“I have a contractor and an architect on call to meet with this week, and you’ll have to make selections on appliances. Make sure the walk-in has a properly working latch. You’ve got a lot of work to do before it’ll be ready for a grand opening, but it’s all yours.”
“How did you know I’d—I mean, what made you—Alec how’d you know?”
I swallowed. “I was just hoping.”
She caught my face in her hands and smiled up at me. “Just this morning, I thought you were never coming back. A week and a half ago, I didn’t even know you existed. This is all so fast.”
“I get it. We can take our time.”
She shook her head. “It’s fast, but when you know, you know? No?”
I grabbed her and spun her around, feeling pure joy surge through me. “Yes!”
She let her head fall back and when she looked up at me, there was something in her eyes that pierced me like an arrow. Love? She was right there with me.
I cleared my throat to get rid of the emotion threatening to thicken my voice. “Let’s look around.”
I’d taken most of the time away trying to finalize the sale of the storefront space, and figure out how exactly a bakery was supposed be outfitted. The owner had smelled a desperate man and tried to play hardball with me. He’d had no idea who he was dealing with.
We toured the store, Carter excitedly pointing out all the changes that would need to be made to outfit it as a bakery. I just watched her excited expression, mesmerized. I’d finally done something right.
“I love this space! Alec, it will be perfect.” Her face fell. “But, there’s one important thing we need to do. Come on.”
I caught a hint of her arousal as she passed me, headed towards the kitchen. She looked back at me over her shoulder with a seductive, come-hither smile. “We have to christen the place.”
She giggled as I chased after her, eager to get my hands on her. Her billowing laughter urged me on and I grabbed her as soon as we reached the back room. Wrapping my arms around her waist and pulling her back against my chest, I rocked my hips against her ass and ran my tongue up the side of her neck. “I missed you.”
I spun her around, picked her up by the waist, and slid her on the counter. I devoured her mouth fiercely, showing her how much I’d missed her. I tasted her, running my hands over her body as I did. I shoved my hands down the back of her jeans and roughly tugged them down her hips as she wiggled to free them. “I missed you, too. More than you know.”
She worked at my belt and growled when she couldn’t get it. “Stop wearing these!”
I yanked the belt off and grabbed the hem of her shirt up and over her head. I couldn’t get her bra off fast enough. I was starving to taste her breasts.
Carter unbuttoned my pants and made enough room to slip her hand inside. She grasped my cock and squeezed. “More.”
I dipped my head and captured her nipple in my mouth, moving from one to the other. Licking and sucking, I teased her into a ball of needy demands. As her hand pumped me, I groaned and then pulled back completely.
“Stand still.”
Carter shivered and watched me with heavily lidded eyes.
I knelt in front of her and helped her out of her underwear. I stared up at her, lifted one knee over my shoulder, and leaned into her. When my mouth was just inches away from her core, I breathed lightly and watched as she shivered before I closed the gap and tasted her.
Carter moaned my name and locked her fingers in my hair. I swiped my tongue up her slit and then delved inside. I took my time, slowly driving her crazy, as I fucked her with my mouth. I found her clit and sucked it gently, flicking my tongue over it faster and faster until she was screaming above me, so close that I knew one more flick of my tongue would send her over the edge.
Being the bastard that I was, I stepped back and ignored her desperate cries as I pulled her off the counter and stood with her positioned just over my cock, her legs wrapped around me. I wanted to watch her face as I slid into her, as she came apart around me.
She didn’t disappoint. When I slid into her tight body, she convulsed around me and dug her nails into my forearm as her neck pulled tight and her face burned red. She came on me like a freight train and didn’t stop as I pulled out and then slid back in.
Carter rocked her hips into my thrusts and I watched as she tossed her head from side to side, her body still pulsing around me. I leaned down and kissed her, hungrily tasting her and letting her see what she did to me.
She locked her legs around me and dragged her nails down my back until she was grabbing my ass, urging me into her faster and harder. “Yes, Alec!”
I held her ass and used it to pump her body up and down my shaft. I was close, but when she shifted her head and bared her neck to me, I lost all semblance of control.
Pounding into her body, I leaned forward and sank my teeth into her neck, marking her as my own and forging a bond between us that could never be broken. Seconds later, I felt her teeth sink into my neck and I came undone.
Spilling my seed into her body as she came harder than before, I found nirvana. It was too great to be anything else. Holding her in my arms, I relished the start of our new life together. “Mate.”
Carter looked at me with glassy eyes, “Mate.”
26
Carter
Progress was coming along on the bakery. There was a painter scheduled within the week to stencil the name on the front: Carter’s Cupcakes. I assured Muddy that I would still make sure her B&B was stocked with baked goods delivered for her guests every morning.
I looked out of the kitchen window and watched my tiny bear cub running at top speed chasing after a large, older, graying wolf who slowed his pace to let the cub almost catch him. Almost. I laughed when the wolf turned and started chasing the cub. Their growls and chuffs of laughter could be heard clear into the kitchen, where I was pulling out a pan of perfectly baked birthday cupcakes for Alec.
We were having a party for him that night. All our friends were coming to wish Alec a happy birthday. I’d heard through the grapevine that a lot of older women in town were coming to check out Duncan.
I turned the cupcakes out on a cooling rack and put the finishing touches on the potato salad before turning back to the window. Jellybean was still playing in the yard with Duncan and she’d been joined by the massive furry bodies of Cannon and Matt. The men in the family all got along quite well.
I didn’t see Alec anywhere, although I knew he’d been out there a few minutes prior. The panic I would have felt in the beginning was gone, though. The claiming marks we’d given one another hadn’t just brought the hottest orgasms of my life, they’d also brought a new level of bonding between us. One that allowed me to rest easy. Alec was mine.
Speaking of the man in question, a large body curved around mine against the sink only a split second after I’d scented him. My mouth watered and I turned to face him. He was naked as the day he was born and standing at attention.
“Sneak away with me, cupcake.”
I looked around the kitchen. “The guests will be here soon.”
He grinned. “You didn’t say no.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but when he kissed me, I was a goner. There was magic in that man’s kiss. I sighed happily against him and gripped his ass in my hands. “We have to make it quick. People will be here in no time and I still need to ice the cupcakes.”
He laughed and slapped my ass as I hurried past him towards our bedroom. “They’ll understand.”
“Alec!”
He easily tossed me over his shoulder and hurried up the stairs. “Fine, fine. I’ll skip that thing with my tongue that you like so much.”
I lifted my head. “No, let’s not skip that. You’re right. They’ll understand.”
THE END
NEXT BOOK IN THIS SERIES
Wolf shifter Raif Williams is a cynical, hard-boiled detective. The last thing he’s looking for is a mate. He’s already married
to the police force.
Clumsy, awkward photographer Denny Wade has sworn off men. Why else would she live in a town of mostly females?
When chasing a lead brings Raif to the eclectic town of Helen’s Corner and face to face with Denny, he's forced to face a truth more frightening than the ruthless criminals he chases. He's just found his mate.
Get Wolf Detective HERE
(Get the entire She-Shifters Series HERE and save.)
Fire Breathing Beast
Dragons of the Bayou
Sky Broussard has spent the last nine years of her life fighting for custody and then raising her now teenage nephews. Between trying to make ends meet as a waitress at the Bon Temps Café, and keeping an eye on two troublesome teens, she’s had zero time for indulging in things like romance.
No worries, she hasn’t been interested in the opposite sex for a long time. Until, she meets the snarling, growling, hotter-that-an-inferno guy who caught her nephews trespassing on his property deep in the Louisiana bayou.
Too bad he’s off his rocker. Seriously. He thinks he’s a dragon, calls her his mate, follows her home, and refuses to leave her side. She really should put a stop to the insanity. She really should. Except, her libido is running on overdrive and he might be her chance to finally lose her V-card.
1
Sky
I had a table of six teenagers who thought it was funny to shoot soda out their straws across the table at one another. Beautiful. A nasty, sticky mess and—I’d stake my life on it—a crap tip. Not only that, but I’d probably be waiting on them for another hour while they horsed around making messes until a parent of one of them came to pick them up. They were around the same ages as my nephews, and wildly immature.
Not that Casey and Nick were all that mature. They weren’t. They just had a different type of immaturity. I glanced to the rear of the café. The boys were in the back office doing their homework, their typical routine after school when I was working a shift. It was a Monday night and the teachers at the charter school they attended had loaded them down with work. Still, they needed to be checked on every so often to make sure they were behaving. Otherwise, one never knew what those boys might get into. What was that saying about idle hands?
I spotted Nick’s size thirteen tennis shoes poking out of the office doorway and I couldn’t stifle the sigh that escaped my lungs at the sight. The kid wouldn’t stop growing. He was already a half a foot taller than me and at six foot, it didn’t look like he was slowing down anytime soon. His feet weren’t slowing down, either. That pair of tennis shoes protruding past the doorjamb were the fourth pair I’d bought him in the last twelve months.
“I can’t believe Kayla is really going to ask Danny to the dance.” A high-pitched voice rang out across the crowded café. “Ugh, how embarrassing for her. Danny already told me he likes me and he thinks she’s an ugly cow.”
I looked back at the table. Danny’s apparent love interest was a pretty blonde with a nasty snarl and an upturned nose. While the rest of the table laughed, my heart went out to poor Kayla.
“She is a cow. I don’t know why you still hang out with her.”
“Do you see her here?”
More laughter. I blew out a long breath. I was starting to think that I was too old for this, but I wasn’t. It was the mileage not the years.
“Sky, can you drop this at table four? I need to run to the back and check my phone.” Amie, the other waitress, held a tray of food out to me and flicked her eyes to the back. “I’m waiting to see about the test results.”
I took it from her and smiled. “Of course. I’m crossing my fingers for you.”
She was trying to get pregnant. Having custody of two teens, I sometimes wondered why she wanted it so badly, but I was hopeful for her. In my mind, a woman went through the pain of childbirth only to end up eventually with teenagers who considered you the bane of their existence. At least I was able to have avoided the “pain of childbirth” part and gone right to the “evil lord overseer” part. Casey and Nick were my brother’s kids, not my own, as they liked to remind me.
I dropped the food off at table four, got them a fresh bottle of ketchup and glanced again at the back. Marcus, the owner, didn’t mind the kids being around after school, but I didn’t want to wear out our welcome. I had nowhere else to send them.
Nick’s shoes were still there, but at an odd angle. Humph. A really odd angle. My stomach dropped. I hurried back to see what was up and found Amie sitting alone at Marcus’ desk. Nick’s shoes had been propped up using the bottles from the cokes I’d grabbed for him and Casey earlier. Crap! I knew I wouldn’t find them in the kitchen, but I looked anyway. No luck. A door led out to the back alley. I already knew they were gone.
“It was negative.” Amie’s voice cracked and broke through my anger. “I’m not pregnant.”
“Oh, Amie, I’m so sorry.”
She shook her head and climbed to her feet. “It’s like the good book says, right? To everything there’s a season.” She blew out a rough breath.
I wrapped her in a quick hug, a comfort-squeeze, then gestured towards Nick’s shoes. “I know of a couple of kids for sale or rent. You can get ‘em super cheap today. Bargain basement prices.”
“No, thanks.” She edged Nick’s shoes out of the way and then pushed her shoulders back and jutted out her chin. “It’ll happen when it happens.”
“That’s right, chère. Keep your spirits up.” I tried to comfort Aime, but my anxiety sky rocketed as I scanned the café. It was packed and from what I could tell, a few of my tables needed tending to. Looked like table six could use drink refills, eleven was nearing either dessert or their check, and table eight should be just about ready to order. Shoot. I couldn’t just go after the boys. Marcus was an understanding boss, for the most part, but skipping out during the dinner rush was not a forgivable offense at the Bon Temps Café. If I attempted to slide out and look for them, he’d have my hide, not that I could blame him.
My stomach knotted in worry. Those boys. I couldn’t afford to lose my job. I’d have to pray now and search for their butts later. Hopefully, they wouldn’t get themselves into too big ‘a trouble while I finished out my shift.
I did what any good worker in a service job does and swallowed my personal issues while plastering a phony smile on my face. In my head, though, I was raging. I took a few deep breaths and tried to extinguish the imaginary shouting match I was having with Nick in my head. He was the older of the two and at sixteen, he knew better. As much as I wanted to yell and scream at him to stop dragging Casey into troublesome predicaments and start stepping up and helping out, a huge part of me just felt sorry for him. Sure, he put me through some major stress, but they’d both weathered pretty tough storms in their young lives.
I got that they were angry and lost but, lord ha’ mercy, Casey had just turned fourteen and he’d already been picked up by the police twice. Each time, somehow, Nick had mysteriously been absent. But, I wasn’t born yesterday. I suspected Nick had been close by and probably the orchestrater of the goings on—at least close enough to have had his hand in the cookie jar, so to speak. Nick had managed to be picked up a few times, too. Maybe he’d just gotten wiser at staying out of reach of the long arm of the law, but it wasn’t like Casey to get into trouble all by himself.
They’d run away from the café before. They hated sitting in the back and waiting on me, but I couldn’t allow them to stay in the house by themselves. It wasn’t safe for mischievous teenage boys to be left alone unsupervised. Of course, it wasn’t fair of me to take up a table in the front when the place was swamped with paying customers, either. That was no way to keep a job I desperately needed.
I realized I was going around in circles in my head, frustrated and scared. Stepping in and taking over the raising of teenage boys when I had only just learned how to care for myself was so darn hard and I really sucked at it. But, I’d be damned straight to the fiery infernos of H-E-double toothpicks if I’
d let those boys go off to be separated and raised by strangers. Not in my lifetime.
I hated it when they ran off. They didn’t have phones—it wasn’t in our budget—and I never knew where they were. Part of me, somewhere in the back of my mind, was just waiting on a call that would turn everything upside down and change it forever. Again.
“Look alive, chère. Your table of toddlers are ready to split without paying.”
I snapped to attention and hurried over to them. “Oh, y’all weren’t trying to slip away before you settled the bill, were you?”
A boy who looked similar to Nick in height and build shook his head. “Er, no, ma’am.”
“Oh, thank heaven ‘cause you see the owner, Marcus…he’s a little cuckoo for cocoa puffs if y’all know what I mean. And nothing gets his goat more than patrons who dine and dash. I’ll let you in on a little secret. He keeps a sawed-off shotgun behind the counter for just such occasions. You know, when people try to leave without paying for the food that he purchases, Big Jay cooks, I serve and clean up after. His finger’s been real slippery lately, too.”
The nasty, snarling blonde girl elbowed the tall boy and whispered to him. “Just pay her.”
“You pay her. You’re the one who wanted to come here!”
I put my hands on my hips and cocked my head to the side. “I don’t care who pays, as long as one of y’all does before Marcus and his twitchy finger go for the sawed-off. I am so not in the mood to clean up blood tonight. Last time I ruined a perfectly good pair of jeans.”
A twenty was quickly thrust into my hand and the lot of them fled the restaurant like they’d just seen Freddy Krueger. I grabbed their bill and swore under my breath. A twenty cent tip. La-di-da. Little shits.
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