by Dannika Dark
“On it,” he said, disappearing.
“Are you cut anywhere else, April? Did they hurt you?”
She shook her head. “I guess I’m just not as badass as you.”
I smiled. “Nobody expects you to be. Reno is all the badass a woman could ask for.”
She laughed and wiped her bloody hand on her jeans. “That’s for sure. He takes good care of me, but sometimes I wish I could be more like you. Maybe he wants a strong woman who can shoot a gun.”
I tightened the shirt on her arm. I admired how devoted April was to her mate. “A woman can be strong in many ways. Sometimes a strong heart is all a good wolf needs, and you are one of the most compassionate souls in our pack. You’ll teach these men good lessons in the years to come, and you’ll be a good example for the children who will grow up in our house.”
“But I’m not their mom. I don’t have any influence.”
I moved a few unbroken bottles out of the way. “You’re not living in the human world anymore. A pack raises a child just as much as the parents do. You’re mortal, and you left the comforts of a safe room in the back of the club to stand by our side. That says everything.”
I gripped the bar to pull myself up and almost lost my balance until she caught me.
“Where’s your cane?” she asked, looking around.
“Hopefully up someone’s backside,” I said with a short laugh.
Reno came around, jingling a set of keys in his hands. Without a word, he lifted April into his arms so she wouldn’t tread over broken glass. He carried her like that all the way to the front door. Then, after watching a few intimate kisses and soft whispers between them, I turned away from the blinding light as they left the building.
Wheeler slid up to the bar and patted his hand on the surface. Like most of the other men, he was shirtless. Probably didn’t have his pants on either, but I couldn’t see over the bar. “Got anything strong back there?”
I turned around and handed him a bottle of whiskey.
“Yeah, that’ll do.”
Jericho sat in the chair next to him and lit up a cigarette from a pack on the bar. It was slightly bent and hanging down. Tendrils of smoke rose from the end and thickened the air with a musty smell.
After a long gulp, Wheeler slid the bottle in front of him. “I see you’re still bringing the badassery, little bro.”
Jericho took a drink and pushed the bottle back toward Wheeler. “Well, when you’ve spent twenty years fighting off groupies, days like these are a walk in the park.”
Wheeler chuckled and took another swig.
I walked around the bar and surveyed the dead Shifters spread about the club. I counted thirteen, which was more than we’d initially thought.
Lexi handed Austin a shirt while he talked on the phone with a local Councilman.
Tables were tipped over, chairs broken, and bloodstains almost hidden by the dark décor. Lexi snorted as she straightened her shirt. “This is going to cost us a fortune. Dammit! Where’s my bra?”
Austin eased up behind her and combed her hair with his fingers. “Ladybug, the last thing you need to worry about right now is your bra.”
She turned around and folded her arms. “I can’t just walk out there wearing a thin T-shirt that’s wet from all the spilled beer.”
“Why not?” he asked, his eyes sexily roaming down her body. “Looks pretty good on you.”
I walked around the bar toward the kitchen. Lynn was sitting at a small metal table with Maizy on her lap, humming a song. Denver, still in wolf form, lifted his nose to pull in my scent.
“I wanted to make sure you two were okay in here,” I said.
“Is it over?” Lynn asked.
“Yes, it’s finally over. I’ll have Austin get Denver to shift. He’s talking to the Council and they’ll probably send cleaners over to take care of the bodies and record their findings. You might have to give a statement. Why don’t you two stay in here for a little while; it’s a mess out there. Maizy, do you want me to bring your blanket and toys? Maybe your mommy will fix you a nice lunch and you can help her.”
She calmed at my suggestion. Sometimes I felt Lynn coddled her too much and maybe that was how humans conditioned their young to feel fear.
“Okay, Miss Ivy. Can I have a coloring book?”
“Sure. You two stay here and I’ll bring everything you need. We’re going home today, Maizy. Maybe if you aren’t tired later, we can take a short walk on the property and collect rocks.”
“Can we do that if it’s okay?” she asked her mom.
Lynn brushed her tangled hair away from her face. “We’ll see how your knee feels, hon. Let’s just wait until we get home.”
I left them alone and went back to our private room, pushing a few chairs out of the way to gather up Maizy’s things.
“What happened in here?” I asked Izzy.
She nibbled on a cookie, and by her calm demeanor, I had a feeling Jericho had popped in before I did to let her know he was okay. “We kept the door locked. It was so quiet that Lynn didn’t think anything was going on. She cracked it open and we heard all the commotion. Before she could close it, one of those Shifters shouldered the door open and knocked her down. Lynn fell backward over one of the chairs.”
I noticed her hands were beginning to shake. “Everything’s fine now,” I said reassuringly. “Maizy’s fine.”
Izzy nodded. “Maizy was within reach and he snatched her and ran out. I slammed the door to keep more from coming in, but Lynn grabbed the shotgun and went after him. Hell’s bells, it killed me to sit in here. But I have this baby and I don’t know, I suddenly don’t want to do stupid things that would put him or her in danger,” she said, curving her hand around her stomach. “The only way to protect my baby is to protect myself. Maybe that’s selfish, but it wasn’t about me.”
“You don’t have to explain. I know.”
I limped to the sofa and sat down beside her. “Do you mind taking Maizy her things for me? She’s in the kitchen with Lynn. Tell Austin to make Denver shift back, if he hasn’t already done so. Denver’s wolf isn’t in a good state of mind and I don’t want him accidentally lunging at a Councilman.”
“Super. That’s just what we need, Denver mauling a member of the Council. I’ll be sure to let Austin know. Be right back.”
When she left the room, I could finally breathe. My child was safe.
My eyes were heavy and my body weak. The light by the door flashed, but I didn’t have the strength to get up. It quietly opened and Lorenzo stepped inside.
“It was unlocked,” he said.
I listened to the sound of his feet treading across the carpet, and the soft whisper of his pants as the fabric brushed together.
Lorenzo knelt in front of me. “Are you in any pain?”
“I just need to rest for a while. Did Fox hurt you?”
He placed his hand on my leg. I’d never taken the time to admire what nice hands he had. Graceful fingers that touched me with tenderness but could also inflict pain upon an enemy.
“Your wolf will be at peace now that your tormentor is dead. His dark spirit will haunt you no more. You can throw out your dreamcatcher and sleep soundly tonight.”
“No, my uncle made that for me long ago, before I was born. It’s been blessed, and maybe someday someone else will need it.”
His face softened and he held my hand in his. “Always thinking of others. I wasn’t always this way—the hard man that you see before you. I once wanted the same things as everyone else, but life turned me a different way. My uncle taught me to fear love, and that dark past in my family has shadowed me for years.”
“Maybe it’s time for you to come out of the shadows.”
He lifted his eyes to mine, and Lorenzo seemed different. “Let me take you home.”
Home never sounded sweeter. He helped me up and out of the room.
Before we reached the bar, someone caught my sleeve. I turned to see Atticus brushing at a few spat
ters of blood on his collar. He hadn’t intervened in the clash between packs because it wasn’t his place to, but he had saved my life.
“Can I still have that dance?”
My eyes drifted down to the tear in his shirt. “There’s no music, and…”
Atticus walked swiftly to a jukebox by the dance floor. After pushing a few buttons and kicking it, the music came on.
I laughed softly and looked up at Lorenzo. “I’m going to dance with that Vampire, and not with your permission. But I’d like to have your approval.”
I didn’t want to explain why I owed Atticus a dance. Maybe I just wanted Lorenzo to trust me.
Atticus lingered on the clean dance floor, the only place in the club that hadn’t been touched by violence. The dark floor gleamed beneath the spray of blue lights, and his bleached-blond hair made him look like a rock star.
And maybe in a different kind of way, he was.
Lorenzo dragged his gaze away from Atticus and rubbed noses with me before letting go of my hand.
And just like that, Lorenzo gave me something I was certain he had never given another woman before.
His trust.
Chapter 21
Home. That word not only defined how I felt with my pack, with the porch steps that led to our front door, and with the lavender scent of my sheets, but it was a feeling I was beginning to associate with Lorenzo Church.
Before we’d left the Blue Door, he’d cleaned every speck of blood from my cane. I felt a twinge of guilt knowing Fox had used it against him, but Lorenzo joked that it probably knocked some sense into him.
We didn’t bother cleaning up the bar before we left because it would have needed more than a mop and a trash can. Wheeler called the owner and suggested he run an estimate on the damages and send Austin the bill. Whether the owner would ban Shifters after this incident was uncertain, but Austin planned to have a talk with him to smooth things over. He didn’t want a backlash from Packmasters who frequented the club.
Cleaners collected the bodies and took statements to report to the higher authority. It was standard procedure to determine if any laws had been broken, which in this case they hadn’t been. Disputes between packs weren’t in their jurisdiction. A Councilman arrived and gave Austin a pat on the back. No one liked hostile rogues living in the community, and Austin gained a little more respect among his elders for handling things on his own.
“Let me look at it,” Reno said, leaning over April’s chair. The only light in the living room emanated from the fireplace on my right.
“You looked at it an hour ago. I promise you nothing’s changed since coming home from the emergency room,” she said with a hidden smile, still reading her book.
Without asking, he reached down and turned her arm so he could examine the stitches. Then he stormed out the door like he had the last time.
“He’s just reminding himself that you’re precious cargo he has to look after,” I said, pulling a beige throw over my legs.
She set her book down and played with a strand of her hair. “I know. It just makes me feel guilty being a liability around here.”
“The only liabilities are the clothes you leave on the bathroom floor that I keep tripping over,” Trevor said from his spot on the rug. He had his legs bent and one crossed over the other. The fire crackled behind him. “Maybe next time you should stay in the room like I suggested.”
I winked at her and gave Trevor a pointed stare. “Had she done that, Fox’s men might have overtaken us. Sometimes the most influential thing on a battlefield isn’t the men wielding their weapons, but the blistering sun, relentless wind, or hammering rain.”
He snorted. “So April is a snowflake? That’s special.”
She tossed a small pillow at his head.
It had been eight hours since we arrived home, and we remained inside until Austin and Wheeler finished scouting the property for rogues. So instead of the walk I’d promised Maizy, I braided her hair while Lexi painted her nails. Lynn kept herself busy cleaning the house—Fox had pulled out some drawers and tracked mud throughout the downstairs rooms. Before dinner, I’d convinced her to take a nap and let me handle feeding the pack. I cooked up a macaroni casserole, buttermilk biscuits, steamed broccoli, and fried ham steaks. It seemed like just the thing to get everyone relaxed and ready for sleep.
Denver walked in with a plate of leftovers and plopped down beside me.
“You’re going to pop if you keep eating,” I said.
“Then I’ll die a happy man,” he mumbled with a mouthful of casserole.
Trevor tucked the small pillow April had thrown at him beneath his head. “You have a stomach like a black hole. I don’t know how you can eat all that and stay fit.”
Denver licked his spoon. “Are you checkin’ me out?”
“I’m not gonna lie. You’re definite eye candy. But I like my men a little more serious.”
April laughed melodically. “He loves the rough men in the romance novels. The mysterious guys with all the swagger.”
Trevor’s cheeks flushed.
“Men like that don’t exist,” Denver said matter-of-factly. “Women write those books because they don’t want to deal with the reality that their hero has dirty laundry, belches, and doesn’t worship the ground they walk on.”
“Reno worships my ground,” April said with a bright smile. “I never imagined I’d end up with a biker who’s a private investigator and carries a gun, but he’s better than any of these book boyfriends I’ve read.”
“So then why do you still read them?” Trevor asked.
She picked at something on her black pants and curled up her legs. “Because I’m in love with romance. I love the idea of it, and I love reading about couples who find it with each other. I like seeing it in this house with Jericho and Izzy.”
“What about Austin and Lexi?” Denver brushed a few biscuit crumbs off his thin green T-shirt. It had a wide V-neck and a couple of pieces tumbled inside, making him pull it up at the bottom to shake them free.
Trevor laughed and sat up, one arm draped over his knee. “That couple is an X-rated movie.”
“I disagree,” I said. “What those two have is fire, and it burns hot. The romance is in the way Austin looks at her when she’s gone off on one of her laughing fits, or the way Lexi looks at him whenever he puts Maizy on his shoulders and takes her outside for a walk. They’re not as expressive with their romantic side in front of the pack because of their strong personalities, but there’s a whole other fire simmering beneath the surface. Those two together are epic.”
“Yeah, and where does Church fit in?” Denver abruptly said.
I straightened the blanket, embarrassed by the question.
How could I respond when I didn’t know the answer myself? We were two lives that crashed into each other. Had I never injured my leg, he wouldn’t have given me a second glance. Who’s to say he wasn’t having regrets about his intent to court me? I’d never asked the mated women in my house how they’d felt in the beginning of their relationships—if they’d immediately known they wanted to be with that man or if it had been an uphill battle. Lexi and Austin had always loved each other from what I understood, and April had needed to get her life in order before settling down with Reno. During their separation, Reno never stopped talking about her. I knew that despite her being human, they were meant for each other. Did they know, or was it only obvious to everyone else?
Was I so blinded by desire that I couldn’t see the obvious—that a man like Lorenzo could never love me back? Lorenzo Church kept many women and mated none of them. What made me think he would choose a lame wolf over another with stronger attributes? A woman who had known a man before her first change and had given birth to a son. It was too much to hope anyone would accept.
“Ivy?” Denver snapped his fingers in front of my face. “Maybe you need to go to bed. Do you want me to carry you upstairs?”
I narrowed my eyes. “No one in this house will carry me an
ywhere.”
“Yeah?” He set his plate on the floor. “Can you walk up those stairs by yourself?”
I had my doubts. Going down stairs took effort, but I wasn’t sure I could make it up after the day I’d had.
“The fire is warm. Why should I leave?”
Denver stood up and ripped the blanket off me. “Swallow your pride and let me carry you.”
When he tucked his hands beneath me, I screamed out, “Stop it!”
“What’s going on in here?” William interrupted. “Denver, you need to step back. That’s enough.”
Denver turned to face him. “Don’t pull rank with me, William. You’re not in this pack. You don’t order me around.”
William stepped forward, slicing him with an intolerant glare. “Pack has nothing to do with it. When I hear a woman in distress—”
“Distress?” Denver laughed. “You mean being stubborn. She can’t walk up those stairs and everyone knows it.”
“Indeed, that may be so. But what satisfaction do you gain by humiliating a woman in front of the pack?”
Trevor sat erect, swallowing William up with his brown eyes.
Denver waved his hand. “You guys are a bag of nuts. I’m trying to do the right thing and help a girl out. Hell, I wish someone would carry me to bed.”
“That can be arranged,” William replied with a dark smirk.
“Denver, when I need help, I’ll ask for it,” I said. “I appreciate your intention, but… Please, let’s not make this more than it is.”
He lifted his plate off the floor and stalked out. “I’ve got to get ready for work. I don’t have time for this.” His voice trailed off into the kitchen.
William brushed the crumbs off the sofa and took a seat. “Not sure why he’s making a fuss of things. It’s nice down here. Cozy fire, blankets, won’t have to listen to Austin and his mate screwing upstairs…”
“Holy hell, ain’t that the truth,” Trevor said. “Twice today already.”
“It’s a natural reaction after winning a battle. Especially when the woman fights by his side,” I said, pulling the blanket over my legs and leaning back. “Alpha men are aroused by strong women.”