With doors?”
One side of Liam’s mouth curled up. “Yes.”
He leaned down until his mouth was leveled with my ear. I shivered when his hot breath pulsed against my lobe.
“If you become Alpha, you’ll need to get over your prudishness.”
I raised my gaze toward him. But I won’t be Alpha, Liam. I won’t even be part of a pack come next week. Maybe I won’t be part of this world either. I didn’t say any of these things. Instead, because I was going to seriously pee myself if I didn’t get to a toilet soon, I accepted his proposal and trailed him to the guy’s bathroom. Two boys tried to go inside, but Liam told them to wait. He opened the door. Three guys were standing at the urinals. Great. Not awkward at all.
“Get out,” he said.
My jaw prickled with embarrassment when I realized he was kicking people out. The three guys turned—just their heads thankfully—and gaped at Liam. When they noticed his serious expression, they zipped up quick, and bypassing the sinks, they filed out.
“You didn’t have to kick everyone out,” I said, going toward a stall.
He leaned against the door to keep it closed and gave me a smug smile. “You’d rather have had an audience?”
No I wouldn’t. I locked myself up in a stall, and squatting over the piss-covered toilet seat, I emptied my throbbing bladder. I tried not to think about Liam standing just outside.
As I flushed, there was banging. Liam must’ve cracked open the door because music blared against the black tiles.
“The bathroom’s out of order,” he bellowed, just as I came out of the stall. He leaned against the metal door then planted one boot on it.
I washed my hands with the pink soap that smelled like antiseptic and artificial cherry.
“I saw you talking with Sarah Matz.”
Of course he’d had an an
gle for helping me out and clearing the bathroom. He wanted information. Instead of beating around the bush and asking if it was illegal to chat with a Pine wolf, I said, “And you want to know what I discussed, I suppose?”
He didn’t respond, just studied me as I approached him, wiping my hands on my dress. The sequins weren’t very absorbent.
“I asked her if I could borrow a dress for her brother’s wedding,” I said.
His eyebrows shifted over his eyes that looked amber in the bathroom’s red florescent lighting. “Why did you ask her for a dress?”
“Who else was I supposed to ask? My aunt is twenty sizes bigger than me, and Evelyn doesn’t own any fancy apparel. I looked online, but unlike tuxes, there’s no shop that rents dresses in Boulder.”
The door pulsed behind him. He opened it and barked, “It’s out of order,” then leaned against it again.
“I’m done, Liam. You can let them—”
“I’m not done.”
I balled my fingers into fists. “That’s all I talked about.”
“Taryn must have a dress.”
“I don’t want Taryn’s dress.”
“I’ll take you shopping tomorrow.”
I jerked back. “No way.”
His gaze ground into mine, and my pulse skittered. I tried to breathe to calm myself. After the fourth not-even-remotely-close-to-soothing breath, I mumbled, “Stay locked in here with me any longer, and it’ll start rumors.”
“I don’t give a shit about rumors.”
“But Tamara will give a shit.”
“Please stop using Tamara as an excuse to push me away.”
“I’m not using her as an excuse. She was groping you earlier! I saw her.”
His pupils expanded and bled darkness into his irises. “You were watching me?”
Heat pulsed against my jaw. “I was looking around and happened to see her and you.”
“You’re the first girl who’s turned me down.”
So this was what his strange behavior was about? No longer feeling threatened, I unclenched my fingers. “I’d say get used to it, but I doubt you’ll ever need to get used to it.”
He didn’t smile, didn’t even react to my indirect compliment.
“Seriously, can you let me out now? This place reeks.” When he didn’t, I reached around him for the doorknob.
He swiped my arm and spun me around so fast he had me pinned to the door with his forearms bracketing my head.
I’d been wrong to relax. Liam was unpredictable.
“Ness”—the way he spoke my name, all rough and low, had my stomach swishing—“I’m not like my father.”
I’d expected him to say many things but not that. “Then don’t hold me against my will.”
His breaths shuddered against my forehead. Slowly, almost painfully, he pushed himself off the door…off me.
And he let me go.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
At four the following afternoon, I entered a modern-looking building not too far away from the The Den. I checked my phone for Sarah’s floor number and pressed on the button that had a big six on it.
As the elevator rose, so did my nerves. What if her generosity was a ploy? What if she’d called up a bunch of other Pine shifters and they were going to ambush me?
I massaged my temples as the elevator doors swept open on the sixth floor. Where was all this anxiety coming from?
I hadn’t slept much last night, getting to bed way too late and getting woken up by Lucy way too early. It was as though she wanted to make me pay for going out. Or maybe she was making me pay for the missing bike—the one I’d left at Aidan’s house the night he shot Liam. I told her someone had stolen it while I’d gone into the DMV to get the sign-up forms. It beat explaining what had really happened to it.
I’d contemplated retrieving it, but I didn’t want to risk Aidan putting a bullet in my skull…if he was even home. Considering his injuries, he could be bandaged up like a mummy in a hospital bed.
When I arrived in front of Sarah’s door, I pressed on the buzzer. A long minute later, there was grumbling followed by footsteps. Sarah opened the door, a pink silk sleep mask that read Go Away wedged up on her forehead. Smudged crescents of makeup framed her squinty eyes.
“Shit. Is it noon already?”
I smiled. “It’s 4:00 p.m.”
“Shit,” she said again.
The outfit she’d worn last night was draped over the back of a lavender velvet couch. Her buffed, white stone floors were strewn with various other articles of clothing. She nodded for me to come in.
“For a girl who wanted a hundred bucks for headphones, you live in a mighty fancy place.” I studied the crystal chandelier that dangled over a leather coffee table. Each crystal was shaped like a raindrop and hung at different heights. “Are your parents in?”
“No. Why would they be?”
“Don’t you live with them?”
“God, no. The second I turned eighteen I was out the door.”
“So this is all yours?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Do you have a roommate?”
She scrunched up her nose. “I don’t do roommates.”
“I wish I could live alone too.”
“You live at the inn, right?”
“Yeah,” I said with a sigh.
“Sucks.”
“Tell me about it.”
Over her black sleep shorts and black tank, she wore a turquoise silk bathrobe with a heron print.
“Want a glass of water? Or coffee? Or—”
I smiled at her attempt at playing hostess. “Just a dress.”
“I need coffee first.” She padded away toward the open kitchen. The stainless-steel appliances shone as bright as the gray ceramic tiles around them. The place was seriously sick, straight out of a lifestyle magazine. As she filled a percolator with ground coffee, I put my bag down on one of the many stools propped under the marble kitchen island. She flicked the switch, then gestured me toward a doorway that was twice the size of a normal doorway.
Like the rest of her apartment, her bedroom was monstrously oversized and covered in clothes.
“You can’t afford a housekeeper?” I asked before realizing how critical that sounded.
Then again, she was a slob, and she didn’t strike me as ignorant of the fact.
“I don’t like people touching my stuff.”
“Yet you’re okay with letting me borrow a dress?”
She cocked an eyebrow as though just grasping how egregious that was. Then again, everything about this girl was a contradiction. She drove a Mini yet lived in a marble palace; she DJed in a club yet obviously didn’t need the money.
“Dry clean it before giving it back.” She flashed me a smile that pried her sleep-filled eyes wider. She slid a mirrored door open with great flourish. “I’m wearing the yellow one. Take your pick from the others.”
I stared at the row of hangers dripping with silks and satins and tulle and sequins. “Are you a gown hoarder, or do you really attend that many fancy parties?”
“That many fancy parties. But I do like clothes. A lot.”
My gaze swept over the rest of her closet, over the teetering piles of sweaters and t-shirts, over the lineup of jeans in every wash imaginable, over the column of shoes that ranged the gamut of sneakers to crystallized heels to every style of boots on the market.
“You’re drooling.”
I snapped my mouth shut. I was drooling—metaphorically speaking. I didn’t have saliva dribbling down my chin or anything.
“Another reason I would never get a roommate… She’d steal all my clothes.”
“Only if she was your size.”
“She’d probably get to my size to fit into my clothes.” She dropped down on her bed, then stretched her arms over her head.
I fingered the material of a black dress.
“You shouldn’t wear black to a wedding.”
“Okay.”
“Or w
hite. Try the red one. Red usually looks good on us blondes.” She stuck her sleep mask back on.
I plucked the red one out and marveled at it.
The coffee machine gurgled, and then it beeped, and Sarah rolled back up.
“Stop eye-fucking it, and try it on.” She tossed her silken sleep mask on top of her mussed-up sheets, then got to her feet and walked back out to the kitchen.
While she was pouring coffee, I pulled off my t-shirt and slid the fluid, backless halter number over my head. Once the fabric settled, I unbuttoned my cut-offs and kicked them off. I stepped in front of the mirror. The dress was stunning. Too stunning. What if I ripped it or stained it or—
“Told you it would look awesome.” Sarah was leaning against the gigantic doorframe, clutching a mug of coffee between her fingers. A gold-foiled word was stamped on it—Princess. How appropriate.
“It’s really nice, but maybe…too nice?” My voice sounded slightly high-pitched.
“Would you rather wear something ugly? ’Cause if that’s the case, I don’t have anything for you.”
“No. It’s just”—I smoothed the fabric of the flowy skirt—“it’s expensive, isn’t it?”
“Probably. Mom gave it to me.” She pushed off the doorjamb. “Look, I’m not going to force you to wear something you’re not comfortable with, but know that I most probably won’t wear it again. I try not to wear the same thing twice. So if you’re worried about ruining it, don’t. There are plenty more where that one came from.”
“That’s really generous.”
She shrugged, and her silk robe fell off her shoulder. She hiked the slippery material back up, then returned to the bed, where she sat cross-legged. “I had a question for you.”
I stopped admiring the dress.
“Why are you the only girl in your pack?”
“I always assumed I was a fluke of nature.” I bit the inside of my cheek. “Do you know why I’m the only girl in my pack?” It struck me I used the possessive pronoun, so I switched it out for, “I mean, in the Boulder Pack?”
“Nope. No clue.” She sipped her steaming coffee. “Must be weird… Weirdly cool.”
A Pack of Blood and Lies Page 20