“The damn boyfriend is a wolf you idiot; I ain’t messing with that,” Deputy John hissed right back as they got in the cruiser, doors slamming.
Leif relaxed, eyes no longer glowing. The cruiser started up with a roar and the deputies peeled out a bit before driving off well past the speed limit for the tiny town. Neither of them said anything until the cruiser was out of sight.
Alec chuckled, smiling wide, eyes curious as he turned to Leif. “What did you do?”
“Made my eyes glow a bit,” Leif said. “Ready to go shopping?”
Alec jumped into his arms, held tilted back for a kiss, and Leif obliged, bending down for a slow, sweet kiss.
Chapter 10
Alec
Shopping with a mate was something of a treat. Leif paid attention to anything Alec focused on—he noticed things that Alec hovered over, reading the packaging, noting the price, even asking if Alec was hungry and whether he wanted to go eat based on what food items he paused by in the grocery section of the store.
All of it made Alec feel well-cared for and tended to and he loved it. After weeks of isolation, abuse, and being forced to use his powers to make drugs, he was enjoying the freedom and the safety of being with Leif.
He wasn’t afraid of what might happen if they came across someone who knew that Alec had been sold off to the mountain mafia.
There was no way Leif was going to let anyone hurt him or use him again. He knew that with a certainty that reached down to his bones.
They headed to the electronics section at the rear of the store, and Alec took Leif’s hand in his and held it as they walked. Leif squeezed his hand and held it in a firm grip, not at all worried about PDA. Alec smiled, wideand silly, blushing a bit, and he caught Leif grinning at him from the corner of his eye.
Alec went straight to the laptops on display, cruising along until he found a model he liked with the right amount of RAM and disk space, and with a powerful CPU. The model was a popular one with good ratings, and he looked around for an associate to help him.
“They cost that much?” Leif asked, puzzled, eyeing the sticker price with disbelief.
“Good ones do,” Alec replied. “If it cost less for these specs I’d be worried about it falling apart after a few weeks.”
Leif hummed in response, clearly thinking. He spotted a person nearby in a uniform vest. “Let me get the associate.”
“Thank you.”
Leif headed off to get help, and Alec went back to examining the computers; though he was set on the model he’d picked, it never hurt to have a backup.
With the stack of cash he took off of Stu and the other men, he had enough to walk out with the laptop he wanted. Crime apparently paid well, and he was astounded by the choices they made to go hunting with so much cash in their wallets. He was reading the stats again when he felt a tickle of awareness—he was being watched. As nonchalantly as he could, he looked up and glanced around.
A figure ducked back behind a row of clothing in the next section over from electronics, their furtive motion catching his eye more than anything else. He had no idea who it was, and had no desire to go hunting through the stacks without his mate. He wasn’t an idiot—if someone was watching him, then they were either a creep or a mountain mafia goon.
Alec’s senses were heightened,and aside from Leif and the associate heading his way, there was no one else nearby. Maybe he was just being paranoid. He was confident everyone who knew him and where he’d been the last several weeks was dead. Maybe. He hoped.
Leif
Alec was nervous about something,and when Leif came back to his mate with the associate in tow, he leaned down and scented his mate while Alec spoke to the employee about getting the laptop. Inhaling hints of distress and anxiety, Leif was immediately hyper-aware of their surroundings. He pressed a kiss to Alec’s temple, and took a few steps back, turning slowly as he perused the aisles and shoppers, looking for a hint of what might be making Alec nervous.
Humans revealed much of themselves in their scents. Emotions, wants, fears. Even superficial things like annoyance shifted and changed the baseline scents for everyone, and it took practice, but an experienced werewolf, or any shifter with a nose, could read another person with a high degree of accuracy.
Leif wandered out only a single row from Alec, discreetly patrolling, scenting as he went, but there was nothing but the scents of the superstore—hundreds of people, cleaners and chemicals, and food from the grocery section. It was a nightmare of scents, but he breathed through it all, parsing out the scents and dismissing them from his higher mind, searching for something that stood out.
He found it floating in the air in the main aisle between electronics and the kids clothing section. A hint of sour anxiety, avarice, and fear. He refused to let Alec out of his line of sight—he mentally catalogued the person’s scent markers and returned to his mate, remembering the scent for the future.
Alec was just paying with a wad of cash when Leif returned to him, his laptop box in a bright blue bag, Alec taking the receipt with a happy smile he shared with Leif.
“All set?” Leif asked, taking his mate’s bag and then his hand in a gentle grip.
“All set; I got a phone too. It’s prepaid so it’s all set up,” Alec shared, waving the shiny new model in his free hand. He thanked the associate and they headed out of electronics, detouring to the adult clothing section.
Alec went tearing through the displays and racks, Leif grinning the whole time as Alec wasted not a moment finding his sizes and grabbing pants, shirts, underwear, and socks, all the essentials. He even found a pair of hiking boots in his size, sitting down to put them on in place of his ruined sneakers, ripping off the tags and leaving the box on the shelf. “I’ll pay for them with the tags.”
