Six Months (16 page)

The kind a virtual stranger didn’t want to know about if he knew what was good for him. He was a PI; what if he turned me in for theft?

“So that’s how it is?” he said. “Your friend said he didn’t know who attacked him.”

My voice was monotone and low. “Reno, if you keep talking, I’m going to lose it. I’m going to scream at the top of my lungs and just… lose it. I’m not feeling well, and I can’t talk anymore. I can’t think anymore. Please, just leave. You don’t want to get mixed up with someone like me.”

All I could think of was Sanchez showing up in the middle of the night with a carving knife. I tried to forget all the hallucinations from the party and the fact I had been on drugs. God, what had happened to me? I used to be on the right track until my train jumped the rails and began heading toward a cliff.

“Is someone after you?” he pressed.

I rolled over with my back to him and he stood up, lingering in the doorway. “I’ll sit outside if you don’t want me in here, but I’m not leaving you alone tonight.”

He closed the curtain and went out the door. I listened to the rain hammering against the trailer for what seemed like an hour before it tapered off. Then I crawled out of bed and went into the living room. I flipped on the light and noticed my fish, Salvador, was floating at the top of his bowl. I scooped him out and held him in the palm of my hand.

“Sorry, little guy,” I said, wrapping him in a napkin and putting him in the trash.

My hair hung in my face in tousled clumps. I couldn’t even run my fingers through it. Trevor was never going to speak to me again after this.

How did he manage to walk out on his own two feet?

My eyes floated over to the sofa. His arm
had
to have been broken. His face had been beaten to a pulp, but when he walked out, the gash in his forehead was gone, and his arm was fine!

Something put a fright in me when I heard a tap against the door. Or a scrape. I peered out the window but didn’t see anyone. Then I heard a familiar whine. I unlocked the door and glanced down at a masked face.

“Hi, sweet boy. Where have you been?” I opened the door and knelt down before my wolf. My fingers brushed through his dry fur and I frowned. “Have you been sleeping under the trailer? Do you want me to fix you something to eat?”

I stood up and reached in the fridge, pulling out leftover sausages wrapped in foil. He trotted inside and shook hard, making himself right at home. I glanced down at his paws and knelt beside him with a towel, cleaning them off.

“You don’t smell like a dog,” I said, kissing him on the side of his snout. “Most dogs get that pungent smell when they’re wet, but… so weird. You just don’t smell like a dog.” My wolf smelled like early mornings in springtime.

He sat down and gobbled up the cold sausages. It gave me a chance to inspect his wound to see how it was healing. Although I couldn’t see anything through his mass of brown fur, he didn’t appear to be in any pain.

I crawled over to the door, locked it, and then wiped up the tracks of mud off the floor.

“Last chance to go back outside,” I offered. As if understanding me, he sprawled out on the tile and yawned. I touched his soft ears and looked into his dark, familiar eyes. “How come nobody loves you? It seems like someone should be out looking for you by now. You’re so handsome. Anyone ever tell you that?”

I tried to keep my focus on the wolf and not the area by the sofa. There were still spatters of blood all around and the crumpled note in the corner. Tomorrow I would clean up the mess and call Trevor to check on him. Once I locked the door, my nerves took over and I found myself wiping down the counters and picking up a few clothes. I placed a tattered blue blanket in a heaping pile by the door, and almost immediately, the wolf circled around on top of it and settled down.

Finally exhausted, I switched off the light and went back to bed, heavy with sleep. Tomorrow I would replace the money I’d taken from the business account. Then I’d contact Sanchez and pay him off before he came after me or hurt someone else.

Not long after, when I was half-asleep, the wolf crawled up in the bed beside me. I nestled my face against his silky fur and held him tight.

When I woke up, it was still dark and I felt the warmth of the wolf radiating against my back
. I blinked, allowing my eyes to focus. It wasn’t predawn like I’d first thought. The sky was overcast and dawn was full of dark, rumbling clouds.

I reached over my hip to pet my wolf and froze. My fingers met with skin—more specifically, someone’s ass. A hard ass, and as I pulled away, I felt the familiar hairs of a man’s legs and peered over my shoulder at Reno. He moaned and hooked his arm around my side, caging me against him.

It didn’t make sense!
The doors were locked and the only one in the house was the… Oh. My. God. What if last night hadn’t been a hallucination? Lexi had mentioned Shifters and Vampires conversationally and… No, this
can’t
be happening.

The idea of Reno curled up behind me—completely naked—did a number on my stomach.

A flip-flop, somersault with a twist.

Girl, are you really complaining about waking up next to a sumptuously naked man with a sinful body?
my inner voice asked with a delicate yawn.
Go back to sleep. Or better yet, don’t. Wake him up
, she said with a wicked laugh in her voice.

“How did you get in here? This can’t be real.”

“It’s real,” he murmured in that sexy don’t-wake-me-up bedroom voice against the back of my neck. “You’re staying in bed for at least three more hours.”

“Why three?”

“Because you didn’t get enough sleep.”

I pushed at his arm. “Let me up. Let go of me!”

Then his hand slid between my legs and cupped my sex, lightly stroking as he answered me in a defiant voice. “No.”

“Yes.”

Then he inched up closer behind me, as if that word incited something in him.

“No,” he said firmly.

Then his fingers worked a little harder, pressing against my panties until I found myself getting wet. He felt it. I felt it.

“
Yes
,” I said in a breathy voice.

Then everything changed between us.

Not like I had expected it to. Reno stopped and curved his arms around me so tightly that I couldn’t tell we were even separate bodies. I felt him everywhere, from the nape of my neck to the tips of my toes. Reno’s naked body against mine was insatiable.

A tremor rolled through him. Subtle, but I felt it. He lightly nipped my shoulder as if it meant something.

“Do you remember what happened last night? It wasn’t the drugs, April. We’re Shifters, and I belong to a pack of wolves.”

I laughed at first. My heart raced at the admission of what I had already suspected but couldn’t quite believe. “Don’t be absurd. That kind of thing isn’t real.”

“You saw it, and I can prove it if you still want to hide beneath a cloak of doubt. There are things in this world that are real whether you want to believe in them or not.”

Deep down, I knew it to be true. It explained something I thought I had imagined as a child—a man running toward the woods and transforming into a deer. For years, I’d assumed I was an imaginative child, but part of me knew what I had witnessed actually happened. But having seen a man transform right in front of me—I didn’t know how to process it. Maybe the drugs had given me hallucinations, but then why would Reno lie?
Perhaps he left his straightjacket at home
, my inner voice suggested.

Reno’s body felt like a hard mass of muscle behind me, and I had to confess I liked it. For the first time in a long time, someone made me feel safe and protected. Before I considered doing something I’d regret, I quickly sat up and pushed him away. Reno was as naked as a jaybird and shifted his left leg forward to hide a little bit of that fact.

Didn’t hide much.

“You’re the wolf?
My
wolf?”

Maybe I shouldn’t have said the last bit because his pupils dilated and he got that heated look in his eyes—a possessive look.

“The wolf that got hurt,” I corrected.

Too late.

Reno sat up and slid his hand around the nape of my neck and his eyes turned stony. “How do you know about my wolf getting hurt?”

“He’s been hanging around here lately. He showed up at my doorstep with a screwdriver in his leg.”

“A screwdriver,” he breathed. Reno turned his arm, looking at the scar, and that’s when I noticed it for the first time. “So that’s what it was. Do you know what happened?”

“No. I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. It’s animal crackers, Reno. You can’t be a wolf!
Can’t!
”

In a blur of motion, he shifted into a brown wolf and I flew out of the bed, stumbling to the floor and covering my mouth. The wolf barked and showed me his sharp fangs as he shook his coat. Before I could formulate a thought in my head, he shifted back.

A shrill scream flew out of my mouth and I shut my eyes, as if that would make him disappear. “This can’t be real. Can’t be.
Can’t be!
”

Reno was on all fours and quickly sat back, wrapping the sheet around his waist. My God, he looked all kinds of hot. He had strong cords of muscles in his arms, no tattoos, and defined abs like male models I’d seen on the Internet. Not that I looked up male models on the Internet, but sometimes a girl accidentally stumbles across pictures when she’s searching for… um… recipes.

“You can’t tell anyone, April. That’s the rule. No one. I’m entrusting you with a secret and it’s the kind with consequences if you break that trust. I’m not kidding around. They’ll get a Vampire to scrub your memory if you betray us, and even worse, I’ve seen humans just disappear.”

The last thing I needed in my life was more trouble. “Vampires? I’ve finally gone crazy. I’m having one of those mental breakdowns.”

“Then I’m on the crazy train with you. It’s real, April. I’d do it again, but I don’t want to frighten you.”

My hands trembled and I hugged my knees, staring apprehensively at him. “Is Lexi one of you?”

Reno rubbed his hand across his chest and sighed. “She should be the one telling you all this. Lexi just went through the change a few months ago. You were going to find out one way or another. If you two form a long-term business relationship, then you have a right to know. Austin disagrees and thinks you won’t stick around at the shop—that you’ll take off and find a new career. Is that what you plan to do?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know. Can we not talk about my career path while you’re shedding on my sheets?”

He threw his legs over the bed and planted his feet on the floor. “Is someone after you, April? I can’t help unless you talk to me, and I’m the kind of man who can help.” He stepped into a pair of boxers and crouched in front of me. “I can offer you protection,” he said, cupping my cheeks and giving me a solid stare.

“Why was your wolf hanging around my house to begin with? Isn’t it a little out of the way from where you live?”

“You’re good at evading answers with questions.” He let go and placed his hands on my knees. “I don’t know. Shifters have to share the same spirit with an animal and that means we have to let them out regularly. I usually go for runs in the wooded area on the outskirts of the city. He knows not to go near humans, but maybe he sensed you were in trouble. I don’t know why the hell he would have shown himself to you. We’re not that different from humans. Wolves form packs and live together as a family. We protect one another and get jobs to take care of our home.”

“Except you also have a tail.”

Then his eyes went molten. “You saved my wolf, April. That’s a big fucking deal in my world, and you’re not even a Shifter. That’s an act of valor that earns you respect among my kind,” he said, his eyes focusing on my mouth. “I owe you my life.”

“You need to leave, Reno. I want you out of my house. I don’t want to see you again.”

“Let’s talk about—”

“No. There’s nothing to say. You lied to me and I’m…”

“What?”

“I’m scared of what you are. Besides that, did you think it was okay to just strip out of your clothes and snuggle up in my bed? You must not think much of me. That alone gets you thrown out of my house because I can’t believe you thought I’d be down with spooning someone I barely know! And I go to
one
party, and the next thing that happens, your brother is giving me drugs. How can I trust you? You weren’t there to protect me. Then some naked guy, drugged out of his mind, decides that he wants to climb on top of me and make me his pet.”

Reno stood up in a violent motion and stalked to the side of the bed, yanking on his jeans. “I’m going to take care of
that
problem.” His voice grew cold and deadly. “And just so you know, my brother is going to get what’s coming to him, but he wouldn’t have hurt you. If you say no, he’ll back off. Didn’t look like you were saying no to Jericho,” he pointed out.

“I was stoned!” I screamed, catapulting to my feet.

He tugged on a shoe and laced it up. “Another reason his ass is in the doghouse.” Reno buckled his belt while holding his sunglasses between his teeth. “Call your friend and check on him, but be sure you’re here at five.”

“Why?”

“We have a date.”

“Oh, we do?” I made a sound with my lips like a horse and flounced into the kitchen, where I poured a glass of apple juice. “I don’t seem to remember you asking.”

“I don’t need to,” he said, coming up behind me. Then he planted a tender kiss on the back of my neck and I wilted like a willow tree. “If you can’t handle this because you think I’m a freak, then I get it. Humans aren’t able to deal with finding out there’s more to life than what they see on the news—it’s why we keep it a secret. Less trouble. But if you’re just pissed off at me for everything else that happened last night, then we’re talking. I’m not turning my back on you.”

I turned around. “You’re not a freak.” I’d never want anyone to feel that way.

His lips twitched. “Good. Five sharp. And put on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.”

Okay, a little weird. “You don’t want me dressing up?”

“You looked… damn sexy in that dress last night, April. Couldn’t take my eyes off you. But that’s you trying to look good for a bunch of strangers. I just want you to be yourself around me. Got it?”

Hmm
, my inner voice thought.
Then pink lace panties and a black bra it is!

“How come nobody knows you guys exist?” Still skeptical, I folded my arms and refused to believe any of this could be real. Perhaps if I buried my head in the sand like an ostrich, the logical side of my brain would win. I used to pretend when I was little that we lived in a world of magic, but finding out Shifters were walking around Austin, Texas? Yet how could I dismiss what I’d seen with my own eyes?

“What do you think? You’re a smart girl, April. Think about what it would mean if we came out to humans. I can’t explain
why
I exist, but here I am,” he said, briefly raising his heavy arms before dropping them again. “We live longer than humans, but we’re not immortal. I’ve served in three wars, traveled outside the country seven times, watched this world change in the blink of an eye, and I’ve witnessed a lot of senseless shit. It’s why I got into PI work. I feel like I’m on the right side of the law and I can make a difference. Whatever happened here last night had nothing to do with your friend, and I’m gonna find out the story whether you tell me the truth or not. Now get dressed because I’m taking you to work.”

“Wait, what? It’s my day off.”

“Not anymore.”

My hair looked like scrambled eggs and he wanted me to go to work on my day off?

“I don’t feel good.”

“Then you’re going to drink water and sit down a lot, but you’re going to work. That’s the Shifter way; you dust yourself off and move on.”

“I’m not a Shifter.”

Reno’s face flushed with anger. “I’m not leaving you alone knowing that asshole who almost killed your friend could be coming back for seconds. I’ll pick you up from work, so grab a change of clothes,” he said, sitting in a tiny kitchen chair that creaked beneath his weight.

I turned around and stormed down the hall.

“Princess?”