Ride the Wicked Woodsman (A Night Falls Alpha Werebear Shapeshifter Romance) (11 page)

So I really didn't want to go to the clubhouse yet again on the sixth morning. I didn't want to see all the hostile or indifferent faces. Didn't want to see the twitching noses and smirks because the stink of estrus still clung to my body.

"The options are I hang up my vest or you come with me," Taron argued from where he sat on his bike, engine revving as he tried, in turns, to coax or order me to climb on behind him.

I stared at him. The choices stunk. Not that I wanted him to be president of the Woodsmen, or even a member, but at that moment in time, his status was buying me a lot of protection without putting his own safety at risk.

"Look, babe, someone pisses you off, maybe it's time to push your alpha at them." He chuckled and revved the engine. "I'd love to see Joshua or Mallory piss themselves when you finally do."

I responded with a wild shake of my head, black hair flying everywhere before clinging to my face when I stopped. Telling me to push my alpha was bad advice. He'd been training me all week, trying to make up for what should have been more than a decade of developing the energy inside me. But I couldn't control it.

A lot of the time, the energy leaving me was at a "meh" level. At other times it was dangerously high, capable of permanently short-circuiting the brain of a weaker alpha or a shifter without the alpha strain.

No way was I ready to protect myself against rumor and gossip with a weapon I couldn't control.

With an exasperated growl rumbling through his chest, Taron turned the bike off, swung one long leg toward me and stood. He pulled me to him. I crumbled against his chest. His hands caressed my hips and backside. Standing on tiptoe, I curled my arms around his shoulders and kissed him on the mouth, my groin pressing against his in an invitation to forget about going to the clubhouse in favor of returning to the cabin and fucking me.

"Stop stalling, she-wolf," he growled affectionately, bending his knees and lifting me off the ground. "In a week when your heat is over--"

I grew dead in his arms, his words an admission that he no longer expected me to conceive.

"Onyx," he rasped, his hold on me tightening. "It's your first heat. You have to keep that in mind."

"Not when you're forcing me to go someplace where almost everyone will try to find ways to remind me I'm worthless and worse."

"Clover will be there while Braeden and I are busy with Church."

"You used that argument getting me outside," I said, squirming and pushing to escape the cage of his arms and get my feet back on the ground. "It's not enough to get me on the bike. She's beta and the guys at the clubhouse know they don't have a chance of her doing one of them. If they're going to disrespect their president's mate when he's not around, they are not going to shut their fucking yaps because the veep's baby sister is in the room."

"Fine," he snarled as he forcibly sat me on the back of his bike. "I'll fix it before I go into Church."

"And face another no confidence vote?"

That was the sharp edge we were balanced on. My arrival in Night Falls had turned an historically contentious pack throughout its fifty-year history into a group of shifters squaring off for internal warfare.

And our side was short on members -- at least among the shifters I had met.

For the first time in almost a week, I wanted my car back. I still had all the money I had arrived in Night Falls with and another two thousand beyond that from selling my little Honda. From the clothes I wore and the food I ate, to settling up with the Crockers for any inconvenience my stay had caused, Taron had covered everything.

"Love, give me one more day of you having to deal with my asshole pack and I'll find another male who can sit with you and Clover at Braeden's when I have to be at the clubhouse."

He drew my reluctant arms around his waist then folded my hands together before giving them a gentle squeeze.

"Please, baby."

I squeezed him back and planted a guilty kiss on his neck in acquiescence.

I didn't want to leave him. I wanted to stay forever, just like I had promised the first night he claimed me.

********************

Landa emerged from the private room where the officers of the Woodsmen MC were holding church. She had a bucket full of empty beer bottles and a wide smirk on her face.

"I fucking hate that bitch," Clover griped, her soft voice just loud enough for every shifter in the room to hear what she had said.

Considering that she was standing right next to me when she said it and we were two of only three women in the building, there could be no confusion among the surrounding males that that bitch she hated was Landa.

"How long has she...uh..." I couldn't finish my question and didn't need to. Clover's nose worked as well as my own and that of every male shifter in the room.

Landa had come into heat.

"About a day and a half," she answered before gently poking at me. "And like everything else wrong in Night Falls, this is your fault."

My head whipped in her direction to see if she was joking. She shrugged and rolled her eyes. "Some of the mated females suffer a little 'Landa anxiety.' The ones that do are in panic mode because she's in heat."

The skanky bitch in question sashayed by with a fresh bucket of ice and beer, her path headed back into the private room.

She stopped, adjusted the weight on her hip and turned to me.

"I'd ask you to help me serve," she sniped and danced a little closer. "But since the discussion is all about how you should be kicked out of the valley, that would be kinda awkward, don't you think?"

"You can stop prancing around me," I sniped back. "I already know you're in heat and I don't have a dick."

She huffed then lifted an unconcerned shoulder. "Further proof you're of absolutely no use to anyone in Night Falls."

"Don't you have a doorknob to hump or something?" Clover asked in her sweet voice.

Landa hissed, her face and upper torso lunging in Clover's direction with a flash of fangs.

My hand jerked reflexively up, my intent to shove at the she-cat's chest pre-empted by a flare of my alpha energy.

Landa jerked back, her hands and legs going slack. She hit the floor for a second, beer bottles breaking around her as she dropped the bucket. Then she was back on her feet, spitting mad and snarling at me.

"Your ass is going to be out of here any fucking day, bitch!" she threatened, foam flecking her lips. "In Night Fall, we've got bear and cat, cat and wolf...no bear and wolf. And, bitch, I'm here twenty-four seven. We'll see which one of us has a bear cub growing in her first!"

One of the male's got up from the table and tried to get between me and Landa. "That's enough, sweet butt. You can't talk to the prez's mate like that."

"Get the fuck out of my way, Mojo," she spat, clawing at the gentle-natured elk shifter who had just returned to Night Falls after taking care of some club business in Canada. "If this bitch is all that, she doesn't need you protecting her!"

"I'm protecting the club, you dumb slut," he growled. "Now get the prez and the rest of the officers their drinks while I clean this shit up."

He tried to turn her around, send her back behind the bar, but she was as hard to hold onto as any house cat. She shoved a leg between his then curled it around the back of his calf, her head stuck under his arm as she fought and seethed.

"Maybe they'll let you stay around as a sweet butt," she frothed. "Or maybe Axel or one of his boys will claim you. Hell, maybe that whole damn family will."

She tried to snake an arm around Mojo and claw at me, but he pushed a few inches backward.

I shook with the energy building up inside me and the need to release it again. That first shot had taken her to the floor. I knew the next one would fry her brain in a way that the neurons would never regenerate.

Damn, I wanted to unleash it like a bullet to the head. Sweat coated my face but I didn't dare lift my hand again to wipe at it. Anything I did might release the energy against my will.

"Skanky bitch like you wouldn't mind that one bit, would you," she yelled. "Of course, it's one dick more than you have holes, so you'll have to get your hands dirty."

"Speaking from experience?" Clover asked, all the gentleness of her usual tone replaced with the slow drip of venom.

Bending forward, she put her face dangerously close to the mad she-cat Mojo still couldn't bring under control. "Don't think for a minute, bitch, that just because they can't hear you while they're in Church your disrespect will go unnoted."

"Yeah?" Landa challenged as she stopped struggling against Mojo and straightened herself. "What, is Mallory gonna spank me? Or maybe Braeden? Do I get to take my panties off first 'cause that's just gonna make my pussy wet."

A whisper of chuckles passed through the room, reminding me of just how few allies I had in Night Falls.

"Let her go," I ordered Mojo. "She has work to do."

He obeyed, even though I had no authority within the pack and even less than none inside the clubhouse.

Landa scooped up the empty bucket from the floor and bowed sarcastically, her ass high up in the air and drawing the attention of more than a few of the males in the room.

"I'll be happy to take the big guy his drink, my lady," she said, pure evil glittering in her blue eyes. "I'll be sure to stand real close to him when I do."

********************

The return ride to the cabin was more stressful than the ride into Night Falls. If Taron knew about the scene with Landa, he gave no indication as we left the clubhouse. And I was pretty sure he knew because Clover had started texting immediately after Landa disappeared behind the closed doors where Church was being held. With the furious pace of her thumbs over the onscreen keyboard, I didn't doubt Landa's behavior was the topic of her texts. And, just like any other twenty-something whose big brother was also her very best friend, I expected Braeden was the recipient of those texts.

And if Braeden knew, could his boss really not know?

Sliding off the back of the bike before Taron had the kickstand down, I jumped onto the porch and waited for him to unlock the door. Since I couldn't go anywhere on my on, it had been deemed unnecessary to give me a key.

A growl passed my lips just as the bike's engine cut off.

"You want to tell me about it?" he asked, lowering the kickstand.

"What in particular?"

I was quickly descending into my default mode of sarcasm, the tone of my question leading the way.

"Something pissed you off while I was in Church," he answered, joining on the porch and fingering through his key ring for the one that would let us inside. "I felt you lash out with your energy."

Despite all the negative energy rolling through me at that moment, my dumb bear had a proud smile on his face, like his cub had just caught its first baseball toss.

"And you figured you'd let me handle it myself?"

"Didn't sense any fear, so, yeah."

He pushed the heavy door open and waited for me to enter. I brushed past him like he was a doorman and nothing more.

I headed straight into the kitchen and pulled a slab of roast beef from the refrigerator. Landa had cooked the food at the clubhouse, so I had suspiciously avoided it. Now my stomach was protesting all the hours that had passed without eating -- something I'd been doing almost as often as I fucked Taron.

Sighing, he locked the door then began sliding the ties into the slats.

"So, you want me to believe it's safe to leave you alone in the cabin," he started, voice fatigued. "But I'm supposed to rescue you at the clubhouse, even when you're just pissed and not afraid?"

I didn't answer, my focus directed at the knife in my hand as I ruthlessly carved up the meat.

Joining me in the kitchen area, Taron tried to put an arm around my backside. I sidestepped, stuck the knife in the sink and put away the excess roast beef. When I returned to the cutting board, he reached again and I tried to sidestep him a second time.

He growled and pulled me to him. "What's this about, Onyx? What is really bothering you?"

I didn't answer, didn't meet his gaze. His heat wanted to comfort me, but for the entire ride back to the cabin, the wind had been throwing Landa's scent in my face.

He amped up the energy flowing from him, his lips and teeth searching for my neck. His cock grew hard and traveled between us in search of his belly button.

I twisted away. "You know it's not working. There's still something wrong with me."

Taron hooked the back of my jeans and yanked me against his big body, his chest pressing at my back and his arms around me like a snug-fitting body harness.

"You're perfect," he said, trying for another kiss.

I jabbed an elbow in his ribs. The act should have been futile. He was bigger than me, stronger and more in control of his energy than I could ever imagine myself being within the next decade. But his hands fell away and disappeared into his pockets.

Turning, I met his glowering gaze with one of my own.

"You're just horny because Landa's been sticking her snatch in your face for the last five hours!"

He blinked, shook his head.

"Your mad at me because some other bitch is in heat?" The rough laugh scratching at his throat told me I was no more than a few wrong words away from pissing him off.

But "wrong" was relative. I was getting the same shit in Night Falls I'd lived more than a decade with in Champaign. And what he had just said? "Some other bitch." What the fuck did that mean, exactly?

I spun on one heel, my stomach too full of bile to eat.

"Onyx..." he started, his tone veering toward conciliatory seconds too late.

"I'm taking a shower, a long one."

I looked over my shoulder, my energy pushing at him, warning him to stay the fuck where he was because I didn't know what I would do -- what I was capable of doing -- if he came after me.

He stayed put. I stayed in the shower scrubbing at my skin until long after the water turned cold. When I came out, the lights in the cabin had been shut off, only the firelight illuminating him sitting with his eyes closed in the big rocking chair.