Rejected Mate (Feral Shifters 1)

“I don’t drink piss water,” I bite out, trying to temper the chill in my voice. It’s not his fault I hate whiskey. All he sees is a leather jacket, tight jeans, and a face that’s a little harder than most girls. Girls like me usually do drink whiskey. “Gin and tonic. Top shelf.”

Joe raises an eyebrow but doesn’t comment on my rudeness. His voice is even and pleasant as he says, “You got it.”

As he walks away, I shove my hands back through my long dark hair and castigate myself for being an ass to the man who’s going to serve me dinner. It was seriously uncalled for. My grudge against Kian has nothing to do with Joe and his attempts at conversation. If the old man decides to spit in my burger, I probably deserve it.

Joe returns a moment later with my glass, and I order one of the specials written on the blackboard above the bar. He enters my order in his computer then goes to wait on the next customer, leaving me to my solitude.

There’s no denying that Joe’s Bar and Grill is popular. The place is packed for dinner, and an even bigger crowd is chilling out on the side patio under a haze of cigarette smoke. Joe has tiny little twenty-somethings in crop tops and short aprons serving tables, and the two teen boys bussing tables look like they could be his kids. Or grandkids. Just another family-owned bar. Just another small town.

Just another day.

After so many years, I feel like I should be used to this level of monotony. Even moving from place to place every week, every two weeks, nothing changes. Every place looks the same. Every bar feels the same, every server the same, every bartender another guy just like Joe. Even my solitude is a never-ending feeling of sameness.

I don’t even feel like a whole person anymore. Like I’ve faded into the wallpaper. I’m a fucking tumbleweed blowing through the desert on a Ducati. Half the time, I feel like I’m a ghost in any room, no matter how crowded it is. Separate from this world but living in it all the same.

As I bring my glass to my lips for another drink, I feel a presence at my side. A man leans in, wedging his body between me and my neighbor. Young, dark hair, dark eyes—a low rent Tom Cruise in his heyday. His elbow slides onto the bar, and his smarmy grin is leveled on me.

Dammit.

“Something’s wrong with my eyes,” he says, “because I can’t take them off you.”

I snort into my glass. “Oh, baby. That’s just fucking awful. Get out of here.”

Smarmy guy straightens and glares at me. “Well, fuck you too. Bitch.”

As he huffs off like a teenage girl throwing a temper tantrum, I give his back a little flippant wave with my middle finger and then return to nursing my drink.

I’m invisible, until I’m not. And no man has been able to cut through this veneer since…

No. Fuck that. I’m not thinking about that tonight.

I toss back the last of my drink as Joe sets my plate in front of me.

He palms my glass. “Another?”

“Please,” I say, hoping the forced smile takes away the fact that my first words to him were pissy. “And ketchup.”

I slather my steak fries in Heinz and make quick work on my burger. It’s average bar fare, which is to say it’s delicious. When Joe comes to take away my empty plate, I order a fresh drink. Three’s the limit. I’ll wash down dinner with this one then head back to the motel for some shut eye.

Last drink in hand, I pass Joe a fifty dollar bill, and he sidles off to make change at the register.

The ice clinks in my glass as I sip it, and I swish the licorice sweetness around in my mouth. It’s the one thing that reminds me of home. Nights beneath the Montana stars, sipping gin while murdering Ridge in poker. Dinners at his house, laughing and bantering with the four alphas of the pack, sharing secrets with his mate Sable, the closest I ever had to a sister. She’ll have had her baby by now. Maybe even more than one.

A pang hits me. Fuck, I miss them.

Suddenly, the back of my neck prickles.

I freeze, my glass still pressed to my lips. Electricity dances across my skin, sending tingles zinging along my spine.

No.

It can’t be.

Setting the glass down on the countertop, I sit up straighter and study the bar in the tiny reflections behind the bottles ahead of me. But the room’s too dim, and too many people are moving around for me to make out anything more than swinging arms and moving bodies.

So I take a deep breath and swivel my chair enough to see the open front door.

And as I do, the domino falls.