Page 7 of Beware of Hodags

RACHEL

Even with the windows rolled partway down, Shepard hardly has to raise his voice in conversation for me to hear him as we make our way into the heart of Rhinelander.

This is less a testament to my good hearing and more to the concise nature of his utterances.

He’s really good at asking me questions—not in that alarming way where you get nervous because someone is obviously trying to gather intel, or that way that feels like an interrogation about your values and interests so they can mirror your personality—but in the good ‘ol fashioned you are my mate, I need to know you.

We’re maybe three minutes into our trip and I’m hoping I’m sniffing him covertly enough not to get caught—my gosh, he smells good—when his phone rings. It’s mounted to the air vent to the right of his hand. It’s positioned perfectly for me to see the screen without even trying.

The contact’s name flashing on his screen is Kayla.

I go still.

When Shepard takes his eyes off the road to send me a look of apology, I stiffen.

He notices, his eyes sweeping between the road and me. “Not what you’re thinking,” he murmurs, reaching out and swiping the accept button.

“Hey, I’m driving,” he informs his caller.

“Big brother,” says Kayla, her voice squawking slightly. “I’m bored. ”

I don’t slump in relief, but I must do something because Shepard reaches out and brushes his thumb along the side of my face before gripping my neck. The squeeze is brief but I like it. A lot.

“Squirt,” he tells his phone. “You’re going to have to find someone else to entertain you. I’m going to be busy for a while.”

“It’s your day off,” she points out. Static hisses on the line. Shepard’s truck is too old for it to have connectivity; thus, this call is brought to us by the phone’s own evidently inadequate speaker.

“Yeah, but I found my girl,” he says. And the way he says my girl… the level of pride and delight in his voice—my heart inflates until it rivals a Macy’s parade balloon.

Kayla’s scoff is immediate. “You don’t have a…” She goes dead quiet. Then, “Wait. You mean… you mean you found your ma—”

“I’ll talk to you later, sis,” Shepard loudly calls over her. “I’ll try to call you in a few days. Okay?”

“No! Not okay! What’s her name? Is she with you now?” Kayla cries.

“I’m with him,” I answer. “I’m Rachel.”

Shepard shakes his head like I’ve made an error we’ll both regret.

Kayla screeches in delight. Then she makes a delighted noise of a different kind. A dark one. “Ooooooh,” she taunts. “Hi, Rachel. Finally! This is my chance to embarrass the crap out of Sheppie, hooray! Are you—”

“No,” Shepard says firmly, cutting her off. “Kayla, I’ll talk to you later. A lot later. Goodbye.”

“Awwww, maaan,” she laments. Then she heaves out a dramatic sigh. “Fiiiiiine. Goodbye.”

“Love you, kiddo. M’bye.”

“Bye,” I add.

Another loud, protesting sigh. But then Kayla’s voice brightens to something both happy and disturbingly fratricidal. “I can’t wait to tell Mom! ”

With that, Kayla hangs up.

Shepard is shaking his head.

“How old is she?” I ask.

“Fifteen.”

I bite my lips, then ask. “Sheppie?”

“My parents hate me. I mean, they say they love me but they gave me that nickname when I was two or three and it won’t die.”

Before I can ask him how old he is, he says, “I’ve never dated.”

Something in my chest tightens. It feels a little bit like relief and a lot like a happy clutch of possessiveness. But I brace myself. Just because he hasn’t dated doesn’t mean he hasn’t had sex before.

While it’s true that some shifters have been known to go many, many dry decades as virgins because they haven’t found their mate yet and they already know that no one else will satisfy—some shifters get tired of waiting.

I know for a fact that if Shepard tried to sleep with anyone, his experiences would have been lacking in emotional intimacy.

That’s just the way it is. Lackluster sex is par for the course if you’re a shifter trying to settle with someone who isn’t your mate.

We’re not built for fulfillment with anyone else.

Even knowing his attempts wouldn’t have been rewarding emotionally, I don’t want to hear about his past hookups if he’s had them.

Unaware of the turn of my thoughts, Shepard muses, “It’s going to be an adjustment, me not being at her beck and call.”

The implication I hear in his words is that he’ll be too busy with me.

I like the sound of this. A lot. I want to ask him how this development makes him feel, if he’s fighting to hide his giddiness like I am, but before I can pose the question Shepard hits his blinker and moves into a turning lane in front of a mini mall.

Rapid clicking fills the truck cab, and while we wait for traffic to clear, I lean forward to see past him .

Trig’s Ace Hardware appears to be the mall’s anchor store. A couple little shops take up the middle. And a restaurant called Tula’s Café is tucked beside what’s arguably the key tenant of the mall, Trig’s Grocery Store—or so says their storefront, which faces a packed parking lot.

“Gotta fix it,” Shepard mutters.

My gaze leaves the shops and lands on his frown as he lifts his attention from his blinker, which is madly clicking as if his truck is on speed.

Oncoming traffic finally breaks and he makes our turn. We wind into the lot and roll into a parking spot facing Tula’s.

A breeze wafts softly in our direction, gently curling in through the windows—and I suck in a breath as I catch traces of terrific smelling food.

Excited to approach the source of this olfactory goodness, I unbuckle.

“Sit tight. I’ll get your door,” Shepard says.

“Oh.” Charmed, I wait as he shoulders open his door. In a blink he’s at the passenger side, tugging my door open for me.

He even goes so far as to offer me his hand. “Milady.”

Licking my lip in anticipation, I take it. Energy charges between us, making us suck in our breath.

I kind of can’t wait for this electric newness to pass while at the same time hoping it never does. “I like this,” I marvel as I shakily step down from his truck.

“What?” he asks, looking at me.

“You making me feel special by helping me in and out of your vehicle. I didn’t think it was possible for you to get any more handsome, but here we are.”

His eyes warm at me calling him handsome.

His answering grin is crooked and sexy. “Get used to it.” And reinforcing his good manners, he places his hand at the small of my back and guides me to the door of the diner.

Holding the door for me, he ushers me inside.

Heavy wooden chairs and tables fill the floor, and upholstered leather booths line the walls.

Couples and families and perhaps groups of coworkers are clumped together, filling the place with the low hum of conversation.

A line of barstools stands in front of a counter, most of them occupied.

We step up to the hostess station but a girl in a black apron calls, “Just have a seat anywhere. Be right with you!”

Hand still settled against my lower back, Shepard steers us to a booth.

I slide in the nearest side and he takes the other, and our waitress comes right over, bearing preemptive waters. Handing us menus from her apron, she asks us if we’d like anything else to drink.

Shepard sticks with water but I splurge for a Hodag Crunch milkshake—which, according to the menu, is created fait maison using green mustard ice cream served with house-made salted pretzel praline cookies.

We both order burgers—a Poutine for Shepard (a third-pounder topped with fried potatoes and dill cheese curds ‘to be served in a Boom Lake-sized lake of gravy,’ says the menu) and a jalapeno cranberry cream cheeseburger for me (also a third pound of gloriously ground beef). I like this place already.

As our burgers sizzle on the grill and a blender grinds fiery-smelling Himalayan mustard into a preparation of frozen sugared milk, I have to discreetly wipe drool from my mouth.

Shepard smirks at me.

“How old are you?” I ask to distract him.

He blinks. “Thirty. You?”

“I’ll be twenty-seven in five months.”

His beard twitches. “So for the next four months and a day, you’re twenty-six?”

“Yeah,” I cover my eyes. “Sorry. I’m twenty-six.”

My belly flips when Shepard’s fingers close around my wrist and tug my hand away from my face. His eyes are warm as he regards me, a smile curling his lips. When he has my attention, he sits back, evidently just wanting my eyes on him.

No problem. I gaze at him happily. “Where do you work?” I ask.

“The paper mill.” He scratches along his jaw, and when he sees me watching, he allows his fingers to give his cheek’s beard hairs one more scritch before he lowers his hand. “Sorry. Itches on hot days.”

I wince for him. “I don’t know if I should tell you, but this?” I wave my hand in the direction of the windows, “is not a hot day.”

He smirks, absently tugging his sharply cut chin hairs. “It is for this far north. Normally I shave it by May, but the Lumberjack Festival has a beard contest and this year I aim to win.”

One side of my mouth rises higher with every word he speaks. “What’s a lumberjack festival?”

“It’s like…” His eyes go unfocused as he works to put his impressions into words. “It’s games and history and family fun. There’s a car show, an arts and crafts fair—stuff like that. They hold it at Hodag Park. It’s pretty neat.”

I lean nearer, trying not to leer at his jawline hedge while I imagine a contest that pits contestants who look like Shepard against each other. Rawr. “Tell me more.”