by Jane Jamison
Pride swelled in him as Carolina stuck out her chin. “No, ma’am. But then again, I wasn’t planning on going for a walk.”
One of the young females, Lisa-May Willis, giggled, then fell silent at the stern glance from Millicent. He liked Lisa-May. She was innocent, still without a mate, and full of exuberant life. Her blonde hair was similar to Carolina’s and she had a cute, petite body. She and her gay brother, Joey, had come to the pack a few years earlier. They’d both still been in their teens and had needed to join a pack for protection. One of the males in their former pack had tried to claim Lisa-May as his own before she was old enough to be mated. Jess had a suspicion that Lisa-May hadn’t wanted to turn the male down. Had, in fact, been madly in love with him, but that her brother hadn’t liked the idea. As her brother, albeit a younger one, she’d followed his decision and left, taking to the road until they’d finally found refuge and a new home with the Sterling pack. Neither one of them ever said much about what had happened, and he, like the rest of their pack, considered it their private business.
Millicent’s half smile came and went, but it was a sign that she liked Carolina. A warmth he hadn’t seen earlier crept into her strange silver eyes.
“Let’s get you into some dry clothes.” Without waiting for Carolina’s response, she turned to Lisa-May. “Little one, take Carolina upstairs and let her clean up. I’m sure you can find something that will fit her.”
“I wouldn’t want to be a bother.” And yet Carolina moved toward Lisa-May. “Still, it would be nice not to keep dripping all over the floor.”
“Go on, then.” Ms. Millicent inclined her head, giving her already stately demeanor even more of a regal feeling.
Carolina hesitated, then looked over her shoulder at him.
“We’ll hang out down here while you get dried off and change,” offered Charlie.
She nodded and let Lisa-May lead her upstairs. As was her way, the young werewolf was already jabbering away at Carolina.
“Let’s talk.” Ms. Millicent waved them into the formal living room, then closed the French doors behind her. “I hope Lisa-May doesn’t talk her ear off.”
Jesse had never felt comfortable in the main house. The furnishings were too grand, too ornately decorated, and simply too damn expensive for his casual taste. But the formal living room was the one room that made him the most uncomfortable. He didn’t dare sit on the fabric couch in case he’d dragged in muck from outside.
Charlie, however, didn’t have the same problem. He slid onto the couch like it was the scarred and well-worn leather one in the bunkhouse. “You know Lisa-May. She’ll talk to a wall. So, yeah, Carolina’s probably already wishing she could get away from the girl’s jabber.”
Ms. Millicent floated to the window and looked out at the rain. Floating. That was how Jesse always thought of her walk. She didn’t plod, or sway, or simply walk. Her walk was so effortless that she didn’t appear to be moving her legs. He figured it had something to do with her queen-like demeanor.
“I understand why you brought her here, but I think there’s more to it than simply being chivalrous.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets. She always made him feel like a kid who’d gotten caught smoking behind the barn and now had to face his mother’s discipline. “Like what? We just met her thirty minutes ago.”
She turned toward them, although it felt more like a confrontation. That half smile of hers was back. “Please, Jesse. Don’t act stupid. You’re anything but that.”
“Sorry. I still don’t get what you mean.”
Charlie snorted, rose, and crossed over to the six foot wide mahogany wet bar. “Come on, bro. You know what she’s talking about.”
Charlie lifted a bottle of whiskey, offering to pour them a drink. Both he and Ms. Millicent declined, but that didn’t stop Charlie. If there was one thing his brother liked, it was whiskey.
She had to be talking about the connection. And yet, he wasn’t ready to admit it. At least, not to Ms. Millicent before he had a chance to talk to Charlie alone.
“You feel something for her.”
She swept closer, making his nerves hop like Mexican jumping beans. He wanted to back away. It was uncommon for a male wolf to show submission to a female, even an alpha female, but Ms. Millicent was no ordinary female. “Again. We just met her.”
“It only takes a moment for a wolf to realize he’s met his intended mate.”
Charlie arched his eyebrows in a you-know-she’s-right look and slugged back his second drink. He didn’t, however, confirm her suspicions, either.
“I don’t know that for sure.” He still didn’t step back when she drew closer. “She’s human, you know.”
“Of course I know. I can smell her, can’t I?”
She came within a foot of him, paused, then studied him a minute longer. He almost let out a sigh of relief once she passed by him.
“If I hadn’t seen the gleam in your eyes when you looked at her, I wouldn’t have handed her over to Lisa-May. Instead, I would’ve given her dry clothes and had one of the other men drive her back into town. You know we don’t like having unclaimed humans around the rest of the pack. Especially unclaimed lovely women who have the scent of arousal drifting off them. It’s too risky.”
“We’ll let the others know to keep their hands off her.”
Jesse heard the growl in his brother’s voice. A growl that told him his brother was ready to do anything to keep her safe. Even come to blows with their pack mates. But it wasn’t as though the rest of the males would attack her or anything. They might, however, decide she was fair game to seduce if they didn’t make their intentions known. That and the fact that human females were a rarity at the ranch made the risk very high.
“Charlie, you know she’s the one you’ve waited for.”
Was it a question or a statement? Either way, he’d let his brother decide how to answer. Charlie twirled the amber liquid around his shot glass. A third drink might’ve hit a human man, but a werewolf of Charlie’s size could knock back quite a few shots before it affected him.
“She might be.”
Way to ride the middle, Charlie.
Ms. Millicent’s laugh, so confident, so sure of herself, unnerved him. “All right. If you two aren’t ready to admit it, then I won’t push any longer. But you’ll have to warn the others. Whether you want to claim her as yours is up to you. Until then, you’re in charge of her safety”—her knowing gaze met Jesse’s—“and her heart.”
He began to smile, thinking her dramatic, but when he saw that she wasn’t kidding, he stopped. “She won’t be here that long. Once she gets cleaned up, we’ll take her back into town. She can figure out how to get her car later.”
Ms. Millicent had her hand on the door. “I don’t think so.” Her gaze drifted to the window. “A rain like this will wash out the road leading to the ranch. You might make it if you hurried, but then again, you don’t really want to do that, do you? No. I think you knew what you were doing. By bringing her to the house instead of taking her back to the city, you’ve made her a captive here. But don’t worry. Judging from the way she returned your looks, I don’t think she’ll mind much. Now get out of those slickers and stop dripping on the floor.”
* * * *
Charlie waited until Ms. Millicent shut the door, then slammed back his fourth shot of whiskey. “That was fucking stupid.”
Jesse let out hard breath. “Yeah. It was.”
“I don’t know why you didn’t want to admit it. She knows anyway.” He set down the glass, then moved his head side to side, relieving the tension taking up shop in his neck. His inner wolf howled, tearing up his stomach in its need to get out. He knew that if he set it free, it would put its nose to the floor and track their mate down. “She’s the one. I knew it the second I saw her in the rain.”
Jesse mimicked the stately female by standing in front of the window and gazing into the storm. “So did I. But I was even more certain of it when I got a whiff of her in the truck
.”
“She smells like honey and something else I can’t put my finger on.”
“Watermelon. She smells like watermelon. I think it’s her shampoo.”
“Yeah, that’s it.” He’d always like the smell of watermelon. It was never too overwhelming and filled with a light sweetness. Just like Carolina. “Then why not admit it? I would’ve, if you hadn’t so obviously wanted to keep quiet.”
“I don’t know. Ms. Millicent always throws me.”
“Beats the hell out of me why. She’s pack and she’s as loyal to us as anyone. As far as I know, she’s never gone against you or ragged on you for any reason.” Even while in their humans forms, they trusted their pack mates without question. Their inner wolves, however, could never fully shake their naturally suspicious instinct.
Charlie would never let his brother know, but watching Jesse around Ms. Millicent and especially around the alpha female of the pack, Regina Sterling, was almost comical. Jesse was one of the strongest wolves he knew, and yet, those two females made him as nervous as a bug landing on a windshield.
“She just does. As for Carolina, I figure I want to know what she’s feeling before I announce it to the world.”
That made sense. It was rare that the intended mate wouldn’t feel the connection, but with human females it was always a gamble. Females were hard enough to understand without adding their human hormones into the mix.
“Okay, then. Let’s go ask her.”
“Uh-uh. Not a chance.”
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of her.” He managed to keep the too to himself.
“Not a chance. Why would I be? Still, if we tell her about the connection, then we have to tell her what we are. She’s not ready for that.”
“Fine. I’ll follow your lead on this.” He often let his brother take charge. At least until he disagreed with him. Then he’d dig in his heels. Like everyone always said, he liked to pick his battles.
“Then we give it time.” Jesse stalked over to the door. “Let’s let everyone one else know she’s under our protection.”
“And that she’s human and doesn’t have a clue what we are.”
“Agreed. Then we tell her that she’s stuck here.”
Jesse threw open the door with his usual force. Charlie caught it before it banged against the wall. “Relax, bro. It’ll all work out.”
* * * *
Holy hell, and people say I talk a lot.
Carolina fortified the pleasant expression she’d had plastered on her face for the past half hour. Lisa-May was a darling girl, but she could talk a blue streak. If she’d known the girl was already back in the bedroom, she would’ve stayed in the shower longer. Instead, she’d tugged on the fluffy white bathrobe hanging on the back of the bathroom door and walked straight into the bedroom with her head down, totally unprepared for the barrage of chatter lying in wait.
“Anyway, my brother—” The young girl jerked her attention away from the sixth set of clothes she’d laid out on the bed. “You remember me telling you about Joey, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
How could she ever forget? Lisa-May had told her that he worked on the ranch, that they were happy to have found a new home after leaving Wyoming, and how he was “the spittin’ image” of Lisa-May. The only thing that had dimmed the girl’s eyes was when she mentioned that they’d left their previous home because Joey had disapproved of her relationship with a man who was too old for her. Joey had insisted they leave. It seemed strange that a girl would listen to her younger brother, especially where men were concerned, but Carolina didn’t feel like she had the right to pry.
“Well, anyway, Joey says that he thinks I’m going to find my true love real soon. I’m hoping for at least two, you know.” Her big blue eyes danced with hopeful innocence. “Don’t you think two is so much better than three? I mean, three or more would be nice—shoot even one would be nice—but I think two is better. I mean, where do you put the third one, for honey pot’s sake?”
She’d tried hard to follow everything the girl had told her, which was, as far as she could tell, everything about everyone on the ranch, but she had no clue what she meant. “I’m sorry. Two of what is better than three?”
Lisa-May furrowed her youthful forehead and gave her a perplexed look. “Why, true loves, of course. What else would I be going on about?”
Going on. I couldn’t have put it better.
“True loves? As in more than one man? So you want two men instead of three?”
“Yep, that’s what I mean. Have you thought about it much? I think about it like all the time, but like I said, where would you put the third?”
Two lovers. Like Rae had. Yeah, she’d given it some thought. A lot of thought.
“Lisa-May, how old are you?”
“I’m twenty. Why?”
“Just checking.” It wasn’t her place to fill the girl in on the birds and bees of multiple sex, but she couldn’t resist. Was she really that innocent or was she playing her? “Um, you do realize you have three holes in your body, right? Three places to put their, well, you know.”
Lisa-May’s frown grew. “Sure I do. There’s the mouth and then the poop hole and then the v-hole.”
“Riight.” Carolina wouldn’t push any harder. If she didn’t get it now, then she’d have to get the answers elsewhere.
Lisa-May’s eyes grew big, and she slapped a hand over her mouth.
“Oh, for honey pot’s sake. You’re talking about—” She made a circle with one hand, then poked her finger through the middle of it making the unmistakable gesture of intercourse. “With all three of them?”
“And you weren’t?”
“Heavens, no!”
“Then what?”
“I was talking about sleeping in bed with them. Just sleeping.” She giggled. “Even with a full-size bed, you’d have no room to spread out. Plus, I had to share a room with my brother when we were growing up and I can’t imagine how loud the snoring would be with three men in the same room with me. Urgh. Talk about noisy.”
Carolina tried not to laugh, but the expression on the girl’s face was priceless. Was she really that clueless or was she playing her? “Oh. Okay. I’m sorry I brought the other up.”
Lisa-May flattened her hand over her chest. The flowery top she wore was a little big, and her jeans had holes in them. She was the epitome of youth and innocence.
“So, if you don’t mind my asking, are you saying that you’ve had three men”—she made the intercourse gesture again—“and that they put their man parts in all those places?”
She had to be kidding. No one was that naïve anymore. Not at her age. She studied Lisa-May, started to question her on it, and decided it was better left alone. If she really was as sweet and unworldly as she seemed, she wouldn’t want to embarrass her.
“I’m not going to answer that question.” She put her hand on the girl’s arm, trying to ease her abruptness.
“Then do you mind if I ask you something else?”
“You can ask, but I can’t promise I’ll answer.”
“But if you do answer, will you tell me the truth?”
“Lisa-May, just ask, okay?” How bad could the question be?
“Do you like Jesse and Charlie?”
She paused longer than she should have. “How could I? I don’t even know them.”
“Maybe not, but you can tell, can’t you? You like them.” Lisa-May pointed her finger at her and narrowed her eyes. “You said you’d tell me the truth.”
“Actually, I never said that. And sure, I guess I like them. They seem nice enough.”
“Oh, no, no, no. You like-like them.”
“Lisa-May, I think your romantic nature is getting the best of you. Again, I just met them. That’s not long enough to form a real opinion, especially an opinion about that.”
She dropped her arm and gave her a dissatisfied look. “Fine. Don’t tell me. I’ll find out soon enough.”
“Okay. Whatever
you say.” Trying to blow it off didn’t calm the butterflies she had in her stomach. She had felt something with Jesse and Charlie.
“I can’t wait to fall in love again.”
The girl’s romantic soul had no limits. “So you’ve been in love before?”
“I thought I was, but Joey said he was just using me. That I was too young to know what love was.” Her expression grew hard. “He still thinks I’m too young to know love when I find it, but that’s not true.”
“Well, most young girls have a crush or two. You need to make sure you don’t confuse the two.” How the hell did she wind up giving love advice? Lisa-May wasn’t that much younger than her twenty-four years, but she was a lot more naïve.
Lisa-May shook her head with no uncertainty about it. “When I meet my intendeds, I won’t have any doubt. Who knows? Maybe I’ve already met one of them.”
She had to admit that she was a little fascinated with the discussion. “Wait. So now you’re saying that you have fallen in love? And that it’s the real thing and not a crush?”
She didn’t want to ask if she could tell the difference between lustful attraction and the real thing. Was that what she was feeling toward Jesse and Charlie? Was it attraction only? And yet, she doubted it.
“Maybe. As for knowing the difference? Yeah, I can. We all can.”
“How can you tell?”
Again, Lisa-May gave her the deer-in-the-headlights look. “Oh. You know. Butterflies in the stomach. That kind of thing.”
She’d backed off from telling her the truth. She was sure of it. But why? It was a simple question. Yet Lisa-May was acting like she was holding the real answer back.
Somehow, she’d gone from playing teacher to acting like the student. It was time to change the subject before she got more involved. “Lisa-May, you’re so nice to help me out, but there’s no way I need all these clothes. I’m only going to be here for a little while.”
“I don’t think so.”
Carolina felt a twinge as her nerves took over. “Why would I stay any longer? It’s a beautiful house and all, but I’ve got to get my car out of the mud and back on the road. I’ve got a job to get back to.”
