Bubbles

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She was back in my arms, and my world was complete. I don’t know how this tiny little bundle of personality had swept me off my feet, but she had. Duke and Gonzo had both had a talk with me and told me not to fuck this up — they could see how much she meant to me, and they were adamant that I do whatever it took to help her deal.

And Matty, bless his heart, had sent me a text to remind me I’m special to a lot of people, and that Lexi would come around, and to let him know if I needed anything while she was sorting through her shit. We’d had a shitload of growing pains to incorporate him into the club as our first male ol’lady, but I was glad everything had worked out. We needed Razor and Matty. They helped round out our family.

I wouldn’t tell Lexi because I didn’t want her to feel as if she owed me anything, but I’d replaced the timing belt on her little Neon, and had changed out the plugs and lots of other small stuff in there while I was at it. She drove entirely too fast, but she was safe and seemed to be able to handle the speeds, so I wouldn’t say anything to her about it. If I caught her driving faster than she could safely handle the car, I’d belt her ass for taking unnecessary risks.

Which reminded me, we needed to have another talk about what I’d punish her for. Grades and safety mostly, but also my pet peeve — not being on time. Something told me the last point was going to get her in the most trouble.

I’d also put a radio in her car, so I could talk to her from my helmet mic while I followed her.

We stopped by the butcher’s shop on the way home so I could get five pounds of fresh beef. The MC grows our own cattle now, and Knife has shown us how to butcher it so we have our own stash, but mine was frozen and my wolf detests microwave-thawed beef.

I cut a few steaks from the slab and put them in the refrigerator, but put the rest in a large, lidded bowl to take into the woods. I stripped down to my boxer briefs, took Lexi’s hand, and we walked off the deck, across the yard, and into the woods side-by-side.

“Can we walk around in the woods for a while?” she asked, when we came to a stop. “I mean, after you’re a wolf? It feels like I should spend time with him and get to know him on his turf. He’s part of you, right? Helps you make decisions?”

“I take it you and Etta had a long talk?” I still think of her as Betty, but I was trying to get used to calling her Etta.

“Yeah. She was careful not to give anyone away she talked about, but she has a customer who sometimes pays her to go to his house for a whole night, and he’s told her a lot about how both of his natures form who he is. Duke gave her permission to tell me whatever she knows about wolves, and she knows a lot.”

Duke always had my back.

“My wolf will enjoy taking a little walk through the woods with you. If he suddenly goes missing, don’t call for us — he probably heard other people and is getting out of sight. Pets have to be leashed in the park, and that isn’t going to happen. We’ll stick close and will show up if anyone gives you trouble. We rarely encounter people on this side of the park, so it shouldn’t be a problem. Also,” I held my boxer briefs out, “stick these in your pocket, so I’ll have them if I need to change before we get back.”

I’d kept a close eye on her while I undressed. She was tense, but it was more anticipation than fear. It wasn’t until I’d taken the lid off the bowl that I remembered how humans feel about watching wolves tear into raw animal meat.

“I’ll move this into the woods and off the trail, so you don’t have to watch me eat.”

“My foster family fed their shepherd a raw diet. I’ll be okay.” She took a breath. “I need to accept all of you. This is part of it. Be yourself. If I have trouble with something, we’ll talk, but it’s my job to be okay with it — not your job to conform to what I think is socially acceptable.”

I closed my eyes and let her words sink in. I’d needed to hear them.

I let her see me change from the front. I know it’s easier to see from the side or back, so you aren’t looking at the face head-on, but she said she wanted to understand, and my little Half-pint was proving to be made of some damned strong stuff.

My wolf came out even faster than usual, and walked to her right away despite me trying to slow him down. I was afraid he’d scare her by half pouncing on her, but she only laughed and put her arms around our neck.

Who the fuck hugs a three hundred pound wolf? My Half-pint, apparently.

For some shapeshifters, their human size and animal size have nothing in common. Take Razor, for instance — he’d be a damned scary crow if his mass had to stay the same. Horse is a much, much bigger bear than he is a human, and Viper’s a big rattlesnake, but he weighs maybe forty or fifty pounds, and not the two-hundred pounds of his human body.

Wolves, however, keep the same mass. It just rearranges.

Lexi was truly fine with us, though. Zero fear, only joy. My spine elongated when she rubbed behind my ears, and when she stopped, I rubbed my scent all over her. I didn’t mean to knock her down, but she only laughed and told me to chill out.

Usually, words need to go through an extra filter before I understand them, but I knew what Lexi was saying as soon as she said them. I’d have to think on that later, when my human brain was fully engaged again.

Meanwhile, I was happy to take a backseat to the wolf, and watch him play with my little Half-pint. He showed her mushrooms off the trail, stopped her before she’d have walked into a giant spider’s web, and when she saw why he’d blocked the trail, instead of tearing it down, she walked off the trail to go around it.

We hiked into a little clearing with a few Civil War monuments, some plaques, a stack of cannonballs, and a cannon. She climbed on the cannon as if she was riding it, and looked down at me. “You’re the size of a small horse, has anyone ever ridden you?”

The human part of me in the background was against the idea, but the wolf stretched out on the ground, inviting her to climb on. I stepped back and considered it again. If the wolf was game, I’d let him. I don’t always do everything the way he wants me to.

She looked surprised. “Are you sure? It’s okay?”

The wolf rolled over and returned to the same position. Playing with her. I couldn’t remember him ever playing with anyone.

She got on and I wanted to be able to tell her to squeeze her legs together, but she’s smart and figured it out. She had her arms wrapped around our neck, her thighs pressed in around our shoulders and rib cage, and within about fifty steps, she figured out how to move with the wolf’s gait.

Just like she’d figured out how to move with me on the motorcycle.

She rode until the novelty wore off, and then walked with the wolf again. I’d never imagined being so in tune with a human. She knew when we wanted her to follow us, when we wanted her to look at something. The wolf didn’t want to change back to human, but he knew she shouldn’t walk around in the woods after dark, so he got her back to the trail near the house and let me easily shift back into our two-legged form.

We come back from the change ravenous, as if we haven’t eaten in days, but I was still tempted to take her right there, against a tree.

I’d wait until I had some food in me and a soft surface under her, though.

I blinked my eyes, wiggled my fingers, and settled into my hips and shoulders. Just as walking feels odd after you’ve roller skated a few hours, balancing on two legs takes a few minutes to settle back into.

I breathed into my human lungs and used my human vocal chords.

“He likes you.”

She handed me my boxers and talked while I stepped into them. “I like him, too. He’s cool, and he sees everything. I mean, you do too, but it’s like he’s part of the forest, or the forest is part of him.” She shook her head. “No, I felt the same way about you when we hiked on the mountain, I just didn’t understand it. The forest is part of you when you’re a man, too.”

“It is. Most humans don’t get that.”

She gave me her best little impish grin. “I’m not like most humans.”

“Not even a little bit, but you’re a city girl. I didn’t expect you to like the forest so much.”

“I didn’t, at first, but one of my friends in high school invited me on some of her family’s hiking and camping trips, and I enjoyed the quiet. No, not the quiet, the connection. Like some primal part of me recognized this is real and the city isn’t? I can’t explain it.”

The wolf had licked the bowl clean, but my nose told me a raccoon had come along to investigate in the hopes I’d left something. I collected it, reached for Lexi’s hand, and we walked back through the yard.

“In Georgia, foster kids can’t spend the night with anyone unless they go through a shitload of stuff to get approved.”

“Her dad’s a teacher at another school, so she was one of the few friends I could spend the night with the first couple of years. The laws were relaxed partway through my junior year, so the foster family is allowed to use their judgement, without having to get the social worker’s approval and fingerprint everyone.”

I could sense her need to change the subject, but I wasn’t expecting what she changed it to. “Etta says you turned your name into a safeword, and I don’t want it to be. I want to call you Adam without it being a big warning flag. She says I have to pick another safeword, though.”

“I can see her saying that.” I’m not a fan of safewords after a relationship is established. She needed one while she was experiencing new things, because saying a safeword is a bigger deal than just saying, “No,” but she wouldn’t need it forever. We’d talk about that later, though — and possibly not at all if she didn’t abuse it.

“She suggested Brussels sprouts, since I hate them so much.”

I chuckled and keyed in the code to open the back door. “Works for me. I need to check my phone to make sure I didn’t miss a call, and then I’ll start dinner. I’m not sweaty since I just changed, but if you want to take a shower while I cook, I’m good in here.”

I had dinner just about ready when she came into the room wearing one of my shirts, and I realized there were some rules we hadn’t talked about yet.

“Sit down and eat, but you can’t wear that shirt outside the house, so it’s probably better you don’t wear it at all.”

She gave me an odd look, and I started at the beginning.

“One of my conditions of parole would mean I couldn’t hang out with my brothers if I wasn’t working for the club. The government has the MC lumped in with organized crime, and I can’t associate with them. However, since the club owns a shop I legitimately work at, doing the trade I learned in prison, it’s a loophole. I still can’t be seen wearing my cut by law enforcement, but I wear t-shirts with our various Rolling Thunder logos to work. So, it works for me to wear a shirt when I’m with them for other shit, too. None of my work shirts say Rolling Thunder MC, just Rolling Thunder, or Rolling Thunder Automotive, so LEO can’t say anything about me wearing them.”

“But?”

I settled her plate in front of her. “Only people in the MC, or our employees, can wear the shirts. There are some ol’lady shirts, but…” I shook my head. She had to accept her prop vest first, and it wasn’t even here yet. “I’ll buy you your own shirts when it’s time, if you want, but you can’t wear mine. Any other shirt I own is fine for you to wear, and I love seein’ you in that one, but you never know when people will drop by.”

“Okay,” she said. “It seems kind of extreme, but I guess ya’ll want to be sure no one else is claiming to be one of you, and you have to start somewhere with the rules.”

I knew what her next question would be and I didn’t want to answer it, but I tried not to cringe when she asked, “What would happen if I wore it?”

“In the house? I’d have to pay a fine. If you wore it out, whether I knew about it or not, it could be a really big deal.” I didn’t want to have to explain how beatdowns worked. Women never understood.

“Define really big deal. Would they kick you out?”

“Not likely, but depending on the situation, and what you were doing, and where you went, it could range from something akin to a suspension for a while, to, well… pain.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Pain? Like a beatdown? No one would hurt you unless you let them.”

She’d understood without me having to explain it, but not completely. I shrugged. “I’m responsible for you. My actions reflect on the club, your actions reflect on me — and the club too, when you’re wearing our logo. If I deserved it, I’d let them.”

She stood and left the room, but I didn’t follow her. I couldn’t work through her specific scent signature, but she wasn’t pissed.

My little Half-pint came back into the room wearing one of my Harley shirts, and the fist I hadn’t realized had been gripping my heart relaxed.

She got it.

I was tempted to go into the backyard and call to check on the prop vest I’d ordered, but the little old lady in North Carolina who makes them for us doesn’t appreciate being rushed.

I heard her phone vibrate, and she pulled it out and looked at it. I expected her to put it right back, but she fiddled with it, and I leaned around to see what was so important she interrupted dinner.

She was looking at her grades, and I took the phone from her.

“A ninety-four? Good job.” I scrolled to another page and saw her list of tardies. It was long, but I couldn’t hold the past against her.

Except her last tardy was for that morning.

I lifted my eyes to meet hers. “You were late this morning?”

She rolled her eyes. Rolled. Her. Eyes.

“Etta and I stayed up late talking. It was fine.”

“What did I tell you would happen if you were late to school?”

She leaned back. “You said I couldn’t hit the snooze in your house. I wasn’t in your house.”

“You have a tardy. We’ll address it with the belt once your food has settled.”

“No. You said in your house!”

Her tone of voice hit me first, and then her scent. Pissed. Indignant. She didn’t think I was being fair.

I sat back. She’d known the rules. She was being too literal. Still, I needed her to understand.

“Consequences aren’t about me making arbitrary rules, they’re about you and me working together as a team so you do as well as you can in school, and then in your job. Your instructors will be asked who of each graduating class they recommend for hire, and even if you’re their best student, they won’t recommend someone who can’t make it to class on time.”

She didn’t get it. I tried again. “Eventually, you may make a name for yourself, so customers will wait however long they have to for the magical stylings of Lexi Washington, but you have to make a name for yourself, and if one stylist is always running on time, while another is always running behind, and both are equally skilled… who do you think they’ll make an appointment with?”

She crossed her arms. “I was at my sister’s house. It doesn’t count.”

I wanted her to see me as fair, so even though I very much thought it counted, I decided to leave it up to her. “When you decide, if you decide, that you deserve consequences, you'll come to me and we'll handle it. This isn't about me being a dictator, it's about us helping you succeed in school and life.”

She uncrossed her arms. Crossed them back. “You’re kind of an asshole sometimes.”

I grinned. “Just sometimes?”

“It was fine.”

It wasn’t, but we weren’t going to keep arguing it. “You slept okay in the plug the other night?” I hadn’t intended to make her sleep in one for a while — if ever — but she’d done it on her own so we needed to talk about it.

“I missed you.” She sighed. “My sister doesn’t understand boundaries, so I learned way more about her and my mother than I ever wanted to know, but it appears they’re both a big fan of the butt stuff. Do you think that’s a genetic thing? Etta says it doesn’t seem to hurt her like it does other people, and she seemed surprised I’ve made it to a couple of fingers with you.” Her scent was suddenly horrified, and she rushed to add, “I don’t kiss and tell! She tricked me into telling her you’ve made it to two fingers and I didn’t hate it!”

I tried not to laugh, and managed it for a few seconds, but then I couldn’t hold it back. She went indignant on me, which made me laugh even harder, but I managed to cut it short to tell her, “I love you, Lexi. Yes, you’ve come along at a nice pace, but it’s been so long since I broke someone in, I don’t think I realized.”

“Broke. Someone. In.”

She said it completely monotone. Her dark brown eyes seemed to go even darker, and her scent let me know she was pissed all to hell and back.

“It’s a figure of speech, Lex. I’m sorry.”

She didn’t say anything, and I had a suspicion she was too hurt or pissed to risk talking without getting emotional.

I shook my head. “That was callous. Cold. I’m truly sorry. I have a zillion excuses, ranging from prison talk to the way we deal with the sweetbutts, but none of that applies to you.”

Still nothing. I tried again. “I fucked up. What do you want to hit me with?”

Finally, she responded, but it was more of a shout than speech. “I don’t want to hit you!”

“I can’t unsay it. I hurt you, and I’m sorry. You can hurt me back, if it’ll make you feel better.”

“It won’t, and you’re just going to have to live with hurting me, just as I’ll have to live with the fact you said it.” She squeezed her eyes closed, and her shoulders slumped. “It’s also possible I’m being a prude again, but it still hit me wrong. It hurt.”

“How about this — when you get a new bike, or you rebuild the engine on an old one, you’re careful with it until everything gets seated and sealed. If you go too fast, it’ll seize. Take it too easy, the rings won’t seat. You have to warm it up slow and watch how hot you get it the first thousand miles. You have to be careful at first so you can drive the hell out of it later. It’s called breaking it in, but it just means you’re taking care of it.”

“That isn’t the way you meant it.”

“I spoke without thinking, and it wasn’t fair to you, nor was it the way I feel about my time with you. You’re infinitely more valuable than a motorcycle, but that’s much closer to the way I feel. I’m getting you used to me and taking care not to hurt you — and trying to give you lots of orgasms while we’re at it.”

“Okay. Whatever. I’m done with this, but please don’t talk about sex with me like that again.”

Fuck, did she have any idea how hard that might be? She was right, though. Seeing it from her point of view, it was harsh.

“Like you said, I’m an asshole sometimes. I’ll try to do better.”