That truth was as clear to him as the displeasure on Merrilee’s face when he cruised up to the A-frame cottage perched above the other houses closer to the lake. She stood on the porch with her legs braced in a wide stance. The overflowing flower boxes framing the windows seemed too soft for the Alpha he knew, even though the rich red blossoms matched her compressed lips. What other incongruities might he might find within?
Not that he’d ever be invited.
He’d known the Harley’s roar in her pristine community would get her hackles up. Which contradicted his earlier thought about not wanting to fight, but there was a good reason he’d been sent off to military school and then the army; he’d always been too good at fighting.
He killed the engine, letting the stillness of the mountain morning return. For a pack of apex predators, Merrilee’s werelings were outliers. They focused on their creative pursuits, ignoring were-typical physical pastimes. Honestly, they were the kids he’d have beat up in grade school before he got shipped off and got beaten on some himself. Now the peace appealed to him. He’d had only a couple hours of sleep after calling his contacts about the strange phae appearance, and the quiet was almost as much a balm as the powerful rumble of the bike.
Almost as much as looking at Merrilee. In her tight leggings and a long, V-neck sweater with a colorful fringed hem that danced under her butt, she made his fingers twitch with a need to play with all the disparate textures.
She didn’t say anything as he swung off the bike, just took a sip from the coffee cup in her hand. The twist of steam told him it was recently poured; likely a pot still simmered somewhere inside. Not that the simmering Alpha outside would let him have any, so he wasn’t even going to ask.
“Got another cup?” He cursed himself when the request popped out anyway.
Merrilee raised one brow. “Long, cold ride this early just to get coffee.”
And a long, cold day in hell before she gave him one was implied.
When he stalked up the walkway, she put the cup down and squared her shoulders. Her bare toes, nails pearly pink from the chill, curled over the edge of the step.
Looked like she was ready for a fight too.
He focused on the flowers and didn’t continue up the porch steps even though the pounding of his pulse in his ears echoed as if he kept right on walking. “Quit challenging me,” he said through gritted teeth. “We have to talk, and I can’t do that with you staring holes in me.”
Though he didn’t look at her, he felt the moment her gaze shifted. Like a hot hand leaving his skin. He kinda missed it.
“What are you doing here, Beck?”
“Had a problem in town last night.”
“I’m sure you handled it.”
He hazarded a lightning glance her way, but her expression was clear. She meant what she said. “Might not be the sort of problem that goes away so quick.” He told her about the imp and Orson’s plan to case the town. “I called some people, asked about unrest among the phae, and what I heard isn’t good.”
For a long moment, only the breeze in the pines broke the silence. Then she grabbed her coffee cup and turned away. “I don’t have decaf.”
For another not-quite-as-long moment, shock locked his muscles before he jumped the steps two at a time to follow her into the house.
The front room was her business office. One lemon-yellow wall boasted design awards. Three computer screens crowded a pine desk big enough to have made his uncle jealous. Splashes of paprika-red and cool lime tones brightened the central hallway that led past a tiny bedroom on one side and bath on the other. He poked his nose in each, breathing her spicy amber fragrance.
Her call echoed down the hall. “Do you want this coffee or not?”
He sauntered to the kitchen and great room at the back of the house and dug in his heels again to admire the view framed in the floor-to-ceiling windows. While the porch at the front of the house had faced the pretty little lake below, the back looked out to the mountains, just trees and sky and freedom. Unlike the cheerful office, it looked wild and a little lonely.
The view of a woman who wanted no one to hold her back.
Merrilee shoved a mug at him. The mug was big, almost a soup bowl, and the coffee was black, just the way he liked it.
Did she know he drank his coffee black, or was she just not willing to give him the pleasure of cream and sugar?
“Thanks,” he said. “Do you have any hazelnut?”
She gave him an incredulous look. “Where is the imp carcass? I want to see it.”
He shook his head. “It was mostly dissolved when I stopped by on the way here. Orson and his quartet started out at dawn. I expect they’ll have a report for me by lunch.”
“I want to hear everything they find,” she demanded.
“Good coffee,” he said.
She paced toward the windows. “My mother told me stories of the phae.”
“I think every wereling mother did. Hard to keep a kid safe under the covers in bed with bogeyman tales when you are the bogeyman.”
Her lips quirked. “Yeah. She told me if I kept sneaking out at night, they’d steal the verita luna from me.”
He studied her over the rim of his mug. “What were you sneaking out for?”
She shrugged. “My grandmother wasn’t getting any younger, and since my mother wasn’t Alpha, I’d decided the more I ran, the sooner I’d change. I figured running under the moonlight would make me better.”
“I thought fighting would make me better. Takes more, doesn’t it?”
She gave him another look, more speculative this time. “Anyway, Mom was always trying to find a way to keep me home until she could finally turn me over to Grandmère.”
“According to my sources, your mother wasn’t stretching the truth too far.” He headed for one of the chairs pulled up in front of the windows, forcing her to follow, and settled into the deep, overstuffed cushions with an appreciative grunt. A heather-gray throw on the back of the chair tickled his nape, as if wanting to swathe him while he contemplated the view. “The phae Queen warps human desires into the magic that empowers her. Who knows what she would do with wereling passions?”
Merrilee lowered herself to the chair beside his but stayed perched on the edge. “Is that what you think this is about? The phae Queen coming after werelings?”
He shrugged. “I’m told the imps are her creatures, used for spying. This wasn’t a courtesy call.”
She drank the last of her coffee in one slug and surged to her feet. “I want to see what’s left of the imp.”
He looked at his coffee mournfully. With a huff, she plucked it from his hands and went to the kitchen to transfer it to a travel mug. She topped it off before screwing on the cap, and he felt an inexplicable surge of pleasure at the small kindness. It was good coffee.
They left the house after she fetched shoes and a coat, and she pulled the door closed behind them.
“Lock it,” he said. “Until we know what’s going on.”
Her jaw worked, but she nodded. “I’ll have to find the key. Go ahead and I’ll meet you there after I borrow a car.”
“I’ll take you down.”
“No, it’s fine. I’ll—”
“I’m going that way anyway.” He gave her a steady look, not a challenge—not quite. And then he slowly cocked one brow.
She stiffened. “Wait here.”
He leaned against the railing while he drank his good coffee and admired the shimmering lake and the impressive amount of noise she made banging around her office, muttering something about Alphas.