Talon (Rise of the Pride, Book 1) (2 page)

The bar was mostly quiet. Liberty wiped down
the old wooden bar top with a fresh rag out of the bucket of clean,
sanitizing solution. The television was on above her head. The news
had been focused on their breaking story for a week now.

The fairytales from childhood nursery rhymes
had come true. Paranormal stories of men who shifted into animals
were no longer fiction.

It was real. It’d been real for as long as
the Earth had orbited around the sun.

One of her waitresses was sitting on a
barstool at the end of the bar, totally engrossed in the newscast.
A pair of men had been filmed shifting into sleek, black panthers
at the edge of a wooded area just south of town not too far from
her bar. Once the news had blasted the information all over the
world, a local man had stepped forward claiming the
unthinkable.

Some of those men had been regulars, and
Liberty had never noticed anything out of the ordinary about them.
They all seemed so…normal. Well, that was a lie. None of those men
were anywhere near normal looking. They all were larger than the
average man that stepped foot into her little business. Each one
was tall, muscular. Their shoulders were wide, arms rippling with
muscles that seemed to overlap themselves. They moved with grace
despite their size. Every woman in the room noticed them when they
took their usual seats in the back corner, ordering their drinks
and food with no problems. Each and every one of the men that
entered was beyond handsome. Sexual prowess oozed off of them
whenever they were around. Even Liberty had to admit that they had
thrown her hormones into overdrive a time or two.

“I still can’t believe this is happening,”
Nicole fretted. She leaned back, her blonde hair falling in
ringlets down her back. “And in our little town! Did you know that
I saw several news vans on my way in earlier?”

“I’ve heard the media is going crazy over all
of this,” she admitted.

Liberty shot a quick look at the screen,
averting her eyes when the man claiming to be the pride’s alpha
started talking about his secret. She didn’t have to even look at
the screen to know who it was, because she would’ve known his voice
anywhere.

Talon Shaw was a regular in her bar. He and
his buddies could be found there every Friday and Saturday night,
staying until last call, and sometimes they came in for lunch
during the week. They’d interacted only few times in the last two
years that she’d been running
The Deuce
, and he’d always
seemed to be aware of everything that went on in the bar. Oh, she’d
noticed how he watched her move around, helping wait tables and
delivering food when the place became busy during rush hours. She’d
be lying if she said that she hadn’t watched him from the corner of
her eye whenever he walked in the door, too.

The man who was the leader of these shifters
was
huge
. His dark hair was short cropped, but on the top of
his head his hair was kept a little longer. That sexy length
obscured one of his icy blue eyes, making him look dangerous. His
arms were so large that she was sure his shirt would split at the
seams if he sneezed. His skin appeared to be soft as satin, and a
few times, Liberty would have a full bodied shiver attack when
she’d thought about the possibility of those arms brushing against
hers by accident. She honestly didn’t think she’d survive that much
stimulus…if she’d ever get that close to the man.

“Are you even watching this?” Nicole called
out.

“No,” Liberty replied, brushing her long,
chocolate-brown hair behind her ear. “It’s none of my
business.”

“Yes, it is,” Nicole insisted. “Do you
realize these guys have been here every weekend? It is your
business, Liberty. Are you going to let these freaks back in the
bar tonight when they show up?”

“Now hold on one damn minute,” Liberty
yelled. “They are as welcome here as anyone else.”

“Are you serious?” she scoffed, throwing her
hands in the air. “I can’t believe this!”

“I’m going to only say this once, Nicole,”
Liberty said, dropping her rag in the bucket and making her way to
the end of the bar. “This is
my
bar and
I
will decide
who is welcome or not. If these guys come in here, you are to treat
them like any other paying customer. Got me?”

“Yes…yes, ma’am,” Nicole answered in
defeat.

“Now, go prep for the dinner rush,” Liberty
ordered, flipping off the television. “This place should start
filling up within the hour, and I think maybe I need to have a
meeting with everyone before we get started tonight.”

She watched Nicole hop off the barstool,
grabbing her order pad as she walked into the backroom. The last
thing she needed was for her waitresses to be mean or hateful to
the group of men…no, the
panthers
that spent time in her
bar.

She busied herself with making sure all of
the coolers were stocked with beer bottles covered with ice. She
stacked cups at each station behind the bar and refilled the napkin
and straw caddies for the bartenders who’d be arriving soon.
Looking up into the mirror on the back wall, she took a deep breath
and continued to work. She didn’t need to worry about the news, she
had to run the bar and keep her staff from quitting out of fear of
the shifters.

It was thirty minutes before the employees
started trickling in for their shift. Moe, the cook, was the first
to arrive, stopping to kiss Liberty’s cheek. “Good evening,
doll.”

“Hey, Moe,” she greeted. Moe had been around
since before she took over the place.
The Deuce
had been in
her family for two generations. Her father had left the bar to her
when he died from a sudden heart attack just over two years ago.
Her mother and grandparents had passed several years prior in a
fatal car accident, leaving her younger sister as the only living
relative in the area.

The Deuce
was located at the very
outskirts of the town of Olive Branch, in northern Mississippi. The
town was just over the state line from Tennessee and the city of
Memphis. Liberty loved her town, never finding the appeal of moving
away. The people there were friendly, and having the oldest, most
popular bar in town kept her busier than she’d ever thought
possible.

Moe tied on his apron, covering his rounded
belly. He was in his late fifties and had already started shaving
his head to hide the fact that his hair was now completely white.
“Before you start prep, I need to have a meeting with
everyone.”

“Sure, darlin’,” he drawled in his southern
accent.

The two bartenders and three extra waitresses
gathered around Moe, waiting for Liberty to make her speech. Her
sister, and co-owner of the bar, stood off to the side, waiting to
hear what Liberty had to say.

“I’m going to make this short and sweet,” she
began, letting her eyes fall on each and every one of her
employees. “We’ve all seen the news and know that it centers around
some of our customers. We will treat everyone that walks through
that door with respect. A lot of things are going on right now, and
we need to show that our customers are our top priority. These men,
who’ve been coming here for a while now, are still just like all of
us. They come in here to eat food and drink beer. I want you to
treat them as if you’d never heard about their story. This is all I
ask of you. If you have any problems, and I mean
any
, you
come get me. Okay?”

Everyone nodded or spoke their understanding,
most of them heading off to their stations. The two bartenders,
Cole Bryant and Luke Everett, squeezed Liberty’s shoulder as they
passed, silently giving her their support. Nicole didn’t show any
emotions as she headed off to the backroom for more supplies. Mary
Grace Browning and Della Carter smiled warmly and started turning
on lights over the pool tables in the back of the bar.

“Sis?” Nova, Liberty’s baby sister, smiled,
wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “That’s awesome that you are
willing to treat those men just like anyone else.”

“Why do you say that?” Liberty frowned.

“People around town are a little spooked.”
She shrugged. “I don’t really see a problem with what they are.
It’s not like they’ve ever caused any trouble in here or in
town.”

“Exactly!” Liberty smiled, ruffling her
sister’s long, brown hair. Nova giggled and swatted at her hand,
shaking her head as she left to get ready for the dinner crowd.

Liberty and Nova were just three years apart
in age. Nova had just turned twenty one a few months ago and
Liberty’s birthday had just passed. Being a bar owner at the age of
twenty four was not something she’d imagined for herself at this
age. She’d hoped to go to college, and had taken a few classes, but
after her father’s death, she had to step up and take over the bar
or it would’ve been lost to the bank.
The Deuce
meant too
much to her and her sister to let it go. It was one of the hardest
decisions she’d had to make as an adult, but she could honestly say
that it’d been the best.

As the bar began to fill up, Liberty spent
time doing paperwork so that she could be on the floor when the
crowd really got going around eight o’clock. Her office was in the
back of the building, down the hallway from the bathrooms and a
small employee breakroom. She’d recently painted the walls a warm
green that reminded her of the woods behind her home. The old oak
desk that had belonged to her father was the main focal point in
the room. His picture still hung on the wall by the file cabinets
to her right. When she felt like she couldn’t succeed in the
business, all she had to do was look up at his smiling face and it
would remind her of the sacrifices he’d made to keep this place
running smoothly. She would touch his portrait and gain some unseen
strength. Sometimes, she felt like he was there watching over her
and Nova, ensuring she didn’t fail. He had loved this bar, and
Liberty would keep
The Deuce
running as long as she had air
in her lungs and love in her heart.

The building itself was an old log home that
had been transformed into a bar. The clatter of booted feet walking
heavy across the hardwood floors was a sound that comforted her. So
was the glow from the neon lights in the windows that faced the two
lane highway that ran in front of the place.

Leaving the office, she checked the
bathrooms, refilling the paper towel dispenser in the women’s room.
She knocked on the men’s room door and yelled, “Management! Is
there anyone in there?”

“I got it, Liberty,” Cole announced as he
came around the corner. “Go on out front and cover the bar for me.
I’ll be right out.”

“Ah, thanks, Cole.” She smiled, handing him a
rag and a bottle of cleaner. He nodded and ducked into the men’s
room without another word.

The hallway by the bathrooms dead ended into
another short hallway. Turning left would take you into the kitchen
and turning right dumped you out into the bar area. She quickly
checked on Moe in the kitchen but didn’t say anything to the older
man. He was busy plating orders and setting them in the window for
the waitresses to deliver to the tables.

Liberty gasped as she turned the corner and
almost plowed right into her sister. “Nova! Where’s the fire,
girl?”

“Sorry,” Nova fidgeted, her face flushed.
“They’re here.”

“Who’s here?” she questioned.

“The cats,” Nova giggled, but zipped her lip
when Liberty scowled at her. “Sorry, Talon Shaw and his crew are
here and everyone is staring at them.”

“Why is your face so red? Did anything
happen?” Liberty asked.

“No,” Nova replied, then smiled. “Um, one of
them was flirting with me.”

“Girl,” Liberty groaned. “Stay away from
those boys. In fact, stay away from all boys. They’re nothing but
trouble. Now, go wait your tables.”

“Okay,” she answered, bouncing off to the
kitchen to grab her orders. At twenty-one, her sister was
strikingly beautiful and single. That was a bad combination.

Liberty shook her head and made her way out
to the bar, glancing over at the booth in the back corner. Talon
and his brother, Noah, sat with four other men, all talking and
laughing amongst themselves.

As if she’d called out, Talon’s head snapped
around, their eyes locking from across the room. His face was
momentarily cast in a shadow from the dim lights; that was until
his head tilted to the side curiously. Liberty was rooted to her
spot as Talon’s ice blue eyes darkened. A hint of yellow seeped
into them, and as quickly as she blinked, the color was gone and so
was the hold he had over her body. His brother nudged him, causing
the alpha to turn his head, but not before the corner of his lip
lifted into a naughty smirk.

“Can you take these drinks over to our local
celebrities?” Luke asked, setting another round of beers on a
tray.

“Sure,” she nodded, sliding the tray onto the
flat of her hand that was suddenly shaky.

As she approached the table, she watched
Talon’s back stiffen. His head raised slightly and his shoulders
seemed to double in size as he breathed deeply. Two of the men
lifted their gazes and smiled. Talon lowered his head and looked up
at her through thick, dark lashes.

“Gentlemen,” Liberty greeted, setting a fresh
bottle in front of each man.

“Thank you,” Talon said, his voice a deep
timbre. In fact, she could’ve sworn she heard a slight rumble
coming from his chest, but she could’ve been mistaken too. The
music was so loud that it may have been a part of the song that was
playing over the speakers.

“Is there anything else I can get you?” she
asked, taking the empty bottles off of their table.

“Yes, darlin’,” a slurred voice said from
behind her. “You can tell these freaks they’re not wanted.”

“Excuse me,” she snarled, setting the tray on
Talon’s table and turning around to find Terry Holmes, a guy she’d
gone to school with, swaying where he stood, his eyes bloodshot and
watery. His blonde hair was unkempt and hung in greasy strands down
to the tops of his shoulders.