by Terry Spear
“Now,” she cried out, pulling at his arm to join her.
He was aching with need and didn’t hesitate to push his ready cock between her slick folds and began to thrust. She met his thrusts with enthusiasm and cried out before he was even ready. God how he loved her. Her climax stroked him as he slowed his thrusts and kissed her mouth, their tongues tangling. Then he began to push hard again, slipping his hand under her buttocks, thrusting deeper.
He felt the end coming and held on for as long as he could. And then he spilled his seed deep inside her. He pulled out and began stroking her again and she followed him with a climax of her own, crying out in pure bliss.
He rolled over onto his back and pulled her into his arms. “I don’t want to ever let you go.”
“Hmm, I want us to always be like this. Maybe next mission, you and I can share a sleeping bag. I heard a rumor, you might have your first field assignment tomorrow…with me.”
He smiled, glad to hear it. “Good. In the meantime, wake me if you need any loving tonight.”
“I sure will. You can trust me on that. Love you, you big old cat.”
“I’m so glad you’re home. I love you right back.”
They made love again during the night, and late the next morning, Erin and Bryce finally made it to the kitchen. She called her brother, while Bryce was making them pancakes for breakfast. “Hey, James, I just mated Bryce and I wanted to be the first to tell you. We’ll get married this December. Are you still going to make an honest woman of Jane in January?”
“Congratulations! And yep. If I don't go through with it, she'll kill me.”
Erin laughed. "I need to call Bethany and then let the boss know so he can put Bryce and me on ‘couple’ missions whenever possible.”
“Okay, I’ll let you go, but congratulations to the both of you again.”
When Erin called Bethany, she screamed with excitement. “I can’t wait.”
Erin laughed. "We'll have fun setting it all up."
Erin called Martin next and he told her he had a mission for her and Bryce then. So the rumor she’d heard was true and she was glad.
This would be the first field assignment for Bryce and the first couple mission for the two of them. She didn't even care that she would give up some of her official time off, just so she could be paired up with Bryce for his first job as a JAG field agent.
Martin briefed Erin about her first assignment with Bryce, telling her that she and he had to learn who was skimming profits off liquor sales at the jaguar-owned Clawed and Dangerous Kitty Cat Club and how he was doing it. But he wanted to tell her that the jaguar policing force had taken over the whole club to celebrate her and Bryce’s and Jane and James’s matings at a surprise party.
“Thanks, Martin. You’re the greatest.”
"Okay, put the call on speaker and I'll let Bryce in on the rest of the mission."
She did and told Bryce it was Martin calling about their first assignment.
Martin said, “The job is at the Clawed and Dangerous Kitty Cat Club. The manager suspects one of his three bartenders—mostly Larry White, because on the nights he works, sales are way off—is taking a portion of the sales. Mr. Callahan has a customer counter so he can determine how many guests he has each night. Unless a lot of visitors are coming to dance and not drink, Larry is somehow taking at least half of the sales.”
“But the liquor and the amount of sales match?” Bryce asked.
“Yep, and that's what confuses the issue. The owner has security cameras both for watching the customers, but also aimed at observing the bartender and cash registers. The manager just can’t figure out how the bartender is skimming off the money. At the owner’s request, we installed two extra video cameras a couple of days ago before the club opened so that you can access the videos with your phones. Maybe you can catch him at it,” Martin said.
“I would think that we have so many jaguar agents hanging out there, the bartender would be reluctant to steal,” Erin said.
“We would too, but he’s been doing this on every shift he’s worked, and we always have some agents celebrating at the club at some time or another. It hasn’t stopped him so far. The manager’s been trying to determine how the bartender has been doing it without getting caught, but he just can’t figure it out. The owner’s been by there too, monitoring the videos and can't see how he's getting away with it either.”
“Is Larry dangerous? Has he had any other brushes with the law?” Bryce asked.
“Not that we could discover. All agents always go in packing on a mission, just in case. He should be there an hour before the clubs opens. If we don’t learn how he’s doing it tonight, you’ll be going in every night whenever it’s his shift.”
“Okay, so we arrest him and incarcerate him,” Bryce said. "After we learn the truth."
"That's the score."
“Ready for your first assignment?” Erin asked Bryce.
“Yeah. Music, dancing, surveillance with my favorite cat? I couldn’t have a better job.”
Martin chuckled. “Good luck to the both of you.” Then he ended the call.
“You really think we’ll have time for dancing?” She poured them some fresh coffee.
“Hell, yeah. We’ll wrap this puppy up in short order.” Bryce served up the pancakes and set the plates on the table.
She sure hoped so because a lot of agents were waiting for the surprise celebration to begin. She was certain Martin had told them they would have the celebration for the engagements at a certain hour, no matter if they resolved the bartender’s theft of liquor sales or not. She was excited about both the prospect of working her first case successfully with Bryce and sharing the news with all the jaguars on the force that she and Bryce were a mated couple.
Eager to prove his worth as a JAG agent, when Bryce and Erin arrived at the jaguar-owned and operated club, he wanted to accomplish this mission pronto. Quite a few of the agents he’d either seen at work or at the Halloween party were here, which proved just how brazen Larry was at stealing from the owner—in front of the jaguar policing force. Bryce didn’t smell one human in the club, nor any wolf shifters. He and Erin ordered a bottle of beer and a glass of wine at a table for four and began watching their phones as if being together on a “date” wasn’t as important as whatever they were doing on their phones.
“See anything suspicious?” Bryce asked Erin after a couple of hours. Here he thought they could wrap this up quickly, but he’d been watching the bartender carefully deposit the money in one cash register or another. Not one time did he see the bartender stick some of the money in his pocket.
“No. I wonder if he is aware that he’s being watched by agents this time.”
“A bunch of them are here, so maybe. Did the JAG just start video recording tonight or earlier?” Bryce wanted to see how another bartender was taking in the money from the night’s sales.
“Not sure. I’ll text the boss.” A few minutes later, she said, “Martin’s sending over the video from yesterday.”
“Okay, got it.” Bryce watched the video from yesterday for about fifteen minutes, then watched the live video of Larry’s actions tonight. “I see a change in the setup. In the first video, there’s one cash register. In the second, there are two.”
“But the manager said that there’s no discrepancy between the liquor usage and the amount of money in the registers.”
Bryce snapped his fingers. “What if Larry’s bringing in his own bottles of liquor?”
“Genius! Why don’t you call the manager and ask him about the two cash registers?”
“I will. He did say he'd been watching him at the registers though. We’ll need him to come down and confirm that extra bottles of liquor that don’t belong to the club are behind the bar also.” Bryce called the manager and asked him about the second register and if he could verify if some of the bottles of liquor weren’t his.
“Hell, I was just watching to see if Larry was pocketing the money. I
never even thought about him making drinks from his own stash of bottles. As to the register, you're right. Sometimes there's one, and sometimes two. I’ll be right over.”
“The manager is on his way over. Why don’t you and I dance our way over to the bar?” Bryce asked.
“I’d like that, Mr. Jenkins.”
“It’s my pleasure, Ms. Jenkins.” Bryce stood and offered his hand to Erin. She took it and the two of them snuggled close while she continued to monitor the video on her phone and he guided them through the dancers on the floor, taking a round-about way to the bar.
By the time three songs had played and he saw the manager come in the back door and glance around the club, looking for Erin and Bryce, they were nearly to the bar. Bryce waved at the manager, who stalked across the floor and the three of them headed behind the bar. Larry had his back to them, mixing a margarita while the manager looked for liquor bottles that weren’t his own.
Larry turned around and saw Erin and Bryce. “You can’t be back here. Leave now or I’ll call the cops.”
“I authorized them to be back here,” the manager said, coming from the opposite direction.
Larry swung around to see the manager standing there holding a box of bottles of liquor. “Yours, I presume.”
Bryce arrested the bartender and figured he and Erin would be taking him to lockup, but another agent at the club came around the bar and said he’d take the prisoner instead. The agent smiled. “Enjoy the rest of your night.”
Martin suddenly showed up at the club and stopped the music. “I just want to say congratulations are in order for Bryce’s first successful mission and that we have two of our JAG agent couples getting married: Jane and James and Erin and Bryce.”
Everyone clapped and cheered them. Then the music played again and several couples began dancing.
“It’s not just a job,” Bryce told Erin as they danced nice and close again, only this time they were strictly here to enjoy themselves, but he realized just how much the agents cared about each other.
“No. We’re family.”
“I don’t think I’ve seen so many agents here at one time.”
“Martin reserved the club for us. But I suspect the owner did it for free to help us catch a thief.”
“I think that was the easiest job I’ve ever been on.”
Erin smiled up at him. “Maybe, but the manager and the owner couldn’t figure it out. They just needed a fresh perspective. Not all our jobs involve gun play, or jaguar teeth, but I’m sure you’ll get plenty of that in the years to come.”
Bryce kissed her mouth. “Sorry, that you didn’t get any time off.”
She drew closer to Bryce on the dance floor, rubbing her body against his like a big cat wanting some loving. “This is not too shabby for working a first mission, don’t you agree?”
"Not too shabby at all."
Martin stopped the music again and called out, “Hey, just got a call about a fight between two male jaguars over a female downtown. Do I have any volunteers to handle it?”
Erin kissed Bryce and hugged him close, dancing to the nonexistent music, her brother dancing slowly by with Jane and he winked at Erin.
They may be workaholics, but sometimes it was just plain time to celebrate.
Epilogue
It was Erin and Bryce's first anniversary of having met and time for Halloween again. It would always be a special time for them.
Erin smiled at Bryce's MacBride kilt. "Going commando?"
"Naturally, for what comes after the party." He looked over her long MacBride kilt as if he was trying to determine if she was too.
"You know it."
"I should have guessed. We usually think along the same lines when it comes to planning what follows. I thought it was cute that Bethany is going to be dressed like she's one of our kinsmen."
"Which she is."
"True enough." He opened the mail he hadn't gotten to and frowned. "Well, good news and bad. The good news is that we got the check for the sale of my house. The bad news is that it's more than the amount they allow for an online deposit."
Erin opened her mouth to speak, then shook her head. "Okay, that means dropping by the bank on Halloween and of course, wouldn't you know, today we have a super moon. Got your sword handy?"
Bryce smiled at her and slipped it on his belt. "You?"
She attached her sword to her belt, glad he'd been giving her lessons on swordsmanship for the show they were going to perform tonight at the Halloween party. Everyone was excited about it. "Ready."
Not that they were expecting a bank robbery to take place…but they were JAG agents…and prepared for anything.
"I've never felt safer going to the bank," he said, taking her hand as he led her outside to his car. "You cast a spell over me, you know, that first time."
She smiled at him as he got her car door for her. "You fought your way right into my heart." She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him, their kilts pressed tight against each other. "I don't know." She felt his cock stirring to life. "I might not be able to wait until after the Halloween party to see what you have for me under your kilt."
He laughed. "Let's make the bank deposit, and we can return home and I'll make another deposit before we head over to the Halloween party."
She knew he was the right one for her. No matter the trials they had to face in their line of work, they were always ready for lots of kitty cat loving.
Bryce hadn't believed he would have given up his opportunity to be a homicide detective with the human police force to join the jaguar policing force until he'd set his sights on one determined jaguar in training, amazed at her moves in the water, "fighting" against her opponent, a male jaguar. Bryce and Erin had taken down two jaguars in the Amazon River, just from using the same techniques in the training she'd put him through earlier this year. She wasn't just a beautiful cat, but smart, a worthy opponent, and fun to be with. But today, she was a sexy lass and all his.
One full moon a year ago had made that Halloween even more magical. And now, the super moon was on full display. He drove them to the bank and saw a car with its engine running, the driver looking anxiously around.
It might be nothing, but Bryce skipped the drive-thru and parked the car next to the running vehicle. "Ready for action?" he asked Erin.
"Always."
"Let's do it."
And in they went, ready for any eventuality. They were a JAG agent-couple team, after all, and loving every minute of it—the good and the bad—through bullet wounds and broken bones and all the loving in between.
Acknowledgments
Thanks so much to Darla Taylor and Donna Fournier for beta reading for me and helping to make the story the best, even during the Thanksgiving holidays!
About the Author
Bestselling and award-winning author Terry Spear has written over sixty paranormal romance novels and four medieval Highland historical romances. Her first werewolf romance, Heart of the Wolf, was named a 2008 Publishers Weekly’s Best Book of the Year, and her subsequent titles have garnered high praise and hit the USA Today bestseller list. A retired officer of the U.S. Army Reserves, Terry lives in Spring, Texas, where she is working on her next wolf, jaguar, cougar, and bear shifter romances, continuing with her Highland medieval romances, and having fun with her young adult novels. When she’s not writing, she’s photographing everything that catches her eye, making teddy bears, and playing with her Havanese puppies and grand-baby. For more information, please visit www.terryspear.com, or follow her on Twitter, @TerrySpear. She is also on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/terry.spear. And on Wordpress at: Terry Spear’s Shifters http://terryspear.wordpress.com/
Also by Terry Spear
Heart of the Cougar Series:
Cougar’s Mate, Book 1
Call of the Cougar, Book 2
Taming the Wild Cougar, Book 3
Covert Cougar Christmas (Novella)
Double Cougar Trouble, Book 4
Cougar Undercover, Book 5
Cougar Magic, Book 6
Heart of the Bear Series
Loving the White Bear, Book 1
Taming the White Bear, Book 2, (TBD)
The Highlanders Series: Winning the Highlander's Heart, The Accidental Highland Hero, Highland Rake, Taming the Wild Highlander, The Highlander, Her Highland Hero, The Viking’s Highland Lass, His Wild Highland Lass (novella), Vexing the Highlander (novella), My Highlander
Other historical romances: Lady Caroline & the Egotistical Earl, A Ghost of a Chance at Love
Heart of the Wolf Series: Heart of the Wolf, Destiny of the Wolf, To Tempt the Wolf, Legend of the White Wolf, Seduced by the Wolf, Wolf Fever, Heart of the Highland Wolf, Dreaming of the Wolf, A SEAL in Wolf's Clothing, A Howl for a Highlander, A Highland Werewolf Wedding, A SEAL Wolf Christmas, Silence of the Wolf, Hero of a Highland Wolf, A Highland Wolf Christmas, A SEAL Wolf Hunting; A Silver Wolf Christmas, A SEAL Wolf in Too Deep, Alpha Wolf Need Not Apply, Billionaire in Wolf’s Clothing, Between a Rock and a Hard Place, SEAL Wolf Undercover, Dreaming of a White Wolf Christmas, Flight of the White Wolf (2018), A Billionaire Wolf for Christmas (2018), SEAL Wolf Surrender (2019), Silver Town Wolf: Home for the Holidays (2019)
SEAL Wolves: To Tempt the Wolf, A SEAL in Wolf's Clothing, A SEAL Wolf Christmas, A SEAL Wolf Hunting, A SEAL Wolf in Too Deep, SEAL Wolf Undercover, SEAL Wolf Surrender (2019)
