by Tamara Hogan
She was so confused.
“Speaking of phones…” Lukas levered himself off the wall, reached into the black leather bag he’d dropped next to the door when he arrived, and extracted a Bat Phone. Walking to the love seat, he bypassed Gabe and handed it to her instead. “Sorry, Gabe, your replacement isn’t quite ready yet. Bailey’s still retrieving your email and contact lists.”
Gabe nodded.
Lorin sighed in relief. Lukas wouldn’t be giving Gabe another prototype if he seriously suspected him of a security breach. When Lukas handed her the phone, she pointedly reached for it with her left hand, leaving her right clasped in Gabe’s. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” As he walked around the back of the couch, he scrubbed his big knuckles against the top of her head.
“Stop it,” she muttered, batting his hand away.
“Children.” Elliott yanked off the black elastic band holding back his hair. “Can we get back to the business at hand?”
“Sorry.” She studied the freeze-framed playback, which showed Gabe staring down in awe at the open capsule glinting under the hood. Noting the timestamp in the corner, she raised a brow. “Look at the time Krispin sent the email.”
Lukas nodded grimly. “He’s got to have a real-time feed.”
“Gabe.” Her mother spoke from the conference table. “Have you spoken to Krispin about this project in any way? Even—”
“Not one word, Alka,” Gabe broke in. “I never talk with the alpha about my work. He has only the vaguest idea of what I do here.”
“He knows more now.” Lukas picked up his chirping mini. “Jack.” The longer he listened, the more his expression darkened. “Hang on a sec.” He pointed to the monitor, still displaying Gabe’s freeze-framed face. “Can you get me a live feed?”
Elliott re-retrieved the nine-camera view. Click, click. Each box now displayed Lukas’s security team, probing, scanning, and examining the floors, walls, and work surfaces with equipment Lorin wasn’t familiar with. Ceiling panels rested against the walls, and any equipment that had previously been attached to the walls now lay on the floor. Jack stood next to the phone Anna Mae had used to call Elliott, a stoic expression on his face. The reason for his expression stood on the other side of the closed door. Supervising from the changing room, Anna Mae Whitman banged on the window with her fist, ripping Jack a new one via intercom.
“Camera Two?” Lukas asked. Elliott maximized the view Lukas had requested—just in time to see heavy boots and jean-clad legs emerge from a hole in the ceiling, right over the biohood.
No wonder Anna Mae was swearing so much.
Chico dropped onto the table with a thunk, straddling the biohood like it was a bull he was about to take for an eight-second ride. “Parallel feed, manually patched into the main,” he reported to Jack.
Overhearing, Lukas’s big fist clenched.
“Very low tech,” Chico continued. “Sweeps wouldn’t have caught it.”
“Rip it out,” Lukas said to Jack. “The whole thing, his and ours. Now.”
Jack relayed the message to Chico. Reaching up with both hands, Chico levered himself back up into the hole over the biohood. The tip of his steel-toed boot brushed against the housing of the hood’s ventilation system.
“Be careful!” Anna Mae squawked over the intercom. “Do you have any idea how expensive—”
The feed went to static.
Gabe sat still and tense at her side as Lukas asked Jack to haul the recording equipment back to Sebastiani Security. Her mother, sitting closest to the hissing monitor, snapped, “Can you turn that off? Please.”
Elliott complied, redisplaying Krispin’s email.
Lukas hung up, looking at his father with disbelief. “Dad, why the hell do you let Woolf on the property, much less give him lab space?”
Elliott eyed Lukas. “You’ve heard the saying, ‘Keep your friends close and your enemies closer’? If he’s working here, I know what he’s doing.”
“And now he knows what we’re doing.”
“Yes,” Elliott acknowledged, leaning back in his office chair, steepling his fingers. “He likely installed the equipment to monitor his own people while they worked—”
“Dad—”
“But he left the equipment installed after they vacated, and that I can’t abide.”
The tension in the room rose, a river about to overflow its banks.
Her mother finally asked the billion-dollar question. “Elliott, what was Krispin doing down there that was worth taking such a risk?”
“Genetic research,” Elliott responded. “He’s trying to get some insight into his wolves’ deteriorating health.”
Gabe flinched again, the action rippling into her body where their thighs and shoulders touched.
“Damn it, Dad, why didn’t you tell me?” Lukas paced at the back of the room. “I can’t do jack shit without complete information.”
“Elliott, why doesn’t the Council know about this project?” Alka asked.
Elliott stared at Krispin’s silent email message with a gaze as sharp as honed steel. “He’s sequencing his own DNA, and funding the work himself. He asked for my discretion. But he’s abused my trust for the last time.”
Lorin’s eyes widened at his tone.
“Change of plans for tomorrow’s Council meeting.” Elliott studied Gabe, then said, “Gabe, I’m sorry for putting you in such an untenable position with your alpha. Please accept my thanks—”
“No,” Gabe blurted. “The work’s not done yet. I want to stay with this.”
“Gabe,” Lorin said softly. “Krispin’s going to be pissed enough that you didn’t tell him what you were working on.”
Gabe’s laugh was humorless, ragged around the edges. “Let’s get real. My family has no political standing to consider or preserve. I’d like to stay on.”
Elliott considered Gabe, then looked at their still-twined fingers. Finally he nodded.
Lorin squeezed Gabe’s hand. She’d taken on Krispin Woolf before—and she’d do it again if it meant protecting Gabe from his alpha—but Elliott’s support was no small matter.
Elliott clicked on the “Reply All” button to respond to Krispin’s request. The only sound in the office was the soft tap of fingers against keys as he typed a short, succinct message, and hit “Send.”
“Ah, crap,” she breathed. Elliott had requested an agenda addition of his own—a status update on Krispin’s genetic research project—copying everyone on the Council.
This was going to get ugly.
***
When Gabe told Elliott that he wanted to stay on, he hadn’t anticipated being pulled into an all-nighter with most of the members of the Underworld Council—nor had he expected to wake up the following morning on his office couch, the sun shining through his window, holding Lorin Schlessinger in his arms again.
Some things were worth incurring his alpha’s wrath.
Still asleep, she tried to shift her weight, tugging on the corner of the blanket he’d hastily pulled over them after they’d stumbled, wordless, to his office after finishing long hours of work. The couch he’d spent many a night upon by himself was a very tight squeeze for two, so all she accomplished with her movements was to snuggle her ass more closely against his groin—which shouted that it was wide awake and ready for action.
Closing his eyes again, he tightened his arm around her torso, tugging her long frame away from the edge and back against his own body, savoring the sensation of simply holding her again. Her surfer-girl hair was loose, sprawled over most of their shared pillow, exposing the nape of her neck.
Gabe bent his head and wallowed in her scent, a combination of rosemary-mint shampoo, sea salt body scrub, and warm skin. Even though they’d been away from Isabella for days, he still smelled the mildest hint of pine.
He stilled when she shifted her head on the pillow. Gulped when she clasped his hand with an inarticulate murmur, tugging it up so it rested between her breasts.<
br />
And then she settled back to sleep again.
She was exhausted and needed to sleep. He should be sleeping too. The day to come would be challenging, to say the least.
Should I call Mom and Dad? Gideon? At least give them a heads up? He sighed as he imagined the conversation: “Mom, Dad… there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that I’m making my first presentation before the Underworld Council. The bad news? As soon as it’s over the alpha will likely boot me from the pack.”
There was sure to be some blowback from what he was going to do later today, but he’d protect his family to the best of his ability. And after last night, he knew he’d have all the help he could get.
How had he acquired such high-powered allies? He could call Elliott on the phone, call him by his first name. Alka, the Valkyrie First, called him “dear.” And Lorin, the Valkyrie Second? He looked down at the sleeping bundle, blinking against the milky haze that never quite cleared. In some ways, he knew her intimately, but in so many others, she was a complete enigma. One thing he was sure of? Lorin had his back.
When the hell had that happened?
Last night, long into the night, he’d worked alongside some other members of the Underworld Council he didn’t know as well. Barely an hour after they’d watched Elliott send his succinct reply to Krispin, the CEO’s office looked and sounded more like a cocktail party in full swing than a meeting location. Elliott’s bondmate, Siren First Claudette Fontaine, had been the first to arrive, with Elliott’s daughter, Incubus Second Antonia Sebastiani, in tow. Lukas’s bondmate, Scarlett Fontaine, pulled in a few minutes later—and yeah, he’d covertly stared at the famous singer whose public profile had dropped to near-zero since she’d become the Siren Second. Thanks to Alka, he’d been fortunate enough to attend Scarlett’s last public performance at Underbelly last fall, the night her sister Annika had been killed.
The night he’d ended his relationship with Kayla.
After kissing Lukas hello—a greeting so lengthy and enthusiastic that they really should have taken it somewhere else—Scarlett had picked up Elliott’s desk phone and placed a monstrous order for Vietnamese food. Jack Kirkland came upstairs from the lab. Elliott’s assistant, Willem Lund, had magically produced a huge urn of coffee, and then conferenced in Valerian and Wyland from Valerian’s place near the Wisconsin border, their faces peering into the room from the monitor hanging on the wall. Lorin finally reappeared, carrying her messenger bag and the memory stick she’d gone to her office to retrieve.
Elliott, Claudette, and Antonia. Alka and Lorin. Lukas and Scarlett. Jack and Willem. So many Council members crowded into Elliott’s office that they didn’t have room for everyone to sit, but that didn’t seem to matter. Lukas tugged Scarlett onto his lap, and Antonia perched, cross-legged, on the corner of her father’s desk. Jack leaned against the same wall Lukas had earlier, in a position so similar it was uncanny.
Krispin had sent a warning shot over the bow with his initial email, and Elliott had returned fire—but the bare-knuckled tactical and strategic firepower on display during the session that followed quite frankly exhausted him. He and Lorin had huddled side by side behind Elliott’s desk, muttering and murmuring, incorporating the long hours of strategy into Lorin’s presentation—now their presentation—as it was displayed on the large screen for everyone to see as they typed. Sequences of events were brainstormed, analyzed, their risks assessed, and argued out to their logical, sometimes brutal, conclusions. Lukas scribbled flowcharts on Elliott’s huge e-board, with Antonia often challenging her father’s or brother’s analysis, displaying intelligence beyond her years and a stunningly Machiavellian mind-set. By the end of the meeting, the possible outcomes listed in the boxes crawling along the bottom of the e-board ranged from “Defer topic to next meeting” to “Imprison WerePack Alpha.” And he’d overheard so many details about the Council’s other activities during breaks and casual side-conversations that he yearned for some brain bleach. No wonder Lorin needed so much downtime. He would, too, if he had to deal with the same nasty crap that apparently greeted her every time she logged on to Council_Net.
Finally, after much stretching and yawning, the presentation was complete and the strategy set—and without discussing it, he and Lorin had stumbled to his office together, collapsed on the couch, and fallen asleep.
And now it was morning, the sun was shining, and Lorin was shifting, turning in his arms so she faced him. Settling again. He lifted his arm momentarily, bringing his watch close enough to his face so he could read the large digital display: 7:10 a.m. The Council meeting started in three hours.
Nerves eddied in his stomach. Shit, he was making a presentation before the Underworld Council. And despite a couple of stolen moments in the lab—despite her presence on this couch—he and Lorin hadn’t settled a damn thing between them yet. He hadn’t told her that he’d made a mistake, yearned to share her bed again, on whatever terms she wanted. And if he wanted more than sex? If his emotions had gotten a little more snarled up in the situation than hers had? He’d keep it to himself.
“Gabe.” With a soft, sleepy sigh, she cuddled closer, bringing her breasts flush against his chest.
He stilled, breath snagging in his throat. Was she still asleep? Did she know what she was doing? The sun slanted into the open window, spilling bright, unforgiving light over her hair and face. Her thickly lashed eyes were still closed. The tensions of the day hadn’t caught up with her yet, so the twin grooves that sometimes appeared between her slashing eyebrows were nowhere to be seen. The corners of her bare lips were tipped up in a sleepy, satisfied smile.
Had he ever seen her wear a lick of makeup? He didn’t think so.
Lorin’s hand emerged from under the blanket, stroking up his cheekbone and sliding into his hair. “You’re not wearing your glasses,” she murmured against his jaw.
“I usually don’t when I’m sleeping.”
She stroked his temple, where the bow usually rode. “But you usually do when we make love.”
Something in Gabe’s chest leaped at her words. “I can’t see very well without them,” he finally said in the understatement of the decade, trailing his fingertip over her eyebrow. “And when we make love”—he repeated her words gingerly, experimentally—“I want to see every inch of you.”
There was no panicked expression, no rush to correct him. Instead, she brought their heads together, nuzzled his lips with hers, and looked at him with mossy green eyes filled with sleepy desire. “Where are they?”
“Never mind,” he whispered. “I’m pretty good working by touch.” There wasn’t an inch of her body that wasn’t burned into his memory, and he wanted to revisit every one.
A tiny sound came from her throat, a release of breath escaping. “Yes, you are.” She licked the corner of his lip with her agile pink tongue. She suckled at it, then started unfastening the pearl snaps of her denim work shirt, working her way down, exposing her bright purple bra. The shirt finally unbuttoned, and Lorin wrestled out of it, her writhing and shifting bringing their bodies into electrifying contact at the groin.
She was destroying him, one molecule at a time.
Leaving her to fight with the cuffs, he cupped her satin and lace-covered breasts, closing his eyes as the tender weight filled his hand. Lorin might live in denim shirts, fleece, cargo pants, and work boots, but his kick-ass Valkyrie Princess wore silk and satin against her skin. He never knew what kind of girly confection he’d find under her utilitarian clothes.
Her shirt now gone, Lorin climbed atop him and made quick work of his. His oxford shoved aside, she jerked his snowy white T-shirt out from his waistband, shoved it up under his arms, and threaded her fingers through the hair on his pecs, tugging so deliciously that he moaned. Her mouth replaced her hands, nibbling and suckling, stroking the sensitive skin under his arms before continuing oh-so-lightly down his sides.
He shivered at the sensation, clenched his teeth. Who knew his sides were erogeno
us zones? The things this woman taught him. His cock punched against the layers of fabric separating their bodies, and he grabbed her hips to tug them more tightly together. She leaned down, and suddenly his nipple was in her mouth. “Jesus.” His fingers clutched her head convulsively. His hips churned, seeking a firmer touch. He shuddered as her lips curved against his hypersensitive skin, shivered when her long, streaky hair dragged over his chest and abs as she transferred her attention to his other nipple.
With a twist of his hand, her bra was unfastened, sagging off her shoulders. Lorin lifted her torso, sending the silky garment sliding down her arms to drape over his rib cage. As she wrenched at the fastening of his pants, he blindly reached for hers. Not being able to see what he was doing heightened his sense of touch. He felt the hard disk of the brass button, could practically read the raised words ridging its rim. Smaller brass buttons marched down the fly under a placket of fabric.
He knew these pants, soft and pliable from countless washings. All he had to do was tug. When he did, the buttons slipped open easily, exposing more purple fabric.
Matching panties. Gabe closed his eyes, rested his palm against the silky fabric. Above him, Lorin gasped, stilled momentarily, then finally located the tab of his zipper, drawing it down with a soft gnash of metal teeth. Gabe sighed in relief as the fabric loosened, gaped.
Her downward progress was impeded by her own body position. Suddenly, Gabe wished—violently—that he had his glasses on so he could better see her hand, poised next to his at the V of her legs. Rising up on her knees, she shifted down his body a couple of crucial inches, the movement causing her pants to sag at the back.
I’m a dead man. But what a way to go, because she was finally touching him, cupping him, measuring every inch of his rampant need with her clever, clever hands. When she leaned down, her hot breath caressed him. His abs clenched. Clenched again as she edged her rough fingers under the elastic waistband of his boxer-briefs.