She pulled down the loose neck of her nightgown. Diana saw the healing wound above her right breast. It had the look of days, maybe even weeks of healing.
The last time she’d woke up remarkably healed, she’d had the same foul taste in her mouth. Like—
No, she really didn’t want to make a simile. Anyone who’d bitten her tongue would know what the flavor was. The thought churned her stomach.
The clock said six fifty-eight and the little dot for pm was lit. Diana figured that the way things had been going lately, she should probably spring for one that displayed the date too, for the next time she passed out.
She tried to think of that fairy tale about the guy who slept for so long, maybe a hundred years, but kept mixing it up with Rumplestilskin and the princess who spun gold from hay. Jax, the gnome, would know for certain.
Maybe she would send him an email or something when all this was over.
Diana made a face. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She had enough problems with werewolves, pardon, wolven, and assorted fringe psychotics, ah, psychics. She didn’t need to drag the fairie realm into the mix, too.
Besides, the gnome expected certain strings if she asked for favors, even knowledge. Diana had reservations enough about dating a werewolf, er, wolven to think about gnomes. She pressed down a shudder. She wasn’t prejudiced. She happened to like her men a lot taller than gnome sized. Jax made a perfectly sized friend.
She gingerly moved to the side of the bed. Deep in her chest, a warning tickle made her pause so as not to trigger a coughing fit. That would hurt. A lot.
The room spun a little when she stood. She steadied herself on the bed and listened. Were her senses getting better?
Chase, the biker wolf guy, had said females didn’t contract lycanthropy because of PMS. Beneficial hormonal surges? Go figure.
She heard something and shuffled to the door to investigate. The hall was no biggie to navigate. Just hold onto the wall and do the geriatric slide to the stairs.
At the stairs, Diana looked down the long bumpy tunnel. It was going to be a bitch. She was already winded.
By holding her breath, she ascertained that people were indeed in the house.
Karen’s happy laugh floated up the stairwell, unclenching the painful knot around her heart. She should go down and see with her own eyes that her daughter had made it out all right.
All Diana had to do was make her way down the looong flight stairs and across eternity in the hall to the living room.
In the past few weeks Diana had been chased down by a pack of werecoyotes.
She knew that first incident for what it was. She’d been attacked by a gang of biker werewolves, and kidnapped and stabbed by a killer after the werewolves. In each instance one of the supernatural wolves had come to her rescue. And Karen’s.
Oh, yeah. And Matthew had taken up with his asshole father for college tuition.
But that was on a more personal, sucky, note. Diana decided to shuffle back to the bathroom instead, where she could wallow in private.
Tank materialized in front of her. She sucked in a sharp breath of surprise.
Her eyes watered, her chest itched deep inside. Diana held her breath, hoping not to embarrass herself by hacking up a lung. Finally, she gave in to the cough, grabbing a fistful of the shirt in front of her for support.
Afterward she realized what, who, she was hanging onto and couldn’t quite seem to let go.
The dark velvety swells and plains of Tank’s muscles were tense under her hands.
The glorious stretch of too small sweatpants announced his untapped potential as an underwear model. Billions of women everywhere were deprived of this sight. And thankfully so, she thought, with more than a little possessiveness on her part.
Diana wondered if she was becoming a slut. Psychic wolven groupie slut, that was her.
“What are you doing out of bed, little sister.”
“I’m not your little sister,” she grumbled and pushed away, her pride pricked.
“I’ve got to go to the bathroom. You scared me. Don’t swoop out like that.”
She glared up at him, feeling childish. Simply because he wasn’t interested didn’t give her cause to throw a guilt trip at him, but she didn’t feel like exercising any selfrestraint.
“I apologize for the fright.” He was so serious. A professor on steroids. Tank unclenched a fist and raised his hand to brush his knuckles down her cheek.
“And for the physical complications our blood donations, mine and Chase’s, have caused you. The addition of more supernatural blood will cause your hormone levels to shift while your body readjusts.”
Huh? The reason she was so worked up was because of all the wolven blood she’d ingested lately?
Tank ducked his head. The thin braids slid over his shoulders and swung free.
Unfortunately, whatever subtle cologne he wore made her feel even more childish. She opened the bathroom door and slammed it behind her.
Too bad he didn’t feel like apologizing for anything else. Like being a man and blaming her mood on hormones.
Diana sighed. God, she was being a bitch. She knew it and that made it worse.
She felt hypersensitive physically and emotionally. She wanted to cry and laugh at the same time at how absurd her life had become. Memories of the near rape by Dog blurred with the kidnapping.
Suddenly, she wanted to see that Karen was all right, not just feel the happy tug that was her daughter in the back of her head.
But first she needed to wash away the nightmares that danced behind her eyelids.
She turned the shower on. The need to scrub the nastiness away before she was too exhausted to crawl back to the bed was more imperative than drawing her next breath.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Diana!”
The thumping on the door made her drop the purple squishy scrubber. Diana clambered out of the tub in defense of the bathroom door. She snatched her towel from the rack and held it to her chest, letting it drape down to cover the important parts.
“Hold on. I’m coming.”
“Diana, open up or I’m going to break this door down!”
“Good God. Don’t get your tail in a twist.”
She jerked open the door. Adam stood in front of her, fist raised to pound her poor door in. A muscle ticked in his whiskered jaw. His facial hair was a couple of shades darker than the straggled mane on his head. The pale husky colored eyes were blood shot.
He looked exhausted and still ready to take on an invasion. Behind him more huge males ranged out. She heard the boys rather than saw them.
“What are you all? Thor and his pals from Valhalla?”
Someone behind the men sniggered. He stared. The men stared. Diana held her chin up, held tight to her towel, and stared right back.
Adam swept her up. She squealed and sucked in a breath. Her chest might be healing super fast but didn’t like being jarred.
Adam froze. He carefully finished scooping her up, one arm under her knees and cradled her close to his chest.
“Adam! Don’t!” She tried to readjust the towel and failed miserably. She knew she flashed everyone in visible range. Thank God the boys were behind the men.
“Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
The man looked and felt so worried she couldn’t help but grin.
“I’m fine. Can I please have some clothes?”
He nodded, shouldering past the crowd to her bedroom door.
“Everyone back downstairs. I’ll holler when you can come back up.”
“But, I want to see my mom.”
Karen’s voice was somewhere in the back with the boys.
“Is she okay? I want to see she’s okay.”
Their protests lightened some of the sadness in her heart. She felt … needed.
Adam set her on her bed like a fragile treasure and went back to shut the door.
Diana started to get off the bed. She really wanted her clothes. The towel clamped to h
er chest just wasn’t enough.
Adam waved her back down and went to her nightgown drawer. He pawed around before pulling out a long blue nightgown she’d treated herself to a few years ago at a pricey boutique in Tyler. It managed to be both conservative and sexy at the same time.
“Turn around.” Diana circled the air with one finger. “Look for the robe on the back of the closet door.” She told him while she slipped the gown on, and then stood for a moment to smooth the silky fabric down.
Turning back, his facial expression said how sorry he was that he’d missed the show. The robe had been buried behind several other, less appealing, robes of terrycloth, cotton, and flannel. Too bad.
She rubbed her nose. He smelled different, stronger, as if he’d been drenched in male pheromones. Like Tank had in the hall. Of course the hall had smelled like a testosterone factory.
“So. What’s up?” She asked, taking the robe and belting it around her waist. As if it was a normal day and he’d come by to pay a visit. Chit-chat.
Adam rounded the bed and pulled back the fresh sheets someone had changed in her brief absence. He picked her back up, tucking her under the covers.
“Hey! I’m not crippled.”
His face set in stone. Concrete male determination filled him.
Diana laid a hand over his. She wasn’t sure what emotions she was receiving from him and what were her own.
“You don’t have to do this. I’m fine.”
He cocked his head to one side and stared at her with the wolfy expression his permanently furry cousins in the wild reserved for scientists and the like.
“Of course I do.”
She gripped his hand on impulse, pulling him down to sit beside her.
“We need to talk. And shut up before you say something stupid, like I need to rest.”
She still didn’t know what had happened after she passed out. She felt her mouth opening, heard the words pouring out, and couldn’t stop them.
“What’s wrong? Is it about the werecoyotes? Did you find Brandon?”
Adam blinked at her like he’d been blindsided. His lips curved into a sensual grin.
“You’re not all soft and sweet, are you, Diana Ridley?”
She narrowed her eyes and gave his shoulder a smack.
“I’m not a dessert.”
He grinned. She smacked him again.
“Seriously.” She took a breath, and then grimaced as a cough took over. Adam dove for the tissue box and shoved a handful into her hands.
“Ummm. Look, I know you want me to be your girlfriend.”
“Mate.” The sound of his voice vibrated through her. “Wolven mate for life. I want you for my mate.”
“Like regular wolves.”
He made a sound that thrummed through his chest, lulling her.
Do not become derailed by the sexy guy proposing. Focus. Did she really want to go through the whole marriage thing again? Diana pushed away from the comforting circle of his arms.
“I’m just not ready for m … ma … commitment.” She was so pathetic she couldn’t even say the word. “I was burned so badly last time. I’m just not ready. Maybe never.”
Yeah. An excuse. At least Richard was good for something.
The intense stare never wavered, making her search for something else to say.
Excuses, excuses, excuses, her conscience taunted. Chicken.
“I mean, I only started dating again. And look how that turned out.”
“I told you ….” Adam was eerily patient. He reached to pull her into his embrace.
She stopped him, pushing against his chest. She couldn’t help but feel how nice it was under her hands.
Slut! Her conscience screamed. Every man in the house was not fair game.
Yes they are! Her hormones rallied.
“No. Keep your hands to yourself. You didn’t want me to date anyone.”
“No, not anyone. Just me.”
She huffed a breath and told her hormones to shut up. She’d been stabbed. She didn’t need to roll around on the mattress.
“You are so aggravating. Why me? I don’t want to be involved. Why not find a nice wolven girl to bother?”
Adam tried to process what Diana was saying. He wanted her trust so that she’d agree to do the mate’s bond. She probably wouldn’t appreciate him doing Richard Ridley bodily harm, or rapping some sense into that kid of hers either.
It was getting idiotic to claim that neither she nor Mack were pack. Or Karen. The boys worshipped the ground the Ridley females walked on. And whether she admitted it or not, Diana doted on the boys. She loved them. Adam saw and felt that plainly though the pack bond.
Adam rubbed at his breastbone with the heel of one hand. He sucked in a breath of the thinning air in the room.
Trust. It all came down to trust. There was so little in his pack, he was falling victim to the effects. He hardened his resolve. Adam J. Weis was no victim.
“Adam?” Diana’s soft question brought him back to the present.
Adam looked down and studied her pretty face for a moment. She had so much love to give. Selfish him, he wanted it all. He gave her a half smile before wiping his damp hands on his jeans.
“I haven’t given you a chance. I’ve bullied and pushed at you to get what I want. Just as you haven’t given me one.”
He waved at her to let him finish, his nervous steps taking him back and forth across the room. He was going out on a limb, like he’d never done before.
“Hear me out. All right?” He took a breath.
“I came here last year, looking for my fiancée, Amanda. Garrick and his pack killed her.” He held up a hand before she could interrupt. “Before you get upset, let me tell you that most wolven matings are arranged. It was all worked out long before Amanda and I met.”
He looked at her for reassurance that she hadn’t completely closed from him.
Diana nodded again.
“Anyway, Garrick was a sick bastard. He did … bad things to the pack, to the boys.”
“I know. Don’t explain, please.” Her voice held a combination of anger and sorrow.
“Someone here tipped off my pack in Tarrant. So I came to find her.”
He stopped to look out the window, hands shoved in his back pockets.
“I did, eventually. Her skin was nailed to a wall, in his basement, the scent of violence and sex still on her fur.”
Diana shuddered. So much of their short relationship involved violence.
There was a mix of anger, grief, and guilt that churned in him.
“They raped and killed your fiancée. What did you do?”
“I didn’t love her. It was all arranged.” He recovered old ground. Guilt swamped him, then anger. “I killed them. I was supposed to report back. But I killed them because they touched what was mine. And because I found out what was happening to the boys.”
To Brandon, but he didn’t want to go into that story. He’d pretended to be a stray so that Garrick would allow him close enough to snoop. He’d snooped all right and found both Amanda’s pelt and the violated child in the same basement.
After that Garrick and the pack wardens were as good as dead. They just didn’t know it. The sick bastards were supposed to be protecting the pack from harm, not causing it.
“Reporting back to Paul, my Pater Canis, was a technicality. I knew Paul would give the okay to clear them out. “
He looked back at the bed to gauge her reaction.
“Only he didn’t. He called it a duel for ascendancy and wouldn’t let me come back. Someone else was moved to the beta spot.”
His half-brother Dom, the lawyer, got the beta spot. Adam’s laugh was dry, humorless. Dom, who Adam had challenged and beat for the position, was back at Paul’s side.
“A moving truck arrived a week later with my stuff.”
“I knew from the first that you were an alpha.”
“No.” Adam shook his head. “I was Paul’s beta warden. I protected the pack.�
��
Diana smiled at the lost tone. He didn’t realize how hurt he was that his old pack leader wouldn’t let him go home.
“I think you are confusing rank with personal power. I’d bet that you were already an alpha at heart when you showed up here. You were more than ready to be on your own and your old leader knew it.”
Adam considered her insight. A heaviness in his chest lightened. Maybe Paul had tossed him from the nest, so to speak, in the only way he knew how. Paul Sheppard was a sink or swim kind of guy.
“I thought that after I cleared out Garrick and his ilk, I’d take the boys back with me.”
“Instead, he worked out a way so that you were obligated to stay here. I think your title fits you, Father Wolf. I’d bet he thought so, too.”
“He’s my father.”
Her surprise prompted him to explain.
“He didn’t raise me. My mother married a man, a psychic, named William Weis. Will’s my dad. Paul Sheppard is …” Adam made a loopy gesture with one hand.
He crossed back to the bed and sat on the edge. If he didn’t finish this he’d go insane.
“As proposals go, I’m sure this one sucks.” He took her hand.
“Listen before you say no again. You give us something that is missing. Hope, I think. The boys need someone who cares enough to make birthday cakes and cookies. To fuss at them when their clothes are wrinkled.”
He was right, the proposal sucked.
“You want me to be den mother to your pack? To ride herd on a bunch of teenage werewolves? That’s why you’re proposing?”
She pulled her hand free. Not that she’d have said yes anyway. But, well…it sucked big time. A girl wanted to know that her man wanted, needed her for himself.
“Hello? I don’t get furry. And I’m not likely to either any time soon. You might try negotiating for another of your kind.”
“You’re angry,” he said.
Damn skippy she was angry. Diana narrowed her eyes. She kept her jaw locked before she told him what to do with his proposal. She did not want to marry him. Den mother indeed.
Adam sighed. He gave up trying to retake her hand and straddled her lap, one arm on each side of her legs, to capture her gaze.
“What you don’t understand is that you are a part of the pack, Diana. You, and Karen, and Mack. Close your eyes.”
Weremones Page 24