Dire Wolf Mates - Chapter 117: Chapter 117

The music got louder as the band switched from a power ballad to something faster, so folks could dance. Nica tapped her foot and shrugged, slightly embarrassed at being caught by her peer.
“I wasn’t staring exactly,” Nica mumbled, but Sheila just gave her a look.
“Yeah, right, but Nica, you can look all you want. Still, you should know that Demon Wolf right there is not like the others. Thor is deep. He’s got power and a temper, too,” Sheila informed her.
“Demon Wolf? Like he’s evil or something?” Nica asked, confused.
“Hell, no, girl. He ain’t evil,” the redheaded she-Wolf continued. “Thor is touched by the gods. He’s our Seer. That means he has the sight. You know, ancient Vikings didn’t use the term Demon like Christians do. You see, Demons were simply otherworldly beings. Folks like Thor, who have a foot on either side of the veil.”
“I knew he was special, but I had no idea,” Nica mused aloud, wonder lacing her tone.
“Yep. That Demon Wolf is pretty special. Look at those shoulders and thighs. No doubt about it, the man is s-p-e-c-i-a-l,” she spelled it out, thrusting her hips with each letter.
Nica rolled her eyes and laughed at Sheila, who giggled, and play bumped her on the shoulder. It was strange, but she felt a sort of camaraderie with the Dire Wolves she’d never felt with anyone back home.
No, not home, Nica corrected herself.
The place she’d been kept for close to six years had never been her home. She shivered, wishing things were different, wishing she were different. Her gaze wandered back to where Thor was checking the IDs of a group of young women, all giggling and pretty.
The females looked happy and free, confident with their tight clothes and made-up faces. Just out for a good time, she supposed. Nica could not help envying their easy looking lives. One even dared to flirt with the unusually large and somber male. Thor’s black gaze was on the blonde as she leaned in and spoke to him, her eyes smiling in invitation.
Something ugly and dark twisted in Nica’s gut, and she frowned, recognizing that feeling for what it was. Jealousy. But she had no cause for that. She didn’t have any claim on the stoic Dire Wolf Shifter. Behaving the fool was something she couldn’t afford nowadays. Nica had other worries, serious worries, but she couldn’t help but watch as he dealt with the trio of blonde beauties.
All three of them had the same golden stare and lithe physiques. They moved with a grace she identified as belonging to Feline Shifters only. Lionesses, if she had to guess. Serious Moonlight, the Dire Wolf MC’s roadhouse and bar, was located right on the border of Blue Valley, prime Pride territory.
They wore skintight jeans and crop tops with strips of tanned skin revealed through expertly cut rips in their clothing. Yeah, they looked good. Confident, too. Perky boobs and tight butts were on display, with their tiny little waists showing off belly button rings and chains.
Nica felt downright dowdy by comparison. She was short and leaning towards the chubby side, despite being a Raven Shifter. Where her animal form was fine-boned and capable of flying, her human body was thick and stocky, with more soft curves than sleek muscles.
She had dark brown curly hair that she usually pulled back into an untamed puff on top of her head. Unless she had hundreds of dollars to spend on conditioning treatments, which she did not, the frizz was a constant in her life. Then there was her face. She had smooth skin, clear of blemishes save for a few freckles on her nose.
But Nica was allergic to most makeup, so she never bothered with the stuff. Her eyes were nice. A bright, clear blue that was attractive, if not pretty. Still, Nica was the kind of girl who’d rather stay home in yoga pants and a t-shirt watching reruns of old sitcoms and eating ice cream out of the carton than get dressed up and go bar hopping.
Yep. That settled it. Nica would never attract a man like Thor. Still, she watched him as he handled the randy Lionesses without moving off his barstool. He was smooth and professional, allowing them entry but not entertaining any of their flirtations. The leader seemed determined. Bold, that one was, for sure.
Thor mostly ignored the female, and for some reason, that made Nica feel better. Her Raven croaked again, a rumbling sound that showed her animal’s content. At least the Demon Wolf, as Sheila had dubbed him, was as indifferent to the pretty Lioness group as he was to Nica.
She recalled how he’d reacted when, to her undying shame, Nica had sought him out after she’d recovered. Her healing sleep had lasted for nearly thirty-six hours after she’d fled her former Murder. Of course, her flight was on the heels of the Crow King’s cruel punishment that had left her naked and bleeding, tied to a post outside like an animal.
No. Not mine. They were never my Murder.
In the wild, a group of ravens was called an unkindness, but even then, they were rare. Ravens tended to live solitary lives, sometimes in pairs, but only that. There were so few Ravens, they often flocked to other Flight Shifters who were more common. Like Crows.
A group of Crow Shifters was called a Murder, and aptly so. The last one she belonged to held just about as much warmth as the word itself. Harsh and cold, the Crow king was a liar, but duty kept his good little soldiers in line, and no one had helped Nica while the male had beat on her. Some had joined in under his orders.
That memory was forever burned into her brain, destroying any kind thoughts she might have ever had about the Pine Murder. After Nica had finally woken from her healing sleep, she’d been full of sweet thoughts and gratitude towards the man who literally caught her before she could crash land on the unforgiving asphalt.
Thor was her savior, and she had to tell him how grateful she was. So, Nica had cornered him that very afternoon, gushing with emotion when she tried to thank him. His reply to her thankful praise echoed in her ears, and embarrassment filled her once more.
“Stop saying thank you. It’s done.”
No doubt about it. Thor Ulger was no fan of hers. He was ice. Frozen through to the bone, that one. Just a statue where a warm, breathing man should be, and she would do well to leave him alone. Some men were just like that. Cold, unfeeling brutes, incapable of affection and unwilling to form lasting relationships.
More memories swarmed inside her mind, sending shivers through her body. She’d learned her lesson about men the hard way. The first time she’d seen Jack Branwen, King of the Pine Murder, Nica was barely twenty years old. Green and gullible, she’d believed the older male when he told her he was in love with her and wanted to make her his queen.
Her widowed mother had been thrilled at the news and could not wait to ship her off. After a brief ceremony, Nica and Jack promised themselves to each other beneath a blooming cherry tree with his Beta, Emmet, and her mother as witnesses.
Oh, he’d been sweet then. Paying her compliments, the first she’d ever gotten from a man. Jack was never handsome, but he was so commanding, with his sharp features and fathomless eyes. He’d read her poetry, brought her roses and sweet cakes from the market near the place where she’d grown up in Maryland.
Jack was tall and lean, his face too hawklike to be truly handsome with his large nose and long black hair. He looked like something out of a Vampire romance. But he was no Vampire, he was a Crow. A King to his people. And Nica was so lucky he chose her. Wasn’t that what her mother said?
“You should be grateful, child, looking the way you do. Too fat to land a regular man, but he sees value in those wide hips of yours,” she snapped when Nica had hesitated about accepting his proposal. “You will not get a better offer!”
So, Nica accepted him at face value. She allowed him to court her, took his gifts, and believed his lies when he said he loved her and wanted her. She hadn’t questioned a thing.
What a foolish girl I’d been. I deserved what happened.
She shook her head, wiping a tear that escaped her eye before anyone could see it. Jack had done a real number on Nica. He loved playing his little games, making her apologize for things she didn’t even know she did wrong, and always making it feel like it was her fault when they disagreed or when she had a difference of opinion.
It was never about anything important until he wanted more than the chaste kisses she offered him whenever they returned from a date.
“I’m a man, Nica, not a boy. I need more from you.”
“I’m sorry, Jack. I don’t know how—I’m a virgin,” she’d confessed one night, guiltily.
“I see. You want a contract first. Fine, I’ll meet with your mother tomorrow.”.
True, they hadn’t done more than kiss, but she didn’t know what he meant by contract until her mother explained she was Jack’s the next night. Then she told Nica to wear her one good Sunday dress, and she drove her to the cherry tree where Ravens had been making their intentions known for years and years. Nica had heard stories about the promising ceremony, but she never expected to have one for herself.
Fear and excitement warred within her, but the sharp look on her mother’s face was as much incentive as the idea of finally getting out of her small hometown and the house she was raised in. Nica’s mother was never affectionate with her, and she wanted more from life than waiting tables.
Jack’s offer seemed too good to be true, but she wouldn’t learn about that till much later. After she’d signed the papers he’d thrust at her, and they spoke their promise to mate one another aloud as per the ceremony, Jack drove Nica to a cheap motel where he took her virginity with Emmet waiting outside the door—what a horrible disappointment that night was. Eye opening, too.
Sex was painful and messy, and over too damn quickly for her to do more than wince and gasp. Jack was angry at the way she’d received him, her lack of warmth. But she was a virgin, and he didn’t seem to care.
“Christ, that was rough. Let’s fuck off back to the trailer park. Maybe Ella and Denise can teach this little puritan something about sex before I have to bed her again.”
Oh, yeah. She’d heard every scathing thing he’d growled about her to Emmet while she’d been in the bathroom, using a damp washcloth to clean the blood from between her legs and soothe the hurt he’d left there. When she was finished, he demanded she get in the car, then Jack and Emmet drove her to the trailer park where he and the others in his Murder lived.
Nica was almost relieved when he put her inside a trailer with two other females and told she would have to wait her turn to marry the King. She didn’t understand, but when she questioned him, Jack told her the promise ceremony they’d had in front of her mother was just that, a promise to marry in the future.
“You ain’t the only one in line. Let’s see if you can hold my seed better than the others,” Jack said, nodding at her stomach.
Nica felt as if the floor had dropped out from under her. Not growing up in a Murder, she did not understand the politics. Apparently, Jack wanted her pregnant before he mated her. That was news to her. Nica wanted to finish school and maybe spend some time getting to know him first.
Thank goodness Ella and Denise had been kind upon her arrival. Ella was ten years older than Nica, with blonde hair and a tall, willowy frame. She was a Crow Shifter who had been promised to Jack since they were teenagers.
Denise was shorter than Ella, but still taller than Nica, with bronzed skin and sharp features and straight black hair. She had been brought in about two years before Nica. The Crow King was apparently desperate for an heir, and after failing to get either of them pregnant, he was still looking for a fertile female to be his Queen.
Lucky for Nica, she had started birth control back in high school to help regulate her period. Still, her reality had hit her hard. She was no treasured mate and there was no impending marriage.
Jack Branwen was a liar.
What she’d thought was the happiest time in her life turned out to be the worst. She was the third in line to mate the Crow King, and she paid her way by cleaning and cooking, doing laundry and other housework the females were told to do. She was made to quit her classes and all outside activity. Her life was to be dedicated to the Murder.
Funny thing was, pathetic as it might sound, Nica could have handled that. She would have done the dishes and washed the clothes, hell, she would have scrubbed the windows and the floors till her fingers bled, if only he loved her. But Jack never loved her. It didn’t take her long to realize that. Unfortunately, there was a reason a group of Birds like them was called a Murder—death was the only way to leave.
Unlucky at love. That’s what you are, Nica girl. Terribly unlucky.