by Liv Brywood
“By whom? You?” He laughed. “You’ve been gone too long and people are questioning your position. The only reason you’ve retained your title is because Nosh is too weak to claim it for himself.”
“Tell Nosh I’ll be back before the next moon.”
“I’m not your errand boy. Tell him yourself,” Mazus snapped. When he reached the entrance to the cave, he shifted and disappeared down the trail.
Stryde turned to Brandy. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
She shook her head.
It broke his heart to see such fear reflected in her eyes. He’d failed to protect her once again. What kind of an alpha was he? Certainly not the type capable of leading a pack. This failure reinforced his resolve to stay away from the Dark Moon pack.
As soon as he could escort Brandy to Ryker’s cave, he’d return to his pack and appoint Nosh as the new alpha. In a way, Mazus was right. He didn’t deserve the alpha title anymore.
***
Brandy waited until sunrise before she felt safe enough to shift into her human form. Stryde had done his best to comfort her throughout the remainder of the night, but being attacked by the black wolf had left her jumpy and afraid.
She paced the ledge overlooking the valley. Would her life be like this forever, fending off one wolf after another? She wouldn’t have refused Stryde if he hadn’t been so adamant about abandoning her with Ryker. But she’d shored up her heart.
After Stryde’s heated exchange with the black wolf, she realized that his problems were much bigger than just dealing with her. Based on their conversation, it sounded like his entire pack was on the verge of war. He needed to return to stabilize his community as soon as possible. She didn’t want to be the reason he lost his status as alpha in the pack.
She glanced at the dais where Stryde lay on his back with his hands clasped over his belly. He stared at the ceiling.
She walked over to him and sat on the edge of the bed. “You should take me to Ryker’s den today. Based on the way you’ve described him, I’m sure he can find a woman to help me through the last two nights of heat. You need to go to your pack and let them know that you’re still their alpha.”
Stryde turned his head toward her. “I think you’re right. I should take you to Ryker’s den. I had no idea how much things were unraveling in the pack. It’s time that I set things right.”
She forced a smile. “Thank you for saving me from that wolf last night.”
“I left you vulnerable. I shouldn’t have left you alone, even for a second.”
She reached for his hand. “I know why you left. You were doing the right thing.”
He pulled away. “Pack up anything you want to take with you. We’ll head down the mountain in a few minutes.”
She fought back tears. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I know you don’t think that changing me was a good thing, but I would have died if you hadn’t. I owe you my life.”
“You don’t owe me anything.” He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and stood. “I’ll be waiting for you outside.”
She nodded. As soon as he turned his back, a fat tear rolled down her cheek. She’d probably never see him again after today. A heavy weight rested in the pit of her stomach. The man who’d saved and protected her was leaving her. To his credit, he’d told her he’d leave her from the beginning, but she hadn’t listened. Over the past three days, something had shifted inside her heart and the thought of leaving him ripped apart her soul. But leaving was the right thing to do.
She folded her clothes and shoved the picture of her mother into one of the pockets. She looked around the cave one last time before joining Stryde on the trail.
“I wish things could be different,” she whispered.
He gazed down at her with a dejected look. “We can’t always have what we want.”
She tilted her head up and stood on tiptoes. He leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. He pulled her tightly against him. The heat from his body melted with hers, but his lips remained gentle. The sweetness of the kiss only made the pain in her heart worse.
When he finally broke the kiss, his eyes shimmered with unshed tears. “I’m sorry I can’t be the man that you need me to be.”
She blinked back her own tears. “Maybe if we wait until the problems with the pack are resolved? Maybe sometime in the future we can try again?”
He stepped back. “It’s better to walk away. You have to trust me on that.”
“But—”
“Don’t! This is hard enough as it is.”
She sighed and turned away from him. “Lead the way.”
He descended the mountain at a clipped pace. She had to half-jog to keep up with him. As they reached the beach, a flock of birds took off from the surrounding trees.
Stryde stopped so abruptly that she slammed into his back.
“What’s wrong?” Her gaze darted along the tree line.
“Something’s off.”
“Is that black wolf back?”
“Shit.” Stryde shoved her to the ground as the crack of a gun sounded in the air. A bullet whizzed by and slammed into the beach. Sand sprayed up and rained down on them.
Stryde yelled, “Crawl for cover. Get into the trees.”
She scurried on her belly across the scratchy sand. When they reached the tree line, Stryde stood and pulled her behind a pine tree.
A dark figure emerged from the far side of the beach. Her stomach dropped. The hooded man stalked toward them. He held a wicked-looking gun in one hand.
“It’s him,” she yelped.
“Shh. Stay down and follow me.”
She raced behind him through a tangle of branches and across a meadow. When they reached the other side, Stryde turned. “I don’t see him.”
“There!” She pointed at the man who skirted the inside of the tree line.
“Come on.” Stryde grabbed her hand and sprinted around a towering boulder. After splashing through a small stream, they rushed up the side of a hill. Her legs burned and her lungs tightened as she fought to keep up with him.
They rushed toward a wall of boulders. Stryde skidded to a stop and shoved her toward a huge rock. Was she supposed to climb it?
While she frantically searched for a handhold, she spied a small crevice between the stones. Maybe he meant for her to hide inside it.
She wedged herself into the hole, fighting to fit. Behind her, Stryde shoved hard. She popped through the opening and fell to her knees inside the tiny hiding place.
“Don’t move,” he whispered after cramming himself into the space.
Footsteps pounded on the ground just outside the shelter. They faded for a minute before returning.
A man’s enraged voice cried, “I know you’re out here, Brandy. I don’t know how you lived. I shot you three times. You should be dead. I came back to bury you, to hide the evidence, but you were gone. I won’t stop. I’ll find you, and I’ll kill you.”
Brandy trembled uncontrollably. Stryde cradled her against him and wrapped his strong, protective arms around her.
“Shh,” he said, so softly she almost didn’t hear it.
The man’s footsteps receded as he continued his quest to find her. Brandy cried softly against Stryde’s chest. She’d never be free of her stalker. Not as long as she lived. How had her life spiraled so out of control?
The sun traced an arch across the sky as they stood huddled together. Minutes turned into hours as they waited.
Finally Brandy broke the tension with a whispered plea. “We have to go back to the sheriff’s house and find a way to convince him that Hugo Lorenzo is stalking me. Maybe the sheriff will listen to you.”
Stryde murmured, “You don’t know what he’s really like. He despises werewolves. He won’t listen to us.”
She sighed. “If we can’t do that, then what?”
“We catch Hugo when he least expects it.”
“How?”
“Do you know where he lives?”
<
br /> “Yes, but…”
“We’ll wait for him inside his house, tie him up and make him confess. Then we’ll go to the police.”
She arched a brow. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. There’s no way it will work.”
“Well, then, we need to go to the police in Joshua Village and tell them everything.”
She shook her head. “They’ll never believe me.”
“It’s our only shot.”
She cringed. “What if it doesn’t work?”
“It has to.”
“We can’t walk into the police station naked. We’re going to have to stop by my house to get clothes.”
“We should wait until nightfall.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “Another night.”
“It will be okay. I was able to resist you last night.”
“After you ran off.”
“After I ran off,” he agreed.
“Where did you go?”
A stream of sunlight peeked through the rocks and illuminated his sheepish smile. “I went to the river to cool down.”
The corners of her mouth turned up. “Well, I don’t have a river at my house, so that might be a problem.”
He pushed a tendril of hair out of her face. His hands cupped her face and he gazed into her eyes. In a wistful tone, he asked, “What am I going to do with you?”
Chapter 13
Night cloaked the forest in a blanket of uneasy silence. Stryde trailed Brandy through the moonlit woods. He didn’t have to see her; he could scent her, and the aroma of her arousal was slowly driving him insane.
Tall trees gave way to bushes which dotted the landscape. This side of the mountain sat in the rain shadow. As the descended into the desert, parched earth replaced the lushness of the forest. Joshua trees rose up from the desert like spectral sentries along the edge of town.
Brandy stopped. “My house is on the other side of town. It’s not far, but we should loop around the outside. When we reach my street, we’ll have to move fast so we won’t be seen.”
Stryde studied the taller cacti for movement. He didn’t know if the stalker had trailed them to town, but he had to be careful. He wouldn’t let Brandy be harmed again. She’d captured a piece of his heart and even though he couldn’t give her more, he could at least protect her.
As he followed her through the barren landscape, he carefully skirted crisp tumbleweeds and sidestepped fruitless prickly pear cactus.
He tried to keep his eyes on the ground, but Brandy’s hips swayed so enticingly that he couldn’t resist the occasional peek. Her stunning beauty could distract even the most focused man. Only a fool would let someone like her go.
He admired her bravery. She hadn’t dissolved into a puddle of despair after being shot at. Instead, she’d braced for a fight. She’d warned him that local law enforcement wasn’t likely to believe her but it was their only shot at catching the stalker.
Brandy stopped and pointed. “See the house with the brown tiled roof?”
“Yes.”
“That’s my house.”
“I don’t see anyone on the street.”
She nodded. “We’ll run to the house and down the left side of it. There’s a gate that leads into the backyard. If we can make it without being seen, we’ll be safe for tonight.”
“Let’s go.”
He clasped her small hand in his and raced down the street, cringing at the circular pools of light from the streetlamps. They were steps from the gate when the porch light from the house next door clicked on.
“Who’s there?” an old woman called.
He froze. They were just on the other side of the fence from her. The smallest movement would reveal their presence.
The old woman’s shoes crunched in the gravel as she traversed the length of the fence. She paused outside the door for one last look before disappearing into the house. When the door slammed behind her, he inched toward the wooden fence. He unlatched the lock and slowly opened the door. It screeched on its hinges.
He stopped, waiting for the old woman to rush out of her house. When she didn’t appear, Stryde set his hand on the small of Brandy’s back and nudged her forward.
As soon as they were both inside the backyard, he carefully latched the gate. Brandy hurried to the back porch. She tipped a flowerpot to reveal a key. After using it to open the back door, she slipped into the house. He followed close behind. As soon as he crossed the threshold, she closed and locked the door.
The breath he’d been holding since he’d entered the backyard whooshed out. “Well, that was easy.”
“I thought Mrs. Eldridge was going to catch us. It’s ridiculous that I had to sneak into my own house. But if she’d seen us running around naked, she probably would have had a heart attack.”
He grimaced. “That’s the last thing we need right now.”
Brandy smiled. “Good thing she’s not as nosey as Mrs. Peabody on the other side.”
He glanced around the kitchen. With the lights off, it was hard to make out more than the edges of the furniture. Moonlight illuminated the chairs and table but didn’t provide any detail. He approached the refrigerator, curious to see the photos which were plastered all over the door.
Brandy plucked one from its magnetic holder and handed it to him. “This is my father. It was taken a few days before he went to prison.”
Stryde stared at the middle-aged man. Brandy had inherited his button nose, but not his dull, lifeless eyes. The man looked defeated, as if he’d spent his whole life fighting the demon of alcoholism and had finally given up. “How often do you visit him?”
She looked away. “I haven’t visited him yet.”
“Ever?”
She bit the edge of her lip. “It’s hard to face him. I know the accident wasn’t my fault, but I can’t help but feel partially responsible for it.”
“It wasn’t your fault. He’s got an illness and needs professional help. Maybe he’ll get that in jail. I hate to say it, but this might be the wakeup call he needed.”
Stryde clipped the photo to the fridge. When she didn’t immediately respond, he turned to see tears streaming down her cheeks. He pulled her into his arms and held her close. “What’s going on?”
“I’m just so tired. The last few days have been too intense. I need a break.”
“Where’s your bedroom?”
“Why?” She sniffed.
“You should get some sleep. I doubt your stalker will think to look here, but just in case, I’ll take the first watch.”
She rubbed her cheek against his. “Will you tuck me into bed?”
He groaned. Her silky skin inflamed his desire. It was the worst possible time to want to take her to bed, but he couldn’t stop thinking about her soft moans and even softer thighs.
She held his hand and led him down a hallway and into her bedroom. The streetlight cast a faint glow into the room. A small bed was wedged into one corner, along with a wooden dresser and a plain white lamp. A desk sat across the room. It was littered with books and papers.
She rushed to straighten up the desk. “It’s not usually such a mess. I’m sorry.”
He caught her wrist. “Hey, don’t worry about it. Let’s get you into bed.”
She yawned and padded across the room.
He pulled back a thick pile of blankets. “You must get cold easily.”
“It gets cold in the desert at night, but we can’t afford to turn on the heater.” She burrowed beneath the blankets.
“Sweet dreams,” he said as he covered her. He yawned as the exhaustion of the day caught up with him.
She stared up at him with big green eyes. “I’d be warmer with you next to me.”
He blinked and washed his hand across his face. Her tempting invitation hung in the air like a thick mist. If he climbed into bed with her, it wouldn’t be to sleep. He knew it. Hell, she probably knew it too. It was only the fourth night of her heat and even though the moon’s power waned,
her scent still overpowered his will.
“Are you sure?” he asked. His resolve melted as she pushed back the blankets to reveal her curvaceous body.
“No strings, no expectations,” she whispered.
***
As Stryde slid into the cool sheets, Brandy rolled onto her side to face him. She’d meant what she said. She wanted to spend one night with him, not thinking about consequences, just feeling his reassuring touch. Being with him made her feel so safe, so protected.
As much as he complained about not being able to protect her, he’d saved her life and had stopped the black wolf’s attack. And when her stalker had shot at her, he’d rescued her from certain death.
But she couldn’t pretend she’d invited him into her bed out of gratitude. The time they’d spent together fishing and collecting berries had shown her a gentler, more fun-loving side of him. She wanted to see more of that, to get to know him more. She couldn’t keep pretending he didn’t matter to her and tonight, she intended to show him exactly how much she cared about him. It was her last chance.
After she settled the blankets across his broad shoulders, she traced his virile chest with her hand. Being with him made her feel more desired than she’d ever been before. He denied his feelings for her over and over, but his body didn’t lie.
She trailed her fingers down his chest and across the rippled muscles on his belly. When she reached the rigid, swollen part of him that demanded satisfaction, she closed her hand around it.
His head dropped back against the pillow. His mouth formed an O. He whimpered her name and grabbed her wrist.
She leaned over to kiss his warm lips. As she stroked him, she pressed her thigh against his. He scooped a hand around her waist and pulled her down. Her chest molded to his. Her lips sought the edge of his chin. A subtle scratch of stubble scraped across her cheek. Before she could nibble lower, he rolled her onto her back. He settled between her thighs but didn’t enter her.
He nuzzled the hollow of her throat. Wet kisses followed in the wake of his tantalizing tongue. His hands roamed to cup and caress every inch of her body. He awakened the beast inside her with his feverish touch.
