Sassy Ever After: Mate of Honor (Kindle Worlds Novella) Read online

  “Po-tay-toe, Puh-tah-toe.”

  Not really, though, considering Evan and Lara were both wolves.

  “I’m a fox shifter, Tory. And worse, I have no family or pack to back me. I never had a shot with Evan Blackthorn. I knew that from the first moment I saw him. His father is the pack alpha. Lara is a wolf, like him. Her father is the pack’s enforcer, and her uncle is the pack’s second. She is basically royalty. They belong together.”

  “I still can’t believe you agreed to be her maid of honor.”

  Bailey couldn’t believe it either. “In my mind, I’d screamed, nooooooo! But the word yes tumbled out of my mouth.” After she’d already said she do anything for the person on the other end of the phone. To add salt to the wound, the stupid Deep Throat character never called back!

  “What about his brothers Luke or Dorian? I hear they are single and ready to mingle.”

  “Yuck. They are the biggest players. Besides, I’m not sure I want any man who has slept his way through the alphabet of female pack members.”

  “Experience is nothing to take lightly.” Tory wiggled her brows and shook her hips.

  “Not happening.”

  “What about his cousin Brad? He’s cute and single. And I hear he’s going to be one of the groomsmen. It could make for a really fun scenting ceremony, at least from what you’ve told me.”

  Bailey gave her a pithy glare. “I’m not his type.”

  “Who wouldn’t love a voluptuous vixen?” she asked.

  Bailey rolled her eyes at the vixen comment. As a fox shifter, she’d gotten vixen comments her whole life. “I have a vagina. He likes dick.”

  Tory’s mouth rounded in a small o. “I had no idea.”

  Bailey let her off the hook. “He just came out last year.”

  “Well, I’m sure there will be some hunka-hunka you can sink your teeth into at the party.”

  Bailey pulled her shoulders back. “I will not be participating in the scenting ceremony.”

  Tory gave her a disappointed frown. “Why not? You never know. You might enjoy yourself, or even better, you might really find yourself a mate.”

  “I would not enjoy myself. I don’t relish the idea of prancing around in fox form to be ignored by all the wolves. I mean, seriously, I got enough of that when I was growing up.”

  Bailey’s mother, Lana, had emigrated from Russia when she was five-years-old with the help of the Blackthorns. They owned one of the largest sporting good chains in the Midwest, and they used their long reach to help shifters and other paranormals who were desperate or in dire straits. Her mother had been both. Mr. Blackthorn, Evan’s dad, and his wife, Lila, had taken an interest in Lana. She worked as domestic help for them in the big house, and in return, they paid her a fair wage and let Bailey and her live in the carriage house on the estate.

  Which meant Bailey grew up with the Blackthorn Pack, but she was certainly not one of them. Not by a long shot.

  It didn’t help that her mother had been crazy. She believed she’d been touched by fortune with a gift for divination in the right circumstances. She used to ask Bailey if she ever saw anything before it happened. And when Bailey would tell her “no,” her mother would say, “Maybe it is good, malen'kiy kotenok moya.” Which meant “my little kitten” in Russian. “The gift only comes after great pain.” Bailey, who struggled to remember her mother’s face at times, never forgot her thick Russian accent. “I hope you are never touched by it.”

  Her mother’s nutty fortune telling shtick made fitting into the pack even harder.

  Lara Hout, Evan’s impending bride, was one of the only females in the pack to make Bailey feel like she sometimes belonged. She and Evan were Bailey’s confidants, her partners in crime, and she and Lara had both developed some serious feelings for the youngest Blackthorn child during their formidable years. When Mach Larson, a friend of Evan’s, had called Bailey a “fat bitch” during their eighth-grade year, Evan had jumped in like a knight in shining armor to her damsel in distress. How could she not love him?

  Because he loved Lara. That’s how. She had to get over this fantasy that she’d carried around with her for too many years.

  “I hear Forrest Blackthorn is putting in an appearance.”

  “Great. That’s all I need.”

  The oldest Blackthorn son used to look at Bailey like she was a bug that needed squashing. The first time she’d been introduced to him, she’d been eight-years-old. She and her mother had been at the Blackthorn estate for three years. Forrest walked in while Bailey sat in the library chair studying math while her mother cleaned. She’d never forget the suspicion in his dark blue eyes when he asked her who she was and why she sat in his father’s chair. Bailey couldn’t get out of the room fast enough to suit either her or him. He’d been twenty-two at the time, just out of his first four years of college.

  This had been a rare Forrest sighting, and over the next several years, his visits were just as infrequent. She only knew this because her mother wouldn’t let her come up to the Blackthorn Mansion aka “the big house” whenever the prodigal son arrived for home visits. It hadn’t bothered Bailey one iota. The man had a stick in his butt, and she’d often wished she could pull it out and make him play fetch with it.

  There had been one solace with Forrest’s visits: Evan liked him about as much as Bailey did, so he would hang out with her at the guest house when his brother came to stay.

  She’d loved those days. They had been few and fleeting.

  The last time she’d glimpsed Forrest Blackthorn had been right after her high school graduation. Mrs. Blackthorn included her in the party for Evan and Lara who had been dating for a year already. Bailey had felt completely out of place. There wasn’t a single person at the party for her except her mother. It drove home the fact that she was alone.

  She remembered Forrest so clearly that day as she spied on him from the ballroom window. He’d been standing outside on the back lawn, his arms crossed, and his expression grim. Much the same as the day he’d walked in on her in the library. Everyone at the graduation, young and old, was having fun. Excerpt for Forrest. And Bailey, of course. For a second, she saw a man who was as out of place in this crowd as she was and she stopped hating him. Until he turned around stared at her like she had four head and three legs.

  Bailey had scurried away from the window like a whipped pup.

  Bailey left for college when she turned eighteen, and before her first semester had ended, her mother had been killed in a car wreck. She’d remembered her mother’s paranoid words, “They are afraid of my truth, malen'kiy kotenok moya. They cannot let me live.” But the wreck had been an accident. A driver had fallen asleep at the wheel and drifted into her lane. The head-on collision had killed Lana instantly. The driver went into a coma that lasted months before he died as well. Mom’s funeral had been the last time she’d returned to the estate. Shifters live hundreds of years, so having her mom snatched from her at such a young age made going back to the Blackthorn land painful.

  So why had Bailey said yes to Lara?

  She threw the shirt Tory handed her on the bed and flopped down beside it. She cast a forearm over her face. “I can’t do it. I just can’t.”

  “You already said you would. You are the freaking maid of honor, Bailey. Quitting two nights before the wedding is not an option.”

  “I hate you.”

  “Because I’m right.”

  “Yes, because you’re right.”

  “I wish I was coming with you.”

  “You’re only saying that because you’re human.” Tory had been at the same high school as Bailey, so she had grown up aware of shifters and other creatures that go bump in the night, but they hadn’t become friends until college. Even so, she’d become as close a sister. “If you actually knew what a scenting ceremony entailed, you and your human sensibilities would go running for the hills.”

  “I would not.”

  She looked up at Tory, the bravest person she knew
, human or otherwise. Maybe she wouldn’t run. Maybe someone like her would be a perfect mate for a strong wolf. After all, Evan did have two other unmated brothers, not counting Forrest. Bailey grimaced. She wouldn’t wish the unpleasant wolf on her worst enemy. “Well…I can ask Lara if I can bring a friend.”

  “Are you bullshitting me? Because if you aren’t, my answer is not only yes, but fuck yes.”

  “I’ll call her. I’m sure she won’t mind.” And Tory would make a great buffer against the other bitchmaids, err…bridesmaids. Those ladies had snubbed the crap out of Bailey at the wedding shower.

  Tory jumped and squealed with excitement. “Yes, yes, yes!”

  “You are a bad ass lawyer, Tory. Bad ass lawyers don’t jump and squeal like thirteen-year-olds.”

  She stuck her tongue out at me.

  Bailey laughed. “They don’t do that either.”

  “Shut up,” she said. “I’m going home.”

  “But why,” Bailey whined. “I need your help.”

  “And I need to pick out an outfit for the party.”

  “Fine. Go. Leave me on my own. To weep. To wither.” Emotionally, of course, not physically, because Bailey planned to eat a piece of gooey cake she’d gotten at the bakery on the way home as soon as Tory left. “To die…”

  “Drama queen.”

  “I really am.” Bailey smiled. “Seriously. Go. Just meet me back here by seven o’clock tonight. The dinner is at eight, and it’s a forty-five-minute drive to the big house.”

  “You make it sound like jail.”

  “Little bit.” Bailey held up her hand and put an inch between her thumb and forefinger. She sat up on the edge of the bed.

  Tory leaned over and kissed her cheek. “You will survive this, Bailey.”

  She might survive a night of watching Evan and Lara groping each other, but she wasn’t sure her heart would. “Promises. Promises.”

  ****

  “Mom says don’t be late for the rehearsal dinner,” Blessing Blackthorn said. Her hair was cut in a short bob that framed her apple cheeks. Her eyes were the color of jade. He had a soft spot for his little sister, even if he didn’t always show it.

  Like now. “I know my duty to this family and this pack. I don’t need a reminder.” He’d been alpha for a week now. There had been a formal gathering of the Blackthorn Pack to announce his ascendancy to leadership. He got the feeling his people would have been happier keeping him in the role of CEO and out of pack politics. Well, tough shit.

  He’d had to meet with Jax Gold, Caleb Rahound, Tristan Wolfe, and Victor Silverback, and other alphas of some of the smaller clans. They’d offered congratulations and advice. Tristan Wolfe said, “Don’t take this gift lightly.”

  Forrest shook his head. “More like a curse.”

  “Every son, especially those who are alpha, must make their own way. You’ve turned your business into your pack, and your father knows that isn’t healthy. Employees aren’t family, a corporate office won’t love you, and your executives won’t always have your back. Not like a real pack will.”

  He wanted to tell Tristan to keep his advice to himself, but he kept his mouth shut. Let the politics begin.

  When the scenting ceremony was brought up, along with the fact that Forrest needed to find a suitable mate, Jaxon Gold, alpha for the Golden Falls Pack, quipped, “Wives are a handful.” He grinned.“But these,” he wiggled his fingers, “are two very happy hands.”

  The rest of the men in the group got a good laugh out of it, and the consensus was they agreed. The air was thick with testosterone, though, and when Victor Silverback mentioned Rocco, Rahound’s old pack alpha to Caleb, the new alpha for Rahound, the tension rose as well. This was why meetings between alphas were usually kept small and short.

  Tristan Wolfe, the eldest in the room, circled his finger in the air and whistled. “Time to wrap this up.”

  Victor Silverback was an old school asshole. He’d given Burn Blackthorn a little trouble back when Burn established his pack.

  “My daughter will be at the ceremony tonight,” he told Forrest when he met him at the door. “It would be a good match.”

  Forrest shook the offered hand but didn’t reply. The only good match there would be the one used to light the fuse on that keg of dynamite.

  Tristan nodded to Forrest as he left. “Welcome to the club.”

  As the rest of them left, Forrest felt less choked.

  The last alpha, Caleb Rahound, a pleasant young man, not nearly as confrontational or boisterous as the other men in the room, shook Forrest’s hand on his way out. “Good luck, man.”

  Forrest forced a smile. “Thanks.” He didn’t need luck, though. Tonight was going to be a disaster. What he really needed was an exit strategy.

  Chapter Three

  The long five-mile driveway into the Blackthorn compound made Bailey’s heart hammer in her chest. The way the trees grew up and over the paved road, blocking out both sun and moon, always scared her. It was as if they were trying to strangle anyone who dared breach their path.

  “Ease up, woman,” Tory said.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “You’re white-knuckling the steering wheel, and your neck is sweating.”

  “Damn it.” Bailey grabbed a tissue from the console and dabbed her neck and chest. “We should just turn around and go back.”

  “Uh-uh. When will I ever get another chance to see the inside of the infamous Blackthorn Mansion?”

  “Oh,” Bailey said. “I forgot. This is all about you tonight.”

  “Sarcasm doesn’t look pretty on anyone.”

  “Bitch, you know I make that shit work.”

  They both laughed, reminding Bailey why Tory Thames was her best friend in the first place.

  “You better now?” she asked as they passed a second security gate. “Besides, it would be a shame for you to not be seen tonight. You look fantastic.”

  Bailey had changed out of her jeans into an A-line flouncy skirt with a fall leaf print. She wore a sage green lace shirt that featured a half-sleeve, a deep V in the front, and a slight flare around the hips. “Yes, and I’m better.” Bailey smiled. “And thanks. It’s a new shirt.”

  “Well, it enhances you in all the right places.” She rubbed her hands together. “Now, let’s get inside because I’m on a wolf hunt tonight, and I can’t do that if I’m babysitting you.”

  “Don’t make me regret bringing you along.”

  The big house, a limestone three-story, fourteen thousand square foot mansion, was a bright contrast against the rich, green forest and the rolling hills surrounding the large structure. The cobblestone circle drive was lined with ten vehicles. Bailey was the last to arrive. Fantastic.

  “I don’t want to go inside,” she admitted.

  “You got this,” Tory said. “And I have your back.”

  Bailey nodded, steeling her courage. “I’ve got this.”

  “Damn straight.”

  “Okay.” She took in a deep breath and let it out as she loosened her grip on the steering wheel. “I’m ready.” She stepped out of the car and walked toward the front door. The brown cut out high heels she wore pinched her feet. “I should’ve worn wedges.”

  “Oh no you shouldn’t have,” Tory said. “Girl, everything about you tonight looks perfect.”

  Rachel Meadow, one of the bridesmaids, had strolled up behind Bailey and Tory. She straightened her peach wrap-around dress and touched her shiny, brown hair. “Those heels are getting a workout,” she said pleasantly as she eyed Bailey’s shoes.

  “Bitch says what?” Tory muttered.

  “What?” Rachel asked.

  Tory and Bailey giggled. They were saved from more of Rachel’s vitriol when the door opened, and a woman dressed in black and white welcomed them inside.

  “This place is huge,” Tory said as they walked into the entry. The floors were hand sanded hardwood, the ceiling was vaulted to the third floor, and accented wit
h exposed joists that matched the floor. The walls were textured like plaster and painted the color of buttercream, the only difference Bailey noted. They used to be a pure white, and the hint of yellow gave off warmth the entry lacked before.

  A woman with strawberry blonde hair and hard eyes ushered them through the foyer and toward the ballroom. She didn’t give her name. Bailey’s stomach ached. Her name wasn’t Forrester. She was the help. Like Bailey’s mom.

  The sounds of voices and laughter nearly sent Bailey in the opposite direction. This was the first time she’d have to face Evan after all these years. The first time she’d have to face her feelings for him. Was she strong enough to let him go? She hoped so.

  Tory squeezed her shoulder. “This place is amazing. I can’t believe you grew up here.”

  “Well, if by here you mean about a half-mile away in the guest house, then yeah, I grew up here.”

  “What are you doing out here?” a man said from behind them as they stood outside the ballroom entrance.

  Bailey froze. She recognized the voice immediately as the same someone who had asked her why she sat in his father’s chair.

  Forrest Freaking Blackthorn.

  Well, she wasn’t a little girl anymore or his servant’s daughter. He had another thing coming if he thought he could push her around now. She turned on him, intent on telling him exactly how she felt about his bully attitude, but when she saw him all the words stuck in her throat.

  Holy crapola. Forrest Blackthorn was nearly as tall as his father, which meant he towered over Bailey. He wore a sky-blue polo shirt that hugged his biceps and his chest, tapering down his long, narrow waist. His jeans fit him a little loose in the waist but tightened over his hips and thighs. Bailey’s gaze roamed back up his body to his chiseled cheekbones, his straight Roman nose, his wide full mouth, and the deep cleft in his chin. Forrest’s indigo eyes widened, and his nostrils flared as Bailey’s eyes finally met his.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  The question snapped her out of the trance his appearance had put her in. “I’m the maid of freaking honor. Who are you?”

  Forrest’s brow wrinkled as he squinted at Bailey. “Have I seen you before?” He dipped his head and sniffed the air around her. “You’re not a wolf.”