“You said you were going to buy me one outfit, but I have three full bags of clothes.”

“So?” Ramsey asked, stuffing the bags into the leather storage compartments on the sides of his bike.

“So this is basically a new wardrobe, and it’s mostly in my least favorite color.”

“But how does wearing them make you feel?”

Vina stared down at her new leather riding jacket and skinny jeans and boots. “Like a bad-A.”

“Like a badass?”

“Yep.”

Ramsey chuckled. “I’m gonna get you to cuss like a sailor, too. Just wait.”

“Why do you want to corrupt me?”

“Because you’re so good and innocent and pure, and I like destroying innocent things.”

“Monster.”

“Atta girl, now you’re starting to get it. Tonight, I’m gonna scare you off even more. Ready for it?”

“For what?”

“Club party. You’ll be the guest of honor.” Ramsey gallantly offered his hand to help her on the bike, but she wasn’t fooled. This man was no gentleman.

Vina hesitated just a second before she slipped her palm against his and swung her leg over the bike. “When I was a kid, I got made fun of in school a little bit. I didn’t care, but I learned tough lessons. One was if someone is nice to you, and it doesn’t make sense that they are nice to you, be wary.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying if you’re bringing me into your clubhouse to tease me, or trick me in any way, I’ll let my animal out, and she will stomp the shit out of everyone you care about.”

What was that look in his eyes? Pride? Strange. “That’s sexy.”

Frustrating man. “What, the fact that you got me to cuss?”

“No,” he said, placing the helmet over her head. “The fight I just saw in you. I’ve never seen a moose shifted, but I have a feeling yours is not one to piss off.”

“No, she’s not.” If he even knew half of it. Maybe she should tell him. Here was his test since he’d been testing her all day. “When I was a kid, I had a temper problem.”

“Yeah?” he asked, mounting the motorcycle and settling in front of her. “Did you beat up the other little kids?” There was teasing in his voice, and she hated it.

“Yes.”

He twisted in the seat and stared at her over his shoulder. “When did you stop being aggressive?”

“In animal form?”

“Yeah.”

She shrugged and settled her hands on his hips. “Never.”

His brows lowered slightly, but he didn’t give her grief for it. His expression didn’t turn worried like Jonathan’s had when she’d first tried to explain her moose.

Points for Ramsey.

And then he did one better. Before he took off, he pulled her right hand tighter around his middle and patted it. It was a silent “that’s okay” that she’d never gotten from a man before. “That damage is acceptable,” he seemed to say. Or perhaps he was just making sure she didn’t fall off, but she was going to pretend the former because his acceptance was a very big deal to a girl like her. One who had grown up different, always making sure her human side was proper and docile to make up for the times she was a rampaging animal.

Her stomach growled, but Ramsey really did have her. Just a mile down the road, he pulled into a small dirt parking lot with a trio of food trucks, neon blue tables between them.

It was busy with a half dozen motorcycles parked on the edge of the dirt lot and twice that many cars. The tables were all full but one.

“You want to go grab that one, and I’ll order for us?” he asked.

Vina unclipped the helmet from her head and got off the Harley. She was getting smoother at it already. “Uh, don’t you want to know what I want?”

“No.” Ramsey grinned. “I would rather figure it out on my own.”

Huh. “Okay, I’ll get our table,” she said softly. She liked saying “our,” but she would keep that little gem to herself.

He took a step toward her, and for a moment she thought he would kiss her again. But he stopped short and said, “You’re different.”

As he turned and walked away, she couldn’t for the life of her tell if he meant that as a good or a bad thing.

Well, Ramsey sure was surprising her, too. Vina made her way to the table, helmet swinging against her thigh. He might be rough around the edges, but Ramsey had been nice for the most part today. And he’d bought her a lot of clothes and hadn’t asked her to go halfsies on dinner either. Maybe it was because he knew her purse was still at the center, or perhaps he was a secret gentlemen. This man sure was interesting to try to figure out.

At the table next to hers, there were six giant men in leather vests and riding gear. She felt watched, and when she looked over at them, a couple were staring at her while the others watched Ramsey ordering at a food truck.

“Hi,” she said, feeling friendly as frick. She even wiggled her fingers in a wave.

The man closest to her had his back to her but he was turned around, and his eyes were too bright a green to be human. His nostrils flared as he scented the air. “You smell like fur,” he rumbled.

Red flags went off. She didn’t talk about what she was. Not with humans, not with other shifters. Especially not with strangers and out in public. “Bad form,” she murmured.

“You Ramsey’s new old lady?” the giant, bearded gorilla of a man asked.

“Oh, I’m not that old. Only thirty-three.”

The man chuckled and said, “Old lady means his girl. Are you Ramsey’s girl?”

I wish. “Uuuuh, we are just hanging out.”

“We figured,” one of them said around a bite of a taco. “That old crow is a dead end. He can’t be with a new old lady.”

Vina sat up straighter. “Why not?”

“Because he’s bonded. Some bitch named Tenlee has his crow, and good luck prying a crow off a mate.”

Vina’s blood went cold. A mate? Ramsey had a mate?

Now Ramsey was twisted around, glaring at the men at the table beside her. He looked scary, and the table next to her went to quietly chewing their food. She could’ve cut the tension with a butter knife.

“Best advice,” the one closest to her said so softly she almost missed it. “Run. Ramsey’s whole Clan is headed for Hell. Run if you want to live.”

Red flags, alarm bells, chills, all of it. Ramsey was coming this way, and the air felt too thick. A mate? He had a mate? And what did they mean about running from Ramsey to survive him? Headed for Hell? She’d thought she’d been there for years. What was happening here?

He set a buffet of food in front of them. He’d stacked a tray, and there was so much. he was looking at her with such an unamused look she was desperate to kill the silence. “Were you a waiter at a restaurant or something?”

His blond brows drew down slightly. Ramsey cast a quick glance to the next table and then back to her. “That isn’t the question I thought you’d ask.”

“You heard them?” she said, not bothering to lower her voice. Those bikers were shifters. She didn’t know what kind they were, but all shifters had heightened awareness to people like them.

“I did,” Ramsey said with a nod as he set a plastic fork and napkin neatly in front of her.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Do you need to talk about it?”

“Yes.”

Ramsey shook his head and gritted his teeth so hard a muscle in his jaw twitched. He jammed a finger at the blabbermouth at the next table and said, “You’re fuckin’ dead, Wolf.”

The man’s eyes blazed and icy blue, and his lip lifted in a snarl, exposing sharp canines. Heart pounding, Vina stood with Ramsey, readying her moose to Change. Six against two was okay. A pack of wolves didn’t scare her animal. The wolves stood too, and there was a loaded moment. Vina shot Ram a sideways glance, but he was smiling. “I dare you,” he said, eyes sparking with excitement.

Sexy psychopath.

A soft growl rattled the wolf’s chest, but he backed down. “I think Karma is already ruining you, King of Crows. I don’t even have to lift a fist.” He twitched his head toward the motorcycles and his Clan walked away, leaving their trays on the table.

What the heck? As she watched them leave, she whispered, “Why would six wolves back down from you?”

“Because I’m the bigger monster here.”

Adrenaline crashing, she plopped down on the bench. “Ram?”

“What?”

“Why are you here with me if you have someone else?” she asked softly.

She’d never seen a man’s eyes look like his—so full of turmoil and pain. He hooked his hands on his hips and looked like he wanted to retch as he stared at the ground and murmured, “Because she’d gone. I had her, but she’d gone.”

Dear God, that sounded painfully familiar. “I thought I had someone once, too.”

His gaze flickered to hers. His eyes had turned black as night. “And do you like talking about it?”

“Never.”

“Good.” He flicked his fingers toward the cardboard containers of food. “I waited tables at an Italian restaurant for a year right out of high school. You choose first. I want to know what you like.”

“But what if I choose the stuff you like? Then you will have to eat something that is not first-place best for you.”

“I’ll survive.”

“Or…we share and eat what we like the least last.”

The corner of his mouth flickered into a ghost of a smile. He studied her face for the span of two breaths before he sat down and picked up a fork. And then he tinked it against hers in a silent cheers. Or perhaps it was a silent thank you that she hadn’t pushed him to talk about his mate. The relief in his eyes said as much.

She dug straight into the bison hash, but he pulled it between them and got his own bite. She liked this—sharing. She hadn’t wanted to share with Jonathan, but here in the heat of the evening, with the soft murmur of talking around them and the sunset imminent on the horizon, she enjoyed sharing everything about this moment with Ram.

“How did you become Alpha of Red Dead Mayhem?” she asked low as she watched the other MC blast out of the parking lot and onto the main road.

“With bloodshed.”

Vina scrunched up her face. “How many fights did it take you to get where you are?”

“Hundreds.” He pressed his palm down flat on the table right by where she rested her left fist. His knuckles were crisscrossed with scars, and there were two new cuts on his pointer and middle.

She reached over and felt the calloused skin there with the tip of her finger. This man had seen and done very bad things. So why on earth couldn’t she make herself move a single inch away from him?

“You gonna run?” he asked, as if he could read her thoughts.

“I’m not much of a runner,” she said, pressing her palm over his hand.

His breath hitched and, slowly, he pulled his hand out from under hers. A rejection. It stung so badly it was hard to breathe, but she forced a smile. He didn’t owe her anything.

No one did.

“How did you get where you are?” he asked around a bite.

“You mean how did I become this delightfully dysfunctional adult? Ha. Good grades in school, hard work, courses in public speaking and social skills, and four Home Economic classes.”

He snorted. “We couldn’t be any different if we tried. Home Ec. Does that mean you can bake?”

“I’ll be baking four dozen rice krispie treats for the community center anniversary party tomorrow. It’s pot luck. They always sign me up for rice krispie treats. It’s kind of my party trick. I add M&Ms and chocolate chips.”

The black had faded from his eyes and left only dancing bright blue. “I can tie a cherry stem with my tongue, crush a beer can on my head, am the fastest shotgunner of Bud Light in three counties, and no pie-eating contest at any state fair is safe from me. I can also make two girls come at once.”

“Ramsey!” she admonished him. “Don’t be vulgar. I don’t want to know that stuff.”

“You’re cute when you’re all innocent and shocked. Your cheeks get pink, and your nose squishes up like you’re judging me.” He lowered his voice and leaned forward. “It makes me want to fuck you until you feel dirty.”

Well, if her cheeks weren’t pink before, they sure as heck were now!

“For that, I’m eating the last bite.” Which she did. “Next,” she said around the mouthful.

Ramsey’s grin looked wicked as he pulled a container of mini gourmet hotdogs from the middle of the table toward them. “I bet you would be fun in the bedroom. All naïve, expect missionary style, and then I would turn your entire world upside down in one night. Your head would never be the same. I would get you addicted to me so fast.”

Her cheeks were the temperature of the sun. Mortified, she shoved a mini hotdog into her maw.

“Eat it slower,” he growled. “I like to watch you.”

“I need a second,” she said breathlessly. Jerkily, she stood and bounced this way and that toward a small two-stall bathroom made of old rusted panels of tin and gritty iron trim. The inside was lit by a strand of outdoor lights. She stared at her reflection in the old, flawed mirror but couldn’t seem to catch her breath. He was doing something to her body, but she couldn’t tell if it was good or bad. Ramsey was the most terrifying and exciting man she’d ever met.

He was also very, very dangerous. Oh, he could fight, she’d seen that, but that’s not what she meant. He was dangerous to her. He was already paired up and still too interesting for his own good. He talked filthy so easily. He had lots of practice at this, was a skilled hunter, and Vina was just…Vina.

She should heed that biker’s warning and run. Save herself from getting addicted, as Ram had put it, and go live a normal life where her head wasn’t jaded from a man who cared nothing for a heart like hers.

But…

Maybe she wanted a change.

She huffed a breath, shook her head in the mirror at how terrified she looked, and then washed her hands just to feel the cool water on her skin. She made her way back outside, chin lifted high. She would not let him play with her like some bored cat on a mouse.

She parted her lips to say as much, but he shocked her to her toes when he looked her straight in the eye and said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t talk to you like that. You deserve better.”

The reaming she’d been prepared to give him got stuck in her throat, and she choked on the word, “W-what?”

“You ain’t like the girls I’m used to.” He shrugged up one shoulder. “I’m trying to decide if that’s a good thing, but until I do, I should act right around you.”

“Act.”

“Yep, act. This isn’t in my nature. I like to push people.”

“But you don’t want to push me?”

“Not yet.”

Whatever that meant. Primly, Vina sat back down beside him. “Your gentlemanliness is accepted. As well as your apology.”

Ramsey grinned a feline expression. “It was sexy watching you snarf down that hotdog, though. You’ll have to open your mouth wider when you take me.”

Vina’s ears were now on fire. “Are you done being evil?”

“Never. But I will pretend for a while.”

“Why did you fight those two men yesterday?”

Victory. She’d shocked that gloating smile off his sexy face. “That’s Club business.”

“Ooooh, is that how it is with Crow Chasers? You boys keep all hush-hush about everything that happens with club politics. The girls aren’t allowed to know anything. Sounds like we’ll never have anything interesting to talk about. I can’t wait.” She snarfed another mini hotdog, but this time chewed with her mouth open and stared at him, daring him to find her attractive.

He arched up one eyebrow and sighed. “Crow Chasers know better than to ask.”

“Newsflash—I’m not one of them.”

“No, you’re not. I suspect you aren’t like anyone.”

Well, that was kind of flattering. She chewed with her mouth closed as a reward for him.

Ramsey pointed to a beer bottle in front of her. It matched one in front of him. “I got you a drink.”

“Trying to get me liquored up?”

“They sell whiskey here. If I was trying to get you liquored up, I would be bringing you shots. Nah. This is payback for you talking to my crow.” He cleared his throat and paid attention to a basket with three street tacos in it. “I wasn’t so nice when you first met me, and you still look at me like I’m not a monster. I’ve been wanting to repay you for showing me patience when I didn’t earn it.”

“Another apology?”

Ramsey’s Adam’s apple dipped low as he swallowed hard. “Something like that.”

“You’re bad, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” he admitted low.

“It’s who you are?”

Another “yes” graced his masculine lips.

“If it’s who you are, you shouldn’t have to apologize all the time.”

Ramsey froze, mid-bite of taco. And then he chewed it slowly, studying her face with narrowed eyes. “You’ll just accept me the way I am.” He sounded suspicious as hell.

“Until it hurts me, yes. I’m not here to change you or mold you into a person who can match me. Live your life. Be you. Let me do the same. And if there comes a time when you hurt me with the man you are…then it’s time for apologies.”

“How will I know when that time comes?”

“I will cry,” she told him matter-of-fact. “I never cry. If you bring me to tears, you’ve messed up badly.”

Ramsey chewed on the side of his lip for a few seconds and then nodded. And then he leaned over to her, his face so close, for a second, she thought he would kiss her. She hoped he would. But instead, he hovered there, gaze dipping to her lips, and then he straightened again, taking her beer bottle with him. There was a chain on his jeans where a small bottle opener dangled, right near his beltloop. Like he’d done it a thousand times, Ramsey popped the bottle cap off and handed it back. And after he’d done the same for his, he did another cheers, except this time, unlike the one with their forks, he added words to the toast.

She thought they would be profound, the way he looked her so directly in the eyes, but what came out of his mouth was, “Here is a toast to bread, for without bread, there would be no toast.”

Vina giggled and tinked the neck of her bottle against his. And then she took a long draw of the frosty beverage to match him.

“I think it’s sexy when you eat your food like an animal,” he muttered through a grin.

“Oh, zip it. I was trying to turn you off.”

“Mission not accomplished.”

Vina swatted him in the arm, and that’s when she heard it for the first time—his laugh. It was deep and booming, and the smile that came with it was stunning. Oh, that boy had been in the mud for a while but God, his smile could light up a night.

“Are you one of them shifters?” a man in a baseball cap asked loudly from a few tables over.

The laugh died in Ramsey’s throat immediately as he leveled the man with a look. When Ramsey didn’t answer, the man took off his old sweaty baseball cap, tossed it on the table, and wiped his forehead with a napkin. “I asked if you were one of them shifters. The crow ones.”

“I’m just trying to enjoy a meal with my girl,” Ramsey said, leaning back from the table. “But if you want to row, I imagine I could rearrange your face and be back before her beer got warm.”

The man spit tobacco on the ground and held up his hands in surrender. “Just an innocent question. You gotta crow patch on your vest, and your eyes keep changing colors.”

The clearing went quiet as people focused their attention on Vina and Ramsey. What the heck? She knew the Two Claws Clan had outed shifters to the public, but the Darby Police Department so far had stopped it from spreading too far and wide. The video of a polar bear shifter Changing in town hadn’t even made it to the mainstream media outlets yet and had been deemed a hoax by most.

“Where did you hear about crow shifters?” Vina asked him.

“You people got websites now. One of them matchmaking ones went public.” The man jammed a finger at Ramsey. “That one looks like one of the guys on the website. And come to think of it, so do you.”

Shocked, Vina forced her gaze back to Ramsey, but he was frowning down at his phone. “What the fuck?” he murmured.

“What’s happening?”

“Drink that. We need to go.”

Panicked, Vina started chugging her beer.

“Slow,” Ramsey encouraged her. “You’re safe.”

“I’m sorry to say this,” a woman said a few tables back, “but ain’t none of y’all safe no more.” She held up her phone to a video of a news anchor’s grim face. “The news is breaking this story right now.”

Ramsey’s phone dinged. And dinged again. And again. Vina’s vibrated in her pocket, and when she pulled it out, there was a text from her mom. Where are you?

Ramsey looked calm and collected as he turned his phone volume down and shoved it in his back pocket. He leaned forward on both elbows and gave her a kind smile. “Trouble can wait. Ain’t nothing anyone can do to stop this now.”

Vina, I’m worried. Your face is on the news. Where are you?

Her mom would start calling relentlessly if she didn’t answer her. I’m safe, she texted, and even though this was the moment shifter lives would be changed for always, she really believed it.

Ramsey was a monster, but he’d told her with such confidence that she was safe.

Perhaps he didn’t realize it yet, but he was her monster.