by Kaia Pierce
The tiny bathroom was choked with steam when I shut off the water. I stepped out onto the thin rug and stared at my reflection in the mirror.
At this point, I was nothing but a foggy blur. With my dark hair and broad shoulders, I could easily have been mistaken for Kaden from afar, the only marked difference between us being his collection of tattoos and my lack of them.
Suddenly restless, I reached out and wiped off the mirror. My face finally appeared after several swipes of my hand. There. If there was one thing that couldn’t be duplicated, it was the look in my eyes. Only I had lived the life I’d lived. My hardships had defined me. Kaden would have had to live three more lifetimes before he could say the same thing about himself.
Suddenly, as if I’d been struck by lightning, an idea formed in my head. The answer was so obvious, I couldn’t believe I was only thinking of it now.
First, I would sabotage his truce with his rival pack. Since Kaden and Garland Grayback hated each other, the best way to make Kaden suffer was to get Garland to do it for me. Once Kaden was too busy dealing with Garland, I would challenge him to another fight.
This time, it would be a real alpha fight, and a real alpha fight was a fight to the death.
I was all in, because I had nothing to lose. I also had a secret weapon, someone who was a member of Kaden’s very own pack. If Liam refused to help me, I had a few ways to change his mind.
My main focus, however, was on Kaden. The first step was to contact him.
I finally stepped out of the dripping, steamy bathroom, grinning like a crazy person at my empty motel room. Still naked, I strolled across the room to the wastebasket in the corner. Then, I reached inside and pulled Kaden’s letter out of the trash.
Chapter 3: Liam
I bent my head forward, watching the last fluid traces of Caleb swirling down the shower drain. It was four in the morning. The opening shift at the bakery would be starting soon. Thinking about my workplace and what Caleb had done to me there filled me with dread, and also excitement. I had to pinch my clammy skin to remind myself that I was still alive, and that it hadn’t been a dream.
I put on the same shirt and pants I’d been wearing earlier at the bakery. His scent was still on them. If I closed my eyes, it was like he was standing in the room with me.
After running a stiff comb through my damp hair, I walked out of the bathroom. My roommate and fellow packmember Logan had the room directly across the hall. Its door was shut, which meant he was probably in bed, sleeping off the whiskey he drank every single night.
My own bedroom door was wide open, the bed beyond looking invitingly cozy with its pillows and blankets. I’d been on my feet all night, so the simple act of looking at it made my limbs ache with exhaustion.
But there was no way I’d be able to sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw him.
Instead of turning left into my bedroom, I hooked a sharp right and went to the back door.
Standing barefoot on the scrubbed wood deck, I began stripping off my clothes. The hazy sky was still dark with night, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long. I figured I had a good hour to run in my wolf form before the sun came up.
I let my unzipped jeans fall to my feet and trembled in the cold air. It was always coldest just before the dawn, and today’s chill had an extra bite to it, reminding me that it was almost winter.
Eager to get out of the cold, I focused inward to call forth my wolf. The shift always began with the rapid growth of fur, which caused a pins-and-needles sensation all over the body. I endured it, and I welcomed it, until the thick, warm fur covered every inch of my body.
Of course, by then, my body was completely changed, too.
With the light of dawn creeping along the edge of the sky, I bounded off the deck, across the yard, and into the woods, no longer even human.
*
When I got back to the house, the sun was finally beginning to peek through the clouds, but I was still too restless to sleep. After putting on my clothes, which I’d left heaped on the deck when I got back, I went into the kitchen to look for some breakfast.
Our cabinets were empty. Our refrigerator was also empty, except for a takeout container of soggy lo-mein noodles and a half-empty bottle of vodka.
My stomach growled, but when I sniffed the air, I could smell that the noodles had gone bad. I tossed the whole thing into the garbage can.
I was still hungry. Luckily, there was one place I could always go to get a good, hot meal.
Twenty minutes later, I was on the road, driving my rusty, rumbly old car across the Southside Riverrun neighborhood to Diana and Sam’s house.
Diana and Sam were fellow Black Paw packmembers. They were married and had two kids in grade school. It was actually Diana who had brought me to the Black Paw pack, a lifetime ago. She had continued to look out for me since then. I practically owed her my life.
I parked in my usual spot right in front of their house. The front door opened when I got out of the car, and Sam stepped out onto the porch.
“Morning, Liam! Did you just get off work?” he said.
I shrugged. “I did a few hours ago.”
Sam pounded down the porch steps, and we met on the driveway right beside his gleaming Harley. His sandy hair was neatly combed, and he wore a blue button-down shirt with a gray tie for his job as an insurance agent. He looked perfectly professional, at least until he began putting on his leather cut. I couldn’t see the back of it, but I could picture it easily in my mind: an enormous patch of a howling wolf with the words Black Paw Motorcycle Club embroidered around it. The MC consisted of our alpha Kaden and his trusted betas.
“Nice. My day’s only just beginning. Gotta head into the office now. Diana’s cleaning up breakfast, but there’s plenty of leftovers if you’re hungry.”
I grinned. “Great. Have fun at work.”
Sam grimaced.
I watched him swing his leg over the seat of his bike. Next, the engine roared to life. Standing this close, it was like listening to machine gun fire. After lowering the visor of his helmet, he gave me one last wave before rolling backwards down the driveway and out of sight. As the loud rumble of his engine faded away, I turned around and walked into the house.
“Diana?” I called out once I let myself in.
“In here!” a voice responded from the kitchen. It wasn’t Diana but her daughter, Emma.
I walked in to see eleven-year-old Emma standing at the sink in an enormous pink parka, chugging a glass of milk. A floppy white beanie pinned her brunette pigtails to either side of her head. On the other side of the bright, cheery kitchen, Diana was kneeling on the floor, helping her son Tucker button up his sweater.
“All ready for school?” I said.
“Yup,” Tucker answered. When he grinned, I noticed that two of his front teeth were missing.
“There,” Diana said, sounding accomplished. After carefully wrapping a scarf around Tucker’s neck, she herded him towards the exit. “Now scoot before the bus leaves you behind!”
Tucker threw his arms around Diana’s waist before picking up his backpack and running out of the kitchen. Emma, on the other hand, wordlessly rinsed her glass and left the room without saying goodbye.
A furrow appeared between Diana’s eyebrows. Her expression was somehow both soft and hard, a mixture of love and concern. She often looked like that when she gazed at her kids. Lately, it had been leaving an ache in my chest for some reason, and I found myself glancing away.
“She’s getting to that age,” Diana said distractedly as the door shut behind them. Then, she blinked quickly and smiled. “Waffles?”
I grinned. “You got any bacon to go with that?” But when I saw her pulling a package of raw bacon out of the freezer, I hastily added, “Oh, you don’t have to. I thought you might have some already c—”
“Shut up and sit down,” Diana said sternly.
I sat.
“Did you come here straight from work?” she asked, nodding at
the front of my shirt. When I glanced down, I noticed that my clothes were still dusted in flour, which was nothing new.
“Yeah,” I lied. I thought it would be easier than explaining that I’d actually gotten off work hours ago and couldn’t sleep because I couldn’t stop thinking about Caleb, or that I was wearing these clothes because some messed up part of me wanted to feel closer to him.
“You must be starving, then. So what’s new, Liam?” Diana said. She pushed up the sleeves of her oatmeal-colored sweater and washed her hands. With her back towards me, the brown hair tied at the nape of her neck looked just like a wolf’s tail.
I bit my lip as I listened to Diana dropping bacon into the pan. The strips made a wet slap before they began to sizzle, immediately perfuming the air with their salty-sweet, bacony aroma.
“Not much,” I said. Once again, it was a lie. My face burned as my mind replayed everything Caleb had done to my body only hours ago. Luckily, Diana’s back was still turned. “Just been working a lot.”
“I see. And are you still thinking about school?”
I chuckled and fiddled with the edge of the woven placemat in front of me. “Yeah. I still haven’t decided what I want to do just yet.”
“Well, you have lots of time. Don’t worry,” Diana said, her voice slightly raised as the bacon’s sizzling grew to a fierce crackle.
I lowered my eyes and cleared my throat. “Can we talk about something else?” I said.
“Sure,” Diana said, not sounding bothered at all. “Did I tell you about what happened to Tucker in P.E. class the other day?”
The bacon only took a few minutes to crisp up. Diana plated them alongside a stack of steaming waffles as she told me Tucker’s story. The waffles were the kind that came frozen in a box, but I didn’t mind. She dressed them up just the way I liked, with a tab of butter, a sprinkle of cinnamon, and a generous drizzle of hot maple syrup.
By the time she set my plate in front of me, I was drooling.
“I don’t know how to thank you,” I said as I cut into the first waffle on the stack.
“You know you’re always welcome. Just eat.”
“At least let me help with the dishes,” I said.
Diana opened her mouth, probably to argue, but she was suddenly interrupted by the doorbell. She held a finger up to me and left the room.
I heard the door open and shut as I turned my attention back to my plate. My ears picked up two sets of footsteps padding into the kitchen. Then, as I shoveled bacon into my mouth, I heard a voice that made the hair on my arms stand at attention.
“Hey, Liam.”
I choked on a mouthful of food and had to gulp down some orange juice before I spun around in my chair.
It was uncanny; his voice sounded just like Caleb’s.
Kaden Daniels, our Black Paw alpha, was standing in Diana’s kitchen with his twin children in his arms. He had a different haircut, and he had tattoos peeking out from over the collar of his shirt, but even then my entire body flushed hot at the sight of him. It was as if I was gazing at Caleb instead of the alpha of my pack.
“Is something wrong?” Diana asked worriedly as Kaden passed her the female twin, Belle.
“Sorry to just show up like this. Something came up, and Josh is at work. I just need someone to watch them for an hour. Two hours, tops.”
“Of course,” Diana said. Without warning, she plunked Belle in my lap and reached for the other child, Bash.
I jerked with shock as I felt the surprising weight of her. She was round and soft and wriggly like a floppy-eared puppy. The fringe of her fine hair was clipped back with a tiny yellow bow, which was the only way any of us could tell the difference between the two babies. Her chubby hands grabbed for my flour-dusted shirt. When she looked up at me, my heart seized inside of my chest.
She had Kaden’s eyes. Caleb’s eyes.
Once again, I felt an ache deep inside of me, along with a dry, lumpy feeling in my throat. I glanced at the bay window and stared out at the backyard, wondering what it was that I was feeling exactly.
“I hope everything’s okay. Nobody’s hurt or anything, right?” Diana said as she bounced a fussy Bash on her hip.
“No, nothing like that. It doesn’t have anything to do with the pack, so don’t worry,” Kaden said with a nervous grin. He slipped a sleek, black diaper bag off of his shoulder and set it on the counter. Then, he straightened out his leather jacket with fidgety hands. “I owe you one.”
“Nonsense. We’re family,” was her response.
Kaden thanked her. Before walking out, he placed a kiss on top of his son’s head and crossed the room to say goodbye to his daughter, too. I was eager to pass her back to him again. He picked her up and held her briefly against his chest. Belle was so tiny inside his massive arms that she nearly disappeared. When he gave her back, there was a white handprint on the black tee shirt he wore under his jacket.
“Thanks, guys. And, um, I would appreciate it if you would keep this a secret for now,” he said.
Diana and I exchanged glances.
“Of course, alpha,” she said as she quickly redirected her gaze.
Once Kaden left, Diana sighed loudly. “There goes my morning.”
“I’ll help you watch them,” I immediately responded.
“You don’t have to.”
“I don’t want to, but I do have to,” I said. “You just fed me a five-star breakfast.”
“Well, if you insist,” Diana said, brightening. She started making cooing noises at Bash. “What do you think, little guy? How about a nice, long nap?”
“A nap sounds great,” I interrupted, which made her laugh.
Together, we carried the babies into the living room. There, Diana left me alone with them for just a minute so she could dig out Tucker’s old playpen.
I waited on their sofa with a baby on each arm, trying not to jostle them too much. Suddenly, I was exhausted. Luckily, the twins were sleepy, too. As they slowly began to doze off, I had to wonder what it was that was making Kaden so anxious.
Chapter 4: Caleb
When I walked into the Highway Diner at the truck stop just outside of town, Kaden was already there. There were only a handful of customers, so I found him easily, hunched over a cup of coffee in the very last booth. His eyes lit up when he spotted me, but I couldn’t say that he was happy to see me.
This was only the second time we were in each other’s presence. The first time had been over a year ago, and…
Well, it hadn’t been a good meeting.
Amidst the sound of clinking silverware and low conversation, Kaden gave a small wave as I approached. His hair was shorter than last time, and he was clean-shaven. I already knew he had children, but today he looked like a real dad. It only served to remind me just how much more he’d been able to achieve.
Suddenly, I was beginning to regret coming at all.
“Thanks for showing up,” he said as I slid into the red vinyl seat. “Coffee?”
I shrugged. “Sure.”
He flagged down one of the passing waitresses. When she came back, she poured me my own mug of coffee and refilled Kaden’s. Then, he waited, his eyes following her, until she trotted out of earshot.
“Thanks for finally agreeing to meet with me. How long are you planning to be in town?” Kaden said, finally turning his gaze back to me.
In that moment, I realized that this was the closest I’d ever been to him while we were both in our human forms. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever get used to looking at him, only to see my own face staring back at me.
I decided to be honest. “As long as it takes,” I said, and I left it at that.
Kaden’s lips flattened themselves into a straight line, and his eyes narrowed. I almost expected him to explode in rage, because that was what I would have done. Instead, he decided to ignore what I’d just said and jumped straight to the point.
“Look. I want to meet you because I don’t want to fight you. I had no idea you existed unt
il last year. So I want to see if we can reach a compromise,” he said.
Just as I thought. I raised an eyebrow. “So a truce.”
Kaden lowered his gaze to the steam rising out of his coffee. “No,” he said slowly, and it was obvious he was choosing his words with care. “A compromise. Truces are for enemies, and we aren’t enemies.”
I smirked. “Let’s call it a compromise, then. I can see why you’d want one. But what do I get?”
Kaden’s eyes narrowed again, just for a second. It almost looked like he flinched. “You know that I already have a truce going on with Garland Grayback. But I have no intention of honoring it, and here’s why. I found out he’s holding a secret shareholders’ meeting behind my back, and I think he’s planning to screw me over.”
I raised my mug to my lips and took a long, leisurely sip. Then, I cleared my throat. “And that’s my problem because?”
“Garland is already toeing the line of the truce. I have no idea what he could be planning. Things are about to get ugly, and I don’t want to endanger my pack. I could use your help to defend us against him. If you do, maybe we can beat him together, and maybe you can be the new alpha of his pack. We’ll both get what we want,” Kaden said.
When he finally finished, he exhaled loudly and stared at me for a long time, his dark eyebrows raised in expectation.
“How do you know we can beat him?” I said in a low voice.
Kaden broke his gaze for a moment, and his lips moved without sound, as if he was practicing what he was about to say. After a few seconds, he finally gave me his response.
“Garland is afraid of you,” he said. Then, he chuckled and shook his head, and I noticed that he had tightened his hands into fists on top of the Formica table. “It’s…it’s really hard for me to admit this, Caleb. But I’m telling you in confidence. Because you’re my brother.”
I sat back in silence, numb with my own shock. Whatever I’d expected at this rendezvous with Kaden…well, it hadn’t been this. In his own way, Kaden was admitting that he was weak, that he needed my help to defend his own pack. It left me speechless. I had no idea how to react.
