Same Rogue (Same #6)

Chapter One

“No!” Bridger Thomas yelled.

He waited a three-count to make sure Vic stopped knocking at his front door, then placed the beard trimmer back to his jaw and turned it on again. Buuuuzzzz.

Knock, knock, knock.

He nicked a line into his thick beard and snarled.

He was going to kill Vic. Seriously. Bridger dropped his beard trimmer onto the counter and strode out of the bathroom.

He was going to Change into his wolf, and murder Vic, and then maybe even eat him just to make sure his ghost couldn’t come back and haunt him with friggin’ dad jokes while he tried to sleep each night.

He stormed through the living room and yanked the door open, ready to unleash hell on his least favorite Rogue Pack member.

What he saw there standing on his porch though, had him freeze into place like a bump on a log.

A woman stood there, mid-thirties maybe.

She wore a tank top that showed her stomach, exposing a sparkly jewel piercing in her navel.

She wore blue cotton shorts and a big purse with leather fringe hanging down to her knee.

She was tattooed all over her arms, and down one of her legs.

She wore her hair in loose curls. Her tresses went from dark brunette at the roots to a brassy golden blonde halfway down.

She wore a ton of make-up, and her eyes were glowing a smoky gray.

“Who are you?”

“Ha ha,” she said in a nervous laugh. She shifted her weight to her other side.

“Are you here to sell something, or…?” he asked, eyeing her old red Camry parked by his truck.

“You’re Bridger. It’s me.” She frowned and glanced around with a confused expression on her face. “Okay, this isn’t a funny joke.”

Bridger caught movement out of the corner of his eye and glared over at Vic’s house. The front door shut fast. He narrowed his eyes. He smelled a rat.

“Why are you here, lady?” he asked carefully. Maybe she was one of the dumb ones. Sometimes pretty women like her didn’t have the brain cells so they coasted on looks.

The lady pursed her lips and looked uncertain. “I’m Nikita. Kit? You call me Kit?”

“I don’t know you,” he growled in annoyance. He was going to have to trim his whole damn beard short because of her incessant knocking, and whatever game this was.

“Are you serious right now? We’ve been talking for weeks. It’s me. Kit. Nikita Rothchild? We’re paired?”

“Did you say paired?” His dry laugh echoed through the clearing. He heard the creak of Vic’s door and glared at it as he peeked outside, knew he was busted, and slammed the door closed again.

“I already have a mate. We aren’t paired lady. Take your crazy and get out of my territory.”

Her mouth fell open and she stood there frozen like she couldn’t believe he’d just called her out, but crazy people deserved callouts. Not everyone had to live in their delusions.

“Yes, we are paired! We were matched! I picked you and you picked me back!”

“No the hell I did not! I like blonds, and tattoos are a turn-off. You have like eight hundred of them. That, and you’re crazy. Offense intended, lady, but we are not a match at all. Not in any way.”

“Is this just you getting cold feet? You swore you wouldn’t do that to me! I drove here all the way from Alabama! I quit my job! My Alpha already approved me breaking the bond to my Pack! I spent my last paycheck breaking my lease to my rental. Everything I own is in my car!”

The tidal wave of emotion was clogging his throat. “That all sounds weird to do for a stranger, yes?”

“You aren’t a stranger!”

“Okay, I’m getting off this crazy train. You’re dismissed, lady.”

“I’m dismissed?” she yelled at a volume that, frankly, hurt his sensitive eardrums. “I’m dismissed!”

She knelt down and started rifling through her purse. Oh, shit, she was going to shoot him or pepper spray him or something.

A snarl ripped through him and his skin tingled until he realized she was pulling out her cell phone. She showed him a text thread. Bridger frowned as he read the last texts.

I can’t wait to see you. Drive faster. But not too fast. I need you here safe. You have precious cargo.

“Who the fuck even writes like that?” he demanded, barely resisting the urge to retch.

“You!” she yelled. She scrolled up and good lord, she sure had been talking to someone, and constantly for a while, looked like.

Bridger grabbed her phone. “Look, clearly you’ve been catfished, and that’s your own damn fault. “Ask for a video for proof.”

“I did! Immediately!”

Okay, his frown was hurting his forehead, and now he was seeing pictures, and to his absolute horror the pictures were of him, here, while he hadn’t been paying attention.

One was of him chopping firewood. One was of him at the river with his shirt off from a couple of weeks ago when the Pack had done a camping trip.

One was of him holding Tru and Tabian’s new baby boy.

Realization hit him like a freight train as he realized who had been there with him during all of these pics. His suspicion was solidified as he opened the video Nakita, or Kitty, or whatever the hell her name was pointed at.

It was a video of him baiting a fishing line at the river. He’d been fishing with Bay and a couple of the guys. He looked annoyed, and he remembered exactly why.

Vic had asked him to wave to the camera. He’d refused, but Vic wouldn’t shut up about it, so eventually Bridger had done it just to get him off his back.

Mother. Fucker.

Bridger connected a call to that number, and he heard the phone ring, clear as day. It was coming from Vic’s house.

“I’m going to kill him,” he assured Kitchen, or whatever her name was.

“Kill who?” she called after him.

Bridger ignored her. Whatever Vic had done, he was going to pay with a pound of flesh.

Vic opened the door and held his hands out. “I can explain!”

Bridger drove him right into his house and hit him square in the jaw.

“Stop!” Lyric yelled. “It’s my fault. I did it!”

Bridger had been cocked to hit Vic again, but at that, he glanced up at Vic’s mate. “What?”

“I wanted to help! We all know you lost your mate.”

“So you thought what?” Bridger yelled, releasing the collar of Vic’s shirt and shoving him to the ground.

Bridger stood to his full height. “You online shopped for some tattooed ex-stripper thinking that would take my mind off Amelia? That couldn’t get farther from my type if you fuckin’ tried.

I cannot believe you would do this without running a single thing by me,” Bridger yelled. Oh, he was heated.

Lyric gasped as she looked up at the doorway.

Bridger turned to find Naskittle or whatever her name was standing there.

Her smokey gray eyes were glowing nearly white.

“I’m not a stripper. You’ve insulted me in every way.

I’m not blond enough, or bare skinned enough, or covered up enough.

” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I was talking to what I thought was a nice man. I didn’t know about Amelia, or that you lost anyone.

I was on the matchmaking site for a year before I chose a potential mate.

I thought I was doing everything the right way.

” She looked around at Lyric, and Vic, and back to Bridger.

“None of this is actually my fault. I was the one who got screwed. You get to go back to your life. I detonated mine for a nice man who doesn’t even exist.” Her glowing eyes were rimmed with tears now, and Bridger had to look away.

He couldn’t see women cry. He just couldn’t. It did something bad to his insides.

The Kitty lady turned and her heeled, fringed boots made hollow sounds against the porch as she strode for the stairs. She jogged down them and speed-walked through Vic and Lyric’s yard, headed for her car.

Good. Right? Good. She should leave.

Bridger needed to get back to his home and finish trimming his beard and enjoy his evening and maybe Change tonight because getting pissed off like this always conjured the wolf. He just needed to forget about this lady.

“Both of you are so messed up for this,” Bridger growled as he left.

“We’re sorry,” Lyric said softly.

He shook his head. What had they been thinking?

He was fine. He didn’t want anyone else.

He never wanted to love anyone but Amelia.

That had hurt enough. And you know what?

He was offended, okay? That KitKat lady was really who they thought he would be interested in?

He was disappointed they didn’t know him better. Seriously, he was disappointed.

He felt even more alone here now that he realized no one really knew him. Had they even tried?

God, he was so pissed off.

He was walking fast, but that was okay. The tattooed lady was already to her car.

She squatted down on the ground and was digging through her purse, and to his mortification, he heard a soft noise that changed the trajectory of his anger.

It was this little helpless sob. It wasn’t for attention either, because she’d tried to swallow it, and glanced at him quickly, then gave him her back.

“I’ll be gone in a second. I just need to find something. ”

“Take your time,” he grumbled, feeling like the dirt on the bottom of her boot.

She’d had a point. He’d aimed insults at her and none of this was really her fault.

It’s not like she’d intended to come here and be the wrong match for someone.

She’d been the one who was tricked. It was so messed up.

Vic and Lyric were going to pay for this.

He would call a Pack meeting tonight and expose the behavior in front of everyone, and especially in front of his Alpha, Liam.

She was digging frantically through her purse, then stood and looked up on the porch, then knelt back to her purse. “Have you seen my phone?” she asked in this emotional little voice. God, she sounded like her heart was hurting.

Bridger swallowed hard as he realized her phone was in his back pocket. “Shoot, here,” he murmured, offering it to her. “I didn’t realize I’d kept it.”