Chapter Four
Bram
Leaving my pack hadn’t been on my radar. I always figured I’d stay there forever. How that would look? I didn’t get that far, but in the back of my mind, it was mine and always would be.
Of course, I had no idea my father was going to pull something as wild as wanting me to mate a stranger, either. If it hadn’t been for my grandfather insisting I had a way out all those years ago, I’d have been stuck and mated to that grunty wolf, living a life I never wanted.
Not that I was sure my new life was going to be any better.
Less than a half hour down the road, my father called, letting me know the car wasn’t mine, even though I’d bought it with my own money.
It was tied to the pack insurance and had my father’s name on the title, something I hadn’t considered.
He thought that would have me turn around.
Instead, it had me pulling into a rental car place and trying to get a vehicle.
Operation rental car failed epically. They didn’t want cash. They wanted a credit card. And if my father was already telling me my car was undrivable, he was a million percent canceling any plastic I had.
I’d been far too trusting, and my accounts were all connected with his. At the time, it made sense. What a fool I’d been.
Not willing to give up, my next stop was the bus station. “Where’s the farthest you can get me from here?” I asked.
The man behind the glass window looked at me like I had six heads. “When do you need to be there?”
“I want to leave as soon as possible and go as far as you can take me.” The longer I was at the bus stop, the more likely my father was going to figure out his threats weren’t working and come and get me.
“It’s going to be expensive.”
I nodded and pulled out my money. His eyes went wide. “No one’s coming after you, are they? Nothing illegal going on?”
“No, nothing illegal. Just had a breakup. I need a fresh start.”
That seemed to work for him because ten minutes and a wad of cash later, I was climbing on a bus. Final destination: San Diego.
I didn’t know anything about San Diego or the West Coast at all really. When I pulled out my phone to see what I was getting myself into, my service was gone. My father really thought he could bully me back to that mating.
We stopped at the next decent-sized town for a pickup, and I yanked out my SIM card and flushed it down the toilet.
Was it overkill? Probably. Father would chill out soon enough, but I wasn’t willing to chance that the other parties involved would as well.
The phone wasn’t going to work as a phone, but at least I could use Wi-Fi.
My father wasn’t the bad guy, not really, but he sure was acting like it. After I got settled into my new location, I’d call him. The pressure from the visiting pack and our alpha would have died down by then. Probably.
San Diego actually seemed like a pretty nice place to live. There were enough touristy kinds of things that I could probably get a job fairly easily. Housing was a lot more difficult, but given that I could just wolf out and sleep in some brush, I knew I’d be okay.
One place that kept popping up in my searches was a club called Animals. People talked around what I needed to know, but there were enough hints in reviews and articles that I felt fairly confident it was a shifter place.
So, when I arrived early one morning, the days blurring together, the longest time I’d ever spent on bus after bus with waits at different stations, I headed straight there.
I got out of the rideshare and was greeted in the parking lot with a smile and a wave.
Odd. I figured people would be there to get ready for when they opened, but I didn’t expect to be greeted like an awaited guest.
The man looked down at my suitcase and up to my face. “Are you here about the job?”
“I am?” Could I be that lucky? “I’m new in town and kind of came without a plan. I’m not sure what the job is, but I’d been hoping you had one for someone like me.” I tilted my head, giving him respect and letting him see that I knew what kind of place this was. Or, at least, I thought I did.
“Oh, you’re wrong. You had a plan. You just didn’t know what it was.” He grabbed the handle of one of my suitcases and started away. “Come with me.”
I followed him inside, and he showed me around the place and introduced me to a lot of people. It was a blur. I was exhausted from my trip. And hungry. Random vending machine food along the way didn’t quite do it for me.
“If you want, we can do a hybrid position. The salary is lower, but it comes with an apartment,” he offered.
We still hadn’t discussed an actual position. That should be a huge red flag. Instead, it was comforting. As if they were accepting me and not what I could do.
“Really?”
“Yeah, really.” He pulled his phone out and tapped until a picture of a car appeared on the screen. “And until you get settled, my mates and I have this old car we are looking to sell. You’re welcome to use it.”
“Why are you being so nice to me?”
“Why would I not be?” He looked perplexed, as if not realizing his behavior was the perplexing part of the conversation.
I accepted the job—whatever it might be—and followed him to the elevator that took us to the small apartment that was now mine. I’d never had a place of my own before. In the pack, everyone lived with their family, many times multigenerational living at that.
“Why don’t you rest. You can come find me when you’ve had enough sleep. No rush.”
“Okay,” I said, biting back a yawn.
I didn’t even make it to the bed, lying down on the couch and falling sound asleep.
The next day, I finally made my way to Zevo and began my new life with my new job, my new place to live, and my new pack. I wasn’t fool enough to think this was really a pack, but my wolf settled down in a way he only did on pack lands, and that was good enough for me.