Chapter 13
Saint
“You fucking refused to answer my goddamn calls, so I came to you,” Steven’s voice boomed as he pushed his way past my door, stomping like an impetuous child.
The sound of his voice echoed in my brain and the ache behind my eyes increased ten-fold.
“Do you mind lowering your voice?” I closed the door, pressing both hands against the surface as I braced for the onslaught of my brother’s wrath.
We were close, or at least we had been. While he was a few years younger, once upon a time we’d been inseparable. But with all things, life had taken a toll. I’d shot my way to stardom with the NHL and he remained in the American Hockey League, still bitter his number had yet to be called.
Jealousy was the crux of our issue, although we’d both refused to admit it. The truth was that my brother was the better hockey player. I just had more style.
Or so I’d believed all these years.
“Late fucking night? Which chick were you fucking? Is she still here?” Steven never minced words, his fault to corral.
Which he often refused to do.
That was his problem. His hot head kept him from ignoring the beast inside.
Sometimes I wondered if his wolf was more powerful than mine. He certainly had more anger issues. I waited as he had the nerve to search the bottom floor of my house.
“Finished fucking with me?” I snarled.
“Somebody needs to,” Steve threw back then laughed. “Oh, I forget. You get plenty of that.”
“Cut the crap, Steve. I was with my new girlfriend trying to create the perfect photographic moment.” I turned around, realizing every muscle in my body ached.
It was an entirely different kind of discomfort than I was used to.
I’d known for years what playing hockey would do to my body.
I expected the aches and pains, the necessity for creams and hot showers.
What I didn’t anticipate was the deep and almost paralyzing shift of pain to my loins.
I craved what I’d just tasted only hours before.
My mate.
Even now, I was still having a difficult time trying to wrap my mind around the possibility that the need was real.
“I see how well that worked out for you. And for your entire family. Do you know what your little display of alpha bullshit has done to me?” Steven confronted me, his eyes reflecting the hatred I’d sensed the moment he’d walked in.
“What do you mean?” I padded my way toward the kitchen knowing he would follow.
“Are you kidding me? You don’t pay a damn bit of attention to my career. Do you?”
I shot him a look before heading to the drawer holding the coffee pods. “Coffee?”
“Fuck, no. I’ve been up for hours. I just stopped by before heading for a mandatory meeting with the coach, the assistant coach, the owner of the team, and the team’s public relations expert.”
Before I responded, I turned on the machine and grabbed a mug, fumbling before being able to place the pod in the holder. “What for?”
“Are you really going to play that card, Saint? Come on. You admitted you’re a werewolf.”
“I’m not a werewolf. I’m a shifter. The last time I checked, so are you.”
“Fucking Christ, man. You all but ruined both our careers and you’re going to play the semantics card? Are you that stupid or just that arrogant?”
“It was a joke.” Although I’d come to understand what I’d spouted off had been taken seriously.
He grumbled under his breath and pulled out his phone, furiously flipping from one screen to another. “Take a look at this.”
With bleary eyes, I leaned forward. The shot of my brother on the ice was cool.
The headline wasn’t.
Another Werewolf in the Wild. Lock Your Doors.
“What the fuck?” I snarled, instantly angry Steven had to go through such bullshit. I’d been his protector over the years, keeping his scrawny ass body from being bullied at school. Hell, I’d gotten more bloody noses than I could count, but the other assholes had been damaged for life.
“Exactly. Trust me. I was shoved onto the radar, but you should see the articles crucifying your existence. Dad called me last night. Some reporter managed to slide past the guards and the gate and get to his house. They photographed him in his smoking jacket. And Dad is getting angry. And you know exactly what happens when our father gets angry.”
I cringed hearing the words. Dad was usually a master of diplomacy.
But not when a member of his family was hurt or challenged.
Pops usually went into protective mode to keep our mother safe.
When their sanctity was challenged, he turned into a true beast, only remaining in human form.
I couldn’t remember the last time the man had shifted.
Our mother either. They were quite content with playing the affluent neighbors who threw lavish barbeques and block parties.
“I was busy. I wasn’t trying to ghost him. Or you.” With the coffee spitting the last of the brew, I moved to the refrigerator to grab the cream. “I’m sorry, bro. I really am. How bad is it for you?”
He shifted screens again. “Take a look.”
An Instagram post from his rival team exclaiming Steven was washed up.
“Fuck,” I hissed and slammed my fist against the counter. “I don’t what to say other than you’re right, I wasn’t thinking about you and your career. I wasn’t trying to jam you up. The shit at the bar wasn’t supposed to get that out of hand.”
“Then why the fuck did you shift? We’ve been trained to keep our heritage out of the public eye. I just don’t get you.”
I stared at the tan liquid in my cup, suddenly disgusted at the thought of drinking it. Sighing, I set the mug aside and rubbed my eyes. Even they ached. At least my body was consistent. “I was angry. The woman didn’t deserve some asshole picking on her.”
Steven slumped against the other counter, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I get that. What if they toss me off the team?”
“For what? For being my brother?”
He shrugged and sauntered closer, eyeing me cautiously. “This shit isn’t just going to go away, man.”
“No, it’s not.”
Suddenly, my brother took a deep whiff. “Well, shit.”
“What?”
“I don’t know why I didn’t catch the scent the moment I walked in. Maybe because I was too goddamn angry. You found your mate. Right? How is that even possible? I was beginning to think it was a myth.”
“There’s not a chance I found a mate. I still sometimes think those were just stories Dad liked to tell us.” Yet my words were clipped and not full of my typical jest.
Inching closer, he took another exaggerated whiff. “Holy crap. I’m not wrong. Wow. I never thought you’d find the right girl.”
“Don’t do that shit. I haven’t found anything because I haven’t been looking.”
“Maybe not, but what did Pops always tell us?” Steven puffed out his chest as we’d seen our father do a hundred times.
He also lowered his voice to match the gravelly tone of the illustrious pack leader.
“‘When you find your mate there is nothing on this planet that will stop you from protecting and knotting her. Enjoy the ride, boys, as that’s the moment the world will open up in the palm of your hand.’ Remember, he also mentioned the potential for excessive anger. ”
Excessive anger. I’d felt that in spades.
Yet I had to laugh as my brother and I had done two dozen times before when Pops had spouted it off. “Well, I’m not mating with anyone.”
We stared at each other. We knew better than to deny when nature called. There were reports alpha males who’d done so in the past had gone completely insane.
The stale awkwardness shared between us was something I hated, but after being drafted into the NHL, our tight relationship had soured. The tension was already driving me crazy.
“I think she was in heat, man,” I said with quiet reverence.
“The she-wolf you fucked?”
My laugh was as tense as I felt. “Not a wolf. A human.”
Steven snorted. “That’s not possible. Maybe you’re just getting old and can’t tell when a woman is wet with need.”
His grin made me roll my eyes. “I can smell a woman’s desire from a mile away.
” Which I could. “This is different.” I could see her face in my mind’s eye as she moaned, her nails digging into my skin.
I wore the scratches with pride even though in mere hours the indentations were nothing but a memory.
The hard-on I was experiencing was painful.
“How so?”
The words didn’t automatically come to my mind.
“She’s impractical as hell, a girl determined to bring me to my knees and not in the way you’re thinking.
She’s opinionated, hardheaded, a pain in my ass with her constant testing and drilling me over the dos and don’ts of social media.
As if I have no clue how to act around fans. ”
“Sounds like exactly what you need in your life. Control.”
“Fuck off.” At least I could laugh as I scrubbed my jaw.
Every time my brother studied me intently, I was either about to hear a barrage of reasons the previous night’s game had sucked or he’d had another epiphany about future business ideas he was eager to con me into.
“Whoa. Are you talking about your PR guru?” He didn’t bother waiting for me to answer before doubling over with laughter.
I bent at the waist, gripping my knees, and did nothing more than groan.
“Well, holy shit. It seems my brother is getting married.”
That brought me out of my sinful haze and I jerked up, glaring him in the eyes.
“Even if there is some truth Lily is my mate, that doesn’t mean we’re getting married.
Sean and Maria are just living together.
Hell, Mark and Patricia travel different parts of the world and still make their relationship work. ”
Steven shook his head. “Mark is a pilot and Patricia is an executive with a travel firm. They can drop everything within hours when she goes into heat. Even if it means fucking in the lavatory during a flight.”
“Trust me. Even if the thought was plausible, Lily would kill me in my sleep. Sharp knife to the jugular. Hell, what am I saying? She’d use a dull knife.”
“Well, the two of you look hot together, even if eight different women appeared in the background with daggers in their eyes.”
“The picture we took didn’t have anyone in the background.”
“You need to pay attention to the shit that’s said about you. Do I need to do everything?” He continued grumbling under his breath as he pulled up another photograph. This time from Facebook. “Nice shot, buddy. You look like a real hero for a change. Not just on the ice.”
The photo captured the moment I’d shoved aside an asshole who’d insisted I owed him an autograph. Lily was in my arms, her head nuzzled against my neck with her hand on my chest. And my brother was correct. The women standing close by were pissed.
I didn’t say anything, finally turning to my coffee. As I lifted the mug, I gathered a whiff of her scent all over again and my balls immediately tightened.
“So far no one seems to know your PR girl’s name, but you know it’s only a matter of time.”
“We’re not trying to keep the relationship a secret, Steven. We’re trying to fool the press, the fans, and all those psychos who are determined to believe in werewolves that we’re the hottest couple on the planet.”
“In other words, you’re trying to fool yourselves.”
“As I said before. Fuck off. We’re faking because that’s what she was hired to do and what my coach, dear old Dad, and the world insists I do or lose everything I’ve worked for. I assure you spending time with her isn’t any fun.”
He glanced at his phone and even from where I was standing, I could see the sparkle in the man’s eyes. “Could have fooled me.”
“You didn’t drop by just to involve yourself in my less than fabulous love life.”
“You’re right. I came here to beat your ass. You need to calm your shit down or both of us will be lucky to get a job at the local hardware store.”
“You won’t be hired there,” I teased. “You don’t know a hammer from a wrench.”
“Yeah, yeah.” He looked away. “I’m sorry I barged in on you, bro. But you need to understand everything you do reflects on me.”
That much I knew. Almost every news article reflected his likeness to me as well as his skills. But there was always something I did better. Which was crap. “I get it. I just thought it would blow over.”
“Not if you keep feeding the beast.”
“Maybe that’s the problem. I need to feed to beast before he refuses to be controlled.”
“So you do believe there’s truth to the crap Dad told us as kids?”
“Which part? That once we discover our true mates our beasts won’t be denied?” Pops had said the words more eloquently than I’d just done, but the gist was the same.
“Yeah, that. What if Lily is the one?”
I thought about his question. Every day thousands of kids were told stories about their ancestors, whether they were great politicians or actors, award-winning musicians or simply the best electricians in the city.
Some aspired to accept their place in a preconceived legacy while others despised the people who’d spawned them.
But if I had to guess, I’d say almost every story was embellished with the joy of being family, adding aspects of history that existed only in fervent minds hopeful of inspiring their children.
With our father, he’d been blunt, refusing to sugarcoat the reality of who and what we were.
We could be rich and famous, entrepreneurs or astronauts, actors or doctors. It honestly didn’t matter because at the end of the day, from our ancestors to our children and grandchildren, the reality of who and what we were would never change.
Canis lupus.
Predatory monsters.