ROMANCE: Lion Protector (Paranormal Shifter BBW Military Romance) (Shapeshifter Alpha Male Short Stories Book 2) (17 page)

Chapter 10

              I slept this time as Anthony drove. I didn’t really feel my life was in danger. If it were, I figured he could have easily remedied any problem I posed at the docks.

              I opened my eyes when I felt the car come to a stop, and found we were at Anthony’s family home again. This time, there was nothing being celebrated. No one called for us when we walked in the door.

              I followed Anthony to the kitchen. He pulled a few sandwich fixings out onto a cutting board and reflexively I started to prepare one large sandwich for us, cutting it down the middle. Then I chopped a few veggies for the side. He searched the pantry until he came out with canned sodas. He passed me one that was clear to settle my stomach.

              “Papa, you up?” he yelled.

              “Anthony?” I heard Grandfather Santino reply.

              “Yeah, Jayne and I are coming up to speak to you,” Anthony yelled back.

“Alright, I’ll meet you in my study,” Grandfather Santino replied not quite as loudly.

              I went ahead and prepared a few more vegetables and threw some cookies from a jar on the counter onto a plate. Anthony put the sandwich, vegetables, cookies, and drinks on a TV tray. We put the unused food away and then traveled up the stairs together.

              As we walked into the study, I could see Grandfather Santino in a wingback chair by the window reading.

              “Well, you two look a sad mess,” he said.

              “She knows,” Anthony said, setting the tray on a table near Grandfather Santino.

              “Oh,” the older man said, looking to me. “Come sit.”

              He gestured to the chair nearest him and I sat. I didn’t know what to say. The day had been filled with revelations, and I was seeing everyone in a different light. The more I thought about things, the less sure I was how good or bad that light was,. For now I was still listening and thinking.

              “It is hard to be involved with men who do the things we do. It’s more challenging for women involved with those of us at the top,” he said.

              I raised an eyebrow.

              “Anthony is my successor. Didn’t you notice he has a key to this house? Have you seen anyone else with a key? He replaced me as editor and he is slowly replacing me as the father of this family as well, along with all that entails,” Grandfather Santino said.

              “I guess in some ways it all makes sense, but I have to think about my career and the baby,” I said without thinking about it.

              Apparently it was a day for announcements. Anthony and I both looked at his grandfather, whose face changed from surprised to excited in an instant.

              “Well, I can assure you that family is important to him. How you feel about what we do is up to you, but our business is important to him as well. What we do balances the scales in the community and gets retribution that satisfies in ways that the police department can’t. How we spin the story in the news keeps the community focused on larger issues where we need to improve as a whole instead of fearing as individuals,” Santino tried to explain.

              The more they explained, the more I understood. The journalist in me wondered what truths were most important and what facts may or may not necessarily need to be public knowledge. In a way, I had been focused on the truths of each day while they focused on the truths of humanity.

              I was so deep in my own thought that I did not notice Grandfather Santino staring at my stomach, which reminded me I was barely dressed.

              The doorbell rang and Anthony and I looked out the window. Santino didn’t even flinch.

              “That would be Sheryl to make dinner,” Santino said. “The biggest mouth in the family. You two better decide whether your baby announcement is official or not. If she knows, the city will know by the time we all go to bed.”

              I excused myself to change clothes. Anthony stayed in the study to speak with his grandfather. In the bathroom I changed and washed my face. There was no helping my hair, but I did find a few bobby pins in a drawer.

              I washed my face again and stared at myself in the mirror. I looked down at my abdomen. I couldn’t be positive, but I thought I was finally starting to get a little weight from the baby. My stomach was still flat, but it had a full appearance. My already somewhat large butt seemed bigger.

              I still had a lot to think about. When I came out of the bathroom Anthony was outside the door waiting for me.

              “I love you,” he said.

              “Well, this is a strange time to say that for the first time,” I said, continuing my path around him.

              “Doesn’t matter when I say it, as long as I say it. And you don’t have to say it, because I know you love me even if you don’t say the words,” he continued.

              I gave him a look as we continued down the hall.

              “I want to tell my family about the baby. I also want to get married. If you want to continue reporting the news, that is fine as well. Use your own judgment about how you tell whatever story you like. I just want to take care of my family. All of it,” he said.

              As he finished speaking, he stopped me in my tracks just before we got to the kitchen. He kissed me before I could refuse – before I could think.

              Everything in me belonged to him, and I knew it. I was his, not just because I was having his baby, but because I wanted to be. I could tell in the way he kissed me now that he felt it, too, and would do his best to have me and our baby in his life.

              “Anthony,” I said.

              “No,” he said and kissed me again.

              I pulled away.

              “No,” I said.

              He stepped back and the color drained from his face. He reached for me. I put a hand up, and he stopped.

              “I love you, too. I love you and I suppose I understand. This just all feels unreal. To think that so much is at the dictate of a few people overseeing it all. Then, to realize the man in my life is the key person at the top of all of it. It is a lot to take in, but I get it. I get it and I love you,” I said.

              He smiled more than his normal cocky grin. He gave a genuine heartfelt smile that reassured me that us being together was right.

              “I also understand why we pick and choose just enough facts to keep people thinking of the bigger picture, rather than just the facts for solving individual cases and crimes,” I said.

              “Whatever you want to report,” he said, even knowing I might put everyone at risk.

              “I think I would like to report on the lighter side of life. As much crime as there is, there is also a lot of good as well. Businesses opening, advancements in science and medicine, and budding youth programs,” I said.

              I would have kept going, but Anthony was already kissing me again.

THE END

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I.

“You know,” Buck said, pulling up on the reins of the sorrel gelding and looking over at Karissa. “I’ve sunk every cent I’ve ever made and a hell of a lot of blood, sweat and tears into building this place up. It wasn’t much when my Dad died and left it to me, but I’ve made do with it and built it into something that he’d have been proud of.”

“It’s certainly beautiful.” Even in jeans and a long-sleeved flannel shirt, Karissa McCall looked the part of an immaculately kept, attorney of a higher social class. Her blonde hair was kept perfectly under the brand new felt hat that she had bought just for the occasion. “It’s so peaceful and that breeze blowing off of the mountain bringing the hint of wildflowers, umm.”

She tilted her head back, closed her eyes and inhaled deeply.

Buck Kaufman was silent for a few minutes, watching the attractive blonde as she enjoyed something of which he held a great deal of pride. She was certainly out of his league, but he couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to hold her in his arms, stroke those silky blonde strands and take in the fragrance of her expensive perfume.

Buck had brought his divorce attorney, Karissa out to the ranch for the day, hoping that it would motivate her to help him hold onto it. 5000 acres of prime grassland with two streams that provided good water and allowed him to produce winter feed along their banks, wandered up off of the plains and up into the edge of the mountains.

Up to that point, it appeared that his plan was working out. She seemed to be enjoying herself and was being swept up into the spirit of “the wind and the wild,” which is how he liked to refer to it. The only drawback was that he was struggling with the fact that his typically sinister outlook on attorneys was slowly changing and she was beginning to become human; a damn fine looking human at that.

“So, you told me that you have 5000 acres that runs right up to the edge of the mountains?” she ventured. “This place must have one hell of a price tag on it. No wonder Denise is going after you so hard.”

That was the end of his fantasies. Just like your typical lawyer to head right back to focusing on the dollar signs. “To me it’s priceless,” he muttered.

“I think I saw a valuation of $15,000,000 in your paperwork?” she ventured.

“That’s just the dollar figure that some assessor put on it,” he replied. He was frustrated that she hadn’t yet caught on to what he was trying to communicate to her. You couldn’t put a dollar amount on something like his ranch. Sure, everything, in the eyes of an assessor, would have a dollar value to it, but the value that he had in the ranch was something that sunk down deep into his soul.

Seeing his frustration, Karissa quickly backtracked. “Yeah, of course, it has a great deal of sentimental value to you that an assessor couldn’t possibly figure into the price.” She was regretting that she had gone in that direction with the conversation. Her problem was that she wasn’t sure how to talk to Buck. They were from two different worlds. In her world, value was always represented with a dollar sign in front of it. Though she could feel that there was something special about
Donavon’s Spread
; the name, Buck had told her, was given to the place by his grandfather, but she couldn’t quite put a finger on what it meant. What she did know, though putting it into words wasn’t coming to her at the moment, was that making certain that Buck was able to hold on to most if not all of it was becoming a major motivation to her.

She’d been on a horse a few times when she was younger, but hadn’t ridden a great deal, therefore, when Buck had invited her to go out to the ranch and go for a ride with him, she had accepted eagerly. She’d been pretty intimidated by her lack of experience when she first swung her leg over the saddle and took her seat, but since Buck had kept a pretty easy pace going, her confidence in her riding skills had grown quickly.

“Look,” she said, trying to fill the long, awkward silence that had suddenly turned up. “I know what you’re doing and it’s working. I promise that I’m not looking at this place in terms of dollars, but in value. There’s a lot more to value than the numbers behind a dollar sign.”

Buck had tried to conceal his disappointment, but evidently she was able to see right through him. She’d nailed down his feelings in that short statement. Since he and Denise had separated, he’d done nothing but worry about how he was going to hold onto his family’s place. It had been in the possession of three generations before he came along and he wasn’t about to become the one that lost it. Needless to say, he had been pulling his hair out, looking at things from every angle and trying to figure out how Denise was going to play her hand.

“I guess I’m wearing my feelings on my sleeve, huh?” He hoped that the stirring attraction that he’d been feeling for her hadn’t been quite as obvious. He wasn’t in the mood for embarrassing himself.

“Yeah,” she laughed softly. “You could say that. But that’s not all, Buck. This place is really starting to grow on me.”

“Well, hell,” he chuckled. “By the time this damned divorce is finished and I have to liquidate, you might pick it up for a song.” It was a cowboy’s way to make light of their own difficulties. He’d grown up with that sort of gallows humor all around him and didn’t realize that Karissa might take it as an insult.

“I should hope that I wouldn’t do that badly,” she countered, pushing her lower lip out in something of a pout. The moment she produced that expression, she drew her lip back in. What had possessed her to act like a schoolgirl? Sure, he was attractive and rugged, she’d thought so the minute he walked into the office, but she wasn’t looking for a man, she had a career to think of and goals to achieve. Besides, he probably wasn’t interested in hooking up with someone while the wound from his separation from Denise was still so raw.
Why am I even thinking about that right now?
She reeled in her feelings.

“I didn’t mean that you won’t do well on my behalf.” He’d just screwed that up. That’s one of the problems that came with two people from so dramatically different backgrounds tried to communicate with one another. Maybe his whole idea of bringing her out to the ranch, other than getting a chance to see how well she filled out a pair of jeans, had been a bad idea.
I wouldn’t mind spending a hell of a lot more time riding with her
.
You better head off thoughts like that, Buck.

Most of the conversation died out from that point on and a somewhat awkward silence lingered around the edges. Neither of them was sure if they were making the other one uncomfortable, or if they were just uncomfortable and projecting their own discomfort onto the other. The more they each tried to analyze it in their own minds; however, the harder it became to try to communicate in any form.

“I thoroughly enjoyed the ride,” Karissa beamed as Buck walked her to her Mercedes after their ride was over. “You certainly have something worth holding onto. I promise I’ll do everything in my power to help you do that.”

“I hope you do,” he replied. “Like I said, this is all I’ve got and means more to me than anything in the world.”

“We’ll meet next Tuesday at 9:00 a.m., then?” she confirmed.

“I’ll be there,” he said. As he was pushing the door of her car closed, he presented one more offer. “You’re welcome out here any time. You’re not bad company, even for a lawyer.”