Between A Rock And A Hard Place

The lake shimmered under a swollen moon, and the boat rocked gently as Rowan rowed us toward the center of the still lake, crickets singing in the reeds as we passed them. Rowan rowed, ha ha.

You had to hand it to him, he really knew how to make a girl feel special. I didn’t blame El-whatever at all for falling as head over heels as she did with him, so much so that she dared disobey her mate, which in werewolf world is a big no-no.

Yellow lantern lights shone bright, bobbing in the light breeze from the shore behind us, and the water was so still it reflected the moon’s perfect silver, broken only by the lazy ripples from the oars. It was the perfect romantic setup, too perfect. I should’ve been suspicious.

I tucked my feet up under me on the bench, shivering a little in the evening air as he leaned lazily on the oars. “So,” I said, forcing a casual tone, “is this where you lure unsuspecting women before you—”

He shot me a knowing look, all smirk and shadowed jawline, taking his jacket off and setting it around my shoulders to warm me up. “Before I what?”

“You know. Whatever you do to them. Seduce them, bite them, charm them into forgetting they have common sense.”

He laughed low in his throat, the rumbling sound sending an unwelcome shiver down my spine. “There is no them, Iris, and there never will be, there can only ever be you. In my mind, in my heart, and eventually, in my bed.”

You know what? To hell with going home, I didn’t even like my old life that much anyway. Keep smooth talking me, Daddy Rowan!

“But you’ve been… different, distant, ever since yesterday.” He paused mid-row, the boat drifting in silence. “Talk to me, my love. Why are you acting so strange all of a sudden?”

I stared at the moon on the water instead of him. “I’m not.”

“You are.” His voice softened, gazing at me earnestly “Something’s going on in that head of yours.”

Of course I could’ve told him the truth, like I’d tried to earlier; that my brain was fully occupied with half-baked ideas for escape, and very horny, very confusing feelings about two very different men in an even more confusing book world. I could've told him that I was tired of eating dodgy meat and that I missed chowing down on Doritos in my tiny studio apartment and not this half-medieval, half-feral world.

But if he thought I was crazy before, then he definitely still would now. My poor Luna has bonked her head somewhere and is slowly going insane, how can I help her get back to normal? That’s probably what was going through his mind.

But I wasn’t his Luna, I knew the kind of girl who belonged here; perfectly selfless, virtuous, willing to die for love. And that wasn’t me. I knew exactly who I was, a lazy, loud-mouthed failure who honestly wasn't very smart, but I had survival mode hardwired into my DNA, and I would write my own heartbeat rather than let a book decide it for me.

As Alpha Rowan held my hands in his, it suddenly occurred to me how we could very easily be spotted, and all the bad things that could happen if Alpha Kieran, my mate, were to somehow walk past and find me here.

And that didn’t make sense, because from what I knew from my 10+ years of werewolf romance reading experience, rival packs didn’t usually share territory, not unless they were either planning a slaughter or avoiding one. Other than that, they usually kept to themselves. So how come Kieran and Rowan were somehow always in close proximity to each other?

Well, in this story, they’d been forced into a very fragile truce after their last war nearly gutted both sides, and the lake was one of the only neutral zones, because it was a shared water source that neither side wanted to give up.

So peace treaties were signed, borders had to be drawn, and patrol schedules were coordinated in order to keep both packs apart. But lines blurred on the water, and sometimes, they met by accident, aside from routine peace-keeping meetings, until eventually they reached a kind of… symbiosis.

Which meant being here, in his boat, in plain view of anyone watching from the trees, was about as smart as juggling lit torches over a pile of gunpowder. Thank you, Author 456, for further complicating my effing life.

And yet…

Rowan set the oars down and moved to sit beside me, the wood creaking under his weight. His knee brushed mine and his mouth tilted into that infuriatingly handsome smile, and suddenly all I could do was go “Proper name, place name, backstory stuff” in my head as I tuned out whatever he was saying and just ogled appreciatively at the Greek sculpture that had somehow convinced me to come out here.

Thankfully I was able to catch the last few words he said “…I can’t tell if you’re pulling away because you’re scared of me… or because you want me too much.”

“Heh. Wow. Um…,” I said, searching for words that wouldn’t make me sound like a sex-starved freak, definitely not Luna material.

He leaned in, close enough that I could feel the heat of him in the cool night air. “Which is it?”

I told myself to back up. To think it over for a moment and remember the war I could start, the amount of ruin I could cause if either of them thought I was playing both sides. But my head was full of him, the lake, the gentle hush of the water against the hull, and the idea of Kieran’s fiery jealousy faded away into the back of my mind.

God dammit! I’m in a book with real life sexy werewolves, it’s not a crime to want at least one of them, right? Don’t judge me, you know you would do the exact same thing.

His fingers brushed my jaw. The touch was so gentle, almost hesitant, the way you would touch the most delicate of fine china. I recognized it as the rare, tiny crack in the domineering armor he usually wore like a second skin, something he pulled back only for his love, for me.

No! Not you, the real female lead. Pull yourself together!

“Tell me what’s bothering you, my love. Let me fix it.” he said, slowly brushing my hair behind my ear.

Actually, don’t pull yourself together, this is great.

“It’s alr… I’m good, fine, everything’s fine. It’s just, here we are, sitting in the middle of the pack boundary. We shouldn’t be here, it’s really dangerous.”

“Yes. Here we are.” His gaze softened, and I knew right then that he wasn’t thinking about territories or peace treaties.

I didn’t move when his lips found mine, couldn’t move actually, because my heart was too busy practicing having a cardiac arrest. He kissed was slow at first, then searching, and I could feel all his pent up yearning and affection. I couldn’t help it, I leaned in deeper, pausing once to whisper,

“This is a bad idea”

“Some bad ideas can be worth the risk.” He leaned in, close enough that I could feel his breath in that delicious spot between by jaw and neck. “Tell me to stop and I will, anything for you.”

As you can imagine, I didn’t tell him to stop.

Which was alarming in itself, because in the margins of my mental survival manual, I’d written in bold black letters: Stay away from these guys and definitely DON’T kiss them. Focus on the mission.

Then without warning, an outraged growl ripped through the stillness, and Alpha Kieran emerged out of the darkness like the grim reaper. Oh hell no, I shuddered to think what he would do with me if he discovered me here with someone else.

He was taller, darker, and potentially far more dangerous in an entirely different way, eyes blazing a bright blood-red as he set his sights on us. “What the hell do you think you’re doing with her?” His eyes cut to me, then back to Rowan, like he was deciding which one of us he was going to gut first.

I scrambled away from him, my mind running through all the half-plausible excuses I could give to somehow account for this, meanwhile Rowan just scoffed, as though this was only a mild inconvenience.

He didn’t let go of my hand, and his voice dropped to a lethal-calm. “Back off, Kieran. This isn’t your concern.”

“The hell it isn’t,” the newcomer growled, taking step after menacing step toward the water. “Disobedient girl. I knew from the moment you started talking crazy that I should’ve put you under lock and key!”

The air between them crackled with the kind of hatred that only years of blood feuds could form. My mouth went dry and the colour drained from my face as I froze, paralyzed with fear. This was personal, and not only that, if they fought here, in neutral territory, the treaty would shatter, and war would follow. And if that happened, innocent people would die.

I wasn’t about to let the death of potentially thousands of people be on my conscience, whether they were fictional or not, so I racked my brain trying to come up with a plan to handle this.

I panicked, and my “Oh no! Must avoid conflict!” plan came out more like “Accidentally cause chaos!”, so when Kieran lunged forward on the deck, I startled, rocking the boat so violently it made Rowan reach hastily for the edge, trying to steady himself.

The next thing I knew, the world tipped sideways and ice-cold water swallowed me whole as the boat capsized. Somewhere above the loud splash and my sputtering gasp, I heard both of them shout my name.

I couldn’t swim, and I was one of those people who had no buoyancy and sank like a rock in water. The world started to dim, and the light from the moon grew father and father away as my breath held, my arms flailing wildly as I reached desperately for the surface.

What the hell have I gotten myself into this time? And what if I die here? Again!