Chapter 15
Alan came back to himself with a satisfied smirk.
Hard to avoid given how absolutely, frigging amazing Tonya was.
Never in a million years would he have guessed that she liked dirty talk.
Or that she could do whatever-the-hell that had been when he’d been inside her.
Controlled rocket launch? Stair step to mind blown?
He was so exhausted, he’d just collapsed sideways, taking her with him.
They were still joined as they spooned on the bed.
And though her breath had steadied, she seemed as bonelessly pleasured as he was.
Except, hell, that wasn’t exactly how he’d dreamed of making love to her. Over the years, he’d imagined thousands of scenarios but all of them had involved tenderness. Sweet caresses and joyous kisses. Never had he lifted her hips and slammed himself home like a...
Like a monster.
He groaned as he buried his face in her back. She still wore her tank top and the light cotton shamed him. He hadn’t even taken off her shirt.
“Oh hell,” she sighed. “You’re thinking again.”
What? He didn’t even say the question aloud, but she answered it anyway.
“You may have changed, Alan, but some things will always be you. I’ve never known anyone who could examine a situation from so many angles, even after the deed was done.”
“What?” This time he did say it aloud, and she chuckled at the confusion in his voice.
“I’m not complaining,” she said. Actually she was. “It’s what makes you such a good lawyer. I can’t tell you how many times you’ve made me or Carl run through scenarios.”
“Carl does that, too. So do you.”
“Yeah, but when we decide, it’s over. You keep searching for what we missed.” She gripped his hand, pulling it closer. “It’s also why you’re a great beta.” Her voice was quiet, the words filled with quiet acceptance.
But he couldn’t let her doubt herself. Not in this. “You just got the job. It takes a while to settle in.”
“It takes a different temperament. Attention to detail and organizational skills. That’s you.”
“Strategic thinking, military precision,” he countered.
“That’s you.” He levered himself up onto his elbow, suppressing his groan of regret as he slid out of her.
But this was too important for her to be distracted.
So he pulled out, then turned her so he could look in her eyes.
“Carl is used to me doing the job. Don’t let him act like you’re a replacement for me.
You’re not. You’ve got your own strengths, your own skills.
Own the position, Tonya. Make it yours. Trust me, you’re more than capable. ”
She stared at him, her blue eyes widening as he spoke. He didn’t know if the message sank in or not. If she’d really take it to heart. In the end, he could only hope that her slow nod meant she would do what was needed. What the Gladwin grizzlies deserved.
“You’re going to be terrific at it,” he said as he pressed a kiss to her shoulder.
“Does that mean you forgive me for stealing the job?”
He lifted his head and frowned at her. “You didn’t steal anything. Carl gave it to you.”
“But—”
He pressed his finger to her lips, silencing her as he tried to find the right words. The most honest words. “Yeah, I was pissed at first. That was my only standing in the clan.”
“Not true!” she spoke past his finger and when he tried to stop her, she grabbed his hand and pulled it away from her mouth. “You’re part of us.”
“Because I can shift now?” he asked, his words harsher than he intended. “Or at least half shift.”
“Because you’ve grown up with us. Because your uncle, father, and now brother are our Maximums. Because the only one who ever felt he didn’t measure up was you.”
Well, that was bullshit. They both knew that there was a quiet prejudice against the nonshifters in a grizzly family.
They were called normals and genetic losers in the game of shifter offspring.
It didn’t matter that they were included in the clan picnics before the wild run through the park.
The pecking order was blindingly clear. The Maximus shifted first, then the others followed into a tumbling, rumbling bit of fun through the park.
And when the shifters disappeared into the park, the normals cleaned up the leftover potato salad.
They grabbed the children too young to shift and helped the grandparents get home.
They were the maids of the clan, and everyone knew it.
But rather than argue, he pulled away from her and headed to the bathroom to clean up. And typical to her stubbornness, Tonya didn’t remain quietly on the bed. Nope. She rolled up right after him, pacing him to the bathroom and talking the whole way.
“Sure, there are dickheads in every group. But you look me in the eye and tell me that your brother didn’t know your worth. That Mark didn’t go to you with his biggest problem. That I didn’t see what you did every day and thank you for it.”
He swallowed. He couldn’t because she was right. The ones who counted had known his worth. That’s one of the reasons he’d stuck around so long. That’s why it had been so hard to leave Gladwin in favor of other dreams. But she deserved the truth.
“I got a job in Chicago.”
She jolted, her entire body stilling. “What?”
“That’s what I was doing when they grabbed me.” He took a breath, pushing away the memory of his abduction. “The day after Carl offered you the job as beta, I put out my résumé to some of the big firms in Chicago. I was coming back from the interview when they got me.”
“And you got the job.” A statement not a question, but he answered it anyway.
“At a great salary.” Then he looked away.
He would have gone. He knew that without a shadow of a doubt.
He would have taken the job and driven off to a great new future in big city law.
Except Elisabeth had found him. Einstein, her partner in evil, had shoved poison in his arm.
And his entire future had burned to the ground.
Meanwhile Tonya absorbed his words, her eyes widening even as she leaned heavily against the door frame. “You were leaving us.”
He sighed. She still didn’t get it. As much as she was the queen of facing facts, she still hadn’t sorted through all the possibilities. But with his silence, her quick mind figured it out.
“You still are leaving,” she said heavily.
“Shall we sort through every possibility?” he asked.
“You get healthy. We either figure out how to change you back—”
“Fat chance.”
Her lower lip pushed out mulishly. “We fix what they did to you,” she repeated firmly. “Or you get a handle on controlling it.” She gestured to his body. “You’re already there. You’re looking and acting fully human now.”
On the outside. He still knew he was crazy on the inside. “There are lots more job opportunities for me outside of Gladwin, and not enough for me to do now that you’re the beta.”
“You can have the job back,” she said. Firmly. Like she really meant it. But he knew how important the clan was to her. And once the kinks got ironed out, she and Carl would be a seamless unit.
“I’m not going back to being the beta. I don’t want it.” Which turned out to be true. And no one was more surprised than him.
“But you could work nearby, right? In Bay City or Lansing.”
“Maybe,” he said slowly. But half measures had never worked for him.
He either left the clan or he didn’t. Living an hour away was still gone because once he left, there would be nothing to bring him back.
Nothing but memories that he already knew were going to be too painful to revisit for a long, damn time.
“So that’s settled—”
“Look at the other probabilities,” he said quietly. “We don’t know the serum’s side effects. We don’t know if I can survive a month much less a lifetime.”
“We all live with that.”
Not like he did. This change was a ticking time bomb inside him. No way could he live like this without some part of him destroying itself. But he couldn’t explain that certainty to her. He couldn’t put words to the knowledge. So he said the one thing guaranteed to end all her hopes.
“I’m going to kill Elisabeth.”
She actually ground her teeth together. He heard it loudly. “We’re going to get her, Alan. She’ll face justice. I promise you that.”
Would that be enough for him? Seeing her in handcuffs? Going through the agony of trial so that she spent a lifetime behind bars? Would that satisfy the black hole in his gut that demanded vengeance?
It might. Except he knew the criminal justice system.
He knew about prison overcrowding and the sympathy juries had for older women.
Evil Einstein had been caught red handed, but thanks to a shifter-aware district attorney, he was now working for the Gladwins.
The bastard’s only punishment was an ankle monitor as he worked in a secret, shifter-backed lab.
All in all, it was a good thing. The serums the dickhead developed could really help the ferals in the community.
Which is why Alan hadn’t put him as target number one on his hit list. That and he knew that Elisabeth was the one who’d pulled the strings.
She had found and manipulated the crazy scientist. So Alan was focused on her, not her whacked-out flunky.
“Not enough,” he said, his words dropping like a wall between them. “She’s evil, Tonya. And I’m going to end her.”
“You’re not trained. Alan, you’ll more likely die in the attempt.”
He nodded. “Or succeed and go to jail.” Because he wouldn’t fight that. No point in committing the crime if he wasn’t going to take responsibility for his choice.
“Do you even hear yourself?” There was an edge of fury in her voice. A shrill note that got stronger with every word. “Alan, think this through! Your life is different. It’s not over.”