Fucking Cougar. She won’t stop following me.
Even she won’t just let me be.
“She growls all the time. She’s not a threat. She’s too tame,” I tell him dismissively.
“She is and will always be an unpredictable wild animal in my eyes. Leave her at home.”
“I try. She’s being clingy because she’s a cat who can’t be told what to do. Cats do their own thing,” I argue, growling a little myself.
He snorts.
“Yeah. Your mood has nothing to do with it, even though she’s fiercely protective of you.” His paper rattles as he flicks the page. “I can’t have a wild, dangerous predator running around in the town streets. Lines have to be drawn.”
I chug the last of my drink, and I stand, but before I can deliver a strategic insult, I spot three fools I can’t stand just outside. They only draw my attention because they’re racing to a car. All three are carrying covered dishes.
I sit back down, frowning as two more walk by with covered dishes.
“Did we get a new girl in town?” I ask.
Vick looks away from his paper for the first time, and he glances out the window. I purse my lips as two more hurry by and get in a different car.
The idiots car pool to go throw themselves at some chick they don’t know anything about?
There’s also a long line to get into the bakery store, and it’s one hundred percent male.
“No one’s said anything to me,” he states in confusion. “I do know this town is sick of the Wild Ones getting all the fresh faces—I don’t know why Benson got lumped into that, considering he lived here for nine years. In the town suggestion box, chemical castration has been mentioned a few times now.”
I cut my gaze to him.
“And people call Wilders excessive. This town’s hypocrisy knows no bounds,” I murmur as I take in the growing convoy of cars leaving Tomahawk.
“Why the hell are they headed toward my side of the lake? There’s nothing out that way but my place. The road dead-ends on my land,” I tell him like he doesn’t already know that.
“Think the men got desperate enough to go after Nila, even though she has three Wilder brothers?” he asks as though he expects an answer.
“There’s still plenty of single women in Tomahawk who aren’t Nila. Even if they weren’t scared of us, no one would fuck with Nila because of Killian. Remember Teddy?”
He shoots me a surprised look. “I forgot all about poor Teddy.”
I nod slowly. “See? I don’t look so excessive anymore, do I?”
His eyes narrow. “There’s a motherfucking cougar chewing up someone’s shoes on the front porch of this diner that is losing business just so you can eat your food in peace. You and I are the only ones in here, besides Mathew. You’re so excessive you’ve gotten bad for town businesses.”
He gestures to the man who’d like to shoot me full of holes.
“You called Vick and tattled on me, didn’t you?” I ask Mathew.
He ducks behind the counter, because he doesn’t have the balls to face me without the other Wild Ones here to reel me in…you know, in case I get carried away.
Rolling my eyes, I face Vick again. “I think my reputation just makes me look worse than I really am,” I inform him.
“You blew up my patrol car last year.”
“That was an accident. It was supposed to be a harmless prank. I replaced the car with a newer model, even though it set me back a pretty penny,” I remind him.
He runs his hand through his hair. “That’s…not the point,” he groans. “Don’t even get me started on all the dead fish you and your brothers buried under the town hall’s floor six months ago. That smell still hasn’t gone away.”
I smile about that one. “That was harmless. I don’t see how it was excessive.”
“You wouldn’t,” he mutters, massaging his temples as though his head hurts. “Forget it. I never get anywhere when we have this argument. I need to go find out if we have a new resident so I can check them out.”
He takes his coffee with him as he walks out, and I go to lean over the counter. Mathew’s eyes go wide from his crouched position, as I narrow mine at him.
“Keep tattling on me me and I’ll play a prank on this diner,” I warn him.
He pales as I push off from the counter, and like I do every day, I pull up Piper’s social media stuff. I flip through the apps one by one, finally getting the hang of all this.
I freeze on her Instagram page.
There’s a picture of her with a familiar quilt hanging on the wall behind her, as she holds up a peace sign while smiling. It’s the biggest smile she’s had in over month.