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

then said, “Then I would tell you that you are being a total jackass, and you need to trust your friends.”

Rick cringed. He shook his head with aches increasing down his back and neck. This was not good. “Ok… Then what if I were to tell you that the secrets I keep are protecting other people.”

More ears picked that up. Curiosity piqued.

“Who am I going to hurt?” Randon replied, lifting his hands. He wasn’t speaking loud enough for most people to hear, keeping it down. “I am not a gossip, and I am not a witch. I am just a familiar.”

Randon had a very good point. Rick considered it and sighed, lowering his voice, “Ok. There’s this wolf pack…”

Surprisingly, Randon did not look surprised. He looked bored.

“And I had a… um… how do I put it?” Rick mucked through his brain for the best description while trying to keep all of it on the down low in the middle of a noisy crowd.

“A fight? An argument?” Randon offered words, waiting.

Shaking his head, Rick sighed. “No. They actually liked me. They wanted to keep me, in fact.”

Randon grew more interested. “Oh.”

“And Dad was against it,” Rick explained. He was not going to tell him about Daisy.

“I see.” Randon looked that way. “So… you think they are trying to bring you back into the pack?”

“To sum up, yeah,” Rick said, breathing a little easier. “If they are actually here, because honestly I would never have expected them to come here looking for me. Dad threatened them to leave me alone.” He was glad he did not have to elaborate much.

“Wow.” Pulling back Randon nodded appreciatively. Mr. Deacon II threatening somebody was a big deal. He didn’t do it often—and he had dealt with the Mob on a regular basis—fending them off that is. “Does this pack have a name?”

“Wolverton,” Rick murmured so no one else could hear. He looked around to see if he could spot any others from the pack. Sighing, he shook his head and pointed to an alternative route. “Let’s go that way. I want to be close to an exit.”

Nodding, Randon agreed. It was a good idea.

They meandered through the convention, trying to not run across any other people from Wolverton—and Rick had not seen any others. However, he did bump across a hunter.

“Deacon,” the hunter said. He also was wearing nose plugs though, looking ridiculous and sounding even more ridiculous.

“Going swimming?” Rick asked, gazing wryly at him.

Listeners-in snickered.

“I dob know whad you’be done bud—” the hunter growled amidst more chuckles.

Rolling his eyes, Rick pulled back. “Of for pity’s sake. Give it up.”

“Nebber.” The hunter glared heavily at him. But he did not dare put a finger on Rick as the crowds were better bodyguards than anything. Everybody was watching. Rick drew eyes in places like that. He was like a walking spectacle—or rather a superstar.

The hunter eyed Randon harshly. “I dob know who you are, bud you bedder beware—”

“Can it,” Randon said with heaps of annoyed derision, stepping past him.

“I will be wadjing you!” the hunter shouted after them while more watchers broke into chuckles.

Rick shared a silent look with Randon as they continued on through the convention hall. Everyone was watching him. The question was, did they really know what was going on?

Startling Reunions

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Four

 

 

Daisy spotted him.

So did Audry. Rick’s head held tall in the crowd as he strolled alongside a dark haired guy who had the gait of a cat. Both were in suits, though his friend’s was definitely not Armani. More like… borrowed but neat. Both going along the stretch of the bustling conference hall, Rick with his wolfish stride, Audry was struck by how handsome Rick really did look. Both of them, really. But a shiver ran through her while taking in Rick’s much more grown physique. He was no longer the nervous young heir she had first met in Paris. He was a man.

“Ooh. He looks good,” Daisy murmured.

Audry shot her a look, already anticipating her to put on the ‘sexy’. It made her sick.

“Ooh. And so accomplished looking. That suit really suits him,” Daisy continued to murmur with lustful eyes. They seemed to be undressing him, actually. Daisy bit her plump lip in anticipation.

Those next to her snickered.

Sure. It suited him, Audry thought sarcastically. It was a rich piece of art—the same kind Rick wore at the first convention Audry had seen him in. He also appeared to take better care of it.

“So that’s what he looks like with clothes on,” someone laughed.

Audry’s eyes widened. Were they serious? Had they not actually seen him clothed?

“Who’s that guy with him?”

“I dunno. One of his friends, I suppose. I hear he’s got lots of them.”

“Will that be a problem?”

“I don’t think so. We’re just here to talk. The guy looks harmless.”

As Rick and his friend got closer, Audry finally recognized Rick’s friend. She had met him during her Master’s research briefly. Their ski trip, two years ago. She couldn’t remember his name, though. He was just one of those guys from Gulinger Private Academy whom she had first thought had been a twin. There had been two friends of Rick’s with the same coloring, and she hadn’t really conversed with either of them.

“Here he comes,” one of their pack said.

Daisy leaned near Audry, draping an arm heavily over her shoulder, and whispered, “Alright. I am going to demonstrate to you how you can get laid.”

Daisy then plucked up the balm again, taking out a little more and massaged it where she had previously rubbed it in. Tossing the balm into one of boxes under the table, Daisy then put on her innocent sweet southern gal act—the same act she had started with when she had approached their booth.

“Just watch how it works,” she said to Audry.

The result was almost automatic.

Rick did not spot them as much as smell them. Audry could see it. It was weird—but then, she recalled, he was like that. He had done the same thing two years ago, almost recognizing her by her scent back then. At this moment, he lifted his nose on the air like someone who had just breathed in the aroma of hot chocolate and warm cinnamon rolls. He inhaled long, savoring the scent. And then his eyes lifted over the room, seeking out the source of the aroma with an expression of hunger. He marched quickly through the crowd, abandoning his friend—who stared after him in exasperation. As soon as Rick set eyes on them, Daisy did a little toot-a-loo wave.

“Hi Rick.” Her arm was still around Audry, practically holding her captive—yet with the appearance of ‘best friends’.

Audry shot her a side look. That blasted woman was such an actress. It was despicable.

Upon seeing them, recognizing them, Rick froze. He looked like the wind had been knocked out of him, nearly swaying there. His eyes dilated in a weird way, resting on them both as if the sight of the pair of them together terrified him. And yet, he rushed up to them as if he desperately needed to be there. “Daisy! Audry. I…”

His eyes then set on the tee shirt Audry was wearing. He blinked at it and stared more. His gray eyes then flickered up to the booth as if seeing it for the first time. Speechlessly, he paled. “Wha…?”

“I know, right?” one of the others from Daisy’s pack said.

Rick’s eyes whipped immediately down to them, recognizing the crowd. Each face. He really did know them. He turned to one. “Farkas….”

For a second, Audry was not certain if he was swearing.

But the guy called Farkas raised his hands in triumph then embraced Rick in a manly hug. “You remember me!”

What a name. Farkas. He had to have had cruel parents. As the group quickly swarmed Rick with pats and hugs of long lost friends, Audry felt dazed. The only reason she didn’t faint was that she was still in the grips of that Daisy.

“Well, yeah…” Rick then shook his head, still looking dizzy. With another headshake, focusing, Rick said to Farkas in particular, “You know all the comic books you left me? The cops took it away as evidence. I never got one issue.”

Audry could not believe what he chose to talk about. Daisy looked equally stunned.

“They took all of the Electricity comic books?” one guy with oddly grayish hair asked, looking entirely dismayed.

Rick nodded frankly, and with condolences. “Dad would have burned them. He didn’t want me having anything with your smell on them.”

Which was a weird statement. Smell. Why was everything about smell with him? Was Daisy right about his super-sensitive nose? Audry knew he had allergies. Thing was, he lost all his business-like manner with these folk. He started talking to them as if he had forgotten where he was or whom he was supposed to be representing at the convention. This was casual Rick. He really truly knew them.

“What kind of evidence would those comic books be anyway?” Farkas laughed with complete fondness for Rick. He slapped Rick heavily on his back. “I mean? That your friends like to read?”

Or look at picture with people in skin-tight clothes, Audry thought in disgust. Of course Rick was a comic book nut. Even a rich kid had to have a stupid teen obsession. He seemed the type.

“Fingerprints, probably,” Rick murmured. He shook his head, taking in all their faces again. He breathed them in, a smile slowly resting on his face with a peculiar sort of nostalgia, like he had missed their smell. He stood as if he belonged with them, and had wanted desperately to be with them. But he also seemed dazed with shock at seeing them there. “My heavens, it has been ages.”

They all nodded in agreement.

“You should hear where the town ended up,” one of them said.

Was this town mobile? Audry wondered.

Rick looked panicked as if the idea of knowing freaked him out. “Oh… no. Uh. Dad would—”

“You’re a grown man, Rick,” one of them said with a teasing look. “You can decide for yourself whom you can hang out with.”

Nodding, Rick pressed his hand to his forehead with a chuckle as if that really weren’t true. And it probably wasn’t. The rich were bound to their fortunes like slaves. Everyone else was a little more free. His eyes raked through the crowd of them, taking them all in as if searching for someone in particular. He narrowed his gaze as he finally asked, “Is Kurt around here?”

Daisy’s pack shared looks. They didn’t respond just yet. Some were pensive, others exchanged glances of warning and silent, if not conspiratorial, hisses. Rick watched them with curiosity about to ask them what was up. But before any one of them could respond to Rick, up jogged Rick’s dark-haired friend.

“Hey! You ran off too fast.” Breathlessly the guy grinned at them all, especially on Rick whom he seemed anxious about. But then the guy’s blue eyes tracked up to the tee shirts and posters Audry’s group was selling at the booth. “Holy shamoly. Where did that picture come from?”

Audry and everyone looked to see where he was pointing. But of course he was pointing at all of it—most specifically to the poster of the rust-haired wolf which previously the leather clad creep had wanted