by Abby Knox
Holy shit!
She forgot about her aching feet and her exhausted body and pounding head. She tossed her ridiculous heels to the curb and sprinted after the car, calling Ash’s name.
It was no use. He didn’t see her and didn’t hear her. But people on the street were definitely seeing and hearing, and staring at her like she was some kind of a freak making a scene. Which, technically, she was.
She calmed herself down enough to attempt to call for a car to get her somewhere. Anywhere. As her hand moved over the screen, another text message from Gavin popped up. Reading it, she knew from his words he was the one she wanted. Not just for another night. But for life.
And then, just as hunger, thirst and her pounding headache were about to conspire to buckle her knees right there on the sidewalk, she heard a set of tires screech, followed by a familiar female voice.
“Chas! Oh my god, what are the chances! where have you been!”
It was her cousin, the soon-to-be-bride, Rosemary.
Chapter 8
Gavin
“My, my, my. What a sparse little wedding party you have brought into my home this morning, Ashton. And where is this mysterious celebrity chef friend of yours?”
Betsy DuChamps sipped her mimosa, her face bright eyed and perfectly painted.
Gavin glanced over at Ashton, who shot him a look.
Ashton replied, “He rolled in late last night from a TV shoot in Seoul. He’s jet lagged AF. I gave him the day off.”
Betsy arched an eyebrow. “AF?”
Rosemary entered the room looking as fresh as a daisy. “It means ‘as fuck,’ mother. The chef is jet lagged as fuck. We excused him from the brunch.”
Betsy scoffed at her daughter’s rough language. “And what about your cousin, GiGi? And Chastity? Don’t tell me they’ve all caught the jet lag as well?”
Rosemary sighed as she plopped down in her dining chair next to Ash. “No, Mama. I believe what they all caught is a raging party last night and they ain’t coming to your ill-timed brunchy-brunch.”
Betsy now raised both eyebrows at her daughter. “Is that so? Well, in my day, when one is invited to participate in activities surrounding a family wedding in which a person is directly involved, one makes a point to—”
Rosemary grunted through a mouthful of breakfast ham and eggs. “Mama! Nobody wants a lesson in wedding etiquette. We’re all quite hungover. Those of us that are feeling human enough to be in this room under your god-awfully bright chandeliers would just like to eat in silence, OK?”
Gavin downed his glass of water from the crystal goblet in front of him, wondering what kind of a nightmare future mother-in-law would plan a wedding party brunch the morning after a bachelor/bachelorette party.
If Chastity’s own mother was anything like this woman, he was in for a rough road ahead.
At least he felt a little less hungover with a belly full of food.
“You must be the tattoo artist I’ve heard so much about. Ashton sure does have some colorful friends, I must say.”
“Mama…”
Gavin looked up and met Betsy’s eye. “Yes, ma’am. I own my own business. Howlin’ G’s Tattoos & Junk on Freret. Come in anytime, I won’t even charge you. Much.”
Rosemary snorted. Ash had to stare straight down at his plate to keep from making eye contact with Gavin.
Betsy did not seem to register what he had said and instead pointed to the wrinkled brown bag and mug of coffee next to his plate.
“Not every day a man brings his own food when invited to a meal at the DuChamps estate,” she purred.
Gavin nodded. “I know this looks strange, but it’s for a girl. A woman. I, uh, heard she liked this particular kind of coffee. Ash asked me to pick it up for her.”
“And who might that be?” Betsy asked.
Rosemary, always one to cut through the crap, replied. “Come on, people. It’s Chastity. He’s looking for Chastity. She’s in the guest wing, sleeping it off.”
Betsy sighed in relief. “Well, thank god for that. Her mother and daddy were not very enthused about her attending a bachelorette party last night. I gave them my word that she would be safe with us and that you all were just going out dancing for a little while with the girls. Chastity would have her usual room, of course, the one that automatically locks from the outside. She’s a devil child, that one. Can’t have her sneaking out without her older cousins to watch over her. Gavin, you may leave the coffee and that brown sack of whatever here with Lety. She’ll see that it gets to our niece.”
Rosemary snorted again. “That’s right. Dancing. With girls. 100 percent with the girls. All night. Dancing so lively she’s still plumb tuckered out since I brought her home ’round midnight. Right, fellas?”
Gavin was glancing between Betsy and Rosemary, trying to pick up on whatever it was that was being communicated. Then Rosemary caught his eye and mouthed, “Guest wing.” Then her eyes darted to his left.
Gavin wasn’t the brightest of men, but this, he understood.
He stood up and excused himself. “Ma’am. Thank you for the brunch. It’s been a pleasure. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some business to attend to.”
Gavin did not give himself time to wait for a response from Rosemary’s mom, but instead picked up the bag of pastries and the mug of coffee and made his way as quickly as possible to the guest wing of the mansion.
Out in the hallway, he found her scent again and followed it to a long, ornate hallway with a series of doors. Lucky for him, all the doors were open except one. He scanned the area. No one was around. He knocked on the door as his heart nearly busted out of his chest in anticipation. He was going to meet her, finally. Again.
There was no answer. He tried the knob, but the door was locked.
The key. Of course.
With shaking hands, Gavin took out the mysterious key from his wallet. She had, at some point, given this to him so he could come and spring her from her gilded prison.
He unlocked the door and stepped inside.
There she was, sound asleep on a bed three times the size of his paltry little twin bed. He had found her.
After making sure the door locked behind him, Gavin set the bag of beignets and the mug of coffee down on the night table. And then he just watched her sleep.
Her dark hair was splayed out over the pillow as she slept on her side. A satin sheet was draped over the curve of her hip. Her breast was nearly spilling out of the top of her dress. The little hint of sequins that he saw triggered another memory, this time of her dancing on the bar. He smiled. His girl was a fun girl, but if she ever did that again, the wolf would be carrying her home over his shoulder, caveman-style. Nobody else was ever going to try to have a good time with his drunk-ass girl as long as he had something to say about it.
Even after a night of partying like it was 1999, this girl looked like an angel. He wanted desperately to touch her, but he did not dare do that to her while she was passed out or asleep.
He watched her for several minutes, until she started to stir awake. Bleary-eyed and unaware of his presence, Chastity rolled over and instinctively grabbed her phone. She muttered to herself, “Any more texts from the mystery man?”
Chapter 9
Chas
It was only about an hour of sleep, but it was still nice to wake up in her special room at the mansion. The four-poster bed, comfortable mattress. And miracle of miracles, she smelled coffee and pastries, as always.
She rolled over and opened her eyes, feeling around for her phone on the night table. Grabbing it up, she muttered to herself as she checked for any more texts from Gavin.
She decided it was time to text him back.
“I feel exactly the same. I’m at Rosemary’s. You have the key. Come find me. I can’t unlock it. My relatives are psycho.”
About two tenths of a second after she hit “send,” there was the sound of an alert.
Wait a second.
Her heart leaped into her
throat and she sat straight up in bed, wide awake.
She looked across the room. He was there. Sitting at the foot of her bed. The brown-eyed, long-haired god whom she’d evidently slept with last night — this morning — had been watching her sleep. And by god, yes, he did have a beard.
“It’s you!”
He smiled. Oh, sweet Moses, that was a smile. He was a hulking man whose arm muscles were busting out of his burn-out T-shirt, with the best-looking grin she’d ever seen. It was the only face she ever wanted to wake up to again.
“Hi,” he said. “I’m Gavin.”
Chapter 10
Gavin
It wasn’t the best opening line. Or, more accurately, re-opening line. They had already done the deed, after all, and were well acquainted with each other, even if each of their memories weren’t totally clear.
But she must have been OK with that, because the next second she was climbing on top of him and kissing his mouth like they were long-lost lovers newly reunited.
Which, he guessed, they technically were.
Gavin closed his eyes as she kissed him, and everything came flooding back.
Gavin had helped her down from the bar where she’d been dancing, when Bobby was angrily yelling at her to get down.
She said something like, “Hey handsome, I’m gonna be straight with you. I’m a virgin and I don’t wanna be a virgin anymore. You in or you out?”
He stammered, “Uh… yep! Same!”
She laughed and looked him up and down. “Nice try, beefcake. But you get points for trying to make me feel better. Listen, if I don’t escape my cousins now, I will turn into a pumpkin at midnight and my uncle will lock me up tight as a drum after that.”
In minutes they had been up the street and he was showing her the inside of his tattoo parlor. Manny was closing up and looked surly as usual. He did not seem impressed by Chastity, nor by Gavin, come to think of it. Eventually Manny disappeared into the back room, presumably to take care of some last-minute chores and to clock out before hitting the alley where his car was parked. Gavin and Chastity sat in the parlor and talked for a good long while. She had thanked him for springing her from the watchful eyes of her cousins. They talked about careers and about how she had none. She wanted to be an illustrator, but her daddy wanted to send her to an all-girl Bible college to keep her on the “straight and narrow.” She showed him her blog, where she’d posted incredible works of art in charcoal, pencil, acrylics, all forms of media. She told him her life story as a sheltered Southern debutante; he told her his story about growing up being homeschooled by Ash’s mother Charlene, from middle school until the age of 17.
Eventually, they had come around to the subject of their supernatural conditions. As they were both drunk, they had no inhibitions about it. He remembered both of them being so excited to learn this about each other—that she was a shapeshifting wildcat and he was a shapeshifting wolf—and then they had kissed for the first time. It had been instant fireworks. And they both knew it. And then, they had decided to get matching tattoos. How he had managed to do one on his own hip, he’d never know. At that point, Manny had popped his head out of the backroom and said something, but Gavin didn’t remember what it was. He did have other pressing issues, such as pressing his lips against Chastity’s.
After the tattoos were finished, they’d gone up the street and he showed her the inside of his shabby walk-up apartment above the Pho Palace.
If Gavin had been thinking ahead, he would have ordered some takeout from that place as a precaution. Best hangover cure in the world was an extra-hot bowl of pho.
He remembered taking off his shirt and boots on the way up the stairs to his apartment, but he didn’t know why. He didn’t know why his drunk ass did a lot of things.
And after that, it was a blur of lips, and damp, sweaty skin. Breasts. The smell of her hair. Thrusting in and out. His hands climbing up her legs and taking hold of her ass, careful not to rub the bandage off her tattoo. And then, the shift. Both of them had shifted. He to his wolf. Her to her cat…a wildcat, to be specific.
Gavin came crashing back to reality. He was here, with her, in broad daylight, in this beautiful room. His head was clear, and she was still into him. And judging by her response to his last text, she was into him just as much as he was into her.
Now it was time to get way into her. Again.
But first, she needed to eat something. “You must be starving. Eat.” He gestured to the night table.
Her eyes went wide. “That was from you? You’re amazing and also psychic!”
He smiled. “Yeah? Why?”
“Because I got home so late that Lety didn’t bring me breakfast. She always brings me coffee and beignets at 7 a.m. She’s been doing it since I was a child, every time I would come to visit. But this time I missed it. But I didn’t truly miss it because you brought it to me!”
Gavin shushed her and urged her to eat. Inside, he was elated. His instincts on how to take care of his girl had been correct. He was all ready to wait for her to drink her coffee and eat her breakfast, but Chastity only wanted one thing.
What could a gentleman do but acquiescence?
Her lips were all over his face and her hands and legs climbed him like a cat climbing a tree. “As much as I love your urgency, Chastity, I want to go slow this time and remember everything.”
Gavin took in every ounce of her, every pore, every breath. He buried his face in her wild mane of black hair and inhaled her scent until it was burned even deeper into his soul. When her dark eyes closed in ecstasy at his touch, he seared her exquisite face into his brain. Her sighs melded with his breath. Her breasts pressed into his grip as her breathing grew ragged. He savored the taste of her mouth. Her nails dug into his back, harder with every thrust into her. Chastity was the wrong name for her.
“You’re a wild one, you are.”
She smiled like a feline demon and clamped her sex hard around his shaft.
“Oh my god,” he moaned. She sent electricity all the way up his spine.
“I am a wild one,” she said. “And now I’m also free.”
He claimed her with his mouth and found her clit with this thumb.
She gasped. “Gavin!”
When she tilted her head back, he got a better view of her hickey. “Do you remember if I made you come last night?”
She groaned out with the rhythmic massage he was giving her lady business. “I wish I could remember. Doesn’t matter. All that matters now is that I’m free in your arms. I’m not worried about what anybody thinks anymore.”
“Baby, I don’t imagine you were ever worried about that.”
She giggled, then nipped at Gavin’s neck.
“I feel like it’s all clear now. I was never meant to live this life in pristine, oversized palaces. We were meant to be together. I’m so happy I found you.”
He kissed her deeply and slowly, exploring her sweet mouth with his tongue as he worked between her folds with more intensity, thrusting his cock into her with more urgency.
“I’m never letting you out of my sight again.”
She was beyond words now. Words were totally replaced by her frantic moans. She gave him such pleasure knowing he could do this to her and her alone for the rest of his life. He had had no one else before her and there would never be anyone else. Nobody could tell him that the wolves can’t mix with others, because if this felt so perfect, it could not be wrong. The pull of pure animal instinct could not be wrong.
The ultimate primal force took hold of them both, as Gavin joined Chas in an orgasm that saw them both howling, roaring and yet somehow letting go of all the barriers that defined them.
“Nothing separates us now,” he whispered as Chas came down off the mountaintop. “Nothing.”
Chapter 11
Chas
The purple dress would have to do. If it was good enough for her to wear as a bridesmaid to Rosemary’s wedding, it would be good enough to serve the same purpose at
her own modest ceremony.
She didn’t care about the color. Why not get married in purple?
And as her uptight parents had basically disowned her when she and Gavin privately announced their engagement to them at Rosemary and Ash’s reception — not wanting to steal any thunder from the bride and groom — Chas certainly wasn’t going to get her dream wedding anyway. May as well take advantage of a $6,000 ballgown. Why let it go to waste?
It’s not that Chas hadn’t enjoyed every last detail of her cousin Rosemary’s amaze-balls New Orleans riverboat wedding. She had, and Rosemary and Ash were the most gorgeous and happy couple she’d ever seen.
It was as perfect and as imperfect as it should have been. Everyone was a little tipsy by the time the ceremony rolled around, because the bridal party had extended the cocktail hour into two hours while the groomsmen executed their plan to get Uncle Lionel to the ceremony.
When the ceremony finally took place, it was not officiated by a Catholic priest. This came as a surprise to Aunt Betsy, a strict Roman Catholic—and to everyone else who had witnessed a Roman Catholic priest rehearse with the bridal party just the night before. Instead, the officiant has been replaced with a genuine New Orleans voodoo priestess—a “Bomba”—as well as a justice of the peace, just to make it legal.
Rosemary had informed Chas, later on, that the switch-a-roo was all Ash’s doing, as the priestess was a personal friend of his. Ash had paid off the priest to go away by making a huge donation to some underfunded convent.
When Gavin had taken Chas’s arm in his to walk up the aisle, wearing that tailored suit, hair neatly combed into a man-bun, his beard freshly trimmed, Chas thought he looked like a movie star.
It was thrilling to see all the last-minute surprises that the couple had included. But they weren’t the only ones with surprises up their sleeves. When the justice of the peace had asked if anyone had any reason why this couple should not be joined in marriage, everyone held their breath when Uncle Lionel stood up.
