A tiny helpless sound escaped her lips. “Did you just call me fff…”
“Fuckable? Yes, I did. Look in the mirror every once in a while, woman. We’re sharing nachos because no one wants a date who takes a sip of water and claims to be full. Lose weight if you want, I don’t care. But to me? You look hot. I’d stick it in you.”
“You say the crudest things. But that’s also somehow the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
“Yeah? That’s pretty fuckin’ sad.”
“You say the F-word a lot.”
“It’s my favorite fuckin’ word in the entire fuckin’ world.”
“I don’t cuss.”
“Maybe you should. It makes everything feel better.”
“Everything like what?”
Nox ripped his gaze away from her and gave it to the map under his hands. His voice was empty when he muttered, “Like life. The F-word makes life feel better.”
“I want a puppy.”
“I’m sorry,” he deadpanned without looking up.
“The one I want is really cute. You wanna see a picture?”
“No. If you were a dragon and lived in these mountains,” he said, jamming a finger at the map, “where would you set up your lair?”
“A real dragon?” she asked, panicking at the thought.
“Nope. Hypothetically speaking. I like to play games. If you were a dragon, and not a submissive, albeit sexy little fox shifter, where would you set up camp?”
Nevada nearly choked on air, and in a rush, scanned the room to see if anyone had heard. “You can’t say that out loud. No one here knows.”
“That you’re sexy? Trust me, they know.”
“No!” she whisper-screamed. “That I’m a fox.”
“Yeah, I didn’t think foxes existed anymore,” he said at normal conversational volume.
She wanted to throat-punch him, which was insane because her tendencies were anything but violent. “I’m leaving.”
“Fine.” He gave her an empty look that dared her to go.
She stood and gathered her purse close. “I don’t understand you.”
“No one does.”
“You’re mean with almost everything you say, but you have these moments of goodness that keep me thinking about you.”
“I’m not one of those men you’ll ever fix, so if that’s in your head? Leave right now. I won’t change. I’m a stone. I’m not capable.”
There was something so frustrating about his outright refusal to ever compromise, but there was something so intriguing about his complete honesty. Frustrating and intriguing, just enough to make her second-guess her decision to go.
“So you’ll make everyone around you compromise, and you’ll never change.”
Something akin to hurt flashed across his eyes, but then they went hard and cold so fast she thought she must’ve imagined it.
“Pretty much. I told you I don’t like people, and I don’t like change. Sit and eat nachos with me and talk about theoretical dragons and shoot whiskey. That’s what I can offer you. Nothing more.”
“Why?”
“Enough questions.”
“Why can’t you offer more?” she asked again, refusing to let him get out of this one. “Why can’t you be nice? Why do you pick? Why when I say I don’t cuss does it make you want to string them together?” Why are you so damaged? That last one she kept carefully in her throat, refused to let it escape because it was too deep, too soon.
His lip twitched up into a snarl. He leaned toward her. “Because I’m the son of the cursed bear, raised by beasts, raised to be affected by no one, and to lift two middle fingers to anyone who would dare try to change me. I am who I am. Accept it or leave.”
“But I’m supposed to change to be more comfortable around you.”
“No, Nevada Foxburg. I wouldn’t ask you to change either. That’s the beauty of spending an afternoon with someone who cares for nothing. You can be just who you are around me, and I won’t judge.”
“Because you don’t care.”
Nox lifted one shoulder in a shrug.
She should go. Nox was dangerous. Not only was he physically dangerous to a smaller shifter like her, but he felt dangerous to her heart too. The cursed bear? Oh, she knew who he was now. He was the only son of Clinton Fuller of the Boarlanders—half-feral, giant grizzly shifter with a wild streak so wide it had clearly stretched to his son. Nox was a grizzly. Of course, he was. But Nox was also too interesting for his own good or hers, and her every instinct screamed that he was trouble. Sexy, sexy trouble. They were doomed as friends, much less more than that. Foxes bred foxes. Thems were the rules. Even if Nox was interested, they were from two totally different worlds.
He was dangerous and safe all at once.
Slowly, she slid back onto the bar stool. And soft as a breath, she whispered, “You said I was interesting, but I think you might be the interesting one.”
“Compliments will get you nowhere with me.”
Nevada blew out a frustrated breath, lifting the strand of hair that had fallen in front of her face. “You’re rude, uncompromising, probably don’t take direction very well, and you should really clean your boots off before you walk into a place. You’re too loud, too careless, and too rough, and I think someday you’ll be mated only to the idea that you’re better off alone because people are too much work instead of admitting it’s you who caused your own loneliness.”
Nox offered her a slow and genuine smile. “Much better.” He nodded magnanimously. “And thank you.”
Chapter Four
Nox was trying not to stare at Nevada.
He was trying to be a cool-boy, but she was making it so damn difficult.
Sexy. Curvy. Fox.
She was tipsy now, relaxed. He’d needed her to relax. Something was wrong with her, but he couldn’t figure out if it was a problem with her human side or her animal side. She didn’t like people. No. That wasn’t it. She couldn’t deal with people. She shrank when anyone passed too close to her chair at the bar. Even three shots in, talking to the bartender made her stutter and blush and lower her voice like she had no dominance at all. She made no sense and made all the sense in the world at once.
Why? Because Nox was fucked up around people too, just in a different way. His was an animal problem, and a self-indulgent part of him hoped her issue with her anxiety was an animal problem too, so he didn’t have to feel so fucking alone with his issues.
Selfish monster. He should leave her alone.
All he did was make the people around him miserable. Oh, he knew it. He wasn’t blind. Anyone he liked, he fought. Anyone he respected, he fought. Anyone he wanted to be friends with? He acted out in a way they didn’t understand, and they ran or pushed him away.
And here was this woman. Fucking beautiful. Curves making her look like the number eight, grade-A tits that would fill his hands, narrow waist, thick ass. He couldn’t stop thinking about bucking into her from behind. Long brown hair curled into waves, soft brown eyes that turned gold when she was scared or when someone got too close to her, full lips that gave him easy smiles the more shots she had. Red. She’d painted her lips red to match that skin-tight tank top she wore under the gray, knee-length cardigan. She was a stunner. Nothing else in here was pretty to look at but her, and it made it hard to concentrate. She kept ducking her gaze and blushing when she spoke in that soft, shy voice of hers. She was a good girl that he wanted to turn bad, and fuck what that said about him.
A short, bald dude passed too close again, and Nevada shrank away, her tits brushing the counter in her hurry to get as far away from him as possible. Nox clenched his fists on his thighs to resist the urge to rip the guy’s throat out just for scaring her. Nevada was going to murder Nox’s instincts if she didn’t get ahold of her anxiety. Already he had shoved two guys away who had passed too close.
She was pouring over the map and nibbling on a fancy-as-fuck nacho. Her bottom lip was pouted out in concentration, and
he wanted to duck under her face and suck on it. The monster in him really wanted to wipe the shot glasses and napkin dispenser off the counter, shove her on top of it, rip her pants down, and fucking unleash on her from behind. And screw whoever watched him claim her. But she wasn’t corrupt like him. She probably wouldn’t appreciate getting publicly dominated. But maybe? She had made him cookies. Cookies were a good sign. She’d thought about him enough to get up early and bake. She’d spent time on these.
He opened the tin and shoved a whole cookie in his maw. Fucking delicious. He’d been a lying little liar when he’d told her he hated cookies. His sweet tooth was his favorite tooth.
“I don’t remember there being any trailer parks in any of these areas,” she murmured, arching her petal pink nail over a set of mountains on the map. The only one I know of is here, right outside of town.”
“Huh,” he murmured around the bite of cookie. Vyr and Torren wouldn’t settle that close to town. The Red Dragon needed space for when he had to Change, and Torren was a bigass dominant silverback with no family group. He would need seclusion or he would go nuts. Maybe they had dragged trailers onto flat land in the mountains somewhere, but he’d done a record check and Vyr hadn’t purchased land here. No one had in the last three months.
Nox scratched at the edge of his thumbnail with his pointer finger in a nervous habit he’d kept since he was a child. Maybe the Red Dragon’s credit card was stolen. Or maybe Vyr was paying some asshole to make a purchase every once in a while to keep trackers off his trail. Maybe he was across the world in hiding and Nox had been duped. Perhaps he and Torren weren’t here in Foxburg at all.
He’d done research on every shifter in the area, and to his knowledge, there had only been two. An old rogue grizzly up in the mountains and a female tiger shifter who only lived here in the warm months and traveled for work when the snow hit. Nox glanced out the massive picture window at the front of the room to the river outside. The clouds were gray and swirling, and the wind was whipping at the trees across the water. Snow was close, and that tiger was probably already long gone.
“Why aren’t you registered?” Nox asked curiously. Usually he didn’t give a shit about anyone’s background, but this had been bothering him. He hadn’t known fox shifters were even still around.
“Because none of us are. It’s against the rules.” Was that a slight slur in her pretty bell-tone voice?
He grabbed the bartender’s attention with a two-fingered wave and growled out, “Water.” He didn’t thank the lanky man, Alex, his nametag read, when he set the drink down in front of him. Nox felt zero guilt for rudeness. He would give him a big tip instead of forcing himself to be fake-polite. Money spoke louder than words always.
“What rules?” Nox asked, pushing the ice water toward her.
She picked it up and automatically sipped it. He didn’t like that. She didn’t know him, and he could’ve roofied that drink for all she knew. He was going to have to train Nevada to be more careful when she was drinking.
“Fox rules,” she whispered. “There’s lots of them.”
“But you’re supposed to register. It’s human law. They like to keep track of us.”
“F-word human law.”
Apparently, she really didn’t cuss. For a moment, he considered saying something to piss her off to see if he could get her to say “fuck you.” Barely resisting the urge, he asked instead, “How do you avoid registration? How do you avoid anyone knowing about you?”
Nevada snorted. “Step one, stay a hundred miles away from the dragons. The stupidest thing you shifters do is put yourself under their wings. You know they’re targets, right? They’re like this big beacon of light for human law. They’re watched closely, and so are all the shifters who gather under them for protection. No one cares about foxes in Foxburg, Nox Fuller, you wanna know why?”
“Kind of,” he admitted through a scowl. Why the fuck did he care about this so much?
“Because everyone’s looking at Damon’s Mountains, Harper’s Mountains, and Kane’s Mountains. They’re looking at the dragons, because they’re like missiles. They’re the only weapons the humans are afraid of. What are a few shifters in a tiny town? Nothing to concern themselves with when they have dragons gathering armies.”
“Armies?”
“Not literal armies. They’re just gathering shifters in crews. Safety in numbers and all, but look at it from the humans’ point of view. You have freaking dragons gathering allegiant shifters under them. Big predator shifters. Doesn’t matter that they are just building families and crews and bonds and friendships. To humans? They’re armies. It’s easier than you’d think for lesser shifters like me to get away from registration when there are firebreathers wreaking havoc. Foxburg is safe because there are no dragons here.”
Oh, the irony. Because if Nox was right, the biggest, baddest, most volatile dragon was here somewhere. At the first sign of a fight, Vyr would burn this place to the ground and devour the ashes of Foxburg.
“That’s a good theory,” he said nonchalantly.
“It’s not a theory. It’s worked for decades for the den.”
“The den?”
“The fox den. I shouldn’t be talking about this.” She sipped her drink again. “It’s just I don’t talk much at all, and sometimes I miss the sound of talking?” Nevada said it like a question, and Nox frowned.
“Why don’t you hear talking?”
“Because I’m on the outside of the den. Always on the outside. I’m different, and different for foxes is a very bad thing. I’m not shunned, but people don’t seek me out either. I work from home because I’m scared of people. I play music all the time or I would drown in silence. And lately I talk to myself because I miss the sound of a voice.”
“Is that why you were shopping late last night?”
She dipped her chin once and wouldn’t meet his gaze. Shame tinted her cheeks red. “I have brothers and sisters. Lots of them. We make big families. Have lots of kits. They all found pairs, and my parents can’t find a match for me, so I just stay the same, year after year, no improvement, stagnant, living in a town where I don’t belong.”
“Your parents make a match for you? That’s fucked up.”
“It’s not…effed up…if you’re like me and can’t find a match on your own. Who is gonna deal with all of this mess?” she asked, swirling her finger at herself. “I can’t even shop during the day. Can’t talk to people.”
“You’re talking to me just fine.”
“You’re different, and I’m tipsy.”
Well, that actually made him feel pretty good. She’d called him different. He was okay with being different. But as she sipped her water and dared a look directly at him with those pretty, soft brown eyes, he was struck by the moment. He could see her future stretched depressingly in front of her. He imagined her in this loveless match with some faceless fox shifter who would keep her stagnant forever. Nox wanted to kill her future mate, and he didn’t even know him.
When a snarl escaped his chest, Nevada flinched and dropped her gaze. “Sorry,” she whispered.
“It ain’t you. Best you don’t talk about your parents making matches anymore. My shifter culture doesn’t like that.” He needed an out before he blabbed about how protective of her he felt. She’d told him any pairing outside of the fox shifter culture would be doomed. Like a damn Romeo and Juliet kind of doomed. That, and he wasn’t made to pair up, so even that thought was terrifying. She shouldn’t be on his radar, but here he was imagining ten different ways to fuck her and make her not see anyone but him. He was the real missile, aimed straight for her, and she didn’t even realize how much destruction he could cause. He needed to walk away, forget about her, bounty hunt the shit out of Vyr, get him thrown in shifter prison, then blow this Popsicle stand like he did every other town he hunted in. It was safest for him, but somehow, more importantly, it would be safest for Nevada, too. She was unregistered? She sure as hell didn’t need Vyr here dra
wing human attention. And he would. He was the least careful dragon in existence. He gave zero fucks about burning property, and he was a loud and proud man-eater.
Nox had a job to do. Get Vyr the hell out of here, forget Nevada and her fucked-up matchmaking fox den, and go back home to his trailer and solitary life deep in Damon’s Mountains where a loner like him belonged.
“Gotta go. Your cookies weren’t horrible,” he muttered, throwing down a few twenties for the drinks and nachos and a good tip.
He was about to walk away when he grabbed the tin of baked goods, and for a split second, he only wanted it for the excuse to track her down and return it when the cookies were gone. He’d already put a tracker on her car at the grocery store. He didn’t even know why he’d done it. He’d just wanted the option of seeing her again. Bad Nox.
In a rush, he set the container on the bar top and strode away without looking at Nevada. He tossed her a two-fingered wave over his shoulder though, which was more of a goodbye than he gave most people.
“Do you want to come to a family dinner with me?” Nevada blurted out behind him.
Well, that stopped him in his tracks. He must’ve heard her wrong. Slowly, he turned. “You want me to come meet your parents?” Hell must’ve frozen over. No one had ever invited him to meet the parents.
Nevada looked like a frightened rabbit. “It’s just…”
Her voice was soft as a breeze and even Nox, with his oversensitive hearing, could barely hear her. He took a few steps closer. “It’s just what?”
“It’s just I’m the black sheep of my family, and I hate going to these things. We could just go as friends, but if people say mean things, you would tell them to F off. But you would say the whole word.”
“What whole word?” he asked innocently. Say it!
“F-U-C-K,” she spelled out. Damn. Clever fox.
“Why are they mean to you?”
Nevada dipped her gaze to his boots and frowned the cutest fucking little frown he’d ever seen. “I think because I’m different. Different isn’t good for us. They don’t like that I can’t talk to people easily. And everyone else is tough, so I’m easy to pick on.”