Chapter 16 Casey
Casey
I dig my hands into the soil and pull the weed up. I can’t even remember the name of it, but I know that if I don’t get a grip by the roots and instead pull from the top, it will snap off and become a menace later.
Waking up this morning with Hazard wrapped around me was unsettling. I laid there, his arm around my stomach as he snored softly, and all I could think was that I would give anything to have the moment stretch on forever.
“What are you doing?”
The question startles me. Not because it’s asked but because of who asks it. Angel crouches five feet from me, his arms resting on his knees, his eyes, as always, guarded and watchful.
“I’m planting my garden.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to be self-sufficient.”
“You don’t want to shop in town?”
How do I answer this? “What if there’s a storm or the road is closed? I would be stuck up here. I need to make sure I have supplies to survive if the worst should happen.”
“Has it happened?”
“Once or twice. The veggies I preserved and canned kept us fed and from starving until they got around to opening the road.”
Angel goes silent watching me.
I rub my forehead with the back of my wrist. It’s not hot exactly, but, under the beating sun, it’s warm. I dig in the soil, turning it and putting the rows of seedlings in.
“What are you planting?”
“Beans go at the back so they can climb the house. I’ve got tomatoes and chilies. Potatoes and squash. And I’ll be planting watermelon and strawberries later.”
Angel creeps closer, I watch his shadow until he’s almost on top of me.
“Is being alone worth it? Does it fix anything?”
His murmur sends chills up my spine.
“I don’t know, but it stops the worst things from happening.”
“What’s worse?”
I clench my teeth, not wanting to answer. “There are lots of worse things. Being with someone you hate, living a life that doesn’t fit you.”
“Living a lie?”
I suck in a breath, but he creeps closer, his face so close to mine that we’re almost touching. I keep my eyes on the dirt, but he’s breathing on the side of my face, so close.
“Why are you trembling?” Angel whispers.
“I’m not.”
He moves suddenly, and I’m lying on my back in the dirt with no idea how I got here. He leans over until we’re nose to nose.
“You smell like menthol.”
“So what?”
“I remember what they say about omegas.”
I stiffen. “I don’t know omegas.”
Angel smiles; his haunting blue eyes are hard crystal chips. “Sure, you don’t.”
I startle, my lips parting as his fingers touch the sides of my hips. He splays out his hand and slowly moves it under my top.
“What is that smell covering?” Angel whispers.
“Nothing.” There’s no conviction in my voice; it’s just a hoarse thread of sound.
“I see you,” Angel whispers.
I tense, but he closes the distance and runs his nose up the side of my face. I exhale in a puff, my chest heaving.
“Angel-”
“Shh, don’t ruin it.”
He turns his head slightly, and his lips graze mine. My eyes are wide open, and he doesn’t even blink.
It’s a powerful kiss, not even a kiss, it’s a touching of lips. Angel draws back, and then he’s up and walking away.
Just like that. Did that even happen?
I sit up, my lips tingling. I want to go after him, but I get the impression I won’t find him.
Angel kissed me.
I thought he hated me.
What do I even do with this information?
I turn back around and continue planting, only to find myself again, surrounded by wolves and Khaos.
“We’re going to help.”
“What?” I squawk.
“You need help; you won’t get this done, so where do you want us to dig?”
I stand up and look at them. Hazard butts his massive head into my thigh.
“All right, I need the weeds dug up, and there needs to be a furrow dug like this.”
Khaos leans over, looking, and then sets to digging.
What would have taken me hours is done in minutes as the wolves lose their minds, digging in my garden.
They love it.
I press my lips together and watch them as they bounce around, and then Riot gets the zoomies.
His butt sinks down, and he just takes off, which sets off Hazard.
The two of them race around the small clear space around the cabin.
They come very close to running into trees, but the sheer speeds they get up to, they swing back around and almost crash into each other, but that just sends them into even faster speeds.
I catch sight of Angel, walking around the side of the house like nothing has happened, his eyes fixed on me. Khaos, who is now in wolf form, simply lies down in the grass, puts his head on his paws, and goes to sleep.
Wrath bounces around, chasing butterflies.
For a long moment, I just stand there watching them. I’ve never seen wolves behave like this. In the pack I grew up in, they would be fighting, snapping at humans, biting and causing wounds. They didn’t play or relax in the sun.
The wolf inside them is a weapon that they wield against everyone who is weaker, and it’s a constant battle, an endless war.
But this pack, they float up and down their dominance hierarchy like it doesn’t matter. Khaos is the leader, but he’s not always stronger. Pack members can and do say no, and that’s okay. They protect each other like the families in the books I’ve read.
There are no politics, no games, just a bond that seems impossible to break.
Watching them is like seeing the sun for the first time, like getting clarity after a long time of confusion. This is what being a wolf is supposed to be.
It doesn’t automatically make you a monster.
You choose what you become.
Just like my mother told me.
I turn back and start planting the seedlings, trying hard not to think about anything. They join me, one by one, until all six of us are in a line planting what would have taken me weeks.
I can’t imagine anyone from my old pack helping like this. It would have been considered human work. Frieda was too old to help me easily, so this is the first time anyone has.
I don’t want to examine why that means so much to me, but it’s touched something inside me that’s all vulnerable and left me wondering if keeping secrets is really the right move to make.
Should I tell them what I am so we can deal with it together?
I remember how the pack treated an omega they caught on our territory. They’d ripped her apart. Her screams still keep me up some nights.
There is nothing more dangerous than an omega, except a pack with a deep hatred and fear of them. They didn’t ask, they didn’t try to help her; they just shredded her.
One wolf can’t hold back the tide of a pack.
And I don’t have a wolf.
No, it’s better to find another way. I have another full moon coming next month, I can get back up there and…face the bear. I sit back on my heels, staring at the dirt.
My gaze finds Angel and lingers there. He knows what I am, but he still kissed me. Why did he do that?
Wrath glances at me. The gleam of menace is easy to read.
I glare. “Don’t you dare.”
He stands up, stretches up on his toes, and shakes. Clumps of dirt go flying, hitting everyone and the side of the house.
“Wrath!”
He bounces around and knocks me on my back, sitting down heavily on my lap.
“Oh, god, get off!” I wheeze. “You weigh a ton, you overgrown fluff ball.”
He wiggles and then stiffens.
“Don’t you dare, Wrath! Stop! No!”
He flops back, smooshing me to the grass. He wiggles around on top of me before springing up and taking off, doing more laps of the yard.
I roll up on my hands and knees and lift my head, coming face to face with Hazard. He opens his mouth in a doggy grin and then licks my face.
“Ugh! Why?” I shout at them. “Just why?”
Khaos chuffs.
I grab the bucket of water. “You think so, do you?”
Without putting much thought into it, I empty the contents of the bucket on his head.
He jumps up and howls, whirling on me with gleaming eyes, and his teeth bared.
“I’m not scared of you, Khaos.”
He snaps his teeth and tenses, crouching low.
I run.
They chase me. I don’t have any hope, but they let me stay ahead, playfully snapping at me and bounding around me.
I can see the guys they could have been if this hadn’t have happened to them. That thought gets shoved out of my head when Riot appears in front of me.
I stop dead, and he changes forms, the familiar haze making it impossible to look right at him until he’s human again.
The others have run off ahead, but it’s just him and me, alone in this silent forest. I can feel it closing in.
“Riot…” I murmur and step backwards.
“You ran.”
He sounds so darkly pleased.
“I didn’t mean it that way,” I admit.
“It doesn’t matter how you meant it; the fact is you did it. Oh, Casey, you ran. I’m never going to let you go now.”
I hear the words, but they still take a full minute to settle in my mind, and then my body reacts, flushing hot, breaking into goosebumps, every single cell on my body attuning to him.
I turn away, trying to give myself some space to control myself.
“Run again,” Riot whispers from right behind me. “Let me hunt you.”
I shiver and open my mouth, trying to find something to say, but I’m speechless.
“Run!” his voice snaps out, and I obey instantly.
This time, there is nothing funny; this feels like a race for my very life. I pump my legs harder and faster, throwing everything into it, knowing I’ll lose. I don’t know where he is, just that he’s behind me.
When I can’t run any further, I stop, turning around, but he’s gone. All around me is silence.
“Riot?”
No answer.
A raven calls and takes flight, but there is no wolf.
I take a step back, scanning the forest around me.
Where is he?
More to the point, where am I?
I shift my weight when I sense something behind me, heat, movement, an aura. I don’t know what it is that alerts, but I stiffen as his hand slides over mine, and then I’m pulled slowly towards him and into his arms. He continues walking backwards, leading me into the dark.
My heart is in my throat, but I follow him. All the secrets between us, the imbalance of power, all the reasons why disappear.
There is only Riot smiling that small smile that promises that everything will be okay.
He presses me up against a tree, under the thick branches of a massive pine, and leans in, his lips pressing to my throat. I swallow hard, breaking into shivers.
“Do you think-”
“No.” Riot cuts off my words as his tongue brushes over my skin leaving pinpricks of sensation in his wake.
“What?”
“No, when you’re around, I don’t think. I can’t think. Thoughts cease, and all there is is you.”
“But-”
“I think about your butt, too.”
I splutter a laugh. “Riot, be serious.”
“Riordan.”
I still. “What?”
“My name…it’s not Riot, it’s Riordan.”
I spread my fingers across his chest. The shirt is cool and soft, but I can feel the heat of him under it.
“I was…less in my pack. They said I was uncontrollable and savage, and I was. I would fight because I could and fight because they tried to make me something else. Everywhere I have gone, all I have left is a trail of destruction. Even our old pack,” Riot’s face tightens, “even they couldn’t accept me and what I was. They feared me.”
I stare up at him. The weight of his wonder, awe, and confusion hits me, pressing into me. I’m lost in the intoxicating incense that is leaching off him. The heat flares in my stomach, my mouth waters, and my knees threaten to buckle.
He’s everything I shouldn’t want.
Fear him? How could I?
“Why don’t you?” he purrs in perfect synchronisation with my bleak thoughts.
“Because,” I murmur, lifting so my lips are almost touching his, “you aren’t the monster who haunts my nightmares, you’re the one that appears in my fantasies.”
His eyes flare wide, and then his hands are on me, lifting me up against him as his lips claim mine.
Fear him?
He’s the one who should fear me.