Truth or Wolf: A Small Town Shifter Romantic Comedy (Wolf Brothers Book 1)

Chapter 11

Eleven

Sweet. It’s time to claim our woman.

She’s not ours. Jesus. Would you settle down? We just met her.

A wolf wants what he wants.

— JULIETTE CROSS

Iwas in a funk. A Grand Canyon-sized ravine of a funk.

Not even discovering that an extremely uncommon firefly species had decided to take up residence in my woods snapped me out of it. As the fireflies had flashed on and off, looking for love in the usual places, all I could think about was Ford.

I moped. And hosted a pity party in the deer blind from which I’d been counting fireflies. Worse, I moped at work.

When we’d unboxed this month’s dog toys this morning, I couldn’t even bring myself to comment on what had come in and what I would have chosen differently. Sanye had given me so much side-eye all week that her eyeballs should have been stuck sideways.

Tonight’s destination was barbecue night, a monthly Moonlight Valley event held in the town park. It was the first one I’d been to this summer, and ordinarily I would have been looking forward to it.

The food was amazing, thanks to Ranger Boone’s competitive barbecue skills, although the park itself was really an ambitiously named acre of grass behind the multipurpose town building. It had parking, though, and a half dozen grills and a nice view of the Tennessee mountains.

Sanye’s patience snapped as she parked her ancient Volvo with terrifying speed and imprecision between two rusty pickup trucks. After cutting the ignition, she turned to me and stopped bottling up her feelings. “You’re in a slump. You’ve been a sad sack all day, and I’m pretty sure it’s about your date yesterday.”

I sighed, my face droopier than a basset hound’s. I did not feel like being social tonight. “You’re an excellent guesser.”

“He’s probably here.” Sanye gestured at the crowd milling around the barbecue grills.

Moonlight Valley took its barbecue very, very seriously. Our town had won the Tennessee Bar-B-Que Contest at the state livestock show three years in a row, along with the State Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest, the Tennessee Pitmaster Battle, and several other competitions. Our pitmasters were legendary, and Ranger Boone was the best of them all.

“I know.” My heart hopped in my rib cage like a bunny startled by a wolf.

“So what’s your plan?” Sanye knew me well.

“It’s a simple one,” I said grimly. “If I can’t avoid him, I’ll say hello. If Aunt Sally is looking down from heaven, she’ll be proud of me.”

“Why don’t you take advantage of him behind the band gazebo?”

Hot kissing behind the gazebo was a time-honored Moonlight Valley tradition, but Ford’s kisses came with strings.

“He wants more than I can give him.”

I didn’t sound convicted because I was wondering if I could come up with a plan to have my hummingbird cake and eat it too. In other words, have a genuine relationship with Ford, pursue my dreams, and not break his heart or my own.

Sanye tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. “I’ve refrained from adding my two cents’ worth about this situation between you and Ford. I understand you have a business plan, and you need to move to Nashville to execute it. But unless you’re literally planning on devoting yourself twenty-four-seven to commercial world domination, I don’t understand why there’s no room for seeing someone. Why can’t you have love? And hot sex?”

“Sanye—”

“Shush. I didn’t get all that long with Evan, and what time we did have together came at a price. Nothing worth having is free, and we both had to accommodate each other. I had not planned”—she nudged me with her elbow as she said this—“on living in military housing in California as the wife of an enlisted man. It was not the glamorous West Coast adventure I’d imagined, and I hated it.

“I had an absolutely terrible job at the Dollar Store, there wasn’t a speck of anything green around me, Los Angeles traffic was even worse than in the movies, and every plant on the balcony of our apartment died because of the drought. But you know what? I might have hated California, but I loved Evan, and I wouldn’t have wished away a second of that time we got to have together.

“So when you tell me you won’t even think about seeing someone because it might mess up your business plan, it makes me angry. Why won’t you consider the possibility that Ford might fit into your dreams and your plans?”

“I—”

“Ford Boone might not be your Evan. He might not be your one and only. But you have declared it to be an impossibility and closed yourself off from every chance of love.

“I know you want to start your own business. I know you want to show your parents that you have what it takes to be successful. But being successful at love is the biggest deal, where you come out richer than rich. So what is the point of building the world’s best pet business if you’re alone like Scrooge?”

“I haven’t figured that part out yet! Okay?” I considered making a break for it into the barbecue-loving crowd, but I knew she’d catch me. “You’re the love expert, not me. I’ve never been in love, and I don’t know what I’m missing.

“Love is scary. It has no boundaries. I hate being vulnerable, I’m a very messy person on the inside, and I need at least a year—probably a decade—to strategize a relationship with Ford.

“I can’t stay here, and pretending that I can is doing him a disservice. It’s lying. He asked to court me. He brought Alessandro flowers. He was thinking forever, and I…” I thunked my head on the headrest.

“And you what? Do you not see yourself with Ford Boone long term?”

“No. That’s exactly the problem. I could imagine it. My imagination has suggested a house with a white picket fence and an overabundance of cats and dogs. I can see my moving up to be part owner at Vanity Fur Salon, or maybe opening a competitor business.

“We’ll go to church on Sundays and Walmart on Saturdays, and we’ll have one of those couple routines. We’ll finish each other’s sentences and order for each other if we’re in the bathroom when the wait staff comes.”

“And that scares you.”

“And that scares me. Because that life is the best life for a lot of people, but not for me. I would hate being stuck here. I would hate knowing I’ll never know what I could have done in a place like Nashville even if the alternative is a cozy farmhouse and fur babies…”

We sat there, and I was pretty sure we were both imagining that farmhouse and how Ford would come striding through the front door and all the animal chaos. He’d sweep me off my feet and kiss me hello, even if he’d been gone for only ten minutes.

It was such an amazing daydream that I dreamed it twice.

Ford was AWOL. I’d expected to find him hanging around Ranger’s barbecue pit or to see his shoulders disappearing into the crowd. I’d expected to come face to face with reminder after reminder of him.

It was anticlimactic.

I was tempted to peek underneath one of the plastic-tablecloth-covered tables where people were congregating to devour Ranger’s delicious barbecue.

My heart had a palpitation, skipping a beat when I spotted Ranger bent over his pit, frowning fiercely at the coals. His brother Knox worked beside him, dishing up coleslaw and slices of custard pie. I decided to torture myself by hanging out near them and watching them work. Everyone knew that men who could cook were sexy.

Nevertheless, no movie scene played itself out in my head when Knox took a break from the pit and sauntered toward me, flashing me a friendly smile. Objectively, he was a pretty, pretty man, but nothing in me lit up in recognition when he looked my way. We were not compatible fireflies.

As I stood up from my picnic table to prevent him looming over me, I decided that if Atticus had eyes the color of a Bora Bora lagoon, and Ford’s shifted between the blue of deep water and a raging storm, Knox Boone’s eyes were a cold, frozen blue. Like a blue raspberry slush where the blue was really a PSA so you could tell it from the strawberry flavor. Even his warm smile was not enough to melt the ice in his gaze.

“How you doing?” Knox had a smooth, radio announcer’s kind of voice. Somewhere, somehow, he’d learned to speak without the distinctive Southern twang his brothers had.

“Just fine,” I lied. “And yourself?”

My manners were impeccable.

“Good.” His gaze focused on the near-empty plate next to mine. “Is Sanye with you tonight?”

“She drove me over here, but now she’s helping out her father-in-law. He’s collecting for something.” Sanye’s father-in-law was better than any GoFundMe.

Knox nodded, his gaze sharpening as he looked about the crowd, as if maybe he was having thoughts of hunting down Sanye. He looked hungry and a little frustrated. I tried to imagine him shifting into a wolf but got stuck on what color he would be—would his pelt match his beard so he would become a dark brown wolf with icy blue eyes?

And then the crowd parted in an almost biblical way. I would have been entirely willing to believe that the clouds opened up, a beam of light came down, and angels began singing. I turned, following the source of the commotion, and found Ford Boone standing directly behind me. His rich blue eyes glittered.

Those eyes sucked the oxygen straight out of my lungs because, unless I was grievously mistaken, Ford was hot for me.

“Alice, can you spare a moment?” he asked in a rough, husky voice.

I nodded.

My master plan flew out the window.

Without any concern for what his brothers, my friend, or the legendarily nosy residents of Moonlight Valley might think, Ford wrapped his muscled arm around my shoulders and steered me away from the crowd and toward the gazebo.

We were hardly alone. Crowds of picnicking, gossiping, barbecue-eating Moonlight Valley-ers surrounded us. They had a lot to say—calling out greetings, asking questions. I was almost certain someone snapped a picture of us, probably for the town Instagram account.

Ford’s arm slid from my shoulder, his hand trailing down my arm to tangle up in my fingers. We were holding hands. In public. After we’d all but broken up last night.

I was half hoping, half dreading he’d kiss me next, but instead he steered us behind the gazebo, brushed off the bottom step, and sat down. Since our hands were attached, I followed him down, my behind landing less than gracefully next to his. I couldn’t remember how to sit. I crossed my legs. Uncrossed them.

“I’ve been thinking.” His shoulder brushed mine.

“Uhhhh?” I hoped he hadn’t brought me out here for witty conversation. I wondered whether it would be weird if I leaned into his shoulder.

“You said you planned on getting out of town as soon as you had the money saved up. You thought you were looking at, what? A year and change?”

My speedy departure was not the topic of conversation I would have chosen. I’d been sort of hoping to revisit Friday, to apologize some more for inadvertently trampling all over his feelings. I wished fervently that I would grow some conversational skills, but, as always, I failed to manifest my dreams into reality.

“Fifteen months,” I blurted out. “Eighteen, tops. Fewer if I can sell a kidney or Aunt Sally turns out to have owned a valuable American Dolls collection.”

Ford’s eyes narrowed, and he nodded, stroking his beard thoughtfully. We sat like that next to each other on the steps—him studying me as if I were some kind of interesting mathematical problem he intended to solve, me watching him manhandle his beard—for far too long.

Abruptly, he asked, “I’d like to propose something.”

What? Propose? He was sitting, not kneeling, I told my heart.

“Let’s date for the next twelve months, but only for twelve months.”

“You want to go out on a twelve-month-long date? Why?”

He lounged beside me, at his ease. Me, on the other hand? I had an old board splintering into my spine and a whole lot of questions.

“Not an extra-long date,” he corrected. “I want us to be in a relationship together, but it’ll be one that has an expiration date.”

“Ummm,” I contributed.

“So we’ll agree on twelve months and then everything will be over and done with before you need to go.” Dating was apparently synonymous with dread chore in Ford’s mind. “And it’s long enough that we can have some fun, get to know each other, but not form a lasting attachment.”

It sounded like he’d put a great deal of thought into this. I loved a good plan, but this one made my heart squeeze, and not in a good way. I’d be downgraded. Instead of being the girl he wanted to court and mate, I’d become his booty call and hookup.

I shifted on the step. Sex was wonderful, and it was great when two consenting adults had fun together. It was just…

It was just that he’d agreed to give me exactly what I wanted. A lighthearted, commitment-free summer kind of romance. Yay… I win?

No. You lose. This is not what you wanted, an annoying voice whined inside me. This is bad.

But I’d gotten what I wanted, so…good?

“You… We…” Ford might have to wait until tomorrow for me to form a coherent sentence. This was not at all how I’d planned on the evening going. Angry tears pricked my eyes. “We’d hook up? Whenever we felt the urge?”

Ford shook his head, turning so he could look me in the eye. His face was stern and distant, almost angry, but not quite. Amber flashed in his eyes.

“No. I do not want to randomly hook up with you when one of us has room in our schedule. We would have a relationship. We would see each other, go out on dates, text, make up silly nicknames for each other.

“I would open your doors, pull out your chair at the table, and lend you my shirts. I would look out for you, not because I lack respect for you or believe you cannot take care of yourself, but because I would be proud that I could do that for you.”

His frown deepened as he thought about this impossible, mythic, beautiful future, a future in which we were together. And then he launched straight into speech, not done rocking my world.

“You would give me shit about being chivalrous, of course. But I would be doing these things because you were my girl and you deserve it. You would come over to mine, spend time with my brothers because they matter to me. I would meet your girlfriends, and I will refrain from killing your third cousin twice removed.” There was more fierce frowning. My heart swooned. “Assuming that all this is acceptable to you.”

“Oh.” My heart launched itself out of the pit of despair it had fallen into and shot up toward the sky. “So the courting thing is still on?”

“It is.” He nodded.

“For twelve months.”

“Yeah.”

The smile splitting my lips was epic. “And we’d be an honest-to-gosh couple, doing all the couple things?”

His face softened, his eyes inventorying my face. “Yeah, with one-week and one-month anniversaries and me making you dinner and buying you little gifts out of the blue.”

I sucked in a breath, excited. But then I realized he’d left out a crucial step in this plan. “But what if we don’t want to be done after our time is up? Are we allowed to revise and revisit?”

The sternness returned to his face. “Once the twelve months are up, we’re over. Even if you’re here in Moonlight Valley, our relationship is done. That’s my proposal. Yes or no?”

Ford glowered at me, jaw set.

“And one more thing,” he added. “There will be absolutely no revisiting. You don’t bring up an extension or additional months again. You don’t ask. I don’t ask. One year and we’re done.”

I loved a strict plan, but this was a level of dating skill I did not possess. My heart panicked, banging around inside me like a pop can rattling wild and free in a truck bed. “Would you give me the cut direct?”

He frowned. “What?”

“Like a nineteenth-century society matron meeting someone who’s blotted her social copybook,” I babbled. “And so she looks through her, pretends she doesn’t see her when they pass in town. Would you ignore me? Would you see me?”

I imagined being ignored by Ford. I did not like that mental picture one bit.

He shrugged. “Yes, I’d see you.”

“Would we be friends? Merely friendly? Church acquaintances who pretend they remember each other’s names?”

“I don’t know.”

“Would we talk? After we drop each other like hot potatoes? Will we have a countdown app or a big Doomsday clock?”

“I’d be polite. I have manners—I’m not an animal.” He frowned fiercely. And a little sadly too, I thought.

“I know,” I said, sounding more than a little sad myself. “But I don’t have a whole lot of experience with dating, and I’m not sure I could be your girlfriend for a whole year and then be nothing at all to you. I’ll have feelings by then.”

“But you could leave me to go to Nashville and that’s fine?”

“There is absolutely nothing wrong with having dreams and ambitions. I won’t apologize for wanting to pursue my goals.” I folded my arms across my chest. My fingers brushed his side, undermining my self-righteousness, but whatever.

“I’m not asking you to apologize for thinking of your future and what you want.” He inhaled sharply, his flannel rising and falling over his impressive chest. His eyes darted to mine, then glared out at the woods. “In fact, I want to support you. That’s a good reason for the twelve-month limit. I won’t be holding you back; you won’t feel like you’re leaving anyone or anything behind.”

I let myself lean against his shoulder. It was flannel-covered, hard and muscled. It was my new happy place. “You’ve thought about this.”

“I know you like plans.”

It was more like I needed them. I did not do well when I was asked to ad-lib my life or go off-roading through life’s choices. In fact, it was safe to say I’d failed spectacularly whenever I approached a situation without a well-thought-out checklist and a backup plan.

I wasn’t going to apologize for that. When you got on a cruise ship, you scoped out the exits and you marked the lifeboats. You made sure you had a life jacket and you practiced safety drills.

Then you got on with sailing and going wherever it was you’d wanted to go. You got on with the fun stuff.

Twelve months with Ford was around-the-world-cruise territory, and I wanted to agree. I wanted to run up the gangplank in this weird analogy and wave goodbye to the shores of sanity and good reason.

“What if we?—”

I’d been about to ask what if we did this for real and I stayed here and we didn’t stop at twelve months? What if I put my Nashville business plans on ice indefinitely?

“What if we…” he prompted.

That was Ford. He listened to me. And then he tried to give me what he thought I wanted.

“Yes,” I said, answering his first question rather than the one I’d posed. “Yes.”

And then quick as a snake I scooted over onto his lap, threw my arms around his neck, and pressed my mouth against his.

It was our first boyfriend/girlfriend kiss—quick and chaste. It would make an excellent welcome-home kiss or a thanks-for-picking-up-coffee-creamer kiss or a hundred prosaic, everyday kisses. I couldn’t wait to try them all out.

I had twelve months to kiss Ford as much as I wanted.

Boy, did I have plans for this man.