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  AN AFRICAN AMERICAN

  WEREWOLF IN LONDON

  - A Sexy Supernatural Interracial Short Story from Steam Books

  Marcus Williams

  Copyright © 2014 Steam Books Erotica & Romance

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author or publisher except for the use of brief quotations in critical articles or reviews.

  As the golden moon pierced the trees and the wind came to a halt, I watched as the man stepped into the light, dark fur turning into dark skin, golden eyes turning back into the blue that it was, and then his entire body cracked and twisted back to its natural form.

  What was he? In that moment, I knew. I knew everything. His dark, naked body began to move towards me – he was covered in dirt, mud and leaves, but none of that mattered. His long, dangling manhood was hardening before he’d even reached me, his chocolate skin could barely be seen if it weren’t for the little rays of starlight filling the woods and aiding my vision.

  He was beautiful – deadly but beautiful. I was ready to be his, but in this moment I had to wonder…

  How did it come to this?

  Oddly enough, my adventure into the dark and twisted world of curses and shape-shifters didn’t start dark and twisted at all. I was just your average twenty-five year old waitress, serving burgers and beer at a local pub in east London. This wasn’t the sort of place that welcomed tourists or the regular, pretentious London-dweller. It was for the old, the familiar and the cheap. Full of white old men, who all had backwater views and still smoked pipes indoors.

  It wasn’t much, but it was a job.

  I was working the dead-shift again, and in a pub that means somewhere between two to six in the afternoon. My boyfriend of six months had gotten into this nice little routine of visiting me when he knew it wouldn’t be busy. He’d come in, sit at a booth until my boss went upstairs, run over and kiss me and then order something so it looked like I wasn’t just spending my time talking to someone.

  I was happy, he was kind and caring, and he didn’t mind that I carried a little extra around the waist. He said my chest more than made up for it whenever I asked him if it bothered him – he was a charmer.

  “What time do you get off?” Iain stood across the bar as I poured him his pint.

  His fair skin, blue eyes and blonde hair were adorable, and that was only matched by his smart dress-sense. He was always in a suit, with a thin black tie and a coat that hugged him perfectly to show off his slender figure. It wasn’t unusual to see a curvy woman with a skinny guy, but I had to admit that sometimes it bothered me.

  “Around six, thank God. I can’t stand to be here when all those men come back tonight.”

  There had been an incident a few nights previous, where some of the regulars who were quite aged had made racist remarks to a group of young, dark-skinned men who were obviously not from the area. Thankfully the men were calm and left without a single bad word spoken back; I ran after them and apologized relentlessly, but they appeared to be fine – I, however, was furious.

  “You know, you really shouldn’t get yourself involved with that kind of crowd,” Iain told me.

  I knew I shouldn’t have, but what were the old geezers going to do?

  A few drinks with Iain turned into a few dozen drinks with Iain, and as the pub began to flood with the regular, crude crowd of old men, he insisted he stay close by to make sure I was alright. He sat at the bar, in-between a racist and a sexist as they drowned themselves in the cheapest cider we offered and began to spout profanities at anyone who glanced their way.

  You could always tell when it was trouble-making time in the old pub. The air grew thick with cigarette smoke, despite the ban on smoking indoors being in place for many years; there were men playing darts and constantly missing the board, giving whoever sat on the nearest table a new piercing if they couldn’t duck in time; and anyone who wasn’t recognized by this clique of grumpy men caused the entire place to go silent as they glared in their direction – and it was one of those times.

  One of the men from the other night, a coloured man who had oddly-flattering blue eyes stepped through the door. They were illuminating, I could see them pierce through the smoke as he headed toward the bar. He didn’t look pleased, but neither did any of the regulars, either. I could tell a fight was going to break out, the poor man was going to be beaten half to death the moment he left.

  I immediately felt the need to do something, to say something or get him out of the bar without causing a scene, but I couldn’t even blink before someone started the abuse.

  “Didn’t we tell that black bastard not to step foot in here again?”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing – well, I could believe it, but I didn’t want to. Out of all the places, all the bars and pubs and liveliness of London city, this man had to come into the one racist corner down the dark alleys and away from the modern world. Did he want trouble? Was he back to start something?

  He arrived at the bar without even looking at any of the men that had slurred both loudly and quietly at him. He didn’t order anything, he didn’t even look like he was aware of anyone in the room.

  “What can I get for you?” I tried to talk to him, but he just starred right through me.

  There was something about it that sent shivers down my spine, and it was just then I felt myself being pulled back behind the bar by the manager who was in his regular charming mood.

  “You get that man out of here right now,” the manager told me. “The last thing I need is the blood of a black man decorating my pub.”

  I really couldn’t stand my job.

  By the time I’d gathered my courage and headed back out front to tell the man to leave, I saw that he’d left already, and a few of the older men were following him out. I knew no good was going to come of it, so I grabbed my jacket and bolted out the door after them.

  The pub was located down a cobblestone path in a maze of small streets and ally-ways, it was one of the oldest areas of London, and unfortunately it was easy to get lost in; especially in the dead of night.

  “Katie!” Iain came running out after me.

  I was franticly looking for the man before something terrible happened, but there were at least four paths from the pub and I couldn’t see or hear anything that would lead me to him.

  “Katie, I told you not to get involved with those people.”

  I knew I shouldn’t, but I couldn’t help myself. It was disgusting, I couldn’t stand by and let a man get hurt. Especially not this man.

  “Katie, he came to this place knowing full well what would happen. He’s obviously trying to cause trouble. Just let them teach him a lesson so he doesn’t come back and it doesn’t get worse. Go back inside and I’ll make sure they don’t take it too far.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. My sweet, kind-hearted Iain was spewing out nonsense and talking about letting an innocent man get hurt because of the colour of his skin. In that moment I didn’t even want to look at him, my blind rage leading me to pick the first path I saw and run off into the darkness.

  Deeper and deeper into the black of night I continued to run, I don’t know why I cared so much or why I was so intent on helping this man, but I couldn’t help myself. Something was drawing me to him and I just had to make sure he was okay
.

  Little did I know that he wasn’t the one I should have been worrying about. As I came across the first street-light and main-road from the pub I also came across the first body…

  He was from the pub, he was stretched out across the floor and out cold, scratches so deep that they’d torn massive gashes in his clothes and left the fabric scattered across the street. I could see that he wasn’t dead, but he was hardly in any state to go back in for a drink.

  What happened? Where was the man? As I hesitated to continue, I noticed another of the men. Rushing to his side, I could then see another, and another. It then occurred to me that maybe the man was okay, maybe he had done this himself. I was scared, the adrenaline that fuelled my feet to run after this man was now screaming at me to turn around and run away, but I couldn’t…

  Then I saw him.

  Golden eyes piercing through the black of night, dark black fur that was as thick as a rug and claws that hung from powerful arms on either side of his body. He was taller, thicker, and a lot hairier. Somehow I just knew it was him, and for some reason I wasn’t as terrified as I should’ve been.

  “Katie!”

  Iain’s voice echoed up the road, and as I turned my head for a moment to see him running up the street, I felt a strong breeze, and then stillness from the direction of the man… He had gone.

  I had no idea what I had just gotten myself into.

  ~ ~ ~

  I spent the next few weeks obsessing over what I had seen that night. One of the guys who was attacked remembered seeing me come face to face with whatever the thing was and he’d told the police. The official report stated that a coloured man came into the pub after starting trouble the night before, that he’d provoked some of the locals and lured them outside where he then proceeded to attack them with several of his friends – none of it was true.

  After I repeatedly denied seeing him nor anyone else, and expressing my concerns about the way the locals were treating coloured people, I soon found myself without a job.

  I told Iain what I’d seen just before he arrived on the street. He didn’t believe me, of course, and he couldn’t understand why I kept pushing to find out. I started leaving in the middle of the night and walking around the ally-ways in that part of town; I had no concern for my safety, because the entire thing felt so surreal to me. I felt like I couldn’t be touched or hurt, I felt like nothing else mattered but finding out exactly what I’d saw that night.

  It became my obsession, a deep-routed compulsion to find the truth, and it caused Iain to show up less and less until one day, a few months after the incident, I found myself completely alone in my apartment, struggling to make ends meet and with no Iain. I had driven myself into isolation, but it didn’t matter. I had to know what happened.

  I didn’t remember how long it’d been since I gazed upon the man in the moonlight; his thick, black fur covering most of his body and his once blue eyes now shining and golden. I had come to terms with the fact that it couldn’t have been human, I’d seen enough movies and read enough fiction to know of all the beasts and ghouls that go bump in the night, and when faced with one I had no choice but to accept that maybe they existed. There was no other explanation – well, aside from the possibility that I had gone mad. That’s why I found myself venturing further and further into the most dangerous places, to vindicate myself.

  That, and because I had found the beast – the man – to be captivating.

  The thick, dense woods that lay a few miles out of the city were the perfect place for monsters to hide. Although not a large, noticeable area when looked at on a map, the woods were large enough and covered enough to house a number of possibilities.

  It was the night I first went there that I got some answers.

  I’d found that not much shocked or scared me anymore. I didn’t jump at the rustling of every little branch in the wind and I didn’t gasp if my foot hit uneven ground. I pursued my curiosity from one end of the woods to the other until I hit the road, then I turned around and decided to try exploring anything I could’ve missed.

  I was so determined and certain that I would come across something, so sure about what I’d seen that night and that there must’ve been more. I think a part of why I was doing this was because the idea that there was more to the world than working at a pub and watching re-runs appealed to me. I wanted this adventure; this secret, scary, fantasy-filled world that might actually exist right in-front of me, in the form of a man who could change into a beast.

  I suppose the most obvious reason I was relentlessly searching for this man was because I was attracted to him. Even with the strange circumstances, I found myself lusting after the dark-skinned gentleman. It was probably a part of why Iain had left me, although I can’t say I cared for his leaving as much as I would’ve before this had happened.

  As I pushed through the branches, thrones and uneven ground, I finally came to a spot like no other. A circular spot that was lit up by the golden, full-moon. The trees were far enough apart so that you could see the rays shining down perfectly, and it was the only place I knew of anywhere near London where streetlights and thick-city-air didn’t cloud the stars in the sky. It was beautiful, it was exactly where I expected to see something from a fantasy world…

  That was when I saw him. Thick, black fur and golden eyes. He didn’t say a word, he didn’t mutter a sound. As his body shifted from the shadows to the moonlight, his fur vanished, revealing his bare, black skin; and his golden eyes turned to their usual dark blue. His manhood was exposed to the open air, he was erect; he was smiling.

  Somehow I knew that he knew that I wanted this. He came over to me. He kissed me. He let his hands run up and down my body. He pressed up against me. He made me cry out. He made me want every last inch of him.

  That was when I woke up.

  That was the first night I got answers. My dream answered the question – why was I doing this? And it was because I craved the lustful danger this man could offer me in my mediocre life.

  ~ ~ ~

  It must’ve been fate or the supernatural itself that led me back to the pub the following day.

  I felt oddly liberated from my curiosity, because in my mind that dream had confirmed the existence of something more, and strangely enough that satisfied me. I couldn’t find him, I didn’t know where to look, but I knew he existed and I knew something more existed, so all I could do until I ran into him was continue my life.

  Not that I had to wait very long, the moment I entered the ally-way where the police tape had just been torn down, I saw him stood in the exact same spot, although he wasn’t in the same form. In the daylight he looked like just any another man: brown skin, tall, athletic build and a casual dress-sense.

  I didn’t hesitate in speaking to him. I felt compelled to, but I also felt like he was waiting for me. A part of me questioned if I was still dreaming, but the pinch that stung on my wrist confirmed it was real.

  The words just came out of my mouth, “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “I know.”

  We stood side by side, looking at the spot in which I saw him last.

  “Have any weird dreams lately?” he asked in an American accent. He turned to me and smiled. I didn’t think monsters could smile, but there it was.

  I don’t know how he knew about my dream, but then again anything was possible in his world. I just assumed it was another thing I didn’t understand, which fuelled my curiosity even more. I was determined to get my answers, but I was also determined to get to know him – even if he didn’t want to answer any questions.

  “It’s called ‘influence’ and most of us wolves can do it.”

  I had no idea what he was saying, but I stood silently as he tried to explain.

  It was surreal. He claimed to be a wolf, and he claimed that his kind could influence human actions, including what they dream about. He could influence us to think we wanted to turn left instead of right; or even scarier, he could influence us to walk in
to traffic.

  I asked him several times if my attraction to him was real or just this influence, but he insisted it didn’t work that way. He could plant the seeds of the thought, but the individual had to decide through their own will. Those with strong wills could deny influence altogether…

  “So my dream was because I’m weak-willed?” I felt slightly insulted – not at all confused that he was telling me about something impossible, but insulted.

  “That dream happened because you let it.”

  I couldn’t help but smile at that response. He knew I wanted him, whether it was for the mystery, for the danger or for the amazing sex I envisioned; I wanted him.

  He started to walk off mid-conversation. I supposed wolves weren’t known for their manners. I felt like I couldn’t let him go, I barely knew him and yet I wanted to know absolutely everything about him. I didn’t care that he’d seriously injured people, that he was some sort of beast or that anything he told me could be considered insane. I just knew I wanted him.

  “Wait…”

  He stopped and turned to me, a smile forming from his thick, luscious lips. “I’ve shown you where to find me.”

  That was it; I knew exactly what to do. I knew exactly what I wanted.

  ~ ~ ~

  I never did go to try and get my job back. I spent the rest of the day in my room, fantasising about all the ways the night could go, imagining his smooth, chocolate hands caressing my pale skin. Imagining his hairy body colliding with my silky flesh. Half of the day I lay on my bed with my hands all over myself, and the other half I nervously paced back and forth trying to shake off the nerves.

  That was when the door rang, I rushed to it – it could’ve been him.

  It wasn’t.

  “Iain?”

  He stood there with flowers. He was just as handsome as ever, his light skin and blonde hair looking shiny and polished. The picture-perfect boyfriend to bring home to the family.