Malcolm tilted his glass to his lips, the peaty liquid coating his tongue as Blaze slipped into the booth across from him. For a moment, the dim drop-hat lights and neon liquor signs that decorated the western saloon cut through the darkness, clashing against the opening of Blaze’s jacket to reveal… Was that an orange pineapple pattern?
“You’re late.” Malcolm scowled before he took another large swig of his scotch. Maybe he did need the liquor after all.
“I’m always late.” Blaze shrugged before fidgeting with the glass of amber liquid in front of him. Jack Daniel’s, from the smell of it. Blaze glanced at the drink like he didn’t really want it.
That made two of them.
Malcolm shook his head. Blaze would order the same as every other cardboard cowboy in this joint. He and Trixie were that much alike. All show. No substance.
“Did you actually expect me to be on time?” Blaze’s brow lifted in confusion.
Malcolm shot his packmate an annoyed look, turning his attention instead toward Trixie. She sauntered across the bar, her perfect Georgia-peach bottom swaying. When she reached the jukebox, she pressed several buttons, and a moment later, Dolly Parton’s “Dumb Blonde” thumped through the speakers.
Trixie was nobody’s fool.
Spinning back toward him, Trixie cast him a pointed look and fluffed her loose blond curls. Even from across the room, he could practically smell the gardenia scent of her hair, and she knew it. The woman lived to taunt him.
And he hated how much he craved it.
Malcolm swore under his breath, his cock instantly responding, even as his hand clenched into a fist. He’d let himself get caught up in her spectacle, and already he regretted it. Fuck. Tonight, he didn’t need any distractions. No matter how tempting.
Still, the memory of the last time he’d tangled his fingers in her silky hair gripped him. She’d been soft and pliable in his arms, sexy as hell. Nothing like the hard, world-weary woman who now glared back at him. He needed to let it go. Lord knew he’d tried more than once to forget it. But for some reason, he couldn’t. He wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
With one final bat of her eyelashes, Trixie hoisted a large tray from the bar top onto her shoulder and sashayed toward the basement stairs, clearly finished with her little show. For now. There’d be more. There was always more. At least until close.
Malcolm twisted in his seat, his lower head aching.
There wasn’t anything real beneath all that cheap glitz, but the fact that he wanted there to be still angered him.
Blaze’s eyes followed his. He smiled a knowing grin as Trixie disappeared into the darkness of the saloon’s stairwell, the scent of her hair replaced by a stringent mixture of the bar’s cleaning agents and spilled beer.
“So are you and Trixie…?”
Malcolm growled, harsh and warning.
There were some things even he didn’t share with his packmates. His poor taste in women being one of them.
Blaze sniffed the air, scrunching his nose like he’d taken a whiff of something disgusting. “Ugh. Never mind. I can smell the pheromones on you from a mile away. Get a damn room.” He waved a hand in front of his face. “Didn’t realize you swing both ways.”
“I’m about to take a swing at your face if you don’t shut the fuck up,” Malcolm shot back. “And that’s called bi erasure. Look it up.”
The last thing he needed was Blaze making less-than-subtle wisecracks about his sexuality for the better part of the evening. Though in Blaze’s defense, he joked about everything. But that didn’t piss Malcolm off any less.
He leaned back in his seat, shamelessly adjusting himself. Goddamn, witch. Like he needed any other reason for his packmates to see him differently. The Grey Wolves had always accepted him, hadn’t blinked an eye at him and Bo, but that didn’t mean any of them actually understood him. Wolves were too focused on hierarchy, on binaries and reproduction for that.
Yet another reason he’d never quite belong among them.
“So where are our motorcycle-riding brethren?” Blaze asked, glancing around the bar expectantly.
Malcolm scanned the room. The nomads of the Detroit Rock City MC hadn’t yet shown their faces. The neon-lit ground floor where he and Blaze sat was mostly empty. Sprinkled throughout the booth and table seating, only a handful of patrons remained beneath the pale-blue glow of the Coors sign script. The multicolored flash from the updated jukebox screen colored the crowd pink or green. But Malcolm could hear the thrumming chatter of the crowd belowstairs, the roar of partygoers preparing for the cage fights. It was down the darkened stairwell, where Trixie had disappeared, that the true action reigned.
“I told them 9:00 p.m.”
“So you did expect me to be late?” Blaze flashed him that stupidly handsome grin of his.
As if on cue, a moment later, the door to the Midnight Coyote swung open. Two leather-clad wolves strode in, eyes combing the space for them.
“This is the perfect setup for a really bad joke,” Blaze muttered, finally sipping his whiskey. “But I’ll save you from it.”
Malcolm growled, willing Blaze to shut up.
The wolf-headed reaper patches on the backs of the wolves’ leather jackets marked the two shifters as Rock City MC as clearly as the Grey Wolves’ Stetsons did.
“Shit. They’re punctual. Right on the dot.” Blaze glanced toward his watch. He slid out of the booth, raising a hand to flag the other shifters down before rounding to Malcolm’s side of the table. Blaze perched next to him, bumping Malcolm with his elbow as he smiled that wry grin. “Try to look a little less like you want to kill someone, okay, Mac?”
Malcolm scowled. “Don’t ever fucking call me Mac.” This meeting was his doing and his alone. He’d set it up as a service to their pack, despite Blaze having been tasked with cementing the potential alliance, not Malcolm. “You wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for me.”
“Now you sound like my mother.” Blaze rolled his eyes.
As the other shifters approached, both Malcolm and Blaze stood, slipping out of the booth.
Blaze was the first to step forward, readily extending his hand. “Blaze Carter,” he said, introducing himself before he lifted a brow. “Have we met before?” he asked one of the men. “You’re a Yellowstone ranger, right?”
“I was. For a season. Been to Wolf Pack Run a time or two.” The younger of the two bikers nodded. He looked at Blaze’s palm wearily before he finally shook hands. “Dom Reyes.” He nodded to the man on his right. “That’s Rigs. Not all the rangers that protect our terra firma are former MC, but I was for a time.”
Which meant Dom, at least, would know several of their packmembers and maybe even be sympathetic to their plight. The Grey Wolves had a vested interest in protecting terra firma, the lands of Yellowstone National Park, considering Wolf Pack Run bordered the vast landscape. Over the years, wolf shifters from various pack allegiances had taken up the mantel of protecting the reintroduction of true wolves into the forests that had once been their home. It was their species’ collective dream that someday, they’d call terra firma their homeland again. That singular cause united their kind across pack lines. A pipe dream if anyone asked Malcolm, but a beautiful, albeit tragic one.
Malcolm scanned their guests, quickly sizing the other two men up. Tall, wide, muscled like most shifters. Their kind was built for the wicked wild of the forest, not humanity’s cagelike walls. The two men’s patched leathers marked them as MC, the accompanying tattoos as pack. From the loose-limbed ease of how he carried himself, the wolf with the buzz cut, Dom, was keener and more eager, less controlled. But the second, Rigs, had seen his fair share of violence, too, felt it more deeply, more personally. He simply hid it behind a too-scraggly beard and world-weary eyes that saw and felt too much.
Malcolm knew the feeling.
“Pleasure.” Blaze touched the rim of his Stetson, then tilted his chin toward Malcolm. “This is…”
“Malcolm,” Rigs finished for him, gruff voice rumbling as he readily extended his hand.
The unexpected ease of the gesture caught Malcolm off guard. He wasn’t used to anyone feeling anything close to ease in his presence. But among their kind, the gesture was still abnormal.
Malcolm extended his hand and the other man pulled him in for an unexpected brotherly hug. Malcolm stiffened, hand falling to his blade. As he pulled back, his confusion must have shown, because the other wolf chuckled, low and deep.
“You saved the life of our club’s pres. You wear our patch.” Rigs gestured toward Malcolm’s leather before he glanced toward his packmate, who signaled his agreement. “You’re one of us.”
Malcolm nodded, despite the hollow feeling in his chest. They wouldn’t say that if they truly knew him. He wore the leather out of necessity, because he was too cheap to buy another to use on his own bike. Growing up as a poor Chicago South Sider was a lifelong affliction, and it’d been years since he freelanced for the MC, long before he became an elite warrior.
He’d been hired to take out the bastard threatening the life of the MC’s pres. It’d been an easy payday. He’d taken the other contract killer with a .44 to the back of the head. Amateur fool had never seen it coming. The kill had barely fazed Malcolm, the memory little more than the familiar tinge of cordite in his nose. But from the looks of it, the passage of time hadn’t lessened the Rock City MC’s gratitude for protecting their leader.
“Pres?” Blaze quirked a brow at the other wolf’s phrasing. “You mean your packmaster?”
The two shifters slipped into the opposite side of the booth. Malcolm and Blaze did the same.
“No. Pres,” Dom corrected. “He rules by the vote of the club.” Those intense, wild eyes narrowed. “We serve no master.”
They may have been the same species, but that didn’t mean their worlds were the same. All the more reason this meeting needed to go well. If the vote of the MC’s membership mattered more than their club pres, they needed to get these shifters before them to see eye to eye, to understand the mutual threat they faced. Malcolm glanced toward Blaze, the concerned look in his packmate’s eyes indicating he, too, understood.
The fate of the Grey Wolves fell on this alliance’s shoulders.
“We won’t waste your time with small talk then,” Blaze said, leaning forward to place his elbows on the table.
Dom and Rigs both nodded.
“We heard about the”—Dom hesitated, searching for the right word—“recent incident at Wolf Pack Run.”
Malcolm felt Blaze tense beside him. Recent incident, his ass. The Volk had decimated them. Malcolm wasn’t one for niceties, and neither was Blaze. Not when it came down to it.
“‘Slaughter’ is the more appropriate word,” Blaze hissed. The easygoing expression on his face faltered, replaced by a glimpse of the tortured soldier who lay beneath. A stark contrast to Blaze’s normal grin.
Malcolm glanced toward his packmate, taking the true Blaze in. He’d seen more signs of the real shifter that lay beneath the obnoxious, comedic facade of late, and while he couldn’t say he was pleased with the reason behind the change, he was glad for it. Malcolm wouldn’t exactly call his packmate a friend, but he knew firsthand Blaze had done everything in his power to protect their pack from his past.
Time had revealed that the Volk’s attack two months prior had been a bid for the twisted, cannibalistic shifters to claim the Grey Wolves’ territory. The Grey Wolf Pack had provided the weapons that MAC-V-Alpha—a shifter-only unit of the U.S. military that Blaze had served in—used to nearly annihilate the Volk years earlier. It didn’t matter that Blaze had done all he could for Austin and the pack. The Volk still got their revenge.
Malcolm remained silent, looking toward the other wolves across from them. The sound of another old country song played in the background. He sensed an uneasiness in the bikers, a subtle tension in the tightness around their leather-clad shoulders. He didn’t need to talk in order to speak, to communicate, and neither did they. An expression, a look, spoke volumes. That was something few ever seemed able to understand.
Blaze inhaled a deep breath, releasing it slowly through his nose to keep himself steady, careful as he chose his words. “If you think the vampires are a plague, wait until you face the Volk,” Blaze said. “They’re like us but twice as strong, twice as fast, and twisted and corrupted from feeding on the flesh of men—like those damned bloodsuckers only worse.” Blaze lifted up a single finger for emphasis. “One can wipe out several wolves in a handful of seconds.”
Rigs nodded, but Dom eyed them skeptically, leaning back in the booth. “You’re asking us to place faith in you, to believe these…creatures exist?” Dom shook his head. “They’re legends, both in our world and yours, the fodder of our elders’ long-ago stories.”
“I’m not asking for your faith,” Blaze spat out. “Faith requires belief without proof. I’m asking for your understanding.” He slid to the edge of the cushioned bench seat, exchanging a knowing glance with Malcolm.
Malcolm nodded his agreement.
Leaning down, Blaze rolled up the pant leg of his jeans, exposing his wounds.
Reddened stitches marred the misshapen curve of Blaze’s thigh down to his knee. One of the Volk had taken a chunk of flesh there. Thanks to their kind’s ability to heal, the injury hadn’t been life-altering. Blaze was finally up and walking again, but still, the sight of the wound there, angry and inflamed with pain, months after their kind normally would have healed, spoke volumes.
Blaze would sport a permanent limp.
“They’re a threat we all face.” Blaze’s blue eyes darkened, turning grim.
For a brief moment, Malcolm could see what Dakota, Blaze’s mate, saw in him—something deep and real that the rest of the world rarely saw.
“Blaze served in MAC-V-Alpha. Two tours,” Malcolm grumbled, voicing what he knew his packmate wouldn’t.
Their worlds might be different, but Malcolm knew the MC held one thing dear—service to one’s pack, club, country—something greater than themselves. There were plenty of MCs, both human and otherwise, who had warped values, especially among the one-percenters, but even among the worst, that respect for service remained true…for men and women who chose to live by their own rules.
“Those beasts were hiding, bidding their time for centuries until they came for us again,” Blaze explained. “We took out their leadership. Only a handful remain. There wasn’t enough”—he hesitated—“food,” he said, choosing his words carefully, “for them to proliferate out in the Russian tundra. That’s why they want Wolf Pack Run, Montana, our mountains near Yellowstone, terra firma.” He nodded to Dom pointedly. “They want all the territories ruled by the shifters of the Seven Range Pact. Those areas are remote enough that they can find humans and feed, and no one would be the wiser to it.”
Disappearances in the state parks, in the wild of the forest and mountains, happened all the time. The terrain made it easy enough to explain a few missing tourists, and in a low-population state ruled by livestock agents, the difference between a human dead from the Volk or a drop from a high rock was all the same.
It was why, led by the Grey Wolves, the seven shifter clans that ruled the Seven Range Pact made the foothills of the Absarokas their home territory, both because that was native land for their species and because the mountains hid them from the prying eyes of humanity.
“Now, they’ve partnered with the bloodsuckers,” Blaze continued, “and with our pack severely weakened, we need more than our alliance with the other Seven Range shifters.”
The vulnerability of that statement hung heavy in the air.
We need you.
Malcolm felt the weight of the phrase. The lives of their packmates depended on it.
“That’s all well and good,” Dom answered. “We may be a mutual species. The Grey Wolves have our respect”—he nodded toward Malcolm—“but when it comes down to it, we’re not pack. Not brothers. Why should we stick our necks out for you?”
It was a reasonable question, but the callousness when Austin and so many other wolves lay buried six feet under the rock of Wolf Den Caverns snaked through Malcolm. The mildewed scent of that damn cave still lingered in his nose. He knew Blaze would feel the same.
“Empathy isn’t something you can beg for. You either have it or you don’t,” Blaze nearly snarled.
“What say you, Reaper?” The question came from Rigs, who’d proved nearly as quiet as Malcolm.
The other wolves’ eyes turned toward him.
Malcolm took a long sip of his drink, considering. The green light from the jukebox caught like an emerald against the crystal. He set the glass back down on the tabletop with an audible thunk. “I think right now…our offer doesn’t look very tempting to you. We’re desperate and you know it. We don’t have much to offer.” He glanced down at his glass, to the amber liquid that seemed lit from within beneath the neon lights. That made it easier to rein in his emotions, appear unaffected.
“But I also know what a bad position a Grey Wolf defeat would put you in, both your pack and your cause to protect the homelands.” He nodded to Dom. “If our pack falls, then who become the dominant shifters in this country? Who controls the land that borders northern Yellowstone? Now, maybe you want that. Maybe you think you’re ready and powerful enough to handle it. After all, I grew up on the South Side of Chicago. I know your pack. From Detroit all the way down to Atlanta, you reign supreme. But your pack is still less than half the size of ours, and if we fall, then who stops the vampires from proliferating here out west? Who stops the Volk from regrouping and building their numbers? Who helps the rangers protect terra firma?
“Maybe the distance buys your pack a few years, but eventually the Volk will move into Yellowstone and eastward into your territory. Can you guarantee that in only a few years, you’ll have the means to fight them while still keeping your own enemies at bay? If the Grey Wolves fall, where do you think the human hunters, the Execution Underground, will turn their gaze? With us gone, you suddenly have a target on your backs.”
Malcolm lifted his head. His wolf moved beneath his skin, the canid gold of his true eyes flashing. “You may be powerful, but not as powerful as us. That’s not posturing, that’s fact. You may not need us to survive, but you do need us to thrive. In the long run, our success keeps a target off your backs, serves your goals, and when your pack is strong enough to draw further attention, when we’ve healed and your own enemies come for you, the favor will be returned.”
He lifted his glass again, swirling the contents. “I say that’s a fucking good deal,” he growled.
He drew his glass to his lips, finishing off the last dregs of the smoky liquid. Even now that he was finished speaking, the other wolves watched him, base animal instincts assessing, evaluating. The reek of death on his skin, the pain in his eyes, the curl of vengeance in his lip. For once, what they saw there must have been enough.
Dom and Rigs exchanged a subtle look.
“The other rangers and I would do anything to protect terra firma.” Dom’s jaw drew into a tight line, his expression speaking volumes about exactly how far that promise stretched. He had done what he had to protect their homelands before and he would again.
“And it’s in the MC’s best interest.” Rigs nodded his agreement.
Dom extended his hand. “We’ll do our best to whip the votes in your favor.”
Malcolm gripped the other wolf’s hand in his, the skin on the hot spots of his palm nearly as coarse and callused as his own, from where they both rode the open road. “If you can whip the votes, the deal is the deal.” He met the other wolf’s golden eyes. “We seal it with the warlock.”