Молли Харпер - How to Flirt with a Naked Werewolf

I grew more and more fidgety. I tried to distract myself, keep my head down, and throw myself into getting plates out the pass. I tried to tell myself I was being silly, overreacting. There was no reason to think Cooper was in trouble. For all I knew, his hunting party was doing well and he was being paid overtime. But I couldn’t get rid of nagging little flares of worry in back of my head as I rounded the counter, preparing to take Alan’s lunch order.

“Hey, Mo,” he said. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m OK. I’ve stopped throwing up every time I crack an egg, which is an occupational plus.”

He started to laugh and looked down at his belt when his cell phone rang. “Sorry. Give me a minute. Hey, Walt, what can I—Slow down, Walt. Tell them to stop yelling, I can’t hear you.”

I tilted my head, sending him a questioning look. He rolled his eyes and shrugged.

“You shot what, now?” he exclaimed, standing, knocking his stool to the floor behind him. “No, don’t bring it here! Take it to my barn. Yeah, I’ll be right there.”

Alan snapped his phone shut. “Walt and a couple of his friends shot a wolf outside of town. They said it’s a big sonofabitch and want me to come see if it could be the wolf that attacked Susie and Abner.”

I stopped in my tracks, blood roaring through my ears. The pad slipped from my hands, clattering to the floor.

Alan looked up and grimaced. “You OK? You look pretty pale. Why don’t you sit down?”

“What about the wolf?” I heard myself ask.

“They’re driving it out to my place now, so I can take a look at it. I need to take some measurements, some pictures, call a vet to do a necropsy . . .”

My head spun as my stomach did an unpleasant slide. I turned on my heel, pulling my keys out of my apron as Alan called, “Mo? You OK?”

Lynette strolled through the door, preparing to flirt with Alan. I caught her arm and pulled her with me as I headed for the door. “Lynette, I need you to take over bar duty. The lunch rush is over. Pete’s taking care of the dishes. I just need you to keep an eye on things for a little bit.”

“It’s my day off.” Lynette scowled, jerking her arm out of my hand.

I snarled, backing her into the wall. “Now, you listen to me. I’ve put up with your bullshit for almost a year. Your lousy attitude, your piss-poor work ethic, and the fact that you take more than your fair share of the tip jar on more nights than I can count. And despite the fact that I’ve had to cover for you, I’ve never said anything. But so help me God, if you don’t step up to the plate this once, I am going to tell Buzz about those butt prints I found on the shelf in the walk-in freezer.”

Lynette blanched. “You can’t know that was me.”

“Well, I didn’t, but I do now,” I said, throwing an apron at her. “Take drink orders, collect on tabs, do your damn job.”

Lynette nodded, mute, as I stalked out the door.

Just because Walt shot a wolf didn’t mean it was Cooper, right? There were dozens of wolves in the area. Walt could have killed any one of them. That’s what I kept telling myself as I pulled away from the saloon.

In the rearview mirror, I caught sight of my neighbors through the saloon window—normal people, eating burgers and living normal lives. I used to be one of them, totally unaware of the world beyond ours. And for a split second, I felt sorry enough for myself to want that ignorance back.

On the drive to our house, I prayed to Jesus, Buddha, Gaia, the Great Spirit, and every other deity I could think of to let me drive home and find Cooper climbing out of his truck, with some story about a flat tire and a dead cell-phone battery. When I got home and found the driveway empty, I realized how asinine that hope was. I climbed out of the truck and dialed Cooper’s cell phone again while I opened the front door. I was sent to voice mail as I did a cursory sweep of the house. “Cooper, if you get this, please, please call me so I know you’re all right.” I snapped the phone shut.

I paced on the porch and tried to work through all of the scenarios in my head. I could rush over to Alan’s, throw myself into the group of triumphant hunters, and . . . what? What would I do if it was Cooper in wolf form? I would collapse, possibly start screaming and beating the men in the hunting party, and get hauled away to jail. It would be awfully tough to raise my baby in a prison mental ward. And what if the wolf wasn’t Cooper? I swiped at the tears flowing steadily down my cheeks now. What if it was one of Cooper’s relatives? How would I handle that? What if it was just a plain, everyday wolf? How would I explain my sudden overwhelming desire to see a carcass?

I was way over my head here. I pulled out my cell phone and called the only number I could think of.

“Eli?”

WHERE WAS JENNIFER GARNER when you needed her?

Alias superspy Sydney Bristow could sneak through the woods outside Alan’s cabin, do a reconnaissance mission, and seek out her possibly dead werewolf boyfriend, then escape without any problem. If Sydney Bristow had a werewolf boyfriend. It would probably involve a Supernatural crossover.

I, on the other hand, had to call Eli and ask him to sneak me over to Alan’s and help me get through this. I’d left Cooper ten or so increasingly desperate voice mails demanding that he call me back. In my final message, I told him where I was meeting Eli and begged him to keep me from seeing my first dead wolf up close. So far, he hadn’t responded.

I was crying full-tilt by the time I pulled my truck into a little clearing off Alan’s drive. Eli was waiting there for me so we could trudge through the woods behind Alan’s house and sneak into the barn. I hadn’t thought much beyond that.

Eli’s expression was sympathetic when I climbed out of the truck. He opened his arms as if he planned to hug me. When he realized I wasn’t stepping closer, he smoothly lowered them and placed his hands on my shoulders.

“Thanks for coming,” I told him. “I didn’t think I could do this alone, and I didn’t know who else to call. And if it is Cooper, I didn’t want Samson or Gracie to see him this way.”

“If you’re not up to it, I can do this alone,” he said.

“No, I think it won’t be real for me unless I see it myself,” I said, shaking my head.

“This is one of the worst parts of my job.” He sighed, leading me into the trees. “Being the one to take on the bad news.”

“We don’t know that it’s bad news,” I said, my tone just a little petulant.

He smiled, but I could tell it was just to humor me. “Of course not. Sorry, Mo.”

I shrugged. Eli was moving quickly and quietly through the trees, leaving me in the dust. I had to half-run to keep up. About a mile from Alan’s house, I had to double over to catch my breath.

“Hold up,” I called. “I’m sorry. I can’t keep going at this pace.”

Eli made a sour face and moved back toward me. “Are you hurt?”

“No, pregnant.” I drew deep, lung-stretching breaths.

“What? Why didn’t anyone tell me?” he demanded, the color draining from his face.

“I asked Gracie not to say anything until Cooper and I got everything worked out.”

Eli seemed livid at having been left out of the loop. I couldn’t tell if the injury was personal or professional. Clearly, as de facto alpha, he expected to know everything going on in his pack members’ lives.

“Aw, damn it, Mo.” He pushed through the trees at a slower pace. He seemed to have recovered his usual bland demeanor. “I wish I’d known. I wouldn’t have let you come. You shouldn’t see this. This shouldn’t be the way you remember Cooper.”