by Holley Trent
The little noises she made into his mouth echoed a memory from months in the past, breathless encouragements that’d had him flicking his tongue into her faster, delving his fingers into her deeper. The mescal had him convinced that he was doing it because he’d needed to bring her down a peg or two, but that wasn’t true. He’d been licking her because he’d simply wanted a taste, and the sample had made him even hungrier.
“Right there,” she whispered, and tilted her hips forward, urging his touch. He hadn’t noticed she’d relinquished her grip on his hair and that her hands were between them, cupping him, teasing his nuts tight and making his shaft throb. “Cat’s already out of the bag,” she said. “May as well make the most of it.”
“Meaning?”
“Come inside, Lance.”
Oh.
He was in motion before his brain had even finished processing the command. From the nightstand, he snatched a condom and lube and equipped himself before she could torture him with any more of that merciless teasing.
He couldn’t remember how she liked it—all in at once or for him to ease in slowly. He opted for caution.
She did not.
Those thighs.
She pulled him in deep and pinned him tight. Her faltering breath against his ear warmed, tickled, and then enticed when it turned into words. “I bite.”
“Sometimes, I do, too.”
She nodded. Swallowed. Urged him on with a squeeze of her highs against his ribs.
She knew the rules. His bites couldn’t hurt her when he was in that shape. If he’d been on four legs, a bite from him would have meant that within a month or two, Blue would have a new Coyote in his pack. Probably, nobody wanted that. Not Blue. Not the Foyes. Not Lily.
Not Lance, either.
For whatever reason, it seemed critical that Lily stay exactly as she was. She was already plenty strong without being changed. Their children wouldn’t care one way or another.
Children?
He didn’t know where that thought had come from, but try as he might to chase it away, the imagery lingered in his mind. The scene was only half congealed because he’d never let his imagination go there before. But there Lily was in every scene, the perfect, doting mother who was there to scoop up the mess left behind after every Coyote shenanigan. And he was happy because she was smiling at him for what he’d given her and not faking it for a change.
Of course he wanted that. He wanted to come home every night to that family in his imagination. His own little pack of howlers.
“You want to swap?” he asked her. He was aware of his weight, and hers.
“If you think I’m going to just lie here and suffer in silence, you’ve forgotten who you’re with.” She gave him another of those unmistakable nudges to get him moving. There probably wasn’t a bronco alive that wouldn’t be broken by the time she was done with him.
Having nothing left to say, he let his focus go to the place where they were joined—a mistake, probably. Even with the latex between them, he was too sensitive. Too strung out, maybe. The sounds Lily made weren’t helping his endurance any. With each thrust, she whispered something he couldn’t quite catch. Maybe it wasn’t English, but he didn’t need to understand, anyway. He caught the gist in the way her belly spasmed and how she clenched around him. And in the way her teeth scored along the corded slope of his neck.
He wanted to roll over, anyway. Wanted her on top having her way, so he wouldn’t feel like he was breaking her. But it didn’t seem to matter. She had a way of moving beneath him, shifting subtly, opening her hip flexors more, pulling him flatter to her, taking him in deeper.
“You’re…trying to kill me,” he rasped.
He wanted to claw at the parts of him that were already tossing in the towel. That ominous throbbing, that aggressive tightening low down.
That “you’re done” warning.
“Not trying to kill you,” she whispered even as she writhed beneath him and sliced into his back with her nails. “I’m trying to…enjoy you. Trying to love you.”
If he’d been able to move at all without falling apart, he would have pulled back enough for her to see his face. She’d misspoken. Used the wrong word in her supposed enjoyment of him. He wanted her to know, but she had a way of distracting.
“Yes, right there!”
The look of determination on her face—teeth set into her lower lip, eyes closed, brow deeply creased—was unlike anything he’d ever seen before. At least, not while sober.
He didn’t move, but it didn’t matter. She had him exactly where she wanted him, somehow riding him upside down, and he was fine with that. Fine with her knowing how to find what she wanted and taking what she needed.
He was easy.
He just put his forehead down beside hers, gritted his teeth, and tried to hold his body together in spite of his lower region’s insistence that he was done. In spite of the fact that the pain of the blades of her teeth in his shoulder was somehow making him hard enough to shatter.
He was practically vibrating from the throbbing, the urgency, her torturing grinds and the bold swiveling of her hips.
Couldn’t take it. Couldn’t last.
Fortunately, she was done. She dug in her heels but loosened her bite as her pleasure erupted in an exhalation.
He muttered his relief and gripped her hips tight as he came, worried she was truly going to kill him if she moved any more.
She might kill him anyway, but it wasn’t going to be that day if he had any say in the matter.
“You’re a fucking praying mantis,” he said when he could speak again.
She lay limp beneath him, giggling.
“Or a black widow. That’s not funny.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of that before.”
“I don’t particularly want to think that anyone has had a chance to make that accusation.”
“They wouldn’t have. You’re special. I can’t break you.”
The statement was so outlandish that he laughed. And he kept laughing until she shimmied out from under him and clapped a hand over his mouth. “Are you critiquing my performance?” she asked him, low.
Sensitive shortcake.
He lifted the hand and somehow managed to squelch the laughter impulse. Her expression was murderous, which was somehow cute. “Not critiquing your performance,” he said. “Perform on me whenever you want. Just assure me you’ll leave enough of me behind that my family can identify my body.”
“Shut up.”
“’Kay.”
He was fine with that.
Fine with her getting him cleaned up, tucking him in, and handing him the remote, too. Not that he could concentrate on the television. Hard to manage when the picture on the screen wasn’t as pretty as the one beside him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Lily hated being jarred from sleep right when she’d just gotten to that delicious cusp of REM, but her reflex was to always answer a ringing phone. She snatched it out from under her pillow, tapped her thumb against the screen, and mustered up a semi-cheerful, “Hello” as she rubbed her eyes.
“Buenos días, mi amor. ¿Te desperté?”
“Oh shit,” Lily said in a panic as she dropped her hand from her face.
Of course, her reflex was to answer. Her body was conditioned to do that because her mother called pretty much at the same time most mornings. If she was at home, she called.
Lily was the one who wasn’t at home, and her mother had her on FaceTime, observing everything that was out of order.
Her mother just smiled at her. For a change, the picture was clear as new glass. Her internet service provider must have been on the ball that morning.
“¿Dónde estás?” She was still smiling as she toyed with the edge of a tortilla. Her breakfast was always the same. Tortillas, a couple of fried eggs, and coffee. Creature of habit, kind of like Lily.
Lily cleared her throat and tucked her hair behind her ears. The little inset picture
on her screen informed her she looked a mess, but that was to be expected. She’d spent half the night warming her bones under a coyote shifter…who was at that moment inching farther and farther away from the camera.
Coward.
“Hablo inglés,” she reminded Lily. “¿Te acuerdas?”
“Oh God, please don’t.”
“Where are you?” her mother asked again, following through on her threat in the language Lance knew.
From the edge of the bed, he cut her an uh-oh look.
Lily cleared her throat again and tried for a light tone. “Well. You know. I’m…in bed. Where’s Antonio?” she asked, hoping to distract the woman. Plus, she really did want to know. He always made those conversations so funny. “I don’t hear him chirping in the background.”
“Putting on his shoes. Getting ready to go. You’re usually up now. Isn’t your horse missing you?”
“Low blow.” The fact that Lily’s horse had self-esteem issues was something of a running gag on the ranch. “I’m sure she’s fine,” Lily said.
“Bueno, si tú lo dices.” Her mother leaned in close and squinted at her screen. “Those aren’t your bed sheets.”
Lily peered at the bedding out of the corners of her eyes. She hadn’t noticed in the dark, but they were gray. She didn’t own gray sheets. Her mother would have noticed because they talked about stuff like thread counts and cotton blends whenever Lily’s favorite department store had a sale on linens.
Lily pinched the bridge of her nose. “Mamá.”
“Tell your friend to lean this way a little bit.”
“No.”
“Do it.”
Lance sighed and leaned into the picture.
“Lemme see your teeth.” The woman didn’t miss a beat, but Lily sure did. She didn’t catch the implication of the command until it was too late and Lance bared both rows of them. A person who knew what she was looking for couldn’t miss the elongated canines.
Oh my God.
Her mother blinked in silence for a few beats and then shrugged. “Surprised he’s not a Cougar, knowing who you know.”
“Mamá?” Lily couldn’t have possibly been more confused. Her mother wasn’t supposed to know about shifters.
“Least he got all of them. Floyd’s teeth were a mess. I think his brother managed to land a punch when they were kids.”
Lance’s expression held all the telltale markers of “Who?” so Lily, stunned, whispered, “Uh. My uncle. My cousins’ late father.”
“Oh,” he mouthed.
“I heard you got married. I just wanted to see if it was true,” Mamá said.
“Who told you?” Lily sat up, gave her eyes a more thorough rub, and next massaged the temple that had begun to throb.
“Your father sent me an email. You know he never contacts me except to tell me about the things my daughter has done.” She snorted. “Always my daughter when you’re being hot-blooded, huh? Never emails me about the good things. I get those from Glenda. If I only ever got my news from one person, I’d think you were a delinquent.”
“I appreciate you diversifying your sources.”
Mamá tapped the side of her head. “Never forget who you get your brains from. I gotta go. They doing road construction again and have to get an early start. Can’t be late to work.”
Lily gave her head a clearing shake. Her mother typically moved through life at double-time, but Lily was usually quicker in making sense of her frenetic transitions. “Wait. That’s it?”
Her mother shrugged. “I trust you to make the right choices. I won’t worry unless Glenda does. She ain’t call me yet.”
“Yet,” Lance murmured.
Lily gave him a scolding nudge with her heel under the covers. “So, you know about shifters, then?”
“More than your father, probably. I don’t stick my head in the ground when things seem weird. I try to find out why. Not too hard when you make the right friends.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Didn’t want to start nothing with your father. He didn’t want you to think I condoned it. I don’t care one way or another.”
“Neither do I.”
“Good. So. What’s your name now?” Mamá asked.
“Still the same as it was.”
“Oh? Modern woman, huh?”
Lily let out a stilted laugh. Modernity had nothing to do with it. She’d simply never had the opportunity to file the paperwork. “Yeah. That’s me. So modern.”
“Well then, what’s my new son’s name?”
Lily must have been too slow to respond because Lance sighed and responded, “Lance, ma’am. Aitkenson.”
“You ain’t from there. Ain’t no Aitkensons there.”
“You’re right.”
“Mouthful. What’s your mother’s name? And her phone number. I’ll call her.”
“Mamá!” Lily held the phone just out of Lance’s reach. If she wasn’t mistaken, he was seriously about to give her that information.
“You know I can get it, mija,” her mother said calmly. “Either you give it, he gives it, or I call around during my lunch break. By supper, half the town will have chatted with me. Maybe I’m due to catch up with them, anyway.”
Lance snatched the phone and said, “Do you have a pen? I’ll give you her number. Just give me a few minutes to let her know to expect your call.”
And so he could tell her that her little boy had taken a bride, most likely.
Belly souring, Lily dragged a hand down her face.
What a mess.
Her mother held up her favorite ballpoint demonstrably and clicked the plunger.
“Cheryl Aitkenson.” He gave her the number.
Mamá grunted with satisfaction, blew them a kiss, and disconnected.
Lily glowered at him.
“Pick your battles,” he said. “And that didn’t need to be one.”
“Oh yeah? So you’re going to go tell your mother about our arrangement now, then?”
His expression was epically peaceful as he snatched his phone off the nightstand, punched in some numbers, and strode naked toward the hallway.
She crawled as far as the end of the bed, following him.
She could hear his muffled voice, probably through the closed bathroom door. He didn’t sound especially agitated, but that may have been wishful thinking on her part. She needed some things to fall easily into place so she didn’t have to be so scared about it. Their marriage may have been precipitous, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t make something beautiful.
Far too curious to stay back, she scooped up his shirt from the floor and pulled it on. He was on his way out of the bathroom when she approached, phone still to ear, eyebrow inching upward at her borrowed attire.
“Yeah, I’ll let you know.” He disconnected.
She cleared her throat. “Well?”
“See how easy that was? Unlike you, I don’t tap-dance around the truth when I intend to tell it.”
“I don’t tap-dance at all. That’s never been one of my styles.”
He snorted. “Well, you just earned yourself a one-on-one chat with my mother.”
The blood in her head took an instantaneous detour southward and left her listing.
Lily Baxter didn’t do the “meet the parents” thing. Never had.
“Whatever,” she said.
“You’ll see.”
“You didn’t.”
He shrugged. “When she disconnected, she was already getting a call waiting beep. Must have been your mother calling on her way to work.”
Lily smoothed her hands over her hair nervously. She’d never been forced to actually interact with her boyfriends’ parents in any significant sort of way before. If she ever got far enough into a relationship that they’d asked, she’d made an excuse to beg off. She’d reasoned that if she met their parents, they’d want to meet hers, and she didn’t see anything good coming of that.
But Lance wasn’t exactly a boyfriend.
“The expression you’re making right now is the ‘there’s been a huge mistake’ one,” Lance said.
“You need to get better at reading my faces, then.”
“Oh?” He pressed a hand to the wall at either side of her face and stole her space, smiling at her. A disconcerting sight given his expressions tended to skew heavily toward snarls and scowls. The smile made him look even more dangerous. That should have panicked her.
Should have, but didn’t.
“Since we’re up…” His gaze flitted downward for a brief pause. Of course, she looked down, too.
As he was naked, there was no disguising how he thought they could be efficiently using their time. And as she’d apparently run out of shame, she crossed her arms over her chest and stared down at his protruding erection. There wasn’t much light in the hallway, but enough to appreciate what she was starting to consider her favorite wedding gift.
“You’re lucky the passage is so narrow through here.”
“Hmm?” She was still staring. Pawing at him, actually. She wasn’t entirely sure when her hands had decided to take control of the situation.
“Yeah. Can’t hitch you up against the wall when the mood strikes.”
She cleared her throat. “Like right now?”
“Yeah. Like right now.”
“Walls are farther apart in the bedroom.”
“Are they?”
Apparently, he wanted to confirm that assertion. He scooped her up and carried her into the room, looking this way and that. “Yeah, I think you’re right.” He tossed his phone onto the bed, opened the drawer, and took out what he needed.
He ripped open a condom with his teeth and somehow managed to unroll it onto his cock without unhanding her.
All at once she was disgusted by his efficiency and strangely proud of it.
“I was going to put a safe here,” he commented as he put her back against the wall near the headboard. “But I think the space might have better uses.”
“I’m flexible. I can make any space work.” And that one was fine. She didn’t even care if the curtains weren’t all the way closed and that if the utility meter reading guy chose that moment to walk into the yard, he’d get a scandalous eyeful. Another thing for her father to catch wind of and email her mother about.