Rough Ride [The Exiled 3] (Siren Publishing: The Lynn Hagen ManLove Collection)

by Lynn Hagen

  “Tell me you don’t want to leave here with me, love.”

  Of course Morgan did. He wasn’t an idiot. Dog was sexy as sin, and the guy was interested in a plain man. Morgan wasn’t sure what was wrong with Dog, but he’d be a fool to pass on the offer. “Where would we go?”

  Dog’s features tightened when his cell phone began to ring. “Sorry, this’ll just take a second.”

  Morgan watched as Dog pushed from his chair and stepped close to the front door of the tavern. As the man talked, Morgan glanced around and saw double doors to the right. They were open, and from what he could see, the adjoining room was a restaurant.

  What a swank place. Too bad Morgan couldn’t afford to eat there. He was starving.

  Dog returned and pulled Morgan from his seat, slid his arms around Morgan’s waist, and smiled. Morgan groaned when Dog squeezed his ass. “Sorry, love, but I have business to take care of. How about we meet here same time tomorrow night?”

  Morgan snorted. “I can’t afford to come back here.”

  Dog released him and then dug his wallet out. He handed Morgan a fifty-dollar bill. “Treat yourself since I can’t treat myself to you.” The guy winked. “Same time tomorrow night?”

  With a nod, Morgan took the money. Fuck it. If the guy was going to give it away, why not do as he said and treat himself. Although Morgan planned on getting out of there and going someplace where fifty bucks would stretch further than a few drinks.

  “Same time,” Morgan agreed.

  Before he knew Dog’s intentions, the man cupped Morgan’s face and kissed him until Morgan’s lungs were on fire. The kiss was slow, passionate, and only whet his appetite for more. When Dog pulled away, Morgan was lightheaded and smiling like a goof.

  Dog chuckled, as if he knew the kind of effect that kiss had on Morgan. “Tomorrow at nine.”

  Sighing, Morgan watched Dog walk away.

  Kyle walked up next to Morgan and stared at Dog’s retreating form. “Honey, that kind of kiss would’ve knocked the curls out of my hair.”

  Morgan shook his head to dispel the magic Dog had woven around him. The kiss had been fantastic, and he’d be a fool not to come back tomorrow, but there hadn’t been a spark when Dog kissed him. Not the kind of spark that would’ve had Morgan dreaming about Dog tonight. Not the kind of spark that had his heart racing and his palms sweaty.

  It had been just a great kiss.

  “You don’t have curls,” Morgan said once his brain rebooted.

  “I have waves. Close enough.”

  “No, you don’t even have waves, Kyle.”

  “It was just a figure of speech,” Kyle argued. “Stop picking it apart.”

  Morgan held up the fifty-dollar bill. “Let’s blow this joint and find someplace we can afford.”

  Kyle smirked. “That would be the liquor store.”

  His friend stilled and sniffed the air. Morgan always felt weird when Kyle did that. The act reminded him of something a dog would do.

  “What is it, Lassie?”

  “Bitch, don’t make me slap you.” Kyle turned toward the door. He cocked his head to the side, his brows furrowed. “Not sure, but from the smell, your friend ain’t human.”

  That got Morgan’s attention. “Is he some kind of shifter?”

  “No, he’s not a shifter,” Kyle replied. “He’s something much darker and dangerous. I just don’t know what, though. I’ve never smelled anyone like him before.”

  Dark and dangerous was something Morgan didn’t need in his already complicated life. With the knowledge Kyle had just given him, Morgan knew he wasn’t returning tomorrow night. Matter of fact, he would steer clear of the place.

  He thought about what Kyle had just said about Dog. “Hold the phone. I thought there were only shifters and humans in the world. Are you telling me there’s more than that?”

  When Kyle quickly glanced away, Morgan’s heart sped up. “Kyle?”

  “Let’s get the hell out of here,” Kyle said as he pushed the door open and exited onto the street, Morgan on his heels.

  Chapter Two

  The room was sweltering as Morgan cracked his eyes open to the extreme brightness of the morning sun. He covered his eyes with his arm and hoped the clouds had mercy on him and covered the bright ball. Everything on his body hurt, but especially his head.

  The voice had gotten so bad last night that he’d nearly polished off the entire bottle of rum to quiet not only the noise in his head but that dark depression that sometimes ate him alive.

  Morgan squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them before tossing the sheet aside. He still felt drunk, and he had to be to work in less than two hours. There was no way a shower would cure his ills. Unfortunately he had no choice but to stagger out of bed and sway toward the bathroom.

  “Hon, you look like that rum gave you a beatdown.” Kyle sniffed at him and then crinkled his nose. “You smell like funky ass and cigarettes. Tell me you weren’t smoking while drinking in your bedroom.”

  Morgan couldn’t tell Kyle anything since he didn’t remember what he’d done last night. He’d gotten so ripped that he’d blacked out. And then, and only then, had the voice grown silent and the numbness kicked in. After that, Morgan could’ve tap danced with a polar bear for all he knew.

  “You think I’m that careless?”

  “You think I’m an idiot?” Kyle pushed him toward the bathroom and started the shower. “I know you smoked, and I also know you were shitfaced because I came into your room last night when your crying got too loud.”

  Morgan couldn’t recall crying. Then again, he couldn’t remember anything after his head had grown silent. “You’re full of shit.”

  “And you smell like shit. Now get your skinny ass into the shower so you can at least try to sober up before we head into work.”

  Morgan stood there, trying not to throw up and wishing the room would stop spinning as Kyle stripped him down. His friend pulled the shower curtain aside and helped Morgan step into the tub. The water jolted him fully awake as he screamed, “You bastard! This water is freezing.”

  If Morgan saw his dick and balls again anytime soon, he’d be a lucky man. His bits and pieces had climbed inside of him to escape the frigid water.

  “It woke you up.” Kyle adjusted the knobs, and Morgan sighed when the water finally turned hot.

  “Payback’s a bitch,” Morgan reminded his friend before he stuck his head under the water. Kyle said something, but Morgan hadn’t heard him. He was too busy trying to rid his mind of the rum still soaking his brain.

  The water felt great as he pressed the palms of his hands against the tile and just leaned there. Morgan’s mouth tasted like trash, and his body was sore, though he couldn’t remember what he’d done to feel that way.

  “I’m gonna get you a cup of coffee while you shower.” Kyle set a clean towel on the counter before walking out of the bathroom.

  Head tilted back, Morgan stared up at the ceiling. Something had to give, preferably not his liver. He couldn’t keep living like this, drowning in booze to shut the voice up. But he’d tried other ways to silence the voice in his head, and nothing else had ever worked. So either he had to suffer with the voice or kill his liver.

  The two choices seemed equally bleak.

  Kyle returned, set a mug on the counter, and then shut the water off. He handed Morgan the towel. Wrapping it around his waist, Morgan stepped out and grabbed the mug. He took a sip and then sighed. The coffee was soothing.

  “Now brush your teeth, get dressed, and then come get some food.”

  “Okay.” Morgan glanced in the mirror as Kyle left the bathroom. One look at his reflection confirmed that he’d been wrecked last night. The dark circles said he barely slept these days, and the look in his eyes said he felt like roadkill. His face was saying a lot, but at least the voice was quiet.

  “Get the fuck out of my room. I didn’t ask you for any help.”

  Aaaand the voice was back. He closed his eyes and gr
oaned. There was no way he could show up to the diner shitfaced, so he’d have to deal with the voice today. Sober. Morgan groaned again.

  “Hurry it up,” Kyle called from the kitchen. “Food’s getting cold.”

  Food was the last thing on his mind. Morgan’s stomach rolled and rebelled against the thought, and he wondered if he’d get fired if he called off. He wouldn’t be fully functional by the time he had to be to work, and dealing with customers wasn’t something he was looking forward to.

  “I’m not going in,” Morgan called out.

  “Yes, you are,” Kyle shouted back. “Don’t make me force you.”

  The idea of Kyle trying to intimidate him made Morgan smile. The guy was as tough as a kitten batting at a ball of yarn. But Kyle was right. Morgan and his migraine needed to go to work, and maybe some food on his stomach would stop it from churning.

  “Get the hell out of my room!”

  Or maybe some anti-psychotic drugs were what Morgan needed. “Go the fuck away!” He slammed his fist into the mirror and then stared in horror as the glass shattered and black blood spilled from his closed hand.

  Kyle raced into the bathroom, took one look at Morgan’s bloody hand, and cried out, “What did you do?”

  Morgan’s legs gave, and he crumpled to the floor, bending his knees as he pressed the palm of his uninjured hand against his eye. “He won’t shut up. Fuck! Why won’t he just leave me alone?”

  Kyle grabbed a towel and wrapped it around Morgan’s hand. “It’s gotten worse since we came to this town.” His friend ran his hand over Morgan’s wet hair. “Maybe we should pack up and leave. You know, get as far away from here as possible.”

  “It wouldn’t matter,” Morgan said through the tears that now spilled down his face. “No matter where I go, I’ll hear him. Nowhere is ever far enough.”

  Lips thinned, Kyle reached under the sink and came away with a first aid kit. He unwound the towel and took a look at Morgan’s hand. “You did a nasty number on yourself. The cut is deep, and you need stitches.”

  Morgan jerked his hand away, afraid his black blood would get on Kyle. He took the towel as well and tossed it on the floor. It would need to be burned. He couldn’t trust that a Dumpster diver or trash man wouldn’t touch the towel. “You know I can’t go to a hospital. Leave the kit. I’ll stitch my hand up.” Morgan glanced at Kyle’s hands. “Did you get any of my blood on you?”

  It had been a stupid move, and now Morgan regretted it. He knew better than to bleed anywhere. He’d just put Kyle in danger by letting his anger take over. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” Kyle turned his hands over and shook his head. “No blood on me.”

  “This time.” Morgan pushed to his feet and sat on the edge of the tub. “Go eat while I clean the bathroom up.”

  “Are you sure?” Kyle stepped back but hesitated at the door. “I really don’t want to leave you alone.”

  “And you can’t chance getting any of my blood on you.” Morgan stood and turned the tap on in the sink. He stuck his hand under the cold water and watched as his black blood bubbled when it mixed with the water and then ran down the drain.

  “How about I cook up a steak for you?” Kyle leaned against the doorframe and watched as Morgan grabbed a fresh hand towel and pressed it against his wound. Once the flow stopped, Morgan grabbed the needle and thread from the box. He kept the kit specifically for him. Kyle wasn’t allowed to touch it lest there be a few droplets of blood inside the kit. Even a drop was painful and burned like hell. He hated the fact that Kyle had grabbed it from under the sink. Morgan had warned his friend, but the impala shifter was hardheaded and didn’t think sometimes.

  The thoughtlessness could have cost him.

  There were latex gloves in there, scissors, thread, needles, and thick bandages. There was also painkillers and antiseptic spray. They kept a few bottles of bleach under the sink to clean up any blood that Morgan might spill after a cut, but he’d never purposely injured himself before, and a stab of guilt ate at him.

  “A steak sounds nice.” Morgan didn’t bother to look up. He concentrated on his hand because he didn’t want to see the sympathy in Kyle’s blue eyes. Morgan didn’t need sympathy when he’d done something as boneheaded as hurting himself on purpose. “Thanks.”

  Kyle lightly touched his shoulder. “You know I care about you, Morgan.”

  “I know.”

  “We’ll figure out what to do if things become too unbearable, but promise me you won’t try to hurt yourself again.”

  Morgan glanced up and stared at Kyle in disbelief. “I wasn’t trying to hurt myself. I was just pissed.”

  “And you shattered a mirror. That glass could have done a lot more damage.” Kyle looked near tears as he turned had headed down the hall. Morgan had never pried into Kyle’s business. He’d never asked what Kyle was running from, but the unshed tears in the man’s eyes said Morgan’s outburst had terrified the man.

  Great, now Morgan really felt like crap. He stared at the empty doorway and wondered if he should go after Kyle. The throbbing pain in his hand reminded him that he needed to close the wound first and clean up the mess. There was no way he’d be able to work with a jacked hand. As much as Morgan had wanted to stay home, he needed the distraction of work, but that would be impossible now.

  God, he really knew how to fuck things up.

  “I wasn’t trying to hurt myself. I was just pissed.”

  Renato paused as the voice whispered through his mind. He glanced around his bedroom, but no one was in there but him. Dog had been trying to talk Renato into going out, but Renato wasn’t in the mood. He was never in the mood, yet his brethren never gave up trying to coax him from the castle, trying to set him up on dates, or being a royal pain in the ass.

  None of that mattered to him at the moment. Renato wanted to know whose voice he’d heard in his head. “Hello?”

  He waited, but no one answered him. Pushing from the bed, Renato checked the hallway, but it was empty. He closed the door and glanced around his bedroom. Seconds later, when a knock sounded on the door, Renato jerked, nearly jumping out of his skin. With a growl, he yanked the door open to find Trigg standing on the other side, a sandwich in his hand.

  “Theo made breakfast. You wanna grab a bite before we head out on patrol?”

  Trigg’s gaze swept over Renato’s bare torso before the man glanced up at him.

  “I’ll be ready in a second.” Renato closed the door. He didn’t like anyone seeing the multitude of scars that riddled his body. Renato’s pain was his own, and how he dealt with it was nobody’s business but his.

  He didn’t bother listening for that voice again. Instead, Renato got dressed and joined Trigg in the hangar. He wasn’t even sure why Trigg had invited him to breakfast. It had been years since Renato had sat down and had a meal with his brethren.

  The hangar was roughly forty-by-forty in size. Anyone who saw it would think it was a long-ago-deserted small hangar, and that was exactly what the winged beasts wanted. The inside of the abandoned hangar was what one would expect. The walls were rusty, the windows had dirt smeared over them so that no one could see inside, and a layer of dust covered every inch of surface. The winged beasts wanted people to think the hangar hadn’t been used in decades. It was one of the entrances to the castle they lived in—a castle that was built into the side of the mountain.

  Inside an electrical box with wires hanging out everywhere was a keypad. If the code was punched in correctly, the side of the wall slid aside to reveal steps that led into the castle. Renato pulled the remote from the inside of his leather and hit the button. The hangar bay door lifted upward.

  That was the only way in and out of the hangar. No one without a remote could get inside. Ten shiny motorcycles lined one wall, and two Hummers, sleek and black, sat next to them. There was even a small sports car. Renato snagged a helmet from the row of them lining the wall.

  When his commander, Nazaryth, found the castle over a
century ago, he placed warding spells over the mountain so that anyone who wandered too close felt compelled to turn around and get away. There was even a balcony that overlooked the valley, but it was covered by a mist that stopped anyone on the outside from seeing it.

  There had been a few times the castle had been breached. The hellhounds had found a way in, twice, and a human—a human who had found the entrance into the green room where the winged beasts grew their healing plants—but Morbius, one of the hell dwellers, had followed the human and had attacked him.

  Every single winged beast had searched the castle for the human when Morbius had revealed that the human had smelled like a mate. It was Trigg who had found the droplet of blood in the green room. It had been Renato who had swiped his finger through the blood and tasted it, only to discover that the human had been his mate.

  Since no human had ever survived a bite from a dweller, Renato had known his mate was dead. The guy had to be. He’d never found the human, not in twenty years. Usually a winged beast went mad when their mate was killed, and once a winged beast went mad, there was no turning back. The beast had to be put down. The madness had never come, but Renato had wished for it.

  For two decades he’d lived with the knowledge that his zaterio was dead and he would always be alone in this world. Nazaryth had tried to convince him that his zaterio was still alive, still out there somewhere. Renato was a realist and knew there wasn’t a chance in hell of that being true. Nazaryth had just said that shit so Renato wouldn’t go postal. Renato would rather have the truth than have false hope fed to him.

  As time moved on, Renato had become more and more distant with his brethren. He’d smiled only a handful of times since that fateful day but hadn’t laughed or felt any sort of enjoyment. He fucked, pure and simple. There were no entanglements, no promises or pretty words. It was nothing more than an act to him, an act to relieve an itch.

  Renato felt only pain and bitterness, had for a very long time. Winged beasts had been created over two thousand years ago, and the longer a beast went without his mate, the more his emotions began to bleed away.