Caught: A Paranormal Romance (The Swamp Book 3)

by Rebecca Royce

  I exploded around him as he emptied himself inside of me. Anton pulled me off of him, only to roll me over so I was back on the blanket on the dock, both of us breathing hard.

  “I know.” I managed to speak. Because I did. All the things he would say if he could, but that I could hear anyway. I’d always know.

  I was feeling better, looser, and Anton had his arm around me as we walked back over to the house. “Do you think anyone saw us?”

  He shook his head. No, he’d set that up and watched it all day. No one had come around that way. At least I now knew where he had been. Things were starting to add up. I grinned at him. “That dock is going to belong to someone else soon.”

  Anton lifted an eyebrow. Unless he bought the house it belonged to. I leaned against his shoulder. “Don’t we own two houses that are falling apart already? How many do we need?”

  I didn’t want to collect broken houses, not when I had so many broken werewolves heading my way. There were only so many things I could commit to fixing at once.

  He nodded. Yep, he understood.

  My hands burned, and I stared down at them as the feeling surprised me. It looked like someone was here. Rainer strode out the back door. “Gus is back.”

  That was fast. Where had he gone? “Must have been close.”

  “Not so close. Gus drives like a lunatic.”

  I didn’t remember that. I’d been really out of it, but maybe he’d been extra cautious with me.

  “Bring him out.”

  Rainer cupped my cheek. “Her. This one’s a woman.”

  That was a change. “Got it. Bring her out.”

  It looked like I was getting started. The sooner I began, the faster we could get to normalcy, whatever that was going to prove to be.

  Rainer nodded, his gaze moving over my body, like he was checking to make sure I was sound before he actually did it. “Jarret will bring him here. Then how about we eat dinner? I’m cooking tonight.”

  He cooked every night. That was a real benefit of having a chef living in the same house, and the fact that he wasn’t actually cooking professionally at the moment. He had all those skills and instincts, and nowhere to use it but at home for us. “Thanks.”

  “Yep. Jarret will be back soon.” Rainer looked down at his phone. “I’m thinking about putting these people being brought here in the other house. Making it a way station, so to speak. We can’t just keep kicking out Loups like we were doing before. We’re actively getting them. We need somewhere for them to sleep and eat before we throw them out.”

  Like a B&B for those needing my assistance. “That’s a good idea. You know there is a third option outside of the idea that they’ll disappear.”

  He stared at me a moment. “They’ll want to join.”

  “Yes.” Anton let go of me to walk in the house. He turned as he approached the door and winked at me. Our time together hadn’t fled for either of us, and he wanted me to know. I would wink back, but Rainer was having a serious conversation with me and that would be just downright rude. That was okay. Anton knew I was winking on the inside.

  “I’ve asked Preston to do a real strong look at the area and what we can acquire real estate wise and what we can’t. There are humans who might want to be bought out, but we have to be careful. I’d love to have what Miranda has, an entirely werewolf town. We should always have had that. They can defend and protect better.” He ran a hand through his hair. “And we’ll have to start charging a monthly pack association fee like my father used to so we can assist any people who can’t afford to buy, we can rent out to them. So many people won’t have anything. The world was taken from us.”

  People were going to show up soon who had been under the control of Ross. They were going to be lost and confused. They might not know how much time had even passed. My guess was they’d find their way here, too. We were going to be a destination of choice for a while, and some of them might stay permanently. They might be our pack.

  But one thing at a time, really. All we could handle was who showed up now and what they needed. One moment at a time.

  Preston snored next to me when the bed dipped, Jarret coming to join us. I knew it was him without having to open my eyes. My wolf senses were really the best thing. He wrapped his arms around me, joining Preston’s from the other side, and I smiled.

  “Hey.” It was still dark outside. It must still be night. That much I could garner without really having to open my eyes. It didn’t have the feel of daytime yet.

  “Hey back.” He kissed my neck where my hair exposed it and settled in. I loved this part of our life. The ease with which we got to simply be who we were. They came and went from my bed, and I always had someone to hold me. I hadn’t known how much I needed it, people to care, but now that I’d had it, I could never do without it.

  And my mates were really cuddly. They might hate anyone knowing it, so that would just be my secret.

  Preston snored on, deep in dreamland, and since I’d come to associate the sound with him, I really didn’t mind listening to the rhythmic breathing, and I let it lull me into my own deep sleep.

  I walked forward through snow, barefoot as I always was in these vision dreams, but I didn’t feel the cold. Snowflakes bit my cheeks, but it wasn’t uncomfortable, more like someone tickled me.

  I never saw who I was there to visit right away. I always had to walk to them, as though it was a choice I was making. That wasn’t true. This happened whether I wanted it to or not, and it hurt. Sometimes they showed me monstrous things, but it always passed, and when it was over, I knew I had to send someone to them and where they were. That was a real gift in the midst of the painfulness of my role.

  Ross being gone didn’t mean that the problems of being an Omega were lessened. They would be with me forever, always my burden. I could fight against it, or find a way to breathe through it. Or at least, that was what I told myself in these moments when I struggled.

  I wasn’t really here. I was in bed with Preston and Jarret snuggling me. They wouldn’t know this was happening until I jerked awake and disturbed their sleep. Not that they complained.

  That was when I saw the Loup in front of me. He was a fully formed Loup in the deep stages of his madness. Probably, he’d belonged to Ross, and now he would be mine, until I set him free.

  “Help.” His words were the deep guttural mumblings of a wrongly formed wolf. Just another indecency thrust upon him by this strange existence so many of our people had to endure.

  “I can.” I nodded. “But I’m not really here with you, and you are far from me. I’m going to send someone to you to help you. If you can control yourself, I don’t want you to hurt them. They are there for me. If you can’t, they’ll subdue you. You want to try not to have that happen.” I was never sure if they understood me. I said it anyway because that way, I knew that I had. I could at least always try to do the right thing. “Where are you?”

  He blinked. They could usually grasp that much in our conversation. Otherwise, I was going to have to look for clues and ask my family to help me find them like they had with Ross. We were people seekers, and thank the universe for the Internet and a total lack of privacy anywhere. Anyone could be found, it seemed, if we knew how to investigate.

  “I’m outside of Vail.”

  I sucked in a breath. “That’s where I was from. In Colorado.”

  “I know.” The Loup blinked rapidly, and realization dawned on me. I knew who he was, just as he knew me. I’d never have recognized him, and I should have because he was my brother. We’d been waiting for my family to return, and now I knew at least why Caleb hadn’t. He’d been lost to us, connected to Ross for the time we’d all been missing, like this. Tears flooded my eyes.

  “There you are.”

  I jolted up in bed, and the tears I’d cried in my sleep followed me to wakefulness in big, heaving gulps of air.

  Preston tugged me to him, strong arms to take the pain, with Jarret quickly behind me, placing gentle k
isses on my shoulder blades.

  “Bad one?” he asked me between kisses. “They’re not usually quite so awful. Tell me.”

  Preston said sweet things in my ear. How much he loved me, how it was all going to be okay. I had to tell them, because truly, there wasn’t a second to be lost.

  “My brother.”

  They both went still for a second before Preston got up on his knees, letting me go. “Tell me where he is, and I’ll be there tomorrow.”

  “Home. He’s close to home. My old home. Outside of Vail.”

  Preston pushed the covers off the bed on his way getting up, and Jarret followed him. I guessed they were both going. The younger one smiled at me, a small movement of his lips that didn’t show any joy. It was meant to be comforting, and I appreciated the effort.

  “We won’t let anything happen to him.”

  I crab walked to the end of the bed and took their hands. They’d not gone to collect anyone for me before, but it was right to send them now. Both my mother and Isaac were out already. Every wolf I helped was important, but this was my brother. I couldn’t help it, and maybe it was nepotism. I wasn’t going to overthink it. I did want it to be Preston and Jarret who went to get him.

  “Thank you.”

  Rainer strode through the door. “What’s going on?” He rubbed at his eyes. “I…I smelled distress.”

  Anton pushed through, also obviously having just woken up.

  “She saw her brother. He’s a Loup. We’re going.”

  Rainer nodded once before he opened his arms, and I walked into them. It was good to have mates. Anton hugged around both of us. Really, really good.

  “His name is Caleb. And he’s a dreamer. He’s the one who wanted to go do great things. Save the world. Sail the oceans in a small boat he commanded himself. Find a human girl he could actually love, and somehow make our lives during the Accords work. And now there he is, lost in the snow.”

  Rainer sucked in a breath. “He’s not lost, because you found him. That’s what you do, MacKenzie Harper, you find lost souls and you bring them home again. You’ll be his miracle, just like you are for the rest of us.”

  It was somehow easier when we had a bad guy to fight. I thought that ridiculous thing as I swung on the porch again. Not that Ross was a bad guy like out of a comic book or something. Well, maybe he was. I didn’t really know what he’d been, but he had been something for me to fight, to find, even to flee. Now here I was without anything to battle but time, and that was not a war I was going to win.

  I had to wait.

  The humans said patience was a virtue. My wolf and I were in agreement. It fucking sucked, and I didn’t feel anything was particularly virtuous about it.

  I’d fixed a wolf today, but he wasn’t my brother. The man—his name was Jesse—had a family, some of whom were here. The rest weren’t accounted for yet. There were a lot of lost souls. Jesse and one of his daughters were in Rainer’s B&B—he hated that name for it—and now I was once again without something to do.

  Except swing.

  Rainer came out the backdoor. “MacKenzie, come with me, please. I’d like to show you something.”

  I ached, but that wasn’t going to be better or worse for going with him, so I quickly followed him to his car. “Where are we going?”

  He winked at me as Anton had done the day before, and then he grinned. Had he known that had happened? I wouldn’t have been surprised. Rainer did seem to know things that were going on, even if he didn’t comment on them. I loved learning things about them every day.

  “You’ll find out.”

  It was the first time I’d been in the car since we’d gotten back. It was much nicer than being in the RV, and I much preferred it. Rainer rolled down the window, and we let the wind strike at us as he drove us to some unknown destination he had yet to tell me about. I chewed on my lip. It wasn’t possible my brother would get there in the time we were away. It was going to take them a bit to locate him, and they’d call on their way back.

  I was allowed to do this. I had to remember that. Much as I was going to live for others, there had to be moments for me.

  Chapter 11

  We left town and drove several miles more, until he pulled off the road to an empty building that had seen better days. But then again, every building I looked at lately had that same situation. Everything needed someone to take the time to fix it. And I supposed we had nothing but time right now, which was a gift but felt off after running for so long.

  Did it ever feel natural to slow down?

  We were wolves, we liked to run, but we also craved pack, home, family. The dichotomy of our lives never ceased to amaze me.

  “What am I looking at?

  The bones of the building were pretty, like a log cabin.

  “I think I’m going to fix this place up and open a restaurant.”

  I gasped. “Rainer, really?”

  “Good idea or bad idea? I’m not doing it without your approval.”

  Well, that was a heavy thing to take on. “I don’t know if I’m the person to tell you what to do. I have no future plans except, I guess, being the Omega. But this is a great spot. It’s right off the highway. I don’t know the area that well yet, but if we’re going to revitalize it by becoming a wolf area, then I imagine people will come to eat.”

  He was talented, made delicious food. Plus, he loved it. And it wouldn’t hurt he was Alpha. It probably was a good thing for business.

  Rainer leaned against one of the poles outside. “You have a good eye. Can you see a restaurant here?”

  I stepped inside the building and looked around. There was a kitchen, albeit not much of one at the moment, in the back. This place had been a restaurant before. I spun around. Yes, I could see people seated, I could see this functioning. Laughter. Good food. The occasional glare at a human who found their way here, since it was a wolf place, even if they didn’t know it. Rainer’s stories at the end of the night. A real look of satisfaction on his face when he came home from doing it.

  “Yes, it could work. It should. This is your place.”

  He stepped toward me, taking a strand of my hair in his fingers. “Ours.”

  My cheeks warmed. “That will take some getting used to.”

  Rainer drew me to him. He was warm, solid, and strong. “I know.” He kissed my neck. “It’s hard. Like it’s going to irk me to ask Preston for the loan. He’ll probably try to just give it to me. We’ll have a thing. But at the end of the day, I’ll take it and be grateful. He won’t understand what the big deal is, because what is his is mine. And eventually, we’ll all settle into the idea that it works that way.”

  I leaned against him. “Look at you being all wise. Is it an Alpha thing?”

  “You know how you changed when you really started to feel like the Omega you already were? It’s happening to me. I saw one of the wolves who stayed today. He was downtown opening a bank account, and I thought…I should really tell him about the hardware store two towns from here. Like I am suddenly consumed with the happiness of the people who are staying.”

  That made sense. They were his now. Like they were mine. “They need to Alpha swear to you.”

  “We’ll get to it.” His voice lowered. “I’m going to pick you up.” That was the only warning I got before he did just that. “This place is dirty. I’m not touching you here. But I always want you, so I’m going to put you in the car and take you someplace else.”

  I smiled at him. “You’ve gotten my approval, and now you want my approval in…other things.”

  His smile could only be called wolfish, which was somehow appropriate, considering all things. When he’d shut me in the car, I leaned over and unlocked the door for him. These were old vehicles. We still had to be considerate of each other. When he’d gotten inside, I climbed right on top of him. “Push the seat back as far as you can.”

  Rainer’s eyes widened. “Here?”

  “Why not?” I felt almost wicked propositioning him t
o have sex with me in the middle of the day in a car on the side of a road where anyone could see. But I wanted him. Now.

  His eyes turned wolf before they returned quickly back to his human form. “Why not? Good answer.”

  He kissed me, running his tongue over my lips. I shivered, wanting more but not wanting to rush it either. “I wish you could see all the ways that you’ve changed.” He kissed me gently all over my face. Then he moved down to my neck. We didn’t have a huge amount of space to move like this. That was fine. We weren’t going to need it. “You were lost when you came to us, and now you are filled up to the brim with light and purpose. You brighten everyone’s existence, and we’re all better to have known you, let alone to get to love you.”

  “Oh, Rainer…” Tears flooded my eyes, cutting me off. He changed his kisses, harder and more demanding, not seeming to be bothered by the fact that he’d made me cry. I quickly ceased, my attention moving from his sweet words to the way that he was kissing me.

  I pulled his shirt over his head and threw it onto the passenger seat. We weren’t going to be able to get totally naked in this car, but I wanted to touch his skin with my skin. I loved how Rainer looked shirtless. Maybe that was some kind of cliché, being really attracted to the sharp draw of his abdomen, the way he seemed like he’d been built out of stone. I loved to touch him.

  Despite the awkwardness of the fact that I could end up accidentally beeping the horn of the car or hitting some gear, I took the time to touch him, just to watch the way that his muscles jumped under my caress. He flared his nostrils. The scent in the car was heady. Even in my human form, I could scent the smell of arousal filling the small space. It was sweet, and not something I could say was relatable to any other smell out there. It was just Rainer and me.