Most Eligible Wolf, Julie Steimle [important of reading books .TXT] 📗

A Fortunate Unfortunate Encounter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Six

 

 

Audry was feeling captive as Daisy’s group had remained around her booth. Most lingered on the skirts of it. Since Rick’s visit, if she dared to wander away to find a security guard one, of Daisy’s group followed her. One had followed her into the bathroom even. And she was not the only one who was followed either. Jandra tried to slip off, and she was followed by the one called Farkas, but she stayed with the security guards because she did not feel safe going back.

“What are we going to do?” one of the NYU group whispered to Audry.

“You guys all go,” she hissed back, thinking it over. Their safety mattered. “Forget the booth—”

But then her eyes set on the most unforgettable person of Rick’s friends. He was strolling on his long legs through the aisles between booths with a green smoothie in each hand, coming towards them. That platinum blonde haired guy with the crooked grin who had been at that ski lodge two years ago—Tom Brown—minding his own business; he was sipping from one of the smoothies, happy as a kid, wearing a hoodie and sunglasses.

A shiver ran through Audry. Had Rick sent him? Or was this just a miraculous coincidence which she could use to her advantage? Undoubtedly he was there to meet up with Rick.

As he strolled past the booth, Audry watched him, anxiously thinking of a way to flag him down while Daisy remained on her corner perch of the table. Tom’s eyes drifted up to the tee shirts and he tripped.

One, two, three—and both drinks dumped right onto the corner of the table and all over Daisy.

“Gah!” Daisy screamed, shaking off the sticky green smoothie, her arms up in protest. Her hair got much of it, but most of it was all over her front, down inside her cleavage, and all over her breezy skirt.  

“I’m so sorry!” Tom laughed, setting the cups down. He pawed around for a towel then pried at the bottom hem of his hoodie. “My bad! Do you want to trade shirts?” He looked ready to peel off his hoodie right then and give it to her, more than willing to strip her of hers. She definitely wasn’t wearing a bra, and the smoothie did not improve that.

Whipping up her eyes onto Tom, Daisy practically growled at him. “You clod! You ruined my dress! I’m all gross now!” She shook off more fruit pulp, the juice dripping down her fingers and face.

Tola was laughing. The others, not so much.

“Are you sure you don’t want to swap. I don’t mind going topless,” he said.

“I am not going to strip right here!” Daisy protested.

Audry and her booth-mates sighed with relief. At least she had some sense of modesty.

“Then maybe you should go wash up,” Tom replied, snorting, letting the hem of his hoodie go. He then looked up to the booth. “I’ll buy you a new shirt. Bartender! One large!”

But then his eyes fixed more on the wolf image on the shirts themselves. He looked to Audry. She could not see his eyes as his sunglasses shielded her view, but she imagined he was staring quite surprised. For some reason, she knew he would react that way to the wolf.

Daisy huffed. “The very idea! You owe me for damages! I’ll sue you for sexual harassment!”

“Do you have a lawyer?” Tom asked with hardly any worry in his voice. His eyes had not moved off the tee shirts. He then said to Audry, “Cool photo. Man, how did you get that wolf to hold still? I can hardly get him to hold still.”

The group listening stiffened, including Daisy.

Audry stared. “You know this wolf?”

“Sure do!” Tom declared brightly. His smile was as wide as his face nearly. “I practically shared a room with him.”

Audry pulled back. “What?”

“Just kidding.” Tom laughed more, though for some reason that felt like a lie. He then pointed to a large one. “I’ll buy that huge one for the lady to wear. And one also for me… and yeah, maybe one for my friend Matt. You know Matt, right?”

“I’ve met him,” Audry murmured, getting the three shirts and counting up to sixty dollars for the cost. Tom dug out fresh twenties from his wallet, handing them over. “He’s a friend of Jessica’s on the police force.”

Tom nodded, grinning. The height of his cheeks told Audry that his eyes were sparkling in appreciation for that mention. The news of a cop friend stirred up and got the attention of the rest of the pack. They knew two police offers, which would mean trouble for them if they lingered. Audry as not unprotected.

“You what?” Daisy asked with a near snarl, her eyes whipping sharply onto Audry. “Is he a friend of yours?”

Feeling braver, Audry shook her head. “No. He’s Rick’s friend. And so is Matt—or Matthew, right? Calamori?”

Tom nodded, grinning. “You’ve got a good memory.”

Audry chuckled, blushing. She was not going to openly admit that she had researched Rick and had learned a thing or two about his friends. Matthew Calamori wasn’t online or anything—not at all in social media, but she did know the guy was working with homicide, especially the kooky cases. Jessica told her.

 “I heard a rumor Rick was going to be here with old school friends,” Audry said instead. “But I also heard he was going to be here with a cop or a CIA agent.” Continuing this scare game against her booth-invaders.

“Both,” Tom laughed proudly, winking. Tom being there made things lighter, and he enjoyed that game as well.

 “Which one are you?” Audry asked, having always been curious about that.

The rest of the NYU student workers at the booth exchanged glances with hope. Cop or CIA, both were good for a rescue.

Snickering, Tom waggled a finger at her. “If I tell you, I’d have to kill you.”

“Oh, that one.” Audry chuckled, watching the effect of those words on the pack within their booth.

Hearing her, Tom let out a long, almost wicked laugh. He was really enjoying the joke.

But then Tom strolled over to Daisy who was looking akin to a bedraggled cat who had thrown up right there, and he whispered to her, barely within Audry’s earshot, lifting his sunglasses so that Daisy could meet his eyes—though Audry could not see the expression on his face as his back was to her. “Look. If your pack does not leave this normal ordinary animal activist alone to her fundraising, I’m going to make your life hell. Audry Bruchenhaus is under Rick Deacon’s protection and therefore mine.”

Daisy visibly bristled, almost like a wolf who hackles raised. “Who do you think you are, talkin’ to me like that?” Daisy bit back through her teeth.

Audry could see his ears rise from a grin. His posture was forbidding, though.

“The name is Thomas Brown. CIA, with license to kill, and a guy who hates anyone who messes with my old roomie, Rick Deacon,” he replied with an almost manic sound in his voice. 

“Oh, give me a—” Daisy said in a normal voice that carried.

“I know a great deal about what you are thinking right now,” he said, still low and confidential. “You’ve been tempted to bite me this entire time. But I also know a lot about your kind’s allergies. And those drinks I just dumped on you—they contain honey.”

Daisy let out a shriek, staring at her arms and shaking them to get off more smoothie. She then scraped with her fingers to remove it. Sure enough she was reacting with a rash.

Her pack swarmed around him. Farkas and the others growled at Tom. Audry watched in complete horror as they all seemed to go savage—no more the peaceful backwoods hick kind of folk—but almost wolf.

However, Tom gazed flatly on all of them as he said in a loud voice, “You guys need to go now. Get her washed up.”

“How dare you!” Tola shouted at him, her hand up as if she would claw him.

Farkas bared his teeth.

“Leave Rick Deacon and these people alone,” Tom said. “You mess with them, I mess with you.” He chucked the large tee shirt at Daisy’s head. “Here’s your shirt. This is all of that wolf you are allowed to have.”

The entire pack bristled, like a pack of wolves. They looked like they would maul him.

“You’d better watch your back,” Farkas growled.

“Are you threatening me?” Tom pressed a hand innocently to his chest. He laughed.

Others around were watching. The pack noticed. Guarding their next move, they surrounded Daisy to get her out of there and to some water.

Tom lifted his sunglasses again, revealing his orange eyes. “Be careful who you threaten, pup. You are in the real world now, and I know to handle wolves.”

All of them flinched.

Farkas shuddered, seeing Tom’s freaky irises. He jerked back, muttering “Demon” under his breath.

But the pack rushed to get Daisy to the nearest restroom where she could wash off the residue of the smoothies.

And they were gone.

Someone from a nearby booth clapped, nodding.

And Audry’s booth-mates cheered. “Hallelujah! Finally someone who could chase those punks off.”

Tom gave him a bow. Then, he leaned against the table and smiled at Audry. “Did I do good?”

Audry laughed. Then she grabbed him in a hug. “Awesome! You did amazing! How did you know?”

Shrugging quite casually, Tom said, “Rick said you looked like you were in trouble. And he told me all about them.”

A wash of calm swept over her. Rick had sent him. He knew they were dangerous.

Tom cackled as if it has been exceptionally funny. But then his eyes trailed to the mess he had made on the floor and quickly took in all the dirty glares of those other people in the near booths around them. It was like Tom was super sensitive to the dirty angry thoughts of others. It gave Audry goose-pimples thinking about it.

“I’ll clean up that mess.” Tom pointed to the slushy bits still on the table and floor. “That’s my bad.”

He then went to fetch a mop. It didn’t take long. He soon dragged back an industrial mop with bucket full of sloshy warm water. Audry wondered first where he had gotten it from, but Jandra came back with him, grinning. A security guard had also come, looking a little flustered at her insistence he be there. He then glanced around as if to ask where the trouble was, though he also peeked at Tom as if Tom was the one who had ordered him there.

“It’s about time,” some of their booth-mates said, seeing her.

Jandra shrugged, trying to explain how hard it was to even get one of the guards to come. “I had to say something about sexual harassment and racism to get him to move from his post,” she muttered. “That guy was the only one to listen to me. And even he would not come until that ghost showed him some badge and said some friends of Howard Deacon the Third were being harassed, and he’d sue if something happened to them.” Jandra shook her head and whispered to Audry, “That guy is lookin’ out for you.”

Audry’s face felt hot.

Rick indeed had sent Tom.

Tom cackled at that, overhearing it.

Funnily enough, he mopped up the mess with a grin as if the job was not below him. Yet in the middle of it, he halted, leaning on the mop stick and pointed up at the one remaining poster. “So how did you get that wolf to pose so nicely? I’ve never seen him sit still that long.”

“How do you know this wolf?” Audry asked again. “You’ve seen him?”

“Of course I have,” Tom replied