Nothing to Do With Pride by Amber Kell Page B

when I find something.”
    Dennis accepted the sticky note KC held out and quickly scrawled his name and number across it. “I can be reached at this number. If you can’t get hold of me, call the pride house.” He heard the bitterness in his voice and was instantly ashamed. The pride had helped him a great deal despite his behaviour towards one of their own.
    The fox shifter stared at him a while. “I thought the pride were good people?”
    “They are,” Dennis agreed, nodding his head. “I’m just not their favourite person. They only let me live there because they rescued me and know I don’t have any place to go. I’m not Adrian’s best friend since his wolf hates my coyote. And after being forced to betray Payce to try to save my sister…well, he’s friendly but I don’t think we’re buddies anymore.”
    It still hurt to see the lack of warmth in Payce’s eyes. The werejaguar used to hug him whenever they met. Since the betrayal, Payce hadn’t treated him the same. Some of it was due to the fact that his werelion mate wanted to rip off Dennis’ head and treat it like a soccer ball, but Dennis knew a lot of it was that Payce still hadn’t forgiven Dennis for his betrayal.

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He could tell Payce wanted to forgive and forget, but sometimes when a trust is broken it takes a while to rebuild. He didn’t blame Payce, but that didn’t stop it from hurting.
    Sighing, Dennis got to his feet. As much as he’d like to kiss the fox shifter, there was an air of fragility about the pretty man that had him stepping lightly. He didn’t need to add the sheriff to the number of people who disliked him. He had enough enemies. Besides if he ruined things with the fox shifter, he didn’t have anyone else to turn to for help in finding his sister. He needed to locate Candice before she did something she couldn’t forgive herself for.
    She might appear to be a psycho killer, but Dennis still remembered her as the shy teenaged girl who sneaked food to him at his rundown apartment after their parents kicked him out.
    “Do you think she’d go to your parents?” KC asked, breaking into Dennis’ bittersweet trip down memory lane.
    Dennis gave a broken laugh. “Since they not only kicked me out for being gay, but made her give up her kid, let’s just say their relationship has never been the best.”
    “Ahh.” KC nodded. “I guess we can rule them out, then. I’ll keep following up on coyote stories. So far that’s our best lead. I’m tracking her credit cards, but all I can find is one listed and she hasn’t used it. Besides, I doubt she had it with her when she was in the facility.”
    Dennis wished he could think of some reason to stick around, but KC probably had better things to do than entertain an unemployed coyote with no prospects.
    “Hey, you used to work construction, right?” A bright blush crossed the fox shifter’s face as he asked the question.
    Curiosity kept Dennis from rising from the chair. “Yeah, I did. I worked with Payce. He did the floors while I did walls and more general construction jobs.” He suppressed the pang of pain at their lost friendship as he tried to figure out what the fox wanted.
    “So you’d know how to shore up a wall?” The hope in KC’s face caused another flare of arousal to jolt through Dennis’ body.
    KC’s nose twitch told him the man had noticed. Luckily, Dennis didn’t blush. If he did, he knew he’d be as bright red as KC’s hair.
    “Yeah, sure. Why—you’ve got something you need help with?” Please let him need help .
    Dennis was so bored he’d agree to hang paintings in KC’s house if it would get him away from the pride compound. He knew the lions tried to be welcoming, but since they also knew

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he’d betrayed a friend, most of them kept their distance. No matter what the reason—once a betrayer, always a betrayer in the shifter world. Add in the fact that coyotes were among the least trusted of the animal shifters and he’d sealed