The Walls of Jericho

Proem

“Wedding rings?” I sputter, stupefied. “You’re kidding, right?”

I must confess; it’s not often that someone gets the better of me. Not Esteban—even though he can be a real pill. Not any of his lecherous regular customers. Certainly not Mr. Adriani—though he can throw me for a loop with the outfits he wears sometimes. Even Damien and Ferdi are just too nice to try.

That’s not the case with Channing Stark.

For as dense and self-appreciating as he can be, when he decides to throw a wrench into my brainworks, it’s a damn big one.

Like this one, for instance.

The smug smile he gives me across the kitchen island as he’s stirring whatever’s in that bowl has me convinced that he’s just fooling around to get under my skin some more, then he replies.

“Nope. Dead serious.”

My eyes narrow. “I’m not marrying you. I don’t even think I’m dating you.”

Channing shoves the bowl aside on the counter, then flattens his palms in the space where it was. “Why?” he demands, completely exasperated. “Why can’t you just go easy on me?”

“Easy on you? Channing, are you crazy? We haven’t even been doing—whatever it is we’re doing for a week.” The subaudible humming exchange of energy between us starts to hiccup and cough, backfiring like 1971 AMC Gremlin with retarded timing. Inside my chest, the same choking feeling starts to collect, then knots up so tight at the lie I’m about to tell that I can scarcely breathe. “All we have going for us is some good sex.”

“’Good’ s*x? For your information, it’s spectacular s*x,” he barks, angry now. “Jericho, I’ve been in love with you for years. Years. Just because it took you that long to figure it out doesn’t mean my feelings are some fly-by-night deal.”

“For your information, your feelings have been your secret. For years,” I retort. “You know what I have known? For years. That you made an almost daily habit of walking past the front windows of Esteban’s diner with nearly every beautiful girl in south Crossroads. Were you really surprised that I never wanted to give you my phone number? Are you still surprised I’m having problems with your sudden profession of mad love? I’m not even your type, for God’s sake!”

He shakes his head with a tight bitter laugh. “Not my type? You wouldn’t know anything about my ‘type’.”

“That’s my whole point! We barely know each other and every time I turn around, we’re bickering about something else. Fighting like cats and dogs.”

“So we’re still working out a few boundaries. Big deal. Every couple has problems once in a while.”

“We’re. Not. A couple!”

I don’t even have time to stagger off the barstool before Channing’s around the kitchen island and yanking me off of it. One strong arm pins me against him at the waist, and with the other, he presses my palm flat on the hollow behind his collarbone—the place where I bit him.

Instantly the staticky backfiring begins to smooth, and when Channing covers the mark he made on my neck with his warm palm, all the tension just drains out of me. It’s like the all the best aspects of a massage and a perfect night’s sleep rolled into one.

“You feel that, don’t you?”

It’s not a question, even though that’s how he chooses to phrase it. It’s a statement. Deliberate and pointed, even if he doesn’t say it meanly.

“My ‘type’ is you. Brainy. Beautiful. Brave.” His words may be soft, but the intensity in his blue eyes is anything but. “It’s getting old telling you these things because you’re not willing to let go of your insecurities, but I’m going to keep repeating it until you accept that it’s true.”

“I’m not—.”

He catches my chin, closing my mouth to silence me. “You are. Damien’s a doctor and Ferdi’s a weapons specialist. Together they’ve been working for over thirty years trying to knock that dragon out of the sky and you did it in about ninety seconds flat. Brainy and brave. You figured out the dragon’s tracking you and were all for using yourself as a lure. The brainy part might be questionable there, but you’re definitely brave. You watched my shift—start to finish—and still got in bed with me. Incredibly brave. And you are beautiful, Jericho. Whatever that poison is in your head about how you’re supposed to look, you need to quit drinking it.”

“Channing—.”

“You’re going to have to have the ring. It’s part of your cover. Part of keeping you safe while we pinpoint the dragon. So shut up and let me buy you the damn thing, will you?”

“As if I can pull off being undercover?”

“Not undercover.” He shakes his head. “You’re being processed, Jericho. Just like Charles Daniels and his family. I should be sending you someplace far away where there’s no likelihood anyone has ever seen you, but I can’t. I can’t bear the thought of it. Consider it a trial run. An opportunity to train me.”

“You’re a werewolf. Not a puppy.”

He huffs a laugh, but his smile is warm. “Will you try at least? Is that too much to ask?”

“As if you’ve given me an alternative?” 

“Sure you have alternatives. I can ship you off to Siberia. Would you rather do that?”

“Offering the alternative of the most miserable place on the entire planet that you could think of isn’t actually giving me a choice, Channing.”

That scarred brow of his flicks and he pats my bottom before letting me go. “It’s called leadership, babydoll.” He starts the griddle warming. “You only offer people choices that you can live with.”

“It’s called being dickish. Don’t think I’m fooled.”

He flashes me one of those million dollar smiles of his and my knees feel wobbly. “Come on, I’m not that bad.”

“Yes you are.” I nod vehemently. “Yanking me out of bed and throwing me in an arctic cold shower definitely qualifies as bad.”

The lingering smirk on his face curls like a silent movie villain’s. “I notice you didn’t mention the spanking among the list of my bad.”

Though I close my eyes and press my lips into a thin line, I can’t stop the hot flush that creeps from my neck to my hairline. “Do you have to do that?”

The griddle sizzles softly as he pours some of the batter on it. “Remind you that there are things that you do like about me? Yes, I think I do.”

I open my eyes and watch as he pours the second pancake onto the griddle in a perfect matching circle to the first one. “Why don’t you buy me flowers like a good boyfriend?”

“I can do that. I’ll be an exceptional boyfriend. You’ll see.”

**

Despite all his big talk about being Alpha and in charge, Channing still asks Ferdi’s permission before agreeing we can take the sleek black Ducati motorcycle in the underground garage. As soon as we get near it, I can tell it’s a whole different animal than the one Channing had.

I tug the helmet he hands me over my head, adjusting the chin strap. As soon as I do, and Channing puts his one, I connect the audio for the two together.

“This bike’s a lot nicer than yours was.” Resting my hand on the body, I ooze myself into the seat.

“What are you talking about? They’re the exact same model,” he replies defensively, swinging his leg over and settling in behind me.

“Trust me, beefcake, they’re not.” I curl myself over it and rest my hands on the handlebars. It takes barely a jolt from me before the thing purrs to life.

The kind of purr that begs the rider to open it up the instant the road gives the room. This is the kind of motorcycle that makes a person feel alive. Makes a person feel glad to be alive. It’s the kind of escape that touches your soul, caresses a part of you that few other things can.

“Why that little—.”

He doesn’t get to voice his complaint. As soon as Channing’s positioned over the motorcycle, we’re off like a shot through the long, dimly lit tunnel. Riding the thing is like floating on air. It’s fast and shrieks speed, egging me to push it a little bit more.

Who am I to resist? It’s powerful and capable, and we’re meant to push each other, plus it’s just plain gorgeous.

Channing feels the little hiccup I give as that thought hits me fully. He compensates instantly, assuming control from me seamlessly. “You okay, babydoll?”

How am I supposed to answer that?

Here I’d been thinking about this motorcycle—powerful, capable, gorgeous. Those were my exact thoughts. The same things are one-hundred percent true about Channing too, including the part about pushing each other.

“I’m—fine,” I sputter. “Figured you’d like to play too.”

“Mmmm.” The purr of enjoyment is accompanied by an uptick in speed.

With Channing driving, I take stock of our surroundings. Or what little of them there are. Like the hallways in Avernus, this is also long, boring and gray. The concrete-reinforced walls and ceilings are dimly lit with recessed fluorescents at regular intervals. “How long is the tunnel?”

“Seven miles. It takes us out at a deserted surface property outside the city, then we can connect to the highway like the rest of traffic.”

“Seems like an awful lot of trouble to go to.”

“Protecting ourselves isn’t trouble. Letting our guard down is. Dragons and werewolves are enemies.” He angles the bike around a long smooth curve and picks up speed.

“I get that. What I don’t understand is why.”

“It goes back thousands of years. I’m not sure I can explain.”

“How about you try?”

I can’t help but smile hearing him sigh. “Is this one of those boyfriend tests?”

“You better believe it.”

“Fine. The dragons are everything you know from the storybooks. Narcissistic. Tyrannical. Above all, they’re greedy. I don’t know the history well enough to give you the details, but at some point, our two species ran afoul of one another. What dragons are conflicts with everything wolves are. We’re pack and family focused. They’re solitary. We use only what we need. They consume everything they get their claws on. We mate for life. They take partners as it pleases them, whether willing or not.

The conflict escalated with the rising power of the humans. It forced both of our kinds to adapt to fit in. It forced us to compete for far fewer resources, which is where their greed becomes a real problem. Not just for wolfkind, but for humankind as well.”

“How?” I lean with him as we go around another curve. “Seems to me humans can be all those things too.”

“They can,” he agrees. “They’re chameleons. They can also be all the things wolves are as well. What humans aren’t, and we aren’t, is eternal and damn near indestructible. When the dragons mess things up so badly that people begin to die, they go find a cave somewhere and take a nap for a few hundred years while the rest of us suffer.”

“You know I’m finding it hard to understand the distinction, right? You’re talking about killing off their kind.”

“If they could be reasoned with, we wouldn’t be.”

He eases off the accelerator and lets the Ducati slow naturally. A minute or so later, we come to an underground lift. Channing pulls the motorcycle into the middle of it and taps my shoulder.

“Care to hit the switch for us?” He points to a keypad on the wall.

It takes barely a second to skirt its security protocols, then the great hydraulics beneath it begin a slow rise to the surface.

“Where does this come out?”

“In the garage of an old property we keep. You’ll understand when you see.”