Not Bad for an Amateur (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (2 page)

Lily tried to introduce herself, but her greeting was ignored and she was ordered to get back in her car, get the hell out, and “do not come back if you know what’s good for you.” She opened her mouth to ask them to explain to her how she was supposed to live like this. The women ignored her question and advanced menacingly. She got back into her car and backed out of the parking space quickly. Those women were beautiful, and from their looks toward her, deadly.

The second foray into her research was proof that she was going the wrong way in this quest for knowledge. This time she went north into that spot between North and South Dakota that some locals still referred to as the Dakota Territories. When she checked into the motel, the manager gave her an admiring look. “You up here by yourself?” When she nodded he introduced himself as Jim Logan with a big smile and a handshake that lasted a little too long. Then he began to ask personal questions, and she told him about researching local folklore. “Oh, we have a great deal of that, missy. We have werewolves around here, according to some people. The moon will be full in a few days, Maybe you will see a few running around here.

“Then there is the spirit walkers that are said to roam the prairie at night. Those are the ghosts of people that died before their time, and now they walk the prairie at night lost, looking for the doorway to the spirit world.

“There is the legend of Willy the drunken monkey that started a fire in the local saloon, back in the early 1800s. They say he burned down half the town running from building to building with his fur on fire.

“We all kind of discount the Bigfoot sightings because of the fact that there is no real forests around here for miles. Everyone knows that Bigfoot only lives where there are forests, right?

“Maybell Walker earned the title of being a legend by wearing men’s clothes, and chewing tobacco while her husband was at home tied to the bed. She found her man with a dance hall girl before old Willy burned the place down.

“They say Maybell did some surgery on her man when he got home, and then passed out on the bed after he beat her up for embarrassing him at the saloon. She tied him to the bed and wrapped some twine around his balls just like they did the sheep. When they turned black she cut them off, and let him loose from the bed. They say from that time on she wore the pants in the family. The poor bastard shot himself in the head a few months after that.

Lily listened to the man for two hours before she finally got the keys to her rented cabin and a stern warning to stay indoors at night here in the hills. She unloaded her suitcase and drove to the local store to get a few days’ worth of groceries. There was seventy-two hours before the next full moon, and she hoped to run into someone or something that could help her learn how to cope with this affliction.

The grocery store was an old-fashioned building with a meat case and butcher behind it. She ordered three thick steaks and two whole chickens. The chickens came from the cooler, but the steaks were cut from the huge hunk of meat the butcher was already cutting up. She would not be able to get fresher meat at any time until the full moon. The fresh bratwurst looked too good to pass up, as did the small pork loin. Lily tossed in a loaf of bread and several small cans of vegetables to the cart. The two chocolate cupcakes were comfort food and absolutely necessary.

At the small checkout counter the older lady was chatty, and again Lily gave her research excuse for being here. The woman looked at the meat and then at Lily. She explained that she was on a no-carb diet, trying to lose weight. It was lame, but the lady shrugged and told Lily that she looked perfectly healthy to her.

Jim Logan was sitting on the small, covered stoop of the cabin when she pulled into her spot. He waved and waited for her until he saw her pulling grocery sacks out of the back seat then came to help her carry the heavy bags. He watched her walk in front of him while he followed with most of the bags and admired the view of her full-hipped walk. When she had the door unlocked and turned to take her bags from him, he crowded her until she let him into the cabin. Jim set the bags down on the little table and counter then decided to get to know her a bit better.

“I stopped by to see if you had everything you needed to get by, and here you are being self-sufficient, already taking things into you own little hands.” He grinned and rubbed the back of his neck. The little shewolf watched him so he preened, stretching his upper body side to side as if he was just working the kinks out, then relaxed totally and gave her what he considered his most sexy look. “Would you be kind enough to have dinner with me around six? We have a small diner that has good food and hot coffee.”

Lily wanted to go with him, but if they formed an acquaintance then he might want to spend time together while she was here, How would she explain that his joking reference to werewolves was actual fact? Providing that he didn’t run screaming, causing her to possibly consider him prey, chase him down, and rip out his throat. No, as badly as she might want to get to know him and his amazing body, there was no way she could do that to him, even if her senses and hormones hated her for it.

Lily forced a polite smile and shook her head. “I am sorry, but I have a boyfriend back in the city, and we are pretty much exclusive. I hope you don’t mind, but I have to say no. But thank you for the invite.” The look of astonishment on his face almost made her laugh. His features went from confident, sexy male to narrow-eyed, irritated male in seconds. Then he turned and stomped out the door. She expected him to slam it behind him, but he left it wide open, not bothering to look back. Lily went to close the door, and she watched Jim stomp his way towards the office. She stood there watching him in regret wondering if she would ever be able to trust herself not to hurt someone.

This solitary stuff was for the birds, no, not the damn birds, even they mated for life.

Lily put away her groceries and munched on a large smoked bratwurst while she got out her notes. If there was any hope for her to contact a werewolf clan or pack, as they were called, then she would not meet them inside her cabin. And wolves were nocturnal most of the time. So she had to be out after dark no matter how scary it might be. Not tonight, tonight she would do a topographical map search to possibly identify probable shelters and areas where packs of wolves could hunt undisturbed.

Two days later and three tankfulls of gas and still no were animals. Well, if they were any around, how would she even know? Tomorrow night she would morph into a furry creature, and she was in unknown territory. Luckily there were miles of prairie to roam. So if she did kill something, chances were it wouldn’t be a human or someone’s pet. There was not even a slim chance that she had hallucinated the first time she had changed.
No
, there was
definitely fur in my
teeth
. There was no way for the event to have been dreamed up by her choice of reading or lifestyle.

Lily was in her car sitting on the side of the road, trying to decide what she wanted to do now. There was no manual for Beginner’s Shifting 101. Her skin was itchy feeling and tingling. Last night she had taken a long hike after midnight, trying to look for signs of nocturnal life, but came back just before dawn to sleep a couple of hours, eat, and shower to drive around in her so far fruitless search.

A large green pickup pulled along beside her, and the handsome man inside of it asked if she needed help. Was every man in the vicinity huge? Geez. “No, I am fine, I stopped to text a friend, and I am just sitting here soaking up the sight of the prairie.” Lily knew it was not much of an excuse, but the man seemed to believe her and touched the brim of his cowboy hat then drove off.

Do I need help? Why, yes, sir, could you point me in the general direction of your nearest pack of werewolves please? I just want to ask a few questions about survival and other stuff. I swear I will be discreet and respectfully leave voluntarily if they decide to kick my chubby ass out of the county for trespassing on their hunting grounds
.

The conversation with herself made Lily laugh. How damn crazy would that have sounded to the man if she really asked for those directions? There was not much more she could do to prep for tomorrow night. So far she planned to eat a lot of meat before it began to get dark. Then she would open the bathroom window so she would have a way back into the little cabin the next morning. Lily had a small carry bag to stash jeans, a T-shirt, and sneakers in and planned to hide them behind the cabin, just in case she needed to get dressed in a hurry and didn’t get back inside fast enough.

When Lily got back to the motel, she went to the manager’s office to pay for the rest of the week. Jim Logan liked to talk and smiled widely when Lily told him how much she loved the area. “I plan on staying around for a couple more days. All of this wide-open space is amazing.” She wondered why his cologne seemed to make her heart thump a bit harder. Normally she could not stand a man that drenched himself in scent. Most of the commercial colognes made her sneeze. This stuff was oddly musky, almost like an old forest. Jim Logan was handsome and he smelled good, yet something about him today made her cautious. He stared at her with solemn eyes even when he was smiling.

The small gray-and-tan wolf crept along the edge of the scrub trees. The howls of nearby wolves called to her, and she wanted to join in but was cautious. She was considered a lone wolf, even a rogue if what she had read was accurate. The beauty of the night and the sounds of wolves calling to the moon made her feel alive.

She made her way higher up in the small outcropping of rocks. The scent of blood pulled at her senses. From the number of howls and growls, she assumed there had been a major kill. At the top of the hill of rock, she perched herself to observe the pack of wolves tearing at the flesh of a deer carcass. Every part of her being made her want to join in with the pack and howl as loud as she could. She must have made some sound because the largest wolf raised his bloody muzzle, scanning the area with his dark eyes shining golden in the moonlight.

He huffed deeply, and the three large wolves around him went still. The wolves involved with tearing the flesh of the deer stopped and waited for some kind of signal from the obvious leader of the pack. Alpha, he is the Alpha of the pack, she remembered. When he began to snarl while staring right at her hiding place, Lily backed away slowly until she could no longer see those yellow eyes. Then she ran as fast as her four paws could take her. There must have been seven wolves in that pack, and if she judged her welcome by the growls and snarling tones of the Alpha, there would be no welcome for a lonely runt wolf like she was. Survival of the fittest was the rule of wild animals. She felt the vibration of many paws running behind her, following her close.

She climbed another outcropping of rocks, trying to find a way to hide from the snarling wolves chasing her. When she looked over her shoulder, Lily almost fell in fright. The sight of the six huge wolves with their bloody muzzles and teeth bared only twenty feet or so behind her caused her heart to thump harder. She was trapped. The hill of rock was daunting for the little wolf, she hadn’t planned on being forced to run and hide from a pack of weres.

She spied a slender crevice in the rock face and decided to take her chances at hiding. At least she would be able to fight facing them instead of worrying about having a wolf pounce her from behind. Her pursuers had fanned out and were closing in fast surrounding her,

There was no choice left. She slid her sweating, furry body through the crevice and barely made it. She felt the scrape as she pulled her flanks inside the opening. Something wet touched under her tail, but she refused to stop moving forward. It was pitch black inside the small cavern that she found herself in. After exploring the cave until her hind leg began to drag, she collapsed in exhaustion. Her breath sounding labored in the empty room echoing off the walls, slowly returned to normal. Every muscle in her body ached from the strain of running flat out on the uneven ground, and the scrape she got while squeezing into her sanctuary burned like crazy. All she could do was to lie there and whimper in pain.

Lily fell asleep where she collapsed. When she woke a few hours later, she could see thin fingers of light through the side wall. There was a small pool of water fed from water leeching through the opposite wall. Her right hind leg still hurt, and when she licked it to clean the wound, the taste of blood reminded her that she had not eaten since before dark last night.

Standing took a lot of effort but she finally made it to the pool of clear water. After drinking her fill Lily limped back to the opening where she had slipped inside this small haven. She peeked outside after smelling the air cautiously. Down the hill to the right she spied them sitting under a scrub tree. No one was looking her way, and she only saw four wolves sitting in the shade. At least two of them were still around somewhere close. She could smell two distinct scents and a vague whiff of another one. So there were probably two right outside the opening and one above on top of the hill. She backed away from the crevice and went back to her cavern, deeper into the rock formation.

It rained for two days. Today Lily watched six of the seven wolves transform into their human forms. The sight was awesome. A man was standing by a white Escalade waiting for the others. He must have gone to get the SUV earlier. From what Lily could see, every man climbing into the vehicle was big. She studied each man, knowing her life might depend on it. The last man to get into the vehicle stunned her. The man was Jim, the manager of the cabins where she was staying. He looked straight up towards the rock. She might be mistaken, but the look of regret on his face made her feel a little better.