Damnation: Reckless Desires (Blue Moon Saloon Book 1) (9 page)

Simon had had the guts to approach her parents after that?

“They said ‘second son is second best,’” he grunted. “And second best wasn’t good enough for you.”

“But…but…” she mumbled it a couple of dozen times. “But I didn’t want Soren!”

“Believe me, he didn’t want you.” Simon’s hands shot up. “Wait, I mean, not like that. He found his own mate. He wanted her.”

She stared at Simon. “Who?” Maybe if she focused on someone else, all this would be easier to grasp.

“Sarah Boone. Remember her?”

Barely. Soren was a few years older than her; Sarah, too. “Sarah, from the little shop in town?”

Simon nodded.

“Sarah, the human?” Jess gaped. “Holy…” She always thought she and Simon had their work cut out for them, convincing their shifter species to let them mate. But humans were totally off-limits. Then she gasped. “Sarah died…”

Simon shushed her with a harsh look at the doorway. “I know. He knows. They burned her alive. Burned the whole place down, just like they did with our clan and your pack.”

They
. The same evil
they
. Her stomach turned as she recalled the gleeful cries of the Blue Bloods drowning out the screams of her packmates. Remembered them growing fainter as she grabbed Janna and ran and ran and ran…

The shadows moved a little, and she shivered until she realized it was Simon, reaching a hand out. Did she dare take it?

The headlights of a passing car stabbed through the room, then drew away, and she found herself reaching for him. Winding her fingers through his and hanging on.

“I was stupid,” Simon said. “So fucking stupid…”

Yes, you were
, part of her wanted to snap. But now that she thought about it…

The bears have agreed to your betrothal to the Voss boy.
That’s all her father had said, and she’d assumed Simon, of course.

Maybe she’d been stupid, too. In all that time she’d put in, all the carefully worded lobbying to her father about the advantages of an alliance, she’d never mentioned Simon. Never dared mention Simon, because it was too early to admit that they were in love. Her pack was old-fashioned and needed time to swallow the idea of a wolf mating with a bear. But once they’d jumped on the idea, it had taken off like a runaway train.

And God, she’d been ignorant of the truth this whole time.

His breath came in uneven rasps, and she was about to speak when a voice came from the hallway, making them both look up.

“Simon?”

It was Soren. Nowhere near as ferocious as before, but curt enough to drag them out of their thoughts.

Simon looked at her. Squeezed her hand. Pulled it closer until he had it pressed against his chest.

Her eyes slid shut. That contact was her anchor. Her hope. Her one chance not to lose it completely while she tried to process everything he’d said.

“Simon,” Soren called again.

Simon sighed wearily and called quietly back. “Be right there.”

He pushed himself to his feet and held a hand out, helping her to her feet. God, she felt a hundred years older, but none the wiser.

“There’s so much more I have to say,” he whispered.

She nodded mutely. Yes, there was. But what she’d just heard was overwhelming enough. A minute or two — better yet, a week or two — to catch up with her racing emotions probably wouldn’t hurt.

“Simon,” Soren called.

She blinked at the hallway. Soren, she wasn’t quite ready to face. Soren, the man her family wanted to marry her off to instead of the man she loved.

It made sense, in a convoluted, barbarian way. She was the eldest Macks child. Soren was the eldest Voss, the one poised to take over the clan someday. Bringing their families together would be a win-win. But Christ, hadn’t anyone bothered to ask her? To even tell her?

God, if her parents were alive, she’d have marched right over and given them a piece of her mind. But they were dead, and she couldn’t summon any anger any more. Only bewilderment.

Jesus, she couldn’t even imagine being mated to Soren. She’d never, ever wanted anyone but Simon. Never.

Second son, second best? Her grandmother used to joke that about a cousin’s marriage into another pack. Jess had never linked it to Simon, though. To her, he was always the best. The only.

Simon stepped away. She didn’t even notice his hand was still wrapped around hers until it slipped out, and then the absence was striking. Painful, almost.

“I have to go out,” Soren said as Simon drew near, and they both turned down the hall.

She hung back in the shadows, not ready to face Soren just yet. She detoured to the ladies’ room. Maybe she could get herself together again.

She stared at herself in the mirror.

Yeah, right.

Simon watched the saloon doors swing on their hinges long after his brother left, off for a late-night meeting at Twin Moon Ranch.

“You okay here?” Soren had asked. “I have to get going.”

Not really okay, but…sure. He’d keep an eye on things, all right.

Harry and most of the customers were gone. Cole was hanging back to wait for Janna, who pranced right over to Jess the minute she emerged from the back, blinking like a deer in headlights. Straight as a ramrod, too, because Jess was tough and strong, even after being slapped with a revelation like that. That her family was ready to marry her off to the wrong man. That she was still being hunted by the rogues. It was a wonder she didn’t crumple to the ground and refuse to go on.

Not Jess. Not my Jess
, his bear chuffed in pride.

No, not his Jess. But Christ, it would be nice if she didn’t have to be so damn tough.

“Are you okay?” Janna asked.

He could see Jessica’s eyes flutter about before she answered with a terse, “Fine.”

He let out a little snort. She was about as fine as he was.

“Listen, I was going to go dancing. You okay with that?” Janna asked.

Jessica’s head snapped toward the door in alarm, and he could read her thoughts.
Rogues. Closing in. Hunting…

“Some of the guys from the ranch invited me out,” Janna said. She leaned in and whispered the rest. “And Cole is coming, too.”

Simon looked out the front windows, where a couple of trucks were parked, surrounded by three ranch hands. Wolves — big, hardy wolves toughened by hard work and the sun. Ty wasn’t kidding when he said he’d send someone over to keep an eye on things.

Jess glanced over at him, and he gave a curt nod. Honest shifters from an honest pack were nothing to worry about. Neither was Cole. Janna would be fine.

“Um…sure,” Jess said. “Have fun.”

Knowing Janna, she would.

“I’ll do the cleanup next time,” Janna promised and headed for the door, where Cole was waiting.

A second later, trucks started up outside and drove away, and Simon and Jess spent a long minute staring at each other, not knowing where to start.

“You sure she’ll be okay?” Jess asked.

“The guys will keep an eye on Janna,” he said.
And I’ll keep an eye on you.

She stared for a moment, as if she’d read his thoughts. Then she shook herself a little and sputtered into the next sentence. “You think that Cole is an okay guy?”

He shrugged. “Seems like a decent guy. No clue about shifters, but with the rest of the guys around…Janna will be fine.”

“Good,” Jess mumbled. “What about Soren? Where did he go?”

“He had a meeting at the ranch.”

Just you and me left
, his bear rumbled inside.
Just you and me.

Her eyes widened. She gulped. Her nostrils flared.

And just when Simon thought she might say something to jump-start the conversation they had to finish, she swung into action. “Got to clean up.”

And zoom, she was off, headed for the kitchen.

“Jess…” he tried, but she immediately shook her head.

He sighed and watched her disappear, then eventually reappear with cleaning supplies.

“Gotta clean up…”

She murmured the words like a mantra, so he backed off. Maybe now wasn’t the time to push an off-kilter she-wolf. Even he had enough sense to know that. If cleaning and numbering and organizing helped her feel together, he’d let her go at it.

So he dragged out a dishcloth and started closing down the bar, peeking at her from the corner of his eye. She wiped every table twice. Some of them, three times. Rearranged the salt and pepper shakers until they were angled exactly right. Nudged the tables into place until she was satisfied, then headed out for the mop.

He sighed and started flipping chairs, which brought her to a sharp stop when she came back.

He raised his eyebrows in challenge.
Yes, I’m stacking chairs for you. Yes, I love you. No, I never stopped.

She scurried to the corner where the pool table sat, turned her back, and let the wet slap of the mop do the talking.
Not ready. So not ready. I still hate you…I think.

Of course, she didn’t hate him. But he’d hurt her, badly, and she wasn’t ready to forgive.

He rolled down the metal gate that covered the swinging saloon doors, then closed the inner door, and locked everything for the night. Checked them twice before going back to the bar to finish up there.

And on it went, the two of them dancing around the silence that hung between them. They were champs at awkward avoidance by now. Why not keep it up?

When the phone rang, they both jumped and stared. Eventually, Simon picked it up.

“Hello?” he barked.

“Simon?” came the voice at the end of the line.

Not a rogue. A familiar voice. “Kyle?”

“Listen, can you come out and help?” The urgency in Kyle’s voice made him stand straighter. Kyle Williams, wolf shifter and Arizona state cop. Twin Moon pack’s inside man in local law enforcement.

“What’s up?”

Jessica cocked her head, listening.

“You got that she-wolf with you?” Kyle asked.

Every nerve in his body went on red alert. Jess had heard, too; he saw her hands go white around the mop handle.

“Simon!” Kyle half-shouted.

“Yes,” he admitted, locking eyes with Jess. If they could trust anyone, they could trust Kyle.

“Good. Bring her. We need every nose we can get.”

“Which one is Kyle?” Jess asked, sliding out of Simon’s car, still thinking about everything Simon had said.

Please. Just sit. Listen…

I never knew how to explain…

Second son is second best…

What hell had he been living in all these years?

“Tall guy, spiky hair. Cop uniform.” Simon pointed to a handful of people huddled in the headlights of a vehicle in the state park lot, but his shoulders still had that uncharacteristic slump.

Stupid. I was so fucking stupid…

God, how long had he been beating himself up over what he’d had to do?

She stopped dead in her tracks and looked up, sniffing. Was that smoke in the air?

Her nostrils flared. Definitely smoke. But with the breeze blowing from behind her, it was hard to ascertain how near or how far the fire was. How big.

She shuddered and rubbed her hands over her arms.

Simon noticed, too; he tilted his chin up to sniff. But his eyes were intent on the people ahead. “Come on. Kyle wouldn’t have called if it wasn’t important.”

“Cop?” she asked nervously. There were good cops, and there were bad cops. “Why does he need us? Why does he need me?”

Simon put a hand on her shoulder, and damn it, her wolf calmed right down. The beast had been sniffing and yowling for him on the twenty-minute drive out of town. She glanced up and cursed the three-quarter full moon for the tenth time that evening. No wonder her wolf was so close to the surface tonight. And it would only get worse in the coming days as the moon grew fuller.

“He’s one of us,” Simon whispered.

A shifter? She didn’t dare ask. Didn’t need to once they’d gotten close enough for her to clearly identify the one shifter by his telltale scent. No human would ever pick up on it, but a fellow wolf sure could. Kyle was tall, with spiky hair, just as Simon had said, and his brow was furrowed in deep rows. He nodded at her and Simon in a quiet greeting.