The Beast & the Storm

The soft light of a Minnesota morning begins to bleed through the sunroof, warming the quilt just enough to pull me out of a dreamless sleep… I don’t need to open my eyes to know exactly where I was… the gentle weight of Princess Emmalyne is settled against my hip, while Smudgie Brat is likely already perched on the kitchenette counter, waiting for the first sign of life…

Outside, the heavy, rhythmic drumming of the rain that chased me into the campground last night has faded to a dull drip. I lay there for a second, staring up at the patch of sky, trying to shake the memory of the “welcome committee” from the evening before.

The two of them were hunkered down under a sagging canopy across the gravel road, surrounded by a small mountain of empty cans and that specific brand of loud, wet laughter that usually means trouble.

“Need a hand there, little girl?” one had hollered, his voice thick with cheap beer and an arrogance he hadn’t earned. He obviously peaked in high school and still uses the same caveman grunts to try and impress the ladies.

I gave them a polite wave—the kind of wave that is supposed to say I’m fine, thanks but usually just acts as an invitation to men like that. They misinterpreted the gesture immediately, swaggering over to stand far too close to me, smelling of old sweat and desperation and offering me a lukewarm beer like it was a key to my bus or somewhere far more intimate.

I managed to hook up the electric, water and septic and shut the door on their grinning faces, but the feeling of their eyes on the “home” I’d built with my own two hands stayed with me.

A sharp meow from Smudgie snaps me back to the present… she is right… I can’t hide behind the curtains forever… I paid for the hookup, the batteries are topped off, and as much as I hate the idea of seeing those beer bellies again, the road is calling…

I sit up, the air in the bus feeling thick and charged in a way I can’t quite explain… my skin feels prickly, like the air right before a lightning strike…

I climb down the three steps from the platform bed, my feet hitting the soft rug as Smudgie immediately begins weaving through my ankles… her tail is a perfect, demanding question mark, letting me know that in her world, breakfast is already ten minutes late…

“I hear you, brat… hold your whiskers for five minutes,” I mutter, heading into the tiny space that houses my compost toilet and shower… It’s a tight squeeze, but it’s mine…

After washing my hands in the small kitchenette sink, I keep up the conversation with Smudgie while I plate up the morning feast for her and Emmy… “There you go, girls… eat up so we can get some miles behind us…”

While they are occupied, I move through my own morning rhythm… I brush my teeth and wrestle my hair into something manageable, then fire up the Keurig for that first, life-giving cup of coffee… The bus smells of French Roast and peace… I smooth the quilt over the bed, pull on my jeans and a fresh shirt, and make quick work of the few dishes in the sink…

The Beast is almost ready…

I pull back the curtains, letting the Minnesota morning light flood the space, and set my coffee safely in the driver’s side cup holder… taking a deep breath, I step outside to face the “real world”… I move quickly, unhooking the electric, water, and septic lines and tucking them back into their exterior storage bays…

I glance across the gravel road, bracing myself for a comment or a stare, but the site is quiet… No beer cans clinking, no “little girl” comments… I feel a wave of relief wash over me as I open the side hatch to clean the litter box, finish up, and climb back inside to wash my hands…

“And we’re off!” I tell the girls, settling into the driver’s seat…

I turn the key, expecting the familiar, comforting roar of the engine…

Click… click… click…

Silence…

My heart sinks… I try again, but the Beast just groans and gives up… It was then that I look out the front windshield… Across the gravel, the two creeps have finally emerged, lounging in their chairs with fresh beers already in hand… they aren’t yelling this time… they are just sitting there, wearing identical, oily smirks that tell me everything I need to know…

They didn’t just watch me all night… they touched my Beast…

I sit there for a long beat, my fingers still wrapped around the key, staring through the glass at those two smug faces… I force my hand to stay steady—I’m not shaking, I’m not—as I reach for my phone on the dash…

Dead… Zero bars…

Of course… The Minnesota woods have swallowed my signal whole…

I lean back against the headrest, a dry, hysterical laugh bubbling up in my throat… if this were one of those horror movies we watched back in Ohio, this would be the exact moment the audience would have to take a drink…

No cell service? Check… Isolated campground? Check… Two locals who look like they are auditioning for the role of ‘Villain #2’? Double check…

It’s a ridiculous, overused trope, and yet, there is that sudden, sharp gulp in the back of my throat that I can’t quite swallow down… It isn’t a movie when it’s your life, and it isn’t funny when you are alone in a built-out bus that feels less like a sanctuary and more like a cage in the moment.

Across the gravel, the louder of the two raises his can in a mock toast… He knows… He knew I was stuck, and he knows I can’t call for a tow…

I look at Princess Emmalyne, who has turned to watch me with wide, knowing eyes… Smudgie is still licking a paw, oblivious, but I can feel that prickly heat returning to my skin… only this time, it isn’t just frustration… It’s the beginning of a cold, hard rage…

They think they’d caught a “little girl” in a trap… they didn’t realize they’d just cornered someone who had nothing left to lose but the road…

***

The damp earth of the Moon Shadow pack’s perimeter is smooth beneath my paws as I lope through the dense Minnesota pines… Knight and Rhett are just behind me, a brown blur and a streak of gold, flanking their Alpha as we make our final sweep of the morning… the air smells of wet pine and distant rain, clean and uncomplicated until…

I skid to a halt, digging my claws into the soft loam.

My massive, coal-black wolf tilts his head, nose twitching as I catch it… a scent so faint I almost miss it, but so utterly wrong for this stretch of woods…

It isn’t rogue… but it wasn’t pack either… It is vanilla and sage, and a vibration that feels like static…

Knight, as the massive brown wolf he is, comes up beside me, his golden eyes questioning, while Rhett, a sleek golden-blonde wolf, circles back, sniffing the air but finding nothing unusual… I don’t need to explain… A low growl rumbles in my chest, and I focus my intent, the bones of my wolf snapping and reforming into the man I am…

Knight and Rhett don’t hesitate; they begin their own agonizingly familiar shifts, the cracking of bone echoing slightly in the silence…

I reach into the hollow tree stump where we keep a cache of supplies near this marker… I pull out tight jeans, a blue t-shirt, and the red and black flannel I usually wear for perimeter shifts… the blue shirt makes my eyes, the color of the ice on Lake Superior, look even more piercing, but I don’t care about that right now… I need to move.

Next to me, Knight is already buttoning up a work shirt, rolling the cuffs up his forearms… he doesn’t look happy about the interruption… “Storm, what is it? The perimeter is clean…”

And Rhett is pulling a well-worn Rolling Stones t-shirt over his head, already grinning as he zips up his black cargo pants… He pats a rock on the tongue of the large ‘Licks’ logo…

“Maybe we found a lost hiker… a really, really attractive lost hiker…”

“Silence,” I command, pulling the flannel on over the t-shirt… “It’s not pack, but it’s not just human either… There is a hum in the air that doesn’t belong here… We’re checking it…”

***

I take a long, slow sip of my coffee, the heat grounding me… there’s nothing to it, but to do it, I think, the Ohio grit finally kicking in…

I stand up and look at my girls… “You two stay put… and if anyone else walks in here, you scratch their willies off… understood?”

Princess Emmalyne gives a slow blink of agreement while Smudgie just twitches an ear. I tuck a canister of pepper spray into my jean shorts pocket and open the front door—the solid, heavy door I’d installed myself…

The air outside is crisp, but the sight of the muddy clods of dirt on the front of the bus makes my blood boil… someone has definitely been up in the Beast’s business… I walk to the side, unlock a storage bunk, and pull out the heavy, oversized wrench that belonged to my Grampa… it feels solid and right in my hand…

I force myself not to look at the two cretins across the road, even though I can hear their muffled, evil chuckling… I’m not going to give them the satisfaction…

I approach the front and prepare for the climb… I’ve gained a lot of weight since leaving Ohio—comfort food is a traveling companion I haven’t managed to shake—and I pray to whatever gods are listening that the bumper will hold me… I heft my big butt up onto the wheel and then the front bumper, my breath catching as I peer into the engine bay… I vaguely recall what it’s supposed to look like, but my eyes are searching for anything that looks out of place…

“Hey, little girl! You sure you don’t need a real man to take a peek at that for ya?” one of them hollers…

“I’m fine!” I grit out, snapping my head toward them with a glare that should have laid them flat…

But the movement is too fast… my work boot slips on the damp metal of the bumper, and the world suddenly tilts… I can already feel the indignity of my ass hitting the mud and gravel… I squeeze my eyes shut, waiting for the impact…

It never comes…

“Whoa! I’ve got you,” a soft, male voice whispers.

Instead of hard stones, I feel a pair of strong arms catch my thick body with effortless ease… I open my eyes and look up, finding myself staring into the lopsided, charming grin of a long-haired blonde guy with hazel eyes… He smells like the deep Minnesota pine woods, wet dog and, strangely enough, a fresh bag of beef jerky…

“You okay there, sweetheart?” he asks, his smile widening as he holds me steady…

I start to offer a breathless thanks to the grinning man, the words “I’m okay” practically on my tongue, when the air around us suddenly fractures… a vicious, guttural growl rips through the clearing, vibrating right in my marrow: “Put. Her. Down.”

I twist, looking over my shoulder as two more men emerge from the treeline like shadows coming to life… they aren’t just walking; they are stalking toward us with a raw, predatory grace that makes my heart do a frantic double-tap against my ribs… In the back of my mind, a stray, hysterical thought flickers…

What is Minnesota putting in the water to carve out three lumberjack hunks like this?

My eyes sweep over them, trying to make sense of the sheer scale of the newcomers… the brown-haired one stops short, his gaze darting between the grinning blonde man and the towering, thunderous presence of the man who growled…

“Uhh, Rhett… maybe…” Knight starts, his voice trailing off as he looks at the ticking muscle in Alpha Storm’s jaw… “Maybe you should introduce us to your new friend?”

Rhett’s grin doesn’t falter, but he heeds the warning in the air… he slowly, almost reluctantly, lets me slide down the length of him until my Converse finally hit the dirt… now I’m centered in a triangle of sheer muscle and unspoken tension, the scent of pine and something dangerously masculine swirling around me…

This cannot be happening, I think, my pulse drumming a rhythm of pure disbelief… but as the three of them close the distance encircling me, the reality of the forest suddenly feels much too small…

The two beer-bellied cretins stumble forward, their faces flushed with liquid courage and a misplaced sense of ownership… they lurch into the clearing, pointing stained fingers at the wall of muscle surrounding me… “Hey! Get away from the little girl!” one of them slurs, his breath hitching as he tries to puff out a chest that hasn’t seen a gym in a decade…

I don’t even try to hide the sneer of pure disgust curling my lip… The sight of them trying to intimidate these three behemoths is almost comical, like two yapping poodles barking at a pack of wolves… When the bolder of the two reaches out, his hand cutting through the air to grab my arm like he actually has the right to touch me, I don’t retreat toward the path…

Instead, I slide closer to the growly, dark-haired man… It isn’t because I’m scared—I could easily handle these two drunks myself—it’s because I am suddenly, inexplicably drawn to his orbit… I just… want to smell him…

As I press into his personal space, a scent hits me that’s unlike anything I’ve ever known… It’s fierce… it’s primal… it’s purely, unapologetically manly…

While the drunks keep rambling, Rhett speaks right over them, his tone as casual as if they were at a garden party… “I’m Rhett,” he says, tilting his head toward the silent powerhouse beside me… “And this is Alpha Storm…”

The world around me blurs… the drunks, the forest, the fear—it all fades into the background as I look way, way up, drowning in the deep, stormy blue of his eyes…

“I’m Veronica…” I breathe, the name feeling like a secret shared between them…

The growly man’s expression shifts, the thunder in his face softening just a fraction as a slow, dangerous grin tugs at his mouth… “Hi, Veronica…” he rumbles, the sound of my name in his throat vibrating right through me…