Moody looked at his email in disbelief, wondering if it was actually possible that he could have such shitty luck. His name was on the roster for this week’s patrol. That wasn’t such a terrible thing. He was used to the patrols. Except, this time, he was paired up with the very last person he would ever choose to do something like this with.

“Wonder if I can complain,” he muttered to himself, knowing there was absolutely no use in even trying. Even if he went around and tried to ask someone to trade with him, he wouldn’t get very far. No one would want to pair up with that person.

Not that anyone would be too excited about the idea of playing sidekick to Moody, either. He lived up to his name, had done it on purpose so often that it kind of stuck, and now he was just, well, moody.

Tossing his phone aside, Moody leaned back on his bed and folded his arms up underneath his head as a sort of makeshift pillow. He studied the cracks in the cement ceiling, then closed his eyes. No use. He couldn’t come up with an excuse to get out of this, and he shouldn’t even bother making an attempt, shouldn’t even bother with trying to think about it. There had been some big changes in the pack recently. Everyone else was handling it. He should be able to do the same. It didn’t matter that he was only an omega and would be expected to cave under the pressure. He just wouldn’t do it. He did have some pride, after all.

Months ago, two lovers had come together to put their differences aside. An alpha wolf named Cain, and an omega named Ralphie. They had a child together, finally finding peace in a relationship that took two tries to get right. That should have been a good thing. Love usually was.

Unfortunately, the two of them were from separate packs. Enemy packs. Cain was a biker from the club of Shadow Claws, which ruled over the west half of the city of Pensacola, Florida. Ralphie was from the east, a member of Lethal Freedom.

After their romance was discovered, tensions soared between the two packs. Then, an enormous threat had arisen in the form of a murderous third pack that wanted to take over the city for their own purposes. Shadow Claws and Lethal Freedom united forces to beat back the threat, and in the process, the SC leader, Destiny, had fallen in love with the younger brother of LF’s leader. They had a kid now, an infant named Axel. But, there had been some heavy fallout from that conflict with the invading pack. Both motorcycle clubs had suffered heavy casualties and terrible deaths. LF’s leader had gone into hiding.

The packs were supposed to be uniting, working together to repair the bad blood and the more recent damages between them. It wasn’t going exactly as planned.

As many changes as there had been, nothing had really changed at all. The wounds were still too new. No one trusted each other. And despite the fact that they were supposed to be one pack now, one conjoined motorcycle club, the wolves still referred to themselves in a separate manner. Lethal Freedom. Shadow Claws. If there was unity, Moody had yet to see it.

Some wolves thought it was unfair that Destiny be the one who was in charge of both groups. He would naturally favor the members of his pack.

Moody knew that wasn’t true. Destiny really considered everyone one pack now. Everyone was his pack. There was no separation in his leader’s mind.

Then again, Moody had formerly been of Shadow Claws. Maybe he was a bit biased in favor of Destiny. Really though, anyone would be. That alpha only had to look in your direction to get you pregnant.

Which brought Moody back to the current dilemma. Before, the separate packs had patrolled their own territories. United, the entire city was one big territory. To keep it even and fair, Destiny assigned a new member from each group to do a patrol to make sure things were going smoothly. Fair was fair. No one could complain about being treated equally and evenly.

Except, they could. There were less members of LF remaining, since they had suffered the heaviest losses. That meant they were patrolling more frequently, since their rotation was smaller. Most of them understood the reason. They complained anyway.

Now Moody had been paired up with the last person he wanted to be with. He had known this day was going to come. Even before all this, Destiny had been so intensely invested in maintaining order in his pack that he did absolutely everything he could to ensure no rifts formed. That meant making sure everyone spent at least some time with everyone else. That meant Moody would be spending time with them sooner or later.

He’d just been hoping it would be later.

If he complained, he was going to seem whiny. Destiny had enough to take care of, being in charge of both packs and his own family. The least Moody could do was this small thing.

No one knew how not-small this really was. No one knew, because he had sworn never to bring this up to anyone. He had made that vow on his own, reached that decision on his own. If he ignored it, all the pain would go away.

Here was the pain, old and shallow now, though the aftereffects still ran deep.

He had been paired up with Isaac Reed. Tomorrow, he would patrol with Isaac. They would spend hours together going around the city on their bikes, exploring anything that looked iffy. They would be close enough to touch.

No choice. Can’t get out of this. I’ll just have to deal with it. Nothing says we have to talk, after all.

Keeping his eyes closed, Moody tried to sleep. The weather outside was growing cold, cold for Florida, at least, and the chill seeped through the concrete and into the air and his very bones. He tugged his blankets higher up around his body, then snuggled down all the way underneath them. Shortly after that, he gave up and transformed into his wolf form. He fluffed out his fur against the cold that persevered in spite of the heating system, and managed to feel better; enough so he could finally fall asleep.

His sleep was choppy, torn with strands of dreams, like blood mingling with spat toothpaste foam.

His internal alarm clock woke him around dawn, his eyes snapping open to stare around in the dark to look for some threat that he knew just had to be present even though there was nothing to scent, to see, to hear. His heart pounded painfully against his ribs, slow to settle. The dark pressed in all around him, crushing his lungs in his chest so that his breath came shorter and shorter as the seconds went by.

“Dammit,” he whispered. His voice hardly made a sound at all, certainly wouldn’t have been heard outside this tiny little room that he called home. Even so, what he had said seemed to be reverberating around inside his empty, cavernous head. No thoughts, nothing, just darkness and a mockery of his own being.

Raising his hands, Moody turned over and pressed his face against the mattress. He didn’t know when he’d become human, didn’t think that it really mattered very much anyway. His heart pounded even faster, harder, spasming inside him. His blood pumped in his ears, a pounding rush like that heard inside of a seashell.

He exhaled against the mattress, the warmth of his own breath filtering back against his face. He inhaled, pulling in warm air, not enough, but some. He didn’t know why this worked to calm him down when he was freaking out like this, it just did, and he needed it right now. If he didn’t stop, he’d pass out and wake up shivery. Couldn’t ride a motorcycle while being shivery. They might be easier to balance than a bicycle, but an average roadster still needed some balance.

Five minutes passed, maybe ten. Time lost all meaning in the middle of these attacks, which Moody had been struggling with ever since he was a child. In the past year or so, they had only gotten worse.

Eventually, his breathing slowed. His heart started to stutter and skip, then settled down into a more normal rhythm. The resultant ache in his chest was slower to go away, though he would gladly deal with that over everything else right now.

Moody sat up, rubbed his eyes. The world swirled dizzyingly around him before coming to a gentle halt. He swayed, then righted himself. His stomach felt tense and tight, as it usually did after these attacks, but it was over. He had survived another one, though sometimes he was pretty damn certain that they were going to be the death of him.

Standing made the dizziness want to return. He pushed that out of his mind, focusing hard on the rickety dresser across the room. The world halted again more readily than before, and he crossed the few steps to the dresser. Yanking on the top drawer, which always stuck, he nearly fell backward as the drawer slid smoothly all the way out. Socks and underwear scattered on the ground, scraps of cloth dangling over the edges of the drawer.

This was an odd miracle, to the point where it seemed like less of a good thing and more of a concerning one.

I really am miserable, he thought, unconsciously quoting what he had heard tossed in his direction a time or two by packmates who assumed he wasn’t listening to them. When something good happens and I don’t really care, that’s miserable.

This thought didn’t affect him much.

Setting the drawer back in its rightful place, Moody bent down to pick up the clothes that had been dropped. He kept some for himself, then put the rest away neatly. He was gentler with the other drawers, withdrawing a t-shirt and his favorite pair of dark blue jeans.

Holding the bundle under his arm, Moody headed over to his bedroom door and pushed it open, then stepped out into the wide expanse that was the second floor of a parking garage.

Destiny owned this parking garage. It was his base of operations before he moved to be with his mate. It was a place where all members of his pack could come at any time, adapted into a cross between a community center and a makeshift apartment building. Wolves could live here in these rooms if they paid rent, which Moody did. He wouldn’t have been able to, had the rent not been so damn reasonable. Destiny was damn reasonable, too much so for his own good sometimes. Even a blind human could have seen that.

The second floor was where most of the rooms and relaxation areas were located. The concrete surface was covered in mismatched rugs and carpets, broken up into sections by furniture and makeshift walls. Bookshelves and tables held games and craft supplies and books, mostly cheap paperback novels from the thrift store. Everything had a used, lived-in quality to it that made the garage feel much more like a home than it otherwise would have.

Destiny put his heart and soul into this place. He expected everyone else to do the same, to at the very least have common courtesy for those who might come after them.

A few other wolves were out and about, reveling in the early hour when things were still so peaceful. Most of them were minding their own business, though an enthusiastic debate was taking place over in the corner. Moody had no idea what the discussion was about. The words were moving too fast, and he still felt a little slow after his abrupt awakening.

Sighing, he started off in the direction of the staircase.

The other wolves who noticed him all turned their heads, watching him, and judging him. The rapid murmur of conversation faded out before being picked up again, at a slower pace than before.

Clutching his clothes closer to his side, Moody took the steps down two at a time and very nearly ran into someone who was standing at the bottom.

Hands pressed against his shoulders, not to catch him but to thrust him away. “Watch where you’re going,” the wolf said, his voice an irritable snarl.

“Get on your own fucking side of the stairs,” Moody snapped. “Just because you’re the size of a semi doesn’t mean you have to act as stupid as one.”

He was really only angry because he was hurt, his shoulder having collided roughly with the concrete wall. He just wanted to be left alone to do his own thing most of the time, but others didn’t like that in him. It was weird behavior for a wolf, even weirder for an omega. They didn’t trust him, and that mistrust manifested itself in all sorts of ways. In fact, he didn’t think there was a way that he hadn’t already seen.

He noticed wolves tended to be a little unimaginative. And he wasn’t just saying that. He’d even admit that his own creativity was lacking, in comparison to humans.

The other wolf snorted at him and climbed up the stairs, not bothering to scoot over any further to the side.

“Spiteful fuck,” Moody said. Rubbing his shoulder, he went down the rest of the stairs and wondered if it might be plausible to exaggerate this injury to get him out of patrol. Was he imaginative enough for that?

As it turned out, it didn’t really matter. Cain was in the showers, which were really more of a locker-room type area that had been specifically built by Destiny because the rest of the garage had been lacking when it came to hygienic needs.

Cain was the second-in-command, in charge when Destiny wasn’t around.

And when neither of them was around, which happened often these days, bad things tended to happen.

But right now, what mattered was that Cain was there. Cain would see him undress, would know that Moody wasn’t injured in the slightest.

“Hey,” Cain said, by way of greeting. “You notice your dresser?”

Moody set his clothes down and then went in search of a towel. The supply was getting low. Someone would need to wash all the dirty ones. “What about it?”

“Top drawer was fixed, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah. That. Yeah, I guess I noticed. You have something to do with that?” Moody undressed, not at all self-conscious. When alphas were in love, the rest of the world seemed to take on a different form. They became blind to certain things, like the nudity of others who weren’t their mate.

“Got tired of you complaining, so I fixed it for you.” Cain shut off the water and wrapped his towel around himself, rubbing briskly.

Moody turned his water on, the spray coming out icy at first before gradually turning warm. “Some warning would have been nice,” he grunted. “Almost dumped my entire dresser on the floor from yanking on it like I always do.”

He couldn’t see much of Cain through steam and water, though he was adept enough to pick up on the fact that Cain was smiling. That grated on his nerves. He hadn’t said anything funny. In his frustration, he scrubbed harder at his skin with the sliver of soap available nearby. Thin, filmy suds were worked up, quickly washed away again by the water. His skin was turning pink, not from heat but from his vigorous washing.

“You’re pretty feisty, aren’t you?”

Moody glared at Cain as water streamed in his face, stinging his eyes. His heart was starting to pound again. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what it sounds like. It’s not an insult.” Cain finished drying off and tossed his towel into a laundry basket. Moody glanced away from the alpha, giving him privacy, though not before he caught a glimpse of that muscular body and fine ass.

That Ralphie’s a lucky wolf. Unlike me.

“Thanks, then. I guess. And for fixing my drawer. Thanks.”

“No problem.” Cain started dressing, pausing to button up his shirt. His thick fingers worked with surprising dexterity. “You’re a good kid, Moody. Don’t let the actions of others throw you off your track. You do you. Only you know what’s right for you.”

Startled by a more intense stinging, this time coming from his sinuses as the onset of tears, all Moody could do was nod. He didn’t trust his voice, didn’t trust his mind. He might say something really fucking stupid and then he’d fuck up his reputation as the omega who didn’t take shit from anyone, not even alphas.

It was just that no one had ever said anything about him in quite that manner, and then went out of their way to reassure him that it wasn’t an insult. No one had given him advice like that, not since…

Best not to think about that.

As Moody finished his shower, he decided that he liked the word “feisty” to describe himself. He’d be using that from now on to defend himself whenever someone dared to judge him.

He finished his shower and dried off, then got dressed. Then, he spent quite a bit longer by the sink so that he could do his hair. He had a very specific style that he wore every single day, and he would settle for nothing less. Someone once told him it made him look like Edward Cullen, as if he should be insulted that he looked hot or something.

After getting his hair exactly how he wanted it, Moody glanced at his phone. He’d bought it for like 50 cents at a thrift shop, one which was often frequented by Shadow Claw wolves, and it had lasted longer for him than most of the newer-model smartphones had for others. Shifting messed with electronics, which was damn annoying. Credit cards stopped working. Computers glitched. Elevators lost power. Phones died. However, the less intricate a system, the more chance a device had to survive. Unless someone really needed a fancy, expensive phone, a shifter was more likely to be found with a flip phone. The basic functions were the same, just without the added annoyance of all those extra, undeletable apps.

It was about time for him to head out to the front of the garage, where he would meet up with Isaac. Other places could be arranged for meetings, since it could be inconvenient for someone to have to come out all the way to the west side of Pensacola just to leave again. However, Moody hadn’t received any notification from Isaac that this would have to be done. He could only assume they were going to meet in the usual place.

Maybe he forgot. Wouldn’t that be a treat? Then I could go by myself and have an easy time of it without him there to hold me back. Or, I’d just work with someone else. Either way would be fine.

He headed out to the front of the garage, passing by another wide area much like on the second floor. However, this floor was used more for business, for essentials. Gas stoves and counters and coffee pots had been installed over along one wall, near a former supply closet that now housed food supplies. In addition to the kitchen, there was a dining area, a laundry room, a gym, a makeshift infirmary, and really anything else that a person could ever ask for. If there wasn’t specifically a room for something, the supplies for it would be available in a closet somewhere. And if that wasn’t the case, one only had to mention their desire to Destiny or Cain. The results might not be instantaneous, but there would be results.

As it was, Moody had no use for any of those facilities today. He’d do his laundry later, maybe putting a dent in the towel problem while he was at it, and he would also eat later. His stomach was too tense for him to feel hungry right now.

There were no windows on the door that led to the outside. Moody had never had much of an opinion on this fact. Some doors had windows. Some doors were all window. Others had none, not even a square inch of glass. Now, he found that he was angry about this. He needed to be able to see outside. He had to know if Isaac was out there, waiting for him. Why the fuck wasn’t there a window? Of all the things Destiny had thought to do to make this place like a home, he’d just so happened to neglect the idea of a front window? It was almost like a personal assault. Like this had been deliberately ignored just to spite him.

Moody gritted his teeth, fighting against the feeling that there might be something off with his reasoning. He was mad. That was all that mattered. Nothing else did.

He reached out, prepared to shove the door open, and that was when he heard a low murmur of voices coming from outside. Stopping in his tracks, he strained his hearing. Might be nothing. Might be something. He didn’t know why he thought that, but he did.

“Glad it’s not me going with him,” someone said. Moody recognized the voice as belonging to an alpha named Ulysses, who he strongly disliked. Ulysses was a busybody of an alpha, always in everyone’s business, like he thought he was leader or something.

“Me neither,” someone else agreed. Moody also knew who they were, though the name wouldn’t come right to the tip of his tongue. He wasn’t exactly the most social of butterflies. “Can’t stand him. No one can.”

They had to be talking about Isaac.

“Such a loser.” Ulysses spoke louder, tossing his voice into the distance as if wanting to make sure that someone far away could hear him. Not a problem for him, since at his normal volume he could pretty much be heard a mile away. “Hey! Good luck dealing with him.”

A softer, more mellow voice filtered through the door, the speaker sounding as though they were standing a bit far away. “I think I can handle it.”

That was Isaac.

Which meant Ulysses and the other wolf weren’t talking about him, they were talking about Moody.

Angrier than before, Moody shoved his hand out to smack the door open. He hoped like hell that it would bash one of these asshole alphas right on the head, make them fall on their ass so everyone in the area could laugh at them.

Instead, the door suddenly surged inward. His wrist bent backward in on itself. Pain jolted up his arm, making him yelp and jump away. Holding his injured wrist with his other hand, Moody glared as harsh as he could through the opened door.

“Sorry, man. Didn’t know you were in here, just standing behind the door like a fucking creep.” The apology came from Ulysses, sounding genuine at first before he realized who it was that he was speaking to. “You get hurt?”

“You nearly severed my wrist,” Moody growled. He narrowed his eyes until they were slits, thin slashes through which the world was warped and ugly. Out of all the ugly things, Ulysses was the ugliest of them all.

“Good.” The broad alpha snorted and pushed his way fully inside. Moody had to lurch even further back or else risk being smacked with the door again.

“For your information, I wasn’t standing there. I was going outside. Like a normal person.”

Ulysses didn’t even bother with a reply for that, just kept going. He went in the direction of the staircase, then mounted them three at a time.

Show off.

The other alpha, who Moody couldn’t place still, even though it was driving him nuts by now, wandered off in the direction of the kitchen. The smells of cooking carried faintly from there, signaling that someone had started preparing breakfast. Common courtesy was to make enough for at least a few other people, though it also wasn’t exactly considered rude to take care of only yourself.

The other alpha was probably going to mooch off that cook’s food. Moody might have done the same thing himself had his stomach not felt so iffy. The fact that he could feel Isaac’s intense gaze piercing into him really wasn’t helping matters.

“Are you okay?”

At the sound of Isaac’s voice, Moody looked down at his hand. That voice could still do things to him, still make him feel things, and he didn’t want to focus on those feelings. He concentrated on his wrist instead, which he was holding so hard that his hand was turning red, fingertips going numb. His fingers felt like vices and it was hard to pull his own grip away. When he managed, he saw that he’d left white marks on his own skin. Blood rapidly filtered back in and the white marks turned as red as his fingertips.

The pain was already fading. It wasn’t really that bad. He said, “I don’t know. It might be sprained. I should probably not go for a ride today. Sorry, Isaac.”

Even saying this wolf’s name made him ache inside.

“If that’s what you want to do, I’ll trust your judgment.”

Moody bristled a little, snapping his head up. He regretted giving his full focus to the other man, knowing how hard it would be for him to pull away again. “Are you saying I shouldn’t go?”

“I’m saying you should do what you think you should do.” Isaac lifted one shoulder in an apathetic shrug. “Don’t read anything else into it, okay? You’ll get yourself all wound up.”

Moody looked down at his hand again, wrenching his gaze away with a guilty feeling much like despair. As much as he didn’t like Isaac now, old feelings die hard.

In any case, his fingertips were no longer tingling, and the pain was really negligible.

“You know what? I think I’ll be fine. Let’s go. Where’s your bike?”

Isaac nodded his head over in the direction of the parking lot. “Over where I always park. You remember where that is, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Meet you on the street, then.”

Isaac sauntered off, his hips swaying in a very sexual and confident manner. Though he didn’t want to, though he tried to look away, Moody followed the alpha with his gaze. It was safer to do so when Isaac wasn’t watching.

Isaac moved like a predator, a stalking wolf, though right now he was in the body of a man. His skin was pale, which was really an accomplishment in a state like Florida. Moody knew from their past experiences together that Isaac was very much a night dweller, living his life in an almost backward manner. He rose around noon, slept just before dawn.

The curves of his muscles were covered in tattoos, a rippling dance of colorful ink that made appearances everywhere on his body. His leather jacket and black jeans fit his body perfectly, giving no illusions as to his shape and form.

Though his face was turned away from Moody right now, the omega knew its every detail intimately. He could recall everything from the brief time they had spent together. Isaac’s strong cheekbones and his powerful jawline, outlined with a well-trimmed fringe of beard. His hair was dirty blonde, golden and deep all at once, and the perfect complement to his whiskey-pale eyes.

He was the kind of man who exuded charisma like a scent, like a pheromone, drawing in the unwitting and the foolish. He couldn’t walk anywhere without being accosted by strangers who were suddenly admirers of his very existence, on the brink of worshipping the ground he walked on. They would have done anything he asked of them, or even suggested.

And he rejected them all.

The fucking weirdo.

Isaac turned around, clearly sensing he was being watched. Their eyes met. Isaac stared at him, unmoving, statuesque in his focus. His eyelids were lowered, an effortless bedroom look.

Moody dropped his gaze in a hurry, turning away in the opposite direction so that he could fetch his own motorcycle. It was a Harley-Davidson roadster, an average hog from an okay company that tended to try to capitalize on the dreams of the downtrodden, the old, the starry-eyed. Moody had held no such illusions when he went to get his first bike, shooting down all the tempting offers that the salesperson threw his way. He eventually wore the man down, got him to show Moody where the plain bikes were. No extra features. Just good, old-fashioned steel and speed.

Moody loved the little bike. It had never let him down and, in turn, he tuned it and took care to keep it in the best shape possible. It was the first thing he had ever bought with his own money, his first big purchase. No matter how many other bikes he had throughout the rest of his entire life, this would be the one that he would remember with the most fondness.

Grabbing the handlebars, he kicked his leg up and over to straddle the bike. Grabbing his helmet, he buckled it under his chin. Then, he jammed his keys in the ignition and listened to the engine as it snarled to life. The rough snarl eased out into a constant, purring growl.

Fluttering his fingers, Moody then tightened them on the handlebars. His wrist ached in an absent sort of way, there and then gone. Ignoring the pain, he moved off, turning out of the parking spot and looping back to head in the direction of the street.

Isaac waited for him as he said he would, perched atop his sportster and looking like a fallen god. Early morning sun gleamed off his skin, turning it a shade of silvery porcelain. He wore no helmet, letting the warm ocean breeze tug at his hair.

“You ready, then?” he asked. His voice made it seem as if he didn’t much care what the answer was one way or another.

Moody hid the fact that this irked him. It seemed to him that Isaac, of all people, should very much care. Instead of answering, he let his engine roar loudly as he pulled out in front of the alpha.

Isaac let him lead the way, and Moody wasn’t sure what he felt about that.