by Cecilia Lane
His bear immediately settled with the bonus of flashed sendings featuring tiny, dark-haired monsters running around his and Liv’s feet. An entire pack of them.
Alex let go of a held breath and forced his shoulders to relax. “Fine,” he agreed.
He could be better. For Liv.
“Good.” Ethan punched him on the shoulder. “Because it sounds like we have some early arrivals.”
Alex cocked his head and swore. Sure enough, the sound of a car bumping up the road reached his ears. “You owe me for this,” he grumbled.
Ethan flicked him off over his shoulder as he strode toward the barn. “Yeah, your regular paycheck!”
Alex steeled himself as the car pulled to a stop. A family of three exited the vehicle—mother, father, and a boy who couldn’t have been more than six or seven. Alex didn’t know for sure. Judging ages was never his talent.
The kid’s excitement was clearly written all over his face and scent. He stared with wide eyes at the house, the barn, and him and Jesse. He’d even dressed as a miniature cowboy, complete with hat and boots.
The kid tugged on the hem of his mother’s shirt. “Where’s Lula?” he asked in a whisper loud enough for even a human to hear across the yard.
“Patience, Gabe,” his mother answered. “They haven’t even started yet. We got here early.”
Jesse went to tend to them, but Alex reached the group first. He nodded to the other man and Jesse backed off. After a long second and a hard-eyed look.
“Early enough to help out. I’m Alex.” Alex winked at the parents and knelt in front of Gabe. “You must be Gabe. I heard you asked especially to meet Lula.”
The young boy nodded and planted his hands on his hips. “Does she really like long stalks of hay?”
Alex held back an affectionate curse for Tansey. Instead, he reached forward and adjusted the brim of Gabe’s cowboy hat. “She sure does. The longer the better. Why don’t we rustle some up and you can give it to her before we head out?”
The boy practically beamed. With a nod from his parents, Alex led him into the barn.
“Wait here,” he told the kid. He dipped into the feed room and returned with a small handful of hay which he passed over to Gabe. He bounced on his toes as Alex opened the stall door and led Lula out.
“Keep your hand flat and hold it out. There you go, she knows what she’s looking for.” Gabe’s loud squeal pierced his ears, and he hunched his shoulders. A couple of the other horses jerked their heads at the noise, but Lula stayed focused on the snack in the boy’s hand.
“Now, since you’re here early, you have to put in some work with us adults. Got it?”
Gabe nodded, smelling serious even with his eyes as wide as saucers.
Alex went through the routine with the kid. He even found him a stepstool to better reach Lula with the brush. After he went over everywhere Gabe brushed to be sure Lula had the proper treatment needed, he showed the kid how to throw on a blanket, then the saddle. Gabe laughed at Lula sucking in a big breath to keep the straps nice and loose, and again at needing to walk her a few steps to trick her into breathing again.
By the time Lula was properly cinched up, and the stirrups shortened to an approximate length for a child, Jesse had brushed down and prepped nearly all the other horses. Alex expected him to be irritated at the extra work, but he only smelled amused.
Soon enough, the second family arrived. The parents and one very moody teenager joined the party. Then they were off, with Gabe clinging to his side like a burr.
The kid was relentless with his questions. Every shrub they passed or hill they mounted, he wanted to know if there had been any cowboy battles in that exact spot. When they passed by the herd of cattle, he asked how many were on the ranch, if they all made milk, and if Alex would let him ride a bucking bull. The last sparked another question and Gabe desperately needed to know if Lula would buck him off into a pit of rattlesnakes.
Alex glanced over his shoulder. Gabe’s parents watched the scenery with contented expressions, probably thankful they weren’t in firing range for the endless number of questions the boy plucked out of his head.
Telling the boy they raised beef cattle instead of milk stock and reassuring him that no rattlesnake pits were on the ranch was easier than dealing with a group of scientists and Liv’s scent distracting him. Alex darkened as the other invading scent of that trip scalded his memory. His bear rumbled protectively. For Liv and for the innocent, incessant kid at his side.
But that rise in his bear didn’t last long. The beast settled back down with a huff, but he remained on high alert.
Something had shifted in the animal. Instead of the unhinged fury and need to fight, there was a new focus. An end goal. Something to live and die for, even.
Alex could have sworn he was losing his voice by the time the group rode back up to the barn. Daisy greeted them with a long, drawn-out moo that set Gabe into a fit of giggles.
Still feeling steady, Alex jerked his head toward the small paddock once they were all dismounted. “Want to meet her?”
Gabe twisted to his parents. “Can I?”
“If he says it’s safe,” his father said.
“Go on,” Jesse said. “I’ll start settling the horses.”
“Stay here,” he told Gabe at the fence. “She can get a little excited sometimes.”
Alex slipped through the wood slats. Daisy spotted him and immediately ran toward him, ramming her head into his side. She nudged him hard again and admonished him with another loud moo. Gabe cackled and clapped his hands.
He managed to lure the calf back to the fence where she stuck her face through the slats. “This is Daisy,” he introduced. “Daisy, meet Gabe.”
The calf slurped the boy with a long, sloppy lick. “I’m not a lollipop, you silly moocow!” he giggled.
Alex snorted and crossed the fence again.
“Thank you so much for the wonderful time,” Gabe’s mother said. “Gabe has been talking about this trip for weeks.”
“Glad we didn’t disappoint.” Alex touched fingers to the brim of his Stetson.
Jesse appeared at their sides. “I have some sanitizer for those slobbery hands.”
Alex’s bear rumbled as he grabbed one of the horses still needing to be settled and entered the barn. The words didn’t taste like a lie. Hell, he even felt proud of himself. He’d kept his cool and let some kid crawl all over the place and have a good afternoon.
Maybe, just fucking maybe, he had a shot at getting his life together.
Inside, Hunter stared at him with wide-eyed shock. Lorne wasn’t far off from the expression, either. Ethan looked as proud as a damn peacock.
“What?” Alex growled at him.
“Who the fuck are you?” Hunter asked. He slowly circled him, then poked him hard in the chest. “You’re real, whatever you are.”
“Maybe a robot, then?” Jesse suggested when he entered with another horse.
Lorne shook his head. “I still vote on body snatcher.”
“Fuck you all.” Alex raised both his middle fingers.
Ethan chuckled. “There he is.”
The work of closing down the trail ride went quickly with everyone helping. Once done, he ran a hand through his hair. Fuck, he needed a haircut. A real one, not the choppy kind he did in his own mirror. The idea of sitting still while someone chatted at him was still too far off.
Maybe soon. For Liv.
“I’m going to wash up and head out,” he announced.
“Got somewhere to be?” Ethan asked innocently.
“Someone to see, more like,” Hunter answered with an obscene rocking of his hips.
Liv. The thought of seeing her again made his heart pound and his dick hard. Yeah, it wasn’t the sunshine and butterflies and rainbows girls talked about, but that was as close as he’d get to admitting his excitement. Especially around a bunch of other men who were as likely to punch him as to push their sappiness on him.
Alex gr
inned. “Least I’ll be getting more than shitty diapers here soon.”
“Implying you’re already dealing with shitty diapers. I knew you were an ass, but you didn’t need to tell us about your hole problems. Poor Liv.”
“Fuck off,” Alex laughed. He flicked them off again and strode out of the barn and toward his hut.
For the first time oh, six years, he felt light. Like he could do anything. He wasn’t stuck being the asshole of the clan. He had more ahead of him than Ethan putting him down. He could be fixed.
The scent hit him full in the face as soon as he stepped on his porch. Alex whipped around and stared down the road.
His lip lifted in a silent snarl. Motherfucker. His monster had tracked him all the way to his front door.
Alex stalked back toward his home, ready to tear into the asshole and exact his revenge for the messy years spent apart from Liv. He stilled the moment he squared up to his front door.
Right at eye level, a picture of Liv dangled from a small knife driven into the wood.
Alex whirled with a roar. His bear lunged forward and tore through his control, ripping out of him in a painful instant.
The others came running, but he was already too far gone. All the jagged edges Liv smoothed down pierced him at once.
Blood. He wanted blood and death. That rogue bastard, preferably. Anything else with a pulse would do.
Ethan reached him first, twin paws knocking him left and right. Lorne nipped at his back end and he whirled, snapping his jaws inches from the other bear. Jesse baited him back around again.
Four on one, and he was stuck in the middle.
Fuck that. He didn’t care. He bit and clawed and tore and snapped. He needed the taste of blood on his tongue. Needed to feel flesh give way under his blows. The fight was the only thing that satisfied his beast.
And when he started to slow and couldn’t hit back as fast, he still didn’t give up. He couldn’t let them win. Bowing down to them was the same as letting that bastard maul him all over again.
Ethan peeled away, leaving the other three to pace just out of range. His alpha’s shape shimmered as fur melted back into skin. Then the man stood in place of the bear.
“Easy,” Ethan said in a low voice. His chest rose and fell in heavy breaths. “Steady.”
Alex pawed at the ground and huffed. Fire still burned through his veins. Blood steadily dripped from cuts all over his body.
He still wouldn’t give up.
“Shift back.”
Alex snarled. Ethan’s eyes filled with pity, which just made him even angrier.
“Shift,” his alpha ordered with all the power he could muster.
Alex roared as his bear was kicked to the back of his head. The painful, forced change left him on hands and knees in the dirt, sweat streaming down his face. He lifted his head just enough to glare murder at his alpha.
Ethan slashed a look to the others. “Go,” he ordered. “Find how he got all the way up here without anyone noticing and where’s he’s gone.”
In a flash, the bears scattered with their noses to the ground. They kept a wide berth from Alex, but edged close enough to his home to gather what fresh evidence they could before chasing down a ghost.
“I did what you said,” Alex panted. “I stopped fighting for one damn minute and that bastard leaves his mark.”
“I know,” Ethan answered.
The man knelt next to him, but didn’t touch him. He was too raw for anything physical. But the near presence of his alpha offered a tiny bit of calm.
Calm he immediately rejected.
A snarl built up inside him. The noise echoed in all the dark places that had hardened over the years. Solid pain, now calcified. He dug his fingers into the dirt. “I can’t do this. I can’t have her and him exist together.”
“You can and you will. You have to grab hold of the good before the bad eats you alive. That’s the only way to survive.”
“There’s no surviving this.” The words tasted like ashes.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Ethan said quietly. “You made it this far. You might be limping and hurting right now, but you’re a stubborn sonovabitch. You think the others could go through having their lives reduced to rubble and make it out on the other side? You think I could? You’ll survive because you don’t know when to give up.”
Alex laughed mirthlessly. “I’m giving up right now. Just fucking put me down already.”
“You know that bastard’s next stop will be your mate’s. Is that what you want for her?”
He shook his head, hard. His bear rushed to the surface, ready to fight again even after being forced back. Alex locked his elbows to keep from falling face first in the dirt.
He knew what it was like to lose his humanity. Those awful, confusing hours where he wasn’t sure if he was dead or alive or somewhere in between weren’t anything he wanted Liv to experience. The loss of control, the thoughts that weren’t his own. Rubble. Ethan saw his world as rubble, but that was too generous. Rubble still had forms and shapes. His world had been reduced to ash. Nothing was left without Liv.
“Then you’ll keep going. Keep fighting. Don’t give up. You can’t let him win.”
Alex sucked down a shaky breath, then another. He rolled his eyes up and met Ethan’s. “For Liv.”
His alpha nodded. “For Liv. And for a giant fuck you to the asshole who did this to you.”
Chapter 18
Liv listened for the sound of a truck pulling to a stop outside her door. Her stomach fluttered despite her best efforts to keep calm and cool. There was no reason to get all giddy or worse, give in to her worries.
Except she was about to go on her first public-outing-slash-date with Alex in six years.
Part of her was convinced he wouldn’t show. The other part of her didn’t know what to do if he did.
He’d disappointed her the night before when he called to say he wouldn’t be joining her for dinner. In the same breath, he promised to make it up to her the next morning. She’d agreed, but she couldn’t get the rough rasp of his voice out of her head.
Liv pressed a hand to her stomach when the rumbling sound of an engine rolled to a stop and then died. She squeezed her eyes closed as a door creaked open, then slammed closed again. Loud steps clunked over her porch and after a moment, knuckles rapped against her door.
Alex had shown up.
To practically anyone else in the world, the action wasn’t a big deal. It felt huge to Liv. He’d left her before without an explanation, but he was here, now, trying to figure out how they fit together.
Mate.
Nope. She shut the door on that thought. His bear was drawn to her. He’d admitted as much when he said he wanted to bite her. But the rest of it? Mating marks and claiming for all eternity? The man himself? That was all too serious when she still wasn’t sure how much she could trust him.
She stared at the door like a crazy person while Alex waited on the other side. Liv shook herself and flung open the door.
“Hey,” she greeted the drop dead gorgeous cowboy framing her doorway.
He’d traded a button down for a plain charcoal grey t-shirt and his work boots for hiking shoes. The dark wash jeans were still the same and still clung to his muscled legs in ways that made her core clench and her mouth dry.
Alex leaned in for a quick kiss on her cheek. “Sorry about last night. Emergency on the ranch.”
Something in his voice made her shelve her hormones and take a step back. “Is everything okay?”
“It will be,” he answered with fierce determination.
Liv pursed her lips, but didn’t say anything else. His reaction felt out of place for something that seemed so mundane. But what did she know? He obviously had an attachment to the calves he hand reared. Maybe he had a rough night with a new arrival. He’d certainly been sparse on the details.
She tugged at the thread of doubt that wrapped around her throat and tightened.
“So what�
��s this super secret plan you claimed to have?”
Alex beamed a smile in her direction, but there was still a moment of hesitation. His eyes, too, didn’t quite match up to his expression. They were too cold, his eyebrows too drawn, to be naturally happy.
“We’re going to the waterfall. It’s a small hike. I figured we could have breakfast there before everyone else starts to crowd the place.”
“You made me breakfast.”
He scoffed and placed a hand over his heart, clearly wounded in the fakest fashion. “Don’t sound so doubtful. I taught you how to grill, remember.”
Before she could answer, he marched for his truck. He popped open the door and crooked a finger for her to follow. Liv shut her front door. By the time she stepped up next to him, he had a picnic basket on the seat with the lid open for her inspection. Inside was utterly packed with a variety of snacks and finger foods. The crowning glory, however, were the twin bottles of orange juice and champagne.
“Are you trying to get me day drunk, sir?”
“Oh, those? Those are all for me, ma’am. Why do you think I invited you along? You’re my designated driver.”
The joking eased her tension. “If that’s all I am, I guess I’ll just stay here.”
Alex moved swiftly and pressed her against the side of his truck. He cupped her cheeks and dipped his face to hers. Liv’s breath caught in the back of her throat as Alex leaned into her. He slowly sipped at her lips, fingers stroking over her cheeks. He pressed against her in all the right places, heating her from the inside out. Tease of a man didn’t change the pace or trail his hands anywhere else, but his kisses alone set her on fire.
“You’re so much more than that,” he breathed against her lips.
The flutters in her stomach returned with enough force she was surprised her feet stayed on the ground.
“Get in,” he said and stepped away. The gravelly sound of his voice sounded like music to her ears. She wasn’t alone in feeling the power of that kiss.
The ride to his mystery destination was quiet. At first, Liv thought Alex was just lost in whatever had kept him from visiting her. But the numerous looks he directed at his mirrors hinted at some other trouble.