by Lauren Esker
And somehow she knew, even before she saw him, that Damon would be standing below her.
He was like a slice of the night, with his dark hair, black motorcycle jacket, and dark jeans. His face was the most visible thing about him, a pale blur turned up toward her window.
"What are you doing?" she called in the loudest whisper she could manage.
Damon shook his head, cupping his hand around his ear.
"Go, go!" she tried to say without being loud enough for anyone to hear, and waved at him, then in the general direction of the driveway.
Damon cheerily waved back, then pointed at the lawn beside him.
"Oh, honestly," she muttered. Her parents hadn't approved of Damon even when they were both kids, but if they caught him now, full-grown and mooning around her window, her dad would probably get the shotgun.
Damon pointed at the lawn again.
Julie spread her arms and made an elaborate shrugging gesture. How am I supposed to get down? They cut down the tree!
Somehow he seemed to know just what she meant, like he could read her mind. He dropped the handful of driveway gravel he'd been holding, dusted his hand off on his jeans, then came to stand right below the window, and held up his hands.
"You must be joking!" she whispered loudly.
Damon shook his head. "I'll catch you," he called softly.
"I've only got my nightgown on!"
He grinned, a white flash of teeth in the dark. "All the better to eat you, my dear."
Her knees went weak, and heat flashed through her, pooling between her legs—as she was suddenly aware that only her silky red panties and diaphanous nightgown would block Damon's view as she climbed out the window.
And yet, she liked that idea very much.
What am I doing? she asked herself.
But she was already putting a cautious leg out the window, hiking up the skirt of the nightgown while her toes groped for purchase on the side of the house.
Acutely aware of Damon watching from below, she squirmed through and sat on the windowsill. Her nightgown fluttered in the night breeze, and she clung to the sides of the open window with both hands. It was only the second floor, but it seemed very high, and Damon a very long way below.
"Go on," Damon called softly. "I'll catch you."
Leap of faith, she thought, and unlocked her fingers from the windowsill.
There was a stomach-lurching instant of freefall; then Damon's strong arms arrested her plunge, catching her under the arms. He set her lightly on the lawn. She gasped at the feeling of the chill, wet grass on her bare feet. Somehow it had seemed much less clammy and unpleasant when she was a little girl.
But even more, she was all too aware of Damon's proximity. He was still holding her, his hands resting on her waist just above the swell of her hips. His smell was a warm masculine musk, filled with something primitive and wild that set her heart pounding. As he looked down at her, she felt her head tipping back, almost against her will, as if she could already taste his lips on hers—
And then common sense reasserted itself. "We're right outside my brother Terry's bedroom window," she whispered.
Damon grinned, showing blunt human teeth that nevertheless had a predatory aspect to them. "I wouldn't mind a rematch."
"Hush," she pleaded, tugging at him. "Let's get farther away from the house before someone hears us!"
She took his hand without thinking about it. They'd held hands as children, innocent and unthinking, but now the touch of his fingers made her tingle all over. He didn't protest as she led him away from the house.
"What are you doing here, anyway?" she whispered fiercely at him. His masculine presence was still fiercely distracting. Letting go of his hand would probably be a good start, but she didn't want to.
"I had to see you again," he whispered back.
"You could have called!"
"I didn't even know you were in town 'til I saw you at the market. I thought you'd left."
The idea that he'd kept tabs on her—even ten years since they'd last talked to each other—made her heart give an odd little flutter. "No, I went to college, but I graduated and came home. My parents offered me a job on the farm until I can find something else."
"What's your degree in?"
"English literature. Which, yeah, I know. People aren't exactly lining up to hire lit majors right now."
"Do you want to teach, then?"
"Right now I'm pretty done with academia." She grinned a little shyly. "Actually, to be honest, I always wanted to own my own bed and breakfast, with guests coming from everywhere in the world. That would be a lot of fun." It was such a surreal situation—here she was, ankle-deep in wet grass and calmly talking about her life goals while wearing nothing but a nightgown. "What about you? What have you been doing with your life since we saw each other last? Military, college, something else?"
"Let's go with door number three." There was a bitter undercurrent to his voice, which she didn't understand until he went on, "Wolves aren't supposed to leave the pack. Especially this pack. My dad doesn't approve of me leaving town. So I'm working on the family farm."
"You're not a kid anymore," she said, and squeezed his fingers. "He can't stop you from leaving if you really want to."
"Julie, I know you mean well," he said, rubbing his thumb across the back of her hand. "But that's not how it is for us. The alpha controls the pack. His word is our law."
Julie shivered, remembering the scene in the woods she'd witnessed. All these years later, it was still sharp in her mind. Damon's bravery, his defiance and pain, twisted her heart even now.
And, although she hadn't noticed it before, now that she was looking up at him, she could see a bruise darkening along Damon's cheekbone, faintly visible in the cold white glow of the floodlight by the barn.
Reaching up, she touched it gently. Damon flinched, but more from shame, she thought, than pain.
"Who did this?" she asked. "Your father?"
He pulled his face away. "I don't want to talk about it."
Julie was still holding his hand; now she took his other hand in hers, and tilted her head back to look into his face. "Can't you do anything?" she asked. "If a pack gets an alpha who's overbearing or cruel, what do you do about it?"
"Put up with it, I guess," Damon said. His mouth twisted in a mockery of a smile. "Until the alpha gets old or sick enough that someone else can defeat them in a challenge."
"Maybe you will," she offered hopefully. She wasn't entirely sure what an alpha's duties entailed, but she was sure Damon would be an excellent one. Though, from the sound of things, anyone would be better than his father.
Damon shook his head. "I think that question was settled already. My father is too strong for anyone in the clan to defeat. And he's in excellent health. We'll probably be dealing with the old bastard 'til he's ninety." He shook his head, and then shook himself all over—a wolflike gesture. "Let's stop talking about this. I don't want to burden you with my problems."
"It's not a burden," she said. "You're my friend, Damon."
"Is your friend all I am?" he murmured, gazing down at her.
His hands were warm in hers, and his body was so close she could feel its heat. It seemed to her that they were circling slowly closer to something they'd been dancing around their whole lives.
She began to stretch up on tiptoes towards those inviting lips, when Damon frowned and took a sudden step back.
"What?" Julie asked, jolted out of her reverie.
"You're freezing." He squeezed her hands. "You should shift. Then you'll be warmer."
Julie shook her head. "I don't want to."
"Why not?" Damon asked. "We used to shift and run around in the woods all the time when we were kids."
"But we're not kids anymore." She couldn't explain it, but it seemed wrong to do the same things they used to. The sense of childish playfulness wasn't there anymore.
"Okay, but take my jacket, at least."
He d
idn't give her a chance to protest, just shrugged out of it and draped it over her shoulders. It was much too big, but the leather was warm from his body and smelled pleasantly of Damon. It was almost like having his arms wrapped around her.
"If you don't want to shift," Damon said, "we'd better get somewhere warmer before we both end up hypothermic. I guess going up to your room is out."
"Yeah, if the maple tree was still there, we could climb up it—but no. Not unless you want to risk waking up the whole household by going in through the front door." Julie smiled. "There's still the barn, though."
This time it was his turn to take her hand, and hand in hand they ran through the wet grass to the barn door. Julie's bare toes were freezing by the time they got there, but Damon's jacket still retained a faint vestige of his body warmth.
The barn door was not locked, merely secured with a latch. Julie fumbled it open, releasing a wave of warmth, along with the smell of hay and sheep. Once the door closed behind them, they were plunged into darkness. Around them were faint rustlings as the Capshaw farm animals—sheep (actual sheep, not shifter sheep), pigs, and chickens—reacted sleepily to the invasion of their domain.
Damon's arm brushed against Julie's jacket-clad one. "Where's the light switch?"
"If we turn on the main lights, someone might see. There's a feed room in the back where we can go."
His hand was still clasping hers. "You'll have to show me the way."
"Can't wolf eyes see in the dark?" she teased.
"All the better to see you with, my dear."
Julie nudged him impatiently. "Knock off the Riding Hood jokes or I'll introduce you to my grandmother. She's seventy-five, works from sunup to sundown on her farm, and is a crack shot with a varmint rifle. I've seen her plink a can in the field at a hundred paces."
"No taking baskets to Grandma's house. Got it."
"The wolf isn't the one with the basket, silly. Don't you know your fairy tales?"
"Sounds like you're an expert."
"All us sheep know the old stories. We have to." But she squeezed his hand to let him know she wasn't afraid of him. His fingers were very warm in hers.
"And are you afraid of things that bite in the dark, Julie?"
"No," she said. Her voice tripped over with desire, not fear. "I'd love to be bitten in the dark."
Just then the fingers of her outstretched hand brushed the feed-room door. She opened it carefully and led them through. When it clunked shut behind them, she flicked on the light and squinted in the sudden brightness.
Like every part of her family's well-kept farm, the feed room was neat and tidy. Feed was piled in sacks along the wall, and bins held corn and oats. The pleasant grain smell tickled her nose.
A ladder led up to a large opening in the ceiling. Damon released her hand and went over to peer up. "What's up there? Hayloft?"
"Yeah. We used to play up there all the time when we were kids."
Damon flashed her one of his bright grins. Without the jacket, she could see that working on the farm kept him in shape; his muscular shoulders and well-defined pecs stood out beneath his tight black T-shirt. "Us too," he said. "Me and Vanessa and our cousins, I mean."
"I guess we're more alike than we're different." She nudged him. "But I knew that already."
Before he could respond, she hopped onto the ladder and scampered up. She and her siblings used to climb around in the hayloft like monkeys. Now everything seemed a little too unstable and small. Still, her bare feet knew the way.
And Damon was just a step behind her. As she climbed off the ladder into prickly, fragrant hay, Damon's hand brushed her nightgown-clad bottom, copping a quick feel.
"My mother did warn me not to go off alone with strange wolves," she said, grinning at him over her shoulder.
"Sorry," he said, not looking or sounding particularly sorry. "I've wanted to do that for years."
Her heart felt like it was about to beat out of her chest. "Is there anything else you've been wanting to touch?"
It was dim in the hayloft, but not dark. Light streamed up from the feed room below, as well as coming in from the halogen yard light through the half-open hay-loading doors. Damon was a study in light and shadow, the flat planes of his chest and stomach starkly delineated. His eyes were faintly luminous in the dim light, and gleamed with desire.
All the better to eat you ...
"If we do this ..." Damon whispered. His voice was husky with desire, but also nervous. "If we do it, there's no going back for either of us."
For answer, she let the jacket slip from her shoulders and then, clad only in the nightgown, stepped forward into his arms. It seemed as if her entire life had been leading up to this. There was a long moment's hesitation on his part, and then his arms came up to pull her forward, and his mouth captured hers in that long-awaited kiss.
She was unprepared for the rush of desire that raced through her, leaving her knees weak and her entire body vibrating with need. Nothing else in her life could compare to this. Kissing Damon was an experience that filled her entire world, until every part of her was focused on him. And it wasn't enough. She wanted it all; she wanted him inside her, and around her. She wanted—needed—
Damon pulled back, breaking the kiss. Julie leaned after him, trying to recapture his lips, but though he still held her, he kept her at bay. "Julie, before we go any further, there's something I need to explain."
"What's to explain?" She could see the desire on his face, feel the urgency in his body. His erection pressed against her leg. "You want this as much as I do."
Damon made a small sound in his throat and drew a shuddering breath. "Can we sit?"
It was slowly penetrating her haze of pent-up horniness that something was seriously wrong. She pulled away and ran a hand across her face, trying to get the logical part of her brain back into the driver's seat. Damon looked more than just worried. He looked wrecked.
"Of course," she said. "Of course we can sit."
They sat in the hay, side by side. She pulled his jacket into her lap and spread it over both of them, then hesitantly leaned into his side. He wrapped his arm around her, and she settled against him, feeling like she could breathe again. Whatever was wrong with him, it wasn't her. They were fine. It was something else.
"Julie," Damon began. "Before we do anything else, before we go further with this, I need to explain about wolf shifters."
4. Damon
Where to start? Damon was all too aware of Julie's warm curves pressed against him. His wolf instincts tugged at him, making it hard to think rationally.
If Julie were a wolf shifter, it wouldn't be a problem. She would understand the feelings she was having, and would willingly join her life to his.
But she wasn't. And, while he didn't know much about the biology of sheep shifters, he did know that different shifters were different. Each kind of shifter had their own customs and culture, and were driven by their biology in unique ways. Julie's clan might have a mate bond just like wolves, but then again they might not.
Desire, at least, wasn't a problem. He could smell Julie's arousal, and her kiss had been more than eager. She wanted it as much as he did. But he refused to accept the gift she offered until she understood what she was offering, and why.
"I'm sorry," Julie said, breaking into his thoughts, and Damon glanced down in surprise at the curly blond head resting on his shoulder. "I'm only thinking of myself here. My parents might get angry, and I hate disappointing them, but they would never ... I mean, I hadn't thought about how much more you have to lose than I do."
Damon reached for her hand, lying loose on top of his jacket, and clasped it tightly. "It's not our families," he said. Not really. Not entirely.
"Then ... are you worried that I'm afraid of you? That you might hurt me? Because you have to know, I would never in a thousand years fear that."
"No." He kissed the top of her head. "It's not that, either."
Julie poked him in the ribs, maki
ng him squirm. "Then knock it off and just tell me. Honestly, you're worse than my brother sometimes."
"Hey, those are fighting words."
"I'll say worse than that if you don't get to the point already."
"I'm not trying to be difficult," Damon protested. "I'm just not sure how to lead into this. There's a question I have to ask you."
"So ask," Julie said. "You can ask me anything. You won't offend me."
"It's not offensive. At least I hope not. I need to ask about mate bonding. Do you know what that is?"
Julie pulled away enough to frown up at him, her expression quizzical in the dim light. "Mate bonding? I always thought that was a myth."
This startled a laugh out of him. "A myth? Really?"
"I always thought it was just one of those things people talk about, but no one really believes in," Julie said.
"No, not at all. All the wolf shifters I know, the mated ones I mean, were mated with a life-bond. My parents, my grandparents, my aunts and uncles. Don't you know anyone who has it?"
"Well ..." Julie said doubtfully. "My aunt Charlotte always said she knew my uncle was 'the one' at first sight." She made air quotes as she said it. "But everyone in the family thought she was being kind of sappy. You have to understand, sheep shifters are very practical, down-to-earth people. We're hardworking folks without a lot of romance in our souls."
Damon smiled faintly. "Wolves aren't like that. We're creatures of moonlight and shadows. The night is full of half-hidden mysteries, and deeper things barely glimpsed. Those shadowed between-places of romance and mystery are the places where wolves dwell. Silk and leather, roses red as blood and nights spent howling at the moon—that's us."
Now it was Julie's turn for a soft laugh. "When my parents got married, they took a few hours off from their farm work for a small civil ceremony and a barbecue at home. They spent their honeymoon night at a small cabin on Grandma's farm—Grandma MacReary, the one with the varmint rifle—and then were back at work bright and early the next day. Mom prides herself on the fact that her first act as a married woman was feeding the chickens and milking the goats."