Page 8 of Wolf It Down, Knot Me Up

My grandma stiffens, chin raised. “I am not letting go of the Crimson Pine Lodge, Gerald. We’ve had this conversation several times. I recall each one. I broke my ankle, not my head.”

The mayor laughs, hands up as if in defense. “Eve. I’m just here to help, but you need to be honest with yourself. There’s a lot of land for you to manage on your own, and you aren’t getting any younger to be alone out there.”

My jaw almost hits the bed.

“She’s not alone,” I pipe in. “That’s why I’ve come home. I can stay and work as long as she needs me. So now you can sleep peacefully at night, Mr. West.”

He turns the greasy smile on me. “Admirable,” he insists. “But between us, is that forest safe for a young Omega on her own? Especially after the terrible incident that happened to you out there just yesterday. Heard all about that attack.” He shakes his head.

I glare at the man playing this game. “News travels fast around here,” I say lightly.

“Small town.” He tucks his hands into the pockets of his pants. “I make it my business to know when one of my townspeople gets injured.”

Before I decide to bare my teeth, a nurse bustles in with a blood pressure cuff and zero patience. “Sorry, folks, I need the room for a few minutes. Visitors out, please, until I’m done with Eve.”

I stand up and walk myself into the hallway, refusing to use the wheelchair in front of this man. He follows.

“You appear to be a sensible young woman,” the mayor starts.

Nope.

“Your grandmother is a wonderful woman but stubborn, and that’s going to get her in trouble, like how she ended up in the hospital. You can help her.” He angles down toward me, and my skin crawls. “Help her see reason that if she sold the lodge, she’d never worry about money again, and neither would you. Don’t you want her to enjoy her life?”

My stomach turns as alarm bells go off. For as long as we’ve been living in the woods, we’ve had someone trying to buy it from us, because ultimately, the piece of land my grandma owns boasts acres of untouched forest. She gets a say on how much logging she permits, but of course, everyone else sees dollar signs. The new mayor seems no different.

The problem is that my grandma is getting old, and aside from me, there’s no one else in the family she’d leave the lodge to. I don’t plan to settle down. I love my grandma, but I decided a long time ago that I’m not a family person. Because what if I discover I’m a horrible person like my real parents? What if I abandon my children just like they did with me? I’m not sure I could live with myself…

“I’ll think about it,” I say sarcastically. Then we stand there in silence for a few moments before the nurse pokes her head out. “You can come back in.”

I’m through the door before the mayor finishes straightening his jacket. He follows just long enough to perform his farewell, a little bow to Grandma, then he gives me a knowing look and strolls out of the room.

I grind my teeth and say nothing until I’m certain he’s a fair distance from us.

“You can’t sell to him,” I blurt out the second his footsteps fade. “Grandma, that man is…”

“Oh, don’t worry about him. I’ve outlasted worse men in my life.” She pats the bed until I join her again. “Now, before Ethan arrives, you’re going to tell me all about Miami.”

I laugh softly and lean against her. “I missed you so much.” Then I tell her everything. Losing my job, the parts of Miami I loved, the things I definitely didn’t, even showing her photos on my phone that somehow never made it into our messages.

Being back here, tucked against her side, I realize just how much I needed this. Grandma has never been like family. She is my family. The only person who’s ever chosen me every single day of my life. The lodge is where I learned to bake, climbed trees, and scraped my knees. If helping her means putting my own life on hold, then it isn’t even a decision. I’ll do anything for her.

3

ROMAN

Twelve hours since I sank my teeth into an Omega I’ve never met before, and her scent hasn’t left me. “Fuck me.”

I pour coffee into the thermos lid, but little has been steady inside of me since yesterday. The coffee is the real stuff, ground this morning because after years of prison coffee that tasted like burnt water, I don’t drink garbage anymore.

I set the lid on the stump I’ve been using for a table. We dropped this pine last week, and I cut the stump flat and square afterward because I prefer a table I made to one I bought. My father was the same. Everything in our cabin in Brazil, he built, and he’d slap the table and say a man should be surrounded by his own work.

The morning is a good one for hauling. Fog’s burning off late, which means the creek’s running high and cold, and the sun’s finally punching through the canopy in long slats between the trunks. Air’s cool enough to keep a man working without sweating through his shirt by noon. Tiny chickadees are going at it all around me in the tree, and that’s fine by me. It’s when the birds shut up that I pay attention.

We’re clearing a half acre off the east trail for Eve. She wants camping platforms out here, firepits, some experience she can sell to lodge guests, and the timber goes to the mill for cash. So this morning I’ve been bucking the last fall into lengths and spray-marking on the next line of trees to fall.

An engine comes up the fire road in low gear, gravel popping. Burgundy pickup, more mud than paint, one headlight strapped in. Grayson parks the thing and swings out of the cab, ink from wrist to neck, sleeves shoved up, and bangs the door shut hard enough to lift the chickadees out of the county.

“Hey, Roman.” He grins across the clearing at me. “How many trees did you take down this morning, big man? Forest surrender yet?”