by Lauren Dane
He made a strangled sound but she smiled at him instead. “What are you up to tonight?”
“Shift’s over at six thirty. I’ve got football practice with my brothers until eight thirty if you want to meet up after that for a late dinner?”
“I’ll be at Aimee’s watching reality television and that show where the women compete for the pretty but awful guy who claims he wants a marriage when he just wants a career selling pants or toothpaste. She loves that shit. I should be home at nine or so.”
“I’ll get a pizza. I’ve got beer already.”
They cleaned up their lunch and he walked her back to work. Plenty of people saw them, hand in hand, heads close together as they spoke. She wouldn’t have to yell it from anywhere.
Then he kissed her. Right on the sidewalk, in the middle of the afternoon right as the kids were getting out of school, Jace laid a kiss on her lips that zinged and pinged through her system like a pinball until he stepped back, satisfied he’d underlined what they were to one another.
“I’ll see you tonight, darlin’.” He gave her a secret look that said all sorts of dirty, thrilling things.
He waved toward her parents before he took off down the street at a long, powerful lope.
“Hot damn,” her mother whispered.
“I know! I try not to think about it too hard or I get so nervous I panic.”
“Well now. I suppose that boy just told all and sundry exactly what was what.” Her dad just shrugged and went back to the Coke float he’d been making.
Chapter Twelve
“First up, I say we catch up on Date the Dolt while you tell me about that kiss your man apparently laid on you in the middle of town in front of God and everybody.”
Aimee handed her a cocktail and they settled on the couch.
Katie Faith gulped it down in three swallows. “For Christmas you’re getting bigger cocktail glasses. These things are tiny.”
Aimee poured her another from a nearby pitcher. “I made plenty. Act like a lady.” She snickered.
“Boring. Anyway, yeah. He totally did. Well, not in the middle of the street, I think my mom’s behind that one. On the sidewalk outside the Counter. Kids were heading through town. Middle and high school just got out. My parents were right inside. Thank god they couldn’t see the sex look he gave me after making out with me in broad daylight. Shew.” Katie Faith fanned herself with a napkin and then put a few snacks on a plate.
“I’m having pizza with him later. I should take it easy on the frozen spring rolls. But we both know I won’t.” Katie Faith clinked her glass with Aimee’s.
“Girl. Hang on and let’s see who he gives the wrist corsage to and then I want to hear about the kiss.”
They watched Gabe, the hunky single dad and widower who owned a landscaping empire stand in front of a table full of the fugliest corsages Katie Faith had ever seen.
“What the fuck are those? I bet it’s one of those flowers that smells like rotting meat. It looks freaky. How’s that sayin’, hey girl, I think I want to keep you around a week more to see if I can’t get to third base on camera?” Aimee asked, shaking her head.
“It looks like the saddest prom date ever. Meat flowers and desperation. Damn, Candy’s eyes get wider and wider each week. The whites are so...obvious.” Katie Faith leaned back a little.
“Like a spooked horse. Maybe Gabe’s cock is ginormous and she’s having second thoughts. I mean, enough is a feast and all.”
“The thing I like best about you is how you’re so genteel and such.” Katie Faith watched as Gabe’s flat, empty doll eyes pointed at Candy as he said he liked how she scuba dived and tried new things on their date.
“Do you think he means butt stuff?” Aimee asked. “You know with the trying new things comment?”
“Maybe that’s why she looks like she needs to be hosed off and brushed down. If Gabe has a big peen—not overrated, I’m just saying—and there was butt stuff.” That dissolved into incoherent laughter and coughing as Gabe anointed his meat flowers on four more ladies and they were off to the next staged opportunity for intimacy.
“Not overrated huh? So you finally achieved consummation?” Aimee asked, turning the sound down while Brittni and Gabe painted pottery and talked about childhood.
“We did indeed achieve consummation. Twice for him. Three times for me. Damn, that makes me cheerful!”
They fist bumped like awkward white girls but didn’t further embarrass themselves by attempting fireworks or jazz hands.
“We did get interrupted. Again. But he came back and it was well worth waiting for. That’s all I’m going to say. Ha! I’m a liar. It was awesome. Like fireworks and a live symphony orchestra climax awesome.”
Aimee nodded, approving. “And he’s packing some heat?” She indicated her crotch as if Katie Faith didn’t know what she meant.
“Monstrous. Well, not scary, but it’s a serious penis. It means business. Girth and length. And excellent recovery time. That extra orgasm for me was from a most excellently talented mouth. Damn, I’m a hussy. I wonder if this is what Sharon and Darrell had and that’s why he couldn’t go through with our wedding. Ugh, I don’t want to understand him and maybe feel a little bad for him though.”
“Whatever. He’s a dingus. I do think you were badly matched and yeah, you’re doing the sex with a werewolf so that means there’s all that imprinting when it’s the real deal. All joking aside, it’s really different?” Aimee asked.
“It’s different than everything else. Not just that it’s mind-blowing because he’s really good, but it’s me and him. Something about us.” Katie Faith lifted a shoulder. “I’m not a nun. I’ve been with werewolves and human men. I’ve been fortunate to have had partners, even jerkwad Darrell, who always made sure I came too. But with Jace it’s more than skill and size, it’s magic. Mine and his.” As she said it, she realized she hadn’t really understood it until then. Her mother told her that connection with the right person could be this electric and wonderful, but she’d always thought love was love. Happiness was something you worked for. And she would have to because Jace was a handful.
“I haven’t felt anything earth-shattering yet. Or mind-blowing. Mildly pleasant, sometimes really pleasant.” Aimee refilled her glass. “My parents have it. Yours too. And now you. I don’t want it right now. I have stuff to take care of that I don’t want to have to negotiate around another person. But I do want it. I want to grow old with someone. I’m glad to know it’s out there.”
“Well, watch out for the bossy ones who’ll kiss you in public so all the wolves in town know not to give you free movie tickets.” Katie Faith explained about the Pembrys who’d come in to the Counter earlier.
“Bossy or not, it sounds sort of romantic in that werewolf way.”
“It was because he’s not usually like that. But I had hoped to keep it to ourselves for a while. Now everyone knows for sure.”
“Everyone knew for sure already. When he took you home from the police station. When he nearly lost his job and assaulted Darrell. That would have been so cool though. Not nearly as cool as you doing it.” Aimee cackled. “Boom! Flying dirtbag.”
“I’d be lying to say it wasn’t enjoyable. I can still see the look on Darrell’s face. For a bit there, I was scared.”
“I hate that he made you scared. He’s going to be in so much trouble with his daddy now.”
Katie Faith snorted. “Makes it worse in some ways because I’m a scapegoat either way.”
“We won’t let you be.”
“I love you, Larnamae.”
“You’re fucked up.” Aimee shook her head.
“I know. So, guess what? Miz Rose is giving me lessons, right?”
Miz Rose gave a lot of lessons to the witches of Diablo Lake.
“Yeah?” Aimee refille
d the chip bowl.
“She told me today she’s sick and tired of all the bickering between the Dooleys and Pembrys and thought the witches around here needed to stand up to them more. Keep them on an even keel.”
“Lemme guess, she thinks you’re the chosen one to lead us to the Promised Land.”
Katie Faith made a face. “Well, yeah, duh. Also she mentioned you being powerful and smart too. Just so you know, she’s on the hunt for you to be in her army.”
“Awesome. I bet we’d have the best snacks of any army ever.”
“Right? I was thinking the same thing.”
Aimee cocked her head. “I think she’s right, you know. About the wolves? The cats have their own issues, but my dad was just saying it’s our job to keep the peace here, to guard that balance of the multinatured living here in Diablo Lake.”
Katie Faith sighed. “Yeah. I think so too. I can’t deny how fun it was to use my magic to defend myself and that balance when Darrell came at me. But it means drama. Problems and complications.”
“Yep. Basically, a day ending in Y. Not like you’d have some normal life elsewhere. What were you going to do? Marry some human? Never tell him you’re a witch? Bring him here once a year, maybe twice? Your life is what it is. You were meant for more than just living day to day. Stop being bitchy to fate. Don’t matter either way.”
On the television Gabe had unhinged his jaw to swallow half of fiery redhead dental assistant Lacey’s face.
Katie Faith recoiled. “Ugh! I can’t believe Lacey is letting Gabe kiss her. With tongue. She could get a cold sore!”
“Especially after he kissed Brittni as their vases fired after their ceramics date.”
Katie Faith grabbed a licorice whip, using it to underline her point. “Brittni and Lacey need to dump Gabe and run off into the sunset.”
“Take his meat flowers and say good day, sir.”
She finished her licorice with a wrinkled nose. “He can keep the meat flowers, though.”
* * *
Jace met Major at the football field. Contrary to what Katie Faith assumed, it was his brother who coached the team. Jace and Damon just lent a hand. It gave the teenagers a chance to run and be rough but with rules.
And it allowed Jace and Damon to hang out with their brother and model adult behavior for the young people. Which meant there was always some sort of break up of at least one fight between wolves but the teens didn’t step over the line. Shifters healed fast. They lived in a very physical world so fighting was part of what they did to handle beefs from minor to serious.
But while sneakiness and predatory behavior were prized, stalking and watching for prey had to be strictly defined so it never crossed into harassment. It was wolf and cat business, not human business.
A black eye from the defensive end who got sick of you wasn’t the same as a shifter using their size to harm a weaker being, especially one he or she was supposed to protect like a child, elders and romantic partners.
“Hey.” Jace handed Major a bag with his dinner in it. “Grandma came by the station just as I was leaving. She made us fried chicken.” He handed the other off to Damon.
“Probably to make up for JJ offering Katie Faith a rent discount.” Damon rolled his eyes.
“Probably treated with some sort of mojo to make him extra fertile so he knocks Katie Faith up and they have great grandbabies,” Major added with a shrug before demolishing his dinner.
“Don’t you have kids to push around and make run until they throw up?” Jace grumbled.
“Indeed I do once my dinner is finished. Lots of spectators tonight.” Major tipped his chin toward the bleachers.
When it wasn’t freezing or raining, they had parents, grandparents, girlfriends, boyfriends, whatever, in the stands watching practice. As long as they didn’t distract the players, Major didn’t make a big deal of it. But that night there were easily twice, maybe three times the normal amount of folks up there.
“Funny how many women live in this town all the sudden, no?” Damon smirked. “Jesus. It’s like everyone from sixteen to eighty-six who isn’t attached is up there.”
“What are you looking at me for?” Jace demanded.
“You kissed Katie Faith in front of God and everybody. In front of her parents. Half the women up there want to make sure you’re going to not treat her bad. Her first go around with a wolf didn’t go so well. The other half, well some of them want to make a run at you before you’re off the shelf for good.” Damon put his empty Tupperware back in the bag, tucking it with his things nearby to take home.
“Y’all better get running!” Major hollered at the boys, who quickly complied.
Jace tried not to look back over his shoulder at the stands as he jogged out to get the tackle dummies set up, but he knew they were there. Watching.
Thirty minutes later, one of his grandmother’s sisters, Alice, waved Jace over with a bellowed yooo hooo and an imperious wave of her cane that sent two other people scrambling to avoid getting knocked upside the head.
He grumbled, determined to wave her away, pretending not to know what she meant, or that he was too busy. It was that or tell her to mind her own business.
“You know she’s only going to get louder. Why punish the rest of us?” Major said. “Go on. Be nice. Grandma will skin you if you’re rude.”
“Aunt Alice is scary enough on her own. She’s wicked fast so stay out of her reach,” Damon joked as he guffawed. Like a dick.
Jace put on his best cop dealing with old people face but she just gave him a long look. “Sure is dry out tonight,” she said once he approached.
“Feels like rain might be coming soon though.”
She blinked. “That was my way of letting you know I was thirsty and needed you to bring me a soda.”
“I’ll be right back, Aunt Alice.” He turned to jog off, but she called out to him that he needed to bring a lot of sodas so she could share.
Out on the field, they ran drills, both his brothers studiously avoiding his gaze.
He took an armful sodas over to her and the rest of the female elders in his family.
“So.” Alice cracked her soda open and took a drink. “Hits the spot. Thank you. You moved Katie Faith Grady in across the hall from you. Right smack dab in the heart of Dooley territory.”
Another one of his great aunts, Carmen, held out a clear plastic container his way. “Cookie?”
He took several with his thanks.
“You two have been flirting up a storm since the minute she got back,” Carmen said.
“And dating for, I’d say three weeks? Four?” Alice asked.
Jace just gave them a general movement. Not really a full on agreement, not a denial either. He didn’t know where they were going with this so he wanted to be careful about what he revealed until he knew more.
“Most folks have noticed it over the last two weeks especially,” Deidre added. She was one of his third or fourth cousins. She and Alice had run together since they were kids. “And if they didn’t, they surely did hear about that kiss this afternoon. You declared yourself loud and clear. What are your intentions then? Rose Collins would be very unhappy if you weren’t taking what you did seriously.”
Jace willed his blush away, setting his jaw carefully. His energy changed and the women all gave him raised brows.
“You mind telling me what you’re doing, boy?” Alice asked in a very calm voice.
“I’m not Darrell. I’m not him.” Jace meant more than just Darrell with the last. He didn’t need to bring up his father for them to understand, though.
Her face lost its calm facade. Instead she frowned and before he could move, she’d latched on, pulling him into a hug as the others clucked and awww’d over him. That would teach him to let them get close enough to hug up on h
im.
He managed to disentangle himself in enough time to see one of the aunties give a glare to one of the younger women who’d been trying to catch his eye.
“This is for real and forever. Things are changing. We just needed to make sure you understood that.” Alice nodded her head once to underline.
“Like I said, I’m not anyone else. And you don’t know Katie Faith very well if you think she’d stand for any foolishness from me or anyone else. She’s a big girl now.” Jace let himself smile at the memory of her distinct hatred of mornings.
How it was that Katie Faith being grumpy made him all hot and bothered, he didn’t know. But there he was, struck stupid by the way she scrunched up her brow and her hair went all bristly as she’d stomped off to the bathroom.
“You all have a good evening.” He bowed slightly, totally done with their test and the conversation.
“Thanks for the Cokes, Jace,” Alice called out as he headed back to where practice was beginning to wind down.
“It’s really gross how many moms are up there scoping out your butt,” one of the kids waiting his turn to run told him.
Jace shrugged. Wasn’t like he was going to complain a bunch of folks found him attractive. He wasn’t unaware of his looks or of his position. He’d grown wary over the years after getting burned by people he thought truly cared about him.
Katie Faith didn’t give a shit about any political stuff. She respected his position and his power, but she just seemed to find her way around anything she didn’t want to do.
Yeah, he knew she liked the way he looked. He loved the way her scent changed when he took his shirt off, or when she stared at his forearms and hands as he was drying dishes.
Compared to that scent—just for him—what was the temptation?
Still didn’t mean he was going to let a seventeen-year-old pup bust his balls. “Give me thirty push ups,” he tossed out as he turned his back and focused on the rest of the kids practicing.
