***

Although his host appeared to have had the best intentions in mind, the clothes he had left for him were impossible to wear. After fighting to get into the pair of shorts and the t-shirt and ripping the latter, Ryder had found it impossible to do anything but walk back into the main room as naked as he’d been the day he was born.

Joe turned on his heel, and his eyes grew wide upon seeing him like that. Ryder was acutely aware that he was breaking the human city’s customs, but there was no help for it.

“I’m afraid I ruined your garment while I was trying to attire myself with it.” He held up the ripped white t-shirt. “I will pay you for it.”

“I should have known they wouldn’t fit you,” Joe said, nodding sagely. His eyes were darting sideways. “And you don’t have to pay for it. It was an old thing anyway that I should have thrown away ages ago.”

“I must insist, Joe. I’ve been nothing but a nuisance to you ever since we met.”

“Joe. Why are you calling me that?” The bemused look on his host’s face was genuine, like every attitude the young man had displayed to him so far.

Ryder furrowed his eyebrows. “Should I call you Mr. Average, then?”

Joe looked down, rocking himself back on his heels, and then started laughing. Ryder felt tempted to smile. Even the way this human laughed tickled his hearing the right way. The more time he spent with him, the more Ryder liked him. In his pack, he was the one least likely to take a liking to a human, and even Cassandra, who was half-wolf, had had a hard time getting him to listen to her visions.

“Damn, I haven’t introduced myself properly, right? I’m such an airhead. Let me do that properly.” His host offered his hand. “Hello, my name is Daniel Wilson. You can call me Danny.”

For the first time tonight, Ryder felt a twinge of displeasure at the human before him. “You lied to me? Why?”

The smile faded from Daniel’s – Danny’s – face. He withdrew his hand too. “It was, um, how do I say this so I don’t sound like a complete freak? I didn’t think you’d say ‘yes’. Or that anyone else I asked that question would say ‘yes’.”

Supposedly, other people in the street didn’t need lodging for the night the way Ryder needed it, so that was probably an accurate guess on Danny’s part. Still, it didn’t explain the ruse.

Danny was shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “Average Joe is an expression,” he babbled. “It describes someone who’s average in everything and never stands out. It describes me.”

“And why were you asking people in the street if they would sleep under your roof? You don’t appear to need the money.”

Danny bit his bottom lip, and Ryder’s frown deepened as he observed his host carefully. The whiff of desire was still there, but tucked under other layers. The wolf in him could smell many things, fear being one of them. Only that it wasn’t the usual sort of fear – no, Danny didn’t fear that the wolf in front of him would devour him for his wiles. He feared other things, but without expressing them verbally, Ryder couldn’t understand them.

“I suppose I have to come clean,” Danny murmured. “Yes, there was a misunderstanding, and it stemmed from the fact that you took my words in the most literal sense. I didn’t ask you if you wanted to sleep under my roof,” he said and looked straight into Ryder’s eyes. “I asked you if you would sleep with me. Which is the euphemism we use around here for, well, for sex.”

Ryder knew why he disliked the city and its dwellers. They were prone to trickery, and now he understood Danny less and less. Just earlier, he had told Ryder that sex wasn’t included. And now, he was saying that his initial intention had been to offer exactly that.

“You’re mad at me. I can tell you’re mad at me,” Danny said quickly. “It’s so weird, because we’ve basically known each other for like an hour, and we’re already burning through so many stages.”

“Stages of what?” Ryder asked carefully.

“Don’t mind me. Look,” Danny said and took one deep breath, “I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable. I came at you in the street with one intention, but it was only because I was certain you’d say ‘no’.”

“Why?” Ryder wanted to understand the human’s reasoning, and the only way to clarify it was to ask the correct questions.

“Because,” Danny said with renewed energy. “I mean, look at you. You’re handsome. And now look at me. Do you see the problem?”

“No.” The more they communicated, the less Ryder understood. Wolves were nothing like that; they said what they thought, and they meant what they said. Danny the human was like a tangled up ball of yarn, and Ryder was no cat to want to play with it.

“Okay, I suppose I deserve the humiliation, and I single-handedly managed to get myself into this situation.” Danny took another deep breath. “My friend challenged me to walk up to you and say those words to see if I could get anyone to say ‘yes’ to having sex with me. No one ever wants to have sex with me, so I thought I was safe asking you, such a great-looking guy, the same thing.”

“Why would no one want to have sex with you?” Ryder asked patiently. Now he was beginning to understand the meaning of the fear he had smelled all over Danny only earlier.

“Because I’m average! I’m Average Joe!” Danny exclaimed.

“You’re not Average Joe,” Ryder riposted. “You’re Daniel Wilson. You told me so just now. Unless that was a lie too.”

Danny stared at him for a moment and then chuckled. “You’re correct. Of course you are. Of course I’m Daniel Wilson. I can show you my ID.”

Ryder didn’t care about such things. “Is that where I will sleep?” He pointed at the small sofa. He would hardly fit in there. If that didn’t work, he’d take to the floor. He had no qualms with doing that.

“Yes. I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.” Danny made a short bow to show his regret.

“There was hardly one. I would have said ‘yes’, should I have understood the meaning of your words.”

Danny stared at him, dumbstruck and wide-eyed. “Why?”

“You smell good,” Ryder said promptly. He needed the rest now. Making the effort to understand humans took a lot out of him. Hunting and fighting weren’t nearly this exhausting.

***