Page 6 of Teeth To Rip & Tear

“We meet again,” Mitchell smirked, brushing his hands down the front of his t-shirt before he closed the door behind him. “You know, this store is exactly what I expected.”

I lifted a brow. “What did you expect?”

“Chaos.”

I raised my eyes to the ceiling, begging god to rescue me. When a moment passed without divine intervention, I turned back to Mitchell.

“What are you doing here?” I sighed.

“Dean would have come himself, I’m sure.” Mitchell winked, though he could have just been blinking with his good eye. “I’ve come to deliver your new bodyguard.”

“You?”

His smile twitched. “No. Him.”

The silver-haired man in the corner had found one of the books about knitting stuffed animals and had made himself comfortable in the bean bag in the corner.

“Him?” I echoed.

Mitchell pinched the bridge of his nose. “Kaleb.” He called out. “Get your ass over here.”

Kaleb didn’t move.

“I don’t think he heard you.” I joked.

“He heard me, Doll.” Mitchell griped. “He’s your new bodyguard. He’s just not used to being in human form. I thought you would prefer not to have a wolf in your store—”

I waved my hand. “Kaleb can be a wolf if he wants to.” A pang of guilt hit me as I realized I was talking about the silver-haired man as if he wasn’t there. I cleared my throat. “Why was Kaleb chosen?” I lowered my voice. “He knows he can’t kill anyone, right?”

Mitchell gave me a strange look. “Kaleb is the only member left of the Beast-King’s court. Your token was a gift from the Beast-King, so Dean thought it was appropriate that one of the king’s inner circle be the one to fulfill the boon.”

I inhaled sharply. “The Beast-King died a hundred years ago.”

Mitchell eyed me shrewdly. “Which makes it all the more suspicious that you have one of his tokens lying around. We thought we got them all.”

I knitted my fingers together. “It was my grandmother’s,” I explained. “She passed a few years ago. Told me to use the coin when I was desperate, and I’m pretty desperate right now.” I laughed, the sound weak and watery.

Mitchell walked closer to the register, pushing his dark hair away from his eyes. “Anything I can help with?”

I waved a hand toward Kaleb, who’d moved on to a book about origami. “He’ll make sure my husband can’t hurt me, right?”

Mitchell’s eyes flashed. “You have reason to think he’ll hurt you?”

I reached up, cupping my neck before realizing what I had done.

Mitchell’s expression darkened; he opened his mouth to speak, but the sound of bones creaking and breaking jolted us apart.

Kaleb had decided he wanted to wear four legs after all. I watched with morbid fascination as the silver-haired man became a silver wolf before curling up to nap in the book corner.

Mitchell made himself scarce, and the silver wolf fell asleep behind the register until it was time to close the store.

I wasn’t sure about the bodyguard protocol, but when the wolf followed me around the store as I locked up, I realized he planned on coming home with me.

It was sunset by the time I got to my car. The quaint shops on Palmer Street were bathed in an orange glow. The air was thick with humidity.

The silver wolf stayed by my side, impassive as ever, his claws clicking against the sidewalk as we approached my car.

I inhaled deeply, trying to clear my mind, when I saw the latest addition to my windscreen.

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