Tanner clenched his jaw. “I bet he was.”
Getting out of the truck, Tanner grabbed her pack from the back where he’d tossed it on the off chance he could convince her to leave after they met with his brother. That hadn’t worked out so well.
They’d spent the past two hours working through the rest of the supplies on the shopping list Chad had given them. It wouldn’t have taken nearly as long if he and Zarina hadn’t spent most of the time arguing. When he hadn’t been harassing her about going back to DC, she’d been badgering him with endless questions about what had happened to put such a rift between him and his family and why he refused to consider taking her antiserum.
Neither conversation had gone very far, and in the end, they’d agreed to disagree. He didn’t intend to take her new wonder drug or run home to see his family anytime soon, and she wasn’t going to get on a plane back to DC in the foreseeable future.
He felt like crap for nagging at her about leaving, especially when being with her felt so damn right, but she wasn’t cut out for life up here. Or any life with him, for that matter. The sooner she figured that out, the better. But she was so damn stubborn, it was like talking to a brick wall. If he was lucky, maybe Lillie would tell Zarina the story about how Spencer had nearly killed her a while back, and Zarina would finally figure out what kind of price she might have to pay being around a hybrid like him. It was only a matter of time before he lost it and did the same thing to Zarina—or worse.
He was just as terrified that something equally bad was going to happen with the assholes who were attacking the preppers. But what the hell could he do? He might threaten to drag Zarina down to Seattle and stuff her on a plane, but she knew he would never actually do it. He only hoped he didn’t end up regretting his decision to let her stay.
Mouth tight, he pulled her sleeping bag and the cheap-ass flashlight out of the pack, then walked around to open Zarina’s door.
He could practically smell the second-rate quality of the merchandise the moment he stepped inside the store. He usually had a let-the-buyer-beware outlook on business and didn’t mind someone making a profit selling cheap crap to tourists who were simply going on a short hike along the trails. But the clerk had seen Zarina coming and ripped her off, knowing he was sending her into the wilderness with shit for gear. That pissed Tanner off. His inner hybrid wasn’t too happy about it, either.
Or maybe they were both still mad at Zarina and looking for someone to take it out on. That would work, too.
Zarina led him past racks of jerky, fishing poles, and brightly colored rain ponchos to the checkout counter, a big monstrosity of a thing made from local fir trees. A skeevy-looking middle-aged man stood behind the counter, flipping through a catalog and ignoring the half dozen customers wandering around the store looking at gear they clearly didn’t know the first thing about. He glanced up at their approach, eyeing Zarina with obvious interest before turning his attention to Tanner. The man straightened to his full height, which still made him a foot shorter than Tanner.
“I guess you found who you were looking for,” he said to Zarina.
“She did,” Tanner answered, tossing her sleeping bag and flashlight on the big wood counter.
The clerk frowned. “What’s that?”
“The camping equipment you sold me,” Zarina said politely. “I won’t need either of these and would like to return them.”
The man jerked a thumb at the poster on the wall behind him that said NO RETURNS! NO EXCHANGES! in big red letters along with paragraphs of fine print only a lawyer could love. “Like I told you yesterday, we have a strict no returns or exchanges policy, ma’am. No exceptions.”
Tanner bit back a snarl. They didn’t have time for this crap. They still hadn’t gotten any of the drugs and medical supplies, and he wanted to be back at the camp before dark in case those assholes with the automatic weapons decided to come back and hit the place again.
“Time for your first exception,” he told the clerk in a voice that was little more than a growl. “You sold cheap camping gear to a woman you knew had no experience in the mountains,” he said through gritted teeth. At least his fangs weren’t out—yet. “That sleeping bag you foisted off on her for ten times what it’s worth is so thin that if she’d been forced to depend on it last night, she probably would have died from hypothermia by morning.”
The clerk’s eyes narrowed. “Now, just a damn minute. I can’t be held responsible…”
Tanner stopped him with a glare. “Well, I am holding you responsible.”
When the man continued to glower right back, Tanner’s hybrid half itched to grab the man by the throat and jerk him out from behind the counter. Tanner might have done it, too, if Zarina hadn’t placed a hand on his arm while sliding the receipt across the counter.
“I’ve circled the items I’m returning.” She smiled at the clerk. “But I’m definitely keeping the pajamas. They’re very comfortable.”
The clerk seemed happy to hear that. Or maybe he was simply thrilled Tanner had stopped tearing gouges out of his countertop. Either way, he worked fast to apply a credit to Zarina’s card. A few minutes later, Tanner and Zarina walked out of the store with most of her money back. It was probably too much to hope she’d use it on that plane ticket he wanted her to buy.
“If I’d known you were so good at negotiating store returns, I would have taken you with me to the Galleria
