by Afton Locke
“How is Dad?” he asked. “Tell me everything.”
“He’s weakened since the attack,” she said.
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” he demanded, more sharply than he intended.
“We were so busy trying to survive and build a new pack, we didn’t notice at first. It started with him cutting corners at the diner. Coming in late. Closing early. Cooking less. When we asked about his health, he got really defensive.” Her lips twisted in a wry smile. “You know how he can be.”
“Ornery as hell,” he agreed.
“He collapsed in the middle of the breakfast shift earlier this week. We’ve been helping out so we can keep the doors open. He tried to convince us it was nothing. That he was just working too hard.”
Alan knotted his hands in his lap. Dad couldn’t die. He had the same mutation, but he dealt with it a lot better, channeling the rage into a safe level of crabbiness. Knowing he wasn’t the only person on Earth with the condition didn’t make Alan feel like such a freak.
“I had a few bad feelings,” she admitted, “but I ignored them because he seemed so confident. Damn it. Why didn’t I trust my intuition?”
“Hey, don’t blame yourself. Did you call a doctor?”
“Because Don’s a wolf, Derek thought it better not to.”
He frowned. “What does Derek have to do with it?”
“Didn’t I tell you? He’s our new Alpha. Hector died in the attack.”
And how many others? Alan shivered. The group in the diner tonight had been very small.
“Anyway, it took time, but we found an expert who handles our kind.”
“Dad’s going to die, too, isn’t he?”
She reached over and covered his hand. “You know he’s two hundred years old.”
He swallowed, drowning in the sensations from her special touch. “I know.”
After she withdrew her hand, they sat in silence for a while. Strangely enough, it felt like the most natural thing in the world. His breaths came slow and easy, and his limbs, heavy and limp, sank into the seat. Being around her had always calmed him, especially in English class at test-taking time. It was his least favorite subject, but her mere presence made the time pass effortlessly.
He glanced over at her, wondering why she hadn’t started the engine yet, but the ignition key rested on the seat between her legs. He covered his face, feeling like the world’s biggest idiot again.
“I have a rental car and a suitcase full of clothes. Why did I get in your truck?” he asked.
But when he reached for the door handle, she grabbed his arm. Then she pulled his car key out of her pocket and dangled it in front of him.
“Need this?”
He grabbed it. “I can’t seem to think straight around you. Hey, thanks for…everything.”
She’d done a lot for him tonight, but the key and the clothes were the least of it. Most importantly, she acted as if she gave a damn about him. Made him feel part of the pack.
“Don’t go yet. There’s something I need to get off my chest.”
His senses rose to full alert. What now? Her face looked so soft in the moonlight, and her eyes were wide and gentle, as if she’d opened a window to her soul. The brownish-green tint reminded him of growing things—Florida’s vegetation and farmland.
“Are you angry at me about anything, Shelley?”
“No, I’m angry at myself.”
He settled against the seat. “I’m listening.”
“There’s something you need to know about prom night.”
He grabbed the door handle again. “No, it’s ancient history. A night I’d rather forget.”
She gripped his arm. “You need to hear this. I liked you back you then, Alan. I really did.”
“You had a strange way of showing it.” He glared out the windshield. “I really believed you sent me that invitation. Obviously, one of your friends forged it as a joke.”
“I did write it,” she said quickly, letting her hand drop to the seat between them. “Before I sent it, my friend Barbara found it. When she assumed it was a practical joke, I-I went along with it. If I’d told her the truth about how I felt about you, my friends would have turned on me.”
He swept a hand over his scalp. “I guess dating the school freak would have ruined your social life.”
“Becoming a refugee after the pack was destroyed put it into perspective for me.” Her shoulders rose. “I’m so sorry, Alan.”
“You should have become an actress. Sure had me fooled.”
“I never dreamed my thoughtless actions could turn into such a tragedy.” She dropped her head into her palms. “Someone could have been killed.”
His knuckles burned with the memory of Curtis’s bones under them. The next day, he heard he’d broken the man’s jaw and one of his ribs. Not to mention the loss of blood, some of which had stained Shelley’s pink dress.
“Is that why you’re still with Curtis?” he blurted. “Out of guilt?”
Her mouth dropped open, but her eyes looked more startled than outraged.
He held up a hand. “I didn’t mean that.”
“It’s okay.” She brushed back her hair, half of which had fallen out of her ponytail over the course of the evening. “I’ve grown up a lot since then and have higher priorities than peer pressure.”
“Looks like you have a lot of them,” he said, pointing to the bag of clothes on the floor and the dirty farm gloves on her dash. “I suspect you work too hard.”
Did guilt from her past drive her to exhaustion today? Ever since he’d left, he assumed she’d never given him or that night a second thought.
“Will you forgive me, Alan? Please?”
He hesitated. What she’d done had practically cut his balls off. Being a freak had never been easy, but he’d dealt with it somehow. That night had turned him into an outcast, cut off from his pack forever.
She didn’t have to tell him she’d changed. Every action, word, and glance she’d given him tonight proved it. Unable to speak, he leaned across the seat and captured her lips in a gentle kiss.
Her fingers drifted to his shoulders as the pupils widened in her hazel eyes, drinking him in.
“Does that mean yes?” she asked.
“What do you think?”
He gripped the soft, rounded shoulders he’d ached to stroke on prom night. Without breaking contact, he took her key, stuck it into the ignition, turned it, and flipped on the radio. A country song about lost love filled the charged air around them.
Her mouth went wild under his—opening, licking, giving him her hot little tongue as an offering. He sucked it hard, not wanting to let her go again. He looped an arm around her back, dragging her closer. The fabric of her tank top stretched so thin, the scorching heat of her skin burned through it.
He should have chosen a bigger pair of pants. His erection was ready to bust out of this pair. He and Shelley were mates, and nothing else mattered.
“I’ve always loved your scent,” she whispered in his ear. “It’s got an edge of aggression. Danger….”
He groaned when she squeezed his thigh, sliding her hand toward the hard bulge of his cock and gripping it. If she was playing another game on him, he didn’t care. After a lifetime of no sex, he planned to enjoy every moment he could.
“You, Alan!” she cried. “I’ve always wanted you.”
“Not as much as I’ve wanted you.” He unhooked her bra and palmed her supple breasts—the stars of his high-school fantasies. Touching her hard nipples sent flutters of heat through his balls, tightening them. “I haven’t had feelings for anyone else.”
She paused, breathing hard. “Really?”
Why had he told her that?
With both hands, she unzipped his pants and released his straining cock. “Let me show you how much I’ve wanted you.”
When her head lowered toward his spread legs, he threaded his fingers through her silky hair,
helping her the rest of the way down. Oh, yeah. She owed him this and a whole lot more.
She flicked the tip of her tongue over the head of his penis, sending a fork of fire through him. He couldn’t take it. The urge to shift tickled his bones, and that would definitely ruin the moment.
“Suck it. Hard.”
He surrendered everything into the soft ring of her lips as it swept down him—the pack’s rejection, worrying about his father, not trusting her. Each thing vanished inside her sweet mouth.
She took all of him, digging her fingertips into his hips. He forgave prom night and a whole lot more. Everything had happened so fast tonight, he could hardly absorb it. Before he knew it, he rose up and down in his seat, fucking Shelley’s mouth with everything he had. Muttering things like, “Oh my God,” “Shit!” and “I can’t believe this.” Must be the beast in him. He had no idea it would be so good at sex.
To his surprise, she didn’t complain or try to restrain him. For one moment, time stood still as she looked up at him with his cock between her lips, begging his forgiveness again. No dream he’d had about her had ever topped this. A blinding tremor ripped through him, and he exploded inside her mouth.
The force of it knocked his head against the passenger door window. When he opened his eyes again, she swallowed and wiped her mouth—red and swollen—with trembling fingers. Damn, he hoped he hadn’t bruised it. He’d love to see the expression on Curtis’s face when he saw it, though.
He brushed her cheek. Feeling his seed clinging to her face sent an aftershock through his groin. As if she was already his woman. His mate.
“I didn’t mean to be so rough,” he muttered.
“I’m fine.” She tore off some paper towels from the roll on the floor and handed him a couple. “It felt perfect.”
“Tonight was…unbelievable,” he said. “I’ll always remember it.”
The softness in her eyes dimmed. “Then…I mean, I thought. It’s good between us, Alan. We’re mates. Aren’t we?”
Scent of her yearning filled the cab, making him want to come a hundred more times—in her hand, her mouth again, and most of all, between her bare thighs. At the least, he should slide his finger under her short cutoffs. Make the denim sticky and wet until she came, too.
She’d gone a long way toward erasing the past, but he’d never be able to forget the prom, and he sure as hell could never find a home in this pack.
“Stay with Curtis, Shelley.” He zipped his pants and fished for the car key he’d stowed in his pocket. “I don’t think starting anything between us would be a good idea.”
Even though she seemed sincere, he’d be a fool to trust her again before getting to know her more. Besides, an unpredictable beast lived inside him. What if it hurt someone else, like her?
But as soon as he stepped out of the truck and closed the door, his knees buckled. The wolf in him howled, begging him to stay.
Chapter Three
Alan opened his eyes the next morning, blinking several times. Where the hell am I? Weak light from behind a nearby polyester curtain told him it was barely dawn. The crash of broken pottery jolted him to a sitting position on the lumpy, blue couch he laid on.
“Goddammit!” The familiar, crusty voice came from the kitchen.
“Dad?”
Right. He was in Florida. A lock of silky blonde hair brushed his memory. Shelley. Her truck. Oh freaking God. Morning wood strained his boxer shorts. Had the former beauty queen really gone down on him last night?
The sound of more cursing propelled him toward the kitchen. Shelley would have to wait. Feeling her sweet lips around his cock was probably just a hot dream, anyway. So was her confession about prom night.
“Hold on, Dad. I’m coming.”
He rubbed his bottom lip, frowning at the ugly scab under his fingertips. As if she’d ever kiss that. Don, wearing a faded bathrobe, batted at the broken pieces of a coffee mug with a broom. He’d grown so thin!
Alan took the broom from him. “I’ll clean it up. What were you trying to do?”
“Fix a lousy cup of coffee. What does it look like?”
Alan suppressed a grin. Ornery as ever. At least the man wasn’t bedridden. He couldn’t handle that.
“Give it back.” Don grabbed for the broom. “I’m not helpless.”
Where had Rita gone? While glancing around for signs of her, Alan spotted the note on the counter, saying she’d arrive at eight to fix breakfast. What if his father had been alone and fallen? Did he need round-the-clock care already? One of many questions Alan would have to figure out while here.
Someone had decorated the room in harvest gold—the way Mom had in the house back home. The same framed samplers about family adorned the walls. Prescription bottles and medical papers littered the counter, though.
“Why don’t you make the coffee, and I’ll take care of cleaning the spill?” Alan suggested, massaging his scalp before a headache could form.
He went ahead and made breakfast—toast, bacon, and scrambled eggs—himself. Exhausted already, he served the food and coffee and plopped into a brown vinyl chair at the kitchen table.
“This slop is barely fit for a dog.” Don grimaced as he nibbled a soggy bacon strip. “Who taught you how to cook?”
Alan raised an eyebrow. “You did.”
“So I did.” Don looked away and slurped some coffee, staining his silver beard. “The point is you’ve been single too long. You could have called once in a while.”
Here it came. The guilt trip for moving away from the pack.
Alan swallowed a bite of toast, but it tasted like wood. “I did at first, but I kept getting an earful of this.”
“You know you’re a coward, don’t you?”
The beast, asleep since the ridicule in the diner last night, stirred to life. He’d give anything to be in his cubicle right now, tapping his keyboard and feeling nothing but calm oblivion.
“I don’t belong in the pack.” Alan drained half his coffee mug and set it aside with a thump. “I almost freaking killed someone. Don’t you remember?”
“I have the same condition you have, but I learned to handle it.” Don toyed with his napkin, turning it over and over. Since when had his hands started shaking? “I could have taught you, too.”
“And killed a few wolves in the process?” Or hurt Shelley? Alan ripped into a piece of bacon while the beast clawed the root of his spine. The urge to shift plucked his tensed muscles. “It’s not a condition. It’s a curse.”
“Are you still crying over a few scabs?” Dad asked. “Our pack already has a beauty queen. A real man wouldn’t care how he looks.”
Okay, he’d matured. Looking like hell didn’t bother him as much today as it did in high school. Under last night’s moon, Shelley didn’t seem to mind the sight of him. Broad daylight might be a different story. Again, he pushed her out of his mind. Dad was the reason for his visit. Not her.
“I’m more concerned about the violence,” he finally answered. “It’s stronger in me. I can’t control it.”
But he was going to have to try for the next few days. Or weeks? God, how long would he have to stay here? What kind of wreckage would he leave behind this time?
Because Dad wasn’t exactly on his deathbed, the future hung in the air like a big question mark. It had been years since they’d shared a meal together. Mostly, he ate alone in his boring apartment. The beast relaxed, releasing its jaws from his spine. Nevertheless, Alan sat stiff and straight in his seat. Getting too attached wouldn’t be a good idea. It would make his father’s eventual passing even harder.
“You’re younger than I am. It weakens with age.” Don glared at him over the rim of his coffee mug. “I’d give anything to feel that kind of energy again.”
“Shelley told me a little bit about your illness.”
Don scooped some eggs into his mouth. “I’ll get over it.”
“Dad, a weak heart isn’t a cold. It’s
not going to get any better.” He gazed at his rental car out the window, wishing he could get in it and drive it back to the airport. “Have you made…plans?”
“What plans?” he asked with a deep scowl. “Picked out a burial plot, you mean?”
Alan looked away. “I meant your property, especially the diner. It’s the nerve center of the pack.”
“The diner? All I know is I need to get my sorry old ass over there so I can serve the breakfast crowd.”
Alan’s toast sat, dense as a rock, in his stomach. Dad was seriously in denial. Unfortunately, it fell on his shoulders to get him out of it. A few siblings would come in handy right about now. So would the support of the pack. Fat chance of getting that.
“Do you have a will?”
“I suppose so.” He knit his thick silver brows. “Your mother made me write one before she passed. At least I had a sound mind and body back then.”
“Good. Who inherits your property?”
“You’re an only child, aren’t you? What the hell do you think?”
Alan didn’t know whether to laugh or scream, but the will would make it easier to escape to his normal life.
“Got it, but you can’t run the diner anymore, at least not singlehandedly.”
The breakfast dishes jiggled as Don stood, shoved his chair into the table, and hobbled toward the bedroom.
“Where are you going?” Alan called after him.
“To put my cooking gear on.”
“But Rita is coming at eight,” Alan insisted.
“Screw the caregiver. Moonlight Diner is my life, and I’m going to run it until I drop dead.” He flung open the bedroom door then clung to it, panting.
Alan rushed to his side. “Keep acting like a pigheaded fool and it’ll happen sooner than later. You’re dying.”
“You think I don’t know it?” the older man snapped.
“Then go to bed and stay there. You need to take it easy.”
Dad grabbed his T-shirt with surprising strength and shoved him backward. “Fuck you!”
Alan’s muscles contracted as the beast in him jumped to life. A canine lengthened, piercing his lip and drawing blood. Reminding himself his father’s fear and loss spoke for him calmed the beast down in time. Barely.
