Wolf at Law by Heather Long (11 page)

Lashes sweeping downward, she hid her eyes from his and then she looked up at him. “I want to be ready.”

That was enough. He could accept the pledge. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, then to her nose and finally taking her mouth again, he sought entry with his tongue. She wrapped her arms around him. Her nails bit into his back, and the only scent he tasted on her was need and desire twining together.

No fear.

No anxiety.

She arched her back and her hips rolled forward. The stroke along his cock scalded him. Breaking the kiss was the hardest thing he’d ever done. Her ragged breathing warned him she was as affected as him.

“When you’re ready,” he promised her. “Not before.”

Curving around him, she tucked her face against his shoulder. Her breath fanned against his neck, a vulnerable place for any wolf to allow another. The realization she could rip out his heart and he’d lie there and let her struck him. “I wish I’d met you first,” she whispered.

Unable to not respond to her anguish, he said. “I would wish the same thing, except for one small matter.”  

She continued to pet him—was she even aware of it? Her thumbs stroked his shoulders, the artless grace in the touch settling his wild need. They had time. The rest of their lives, in fact. “What’s that?”

“You are who you are because you survived, because you’ve had to struggle. I hate that you’ve had to go through any of it, and I will never allow anyone to harm you that way again. But, had you met me first, you would not have Alexis.” The truth was, she would be a wolf. He would have turned her, and they could have their own children. Yet the thought of that beautiful, spunky little girl not existing? It hurt his heart.

Tiffany sniffled. “I love her so much.”

“I know,” he told her. “I love her as my own. Thank you for surviving. Thank you for bringing her into the world, so she could be a part of us too.”

Because she was. Tiffany was his other half and her daughter was his. He’d lay down his life for both of them. They sat together in silence for another long stretch, then a voice echoed from around the house. “Mommy!”

“Speak of the little devil.” Tiffany laughed when she leaned away from him. The tears in her eyes continued to sparkle, but the smile on her face lifted his heart. “You should get dressed.”

“If I have to,” he teased. Then stroked a hand over her belly up to her breast and cupping it through her shirt. “Next time, I’d like to see you.”

With a slow nod, Tiffany extricated herself from his lap, but not before he felt the tension peak her nipple through the shirt. “I want that, too, but I’m still married.”

He was aware. Not quite trusting himself to respond yet, he helped her to her feet as he stood. Then he reached for his clothes. “Not for long,” he said, and that was a promise. “Then I want you to marry me.” He wanted a lot more than marriage, but they’d start there. One step a time, he reminded his wolf.

Not making any pretense of looking away as he dragged on his clothes, Tiffany clasped her hands together. “Is that a proposal?”

“No,” he said, then realized he meant it. “When I propose, you will know. For now, consider it a promise.”

“You always keep your promises, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he said, and after buttoning his shirt, he reached out a hand to her. “Do you trust me?”

“As crazy as it sounds?” Tiffany said. “Yes, I do trust you. Ryan?”

He drew her into his arms, holding her against him. “Yes?”

“Promise me you’re for real? All of you? The wolf parts and the unbelievably kind, good man parts?”

“I promise,” he told her, then added, “I’ve made some choices over the years that I haven’t always been proud of, but I will be true to you. I promise.”

“Okay,” she said slowly. “I guess we have a lot to learn about each other.”

He grinned. “Yes.”

“Mommy!” Alexis’ imperious voice called again.

“I’ll be there in a minute,” Tiffany replied, then glanced up at him. “You do realize that she’s going to think it’s all about her.”

“Of course she is,” Ryan matched her grin. “Just as she should.”

His mate accepted him. He could take any other challenge coming their way, especially a pint-sized dynamo.

The next week passed with almost a dreamlike quality. True to his word, Ryan didn’t press her for sex or try to take advantage when she crawled him like a pole. Kissing him let her forget…almost everything, including the fact that she wasn’t going to sleep with him until after her divorce was final. The judge, as it turned out, not only granted the restraining order she’d requested, but also expedited the filing of her divorce and child custody papers.

Sooner or later, she’d have to walk into a courtroom and face Giles, but locked away in the secret house by the lake seemed like a million miles away from the dark life she’d been living. Leaning back on her knees, she surveyed the section of garden she’d taken over since arriving. The weeds were choking out some of the flowers and, though it had been tended, no one had really loved on it. A half-dozen yards away, Alexis let out a squeal of laughter and tackled Collin.

Her four year old was hardly the fierce little fighter she played at being, but the older man let her take him to the ground, then he lurched upward and staggered around comically overburdened by the laughing girl clinging to him.

Comically because, like Ryan, he was also a wolf. She’d been learning a lot about wolves. They were stronger, had a powerful sense of smell and could even discern truth from a lie in how it changed a person’s scent. Not that there was anything weird about that.

She snorted and went back to pulling weeds. No, all of that could be reconciled. Of course, the fact that every other person knew the moment she was turned on by Ryan disconcerted the hell out of her. They’d all been enjoying a lovely dinner on their second day at the house when Ryan had reached for her hand and kissed her fingers. She’d felt the caress zing through her system.

The man could melt her with a look, to hell with touching her. The next thing she knew, the others excused themselves and swept Alexis away with them in their rush to leave the table. When Ryan explained, Tiffany had honestly thought she would die.

Five days later, the memory still humiliated her some. He could only chuckle and tell her nothing was wrong with it. In fact, he loved that he affected her so much. He claimed if she had his sense of smell, she’d know she did the same for him.

So much wolf stuff she had to learn. They had rules, a lot of them, and most weren’t easily discernible. Dominance played a part and Ryan held dominance over the other three wolves in the house. After him was Zane, then Collin and Rory—though she couldn’t tell where they fell in relation to each other. Zane was some kind of soldier, or maybe a cop.

A wolf cop.
 

Tiffany laughed. Did the wolves have cops? Ryan was an attorney, so maybe they did. Who knew? They could have whole conversations with a look, and the landscape of a room changed the moment a new wolf entered. Alexis, thankfully, seemed utterly oblivious to the shifting tides and the others deferred to her because she was with Ryan.

Apparently she was more dominant than Rory, whatever the hell that meant. Another burst of laughter from the trees pulled her from her thoughts. Alexis was so happy here. She’d already asked about decorating her room. Where Tiffany hadn’t been sure of an answer, Ryan promised her a room of her own to do whatever she wanted with when they moved to their final home.

Willow Bend, a town full of wolves.
I wonder if they have their own homeowner’s association there? Maybe the school is like Wolf 90210.
The absurdity of the whole idea burst through her, and she laughed. She was still snickering when Ryan appeared. Everything in her warmed at the sight of him. She loved him. The thought struck her out of nowhere, but she didn’t discount the force of it. She’d fallen in love with his kind heart, gentle spirit and fierce devotion. That he turned into a wolf—well, that was weird, but she was adapting, too. The others hadn’t shown her their wolves. The one time she’d asked about it, Ryan had growled.

Actually growled.

It was the sexiest damn thing she’d ever heard.

“Hey,” she said, still grinning. “You’re early.” He’d left first thing that morning to take care of some business deal for the pack.
Pack, not gang
. Hell, she was getting the lingo down.

“Tiffany.” The utter seriousness in his tone sobered her.

“What’s wrong?”

He glanced over at Alexis, then at Collin. She understood the faint jerk of his head and so had Collin, because the man scooped Alexis up and lured her back to the house with the promise of brownies.

Setting aside her tools, Tiffany rose and dusted her hands. “What’s wrong?” That she had to repeat the question worried her more than having asked it in the first place. Ignoring the dirt, he caught her hands and pulled her to him.

“Your mother’s in the hospital. My office was notified as the filing attorney because they couldn’t locate you.”

Fear pummeled her. “What happened? Did she fall off her stool?” The question came out harsher than she meant it. She loved her mother, but the woman… No matter how hard Tiffany tried to get her sober, her mother seemed intent on crawling back into the bottle.

“No.” His grave tone punched through her fear. “Tiffany, she was mugged. Attacked on her way to her apartment. She might have been passed out, but…”

Legs going weak, she would have fallen if he hadn’t been holding her. “Mugged? Is she all right? Will she be all right?”

“The hospital wouldn’t tell me much.” Ryan’s jaw flexed. “So I went. She’s in bad shape…”

“She’s always in bad shape,” Tiffany said, suddenly not wanting to hear the rest of it. “She’ll get better and then find a bottle again.”

“Tiff. Sweetheart, this wasn’t a normal mugging. Someone beat her pretty severely.”

Oh, please don’t say it.

“I’m telling you because you need to know. The injuries that I read on her chart are consistent with what happened to you…”

No.
She squeezed her eyes shut.

“…you’re going to want to see her. I’ll make it safe for you, but I’m pretty sure it was Giles.”

“No. No. No.” Tiffany shook her head. “He had nothing to do with my mother. He hated her, used to say the crudest things about the trash…” The worst things in the world. Particularly about Tiffany crawling out of the gutter, too bad her mother couldn’t be bothered. “Ryan, please say he did not beat my mother because I left him.”

“I won’t say that.” Steady. God, he was so steady. “I would never say that. He beat your mother or had her beaten because he’s a bastard who needs to be put down.”

The level of controlled violence in that statement should have scared the hell out of her. Pulling her hands from Ryan’s, she paced away and stared at the garden, at the quiet oasis where she’d managed to forget the hell of her life. In the short time she’d known him, her world had been transformed.

But that didn’t change where she came from.

“I have to go.” Her mother had a disease. Maybe she never wanted to get better, and maybe Tiffany could do nothing for her.

“I know.” The hell of it was, he did know. She could hear it in his voice. His arms slid around her, and he tugged her to rest against his chest. “You would never forgive yourself if you didn’t because you are a strong, loyal, and fierce woman.”

“He’ll be there,” she said. Why else would Giles have done it? He couldn’t find her. Couldn’t find Alexis.

“So will I.” Ryan growled and the vibration of it chased away the chill in her soul.

“You can’t fight this battle for me.”

“Watch me.” He gave her a light squeeze. “You won’t go anywhere near that man without me.”

“Ryan, he’s dangerous…”

“…so am I…”

“…and if he finds out about any of you…”

“He won’t.”

“…but if he does.”

“He won’t.” Ryan repeated, then nuzzled the shell of her ear. So much strength wrapped up in a package of utter gentleness.

“I’m scared,” she admitted.

“You have nothing to be afraid of. We can have her moved to a private hospital, and you can visit her there. I will be with you every step of the way, and Zane will take point.” When he said it, she believed him.

“Ryan, I’d never forgive myself if I was the reason something happened to any of you.”

“Keep insulting my ability to protect you.” He softened the words with a tease, then nipped her ear. “I’m looking forward to the challenge you keep throwing down.”

Exasperated, she twisted and caught his face in her hands. “Let’s get one thing straight. You protecting me is beautiful, but that means I get to protect you, too. Giles can hold a grudge like no other. If he knows what you are to me, it will just piss him off.”

“Good.” Ryan smiled and nothing friendly existed in the smile. “Let him see exactly who he will be dealing with. Now, do you want to go see your mother?”

The safest option would be to let the medical professionals deal with it, but her mother had no other family. No one else to help her and, despite their differences and her mothers many epic failures over the years, “She’s my mom.”

“I know, sweetheart.” He pressed a kiss to her lips. “Go get changed. Zane is informing Collin and Rory. Then we will go.”

“You already made all the arrangements, didn’t you?” Why did she even ask the question?

“Yes,” he said.

Shaking her head, Tiffany stepped around him and headed for the house. She did need to clean up, then change and tell Alexis she was going out. If she didn’t lay some rules down the others would let her run wild. They thought she was hilarious, but children needed structure.

Why would Ryan make plans without telling her first? The thought chased in her into the house with Ryan in quiet pursuit. Awareness of him shivered over her skin. She paused at the entryway to the kitchen. Alexis sat on the counter mixing a ginormous bowl of chocolate while Rory and Collin argued over the recipe.

“It’s supposed to be 300 then 250.”