Chapter 8
Savannah
Iwake up to bright daylight. The space beside me is empty, but when I lay my hand on the sheet, it still carries a hint of Beau’s warmth. His smell. Every time I woke up during the night, he was there. His muscular bulk curved around me. Protecting me.
Last night floods back, and my body wakes up, desire licking at my skin, wrapping itself around my limbs.
It wasn’t supposed to happen. He kept pushing me away.
But then it did.
I pleasured him, took his big, beautiful cock in my mouth. And I made him come. This big, powerful alpha climaxed in my mouth, legs trembling, groaning out my name like it was a precious jewel.
I felt strong, wild, sexy. I felt like his.
I’m still terrified of mating. Those awful sounds I heard on the territory still echo in my head. But my desire for Beau is stronger. I need him inside me like I need to breathe.
Still, he won’t take me.
Keeps saying his wolf is a difficult one.
Whatever that means.
I reach for my phone, check the time.
Then I leap out of bed like I’ve been electrocuted. Somehow the alarm didn’t go off, and I was supposed to be at work a half hour ago. Crap, crap, crap.
I cast around for my clothes. Find a few scraps in the corners of the room. They got shredded when I had my first shift last night. Double crap. I yank the sheet off the bed, wrap it around me and burst outside.
And I stop dead. Because there’s Beau, sitting at the table, in nothing but a pair of shorts. His dark hair hangs wet around his face and his beautiful golden torso glistens with water droplets.
My golden river god.
My breath shudders in my throat as I take him in.
He’s busy, working at a laptop and he doesn’t look up right away.
My heart hammers because I have no idea what he’s thinking now. If he’s regretting last night. If he’s about to say something that’ll bring my whole world crashing down.
“I’m late for work,” I announce.
Now he raises his head and breaks into a grin. “So happens I changed your shift for you.”
I stumble down the steps. “You did?”
“Yup. I figured we’d go shopping this morning. You’re on at five p.m. instead.”
“S-shopping?” I stutter.
He eyes the sheet that’s wrapping my body. “By my reckoning you’re down to one set of clothes, and to be honest with you, they’re not exactly in the best shape.”
Okay. He’s got a point. If I go to a discount store, I should be able to buy a whole new outfit with yesterday’s earnings, I calculate. Maybe a couple of sets of underwear, too.
“Don’t you worry about money, darlin’,” he says. “I’ve got plenty.”
I plant my hands on my hips. “I can’t take your money, Beau. You’ve done more than enough for me already.”
His grin gets wider. “To tell you the truth, I’ve got more money than I know what to do with.
My needs are small.” He throws a glance at Bertha.
“I donate a bunch of it to various charities that take care of disadvantaged kids. The rest of it is just sitting in my bank account doing nothing. Can’t think of anything I’d rather do with it, than get your sweet body dressed up in the way you deserve.
Now go get yourself ready, and I’ll fix you something to eat. Then we’re going shopping.”
Is it wrong of me to be so excited? I hurry through my shower, my tummy tingling.
I’ve never been taken shopping in my life.
Hell, I’ve never had brand-new clothes before.
All our clothes came from Goodwill. Werewolves who live in packs don’t think a ton about their clothes.
I dry off fast and pull my old things on, hoping I’ll be in time to help Beau in the kitchen.
He’s halfway done, but I make the toast and pour the coffee.
We lay everything out at the table, and he takes his seat with a contented sigh.
“Isn’t this the life?” he says, his blue eyes catching the morning light as he gazes out at the sparkling river.
I wish that every day could start like this; me and Beau sitting beside Bertha, eating our breakfast, full of simple appreciation for the nature around us.
Just for this moment, I like to believe there’s magic in the air, in the water. This little supermarket parking lot feels like paradise. I’m no longer an unwanted halfling, but the mate of the river god.
I’m still wondering how we’re going to go shopping, when a throaty roar starts up from the far side of Bertha and Beau tears around the corner on his stylish black motorcycle. A café racer, he calls it.
“We’re going on your bike?” I say stupidly.
“Sure are.” He flashes that sexy grin of his and hands me a helmet.
I fumble it on, and he helps me, fastening the chinstrap snugly under my chin. “Sit close,” he tells me. “Hold tight to my waist. And don’t be scared. A werewolf’s reflexes are faster than lightning.”
I nod, knowing he’s right.
I think I’m prepared for the speed, but it still startles me as he weaves in and out of the traffic.
I wrap my arms around his muscular waist, and grip with my thighs as the wind blasts past us.
Every time we stop at a traffic light, he checks in, squeezes my hand reassuringly, and I stop feeling scared.
I know he’d never let me come to any harm.
When he pulls into a shopping mall, I gawp at it like the little hick I am. I’ve only seen these in movies before.
Beau takes my hand, leads me along while I stumble, overwhelmed by all the new sights. My head swivels this way and that. So much choice; so many fashion stores full of clothes so much prettier than anything I’ve owned before.
He looks around a little dazedly, rubbing at his hair. Guess he’s not used to female fashions, either.
“Let’s start here.” He points to a store. It looks real fancy.
“I don’t know—” I start to say.
He picks out a real pretty outfit in the window. “Think that’d look perfect on you.”
When I protest, he drags me inside.
He takes charge, picking out outfits, asking the shop assistants for advice.
They fawn over him, batting their eyelashes.
Every woman has the hots for him. Jealousy surges in me, and I feel embarrassed being in the store with all these nice things, all the other girls dressed appropriately, when what I’m wearing is basically one step up from rags.
To make things worse, my wolf keeps growling possessively.
Now she’s woken up, I can’t get her to go back to sleep.
Beau leads me to the dressing room, and gets an assistant to lay out all the clothes for me.
“Now, go in there and try everything on,” he tells me.
A thrill goes through me as I stumble in and pull the curtains shut. I kind of like it when he’s bossy like this. Like it more than I should.
I pull on one outfit after another, tear back the curtain and show him.
Beau likes the things that cling tight to my curves, emphasize my rounded hips and big boobs. I’m usually real self-conscious about them, but I feel myself blossoming through his compliments. Try to see myself as the sexy woman he insists I am.
By the time we’re done, I have three new pairs of jeans, two dresses, and a bunch of shirts and lingerie.
The assistants pack them so prettily in tissue paper with little bows and stickers, before handing them over in expensive bags.
Beau insists on carrying everything, and all I can do is wander along, holding his hand, feeling like a princess in a movie.
He insists I get a bunch of nice toiletries, too, and a hairdryer and a new backpack.
When we’re finally done, he looks at his watch.
“Just time to have lunch before I need to get you to work,” he says. “What do you want to eat?”
We go to a food court, and I’m like a kid in a candy store. Burgers, tacos, pizza. All these things I’ve read about in books or seen in movies. All these things for other people, not a feral girl from a savage pack. My stomach is rumbling, but I can’t decide.
“You’re overwhelmed, aren’t you, honey?” Beau says, his eyes tender. In the end, he winds up ordering burgers, quesadillas, hotdogs and strawberry shakes for us both. It’s too much food, but I savor every delicious mouthful.
“Thank you. That was the best day ever,” I say, as he fits all my things into the pannier on his bike and we climb back on.
“The pleasure was all mine,” he says, and his eyes crinkle at the corners. “It was worth it to see you looking so happy.”
He’s a dream. An absolute dream, I think as we pull up in front of the bar. Soon, I’m going to wake up and find I’m still sleeping in a filthy riverbed, and this whole thing was a product of my poor, delirious mind.
I expect Beau to roar off again, but he shuts off the engine and strolls inside the bar with me. He looks around, takes a seat in the farthest corner. “I’m just gonna work here for a while,” he says. “You won’t even know I’m here.”
Not true.
All night long, Beau’s presence blazes through me like wildfire.
My eyes keep drifting to his ruggedly handsome face.
Every nerve in my body cries out for him.
I long to feel the sexy scrape of his beard against my skin.
His firm, plush lips crashing against my own.
Those big, callused hands wrapping around my body. Possessing me.
Now I understand what he means when he says his wolf is a difficult one—he’s warning me not to fall in love with him.
But it’s too late.
I’ve already given him my heart.
Two more days pass like this.
Beau takes a copy of my roster and Meredith’s, and he watches me when she’s not around. She grumbles, but I think she’s secretly glad he’s there. A free security service.
Because there are a lot of shady characters on these streets, shuffling in, looking for people who don’t want to be found. But one look at Beau, and they never come back again.
He’s leaving his scent all around town.
Letting everyone know he’s with me.
“He’s a real possessive one, that man of yours,” Meredith comments. Her elbows are propped up on the bar, eyes lingering on Beau’s broad shoulders and tight buns as he leaves to run an errand.
“He’s not mine,” I say.
She slides me a sideways look. “Not from where I’m standing, hun.” She sighs luxuriously. “I’d kill for a guy like that.”
So would I. Because he’s not mine.
After work, Beau brings me home and we have dinner, watching the sun go down or staring up at the stars.
And we talk. He asks me everything about my life before him, my dreams for the future.
I didn’t even know I had dreams until he teased them out.
I told him how I liked to make little handicrafts and sell them at the local market.
When I told him how much I was selling them for, he shook his head in disbelief and pulled out his laptop.
Turns out there are Internet sites where you can sell them for five times the price.
“You make ’em, I’ll get them sold for you,” he says.
He encourages and probes me until I admit I always wanted to make clothes, and he says he’ll get me a sewing machine and all the things I need to go with it. I can take a course to learn the techniques.
It’s pure bliss here—just him, me and our little bus. And all these dreams I never dared entertain before.
Except he hasn’t so much as kissed me since that first night. He barely even touches me.
And it’s driving me insane.
My panties are soaking wet, all the time. My nipples ache, hell, my clit throbs. I feel like a cat on heat. Hungry for him, and only him.
And the worst part is, I know he feels the same. I catch the yearning in those fierce blue eyes when I come down the steps in the morning; see his cock swelling beneath his zipper.
But he pushes it away.
Ever since that first night, he’s insisted on sleeping outside. And sometimes I hear his wolf prowling around. Feral, anguished.
Suffering.
How long before this gets too much for Beau and he leaves me?
My wolf howls at the thought.
I think she’d curl up and die if he left me.