Chapter 9
Why did he smell so fucking good?
Despite my furball between us, I still inhaled him several times and fought back an actual moan.
It was especially intense around his throat, making my fangs tingle inside my mouth.
I should’ve known this fiasco would lead us to the Falls, but a small part of me had hoped whatever threatened me would’ve resolved within twenty-four hours.
Shame on me for assuming anything involving wolves was ever easy.
They called vampires complicated, when they were the ones with the politics and pack rules.
And family. And people to rely on.
Frustrated, I kicked my boot against Harkin’s calf.
“What the hells was that for?” He yelled at me through the roaring winds.
“My foot slipped,” I lied.
There were only two people now in all the universe who knew my maker’s name.
Harkin, the bastard, was officially one of them.
Fuck, did I hope I was wrong about Morcant.
He’d kept away from me all this time. What logical reason would he have to find me all the sudden?
None. It was the only reassurance I could give myself.
My stomach gurgled when we passed the “Now Entering Plena Falls” sign.
Timber trees surrounded the town’s name, a full moon hanging above it, contrasting the Cove’s crescent moon symbol.
They thought I was a sheep entering the wolf’s den, but I was a damn tigress stalking into their territory.
They may have had their wolf forms, but I too had sharp teeth, speed, and experience.
Did I think Harkin would double-cross me and toss me to his pack to have fun with?
To my surprise, no. Did I think he wouldn’t be able to control all of them?
Also, shockingly, no. What I couldn’t account for were those stray moments.
I knew Harkin was a powerful alpha, but the pack was many and he was one wolf.
Even with his support, I would remain vigilant.
Harkin pulled into the entrance, a modest dirt road with two rickety street lamps.
Whereas Arcane Cove had structured grid roads with houses, apartment buildings, and businesses, Plena Falls said to hells with that and opted for more open space.
I kind of dug it, if I were being honest. Bungalows, tiny houses, and trailers lined each side of the road with ample space between each.
It wasn’t nut to butt style like most suburban layouts.
The lighting was minimal, with only the occasional overhanging street light.
Near the front entrance, most homes had but one small lamp.
Shifters had superior night vision, so why should they care if rare guests couldn’t see?
Harkin pulled into an asphalt driveway next to a long, rectangular house with a tin roof.
It didn’t look like much. You’d think he’d be in a gigantic house as alpha, not some mediocre shack.
Then again, Harkin seemed pretty simple.
Most times, so was I. All I needed was a roof over my head and a deep cellar.
Harkin cut off the engine. “Gonna get changed. You can let Waffles scope out the place before we head to the meeting.”
“Alright.” I got off the bike to follow Harkin and stared numbly as he unlocked the door.
He walked in, but I didn’t follow.
His home. His abode. His scent would be everywhere.
It took several beats before Harkin’s head appeared through the doorway. “Shit, you really need an invitation?”
Damn it. That made me laugh.
“No,” I replied through a light chuckle. The threshold seemed to throb while I moved over it, and I sucked in a quick breath.
From the exterior, I hadn’t expected the vast loft floor plan. Sparse and simple, the space had just a table, chairs, sofa, and TV, though it felt cozy.
Waffles kicked his legs, squirming in the harness to be let down. When I released him, he immediately got the zoomies, sprinting around the perimeter. He scraped his claws on the slick floor when he’d slip around the corners.
“Seems he likes it.” Harkin gave a dopey grin as he watched my dog.
Watched him almost adoringly.
I folded my arms and did several turns, taking in the space. “This is a lot of room. What do you do in here?” I thrust my hands forward. “Wait. Don’t tell me. Ballet.”
Harkin sauntered toward a hallway. “Sparrin’ mostly. But I have done the Viennese Waltz in here before.”
My belly swooped. That inconvenient flutter inside my stomach. “You can waltz?” I spun around in time to witness Harkin reaching for the neck of his shirt over his head, yanking it off.
Aurora, it’s not as if you haven’t seen him half-naked before. Chill.
“Waltz, two-step, salsa,” Harkin rattled on as if discussing a grocery list versus him dropping a boulder into an otherwise very calm river.
“Who are you?” I looked at him wide-eyed. I couldn’t help it.
Harkin laughed, still shirtless. It made his pecs hypnotically bounce. “We barely spoke when we first met. How in the world would you know what I can and can’t do?”
We’d said all of twelve words between the two of us a quarter century ago. Twelve.
“Right, but you’re supposed to tell me things that’ll make me hate you more, not—” I cut myself off by pinching my lips shut.
Harkin turned to face me, the lighting casting majestic shadows over each of his abs. “Not what?”
Not make me like you.
I balled up a napkin resting on the kitchen island and tossed it at him. “Go put a shirt on, you barbarian.”
Harkin caught the napkin with a snatch of his hand and smiled, but it was a weaker one, a disappointed one. “You say that like it’s an insult.” He disappeared down the hallway, giving me a view of those three slashing scars on his back again.
Waffles slid in front of me. He panted so hard his entire body vibrated.
“Aw, you thirsty, boy?” I hopped into the kitchen, scrutinizing the cabinets, imagining each had a pressure-release bomb. “Hey, Harkin,” I hollered.
“Yeah?” He yelled from another room.
“Do you have a metal bowl or anything?”
“Bottom cabinet on the right, near the fridge.”
I grabbed one and rested a water-filled bowl on the floor. Waffles attacked it, getting more on the floor than in his actual mouth. Silly goober.
When Harkin returned, I gripped the counter firmly, suppressing the urge to trace a fingernail over a fang.
He had changed into a black button-down shirt, jeans, and boots.
His hair was ruffled, and a single loose wave hung over his forehead.
He rolled the sleeves up to his elbows, too focused on securing the buttons to witness the puddle of drool collecting on the floor from my mouth.
“Say, did I—” Harkin started. He stopped when he saw me bent over the counter with my chin resting on my palm. “Everything okay?” His wolf glimmered through his gaze, his canines slightly showing from his small grin.
“Peachy. Waffles approves, by the way.” I jutted my thumb at the pug licking the metal bowl clean. He pushed it across the floor until it bumped into Harkin’s boot.
Harkin squatted to scratch my dog’s head. Again, so adoringly. What the shit? “Good. I’ll toss him a steak when we leave. Really win him over. Any reason for his name, by the way?” He strolled into the kitchen.
“What? Does Waffles not meet your dog-like standards?”
Harkin snatched a water bottle from the fridge and a piece of meat wrapped in butcher paper. “You gotta admit it’s unusual.”
“That was his original name. Actually, it was Les Gaufres, the French word for Waffles.”
“You adopted him?” Harkin grabbed another bowl and set the meat inside it.
“More like inherited, but yup, he and I have been together for a very long time. Isn’t that right, Waffie Waffs?” I made scrunchy faces at him. Waffles gave a small yip before pushing the bowl again with his nose.
Vanilla and pine suddenly enveloped me. It saturated my nostrils and caused shivers down my arms. “You’ve been around for a very long time. Haven’t you?” He stood right next to me.
I faced him, sinking my fangs into my lower lip. “By human standards, I’m very much your elder, wolf.”
Harkin’s nose wrinkled slightly, his amber eyes turning molten. “Yeah? Don’t you go thinkin’ that it’s gonna get you anywhere.”
“No? Is that what you think?” My eyes fell to his bobbing throat. I came closer, my lips parting. “Alpha?”
Harkin’s hand cupped my elbow, sobering me and making me blink. “We’re gonna be late.”
“Pack business.” I slid my hands down my thighs. “Right. The boring stuff.”
“It ain’t boring. It’s necessary.” Harkin walked toward the door.
“For you all, maybe. However, we have a very different view on what we deem necessary.”
“Play nice tonight.” The wolf grabbed a cowboy hat hanging by the door and slipped it on his head.
My stomach caved in on itself. A Stetson. The Stetson?
I sidled up to him with a noncommittal shrug. “Can’t promise anything.”
“I’m serious, Aurora. They’ll listen to me, but that don’t mean they still won’t try to rile you up. You’re the first and only vamp that’s ever been in the Falls.”
“Gee, I wonder why.”
“Aurora.”
Harkin saying my name in that all demanding and gruff tone was something I feared I could get used to. A trace of worry coated his words, too. It warmed my otherwise chilly skin.
Rory. I wanted him to call me Rory, though.
“Sure,” I answered. Harkin gave a curt nod and opened the door. “I’ll try,” I finished.
His cheeks flapped like an agitated wolf.
“Is that the same Stetson?” I eyed the black hatband with silver accents and a pewter wolf’s head. If it hadn’t been the same, he’d kept the band.
Harkin’s eyes turned upward. “Yeah. It is. Gotta lot of fond memories with this hat.”
My heart would have stopped. Just stopped beating for a solid three seconds.
“I’m sure you do.” I put on a smile and gestured outside. “Lead the way.”
We walked a couple of blocks to a wide wooden lodge that looked like a clubhouse.
Dozens of shifter scents flooded my nose, making my fangs quite antsy.
To save face and to keep my word to Harkin, I forced them to stay sheathed.
Overlapping conversations flooded from within before Harkin opened the door.
Once he went inside, the building fell silent.
It wasn’t because of me, not yet. It was out of respect for their alpha entering the space.
“Everyone,” Harkin’s voice boomed with authority. “I apologize for leaving you without a word yesterday. Something came up that needed my attention.”
I’m a something now?
“I’ve enacted the alpha bind,” he announced, reaching for me behind him. His massive hand delicately wrapped around the back of my neck, bringing me in front of him.
Some sixty shifters growled, snarled, and flashed their wolfish eyes at me. Instead of baring my fangs, I lifted my chin. Confident. Cool. And in control.
“Yes, she’s a vampire, but she is not to be harmed. If I see, or get word that any of you so much as touch the tip of a claw on this female, you’re out.” Harkin paused when the shifters broke into shocked whispers. “No trial. No mercy. I’m exiling you from this pack. Understood?”
My gods. Why was this so—attractive?
The space became a clamor of “yes, Alpha.”
Harkin slid his hand between my shoulders. His lips hovered near my ear. “Go on and sit in that corner table, sugar.”
Harkin hadn’t asked me. He didn’t even say please, and yet I was perfectly content to do as he asked. Elated to do it.
I kept a smug, carefree smile as I sat down, reserving a glare for any shifter that looked my way. It was understandable. In a gaggle of vampires, a singular shifter in their midst would cause an uproar. Especially if they were told not to even toy with the shifter.
Oh, this was too rich.
Harkin stood at the front, going into pack politics and other shifter mumbo jumbo I couldn’t give a flying fang about. Occasionally, a shifter would steal a glance at me. I’d give taunting waves, pretend to yawn, whistle, and one that glared especially hard, I blew a kiss.
Silhouetted forest artwork flooded the side walls, wolves of every color peering through the trees. The glowing yellow eyes penetrated through the blackness. On the front wall, the same patterns continued. Only hidden deeper in the painting was a bipedal wolf howling at a full moon.
It was when the meeting ended, the organization of it dwindling, that a female wolf approached me. She loomed over me because I was sitting, but when I stood, I was several inches taller than her.
“Is this your plan?” She asked, her lime-green eyes fiercely glowing, almost threateningly so. Her hair was voluminous, long, wavy, and ash-blonde. Her jaw was so pointed it could cut glass, much like the slope of her nose.
“My plan? You’ll need to elaborate.”
In the edge of my vision, Harkin attempted to swiftly deflect questions from pack members, while catching glimpses of me.
“To pounce on our alpha? To weaken him?” The female’s fists shook at her sides, rattling the zippers on her leather jacket.
“Honey, if I wanted to do that, I wouldn’t have made him bound to me because I’m in danger from something.” I rolled my shoulders back, preparing for the worst.
The female’s eyes flashed into pure wolf, her canines growing. “Oh, you’re in danger alright.”
Well, that sure lasted a while.
I let the fangs spring free.