Page 10 of Were-Geeks Save a Kitten

There were a lot of smart-ass responses he could make, but once again, Gelpack could out-patience a rock. Yordan decided to give the question a serious answer.

“Anything that intentionally hurts or endangers another person.” And he wasn’t so sure on the intentional part.

“How many such actions are necessary to become an asshole?”

Again, there was no emotion in the question. It could have been asked by a computer. Maybe that was what Gelpack was. Either way, Yordan had no answer.

“How the fuck do I know? It depends on how often and on how serious the asinine things are.”

Gelpack didn’t respond, but then again, he didn’t really need to. The next question was obvious. Had Yordan done things without regard to other people’s feelings or the injuries that might occur? Of course, yes. Had he intended for Joey to get thrown into a tree? No. But he’d lit a fuse when he’d poked at Fuse. And never had a guy’s handle been more accurate. Then he’d sat back and laughed as Joey had landed hard against a tree and their day’s work had turned into fighting gators in a swamp.

And that was the most recent example of him being a dick.

All during the long drive up from Florida, Yordan had stewed on what he’d been doing. Gummy was right. He’d never been this reckless before, and yet the last three months had seen him becoming increasingly obnoxious.

The question was, why?

“I’ve been feeling twitchy lately,” he finally confessed. “Like an itch right at the base of my brain. Don’t ask me why because I don’t know. I just keep thinking about everyone who has died.”

They’d lost so many in the past eighteen months. Not all of them died. In fact, most of them opted out after facing ghouls and psycho fairies, monsters of every ilk and mundanes who thought up every stupid excuse not to see what was right in front of their noses. So many of their fighting forces had simply thrown up their hands and called it quits. They wanted to settle down, have families, and not risk their lives on the latest demon doll that caught the public consciousness. Thanks to the internet, new scary monsters were popping up everywhere, and whack-a-demigod got old really fast.

Yordan had considered stopping as well, but unlike the others, he had no one to go home to, no family outside of Wulf, Inc. His mother and older brother were long dead, both from overdoses. He’d never known his father. Even the town he’d grown up in had been sucked into the Wisconsin dead zone. The best thing that had ever happened to him was getting bit by a preteen werewolf who’d thrown himself into horror flicks until he’d become one.

Both of them had been scooped up into Wulf, Inc., and suddenly, Yordan and Coffee (real name Dwayne) had an entire werewolf family. They’d both thrived here, and while Yordan had worked with Gummy, Coffee had joined Nero’s elite pack.

Coffee died a few weeks before the Wisconsin black hole of death appeared. Which meant Yordan had no close friends left except Gummy, who was now calling him an asshole.

Hell, was he a loser or what?

“I’m not going to be a dick anymore, okay?” He didn’t exactly know what he was going to do or how he was going to apologize to Gummy, but he wasn’t going to continue like this. Twitchy, acting out, and never thinking beyond the boom in the next gator mound. He was too old to be acting like a moody teenager.

But what was he going to do? He felt so alone sometimes that causing an adrenaline rush—even a stupid one—was the only way to fill the emptiness.

He finished off the last of the beer. Maybe figuring out what fairy bullshit was going on at the motor pool would distract him for a bit. And while he was doing that, he was going to decide whether it was time to quit Wulf and find a gay bar somewhere. Maybe one in Scotland with a whole bunch of redheads with pert behinds.

He looked back at Gelpack. “Any other questions?”

“Thank you for your time. I will let you know if I require more definitions.”

Oh joy.

Chapter 5

And the Winner of the Wet T Is...

Yordan moved quickly upstairs, feeling like he’d been beaten to hell and back. He was too young to feel an all-nighter like this. He really didn’t want to talk to anyone, so he avoided the kitchen and living spaces, heading to the bedroom wing without seeing anyone. He’d lived here for almost two years ages back, and so he went for his usual room, second to last on the left. But in order to get there, he had to pass down a long hallway of emotional land mines.

Nero’s combat pack lived here, and they’d taken the nearest rooms for their own. But before Nero commanded the geek squad, he’d had the slickest, best pack in Wulf history. Or so they’d claimed. And then they’d died in a hideous demon hunt gone wrong.

Yordan had known them, most when they’d come to HQ for initial training. Shit, every inch of the mansion held memories, but the bedroom wing was a barrage of things that were lost, people who were gone, and opportunities that would never come again.

He touched Mother’s door first. That was her handle because she loved to say, “I’m not your mother. Clean up your own shit.” She was badass through and through and could shoot the wings off a fly with her Beretta, but she had a secret love of all things dragon that he’d discovered on her second day in training. Dragon mythology, dragon tattoos, Dungeons & Dragons, and even dragonflies.

His lips curved in memory at how he’d teased her about her obsession, and out of reflex or nostalgia, he tried her doorknob. The door opened easily, and he braced himself to see someone else’s things inside. Any of the new geek recruits, maybe. Or just the bland sameness of a basic guest room.

He winced. This room was occupied by a Star Trek geek, by the look of things. Not to mention the large pile of MCU graphic novels in the corner. Yordan shut the door before he accidentally smashed a cardboard model Enterprise.

He should have just gone on then. Straight to his bedroom and oblivion, but instead, he found himself looking into each bedroom door, to every single member of Nero’s team that had died. He’d known these people, trained and gotten drunk with them. It was only the luck of the draw that he’d been with Gummy’s team instead of with them when a psycho demon had wiped them from the planet.