The Beast in Him

CHAPTER 28

Smitty barely stopped himself from snatching the keycards from the poor woman at the front desk. He had no idea what he looked like, but after three minutes, her hand started to shake and she couldn’t get him through the check-in process fast enough. He stormed away from the desk and toward the elevators, brushing past his sister and Ronnie Lee as he stalked toward the elevators.

“Bobby Ray, wait.”

“Leave me be, Sissy.”

He slammed his fist against the elevator button and the doors smoothly slid open. He walked inside and his sister’s hand slapped against the frame. “There’s something I need to—”

He barked and snapped at her fingers, almost taking them off, and his sister jumped back about ten feet. The doors closed and he hit the button for his floor.

He couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe her. What the hell did she want from him anyway? He’d offered her a proper Smith courting. He risked abuse at every family reunion for that, but he was willing to do it. For her! And what does she do? She throws it back in his face like it meant nothing.

She also had the nerve to be angry at him. She won’t tell him what’s wrong. Won’t tell him why she’s so mad. And doesn’t want him to mark her. But while she’s fighting him, in the same goddamn conversation, she admits she loves him.

“That’s it,” he snarled to himself. “That is goddamn it.” He’d throw his crap into his room; then he’d find that little gal and he’d find out exactly what the hell was going on. He’d hit the end of his leash, and she’d damn well know it.

Smitty opened the door to the hotel room he’d gotten himself so he could be near the crazy woman he loved while his team secured the wild-dog’s den and tossed his bags and jacket inside.

Busy kicking the sleeve of his jacket away from the door so he could close it and go search out Jessie, for the first time in his entire life, Smitty never saw it coming. Didn’t scent it. Didn’t hear it.

He just never saw it—or him—coming.

“Boy.”

At the gruff words, Smitty froze.

“So your sister called and said you’re fucking up your life again. And why does this not surprise me? You were always a little bit dumber than the others.”

Smitty closed his eyes and thought of all the wonderful ways he’d eviscerate his baby sister, before turning to face Bubba Ray Smith. His daddy.

Jess stood on the corner on the far side of the hotel and seethed. She didn’t even need her coat she was so goddamn mad. Courting her? And what? Dinners? Dancing? Dates? What in all holy hell led him to believe she wanted to be courted?

She needed to score some chocolate. She needed it so goddamn bad she might actually shut down a Godiva store at this point.

She looked up the street. There has to be a goddamn chocolate store somewhere on this street. Or maybe inside. But Bobby Ray was inside. No, she’d have to go find it down the street or freeze to death trying.

But before Jess could take a step, before she could hope to make a run for it, a voice behind her froze her in her tracks.

“Well, well, well. Jessie Ann Ward. As I live and breathe.”

Jess closed her eyes. No, no, no. Anyone but this. Smitty. Sissy Mae. Even Big-Boned Bertha. But not her.

“I’m not gonna bite, suga. You can turn around.”

She did—and faced Smitty’s momma. Janie Mae Lewis, originally of the Lewis Pack out of Smithville, North Carolina. Built like a first-string linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys and quite beautiful, the female smoked a rolled cigarette and stared at Jess through the smoke. Smitty had gotten his mother’s eyes. Only hers were harder. Colder. Even Sissy’s eyes weren’t that cold.

“Miss Janie... I... uh... ”

“Lord, stop your stuttering, girl.” She smiled... sort of. “I always did make you nervous. The dog in you just wants to run away, don’t it?”

She was right. Where Jess ran from the other She-pups because they’d outnumbered her and she’d gotten tired of getting her ass kicked, she outright avoided Miss Janie. Even though the female had never been anything but polite and somewhat kind, there’d always been something about her—that lone lioness separated from the Pride because she threatened the others’ cubs.

“My, my. Jessie Ann Ward. Look at you.” She took a long drag on her dwindling cigarette. “You’ve always been adorable but now... ” She smiled... sort of. “I wasn’t surprised to hear my youngest boy locked on to you. He’d always had a mighty hunger for little Jessie. Went out of his way to protect you, course it always backfired. Set some of them girls against you somethin’ fierce knowin’ he wanted you and not them. At least he didn’t want them for the long haul. Just a quick fuck in the back of that old pickup truck he used to drive. But you were special. He wanted to give you much more than that.”

Oh, God. Please make her stop. But she knew Miss Janie wouldn’t stop until Miss Janie was damn good and ready.

“Daddy.”

“Boy.”

Must he continue to call him that? The older four at least had adequate nicknames—“Stupid,” “Idiot,” “Fuckhead,” and Smitty’s personal favorite, “Shit for Brains.” But Smitty always remained “Boy.”

“So is it true?” his daddy grumbled.

“Is what true?”

“That you’re too much of a pussy to take your woman? To take what’s yours?”

The old man had been saying that to him since the day Smitty had graciously—at least he’d thought it gracious—let Rory Reed take his Big Wheel. He knew he’d get it back, but he didn’t see a point in dragging the boy off it and beating him to death for spending more than five minutes on the damn thing. But his daddy had a fit. Calling him weak and telling him, “What? You’re too scared to take it, you big pussy?” Yes. Every seven-year-old boy should be called “pussy.”

Smitty didn’t “take it” because the Reeds were like family. Especially with Sissy Mae and Ronnie Lee being thick as thieves. But reason and logic meant nothing to Bubba Smith. Never had, never will.

“Exactly how do you think you’ll grow this Pack when you don’t even have the guts to claim your woman? Do you think them Reed boys will let you lead when they know they can take it from you at any time?”

Smitty had two options here: tear his father’s throat out and do twenty-five to life in a state-run prison like his Uncle Eustice, or spend the rest of the day arguing with the man for no reason.

As Smitty wondered how tough Sing Sing prison could really be, it suddenly occurred to him that he did have a third option. An option he’d never tried before.

“I don’t have to explain a damn thing to you.”

His father stared at him blandly. “What?”

“You heard me. I don’t have to explain anything to you. I don’t answer to you. Or anyone. This is my Pack. My woman. I can handle this any damn way I please. So you need to move your fat ass out of my way.”

Smitty didn’t wait for his father to do that; instead, he calmly walked around him, heading toward the elevators. Even as he felt rage, he also felt like he’d turned a corner. Like now everything in his life was different.

He needed to find Jessie Ann. He needed to find her now.

“You know, boy,” his father said behind him and Smitty didn’t stop to hear the old coot out, “it’s about time you figured that out. I guess the Navy smarted you up some, huh?”

Smitty didn’t turn around until he got on the elevator. His father still stood there, watching him. Then, the old wolf grinned at him and winked before ambling away.

The doors closed and Smitty snarled, “Bastard!” Completely terrifying the rich couple standing next to him.

The older female dropped her cigarette to the ground and pulled out papers and tobacco to roll another.

Not knowing what else to say, Jess went with polite. “And how are you doing, Miss Janie?”

“Can’t complain. Not that anyone would listen if I did.”

“And you’re just visiting? Here to see Bobby Ray and Sissy?”

“Darlin’,” she said on an annoyed sigh, “must we really stand around in this cold bullshittin’ each other. I am so not in the mood.” A surprisingly dainty tongue lashed out and swiped along the paper before she sealed it. “We both know why I’m here.”

“Uh... we do?”

Those cold wolf eyes sized Jess up in a heartbeat. “I thought by now you would have gotten my boy to mark you. What exactly are you waitin’ for?”

Feeling her temper—and that desire to throw things at Miss Janie’s big, fat head—sliding out of her, Jess said softly, “I am so positive this isn’t your business.”

“All my sons are my business, little girl. Don’t you forget it.”

“Smitty’s taking his time,” Jess finally answered in the face of those cold wolf eyes daring her for a challenge. “Apparently he’s not big on rushing.”

Miss Janie gave one of those sorta-smiles. “No, he’s not. He likes to think. Likes to plan, my boy does. Still... ”

Jess looked up as a plume of smoke hit her dead in the face. Bitch.

“Still?” Jess asked around several coughs.

“Everyone thinks the Smith males are all the same, but they’re not.” Miss Janie leaned back against the brick wall of the hotel. “Each of my boys is different. And the same with Bubba and his brothers.”

There went that sorta-smile again. “But even the slowest movin’ wolf don’t wanna hunt some prey that’s just sittin’ there starin’ at him. Waitin’ for him to notice her. Sure, he’ll eat it. But it won’t be half as satisfying as the one he has to chase over miles of untouched land, until he runs her down.”

Jess blinked. “All right then.”

“I can tell ya what my boy’s planning ’cause I do know him so well.” She took another long drag on her cigarette, knowing she had a rapt audience. “You see he’ll wanna do it right. This is Jessie Ann we’re talking about after all. Sweet little innocent with her big dumb dog eyes, just beggin’ for someone to scratch her belly.”

“Hey.”

“His biggest worry will be scaring you off. He never wants to see regret in those big brown eyes. That’s probably why he’s taking so long. Fighting his instincts. Fighting his own needs. Maybe he even thought about courtin’ you. Like that’ll go down well with the family. But it won’t matter ’cause it’s you. But to get this movin’, he’ll suck up enough until you accept his apology, and then today, tomorrow... next year... when he thinks the time is right, he’ll take you to a real nice hotel. Some place he can’t afford, but he’ll put it on his card. He’ll make sure there are clean sheets and champagne. Flowers, if you’ve a mind for that. Or chocolates, if that’s more your style. He’ll take ya nice and sweet on those clean sheets. And that’ll be your life for the next forty or fifty years. Nice and sweet and oh-so-clean.”

If I set myself on fire... would she stop talking?

Besides, Jess already knew this. She’d known this from the beginning.

“I don’t know you all that well, but I do know dogs. And dogs like it rough and tumble just like the wolves, unless you’re one of those prissy little pillow dogs. If that’s the case, maybe he’ll put some bows in your hair and give you a pink studded collar.” She laughed at her own joke and didn’t seem to mind that Jess didn’t.

“Look at this.” Miss Janie finally said, tugging her down jacket off her shoulder and pulling her thick pink cableknit sweater aside, revealing an age-old wound. Flesh that had been torn and ripped, more than once based on the healed-over scars on top of scars. “That first time, when he made me his, bastard nearly tore my shoulder out. Best night of my life, though. And we’ve repeated that night—often.”

She dropped the remains of her cigarette—no more than a stub now—at her feet. “Mind if I give you a little advice, suga?”

“I’m relatively certain I could cut your throat and you still wouldn’t stop talking.”

The older woman threw back her head and laughed. A rich, deep, somewhat frightening sound. “You’re probably very right about that. Bubba always said nothing he loves and hates more about me than my directness. But I promise. Last bit and then I’m done.”

Shrugging, Jess knew she had to let the female finish. No matter what happened between Bubba Smith and his sons in the eternal Smith fight for dominance, Jess didn’t see Miss Janie giving over her mantle of power to another female anytime soon.

“Make him chase you down, suga. Make him hunt for you.” Miss Janie stepped toward her until they were barely a few inches apart and whispered, “Because we both know... you are just achin’ to be caught.”

Jess slowly looked up at the woman Smitty endearingly called “Momma.” They didn’t say another word to each other. They didn’t have to.

The automatic hotel doors slid open and four older She-wolves walked out.

“Janie Mae,” one of them called out, “I thought we were goin’ shoppin’.”

“Oh, we are. I’ve got Bubba’s credit card and miles of jewelry stores to explore before the night falls.”

“He’ll be mad,” one of the females reminded her with a smile, “when he finds out you spent money.”

“Guess he’ll just have to punish me then, won’t he.”

I could make a run for it. I might be able to lose them in the city traffic.

Miss Janie pointed at Jess. “Y’all, you remember little Jessie Ann Ward, don’t ya?”

The women stood around her now and Jess, at her cool five-nine, felt surrounded by giants.

“Of course!”

“How are you, darlin’?”

“Isn’t she just the prettiest little thing?”

Jess smiled and nodded and tried to wish them all away. Miss Janie must have seen it in her eyes because she suddenly walked toward the corner. “Come on, y’all.”

“They say a snowstorm’s comin’, Janie Mae,” one of them informed her.

“Then we better get a move on. I’m thinkin’ there’s a diamond necklace with my name on it.”

Miss Janie stopped at the corner and looked at Jess. She smiled. A big one and real. Almost warm. “Don’t forget what we talked about, suga. I won’t say being with a Smith is easy—” the older She-wolves snorted and laughed at her statement—“but it’ll be the best ride you ever have.”