Caleb

by Willow Hazel

  Sarah trembled slightly. “Are you sure?”

  Caleb wrapped an arm around her and pulled her against him. “Don’t worry, I’ve got you, and I won’t let anyone ever hurt you. I promise you that.”

  The crowd thickened again around them as more people pushed in.

  “I guess I just thought maybe they’d never come back,” Sarah said. “Silly hope, I guess.”

  “You stay with me, and I’ll always make sure you’re protected, no matter what. It won’t matter if they come at you, or someone else does.”

  Sarah looked up, and he locked gazes with her. He wasn’t sure exactly what he felt. Yes, she was Blooded, but the more time they spent together, the more he cared about her and not just her sweet body. He wouldn’t call it love, but it was far more than casual interest.

  The truth was he was glad that she didn’t want to go back to graduate school right away, glad that she was choosing him. For the first time in a long time, he started wondering about what it’d be like to have an investment in the future that wasn’t centered only around the pack.

  He needed to make sure that the True Sons didn’t screw that up for him. Even if they didn’t injure Sarah, they could easily scare her into trying to hide from all werewolves.

  Caleb inhaled deeply, trying to ignore all the other scents, including the intoxicating sweetness of the Blooded right next to him. It wasn’t exactly easy with the crowd, but he was sure the earthy scent of the other werewolf had grown weaker.

  The alpha glanced around, looking for the bald man he’d seen earlier. Nowhere in sight. He’d moved. Ca;eb wasn’t sure if he’d left, but the diminishing scent suggested as such.

  “I think our boy left.”

  “Just a message, then?”

  “Yeah, just a message. May have just been wanting to get close enough for me to smell him, but since I saw him, he wins.”

  A loud boom rumbled overhead. Their heads shot up, and a massive multi-colored explosion filled the sky. Several white streams of fire popped into existence with a staccato series of explosions a few seconds later.

  “Fuck that guy,” Caleb shouted. “Let’s just enjoy the night.” He pulled Sarah closer to him and caressed her back. “And enjoy some explosions.”

  He meant what he’d said. He’d protect her, no matter what.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sarah squirted a table with some cleaner before wiping it with her rag. This was a task she could handle without any complicated questions or fear. Nice, low-key, didn’t require a lot of thought. No freaky biker werewolves showing up to issue cryptic threats.

  Fortunately, it’d been a week since they’d run into the True Sons, and there’d been no other signs of them. As weird as it was to think about later, she’d had a great time watching the fireworks after the other werewolf took off. It was like for that twenty minutes, he didn’t even exist.

  Maybe she wouldn’t have felt that way without Caleb there, but Sarah was already getting used to her new normal of living and working with werewolves. For all their amazing abilities, in the end, they were just men, each with their own personalities and quirks.

  She let out a quiet chuckle and moved to a new table. Was that the human way? To adjust to even the most outlandish of things with ease?

  Before the fateful night she’d come to Devil’s Den, she would have said there was no such thing as magic, and now she lived in a world where a dragon king ruled Maricopa County.

  Maybe it wasn’t any more ridiculous than a world where people used something like the internet to send memes and argue politics.

  What she appreciated most about Caleb was his straight-forward nature. She’d gotten so used to the professors and graduate students at the university, all of who spent so much time putting on airs and signaling just to prove how intelligent they were. Caleb said what he meant and felt. It was refreshing.

  Of course, that didn’t change the fact that his pack was being targeted by a group of werewolf criminals.

  Sarah sighed. There was nothing she could do really about the True Sons, so she did her best to only worry about what she could actually fix, things like doing her current job well.

  Caleb had several of the pack out searching the area, but without some clue as to where to start, the whole thing seemed hopeless. Werewolves had a good sense of smell, but that didn’t mean they could pick out other werewolves miles away in the middle of a city.

  From what he’d told her, this kind of Hide and Seek was unusual for his kind. Wolves liked to loudly announce their territory and make their borders clear. That did fill her with a little unease as it suggested the True Sons, or at least their leader, wasn’t the dumb thug they might have thought.

  He knew just when to poke at Caleb and when to hide. She couldn’t imagine this going on forever though, and she couldn’t help but wonder if the True Sons were waiting for the right moment to ambush Caleb’s pack.

  Sarah walked over to the next table to clean. Frustration more than fear clung to her. Caleb would protect her. She knew that, not just in her head, but her heart.

  No, her real problem was that her relationship with Caleb felt in limbo. It’d be hard to really plan for the future until the hanging threat of the True Sons had been handled one way or another.

  All her life, she’d felt uneasy and didn’t feel like she was where she needed to be. It helped motivate her to leave her job and go back to school. Now, she’d found where she was supposed to be.

  Not so much the job, she didn’t care that much either way, but the people, especially Caleb. Even the mere thought of leaving him stung her heart.

  Once everything settled down, she could go back to her studies. She scrubbed hard at a stubborn stain. Maybe there was some sort of job she could do to help out the werewolves, or at least the pack. It’d take her time to learn more about the culture, just as it would with any subculture, but she was sure she could be helpful. From what Caleb had said, it didn’t seem like they’d done the best to apply modern organizational and research techniques to helping their people.

  Who knew what the future would bring? All she knew is they just needed the True Sons to back off.

  The door creaked open behind her. Sarah sighed. She’d forgotten to lock it earlier. There was nothing worse than drunks coming in after closing time and thinking they could flirt their way to another beer.

  Her back still to the door, Sarah said, “I’m sorry. We’re closed. You’ll need to leave.”

  “Nah, I don’t think so,” a rough voice said.

  Sarah turned and was just about to give the man a piece of her mind when she saw who had entered.

  Bald. Check. Beard. Check. Leather jacket with two axes over a skull. Check.

  Sarah managed not to groan. Talk about speaking of the Devil.

  The True Son inhaled deeply then gave her a sick grin. “Remember me, sweet thing? Hope you enjoyed the fireworks.”

  “Go to hell,” Sarah said. “This is Caleb’s territory.” Her heart already thundered, but she didn’t want to give the bastard the satisfaction of seeing her scared. He only hoped he couldn’t smell it on her.

  “Hell?” The True Son grinned. “Been there. Got the t-shirt with Satan’s autograph. You scared, sweet thing?”

  “Annoyed mostly. I have things to do. So leave.”

  The True Son took a few steps forward, but Sarah didn’t move, other than her hands shaking slightly.

  “Why you still with these pussy wolves?” the bald man said. “When you could be with real wolves?” He inhaled deeply. “Oh, yeah, you smell so good.”

  Sarah desperately tried to think of something to say to get the man to leave. “If they’re so weak, then why did your leader run the first time he met Caleb?”

  The True Son growled, and Sarah winced. The other pack members had already proven they had no problem roughing her up a little, but the one thing she had learned while living with Caleb was that wolves respected a little backbone.

  She gulped, wonde
ring if that was unique to Caleb and she’d just made a huge mistake. It wasn’t all that long ago that two True Sons had shot her window after all.

  Even though Caleb had it replaced the next day, that didn’t do anything to erase the memory. Most of the time she didn’t think about it. Around Devil’s Den and Caleb she felt safe. At least when she wasn’t alone in a room with a biker werewolf.

  The biker took another step forward, and this time Sarah stepped back, trembling slightly. If she knew the enemy were only human, that’d be one thing, but she’d already seen the power of werewolves.

  “You need real wolves,” he said. “Real wolves who would do what it takes to get a wolf out of you. That’s all you bitches are good for in the end.”

  Sarah shuddered, though more out of revulsion than fear. Lecturing a werewolf biker about feminism probably wouldn’t do much good.

  “Get out of here, or you’ll regret it,” Sarah said.

  Her gaze drifted to a knife on the bar. Caleb had been using it to chop lemons, and it wasn’t silver, but it’d be better than anything. From what she’d had seen, even if werewolves regenerated, they still felt pain. She wasn’t about to let herself be kidnapped.

  The other man frowned, but it seemed like he was looking at something past her.

  “You heard the woman,” Caleb said from behind her, his voice low and full of menace. “Get out of here, or you will regret it, you bastard.”

  Relief flooded Sarah, and she stopped shaking. She’d been so focused on the man in front of her that she’d forgotten that Caleb wasn’t far from her the entire time. He’d just been checking inventory in the storeroom. She offered the True Son a forced smile and hurried to Caleb.

  The biker let out a low growl. “You ain’t big shit, Caleb Drake.”

  Caleb shrugged. “I’m big enough shit here, asshole.”

  “You think you’re untouchable? You think we won’t move on your pack?” He shook his head. “Jake don’t like how you hurt our guys. He’s gonna get a little payback soon.”

  “He doesn’t like how I hurt your guys?” Caleb snorted. “I don’t like how your guys shot at my woman.”

  Sarah spared him a glance, her heart warming, despite the situation, over Caleb calling her his woman.

  “If Jake was any sort of alpha,” Caleb continued. “he’d hurt those guys more than I did. They could have killed a Blooded. They deserve to die for that alone, and I didn’t even kill them.”

  “You think you’re tough? You think you can take on the True Sons?”

  Caleb chuckled and shook his head. “I don’t think that.”

  Sarah gasped, surprised that he would show weakness in front of the enemy werewolf.

  “Yeah, I didn’t think so,” the True Son said with a sneer. “Now Jake has a messa—”

  Caleb laughed. The True Son’s face scrunched up, and Sarah shot him a quizzical look.

  “What’s so fucking funny?” the biker said.

  “You don’t get it.”

  “Get what?”

  “I don’t think that I’m tougher than the true sons. I know I’m tougher.” A feral grin appeared on Caleb’s face. “I’ve proven it. And I didn’t kill your guys even though they really, really had it coming, so you all should stop bitching like little girls.”

  The two men locked gazes, both letting out low growls.

  Sarah stood slightly behind Caleb wondering when they’d shift. The one thing she’d learned about werewolf fights is that they seemed to be over quickly.

  “If you want to do this,” Caleb said, “then let’s do this.” He narrowed his eyes. “But I’m tired of this shit, and it’s late. I’m starting to think the best way to handle your pack is just to kill one of you every time one of you ugly sons of bitches shows your face.”

  The True Son snorted and backed up. He pointed at Caleb. “Don’t think is over, because this ain’t over.”

  “No, but it soon will be. You take that message back to Jake. We’re coming for him, and when we do, I’m not gonna be as nice as I have been.”

  The other man kicked a chair over and stomped over to the door.

  It wasn’t until he was out the door that Sarah let out the breath she’d been holding. No bloodshed after all. Just because she’d come to expect it didn’t mean she’d gotten used to it.

  Caleb gave her a hug. “It’s okay, I got you.”

  “I really thought he was going to try and fight you.”

  “Nah. Wasn’t worried about that. He needed to put on a show, but challenging an alpha yourself is hard, even an alpha from another pack.” He squeezed her shoulder.

  “What if he comes back?”

  “He’s not going to. The True Sons are just trying to work our nerves. This was just the start, but I don’t expect anything for a day or two.”

  “What do we do?”

  “We let the pack know, and we get ready.” Caleb kissed her on the forehead. “Let’s finish locking up and head upstairs.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Once upstairs, Caleb led her to his closet and pulled down a small box. Inside lay a pistol and several magazines already filled with bullets.

  “Silver?” Sarah asked eagerly.

  Caleb chuckled. “No way in the hell would I sleep in a room with a lot of silver nearby.” He tapped the bullets. “Just normal, but put enough bullets into a wolf, and it’ll slow him down enough. I’ll show you where to hide this under the bar tomorrow. You shoot the guy, and he’s down long enough for me or another pack member to come in and finish him off.”

  She stared at the gun, then sighed. “I don’t know if I can shoot someone, even a True Son. I’ve never fired a gun in my life.”

  “It’s easy. Point and shoot.” He grinned. “And you already slammed your car into two of them.”

  Sarah winced. “It’s more they slammed their bikes into my car.”

  “Don’t worry,” Caleb said with a shrug. “It’s not like you’ll actually be killing them. You could unload every bullet in this box into a True Son and not kill them. It’s just about slowing them down.” He shook the book a few times and then put it back in the closet. “For now, you don’t have to worry about it. I just wanted you to know there’s a weapon here you can use to defend yourself. For now though, I’ve got you.”

  Sarah wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled herself against him, her breasts flattening against the hard planes of his chest. He loved the feel of her being pressed against him, even through the layers of clothes.

  Caleb let out a little grunt as his cock twitched. He wanted to plant himself right into her, but after what she’d just been through, it might not be the best time. He could understand that, even if his dick didn’t. He’d be able to resist.

  At least he thought he could until her hand trailed down to rub his jeans-clad dick. She looked up at him with a mischievous grin.

  “You know I always want to be inside you.” A low rumble escaped Caleb. “But are you sure about this?”

  Sarah bit her lip and nodded. “Yes. I was scared, and I thought he was going to start something, so now I just want to feel good. I want to do something that we’ll both like, but doesn’t require any thought. I just want you to remind me of what it’s like to be alive and wanted by someone brave and kind.”

  “I’m brave, but I wouldn’t say I’m kind.” Caleb chuckled and kissed her lightly. “And screwing requires a little thought, if you’re doing it right.”

  “You’re a wolf,” Sarah said with a smile. “Just give in to your instincts.”

  He grinned. “Maybe you should give into yours, woman. What are they telling you to do?”

  Sarah rubbed the length of his cock with her hand and licked her lips. “Okay, then, I will.” She reached down to pull her t-shirt off. He loved the sight of her breasts, bra or bra-less. She removed her boots, and then went to work on her pants shimmying them off in a display that came off a bit more playful than erotic, but Caleb still liked the direction she was going.

/>   Deciding to speed things up himself, Caleb took the time to remove his own clothes. By the time Sarah was out of her pants, he’d removed his shirt and jeans with ease.

  She reached behind her back to unclasp her bra and let it fall to the ground, freeing her wonderful, pert breasts. His hands itched to reach out and squeeze them. His mouth watered at the idea of sucking on one of her nipples.

  A moment later, Sarah dropped her panties to the ground and stepped out of them with a wide smile. She sashayed toward him, staring at him with her blue eyes, her black hair contrasting against her pale skin.

  “I love your body,” Caleb said. “I’m addicted to it. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get enough of it.”

  Sarah smiled seductively, and then slowly lowered herself to her knees. Caleb’s cock throbbed in anticipation.

  She reached up with her nimble fingers to pull his underwear down. His cock sprang free. She guided his underwear down all the way to the ground, and he stepped out of them.

  They stayed there for a moment, Sarah on her knees, Caleb standing over her. He watched her breasts move with the rise and fall of her breathing.

  “You’ve tasted me so many times,” she murmured, “but I’ve never tasted you. That’s kind of selfish.”

  Caleb grinned. “Yeah, that’s one way to look at it, but you can always make it up to me.”

  Sarah reached up and rubbed the tip of his cock with her palm before slowly running her hand down the shaft.

  He let out a quiet moan as she moved forward to run her tongue down his cock as well. After running her tongue on both sides, she pulled away and wrapped her fingers firmly around his dick.

  Her hand passed up and down a few times before she opened her mouth and took him inside her, her tongue bathing his cock inside. She tightened her grip around the shaft and then shifted back and forward.

  Sarah took him deeper into her mouth, and Caleb groaned, the pressure in his balls starting to build. She pulled back to lick his slit before sucking him back in. She increased her pace. Her eyes staring up at him as she did so. Begging him for more.