Chapter One
“Goooooooooood Moooorning Cedar Valley!” Rod Turner boomed into the microphone, wincing as his own voice pounded at his sensitive temples with each syllable. Hungover wasn’t how most people came to work, but it sure worked for him.
Tabatha, his producer, frowned at him from the control booth. She was always saying he should try just one day sober. What she didn’t know was this was the only way he could work. The only way he could be Hot Rod Turner, Cedar Valley’s favorite hometown DJ. It was the only way he could laugh and be on top of the jokes and communicate with the callers.
It was the only way he could be what they expected him to be.
Because without the hangover, he was just all kinds of fucked up angry. He was a different person sober.
That was just the goddamn truth.
“Hot Rod Turner here, and I’d say it’s a beautiful morning, but have you looked outside? I mean, have you? The sun is hiding behind a sky the exact damn color of my hopes and dreams, friends. That is to say, gray. One of the Fifty Shades, but hell if I know which one. This tells me it’s time for a look at our forecast. So here we go. Dan Davis from KJRH Channel 10 is here to tell us if we’ll need our umbrellas today. I’m placing my bet on hell yeah, just so you know.”
Tabatha signaled for the break and Rod waited for the mic light to flip to red before he slouched in his seat, rubbing his eyes while the weather report rattled on in his headset.
The door to his booth swung open and he knew it was Tabatha by the strong air of exasperation that filled the room.
“What the hell is wrong with you today,” she hissed.
“Same as usual,” he muttered. “I’m awake when I wanna be sleeping.”
A long sigh brought his gaze up. Tabatha had been with him since the Hot Rod morning show started. Was even going to travel with him to fucking New York when he’d been offered the gig of a lifetime so many years ago. She was almost the lead producer for a syndicated top-rated morning show. Until he’d turned down the job so he could be around for his mother when she needed him most. He’d do it all over if he had to, but it didn’t change the fact that he’d fucked up Tab’s future.
Yeah, his choices had affected her. Bigtime.
But she didn’t come to work drunk every morning. She didn’t look disheveled and broken. Because she had moved on like a normal person would when their life dreams went belly up, and made the best of her situation.
And now she glared at him over the top of her thick glasses.
“Rodney Douglas Turner. I am not playing games.” Oh, damn. The middle name. But it didn’t scare him much unless it was coming from his mom. “You’re worse today. How are you worse? What happened?” She pressed a finger to her earpiece. “You have fifteen seconds to tell me.”
“Nothing happened.”
It wasn’t a lie exactly.
Nothing had happened.
Things were the same as they’d been for nearly a decade.
His mother was still battling a beast of a disease that some days attacked with a vengeance. Bad. Ass. She was. And he was still her rock though he felt weaker than a fucking puppy.
He was still drowning his troubles in booze and pool games at Red Cap Bar & Grill every night with his friends.
He still came to work every morning, to a job that was going nowhere… because the best place it could have gone, he’d shut down years ago.
He was lonely and had grown tired of playing around. He wanted things he couldn’t have. Things he was no good for.
Like a woman.
Shit. Some things had changed, hadn’t they? If he was really honest, yeah. Things were different.
He’d watched two of his best friends find love in the last few months. Not just love. Aaron and Rider had found forever love. They were settling in for an eternity with their vixens.
And that was another change.
Vixens.
These days, life was like living in the twilight zone. Or Oz maybe. Foxes and panthers and wolves, oh my. He’d learned his longtime friends from the Dirt Track Dogs racing club were all practically characters out of a Supernatural episode.
Shifters. Humans that shared their bodies with animals. Werewolves, werebears, all species of wild cats. Even werebirds. All the people he’d rubbed elbows with for most of his life, got down with at the bar, tore up dirt with on the race track… they were all paranormal as fuck.
And now, there were the Vixens.
The hottest thing to hit Cedar Valley since…
He was going to hell for this comparison.
Yep. Shit.
The hottest thing to hit Cedar Valley since the wildfire of ’94.
A group of dirt bike racing fox shifters who’d come to Cedar Valley seeking asylum with his buddy Drake. Also known as the alpha of the Dirt Track Dogs pack. Not that Rod had known it at the time. Sure, the guy had barbed-wire wrapped cojones and pretty much ruled the track and anywhere else he wanted. But a werewolf who ruled an entire pack of shifters?
Yeah, shit.
Rod never saw that one coming.
But one by one, the Vixens were finding mates. First Lexington had claimed Aaron. Or maybe that was the other way around? Whatever. Then Sally had found her place with Rider, who… fuck, well… if Rider could be happy, that made Rod think maybe there was hope for all of them.
But then shit like last night happened, and whatever hope he felt went swirling down the porcelain throne with one nifty little flush.
“Five seconds,” Tabatha snapped.
He sat forward, adjusting his headset. “I told you, it’s nothing. You got my song cued up?”
She made a noise of frustration and stomped out of the room calling, “In three, two, one…”
Rod watched the light change from red to green. “Annnnd there you have it folks. Even if the sky doesn’t get lighter, your morning can. Because I’ve got the playlist to make your drive well so you can thrive well. I’ll be the wind beneath your wings and the sweet cherry pie you’ve been craving. Mmm mmm. Let’s get things started with a little Foxy Lady, Hendrix style. Playing for ya right now on HAWT 105.9.”
He flipped the switch on the music and slumped back in his seat, rubbing his temples.
This song was overplayed lately. But no one was complaining, and he wasn’t stopping. Because it reminded him of a certain vixen. One with hair the color of fucking coffee and eyes like a stormy sky. Maybe that was why the damn weather was pissing him off so much. And skin like the smoothest cream with a hint of caramel. Who moved like a sweet dream and looked away when he tried to look her in the eye, and had a name like something out of a wet dream fantasy.
Seraphina.
Seraphina.
God. Just her name gave him a boner.
Which made things hard—ha ha—when she showed up to Red Cap like she did last night, crying and shit, but drying her tears when some asshole made her smile with his stupid stories about his cute little daughter.
Except the asshole wasn’t an asshole. He was one of Rod’s closest friends. And his stories weren’t really stupid. They were all humorous and shit, because little Megan was turning out just like her mother, God rest her soul. Mouthy and syrupy.
And Adam was a hell of a lot better at calming women down. Even paranormal women apparently.
Seraphina—the Dogs and Vixens called her Sera but Rod was never shortening her sexy-as-sin name, unless it was to call her SeraMyGirlBacktheFuckOffphina—had listened and was smiling through those watery eyes in minutes. She never even said what was bothering her. Adam never asked. And Rod was too busy pretending he didn’t care.
Dick move.
King Kong sized dick move.
But the truth was, her coming in there like that had wrapped his heart in chains and made him feel like he was choking. He wanted to… what? Hunt down whatever made her cry and kill it hard. That’s what.
It was the same suffocating feeling he’d gotten when he learned the Vixens were being hunted by their former skulk. Their own people. They were tracking them to make them mates and breed babies out of ‘em. And it didn’t matter that the girls said no. They were like property to the foxes. But Drake and the Dogs treated them with dignity. Gave them a place among their pack and their race club, and the safety of numbers.
The fox skulk didn’t dare come after the Vixens now. It would be fucking suicide.
But that didn’t stop Rod from wanting to beat the males to all hell. Bloody ‘em up a bit. He didn’t even care that they could pull an animal with sharp teeth from their bodies. Fuck that. He was a guns blazing type. If it was his time to go, it was his damn time.
Shit, he was tired. And he still needed to drive his mom to the city after his show for her doctor appointment.
Leaning forward he pushed the heel of his hand into his forehead to ease the pounding there. He’d just rest a little while the song played.
Seraphina.
Hot as fuck Seraphina.
He should find out why she was crying and do something about it. Something bigger than what Adam had done for her. Make her smile bigger. Or annihilate the cause altogether.
She’d like that wouldn’t she?
He closed his eyes.
Seraphina.
He wanted her to like him kind of.
Because he was the bastard who refused to believe zero of his dreams would come true. He’d done too much and worked too hard. Dream by dream, the world tried to prove him wrong. But there had to be one out there that would work out.
Just one.
Maybe her.
Seraphina.