Rough (Wolf Ranch 1)

In his letters, he hadn’t said it either. In fact, he’d emptied his heart to me in those six notes. Everything except those three words. He said if I took him back, that he’d share them with me. Say them, so I could hear them from his lips. Believe them.

“Marina… I have to go.”

“To see Boyd?”

“Yes. I have to go right now.”

“I’m coming out to meet him! In fact, I’m booking my flight now!”

I gave a watery laugh as I hung up on her, and I could hear her shouts of happiness. I hopped up from the floor and ran to my car. I’d waited my whole life for a man to be mine, to make a family with. A life with. I had it with Boyd. I just had to go and get it.

26

BOYD

My mother used to say plan for the outcome you wanted to achieve—even if it seemed unlikely to happen at the time. When I hit puberty and was pissed off that I hadn’t had my first shift yet, she would pull me down to sit beside her and say, “Let’s plan the party we’re going to have to celebrate your first shift.” And then I started making a list of all the things I wanted to do at my party, which was mostly about food because I was a growing pup and could eat the entire refrigerator’s contents in one sitting. We made a list of all the food I wanted at the party: pizza and hamburgers and chocolate cupcakes. We talked about who I wanted to invite: just family and the ranchers, not the rest of the pack. By the time we were done, my mood had changed from resistance to anticipation.

It had been wise then, and I tried it now.

Audrey hadn’t taken me back, but I was planning for when she did. I’d told Rob I was claiming one of the ranch’s private cabins as my own. No way would I claim my mate in my childhood bedroom in the main house. He’d nodded in agreement, and that was that. I’d gone up there, to the one our grandparents used to live in before they died and began to clean it out.

Besides a good scrubbing, it needed some upgrades—granite countertops in the kitchen, some nice Italian marble in the bathroom. The floors were a beautiful tongue and groove oak plank. All they needed was to be sanded and refinished. The walls—hmm. I’d have to wait for Audrey to take me back to make decisions about the walls. I didn’t know if she’d like them to remain rustic, with the logs showing the way they were now, or if I should cover them in plaster and let her pick paint colors.

I would do all the work, of course.

She worked hard enough.

So far, I’d spotlessly cleaned the place and had a new king-sized bed delivered, complete with the best mattress and real linen sheets. I’d yet to have her in a bed and fantasized about what I’d do to her first.

Like planning my first shift party, getting in the mode of imagining how I would trick this cabin out until it met every last one of Audrey’s dreams lightened my mood.

Hope started to bleed in.

Enthusiasm for the future I imagined for us. Together. Mated.

This cabin was for us, for the family I would give her. Hell, it was the first place that was really mine. I’d left home and pretty much lived in hotel rooms ever since. It felt good to stand here, to know this was where I’d live with Audrey for the rest of our lives.

First, she had to take me back. Second, I had to mate her. I’d had a long talk with Rob about the mating bite, and he thought I could fight the instinct to tear her flesh and keep my human consciousness enough to choose a safe enough place on her body where I didn’t bite too deep. Audrey was a doctor, and I’d get her thoughts on it… assuming she’d be okay with it. I had to hope that since she didn’t seem bothered by the fact that I was a shifter that she’d be okay with this, too. She’d know muscle density and shit. The bite would hurt her—and I fucking hated that part because she wouldn’t heal quick like a wolf—but it wouldn’t kill her.

I was getting too far ahead of myself, and I closed my eyes, took a breath. Calmed myself and my wolf. I’d get her back, I just had to have patience. For a guy whose job lasted eight seconds at a time, it was fucking hard.

I heard the crunch of gravel and stepped out to see who it was. The cabin was built on a bluff over the first rise from the main house. It had views of the mountains to the south and practically all of Montana to the north. The road that led to it dead ended at the cabin, so no one ever drove out this way. I recognized Rob’s truck and—oh fates—Audrey sat beside him.