“You okay, Prez? You look like shit.”
He barely managed a smirk at his brother. “Just tired as fuck.” He rocked back on his heels again.
“Whoa.” Monster caught him before he collapsed. “You’re not riding. You’re sleeping here.”
“No. Home. Cass.”
Monster must’ve understood. Prowler was slightly aware of getting loaded into a cage and the being put to bed with his brothers debating over undressing him or not.
After that … nothing but black.
EIGHT
TAYLOR
Prowler said he loved her. Three words she never expected but wanted more than she’d realized. Well actually, it was just two—love you—but who needed the I? It was obvious the speaker was the I. Love you was efficient.
She giggled. Literally giggled to herself as she headed out of her half-open garage, barefoot.
“Nope.” She tiptoe-hopped back as soon as her feet practically caught fire. Her drive was paved in lava.
“Duh, Tay, it’s Vegas.” Once inside, she slipped her now decidedly cooler tootsies into some slides. She planned to just pop over really quick and tell Prowler …
What? What did she plan to tell him?
Love you too?
The whole wolf thing is …
“What the fuck?” she asked herself before she opened her front door.
Did he really admit to being a werewolf?
“That’s impossible. Shifters aren’t real.” Taylor paced back and forth, talking to herself. The clop and shuffle of her slides on the hardwood floor created a soothing rhythm.
“I mean, they’re hot as hell in books, but real? Nah. If shifters are real, someone would’ve seen them by now. Surely the government would … not tell us shit if they knew. But Booktok. Yeah, they would’ve definitely tracked them down, humped them silly, and posted all about it.”
She laughed again, but this time it was more hysterical, less giggle.
“Hysterical—that’s a sexist fucking word. Like only women get a little crazy now and then. Why not testiria? Men get crazy too.” Ugh, she was losing her ever-loving mind.
“Deep breath, you’re getting off topic, sister. Why not just look him in the eye and talk about it? Surely if it was even the most remote of possibilities, I’ll be able to tell face-to-face.”
Opening her front door, she saw Prowler hugging his ex. This time, he wasn’t an inactive victim, but the initiator.
Taylor closed the door before she jumped to conclusions. They share a child, for fuck’s sake. She refused to live in a perpetual state of jealousy. Not only would that destroy her soul, but it was also a relationship killer. If they were going to make a run at being a couple, there had to be trust.
That would start now. As much as it hurt, she had to try. “It’s not right to make Prowler pay for the trust another broke.”
Taylor repeated that to herself over and over until she felt it. There was only one thing to do—make a list. Taylor couldn’t explain it, but she found comfort in lists. She was sure her therapist would circle it back to her childhood and taking control now after the trauma she suffered then. It seemed everything in therapy, up until recently, circled back to that.
“Ha, look at that. I just saved myself a two-hundred-dollar session, Dr. Fayne.”
When she heard Prowler’s bike roar to life and fade away, she texted Cass.
Taylor: Wanna come over and stuff our faces with vegan ice cream and watch Jay and Silent Bob?
Cass: Not tonight. My stomach doesn’t feel so hot. Raincheck?
