Seven Years

“The power is on and the shipments are due to arrive today. The twins are unloading while the girls set up.”

I tucked my hands under my arms. “Lorenzo paid for all that?”

His brows knitted and he tucked the smoke behind his ear. “No. Austin did.”

I took a moment to process that, because I had never asked him for any help in that regard. It wasn’t even his problem, and yet he took money out of his own pocket to keep the store running. A store that only paid me a mediocre salary.

“I can’t believe it,” I whispered. Jericho shook his head a little to get his hair out of his eyes and I lowered my voice. “What happened to Beckett?”

Jericho made a slicing motion across his throat and I shuddered. “Austin took care of that problem, and your friend took care of his.”

“Which friend?”

The wolf’s toenails clicked on the tile as he turned in circles and sat in front of me.

Jericho combed his fingers through his hair. “Your neighbor. I guess she knows some cleaners and instead of waiting for the cops, she had the body removed like nothing had happened.”

“Are you sure you don’t mean Lorenzo?”

“Nope,” he said, shaking his head. “Shifters have connections, and I guess she’s got the hookup for taking care of dead bodies.”

“Naya is a Shifter?”

My legs weakened and I closed the door.

“Mmm. We went to check on things and she was in there picking up roses. Nice tits on that one.” Then he looked at the shock plastered across my face. “You didn’t know she was a Shifter? Our kind tends to gravitate toward one another, even if we don’t know it. We also look out for those we bond with, so if you two were tight, then that explains why she went the extra mile. Believe it or not, this city is teeming with Shifters. Not sure what her animal is, but I’d be willing to bet it’s a cat,” he said, rolling his tongue over his bottom lip. “Afraid I’m not into cats; too much maintenance. But they’re prettylicious to look at.”

“I think I’m going to throw up now,” I declared, walking around him and into the living room. Naya was a Shifter? It made sense, but I still couldn’t believe it. “Where’s Maizy?”

“Denver’s keeping an eye on her in the study across from the atrium. When I last checked, she was looking at the pictures in some old World Almanac we’ve had around for about fifty years. He took her outside to play ‘slay the dragon’ this morning. They were trying to kill the snake Reno saw under the house.”

“What?” My question was more of a declaration I would kill him if he was serious. “Can you trust him with her?”

I was beginning to have second thoughts about Denver if snake hunting was on his daily agenda.

Jericho waltzed by me and lifted a box of matches from the bar. “Emphatically. It’s his wolf I don’t trust. Denver has control over his animal and doesn’t shift on emotions, so she’s safe with him. But don’t ever let that child near his wolf. He’s loco.”

* * *

I decompressed in the shower and allowed the hot water to rinse away my salty tears. While I had no physical marks from the attack, the emotional ones left behind became fingerprints that would never wash away.

I’d never seen it coming.

I kept analyzing our relationship to see if there were any signs that Beckett was capable of that level of violence, but he’d only been aggressive with other men. He obsessed over professional wrestling, and sometimes I wondered if he took the job as a bouncer just to push people around and feel superior. Off the clock is when he got in the most fights, and usually it was after a few beers if he spotted some guy talking to me. But he never actually pushed me around, quite the opposite, in fact. Outside of his infidelity, I thought Beckett loved me.

Maybe too much.

His behavior had started to change after we split, with phone calls and confrontations. Losing me didn’t seem to push him over the edge as much as the thought of another man in my life. And being as drunk as he was…

Then the memory of his death slammed into me like a train. I shouldn’t have felt guilty for someone who tried to choke me on a blanket of rose petals and glass, but I did. Then I got angry and threw a bottle of shampoo against the wall, hating him with every fiber of my being. Rage poured through me as I shut the water off and tore down the shower curtain—the rod clamoring on the tile. I growled, sobbed, and made guttural noises—gripping the edge of the tub and letting the pain consume me.

Denver called my name from outside the door and I heard Austin’s wolf viciously snarl.

“You okay in there?” he yelled.

Was I?

Had Austin not showed up and forced me to shift, I would have died. My mother would have had to bury another child.

I kept to myself for the rest of the morning before talking with my mom. She seemed to accept the facts more easily than I did on what I was. Later that afternoon, she put on a brisket, preparing to floor these men with her world-class cooking. I stirred the potato salad while sitting at the table, but I was in no mood to cook. It was also hard maneuvering around the kitchen with Austin’s wolf at my feet.

He never once left my side since the moment I woke up.

Denver said Austin had showed up at my apartment to keep an eye on me. I wondered if he felt guilty and that’s why he wouldn’t shift back. When I asked Denver why he thought I didn’t shift during the attack, he shrugged. Said it happens sometimes with the new ones, especially when mixed signals are sent to the wolf.

Once the brisket was in the oven, Mom went to take a nap with Maizy. It was hot that day, and the cicadas were singing in rhythm as the afternoon sun baked everything in sight. I sat in a lawn chair in the front yard with my legs browning in the sun, trying to shake off the attack. I noticed someone had parked my car next to Denver’s yellow truck and had given it a wax and shine.

It was then I decided my mom would have to stay with Austin. Until my father was caught and this whole thing was resolved, she wouldn’t be safe living by herself. Judging by the way he had treated Maizy, my dad wanted nothing to do with his kids.

At the end of the road, a white car approached and Austin’s wolf trotted off the porch with his head low. The car parked on the right side of the driveway and a man who looked to be in his fifties waited inside, staring at the wolf apprehensively.

“Austin,” I called out. “Let him out so we can see who it is.”

His black wolf hopped on the porch and sat beside me. Denver was the only other pack member on the property, and he was snoozing in the atrium with his earbuds on.

A stocky man wearing a pale blue dress shirt and red tie stepped out of the car. “I’m looking for Alexia Knight.”

“Who wants to know?”

He shut the door, leaning against the hood as he stared at the wolf. “My name is Tom Gardner and I’m Charles Langston’s attorney,” he said with a southern drawl. His refined accent that told me he was from money. “I spoke with your neighbor, Miss James, after talking with one of your coworkers. It took a little convincing, but she gave me this address. I need to speak with you on legal matters. Do you mind locking your dog away?”

“He won’t hurt you,” I promised, grabbing a tuft of Austin’s fur. I should have reconsidered handling an alpha, but I needed to communicate to him that he had to behave. This guy didn’t seem like a threat. “Come up on the porch and have a seat,” I said, squinting at the afternoon sun.

He tucked a brown satchel that looked a million years old beneath his arm and cautiously approached, not showing fear in front of the black wolf. But I could tell the sweat on his brow wasn’t from the sun. He took the farthest seat on the left and Austin’s wolf sat down in front of my chair.

“It’s with great regret that I must inform you Mr. Langston is deceased.”

My heart stammered and I covered my mouth. “What? Oh my God.”