Boarlander Silverback (Boarlander Bears Book 3) (12 page)

Alison clenched her shaking hands at her side as Finn drove away. She was so angry she couldn’t see straight, couldn’t keep her breathing steady. She hated him for what he’d done. She’d been bonding with the shifters here, and now they would never trust her. Never accept her. She would be an outsider, just like the rest of her life.

Ghost. There was a fucking reason she didn’t share her nickname.

She was tired of being invisible.

And now Harrison, Clinton, and Mason were looking at her with suspicion, and across the road, Bash and Emerson were scanning the others’ faces, confusion pooling in their expressions.

Tears stung her eyes, and flames of embarrassment licked at her cheeks and ears. “I don’t have ulterior motives for being here,” she rasped out as she stared at the ground. “I just like being around Kirk. I like being around all of you. I feel normal here.” A tear streamed down her cheek and angrily, she dashed it away. “I was the Ghost because it was my job. I’m not undercover anymore.” She drew in a deep, shaking breath. “I’m not anything.”

Kirk hugged her tight against his side. “You feel like a lot to me.”

“You’re partner is an asshole,” Bash called across the street. “I do
not
like him.”

“I could kill him for you,” Clinton said, a little too hopeful for comfort.

Kirk scrubbed his hands down his face and muttered, “Clinton, he might be an asshole, but it’s still not polite to kill people.”

Clinton stomped off, shoving his way roughly between Alison and Kirk. “I was just trying to help.”

“Murder isn’t helpful,” Mason called.

Harrison blinked slowly, and his shoulders sagged like he hadn’t slept in a year. “Alison, if you betray us in any way, there will be hell to pay.”

“Hey, Harrison, you’re a poet and you didn’t even know it,” Bash said as he approached. “Ally girl, you don’t look like no ghost to me.” Bash walked around her and poked her arm hard enough that it would probably leave a purple bruise in the morning. “You ain’t even see-through.”

“Just to be transparent,” Kirk told Harrison. “Ally already told me about killing that drug dealer. It was self-defense.”

“But she didn’t tell you the other stuff,” Harrison said, hands on his hips, head cocked, eyes dead. “I could tell by the look on your face.”

“Those are my stories to tell,” Ally said. “Eventually, I want to tell him everything, but no, Kirk doesn’t know every detail about my life yet, like I don’t know about every second of his. The nickname? It wasn’t one I came up with, and I didn’t like it. I want you all to call me Ally and look at me like I’m just another person. I’m trying my damndest to leave my past behind me. Kirk is my future. He’s who I want to share stuff with, but before I came here, there was no one I trusted. I don’t know who Finn talked to about my work, but that shit is classified. I was part of several operations that were covert and never discussed. He was out of line airing that information, but worse than that, he made you all look at me differently—like you’d never seen me before.” She gestured toward the trail in the woods behind them. “The girl you saw at the falls. The one laughing and relaxing? That’s the Ally I want to be. Not some stupid dead personality assigned to me because of the job I used to do. I want to feel”—she shrugged her shoulders up to her ears helplessly—“real.”

A slow, proud grin washed over Kirk’s face, and he murmured, “Truth.”

And when she looked back at Harrison, he was smiling now, too. “Works for me. Come on Ghost Girl. Let’s get drunk.”

“Wait,” she said stunned as the others walked away. “You’re not going to rake me over the coals?”

“Nah,” Mason said. “We can hear a lie. Finn didn’t tell one, but neither did you.”

She arced her shocked gaze to Kirk, but the smile had faded from his lips. His eyes were glued to her shoulder. “You’re still bleeding,” he murmured in a strange voice.

Sure enough, her puncture wounds were staining the T-shirt, which made perfect sense because it still hurt like hell. “Well, yeah. You bit me, Kirk. And then you jumped off a cliff with me.”

His chest heaved as he lifted bright gold eyes to hers. “I didn’t realize humans were so fragile.”

She frowned over her shoulder at the dark spots on the baggy shirt. “Well, I’m not dying.”

Kirk shook his head and pulled her hand toward the biggest singlewide at the end of the trailer park. “I’m not taking care of you like I should.”

“That’s debatable.” She lowered her voice and lightened her tone. “You did give me one awesomely explosive orgasm under the falls.”

Kirk didn’t seem amused, though. In fact, he didn’t respond at all until they were up the porch stairs of a trailer with the lopsided numbers 1010 hanging beside the red door. “Why aren’t you taking me to your trailer?”

“Because the walls are open, woman. It’s a cesspool of mold spores, and I never gave a single thought to infection until just now. I took you swimming in a murky river with open wounds. I’m a fucking idiot.”

“Not true at all, and you didn’t bite me that deeply.”

A long, low growl rattled Kirk’s chest. “Stop lettin’ me off the hook. Bash is convinced this place is magic.”

“The trailer?”

“Yeah. Ten-ten has been to every trailer park in Damon’s mountains. It has been home to almost every single mate at one point, and they all swear the same, so call me superstitious, but it feels like a smart fuckin’ idea to suck up some good vibes from this place.” He pulled her inside and turned on her, then stood back a few paces.

She arched her eyebrows as he stared at her. “What am I supposed to do now?”

“Do you feel anything different? Do your wounds feel better?”

“Okay, you’re being insane. Do you have a first aid kit in here? Oh, my God, there’s a mouse!” She pointed to the rodent scampering across the floor. Nope, nope, hell nope, she didn’t do mice. Alison bolted for the door, but Kirk was to her in a flash.

“It’s Nards. Shhh. It’s just Nards. He’s a pet.”

Was that her whimpering? Alison climbed up on the couch. “Why would you have a field mouse as a pet?”

“Well, because he’s nice and gentle and…polite.” Kirk frowned. “I thought it was weird at first, too, but now I have one of his babies in my trailer.”

“On purpose?” Okay, she was screaming now.

“Yes. Her name is Teats, and she lets me hold her.” Kirk cleared his throat and muttered, “She eats seeds from my hand.”

“I had rats in all of my apartments in Chicago, and they were
not
nice. Not nice at all.”

“Okay, well look.” Kirk pulled a bag of jalapeño-flavored potato chips off the kitchen counter, knelt down, and handed one to Nards. And sure enough, the little mouse took it politely, then scurried off through the kitchen.

A shiver trembled up her spine, but she stepped gingerly off the couch and tried to regain her composure. Kirk stood slowly, and he looked like he was hiding a smile.

“What?” she asked.

“Nothing.” Kirk cleared his throat and now his grin was stretching wider. “It’s just you’re this tough, badass, tatted-up undercover cop, and you’re afraid of a pet mouse.”

She smoothed her shirt farther down her knees and looked primly up at him. “Nards just surprised me is all.”

“Nipples lives here, too.”

“There are two of them?” Kirk hunched at the volume of her voice, so she lowered it to a less psychotic pitch and said, “That’s just lovely.”

“First aid kit is this way.” He sauntered off through the kitchen.

“The way the mouse went?”

“Yep.”

An open doorway swallowed him up, and now she was left in the middle of the living room alone, shifting her weight from side to side on the squishy laminate flooring and studying the small home. White walls, a sagging white ceiling with more than one leak stain, white kitchen cabinets, and green couches. There was an expensive looking television resting in the entertainment center, though, and the kitchen table looked high quality and handmade. Even the two dark wood ladder-back chairs beside the table looked fancy. She’d lived in way worse. As she ran her hands along the polished wooden countertops of the kitchen, she did get a strange chill up her spine, and this one wasn’t from fear. It was from…she didn’t know.

“You coming?” Kirk called from Mouseland.

Alison blew out a long, steadying breath and braved the bedroom, which, as it turned out, was huge and took up a third of the trailer. “Wow,” she murmured. A thick cream and blue floral comforter was folded down invitingly on the bed, and flanked on either side was a pair of windows and old-fashioned hanging lights. There was a built-in dresser and two closet doors, and on the opposite wall was a bathroom. Kirk stood inside, ripping open a package of first aid supplies and muttering something too low for her to hear.

No Nards in sight, she leaned against the doorframe. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, just worried. And my gorilla is ripping at my insides.” He cast her a quick glance. “I didn’t know it would be like this.”

“Like what?”

“I’m rough, Ally. I mean, it’s in my nature to be rough, and I didn’t give two thoughts about how you would be affected by that.” He laid out the supplies on the counter and lifted the hem of her shirt over her head, then peeled her damp tank top off as well. “Female gorilla shifters like being roughed up, with affection and in the bedroom, and silverbacks don’t worry about them healing. I’m freaking out a little. I think I’m going to be shitty at this.”

“It’s okay, Kirk. You were raised around people like you. And then you were part of Kong’s family group.”

“But…” He waved his hand at her puncture marks. At least they weren’t bleeding anymore, but they did look angry and red. Kirk’s head almost reached the ceiling in here, and his wide shoulders blocked an entire half of the wall from view. “I guess I didn’t really give much thought to a human mate because I always assumed you would be different.”

“A shifter, you mean?”

“Yeah.”

She leaned her butt against the counter as he began cleaning her shoulder. “But you don’t regret me, right?”

“No.” Kirk shook his head and kissed her lips, just once. Just a single sip. “No, Ally, I have no regrets. I just have a lot to learn.”

She smiled in relief, rocked forward, and rested her forehead against his bare chest. “So do I.”

He chuckled deep in his throat, but swallowed the sound the instant she winced against the burn of the cleaner. “I hate this.” He pressed his lips on top of her hair and let them linger there for a few moments before he started taking care of her again. “I hate seeing you hurt.”

She ran a light touch over the gunshot scar on his shoulder. “I know the feeling.”

As he bandaged her, his attention dipped time and time again to her breasts and the tattoos that covered most of her left side, and she understood since she was drinking in his body as well. Muscular neck, perfectly defined pecs, eight-pack abs that flexed with every breath, and that light trail of hair that led from his belly button down into his jeans. With her fingernail, she traced the strip of muscle that delved over his hip bone and into the waist of his pants. And when she pulled his jeans forward and ran her touch along the edge of the fabric, a shiver took Kirk’s shoulders, and he let off a soft groan.

“Woman, I just told you it’s hard to be gentle. You’re hurt. Don’t push.” His voice came out all inhuman and rough. Sexy silverback.

Feeling empowered that she could affect him so easily, she unsnapped the button of his jeans and gave him a naughty smile. “Should I stop then?”

His gaze on her hands, he shook his head with a jerk. Oh, beautiful man, with those blazing golden eyes and his chestnut hair falling forward against his sharp cheekbones. Alison pulled his zipper down slowly and unsheathed his thick erection. The head of his cock was swollen, and his length hard as stone, standing rigid against his belly. She ran her finger down his shaft and reveled in the satisfaction from his soft, needy growl.

“You’re fucking killing me,” he murmured as she slid down to her knees, taking his pants with her.

Kirk leaned back on the sink on one locked arm and ran his fingers through her hair with the other. Gently, she clamped her teeth on the head of his cock. He hissed, gripped her hair, and eased her back. He shook his head slowly, his hair twitching against his jaw with the motion. He looked feral right now. Inhuman. Wild. Hers. With a smile, Alison gripped his shaft and slid her mouth over him. His grip tightened in her hair, and he let off a soft sound deep in his throat, but he didn’t pull her onto him. Instead, he let her set the pace, stroke after stroke, until his abs were twitching and his breath came ragged. And when his hips rolled with her motion, she knew she had him.

“Ally, Ally, Ally, stop. Stop or I’m gonna come in your mouth.”

That sounded awesome, but Kirk eased out of her and blew three short breaths, then pulled her upward with a surprising amount of strength. She forgot how much of his power he hid. His chest was still making that sexy rumbling sound and, biting back an excited grin, she shimmied her damp shorts down her legs. Her insides were on fire, ready for him. Her body reacted to him like she was a firecracker and he was a match. His touch caused instantaneous, tingling, glorious heat.