by E A Price
“Coffee?” He inclined his head at the state of art coffee maker the enforcers now had. Before Mal arrived, they made do with a twenty-year-old coffee pot, but Mal was no-nonsense when he came to coffee. One of the smaller details as to why she loved him – she adored coffee.
“Yes, I’d love some; I’ve been dying to try out your new machine.” His lips quirked and she tried to dial back her enthusiasm. “I mean, yeah, sure, whatever.”
He nodded and poured her a cup in a mug that had a picture of reindeer on it and said ‘ho, ho horny.’
“Nice mug,” she quipped.
Mal grimaced. “It’s Burke’s. He loves that thing.”
“I know,” she said, only a tad smugly. “It was a birthday gift from Teena. We shopped for hours until she decided on that thing.”
Teena was Ariel’s best friend, and Burke’s object of affection. Ariel believed that Teena could have given him a half pack of gum and he would have loved it. But Teena was someone who loved silly jokes and kooky slogans. Burke was actually a good fit for her.
Mal gave the mug a critical look before handing it to Ariel. “No wonder then. He’s been mooning over her for weeks.”
Ariel smiled. “The feeling’s very mutual. Though, Teena’s trying to play it cool.” Probably so that her huge older brother, Tank, didn’t try to warn Burke away from her. Tank believed that no male was good enough for any of his sisters and was convinced they needed protecting. Usually, it was the males who needed protecting from his sisters.
She took a sip, briefly closed her eyes and let out a sigh. “Oh, that is good,” she moaned.
Ariel opened her eyes to see Mal watching her with an almost pained expression. He cleared his throat. “Oh yeah, I got it from Magic Brew.”
A local coffee shop known for their invigorating coffee blends. “I love that place.”
“I know.”
Their eyes met, and Ariel felt her insides liquefying. Her reindeer hooted coyly. Her thoughts immediately turned back to their kiss, and she could feel the heat once again rising through her body. Had Mal ever seen her when she wasn’t blushing?
“What can I do to you,” he coughed, “do for you, Ariel?” His eyes focused on the coffee he was drinking.
“Right,” she muttered, remembering the whole reason she came down there in the first place. “In a couple of days, I’m going on a camping trip.”
His snapped to attention, and he almost seemed suspicious. “You are? Since when? Where are you going? Who’s going with you? When was this planned?”
The questions weren’t unexpected. She grew up with an overprotective father and two brothers. She could barely sneeze in high school without running it past one of them first. She dealt with each question in turn.
“I am and since an hour ago. About four hours outside town – it’s a park, so hardly the wild outdoors. I’ll be going with a bunch of shifter kids, and I’ve managed to persuade Teena to leave her straightening iron behind for a couple of days. Technically the trip was planned months ago, but I was only asked to go an hour ago.”
Mal stared at her, and she smiled and explained. “There’s a local shifter youth group that organizes activities for kids – it’s open to all shifters and supposed to promote inter-species harmony. I used to go when I was a kid, and I used to be a chaperone when I was a teenager. Anyway, the couple who currently run the group can’t go on the annual Thanksgiving camping trip this year, so Mrs. Damson asked if I would step in, rather than canceling it. It’s just a few days of hiking and Thanksgiving-related crafts…” She was losing his interest a little at the mention of crafts. “Anyway, I always enjoyed it when I was younger, so I agreed I would do it.”
He grunted. “Why can’t they go?”
“Oh, umm, according to Mrs. Damson, she and Mr. Damson are getting a divorce due to… irreconcilable differences.” Except those weren’t the words Mrs. Damson used – no, her explanation involved the words: cheating rat-bastard, skanky whore and nail his ass to the wall.
“It’s only for two nights.”
He grunted again. “You can’t go without an enforcer.”
“I know,” she replied patiently, “that’s why I’m here. I know a lot of the enforcers have families, but I thought that since Teena’s going, Burke would want to come along.”
Mal’s expression didn’t show that he was overly impressed by that idea.
“But also, given that Penny will be going camping, I wondered if Tank would want to join us.”
Tank had recently mated and adopted his mate’s three young wolf shifter daughters. He adored them, and according to his mate – Marion – he hadn’t been too thrilled about the idea of Penny being away for a couple of nights. The Damsons were both bear shifters and both teachers, so he had relented, but given that they were no longer going, she figured Tank might prefer that he went along too.
Mal looked mildly mollified. “If Tank’s going, then that should be okay. I’ll let him know.”
“You’ll ask him?”
“I’ll tell him,” he said pointedly. “Will two enforcers be enough? I could probably spare Jax.”
“Two should be more than enough. After all, it’s only for two nights, and there are only nine kids. There are a lot more in the youth group, but most of them already have Thanksgiving plans.”
Besides, she wasn’t sure Heather – Jax’s new mate – could stand to lose him for as long as two hours, never mind two nights. Their mating was fresh, and Heather could be pretty possessive over him. Heather already had half an idea that there had been some flirtatious behavior between Ariel and Jax. Complete poppycock of course – Jax was even more clueless about flirtation than Ariel. Jax was lucky that the object of his affection had done most of the work for him on the seduction front. Or that Heather was interested at all she thought as her reindeer sighed.
Mal watched her for a few beats until she was well and truly squirming before he nodded. “You’re probably right, just… be careful out there.”
“It’s a park; I think the worst that can happen may be that I step in some animal poopy,” she laughed. Then, she cringed for bringing up poo in a conversation with the male who made her heart flutter, and worse, she called it ‘poopy.’
“You can always make Burke carry you,” he suggested mildly.
“I wouldn’t dare. I’ve seen him play football – he’s a fumbler. Though, it may be that he just PTSD from playing with Tank’s girls. Whenever he’s playing, if someone comes near him, he automatically drops to the ground and cups his… ah…”
Ariel flustered as she tried to think of a decent way to say genitalia. What was a good way to say testicles to the man she had a crush on when talking about one of his employees? How would Nadia put it? She probably wouldn’t have brought up Burke’s balls in the first place.
“Ah…”
“Yes?” Mal looked mildly amused as she became more and more self-conscious.
Thankfully, her phone chirruped, and she almost fell to the floor in relief. She pulled it out and said a thank you prayer in her head. “I have to go. I offered to play cello at the local senior center – they’re having a tea dance.”
Mal stared at her. “No kidding?”
“Thank you, though, for your help. Let me know if Tank or Burke don’t want to go.”
“They’ll go,” he said firmly.
The surety and the commanding tone did awfully funny things to her insides. Ariel decided she really needed to leave – playing a few waltzes on the cello (an instrument she hated learning as a child – and she was pretty much open to anything) would certainly cool her jets.
She handed the mug back to him. “Well, again, thank you. I better go; I can’t keep the seniors waiting.”
Mal nodded a goodbye and as she turned she thought she heard a tiny groan, followed by the muttered words ‘Saint Ariel.’
Her reindeer grunted in annoyance, while Ariel flamed in mortification and skedaddled as quickly as she could, virtually knocking
over Burke who was waiting outside for her. He was assigned to her that day and, for once, had been on time, and waiting to drive her to the senior center. She mumbled that she needed a moment and rushed to the nearest bathroom.
She didn’t know why she was so upset. Almost everyone in the herd called her that at one time or another – why wouldn’t Mal? It just hurt more knowing that he too was making fun of her, just like everyone else. She had clung to the hope that he at least would see her differently. But no, why would he? While she adored him from afar, to him, she was just another herd mate – and a silly one at that.
Ariel sighed and pressed cooling water to her cheeks. “No use crying over spilled milk,” she murmured to her entirely unimpressed reflection.
She sighed again and decided that if she was going to get upset, she would do it later. She had ten things on her ‘to do’ list, and when she had done them, then she would allow herself a little wallowing. She should just distract herself until then.
Luckily – depending on how you looked at it – a nice, distracting text message inveigled its way onto her phone at that very moment. Why was it distracting? It was a text message from her one and only ‘boyfriend,’ Hollis and he said he was back in town and desperate to see her. Oh, dear, that probably wasn’t good, and hey, she was already pretty distracted!
Chapter Five
Riker raised his hand in hello, and Mal wound his way through the busy bar to find his friend. Riker had called; surprisingly, he was in town, having just wrapped up a hunt, and wanted to get a beer with Mal. It was early, and he wasn’t much of a day drinker, but Riker was indeed someone for whom he would make an exception.
Mal was grateful for the distraction. He was uneasy about the idea of Ariel going away for a couple of nights. Logically, he shouldn’t have anything to worry about; both Burke and Tank had jumped at the chance to go. Tank because he worried about Penny, and Burke because he was determined to get into Teena’s overly tight hot pants, and also Tank because he wasn’t altogether keen on Burke getting into Teena’s aforementioned pants. They would both ensure Ariel’s safety. Not to mention Teena. All of Tank’s sisters were forces to be reckoned with, but he considered Teena to be the scariest. Yet… his beast was still worried.
Ariel was the sister of the alpha of a very wealthy reindeer herd. She could easily be a target for kidnappers wanting ransom, or worse, for some horny, asshole of a shifter to force into a mating to get his hands on her family’s fortune. He’d seen it before. Daughters of alphas had been taken from their beds and unwillingly forced into matings just for that reason. Shifters could be utter bastards. Happened a lot in the bad old days when females were treated as little more than commodities. Shifters outside the hunters would be amazed at how often it still happened.
The thought of any other shifter laying a paw on sweet, young Ariel…
Riker let out a bellow of a laugh as Mal approached. “You look like you spent four months hunting a possum shifter only for him to fall into the Grand Canyon.”
That was something that had happened to Mal, and he imagined he had a similar expression at the time. Mal chased the blighter for four months, only for the guy to trip and fall to his death while on a sightseeing tour.
Mal allowed a bit of the tension to leave his body, and the two of them said their hellos followed by a couple of whacking back-slaps.
“Got you a beer,” rumbled Riker.
Mal grunted in thanks. “Celebrating?”
“Yeah, just caught up with twin fox shifters. They set about twenty fires in total. Took a while to get them – nobody realized they were twins! Thought one guy was just real fast.” Riker chuckled and shook his head.
“Yeah? How’d you get them?”
Riker smirked and dove into a highly colorful, and knowing Riker – who didn’t need to embellish his tales to brag - a 100% true tale. Over the year he had seen Riker off and on whenever the wolf shifter was in town, and had, with a lot of jealousy, listened to his exploits. Mal usually enjoyed the stories, but he found his mind wandering today.
He wondered whether he should add another enforcer to the camping trip. Tank had assured him it was not going to be a problem – it wasn’t precisely rough outdoors stuff. This was just a bunch of kids who were going to be spending a couple of nights in a cabin – a basic cabin, but a cabin nonetheless. Tank didn’t foresee any problems in taking care of eight kids and Ariel, while at the same time trying to keep Burke away from Teena. But Mal was still worried. Neither Tank nor Burke would make Ariel their priority. He wondered whether he could insert himself into the camping trip…
“In the end, they just gave up, which was kind of a relief. I didn’t really want a ‘127 Hours’ situation on my hands.”
“Yeah,” muttered Mal.
Riker gave him a thoughtful look. “You okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Sister okay?”
He sighed. “She’s fine.” Irritating in the extreme in that she refused to tell him about the father of her baby, but fine.
Riker tried to stifle a grin. “She’s not your type, then?”
Mal startled. Was he talking about Ariel? How did he know about Ariel? How did he know Ariel was too good for him? “What?” he almost spluttered.
Riker’s expression turned mildly concerned. “The brunette at the bar – she’s been throwing you looks since you came in. Figured you already saw her.”
Back when he was a hunter, on stepping into the bar, Mal would have had it mapped out, making sure he was aware of everyone in the room – because a good hunter was always aware of any dangers. Riker had probably done that, but Mal hadn’t. Maybe he was getting sloppy the longer he wasn’t hunting. Perhaps he was just preoccupied.
Mal chanced a look and spotted Nadia. Both man and reindeer grunted in irritation. The female wasn’t the shy type and had made overtures to him on more than one occasion that she was interested in him. It was not reciprocated, and he made sure she knew that.
“She’s part of the herd – that’s it.”
Riker left it at that. He was no more interested to hear details on Mal’s love life than he wanted to give them. Not that Mal had any details to share… not for years now. Mal had never gone in for relationships, but he’d spent nights with other hunters. They were females who were like him, not interested in anything resembling an emotion and completely focused on their next hunt. They only cared about themselves and being a hunter, and that was something Mal could understand. But females like Nadia, ones who wanted to play games and flirt, and incite jealousy to get their way, no, they weren’t for him. Little blonde creatures that wore their hearts on their sleeves, seemed physically incapable of doing anything selfish and blushed at even the hint of a smile were an entirely different matter.
Nadia moved away from the bar, moving as if to approach their table, but a firm glare from Mal had her stopping in her tracks and quickly wheeling in another direction.
“Always the ladies’ man, Malachi,” chuckled Riker.
Mal grunted and waited while Riker regarded him steadily. “You know,” said Riker eventually, “this is the first time I’ve been in town when you haven’t been impatient to ask me if I’d heard anything from the council.”
“About the suspension?”
“Yeah, usually it’s the first thing out of your mouth whenever we meet up.”
Mal thought about that for a few moments. It had been weighing on his mind for a year, but yeah, surprisingly, he had managed to forget it entirely in the last couple of hours – even in Riker’s presence.
“Right, yeah, so any news?” he asked, almost positive there wouldn’t be any.
“The council rejected Evans’ last appeal – they won’t let him be a hunter again.”
Mal grunted, not entirely surprised. He was sure the council had been reluctant, given that they liked legacies - Evans’ three brothers, father, uncles, grandfather, great-grandfather and so on, had been or were all hunters. But even the council coul
dn’t find any redeeming features in Evans’ track record.
“Your suspension’s over. Council wants you back tomorrow.”
Mal stared at him for a few beats, but nothing in Riker’s equally hard stare flickered. This wasn’t a joke. He wasn’t dreaming. He finally had his job back. Finally, what he had been waiting for - what he had wanted for a year. His job – the most important thing in the world to him, the thing he lived for was within his grasp…
“Huh.”
Chapter Six
Ariel folded a napkin over her knee. “This is nice, isn’t it? We so rarely get to have lunch.”
Carrie gave her a suspicious look but didn’t say anything as Mikey fussed in her arms.
“I don’t know about you, but I have lunch every day,” said Teena, distractedly. She was making faces at Burke who was getting them some drinks.
It was sometimes hard to tell whether Teena was teasing or just taking things too literally. She was definitely a tease when it came to men, and not a flirty tease. She was more likely to go wild with a whoopee cushion than try to make her boyfriend jealous by kissing his best friend. That came from growing up with two sisters – the three of them mercilessly ribbed each other, tormented one another and were endlessly competitive. Their brother, Tank was about the only one who could control them, and even then it was a bit dicey. No wonder half the herd was terrified of him. Though, more were wary of Mal, and Ariel didn’t find him the least scary. Another word starting with S maybe… and the other letters were e, x, and y.
“I meant lunch together,” clarified Ariel.
“You’re a busy woman,” said Carrie.
Ariel couldn’t tell whether it was supposed to be a jibe at her being ‘Saint Ariel’ or whether Carrie just meant it is a fact. Either way, her reindeer was still huffy over Mal calling her ‘Saint Ariel’ so she decided to push on regardless.
“I am that,” said Teena, and this time Ariel was sure she was teasing.
