Page 73 of Hunter Moon

“Sounds like a lucky bastard. Cider House?” Aspen asked with a grin just for me.

Shiloh was working that night, and I could definitely use a hard cider to take the edge off. “Sounds great.”

We got there, and the bar was just the same as it’d always been—a little dingy, some of the tables sporting carvings from drunks who wanted to leave their mark somewhere. It had a murky kind of charm to it, even the slightly sticky, worn wooden floorboards and the light from retro glass lampshades hanging from the ceiling.

It was a place I’d always loved. When we were teenagers, it’d always felt like we were being edgy and brave going in, even when we came just to share a basket of fried pickles and onion rings. It was where the pack gathered, felt like home even more than Mom’s house did. But I’d stopped seeing it so clearly while Aspen was gone.

Now that he was back, everything was in sharper focus—not just places, but my past, my present, even what I hoped for the future. It didn’t have to be doom and gloom with Aspen there.

Against all reason and ignoring the prickling unease in my stomach, I wanted to make plans for something better.

“So,” I said, fiddling with the corner of the thick paper napkin under the utensils, “I’ve been thinking about that tattoo—”

Aspen’s eyebrows shot up, but he didn’t say out loud that he hadn’t thought I was serious about it. When we were kids, I’d thought it was crazy that he’d sit there while someone poked him with needles. Told him as much, even when I kissed those spots of ink across his golden skin. “Yeah?”

“I don’t really know how to... do it? Like, do you call ahead and make an appointment? Where should I go?”

His smile widened so I could see his overlarge canines. “I know a couple guys. One in Norfolk, but I’ve heard good things about a place in Charlottesville if you’d rather go there.”

I shook my head. “Norfolk sounds good. We could take a couple days, go to the beach. I mean, if you wanted to come with me.”

He reached across the table, his hand closing over mine. “You think I’m going to let somebody wave needles in your direction and not be there to back you up?”

My cheeks got hot, and sure, I had every reason in the world to think that. Except weirdly, I didn’t. “Now that you mention it, maybe it’s not such a good idea to have my alpha there to get all growly and defensive about it.”

Instead of getting offended, Aspen just preened, his fingers flexing around mine in a tight squeeze. “I can hold it together. I’ll keep all growling to a minimum.”

“Good.”

Shiloh came up then, set our drinks and a basket of pickles between us, but with a smile and a nod she was gone. One more person who didn’t think Aspen needed to be on blast for his crimes against my broken heart, so long as he’d be there to stitch it back together.

But a tattoo was a small part of what I wanted—a fresh start, and Aspen there to make it with me.

He dipped a fried pickle into the ranch and popped it into his mouth, chewing and smiling and stout as ever.

“I was also thinking I might look for a place of my own,” I blurted out. “Isaac Tartt brought his car in for maintenance today, and he’s got some empty places to rent out. So I was thinking, you know—maybe Shy’d feel better leaving the house if I did it first.” Across the bar, I felt her glare on the back of my head. Didn’t matter—wasn’t any secret that she was head over heels for Talin and had been putting off leaning into her own happiness. I couldn’t help thinking that was because I hadn’t found mine. “And it’s time, you know, for me to have some space of my own.”

Only I didn’t want tobeon my own. I hated the idea of that. It felt vulnerable and exposed and lonely and none of those were things werewolves dealt with very well.

“Would you want to look at a place with me?” I asked, sure my nerves came through my scent in the sweat on my palms and under my arms.

Aspen stared at me for two long, horrible heartbeats. Then, he was out of his seat, his firm hand wrapping around the back of my neck to drag me in. The edge of the table dug into my chest, but I didn’t give a single shit as his mouth closed over mine. His tongue was tart and vinegary from the pickle, and I couldn’t get enough.

When he sat back, leaving me breathless, his hand played with mine. “Baby, anywhere you are is exactly where I want to be.”

47

Aspen

Maybe I was just being overprotective because of what the Reid pack had done to my mate, but I didn’t think that was it.

Something about the way Cain Reid kept circling, kept prodding, pushing everyone’s buttons, trying to get a rise out of each of us, felt familiar.

It wasn’t just an insensitive ass, or a bully who enjoyed seeing people hurt. It was a fight. He knew where our injuries were, and he was prodding them, methodically, one by one.

Linden, because new alphas were notoriously unstable, and packs with brand new leaders were juicy, vulnerable targets. That, to say nothing of the fact that Lin didn’t fulfill the old-fashioned, ignorant view that all alphas had to be big, burly, and think of violence first and always.

Brook, because of what the Reid pack had already done to him, and because hurting a pack’s omegas was sure to get a rise out of them. Because they thought they had broken Brook, which only proved that they didn’t know him at all. He was hurt, yes. Terrified, even. But a scared Brook was more likely to bite your head off than run away, if you were threatening the people he loved.

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