Shifter's Moon (Paranormal Shifter Romance) (4 page)

             
She slapped the handle again and swung off the bike, her hands on her hips. 

             
“You got another way home?” Jake said, sipping at the lip of the mason jar.  He already knew the answer, but some part of him wanted to force some humility into the girl in front of him.

             
“Yeah, the public bus comes by every 10 minutes,” she replied sarcastically and took her helmet off. 

             
“Alright, alright,” Jake said. “Hang on a sec. I’ll give you a ride.”

             
“No way. You’re still drunk. Give me the keys, I’ll drive,” she said, extending the flat of her palm.

             
Jake let out a weak laugh.  “Are you serious? It’s… it’s my car,”

             
She thrust her palm at him again. 
She is definitely something,
he thought, reluctantly reaching into the back pocket of his jeans and dropping the keys into her hand.  He couldn’t even reproach her.

             
“Help me get the bike in the car,” she said, motioning toward it.

             
“I don’t think it’ll fit.”

             
“We don’t need to go far,” she said, rolling it towards the car.

             
With some grunting they managed to get the front wheel of the bike into the back of the car, and it slid forward but its rear tire still hung out the back awkwardly. 

             
“You sure it won’t it fall out?  I take no responsibility if your bike takes a tumble,” he said, putting his hands in front of him.

             
“That’s why
I’m
driving,” she announced.

Even though she was ill-tempered and fiery, the honesty in her demeanor was strangely refreshing.  He thought of his circle of friends back in the city.  Everyone seemed to hide behind masks, constructed camouflages that always shielded their true thoughts and emotions.  Maybe that’s what had eventually exhausted him, trying to keep up with the disguises all the time, guessing at what others were thinking, being forced to put on his own masks to the point that he had lost sight of what he was truly feeling. 

             
That’s what always kept Alissa and me at a distance,
he thought,
it didn’t matter how close we got physically, there was never any honesty.  I never knew what she was feeling, and I never let her know what I was feeling. 
In the final months they’d been together it had been more of a competition than a relationship, with each person trying to out maneuver the other and at the same time guard themselves from the other.  

             
And now here was this girl who had somehow beat him at his own game but neglecting to even play.  He felt a stab of shame, and hoped she wouldn’t notice it written plainly on his face.  He swallowed the last of the coffee and set it on top of the plate, and then jumped down the bank and sat down in the passenger seat.

             
“You gotta punch it a few times before-”

             
Lia deftly pushed down on the clutch as she turned the ignition and the car growled to life.  She shrugged.  “I might’ve had one of these when I was a kid,” she said matter-of-factly.  Jake rolled down his window as she peeled out and couldn’t hide a smile that spread on his lips.

Chapter Four

The town of Barrelgrove was less than a town than a single main street lined with a few shops, a couple of restaurants, and a convenience store.  There were a few small clusters of grid-locked avenues and houses, but for the most part folks lived just outside the down on the back-roads where they had their own farms and little homesteads.  Lia looked across at Jake who had a dreamy expression plastered across his face.

             
“What are you doing?”

             
“Hm?  Oh, nothing, just taking it all in.”

             
“There ain’t much to take in,” Lia said, “although if you’re looking for a killer blueberry pie, Irma’s there is great.  I don’t know how she does it, but-”

             
Lia stopped when she realized she had let her guard down and was being friendly to him. 

             
“Thanks for the tip,” Jake said, allowing her to save face.  “I’ll have to check it out later, maybe.  After all, I don’t know if I can survive on just bacon and Wild Turkey.”

             
It was a joke, but Lia didn’t laugh, and Jake wondered if the mention of alcohol had turned her off.  He had, after all, a terrible time with first impressions.  And Lia’s second impression of him had been hung over after he’d wallowed in self-pity the night before.  He felt another stab of shame, and wasn’t sure where it originated from.  It’s true, he’d been somewhat meek in his youth, but moving to the city, living with Alissa, trying to make it as a writer, had all hardened him to the point where he had adopted a more
laissez-faire
personality. 

             
The fact that he now felt ashamed in the presence of the dark skinned girl, who adroitly shifted the gears of a car that had took him years to master, confused him. 
Am I really concerned with how she thinks of me?
he wondered, and took a moment to scan her casual posture with his peripheral vision.  She immediately sensed him and her head snapped in his direction.  Those large black eyes again.

             
“Uhm.  Where did you find that bacon, anyway?”

             
“Gramps had a deep freezer in the basement.  Most of the stuff was badly freezer burnt, but meat’s meat, right?”

             
She nodded and pulled up against the curb of a convenience store.  “That reminds me, I have to pick up some supplies. I’ll be right back okay?”

             
“Where am I… I mean, where are
you
taking me, anyway?”

             
“I live with my grandmother.  It’s just a couple minutes down the road, we’re out of groceries.  Just stay here,” she said, with such authority that Jake didn’t even unclip his seatbelt. 

             
He watched her strut up the boardwalk and head inside, her baggy jumper barely concealing the athletic form that was hidden underneath.  She was very wiry, and Jake imagined that years as a mechanic had probably given her that solidness.  He rubbed his temple again, trying to relieve the fresh pins and needles of the hangover.  He heard a growl of engines behind him and stared back up the street where a handful of guys on Harley Davidsons were rolling indolently toward him.  He felt the muscles in his arm tighten and reflexively locked the door as they drew closer. 

             
There were four of them and he could see the leader was a good foot taller than his companions, with a black handkerchief wrapped tightly around his forehead and dark aviators that seemed to wrap around his face like a reflective blister.  His leather vest was open at the front, revealing a tanned strip of hairless skin that was ridged with muscle.  On his right arm was a crude tattoo of a dream catcher, with long stylized feathers running down the outside of his bicep, and in the center of the dream catcher was the outline of a wolf’s face. 

             
The four motorcyclists pulled up gingerly beside the car and Jake ducked his head and pretended he was asleep against the window.  The sound of their engines seemed to conduct through the thin pane of the glass and rattle his teeth. 

             
The leader of the bikers swung his leg off and Jake peeked through his eyelids and saw him take his aviators off and stand there. 
Waiting for the music to start or something,
he thought sardonically.  He knew the type.  Small town thugs that thought they were the coolest thing since sliced bread, and had no problem trying to convince you of it.  For some reason the fictitious history that Jake invented for the muscle-bound biker in front of him seemed to lighten the mood, and he found that he wasn’t intimidated in the slightest.

             
The leader ran his hand through his raven black hair and hopped up onto the boardwalk.  Jake saw that his companions remained firmly on their bikes, as if waiting for an order to dismount.  Just then Lia came through the convenience store door and Jake’s heart leapt as she stood face to face with him.  They seemed to hold each other’s gaze for a long time and he wondered if there was some history there.  Neither of them made a move, they just stood there, facing off in some silent or unspoken game of wits, until Jake finally opened his door and leaned on the roof of the car.  He might’ve been crazy, but he could swear he saw the biker’s nostrils flare out, as if he were sniffing the air.

             
“Hey, Lia!  Hurry up, what’s taking so long?  I feel like a dog that’s been left in a hot car,” he shouted up at her, and it broke the magnetism between her and the biker.

             
“Uh, yeah, I’m coming,” she blurted back.

             
The biker watched her go and then turned a menacing eye on Jake. 
Oh great, now I’ve got his attention
, Jake thought and gave him a friendly nod.  He sat down in the passenger seat again and took the paper bag of groceries in his lap as Lia started the engine and pulled out into the main street again.

             
She kept looking up at the rear view mirror nervously and her knuckles tightened on the steering wheel.  In the distance the biker stood and watched them like a statue.

             
“A friend of yours?” Jake finally asked, uncomfortable with the silence that seemed to stretch between them like a cord.

             
“No,” she shrugged, but Jake sensed there was more to it than that.

             
“Are you okay?  Your hands are almost shaking.  I mean, if you weren’t trying to strangle my steering wheel, they’d be shaking,” he said, and without thinking reached out and put his left palm on her knobby hand.  He was surprised at how hot her skin was to the touch.  He felt something almost electric when his skin touched hers. 

             
She didn’t jerk back, but her head turned at him in surprise.  But there was genuine worry in Jake’s voice.  He hardly knew Lia, but he knew her well enough to know that it probably took more than a little to upset her.  Lia let out a long exhalation and shook her head.  Her eyes relaxed slightly, and he pulled his hand back to his own lap.

             
“No, I dunno.  I’ve never seen him before.  It’s just stupid, I know. I got a weird feeling.  We get a lot of weirdos that pass through here, y’know.  They try to stay off the main freeways, and end up using our back roads,” she said, and leaned with one arm out the window.  The wind caught her hair and she closed her eyes for a second, enjoying the feel of the air moving through it and over her face.  As if suddenly recalling something she added, “Thanks, for calling me back to the car.” 

             
Jake nodded.  “And here I figured you were totally into guys with the Hells Angel vibe,” he joked, half expecting another cold glare from her.  When he turned to gauge her reaction he was surprised instead to see a thin close-lipped grin.

             
“That is
not
my type, believe me,” she replied, “I just like bikes because it’s more open.  You can see and smell everything.  And, for the most part, guys leave me alone when they see me on a bike… probably because they assume, like you, I’m some sort of hog-roadie.”

             
“Oh, I didn’t assume that.  I learned a long time ago to reserve my judgement.  First impressions are almost always inaccurate,” Jake said quickly, and realized his attempt to dispel Lia’s impression of him was probably less than subtle.   She returned a grin and bobbed her head.

Eventually they reached another side road and Lia took a turn and headed up a narrow gravel path that opened into a large clearing.  A large meadow was coming into bloom with yellow buttercups and the forest line that hedged the acreage was a thick wall of spruce and cedar trees.  There were several outbuildings, including a make-shift chicken coop and a large dark red barn, but the main house looked like a European style cottage with a rounded stone wall that faced out across the fields and there was a spindle of smoke rising from the quaint chimney that jutted from its roof.

             
“This is where you live?” Jake said.

             
“It’s my grandmother’s property.  But yeah, it’s home,” she said, pulling up and turning the ignition off.  She held the keys out and Jake accepted them.  “You’d better come in just for a sec, otherwise
she
will give me an earful for not repaying you.”

             
Jake followed her up the stone steps that led to the front door.  He breathed in deep and could smell the fresh green scent of grass and the sweetness of hay drying in the barn.  Down below them in the field a rooster let out a crow.  As he stepped into the cottage he was struck with an array of aromas that reminded him of an apothecary.  There were herbs hanging on the walls and from the ceiling to dry, and there was a earthy steam that seemed to cling to the roof.