by Em Ashcroft
The shower was spacious enough for Rachel to enjoy her time there, but she didn’t linger. Still, as she was climbing out and wrapping one of the fluffy white towels around her hair, ready to start the process of making it presentable, someone knocked at the door of the suite.
Rachel waited, but Dana didn’t appear, so, sighing, she wrapped a towel around her still damp body and crossed the soft, carpeted floor of the main room to the door. She opened it cautiously.
A long, low whistle greeted her. “That’s what I call a great welcome,” Sam said, tipping back his dark brown Stetson.
Chapter Two
If Sam had to describe Rachel in a word, he’d probably say “cute,” five and a half feet, every inch of it packed with sensational sex appeal. Last year when they’d first met, Sam had fought to keep his hands off her because the management of the vacation ranch never touched the guests. Especially since humans had become potential breedmates. Until Brooke happened to his business partners.
Once human women had become potential breedmates, they’d come flocking to Goldclaw. They’d always come anyhow, but before, there’d been a kind of unspoken pact that what happened at the ranch stayed at the ranch. Shape-shifters needed other shape-shifters to breed with, to stop the race dying out, so everybody involved knew any liaison could only be temporary. Now, women came with a more serious purpose, so it was easier to say no to them all.
Until Rachel. She’d made it clear she was available, and Sam was ready for some fun, but his breed partner, CJ, had nixed the mouthwatering possibilities of a few days extra-mural activity. Of all the breed partners Sam could have found, he had to get dour, complicated CJ. Not that he didn’t love him like a brother, but…
Still, CJ wasn’t here, was he?
Sam grabbed his hat off his head. “I thought I’d come by and say hello.” Would she ask him in? Fuck, but this woman looked even better in a towel than he’d imagined, and he’d imagined plenty this last year.
It was worth coming up here, just to see her like this. She had her hair twisted up in a towel, so her neck and bare shoulders were on display, gleaming with water he’d just love to lick off her. She clutched the towel to her breasts as if it was her lifeline, and fuck, why did the hotel have to be so generous with their towels? A tiny hand towel would have been Sam’s preference right about now. Or a washcloth.
Rachel gulped. “I thought you’d have forgotten me by now.”
That breathy voice went straight to Sam’s groin. He could hammer in nails with his cock if he carried on standing here for much longer. He grinned. “Now why would you think that? Brooke tells us how you’re doing, and every time she says your name, I remember your visit.”
“Ah.”
“I didn’t need Brooke to remind me,” he said. Shit, he should be better at this stuff by now, but he’d always been a bit tongue-tied around women he liked. No, to be honest, the women he lusted over. When she’d opened the door to him, he’d damn near forgotten his own name, much less why he’d come here today, but he needed to tell her why he’d come. “Brooke’s downstairs, but she’s been delayed, so I said I’d come up and let you know.”
“Oh, right.” Flustered, she flicked a glance around. A pair of jeans and a white T-shirt lay over the back of the couch. “I’d better change.”
“Don’t bother on my account.” He meant it. He wanted nothing more than to pick her up, lay her on that sofa, and peel the towel from her body. Eventually she’d get dry, but maybe not quite yet. Not until they’d gotten good and sweaty.
Oh shit. On the excuse of moving farther into the room, he shifted his erection so it didn’t feel so uncomfortable. “Did you know Brooke married her breedmates?”
“Yes, she told me.” Rachel grabbed the clothes and stood, clutching the garments to her chest like a shield. “I’d better go. Help yourself to…” She waved vaguely around. “I’ve only just gotten here myself, so I’m not sure where everything is.”
“I’ll be fine.” If she didn’t put something on soon, he’d explode. Turning, he headed for the mini fridge. “I’ll get myself a bottle of water, if that’s okay.”
“Sure.”
Much to his disappointment she headed for the shower room, went inside, and firmly closed the door. Sam had a bit of the voyeur in him. Hell, just about every shape-shifter did. Being forced to mate in pairs in order to beget shape-shifter children tended to take care of that. He’d never gotten the appeal of sharing before, but the thought of seeing Rachel and CJ deep into each other did nothing to help his arousal subside.
He let the cool air from the mini fridge wash over his face as he took out the bottle of water. Unscrewing the cap, he took a deep swig.
Hastily he pulled his mind away from the all-too-vivid scene playing in his mind and glanced around the suite. He was glad she’d gotten one up here.
He turned his head as the door to the bedroom opened and a tall, skinny blonde in designer jeans and a little top sashayed through. Although dismayed that he wouldn’t have Rachel to himself, he gave her a smile and a polite nod.
After an initial hesitation, she walked across the room to him, holding out her hand. “Hi, I’m Dana. Can I help you?”
“I’m Sam Goldclaw. I’m just waiting for Rachel. She has a visitor downstairs, on her way up.” At Dana’s raised brow, he explained. “Brooke Parker-Goldclaw. She used to work with Rachel.”
The blonde smiled. “Oh, sure, yes, I remember. I arrived just after she left. I work for McCall Publishing, but I transferred to the magazine after the scandal.” Her smile turned more intimate. “I guess you saw some of it.”
“Some,” Sam admitted. That particular memory wasn’t one he appreciated revisiting. Even the part where his partners in the ranch took Brooke and made her their own. That, after Sam and CJ had resisted Rachel’s willingness all week.
Now, though? Although he’d tried, Sam couldn’t forget her. The hunger hit him as hard as ever the minute he’d laid eyes on her.
On the other hand, Dana didn’t do a lot for him. He must be losing his shit because he’d have been all over her a couple of years ago. As long as she wasn’t a vacationer, of course, and these gals were here on business. Not guests of the ranch, but fellow workers.
Dana sauntered across the room, and sat, leaving a space for Sam. He didn’t feel inclined to take it but wandered over to the window, staring out at the bright day. Tinted glass meant he didn’t have to squint, just like the stuff they’d had put into their own ranch house.
“What do you do for the magazine?” he asked, more to kill time than because he wanted to know.
“I work with the models,” she said. “We get all the top models posing for the magazine, and we have to take good care of them.” She glanced toward the open door to the bedroom.
It hit Sam why he had taken against Dana. She’d stolen the bedroom and left Rachel to the sofa bed. Of course the decision was up to the women, nothing to do with him, but still, he resented it for Rachel’s sake. She should be pampered and cossetted. If he had anything to do with it, she would, he decided, pushing away from the view of the parched fields and the trees at the edge of the fields.
“Did you know you were going to share?”
Dana shrugged. “When I knew what floor we were on, I kinda guessed, so I came up here fast, to bag the bedroom. The new boss is a bit more expense-conscious than the old one.”
The door to the shower room opened, and Rachel walked in, fully dressed now. She must have heard the last remark because she said, “He doesn’t steal as much, that’s for sure. Chelsea gave us perks to make us compliant. We didn’t ask too many questions that way.” She grinned at Sam, who couldn’t help but grin back.
When a knock came at the door, Rachel turned her attention to it and strode across to answer it, giving Sam a great view of her pert ass. He couldn’t help wondering what it would feel like nestled in his hands.
Her cry of delight when she opened the door and found Brooke standing there ma
de him smile. While the women hugged, two tiger cubs rolled in after her, bound together in a play-fight. Dana squealed and leaped back to let the babies tumble past her into the space in the middle of the room.
Brooke broke away from Rachel and spread her hands in apology. “That’s why I was late. They shape-shifted in the lobby downstairs.” She carried a baby bag, bulging with whatever babies needed. Sam had no idea, but one day he might find out. Not that he was planning it, but these days, when almost every human female was a potential breedmate, the odds were pretty high that he would. The shape-shifter races needed babies.
These two ignored everything else, including Rachel’s laughter and Dana’s alarmed squeaks. They growled and attacked each other, baby claws extended.
“That’s the way they learn,” Sam explained. “I rolled around with my brothers at that age.”
“It’s hard when they shift back and you have two helpless babies,” Brooke said. “If we’re not there to scoop them up, they might just lie there crying.”
Sam nodded, grinning at the sight of two squalling bundles of striped fur, totally absorbed in each other. “They can move better when they’re like this.”
“You’re telling me!” Brooke said with feeling. She pushed her hair behind her ears and squatted down on the floor. Her beige shorts must once have been crisply pressed, but an hour with the twins, and they were creased up to hell. Although she was tired much of the time, Sam knew how hard her men worked to keep Brooke happy. She was well loved and cared for.
The cubs had a nanny, but more often than not, they ended up with their mother or even one of the hands. Bundles of mischief, they had the temperament of babies everywhere. The world revolved around them, as far as they were concerned, and sure enough, it did.
Who wouldn’t love such cute, lively infants?
Dana, it appeared, who stood behind the sofa, clutching the back of it. Sam frowned at her. “Are you phobic?”
Dana shook her head. “No, but they’re animals!”
Sam tilted his head to one side. “I think you’ll find most of the people who live in Goldclaw are animals.” He nodded at the twins. “These won’t be the last two tigers you see.” He was tempted to shift, but he contented himself with a growl low in his throat, the kind of rumbling, protective roar of warning a tiger might give to another who threatened his territory.
Dana’s eyes widened, and she swallowed. “Sure. I’m just not used to it, I guess.” Forcing a smile, she came out from behind the sofa and gingerly approached the cubs. “Here, kitty, kitty.”
Sam howled with laughter. He’d never heard anything so funny in his life. But the enticement seemed to do the trick. One of the cubs sniffed at her fingers but then went back to tormenting his twin. The other took no notice whatsoever.
At least she wasn’t hiding behind the sofa. What would she do confronted with a twelve-foot tiger in all his magnificence? Some of the Goldclaw tigers could reach fifteen feet, nose to tail. They would intimidate even one of their own kind.
“Why did you come if you didn’t like tigers?”
Dana shot him a shame-faced look. “I didn’t know I’d react that way. I’ve seen them in zoos, and they’re fine on the other side of the glass or in the pit.”
This time Sam’s growl was involuntary. The thought of confinement did that to him.
Dana blinked at him but stood her ground. “I’ll get used to it. It’ll be good for me.”
“Sure it will,” Brooke said. She glanced up at Dana. “I don’t remember you.”
“I’m from McCall’s,” Dana said, and Brooke nodded. “Model liaison.”
Somehow, Rachel had moved closer to Sam. He couldn’t feel sorry about that. A grin wreathed her face, dimples denting her cheeks. “They are so cute.”
“Yeah, but don’t get too close when they’re this playful. Their claws are fairly soft still, but they could still deliver a scratch.”
She gave him an amused glance. “You don’t say.”
Golden-and-black-striped cuties uncurled and unwound, pink tongues lolling out of the sides of their mouths, blue eyes gazing up at the adults. At last they’d noticed where they were. One cub flopped on his side, his small flanks heaving as he regained his breath, and his twin lay on her stomach, her paws sprawled out untidily on each side. She laid her head on one front leg and peered up at Sam.
He grinned at her. “Tired, baby?”
A ripple passed over them, and the fur became pink skin, paws retracting into baby limbs. Brooke ignored Dana’s gasp as she leaned over and picked up the girl.
“Thank heaven for that. I thought they’d never shift back!” Lifting her daughter into her lap, she swiftly diapered Della, and deftly slotted her into a onesie. When she tossed Sam a diaper, he did the same with Ryan, the boy twin.
“This is a new skill,” he said. He and his breed partner had babysat a time or two. “I’m going to miss these little tykes while you’re away.”
“You’re going away?” Rachel echoed, dismayed.
Brooke shrugged. “My husbands say I’m owed a honeymoon, and it’s best we go while the ranch is closed. But we won’t leave just yet.” She leaned back, cross-legged on the floor, her daughter in her lap. “Does anybody mind if I feed them?”
“No,” Rachel and Sam said. Dana said nothing but left the room and returned with a towel. Brooke took it with thanks and used it to drape over her lap while she lifted her T-shirt and matter-of-factly latched Ryan on her nipple.
The sight did not shock, surprise, or alarm Sam. Why should it? Brooke’s husbands loved to watch her feed the twins, and then they’d pamper her outrageously, one of them putting the babies to bed and the other taking care of their wife. Until today, Sam had been happy for them but hadn’t wanted it for himself. Now he wasn’t so sure. Wasn’t it time he settled down with a woman and set about making babies?
Shit, where had that thought come from? He glanced at Brooke. As if he’d met a woman he lusted after and immediately started thinking about babies and homemaking. Not a chance. But that didn’t stop him wanting her.
* * * *
The tiger cubs were darling. Rachel had wondered how it worked, having babies that shifted into tigers, but now that she’d seen it for herself, everything clicked into place. After all, their fathers were full-grown shape-shifting tigers, so it made sense. Brooke had obviously worked out a way to handle the shape-shifts. Brooke fed the babies and gave Rachel a word of thanks when she found a bottle of water and put it by her side.
Watching the boy, curled up into his mother, snuffling and sleepy, she could hardly believe he’d been a bundle of gold and black fur, scampering around the room with his sister. “I bet they’re a handful, aren’t they?”
“And then some.” Brooke made a nest of blankets for the boy and laid him gently down. Sam had already done something similar for the little girl. “They prefer to sleep on the floor,” Brooke said, “even though I insist on them using their cribs at home. Otherwise I’d never find them once they woke up.”
Dana left the room while the others chatted.
Rachel shouldn’t feel so comfortable around Sam, she really shouldn’t, but sitting next to him, on the sofa she was suddenly hyper-aware turned into a bed, it was as if a year hadn’t passed since she’d seen him last. She’d missed him, missed just talking. Sam didn’t want her in any other way. He’d made that clear last year, although for a minute, when he’d first come in, she’d thought he was about to kiss her. That was wishful thinking, most likely.
To stop concentrating on the man at her side, she talked to Brooke. “I’m still pissed that you got married so quietly. I wanted to be your bridesmaid. After that fiasco last year, I’d have loved to wear something pretty and stand behind you. It was great to see you fall for your guys, but I didn’t get to see the happy ending.”
Brooke laughed. “This is the happy ending. The wedding was nothing. Once I thought that would matter to me, but as it happened, it didn’t. We did it for t
he kids.” She paused, smiling, the warmth in her eyes not meant for anybody in this room. “Maybe a little bit for us. I didn’t want any fuss, and the last thing I wanted was to repeat last year.” She shuddered.
“That’s the last thing anybody wants,” Rachel murmured. “We’ve all moved on since then. Now Chelsea’s just another woman in an orange jumpsuit. I wonder how she’s accessorizing that,” Brooke said dryly.
“She’ll be wearing one for a long time,” Rachel said. “I couldn’t believe it when they took her away. I mean, obviously I didn’t know her as well as you did, but she was queen of fashion when she ran the magazine. I wouldn’t have given that up, not for—”
She broke off when Sam put her hand over his. Turning to him, she met a smile, warm and intimate. The man had shut her up. That was pretty awesome because she was only just getting that familiar runaway-train feeling, the one where her mouth seemed to run on independently.
Rachel kept a firm rein over her tongue until the end of the visit, when Sam announced he had to get back.
“The ranch may be closed, but animals still need feeding.”
She missed the touch of his hand when he got to his feet and reached for one of the babies. They curled up together, in their own world, perfectly content. When Sam picked up the little girl, she hardly stirred but curled into him. For a man with such work-weathered hands, he was bone-meltingly gentle, tenderly curling the baby against his chest, where she snuggled contentedly.
Rachel got to her feet to see them out. “Will I see you tomorrow?” she asked Brooke.
Brooke grinned. “Actually, I’m staying in the hotel overnight. My husbands are coming over when they’re done with the chores, and we’re having a romantic evening here.”