“Gave you extra aioli,” he tells me slyly, as if he’s slipped drugs into the bag.
I shake my head and roll my eyes. “Thanks, boss.”
As the bell above the door dings to signal my exit, I hear Kiki’s voice over the bustling lunch crowd. “Tell Raegan we’ve got her back!” she shouts, a piercing edge to her banshee voice. I wince, along with several patrons while still murmuring their agreement. “That shit with legs is gonna rot for what he did!”
Being married to Sheriff Simmons, I’m sure Kiki got all the juicy details about the arrest after the fact. I’ve managed to avoid the gossip mill since leaving work last night, so I’m not caught up on the latest verdict. I know Twitty took Patrick to the police station with Aidan, but Shadow Hills Precinct only has two jail cells, one of which is mostly utilized as a drunk tank for Mayor Musthaven’s nephew, Phillip, who gets shit-faced drunk off moonshine vapors every night and then floats out of his cell every morning.
I wonder if Patrick will be transferred to the city given his assault charges. The further away the better.
I give Kiki and the rest of the cafe a thumbs up and head back to Raegan’s apartment. When I get there, she’s horizontal and curled into a ball on the couch watching a cooking show. She startles slightly when I open the door, but her shoulders relax after seeing it’s me.
I hold up the take out bag from Kiki’s and her eyes brighten. “Pimento grilled cheese?” she asks.
“And fries.”
She jumps up from the couch and rushes to the kitchen counter where I lay out all the food, picking up the bag of fries and holding it to her cheek. “They’re fresh,” she says wholesomely before turning her gaze to me. “You’re my hero!”
She certainly makes me feel like one.
We both agree that the fries from Kiki’s are better than any fast food chain because they’re double fried. That extra crisp makes all the difference, and as I watch Raegan take her first bite, I’m happy to see that something so small is able to bring her so much joy.
I spend the rest of the day by her side. We watch a marathon of one of our favorite crime dramas that’s playing on TV while devouring the food I brought. After a few hours, we decide it’s time for a snack, so together we playfully make tacos in her kitchen with a pack of nearly expired tortillas and whatever toppings she happens to have on hand.
Raegan uses rotisserie chicken, greek dressing, feta, and cherry tomatoes. I decide on leftover ground beef I found in a tupperware container, sprinkle cheese, and a mixture of ketchup, mustard, and mayo for the sauce.
“Why’d you have to make yours so refined?” I tease her.
She scoffs. “What’s so fancy about a chicken wrap?”
I gape at her. “It’s not supposed to be a wrap! The point was to make a taco out of random ingredients!”
“Your taco is not random. You basically made a cheeseburger.”
“Exactly. A cheeseburger taco is awesome.”
She takes a massive bite of her creation, dressing running down her chin. “Well my Mediterranean taco is delicious,” she says, mouth full.
“It’s a wrap,” I deadpan, but she just continues eating.
We laugh, sliding down the cabinets to sit on the floor.
She’s leaning back against the bottom row of cabinets with one leg tucked in close and the other stretched across the floor. Her slippered foot taps against my thigh as I sit perpendicular to her, my long legs reaching from one side of her tiny kitchen to the other. We’ve finished eating, but neither of us has made a move to get up. Down here, it feels like another safe pocket for her to hide in, only this time we’ve made it together.
My thumb haphazardly traces circles on her calf, and as I watch, the rest of my fingers move slowly over her knee and up to her thigh, I see goosebumps raise along her flesh. She must have noticed it too, because she bends her leg, effectively pulling it from my reach.
Something is brewing beneath the surface for both of us. I know my reason for fighting it—it’s clearly my wolf nature trying to stake its claim on her—but what’s her reason for pulling away? The only logical explanation is that she will never see me as more than a friend. Yet when I catch her swallowing a lump in her throat, I know that can’t be true. There have been signs, like the way she looked at me this morning, her eyes glimmering with a word I can't fathom.
After my first shift, I spent an extensive amount of time with the pack, learning the signs of my natural instincts and how to fight against them when in my human form. If I wanted to keep my secret, I had to hold back my aggressive nature when placed in a conflict outside of my control. And I have. For the most part.
I should have been able to keep my cool with Patrick, but every time I was confronted by him, one outlying factor changed everything: Raegan.
It was her presence that triggered my need to show dominance, to crush him under my heel and claim her asmine. The word echoes in the back of my mind like a mantra each time I feel the need to protect her.
Mine.
Mine.
Mine.
