Come Out Swinging (Reach for the Moon Book 2)

by Sam Hall

  We were dismissed, I felt it, Aidan felt it, so it was no surprise when she got to her feet, collecting the cans and moving to empty them in the sink. I grabbed the pile of printouts and shoved them into my jacket pocket.

  “Your problem isn’t working out who killed your dad. Yours is working out who wouldn’t want that?” She slid me a sidelong look as I walked into the kitchen. “So much to be gained by luring you back. Look at my brother, hanging on tenterhooks for the slightest bit of attention. This town, it’s set up to keep the same cycle of dysfunction going on and on and on. Work out who has the most to gain from that, and you’ll have your answer.”

  “Paige…” Aidan called out as I marched along the driveway. “Paige!”

  I looked down to where his hand had wrapped around my forearm, enough to make him realise what he was doing. He yanked it back, brushing his palm on his jeans, as if that was what it took to dislodge the feel of me.

  “I’m sorry. I thought that was gonna be more useful—”

  “Is she right?”

  “What? Which part?”

  “Does everyone in this town have motive to kill Dad? Did everyone…” Tears pricked at my eyes, but I blinked them furiously away. “Did everyone hate him?”

  He let out a long sigh, fingers closing, then going limp again.

  “You get my dad on the piss? You’d hear some stuff you wouldn’t want to hear. He never got over your mother, especially when she went so young. He blamed your dad for that, was sure that if he had been her mate, she wouldn’t have…”

  “Killed herself. That’s what you mean to say, don’t you? Everyone talks about her dying, but that’s what happened, didn’t it?”

  “I was just a kid then too, but yeah, that’s the assumption. But, Paige, the alpha, he was a good man. I love my dad, and he’s pushed me hard to step up, to try and find a way into leadership of this town without being caught up in the enforcer pathway, but doing that has shown me something. Your dad kept the town calm, orderly, prosperous. He intervened when he needed to, not just because he could. My dad, he’s a great businessman, has a cutthroat instinct that’s meant he’s become bloody successful, but…” He shook his head slowly. “The more I studied the power structures in this town, the more I wondered if your mum hadn’t made the right decision. Adam kept a lid on all that’s…simmering in Lupindorf, and someone wanted to turn the heat up. That’s who got rid of him.”

  I paced back and forth, as if that was going to help me process this information, and Aidan just stood there and watched. I listened to the sound of my feet crunching on the gravel path, the night birds calling, my breath rasping, until finally, Aidan said, “Why don’t we go and get a proper drink?”

  “What?”

  I froze where I was, looking up at him sideways.

  “Let’s go to Stevie’s and smash a few tequilas. It won’t help what you’re going through, but it might help for right now.”

  I blinked, suddenly able to feel the bar around me, the close, noisy atmosphere, the slide of tequila shots across the bar. He was right—it wasn’t going to help. I needed… So much rushed to the surface to complete that sentence. The idea was completely seductive, because all my current solutions were lengthy protracted things, and right now, I wanted, needed, simple. I nodded slowly, testing out the idea, and the part of me that was still a teenager, running to Stevie’s bar to hide out from my problems, came to the forefront.

  “I’m taking my own car,” I said.

  “Of course.”

  “This isn’t a date.”

  He snorted, then smiled, that golden smile that lulled all your concerns.

  “I don’t want a date, Paige. I just want to be able to hang out a bit.”

  “I’m texting Mason where I’m going. He might come down. All the guys might come down.”

  His smile faltered for a second, but he resituated it determinedly.

  “If you decide… If I’m… I’ll need to meet them too.”

  “Because you knot for me.” My teeth clamped tight as my eyes dropped down, frustration, the feeling of being a rat in a trap rising and rising. “Fine,” I ground out. “I’ll meet you there.”

  Chapter 12

  “You knew I was coming?”

  When I plonked my butt down on a stool, shots of tequila were racked up and ready to go, Stevie waiting behind the bar.

  “Well, there’s been talk…” she said with a mysterious smile. “So it’s true then?” She looked Aidan over.

  I took one shot and downed it as he sat next to me, his elbow perilously close to mine.

  “What is truth? Like when you come down to it, what does that actually mean?” I growled out.

  “Oh crap, we’ve started with philosophising? Usually, you need at least a few drinks in you before you start with that shit.”

  I glared at Stevie, who held her hands up in response, moving off to serve a customer but leaving the bottle behind. I heard Aidan shift beside me, so close yet not. There was a prickle in the air between us, the memory of him unzipping his pants to show—

  “Tell me something true,” I said, putting my hands across the shots, stopping him from taking one, a small smile forming and fading as he studied my face, wanting to see if I was joking or not. “Doesn’t have to be deep or profound or even about Dad, but—”

  “I remember you from school.”

  I blinked, the words just blurted out, so it took me a bit to take them in.

  “What? You can’t have.”

  “You were too young. Way, way too young. I was in year eleven when you were in year seven, so you were just a kid, but I knew who you were, what you looked like when you came to high school.” He reached out, picking up my hand, taking a shot from beneath my lax fingers, and downing it. “I used to catch you watching me sometimes. I’d be mucking around with my friends or girls, and I’d look across the yard and…” He smiled as he put the glass down. “It wasn’t a sexual thing or anything, but…I liked it, your attention. I found myself doing more and more crazy things, hoping I’d get it.”

  I frowned as I grabbed another shot, drinking it but watching him over the rim of the glass until I put it down empty again.

  “You were like the golden boy of the school.”

  “I was just a dumb kid, along with all the other dumb kids,” he replied, his hands flattening out on the bar. “I got tall, filled out early, and girls noticed.” I knew that was true because I’d noticed. “I had a core group of mates from primary school like everyone else, but if you can draw the girls in, you find a whole lot more.” He shook his head, his eyes sliding to me. “I knew nothing was gonna happen with you, not until you were out of school too, but…” A slow smile formed. “I liked you watching me. A fucked-up part of me felt like…I was performing for you, showing you what it would be like.”

  “If I chose you?”

  “If you chose me.” He held my gaze for several seconds, a full glass between his fingers as we stared. “Of course Declan happened, then Mason. I figured it was all stitched up and I’d missed my chance. And then you left town.”

  “You never came near me. Never said a thing,” I said, my eyes narrowing.

  “You broke up with Declan and needed time to grieve. I wasn’t going to hit on someone else’s girl, and trying to glom onto you when you were getting over a guy just seemed wrong. I figured I’d come by, talk to the alpha, see if it was OK to ask you out.”

  “And did you?”

  This felt like a car crash I couldn’t look away from. It wasn’t horrible, the story he was telling, but just…weird. He told me a story that was just so different to the reality I’d been used to, it was hard to reconcile.

  “Several times.” He tipped his head in my direction, then downed his drink, and I watched him wince at the taste. “You know what Adam said each time?” I shook my head. “‘Not yet.’ Not yet when you broke up with Dec. Not yet when six months had passed. Not yet when your eighteenth was looming closer. When my family had
been invited to the big party. When you were about to make your big choice. Not yet. I figured then he was just letting me down easy, which pissed my dad off. He felt like it was just the same old shit as with your mum and him, that Adam was standing in our way again.”

  He shifted in his seat, swivelling around so his elbow rested on the bar, his body facing mine. “Dad berated and harangued me every damn day until the moment you left. And then you came back.”

  “And then you harangued me.” My eyes narrowed to slits. “You hassled me about getting time with me, about Selma not being a suitable candidate.” My fingers tightened into fists, and he noted that. “You tried to force things, force me.”

  “Everything I’ve been raised to believe about the heir came from my dad. That’s not an excuse, but it’s an explanation. Our parents, they leave a lot out in their recounts of what happened to them. They want us to learn from their mistakes, but at the same time, they don’t fully understand what they went through. Did Dad feel what I felt when you walked into my office asking for me? Did his heart flutter in his chest, did twin feelings of desperate fear and sheer fucking gratitude hit him? Did he find himself shaking like a goddamn leaf when your mum spoke to him about whatever prosaic thing she wanted to talk about, his eyes following her lips, struggling to follow her words? I did better on my own, kissing girls and playing the fool at school. You wanted to watch me, wanted to see what I’d do next. When I followed his, my interpretation of what he taught me, it all went to shit. I could feel you slipping through my fingers, so I just gripped harder…”

  He stared with eyes shining silver for several heartbeats, then turned back to the bar.

  “I get it now, all the fucking trite things they say about love. Dad thought he missed the boat because of something that he’d done, then spent his life trying to school me so I wouldn’t make the same mistake.” He shook his head and snatched up the last shot. “It just made it worse, so much worse.”

  I’m not sure why I did what I did. There was a part of me, instinctual and full of the devil, that rose sometimes, and now it reached over, closed my fingers around his, and tugged the drink towards me. There was a bottle in front of us, so I could have lined up a row of shots and smashed them down without even acknowledging Aidan. Instead, I brought his to my lips, his eyes trained on every movement, as they parted, as we tipped the drink back, as I swallowed the burning contents down, feeling that slow, steady warmth pulse out for the short period of time wolf shifter biology allowed. His fingers wrapped around the empty glass, his thumb brushing against my bottom lip, capturing the last few drops before my tongue flicked out to suck them down too.

  “Fuck, Paige…”

  “Hey, baby.”

  The spell was broken by a deep voice, a set of arms going around me, the smell of the leather, musk, and the night air upon him as he buried his nose in my neck.

  “Mason…” I gasped, my eyes closing as he surrounded me with his body, his scent, him. He was marking me, I realised, claiming me before everyone in the bar, including Aidan, making clear I was his in a ham-fisted, entirely exhilarating way. Had the guys argued about who was to come down and keep an eye on me? Had they realised that Mason would be the best bet because any kind of public display thrilled me to the core, overlaying all that old pain and building something new?

  “How’d it go? Did you get what you need?” he rumbled.

  “Just more questions,” I forced out, fighting the urge to squirm against him. It was too much, the feel of him, the burn of Aidan’s eyes as he watched my mate hold me tight, the thumb I’d licked clean drumming on the counter with the others.

  “Looks like you guys are up for another round,” Stevie said. “Anything for you, Mase?”

  “I’ve got everything I need right here.”

  Which somehow resulted in me playing pool with the two of them.

  “Can’t play doubles,” Mason said as he racked up the balls. “Not enough people.”

  “Oh, I think I can hold my own against you two,” Aidan replied.

  “Yay, male posturing and innuendo,” I muttered to myself.

  “Whaddya reckon, Paige?” Mason asked, coming to settle behind me, making me painfully aware of the way his hips fit against mine. “Me and you against Aidan.”

  “Or, y’know, we could sort out whatever weird psychosexual shit is going down here?” I asked.

  “What?”

  They both looked on as I grabbed a cue, chalked the tip, then leaned down to smash the white ball into the cluster at the top of the table. I stood back, watching where they stopped, several dropping down into the pockets.

  “What’s going on here? You walk in to find me sucking his thumb,” I jerked mine at Aidan, “so you plaster yourself all over me, marking me like a dog does a tree?” I glared at Mason. “Then you want to ‘play pool.’ What’s on the table? Winner gets to bone me in the pub carpark?”

  I was being entirely flippant, but each man let out a low growl.

  “Not the carpark,” Aidan said in a silky voice. “I’ve got an empty property two houses up. Fully furnished, so we’d—”

  “I was joking,” I snapped, holding up a hand to stop that mental image flooding my brain. Oops, too fucking late. “OK, so that’s what you get if you win. What do I get?”

  Mason’s hands went to my waist, his mouth upon the nape of my neck sending shivers down me.

  “Whatever you damn well want.”

  All righty, then.

  I bent over the table, Mason not moving an inch, and when I looked up, Aidan had his eyes trained on where my butt was jammed up against another man’s hips. I took advantage of his distraction, taking several shots before my last one failed, the blue ball hovering perilously close to the pocket before I stood up.

  “Your turn,” I told Aidan, and it took a second for him to register what was happening. I snickered when he went to the cue rack with a dazed expression. “What the fuck?” I asked Mason, who seemed to be doing his best imitation of a shadow right now. I never thought I’d see the day when the feel of his body against mine raised my hackles, but I had to know who exactly this was for. I turned around to face him, and he surged forward, slotting in between my thighs, a cocky smile on his face. “Who’s this for, Mase? Me, you, or Aidan?”

  “You’re feeling a lot better,” he said, punctuating his answers with kisses, which was dirty pool right there. My hand went to his hair, digging into that short crop, wanting, needing the taste of him as soon as his tongue touched mine. “I’ve watched you bleeding out on the floor. I’ve watched you fight to breathe, buried under a mass of cords and cables in the hospital, and I’ve watched Micah and Declan make you fucking come hard. I’m done watching, Paige. I wondered how the hell this was gonna work, but it’s through communication, isn’t it?” I nodded. “Well, I’m communicating an intent. Whatever you’re up for tonight, I need to be there. I need to feel you, taste you, stroke you—”

  “It’s your shot,” Aidan said bluntly, holding out the cue.

  I grabbed Mason’s jacket, holding him still for a moment, which made him smile.

  “I feel like I’ve been waiting my whole life for you to say that to me.”

  His smile widened, then faded when he saw how serious I was, his hand reaching up to stroke the side of my face.

  “Then I need to say it a whole lot more. In the house, when you were out, my skin was crawling. I paced the floor over and over, until Zack shouted at me. Went for a run, tried to work out this itch under my skin, but smashing the bag, running until I was gasping, it didn’t do it. Maybe it’s too soon, maybe you’re not ready for this yet…”

  He pulled away slightly, and I hated the stab of fear that created, but instead, he picked up my hand and grazed his lips across my knuckles.

  “I’ll back off a bit. I don’t want you to feel like a bone being fought over by two dogs.” Those deep brown eyes held mine effortlessly.

  I just stared at him blankly as he pulled back, grabbing
the cue, and leaned over the table. He winked as he was about to take his shot. Mason fucking Klein winked at me before belting the white ball with his cue.

  Chapter 13

  So this was some kind of unique torture.

  Somehow, we were caught in an endless round of games of pool, our focus narrowed right now to the table, the balls, and each other. No one actually touched all that much, only accidentally. Getting too close as we moved around the table, not pulling back far enough as the other person took their shot. It was death by a thousand glancing touches, and I was going out of my mind with it.

  The plentiful drinks, their constant attention. In a moment of clarity, I thought I saw the purpose of it. Mason and Aidan, they were redirecting my focus away from the situation with Nance, letting me lay down my burdens for just one night, because I’d have to pick them up and fight things out tomorrow.

  Which left me to wonder, what did I do with the rest of my night?

  “It’s your shot.”

  The two of them watched me stand there, leaning on my cue, watching them and the table with bleary eyes. Alcohol didn’t affect shifters the same way as humans, not unless you drank a shit ton of it, and I had.

  “Time to finish the game,” Stevie said, appearing on my right with a tray full of empties. “I’m closing up.”

  “Winner decides what happens next,” one of the guys said darkly. Both of them watched me so, so closely as I bent down, the white ball feeling like it wavered and shimmered in my line of sight, so I just breathed in and out as the alcohol in my blood burned off. Its edges, its placement, the angles I’d need to strike to get the last ball in slowly came to me as I shook off this fuzzy caul. As I took a deep breath in, then out, I could feel it—the need, the desire to shank the shot, lose the game, give the choice over to them and chance, to see what it all would lead to.