Three Shifters for Sarah (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (5 page)

“That really looks bad. You should have it looked at.”

“Oh, I’m not worried. It’ll heal.” Sarah winced. Ruth had dabbed her napkin in her ice water and was washing off the wound.

But Sarah didn’t waste a second thought on the mark on her shoulder. It was just a dumb reminder of a very irresponsible act. No permanent harm had been done, and she had lived through the experience and hopefully was a little wiser for it.

The wound on her shoulder would heal, but how about the one in her heart? For a second Sarah found herself wishing she was riding across the range with her three cowboys at her side and not stuck in the claustrophobic confines of the city.

But her time with them was over. She told herself she had to forget.

Ryan lifted a hay bale in his powerful arms and carried it back into the stables for the horses’ morning feeding. This was not the type of work an Alpha normally did, but Ryan did not mind. The hard work kept his mind off recent painful events and in a way was also penance of his sins.

There was nowhere to direct his anger except back at himself. He felt shame at the way he had behaved with Sarah. His behavior with her had been more like an adolescent than a pack Alpha. Now any chance of a future he might have had with her was ruined. He’d have to live with that, but he had also spoiled all hope his two Betas might have had with her, and that was almost too much to bear. But the thing that drove his mind over the top with rage and humiliation was the knowledge he had hurt Sarah, the woman he had come to care for.

The woman he would never see again.

“I thought I would find you here.” TJ had been waiting for Ryan in the back of the stable.

Ryan gave his young Beta a polite nod but did not speak as he hustled past him with the hay bale in tow.

TJ grabbed him by the shoulder, causing him to drop the hay on the floor. He looked like he wanted to punch him in the face. If he had tried Ryan wouldn’t have stopped him. “Goddamn it, man! You’re our leader, why don’t you start leading?”

“Manual labor is good for a man. You should try some yourself instead of moping around the yard all day.”

“It’s been six days,” TJ reminded him.

Ryan opened the first stall. A big bay horse pranced out and went straight for the hay bale on the floor. Ryan went to the next stall and freed that horse for breakfast as well. He didn’t look back at TJ or answer him. There was nothing left to say.

“Sarah has been gone for six days, and you’re not going to do anything to get her back?” TJ persisted.

“Look, TJ, she wasn’t a prisoner here. She had every right to leave, and after what she saw I can’t say I blame her.”

Ryan kept his voice calm as he patted one of the horses between the eyes, but inside felt anything but calm. So far he had not told either of his Betas that he had mated with Sarah. They knew the two of them had sex, but they thought it ended there. They didn’t know that she now wore his mating mark, a mark he had placed on her in the heat of passion and without her consent.

“Don’t you love her?” TJ demanded.

“I love her too much to go after her and foist any more trouble on her.” Ryan realized he had already hurt Sarah once. He didn’t think he could trust himself around her again. The problem was not a lack of love for her. The problem was he loved her too much.

“But she’s your mate as well as mine and Lance’s. What are you going to do about the future?”

“There’s nothing we can do.” Ryan was resigned. “She’s a human and not a shifter. We knew the odds were stacked against us when we first met her. To let her go back to her own kind is the right thing to do.”

TJ look staggered by his words as if he had just been punched in the gut. “But I don’t want to lose her,” the young Beta proclaimed.

“I’m sorry, TJ.” Ryan took the young man in a bear hug. He had screwed up his life and felt he owed him a lot more than an apology or a hug, but didn’t know what else he could do. “Perhaps you and Lance will find other women someday.”

“You know how hard it is to find a true mate like Sarah was for us.”

Ryan shrugged in frustration. “If you don’t find an actual soul mate, then you should find ordinary women with nice round butts and have plenty of sex and lots of pups with them.”

“We already found a girl with the cutest butt I ever did see. I’m pretty sure she would have given us some fine pups and you let her get away.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What about you?” TJ asked him. “Are you going to live the rest of your life like a monk?”

“If you mean without a woman the answer is yes. I think I will. Sarah was my one woman, my mate. She’s gone now, and I’ll live alone. But I’m the pack Alpha, and I have other things to worry about.”

“Well I can’t live celibate. I need sex, man. But I don’t want any woman but Sarah.”

“Forget about her. She’s gone. Move on.”

TJ stormed past him in a fit of anger. “I won’t give up so easy, and if you’re not going to do something then I will.”

“Wait a minute, TJ,” Ryan halted his Beta with a hard voice. “I am still the Alpha here, and I’m telling you as your Alpha you won’t do anything to bother that woman. We’ve caused her enough pain and I won’t let her suffer anymore. Do you understand?”

TJ started to come back with a rage-induced retort. Ryan stared him down, and TJ kept his silence.

“Sarah has a life of her own back in the city. She’s probably already started to get on with that life and forgotten about us. We’d do well to get on with our lives out here and forget about her.”

“I’ve never disobeyed you, Ryan.” TJ was breathing hard, holding back his emotion.

“I expect this won’t be the first time. Now get out of here and let me get back to work.”

* * * *

But there was a first time for everything, TJ reasoned as he shoved clothes into his duffel bag. He would pack light. If he needed to stay longer in the city, he could always buy what he needed while he was there.

This time around he was going to blatantly defy Ryan. Later on he might be in trouble, but he would accept whatever the consequences were for his actions, and already he had made a flight reservation for that afternoon.

He owned a large home that he had built himself next to Lance’s house. Not knowing how long he would be gone, he made sure it was locked up tighter than a drum before he pulled out of the drive in his truck.

“You going into town, TJ?” Harry, an old guy that was a retired foreman of the ranch and still had a home there, called inside the open window of his truck and forced him to a stop.

“Got some business to take care of, Harry,” TJ replied to him and tipped his hat out of respect to Harry’s advanced years.

Harry came up to the window of the idling vehicle and handed TJ a slip of paper. “Will you get my wife’s blood pressure medication filled at the pharmacy when you’re in town?”

Always trying to lend a helping hand, TJ would assist the older people of the pack to get their medication or make sure they got out to visit their grandchildren, and though he was the youngest Beta in the pack’s recent history, he was by far their favorite.

TJ wanted to help the old guy, but he had to shake his head. This time he just couldn’t. “Sorry, Harry. Lance is up in the north pasture working with some of the new broncos. Ask him to make a trip for you. I know he’ll be happy to help.”

Old Harry looked in the back at the hastily thrown together duffel. “You going someplace, TJ?” he asked suspiciously.

“I reckon I’ll be gone for a spell, Harry,” TJ told him honestly.

“This have something to do with a woman?”

“Everything to do with one.” A smile came to TJ with a faraway look out of his eyes. “Only she isn’t just any woman. She’s the most beautiful woman in the world, and I’m going up to the city to claim her as mine.”

A worry flickered briefly through TJ’s head. He had spied the distant forms of Ryan and Lance off on the flats of the north pasture. Each of them was mounted and riding hard, kicking up prairie dust behind them, but fortunately they were about half a mile away and could not see him. That meant TJ would get a head start which was all he needed.

“Will you do something for me, Harry?” TJ asked.

Harry gave a toothless grin and patted him on the shoulder. “You know you don’t have to ask, young fellow. Name it and I’ll do it.”

“If anyone asks, you didn’t see me today.”

Old Harry looked out into the pasture at the tiny dots that were the forms of Ryan and Lance galloping past the sage brush. Then he looked back inside the cab of the truck to TJ and gave a nod of understanding.

“Go on and get out of here, boy. I don’t rightly recall having seen you since Sunday.”

TJ slapped the old man on the shoulder. “You’re a friend, Harry,” he told him.

“Go get that lady of yours.”

TJ gunned his truck and put the Hemi V8 engine into drive. “I’m fixing to do just that, Harry.” His tires throwing back gravel and dirt, TJ headed for the regional airport at top speed, his jaw set and a determined squint out of his eyes.

Finances were not a problem for TJ. Though still shy of thirty and rough around the edges, both he and Lance had inherited a sizable estate from their parents. The role of Beta for the pack did not pay anything and carried with it responsibility and extra work. But joint ownership of the Circle T had proved to be quite lucrative, and TJ found he was financially independent at a young age.

So when he got to the airport and found the flight to Chicago where he would make his connection to New York had already departed for the day, he was not deterred. There were plenty of little puddle-jumper planes parked in hangers around the taxi way. All he had to do was find a pilot and he would be in business.

“You see I already have reservations out of Chicago this afternoon,” TJ explained in his calm, laid-back way to the first pilot he met. “I’ve got to be out there by four o’clock their time to make my flight to New York City.”

“Sorry, fellow. I can’t take you all the way to Chicago this afternoon.”

“Could I get you to change your mind for…?” TJ named an obscene figure to the pilot. But hell, it was just money, and what TJ was chasing was a whole lot more important.

The pilot did a double take at the suggested sum. “You on the up and up about this, mister?”

Although TJ had several gold cards and a sizable bank account he didn’t like checks or credit. He preferred old-fashioned hard cash, and now he took the wallet from his jeans and began counting out hundred-dollar bills.

The pilot’s mouth started to water and he smiled. “You got yourself a deal, mister.”

“Oh and one other thing.” TJ held him back. “You know the airport in Chicago?”

“I know both of them. Why?”

“I ain’t never been there before. There’s an extra hundred in it for you if you make sure I get on the right flight.”

“You got it.” The pilot smiled as he counted his money. “You ever flown before, cowboy?”

TJ gave a grin as wide as the Great Plains. “Well hell, I figure there’s a first time for everything.”

Ryan was in the shower. After a hot, sweaty day spent riding horses on the range, the cool water pouring across his muscles was a welcome relief. His cock was rock hard, red, angry, and downright uncomfortable. Ignoring it wasn’t an option. Ryan wondered if he should take up masturbating again, a habit he had not indulged in since he was a boy. Hell, if he wasn’t going to fuck any more women, and he sure didn’t feel like it with Sarah out of his life, he had to get relief somehow.

He turned off the spray and leaned against the tile wall. There was so much regret welling inside him for what he had done to Sarah. What must she be feeling about now with his mark carved into her shoulder? And she didn’t even know what the damn thing was.

The animal side of his nature had won out the night he had slept with her. He had taken his woman, used her for his pleasure, marked her, and left her alone. She deserved better and a part of him was happy she had the strength to leave while she still could. From this point on he would never pursue her again. His love for her would keep him from hurting her and the only way to see to that would be to utterly leave her alone.

Lance and TJ had both been cheated out of a chance to be happy with Sarah and make her happy in return. They were good men and would have done right by her. Ryan condemned himself. Because of his actions they would never get the opportunity to find out if they would have clicked with her or not. Now she was irretrievably lost to all three of them.

His body was dripping wet, and his skin felt warped from the long shower as he stepped onto the mat of his bathroom floor.

Living out in the country, they didn’t stand on formality, and Ryan never bothered locking the front door to his home. Now he heard someone walking back through his house and down the hallway outside, but his shifter senses told him to relax, it was a friend.

Lance stood out in the hall leaning against the wall waiting for him as he wrapped a towel around his waist and stepped out of the bathroom.

“You look like you’ve got bad news for me,” Ryan said after reading the grim expression on his Beta’s face.