“Okay, but don’t drive in your current state. I’m worried about you. You’re too distracted.”
“I thought you said the females in the Masters family only mated with one man. What happened to that plan?”
“No idea. In fact, Zach is on the phone with his parents now. He looks like he’s going to pull his hair out in confusion.” She giggled.
Cooper exhaled long and slow. “I’ll call you later.” He ended the call and dropped the phone in his lap. “Shit.”
He thought back on the whirlwind of emotions that had ruled his life for several years. Until six months ago when his brother Sawyer met Logan Masters and Amanda Williams, Cooper hadn’t known if he was destined to mate with Logan or Sharon. Both he and Sawyer had been relatively certain they would each belong to one of the other two, but there was no way to know who would end up with whom.
And then Sawyer had thrown in the towel and moved to Cambridge, putting everyone out of their misery by confirming that indeed he would share a mate with Logan.
The pressure that lifted off Cooper’s shoulders when he found out had been tremendous. Half the reason he’d been hiding from his future was because he didn’t want to share his mate with another man. It made his skin crawl just thinking about it.
Rationally, he’d known it was out of his hands. But that didn’t keep him from bucking the system, so to speak.
For six months he’d known with absolute certainty that the mysterious Sharon was his for the taking as soon as he pulled his head out of his ass. The shock of finding that to be untrue had left him unfocused and distracted for the past four days.
And now this. A new twist. Sharon was his. He hadn’t been wrong.
And he had to share her for the rest of his life with a tall, handsome human named Jackson. A man who didn’t know a fucking thing about the existence of shifters.
His chest heaved. He wasn’t sure he would survive this thing. It made him tired thinking about everything that needed to happen in the next few days.
Because if there was one thing he was super clear on, it was that putting off the inevitable would only make things worse. Every one of his siblings had been through this. Fighting Fate was a lost cause.
His hands were sweating, and he opened his palms to wipe them on his thighs. Already he was showing signs of the distress common to shifters on the verge of mating. The crazy part was that he still hadn’t met the woman in this equation. He’d never even seen her. Not even a picture.
With a deep breath, he threaded his fingers together and leaned his forehead against them.
Think, Hamilton.
Chapter Seven
Sharon was a wreck. Even though she’d spent the afternoon preparing lasagna, French bread, and salad on her perfectly good leg, it was close to seven, and she needed to put on her game face and resume the farce of pretending to be injured.
It happened to shifters all the time. Whenever one of them got hurt in front of humans, they had no choice but to play the healing game for as long as that particular injury would normally last for a human. Otherwise, they would raise suspicion.
Broken bone—six weeks in an uncomfortable cast. Stitches—one week with an enormous bandage that covered the area and then weeks of makeup to create the fake scar tissue. At least she hadn’t been hit in the face. That would have been so much worse.
When the doorbell rang, she glanced around to make sure everything was in place, picked up her crutches, and hobbled across the front room.
She opened the door with a smile. “You found it.”
“I did.” He entered, twisting a bottle of wine around in his hand to show her what he’d brought. “Hope you like red?”
“Love it.” Even if she hated the stuff, she would have feigned interest for the rest of her life just to help him relax at that moment.
And it worked. He blew out a breath and nodded. “Good. Well, then.” He stepped past her and glanced around the condo as she shut the door awkwardly, hating the unnecessary crutches immensely. Thank God she hadn’t broken a bone.
“Nice place.” She watched his fine ass encased in perfect jeans as he strolled into her space. The untucked dark blue shirt was sexy as hell. It fit him perfectly, stretching across his chest in a way that made her lick her lips.
“Thanks. It’s been through a lot. All of my brothers lived here at one point or another. I’m the youngest in the family and the last to occupy the famed bachelor pad.” She giggled nervously.
“Well, you must have been here a while. It has a woman’s touch.”
It didn’t. He was lying to make her feel good. She didn’t care that much about girly stuff, and she rarely spent much time at the condo. For all the whining and moaning she’d done pretending to want her own space and freedom, as soon as Logan moved to his new home on the edge of the reservation halfway between Cambridge and Sojourn, she’d instantly felt lonely.
And that had only been a few weeks ago. Until then, she’d moved back in with her parents at the edge of the resort to give Logan, Amanda, and Sawyer their space.
Not that she would have wanted to live in the same condo as the three of them, anyway. The thought of hearing them mate through the thin walls gave her the chills. “I’ve actually only been here a few weeks.”
“Oh.” He didn’t say anything else. Instead he headed for the open kitchen plan and set the bottle of wine on the counter. “Smells delicious.”
“Thanks. I guess I should have asked you if you liked lasagna first.” That same nervous laughter squeaked out. “Please tell me you eat red meat and like Italian.”
He smiled as he stepped closer to her. “Would you have told me if you hated Merlot?”
She scrunched up her face. “Touché.”
He kept approaching, slowly, stalking toward her until her heart raced from the proximity. His scent was intoxicating. If he were a wolf, instead of just named Wolf, they wouldn’t be standing there posturing. Instead they would already have their clothes off, and he would be buried inside her until she saw stars. The irony of his name wasn’t lost on her.
Actually, she realized, that wasn’t exactly accurate. If he were a shifter, they would have mated Tuesday night after she’d shifted just long enough to keep her leg from splitting open again with the effort.
Or last Friday.
Or fuck. Who was she kidding? She would have nailed him to the wall in the locker room at the lodge one of the many times he’d come there to ski over the winter.
She hadn’t admitted it to anyone, but she’d seen him there. He’d watched her from a distance while she taught classes or sold tickets or snapped tiny skis onto small children.
At first she’d thought he was some random human who found her attractive. Over time she’d wondered if she was wrong about him. In order to avoid finding out the truth, she’d kept her distance.
Cooper was hers. She’d known that for so long it had become her own personal truth. Not this Native American, human man who lived forty minutes away in Sojourn on the reservation.
So she’d stayed far enough away from Jackson Wolf to avoid fully scenting him and rocking her foundation. She told herself it was a simple crush. An attraction. There was nothing wrong with finding some guy sexy from afar. Especially not a guy like Jackson. He was tall, hovering over her own five eight. He was built, even though she now knew he was an accountant most days, when he wasn’t tracking down illegal loggers.
His hair was thick and dark. He kept it cropped short, but she wanted to run her fingers through it. She could have approached him any number of times and even dated him. But something had held her back. Obviously Fate had Her timing. And She meant for Sharon to realize who Jackson was to her last Friday, not a moment before.
Jackson had inched closer while she pondered her weird existence. He stood so close that he reached out a hand and stroked her cheek. His touch sent a rush of adrenaline through her body.
She inhaled his scent long and slow. He smelled of the outdoors under fr
esh clean soap from a recent shower.
In a deep, gentle voice he spoke again. “So, I’m going to eat lasagna and you’re going to drink Merlot for the rest of our lives without ever admitting the truth?”
Before she could react to his statement, he dropped his hand, his face registering shock. “Shit, that sounded a bit presumptuous. I didn’t mean…” His voice trailed off, a deeper tone than his usual.
All Sharon could think about was the loss of his touch. The sound of his soothing voice. The words hadn’t mattered. What mattered was the way her pussy clenched when he spoke them. In the end, a flush raced up her chest to settle on her cheeks. She would orgasm to that voice a million times in her life.
Too bad one of those times wouldn’t be tonight.
She needed to get her head on straight. The guy was human. Easing him into her life was the plan. Not pouncing on Jackson Wolf like she was some sort of…wolf.
He turned his face, and she dropped one crutch to grab his arm. It clattered to the floor. Instead of addressing his embarrassment, she backed up to his previous comment. “I’ll never tell. From here on out, my new favorite beverage is red wine.” She smiled to ease his tension.
His eyes sparkled as he grinned. “Italian is my new favorite food.”
“Then it’s settled.” She almost forgot everything that mattered and set her foot on the ground to lean into him. Luckily, she found one functioning brain cell and stopped herself.
It was going to be a long night.
»»•««
Jackson swallowed the last bite of lasagna on his plate and leaned back in his chair. He crossed his legs at the ankles and sipped the Merlot. It was good. He wouldn’t know if she agreed or not—perhaps ever—but he liked it. “That was the best meal I’ve had in months. Thank you.”
She shrugged and leaned her chin on her hand, her elbow on the glass-top table across from him. “You did save my life.”
He shook his head. “I think you’re exaggerating.”
“What makes you say that?” She eyed him suspiciously, the corners of her mouth turned up the slightest bit.
“For one thing, you look awfully good for a woman who lost as much blood as I saw just a few days ago. So, I have to assume the cut isn’t as bad as it seemed at the time. For another thing, it wasn’t that far down the road to your parents’ lodge.” He leaned forward, tucking his legs under the chair. “And let’s not forget that at least another dozen cars would have come by right behind me if I hadn’t been the one to stop.”
He loved the way her face scrunched up in fake disagreement. “You can’t know all that. You have a vivid imagination.”
“Do I?” What he wanted to do was push the dishes from their meal to the side, lean over the table, and haul her onto her feet so he could kiss her senseless. Instead he continued the necessary banter that accompanied the first date dance.
She giggled. “You do.” She nodded behind her. “Let’s move to the couch.”
He couldn’t think of a better plan. If he could at least woo her to first base, the night would be perfect. And he’d come a long way since last Friday. For an entire week, he’d managed to ignore the fact that all of her siblings lived in unconventional threesomes.
Was it possible she truly didn’t lean that way too? Jazmine thought so.
The problem was, as attracted to her as he was—and damn he was sweating just thinking about lifting her dress over her head so he could see her naked body beneath him—he needed to address that elephant before he went any further with her.
No way in fuck was he going to share her.
If he thought for one second she intended to play that game, he needed to run and never look back. It would hurt. Hell, his cock had been hard for a week. He needed to fuck her so badly he couldn’t concentrate on anything, but he still wasn’t going to share.
Ever.
As Sharon hobbled toward the couch using one of the crutches, he followed behind her, admiring her fine ass for the second time this week. She’d walked away from him yesterday with that tight muscle swishing, and here he was trying to swallow around his dry mouth again tonight.
She had on another dress tonight, probably because it was easier than trying to pull jeans or pants over her injured leg. This dress was sexier than the last one. Black. Tiny. Tight. The material looked soft and comfortable, and it hugged her to perfection. So very fucking sexy that she had to know what it did to a man.
And she had to have worn it on purpose.
Maybe first base wasn’t a pipe dream…
But first things first.
She tugged the hem at her thighs as she settled on the couch and twisted slightly to face him.
He lowered himself next to her, leaving a reasonable first-date space between them. For now.
They’d exchanged all the necessary pleasantries about jobs and family during dinner. All of which was completely redundant since Jazmine had told him everything about her and apparently vice versa. But they’d gone through the motions.
It was time to get serious. He could wait for the second date or the third or fourth or fifth, but why put off the inevitable? It would only make things worse if he grew attached to her and then had to walk away.
Clearing his throat, he gathered courage. “So my sister tells me your brothers all live unique lifestyles.”
She smiled slowly. “They do…”
She was going to make this hard. “That’s kind of unusual, isn’t it? All of them?”
“I suppose it would look that way to most people.” She twisted farther, bending her knee and settling her bad leg on the couch. She leaned her elbow on the back cushion and tipped her face into her palm. And gave him nothing else.
Damn. “And you?”
“What about me?”
“Do you, uh, have the desire to live with two other people?” There. He said it. It was succinct.
She paused, licking her lips. “I’m my own person.”
What did that mean? This wasn’t going well. And to make matters worse, she lifted her head to run her hand through her hair. The dark locks fell in waves over her shoulder, enticing him to lean forward, grab a handful, and bury his face in the thick softness until he memorized the scent of her shampoo. Torture.
“Are you worried about me wanting to be with two men?”
He blew out the breath he’d been holding. “Yes.”
“Well, don’t be. That’s not in the cards for me.”
He watched her face. She seemed to speak in riddles. But she also looked sincere. He had no choice but to take her word for it. And he couldn’t go another moment without tasting her.
Leaning forward slowly, he set his hand on her shoulder. “May I kiss you?” As he glanced back and forth between her gorgeous dark eyes, she smiled.
“Please.”
He lowered his lips, closing the distance until their mouths touched. In an instant, the temperature in the room went up ten degrees. Fireworks went off in his head. The connection was unbelievable.
People said when you met the one, you knew.
For the first time in his life, as he slipped his tongue into Sharon’s mouth and fully tasted her, he thought maybe people were right.
This woman was the one.
Chapter Eight
Sharon closed her eyes and sank into the best kiss she’d ever had. It was worth the wait. Jackson held her shoulders with both hands, his fingers digging into her almost too tightly. But she loved it. It grounded her, seemingly keeping her from floating away as he angled his head to one side and deepened the connection.
Her body was on fire. Her nipples strained against the black lace bra she wore under her tight-fitting black dress. Her panties were wet from the constant arousal she’d experienced since he arrived. Who was she kidding? She’d been aroused by the thought of him before he’d arrived. And now she was forced to squirm as her clit pulsed against the lace, demanding attention.
The chances of her clit getting its way tonight were slim
. But Jesus mercy she felt the driving need to mate. Nothing in her life had prepared her for this moment. No matter how many stories she’d heard from the mates of her four brothers, she hadn’t fully comprehended the scope of the need.
It consumed her.
It fueled her.
It drove her to forget her fake injury. How was she going to be able to keep up that charade with Jackson’s tongue teasing her into submission?
A noise in the background burrowed into her psyche and interrupted her perfect cocoon of denial. The one where she wanted the world to melt away so she could rip her dress over her head and stare into Jackson’s eyes while he fucked her senseless and they didn’t come up for air for three days.
Right. Because that’s exactly how regular humans started all their lasting relationships.
The noise broke through her mind again, jarring her enough to break the kiss. She gasped for air, setting her forehead against Jackson’s while she concentrated on the sound.
“Door,” he whispered. “Someone’s at the door.”
She jerked upright, and he released her shoulders.
Who would be at the door? Every single person in her family knew better.
It was getting late too. Couldn’t be a sales call.
“You want me to get it?” he asked.
“No. I’ll…” She started to push off the couch before she remembered her fake injury. “Sure. You get it,” she said as she relaxed back into the cushion. At least if it was a kid selling something, Jackson would stand a better chance of chasing the teenager away. Sharon was too soft. She’d buy whatever they were selling even if she already had a dozen of them.
Jackson hauled himself off the couch and headed for the door.
She pursed her lips, fighting a grin while she watched him discreetly adjust his cock.
When he opened the door, the last person she ever expected to see stood on the front step. She saw him clearly as Jackson stepped to one side to give her a full view. Even though she’d never met Cooper Hamilton, she would know him anywhere.
Sharon's Wolves (Wolf Masters Book 10) Page 4
