by T. S. Joyce
He eased them open, and they were blazing such a light silver there was almost no color other than his pupil.
“You look really pretty today,” he said in a voice that sounded a bit like a demon’s.
Butterflies, bats, and birds were a hurricane inside of her.
“I’ve been checking you out, too,” she admitted, dragging her hands down his chest.
“It’s a good surprise seeing you here.”
“I’m eating lunch with my dad.”
Kade straightened his spine and searched her face. “Your dad is here?”
“Yep. He’s inside.”
The growl died in his throat. Kade pulled his baseball hat from her hand, then put it on her head, the bill backward. “You’re so fuckin’ cute. I’m gonna go meet your dad.” Before she could respond, Kade pulled her by the hand toward the door.
“Okay, this is hot.”
“What is?” he asked through a frown as he held the door open for her.
“You wanting to meet my dad. And not being intimidated by it.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to meet him? He’s one of your people.”
Okay. Simple as that then. Dad was important to her so Kade was making him important to him, too. The second he walked inside, Kade strode right over to Dad and offered his hand for a shake.
And as she watched Kade swallow his unsteady growl to greet her dad, shake his hand like a man, look him in the eyes, and show him respect…she had this moment.
Dad was smiling at something Kade said, nodding his head, and Kade looked back at her with an expression that asked, “Why aren’t you here beside me?” Dad looked impressed and shocked all at once, and the two most important men in her life were looking at her with matching smiles. She wanted to cry, in a good way. She’d never dated anyone who wanted to meet her dad, even if she’d begged them. And Kade had wanted this. She hadn’t even had to ask. He just…met her needs.
And right now, in this moment, she realized she loved him, and the love she felt was irreversible. It wasn’t caused by her heat, wasn’t caused by lust, wasn’t just a crush on a boy. Her heart just decided he was it, and she knew down to the marrow in her bones she would never want another like she wanted Kade. Wanted his safety, wanted his happiness, wanted his steadiness, wanted his body, wanted his soul—all the good and bad parts of it. And most of all, she wanted him to feel irreversible love for her, too.
They waved her over, and in a daze she sat by Kade and listened to him talk easily to her dad. He was growling still, but Dad wasn’t making him pay for that instability. He wasn’t calling him out. He just kept talking like the threatening noise wasn’t there.
Kade ordered his own hamburger and snuck Leah money for the whole bill before she or Dad could pay. As they sat there chatting, Kade slid his hand over her thigh, and she wrapped her arms around his bicep happily.
I’ve waited my whole life for him.
Kade stopped what he was saying mid-sentence and jerked his attention to her. “What did you say?”
“Hmm?” She kissed his shoulder and said, “I didn’t say anything.”
His teeth showed in a flash of a smile, and then he leaned in and murmured against her ear, “I’ve been waiting for you, too.”
Chapter Eleven
The sound of the saw drowned out Kade’s snarling. That’s why he had been drawn to tools in the first place. Loud noises made him feel almost normal. He could work alone and pretend his wolf wasn’t a raving lunatic, growling at a saw just because it existed. He didn’t wear earplugs when he worked. He wanted to hear the sound of metal sawing through wood. It was his only therapy. It used to be the only part of his life he had any control over because, when he was in the shop, restoring something or building it from nothing, he felt the most at peace a monster could feel.
Or that’s the way it used to be before Trina. Now she was his therapy. She had been for weeks. She was his motivation, his peace. But working wood helped in the hours between seeing her. And this work was an income. There was now a drive inside him to take care of Trina. Oh, that lion never asked since she was independent as fuck, but if she ever slipped, he wanted to be there to prop her up. And that meant saving. It meant putting money away for help if the bar ever went into a dip, money for presents…money for a ring someday because, hell yeah, he was reaching for the damn stars at this point. He would one-hundred percent go crazy or die before he went shopping for diamonds, but it was still fun to think about, still a goal he wished he could achieve, still a gift he would give his bones to be able to give her someday. Trina deserved everything.
He had three orders for matching chair sets sitting in his email right now but was falling behind thanks to the damn wolf. He took the body for too long. Every time Kade woke up, he’d lost days. He’d lost time. He’d lost life. Too much of his time was spent as a wolf. Which sucked for lots of reasons, but most of all he missed Trina. And he missed his shop.
He loved the way it smelled in here. Like sawdust and oil and metal and smoke, paint and wood stain... And one familiar wolf.
Kade turned on his stool. Behind him, Mick, the Second in the Wulfe Clan, was standing in the doorway, blond hair mussed, a motorcycle helmet dangling from his hand, and a dead-eyed stare directed right at Kade. Kade flipped the switch on the saw mid-cut and sniffed the air. There was something else on the breeze, just below the scent of dominant werewolf. It was sickness. Mick was sick. His wolf was unsteady, and the man’s eyes were changing from brown to green and back again. Kade knew all about crazy wolves.
“You’re pretty fuckin’ brave to stare down a beast with a taste for blood as big as mine. Dumb as a post to come into my territory, too.” He pulled off his gloves and tossed his baseball hat onto an old wooden chair in the corner. Shaking his hair out, he asked, “What the fuck do you want, Mick? Besides a slow death?”
“You’ve been causing us problems. Problems. You’ve been causing me problems.” Mick had a tick. He twitched his head twice hard and growled something indecipherable to himself.
“Maybe I’m not the problem,” Kade said.
“We’re considering peace with every Clan in the territory, but we just can’t seem to get you to shut the fuck up or stop fighting.”
Kade smiled, canted his head, and then softly he howled, “Owoooooo.”
“I’m here to give you a choice. Option one, you come into the Clan. You’ve messed with the entire pecking order every fight. We need it steadied out, and something tells me you won’t quit fighting just because we ask politely.”
“Ha! Are you fuckin’ serious? You want me to join your Clan? I would rather piss on an electric fence. Listen carefully, Mick, because I won’t repeat myself. I’ll die before I ever pledge to a werewolf Clan.”
Mick twitched his head twice again. The hand that held the motorcycle helmet shook. “Well, that brings me to option two.”
Kade huffed a laugh. He was already so fuckin’ ready to fight just seeing this asshole in his shop. Inside, his wolf was snarling to be released, and his arms and legs were already tingling with the first signs of the Change. There would be no stopping it now but…go on Mick. Give the wolf even more reason to kill you for trespassing on his territory. “And what’s option two?” He already knew the answer. He just needed Mick the Prick to say it out loud to get his wolf bloodthirsty.
“Option two, you die. Either way, you won’t be messing with the hierarchy of my Clan anymore.”
“You and what army are gonna kill me, Mick? You couldn’t do the job with your entire Clan at the GutShot. I damn near killed your Alpha, so tell me,” he barked out, “why the fuck are you really here?”
Mick lifted his chin higher and stared down his nose at Kade with an empty smile. “I was ordered to give you options. You picked option two, just like I knew you would.”
Mick’s eyes blazed bright green as he pulled a Glock from the back of his jeans.
Coward. Mick was a fuckin’ coward. He had a wolf inside of him, and he
brought a gun? Weak. Kade was going to kill him.
Time slowed to a crawl as Mick lifted the weapon. His finger was already on the trigger. His feral eyes were dancing as though he couldn’t wait to pull it. As though he couldn’t wait for revenge for all those times Kade had bested him and his Clan.
They should’ve been stronger.
Kade let the wolf have his body and, shhhhhit, it hurt. When the wolf came out enraged, it was like falling into a fire. He was fire. He was fire and death and everything dark. Kade used to hate it, but in this moment, he embraced the darkness. It was time to use the poison inside of him as a weapon.
He hit the sawdust-covered ground on all fours and dug his claws in, bolting straight for that asshole. There was this satisfying look of shock on Mick’s face. He hadn’t expected Kade to charge him. That much was clear from the way his eyes went round.
Better aim good, Mick. One bullet ain’t gonna save you from me.
With a ripping snarl, Kade bunched his muscles and sailed through the air right for Mick.
And Mick…that coward…that weak wolf…
He pulled the trigger.
Chapter Twelve
Biting her thumbnail, Trina frowned at the door to the bar. Her shift had ended an hour ago. Kade had planned to pick her up and take the motorcycles on a trip to Corvallis, maybe eat lunch along the way. She’d been so excited when he’d asked her, but he hadn’t shown up. It wasn’t like him. Sure, she had to get used to days at a time when he was out in the forest running around as a wolf and unable to Change back, but he usually told her before he was going to go off the rails. Or she could tell from the shaky control he had over the wolf. When it got worse, he was usually close to a Change. But when she’d left his bed this morning, he’d been calm and relaxed. His eyes had even been their human color when he’d walked her to her motorcycle and kissed her goodbye.
Trina had been harboring this awful feeling in her gut all morning—like something was wrong. It was that animal instinct that roughed her fur up the wrong way. Like that clammy feeling right before a big storm that told her to take shelter.
But she’d pushed those feelings to the side while she worked because everything was fine. Kade was doing better with Changes, and Dad was doing good, on a flight to pick up supplies for the Two Claws Ranch. Ten and Kurt were happy as little clams when they’d come in for lunch earlier with Kurt’s little boy, and the bar had actually turned a little profit this month. Life was good. She needed to stop waiting for that other shoe to drop and just accept that she was all right. That she was allowed to be happy without any strings attached.
It was probably just the loss she still felt. When the Darby Clan had made their decision and got themselves killed, she’d had to accept that the ache in her chest was a part of her now. That emptiness was something to get used to. But today, it felt bigger, and she didn’t want to go back to feeling scared of letting people in. She didn’t want to go back to being terrified of loss. Trina wanted to keep moving forward.
He was just running late.
Probably just lost track of time while he was working. He was like that. Very driven. That woodshop out behind the Blackwood Clan house was like Kade’s church. That’s where he found sanctuary, so she should just call him again and see if he picked up.
She hit his number and waited as it rang and rang.
Well…okay…maybe he had his phone turned down and the music up. She imagined his phone on his workbench in between piles of tools, the screen lighting up as she called but the vibration of the call lost in the noise of a rock song. And then she imagined Kade in there working away without a shirt on, sweat dripping slowly down his perfect chest and abs. And then her daydream turned to him pouring a bottled water over his head in slow motion with the saturated sunlight behind him and, holy shit, she needed him to give her some relief.
I need dat dick, she texted, smiling at her own wit as she hit send. Just to let him know she meant business, she glanced around quick, checking to make sure no one was paying a lick of attention to her. She drew her arms in and squished her cleavage together in her V-neck shirt and then took a selfie real fast and sent that to him as well. She wasn’t a man-chaser anymore. She, Trina Luna Chapman, was now a bona fide man-catcher.
And when her phone dinged with the answering text, she grinned a feline smile as she lifted it to her face. Boobs always did the trick with that wily wolf.
She was so prepared for some witty, dirty banter from Kade, she didn’t understand the words of the text on her glowing cell phone screen. It wasn’t from Kade. It was from Leah.
Gun.
Kade’s gone.
Blood everywhere.
Dead wolf.
“W-what?” she murmured aloud. Heart beating against her ribs, she connected a call to Leah.
She picked up on the first ring, but Trina could barely hear her between the sobbing.
“Just came home—sob—everything smells like pennies—the grass is wet—blood on the sawdust—Trina!— there’s blood on the sawdust! And a big wolf. He’s been mauled. He’s just staring back at me—sob—there’s something in the woods—sob—I can feel something awful out there—sob—it’s talking to my wolf—sob—I don’t know what to do!”
Trina was already running for the door. “Leah, Leah, stop! Breathe, girl. The dead wolf. Tell me it’s not Kade,” she demanded as her shoes hit the parking lot pavement at a sprint.
“I don’t know.”
“Leah!”
“I don’t know! It’s gray and cream like Kade’s but the blood smells different. It’s totally torn up. It’s hard to tell anything.” A long snarl ripped through the phone. “Trina—Trina—snarl—I think I’m going to be sick.”
“No, you aren’t. You’re about to Change. Where’s Ethan?”
“On a job out in Stevensville. He isn’t picking up or answering my texts. Where are you?” Another growl rattled through the phone and then a groan of pain. “Trina. Trina? Are you close? I don’t feel good.”
“Don’t Change! Leah, listen to me!” Trina threw her leg over the seat of her bike and revved the engine. “I’m headed to you. Don’t you disappear into those woods. We don’t know what’s out there! You can’t Change alone right now.”
There was a grunt of pain, and then the phone clicked and went dead.
“Leah? Leah? Fuck!” she yelled, yanking on her helmet.
Trina blasted out of the parking lot like a rocket. Her bike was deafening against her sensitive eardrums as she zoomed onto the main road. She only had a month of riding under her belt, but fuck it. If Trina crashed, she was a shifter. She would survive…probably.
Please don’t be Kade, please don’t be Kade, please don’t be Kade!
There was an old work truck in front of her, going way too slow. The wind whipped against her face as she hit the throttle and pulled to the center stripe. A semi was coming from the other way, no room to pass. Shit. She eased off and rode the tailgate for a few seconds before she muttered, “Fuck it,” and hit the throttle again. She whipped her sportster onto the rumble strips and then passed the truck on the shoulder. He was cussing out the window when she rode by, but she didn’t care. Leah was out in those woods with something bad, and Kade…Kade… Tears of frustration burned her eyes, but Trina had no time for weakness right now. She was a cat of action.
It was all she could do not to reach for her phone and bring in every allied shifter in the known territory down on Leah’s land and snuff out whatever had hunted Kade… Kade…Kade…oh, God. With every fiber of her being, Trina knew she wouldn’t be okay if the dead wolf was him. That’s what this awful empty feeling was in the pit of her stomach, right?
Was it another broken bond? Oh, God, Oh, God…
She took the turn onto Leah’s dirt road driveway and spewed dust as she steadied out. The fine hairs on her arms stood straight up as she felt the darkness in the woods that Leah had described. A snarl rippled through her body. The cougar wanted out. The animal in
side of her wanted to defend herself. She wanted to survive whatever was happening here.
There was evil in these woods.
Heart in her throat, she slammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop in front of Leah and Ethan’s mansion. It was cloudy today, and the place looked haunted, empty. Trina cut the engine and froze, listening for any movement, any heartbeats. There was one, hammering as hard as hers, racing hers.
Trina dismounted and sniffed the air. Pennies, just like Leah said. Blood. Lots of it.
Under the porch, Leah whined. Big ol’ werewolf hiding under a house? Yeah, whatever was in the woods was bad.
Trina set her helmet on the seat of her Harley and fought back the urge to Change. The monster in the woods was calling to her like a damn siren.
“Come on,” she murmured as she passed the place Leah had dug out under the porch. A massive black werewolf with silver eyes slunk out from under the house and scanned the woods before she loped beside Trina, her ears and tail down, her attention on the woods.
For comfort, Trina rested her hand on the back of the wolf.
Trina would’ve left Leah under that house if it had made her feel safe, but right now she was selfish. She couldn’t look at the dead wolf alone. If it was Kade, she was about to break, so she would put that burden on Leah and ask for forgiveness later.
The scent of blood thickened the air and made it hard to breathe. The wolf had fallen right at the entrance to the woodshop. She could see the mangled body from a distance but couldn’t tell…couldn’t tell…
Trina jogged, then ran. She skidded to a stop right beside the enormous wolf and dropped to her knees as she searched the body. Gray fur, cream tips, just like Kade…but this wasn’t Kade. Gold-green eyes stared back at her. The eyes of Mick, Second of the Wulfe Clan.
“It’s not him,” she chanted in a thick whisper. “It’s not him.”
Tears streaked down her cheeks, and she reached out to Leah for comfort but Leah wasn’t close. She was pacing back and forth, her tail tucked. Back and forth, back and forth, putting herself between Trina and the haunted woods.