Between Two Wolves (BBW Paranormal Shapeshifter Menage Werewolf Romance) (7 page)

“I don't want you to get the wrong
impression about us. When we said we share, that doesn't mean we're players.”

I sat back, spitting out the sand. “I don't
know you guys, so...you know.” I shrugged, pushing back from the edge of the
pool, sinking down into the water like a hippo, until the water was up to my
neck. The rest of the pool was taken up with Jericho and Colt's long legs. I
kind of nestled between them, breathing deeply, enjoying the swirl of the water
around me.

Colt sat forward until we were almost eye
level. “I said we share what we find interesting. And that does include women.
But...” He ran a finger along my cheek. “Those have been few and far between.”

“Oh.” I had the sense there was a lot
more than a few, and the far between carried a whole lot of history. But I was
willing to let it all go for now. I was relaxed, in that good way you get after
great sex, but sitting in the hot water was making me sleepy. I sat up without
slipping under again.

“I'm ready to get out, if you guys are.”
For some unknown reason I was hoping for a little privacy to get dressed. Sex
was one thing; getting dressed another. It seemed oddly intimate to get dressed
in front of the guys, guys I probably would never see again.

They took the cue, climbing up out of the
pool. They were less shy about getting into their trunks, and I averted my eyes
for that brief moment.

“Where are you camped?” Colt shouldered
his pack. “If you want company, that is.”

“Oh...yeah.” It hadn't even occurred to
me there might be more to this than just...this. “Up the path, on the left.
You'll see my stuff...” I guess I did want their company.

“We'll walk slow, give you a chance to
get dressed.” Colt nodded his head, and he and Jericho skirted the pool,
heading toward the woods

“I won't be long.” I stayed in the water,
the eddies, and currents matching the swirling emotions inside of me.  I
waited until they were out of sight, then climbed out of the pool. My shorts
were there, but it took a minute to find my t-shirt. I was wet, the clothes
were half-dry, and everything was covered in sand. I smiled.
Just what you'd
expect on a camping trip.

I grabbed my stuff, and headed up the
trail. I could hear them talking up ahead, but I didn't make the effort to
catch up. It was nice knowing I had company, even though it took away the
me-in-the-wilderness-alone
theme to the weekend. But what the hell, maybe this was what fate had set
up for me. Maybe this was what I needed.

As far as testing my limits and my
boundaries went, I was chalking up new experiences, right and left. First sex
with a stranger, then sex with another...and then both at once.

What the hell was I doing?

But I'd thrown judgment out the window,
self and otherwise. This was my weekend, and I was going to follow wherever
this oddball path took me. At the moment, that path seemed to be dragging me
through a whirlwind of crazy sexual adventure.

The sun was almost down by the time we
reached my little campsite, if an abandoned tent, and a lone pack could be
called a campsite. It was much darker beneath the canopy of trees. The pines
added a green bulk that seemed to soak up the last of the sunlight. We all had
flashlights, and Colt and Jericho made a complete circle of the area. I stood
in the middle, a little bemused. I'd never seen anyone do that before, except
in rattlesnake country. But we didn't have rattlesnakes here. I chalked it up
to idiosyncratic camper superstitions. 

“Nice tent. You want some help setting it
up?” Colt dropped his pack beside the pile of nylon and fiberglass, picking up
the pieces I'd left in a heap.

“Help yourself. It was what drove me down
to the springs. I'd given up trying to puzzle it out.” I picked up my pack,
ferreting out matches and my fire starter kit. “I'll get the fire going...”

But Jericho already had a tiny flame
cradled in a bunch of pine needles, and I watched as he tenderly set it among a
pile of tinder, carefully feeding it small twigs, the flame growing quickly. He
glanced up, catching my gaze, grinning at me over the flickering flames.

“I got a merit badge in camping when I
was a kid.”

“I see.” I dropped the stuff back into my
pack. “Is there anything you guys can't do?”

“Not if it's involves living off the
land.” Colt stepped away from the tent. It seemed like it had materialized out
of nowhere. “We've been roughing it in some way since we were kids. Both of us
grew up near here, spent most of our time messing around in the woods.”

“Or getting into trouble.” Jericho added
a larger branch to the fire. The flames licked around it, turning blue and
yellow. Jericho dropped to the ground, leaning his back against the log. He
gave me an encouraging smile...
hell, he gave me a smile that could have lit
a fire without matches.
But I stood for a moment, debating where to sit.
Suddenly I was shy, like I was on a blind date, not sitting around the fire
with two guys I'd just had sex with in the hot springs. Two guys who certainly
had an affect on me, and my libido. I perched primly on the log.

“I'll round up some more firewood.” I
just caught a glimpse of Colt as he disappeared silently into the woods. Jericho
tugged his pack closer, pulling out a thermos. After a minute he handed me a
metal cup. “Here. Brought enough for all of us.”

I took an experimental sniff, then a sip.
It was bourbon
, I thought. Whatever it was, I was pretty sure it was the
strongest thing I'd ever tasted.

Jericho stretched his legs out toward the
fire. We watched the flames for a minute. Somewhere in the woods a night bird
called, its mate answering. Then it went still, and the only sounds were that
of the crackling fire. Jericho stretched again, looking up at me over his
shoulder.

“What's your game, Red? You're a good
girl.... you're not someone who sleeps around. So, why the sudden ménage in the
hot springs? Feel like taking a walk on the wild side?”

The fire crackled, sparks rising against
the backdrop of the dark trees. Above that was the deeper black of the sky,
brilliant stars pinpricks in the dark. The fire caught Jericho's eyes, and for
a startling moment I swore they glinted red. I blinked, and blinked again. But
the moment was gone.

“I don't...I'm not.” I shifted on the
log, took another sip of bourbon. It burned like proverbial fire. I swallowed
hard, tried not to cough, and wasn't entirely successful. The last thing I
wanted to look like was a lightweight in front of these guys. There was
something about them that brought out my competitive edge, among other
feelings, or urges, or desires. I shrugged, trying for nonchalance.
Like
this is normal for me: sex in the afternoon; drinking the hard stuff at night.

“Let's say I stepped out of my life for
the weekend.” I looked down at Jericho, but he was staring into the fire, for
which I was profoundly grateful. I wasn't sure I could stand that piercing gaze
at the moment. “I needed a change, needed to do some thinking.”

“I'm all for getting away from it all,
looking inward, doing a bit of soul searching. And for you, if that means a
weekend fling, so be it.” He took a swallow of his drink. “Anything I can do to
help you...” He glanced behind me. I turned to see Colt materialize from the
forest carrying an armful of firewood. “Anything we can do to help, just let us
know.”

“Help who?” Colt dropped the wood,
grabbed a branch and added it to the fire.

“Red. She's on a voyage of
self-discovery. I told her we're here for her.”

Colt crouched in the glow of the fire,
poking it with a stick. The fire roared up briefly, then settled back. I caught
the smile on his face, and was eternally grateful for the darkness around us,
and that if either of them noticed my blush, they'd think it was a rosy glow
from the fire, or the fire of the bourbon. Both of them had already gone a long
way to helping me do whatever it was I'd come here to do.

“I don't want to pry, but there must have
been something that prompted this weekend away. Care to share?”

I took another sip of bourbon. It was
kind of growing on me, the warmth sliding through my body. The last little bit
of shyness melted away. There was no reason not to tell these guys the reasons
I was here; chances were pretty good I'd never see them after this weekend.
Might as well get the truth out there, get it out of my system.

“A couple of months ago my boyfriend...my
fiancé, actually, cheated on me. He'd started dating my college roommate...” I
took another shot of liquid courage. “He wanted an open relationship; I wanted
nothing to do with him.”

“So you took to the wilderness to clear
your head?” Colt nodded. “Sounds like a good plan. Hard to think when you're
surrounded by reminders of the guy.”

“Exactly.” I waved my arm, intending to
point at Colt, but managed only to slosh a bit of bourbon on the ground. Jericho
reached up, gently taking the cup out of my hand.

“Maybe you've had enough for now.”

“Oh...sorry. I've never been good at
holding my liquor.” The warmth in me was making the world a little fuzzy around
the edges. It was a pleasant fuzziness. “And I had some wine before...”

Jericho laughed, a nice sound. I could
get used to that sound. “It's okay. You just do what you need to. We'll watch
out for the big bad wolf, make sure you're safe while you sort out your life.”

“Oh, hey...that reminds me. Did you guys
see a wolf today? A big black wolf...don't know if it was bad...” I reached
behind the log, digging in my pack for my phone. “Here...I took pictures.” I
flipped open the phone, scrolling to the shots of the wolf on the path. I
leaned forward and held it out so the guys could see it.

“See?” I flipped through the photos. The
first one was clear. The rest wouldn't win me any awards. “He sat when I asked
him to, but I didn't get a picture of that. I thought he might have been the
ranger's dog, but the guy said...”

I got the feeling no one was listening to
me. I glanced at Colt, then to Jericho. Neither were looking at me or the
phone. They were looking at each other, and the look they exchanged was one I
couldn't miss, even in my happy state. Something was wrong, very wrong.

“You did see it, right?” I slumped on the
log, then slid down onto the ground between Jericho and Colt. “I think the
ranger thought I was crazy.”

“Ranger?” Jericho's voice had an edge to
it. “What ranger?”

Colt coughed, then turned away as he
fumbled for...something. “Yeah, Jericho, there was a ranger...” His voice was
muffled.

I turned to Colt. “Were you on the path
ahead of me? You must have been, if you saw him, and then showed up at the
springs when you did. Or did you say you came from the other way?” Wine,
bourbon, and the afterglow of sex had muddled my recollection of what he'd said
when we first met.

“Yeah, I saw the wolf.” Colt sat up,
absently poking the fire. “I saw the ranger.”

Jericho tensed beside me, leaning forward
to look past me at Colt. “Were you going to tell me? Or just wait till he
showed up here? What the hell were you thinking? Or you weren't thinking, were
you?”

I sat perfectly still between the two of
them, confused, the fuzzy feeling fading. The air was charged with tension,
everything changing. I wasn't exactly scared, but I was no long drifting in a
comforting haze of alcohol and sex.

“What did I say? Did I say something
wrong?”

The tension held for a moment, then
shifted. Whatever was going on between them, they'd let it go, at least a
little. Jericho finally stood up, making a point of stretching, even though I
knew he was far from relaxed.

“You're fine, Red. This is between Colt
and me. Nothing to do with you.”

“You're not going to fight or anything,
are you?”

Jericho moved around the fire, heading
for the trees. “No. Just guys being guys. No fighting. I'm going for more
firewood.”

I relaxed bit by bit. Maybe in my muddled
state I'd misunderstood whatever had just happened.

“So, you did see the wolf? Big,
black...blue eyes...” I looked into Colt's blue eyes, at his dark hair. It had
dried now, and it curled around his shoulders. In the light of the fire it
looked tipped with deep red. But in the sun...Would it be tipped with silver?

Colt turned to me. “Big black wolf. Yeah,
I think I've seen him before.”

I stared at him, almost unable to look
away. Blue eyes, black hair...

“You've heard the stories, Red? The
legend of Black Wolf Mountain...the rest of it, the territory to the north, all
the wild stories.”

I nodded, not looking away, unable to
even if I wanted. But I didn't want to look away. It felt like I could look
into those eyes for a long time...forever. If only.

“So do you believe them, the stories you
heard around the campfire?” Colt reached out, winding a strand of hair through
his finger, tugging lightly. “You know, I could really fall in love with this
hair.”

“Obsessed much?”

“Yeah. Pretty much. Is that a problem?”

I shook my head, leaning toward Colt,
following my strand of hair. His gaze slid down to my lips, a look so sexy I
almost felt the caress of him against me. Swoon was never a word I'd have used
to describe how I felt with a guy, before this. I closed my eyes, swooning. But
his words tugged at me, and I stopped leaning forward, stopped swooning. He
tugged on my hair, but I pulled back, the strand held taut between us. I opened
my eyes.

“Wait...stop distracting me. You asked if
I believed in the stories. What stories?”

“Red...Risha...there's something you
should probably know about me, and Jericho. Something that might change how you
think about us.”

“Oh. Okay
.” Married? Girlfriends? I
thought we covered all that.

He let go of my hair, watching it as it
fell against my shoulder. “It's not what you think...none of that.”

The instant his eyes met mine I knew it,
in my heart, in my soul, in every cell in my body. I went cold, then hot, then
felt that swooning feeling again. Only it was more sickening than sexy this
time around.

“You're the wolf.”

He didn't answer, didn't have to. It was
written clear on his face. My heart took off like a racehorse out of the gate,
and I dug my fingers into the sandy dirt under my hands. This was worse than a
girlfriend, or a wife.
Oh my fucking God
.

“It's okay, Red. Really. I'm not the big
bad wolf of legend. Neither is Jericho.”

That snapped me out of wherever my head
had gone. “Jericho? He's a...thing like you?”

“Don't say it like that. We're not
things.” He actually sounded hurt. And I actually felt bad for...what?
Insulting his heritage?

“Then what are you?”

“Right now, I'm just a guy. Like I was
before, at the springs. Just a guy sitting around the fire, enjoying your
company.”

“Then who or what were you before? On the
trail?”

“That was also me. Only in wolf form. We
call ourselves shifters. We can change shape. And in our case, it's from human
to wolf, and back.”

“Are you serious? This sounds crazy.” I
could barely breathe, my head swirling in colors of black and grey, and I felt
as though I might almost pass out.  

I looked closely at Colt, at the face of
the man who I'd had sex with just a few hours earlier. I thought having sex
with a stranger was way outside my comfort zone, but what he'd just told me
pretty much blew all that right out of the water. My instincts kicked in, and I
felt just like I did on the path. The urge to run was almost overwhelming. He
was either telling the truth, or he was completely and absolutely insane. At
the moment, either or both was just as chilling to think about.

But this wasn't the wolf...or it was. But
it was also Colt. And I happened to like Colt. I liked Colt very much. It was
obvious the dynamic between us had changed; the light-hearted banter was gone.
The sexual tension was still there, but it was overlaid with something a lot
like fear.