"A job?" I asked incredulously.
"Yeah, as a farmhand," he explained. "We have a lot of animals, and a good four-hundred acres of crops. We need as much help as we can get," he laughed, and then his face became gravely sober.
"Some cattle have been getting attacked by some sort of... animal." I didn't miss his hesitation. "Jack and I were talking about it. He said you like to run off into the woods at night and go howling at the moon"—I felt my face drain of color—"so I figure you've gotta be scarier than anything else out there. I'm afraid I can't offer you much more than room and board, but if you're stronger than you look and are willing to work, I think we could work something out here." He extended his hand out for me to shake.
I crossed my arms. "You and Jack were talking about it, huh? So, it's all decided for me." I scoffed and shook my head.
His eyebrows furrowed together. "Jack and Ma Peter have been friends of our family for a long time. He told me you were wild, but he thought you'd be the kind of person who wanted to help friends out when they're in a tricky situation. Maybe he was wrong."
My eyes darted over to Noah. He was pretending not to listen by shuffling through a deck of cards. The threat of danger to him, even indirect, had my heart pumping faster.
"How many cattle have been attacked?" I asked.
Buck's voice was low when he replied. "Twenty."
I tried not to remember how many vampires had come to attack the pack in their undead army. I pretended I didn't still hear the crunch of their bones under my fangs. I didn't look at the fumes of purple smokestacks curling towards the clouds.
"Do you know what did it?" I asked.
Buck's face became hard as stone. "No," he said, dropping the word between us on the table, where it seemed to land with a thud.
When he offered no further explanation, I uncrossed my arms and folded my hands in front of me. "Okay," I agreed. "I'll stay here until the danger is gone." And then I'll take the rest of it with me, I added in my head.
Noah was biting his lip and looking down at the table. I wanted to smooth out the worry line between his eyebrows so badly my arm twitched forward involuntarily. I would make it safe for him here. It was the least I could do after imprinting and putting myself in such close proximity to him. Animals could be dangerous sometimes, sure, but I was lethal.
"You could sleep in our spare bed," Buck offered.
I stood up quickly, the bench clunking behind my calves.
"I should go now," I said. My voice wavered as my eyes fixed on Noah.
He stared up at me, a flash of betrayal on his face, then confusion and disappointment. Why was he so disappointed to see me leave? As I fled the room, I heard him hurrying after me. The scent of Buck's cigar wafted into the front hallway.
"That's a filthy habit, Buck," Diana scolded her husband as I threw open the screen door.
I could hear the smile in Buck's reply. "No worse than some."
Noah was hot on my heels. I hopped the railing of the porch and bolted to one of the many footpaths leading out to the different fields on the farm. The setting sun reached around the branches in shafts of golden light. I ran through a bush with red poison berries and stopped to look over my shoulder.
He was there, of course. As he came to a stop next to me, he leaned forward and panted with his hands on his knees.
"Geez, you're fast," he huffed. "Where'd you learn to run like that?"
"A long string of bad decisions," I replied, crossing my arms against my chest. "What can I do for you?" I asked, hoping to get whatever it was out of the way so I could go scream into my pillow.
"I thought I'd walk you home, since there's supposed to be this big bad wolf out there."
I froze. "How do you know if it's a wolf?"
"I-I don't," he stuttered, refusing to look me in the eye and walking forward on the path. "Here, Jack's place is this way."
I didn't follow him right away, and he didn't look back to check, but for some reason I didn't want to run in the other direction. Finally, I groaned with the effort it took to fight against the pull, gave up, and followed him down the thin path through the undergrowth.
"So, are you still gonna take the job?" He asked over his shoulder as he held a branch out of my way and let me pass.
I stopped in front of him and tried to figure out his angle. He couldn't possibly feel the pull as strongly as I did—he was only human, after all—so why did he want to walk me home? What did he want? Maybe he thought I was easy. Maybe he thought there wouldn't be any witnesses out in the middle of the woods—which, if he were planning on being a creep, would probably result in more damage to his face than mine.
But he didn't seem to want anything but an answer. I nodded and kept walking.
"Is that a yes?"
"On one condition," I amended, a small smile picking up the corners of my lips.
"What's that?"
As someone who had grown up sharing a room with my brother, and then sharing a brain with a bunch of teenage boys, I knew my priorities in a crowded house.
"I want a lock on my door. On the inside."
Noah grinned as the sun dipped below the tree line.
"I can make that happen," he promised. "We could really use another able body around here, if you'll pardon my phrasing—I mean—" his eyes darted down and then back up so fast I wasn't sure if he was going to try something or if he just felt the same aching need I did.
I hadn't kissed anyone since Sam. I wondered how it would feel to kiss Noah, how it would compare, even without the magic of the imprint. When we shared a mind, the boys used to have no idea how I managed not to be horny all the time. I used to tell them if they had two brain cells to rub together they would know.
Now I wasn't so sure.
He had stopped, his brown eyes boring into mine. My feet took a step forward, so there was only a foot of space between us. His lips parted like he was going to say something.
Before I did something stupid, I turned my head to look at the path leading to the back of Jack's bar, but Noah grabbed my wrist. I spun around reflexively, like a shiver of my spine.
"You're not from around here," he stated.
I rolled my eyes. "What gave it away?"
"You see things different," he continued. "I don't know what it is about you, Leah, but I promise I'll figure it out." At the end he was grinning so foolishly I had to laugh.
"What?" He asked in mock-resentment. "You think I can't?"
My laughter cut off abruptly. "No," I responded, shaking my head. "I think you can. Which is why I don't want you to try."
He pinched his lips and drew his eyebrows together. "You've got skeletons in your closet, hmm?" He rubbed the end of his chin and finally his face broke out into a wide grin, like the sun poking through a cloudy sky. "That's hot."
I slapped his shoulder lightly, then left my hand there, letting the moments drag on where we were touching, until finally I had to draw away.
"I'll come back," I promised.
"When should I tell Buck you'll be around?" He asked in a low, conspiratorial tone.
"Eventually," I sighed, slipping my wrist out of his grasp. "I need to talk with Ma and Jack."
"Should I wait here?"
I laughed. It sounded rusty even to my own ears. "No, thanks. I'm the scariest thing out in the woods at night, remember?" I reminded him.
He laughed, too, though his smile didn't dimple both his cheeks. A swell of nausea crawled up my throat as he waved off any idea of danger from me, and I quickly ducked into the tall grass with a strangled "Goodbye!"