Over the course of the drive, she gets herself under control, taking deep breaths, talking to herself, convincing herself that this is the right way to go. After all, she reasons, everything was pointed towards an end to her and Ashton. He’s a werewolf, and I’m not. That pretty much sums it up. I don’t belong in his world. He needs to be with one of his own kind, someone that can understand, someone that can be his mate. She tries to forget about the fact that it makes her nauseous to think about him with someone else or that after less than ten days together it’s hard to imagine her life without him in it.
As she pulls into the parking lot, she rests her head on the steering wheel, taking deep breaths, collecting herself. She checks her face in the rear-view mirror. Luke’s hands haven’t left a mark on her cheeks or her neck. The thought of his hands around her throat makes it difficult to breathe, as if it were happening all over again. Her eyes are puffy and red but, apart from that, there’s no permanent damage. Her headache is in full swing again, but that is becoming the new normal.
She walks through reception at speed, making a b-line for Finn’s room. She could use a friend right now, preferably someone that didn’t think she exchanged sexual favors for money. But before she makes it half way down the corridor her friendly neighborhood motel receptionist stops her.
“Umm, Ms. Braun…Sofie!” Brett calls out.
She had wanted to avoid everyone apart from Finn. “Brett, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve had a really, really long day followed by a really, really long night, and all I want to do right now is to go to my friend’s room and get as wasted as humanly possible. So, if you don’t mind?” She turns around without waiting for a response, wondering if she really is as crazy as his expression tells her he thinks she is.
“Okay, umm…right, well, I sure am sorry to hear that Ms. Brau…Sofie. I just thought you might wanna know that your friend was here looking for you.” Brett’s earnest explanation pulls Sofie up short.
She doesn’t turn around to face him. For a split-second she wonders if he means Ashton, but Brett knows him. He wouldn’t be so vague about a man that he knows Sofie’s dating, if that’s what she could even call it. “My friend?”
“Yeah, he said he was an old friend of the family, of your dad’s?” Brett looks at the back of her head questioningly.
“What did you tell him?” Sofie’s mind is racing, as she asks the question. She already knows who the mystery visitor was. Her father didn’t have any friends, not anymore at least. All he had were debts.
“I said that you were out, didn’t know when you’d be back,” Brett shrugs wondering if he’s done something wrong. “Are you alright?”
“Fine. Thanks for the message.” Sofie hurries down the corridor, passing her room and hammering on Finn’s door.
Brett scratches his head, asking himself if all beautiful women are so highly strung.
“Hold on! Hold on!” Finn shouts through the door. He opens it, ready to inform whoever it is that he’s reached the highest level yet of Grand Theft Auto, and he’s found some secret Easter Eggs that no other player seems to have discovered. But he takes one look at Sofie’s tear-stained face and shuts his mouth, ushering her inside.
***
“Are you going to tell me what happened or are you just going to raid my mini-bar?” Finn is sitting on the edge of the bed, watching Sofie as she empties as many tiny bottles out of the refrigerator as she can. “Was it Luke? Did he try something?” Finn asks
“Yes and yes.” Sofie collects the miniature bottles in her arms and lays them out on the bed, taking a seat opposite her friend.
“Is that all you’re going to say? Well, are you okay? Did he hurt you?” Finn adjusts his glasses like they’re going to give him better vision of the past, of what happened to Sofie.
“Finnbarr, it has been a really long day, a really long week, a really long life. I don’t know about you, but I could really use a drink, or several,” she says, looking at the little selection laid out between them. She chooses a miniature bottle of tequila and unscrews it, ready to toast with him.
“Fine, well what are we drinking to?” Finn grabs a tiny vodka bottle and follows Sofie’s lead, raising it up to chink with her.
“How about to the end of the shittiest day of my life?” Sofie suggests, smiling sadly.
“Well, your life hasn’t ended yet, so it’s not technically the shittiest day. You could live to be a hundred and have tons of days shittier than this one…” Finn peters out as he catches Sofie’s look.
“Thanks, Finn. That’s really uplifting,” she mutters.
“Alright, well, how about to good friends?” Finn suggests the toast uncertainly, like he’s waiting for Sofie to rebut it.
“To good friends,” Sofie agrees before raising the bottle to her lips and drinking it down without a pause. She makes a face as the bitterness of the drink sends her taste buds into paroxysms. She selects another bottle from the load between them as Finn finishes his. “How’s Darwin?” She supports her head in her hand, hoping that the strong alcohol will go some way to dulling the ache in her mind and her heart.
“Not great, he’s pretty heavily medicated.” Finn sighs, taking his glasses off and cleaning them, a sign of his upset. He cares about Darwin—although he would never admit it to his face. “He’s still freaking out about what he saw, keeps insisting it was bigger than any wolf he’s ever heard of. I tried to tell him that it must have just been a trick of the light or maybe it just looked bigger to him because he was scared. He didn’t like that much.” Finn raises his eyebrows before taking another swig.
“I’ll bet,” Sofie says and smiles ruefully. “What did he say?”
“Told me that if I didn’t have anything sensible to say that I should get the fuck out.” Finn laughs as he recounts the story.
“Sounds like him,” Sofie says with a smile, thinking how much she would like to see him and how little he would probably want to see of her.
“He asked after you, you know?” Finn looks at her from under his floppy hair. “He wanted to make sure you were alright.” When Sofie doesn’t say anything, he continues, “He cares about you, talks about you when you’re not around, how he wishes his daughters could be as independent as you, how you’re the best geologist he’s ever worked with.”
Sofie looks up at him. “I think you should be speaking in the past tense, Finn. Darwin and I aren’t exactly like this anymore.” She holds up her crossed fingers.
“A few days of stupid fights doesn’t change a year and a half of mutual admiration, Sofe, no matter how sorry for yourself you might be feeling right now.” Finn gives her a pointed look.
Sofie can feel herself getting emotional again, she needs to move things into another direction. “So, my favorite computer genius, you get anywhere on my bank account? Figured out who’s been hacking my pitiful savings?” She’s already pretty sure she knows the answer to their latest technical mystery, but it would be nice to actually be told something certain, just for once.
Finn pauses, the next bottle half way to his lips. “All roads lead back to Shale. You were right.” Finn takes another swig.
“I do tend to be.” Sofie smiles back, raising her bottle to toast again. “To always being right.”
“Now that is something I can get on board with.” Finn smiles triumphantly, as they toast again.
But Sofie had to admit, sometimes being right didn’t make you happy. Luke knew about her debts, knew about her problems and, when she carried on seeing Ashton, carried on ignoring Luke’s advances, he’d taken the next step. He’d used her finances, or lack of them, to give him a way of making her dependent on him, making her need him.
“I can’t work for him anymore,” she says the words that she hasn’t admitted to herself up to this point. “I can’t work for someone like that anymore, not for all the tea in China.” She knows that she’ll do what she needs to, what Luke has forced her to do, to make sure that Ashton and the others manage to ke
ep their secret, and then she’ll move on.
“You’re not serious.” Finn looks at her skeptically, but his eyes go wide when it becomes clear that she’s about as serious as it gets. “I mean, I get that Luke is a slime ball and creepy and…”
“And a stalker? I know you haven’t forgotten those cameras you helped me install in my apartment,” she reminds him—although she knows he’s more than aware of her reasons for leaving Shale.
“I get all that, Sofie. But you and I both know that you’re not exactly swimming in options here. What the hell are you going to do?” He looks at her expectantly, fiddling with his thick-rimmed glasses.
“I’ll get a job, like normal people do. I’ll live a life that doesn’t involve being afraid that my boss is going to jump me at any available opportunity!” She tries to laugh at the ridiculousness of her situation, but she knows that she’s more likely to cry than anything else.
“Turn your phone off.” Finn motions towards her bag.
“What? Why?” She looks at him uncertainly, like she’s wondering if he’s screwing with her.
“Just turn your phone off.” He folds his arms waiting for Sofie to do as he’s instructed.
“Alright, Mr. Conspiracy Theory, I’m turning it off.” She holds up her cell to show how she’s obeying orders. “You going to tell me what that was all about?”
“I’m a hacker. I know what’s possible, I don’t plan on running the risk of anyone listening on what I’m about to say.” Finn leans in conspiratorially. Sofie almost rolls her eyes, but the seriousness in his face makes her stop. “What if we can prove that Luke is a slime-ball par excellence? What if we can make sure he gets everything he deserves? Wouldn’t that be reason enough to stay at Shale, at least until we get him?” Finn looks earnestly at her.
“What are you talking about?” Sofie looks at her friend, doubtfully.
“Shale has broken a lot of rules, a lot of laws with what they did to us, hacking our personal emails, our phones, doing what they did to your bank account.” Finn gestures with his hands, as if to say et al.
“Yes, and I know how hard it is to prove all of that. You told me so,” Sofie reminds him.
“I just need some more time; it’s not painting by numbers, Sofe!” Finn grumbles irritably, hating it when his expertise is called into question. “I’m not asking you to stick around forever. All I’m asking is for you to be smart. Give me a little time to come up with some proof against Shale, against Luke, something that will actually stand up, something that will send that fucker to jail. Can you do that for me?” Finn’s belief in what he can achieve is so strong it almost convinces Sofie. “Besides, you can’t leave Darwin with all the work on the site; he can’t cope. Between the divorce and the scare he had today, he needs all the help he can get.”
“Thanks for the guilt trip, Finn. But you didn’t need to use the boss against me. You had me at jail.” She clinks bottles with him.
“Sofie Braun, you say the sweetest things to me.” Finn laughs, and Sofie joins him. She feels like it’s been an age since she’s genuinely laughed. There really was a lot to be said for best friends.
They talk for a while longer, and then Sofie catches sight of the time. “It’s an early start tomorrow. I guess I should try to get some sleep before I go all Gorillas in the Mist on the poachers tomorrow.”
Finn nods slowly. He looks like he keeps changing his mind over whether he should ask a question that’s clearly eating at him. The alcohol they’ve consumed gives him the push that he needs. “I’m not the biggest fan of hunting and killing animals, not really my thing. Never been good with blood. I fainted when I had to dissect a frog in Chem class freshman year.”
“Where are you going with this, Finn?” Sofie narrows her eyes, aware that something is up.
“All I’m asking is why are you so bothered about these wolves? It’s not the nicest thing that Shale has ever done, sending in poachers to kill a bunch of animals sure but, news flash, we work for an oil and gas company. They don’t do nice! What’s the deal?” Finn looks at her earnestly, willing her to give him an answer. He figures he’s not asking for much, but it’s a whole lot more than Sofie can give.
“There’s no deal. I just don’t agree with it. I don’t think Luke should have blackmailed his way into Spring Canyon. God knows how much he had to hand over to buy the senator’s approval for the dig. He shouldn’t be able to walk around acting like he can just do whatever he wants, like he can buy or bargain for anything that he likes!” Sofie’s not just talking about the canyon anymore; she’s talking about herself.
Finn squints at her, the alcohol making his brain fuzzy. “You’ve been different ever since we got here, Sofe. You can lie to other people, but not to me.”
She knows that this is another one of those times that she’s hurting Finn by not telling him what he wants to know. However, there’s no way around it. There’s too much at stake for the wolves without adding in someone else that knows the truth about them.
“I know, Finn,” she says and sighs as she gets up from the bed, picking up her high heels, which she had discarded by the door as soon as she walked in. “So don’t make me lie.” She slips out of the door before Finn can respond.
As she unlocks the door to her bedroom, she sighs deeply, pushing it shut behind her with her bare foot. It had been a shitty day, a shitty night, and now she felt like a shitty friend. She wishes that Ashton were there. She wishes that she had just told Lindsey her secret. But then if she had, she would lose Ashton just the same. He would always put the pack above her, above them. There wasn’t any way around that, no matter how she spun it.
***
Lindsey drives to Ashton’s place, beating herself up over what she’s about to do. She doesn’t want to tell Ashton what she saw, she knows what he’s like, how his temper can make him react without thinking. There was far more to the story than meets the eye; Lindsey knows that without having to think too deeply about it. There was more that Sofie wanted to say, but she didn’t trust herself to. Whatever kind of trouble that girl is in, it’s bad. She’s scared for her friend, really scared. And the vision that I had of Sofie covered in blood, screaming, it refuses to go away, she thinks.
The lights are on in Ashton’s house, and she clatters up the stairs in her heels, but the door is locked. She hammers on it with her fists for good measure, but there’s no sign of him. He’s not there, but Lindsey has a good idea of where she’ll find him.
She sends a message off to Hector telling him not to wait up and then slides her vertiginous heels off and unzips her dress, slipping out of it and letting it drop to the dirt floor. “Ash, you owe me a serious dry cleaning bill,” she mutters to herself as she strips naked. “Here we go.”
As she says the words, she looks up to the starry night sky and her body starts to shift, to move. It’s not a painful process for her anymore, not like the first time. She’s used to the shifting; now, she embraces it instead of fighting against it. She morphs into a chestnut brown wolf. She’s smaller than most of the others, just like she is in her human guise, but you’d be mistaken if you took that to mean that she wasn’t powerful.
Once her four feet hit the ground, she starts running to the tree line, going in search of Ashton. She knows where she’ll find him. They’ve been friends for so long she doesn’t need to use her intuition or ‘second sight’ as the Elders would have called it to reach out to him.
She stops for a moment, lifting her head, scenting the air, and then ploughs on in the same direction. It only takes her a few minutes to travel a distance that it would take a human hours to cover. As she walks into the clearing, Ashton turns around to face her. Being an Alpha, his senses are honed, stronger than any of the others. He would have heard her coming from miles off.
He stands in the middle of the clearing, still in wolf form and again she’s taken aback by his presence. It doesn’t matter how many times she’s seen him as the golden wolf, the impact of it takes her breat
h away every time. He is exactly what an Alpha should be, so much so that sometimes it was easy to forget his human side.
I thought I’d find you here. Lindsey doesn’t have to open her mouth to communicate with him. In wolf form, their mind-to-mind connection is strong enough for them to be able to talk to each other telepathically. It was something that only the most talented weres could do.
It’s where I feel most at home, where I feel like I belong. Ashton looks at the trees around him and the stones, the dark rocks, the same rock that Sofie wears around her neck. It’s the central point of power in the canyon, and for them it was sacred.
That may have been true a few weeks ago, but things have changed. This isn’t where you are most at peace, that’s somewhere else, with someone else. Lindsey watches as his eyes go from golden to blue, signaling that his human emotions are coming to the fore.
But Ashton clearly isn’t in the mood for a conversation about his feelings for Sofie. What do you have to tell me?
Lindsey hesitates, trying to work out what she can hold back.
Have you forgotten your promise? Ashton’s voice is loud in her mind, and she curses herself for allowing him to make her swear to tell him everything. There was no greater vow than a promise shared between pack. She couldn’t betray that.
I didn’t see much. The snake took her to a private room, and I couldn’t get in. Lindsey looks at the ground, pawing at it, hating what’s coming next.
What did you see? Ashton is anxious, and he knows that there’s something she doesn’t want to tell him.
I saw them walk out arm-in-arm. I saw the snake give her money in cash. A lot of money. She closes her eyes against the anger that she can feel brimming out of Ashton.
What else? His voice in her head is nothing more than a whisper, but its coldness makes her afraid.
Ashton, I don’t know what happened. All I can tell you is what I saw. But don’t make me tell you. Go, speak to her. Talk to her. Let her explain what happened. I shouldn’t even have been there anyway, spying on her. It’s not right. She’s your mate, not the enemy. Lindsey stands her ground despite the anger that she can see brimming in his eyes.
Thunder (Alpha Love - a Paranormal Werewolf Shifter Romance Book 3) Page 12
