“I’ll think of something.”
Ginny heard Jack moving around inside, his soft footfalls climbing the stairs, and she knew he’d head straight for the bed. The kind of healing he’d done -- and still had to do -- required enormous reserves of energy, and he probably wouldn’t wake up until hunger drove him from the bed.
She and Hazel sat in silence until they heard hoof beats, and several riders appeared in the distance. Ginny recognized Oliver and Lottie, as well as Thomas, the tall beta who served as Jack’s second-in-command.
Hazel’s nervous energy returned, magnified a hundredfold as the girl’s gaze fixed on Oliver. A soft whimper escaped her throat and her fingers tightened painfully on Ginny’s arm. “Is it supposed to feel like this?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I’ll send him out to Dawson’s place, sweetie. He won’t be around for long, all right?”
“Okay.”
The newcomers were still twenty yards out when Thomas held up his hand and said something too soft for Ginny to hear. Lottie nodded, and Oliver tugged off his hat and glanced toward the porch. They both pulled up their mounts and stayed put.
Thomas approached on his own, stopping just short of the porch. His booted feet hit the ground with a soft thud and he took the porch steps two at a time. “Ginny?” He spoke to her, but his worried gaze was fixed on Hazel. “What’s going on?”
She stroked one hand through Hazel’s hair. “Jack’s upstairs, and he’ll probably sleep all afternoon. Hazel? Can you go check out my cupboards and see what I can throw in a pot for dinner?”
“Okay.” Hazel rose to her feet and scurried inside without so much as a glance at Thomas, who watched her go with a distant, worried look.
When she was gone, he transferred that calm, measured gaze to Ginny. “Do you know how long she’s been fighting it for?”
“Too long.” Ginny rose and shoved her hands in her back pockets. “Today almost broke her, though. I’m trying to talk her past the waiting, but I don’t know how much good it’ll do.”
“Shit.” Thomas pulled off his hat and ran his fingers through his short hair. “She’s young for it, so I hadn’t really noticed how bad it had gotten.” He hesitated, then glanced at Ginny and asked the last question she would have expected. “What do you need us to do?”
She wanted to protest, ask him why he was asking her, but her answer came automatically. “Take Ollie and head out to Dawson’s spread. Make sure anyone who has ideas about making trouble knows what happened, and tell them to come fetch their friends’ bodies before nightfall. Lottie can stay here and help me with Hazel. All things considered, I think it’d be smarter for you to escort them back to town instead of Ollie.”
Thomas studied her for just a moment too long, and she got the oddest feeling he’d been testing her. The corner of his mouth ticked up and he nodded to her. “Can’t argue with your logic, Ginny. You’ll look after Jack?”
Her own smile was rueful. “He’s in good hands. I hope Ollie told you he’d need something to wear.”
“Ah, yes.” Thomas hopped back off the porch without bothering with the steps and moved back to his horse to unbuckle a saddlebag. “I brought some things from my house. They may not be a perfect fit, but they’ll do.”
“Thanks.” She took the bag and waved to Oliver and Lottie, both of whom raised hands in greeting. “Send Lottie over. Maybe, together, we can talk some kind of sense into Hazel.”
Thomas snorted. “Good luck with that,” he murmured as he followed her gaze. “Can’t talk sense into a werewolf in love.”
Which meant Lottie was still skirting his courting with careful deliberation. “I suppose you can’t. Be careful, Thomas.”
“Mmm. You too, Ginny.” Thomas shot her a serious look. “Take care of the alpha.”
“It’s the least I can do.”
He smiled as if he found the comment amusing and swung back up onto his horse. “I’ll see you later.”
“Yes, you will.” She walked inside as he rode away.
Hazel was in the kitchen, making more noise than progress as she banged through the cupboards without focusing on anything long enough to even see it. “Is he gone?” she asked without turning around.
“Headed out with Thomas to take care of a few things.” Ginny opened her vegetable bin and gathered some potatoes. “Can you peel these for me? Lottie will be in any minute now.”
“Okay.” But she didn’t move toward the table, just kept pacing nervously until the door finally opened to reveal Lottie. Hazel jerked to a stop and turned. “Pick one,” she blurted.
Charlotte Daniel hardly ever looked nonplussed, but she blinked at Hazel. “Pick one what?”
“One of those boys,” Hazel replied, her tone agitated. “Just… pick one. And I’ll do it. And this can all be done with.”
Lottie shot Ginny a confused look. “What happened?”
She sighed. “Oliver Russell is apparently very hot in the middle of a gunfight.”
“Oh.” The shorter blonde woman blushed a little. “I, uh… suppose he would be.”
Hazel’s snarl tore through the room. “Oliver fucking Russell can go fuck himself, with his fucking hands and his fucking growling orders and all of his fucking hotness.” And with that completely incoherent statement out of the way, the girl burst into hysterical tears.
Chapter Six
Ginny’s bedroom was dark when Jack awoke for the second time that day. His boots stood beside her bed, but the neatly folded clothes on the chair belonged to Thomas.
He sat up and took slow, careful inventory of his aches and pains. He was sore and exhausted, but the wound on his arm had knit shut. The most persistent discomfort was hunger, but the smell wafting up from the kitchen would cure that.
Jack rose from the bed and pulled on the pants. He buttoned them as he moved toward the stairs, too hungry to bother with a shirt. And too worried. He’d half expected to wake up with Ginny curled around him, and her absence had been almost as uncomfortable as the rumbling of his stomach.
She was in the sitting room, a book in her lap. She looked up and marked her place when he stopped in the doorway. “You must be starving.”
His heart jumped, and he had to fight to keep his tone casual. “I am.”
“I made stew,” she murmured, rising, and she didn’t look at him as she brushed past and headed for the kitchen.
He followed her to the kitchen, refusing to acknowledge the dread uncurling in the pit of his stomach. “What happened after Thomas got here?”
Ginny ladled the hearty-looking stew into a bowl. “He and Oliver rode out to Dawson’s to make sure things were settled.” She set the bowl at the end of the table next to a platter of rolls. “And Lottie’s going to find a mate for Hazel.”
It almost distracted him from the food. Almost. He tugged out the chair and dropped into it. “How on earth did you manage that?”
“She can’t wait any longer.” Ginny poured two mugs of coffee and slid one in front of Jack as she sat down at the table. “I think today’s close call with Ollie really scared her.”
He tried to quiet his growling stomach with one of the rolls and washed it down with half of the coffee before replying. “You never told me what happened.”
“To Hazel?” She shrugged as he began to eat. “During the firefight, she was fetching more ammunition for us, and she didn’t stay down. Ollie lost it a little bit, and all the protective growling sent her spinning.”
Jack sighed and rubbed at his forehead. “It’s too much some days, Ginny. It’s too damn much for one man to handle.”
“I know, Jack. I wish --” She broke off and stared down at her hands. “I wish you didn’t have to do it alone.”
She sounded guilty, and the dread seized him. “I don’t have to, Ginny.”
“No. I suppose you don’t.” Her eyes met his, and the gentle regret in their hazel depths stole his breath. “But it can’t be me, Jack. I can’t help you.”
There
was only one question to ask. “Why?”
Ginny trembled. “Because I’m selfish and scared and I can’t handle it.” She stood abruptly, almost knocking her chair back. “I can’t handle the way you look at me, like you see something more than what I am. And I’m not good at the alpha thing. Not like you are, Jack. Not enough to do it all the time.”
He had to curl his fingers around the table to keep from rising to his feet. “And if I weren’t the alpha?”
She stopped and stared at him. “What kind of question is that?”
“The kind a man asks when he’s hearing a lot of excuses.”
Her eyes went dark. When she spoke again, her voice was flat. “You’re right. I don’t need excuses. You said you’d leave me alone if I wanted.”
She didn’t want it. But even knowing that, even being sure…
No, he couldn’t give her up. So he told her the truth. All of it. “I’ll leave you alone, if that’s what you want. I’ll do anything you want. Anything that makes you happy, Ginny. Because I love you, and I need you to be happy.”
“No.” She barely managed the word before tears spilled from her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. “Jack, you don’t -- You can’t. Not me.”
He was on his feet and crossing the distance between them before he realized he’d moved. He stopped just short of wrapping his arms around her, telling himself it wouldn’t be fair. Not to either of them. “You deserved the truth, so I gave it to you. What you do with it is your call, Ginny. Just… don’t cry. Jesus, please don’t cry.”
“I’m not,” she insisted through her tears, still shaking. “I -- Christ, Jack. I don’t deserve it. I’m bitter and I don’t deserve it, and I love you, too.”
She threw her arms around his neck, and he buried his face in her hair and tried not to clutch at her too tightly. “If you don’t want to do the alpha shit, you don’t have to. Even if you just talked to me sometimes about it, it’d be more than I have now.”
“I’d do it,” she whispered in his ear. “For the pack.”
“And you’d be amazing.” He pulled back and threaded his fingers through her hair. “You would make my life so much easier. But I could probably take life being hard if it meant I had you.”
Ginny sniffled and laughed even as she kissed him. “I’m going to make it hard enough, so I’d better help you with everything else.”
Honor demanded he tell her she didn’t have to decide that night. That he give her time to think. The wolf demanded he accept what she was offering. Now.
In the end, he settled for a compromise. He nipped her lower lip. “Be my mate for now. We’ll worry about the rest later.”
“Yes.” She laid her hand on his cheek and kissed him again, slowly, her tongue sneaking out to touch his. He groaned and pulled her closer, and the kiss was just getting interesting when his stomach let out an angry grumble.
He pulled back and kissed her forehead. “I suppose I should eat before I let you distract me.”
Ginny laughed and bit her lip. “I should go away, then. I’ll be upstairs… in the bedroom.” She brushed one last kiss over his cheek and walked out.
Jack polished off the food she’d put on the table and a second serving from the pot before the edge of his hunger had eased. In any other circumstance he would have collapsed again into much needed sleep, but the thought of Ginny waiting for him in bed made sleep the least appealing prospect ever.
After a brief stop in the bathroom to clean up, Jack climbed the stairs and stopped in the doorway. Ginny sat on the bed, propped against a pile of pillows, reading the same book she’d had downstairs. Now, though, her red hair tumbled in a wild cloud around her mostly bare shoulders, and she wore a thin gown of green, lace-edged silk.
“Wow.” He leaned against the doorjamb and smiled. “This is a sight I could get used to.”
“Not in the least.” She tossed the book on the floor and rolled to her knees, her expression playful. A slit in the gown bared her leg to the top of her thigh. “I mostly sleep naked.”
The things he could do to her… His cock hardened as he stepped over the threshold and let a slow, wicked smile curl his lips. “Well, where’s the fun in that?”
“You seemed to like it well enough last night.”
“That?” He was glad he hadn’t bothered with a shirt. The borrowed pants hit the floor and he stepped out of them before curling his fingers around his cock. “Oh, honey, that was just getting to know you.”
Ginny’s gaze dropped to his hand, and she whimpered and fidgeted on the bed. “You already knew me.”
“Not as well as I wanted to.” He fixed his gaze on hers again. “Turn around and brace your hands against the headboard.”
She didn’t move at first, just twirled a lock of hair around one finger and licked her lips. Finally, she turned away and crawled up the bed until she reached the iron headboard. Her hands curled around it slowly, and she glanced back at him over her shoulder. “Like this?”
He stepped forward and ran his hand down her back and over the green silk, rubbing it against her skin. “Just like that.”
Her back arched, and she hissed in a breath. “Jack.”
The bed dipped as he set his knee on the edge, then knelt behind her. He indulged himself with a slow caress, feeling the curves of her body beneath expensive silk as he traced over her hips and squeezed her ass. When she whimpered again and rocked back toward him, he smiled and began to inch the fabric up. “Don’t move your hands.”
Her knees moved, though, sliding farther apart. “Not even to help?” she teased.
“If you want me to spank you, just ask, baby.”
“No.” She laughed, a husky, aroused sound. “But maybe you should tie my hands to the bed. Just to be sure I don’t move them.”
It was an excellent idea, but he wasn’t in the mood to be distracted. He eased her gown higher, until her thighs were bare and it was obvious she had decided to forego underwear. “Maybe I’ll tie you up when I’m done being amazed by how fucking gorgeous you are.”
Even her shoulders blushed. “Nothing compared to you, honey,” she whispered. “I still remember the first time I saw you.”
So did he. “You were seventeen,” he murmured as he leaned over her and curled his hands around the iron on either side of hers. “You were wild. And I’d just taken over my father’s place as alpha. I was young and full of myself back then.”
“I wanted you.” Ginny turned her head and her hair slipped away from the curve of her neck. “And you scared the hell out of me.”
He brushed his lips over her pulse. “Why?”
“I wasn’t ready for you,” she admitted. “Not by a long shot.”
“And now?”
“Now?” She arched again and rubbed her face against his. “I love you. I’m ready.”
He’d planned hours of teasing foreplay, of tormenting her and making her beg, making her his. Instead he thrust into her with one powerful stroke, burying himself in the heat of her body and driving a choked cry from her throat. Teasing could come later, after he’d made one thing clear. “Now you’re mine.”
“I already was.” Ginny’s head hit his shoulder, and she moaned and bucked. “Just like you belonged to me.”
“For longer than you know.” He slid one hand along her arm, savoring the smooth warmth of her skin as he trailed his fingers down to her shoulder, then around to cup her breast. He caught the tight nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “Five years’ worth of fantasies, Ginny. Imagining the things I’d do to you. The things you’d do to me.”
Her gasp tickled deliciously along his nerve endings. “Mmm, me too. Want to hear what I came up with?”
He pinched her nipple harder, just to hear that noise again. “Tell me.”
“R-Rainstorm last fall,” she panted. “You came into Lottie’s wet to the skin. And it was a cold rain, so you steamed when you went and stood next to the heater.” She tightened around his cock as a shiver ran through her. “I fa
ntasized about your skin warming up under my tongue.”
The temptation to move was powerful, but he loved the way she squirmed beneath him. He slid his hand lower, dipped between her legs and brushed against her clit. “Did you touch yourself when you thought about it?”
She jerked. “I damn near did right in front of you. And when I got home… God, Jack, I was so wound up I couldn’t think until I made myself come.”
He rewarded them both with one sharp thrust before he straightened up. Her nightgown still hung around her waist, so he dragged it up over her head. It was long enough to slip easily through and around the ironwork on the headboard until her wrists were bound. “I’m sure this is plenty expensive, so don’t go ripping it up.”
“Lottie gave it to me months ago and told me to wear it for you.” Her whole body trembled, and she gripped the headboard tighter.
“Maybe I’ll thank her.” He leaned down again and bit the back of her neck. “Later.”
“Uh-huh.” Her pussy squeezed tight around him again. “Later. Right now, I need you.”
“I know.” He smoothed his hand down her back and rubbed his thumb over the curve of her ass before drawing back. He could hear her heart pounding as he hovered, teasing her with his cock barely inside her. “Say it again.”
“Need you.” The silk strained as she fidgeted and stretched, trying to take him deeper. “Jack, please --”
He gripped her hips and surged forward, and the wolf howled satisfaction inside him. She was his, finally his, and by the time he let her out of this bed their scents would be so entwined no one would ever question it again.
Ginny shrieked, and the silk binding her ripped a little. “Fuck!”
He panted for breath as he thrust again. “That’s the idea, honey.”
She tossed her head and moved as much as she could, rocking her hips back in a desperate grind. “I told you -- one of my fantasies.” Her voice broke when he drove into her again. “Tell me one of yours.”
Maybe he should have found one of his dirtiest fantasies. One of the wicked ones he dreamt about at night, or the illicit thoughts he had when he jerked off in his bed alone.
Down & Dirty (Bundle) Page 6
