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Markus thought about what he’d seen in those two seconds before he’d turned away and ran to hide in the bathroom like a teenage girl or something.

The hair hadn’t been blond, not really, but it wasn’t dark enough to be considered brown. Even a light brown. It was the color of dark sand, with a few darker strands streaking the hair, but it seemed more natural somehow. It was like honey. As stupid and cliché a description as that sounded, that was the only thing he could call it.

Not that Markus was an expert in hair care or anything. He’d never been to a barber shop before, and every time he’d had a haircut, it had been done by Old Maggie, the pack’s wise woman.

He needed a haircut right now. His darker hair was disheveled and didn’t look like it was done well, or on purpose, like the hair of the stranger in the booth.

He was simply perfect. If there was one thing in the world that would help Markus overcome his grief over losing John, it would be having the man sitting out there, looking through his menu.

Markus needed to clean up first. Looking himself over in the

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mirror one last time, he wanted to groan. He looked like the fucking  undead or something.

He splashed cold water over his face, and then did it again three  more times, rubbing the cold water into his eyes especially. He dried  his face off and combed his fingers through his hair, using the water  to try to style it to his liking.

He still looked like shit, but it was the difference of comparing  someone who looked like the walking dead to someone who just  looked like they woke up on the wrong side of the bed. It was still  pretty noticeable.

With nothing else going for him, Markus took in a deep breath. If  he, by some miracle, managed to convince the guy out there to let  Markus fuck him, he would be more than happy.

For a time.

If Markus was turned down, well, it wasn’t like he hadn’t seen it

coming. He could always comfort himself by saying that he’d at least  tried for something else when everything seemed so shitty lately.

He stepped out of the bathroom.

The gorgeous stranger was still in his booth. The only difference  was that he now had a cold beer beside him. He also had a book in his

hand, some big and heavy tome that looked like it came from a

classroom.

He looked young, around Markus’s age at twenty-five or so.  Maybe he was a student or perhaps a teacher’s assistant.

Suddenly those glasses on his face became a whole lot sexier.

Markus walked by the booth, pretending he didn’t care about the man’s presence at all. He kept his back straight and his eyes firmly ahead, but he was still able to notice the way the man’s head turned just barely when Markus passed him by, and the scent that came from him was all wanting lust.

He could barely contain his excitement when he made it back to his barstool. His body practically trembled with desire.

Holy shit, was that man digging him, too? Markus had hoped for

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this and everything, but he hadn’t expected it would be so easy as

that.

He thought he was going to have to work for it at the very least.

Markus half turned in his seat, looking back at the handsome professor as he sat there reading his book with a straight back.

His eyes slowly turned to the side, though his head didn’t move.

Their eyes met, and Markus smiled at him. The man’s eyes snapped back to his book, and the blush that bloomed over his cheeks was adorable.

For whatever reason, despite how lousy Markus knew that he looked, this guy was still into him.

He was totally going for this.

Markus took his beer, turned, and slid into the booth at the

stranger’s table, just across from him.

He was still looking at Markus with that partly curious, partly  wanting, and partly worried look on his face.

Markus cleared his throat and put out his hand. “Markus Lane,  don’t think I’ve ever seen you around here before.”

The man with the face a Hollywood actor would pay, or kill, to  have smiled and reached his hand across the table and grasped  Markus’s.

“Lance Malloy, and I’m just passing through.”

Markus pushed back the stab of disappointment he felt. Well,  whatever, most people who came to a town this size were just passing  through anyway. It wasn’t like there was a very big reason to settle  down in a one-street town like Brampton. He was probably off to visit  family somewhere several hours away.

If he was just stopping by for lunch and heading out in a matter of  minutes, then Markus’s chances of getting this man naked had just  shot down to practically nothing. There was no telling with some  people, really, but the man sitting across from Markus, Lance Malloy,  didn’t look like the type who would go for a quickie with a stranger in  the bathroom of the only restaurant in town.

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“I mean, I’m here for a couple of days, but I won’t be staying,”  Lance said, adjusting the glasses on his nose.

That little move actually made Markus’s cock twitch. He’d never  known before now how sexy that looked.

Then his words registered, and Markus’s hopes lifted once more  as his odds shot up. That was just fine. It wasn’t long term or  anything, but Markus wasn’t sure if he wanted to jump into a  relationship while he was nursing his stupid broken heart. Lance was  good looking, and clearly he was interested in Markus.

A fling with a stranger would be just the sort of thing to make  Markus feel better.

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Chapter Two

“How long are you in town for?” Markus tried to see what it was  that Lance was reading, but the other man swiftly closed his books  and put them away in a messenger bag beside him.

Embarrassment flooded Markus’s cheeks. “Sorry. I wasn’t trying  to pry or anything.”

“Oh, don’t worry. It wasn’t that. I just always thought it was rude  to have your things on the table while having company.”

Markus grinned at him, and just then the bartender came over with  a veggie burger plate and side salad and set it down in front of Lance.

“Vegetarian?” Markus asked, suddenly worried that Lance  wouldn’t approve of his mostly protein diet, which was stupid  because Markus wasn’t planning on dating the guy or anything.

Just flirting with him and fucking him.

Lance gave a halfhearted shrug. “I try to eat healthy whenever I  can. I’ll do this for about a week before I start to miss real burgers and  meat-lover’s pizza too much. Then I’ll binge.”

Markus could handle that. “In that case, would you mind if I  joined you for lunch?”

He was supposed to be back at the pack by now. He’d been gone  for longer than the designated time a were was allowed to be around  other humans, but hey, he was behaving himself, kind of.

Lance’s blue eyes lighting up was just the sort of good sign that  Markus wanted to see, and he could smell the mild lust wafting from  the man.

It would be coming off him in waves before they left the

restaurant if Markus had any say in it.

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“No, not at all. Actually, it’s really nice to be able to talk to  someone local. I don’t feel like such an outsider with you sitting with  me.”

Neither do I.
 
Markus shook away the thought. Weird.

He called the bartender back over, shoving away the offer for another beer in favor of a club sandwich with extra turkey, triple extra bacon, and extra cheese.

Lance’s jaw just about hit the table. Markus laughed at him.

“How do you—” Lance shifted in his seat to get a better look at  Markus’s body, as if he could have missed it or something. Markus loved the way the other man’s eyes lingered, and he couldn’t wait to get naked in front of him. “You must have a killer workout.”

Some people might consider shifting into a wolf, running through the woods, and hunting down buck and other game to be a pretty good work out.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Markus said vaguely. He was going to need  some kind of distraction until the food got here, which he was only  using as another distraction for when he finally got inside the man  across from him.

“So, what do you do for a living?”

* * * *

It was good conversation. Really, Markus had been surprised, and then the food came quickly, allowing him to eat it at roughly the same time as his dinner partner, and they both managed to finish up before the supper rush came in, which Lance was eager to avoid, for whatever reason.

The whole time, Markus had covertly flirted with the handsome human across from him, and when Lance began to shyly return his advances, then they got to be a little more obvious and open to each other.

It wasn’t like there had been anyone in the restaurant when they

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spoke to each other anyway, so aside from when the bartender came  over to make his rounds, they were able to act as though they had  been talking and hinting in the privacy of one of their homes.

The only thing Lance had been vague about was his occupation,  but Markus wasn’t too worried about that. The guy didn’t give off the  vibe that he was a hunter, and not everyone wanted to talk about what  they did for a living anyway. It kind of made it easier for Markus to  avoid the natural follow-up question of,
 
I do this, what do you do for  a living?

It was hard for a werewolf to hold a steady job, and he didn’t  much feel like lying to the guy.

All in all, despite how shitty everything had felt that morning,  Markus felt pretty damn good as he walked out of the restaurant with  Lance beside him.

His cock was throbbing as he watched the other man walk. He tried to watch, anyway. It was difficult to do something like that without the other man noticing, and Markus really didn’t want to fuck this up.

The other man still carried his messenger bag over one shoulder and had declined when Markus had offered to carry it.

It took Markus a second to note that they weren’t walking to a vehicle parked in the parking lot. “Where’s your car?”

“I walked here from the motel. I figured the town is small enough that I could do that and still make it to the trails.”

That made Markus stop. “The trails?”

Lance turned to look at him. “Yeah, you know, for hiking and stuff.”

Suddenly Markus had an idea. This sort of thing happened a couple times out of the year. The area was beautiful and filled with thick forest and the occasional lake. Nature lovers, and hunters, came

here to get away from the city. Clearly that was what was up with

Lance. He was on a vacation or something.

“Are you looking for a guide? I know the area pretty well. I could

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show you a lot of good places. Most people don’t even know about  them. They’re completely private.”

He’s purposely mentioned the last part, keeping his eyes on  Lance’s face.

His expression was interested, but a kind of neutral interest. Had  Markus not been able to hear the way his heartbeat picked up, or smell the musk rolling off the man, he wouldn’t have known if Lance was more interested in the chance to see some interesting scenery or be alone on it with the powerful, sexual magnet that Markus had suddenly become.

“Really? Should I go and grab some water bottles? Or can we go now?”

Markus looked over the other man, getting impatient as all hell.  He was wearing hiking boots, and it was only about a ten-minute walk to the nearest pond.

That pond on pack land wasn’t the only one in the area that was secluded and beautiful.

“We can definitely go right now,” Markus said, and when he put

his hand over Lance’s shoulder, the other man seemed content to be

led away.

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Chapter Three

Lance never considered himself to be the kind of person to just do something like this. Sure, there had been a few kinky, experimental things in college, but after that, his need for some sexual adventure had dwindled.

His need for sex had shrunk to practically zero after he’d broken things off with his partner. Getting out of a five-year relationship would do that, he was told.

Then his eyes had landed on the god sitting at the bar, and then that man had introduced himself, shared a lunch with him, made it

plainly obvious he was interested, and now they were walking  through the slim trail in the woods, brushing branches out of the way  as they went, toward a secluded spot that Lance was positive he  wouldn’t be paying any attention to.