There, standing before her, was the man who had been playing guitar in the square. He was minus the guitar. He looked past her and to the guy at the counter. “Hey, Ernie.”
The guy at the register grinned and gave a small wave. “How’s it going tonight, Wheeler?”
Wheeler offered a smile that made Nicolette wonder why she’d felt the need to practically run from the square. Sure, he was a big guy, but he didn’t feel like a threat to her. And she was a pretty good judge of character.
“Coffee?” asked Ernie.
“Yep,” said Wheeler, his attention moving to Nicolette. “Hello. Didn’t I just see you back in the square?”
She nodded. “You did.”
He kept smiling but his gaze went to the front window. While his facial features didn’t betray his supposed pleasant mood, the pulse of power that seemed to come off him did. It wasn’t directed at Nicolette or Ernie. No. The man who had seemed so carefree when he’d been singing stared out into the night like a man on the hunt.
He faced her, and the power that had come from him stopped in an instant. “What do you have there?”
“Cupcakes,” she replied and went to walk around him to get to the door.
Reaching out, he took hold of her upper arm ever so gently. The act made her breath catch. She locked gazes with him—and for a moment, she could have sworn again that black flecks appeared in his royal-blue eyes. Like what she’d thought she’d seen earlier.
“It’s getting late. You want to head home quickly. You don’t have any more stops to make,” he said.
“Actually, I need to get soy milk,” she blurted. “I think. Maybe I don’t. I can’t remember if it was that or tofu. Could have been fruit snacks. Grr, I should have remembered all this when I got the darn hummus.”
His brow creased, and he squared his large shoulders. “No. You want to go straight home.”
“Everything all right, Wheeler?” asked Ernie.
Wheeler kept hold of Nicolette’s arm but looked at Ernie. “There is nothing to see here. Go on about your business.”
Ernie didn’t so much as question the command. He just walked off and began to wipe down counters towards the back of the bakery like nothing was out of the ordinary and people told him what to do daily. Maybe in his world it was normal. In Nicolette’s, it wasn’t.
Her attention went to Wheeler’s hand that was still wrapped around her upper arm. “Excuse me.”
He released her arm quickly and gave her a questioning look before sighing. “He could have told me you were immune.”
“What?”
“Sorry about that. I just, well, I saw that guy watching you, and I was worried. Just wanted to be sure you got home okay.”
She continued to eye him.
He put his hands up slowly. “I’m friends with Cody.”
Nicolette groaned. “Let me guess, he told you not to let me near any men.”
Wheeler chuckled. “Something like that. He’s a good guy. Worries a lot about you and Clara.”
“You know Clara?” she asked, surprised that Clara had never mentioned the man before. He seemed to be her friend’s type.
“Sort of. It’s hard to explain,” he returned. “Can you do me a favor and maybe forgo any more errands tonight?”
She stood there for a long, tense moment, wondering why it was so important to the man that she head home. She nearly opened her mouth to ask as much when something deep down told her to trust him and do as he’d asked. She nodded. “I can.”
He winked. “Thanks.”
“Can you do me a favor and stop bossing Ernie around?” she asked.
Wheeler licked his lips and smiled. “I can.”
Chapter Six
Garth sauntered down the street, soaking in the sights around him. It had been decades since he’d been to Savannah, Georgia. The last time had been with Gram some forty years ago. They’d had a hell of a good time and managed to get booted out of more than one bar before finding themselves back at a rental house full of hot women.
This trip wasn’t as thrilling. So far, it seemed pointless. The prisoner in need of transportation was delayed in arriving in Georgia, so Garth was stuck there for at least another day, possibly more.
Corbin’s ultimate plan to get Garth away from Gram’s bedside was turning out to be more successful than anyone could have guessed.
The desire to stretch his legs had hit and, since Garth didn’t think there was a great place in the city to shift forms and run free, he’d had to settle for walking on two feet to get out his excess energy. He’d have preferred four. But after letting Auberi inject him with only Odin knew what, shifting seemed unwise.
He didn’t want to be stuck in wolf form again.
The sun had set an hour ago, and the city was bustling with people coming and going from various restaurants and businesses. The block he was on had a certain charm to it that he couldn’t put his finger on but that felt right. It might have had something to do with the number of beautiful women strolling about. It was hard to avoid noticing them.
As a group of four hot women walked by, each of them turned their heads and eyed him as if they were the ones doing the mental undressing. Garth couldn’t hide his grin. Modern-age women were amazing. Being ogled by them was high on his to-do list. If he was lucky, he’d get a repeat performance of his last visit to Savannah. A number of hot chicks and him, alone for a weekend. There was nothing quite like being immortal and not tied down. So many operatives seemed to be falling into the trap of mating that Garth was concerned he might be bitten by the bug.
No thank you.
He liked single life just fine.
Being a free agent meant he could do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. It was awesome. And he couldn’t wrap his mind around the concept of meeting a woman who made him forget about every other female out there. The idea was foreign to him, despite witnessing numerous friends falling victim to it. Poor bastards. Stuck with the same women for eternity. Seemed more like a curse to him than a blessing.
He was so caught up in looking over his shoulder at the four women, who were still checking him out, that he didn’t see there was a person in his path until it was too late.
He careened into someone who made his entire body light with need.
Instincts kicked in, and he grabbed the person by the upper arms to steady them, mindful of his grip. As a supernatural, he could break a human’s bones without trying very hard.
Before he could fully comprehend what was happening, the same ear-piercing buzzing noise he’d heard twenty years prior hit him like a ton of bricks. Somehow, he managed to stay upright. He didn’t cover his ears this time because the noise, while alarming, didn’t last as long as it had before.
It cleared slowly and left him feeling as if he were coming out of a fog.
Something smelled sugary. Too sweet. And the person he’d bumped into seemed to melt against him in a sloshy way. That wasn’t right. Was it?
Looking down, he found himself staring into huge blue eyes rimmed with black lashes. For a split second, his mind filled with the image of the little girl who had nearly died on the table in the lab twenty years ago. The same fierce need he’d felt then in regard to protecting her came flooding back, washing over him, wanting him to do the same for this woman.
His throat went dry as panic welled in him. He did not want to lose his shit and shift forms again. Not now. Not in front of all the humans, and not in front of this woman.
Pull it together.
He really couldn’t help but be reminded of the little girl from so long ago. The woman had the same eyes. But they weren’t the same person. They couldn’t be. The odds were incredibly high against it.
As he shook the insane thought that the little girl from twenty years ago was now the hottie before him from his head, he found himself captivated by her. The other women he’d been staring at when he’d ran into the newcomer faded quickly from his memory.
She was tall for
a woman, easily five eleven. Her long, wavy black hair hung to her midback, and she had thick black lashes that drew even more attention to her eyes.
Suddenly, the thought of forever with just one woman seemed like the best idea he’d heard all day. His wolf nudged him from within, agreeing with his assessment. It wanted this woman too—and not just for a one-night stand. No. It wanted him to hold tight to her and not let go.
Ever.
That in itself should have been enough to make him release her and run in the opposite direction. That wasn’t what happened. Her full, rosy lips parted and before Garth could stop himself, he bent his head and pressed his mouth to hers.
Her taste was out of this world. As if someone had dipped strawberries in powdered sugar. Pleasure shot through him so fast that he nearly came in his jeans right then and there on the sidewalk.
It was as if Freyja, the Norse goddess of love herself, had struck him with a bolt of desire too intense to deny. He was powerless against whatever was happening. He ate at her mouth and moaned passionately as he ground his body against hers.
Delirious from the intense need flashing through him, Garth continued to kiss the woman. She was like a drug. There was simply no other way to explain the all-consuming urgency he felt to continue his sensual exploration of her lips. His tongue was every bit the Viking he was as it plundered her sweet mouth. Her tongue met his with a fiery intensity that caught him off guard and turned him on more.
He moved, grinding himself against her. She had womanly curves that he wanted to run his hands all over before licking every inch of her. She was all woman, and he wanted to lose himself in her.
Mine.
The word raced through his mind and it was a wake-up call. He halted the kiss but kept his mouth on the woman’s. As Garth realized he was kissing a woman he didn’t know, and who he’d not gotten permission from, he began to draw back, prepared to be slapped across the face at the very least.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean—”
Grabbing hold of his T-shirt, the woman made a faint growling noise that appealed to his shifter side and yanked him back down to her. The next thing he knew, her lips were on his and their tongues were caressing one another once more.
He nearly exploded in his pants. That wasn’t something that happened to him. Ever. He had amazing self-control in the sex department. The female was shredding it with nothing more than a kiss.
An amazing fucking kiss, but a kiss all the same.
As her tongue slid around his, thoughts of having her lips on other areas swept over him, and he whimpered into her mouth. He wanted to lift her to get a better angle and devour her. Never before had a kiss been like this.
This fulfilling.
This erotic.
This close to making him embarrass himself.
The craziest part of it all was how much he didn’t care. Kissing a random woman on the street was out of the realm of norm, even in his world where nothing was as it seemed. He wanted to sink to the ground and lose himself in her silken depths. He wanted it like he’d never wanted anything in his long life.
The beauty put her palms against his chest and then pushed, not hard, but enough for Garth to know he should end the kiss. He didn’t want to end it. But he did.
Reluctantly, he drew his lips from hers and instantly mourned the loss. His entire body tingled with raw possessiveness for the woman against him. He wanted to ravish her. To mark her as his for always.
Always?
He stiffened but didn’t back away from the female. His thoughts went to the serum he’d agreed to test. Was it affecting him like it had Malik years ago? Would he need to be pinned down for hours? Did Auberi’s parting curse have weight?
Fucking Auberi probably slipped me something different.
Even with the knowledge that the vampire might very well have given him something that messed with his system, Garth didn’t step away from the woman. Instead, he stared down at her, doing his best to keep from reclaiming her lips with his. Resisting was hard to say the least, especially since her lips were now slightly swollen from their fervent interaction.
Garth was positive she was the single-most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. He’d been around a hell of a long time and had lain eyes upon thousands and thousands of women. They all paled in comparison to the one standing before him. He couldn’t seem to stop himself as he reached out and pushed her silky hair behind her ears. His fingers skimmed her pale skin on the way back.
When he realized he’d not only kissed a stranger, but she’d kissed him back, a wry grin spread across his face.
She wanted him too.
Good.
“I really love modern women,” he said, his voice cracking slightly, making him sound like he was going through puberty.
“You’re not local.” The tiniest of tugs happened at the corner of the woman’s mouth before her eyes widened and she took one giant step back from him, like he was contagious or something. No sign of fear came from her. Which was good, because Garth wasn’t sure he’d have been able to handle it if she were scared of him in any way.
She stared at his chest before looking down at the ground. A frown appeared on her face. “Oh no.”
Garth drew in the sight of her and, as he did, he realized there was something smeared all over her baby-blue T-shirt. It was then he noticed that whatever it was, it was also all over the front of his shirt as well. And on the tops of his boots. When he spotted a smashed box labeled “Bakery,” he understood what the sickly-sweet-smelling goop was, or had been.
Cupcakes.
And he was covered in them. A whole lot of them.
The woman bent quickly and began scooping up smashed cupcakes before trying to deposit the mess into what was left of the box. She then lifted her head, jutted out her chin, and gave him a scathing look. “You weren’t watching where you were going.”
He opened his mouth to object, but she cut him off.
“You were too busy checking out those women in the short skirts. I saw them. Everyone saw them.” She stood. As she lifted the damaged box, the bottom fell out of it, and all of her hard work landed back on the ground. This time it splattered up and onto Garth’s pant leg. The woman stiffened, her eyes widening. “And then you…you…you kissed me!”
He blinked, coming to his senses. “Yes, I did. And you kissed me right back. Or are you forgetting that part?”
“What did you just say?” she demanded.
He repeated it.
“That’s what I thought you said. But you’re kind of hard to understand.” Her hands went to her hips, drawing his attention there. She had great hips. The kind that a man could hold onto when he was pounding into her. As his thoughts drifted to doing just that, she stamped her foot on the ground.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she said sternly.
“Like what?” he asked, pulling his gaze up her ever so slowly. His cock liked what it saw, as noted by the fact it was pushing against his jeans, trapped between the material and his upper thigh. It was anything but comfortable, and he very much wanted to adjust it. When his gaze managed to make its way to her face, he found her sexy mouth tightening into a stubborn line.
Just like that, she cured his hard-on issue.
She was pissed.
“You could at least help me clean this up,” the beauty snapped, and then bent again. She mumbled something about him being a big oaf, and the way she said it made Garth laugh softly. She glanced up at him. “Hey, you let your hair down and changed your shirt. It was gray before, and you had a braid.”
Confused, Garth simply watched her. He’d not done anything to his hair or his shirt.
She sized him up and narrowed her gaze, seeming to scrutinize his features. She touched just above her right eye. “Weird. I could have sworn you had…never mind. I guess it was a play of shadows.”
“You’re a very odd woman,” he countered. Even with that, he wanted her. He didn’t need her to be sane, just willing.
Odin, please make her want me too.
“And you’re a friggin’ giant who should pay more attention to where he’s walking.”
Mysteriously, it no longer bothered him in the least to be the subject of her sharp tongue. If anything, it was amusing. It didn’t look like she could hurt anyone, let alone him. He chuckled, pleased she seemed to be able to understand his heavily accented English now.
“This is not funny,” she retorted, expelling an irritated breath. “Where am I going to find gluten-free, dairy-free, peanut-free, wheat-free, sugar-free, egg-free, preservative-free cupcakes by tomorrow morning? I had to special order these last week for them to be done tonight.”
The list of all the ingredients that were missing from the baked goods left Garth wondering what in the hell the cupcakes had actually been made of. Air? He wasn’t sure he wanted to know, especially with as disgustingly sweet as they smelled. They turned his stomach.
“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” she demanded, her accusatory gaze swinging towards him.
“Nothing you’ll want to hear.” It was quite clear she wasn’t in the mood to listen to his apologies. Not that he’d offer any.
He wasn’t sorry he ran into her. Doing so caused them to meet.
He wasn’t sorry he kissed her. It had been divine.
And he wasn’t sorry he wanted to kiss her again. What man wouldn’t?
Shrugging, he bent and picked up the thin cardboard box the baked goods had been in. He thrust it out to her. “Here. Feed this to the children. It’s a paper product and will taste the same as the cupcakes. I’m sure of it.”
Fire lit in her eyes, and Garth found himself smiling even wider. Oh yes, he liked a fierce woman for sure. She gave him a firm look before her lips twitched and the agitation on her face faded away. He knew then she was fighting to keep from smiling. She really wanted to be angry with him.
That, in itself, was endearing.
He licked his lower lip, desiring her in ways he shouldn’t. The things he wanted to do with the woman were against the law in some states. “Want me to bump into you again so you can yell at me some more? We both know that you’re working very hard to stay pissed at me.”
Act of Brotherhood: Paranormal Security and Intelligence (PSI-Ops) an Immortal Ops World Novel Page 9