Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Raine
I’m insane.
Certifiably insane.
No way in hell should I be going to Dane’s house, with Dane on his bike.
To my surprise, walking out of the house with him to his bike, I saw my car sitting in the driveway. He had it dropped off by one of his brothers before even bringing the flowers into my parents’ home.
A part of me really liked the fact he fixed my car for me. Another part didn’t know what to think at all. He didn’t have to fix it. Or even get it back to me. I knew my dad and brother were going to handle it. At least, I thought they were going to .
The whole way to Dane’s place, I kept telling myself I shouldn’t have left the house. I shouldn’t be on the back of his bike. I shouldn’t enjoy the feel of pressing up against him. I shouldn’t feel anything toward him, but I do. I feel lots of things, all of them confusing and conflicting inside me. I don’t know what to think . . . to do . . . it’s more than a little nutty in my head right now. I mean, seriously, Dane is the hottest man/shifter. It doesn’t matter how someone wants to classify him. Regardless, he’s the hottest I’d ever seen in my life. His voice alone sends tingles down my spine, going right down between my legs. No man has ever sent instant shockwaves to my nether region, and it freaks me out that he’s able to do so.
Dane rode easily down the twists and turns of the curvy road, slowing only when needing to. He comes to a near stop and turns onto a dirt path, which at the end of it I find a house sitting. It’s not just a house but a log cabin. One that looks beautiful and familiar to me. Which is weird since I’ve never in my life seen it before.
The log cabin was situated in the middle of a clearing surrounded by trees. It was a beautiful setting around the cabin. Off to the side and a bit past the cabin looks to be a garage with a carport.
Dane slows, rounds the house, and, yep, it’s a carport. He comes to a stop, kicks the stand down, and then glances over his shoulder.
“Need help getting off?”
I knew what he meant, but that question went through my head in several different scenarios. He’s going to need to not ask questions like that.
Clearing my throat, I answer while shaking my head. “I’ve got it.”
Barely.
I do everything I can to hide the pain of moving while climbing off the back of his bike. But I manage to do so, though I don’t miss the rumbling growl that comes from Dane.
Dane shifts off the back of his bike, takes my hand, and guides me into the house. A strange feeling comes over me at the thought of the two of us being alone, no one around. I’d even left my phone at the house, not by choice, but by accident. I’m sure if I needed to, I could ask Dane to take me back for it. However, I know all the numbers by heart that I need to know. Plus, I’m pretty sure if my parents need to get in touch with me, they’ll be able to find Dane’s number. I’d left a note with my mom letting her know where I was going, not that I needed to. It’s just the polite thing to do.
I shove the thoughts aside as Dane unlocks the back door of his cabin and steps inside ahead of me, nose to the air, ensuring that no one is there besides us. I’d seen my dad do this all the time growing up.
Satisfied, Dane draws me deeper into the house. I scan the room, taking in the fact it didn’t look like a bachelor’s pad. It actually looked beautiful in its rustic decor.There were barn-style doors for cabinets. The table off to the side of his kitchen looked hand-crafted. Like he’d gone outside, chopped the tree down, and then carved it himself.
Dane lets me go and moves to the fridge that wasn’t rustic looking at all. It was stainless steel with two doors and a freezer section at the bottom. “You want a beer?” he asks.
“I don’t drink beer,” I tell him, honestly. I hated the taste of it. I rarely drank liquor, but when I did, it was always vodka or gin. I wasn’t a dark liquor drinker. Mostly, I stuck to coffee, tea, and water. You couldn’t go wrong with those.
“What do you drink?” he asks, twisting back to me, a brow cocked, a beer in the hand not holding the fridge open. “Got water and tea. If you want a soda, just tell me which one, and I’ll get the prospect to bring it up when he brings the pizza.”
“You’re having a prospect deliver the pizza here?” The question slips past my lips before I can help myself.
“Don’t typically get deliveries out this far in the boonies, baby. Mailman even refuses to come out here. Had to get a postbox in town. If I want anything out here, though, I’ll note I’m not typically here, I have a prospect bring it up, or I get it while still in town.”
“Why didn’t we do that? It would have been the easier thing to do.” Okay, my mouth needs to stop speaking before my brain fully catches up. Damnit.
Dane’s lips quirk up at the edge, and he moves from the fridge, it closes behind him. “Raine, baby, I’m not going to put a pizza on the back of my bike. My truck is out in the garage, and I wanted you right where you were while we road up here. Prospects gotta do their bit before they get their cuts, and if that means bringing pizza out here, that’s what they’re gonna do,” he says, coming closer, setting the beer on the counter as he does so. When he gets in close, he moves into me, hands on my hips. “Now, dolcezza , what do you want to drink?”
“Do you have any flavor packs for water?” Okay, so I drink water, but I love flavor packets.
“Do I look like the type of man to have that shit around his place?” He chuckles.
“Ugh, no. ”
My heart stutters a bit.
“Regular water or a tea. It doesn’t matter. Well, so long as it’s sweet tea.” I didn’t do unsweet. I need the sweetness to it.
“Right,” he mutters, gives my hip a slight squeeze, and walks away back to the fridge. He reaches in and pulls out a bottle of tea. I recognize the label and smile as he says. “Sweet tea.”
“Thank you.” Slowly stepping toward him, I take the bottle. “So?—”
“Let’s go into the living room,” he states, interrupting what I was going to say. “Told you we’d have a movie marathon, and that’s what we’ll do.”
Taking my hand, he guides me from the kitchen to a room that didn’t look at all like a living room. Living rooms are supposed to be about guests and be inviting. No, this room held a couch that could be seen as nothing more than a big bed that was fuzzy and looked very comfortable. On the wall, there was a huge TV with a sound bar underneath it. The curtains were black-out ones, keeping the room dark. On either side of the couch sat an end table that had pipes going up them to where a lamp was attached. It was pretty cool looking.
“Go ahead and get comfy. Take your shoes off, and we’ll pull up the first movie.”
I didn’t know what to think about him being like this with me, but I have to admit, it’s nice. So nice that I’m not sure I can trust it or not.
“You’re kiddin’ me.” Dane laughs, arm stretched across the back of the couch behind me. He’s got his body propped on his side, and he’s facing me. Laughing. Straight out laughing.
“I don’t see what’s so funny,” I tell him, grumbling.
“You don’t see telling me that your favorite movies are the American Pie collection as funny? Babe, those movies are the shit. At least you didn’t go for the Twilight ones.”
“Those wolves just don’t hold comparison,” I speak truthfully. I mean, sure, they’re okay movies, but nothing like the books. The book is typically always better.
“Good to know they don’t hold comparison.” Dane grins, shifting slightly. “Ready for Meg 2 ?” We’d just finished watching the first one. While watching, we chatted a bit. Him asking me questions about random things. Nothing heavy. Mostly, it was like what is my favorite movie. I told him and asked the same. The whole thing was nice. I’d never had anything like it before.
Brady was all about himself and his buds—that and making a fool out of me. I don’t know what I saw in him in the first place. He’d worn a mask that hid the man he really was from the rest of the world.
Dane, though, he’s not Brady. Nothing like him. He’s . . . well, I don’t know what he is.
“Why were you in the woods last night?” I blurt the question without thinking.
Dane’s head jerks slightly, and his brows draw up slightly. “What?”
“What were you doing in the woods? Were you just running, or had something happened?” I take a breath and scooch up slightly. “If you don’t want to answer, you don’t have to,” I add, not wanting him to think . . .
I don’t get to finish my thought as Dane scoots toward me, his free hand coming to curl around my hip. “Raine, you can ask anything you want. I’ll answer any question unless it pertains to the club. Only then will I tell you that it’s something I can’t answer.”
“Okay,” I breathe.
“I’d felt like a run last night. I needed to shift. It happens. The need to be as my wolf. To feel the earth beneath me as only I can when he comes forward. You grew up with shifters raising you, you ever go out with them?”
“Yeah, Dad would let me ride on his back. Bandit would too, but usually, it was Dad. Mom would play with me while in wolf form, though as I got older, the less I went out with them,” I explain with a shrug.
Dane gives a nod and strokes his fingers along my side. “The older a pup or cub gets, the less they need their parents. They have to make it on their own and prove to nature and themselves, as well as their packs, that they can do just that.”
That makes sense.
“You ready to tell me about what happened out there? Did you know those men? From what I heard, they knew you?—”
“I know them,” I blurt again without thinking, interrupting him. It was like the words just came out on whelm. I shouldn’t have said it, but I did.
“Raine, I heard them out there. It took a lot for me not to tear them limb for limb. The only reason I didn’t is ‘cause you were there. Now, talk to me. The prospect will be here in an hour with the pizza. If we get this out of the way, we can enjoy the pizza free and clear.”
Free and clear.
I’ll never be free and clear .
“I can’t,” I tell him. “It’s not your problem or my brother’s.”
“ Dolcezza , you’re my mate. Anything to do with you is my problem. And to fix it, I need to know what the fuck I’m dealing with,” he explains.
“Just because you say we’re mates doesn’t mean my life is any of your business,” I say a bit heatedly.
“Raine,” he growls.
“Dane,” I snap and sit up straight. “I might not be a shifter, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know how to take care of myself. Last night, I’d been caught by surprise.”
“Raine, I fixed your car myself,” he states matter-of-factly. “Your car might be a piece of shit, but it shouldn’t have broken down where it did. The fact it did, and those men happened upon you, didn’t add up. So, you knew them. They knew you. I got that part. Same as I got that they were delivering a message. Now, what was the message?”
I narrow my eyes on him, glaring at him, not liking how easily he put that together. I could tell him and get it over with, but I don’t want to. It’s not anything he needs to concern himself with.
“I want to go home now,” I announce.
“Baby, you ain’t goin’ home right now. We’re discussing this shit, then eating pizza, and after that, we’ll watch something else. After that, I’ll take you home if you want, but we’re spending the day not only getting to know each other but also giving you a chance to learn you’re safe with me.”
That’s sweet. It really is, which makes it suck that I can’t deal with this.
“Talk to me, Raine,” he grunts.
Sucking in a breath, I shake my head. “I can’t.”
“You won’t,” he counters.
Instead of giving him words, I just simply continue shaking my head.
Dane’s phone rings, breaking through the moment between us. He growls, twists, and grabs it off the nightstand. Without looking at the screen, he answers it, bringing it to his ear, barking, “What?”
There’s a long pause, he is listening to whoever was on the other end. Then he growls harshly. “No fuckin’ way. You ain’t coming here, and I’m not coming to the clubhouse. I’m with Raine, and we’re —”
He doesn’t finish what he is saying, evidently being interrupted.
“Prez, it can wait. You show here, it’s going to fuck everything up. Karsyn can get over wanting us there.”
Another long pause, and Dane growls. “Right. Fuck. Whatever. We’ll be there.”
Pulling the phone away from his ear, he tosses it onto the couch, eyes coming to me. “Looks like our date is being moved to the clubhouse.”
“What was that all about?” I whisper, uncertainty seeping inside.
Dane lets out a rough sigh, rakes his hand over his face, and gets to his feet. “My sister and I, we don’t share the same mother. Our dad had two mates. My mother was by choice. He married her after they found out she was pregnant with me. She was killed by blood witches in front of me when I wasn’t old enough to defend her or be able to do anything about it. His second mate, she was his fated mate. I didn’t even know about her until recently. She was an earth witch. Karsyn, my sister, she’s more than just an earth witch. Powerful. Yet, she’s also a pain in my ass.”
“Your sister is a witch?”
Holy shit. I’d never met a witch that I knew of.
“Yeah, she’s a witch. Lake’s a Fairy. At your brother’s clubhouse, I know Harmony’s a witch as well. I believe Jabba’s ol’ lady is one too, but I don’t know them all that well. The truce between clubs is still new, so we’re not that close.”
“Wait a minute, Harmony’s a witch?”
“Yeah.” He nods.
“Wow,” I whisper softly to myself, though I know he heard me. “I can’t believe I didn’t know about this. ”
“Not something anyone’s gonna just blurt to everyone. We’ve got a delicate situation we’re dealing with, and we’ve got to protect the women from the evil that wants to take them.”
I could understand this. But I mean . . . it’s not like I need to know everything about my brother’s life and, in turn, his club, but you’d think he’d tell me something like this knowing how I already feel like an outsider sometimes in my own family.
It’s hard not to feel this way. I’m human. There’s nothing special about me. Now, I find out that there are witches in the mix too. Let’s not forget he mentioned a freaking Fairy to boot.
Dane bends at the hips, reaches for me, lifts me up off the couch, and sets me on my feet in front of him, hands staying at my hips. “What’s with the look that just crossed your face, baby?”
“Nothing.” No way am I telling him my thoughts of how out of place I feel.
“Don’t lie to me, Raine.” He growls, his eyes flashing, the blue of his eyes deepening. “Tell me what’s with the look.”
“It’s nothing.” I try again. “Don’t we have to leave?”
Dane looks at me closely, his arms circling me fully, pulling me even closer. “We’re not done with any of this conversation, but I’ll tell you something that I want you to think on.”
“What’s that?”
“Fated mates are fated for a reason. So, for you to be my fated mate, there’s got to be something special about you that the Goddess of the Moon and fates deem worthy, right?”
Well, that’s one way to put it.