“They’ll be worried back at The Haven Center.”
I crawled forward a few more inches and set my chin on Jordan’s thigh, peering up at him. I knew we should go back, but I liked it here. If Jordan said we should leave, though, I’d follow him.
“Come on, fluffy. We can go back the way we came, yeah? I’ll shift, and then we can talk.”
I attempted to stand, but sharp pain shot up my right foreleg, and I collapsed against his legs with a whine.
“Are you hurt?”
Jordan’s big hands caressed my back, reassuring me. I rolled over and attempted to lift the injured paw. It seemed fine, so I tried to put some weight on it and promptly collapsed again.
Jordan ran his fingers over my leg. “Looks like there’s some swelling… maybe only a sprain. Maybe a fracture. Can you shift? That should heal it enough for us to get back to the center.”
I huffed and tried again. This time, becoming human seemed even more impossible, like capturing smoke with a butterfly net.
“Not now, huh? Well don’t worry. You’re a bit of a thing. I can carry you. If you’ll let me.”
I should have been terrified, but I would let Jordan do almost anything he wanted with me right now. Was that healthy? I knew he smelled like mate… my true mate… but after so long without an identity of my own, was it okay for me to attach myself so quickly to an alpha, simply because he was the only one in the world who didn’t scare me?
I wheezed in pain as Jordan accidentally bumped my bruised side, but he was ridiculously careful with me.
“I don’t feel safe walking through the dark woods in my human form. I’d probably trip and drop you. So we’re just going to walk down this street here. We’re not too far from campus. Shouldn’t take us more than thirty minutes or so.”
He was going to walk through this quiet residential neighborhood completely naked, streaked with mud, carrying a waterlogged wolf?
Well, it wasn’t like we could call a ride. Had my cell phone survived the rain? And with me not able to walk or shift to heal, what were our options?
The warmth of his chest reached through my cold, wet fur, warming my body. Between his heat and the easy sway of Jordan’s gait, I actually relaxed, certain for the first time in a long time, even being carried down a dark street by a naked alpha, I was safe.
6
Jordan
Every time a car passed or I walked under a streetlight, my neck prickled. I didn’t feel uncomfortable carrying Wyatt—he really was a bit of a thing. Maybe half the size of a full grown wolf? But he wasn’t a child. He was all man; I could scent that. And holding him felt right.
But I was all too aware shifters weren’t always safe in our world. And walking naked down any street for any reason wasn’t a great way to signal good intentions. It would only take one Humans First activist or sympathizer to call up the wrong cousin, and then Wyatt and I would be in a world of trouble.
So I wasn’t at all surprised at the sudden whoop-whoop and flash of blue lights.
Wyatt’s tail curled around me in concern, and I scratched my fingers into his deep, soft fur. So damn soft. “It’s okay, fluffy. I got you.”
I felt more than heard the grumble in his chest. I wasn’t sure if he was responding to “fluffy” or the approaching danger.
As I turned to face the police car, two officers popped out. The tall one rested his hand on his gun, not so casually, and the short one flashed a super-strength flashlight directly in my eyes, blinding me.
My eyes squinted almost shut. I could scent them, though. Humans. I doubted I’d get much understanding from these two.
“Good evening, sir,” one of them drawled. Great. A cowboy. “We received a report of a naked man streaking through this neighborhood while carrying a dog. There’s a good chance that would be you, wouldn’t it.”
The light finally pointed to my feet, and I blinked away the afterimage. “Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it streaking. More like strolling. And he’s a wolf, not a dog.”
Sarcasm was not helpful right now.
“Sir, you do realize we have public decency laws, don’t you? That means not running around naked in public.”
I drew myself up as tall as if I’d been wearing a suit at a funeral. “Well, sir, I’d happily put on a pair of pants, even a sheet, if anyone would be kind enough to provide me with one. Unfortunately, I have nothing available.”
The officer with the flashlight peered closer at me. “You one of them shifters?”
Ah, he was the cowboy. The other one tightened his grip on the butt of his gun, and I tensed, ready to turn my back to protect Wyatt.
“I don’t suppose it’s normal for humans to walk around unclothed carrying large animals.”
“Not exactly normal for your kind, either.”
He had a point, but the “your kind” made my eye twitch. “I’m a security guard at the omega counseling center on Hartford Ave. Wyatt is a resident there. We had a bit of an incident and ended up here, shifted.”
“Why didn’t you run back the way you came?”
The other office remained silent, and I kept one eye on him. “Wyatt’s injured. He’s not able to support himself.”
Nodding, the officer looked us up and down. His eyes didn’t skip over anything. Not a hint of embarrassment at my lack of modesty. “Well, I’m gonna make a couple calls. We’ll see if your story checks out.”
What did he think we were doing out here like this? Selling drugs? Enacting kinky sex shenanigans? Who in their right mind would want to walk around naked on a stormy Chicago night?
I managed to keep those questions to myself and nodded to tall, tense and surly. “Busy night?”
“Oddly enough, this isn’t the craziest call I’ve been on in the last twenty-four hours.” Despite his resting asshole face, he seemed surprisingly friendly.
“Oh?”
“Imagine you’re going in on what you think is a drug bust, but the perps are actually involved in the illegal importation of reptiles, and your boss doesn’t believe them, so he cuts the biggest bag open.”
I blinked. Even Wyatt tilted his head. “What was it?”
“A mama rattlesnake whose eggs hatched in transit. Thankfully, snakes aren’t protective, but they sure do get hella mad when you go tossing them around in a bag together and then let them loose. And then you have ten of those little fuckers slithering around…” When he broke a smile, his face completely changed. “Sure was worth it to see the captain hopping around like a four-year-old girl.”
The cowboy came swaying back. “Story checks out.”
The tall one released his hold on his gun.
“So we can go?”
Cowboy scratched his chin. “Better yet, why don’t we give you a ride? I don’t wanna be fielding calls for the next twenty minutes about a whole ‘nother kind of snake swinging in the wild.”
Wyatt huffed, and it took me entirely too long to get what the cowboy was referring to. And then I couldn’t help but blush. We shifters were used to nudity, but unless it was with your best friends, everyone kind of pretended they didn’t see what they saw.