He pushed a finger inside her, thrusting in and out as he worked her clit with his lips and tongue. When she began to moan in time with his thrusts, he added another finger, pushing her higher and higher until she felt as if she were floating. She was aware of nothing but the sound of her own cries in her ears and the feel of Creel’s mouth as he worshipped her body.
As her climax approached, she tensed against his mouth and her thighs trembled. He withdrew his fingers and grasped her ass, holding her against his mouth as he French-kissed her pussy, tongue-fucking her until she was moaning helplessly.
The singing sensation between her thighs spiraled and intensified, then something broke and waves of blissful release washed through her as she came hard against Creel’s clever mouth.
He looked up at her and grinned, his mouth and chin shiny with her juices. She was beyond speech – she just held on to his shoulders for support until the strength in her legs came back.
They walked back to the cabin together, and he said, “Hey, think there’s enough room in the bed for me?”
She hesitated, trying to think of what to say.
“I’m pretty tired,” she said. “I think I’m just going to go to sleep early.” And she walked away quickly so she couldn’t see the look on his face.
Chapter Twelve
Creel and Douglas sat outside the north side of the construction site a couple of days later, eating sandwiches that Miranda had made for them and drinking coffee from a thermos. The summer evening was cool but mild, and the wind rustled through the towering oak trees that surrounded the property. Shifters always incorporated as much of the natural surroundings as they could into their towns and cities.
Hell, several of the guards that night were up in the trees. There were cat shifters of one species or another, entertaining themselves by leaping from limb to limb. And the south side of the project was being guarded by bears, who also favored a treetop vantage point. Creel relied on his superior sense of scent and hearing.
Creel had been informed that some members of Miranda’s old pack were working on the construction site. None of the workers had been on site when he and Douglas had arrived, and he’d put the word out that if he so much as saw any of them put a paw on the property when he was there, he’d remove it and feed it to them.
“How’s everything going with Miranda?” Douglas asked Creel after they’d finished their sandwiches.
Creel shrugged. “Fine. How’s it going with Sophia?” He didn’t actually care about the state of Douglas’ love life, he was just trying to change the subject, because things weren’t going that well with Miranda.
But it worked, and Douglas lit up and started talking about how Sophia was going to move in with him and they were already looking for a spot to build a restaurant. There was some relatively flat land near the Rotgut that didn’t have too much ledge underground, and they could also put up a town hall and maybe have a grocery store there.
Creel nodded and muttered “uh-huh” in all the right places, but his mind was elsewhere.
Miranda was avoiding him. For the last few days, she’d actually claimed that she’d stayed late working at her shop. He knew that was B.S. because she’d been talking all along about how her store got no business, and then all of a sudden she was working late into the night making more inventory and dealing with customers? Right.
He didn’t even bother going to the store to check up and see if it was true or not, because he knew she was lying and he didn’t want to know what was really going on. Was she hanging out at her empty store just to avoid him? Was she hanging out with someone else? The thought roused murderous feelings in him, but he hadn’t scented any other men on her.
When she came home, she was polite but distant. She’d make brief small talk and then go into the bedroom and shut the door.
It made him ache all the way to the bone. He did everything he could to keep busy, chopping up enough firewood to last him through the next five winters, changing everything on his car that needed changing – oil and air filters and belts, and rotating the tires so many times they ended up back where they’d started. It didn’t help. He craved her nearness, her body pressed up against him. He wanted to see her smile and hear her chatter through their meals. He wanted to know why she’d suddenly withdrawn from him. She couldn’t still be mad at him about him snapping at her that one time, could she? She’d seemed as if she’d forgiven him.
He could have pushed the issue, but he didn’t, because it wouldn’t be fair. What did he have to offer her? A relationship with a man consumed with rage and bitterness, who could slide into madness and go feral any day now? A man who no longer believed in love?
A familiar, bitter scent swept into his nostrils, and he jerked angrily and looked around. Angrim and half a dozen of his pack members were headed their way.
“Asshole alert,” Creel growled, and Douglas glanced over at them and sighed.
When Angrim reached them, he said stiffly, “I have very good hearing, you know. And I heard what you just said about me.”
“Yeah, I meant for you to.” Creel meet his gaze boldly and didn’t bother to stand. Douglas followed his lead.
“What’s your problem with me, anyway?” Angrim’s tone was aggrieved. There was a hint of a whine to it.
“You’re a rules-obsessed little bureaucrat who loves trying to throw his weight around.”
Creel and Angrim stared at each other for a long, long moment before Angrim finally swallowed hard and glanced away.
“I would think you’d be more concerned with the latest news about the threat to our security, than with trying to undermine my authority.” And Angrim stood there with a smirk on his face, waiting for Creel to ask him what the latest news was.
Creel failed to oblige him. Instead he grunted, “Uh-huh,” and walked over to a metal trash bin to throw away his sandwich wrapper. When he came back and sat down, Angrim said impatiently, “Do you want to know what the news is?”
“Clearly you want to tell me.”
Douglas choked down a snicker, and Angrim glared at him before continuing. “We have received new threats from the Human Defense Militia, from an anonymous email account. They’re saying that they’re going to blow up the meeting house.”
Creel sighed. “Angrim, we’ve got our best scenters, including me, taking turns walking through the building and the perimeter of the building several times every day scenting for explosives. Has anyone ever even seen this Human Defense Militia in action? Not that I’ve heard of. It could be a lone human computer nerd, emailing you from their headquarters in their mama’s basement.”
Angrim looked mortally offended. “A militia means more than one, obviously.”
Douglas and Creel exchanged glances. There wasn’t any point in saying that if there was just one lone anti-shifter whack-job, he could call himself anything he wanted. Militia. Army. Lord of All Creation. Angrim wouldn’t listen to reason, because he was too eager to see conspiracies in every corner.
“And we have a spy on the Council for Interspecies Relations,” he continued self-importantly. “Our spy overheard a conversation with their chief of security. He was getting information about the construction of the meeting house. Apparently the person even sent them pictures. They probably want to blow us up too. We’ve got our teams on it, and when we find out who the spy is, we’re going to string them up in the town square.”
“Bad idea,” Creel said coldly.
“What are you talking about?” Angrim snorted. “This is shifter territory. Humans have no rights here.”
That was true. Shifter territory had very specific borders, and any human who came into shifter territory without the invitation and protection of a pack or pride in that territory was fair game. That was doubly true if it turned out that the human was spying. Humans had no say whatsoever in what happened within shifter lands.
Creel shook his head in annoyance at Angrim’s stupidity.
“You may have the right to do it, b
ut you’ll cause bad blood with the humans. The smart thing to do would be to put the human on a bus out of town, notify the human media, and file a formal protest.”
“Well, maybe I just want to do the stupid thing,” Angrim said, glowering at him.
“Yep, I expect so.”
Angrim turned and stomped off, rigid with anger. His men followed him, waiting until they were a couple of blocks away to cast nasty looks in Creel’s direction.
“Wow,” Douglas said. “That was surprisingly sensible and non-violent of you.”
“Nah,” Creel said. “If Angrim stirs up shit with the humans, they’ll be all up in our business. Which means they’ll be all up in my business. Keeping the peace just means there’s that many fewer idiots I have to kill.”
Chapter Thirteen
Creel frowned at the hand-written invitation to Douglas and Sophia’s housewarming party. Miranda had left it on the breakfast table for him that morning; she’d left the house for work while he was out for a run.
Did that mean that she was going to go to the party tonight? That seemed like the kind of thing she’d do, what with her being all social and actually enjoying other people’s company.
Although these days, it seemed like she wanted to socialize with anyone but him.
The party was in a couple of hours, and he was beginning to think Miranda might not even come home from her shop before the party started.
He could just stay home and sit it out…but the thought of Miranda at a party without him, with men possibly trying to hit on her, set his wolf howling with rage.
Muttering curses to himself, he headed into the southern territory to pick up a decent bottle of tequila as a housewarming gift.
Maybe if Miranda was there, she’d loosen up a little and talk to him. He needed to talk to her, he realized. He couldn’t go on like this, with her so close to him and yet so maddeningly far away. He was getting more and more irritable, snapping at Douglas and Hyatt when they didn’t deserve it, growling at Rory just for trying to say hi to him. He kept spontaneously half-shifting without realizing it. He’d be pacing in front of the meeting house working security, and before he knew it, he was furry and his mouth was filled with fangs.
And his wolf was itching for a fight. It took everything he had to force his wolf back down.
Once upon a time, he might have shrugged it off as the inevitable darkness coming to claim him. He’d given Douglas those silver bullets for a reason. An Alpha Prime gone feral needed to be put down as quickly as possible, or the carnage would be unbelievable.
Now, for some reason, he found himself fighting the darkness.
Well, not for just some reason. Because of Miranda. She made him want to carry on.
He found himself counting the minutes until Douglas’ house party started.
When he showed up, there were already dozens of shifters there, and a roaring bonfire to the side of Douglas’ house crackled and blazed.
Douglas lived in a small, simple white-clapboard-sided house with a steep peaked roof. He’d built it himself. Creel suspected that the geraniums planted out front were Sophia’s doing.
Creel scanned the crowd, tension twisting inside him. Then he saw Miranda standing across the lawn talking to Sophia and Hephzibah, and the tension loosened. She looked lush and sexy in a red peasant dress, with a red scarf tied at the neck.
Suki and Hyatt were standing together by the edge of the crowd, holding hands. Hyatt had an enormous stupid grin on his face, and Suki was staring up at him with eyes shining. Miranda had done good there, Creel had to admit.
Rory was also there, but he was standing across the crowd from Hephzibah, who seemed to be sneaking mournful glances at him. He had a camera on a tripod and was taking pictures of the moon and he didn’t seem to be aware that Hephzibah existed.
Oh well, you couldn’t win them all.
“Hey, you made it!” Douglas waved at Creel to come over and handed him a beer from a Styrofoam cooler. There was a fresh claiming mark on Douglas’ neck.
Creel glanced at Miranda and Sophia, then looked away. “Nice party,” he said to Douglas. “Congratulations on being ensnared. I think. Or did it happen while you were passed out drunk and helpless?”
“It did not. I’m a lucky wolf.” Douglas was grinning from ear to ear. “So, looks like you have some good news too. I heard about Miranda’s shop. Does this mean that you reconciled with your brother?”
Creel stared at him blankly. “Does what mean that I reconciled with my brother?”
“You know. Your brother sending all that business to Miranda. I heard about it in town today,” Douglas said with a puzzled look.
Then Douglas saw the look on Creel’s face
“I’m sorry,” Douglas said quickly. “It looks like I stuck my foot in your business.”
“Nah, it’s nothing,” Creel said shortly, and began pushing his way through the crowd to get to Miranda.
Miranda was somehow in cahoots with the person who’d utterly betrayed Creel and the memory of their parents? And she was keeping it a secret from him?
Thick fury sizzled off him, and he saw people on either side of him wince and move away.
It didn’t matter.
They really, really needed to talk.
* * * * *
“Congratulations!” a drunken coyote shifter female trilled to Miranda. “You lucky girl, you!”
“Thank you,” Miranda said politely.
Creel muscled his way towards her, elbowing people out of the way, and he did not look happy. She patted her neck self-consciously. So he knew.
Sophia glanced at her and murmured, “Me and Hephzibah need to go see a man about a dog.”
“We do? What dog?” Hephzibah said confusion as Sophia led her away.
Creel waited until they were out of earshot before he turned to scowl at Miranda.
“Were you planning on telling me that my brother was the one sending you all that new business?” he asked.
Okay, so he didn’t know. He was just crazy.
“He did what?” She shook her head. “That doesn’t even make sense.”
“Douglas said he heard about it in town today.”
Miranda stared at him in dismay as comprehension dawned. “Of course, that explains it. All those new customers suddenly showing up out of nowhere. I wish I had known – I would have told him not to.”
She felt sick now. The last few days had been so wonderful, with people crowding the aisles of her store, snapping up all her merchandise, praising the wonderful scents and designs of her candles. She’d almost stayed busy enough to keep her mind off of Creel. Almost.
And it wasn’t really because they liked her merchandise. It was because Benjamin had sent them.
Creel’s brows drew together. She could feel him struggling to rein in his anger. “Why would he be sending business to your shop?”
Miranda sighed. “He came by my store one day, and asked me what my intentions were towards you, and was kind of rude about it. I could tell that he genuinely cares about you, but he was being a jerk, so I told him to leave. I guess this is his way of apologizing.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me about that?” Creel bit the words out.
She stared at him defiantly. “Well, we don’t have a lot of deeply personal conversations, now do we?”
Before Creel could answer, several women walked up to her, giggling and drinking wine coolers.
“Let’s see it!” one of them trilled.
“Never thought I’d see anyone tame Creel,” one of the other girls giggled. “God knows we all tried. You must have a magic va-jay-jay.”
“Tracy, really!!” One of the other girls shrieked with laughter. And she peered at Miranda’s neck. “Oh no,” she said. “Why do you have it covered with a scarf? Your claiming mark didn’t get infected, did it?”
Creel stared at her. Miranda wished the earth would swallow her up. This night was just getting better and better.
She mana
ged a smile for the girls, and cleared her throat. “Well, it actually was for a few days – that’s why I kept it covered. By now I guess it’s fine.” And she took her scarf off, and Creel’s heart dropped to the bottom of his stomach when he saw what was there: a claiming mark. He stumbled back a step.
That mark hadn’t been there when he’d first met her. Somebody else had claimed Miranda? While she was living with him?
She avoided his gaze. “I need to go talk to Sophia,” she said, staring at the ground. “It’s probably going to be a really lengthy conversation.”
Creel’s head was whirling. He turned and walked over to the coolers full of beer and proceeded to down bottle after bottle, but he was so angry and frustrated that he could feel the alcohol burning right out of his system.
He kept waiting for Miranda to come back and explain everything, but she never did. Then he went to find her, and he didn’t see her anywhere. She wasn’t inside the house, she wasn’t in the yard. Neither was Sophia, and neither was Douglas.
What the hell was going on here?
Hephzibah stalked up to Creel and poked him in the shoulder. “If you are not going to go search for Miranda,” she said indignantly, “I will. Of course I have no fighting skills and therefore I will probably be murdered, but I believe that human interpersonal relationships involve a certain quid pro quo which requires—”
“Murdered?” Rory had been hovering in the background. “Don’t do that. I’ll, er, I’ll go with you.” He swallowed hard and his eyes went wide.
“Hold on,” Creel said. “Where is Miranda and why do you think that you would be murdered if you go look for her?”
“Sophia and Miranda went to see if Douglas was all right, because he went to the Mathers property and never came back,” Hephzibah explained.
His Curvy Mate (Alpha Prime Book 2) Page 9
