I looked from the bed to Declan and back again. He’d gotten up at the crack of dawn to build this? Why?
“Hey,” I said.
“You can’t sleep on the floor anymore,” he said, still without looking at me.
Why wouldn’t he look at me?
“Salt will keep the slugs out. Just be careful not to break the line by the door.”
I looked down to the freshly poured line of salt. And I knew.
He was here building me a freaking bed because he didn’t want me invading his space again. He didn’t want me coming to him. He’d been nothing but cold to me before, so why would I expect anything to change now?
My face was hot, my whole body was hot with embarrassment. I couldn’t believe I’d had sex with him, that I’d gone to him for comfort. It was a lapse in judgement I’d never let happen again.
I grabbed my clothes bag and turned for the door. “Yeah,” I said. “Thanks. Fan-fucking-tastic.”
Chapter 10
Declan
I didn’t understand Daphne’s reaction to the bed. I had thought she would like it. Sure, it wasn’t much to look at yet, but it was going to be great when I was really finished with it.
The guys from Forbidden Hardware showed up with Daphne’s mattress, which I took upstairs and put on the bed myself. They also brought the granite for the countertops. I double-checked the measurements and they helped me hoist it into place. I didn’t really need the help, but that’s what subcontractors are for, so I figured I’d take advantage.
I barely talked to them. My head was back with Daphne. She’d been so pissed, it didn’t make sense.
Once the counters were in place, the guys left, and the kitchen was empty again.
I missed Daphne, dammit. But I shouldn’t. She was human, and I shouldn’t let it go any further. It was a mistake to get as close as I’d gotten.
But I couldn’t imagine my life without her. That certainty I’d felt after talking to Finn was still lodged in my gut.
Fuck, I didn’t know what to do.
My phone rang, so I pulled it from my pocket. It was Moira.
“Did you find the guy on the road?” I asked.
“Nope,” she said.
“He probably slimed off into the woods,” I muttered. I walked up to the rear window of the kitchen that overlooked the back of the property. Nothing suspicious out there.
“Dec,” Moira said. “I think you need a break.”
“Nope,” I said. There was something out there that didn’t belong, near the basement door. “Hang on.”
“Declan, you can’t ignore me right now,” Moira said.
Proceeding to do exactly that, I stepped outside and over to the outer basement door.
My salt barrier had been disrupted. A large black thing, big as my arm, lay across the salt, twitching. It wasn’t shiny like a slug, but it looked like it used to be. Grains of salt were stuck to the flesh. As I stared at it, it lashed one way, and then the other. Then it went mostly still, with the occasional twitch.
I nudged it with the toe of my boot, trying not to gag. The underside was withered where it had been lying against the salt, shriveled like a rancid raisin.
“Fucking disgusting,” I said. I should have put on the shoe covers.
“What is?” Moira asked.
“I think I just found a piece of the Slug King. Looks like its tail.”
Moira laughed. “Seriously, Dec, you need a break. How about you take a week and stay at James’s, and Brody or Finn can live in the trailer?”
“Not gonna happen,” I said, backing away from the twitching piece of giant slug.
“I’m the boss,” Moira said. “It’s up to me.”
I didn’t like playing the alpha card, but she’d given me no choice. “I’m the alpha. I get to say where I sleep, and I’m sleeping here.”
When I looked up, Daphne’s face was in the kitchen window, watching me through the screen.
“Gotta go,” I said to Moira, who was too busy sputtering in indignation to listen to me, anyway.
Ending the call, I stuffed my phone in my pocket and looked up at Daphne. Had she heard the alpha comment? It would sound mighty weird to a human. Usually the shifters in Forbidden were more careful about calling me alpha out loud, since about fifty percent of our population was human without any supernatural inclinations whatsoever. And here I’d gone and maybe broken my own rule.
If she had, she didn’t say anything about it. Instead, she pointed past me. “Uh, Declan? What is that?”
“A big-ass slug,” I said. I couldn’t tell her what I really thought—that it was a piece of the monster I’d seen sliming its way along the road. She was human; she didn’t know about magic. “Nothing we need to worry about. I’ll get some salt at the hardware store.”
And more salt. Lots of salt.
Did this slug problem have something to do with the basement? There was no denying several trails had been slimed around this outside door. I had to show Moira and my brothers, sometime when Daphne wasn’t around to overhear. Maybe we’d make our way down there to check it out.
Yeah, I wasn’t in a rush for that.
Before Daphne could get a closer look at the piece of slug, I swung back my foot and kicked the ugly thing into the trees.
A grayish slime covered the front of my shoe. Looked like I’d be buying salt and new boots.
Daphne was standing in the kitchen when I came back in, hands on her hips, a smear of dirt on her cheek.
“I feel like you’re not telling me everything,” she said.
I wasn’t sure what to say. I didn’t want to lie to her or downplay this. “Trust me, there’s stuff you don’t want to know.”
“Don’t coddle me,” she said. “I get that enough from my parents. That’s the worst thing you could possibly do.”
I held my hands up. “Okay. Sorry. I’m not trying to coddle you. But I do think you should sleep with me in the trailer again tonight.”
“What?” Her eyes went wide and her mouth dropped open in indignation. She made a huff of impatience. “You don’t get to...to...you don’t get to tell me what to do.”
“It would be safer,” I said, taking a step toward her.
It was quiet in the house, empty except for Daphne and me. Everyone else must have taken off for a lunch break.
“Oh,” she said, sarcasm lacing her tone. “You think you’re going to protect me?”
“That’s exactly what’s going to happen.”
“Great.” She snorted. “Looks like I left one daddy, only to find another.”
“You’re reading me wrong,” I said.
This conversation was quickly getting out of control. I took another step toward her, then another, until our chests were nearly touching.
“I like to protect the people I care about,” I said. “It’s who I am, how I’m wired.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but my lips were already on hers. She sighed and gripped my shirt, her body giving softly to mine. I didn’t want to stop, I wanted more. Always more with Daphne. The tight control I kept in my life spiraled away when she was near.
She shoved me back with a gasp, her blue eyes bright with lust and anger.
I’d fucked up again. She was human, and I wasn’t supposed to want her. It would be easier if I didn’t.
“I can do this on my own,” she said, her voice a growl. “I don’t need you in here with your big man attitude, ordering me around. I’ll sleep in my own bed tonight, since you obviously want me out of yours—”
“What on earth are you talking about?” I asked, but she ignored me. “I just said you should stay—"
“And I’m getting some groceries, and I’ll drive myself, and I’ll pay for them myself. With my own money. And nothing you say can convince me otherwise.”
She was breathing hard, chest heaving, a pink tinge to her cheeks. Even when she was mad as a wet cat, she was sexy as fuck. The look she gave me said she hated my guts, but for some reas
on, I wanted her more than ever.
“Fine,” I said. “Fine. Do it your way. But while you’re in town, grab a couple more bags of salt, will you?”
Chapter 11
Daphne
My mind was going a mile a minute, frustration teeming at the surface. I put cans of green beans down on the cabinet shelf harder than was necessary, but the bang of the metal on the wood was satisfying.
I hadn’t seen Declan since I’d returned from the store, but with the sounds coming from the basement door in the corner, I was guessing he was doing something down there. Probably building and destroying beds so he could tell me some more places I was supposed to and then not supposed to sleep. Whatever.
I got his salt, like he’d asked. They didn’t have any big bags like the hardware store had, but I figured canisters of table salt were good enough. If not, he could go to the store himself.
Under my anger, there was an inkling of worry, one that I’d been doing a pretty good job of holding at bay. Now that I was already upset, I couldn’t help but think about all of the money I was pouring into this place. What happened if I ran out before the B&B was ready for guests?
After a few more good slams, all of the food was where it belonged. I knew I was lucky to have my kitchen coming along so well so fast, given what it had looked like when I’d arrived, but it didn’t make dealing with Declan any easier. Without anything left to put away, I’d run out of excuses not to let him know I was back.
There was a knock on the door, and I was grateful for one last excuse.
I headed down the hall toward the front of the house. It was probably one of the O’Malleys, although that would be weird, since they hadn’t been knocking. They’d pretty much moved in like they owned the place.
I opened the door and my stomach dropped.
Standing on my porch was a woman with big blond hair, a fitted designer dress, and sky-high Jimmy Choos. My mother.
She reached out like she was going to hug me, then wrinkled her nose and pulled away. “Daphne, darling, you look absolutely…”
I took a deep breath. I can do hard things. “Hi, Mom.”
“When your father told me how distraught you sounded over the phone, we bought plane tickets straight away.”
We. I looked to the driveway, to where my father was ambling out of the driver’s side of a rental car. The engine was still running.
“Did you tell her?” My father waved toward us.
“Tell me what?” I crossed my arms and regarded my mother.
Her brows knitted together. “This hovel is worse than I ever could have imagined. Tell me you’ve been staying at a respectable establishment in town.”
I frowned and looked back to my father.
“It doesn’t matter anymore.” My mother waved a hand dismissively. “Gather your belongings. We’re taking you home.”
“I am home.”
The sound she made was half laugh, half horror.
“I appreciate everything you’ve done for me,” I said. “And that you want to be here for me now, but I can do this. I don’t need to be rescued.”
“Of course you do.” She shivered and made a face of disgust as she looked around the porch. “Just look at this place.”
“It’s time for you to go, Mom.”
“What’s taking so long?” Dad shouted.
“This stubborn streak of yours, it’s only going to get you into trouble,” she said.
“This is my life. Bye, Mom.” I turned and headed back inside, leaving the door open for her to follow if she wanted. I knew she wouldn’t.
My phone dinged in my pocket. I checked the screen and found a text from my dad. Call when you change your mind.
Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes and I marched straight to the kitchen. I could do hard things. Anger and sadness mingled into the perfect storm of combustion. One more straw and I was going to scream.
I sucked in a deep breath.
“Declan, I’ve got your salt.” I opened the basement door, and someone—something—was there staring at me.
It was big, taller than me big, and green. It had yellow balls for eyes, and it was creepy as hell.
No, I couldn’t be seeing this. Impossible.
Not in my B&B, dammit!
A black hole began to open beneath the yellow eyes. Was that a mouth?
There was no time to fight revulsion. I tried to slam the door in its face, if it had a face.
The door didn’t close. Instead, the creature pressed forward against the wood. I held my weight into the door, but the monster slowly pushed me back into the kitchen. My feet slid against the tile floor as I tried to find purchase.
“Declan!” I didn’t know why I yelled for him. I should have just screamed for help and in horror.
The human-sized blob came closer, and I tried to run. A glob of green goo splatted out from its body, blocking the path ahead of me with a gelatinous web. Slugs swam out from the goo, spreading across the wall. It had me cornered. This nightmare monster had me cornered.
“Daphne, don’t move.”
I glanced up and Declan was there, standing by the kitchen door.
“This is going to sound crazy, but magic exists,” Declan said. “Don’t freak out. I’m going to look very different in a few seconds.”
“Don’t freak out? Are you kidding me? Do you see this thing?”
Through the globby web, I could see Declan taking his clothes off.
“What are you doing?” My voice was more shriek than words.
“Trust me.”
Before I could say anything else, Declan was enveloped in a white glow like an alien in a sci-fi movie. I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but no sound came out.
The slug monster shot another web of slime, this time on my other side. It leaned its body closer, and its eye seemed to lengthen. I stared in horror as it grew away from its face into a long stem.
The eye-stalk swerved toward my face. I swatted the eye away, but the slime stuck to my hand. Then I found my voice, and it was a scream.
The cage of goo tore, and I expected it to be Declan on the other side of the green web, but it wasn’t. It was a fucking wolf. The monster turned toward the wolf, who was ripping through slime tendrils with its teeth. Either the slime smelled a hell of a lot tastier to the wolf than it did to me, or the wolf had rabies. Whichever it was, I was screwed.
As soon as I had an opening, I bolted. Racing for the door, I was about to escape from the kitchen, but then I remembered the salt on the counter. I grabbed one of the canisters, wrenched open the top, and tossed the thing like a grenade at the slime monster.
The salt spiraled through the air, spilling everywhere. It hit its mark and wedged, spout-side down, into the back of the green creature. Through its translucent skin, I could see the salt pouring slowly out into the gelatinous flesh. The creature withered from within, melting down to the floor. Soon, it was nothing but a four-foot-long, shriveled-looking stick.
The wolf, covered in green goo, turned to me.
I should have run. I knew I should have run. But instead, I stood there staring into its eyes. There was something familiar, and not just because I knew this was the same wolf I’d seen outside before. There was something else. Where was Declan?
The wolf was surrounded by a white glow. I squinted at the light. What the hell was happening?
A few seconds later, standing there covered in gross green goo, was Declan. Naked.
“What. The. Fuck.”
“Nobody believed me that the Slug King was real.” His handsome face was split into a wide grin, and I wanted to scream.
“That’s not what I’m talking about, Declan.”
“I know,” he said. “I didn’t tell you because I couldn’t.”
“So there was never an opportunity to say hey, Daphne, I’m a wolf? How about when I spilled my guts to you, telling you all about my damage? Or before you put your dick in me? You seemed to be perfectly fine sharing then.” Mayb
e that wasn’t fair. It had been me who’d done all of the talking. But I did have a right to be mad. I did.
“I’m sorry.”
“What is wrong with this town? Slug Kings, werewolves—what the hell else is out there?”
“Shifters,” Declan said, in a totally normal voice, like all of this was no big deal to him.
“And what is shifters? Some weirdly evasive guy who’s going to climb out of my basement next?”
“There’s no such thing as werewolves. I’m a shifter,” Declan said.
“Okay, cool,” I said, not meaning it even a little.
“Shifters change into animals. My family’s wolves. There are a lot of us in Forbidden, some other animals. I didn’t tell you because I couldn’t. Humans aren’t allowed to know.” His mouth was tight, his eyes searching.
With a straight face, I said, “Sharing is forbidden.”
His lip twitched, a hint of a smile. Just as quickly, it was gone.
“Did you make me a werew—shifter—when we, you know...and you were all bitey?”
“No.” His voice was firm, and if I wasn’t mistaken, there was a touch of hurt in his usually hard green eyes.
“Yeah, okay,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll have more questions later, but for now, what do we do with the Slug King corpse?”
“I’ll get a tarp and deal with it. I’ll put it out by the edge of the woods.”
I watched him turn, and admired his perfect shifter ass. Maybe I shouldn’t have sent my parents away. My life was a fucking mess, and the entire town of Forbidden was a bizzaro version of reality. “Thanks,” I said, then looked away. “You should shower and put on some clothes, too.”
Chapter 12
Declan
Daphne seemed to have accepted the whole magic and wolves and monster thing fairly easily. I was surprised.
Then again, she hadn’t really looked at me since I’d shifted in front of her.
Even though we were both painting the kitchen, we were at opposite sides of the room, not talking.
Claimed in Forbidden: A Wolf Shifter Romance (Alphas & Alchemy: Fierce Mates Book 1) Page 6