Lift Her Up (Kaid Ranch Shifters Book 3) Read online

  No.

  Wes shook his head. It was a lie.

  No.

  Sam would never join Leif. Not after what that monster had done to them. He wouldn’t.

  Chest heaving, Wes closed his eyes and focused on the bonds he’d worked so hard to shut down completely. Being open hurt. He could feel wisps of those bonds to Hunter, to Bryson, to their mates, Sadey and Maris. To…to…Summer. The cloudy black one was to Leif. But… “I can’t feel Sam at all.”

  “I told you,” Summer said as she passed by and ran into his shoulder hard enough to jolt him backward. “He ain’t Sam anymore. He’s Bones now.”

  “What do you want from me?” Wes asked, choking on the words.

  “To free Sam. To kill Leif’s entire pack or die trying,” she said lightly as she disappeared down the hallway.

  Oh, was that all? She just wanted his death?

  “Why would you care so much about Sam being avenged?” he asked.

  “Because…” She swallowed hard and cleared her throat. “Because,” she said softer, “once upon a time, you three Kaids were my family. And maybe we aren’t that anymore, but I still want all of you to be okay and be happy.”

  She could’ve knocked him over with a feather right now. His chest was on fire with ache, but he didn’t understand all the emotions flooding him. “Summer, who said you aren’t family still?” he asked in a hoarse voice.

  “There it is,” she whispered. Summer lifted her chin higher, and anger flashed through her eyes. “There’s that sincerity in your eyes I used to pray for when I belonged to you. Pity you couldn’t find it back then when I could still be saved.”

  “Summer—”

  “No, Wes. I don’t need your pity. I want one thing from you, and that’s for you to kill Leif. Do it slow if you can. I’ll watch.”

  “And if I die going after Leif and whatever army he turned his pack into?” Wes asked darkly.

  She didn’t even flinch. Her eyes remained emotionless as she murmured, “Then I’ll watch that, too.”

  The sweet Summer he used to know was dead and long gone. He’d killed her, so he supposed this was fair—a death for a death.

  “I’ll pack my things.”

  Chapter Two

  As quietly as she could, Summer Rayne blew out a shaking breath. She couldn’t let him hear her, couldn’t let him know he affected her still. The oversize kitchen table creaked as she locked her arms against it. Never in her lifetime would she have guessed he would go and build up a ranch for him and his brother. Oh, he’d always been a worker, but this place…

  She swallowed hard and looked around at his house, decorated with a moose antler chandelier, exposed beams, and stone hearth that stretched from hardwood floors to log ceiling. Stainless steel appliances sparkled from the large kitchen, and the beige granite countertops were perfectly clean and bare of dirty dishes. When she’d been with him, he had been human and a messy sort of bachelor.

  Perhaps the wolf made him keep his den clean.

  God, he looked good. Wes was even broader in the shoulders than she remembered. More chiseled. Bigger, stronger. He still had the bright blue eyes that slanted up slightly to make him look dangerous with every look. Those cheekbones could cut glass, and he wore scruff on his face now. He’d grown his hair out, too. It was a dirty blond that reached his jawline. No smile lines, but that was no surprise. He wasn’t a happy sort of man. He’d never had them except around her when she made him laugh. She could do that once upon a time, but now?

  Summer looked at her reflection in the window near the table. A reflection she still didn’t recognize. Now, she was all darkness.

  He’d turned her into this. And even though it had been an accidental bite from a newly created werewolf, it was what he did afterward that had scarred her for life. He’d left her all alone. Newly turned. With no one to talk to. No one to explain the changes in her body. No one to explain her new life…

  No one to save her.

  He’d just vanished. And landed here, in this mansion, on the biggest ranch in the area, apparently. He was doing great while she would never be doing great again.

  Tears burned her eyes, and she blinked them away fast.

  The worst part…the very, very worst part…was being betrayed by the only person she’d ever loved. Betrayal like that made a heart go cold. It stunted any chance of finding love again because she wouldn’t dare risk opening up to another. Perhaps she would’ve been a good, logical, and safe werewolf, but her animal had been forged from heartbreak. And along the way, Summer had accepted her new self. Didn’t mean she didn’t wish she could go back and do things differently. She would’ve never given Wes Kaid the time of day if she’d known what she knew now.

  At least he’d given her the wolf, though, so she wouldn’t every be truly alone. Bright side.

  But she hated him.

  The wolf inside of her snarled.

  Fine, she probably hated him.

  Another growl, and she sighed.

  She really wanted to hate him.

  Biting her bottom lip to punish herself for tearing up, Summer straightened her spine and put some steel into her voice when she called, “Do you want me to go get Hunter?”

  “No,” came the somber answer.

  “What? Why?” she asked.

  He didn’t answer. She could hear him rustling around in his room and imagined him throwing a bunch of random clothes in the duffle bag she’d seen in his closet when she’d snooped around for a female’s things. In her defense, her wolf needed to know if another woman was shacked up with Wes. Surprising the wolf was a very bad idea.

  Either Wes was single, or his lady dressed like a cowboy.

  Probably single. Wes was a disaster to date. Any woman who made it through his gauntlet of distance, emotional baggage, head games, and rejections for any amount of time had her respect. She’d only lasted three years, and lookey what had happened? Permanent damage and an eternally skewed view of the unfairer sex. But he was hot, so at least he had that going for him. Really, unfairly, incomprehensively attractive. That was the lure, that and some bone-deep sexual attraction that drew the ladies in like they were hungry fish and he was a tasty worm. Not her, though. Not anymore. Summer didn’t even like worms. She was unaffected by him.

  Wes strode into the living room, his boots thunking hollowly against the hardwoods, his jeans sitting low, belt buckle with a motherfuckin’ bald eagle positioned right over his dick, its beak open in a bird-of-prey scream, like come-and-get-it. White T-shirt under an open blue and white flannel that made his baby blues a stupid shade of you-know-you-want-to-ride-this, and a cocky smirk that she knew from experience was the closest thing that man ever got to a smile. A heavy brown canvas duffel bag hung from his shoulder, and he clenched the strap with one large hand in a pose definitely intended to make his arm muscles flex to accentuate the curves of his shoulder and triceps. Even his chin-length hair was waving perfectly under his cream-colored cowboy hat like he was some model in a photoshoot. Where was the fucking breeze even coming from? Or did his hair just move like that by magic? To attract females. Obnoxious. His perfectly trimmed short beard was annoying, too. He definitely manscaped now…probably had a six-pack under that shirt…

  “You still think I look good,” he accused her.

  A professional at emotionless facial expressions, Summer murmured coolly, “The only thing I find attractive about you is your duffle bag. Probably gonna steal it later.”

  The smirk fell from his face, and Summer smiled internally as she walked out of his house.

  These next few days were going to be more fun than she’d thought.

  “Which one is your rig?” she asked innocently, like she couldn’t smell Wes’s Old Spice cologne wafting from the black on black Ford Raptor sitting out front.

  “Since you’re playin’ dumb, it’s probably the one you’re walkin’ straight to,” he muttered from behind her.

  “I’m not playing dumb. I’m just waitin
g for my chance to insult you.” Summer turned and gave him a Cheshire cat smile over her shoulder. “The setup for an insult is always important.”

  Wes’s frown was cute. If she thought stuff like that was cute. Which she didn’t. Because it was Wes. Wesley.

  “I used to say that,” he told her.

  Oh, she knew. Thanks to the wolf, she remembered every single thing that had ever happened in vivid detail.

  “Okay,” he said, making his way around the passenger’s side door. He opened it for her and leaned on the door. “Go on and impress me with an insult on a motherfuckin’ Ford Raptor. You can’t get a better truck for performance.”

  Summer smiled with teeth and then slammed the door closed without getting in. And then she opened it again for herself. “Don’t need a man to open a door for me. Especially not a Kaid.” Primly, she climbed up into the passenger’s seat and said, “You gonna try to buckle me in next so I don’t chip a nail?”

  Wes looked so shaken, he just stood there with his mouth hanging open. “Uuuh…I…” His frown deepened. “That was the first time I ever opened a door for a gi—”

  Slam!

  Summer pulled it shut before he finished talking. No admissions, no saying he’d changed, no making her feel special. He was probably going to be dead in a couple of days.

  Wes tossed his duffle bag in the bed of the truck and made his way to the driver’s side door, yanked it open, and got in.

  “Don’t get attached to things that burn you,” Summer recited out loud.

  “What?”

  “That’s what my therapist says. It’s my mantra now.”

  “You have a therapist?” he asked in a baffled tone.

  His hair was hanging in his face on one side. Kinda cute if she was into that kind of thing. Which she wasn’t. Maybe she would shave his hair in his sleep so he would stop annoying her with his attractiveness.

  “She’s very nice,” Summer said softly.

  “Is she human or shifter? You can’t be telling humans what you are, Summer. It ain’t safe.”

  “Why don’t you want Hunter to come? Do you still hate him so much you’ll leave him out of seeing Sam?”

  Wes huffed a dark laugh. “You don’t know me anymore.” He turned the key, and the engine roared to life.

  Summer buckled in and pulled her knees to her chest, stared out the front window as Wes drove them down the long gravel drive away from his home. “Raptors have damn near 500 horsepower and are built for performance and speed, and you have it on a ranch. It’s not a hauling truck, Wesley. It’s a truck made for getting attention. You always needed that though, didn’t you?”

  “We take Bryson or Hunter’s rigs into town when we blow off steam or run errands, Summer. This truck sees the feed store and the ranch. I got it for four grand under MSRP, and it’s my dream truck. I saved for it. It ain’t for anyone but me. And when I have a bad day, I leave all this ranch shit behind me and take it out and jump it. They’re made for that, too. And he hauls what I need just fine if the boys’ trucks aren’t available to me. You really don’t know me anymore.”

  “Why leave Hunter?”

  “Look, you don’t just get to come in here and ask questions. My life isn’t an open book for you to insult. I don’t want him coming with me. Bryson either. End of discussion.” He reached forward and turned up the radio dial to volume level eight—almost, almost, loud enough to hurt her ears.

  “I never saw a trio of more broken brothers than you Kaids,” Summer murmured. Wes didn’t respond, so she kept right on talking. “I always wondered what it was, you know? Back in the days when we were together and things made sense. I could understand most things about you except your relationship with your brothers. Sam was like a demigod to you that you barely were brave enough to talk to. You were this better version of yourself around him, like you wanted so desperately for him to like you.”

  “That’s enough.”

  “And Hunter? He looked at you like you were the moon, and you treated him like dog-sh—”

  “I said enough, Summer.”

  His tone was different, and it stopped the word in her throat. Just froze it there. That had never happened to her before. She clutched her neck and tried to finish the word “shit” but she couldn’t.

  “What have you done?” she choked out. “How did you do that?”

  Wes slid her an angry look and said, “Please don’t make me do it again. I don’t like it.”

  Alpha. The word whispered to her through the bond. Alpha? No, no, no, Wesley Kaid wasn’t built to be an Alpha. He was an enforcer. A fighter. A killer.

  “Did you brand them?” she asked in horror.

  “Hunter, Bryson, Sadey, and Maris are mine.”

  Something about that stung to her core. He’d chosen them. Improved enough for them. Branded them, but what had he done to Summer? Changed her into a monster and abandoned her.

  She slammed her head back against the seat to punish her emotions and stared out the window. “I guess I don’t know you anymore. But then again, maybe I never did.”

  “You’re probably the only one who ever really knew me.” He said it as soft as a breeze, and she almost missed it.

  Why? Why did seeing him again wrench open all this emotion? She’d been working on this moment, preparing for it for a month, ever since she’d dug into the sickly bond that kept haunting her dreams. She’d followed every new instinct she possessed and found out Sam was alive. All she had to do was stay unaffected like she had been practicing the last few years. It was simple.

  Wes made her weak, and she hated it. He ruined everything.

  He reached forward and turned down the music as he rolled to a stop at the main road. “Where are we going?”

  “Ooooh no. I’m not telling you. You’ll ditch me at the first gas station.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because abandoning people is your number one move.” Yeah, she threw it out as a burn, but he didn’t react like she’d thought he would. There was no fire, no insult hurled back at her. Instead, he nodded his head and said, “I understand how you would feel like that.”

  “Cut it out! You’re being weird.”

  His nostrils flared, and he looked like he was counting to three in his head for patience. “I wish I could ditch you right here.” There was truth in his voice.

  “Aaaah, that’s better. There’s Old Wes, wanting to shine through the mature imposter that has taken over his body.”

  “I miss when you were nice.”

  “I don’t. Nice me got hurt. Take a right and keep going south until we hit the New Mexico border.”

  “You’re really not going to tell me where Sam is?” he asked, turning onto the two lane paved road.

  “Nope. Not until we’re close.”

  “You’re annoying now. That’s new.”

  “You’re an asshole still. That’s old.”

  “Controlling.”

  “Full of yourself,” she spouted off.

  “I liked your hair better blond.” His voice rang with a lie, though.

  “Untrue, ha! You like how I look now.”

  “Like a goth Barbie Wolf.”

  “Maybe I have my nipples pierced now.”

  When Wes jerked his attention off the road to her, the truck swerved dangerously.

  Summer grinned. “Joke. Probably.”

  “Holy fuckin’ shit,” Wes muttered, looking grumpy. “You gonna mess with me the whole way there?”

  Summer mimed shaking something up then looked at her hand. “Magic 8-Ball says it is decidedly so.”

  Wes snorted and then reshaped his expression into one of indifference. “Where’s your clothes?”

  “On my body.”

  “No, I mean the clothes you’re traveling with. And how did you get into my house without anyone catching you?”

  “A lady never tells her secrets.”

  “That’s actually the opposite of true. Women blab every secret.”

&nbs
p; Summer rolled her eyes. “I’m not most women.”

  “No, you got nipple piercings now.”

  “Hahaha, I knew you would keep thinking about that. Typical. Always thinking with your dick.”

  “Maybe I don’t like nipple piercings. Maybe it’s a turnoff.”

  “I can see your boner from here.” She pointed.

  “Pointing is rude.”

  “I learned my rudeness from the best.” She pointed at Wes’s face.

  He turned the radio back up, and Summer settled in for a long ride, sure to put her feet up on the dashboard because Old Wes kept his truck sparkling clean, and from the pristine condition of this fancy truck’s interior, New Wes had kept the habit. There was definitely mud on the bottom of her boots. She ground her feet against the dash to make sure as much mud got on there as possible.

  He slid her a narrow-eyed glance but didn’t say anything.

  The silence lasted for exactly two minutes. She used that time to draw little penises into the mud smears on the dash with her index finger. Wes was growling a lot.

  Wes turned down the radio again. “Seriously, how did you get onto my property?”

  “The truth?”

  “That would be nice,” he said sarcastically.

  She inhaled deeply and rambled all on one breath, “I figured out Sam was alive a month ago and started going to my therapist more to prepare me to meet you again and then I hitchhiked all the way here from Aspen because I can’t drive on account of the wolf because she makes me have severe road rage so thank you for that little gift and then I walked right onto your property and let myself in the back door and none of you idiots even had a clue I suppose because your land smells like cow crap and all of the mooing is very loud and Hunter and that Bryson guy weren’t paying very good attention.” She inhaled deeply and then said, “I had plenty of time to go through your whole room. I wasn’t quiet about it, and nobody came to stop me. No one at your ranch pays attention. And that’s why you morons almost got taken out by the Westland Pack. The end. Oh, and I need to stop by a grocery store.”

  “For clothes and bathroom stuff?”

  “Nope, for nipple piercing cream,” she said sarcastically.