by J. L. Wilder
Amy was onto him. He and her mother had been talking in whispers for the past week about how they were going to get her out of the house, and she had absolutely no interest in getting out of the house. The outside world was overwhelming. Just the prospect of getting up and making herself presentable was overwhelming.
“Thanks, Dad,” she said again, knowing that he was trying his best. “But there’s a Cake Toppers marathon on today, and I really want to watch it.”
“We can record Cake Toppers,” her father pointed out. “We’ve got a DVR.”
“I know. I just thought I’d watch it live.”
He sighed. “Ames, you’ve got to get out of the house. You can’t hide out here forever. I know Chris did you dirty—”
“It wasn’t his fault,” she said. “He wanted to have a child.” And I couldn’t give him that.
“Well, be that as it may,” her father said, a bit gruffly, “where I come from, when you marry a woman you stick by her, even if that means a change in your own plans. In sickness and in health, and all that. Right?”
Amy didn’t answer aloud, but her mind was screaming in agreement. This was the very thing she had been thinking since Chris had told her he wanted a divorce. It wasn’t her fault her body wasn’t cooperating with their wish to have a child. She hadn’t done anything wrong! And it wasn’t fair that Chris could walk away from the situation and try with someone else, but Amy never could.
I can adopt, she reminded herself. It wasn’t as if she would never be able to have a family, if she decided that was still something she wanted to pursue. But she would have been able to adopt a child with Chris if he had stuck around. He must have known that.
It hadn’t been good enough for him.
She hadn’t been good enough for him. There was no other way of looking at it that Amy could see.
“What about this afternoon?” her father asked. “I’m thinking of making a trip to the hardware store. Maybe you can come along with me? That wouldn’t be too much, right?”
Amy hesitated. “Would it be a long trip?” she asked. Her father could get lost in the hardware store sometimes, choosing between different lengths of nails, trying to decide whether a given project required two-by-fours or four-by-fours. The last thing she wanted was to spend hours lingering in the wood aisle, leaning on a lumber cart while her father talked to a store employee and asked for things to be sawed down.
“Just a short trip,” her father said. “I’m just getting paint for the living room.” He smirked. “Your mother’s going to work again.”
Amy’s mother dealt with her anxieties by redecorating. When Amy had first come home and announced her separation from her husband, her mother had retiled the kitchen. Now she was apparently repainting the living room. Amy’s father might be willing to position that fact as comedic, but Amy herself knew that there was nothing funny about it. Her mother wouldn’t be painting if she weren’t upset about something.
And it’s probably me, she thought, feeling exhausted and terrible. These days, it’s always me.
It was so difficult. She knew that her parents had always been proud of her up until now. She had always made good grades in school. She had married a boy from a good family. She had given them plenty to brag about over the course of her twenty-four years.
And she knew that they loved her. No matter what she might be going through now, she knew she could count on them to always have her back and to be on her side. She was very lucky in that regard.
“I suppose I could come along for that,” she told her father, because she didn’t want him to worry. Because she wanted to be nice. She wanted to be easy to get along with. And most of all, she wanted to alleviate the stress her mother was under. If her parents saw her making progress and getting out of the house, Amy knew, they would be sure she was getting better.
Even though, in reality, she didn’t think she was getting better at all.
To be honest, it was hard to imagine ever feeling better again.
Her father patted her shoulder gently. “That’s my girl,” he said. “I knew you could do it. Why don’t you enjoy that coffee and relax for the rest of the morning? Do you have a good book to read, or do you want to borrow something from my library?”
“I have one.” She pointed to her nightstand. The book there was a sci-fi classic, one she had read before, but that was for the best. Amy didn’t want to find herself accidentally reading a love story. She didn’t think she could have stood it.
Her father picked up the book and flipped it over to read the text on the back cover. “Is this one any good?” he asked. “Should I give it a try?”
She almost felt like crying at how nice he was being. He didn’t want to read this book, and she knew he didn’t. He was not a fan of fiction. He preferred histories and biographies, thick tomes that he could sit down with for hours in his leather armchair. She wasn’t blind to how very much he was reaching out to her right now.
“I’d skip it,” she said, keeping the conversation light and breezy instead of collapsing into tears. “It’s really not that great. I’ll tell you how it ends, if you want.”
He smiled at her, and she felt as if she were sixteen years old again. “Okay,” he said. “I’m going to be heading to the hardware store at about three o’clock.”
“I’ll be ready to go,” she promised, knowing that she couldn’t back out of it now without making a scene. She was committed.
“You’re a good girl,” he said, patting her on the shoulder again.
When he was gone, Amy flopped back down on her mattress, pondering his words. You’re a good girl.
She knew she was.
But what if that was all she was?
Chapter Three
VINCE
The next day was as worthless as every day prior had been. Vince, Ace, Dax, and Tommy explored the town of Centennial so thoroughly that Vince was sure they had learned every scent in the place. There was no way they could have overlooked an omega, or even a shifter of a different rank. There was nothing here for them. It was as simple as that.
“Bar tonight,” Ace declared once they had returned to their motel room. “We need to blow off some steam.”
Vince couldn’t argue with that. If he couldn’t go out running—and it was clear that he couldn’t—hitting a bar was probably the next best option. They’d have a few drinks and do a bit of people watching, and maybe there would even be an opportunity to hook up with a girl. Of course, it would be a human girl—today’s search had made it clear that there were no shifters in Centennial—and humans were never quite as appealing. But that was okay. They were better than nothing.
“I need to take a shower first,” Tommy declared, and he disappeared into the bathroom. Vince didn’t blame him a bit. They were all sweaty and dusty from the day’s search. But Vince himself felt no need to take a shower. There was something pleasant about going to a bar in your worst state, he thought. It was like a declaration that you didn’t need to dress up, that there was nobody there you needed to impress. It was a power move.
Dax shucked off his jacket with the Hell’s Wolves colors stitched on the back and flopped down on one of the room’s two beds. He had claimed a bed for himself when they had moved into this motel, citing the fact that he was the oldest. Of course, as the alpha, Ace had laid claim to the second bed, meaning that Vince and Tommy were sleeping on the floor. Tommy suspected that fact mattered more to Dax than it did to him.
“What bar are we going to?” Dax asked now. “I didn’t see one in town.”
“That’s because you don’t pay attention,” Ace said. “Honestly, I’m sure we’ll never find an omega if we’re relying on you to suss her out.”
“We’ll never find one anyway,” Dax said, “because there isn’t one here.”
Vince closed his eyes, wishing to God that Dax would stop antagonizing Ace.
But Ace impressed Vince by keeping calm, for once. “Maybe there is,” he said. “Maybe there isn’t. A
ll we can say for sure is that we haven’t found her yet.”
“I don’t know where else you think we’re going to look,” Dax said.
Ace didn’t rise to the bait. He made his way over to the duffel bag he carried with him on the road and pulled out a fresh pair of socks. This, apparently, was the only concession he was interested in making toward cleanliness before they went out. He stripped off the dirty socks he’d worn that day and replaced them with the clean ones.
Tommy emerged from the shower and donned a whole new outfit. Vince had to laugh. “You don’t even look like you belong with us,” he said.
“And why would anybody want to look like they belonged with you jokers?”
Vince cuffed him on the ear and pulled on the boots he’d kicked off when they’d come in the door. “Let’s hit the bricks. I need a drink, and I need it sooner rather than later.”
“Everyone got money?” Ace asked.
Vince himself had plenty. Griff had given them all a travel stipend from the pack’s savings when they’d set out on their little odyssey, and Vince still had most of his left. He knew they others must too. Except for gas for their bikes and cheap motel rooms, they’d hardly paid for anything. Even their meals had been cheap and of the bare bones variety.
They made their way outside to the row of bikes parked in front of the motel and mounted up. There was no discussion of the order they would ride in—it was always the same. Ace led the way with Dax following on his shoulder. Tommy came third, because he was the youngest and lowest in rank and needed to be in the middle of the pack. Vince, as always, brought up the rear.
The bar Ace had chosen wasn’t exactly a dive—it was sort of artfully dilapidated, clearly taking pleasure in its own run-down appearance. The floor was made of warped boards and the decor consisted of magazine centerfolds torn out and framed. You could see the frayed edges where the pages had been ripped from their magazines, but they had also been mounted behind glass. The counter was stained and ringed, but it had also been sealed under a coating of protective wax, making it clear the whole thing was deliberate.
Dax made his way over to the pool table in the corner. “Who wants a game?”
“I’ll get the drinks,” Vince said, knowing that if he ponied up for the first round one of his packmates would get the next one. They would break even by the end of the night. They just needed to make sure they didn’t get carried away and spend too much money here. They hadn’t been out to a bar in a while, though, and Vince was feeling okay about indulging. God knew they’d earned a break.
As the rest of the pack made their way over to the pool table, Vince stepped up to the bar. The bartender was a woman who was probably in her late thirties, but she looked at least forty-five. Vince guessed cigarettes were starting to catch up with her. It was kind of a shame. When she smiled at him, though, there was kindness in her eyes. “What can I get you, honey?”
“What’s on tap?” he asked.
“Rudy’s Booty.”
“I beg your pardon?”
She grinned. “Not from around here? It’s the local microbrew. Stupid name, but it’s not bad. Want to try it?”
“Sure, I’ll take four.”
She nodded and disappeared. Vince turned around, leaned his elbows against the bar top, and surveyed the room.
With the exception of the bartender, there wasn’t a woman in sight. The place was all men. Great, he thought. He supposed it was possible a woman would arrive as the evening went on, but so far things didn’t look promising.
The bartender returned. “You want to open up a tab, honey?”
“Cash.” He pushed a few bills across the bar, more than the drinks cost. She had been kind.
She nodded thanks and swept his money up into her apron pocket. Vince picked up the drinks and headed over to the pool table.
Dax, Tommy, and Ace had been joined by a group of men who looked like the sort who spent every night at this bar. They were bearded and tattooed, with the unlikely combination of biceps and potbellies that usually comes from working out and drinking too much beer.
“Two hundred,” one of them said as Vince walked up.
“Three,” Dax countered.
Tommy grabbed Dax by the shoulder. “Are you crazy? That’s our hotel money.”
Vince recognized the situation right away. It was a hustle. He hated it when his packmates did this, because it wasn’t necessary. Sure, it was good to know that they could hustle a bunch of barflies if they had to, but right now they didn’t need the money. There was no reason to take advantage of these guys.
Still, he couldn’t very well blow up their game now, or things would go south fast. He grabbed a seat nearby and sat back to watch the game.
Dax and the townie agreed on stakes of two-fifty, and the game began. Dax’s first few shots were messy and terrible—enough to let the townies believe they actually had the upper hand—but then he turned on the heat. The game was over quickly, and Dax was tucking the bills into his pocket.
The townie frowned. “You played me.”
Tommy hadn’t even bothered to maintain the worried facade he’d put on before the game once Dax had started winning. The con was insultingly obvious. Now the three townies got to their feet and advanced on Dax.
Ace stepped forward. “No one wants a fight, gentlemen. He won the game, fair and square.”
“No, he lied,” the townie insisted. “Made us think he didn’t know his way around a cue.”
“It’s not his fault you got suckered,” Tommy taunted. Vince closed his eyes briefly.
“Return the money,” said the biggest of the townies. He was standing behind the man who had played the game, and he was clearly the muscle of the group. “Return the cash, and we all walk away from this.”
“No way,” Dax countered. “I won.”
Vince got to his feet. This was heading quickly in the direction of a fight, and if there was going to be violence, he wasn’t going to leave his pack to face it alone.
Besides, he realized, he had been itching for confrontation. Maybe they all had. They’d been on the road too long, away from their home and their pack alpha and their wolf forms. They were all feeling uncomfortable, unnatural. Maybe that was why they had allowed the con to play out in such an obvious way. Maybe they had wanted to be confronted by these bruisers.
The fight began in a blink. One of the townies launched himself over the pool table, hands outstretched as if to wrap around Dax’s throat.
“Hey!” the bartender shrieked to the sound of breaking glass. “No fighting!”
Nobody listened. Ace landed a slug on one man’s ear and sent him sprawling. The third man grabbed Tommy’s wrists and began to grapple with him.
Vince threw himself into the fray, his arms locking around a thick waist, pulling the man from Dax. It felt so good, so primal and natural, to engage in something physical like this. It was pure and unthinking and wonderful. He didn’t even mind when the man got a punch in on him. He barely felt the pain. There would be a bruise later, he thought, but right now there was just the exultant feeling of using his muscles, bringing every ounce of his strength to bear on these idiots.
They’re just weak little humans. They’re nothing.
These were thoughts Vince didn’t have when he wasn’t fighting. Humans weren’t nothing, they were simply what they were, just as he was. But in the heat of the fight, they felt small and inconsequential, as if they were a collection of gnats and he was a giant, swatting them away.
The fight was over quickly. The three townies scrambled to their feet and ran out of the bar, shouting insults over their shoulders at Vince and his pack. Vince got to his feet—he had been sent sprawling by one of the townie’s punches—and dusted off the knees of his pants.
Everyone else in the bar was staring at them.
The bartender cleared her throat. “Listen, guys,” she said. “I don’t want to call the cops.” But I will, her tone said.
“No, it’s all right
,” Vince said quickly. “We’re sorry to have alarmed everyone. We’ll move on. Thanks for the hospitality.”
Nobody said a word to them as they headed for the door. Vince hadn’t even had a chance to finish his Rudy’s Booty, he reflected sadly, and the bartender had been right about it. It was good.
This sort of thing always happened. It followed them around. They just couldn’t seem to escape from their animal natures, no matter how hard they tried. That was why living in the woods alone was so vital to their way of life. At least in the woods they couldn’t draw attention to themselves.
We’ve been stupid about this, Vince thought.
“I’m going for a run,” he told the others. “Tonight.”
Chapter Four
VINCE
He rode back to the motel with the rest of his pack, mostly because he knew it was important to get his bike back there. A part of him was tempted to just leave it at the bar and come back for it later, but that wasn’t a good idea. It could be stolen if he did that, and then he would really be up a creek.
Ace hadn’t spoken to him—or to anyone—since he’d announced he was going to go running. As soon as they reached the motel, Ace stormed into the bathroom and slammed the door behind him. They heard the shower start to run.
“He’ll be in there for a while,” Dax said, sitting down on his bed and yanking off his boots. “Might as well go now, Vince, if you’re going.”
Tommy shook his head. “Don’t,” he said urgently. “Don’t go, Vince. It’s only going to provoke him if you do.”
“Going to provoke him?” Dax laughed. “He’s already provoked, Tom. You saw how he was. He’s liable to stay in that shower for a week.”
Tommy sighed. “I suppose you’re right. But did you really have to go against him?” he asked Vince. “You know it’s just going to make the rest of this trip hell for all of us.”
“He’ll get over it or he won’t,” Vince said. He had hardly been able to think since they’d left the bar. It felt like a live wire was sparking beneath his skin, and now that he was aware of it, he couldn’t believe he’d ignored it for so long. “I’ll tell you what’s crazy, though. What’s crazy is having four shifters in a shitty motel together and never letting nay of us run off any of our energy. I’m not surprised it came to a fight tonight.”