Page 1 of Wild Bliss

Prologue

Sawyer Hathaway stared at the Bliss Town Hall like it was asnake that could bite him. Would bite him. Might bite him. Maybe.

He growled and was reminded he wasn’t alone when a caninehead came up, swiveling and looking around for a threat. The German shepherdmix was proof that things happened to him when he moved into this weird world.He’d found the dog eating out of the trash bin behind the bar he owned. She’dbeen skinny as hell and flea bitten and scared. He should have shooed her away,but he’d known the minute she whined and tried to grab a moldy, half-eatensandwich that he would at least take her in for the night. He’d fed her andgiven her a warm place to sleep and taken her straight to Noah Bennett’s animalclinic here in Bliss.

And somehow he’d left with her and a bunch of medicationsNoah had convinced him she needed. Now he had a dog.

He wasn’t a guy who had a pet. He was a badass, a once upona time criminal, a dude the sheriff feared. He wasn’t a dog dad.

“It’s okay.” He reached out and patted her head. “The onlythreat here is to my dignity. The sheriff doesn’t like me. Probably becausehe’s an ex-DEA agent and I used to be a member of an MC that ran a shit ton ofdrugs. I didn’t do it for the money, but I don’t think the sheriff wants arundown on how I went into a life of crime to try to save my brother.”

The same brother who’d stood in front of him and told him hedidn’t want to see him again because Sawyer was part of a life he wasn’t evergoing back to. Now Wes had a wife and kid and a house in Denver, and Sawyerhadn’t seen the brother he’d spent much of his life and pieces of his soultrying to protect in years.

The dog stared at him with soulful eyes. She was a goodlistener. She was probably the only listener Sawyer’d had since he’d joined theColorado Horde. He’d had friends before then. Ty and Lucy and River. He’dpushed them away because of the danger he’d represented in those years and wasonly now finding his way back, which was precisely why he was sitting in hisJeep as the town Christmas party went on in front of him. He watched as MaxHarper herded one of his kids inside. The boy. Sawyer would bet his wife Rachelhad taken their oldest, Paige, with her when she came in to set up for theparty. Sure enough, Rye Harper, Max’s twin brother and Rachel’s other husband,hustled in behind them.

Max Harper. Sawyer shook his head. “Even after all theseyears it’s weird to think of Max as a dad. As a husband, really. He’s thesingle biggest asshole I’ve ever met, and I’ve met Taggart. Max was born anasshole. Like the man was born without a single fuck to give. The good news ishis brother seems to have gotten an adequate amount. Still have no idea howRachel puts up with him. Not that I know her well. She doesn’t exactly frequentHell on Wheels.”

Hell on Wheels was a world he understood. It was the bar hisgranddad had started over forty years before, and Sawyer had ended up in chargewhen he’d died five years back. Just in time for Sawyer to find refuge there.The bar had become the bane of his existence and his sanctuary. He worked andthen went home to sleep, and then started it all over again. He rarely cameinto Bliss, preferring to drive hours to larger towns where no one askedquestions or tried to make small talk.

No one asked about his dog or if he’d finally named his dog,and how the hell did he have a dog?

There was a tap on his window, and it took everything Sawyerhad not to reach for the gun he kept close at all times—a habit mostly fromthose years when the world had been brutal and dangerous. Luckily he’d trainedit out of himself enough so he didn’t point a gun in Jax Lee’s face.

The smiling dude waving at him while standing in the snowhad married Sawyer’s childhood friend years before. “Hey, Sawyer. How’s itgoing? You missed the dinner party last Saturday.”

It was past time to get this over with. He might be able topawn everything off on Jax and get back in time to… Work a shift he wasn’tsupposed to work? Lark would get pissy with him since she rarely got to handlethe bar by herself. Apparently he was overbearing or something according to hisemployees. Lark had been happy to send him off, perfectly thrilled to have aSaturday night all to herself. Well, and the other three employees working thisevening. Lark and Sidney would handle the bar and customers, while Gil workedthe fryer and Joe punched the crap out of anyone who thought Lark and Sid wereon the menu. The Saturday night crowd could be rough. It was precisely why healmost never skipped one.

“Sorry, had to work.” He’d gotten the evite complete with apicture of River and Jax and their big dumb dog looking cute standing in theirkitchen. It was sweet and normal, and he’d known he couldn’t sit at theirtable, and it wasn’t because of the vegetarian fare. It was because he wouldhave to sit with them and Lucy and Ty and their partner, Michael. It wasbecause he would be the only one there alone, the only one who didn’t belong.Not that he’d ever actually belonged with them. They’d formed a family over theyears, and didn’t every family need a black sheep?

Black sheep didn’t go to family dinners.

Jax merely smiled and waved it off. “Of course, but youshould know River’s determined to get on your schedule. You going in? Hey,girl. How are you? Buster’s inside. I’m sure he would love some company.”

The dog’s tail wagged madly as though she knew a good thingwhen it came into her life. Jax was a good thing. Sawyer was… He was the onewho’d found her and gotten talked into keeping her. Would Buster like somecompany? River had always loved dogs, and weren’t two better than one?

The idea of pawning off the pup on River actually didn’tmake him feel good. He’d gotten kind of used to her being around. Not becausehe liked her or anything. No. He didn’t like having her lie her head on his lapor wag her tail when they went for a walk. She forced him to be more active.Yes, an excellent and logical explanation. He had to take her on walks and outto the bathroom, and it felt good to move more.

“I was just going to drop off some stuff.” He wasn’t surewhy, but he’d bought presents for his friends this year. Some bug had gotteninto him. Maybe because Michael and Ty had started coming in regularly withLucy, and they always found some reason to force him to sit down for a whileand share some truly greasy fries with them while they talked about what hadhappened up at the resort during the week. River and Jax would join them fromtime to time. The last year had made him…the word made his stomach turn…long.He needed to stop longing. It wasn’t manly. “Hey, I should get back to the bar.Could you take some presents in for me?”

Jax’s head shook, and he held up his hands, both carryinglarge bags. “Sorry, man. River loaded me up. Come on inside. There’s turkey anddressing, and I’m sure Max is going to spike the hell out of the punch. Oh, andStella made chocolate pies. You know since she’s semi-retired no one except herhusband gets chocolate pies.”

It had been a long time since he’d been to Stella’s. He usedto go a lot as a kid. When he would play at Ty’s place, and Ty’s mom invitedSawyer’s granddad to dinner sometimes. They would always go to Stella’s and letTy and Sawyer and his brothers sit in their own booth like big men while theylaughed and shared stories of raising wild boys, as they called them. River’sfather would join them every now and then, and he would look over from thetable he sat at with his friends to see his grandfather smiling, and the worlddidn’t seem so awful.

A deep sense of nostalgia swept over Sawyer.

He was a long way from that boy. His grandfather was gone.His brothers were out in the world and didn’t seem to care about him. Did hehave to lose all his friends?

Jax’s smile faded, a serious look coming over his face.“Sawyer, River misses you. It’s been years, man. You can’t hole up forever.”

He didn’t see why he couldn’t. He’d holed up pretty well.And yet he found himself opening the door and letting the dog bound out. Therewas something magical about seeing her tail wag, her whole body bouncing aroundlike this was the greatest moment of her life. Mere weeks before she’d growledand snapped and tucked her tail between her legs.

He could do this. He hauled the gifts out and followed Jaxup to the town hall. The place practically glowed against the snow and velvetwinter night. He felt weird walking into this particular Hallmark movie.

Until he looked around and realized this film would nevermake the Hallmark Channel’s Christmas movie list since everyone was throupledup.

Threesomes were all the rage in Bliss, and he was surroundedby them. He caught sight of local rancher James Glen sitting by one of the manyChristmas trees decorating the hall, his wife, Hope, in his lap, and theaforementioned vet he shared said wife with at his side. The mayor of Bliss wasdancing with his wife, Laura, though their partner Cameron Briggs was plasteredto her back, his hands on her swaying hips. Ah, Christmas in Bliss. He waspretty sure one of those trees was decorated with beets. Yeah, Mel Hughes wouldhave brought the beet tree in. He glanced over and, sure enough, there was theold guy sitting with his girlfriend, who would be his wife if the man wasn’tworried aliens could track him through government paperwork. He was talking tothe newest trio in town. Elisa, Van, and Hale were sitting at a table withMel—Elisa’s father.

“Can I help you with those?” Callie Hollister-Wright gavehim a big grin. She was a pretty brunette with shining eyes and a smile capableof lighting up a room. She had a Santa hat on her head and blinking Christmastree lights she wore as earrings.

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