Page 116 of Ice Wolf
He laughed as if caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Not the same as getting fresh air. You know how your mother can be when she gets in one of her moods. The upcoming wedding had her all in a tizzy. She’s driving me crazy with the lists she’s already created. I had to get out of the house, or I’d lose my mind.”
“Dad. You do know there isn’t going to be a wedding. Right?”
“Try telling your mother that.”
I grabbed my jeans, jerking them on as he fastened his belt. “She hates me.”
“Your mother? No, she just wants the best for you and that’s settling down. Although I will admit, she’s become concerned about the excessive use of violence in your games.”
“It’s a hockey game. The guys are brutal. And I’m not talking about my mother. I’m talking about Lily.” After fastening my jeans, I yanked the wadded shirt from the top shelf. As I brought it to my nose, I both hated and loved the fact her scent was all over it.
And I wasn’t talking about her sweet, luscious floral perfume.
Her mating scent. It was much stronger. Because of the increased chemistry between us, my hunger was raging off the charts. The hunt had done little good.
“What happened? Did the two of you have a fight? If so, bring her flowers. Not just any flowers. Don’t be the typical guy and purchase the cheap red roses from the grocery store. Go all out and head to a florist.”
“No, we didn’t just have a fight. Well, maybe. She learned the truth.”
“From the idiot from theSungazer?”
“I told her. I had to. She overheard a conversation I had with Steven. Incidentally, he thinks Rocco is attempting to derail me intentionally.”
He whistled, his gaze indicating I’d fucked up big time. “A distinct possibility. Just play the game your way. As far as what happened with Lily, that’s not good.”
“No, it isn’t. After I answered some very logical questions she had, she asked me to shift. As in right there in front of her. Can you imagine?”
Another club member walked into the locker room, passing through on his way to the showers. He’d wallowed in the mud. His hunt had been much more exciting than mine.
“Hey, Bob,” Dad said as he waved. “Comin’ to the barbeque on Sunday? I managed to snag over twenty pounds of Wagyu beef.”
“Oh, shit. That sounds delicious,” Bob told him. The two had been buddies for years. I’d gone to high school with the man’s son who was now some big MIT professor.
A sudden vision of the two men ripping off raw meat from huge bones was too much to take. What I hadn’t admitted to my father even once was that I no longer wanted to be a shifter. I wished there was a blood transfusion that would end what I considered a curse.
“Margie and I will be there. Just let us know if you need us to bring anything,” Bob told him. “Good to see you, son. Good luck with the playoffs. You’re on fire.”
On fire.
Yes, I was, but my sudden boost in energy wasn’t just about the love of the game, but also about the desire that was eating me from the inside out.
Bob headed out, whistling the theme of the Indiana Jones movies as he did.
“You are bringing Lily on Sunday. Right?”
I glanced at my father. He wasn’t listening to me, or he didn’t understand that not all women thought a wolf was sexy. “She won’t come. She’s all but told me she wants nothing to do with me and I’m nothing than her client. Her aggravating pain in the ass client she can’t wait to get rid of.”
He clapped me on the back. “Son. You need to learn a few things about women. That’s their love talk, like a spider luring an insect toward her web.”
“Need I remind you that insects die?”
His look was classic. He thought he was the cleverest man in the world. “Have I taught you nothing? I’m certain she’s confused, but the closeness you share is real. Your mother and I witnessed it with our own eyes. Even before she walked in, we gathered her intense scent. She’s part wolf. My guess is her parents thought they were protecting her by keeping Lily in the dark. But hormones will be hormones. Give her some time to come around.”
“She’s disappeared. I don’t even know if she’s going to come to the mandatory meeting with the coaches. How am I supposed to handle that? One-eight-hundred-find-my-fiancée?”
He tapped his nose. “Your skills are rusty. We need to set you up with a wolf trainer.”
A wolf trainer. An expert who knew how to handle every crisis a fledging shifter had from internal rage to the need to shift at the most inappropriate times and the command of our special traits.
