Chapter 4
Chapter
Four
Friday night, Gavin picked up Devon, a fellow security officer and someone he’d grown up with in the pride, in a black SUV that he borrowed from Ryan. His own truck wasn’t big enough for four people unless the girls wanted to be squished on the bench seat between him and Devon, so he opted for the big SUV instead.
“This is nice,” Devon said as he slid into the passenger seat and buckled up.
“Right? I should get one of these. Maybe after I find my truemate and start a family.”
“I was thinking the same thing.”
“Any prospects on the horizon?” Gavin pulled away from Devon’s house and headed down the road to pick up Lena and her friend Ava.
“Nah. You?”
“Nope. My tiger is feeling pretty hopeful. I can’t really figure out why.”
“Maybe your mate is at the club.”
He doubted it. What were the odds that he’d be tasked with escorting two pride females to a shifter club and happen to meet his truemate there? It seemed the kind of twist of fate in a romance novel or the sappy movies his mom liked to watch.
“That would be cool if it happened.”
He stopped in front of Lena’s house and honked twice. The front door opened a few moments later and the two females walked out dressed to kill in short skirts and skin-baring tops.
Devon stared out the window in silence as they walked toward the vehicle. He opened his door and said with a low voice, “I think about asking Midas to arrange a mating for me sometimes. Then I think that there are beautiful females in the pride that I’d love to hang out with, but I don’t know if I could just fall in love with them, you know? What if you get arranged to be mated but never really, truly fall in love with the one you’re set up with? That would be a fucking rough life.”
“I never thought about it that way.”
Devon grinned. “I’ve got lots of time on my hands since I’m single.”
He opened the passenger door as the girls drew close. “Evening, ladies. You look ready to have fun.”
“We are!” Lena said. She slid into the bench seat of the second row and smiled at Gavin. “Thanks so much for driving us to Lykos. Normally Ryan would, but he said he had to catch up on paperwork.”
“No problem,” Gavin said. He put the SUV into gear and pulled away from the curb, accelerating toward the stop sign at the end of the street. “We’ll be there in about an hour, so make yourselves comfy.”
The drive was uneventful but certainly not quiet as the females chattered excitedly about who they might run into at the club and how attractive a certain fallen angel bartender was.
When they got to the club, Gavin parked in the lot and got out. “Hold up, ladies.”
The girls stopped and faced him and Devon.
“A couple ground rules,” Devon said. “First, don’t leave the club, period. If you need to come out to the SUV, get me or Gavin.”
Gavin nodded. “Second, we’re not bringing any males back to Whisper Creek, so don’t ask. If you want to take phone numbers and make plans for another night, that’s fine, but only four people are getting into the SUV at the end of the night and it’s the four of us.”
“Got it,” Lena said. “Anything else?”
“Yeah, don’t do anything that I’m going to have to have an embarrassing chat with Ryan about, all right? I’m not interested in tattling, but I will snitch if you act like fools,” Gavin said. He gave the girls a hard stare for good measure, and they giggled, which was not the response he’d been hoping for.
Ava put up her hand when Devon let out a soft growl. “I promise we’ll behave. We just want to have a drink and dance and have fun. Some of the females from the wolf pack are supposed to be here tonight so we’re looking forward to hanging out with our friends.”
“Sounds good. We’ll be at a table. Let us know if you need anything.”
The line was moderately long in front of the club but moved fast. Shifters were given priority into the club over humans or other supernatural creatures, so they skipped ahead of a handful of people who’d been waiting.
Lykos was owned by the wolf pack and run by Paris, a fallen angel. All the shifter groups in Northern Ohio were welcome in the club. Along with the tigers, led by Alpha Midas and his mate Maya, were bears, wolves, white lions, falcons, and dragons. The groups all had their own territories, but all the alphas were allied to each other as well as to a local Wiccan coven and the vampires who called downtown Cleveland home.
Northern Ohio was a supernatural melting pot and a pretty damn cool place to live.
The club was packed when they made it inside. After waiting at the bar for drinks, he and Devon took their beers and went to look for a seat.
“Hey, you need a place to sit down?” a male hollered over the music.
Gavin looked around until he found the source: Brick, the second in command of the wolf pack. He and Devon left the girls who were already dancing with their she-wolf pals and headed to a table with several males.
“Hey, Brick, thanks for the invite to the table,” Gavin said.
“No problem. You know Solan,” he said, gesturing to the male next to him. “This is Leo and Stewart.”
“Nice to meet you guys,” Gavin said. “This is Devon.”
“S’up,” Devon said.
They settled at the table, arranging themselves so he and Devon could keep an eye on their wards for the night.
“Babysitting?” Solan asked.
“You know it,” Gavin said.
“Us too,” Brick said. “There’s a group of females who like to come here every Friday night, so Adam had me set up a schedule for escorts and he made me put my damn name on the list.”
Gavin chuckled. “Normally Ryan brings his sister and her friend, but he was busy tonight.”
“Maybe,” Devon said. “Or maybe he just wanted a night off from this.”
“That’s entirely possible,” Gavin said with a laugh.
He took a drink of club soda since he was driving and not drinking anything with alcohol and scanned the club. He’d been thinking his tiger was feeling like tonight might be his lucky night when his truemate walked into his life, but he didn’t feel even a twinge of curiosity at any of the females he saw. His tiger wasn’t even interested in walking around and exploring.
So tonight wouldn’t be a lucky in love sort of night for him and that was okay.
Sort of.
It wasn’t like he could push fate to move any faster.
“I just think we have to keep on our toes.”
Gavin glanced at the table of males, realizing he’d missed half a conversation while he was staring at the dancing crowd. “Keep on your toes about what?”
“The HAS assholes,” Brick said.
“You mean the Humans Against Shifters?”
“Yep.”
“Have you seen them around? Are they bothering the pack?”
“No, but we’re just keeping alert. Extra patrols and such.”
Gavin hummed. “Us too. We haven’t seen or heard from them in months. Maybe their leader Brent decided it wasn’t worth the hassle.”
“I don’t know about that,” Leo said. “If he’d moved on, then he would have shown up in another state messing with shifters. It’s like he went into hiding.”
“Good point,” Gavin said.
“We’ve got our best people scouring online for any word about him and of course all our patrols,” Brick said. “If we hear or see anything, I’ll reach out to let you know. We should keep all the shifter groups updated with information on him and his followers.”
“Agreed,” Gavin said. He and Brick exchanged numbers and promised to help keep their people safe. It would be nice if Brent stopped trying to take out shifters forever, and no one ever heard from him or his organization again. However, Gavin doubted that someone so fanatical would just give up after working so long trying to make the world shifter-free.
As the night wore on, Gavin wondered what Brent was actually up to. He’d done some shitty things since he’d come to Northern Ohio and gone after the tigers including bombing the vampire bank where the tiger’s construction crew worked and abducting Midas’s and Romeo’s mates. They’d even attempted to abduct young tigers as they got off the bus from school.
“We’re ready to go,” Ava said breathlessly as she and Lena appeared at the table. “Paris just did last call, and all the cute guys are gone.”
Leo cleared his throat noisily and Lena giggled. “Present company excluded of course.”
“I’ll settle your tab and we can go,” Gavin said.
“I already did,” Lena said. “We’re good.”
“Take care,” Gavin said to the males at the table. “I’ll be in touch if we see or hear anything.”
“We will too,” Brick said. “Take it easy.”
Their quartet headed out into the warm June evening among the other patrons who’d decided it was time to go.
Gavin unlocked the SUV and stopped to stare at the night sky before getting behind the wheel. Tomorrow was the full moon. His tiger was humming in his head and making him feel like something might happen, but the beast hadn’t been feeling any kind of way about anyone in the club.
Was the full moon going to bring someone amazing into his life?
He sure as hell hoped so.
He’d been single long enough. He was ready to start the next chapter of his life and to see where the future would take him and his truemate.
He just had to find her first.