Page 22 of Running on Empty

“These fellas reckon they’re your fated mates—” Jonesy started to say.

“The fuck they are. I’d rather sodomise myself with a wire brush than spend another second with these fucks.” My eyes flicked from the Spencers to my boss and back again. “This is not how this shit works.” My focus settled on the Spencers. “You don’t get to march in here—”

“And do what?” Jack said, as all four of them took a step closer. “What are we doing, omega? Just trying to have a conversation.”

“One I don’t want to have. I’ve made that perfectly clear,” I replied.

“You’re looking pretty willing here,” Jonesy said, smirking down at his phone as I heard the now familiar sounds.

My heart felt like it slowed, then stopped as he played a video clip, my wolf whining in my ears as my boss watched the same one they’d sent me. And Jonesy? He stared at the screen with the same lascivious focus he did the porn clips we sometimes caught him perusing on his break, when he’d hiss at us for interrupting him. I’d known he was a weaselly, shitty fucker, but I’d also been able to maintain firm boundaries with him.

Until now.

I took a step towards him, my wolf growling, snapping her jaws, ready to slap that phone out of his hands, then smack him down. As I moved, the Spencers perked up, to a man, their eyes gleaming with feral anticipation. But I was determined that this time they weren’t going to get what they wanted from me. I didn’t know how I’d stop them, though, so my eyes flicked around the room to look for a way out. And then I saw the external gate and the wolf and I were in perfect accord.

The gate was kept locked at all times. A thick coil of chain was wrapped around it as well. At one point staff had been able to exit this way, but then we’d had a worker who’d used it to ferry boxes of spirits out to their mates, ripping off the pub. As I looked at it, my muscles tensing, fur rippling all over my skin, I knew what I needed to do.

“Don’t.” It was a pleasure to see Jack’s smile slip. “Don’t move a fucking muscle.”

“Or do it,” Blaine smirked as he folded his arms across his chest. “Nothing I like more than the chase.”

“Consider this my final notice, Jonesy, you fuck,” I growled at the arsehole, my voice more wolf than woman right now, and his eyes went wide as my uniform started to split.

There’s a moment mid-shift where a shifter’s strength is that of both wolf and human. I grabbed the chain with claws, not hands, my wolf’s muscles popping out all over me as the shift took over. Adrenalin coursed through me as I twisted the rusty links to find the weak spot and break the chain. But it was the wolf that slammed her paws into the gates, forcing them open.

The men shouted things, swore things, but we didn’t care anymore.Home, the wolf thought, that was all she wanted. We went streaking down the road, people watching as we went past, but we paid them little mind. A thin howl in the distance had us moving faster and faster, paws thumping down on grass, then asphalt, running faster and faster until we turned up my street.

Half the reason I’d put up with Jonesy’s shit all this time was the fact the pub was just a few streets away from my place, so I was home before I knew it. But the wolf didn’t trot up my driveway. She hated my house, unable to understand the fact that we needed to stay in it with the insane price of housing now. It was a site of too much pain, too much tamped down anger, and the fight to keep her under control was a daily battle.

Except when we were here.

Ollie bounded out at the sound of my approach, on full alert at first, then his muscles loosened and his tail started wagging furiously when he scented me. The wolf sailed over the front gate, landing in the Kellys’ front yard, then ran over to the front door, scratching at it when we got there.

Then the door opened.

“Stevie?”

Jax looked down at me in concern but the wolf pushed past, running down the hall and using her nose to push open Ronan’s bedroom door. She jumped up on the bed where he was sitting, shirtless, a knife in one hand, his whetstone in the other. His other knives were spread out across the knife roll that he usually kept them wrapped them in. He set the whetstone down on the quilt.

“Hello, beautiful,” he said, his eyes green as he met mine, green as glass. His smile was his wolf’s, sharp and jagged, as he patted the space beside him. The wolf spun around three times before settling down.

Chapter14

“She came to you first,” Jax said, a feeling of betrayal evident in his voice.

“That she did.” I flinched as his hand landed in my ruff, fingers ruffling the fur. But the wolf? She preened under the attention and shot Ronan a hopeful look that he would keep patting us, and he smiled in response before looking up at Jax. “So you can fuck right off now. Better yet, go running to brother dear, like usual, so the two of you can concoct another plan that’s doomed to fail.”

When those green eyes met mine, the wolf and the man experienced some kind of accord, which was emphasised as he raised one of the blades.

“You don’t want to play nice with those idiots that think they can hunt you down and use you.” He nodded then narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, we know what Jack Spencer and his little bros have been trying to pull. The woman won’t like this much, but that app we put on your phone? It tracks all the calls coming in and out, messages too.” A smile curved his lips, but not from joy. Something dark lurked there. “Even the pathetic attempts all those fuckin’ alphas on Howlr made to try to catch our girl.”

The wolf jumped to her feet, sniffing at the air between us, then leaned towards Ronan. He leaned forward until we were almost nose to nose. He ran his thumb along the knife blade, the keen edge making an instant cut. His smile dropped and his eyes bled to pure silver as his wolf peered out.

“You need blood.” His head tilted to one side, an entirely animal gesture, then he held his thumb out to offer me the blood beading along the cut. The wolf licked it clean without a thought, the coppery burst on our tongue welcome, a point of connection. And Ronan smiled, knife still poised. “And I’m gonna get it for you.”

“You can’t pull the kind of vigilante shit you’re thinking about,” Jax said with a sigh, but both Ronan and I looked up at the same time to stare into his eyes.

“Watch me,” his brother replied. “Now shoo.”

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