Jake flattened his lips. “Can’t say I’d disagree with it, either.”
“Most cases, that’s pretty good advice. But there’s always exceptions, too. When two people meet, and they can feel it. They know they’re the ones who are supposed to be together, come Hell or high water.” She caught his gaze. “Jake, when I look at you, I feel that way. But it scares me to shit, because I wonder if my heart’s lying to me. Or if it’s just… All this emotion. This crazy week, and how you’ve been there for me. You saved my life, for fuck’s sake. How can you not love someone for that?”
He watched her with a silent, serious regard as she poured out her worries. As she blundered through an accidental confession that, between the day they’d first met and this moment, she’d fallen in love with him.
That expression, so attentive, so intent, freed the words held prisoner by her fears. She’d locked them away, even if that admission of love had escaped. Now, she couldn’t restrain them. They poured out of her in a rush. “Maybe in another universe, one where I didn’t find Lou’s secret phone, I would have figured it out a little bit more every time I brought you drinks. Maybe I would have realized I loved you, and I would have left that damn dysfunctional marriage.”
Worked up now, she pushed off the table to pace toward him. The outpouring of words refused to stop, too long denied to let up when they’d started to flow. “And you know, maybe I would have been the one who strayed. Decided I couldn’t take another day with a man who didn’t want me for more than a trophy on his shelf, and ran away to someone who did. So what if I want more than roommates? What if I- What if I wanted just mates, you and me, together? Ah, God, what if I’ve scared you off ranting like a fucking lunatic?”
Before she could stammer an apology, Jake reached out to put gentle hands on either side of her face to command her gaze. “Then you’ll be my mate,” he said in a deep, raw voice. “And I’ll prove I love you every day until the sun stops rising. Wolves mate for life, Anita. We go our whole lives wondering if we’ll meet the one who’ll want us, man and beast. Tell me you’ll have me, and I’m all yours.”
Tears spilled down her cheeks, down his hands where he cupped her face. Jake had supported her since the start of this shitheap of broken vows and ugly behavior. He’d seen what she would have to wade through to win her way clear. And still, he offered himself to her with a sincerity that overflowed her bruised heart with hope. “I want you,” she said, and the words tasted like salt as her tears coated her lips. “Man and beast.”
Then he kissed the tears away, and the touch of their mouths tasted sweeter than honey. One kiss became two, two became three, until the water burbled over the top of the pot to hiss on the hot burner. Jake reached back to turn the stove off.
Dinner could wait a while. Mates could not.
Anita coughed and choked as she came awake. Smoke filled the trailer’s small bedroom with acrid fumes and airborne soot. Flames roared from nearby, close enough to tighten the skin of her face with their heat.
“Jake!” Her voice came out a wheeze. She reached out to shake the man next to her, but he lunged out from under her hand to look out the bedroom partition.
Angry orange fires lit the noxious black smoke that roiled through the living room. The blaze tore through the trailer too fast, headed toward the bedroom at the other end. Smaller fires ignited as the heat combusted cloth, wood, whatever it could burn. They had minutes at best before the entire place turned into an unstoppable inferno and took them with it.
Anita scrambled out of bed to the window. The latch stuck, rusted into the lock position. When she got it unlocked, the window stubbornly resisted every attempt at opening. She crouched low and threw on a big T-shirt she found in the laundry basket. She nabbed a pair of sweats from the same pile while Jake slammed the accordion divider closed to block off the smoke. If they were going to break the window out, they should have at least an excuse for protection from glass shards, and she’d need to lay something over the jagged edges in the frame. Laundry would do. “Can we get to the door? The window’s stuck.”
“No.” Jake tore the top blanket off the bed to jam against the gap at the bottom of the partition. Smoke still streamed in from the top, but there wasn’t time to deal with that. Instead, he rushed to the small window. “Too much fire. Hold on.”
His body twisted. Mass erupted over his frame, muscles and height beyond what a normal man could possess. Fur bristled out from his skin and stood up along his back as the wolf reacted to the danger in primal fashion. His lips peeled back into a snarl that showed sharp white teeth. She’d said she would be with him, and now, fire threatened his mate. Not even fire dared anger the wolf, or so she hoped for both their sakes.
Anita grabbed their phones off the nightstand and dialed 911 while Jake shoved a clawed hand through the glass of the window. Heedless of the sharp edges, he wrapped both hands around the right side of the frame. Metal screamed as he tore the wall open. Wood and insulation stuck out of the jagged rip in the violently expanded window.
A gust of fresh air hit her, but she could hear the fire roar louder in response to the change in drafts. Jake grabbed her up in one arm as she clutched the phone to her ear and screamed his address into it. With the other, he bent the upper edge of the wall away to give himself more room for their escape. She buried her face against his neck to protect it from any debris that rained down on them.
And then they were out. He set her gently on the ground a good distance from the fire. “Stay here,” he growled, then headed back toward the trailer before she could stop him. She understood why when he loped to his motorcycle to move it away, too, before the fire could overheat the gas tank and cause another explosion. They didn’t need that, or a lack of transportation, on top of the rest of their troubles.
From here, she could see the scope of the blaze. It had demolished the living room side of the trailer by now and left only the most tenacious ribs in the structural skeleton of the home behind. Those too would burn, despite their last show of defiance. Flames licked up the wall near where Jake had torn their way out, hungry to consume the last of their prize. They had gotten out just in time.
Another small explosion punctuated the thought. One of the propane tanks used to heat water and run the stove detonated. Half the fragile, burned structure collapsed. Within moments, it no longer resembled a trailer at all.
Emergency services said they had firetrucks en route to her location. Anita killed the connection, even though they told her to stay on the line. She didn’t have the energy to tell them they were already too late. They could, at least, prevent a brushfire in the dry tinder of the desert landscape.
Jake changed forms again as he leaned the motorcycle on its kickstand. “You all right?”
“Yeah. You?” She handed over the sweatpants she’d grabbed for him. Both their clothes smelled like smoke and ash, but they protected dignity despite the smell.
He took the pants with a small smile he dragged up from somewhere. “I’m fine. Got a couple cuts when I knocked out the window, but they’ll be gone within the hour.”
“That’s a tarnished silver lining, but I’ll take it.” She shoved her hair back from her face. Her hand came away with a new layer of soot. “Fuck, Jake, I’m sorry. That was your home.”
“That was someone else’s home. I just rented it.”
“But your stuff-”
“Can be replaced.” He reached out to touch her cheek with gentle fingertips. Minutes ago, they’d ripped open an aluminum wall. Against her face, they wouldn’t hurt a gnat. “The most important thing in my life is safe.” He gave a dramatic pause, then said, “My favorite pair of sweats.”
Stress and panic dissolved into hysterical laughter. She laughed as she smacked his arm, laughed until she had to lean against his chest for support. Then they stood together, arms around each other, grateful to be alive while they waited for the firetrucks to show up and smother the last of the flames.
The firetrucks a
rrived about ten minutes later, casting red and blue patches of hyperactive light on the shrubs and cacti all around. To Anita’s surprise, the Bully Boys arrived with them. Three bikes and a truck pulled in behind the emergency vehicles. Anita recognized Shane’s beast of a bike as the one in the lead. Of course. They have emergency channel scanners to pick up transmissions of people in trouble. That’s how they knew to come. Jake didn’t even need to call them.
Her heart squeezed. That was how family should act. No, it was how pack should act. Pack chose you as much as you chose it. Pack appeared when you needed help and couldn’t ask for it yourself. They appeared in the night, mere feet behind the emergency vehicles, because one of theirs had tumbled headlong into the shit. And even after all the trouble today, even though Jake was the newest of them, they showed up as fast as their wheels could get them here.
“Jake!” Shane called as he jogged over towards them. Anita wondered if he’d managed to sleep yet. When he saw her, he smiled, as genuine an expression as she’d seen. “Anita! I wondered if I’d find you here. Are you both all right?”
Anita cocked an eyebrow. He doesn’t sound pissed that I’m here. Nicole said he would be. Interesting. Also interesting that she didn’t tell him she’d come out here and talked to me. Guess she hasn’t decided she’d like to spin her story yet. “We’re okay, Shane. Thanks for showing up.”
“No problem. I meant to come out earlier to talk to Jake about what he called in. Guess it’s just as well I didn’t make it. I would have had to turn around and come back again,” he said with a mock-stern stare at her, as if the two of them didn’t know better than to steer clear of dangerous tragedies and really ought to learn.
No mention of sending Nicole in his place. Anita decided to keep it quiet herself, until they knew how they’d need to approach the topic of Nicole’s infidelity. She chuckled at his bit of humor, then said, “The Ferals on the road to Jake’s place were after me. One of them seemed lesser, but the bigger one? He talked to me.”
Shane’s eyes widened. “He talked to you. That’s new. Not sure I like that at all.”
“You and me both. It was your basic threats, but…”
“But it was words, and that was weird enough. I’m sorry we didn’t get to them before they could bother you. This week has been non-fucking-stop.”
Anita chuckled ruefully. “I hear that.”
He glanced toward where the firefighters hosed down the smoldering wreckage of the trailer. “Fuck, Jake. I’m sorry. Don’t worry about a thing. We’ll get you on your feet again.”
“Thanks, Shane. We got out in time. That’s what matters.” He wrapped an arm around Anita’s shoulders as he spoke, a gesture of both protectiveness and declaration. He didn’t intend to let her go, no matter what his alpha said.
“So am I.” If the alpha wanted to tear them apart, he didn’t give them any sign of it. “We threw some things together for you, in case you’d escaped buck naked. Got a couple things that will fit you, too, Anita. Nothing fancy, but clean.”
“If it’s clean, it’s perfect.” Clean, and maybe had bottoms. Anita kept tugging the hem of her borrowed T-shirt down so as not to flash the nice werewolf with her girly bits.
“We brought enough water for you to wash off a little, too, and towels. Travis keeps the emergency rescue bag in his truck.” Shane gestured back toward the vehicles. “You two know how that fire started?”
Jake shook his head. “No. We woke up almost too late. That fire moved fast and burned hot.”
A frown creased Shane’s mouth down. “Trailers aren’t real fireproof, but that burn sounds awful fast. Holly!”
One of the werewolves by the truck picked up her head, then trotted over to them. A woman with fiery red hair and green eyes sharp enough to cut through even the hardest bullshit. She stood a diminutive five feet and change, but walked like she towered over everyone. “You bellowed, alpha?”
“I bellowed.” Shane’s amused look at Jake and Anita implored them to see what smartassery the alpha had to deal with on a regular basis. “Go nose around the ashes before the fire crews fuck it up with too many scents.”
“Go put my nose in someone’s ash. Right.” With a crisp mock-salute, Holly trotted off again.
Shane smirked. “That woman is a kick in the pants. But her nose is never wrong. Come on.”
He gestured for them to follow him to the truck. As they walked, Anita asked, “Her nose? I don’t follow.”
Jake chimed in. “Holly’s one of the pack’s scouts. Best nose in the business. She could track a snake across an arroyo in June.”
“She can also smell chemicals. Like accelerants,” Shane added. “Some of the investigators use arson dogs. We use Holly.”
Anita stopped in her tracks. “You think this was arson?”
Shane’s smile contained no humor, but plenty of buried pain. “I think there’s a lot of people who are all worked up about you two right now.”
Lou. The name came unbidden. Anita swallowed heavily. “Let’s hope we forgot to turn off the stove.”
“Let’s hope,” Shane said, but he didn’t sound convinced.
Shane and Travis held up tarps so Anita could wash the worst of the soot off her before she put on clean clothes. By the time she pulled on the sweat pants and T-shirt they’d given her, Holly had returned. “Jake, you didn’t have any gas cans in the trailer, did you?” she asked the nearest tarp.
From behind the flimsy privacy screen, Jake answered, “Nope. There was an empty can by where I park my ride, but that’s it.”
“Thought so.” Holly turned to look at Anita. “The whole front of that trailer reeks of gasoline. High grade, because I guess whoever set this fire thought you deserved the very best. I’m sorry. Pretty sure someone decided you’d look better crispy on the outside.”
Anita tried not to jump to the most obvious conclusion, but it lashed out and hooked her in. Lou. I wouldn’t come back to him. Then the Bullies made Lou give back the motorcycles he was holding over them. He’s already threatened me today. Would he really go this far?
“Anita?” Shane had asked her a question, by his look and the tone of his voice, but she hadn’t heard it.
She swallowed against the anxious churn of her stomach. “I’m so sorry, Shane. I missed what you asked.”
“I asked if you thought Lou would do this.” Shane sounded so apologetic, so unsure. Anita understood. Right now, she and Shane waded through the same awful doubts, where they had to question if their former husband and friend could stoop so low as arson and attempted murder. If the man they had known and loved would go this far.
And like Shane, Anita wished she had a better answer. “I don’t know. I didn’t think he’d go so far as cheating or threatening me, either.”
“Yeah. I hear you.” Shane scrubbed a hand over his face. “Do you know anyone else who’d do this? Maybe the woman Lou was cheating with?”
That pulled Anita up short. Lou, she could see angry enough to start a fire for retribution, and that realization had sobered her as his former wife. But Nicole? Nicole, who would never lower herself enough to fit in with her boyfriend’s pack, who wore frilly underthings and did her make-up just so, who would pitch a fit if she chipped one of her fancy nail wraps? Was she capable of arson? Murder?
Anita remembered their conversation outside the trailer. The cornered-rat look of desperate fear Nicole wore as Anita demanded Shane hear the truth. A cornered rat would attack a threat without any hesitation if pushed too hard. “That could be, too,” Anita replied.
Shane scowled. “Did you ever find out who it was?”
The words stuck in her throat. Yes. Your friend, my husband, is cheating with your girlfriend. God, I have to tell you right now, no matter what I said to Nicole. If she had any part in this... “Yes. A little bit ago. Shane, I- I should say that I don’t have solid proof of this I can show you. But you deserve to know.”
The alpha werewolf paused, still as a statue. His earnest expressi
on deadened, turned flat and hard. To Anita, it looked like the doors of someone’s heart slamming closed against a storm that threatened on the horizon. “Nicole.”
“Nicole.” Anita took a deep breath, then let it out again. “She came by earlier. Implied you had sent her to check on Jake. We talked, she tried to convince me to leave town…”
Her mouth went dry. Leave town. What would have happened if she’d listened? If she’d packed up and left? Would Jake still have his home? His safety?
“…and she threatened me if I told you,” Anita finished, while the what-if thoughts chased themselves around her mind. “I told her she had until tomorrow to tell you herself, then I would do it. But after the fire, if she was involved, even if she knew Lou intended to do something but didn’t do it herself, you had to know. I’m so sorry.”
Shane looked away, toward the soggy ruin of ash and warped aluminum. An apt symbol for how he must feel, she reflected, since her heart felt just like that. “So am I.”
“I could be wrong. Like I said, I don’t have real proof.”
“No.” Shane’s gaze dropped to the ground as he shook his head. “No, Anita. You’re right. Knowing that, how she’s acted for the last several months makes sense. Her sudden interest in getting a bike for herself. Her demand for that specific bike. One that would need repairs. She’d come home late, smelling like the garage, and I’d think she’d been checking her ride. The way she tried to protect Lou today. God, I am a fucking idiot.”
Anita laid her hand on his arm. “If you were an idiot, then I was, too. We had no way to know the people we loved would turn out this shitty.”
Shane lifted his head in an expensive gesture of gathered dignity. It seemed to cost him so much effort to pick up his chin, to shoulder the burden of both alpha wolf and man. Show strength, not weakness. Lead the pack, and mourn later. “No. We didn’t. Thank you for telling me, Anita. It wasn’t something I wanted to hear, but I had to. And you were a good enough friend to say it.”
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