Smitty stared at his sister, probably debating whether she’d really hit him with it. He had to know she would.

“I’m out of here.”

They watched him storm out the back door, strip, shift, and take off into the woods behind Shaw’s house.

Ronnie let out a breath and looked at her friend.

“What?” Sissy asked. “You think I’d waste all this good tequila on that fat head?”

“Well, you did have me worried.”

The rest of the day went by slowly and uneventfully. Jess mostly stayed in the kitchen with May under the pretense of helping her bake cakes for Johnny’s birthday the following day; but since she couldn’t bake anything but chocolate chip cookies, she really stayed in there because no one would bother her. May said little and Jess sat in a corner and re-read Tolkien’s The Two Towers for perhaps the ninety millionth time.

But even J.R.R. couldn’t distract her from thoughts of Smitty. It hadn’t been easy walking away earlier. But she knew she had to. Knew she had to walk away and not look back. Not if she wanted all of him. The man who came to her that afternoon might as well have been a full-human for all the passion he showed her. A Beta with extremely low expectations of his mate.

As soon as he took her hand, she could see their lives played out in front of her. Nice quiet, simple lives with about as much passion and love as you could get out of a vibrator. She’d rather be alone than live that way. She’d only known her parents fourteen years, but what she always felt certain in was their love of each other. It was passionate and wild and beautiful, and she was the product of that.

If she wanted a solid but passionless relationship, she’d start returning Sherman Landry’s calls. But she didn’t want Sherman Landry or the boring relationship he could offer. Jess wanted more. And in that disgusting bathroom off the turnpike, she really thought she’d found that with Smitty. Then he’d pushed her away. Not comfortable with what he’d felt. With the Smith inside him.

Sure, she could tell him what her problem was. She could tell him how she wanted a true Smith mating because that’s how she’d know she meant everything to him. But she knew Smitty enough to know he’d simply fake it to make her happy. He’d take her to bed, fuck her stupid, maybe get a little rough with her, and mark her. But it wouldn’t change a damn thing. It wouldn’t make him okay with who he was and always would be simply due to his DNA strain.

Jess now realized, as she dragged herself up to her room on the top floor, that she’d never have him—hell, never want him—until he could accept who and what he was. You had to accept it before you could go beyond it. Instead, Smitty probably spent more time fighting his desires than moving to the next stage of his life.

It broke her heart, but to be blunt, it wasn’t her problem. As her mother used to say, “Some things a body just has to figure out on their own.”

Jess walked into her room and closed thedoor. She really hoped she could shake this by tomorrow morning. They had a full day planned for Johnny and she wanted his seventeenth birthday to be a blast for him. What she definitely didn’t want was to bring the whole thing down by being a sad sack.

She sat on her bed, untying and toeing off her boots. She briefly debated changing into night clothes, but she simply lacked the energy or desire. So she flipped off the light and stretched out on the bed.

After a few minutes, she caught his scent. She hadn’t noticed it before since she’d been unable to get the essence of it out of her head in the first place.

She sighed. “What do you want, Smitty?”

He stepped out of the shadows. At least he looked as miserable as she felt.

“I know you don’t want to see me right now.”

“You’re right.”

“But I don’t want to sleep alone again tonight. I miss you, Jessie Ann.”

“The same way I miss my dogs after I dropped them off at the kennel yesterday?”

He went from miserable to angry in about two seconds. “What the hell does that mean?”

Too tired to argue, she turned on her side. “Forget it. It doesn’t mean anything.”

She heard him take a deep breath, trying to calm that temper he insisted on hiding from her. “Do you mind if I stay?” he asked.

“Whatever.”

She heard his coat drop to the floor, followed by his boots. Then, fully dressed, he crawled into bed with her. He spooned her from behind, one arm tight around her waist, the other curving over her head on the pillow. She reached down and pulled the comforter over them before she settled back in.

He snuggled in closer, burying his face in the back of her neck. She placed her hand over the one on her waist, her fingers sliding between his. He closed his hand, locking his fingers around hers.

Like that they fell asleep and Jess realized nothing in her life had ever felt so right before.

In the morning, when she woke up to the pups banging on her door, he was gone.

Chapter 25

It had taken her second in command getting between them to separate Brendon Shaw from Bobby Ray.

It had started off like any other morning hunt. The Smith Pack wolves tracking down a deer and taking it down. And just like every other hunt now that lions had become a constant part of their lives, the cats happened on by to steal their meal. If there was only one, Mace or Brendon, they usually put up a fight. But with Mace, Brendon, and Mitch, Sissy thought they’d just let them have the damn thing and go after another one. But Bobby Ray had fought back with a vengeance. Mace backed off immediately, understanding Bobby Ray better than any of them did. She had no doubts you learned a lot about a man when you were stationed with him in a war zone. Mitch enjoyed his job, and Sissy even had the sense he was seriously considering not going back to his police job in Philly, so he’d backed off pretty quick too.