Wade
I’d been hung over from a straight week of drinking my troubles away. I’d gotten fired—again—for fighting. I never fought with humans. They were just too breakable. But give me a shifter, any shifter, and my bear wanted to fight.
This time it was a nearly completed wall that was torn to splinters.
So I took the unexpected free time to pick up where I’d left off.
Tequila.
I’d drunk nothing but whiskey last month, so this month was tequila.
Truthfully, if I had to drink what was offered, I’d drink anything.
I’ve drunk grappa and bathtub wine, and the most wretched moonshine.
Whatever it was, I just needed to drink it.
It takes a hell of a lot to get a shifter drunk. Like a whole bottle every thirty minutes.
Personally, I think with all the alcohol I drink, that it’s starting to affect me differently than most shifters. I think it works harder and faster on me.
Probably not a good thing, but it’s kept me from trying drugs.
Have no idea what something like heroin or Oxycontin would do to me, but I would’ve tried it if the booze hadn’t started working better.
Memories were the enemy—were the things I drank for.
Trying to keep them away from me—trying to forget.
But I’d never forget what had happened. I’d never forget my mother’s cries, the sounds of my father being ripped to pieces. I remembered how the loupes had smelled—wrong, and sour. I remembered my older brother Maddox hiding us, my younger brother Ashe and I from them.
And the fear that came when they’d found us.
And then Maddox had shifted—I’d been too scared to even move. But Maddox had changed into his bear, and he’d killed them all—torn them to shreds to be specific.
And somehow that had made me afraid of my brother. He’d lost all control that day and had never let his bear out again after that.
I became afraid of myself then. Afraid I’d lose control too. That I would become a loupe.
So I was hung over in the crappy camper I lived in, empty bottles of cheap tequila set here and there, all over the camper, as I woke up to the sight of my dead grandmother sitting in the lone chair I usually drank sitting in.
“I’m still asleep.” I buried my face in the musty old pillow. I dreamed a lot, which was another reason I drank so hard.
“You’ve been sleeping long enough, Wade.”
I looked up at the little woman sitting in my chair. The way she’d said my name, like an indictment.
I scented the air. Her scent was faint and stale, but it was there. So was the licorice and chamomile candy she preferred.
“This is pretty fucked up, Nonna,” I said, rolling over and giving her my back. “I sleep naked, you know.”
“Language,” she chastised.
I needed a cigarette… and they were in my jeans. My jeans were on the other side of the room.
Fuck it. Maybe if I got up and walked a few paces the stupid Nonna dream would just go away.
“I’m not a dream dear, and by all means, have a cigarette. A nasty habit, but since it can’t give you cancer, there are worse things you could spend your money on.”
I stood up and stumbled, my balance fucked up from the hooch. I walked over to my jeans, pulled my pack of L&M’s from the pocket, with my lighter, and lit one up. As I took my first lungful of smoke for the day I pulled my jeans on.
But when I turned around Nonna was still there, neat as a pin, her iron hair pulled back in a tight bun, her purse sitting in her lap.
“So you’re a ghost now?”
She sighed. “It’s a long story, but let’s just say I’m a ghost with a few extras.”
I stared at her for a moment and then shook my head. “Nice to see you, Nonna, but go ghost someone else.”
I walked over to the camper door and walked out into the cold mountain air Montana was famous for and walked over to a bent looking pine tree and pissed on it.
I heard the candy wrapper as I finished up, gave my junk a shake and then tucked back into my jeans.
“You know, it’s considered rude to watch someone take a leak.”
She snickered. It was a classic Nonna sound. “I doubt a man that pisses outside cares about what’s considered rude or not.”
There was a pizza box on the little picnic table someone had left here. I opened it up to find a single slice of pepperoni and mushroom. Breakfast.
I took a big bite of the cold pizza and said through a full mouth, “So what do you want… Nonna’s ghost?”
“You’ve taken this much better than Maddox did.”
I scowled at his name. We didn’t talk much. I guess it was just natural for brothers to grow apart. Same was true for Ashe and me. Nonna had always said we were lone bears. Guess it was true.
“That you’re a ghost now?” I asked. “Well, I’m still hung over, probably drunk too, so maybe you’ll get a better reaction later.”
She was just suddenly sitting across from where I stood at the picnic table. I hadn’t seen her move a muscle.
“You’ll probably be drunk later, so I won’t get my hopes up.”
I smiled as I took another big bite. “Wise woman.”
“But before you get too inebriated I need you to sober up, gas up this—” She gazed at my ramshackle truck and the shitty metallic and rust colored camper it pulled. “—beast of yours… we have a trip to take.”
I just stared at her.
“You have a journey to make, and a beautiful maiden to save.”
I closed my eyes and shook my head. Laughter bubbled bitter and sour from deep in my chest. “No, I don’t. I’m no one’s knight in shining armor.”
“Yes, you’re right. You haven’t cleaned… anything it seems. Especial your armor.”
I saluted her with the last of the pizza before I popped it in my mouth. “As long as we’re on the same page here. Maybe Maddox can do this one for you?”
She pursed her lips. “Your brother has a mate to look after right now, and… maybe something extra.”
Mate? Extra? “You’re shittin’ me, right?”
She sighed heavily and shot me a sober glare. “Maddox has found his mate. They fought some terrible enemies together and fell in love.”
I leaned over the table and gazed into Nonna’s eyes. “And the something extra?”
She grinned, her eyes sparkling with wickedness. “They’re getting married soon.”
Oh…
“And I foresee a baby will come soon.”
I rolled my eyes. “You know you have no talent at prognostication, right? You were always telling us you saw this or that terrible thing happen to us. And it never did.”
She brushed what I’d said off with a flick of her hand. “I was just trying to keep you idiot children from breaking your necks or getting your heads blown off. I’m talking about truly being able to see into the future. And now that I’m so close to the great hereafter, I can see even clearer.”
Bullshit…
I turned and walked toward the camper. A shower and some coffee might make all the difference. Might even get my Nonna out of my head.
“She’s quite pretty.”
I stopped at the door to my camper. “Who, your maiden?” I turned and bared my teeth at her in a predator smile. “Funny how she went from a ‘beautiful maiden’ to just ‘pretty.’”
Nonna stood and walked through the picnic table—a neat little trick—and came over to me. “Let me show you.”
She settled her hand on my arm. I not so much felt her hand as felt this sensation, like a cool breeze on flesh, and then a tingling.
And then I was standing in the sun, heat saturating the dry air, the scents of a strange forest in my nose, and my hand was holding that of another.
It was small but strong, the hand of a woman who worked.
I looked up and she was staring at me. Her faded green eyes practically glowed—no, they were glowing. A shifter. I pull in a breath and scented cat. Her hair was long and wavy, and a strange honey blonde that seemed to darken the closer it got to her face.
And that face, with pretty little dimples, and a full, succulent looking mouth.
Oh god…
And then she smiled at me and the world just stopped, everything standing perfectly still as she said my name.
That image ripped away from me in an instant, and I was again standing in the doorway to my camper, the Colorado winter pricking every inch of my bare torso, and Nonna staring up at me with a cat-that-ate-the-canary look in her eyes.
Damn…
My bear rose up and slashed a claw down my chest, making me stagger back a step. I pushed back at him and then grabbed for Nonna—but of course, my hand went right through her.
Shit!
“Who is she? Where is she?”
Nonna walked back over to the picnic table and settled herself back where she’s been sitting before.
“She’s your brother’s mate’s sister.”
I blinked. “That was a mouthful. So you think I’m going to go get hitched up to some shifter-cat-girl like my brother?”
“She’s a puma, and no, I’m not saying you should make her your mate.”
Why did her saying that make me feel bad? That disappointed feeling making my chest sink in.
“But you saw what you saw when I showed you the future. Was she your mate then?”
You bitch… “Didn’t you see it for yourself?”
She smiled. She was really obnoxious when she did that. “I saw a future. You saw your future. They’re different.” She gave me stern look. “And if you ever call me a bitch again I’ll curse you good.”
She can really hear my thought?
“Yes,” she said in an irritated tone, “I can hear your thoughts. So unless you want me to curse you with something that will make your prized penis rot off, I suggest you keep a civil tongue in your head, and in your thoughts.”
“This can’t get any weirder.” I have a fresh bottle of tequila under the sink. I actually have many bottles of the burning shit stashed all over my camper.
“No time for another bender, Wade. You should shower, as you planned. You really do stink.”
“Hey!”
“You have a long way to travel, and not a whole lot of time.”
A flash of that beautiful woman’s face slid into my mind, the way she smelled, how her hair blew in the hot wind of wherever we were.
And then I heard myself say her name.
I said it out loud as I said it in the memory.
“Roxy…”
Nonna tittered and leaned forward, her eyes sparkling. “I didn’t tell you her name.”
Roxy…
I turned and climbed up into my trailer. “I have a beautiful maiden to save. I’ll be ready to go in ten.”