Page 64

Nate

R ain lashed at the visor of my helmet, and the cold wind chilled my bones.

Gritting my teeth, I cranked the throttle on the bike and flew down the highway.

It was dangerous and reckless, but I didn’t care.

I careened around several cars and bobbed between semi-trucks as I blasted my way farther down the road.

Rain soaked down to my skin, and all I could think of was that I’d told Cameron I’d try to join the pack to be with her.

But would I? That thought still clung to my mind, like a fish hook dug in deep. Had I been honest with her, or had I lied? I didn’t know for sure.

In the past, I’d run from situations, from people, from danger.

This time, it was different. I wanted to run from feelings, from the hopes and wants that I’d begun to have when I was with Cameron.

Those were things I had no business having.

I’d spent my entire life alone, drifting from town to town and city to city.

That life had served me well, and I’d made my peace with it.

After all these years, I’d settled into a rhythm.

Bouncing around, taking assignments, making the barest contact with packs to keep from going feral, and then moving on.

Cameron had shattered that comforting shell.

Being with her had shown me what life could be like.

And I liked it. But joining a pack? The odds weren’t in my favor.

Could I survive a rejection like that? To be told I wasn’t good enough for the millionth time, all while knowing I could never be with her?

I didn’t think I could. Maybe it would be better if I just disappeared from her life and let her get on with hers.

My inner wolf gave a loud, angry growl at that thought. His will surged forward, trying to force me to turn the bike around.

“Enough,” I hissed, asserting control of myself once more.

Well, my wolf had made his opinion abundantly clear. Even if I did stay, one thing was still true: I needed a few days away to wrap my mind around it and allow Cameron to get fully admitted into the pack. I’d honor my word, but I had to lay low for a bit.

Sensing my thoughts, my inner wolf relaxed somewhat. But he was still there, ready to pounce if I got squirrely again, like some overbearing teacher looking over my shoulder to make sure I wasn’t cheating on a test.

A growl of irritation rumbled out of my throat as I swung my bike across two lanes of traffic, sliding between a couple pick-up trucks to head to the off-ramp a few kilometers ahead.

My gas tank was running low. If not for that, I would have driven forever.

The horizon wasn’t far enough away to escape the emptiness deep in my chest. How could one woman do this to me?

Dozens of women in the past hadn’t, so why was it so intense with her?

How had she managed to sink so deep into my mind so fast?

Before I could ruminate on that thought for too long, I was jolted back to reality.

The back of my bike lost traction, sending me into what should have been a death wobble.

My hands tensed around the handles, fighting for control as my bike nearly fishtailed.

The only thing that kept me from becoming a bloody bouncing ball on the highway was my skill and my shifter reflexes.

Once I got the machine under control, I lowered the speed and took my exit. This weather wasn’t safe to drive a car in, let alone on a motorcycle. I needed to find a place to hole up for a bit.

My heart thudded in my throat as I pulled into a gas station. That had been close. Too close. Not only had Cameron invaded my mind, but she was making me do things even riskier than usual. Not good. I needed to focus. Otherwise, I’d end up dead in a ditch somewhere.

I hauled my helmet off, shaking off the water, and scanned my card before jamming the gas nozzle into the gas tank.

While it filled, I glanced around, trying to get the lay of the land.

I was probably fifty kilometers from the campground where I’d left Ollie and Cam.

I’d only been here a handful of times in all my years.

Though, I did remember some of it. I was almost positive I’d stayed at the fairly cheap motel down the road a few years back.

I could wait there and head out tomorrow morning when the storm had moved through.

Bonus points because there was a shifter dive bar near the motel.

When the tank was full, I slid my helmet back on my head and followed the road. Sure enough, the motel was right where I remembered. Out front, what had once been a pool was now a dirt-filled rectangle of weeds and grass. I didn’t give a shit. All I needed was a bed and a shower. Nothing more.

“How many hours?” the decrepit old man behind the counter wheezed as I stepped in.

“One night,” I said, slapping my card down.

His eyebrows shot up. “Oh, a whole night?” he grinned, showing a mouth missing half his teeth. “A big spender. What’s the lady’s name?”

I frowned. Maybe my memory was more fuzzy than I’d thought. That, or the last time I’d been through here, I’d been too damn tired to realize what a shithole place this was.

“Just give me the key, old-timer,” I grunted.

He slid the key across the counter without another word.

Twenty minutes later, after peeling myself out of my wet clothes and showering, I dressed in dry clothes and headed to the bar next door.

I needed a fucking drink. My mind screamed at me to take a nap to erase the weariness after the battle with the feral, as well as the conversation I’d had with Cameron, but I was far too antsy for sleep.

No, a stiff drink was exactly what I needed.

Doing my best to stay out of the rain, I hurried to the bar and stepped inside, shaking the rain from my jacket. Heads turned in my direction, tilting up, and noses subtly sniffed the air. Once they’d marked me as a shifter, they all went back to their conversations and drinks.

The place was busier than I’d anticipated it to be this early in the day. Around a dozen people filled the bar. A man playing pool slammed his cue into the ball, sending a bang through the room as I strode toward the bar.

The bartender strolled over to where I’d taken a seat, all the while polishing a glass.

“What’ll it be?” he asked.

“Jack and Coke on ice. Hold the Coke and ice,” I muttered.

The bartender chuckled. “I like that. Funny guy. Be right up.”

A moment later, he placed the glass before me. Instead of slamming it back, I took a single sip and held it in my mouth, savoring the taste as well as the burn. The alcohol seeped into every crack and crevice of my mouth. I swallowed, and a line of fire trailed down my throat to my stomach.

Several men near me were giving me strange looks. I’d grown used to that over the years. The scent of a lone wolf was different from a pack wolf. It wasn’t overt, though, and it often took a few minutes for the smell to register. Obviously, these men had begun to notice.

I hoped no one would try to start anything before I had a few drinks. Beating the shit out of a guy in a shifter bar was one way to draw attention to yourself, and I really wasn’t in the mood for that. That was the last thing I needed.

After draining the whiskey, I ordered a large draught of beer, then took the frosty glass to a corner table where I could drown my sorrows in peace.

It didn’t take long for that plan to go out the window.

The group of guys playing darts kept casting their eyes toward me.

The three of them bent their heads together in whispered conversation.

This was not going how I’d wanted it to.

As I sat there, contemplating whether I should chug the beer and get out, one of them broke off and headed my way before I could make up my mind.

“You’re a lone wolf, right?” one of the men asked as he slid into the chair across from me.

I glared at him. He was a big guy with ham-sized arms, a long beard that nearly touched his stomach, and a braid of red hair going down his back. He looked like the prototypical chopper-style biker dude.

“Maybe,” I muttered, then took a drink, never taking my eyes off him.

If he had something against me, his face didn’t show it. He didn’t have that look of contempt or disgust a lot of shifters had toward lone wolves. At the back of their minds, they all thought we were only a step or two away from going feral.

He glanced over his shoulder at his friends, who’d resumed playing darts, then looked at me again. I braced myself for whatever slur, condemnation, or threat was about to come out of his mouth.

“I heard you lone wolves sometimes do jobs for people. Stuff on the down-low, you know what I mean?”

I paused, beer halfway to my lips, and frowned at him. This was not how I’d anticipated this going.

“Excuse me?” I said, setting the glass down.

“Are you looking for work? I need some help, and a lone wolf would likely be the best for the job.” He fiddled nervously with a cocktail napkin that lay on the table.

“I’ll bite.” I kept my tone noncommittal. “What’s this job?”

His eyes snapped back to mine, and a hopeful gleam shimmered deep within. “It’s my cousin. He’s gone missing. I was wondering if I could hire you to try and track him down. Lone wolves are supposed to be the best trackers.”

That was more of an urban legend among shifters. True, the few lone wolves I’d come across were good at tracking, but that was mostly because we had practiced at it. I was very good at finding people. It was the entire reason Ollie had contacted me to find the feral killer in Toronto to begin with.

“Why aren’t you going to your own pack to help?” I asked.