I really wanted to see him.
I sunk my head between my hands. My hair felt overly dry, in desperate need of moisturizing. This was so stupid. We were different people now. Why would I even think that things might be the same between us?
I couldn’t risk our friendship a second time. I’d just have to pretend those conversations never took place. Xavier would get the hint, wouldn’t he?
Day 256, Year 2251
Dear Xavier,
How have you been
I know it’s been awhile
How is military life
Living in New Tokyo is
I got married. And then divorced. I let myself get suckered in by a pretty body and a handsome face. I let myself think that looks alone would be good enough. You’d think I’d know better after what happened when Skye fell for that space pirate and almost got abducted. We all know how well that turned out. But if there’s no love, you might as well be contracting a freelance sex companion.
Maybe I’m not as bad as I think I am. But you know me, I’m stubborn. I have to make my own damn mistakes in order to learn anything.
I helped a friend buy an election. A small position on the city council, but one in charge of zoning. We’ll see how far that goes. (I really shouldn’t say much more. The government is probably going to read and censor this, aren’t they? But it doesn’t really matter because I probably won’t send this one either.)
That’s why it’s better that you’re not here in New Tokyo, I guess. I can make my mistakes without being watched by you. Somehow, I feel more free to fail because you’re not here. I don’t know why that is.
I’m becoming my scum space pirate father in some ways. And considering how much you disliked him, I know you wouldn’t approve.
But it’s funny. Even though you’re not here, you’re always in the back of my mind.
Lauryn
Day 406, Year 2256
“Wow. Look at that one. Those arms can’t be real.”
I was sitting at the hotel bar, having a martini and doing the networking thing, when my drinking partner’s mouth dropped open. We had bonded years ago over the fact that neither of us went for those popular body alterations. Jana was a brilliant data scientist who could pull patterns and answers out of dust motes, but you would never know it if you didn’t look beyond her penchant for ridiculous hats. Today she was wearing something that seemed to be made of purple feathers and gold wire artfully twisted into a tree. Or a hand. I wasn’t quite sure.
I turned, and saw the back of a tall man in line at the information desk. The cuffs of his short sleeves were tight against his massive biceps. Never-ending shoulders made it seem like he was ready to burst out of his clothes like a stellarwebs show character.
On any other day, I probably would have smiled and admired such an exemplary vision of a man, but I had other thoughts in my mind. Xavier was inward bound. A few hours ago, my secretary had alerted me that he had boarded the private plane to Banff.
That was when my heart seemed to start beating again.
The best thing to do was just to apologize and try to move on and be adult about it. Which explained why I was sitting at the bar, on my third martini, trying to drum up the courage to do it. Argh. Why the hell did I think that having him stay in my suite was a good idea - even if it was an apartment suite with a separate bedroom? It was too late to get him a different room. The hotel was sold out.
I turned back to Jana. “Yeah, guys don’t wear things that tight unless they're gay.”
Jana sighed. “You’re probably right.” All of a sudden she pulled down her hat, twinkling the bells tangled up in the wire tree. “Oh my God, he’s looking over here!”
I laughed. “What, are we in high school? Please. A man like that ain’t interested in us. He’s probably got some golden-skinned little sidepiece with pointy ears and jeweled nipples waiting for him in the upper levels.”
Jana released her hat. “It’s like watching a stargod come to Gaia. Look at those cheekbones. That mouth. You think he’s here for the conference? Maybe he’ll be on one of the panels."
I turned to look, but just as I did, the guy swiveled his chair around so that all I could see was his back and a cap. It figured. “Hey, we should go to the other networking cocktail party.”
Jana gave me a side eye. “The one that’s about to happen on the lake? On a boat? When did you suddenly stop hating, and I’ll quote, ‘boats and other things that float’."
I winced at her remembering what I said last year. That’s what happens when you drink with your friends. “I don’t know. Just thought it would be interesting. Trying new things. Adds some spice to life, right?”
“Riight. Oh, look at that man smile. He could melt glaciers with that smile.”
“Will you just stop?”
She pouted. “Oh, you’re no fun. You’re not even looking.”
“Fine.” I turned to look, but of course, at that exact moment he got up and walked to the elevator. Damn, she was right. Watching him walk was like watching sex in motion. The sway of that muscled ass in those tight, but not too tight jeans. The widened swing of those powerful arms. Now that was a man to hold on to, a man that could handle a woman my size. I could imagine straddling that big, powerful body—
God, what was I thinking, getting all hot and bothered right now?
“See, I told you so,” said Jana too smugly.
My texter beeped with a message. The resort had com-shielding built into the walls to facilitate in-person interactions and networking. The only way to communicate other than face-to-face was text chatting on old-fashioned text chat devices or archaic wired voice telephony. My mouth went dry as I looked at it.
I’m here. Will I see you soon?
Shit. I was in trouble.
Glad you made it! Sorry, I have a few more social-business obligations to take care of. It might take awhile. Don’t wait up.
Is there a reason we’re staying in the same suite?
I fumbled with the phone, nearly dropping it.
Hotel was sold out.
I see. See you soon.
I paid for our drinks and stood up. “Let’s just go to the boat.”
I had always hated boats. And now I was stuck on one with a bunch of business people pretending to have a good time while trying to gain an advantage over everyone else. I used to actually enjoy these things, but now, I just wasn’t in the mood.
It wasn’t that boats made me queasy or sick; I've never had that problem. It was the fact that if I fell in the water, my hair would shrink and turn into a disgusting mess that would take me hours to deal with.
I used to love swimming when I was little. Xavier and I would spend weeks at our local swimming hole. It wasn’t until I was twelve and my hair started getting really kinky that I stopped. A bunch of local boys decided to stick a waterfly cocoon in my hair when I fell asleep by the beach. Xavier found out and somehow managed to make sure they never even looked at me again.
I sipped my fourth, and I vowed, my last martini of the night. Jana was engrossed in a conversation about data scaling structures so I walked over to the railing. A couple giggled in the dark, and I moved to give them privacy. I maneuvered myself toward the front of the boat into a little alcove in the bulkhead, which I fit in, just barely. The white reflection of the full pink moon rippled slightly from the boat’s passage on the still surface of the lake. I closed my blazer a little more tightly around myself to protect from the chill. All around the boat, little glowing octopi darted amongst the black waters, like tiny moving stars.
LD Holdings was now such a big corporation that I didn’t have to lie, cheat, steal, or blackmail anymore. Okay, maybe not the blackmailing, because there was this new asshole around who was responsible for too many hard working families being evicted from their homes. I wondered if I could have made my company what it was without cutting corners.
No. That would have been impossible. If you’re coming from the bottom up in New Tokyo, you
have to take, no, make every advantage you can to survive. Or you’ll be gone before you even arrived. Even now, looking back, I would do it all again. And maybe that was why I was so troubled. Because Xavier deserved a good woman who would have given it all up for him and stay in that little town. And stars knew, I had never been that woman.
One could see the lake from the balcony of my top floor suite at the hotel. I looked at the lights of the hotel and wondered if Xavier was looking out from that balcony right now.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” said a deep voice from somewhere behind me.
I didn’t turn to look. I didn’t really feel like being propositioned by a stranger tonight.
“Yeah,” I said in a tone that I hoped conveyed that I didn’t want to be bothered.
“When I was off-planet, there were two moons where I was stationed; a red one and a blue one. They were both beautiful in their own way, but they weren’t the moon that I grew up with.”
That voice…what the—?
I turned. And had to look up into eyes that I had known almost forever, but had somehow changed color from green to slate gray. That wasn’t the only thing that had changed.
The baby fat was gone, and dark stubble covered a cleft chin that look like it had been carved from someone’s wet dream. He was taller than I remembered, and what seemed like ten times the size of the man he had been. He was wearing a blazer, dressed formally, but even that couldn’t disguise how massively wide his arms were.
“Xavier?” I couldn’t believe it. I looked him up and down. “What - who -”
He smiled a smile so predatory that it made me quiver. “It’s good to see you again.”
This was Xavier? “What are you doing here?”
He handed me a glass with ice and some clear liquid. “You invited me.”
I gripped the cold glass as if holding it could stifle the heat I suddenly felt. “I mean on the boat. How did you know I was here?”
“The resort is very eager to help the guests of Lauryn Daring.”
I looked at the glass, then back at him. If I looked hard, I could find the boy I remembered. His hair was cut much shorter, military style, and there was a faint scar cutting across his right eyebrow. There was a hardness to the planes in his face that hadn’t been there before.
But it was the way he looked at me that made me want to tremble. I handed the glass back to him. “I’ve had too much to drink tonight.”
His big fingers enclosed my hand. His palm was searing. I jerked my hand, but he held me fast. “It’s just water. Drink.”
I did as he commanded. I wanted to run and hide from that piercing gaze. Foolishly, at the same time something deep inside me wanted him so desperately it was almost hard to breathe.
Xavier squeezed my hand. “You haven’t changed at all.”
I remembered his words the last night I saw him. “You may not believe it, but I’ve always thought you beautiful.”
He was the first man to ever say that to me.
I closed my mind to those memories. “You, on the other hand, changed quite a bit.”
He ran his fingers through his hair. The motion folded back his arms, widened his chest in a motion that made him seem even larger. “Being stationed on a planet with heavier gravity will change you. Among other things."
I gripped the railing. Heavier gravity. Oh, damn. That was like forcing your body to constantly lift weights, nonstop. For more than a decade. No wonder he was built like a deep space starship.
Not in a billion years was I prepared for Xavier to be this big gorgeous man. Thinking about it was making me light-headed.
He was watching me with a gaze that made me feel as if he knew exactly what I was thinking. “Are you okay?”
The boat wobbled as the engine suddenly revved. I turned to grab the railing, and stumbled. He caught me as if I were as light as stardust. His arm was like warm angel-steel as it wrapped around my waist. I was leaning against a mountain of solid muscle. I took a deep breath trying to steady myself but all I did was inhale his scent, all man and a note reminiscent of the oaksandal field we sat together in so many years ago. Goosebumps shimmied up my body and I started to feel hot and cold all at once.
“Just surprised to see you here.”
The engine thrummed underneath us. I would barely be able to hear him if I wasn’t so close. His other arm wrapped around me. I should have felt trapped, but oddly enough I felt more like a cat in heat. My heart was beating so fast it felt as if it were humming. I straightened up, trying to pretend I had no desire at all to rub myself against him and purr.
He laughed, a deep rumble in his chest that felt as if it vibrated right through me. “I could say the same about you. I thought you hated the water.” He began stroking my bare upper arm, up and down. The roughness of his calluses sent tingles all the way down to my core.
“I still do. But networking is a necessary…” His fingers trailed across my shoulder, to my bare neck. "…evil.”
His chest rose against me as he inhaled deeply. “I missed you.”
This was crazy. This wasn’t the Xavier I knew, the boy I grew up with. This Xavier was a real stranger. It took all my strength to pull away from him, to look him in the eyes.
“You’re so different than what I remembered.”
“There are wolf-shifters on Alzar-4,” he said, closing the distance between us. My heart pounded. Part of me knew I should step back, but I refused to give any ground. A primal feminine part of me trembled at his approach and I felt myself becoming damp. “They are perfectly adapted to the terrain of Alzar-4. So when they called for volunteers to liaison with the packs, I signed up.”
“You became a liaison,” I echoed his words like an idiot. Wait, was he saying what I think I was saying?
He was so close to me.
“And certain packs will only accept other wolf-shifters.”
I reached up to touch his face. He was so close, and yet I felt as if I were reaching across a bridge I thought I had long destroyed. The stubble on his face scratched at my fingers. “You became a werewolf.”
He leaned into my hand, cupping it. Slowly he turned, brushing his lips against my fingers. His mouth was so hot. He flicked the tip of his tongue against a fingertip. Need burned inside me, twisting my thoughts. He was a delicious dream given real form. Not only that, it was Xavier.
Oh stars, it was Xavier.
Desire coursed through me. I was startled at how powerfully I wanted him. All I could think about was him and how much I wanted to see and feel the rest of him.
“It doesn’t frighten you, what I am,” he said, his lips on the inside of my wrist. He could probably feel how fast my pulse was racing, but there was nothing I could do to hide it from him.
“No.”
“In fact,” he said, yanking me against him with one arm, "it turns you on." I could suddenly feel his massive hardness against my belly, as he wrapped a hand around my wrist. His tone was so arrogantly smug it made me struggle for a moment, but it was like trying to move a stone statue. All my useless wiggling did was make it even clearer that I was trapped. This was not the Xavier I remembered.
Fuck, that made me wet.
His eyes widened in predatory delight. He pushed me against the bulkhead of the boat. “It turns you on,” he repeated.
My heart was a drum. I felt so hot it was amazing that I wasn’t burning up. “You’re crazy.”
“You've never been good at lying, Lauryn, at least not to me.” He released my wrist, pinning me against the bulkhead with his hips. One hand began traveling up the slit of my skirt. Oh God, the touch of his fingers against my thighs was going to kill me.
“Werewolf, remember? Heightened senses are part of the package. I can smell how wet you are.” His fingers found the trail of liquid streaming down my legs. He grinned in savage delight. “You’re dripping. You want me. You can’t deny it. You want me to fuck you. Maybe even right here.”
His fingers easily slid between my lace pa
nties to find my wetness. His callused fingers against my clit induced shudders. My pussy clenched as he stroked me. I arched my hips wantonly. It had no right to feel this good.
What was I thinking? I couldn’t let him do this to me, not here, not now, where anyone could just walk right by and see. I grabbed his wrist, trying to stop him, but all I did was make him skim his fingertips to my entrance. “Fuck,” I gasped, trying to be quiet. I would be in trouble if one of my clients walked by. I shuddered at the sensation of his fingertips rimming my pussy. My hips strained against his control. My body needed him, not just his fingers, but his cock inside me.
“Xavier, please. We can’t do this here. Someone might see.”
“Shhh,” he said easing his hips back, his fingers still between my wet thighs. His stubble grazed the tip of my ear. “Looks like someone else is doing the begging tonight.” He tipped my chin up to him. I looked at him, his eyes searching mine. “I’ve waited for this for a long time.”
His mouth claimed mine, hard and fast. Electricity shot through every fiber of my body. Every last bit of my resistance was demolished by his mouth’s brutal assault, leaving me a tremoring wet pool of need. His tongue lashed mine for all the years we had been apart. I let him in, opening myself to him, hoping that somehow I could convey how much I needed him, how much I was sorry.
He pushed me against the bulkhead. Two thick fingers impaled me. My knees buckled at the feeling of him inside me. He held me up.
“You are so fucking tight. You’re perfect, Lauryn.”
Holy shit. He wasn’t just holding me up but lifting me off the ground so that his mouth was level with my chest. With his other arm, he yanked open my shirt. Buttons popped and scattered. Another movement and my nipple was free. He sucked. Pleasure streaked through me. It was all I could do not to moan out loud.
I rode his other arm. He was solid as stone as I as rocked back and forth, impaled on him. The thought of the massive strength required to hold me steady with a single hand nearly made me dissolve right there. He licked and kissed upward, lowering me back down to my feet. He kissed me again. The taste of him was like coming home and I wanted more.
The Boy Who Came Back a Wolf Page 2