Nina made a face. “You mean more therapy? Like maybe a fucking couch and a bottle of Xanax?”
“No. I mean talking about your feelings with a skilled professional, Heathen. A paranormal professional.”
They’d cornered Nina shortly after her accident and broached the subject of seeking counseling for how displaced she was feeling. Someone to talk to who could help her cope with her fears about leaving this world before her baby and her husband, her friends.
She’d spouted all the typical Nina protests until Teddy mentioned how she’d someday have to explain to Charlie and Carl, who didn’t totally understand mortality as it pertained to Nina, why she wasn’t immortal and they were, and that was the tipping point to her reconsidering. Nothing was more important to Nina than Charlie and Carl.
“Feelings-schmeelings. I hate fucking talking about how I feel. I feel fine.”
“Nina…” Teddy warned as Marty and Wanda rolled their eyes. “If I can be strong, so can you. Always be the hunter.”
Nina scrunched up her beautiful face. “Oh, shut the fuck up. I said I’d go and I’ll GD go. But for now, c’mon, we gotta get ya all dolled up and slap some crap on your face so you can cry it all off when you’re slow dancing to some sappy shit. Bust a move, Teddy Bear. Your man’s gonna be here any minute.”
Teddy fought tears as she took the dress Nina held out to her. Everything made sense to her now. “So, that’s what that shopping trip last week was about?”
Just last week, the three of them had flown in with Carl and stayed the weekend at the ranch with Teddy and her brothers. She’d given them the tour of the newly renovated Sanctuary, shown them the sights, watched as Nina bonded with the horses at the ranch and at Sanctuary, and they’d taken her shopping for a total makeover.
There’d been creams and lotions, lip gloss after lip gloss, a hair appointment with some fancy man with a fancy French accent and magical scissors.
There was squealing over her hair, finally trimmed and layered in a style that made her feel like a princess, and sales and discount designer malls and a final stop at an exclusive boutique, where the women had tried on dresses for an upcoming graduation for Wanda’s niece, Naomi.
Wanda told her they were going to surprise Naomi with a prom dress, and being that Teddy was Naomi’s size, asked if she’d try dresses on in her stead. They’d coaxed her into giving them her opinion because they claimed they were old and outdated and if anyone in the group was even remotely close to Naomi’s age, it was Teddy.
She’d happily obliged, trying on at least twenty dresses before she made an entrance in the last one of the day—the one that made all the women sigh with pleasure, even Nina.
It was strapless and mint green, with a bodice covered in iridescent pink rhinestones. The skirt was bell-shaped, cinched at her waist and made out of a combination of mint-green tulle and silk that floated around her knees like a whispered caress.
Everyone had agreed Naomi would love it, and Wanda had shelled out far more money than Teddy had dedicated to ten years’ worth of clothing, and they’d left to join her brothers and Cormac for dinner.
Marty cupped her jaw and smiled. She looked like a fairy princess with her hair falling around her face in soft waves, gleaming against her sapphire-blue dress. She held up a curling iron and Wanda dangled a makeup bag. “Let’s get this show on the road. It’s princess time!”
Teddy barely had time to process her surroundings before they had her in her office, where curling irons heated and makeup was pulled from a bag and set on her desk. Eyeshadow brushes worked their magic, slick gloss slid over her lips, shoes appeared out of nowhere, sparkly and probably two inches too dangerously high for someone as clumsy as her.
Marty curled and fluffed her hair, and Wanda spritzed and chatted happily while Nina steamed her gown. And then they were tugging off her old denim shirt and ordering her out of her jeans and dropping the dress—the most beautiful dress she’d ever seen—over her head.
Pulling her into her office’s private bathroom, they pushed her toward the wide mirror, where her breathing hitched.
“Ohhhh,” she murmured. Unable to believe this was her reflection. Her hair, now a mixture of platinum and caramel highlights, sat high atop her head in soft curls that fell in all the right places around her face.
Her eyes, once a plain hazel, now looked mysterious and smoldering beneath the deep brown and green smoky eye Wanda had created with eyeshadow and mascara. Her lips shone peachy-pink, glossed and pouty; her cheekbones highlighted by a sparkling peachy glaze of something Marty said was a new product at Pack.
But the dress. Her dress stole the show. It was perfect, hugging her curves in all the right places, while lifting her breasts and shimmering in a dreamy confection of fabric.
“You look amazing, sweetie,” Marty said from behind her, gripping her shoulders and squeezing.
Wanda gave her a warm hug, too. “Our little Teddy is all grown up, girls. Isn’t she beautiful?” she asked with a hitch in her voice.
“You fucking look like Cinderella, Teddy Bear. Ask me, I’m pretty sure I met her doppelganger in Shamalot,” Nina said, pinching her cheek with affection before pulling a bag of Goobers from her hoodie pocket and dropping some in her mouth.
Teddy turned from the mirror, her eyes brimming with tears. “You did all of this for me?”
Marty whipped a tissue from the inside of her bodice and dabbed at Teddy’s eyes. “Don’t cry now, you’ll muss your makeup. And yes, we had a little something to do with it.”
She squeezed Marty’s hand. “Something?”
Wanda smiled coquettishly and held out a long gold box with a tiny gold bow. “Yes, something. Now, this is from the three of us. Wear it with all our love. We have to hurry, so open it!”
Teddy popped open the box to reveal a note inside. She cocked her head when she unfolded the paper.
Her mouth fell open. She blinked her eyes twice and reread the slip of paper. “It’s the deed. The deed to…Sanctuary?”
Nina used the heel of her good hand to knock Teddy in the shoulder. “You didn’t think we were gonna let all those damn eagles and monkeys and giraffes and shit be shipped off to some jackasses who don’t know what the fuck they’re doin’, did ya?”
Her heart throbbed in her chest as she gaped at them. “Wait. You bought Sanctuary for me?” she squeaked out in disbelief. “But you donated all that money to the renovations already! If it wasn’t for you, Mr. Noodles wouldn’t have an enclosure, let alone a sign language teacher. You already paid a fortune to help here. I can’t let you buy—”
“The fuck you can’t, Sunshine. Look, kiddo. We’re rich. All of us. Like no-joke, make-it-rain-cash rich. You’re our friend. You needed help. We helped. This ain’t nuthin’ but a blip in our bank accounts and it’s for a good cause I can get behind. Plus, you and Cormac are a damned good investment as far as we’re concerned. Now take the fucking deed. You and Pooh Bear go off and save all the furry and/or winged babies you can with the peace of mind that this shit is yours. And never forget, Mr. Noodles the monkey is my boyfriend. He needed someone to help him express himself so he’d quit flingin’ poop at little Jo-Jo out of anger. He was frustrated is all. I get that. My primate man gets only the best if I have shit to say about it.”
When the women had first come to the shambles of Sanctuary, just shortly after they’d taken down Stas, and Cormac and Toni were preparing to testify against him, Teddy had been in the process of trying to find last-minute investors who’d donate money to save the place she loved.
Checkbooks had flown from purses as each woman had donated a hefty sum. Sums big enough to allow Teddy to pay off the bank and take care of some of the more pressing structural issues haunting Sanctuary. Then they’d called their friends and they’d donated, too.
Mr. Noodles, the Macaque monkey, had taken one look at Nina cooing up at him from the ground and lobbed a pile of his lunch—a lunch that had just exited his back end—right at her
head. But Nina didn’t get angry. Instead, she’d climbed the tree he sat in with one hand, against their protests about her recent injuries, and talked to him for two solid hours and even though Mr. Noodles was deaf and couldn’t hear a word she said, he’d curled into her arm and wouldn’t let go.
She agreed, because he was deaf and his mother had abandoned him, leaving him incapable of surviving on his own, that he was just misunderstood, and she’d set about finding someone skilled enough to teach a monkey sign language—which, it turned out, Mr. Noodles learned quickly. His anger turned to productivity right before Teddy and Cormac’s eyes.
Nina, Charlie, Carl and Greg skyped with Mr. Noodles every week now without fail to check on his progress.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “I’ll never be able to thank you enough for this. For everything. For saving both Cormac and me. For giving me back the place I love almost more than anywhere else.”
Carl poked his head inside the bathroom, two of Sanctuary’s parrots, Kanye and Kim, sitting contentedly on his shoulder. The zombie loved animals as much as Nina and his uncanny ability to soothe them, communicate with them, had Teddy dialing him up on more than one occasion since they’d been back to ask for his advice when she struggled with a new rescue.
She couldn’t help but notice how smart and mature he looked in his tuxedo, with his hair brushed over his forehead and his shiny cufflinks winking under the bathroom light.
Carl thumped her on her shoulder and held out his arms, pulling her into a crooked hug full of his particular brand of warmth. Then he pointed to the watch on his wrist. “Ur…” He struggled with the word.
Teddy cupped his jaw to reassure him. “Go slow. I can wait.”
Carl had managed to express to Nina how frustrating it was for him to keep people waiting when he attempted verbal conversations—because Carl was always worried about everyone else’s comfort but his own.
Nina and Greg had considered a signing teacher, but Carl had trouble keeping his fingers glued to his hand; bending them to sign was likely going to prove difficult.
So instead, Teddy reminded him that she didn’t mind waiting at all, due to the fact that when Carl spoke, he didn’t need a lot of words to fill up a conversation. What he managed to say was always valued and important without the hindrance of frills.
Carl smiled and repeated, stuttered and broken, “Uur—eeee.”
“Hurryuphurryuphurryup!” Kanye squawked impatiently, dancing along Carl’s shoulder.
Teddy laughed, straightening his boutonniere. “What am I hurrying about?”
Carl took her by the hand, tucking it under his arm. “This way.” He tugged her back out of the office and down the long hall.
As she entered the penguin room, where waterfalls trickled out their tune and Suits the penguin waddled up and down the paths leading to the beautiful new pool just recently installed, she saw Cormac.
Dressed in a blue tux with blue ruffles, holding a corsage in his hand, so handsome her teeth ached from just looking at him.
He held out his arms to her and she rushed into them, burying her face in his broad chest, just the way she’d done so many times before.
“For you,” he said, holding up the wrist corsage made of mint-green and white carnations.
She held out her hand with a smile and let him slide it over her wrist. “It’s beautiful. Thank you.”
He’d been right about their getting to know each other. They’d spent hours and hours full of movies and lunch dates, dinners made up of Porterhouse steaks, walks in the forest, and visits to the cabin where their relationship had begun.
They laughed, they talked, they even had a couple of fights. They made out like teenagers, they slow-danced under the Colorado stars. They moved Cormac into an apartment and continued to fight a long, hard battle with his credit card companies to get his ruined credit back in order, with Lenny Kravitz always on his computer desk, purring.
They spent days working on the rebirth of Sanctuary, making phone calls, overseeing the construction of new habitats, plowing toward a mutual goal just like Cormac had promised.
They created a routine all their own. One they could count on, day in and day out, no matter what, and they never missed dinner together, whether it was at the ranch with her brothers or at Cormac’s place.
And now they were here—together—at her prom.
“Did you do all this for me?” Teddy managed to squeak out as she lifted her head and took in the clusters of balloons in pastel colors floating about the room. Lights twinkled from corner to corner, a DJ played 98 Degrees, streamers in rainbow colors swayed from the ceiling, and a banner reading Teddy’s Big Excellent Prom hung from the long string of tall windows overlooking the grounds.
“For our first official date,” Cormac said on a warm smile, pulling her to the dance floor in the center of everything and twirling her around. “But I didn’t do it alone. I did it with the girls and Carl and Arch. All refreshments courtesy of Archibald and Carl, in fact.”
She giggled. “But we’ve had a million dates since we got back to Colorado.”
Pressing a gentle kiss to her lips, Cormac shook his head. “Ah, but we didn’t have this one. This one is special.”
“So you planned this? All of this?” she asked, as he pulled her tight to him and grinned down at her.
“Yep. Right down to the rainforest theme.”
Teddy sighed and kissed him hard. “Thank you. It’s beautiful.”
“Speaking of beautiful, have I told you how beautiful you look tonight?”
Her hand went to the floaty dress, swishing at her knees. “Courtesy of Marty, Nina, and Wanda.”
“It’s amazing. You’re amazing,” he whispered.
Melting against him, Teddy wondered what had inspired this. “What made you choose a prom?”
“You remember that night Arch gave us that whacky tea?”
She chuckled and nodded, snuggling closer and inhaling his cologne. “I do. You saw a unicorn. Did we ever name the unicorn?”
“I’m still thinking on it, but do you remember telling me you never went to your prom?”
Her heart melted. He’d listened to her when she’d said she was too embarrassed to ask her brothers to buy her a dress because money had been so tight. He’d listened.
Teddy wrinkled her nose. “Ugh. I’m convinced it was the tea that made me do it. Kinda pathetic, huh?”
Cormac caressed her cheek with his big palm. “Not even a little. I remember thinking I wanted to give you back something every girl should experience at least once. But I also wanted you to always remember this night for more than one reason. I have ulterior motives.”
Closing her eyes, she wrapped her arms around his neck and counted her blessings. “Ooo, an ulterior motive? Do tell.”
Bracketing her face, he slowed their movement and looked into her eyes. “I wanted you to always remember the night I told you I’ve fallen crazy in love with you, Theodora Gribanov. I wanna do this life mate thing so hard we hurt it.”
Her heart throbbed in her chest, but she looked him right in the eye and whispered on a happy sigh, “I love you, too, Cormac. Let’s put the hurt on this life mate thing.”
Cormac’s lips pressed against hers, his tongue slipping into her mouth, sending a thrill of yearning to her heart. “So you know what this means, right?”
“Does this mean I have to lose my virginity to you after we get drunk on spiked punch?”
“Don’t you have to still have that to lose it?” he teased against her mouth.
“So fresh, Vitali. Knock it off or I won’t let you get to second base.”
“Which brings me to this—I don’t know about you, but I was wondering if it might be time to, you know, consider sealing the deal?” He winked comically at her.
“Seal a deal? Whatever do you mean, Mr. Vitali?” she joked, knowing exactly what he meant.
They’d chosen to wait to make love. There had been many grueling nights when they’d
almost caved due to their raging hormones, but they wanted the time to be right. For the physical expression of their relationship to mean something.
For love and total commitment to be their motivation.
Curving his arm around her waist, Cormac hauled her closer, letting her feel what he meant. “You know exactly what I mean. Don’t torture me. Either you’re in or you’re out.”
“Isn’t this the part of my teen dream where I crash to reality when I remember guys say whatever they have to in order to get in your pants?” she asked, running her fingers over his arms and luxuriating in his muscles.
He ran his lips over her neck, making her shiver with anticipation. “You don’t have pants on. And I’m crushed. Do you really think I would say ‘I love you’ to just get you into bed? Have you no soul?”
Her head fell back on her shoulders as she laughed. “That’s what I wanted to hear. Tonight could just be your lucky night.”
He growled playfully at her, swirling her around the dance floor as everyone joined them. Music played, the girls and their husbands danced, and Vadim and Viktor did the limbo. Carl asked one of her staff members to dance; Darnell did the outdated but hysterical robot. Toni and her fiancé Prince Iver ruled the chicken dance, and Arch did an amazing twist, outlasting every one of them on the floor.
It was a night full of magic, full of promise, full of all the people and animals she loved most.
Several hours and some weenies in a blanket later, back at Cormac’s apartment, he pulled her into his bedroom, where he’d lit dozens of candles and had a bottle of wine chilling in a bucket.
The room, swathed in a soft, flickering glow, was enchanting, leaving her breathless at the care he’d taken to make tonight perfect. He’d made up his big bed with soft pillows and a thick comforter and placed a pink, fuzzy bathrobe on the chair in the corner.
“As if you hadn’t already outdone yourself,” she whispered, tears forming at the corners of her eyes.
Cormac popped the cork on the wine and poured her a glass, handing it to her with a hot kiss that made her toes curl.
Teddy reached up and loosened his bowtie as she took a sip, before she set it down and grabbed the lapels of his jacket, pushing it from his wide shoulders. Her hands ached to touch his flesh, experience him in his entirety, the way she’d fantasized each time he took his shirt off when he was working on a project at Sanctuary or when he wore a pair of jeans that made his already outstanding butt look even more outstanding.
Bearly Accidental (Accidentally Paranormal Book 12) Page 19
