Jaxon coasted through the piney Wyoming woods. Usually this last straightaway through Damon’s Mountains made his stomach clench. The roamer in him would buckle about staying in his trailer and wouldn’t want to settle into a few days of working here. The restlessness would be there, urging him to move on, even though he hadn’t even seen the place yet.
It had always been like that. Since he was a cub, Titan wanted to move constantly.
Today was different, though. Today he had her with him.
Jax cast Annalise a sideways glance, just to see her reaction to the Grayland Mobile Park when she saw it for the first time. She was leaned forward, unbuckled already, sitting on the edge of her seat, bright gold eyes on the white gravel road, hands clenched on top of her thighs. She was humming with tension. She-Devil would come out again soon.
It made him happy and sad all at once. He was bonding with the animal side of her, too, and so damn glad now that she was a shifter and could handle this complicated life beside him. But Annalise was sore from all the quick Changes, and She-Devil was more unstable than ever. The shredded seats were proof of that.
At the low growl that rattled her throat, he dragged his attention back to the trailer park.
In front of the fire pit at the end of the road stood a man who was a sight for sore eyes. Blond hair, blue eyes, muscled up and wearing a white T-shirt like Jax’s over holey jeans, also like Jax’s. Clinton was about to give him so much shit for stealing his style.
Already, his eyes were narrowed and his arms were crossed over his chest. Fuckin’ grumpy, half-psychotic Boarlander.
Jax parked by the fire pit and scanned the half circle of trailers behind it. There was another cluster of trailers off to the right, but no one seemed to be home. Usually this place was chaos.
Jax got out. “What the hell are you doing here, old man,” he joked. Clinton always bristled at that. Shifters aged well. He looked thirty-five, forty, tops.
“The fuck you wearin’, boy?”
“I wanted to match,” Jaxon said, waiting at the front of the truck for Annalise to join him. She was walking too gracefully for how much her body was hurting. Yep, She-Devil was a-comin’. She slid her hand into his and waved at Clinton, who narrowed his eyes to bright blue little slits. His nostrils flared as he scented the air.
“Pussy,” he said.
Annalise bristled beside Jax.
Clinton grinned remorselessly and finished, “Cat.”
Jaxon glanced around suspiciously. “Seriously, what are you doing here? And where is everyone?”
“Gray Back Assholes are up at Bear Trap Falls. I’m here beautifying the place in their absence.”
Jaxon threw a quick glance at Clinton’s truck. The tailgate of his white Raptor was lowered, and in the bed were about twenty bags of fragrant fertilizer. “Whyyy?”
Clinton arched his blond brows. “Because last week Creed made a bet that I couldn’t kick his ass in flip-cup, but I did. And then when he was supposed to pay up, he didn’t.”
“What was the bet?”
“He had to dress in one of Gia’s tightest and prettiest dresses, a bright fuckin’ red one, and wear lipstick and high heels and take a picture for me and Jason to post on our pages, but he pussied out.” He gave Annalise a devil-may-care smile. “Not a cat joke. Creed really is a giant, gaping pussy.”
Annalise giggled.
“So then I said I was gonna shit in his front yard if he didn’t pay up,” Clinton continued. “And I was going to, but my mate said I need to have better manners and it wasn’t sanitary, blah blah blah, so this is the compromise. Happy wife, happy life. Wait, I can do better. Happy mate, and I don’t have to masturbate.”
Jaxon eyed the mowed yard in front of Creed and Gia’s perfectly kept trailer. “You’re gonna spread all that manure over Creed’s yard?”
“Yeah. I got the smelly cow kind, too. You wanna help?”
Jax rubbed his jaw to hide his smile. “I would love to, but I have to introduce my lady to the crew.”
“Your lady? You mated, Jax?” Clinton asked.
Jax pulled his snarling little she-hellion against his side proudly. “Sure am. This is Annalise.”
“Mmm,” Clinton said, lifting his chin and glaring down his nose at Annalise. “You’re broke as fuck, aren’t you, pussy cat? You smell sick, sick, sick. It’s okay. I’m sick, too. So are all the Gray Backs you’re about to meet. Eternal fuck-ups, all of them.”
Annalise pursed her lips into an upset little moue, and she smelled upset. She opened her mouth to say something, but Clinton bent smoothly and plucked a yellow weed flower out of the grass, then handed it to her. “Welcome to the C-team.”
Looking utterly baffled, Annalise took the dandelion flower slowly from his hand.
Clinton spun on his heel with a flourish and flipped them off over his shoulder as he announced, “I’ve got shit to do.”
Jaxon chuckled and pulled Annalise by the hand toward the trail in the woods that would lead to Bear Trap Falls.
“Should we…” she asked, her focus behind them where Clinton was unloading bags of fertilizer. “Should we stop him?”
“Nah, Creed has it coming.” He tossed her a grin over his shoulder. “A bet’s a bet, and he didn’t pay up.”
Chapter Thirteen
Annalise couldn’t keep her eyes from the big muscle-man currently ripping into a giant bag of lawn poop. He swiveled his leg and punted an old pink flamingo that had been stabbed into the yard in front of one of the trailers, and it went sailing through the air and landed in the fire pit. Was he singing the “Beans, Beans, the Musical Fruit” song?
Jax’s hand was relaxed in hers, but when she tripped over a gnarled tree root and pitched forward, he tightened his grip and supported her.
“Ow,” she muttered, favoring her stubbed toe.
Her pink flipflops clacked with every step and echoed through the lush, green woods. The trees here were tall with thick trunks and rough bark. The air smelled like pine sap and rich earth. And animals. Lots of different animals.
She-Devil snarled inside of her, and pain blasted through Annalise’s stomach as she fought the urge to Change.
“It’s okay if it happens here,” Jax said fast. “You’re safe.”
Annalise swallowed over and over, trying to keep from retching. Her body hurt so bad. Her legs were stiff, her muscles felt torn to hell, and her joints ached with every movement. She-Devil would give her a slow death like Jax had promised Brody. It was ironic that she would go in the worst way out of the two of them, and she hadn’t done anything wrong other than go on a date with an evil man. Well, and kill him after. Maybe this was Karma speaking.
As the animal scents grew stronger, another wave of pain took her, and she had to stop. “Jax, I’m sorry.”