True Confessions of a Vegetarian Wolf (Ours Evermore)

Chapter 1

Beatrix

A flash of fur with scared, wide eyes in her headlights was all the warning Beatrix got. With a gasp, she slammed her foot down on the brake pedal and screeched to a stop.

Angry horns sounded behind her, but she ignored them.

“Doggo?” she called out as she fumbled with her car door. Leaning out of the open door, she nearly got decapitated by an angry driver swinging around to pass her.

“Asshole!” she screamed at the car, then realized she should probably pull over before trying to find the stray dog.

Without even closing her door completely, she parked badly in a parallel spot with a flashing meter and jumped out. She was super crooked with her car still angled in the road a little, but at least she wasn’t impeding traffic anymore.

“Stupid bitch!” someone yelled as they barely missed the back corner of her car.

She didn’t even bother flipping them off; she was on a mission. Dogs in need came first!

Even though she couldn’t have a dog of her own, she loved them dearly. She volunteered at the Humane Society and helped with their social media. Someday she planned to have a house with a massive backyard so she could adopt all the sweet dogs who didn’t find homes.

All that meant there was no way she was going to let a dog get hurt if she could stop it. She’d found strays before and smuggled them into her apartment for a night of being spoiled before taking them to the shelter the next day. She could do the same with this one.

Running across the street, she followed the dog down an alley.

The scared creature ducked behind a pile of plastic crates full of empty wine bottles.

Crouching down, she tried to see the scared animal.

The dog was medium size and obviously a mix of something long-haired, with adorably floppy ears and a short snout.

“You’re a cutie,” she cooed to the dog. It was sitting with its fluffy tail wrapped around its front feet. The dog was shaking badly, obviously terrified.

“You’re going to be okay,” she promised the animal. The dog made a little whimpering sound that broke her heart. “No, please don’t do that. I’m not going to hurt you. If you trust me a little, then I’ll get you someplace safe with plenty of food and goodies.”

The dog didn’t move. She wasn’t surprised.

“You’re too scared,” she murmured, standing up and looking around. She needed treats and something to use as a leash. There was nothing in the alley except a dumpster and stacks of glass and cans to be recycled.

“Why did I clean out my car yesterday?” she lamented.

Three leashes and two boxes of treats got shuffled up to her apartment along with all the dirty work out clothes, change of shoes, and other random items that had collected in the car over the month.

She’d meant to put the dog items back in her car in a nice, organized tote she’d bought, but it was all still sitting next to her front door.

She crouched again. “Please stay here. I’ll be right back and I swear, everything will get better.”

She stared at the dog for a moment, but all the creature did was shake and watch her with wary eyes. Right, she needed to hurry before the dog tried to bolt again and risked getting hit by a car.

Rushing out of the alley, Beatrix looked for any open businesses. At this time of night, it seemed like everything on this block was closed, but she tried doors no matter if it looked dark inside or not.

The third door she tried opened. She wasn’t expecting it and stumbled inside a small, well-lit bar. Just like what might happen in a movie, everyone stopped talking and turned to look at her. Most looked curious but several seemed downright surprised.

Was this place a private club? Whatever, it wasn’t like she wanted a drink or anything. She needed help.

There were a man and a woman behind the bar. Instinct had her going to where the woman was standing. There was a small space between two patrons sitting at the bar where she was able to scootch in to address the bartender.

“Um, hi, I’m sorry to bug you, but I need some help.”

Before the woman could answer, the man to her left sucked in a breath and stood up and faced her.

“I can help you,” he said. His voice was smooth with a hint of an accent she recognized from Downton Abbey.

She turned to face the stranger and found herself confronted with the most handsome man she’d ever met.

He had a chiseled face, like from her childhood graphic novels, thin lips that enhanced his severe look, but a head full of luxurious light brown hair that looked like he’d tried to style it, but gave up halfway through.

All that was nice, but it was his intense, dark blue eyes that held her captive. Could eyes be described as navy blue? She didn’t know, but she swore that was what his eyes looked like.

A punch of lust made her suck in a sharp breath. She wanted to touch him so badly her hands shook.

“Um, miss?” the woman behind the bar said, leaning over so she could touch Beatrix’s sleeve. “What’s wrong? Why did you say you needed help?”

The urgency in the woman's voice and the dog waiting in the alley for rescue helped Beatrix set aside the desire trying to overwhelm her.

She tore her gaze away from the alluring man to address the bartender. “I need a rope or pieces of twine and some kind of food item that might tempt a dog.” She pointed. “There’s a scared stray hiding in the alley, and I need to get it out.”

The bartender’s expression turned sympathetic. “That’s sweet of you! We actually have a few leashes and a bag of treats here.”

She moved down the bar and crouched out of sight. When she came back up, she had a slip lead in one hand and an unopened bag of training treats in the other.

Beatrix beamed at her. “Perfect!”

She accepted the items and turned to ask the guy for his number or something so they could maybe hook up some other night, but he was already taking the leash from her and moving away from the bar.

“I’ll help you retrieve the dog,” he said. “It’s too dangerous for you to be in a dark alley by yourself with a dog of unknown temperament.”

She almost snorted. This guy posed more danger than any dog in a dark alley, but something about him kept her from refusing his offer.

“You can trust Arthur. He’s a good guy,” the bartender said, then her voice went low with warning. “Although if he acts bad at all, I know someone who can put him in his place.”

Beatrix swung her gaze to the bartender and held out her hand. “I’m Beatrix, and I like women who protect other women.”

A smile exploded across the bartender's face. “I’m Rissa.” She pointed to the male bartender standing next to her. “This is my partner Zan.” Then she pointed to a man sitting at the end of the bar. “That’s Anatoly, our third.”

Anatoly lifted a wineglass. “Hello Beatrix. Don’t worry, Arthur knows he needs to behave.”

“I’m not that much younger than you, Anatoly,” Arthur growled. “I wouldn’t be so casual about issuing challenges.”

Anatoly was unbothered. He tipped his wineglass at Zan and Rissa. “Unlike you, I have them. That makes me much stronger.”

There was some weird subtext she wasn’t getting here, but honestly, she didn’t care because there was a dog waiting for her.

“Guys, enough!” Rissa said, slapping a hand on the counter. She gave Beatrix a smile. “Sorry about that.”

“Right, yeah, no worries,” Beatrix said, unsure what else to say.

Rissa pulled a phone out of her back pocket. “I’m going to call a friend. He runs a rescue. If you can’t catch the dog, don’t worry, Titan’s amazing with animals. He’ll be able to catch the dog, just don’t let it run out of the alley, okay?”

Relief and disappointment warred inside Beatrix. She knew she shouldn’t try to sneak another dog into her apartment, especially after the howling-Rottweiler incident. But still, she felt sad at missing out on doggo company for the night.

“Great, thanks,” she said to Rissa with a forced smile. She turned to leave the bar with Arthur right behind her. When she stepped outside, she noticed her car and winced. It was way further out in the road than she thought it was.

“Here,” she said, shoving the treat bag at Arthur and pointing at the mouth of the alley. “The dog’s down there, hiding in the stack of recycling. I have to move my car.”

“No,” he said, even as he accepted the bag of treats. “Give me your keys.”

She was already searching for them and realized with absolute horror that she hadn’t pulled the keys out of the ignition.

“Oh shit, I left them in the car,” she said with a shake of her head.

Arthur didn’t say anything, but he did look slightly relieved. “That makes it easy.”

“Wha—”

Before she could finish asking what he meant by that, he stepped back and stuck his head into the bar. “Zander, please move Beatrix’s car to your parking garage. The keys are in there.”

Zander grinned and jumped over the bar with an impressive level of athleticism.

“Sure,” he said cheerfully, brushing past them to head to her crooked Toyota. “I’m guessing it’s that one.”

She probably should have protested about this man she barely knew driving her car away, but honestly, she felt a strange kind of peace being around Arthur. It was almost like she instinctively knew he was trustworthy and wouldn’t make any bad decisions when it came to her and her things.

Then Arthur took her hand and cemented that thought.

Normally, she hated when people touched her without warning, but this felt different. It was as if they’d known each other forever instead of a few minutes.

“Down here?” he asked as they got to the mouth of the alley.

She pointed to the stacked recycling. “Yeah, over there. Poor little guy is scared to death. It’s probably my fault, I almost hit him.”

“You did nothing wrong,” Arthur said quickly as he walked down the alley. “It’s the fault of a careless human.”

He must be involved in rescue because that’s the type of stuff she said all the time with other volunteers. There’s no such thing as a bad dog, only bad humans or owners.

“That’s true,” she agreed.