Chapter 4
Beck
The heated wisp of Sloane’s breath dancing across my face was a powerful aphrodisiac and some men, let alone beasts of the wild, could go nuts from hunger.
Not this man.
I was calm and collected while taking a step away, offering a smile that should rock her world.
She appeared bored.
Now sweat had beaded across the back of my neck.
Not a good look, Beck. Not at all.
With the drink in her hand, she lifted the glass. Not as a salute to my awesome talents, but as a sendoff.
A guy could take a hint. Or at least he should.
Without waiting to see if she’d press for more, I headed toward the guys, who were none too happy I’d enjoyed spending time with a lady.
“About damn time, dude,” Tripp huffed.
“Where are the shots?” my man Cujo pressed. When Bernie eyed Sloane as if she’d suddenly become eye candy, my wolf reminding me that he was awake again caught me by surprise.
At least I knew the beast hadn’t succumbed to boredom since I’d ignored him for so long.
“Coming. You guys are a pain in the ass. Next round is on you, Cujo boy.”
By the time I made my way to the bar once again, she’d returned to being absorbed in her work, typing faster than anyone had a right to. I had an urge to look over her shoulder, but had a feeling all I’d do was aggravate her.
Maybe Bernie was right in that annoying her wasn’t an option that should be on the table. As I slipped into the open seat, I realized something that hadn’t dawned on me before.
The lovely reporter hadn’t asked me a thing about being a shifter.
Not a single question, not a snide remark about how the only way Ford made a shot or I deflected a puck was because of our extraordinary abilities. Not a single snide off the cuff comment about how we’d taken the place of legitimate hockey players.
Or even a sly question about whether all the ridiculous rumors still floating around were true.
We were demons in disguise.
We drank blood.
We shifted every full moon.
We lived forever.
We had extra-large cocks.
Now she knew the answer to that one, but I wouldn’t mind showing her again, only this time in private.
And my personal recent favorite, which was that we were building an army to take over the world. The family unit had enjoyed a few good laughs over that one. Maybe it was time to share that our population, at least our particular species, was shrinking.
Or perhaps I should say evolving.
With more human-shifter marriages without being mates, human DNA had become dominant in most cases. Not all. However, our scientists believed at the rate we were going, we could be extinct in fifty years.
Hence the push from the elders to have more cubs indiscriminately.
No, thank you. The last thing I wanted or needed was for wolf pups to be running around nipping at my ankles.
I’d had my very first interview since identifying as a shifter that hadn’t included anything about shifting.
Hmmm… Maybe I liked this girl.
With the tequila shots passed out, we each lifted our shot glasses.
“A toast,” I threw out.
“To getting laid.”
“To two-million-dollar contracts.”
“To curing cancer.” Doc threw out the last one and the rest of us groaned.
“To winning the Stanley Cup, you morons,” Bernie huffed in disgust, rolling his eyes as he did.
“Exactly!” We clinked glasses, tossing back the liquid. While I felt freer than I had in a long time, another first was already driving me crazy.
My wolf clawing at the surface to join the party. If he did, he’d be a handful to handle and I wasn’t in the mood to babysit.
Every few seconds, I couldn’t help but glance in Sloane’s direction, curious as to what she was doing.
When I did, my heart rate increased until finally, it was hammering in my chest. But I couldn’t help myself or the desire that was furrowing in my groin. The ache was real and entirely different than when on the ice.
“If you’re not careful, she’s going to figure out you’re staring at her,” Cujo said so only I could hear.
“Maybe too late.”
“Then go jump her bones.”
“Trust me. She’d kick my ass. I’m not interested.”
“Sure, you’re not. Last time I checked, I heard shifters don’t lie. Think of it this way, bro. Keeping your distance will be good for your career. No telling what the lady reporter will write. You should read her shit. Brutal, man. Just brutal.”
Maybe I would read a few of her articles, so I knew what to expect.
So she was tough. Should that bother me?
Well, maybe… I was a rookie and while my agent was a kick-ass man out of New York, I often felt as if I’d come along for the giant wave Ford was riding.
This was a make it or break it year for me. Any missteps and I could be toast.
If I was a smart man, which is what was indicated by my summa cum laude diploma, I’d keep a mile-wide berth from her. However, me being me, a guy who also didn’t like playing by the rules, the intrigue was more powerful than the concern.
I slowly tilted my head. “Where did you hear that horseshit? We lie all the time.” Maybe to prove a point. Maybe so my cock would finally deflate, I turned my chair so my back was to her. There. I could handle my hunger like a decent man.
Five minutes passed without finding the urge to look in her direction.
I could avoid surrendering to my needs.
Ten minutes.
See. I could do this.
Then why was my skin clammy? Jesus. Over a woman? Really? I scrubbed my jaw while my foot began to tap on the floor as if with a mind of its own.
I easily lasted the next six or seven minutes after that with the bartender refreshing our drinks. But who was counting?
After another three or so, sweat trickled down both sides of my face.
Fuck me. This was getting ridiculous. Why in the hell was I pining away for a woman who obviously couldn’t stand my existence?
Sure, she was one fine-looking woman, but my cravings were much deeper than simply getting my dick wet.
Great. Now I was a crude son of a bitch.
“Well, you don’t need to worry about her any longer,” Cujo said as if I should be relieved.
“How so?”
“She disappeared.”
I swung around to face the bar, immediately letting out a deep, almost agonizing breath. Well, fuck. There went every boy’s wet dream.
“Wow. You look ridiculously disappointed.”
I glared at my friend. “She was fun to fuck with.” When his eyes opened wide, I laughed. “Not like that, your asshole. She could give as hard as she took.” I scanned the bar’s entrance in hopes of catching her. She’d obviously slunk out hoping I wouldn’t pay any attention.
Annoyed, I shoved back my chair.
“Going to hunt her down, wolfman?”
“That would be my brother,” I threw back, Ford’s nickname on the ice suiting him. “You big dog. Just going to the bathroom. Wanna follow?”
Cujo threw up his hands. “I think you can handle your dick all by yourself. You’re a big boy.”
Yeah, I was. A big boy with a painful hard-on.
I strolled through the bar, troubled that I’d allowed the woman to get to me.
I wasn’t usually so obvious about my attraction.
Unless I was faking it for the cameras. There was nothing wrong with hamming it up for the media.
As long as I was careful about who I was seen with.
I noticed the sign indicating the location of the bathrooms and grumbled the entire time I took long strides down the hallway.
Even before a sound captured my attention, something else did. A strange and very overt feeling of impending doom. When my wolf was summoned to the surface, it usually meant someone was about to get hurt.
It didn’t take me long to realize why my hackles had been raised, my canines threatening to break through my gums.
The sexy reporter was in peril. Maybe that was a little too exaggerated as she appeared to be holding her own with a jerk of a guy refusing to take no for an answer.
I could tell the dude was drunk as a skunk by the stench in the hallway.
The staff would need to use a deodorizer.
A flash of something very dark came close to erupting deep inside.
While I’d often called the game of hockey one of premeditated violence, I wasn’t typically prone to fighting emotions surrounding longing to beat the shit out of someone.
Apparently, there was a first time for everything.
“Hey, buddy. I’m going to say this once to you.
You’re going to leave my woman alone,” I told him nicely, trying to use my inside voice as my mother had reminded me dozens of times.
My deep baritone was a powerful instrument according to my high school music teacher.
Somehow, I don’t think she’d been giving me a compliment. “Are you alright, honey?”
Maybe because when I used that voice, my wolf had already breached the surface.
I walked closer, noticing the expression on Sloane’s face. She was annoyed but refusing to back down. However, she flashed a look indicating surprise at the confrontation. I wasn’t just a damn pretty boy in a jersey.
“Mind your own bidness,” the asshole dared say. Yes, he was slurring his words, but there was something about his tone that bothered me.
When I took a long stride closer, she threw out her hand suggesting caution. I was no fool. I’d been around the block a few times with reporters and even fake fans determined to catch the big, bad wolf doing something heinous.
“It’s okay, sugarplum,” she answered. “We were just having a friendly conversation. Weren’t we?”
“I just wanta have a drink with you,” the guy slurred, his body swaying. When he pointed his finger at her, I bristled. I’d seen a lot of drunk guys in my day and he was closing in on becoming violent.
I counted to five in hopes of putting my wolf to sleep.
“Go sleep it off, bud. Can’t you see you’re irritating my wife? That’s not a good idea.” I moved closer still, even though she gave me a look that screamed she could handle the jerk. Or maybe after the long night she preferred ‘handling’ him in a way he wouldn’t soon forget.