by Scarlett Ray
“Corn fritters!” he announced cheerfully.
“They’re his favorite,” Dani explained, rolling her eyes with a smile I could only describe as maternal. I was still having trouble wrapping me head around the idea of her as a mother. I couldn’t recall her being that interested in kids when we were younger. But from the look of him, she must have had a few years to get used to it.
“You’re already helping with dinner, huh, Nicky?” I asked, and he looked up at me with big brown eyes. Definitely his mom’s eyes. “How old are you?”
“I’m four,” he held up four fingers. “My birthday was in May.”
I took in a slow, deep breath as I ran some numbers in my head. His age and his looks made it real easy to think he might be mine. But Dani would’ve told me that, wouldn’t she? If nothing else, Anton would’ve dragged me back by the scruff of my neck and demanded I help. Or Maggie would’ve told me. Or Luke. More likely, it was just wishful thinking on my part. More likely, Dani had started seeing someone else immediately after I left, maybe to stop thinking about the time we were together.
My wolf said it made no difference. He said that Nicky was Dani’s child, and Dani was my mate, so he was my responsibility. Except Dani wasn’t my mate, and she never would be. And it would be a lot better for everyone if you’d stop saying so. He growled right back and refused to change his mind.
I was brought back to the moment when Dani hissed and jumped back from the stove, clutching her arm. I distinctly heard her say, “Shhhoot fire and save the matches!”
I had to hold back a snicker. That was one phrase you weren’t likely to hear in Minnesota. “You okay?” I asked. “Sure you don’t need help?”
She shot me a sympathetic look, “I hate to say it, Noah, but I think Nicky’s more help in the kitchen than you’ll ever be.” Nicky giggled at the thought, and I couldn’t honestly be upset when they were both smiling like that. They were a nice little family. Even if they weren’t mine.
Once the fritters were cooked, Dani made a green chile sauce to go with them, and the combination was incredible. From-scratch cooking like this was one of the biggest things I’d missed during my time away from Palo Verde, and I must’ve told Dani a hundred times how much I enjoyed hers. As we were eating, Nicky talked about what he was doing in his preschool class, and I couldn’t help feeling like he was a lot more outgoing than most kids his age. He had plenty to say and wasn’t shy about saying it—but then, maybe that was something he’d picked up from his mom.
She gave me a summary of what it was like taking over for her parents, and she was obviously not enjoying the switch. Maggie was helpful, she admitted, but she could only do so much. “And there are so many things I just have to ‘get used to,’” she grumbled, “because it’s ‘just the way things are.’ Like there’s no way of changing it, no matter how wrong it is.” I could see how that would bother her, personally; she’d always been a proactive person, so any situation she couldn’t control or at least influence drove her crazy.
I tried to lighten the mood a little by telling them about my college experience. First, there was the fact that I was about six years older than most of the people in my classes, which was a little tough to get used to. Even worse, there were people younger than me, kids, who were upperclassmen and TAs I had to take instruction from. The coursework was interesting, at least. My degree was a B.S. in Forest & Natural Resource Management, which sounded incredibly boring—both Dani and Nicky agreed—but was actually helpful, considering what I wanted to do.
“I might even know more about the preserve than you do now,” I joked with Dani, and she rolled her eyes.
“You might know more about the trees, but you don’t know more about the preserve,” she argued.
I thought about offering to help her learn the ropes of her own job, since my coursework had taught me a lot about conservation, but I didn’t want to overstep or insult her.
Around 8:30, Nicky was starting to yawn pretty frequently and struggling a little to keep his eyes open. Dani noticed and told him with a sympathetic smile, “Looks like it’s someone’s bedtime.”
“No, I wanna visit some more,” he said, rubbing his eyes. He was obviously fading fast.
“Come on, baby,” Dani got up and scooped him into her arms, and he didn’t bother fighting. “Say good night.”
“Good night,” he mumbled, waving to me as she carried him toward the stairs.
“Night, bud,” I answered with a smile.
They were gone for a few minutes, leaving me alone to think. This was the part where the evening got a little dicey. If it was just me and Dani talking, I was sure to have a harder time thinking about anything other than the shape of her lips and the sound of her voice. Maybe I should go ahead and call it a night now. Maybe that was a better plan than trying to stick around just to talk with her. It was definitely a safer plan.
Luke had told me I could be friends with Dani, as long as I could keep it that way. But he didn’t know I’d had sex with her all those years ago. He didn’t know how miserably hard it was to not think about the taste of her lips or her breath in my ear. Hell, even while she was cooking and during dinner, I’d been fighting with myself not to stare. She had taken her hair down from its braid, and she looked so much more comfortable here than she had earlier. More than once, I’d caught my eyes wandering down her slower and closer than they should’ve.
While I was still debating with myself, she came back downstairs and laughed, “I’m surprised he lasted that long. He’s usually in bed by eight.” Starting to gather up dishes from the table, she asked, “You want to help me with this?”
“Oh, sure,” I brought plates and cups from the table while she rinsed them and put them in the dishwasher, and I finally worked up the courage to ask what I’d been wondering since I got there. “So. A kid?”
“Mm-hm.”
“Didn’t expect that.”
“I figured it would be a surprise,” she chuckled.
“But it’s just you, huh?” I asked, and her smile faded.
“What do you mean?” her tone said I needed to be careful what I asked.
“Just…I mean, you and his dad aren’t together, or…?”
Dani took another plate from my hands and paused, “No. We’re not. Not at the moment, anyway. Nicky and I still get along okay.”
“Oh, yeah, I didn’t mean— Ahem. I wasn’t trying to say you can’t do this on your own. If anyone can, it’s you.”
“I do my best, anyway. But right now is the easy part; once he gets to be a teenager, we’ll see if I’m still handling it this well,” she said as she bent over to finish loading the dishwasher, showing just how tight her jeans were and giving me a view of her ass that jump-started my heart.
Damn it, she didn’t even have to try and I was already practically drooling over her. It suddenly became very clear to me that if I stayed, I was going to end up jumping her. If I didn’t leave immediately, I was going to lose whatever chance I still had of letting this be a just-friends thing in my head. And if I made a move she didn’t want, it would most likely ruin whatever relationship there was still between us. I didn’t want to risk that.
“Uh, I should probably get going,” I said, taking a step back and forcing my eyes away, looking anywhere but at her.
“Already?” she replied, I could hear the frown in her voice. “I figured you’d want to stick around and catch up a while longer.”
“Well, it’s getting late—”
“It’s not even nine yet,” she laughed.
“—and we both have work in the morning.” Could she tell I was making excuses? It felt real obvious from where I was standing. “Besides, we have plenty of time to talk now that I’m back. Just, uh, some other time.”
Dani watched me critically for a second before giving in with a shrug, “Fair enough. As long as you don’t go running out on me again.” She smiled like she was joking, but I got the feeling she meant it more than she let on.
> I stayed on my guard as she walked me back to the front door, keeping a firm hold on my self-control and my beast’s urges. I told her, “Thanks for having me.”
“Glad to,” she said, slipping her hands into her back pockets. She tossed her hair back over her shoulder, and I had a brief impulse to bury my face in it. Just standing that close, being able to smell her was torture. She didn’t bother with perfume or flowery shampoo, so I knew the scent was 100% her, and it was—always had been—painfully attractive.
Trying to force my heart to slow down, I cleared my throat, “I guess I’ll be seeing you. Around the preserve, maybe.”
“Mm-hm.” I couldn’t help noticing her pulse had gotten quicker too; I could see it there, right under her jaw, and my instinct was to run my tongue over it, bite down on her neck, mark her so there was no question she was mine. Knowing that the longer I stayed, the more likely my willpower was to break, I gave her one last tight smile and went to open the door. But she reached out and pushed it closed again, stepping in even closer. The way she smiled, it was almost like she knew what was going through my mind and wanted to see me snap.
“Dani, what—”
“Don’t play dumb, cowboy,” she slid her hands up my chest to wrap her arms around my neck. Her fingertips brushed the nape of my neck, forcibly reminding me of the last time she’d gotten this close. “You think I didn’t notice those eyes all over me the whole night? You’re lucky my son was around or I would’ve called you on it sooner.”
Still remembering the conversation I’d had with Luke, I muttered halfheartedly, “I think you were imagining things.”
Dani raised an eyebrow at me, “Oh yeah?”
As if she was trying to test me, she stood up on her toes and kissed me softly. Too softly. My desire for her overpowered my resistance for a second, long enough for me to grab her around her waist and drag her back for a proper kiss. Pushing my fingers through her hair, I grabbed a handful and tugged just hard enough to make her gasp, then slipped my tongue into her mouth when her lips parted. She didn’t argue or resist for a second, clinging tight to me and meeting me just as eagerly.
Her body had always been lean, like you’d expect from a girl who grew up doing ranch work, but she was still soft in all the right places. My free hand slid down her waist, then around her hip to grab her ass through those tight Levis, and every inch I explored made me want her more. And even beyond how good she felt physically, there was that familiar assurance that this was exactly where I should be. The same feeling I’d gotten the first time I kissed her. The same feeling I got every time we were together and my beast insisted she was my destined mate.
When she finally did break away from me, panting hard, she had a knowing grin on her face, “Mm, did I imagine that too?”
Trying to blink my way out of a lust-driven haze, trying to ignore my beast’s desire to fuck her there and then, up against the wall, just like before, I argued one last time, “Listen, I should probably—”
“Come to my room? Yeah, I think you should,” she said, already pulling me toward the hall by my hands. She could see how bad I wanted it, so she wasn’t going to take my unenthusiastic no as an answer. And I was sick and tired of pretending.
“You always been this bossy?” I asked as I went along with her.
“Don’t act like you don’t know me,” The room she took me to was the same one she’d had years ago. First floor, left hall, last door on the right. She locked the door behind us and then pounced on me again, kissing me hard while her hands worked down the buttons of my shirt. I got to work too, tugging her shirttails out and just barely resisting the urge to literally tear it off her. When her hands reached my belt buckle, I grabbed her wrists to stop her, “We’ve got all night. Let me do it right this time.”
Even in the room only lit by a single floor lamp, her eyes were shining, warmer than ever, as they wandered down my bare skin. Then they went to my hand, which still had both of hers caught, and she wet her lips, “Mm-kay.” She tugged her hands out of my grasp and went to sit on the bed and strip out of her shirt, “This what you mean by ‘do it right’?” Holding eye contact with me, she reached behind her back and unhooked her bra to toss it aside.
“It’s a good start,” I growled, coming to meet her and push her down on her back. Like I’d wanted earlier, I found her pulse with my lips and slowly kissed my way down her throat. When I bit down on her shoulder, her answer surprised me.
“Harder,” she panted, losing her fingers in my hair. Well, that wasn’t a request I was about to fight. My teeth clamped down harder, hard enough that I knew she’d have a bruise in the morning, and she let out a low, ragged moan. God, I loved seeing her like that, half-naked, arching her back under me, begging me to be rough with her. She was like that the first time too. Harder. Faster. Shit, I was hard already just thinking about it, knowing where this was going.
I worked my mouth down her collarbone to her tits and outlined the shape of them with my tongue, tasting every inch of flawless brown skin I could reach. While my mouth was busy making sure she could hardly catch her breath, my hands got her jeans unfastened. Already, I could smell how wet she was, and it was starting to drive me crazy. Dani lifted her hips without question to help me get her undressed, even spread her legs for me, despite being a little shaky. But when I leaned down and started to kiss her hips, her moan sounded a little nervous.
“Something wrong?” I asked, looking up at her. For once, she looked unsure, even blushing.
“No. I’ve just never…ahem, it’s fine,” she dropped her head back so she wouldn’t have to look at me.
“Are you sure? I don’t have to do this.”
“It’s fine, I said,” she snapped. The fact that she was getting defensive just made me that much more determined to get a straight answer. I sighed and sat up to lean over her on one hand, sliding my other between her legs to tease and play with her pussy.
“I don’t wanna hear ‘it’s fine,’” I told her plainly while she was squirming and gasping, trying to catch her breath. “Either you want it or you don’t. Tell me one way or the other.” In any other situation, trying to push her around like that would’ve earned me a swift right hook, but when she was already melting a little, it seemed like a safe bet to try.
“I…” her breath hitched when my thumb slid over her clit, and she ground out, “I want it. Okay? I do.”
“Was that so hard?” I stole another quick kiss before putting my mouth to work between her legs. I went slow at first, running my tongue up the crease of her thigh, then along the shape of her lips, teasing a little to get her worked up. When I finally rubbed my tongue over her clit, the sound she made—a lot higher-pitched than I expected—was so good I couldn’t stand teasing her anymore. Wrapping my arm around her leg to hold her still, I focused on pleasing her however I could, on figuring out what made her twitch and gasp for more.
“Good God, Noah,” she panted, pushing her hair back out of her eyes. “Mh, when you do something right, you…do the damn thing right.”
“Don’t like to leave a job half-done.”
“Yeah, well if you keep that up, you’re gonna be—ah—done too soon,” she laughed breathlessly. When I didn’t stop, eager to see her cum for me, she reached down and grabbed a handful of my hair to push me away, “You’re not getting off that easy. Come here.”
I wiped my mouth and did what she said, trying not to get distracted staring at her body.
Before I could even lie down beside her, she was already working on my belt, hastily getting my pants open to slide her hand down the front of them. When her fingers wrapped around my cock, I was forced to realize just how hard I’d gotten from having my mouth all over her. “Shit,” I groaned.
“You had enough ‘taking things slow yet’?” Dani asked with a knowing smirk, her steady stroking making it a hell of a lot harder to focus on answering.
“Yeah. I…uh, do you have condoms, or…?”
“Nope,” she didn
’t seem really concerned, though, tugging at my belt loops until I got the hint and took my jeans off. She continued, “It’s not like I’m gonna get pregnant again, so don’t worry about it.”
I thought about asking what she meant, but with her pushing me onto my back and climbing up to straddle my hips, there were more important things to focus on.
“Go ahead and make yourself comfortable,” I teased, sliding my hands up her thighs.
“Don’t mind if I do,” she didn’t bother making a fuss about the moment, sliding the tip of my cock against her slick folds and then pressing down until I slid inside, forcing a moan out of both of us. She shifted her hips a little to get used to it, then settled them all the way down against mine, burying me deep inside her.
“Goddamn,” I groaned, digging my fingers into her soft skin and forcing myself not to move when she wasn’t ready.
“Mm-hmm,” she moaned, biting her lip. Dani ground her hips slowly against mine, either letting herself adjust or just enjoying having me that deep. Once she’d gotten her bearings, she lifted up and pressed smoothly back down. The friction made my head spin. But it seemed like it wasn’t enough for her; pretty soon, her rhythm got rougher, faster, harder, until she was gasping for every breath, letting me hit bottom with every thrust.
“God—Noah,” she managed, dragging her fingers through her hair to pull it back out of her face. Even when she was obviously struggling to breathe, she kept her hips working, rolling them against mine for more. Had to give the girl one thing: she knew how to ride. But I figured she wouldn’t mind me helping her out. Keeping my firm hold on her thighs, I bucked up into her, meeting her movements to go even deeper, and she let out another rough, satisfied moan, “Mmm, fuck yes.”
When her eyes met mine and she gave me a wily little smirk, I decided I was tired of being passive. I sat up enough to slide my hand behind her neck, then dragged her down for a bruising kiss. Her nails dug into my shoulders, and I growled into her mouth while my free hand wrapped around her back to keep her trapped against my chest. In this position, it was a lot easier for me to help her; she yelped against my lips when I started fucking her fast, faster than she could go on her own.
