ROMANCE: SPORTS ROMANCE: Bad Boys of Sports: A Complete Collection (Alpha Male, Football, Hockey Secret Baby Romance) (Contemporary Sports Romance) (27 page)

CHAPTER 6

“This looks familiar,” Tobias observed, looking out of the car window at the looming trees. They were driving up the long driveway to a small house, and Tobias had been staring out the side window the entire time.

“It should. You built it for me,” Sadie said softly.

“I did?” he asked as his eyebrows shot up.

Sadie nodded her head, hoping that he would remember.

“Yes. You asked me to move in with you, but I wasn’t ready for that.  So you built me this place and gave it to me a year before you disappeared. It’s small, but it’s mine and I love it.  It’s perfect for us.”

They had arrived at the small white house. It had a stone pathway that led up to the wrap around porch, and it had neat, well cared for flowerbeds on every side of the house. It was an extremely adorable house.

“Us?” Tobias asked.

Sadie nodded her head and opened her car door.

Out of the house came Julie, holding little Davie’s hand. Julie’s eyes grew wide when she saw Tobias get out of the car, and she knew that it was time to leave. Leaning down, she gave Davie a tight hug and began to walk towards her car. As she passed Sadie and Tobias, she put a gentle hand on Sadie’s shoulder.

“Call me if you need me, sweetie,” she whispered. Julie didn’t wait to hear Sadie’s response. Instead, she kept walking to her car, understanding that this was a very private moment for the family.

“Is that who I was supposed to meet?” Tobias asked, hiking his thumb towards the disappearing car.

Sadie smiled softly and shook her head. “No.”

“Mama, I missed you!” Davie yelled, hopping off the porch and running to his mother’s arms.

“Hi, my little bug! I missed you too,” she said, giving him a tight squeeze as she lifted him up to her hip.

“Who’s this?” the little boy asked, poking his little finger into Tobias’s chest.

Tobias’s faced was slack-jawed in shock.  He could clearly see the resemblance to the boy, and knew who it was before Sadie had a chance to clarify.

“You’re my son buddy,” Tobias whispered, snapping out of it.  He reached out to stroke the little boy’s cheek. “Wow. Look at you.” His eyes misted, and he looked back at Sadie. “He’s perfect.”

Sadie laughed and wiped a tear out of her eye. “Yeah, he kind of is, isn’t he?”

As Tobias held out his arms to take Davie into them, he felt a sudden wrench in his gut, doubling him over.

“Oh God,” he groaned, holding his stomach.

“Tobias?” Sadie asked, suddenly concerned. “Tobias what is it, what’s wrong?”

“Stand back,” he shouted, going to his knees. Fur rippled over his body as the shift took over, changing his body from man to wolf. The large, muscled black wolf stretched his legs where Tobias had just fallen, and lifted his snout up to howl at the dusky sky.

In his mind, Tobias reached out to Davie. I know I look scary. But I won’t hurt you, Davie. You’re just like me.

The little boy looked down at the wolf, answering him with his words. “Can I be like you?” the little boy asked aloud.

The wolf barked, and nodded his head. Davie began to wiggle in his mother’s arms.

“Put me down mama,” Davie demanded, pushing at her.

Sadie looked from the wolf to her son, not sure what to do. On one hand she understood that the wolf was Tobias, but on the other she wasn’t sure what the wolf would or wouldn’t do. Before she could make up her mind, Tobias pushed himself out of her arms, tumbling to the ground.

“No!” Sadie gasped, moving to try and catch her son before he hit the ground. She froze as she watched her perfect little boy transform mid-air, shifting from human to wolf right before his tiny paws hit the ground. Shock ran through her as she looked from Tobias to Davie, not sure what was happening or why. Davie had never shifted before; she hadn’t even known that he could.

The little pup yipped happily at the larger wolf and licked its snout as it approached. Tobias sniffed over his pup, nuzzling him before he grabbed the scruff of his neck and picked him up.

“Where are you going?” Sadie asked, taking a step towards the wolves. “Tobias, you can not run off with my son! Both of you shift back right now!” She yelled, pointing at the ground.

In response, Tobias took a step backward and ran off towards the trees, with little Davie in his mouth. He could hear Sadie screaming at him to come back, but he couldn’t, not yet. His memories were suddenly flooding back to him all at once, and he knew in that moment that the most important thing for him to do was teach Davie what it was like to be a wolf shifter, and how to control it.  It was something that Tobias wasn’t lucky enough to have, and he knew that he couldn’t allow his son to go through the same torment that he had because no one ever showed him.

~

Sadie picked up the phone and put it back down for the thousandth time in the last day. It had been a little over twenty-four hours since Tobias had disappeared with Davie and she had been panicking ever since. Every fiber of her being wanted to call the police, but she knew that it would be of no help. After all, what would she say?

Help, my ex-boyfriend, who’s also my baby daddy, transformed into a wolf, then caused my son to turn into a wolf, and then ran away with him.

Yeah
, she thought, putting a cigarette in her mouth, that would go over super well, she was sure. Still, she couldn’t just sit around and wait either. After Tobias had disappeared, she had tried to follow them into the forest. She searched for hours for them, long until she was completely lost, and couldn’t find them. It was well after midnight before she stumbled back into the clearing where her house was. Her body was exhausted, and she had fallen asleep before her head hit the pillow. Still, when she woke up the next morning, she was dressed and out in the woods again, looking for her boys.

Towards dusk she headed into the house, needing something to eat. What she did instead though was grab one of her emergency cigarettes and lit it up, needing something to take the edge off. She hadn’t been a smoker before she had Davie. Still, when there was something extremely stressful going on, she always went to them. It was her guilty habit. The cigarette was beyond stale, but she didn’t care. She didn’t smoke them for the taste, but the calming effect that the nicotine had on her nerves.

Not sure what to do but wait, Sadie grabbed a blanket and headed out to the rocking chairs on her porch. If she couldn’t find them in the woods, then she would stay outside and wait until they came back. As the sun disappeared through the trees and twilight took over her world, Sadie watched as the little solar lights she planted as they began to light up and glow softly among the flowers and the stone walkway. The soft, tiny lights made her feel a little less alone, and she turned her eyes back to the tree line.

“Come on Tobias, where are you?” Sadie whispered.

Just like before, she felt a chill go down her spine before she saw him.

CHAPTER 7

As soon as she felt the chill down her spine, she knew that it was him and that her son was safe. Anger, relief, and happiness all flooded through her as she watched the giant wolf and the tiny wolf puppy come trotting from the tree line, looking happier. Her little boy was all but running to keep up with his larger father, but he looked very happy and carefree.

Sadie ran from the porch and scooped the pup into her arms, crying as she held the little ball of fur to her. A second later she felt the fur disappear, and the pup grow, and held her little boy again. He was smiling and raining tiny kisses over her face.

“Mama, I’m a wolf!” he chirped as if nothing could ever make him happier than know that.

“You sure are darling!” Sadie said breathlessly, squeezing him in a tight hug. She was trembling with emotion, but she didn’t want to take her fear out on her son. Instead, she forced a smile onto her face and began walking back to the house. “Come on, let’s get you a bath and into your pajamas okay? Are you hungry?”

Tobias nodded his head and began to tell Sadie everything as the three of them headed into the house. As the mother and son ate some mac and cheese and had a bath, Tobias remained in his wolf form, waiting until the boy was safely tucked into his bed and sound asleep before he shifted again.

“He passed out like a light,” she said as she came back into the living room, finding Tobias in human form, sitting on the couch with a blanket wrapped around his waist.  His chiseled upper torso was an eyeful, and Sadie momentarily forgot herself until he grinned at her sheepishly, expecting a lashing. He didn’t have to wait long.

“How could you do that to me?” Sadie hissed. “You’re just now starting to get your memories back, and then you decide that it’s a good idea to shift, force my son to shift, and then run away for an entire freakin’ day? What the hell is the matter with you?”

“I’m sorry,” Tobias apologized, holding his hands up in surrender. “Really Sadie, I am. It wasn’t me. I mean, it was me, but it wasn’t me. It was the wolf. Look, I can’t explain it.  It’s like a primal force took over – the need to protect my son. I needed to teach him how to control his shifting.”

“Okay, that’s fine,” Sadie said sarcastically. “But you didn’t think that it would be a bad idea just to run off without telling me?”

“I couldn’t control it, not really,” Tobias urged again, hoping she would believe the truth. “Honestly, honey, I couldn’t. I had no way of telling you. It wasn’t until Davie learned how to shift and unshift just a few hours ago that I could even get myself back to human form. We had to communicate telepathically like shifters do.”

Sadie blinked, surprised. “You and Davie are telepathic? You can read other people’s thoughts too?”

Tobias shook his head, and risked standing up to be hit.

“It’s not like that. We can only communicate that way with other shifters. I – look, I’m really sorry about how this was handled, but it happened, and now it’s over. Seeing Davie – it somehow brought back a lot of memories, Sadie.”

The tone in Tobias’s voice stunted Sadie’s anger, and she stopped to listen. Biting her lower lip, she fidgeted with her fingers before finally sitting down on the couch to hear what he had to say. Patting the cushion beside her, she promised Tobias that she wouldn’t strike at him. When he once again to a seat, he reached over and grasped her hand, giving a familiar squeeze.

“I remember you,” he gently whispered, cupping her cheeks with his warm hands.

Sadie let out a muffled sob and brought her hand up to her mouth. There was so much meaning behind those three small words. For nearly four long years she had missed Tobias every day, and every night.  She missed his scent, his touch, everything.  When she first talked to him at the bar, and he didn’t recognize her at all, it had crushed her.

“I remember every memory that has you in it, and I have to say, you made up a majority of my life,” Tobias continued. “Even before we fell in love, and you were this scrawny little tomboy that followed me and the other farm boys around the schoolyard.” He stopped and chuckled, recalling the memory.

“You were annoying then, and I wished you would leave us alone. Then bam, when I hit thirteen it was like a switch had gone off, and all I could ever think about was you. I can’t even count how many times my dad yelled at me for nearly runnin’ the tractor into the creek because I was daydreaming about you so much.”

“That’s a lie,” Sadie said sarcastically. “You didn’t even ask me out until we were sixteen.”

“That doesn’t mean I wasn’t in love with you way before that,” Tobias replied quickly. “I remember tryin’ to hide it from the other guys because I wanted to look cool, but it was so hard. When we would sling mud at one another, all I really wanted to do was give you flowers, and feel how soft your cheek was. I had it bad. Still do.”

Sadie blushed, and couldn’t help but smile.

“Tell me more?” she asked.

“Shifters usually know all their lives what they are.  I guess my dad believed that the gene had skipped me, but it turns out I was just a late bloomer.  I believe he would’ve taught me how to control it if he knew it was in me too.  He died before he could, though, and not having him around during all of it cost me a lot.”

He paused, and the smile slid slowly away from his face. “The night I disappeared was the first time I shifted.  I didn’t know what was happening, and I stayed in wolf form for a long time.  I didn’t know it at the time, but it was years that had passed by.  I just didn’t know how to turn back.  I lived as wolf’s life in the wild for so long; I lost my human memories.

“Then one night the pack found me. They saw what I was, and showed me how to shift back to my human form.  I was so savage by then; it was a difficult process.  A painful one too. 

“I guess at one point my parents had been a part of them, or so I found out later. When things got too feral they decided to leave, and came here to get away from it.  With private land, they thought they could live as wolf and human in peace.   That’s the story I gathered from bits and pieces from the pack, anyway.  The idea of a peaceful life started appealing to me, and I eventually I decided to come back to the ranch.”

Tobias finished his story, and stood up to walk over to the window facing the front of the house. Pulling the curtain back, he looked outside at the moonlit yard. It looked so calm, so peaceful. If he hadn’t been taken, this would have been this home too. It was hard letting go of everything that had happened, especially now that he could remember it all. But if he wanted to be happy with Sadie and Davie, he knew that he had to somehow.

“Do you think the pack will come back for you?” Sadie asked, still sitting on the couch. More than anything she wanted to rush into his arms, but she just wasn’t sure if he was ready for that yet.

Tobias shook his head. “I doubt it, not after the damage I did to the hunters in town yesterday. They’ll let a wolf go if he really wants to leave a pack.  Actually, it’s more like excommunication for abandonment, so I’d say we’re safe from them lurking around.  They probably want nothing to do with me now.  I’ve chosen my path.” 

He turned back to Sadie; taking in how beautiful she looked, sitting in her sundress on the couch, her long hair flowing over her left shoulder. She looked as if she hadn’t aged a day since she was seventeen, though he was sure she didn’t realize it.

“I missed you…
so
much,” he whispered, reaching his hand out to her. She put her hand in his and let him pull her up from the couch. His arms felt like heaven around her, and she immediately nuzzled into them. “Is there any way, at all, that we can pick up where we left off?”

His words filled Sadie with so much love and joy that she thought she was going to burst. Her dreams of being reunited with him had finally come true. It all felt surreal to her, and she wondered if she was dreaming the entire thing. After all, it wasn’t every day you found out that shifters existed.

“Can you do one thing for me first?” She asked, looking up into his eyes.

“Anything,” Tobias whispered, nodding his head.

“Will you kiss me?”

Smiling, Tobias lowered his head, and after four years of waiting, he finally kissed her, and warmth filled her heart and her body.

“I feel like I’m dreaming,” she whispered.  “I’ve needed that for so long, and didn’t know I’d ever get it again.”

“If I could take back the years I’ve left you and Davie to fend for yourselves, I would,” he said, voice thick with remorse.

“It’s not that.  Davie and I were doing okay.  I have my parents and Julie to help…” Sadie bit her lip, suddenly feeling shy.  “The hardest part was not having you here.  It felt like a limb had been cut off from my body.”

Tobias reached out and held her in his bulging arms.  She felt so safe and happy in them. She couldn’t help but notice, though, how much more rock-hard muscles he seemed to have grown since the last time he’d held her like that.  She breathed him in deeply, and even his scent that had once been so familiar changed a little – it had a distinctly stronger aroma.

“I really,
really
missed you, Tobias,” she said breathlessly with her eyes still closed.

She slowly opened them to find Tobias’s piercing gaze on her, glinting in the dim light like an animal’s.  For a moment, fear gripped her as she felt her heart caught in her throat.  His face closed in on hers, and she felt paralyzed. 

He kissed her hungrily then, to Sadie’s surprise, his tongue pushing down into her mouth with ferocity.  She pulled away and looked at him with astonishment.

“I’m sorry, Sadie,” Tobias said, catching his breath.  “I didn’t mean to be so forward.  It’s just that my instincts have gotten so… wild.   Ever since I saw you at the bar that day looking so beautiful, I’ve been trying to hold myself back from doing damage to you.”

Sadie smirked at his frank confession.  This big, strong man thinks she’s beautiful and wants her bad. 
I can deal with that
, she thought, and grabbed his hair with both hands, kissing him back with a hunger of her own.  Tobias let out a low laugh as he grabbed her ass and pulled her onto his lap.

She tugged off her summer dress over her head and let him unclasp her bra.  He immediately took her nipples into his fingers and massaged them gently, yet urgently.  She threw her head back in deep pleasure as she felt his throbbing manhood stand up underneath her. 

“Now, honey,” she said into his ear.  “Take me now.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said with an amused smile.  He all but ripped the panties off of her, picked her up by the waist, and slid her onto him.  She whimpered in utter pleasure.

Tobias guided her by her waist, up and down his body, his considerable strength easily controlling his hold on her.  It didn’t take long for Sadie to reach her climax, and she moaned in ecstasy.  Tobias followed suit soon after, letting out a low growl of satisfaction.

Panting, Sadie held on to Tobias’s muscular neck.  “That was even better than I remember,” she whispered into his ear.