Dedicated to Del (Southern Werewolf Sisters Book 4), page 1
Dedicated to Del
Southern Werewolf Sisters
Book Four
Heather MacKinnon
Dedicated to Del © 2021 Heather MacKinnon
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This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Earning Evey
More from Heather MacKinnon
About the Author
Chapter 1
Del
“Excuse me. Could I ask you for a favor?”
I froze as his deep, gravelly voice washed over me. It was melodic, but also harsh in a way that made me want to hear him sing. I’d been listening to his mumbled conversation with the guy next to him for the past hour while I waited for my turn to perform.
But hearing it out loud and directed at me was so different, yet somehow familiar. Like I’d heard it a thousand times before when I knew I’d never met him.
I turned to the voice and found a set of brilliant hazel eyes pointed right at me. The man smiled, his teeth bright next to the dark hair on his face. I stood there staring as I tried to figure out how a man could be too scruffy to be beautiful.
Or maybe too beautiful to be scruffy.
But damn.
He cleared his throat, and I blinked at him. “Huh?”
His smile got wider. “I was hoping I could ask you for a favor.” His accent was thick, and his words dripped through me like honey.
“What’s that?” I finally said.
He sat back on his stool and nodded to the drink in his hand. “My buddy here is tryin’ to tell me that his craft beer is better than my PBR. I was hopin’ you could set him straight.”
I shook my head in an effort to clear some of the haze. When I got a look at the bottles they were holding, I smirked. “Well, I’m really more of a vodka Red Bull girl myself, but that’s a Wicked Weed IPA he’s got. You really can’t do better than that here in Asheville.”
The man’s smile was still wide as the guy behind him snorted. “Told you,” he grumbled, but the man didn’t seem to hear.
Instead, he lifted his hand and called for the bartender. “Can I get a vodka Red Bull, please?” he asked, eyes still on me.
I pursed my lips as the guy behind the bar poured my drink and slid it over. “That might be the most creative way anyone’s ever bought me a drink before,” I said as I took a sip.
His eyes lit up even brighter. “I’ll take creative. I’m Theo,” he said and extended a hand toward me. “What’s your name?”
“Del,” I said as I reached for him.
The moment our fingers touched, a lightning bolt of heat shot through my body. The hair on my arms stood on end, and my skin sizzled as he wrapped his hand around mine.
“Nice to meet you, Del.”
He had to feel the buzzing, right? This low-level vibration that started where he was still touching me and spread to every inch of my body.
I shook my head again as I pulled my hand out of his. “Thanks for the drink, Theo.” I picked it up and took another swallow, hoping he didn’t notice the way I was still shaking.
“I was surprised to hear you prefer vodka red bull to moonshine,” he continued.
He was referring to the alcohol werewolves preferred to drink. It was much stronger than human liquor, which did next to nothing for us.
This meant he was a werewolf, and he knew I was one, too.
I raised my brows and stared at him over my glass as I took another long sip. “I like to have a clear head when I perform.”
“That’s rare for a musician.”
I shrugged and set the drink down.
Theo nodded toward the stage. “So, you’re auditioning today?”
I glanced to the front of the room as the next act set up. My stomach knotted deep inside, but instead of causing fear, all it did was make me more anxious to get out there myself.
This gig was a big deal. Maybe the biggest deal of my life.
Apparently, a popular country-rock band from Nashville was in town on tour and lost their opening act. They were holding emergency auditions for a replacement, and I wanted to be it.
“Yeah. It should be my turn soon. What about you?”
He smiled again, and my heart slammed against my ribcage. “I’ve already tried out.”
Damn it. I was ten minutes late because I’d misplaced my keys again, and I guess I missed his performance. I was thankful I hadn’t lost my turn, but now I regretted not catching his set.
“How’d you do?”
His grin got even wider, his eyes damn near sparkling at me. “I killed it.”
Strangely, his cockiness wasn’t a turn-off like it should have been. I’d been around enough musicians to have tons of experience with big-headed wannabe rockstars.
For some reason, Theo’s arrogance only made me laugh. “Good for you.”
“What are you performing?”
I shrugged. “Not sure yet.”
Theo chuckled, the sound full of disbelief. “You came to an audition and you don’t even know what you’re playing?”
I shrugged again. “Yeah, it’s kinda how I work. If I’m performing for a crowd, I usually make a set list in advance, but if I’m tryin’ out for something, I don’t make up my mind about what I’m singin’ until right before I go on stage.”
His smile lingered as he shook his head back and forth. “Why?”
I pursed my lips as I tried to put my thoughts into words. “It’s like… I have to feel it, you know? I need to be at my absolute best, so I sing whatever’s on my mind and in my soul at that moment.” I sighed as I took another sip of my drink. “It’s never the same song twice, and it’s always a surprise to me too.”
Theo laughed. “That’s crazy.”
“Guess I’m crazy then.”
His strange-colored eyes flashed with humor, but before he could say anything else, the next act started playing and we both turned to watch.
The Asheville music scene was small, so of course I recognized the duo on stage. They were playing a Florida Georgia Line song, and my hips started swaying without my permission.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Theo inch closer, his eyes on me again. “You like this song?”
“I like almost all songs.”
“What about the band you’re auditioning to open for? Do you like their songs?”
“I don’t know them that well, but I like the one they have on the radio right now.” In fact, it had been stuck in my head all week because the local stations had it on repeat.
He seemed to like that answer because he took another step closer and then turned to watch the guys performing. When they were done, we all clapped, and they left the stage.
“What did you think?” Theo asked.
Somehow, he’d gotten closer. Now I could smell the hops on his breath, and beneath that, his true scent. It was woody cedar and the metallic scent of steel, and I instantly knew he was a guitarist.
“They did great.”
“But?”
I frowned at him. “How do you know there’s a but?”
“A good musician knows there’s always something that can be better. And a great musician usually knows what it is.”
His smile was so wide as he stared at me, and I honestly forgot to breathe for a moment.
I dragged some precious oxygen back into my lungs. “How do you know I’m a good musician?”
“Just a hunch,” he said with a wink.
A simple flick of his eyelid shouldn’t have made my heart pound like that, but it did.
I cleared my throat and looked away. I had to if I was going to get a coherent sentence out. “They work well together and always do a great job, but I think they coulda picked a song that fit them better.”
“Like what?” I turned to give him an exasperated look, and he just laughed. “I’ve got a feeling you already know what they shoulda sang. Am I wrong?”
I licked my lips, and his eyes darted to my mouth. “I sa
Theo’s bright eyes met mine again. “That’s a good song.”
“I know. And those guys slayed it last time.”
He smiled again, and it was like every time he did that, he got more good looking. “What about this girl?” he asked with another nod at the stage.
I tore my gaze away from his to glance at the front of the room. When I did, I found one of my least favorite people in Asheville.
“Oh,” I deadpanned. “That’s Britt Samuel. She’s good.”
Theo laughed so loud a few people turned to stare at us. He stifled his chuckles and took another step closer, lowering his voice more. “You are an awful liar.”
I frowned up at him, willing his woodsy scent to stop clouding my thoughts. “I’m not lyin’. She is good.”
“Okay, then where’s the but?”
I rolled my eyes. “There’s no but.”
“You’re lyin’ again.”
A soft growl rumbled out of my mouth, and Theo had to press his lips together to hold back another laugh. “Fine,” I spat. “She over sings, she’s usually a half beat too slow, and she’s a bitch, okay?”
His eyes were bright with humor, and I could tell it was taking an immense effort for him to hold it in. “Why is she a bitch?” he murmured, moving even closer as our conversation became more private.
I sighed. “She thinks there’s only room for one female singer-songwriter in Asheville and she’s sure it should be her.”
“Is she right?” I turned to him with a glare, and he held up his hands. “About there only being enough room for one of you here,” he explained, his lips twitching with another grin.
The fight flew right out of me, and my shoulders slumped. “I don’t know. Maybe. It does kinda seem like any time we’re both up for somethin’, they always pick me or her and never both.”
That truth was a tough pill to swallow, especially when all I had to wash it down with was the hopelessness of my situation.
Because I wasn’t like Britt. I never wanted to be the most popular female artist in the city.
I wanted so much more.
Asheville would never be enough for me. I’d never learn enough, grow enough, accomplish enough staying here. I needed to spread my wings and fly far away from this place.
But there were four reasons I never did, and each one of them started with one of my siblings. Hell, now I’d have to add Ellie into the mix, too. And her kids. And Callie’s kids. And, shit, now Bea was having a whole fucking litter.
All those reasons added up to too many excuses to stay.
“But let me guess, they mostly picked you?” he asked after a quiet moment, breaking me out of my thoughts.
My eyes darted to his and away before he could read the truth. But I guess I wasn’t fast enough.
“I thought so,” he said, his deep voice even closer than before.
I fought off a shiver as I took a half step back and turned toward the stage. Britt was just getting ready to start, and I wanted to watch out of respect, if nothing else.
She predictably chose a big Shania Twain ballad and just barely hung onto every note. It was honestly kind of hard to watch.
My skin began buzzing again as Theo leaned close, his hard chest bumping into my arm. “You’re right. You’re so much better than her.”
I bit my lips to keep the smile off them as I turned to him. “You’ve never heard me play.”
He leaned back and shrugged. “Call it a hunch.”
“You seem to have a lot of those.”
His grin was back and as wide as ever. “With you? Yeah.”
My stomach pinched sharply as he stared at me with his fathomless hazel eyes that seemed to be every shade possible. Blue, green, brown, amber, turquoise. I couldn’t just focus on one color because they all mixed so seamlessly.
I finally ripped my gaze away from his in time to watch Britt take an exaggerated bow for the smattering of applause she received. I might have felt bad for her, but she didn’t even seem to notice as she strutted off the stage.
Theo leaned in to say something else, but his voice was drowned out by another.
“Del McCoy,” someone announced over the PA system, and my heart beat hard once before taking off at a sprint.
“That’s me,” I muttered to Theo as I tossed back the rest of my drink and grabbed my things.
“Do you know what you’re singing yet?” he asked with what sounded like equal parts humor and worry in his tone.
I shrugged and turned to head for the stage. “I’ll figure it out,” I called over my shoulder.
I didn’t bother taking a last look because I knew it would just distract me. Right now, I needed to tune into the multitude of songs swirling around my head and figure out which one was loudest. Which one had the most to say to me.
This was an important audition, and the fact that I still hadn’t figured out what I was singing had my palms sweating despite what I’d said to Theo. I wiped them against my jeans as discreetly as I could, as I made my way through the venue.
“Excuse me,” I muttered as I skirted past a group of people, my head still in snarls.
Why was I struggling so much to pick a song today? It was never this hard for me. I usually woke up the morning of an audition already knowing what I wanted to sing, but my muses had been strangely silent all day.
I dug deep for what I was feeling most connected to, but all I kept seeing were Theo’s hazel eyes. It was like he’d eclipsed my day before I’d even met him.
Before I knew it, I’d reached the stairs. I tried to pay attention to where I was walking because the last thing I wanted to do was trip on my way up, but just like I’d manifested it, the toe of my boot got caught on the top step and I went stumbling forward. I caught myself with a chuckle and threw back my shoulders before heading toward the center of the stage.
When I reached the microphone, I stared out into the crowd and gave them a grin. “There’s somethin’ wrong with your stairs.”
The tiny crowd roared with laughter, and I smiled harder at them. The feeling that came with being on stage raced through my veins, invigorating me and focusing me all at once.
This was where I was born to be.
This was what I was born to do.
Even though I knew that with every fiber of my being, it was easy to doubt. Especially after a string of things not going my way. But when I got the chance to perform, even for just a few people, it was enough to remind me.
Most of the people watching were obscured by darkness, but I knew exactly where to find him. Without permission, my eyes started scanning the crowd, looking for one shadow in particular.
Theo was still leaning against the bar where I left him, his eyes shining bright even from this far away. My smile grew just for him before I turned to pull out my guitar.
The songs in my head were still spinning around, but there was one that slowed down each time it passed. It wasn’t one of my stronger songs, but it was fun and upbeat, and I knew I could make it sound great acoustic.
I also knew the reason it stuck out was standing across the room and hadn’t taken his eyes off me.
“Fuck it,” I mumbled before turning around and approaching the microphone again. “Hey, y’all. This is Blank Space.”
Chapter 2
Theo
“Del McCoy.”
Her name rang through the venue like it had been ringing in my head since I heard it yesterday. Our manager, Mason, mentioned there was a female werewolf auditioning, and we’d all been hoping she was a good enough fit and we could take her on the road. It just made things easier when we toured with other wolves.
What I got was so much more.
“That’s me,” she said before bringing her drink to those bright red lips and draining the rest.
I watched, entranced, as she calmly collected her things. It felt like our time was running out and I was anxious to hold on to every precious second. “Do you know what you’re singing yet?”
She shrugged, her crimson lips curling with a grin before she turned away. “I’ll figure it out,” she said over her shoulder as she headed toward the stage.
I watched her ass sway back and forth in her skin-tight jeans, not giving a single shit if I got caught staring.
