Page 245 of His Hungry Wolf

While she was catatonic, I went to work. Someone had to make sure we had a place to sleep and food to eat. By 14-years-old, the only person I could rely on was myself.

Most of the time I wore clothes that were a size too small. I couldn’t afford anything else. And when the first kid at school pointed it out, I whooped his ass for bringing it up. No one made fun of me for it after that.

I went from doing errands that could have gotten me killed at fourteen, to betting on myself in wolf fights at 20. I had always done whatever it took to survive.

If Cage hadn’t found me and told me we were brothers, I would probably still be doing it. Instead, he introduced me to his college football coach, arranged for my scholarship, and rescued me from that world.

Yet even with how far I’ve come, the guy I fell for still thinks I’m too hard to love. That had to be why my mother chose to vanish into her own world and why I grew up without a father. I was too hard to love. I was a wolf rejected by my pack and that was all I was ever gonna be.

Thinking that, everything became too much. My head throbbed and a painful agony ripped through me. I felt like I was going to explode. I needed to release it. But instead of shifting like every fiber of my being wanted me to, I locked my eyes on the next parked car in front of me and let go.Kicking the door as hard as I could, the metal bent on impact. It wasn’t enough. I needed to hear a crash. So balling my fist, I pounded on the passenger window. It wouldn’t give in so I slammed harder. Eventually, the glass exploded into a thousand pieces.

As loud as it was, that still wasn’t enough. Kicking the back door I dented that. About to climb on the hood and put my foot through the windshield, something stopped me. It was a siren. It woke me up as if I had been lost in a bad dream.

Clearing my head, I stared at what I had done. I had demolished the car. This was bad. I had lost control of myself and this was the result.

“Get on the ground!” Someone yelled behind me. “I said get on the ground.”

I had just ruined everything. I was about to lose my scholarship and my only shot at life. If I were a smarter person, maybe I would have let out my wolf and run. I didn’t.

I had done this. I had been the one to mess up everything good that I had going on, no one else. And I wasn’t going to fight my self-inflicted destruction.

Not getting onto my knees fast enough, someone shoved me from behind. I fell landing on the broken glass. Before I could get off it, someone was pulling my wrists together and slapping on cuffs. They were tight enough to cut into my skin. Again I felt my wolf surface but I pushed him down.

“You have the right to remain silent,” he began.

I didn’t have to listen to the rest. I was familiar with it. I was going to jail. Since I couldn’t afford bail, they were going to hold me for two to three days until I went up before the judge.

From there I would be sentenced. And unlike when I was under aged, this crime would follow me for the rest of my life. I had done this to myself. And to be honest, I always knew it was a matter of time before I screwed things up out here.

I followed the cops’ instructions without resistance. In the back seat of the squad car, I let my mind wander. I thought about all of the things that had gotten me here. I thought about the first time I saw Kendall. At Cage’s graduation our eyes had met. He was the cutest guy I had ever seen.

Dressed in all black, he had a bit of an edge to him. His mess of brown curls highlighted his angular features. And completing his I-don’t-give-a-fuck look with delicate, round-rimmed glasses, I knew that there was more to him than he let on.

There was more to me than I let on. And it wasn’t just that I was a wolf shifter. Even my kind dismissed me as the thug who hosted wolf fights. The person they saw was the one ready to take someone out for looking at me funny. What can I say? I had a short fuse, even for a wolf.

But that hadn’t always been me. There was a time when all I wanted was for someone to hold me and tell me that everything was going to be alright. He was still in there somewhere. And when I saw Kendall for the first time looking as vulnerable as he was, I desperately wanted to do that for him.

Maybe no one would ever do that for me, but I could be his rescuer. I wanted to protect him. I wanted to give Kendall the love I could never have. But the moment I was given an opening, I fucked things up by being myself.

At the station, I answered all of their questions and was escorted to my cell. There were two other people there. One looked drunk off his ass, and the other… well, he looked like me, a thug whose time had run out.

I wasn’t in the mood for talking and neither were they. This wasn’t my first time in jail so knowing I would be there for a while, I got comfortable. It was to my surprise when a cop appeared on the other side of the bars and said my name.

“Nero Roman?”

“That’s me.”

“You made bail. Let’s go.”

I got up sure he had made a mistake. But if they were going to let me out on a filing error, I was okay with that. Walking back to the sea of desks, I scanned the room spotting someone I didn’t expect to see. Quin was my brother’s boyfriend and he was looking pretty freaked out.

Considering Quin’s father had more money than God and he grew up sheltered from the realities of shifter life, there was no wonder being in a police station made him look like he was about to pee himself. The only question was what he was doing here. I hadn’t used my one phone call. I couldn’t think of anyone who would help me.

When I got within arm’s length, Quin threw his arms around me. His embrace was genuine and tight.

“Jesus, Nero, what happened? What are you doing here? And, why didn’t you call me?”

I was about to answer when someone else I knew walked through the doors, my roommate Titus. He was a wolf shifter I knew from back home. He had been inspired to attend East Tennessee University by the same two people I had, Quin and my brother. He approached and threw his arms around me too.