2

My eyes bulged when she told me. I’d never actually met a shifter. Not in real life, anyway. There was a wolf clan compound about three hours from where I lived back home. And a girl I knew in school had sworn up and down her aunt dated a lion shifter when she was younger, but no one believed her. My butterflies exploded into full-blown nausea.

“It’s fine,” Kim said. “Here, this will make you feel better.”

She shoved her hand into a fifty-gallon drum of ice and beer and pulled a bottle of Corona out. I blinked rapidly as she slapped it into my hand and pulled me along to introduce me to some people she knew. I didn’t even slightly hear their names. Instead I glanced around while twisting the top off the beer. I’d never had a drink before, and it felt wrong, but I lifted the bottle up to my lips anyway with my stomach clenching from nervousness and a healthy dose of fear. This was it. This was me being rebellious and daring. Maybe a little too much so. After all, I didn’t really know Kim. Had she brought me somewhere dangerous?

The liquid hit my lips. Okay. Weird. Not bad, but not good either. Kind of sweet, but also sort of musty. Almost like wet, yeasty bread. I didn’t let the taste stop me, though. I tilted my head back and drained half the bottle in four quick gulps. The taste was worse that way, and I decided to just sip on it for a little while as I followed Kim around the building. She mingled with people she knew or met new friends. After about twenty minutes, I started feeling much calmer and less stressed. Maybe the beer was having an effect. I definitely wasn’t as self-conscious as I had been walking in.

After starting my second beer, I got the feeling I was being watched, almost like fingers brushing my neck. I turned around, scanning the room, trying to see if I was crazy, and that’s when I spotted him. Leaned against the wall on the far side of the building, his gaze locked on me. He was too far away for me to see his eye color, but he was drilling straight into my soul with that look. And holy freaking crap. He was gorgeous.

And then he noticed me noticing him, before he pushed away from the wall and started toward me. Holy crap. The closer he got, the better I could see his face. He was older than me, somewhere between twenty-five and thirty maybe? As he got closer, everyone hurried to get out of his way. He didn’t have to excuse himself at all. It was like the seas parted before him. Seeing the patch sewn on his leather jacket, I tried not to gasp. He was a shifter too. This man, this shifter, walked right up to me, incredibly close. Way inside my personal bubble.

As he leaned his face close to my ear to talk, I smelled him. Sweat, motor oil, mint toothpaste, and soap. It was a pleasant combination for some reason.

His lips almost brushed my ear as he said, “Never seen you around before. I’m Rhett, but call me Grizz.”

I turned my head, both to put a little distance between us and to get a better look at him. His black hair was long and tied back. There was thin stubble across his face, not long enough to look sloppy, but just enough to look good.

I tried to answer as calmly as I could, “Um...my...uh, my name is Zoey, but call me Zo.”

He laughed at that, a beautiful, deep, masculine laugh. I smiled too, and against my wishes, my nipples went hard and started to ache as my cheeks went scarlet.

“Well, Zoey-goes-by-Zo. It’s very nice to meet you. How old are you anyway? Did you just move here?” Grizz asked.

I shook my head rapidly. “No. Just visiting my aunt for the summer before college. I’m eighteen.”

“Well, I’m very glad you’re here. I love having something beautiful to look at,” he said.

My cheek grew even hotter, and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to continue breathing. He was flirting with me, I knew, but this was not like the way high school boys flirted. He was...aggressive. I had to admit I kind of liked it.

“So, um, what do you do?” I asked.

He shrugged and said, “A little of this, a little of that.”

I smiled, feeling more comfortable. “That’s pretty vague.”

“I meant it to be,” Grizz said and winked at me.

It went like that, between us, for almost an hour. The flirting was nice. Eventually, he put his hand on my lower back, and I put mine on his arm. Each time we touched, it was like electricity crackled in the air. Finally, Kim found me again. Her eyes went wide when she saw who I was talking to.

“Hey, Grizz,” Kim said.

He only nodded to her and smiled.

Kim looked at me with narrowed eyes, like she was shocked I was talking to Grizz. “Hey, it’s getting late. You ready to go?”

I wasn’t, but knew I had to get home at a fairly decent hour. I’d only just gotten to Idaho. I couldn’t stay out till dawn. As cool as Aunt Patty was, that would probably not be a great idea.

I looked at Grizz. “It was nice talking to you tonight.”

He brushed his hair back and behind his ear. “Yup. So, how long are you staying in town? You said all summer, right?” Grizz asked.

I only nodded in response.

“You should come back and see me sometime. I’m here almost all the time.”

I nodded again like an idiot, and said, “That would be really nice.”

And I did keep going back. The first couple of times, it was a little weird. No party or other people hanging around. We would just sit and hang out. I met his brothers, Hutch and Reck. Hutch was a little bit of an ass, and Reck was just a kid, maybe twelve or thirteen. He seemed to be a handful.

It was apparent they were a rough bunch. I didn’t ask, but it didn’t take long for me to figure out that Grizz and Hutch were in some kind of gang. It didn’t seem like they liked to talk about what they did. Those first few weeks, I learned that I liked vodka and orange juice, and I got drunk for the first time. Thankfully, Grizz called Kim to take me home that night. Again, Aunt Patty was super cool about it all. Telling me about the time she and my mom had drunk half a bottle of whiskey while my grandparents were out of town. They’d puked for nearly the entire next day.

As embarrassing as that had been, Grizz had never made fun of me or joked about it. He wasn’t like any man I'd ever met. He complimented me often, made me feel wanted, desired. Being around him made me feel sexy. And I had never felt that way in my entire life.

On my third week in Forest Heights, Grizz called me and asked me to come up to the clubhouse for another party they were having.

“Tonight? Is it going to be like the one where I met you?” I asked.

He grunted and laughed. “Probably.”

I rolled my eyes. “Okay, sure. Why not?”

Kim and I got there just after nine. It was actually an even bigger party than the last one. Yelling and shouting greeted us from inside. I walked in and saw two of Grizz’s gang were having a wrestling match in the middle of the room with everyone circled around them. It looked like a few people were exchanging money, betting on who they thought would win.

Kim went right for the circle, but I skirted the edge and found Grizz leaning against the makeshift bar. It was just a piece of plywood on top of two sawhorses, with bottles all across it. He turned and spotted me. Without a word, he grabbed a bottle of vodka and a jug of orange juice from a tub to his right.

“Should I make the girl her favorite drink?” he asked once he’d already started pouring.

I nodded and watched him make it. He didn’t have his jacket on, and I could see the muscles in his forearms and biceps flex as he made the drink. I grew warm just being near him.

I’d had a thought, plenty of them, about what might happen tonight. It terrified me, but I felt like an asteroid caught in a planet’s gravity. It felt inevitable. Inescapable. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to escape.

We both had a couple of drinks and talked as we watched a few of the wrestling matches. They all ended with laughs and backs being patted. It was all good-natured.

I had to hide my surprise when two of the girls in the crowd went for a match. They were both scantily clad to begin with, and quickly became mostly naked as they struggled against each other. The screaming and yelling got louder once nudity was involved. Grizz smirked as the last match was over and the music was turned up.