by Price, E A
“Hello Kayleigh dear.” Mrs Martin gave Kayleigh a sickly sweet fake smile, and Don a disapproving glare.
Don raised an eyebrow at Kayleigh who rolled her eyes. He chuckled quietly. Their own little secret joke, that felt nice.
“I just wanted to offer my congratulations.”
“Hmmm? What for?” Kayleigh was too busy eyeing up Don to really pay attention.
Mrs Martin scoffed. “Your engagement of course, I heard Greg proposed.”
Kayleigh’s eyes widened and she snapped back to Mrs Martin. That was really something that she ought to remember... Instinctively she rubbed her thumb over the back of the engagement ring.
Kayleigh was flustered. “Oh yes of course, yes he did... we’re... we’re getting married.”
“I’m sure you’ll both be very happy, I hope you have a long and joyful marriage.” Said Mrs Martin in a syrupy voice, the hardness of her eyes made Kayleigh doubted she really hoped that. Happy marriages didn’t make very good gossip.
Kayleigh turned back to Don a little shamefaced. Why she didn’t know, she hadn’t done anything wrong. It’s not like she had even flirted with him, her mouths inability to connect to her brain made sure of that.
Don wasn’t smiling anymore. “Congratulations.” Was it her imagination or did he say that a little stiffly?
Kayleigh laughed nervously. “Ummm thanks. So, Mal was telling me that you’re spending the week camping.”
“Kind of, we’ll be honing his tracking and hunting skills.”
“Ooooh that sounds like fun.” In all honestly spending the week in a tiny tent with Don did sound appealing...
He stared at her. Maybe he thought she was being sarcastic. Seconds ago he was all smiles and easygoing charm, now he was being a little standoffish.
“If you ladies will excuse me I must be on my way.” He tipped his hat to them. If Mrs Martin wasn’t there she truly would have swooned.
Don strode over to Mal and Terri. Kayleigh couldn’t help but notice, mostly because she was gawping at him like a lovestruck teenager, that he had a really sexy walk. She’d never considered a walk sexy before, but damn! His long muscled legs had a laid-back swagger and god his ass was perfect.
She wondered if she could get him to walk back over here just to send him away again. She shook her head, what the hell was she thinking? Alright so he looked delicious, and was smoking hot, that didn’t make it okay for her to openly leer at him. Did it? No, of course not! She had a fiancée, she should be looking at him. Her fiancée had no qualms about looking at other women though... it’s not like she was doing anything wrong... not really.
After a few impatient words from Don Mal finally let go of Terri, and with one last puppy dog look that sent Terri into a fit of giggles he was out the door. Don followed behind. Noting Kayleigh watching him he tipped his hat again. Double swoon.
She wondered if Don had a mate already... no bad girl! It didn’t matter as she already had a fiancée. A fiancée! Still a little harmless daydreaming can’t hurt, can it?
*
Don glanced in the rearview mirror in exasperation. They’d only been on the road for an hour and already Mal was snoring. Not quietly snoring either, he sounded like a damn donkey with a head cold. He felt a new respect for Mal’s mate having to sleep next to him every night.
That thought gave him a twinge. Mal was only 19 years old and already he had met his mate, they had bonded and they were expecting a pup. It threw into relief his own failure in that area of his life.
Felicity the other new Enforcer he was taking to train grunted, rolled up the magazine she was reading and twisting back in her seat swiftly thunked Mal on the nose. Mal howled awake and they started arguing. Loudly.
Don groaned. He liked nothing more than hunting and tracking. Alone. Spending a week in the middle of nowhere with two immature, hormonal, squabbling wolves was not a thrilling prospect. But as the pack’s tracker it was his responsibility to teach others. His Alpha Adam and the Chief Enforcer Acksel insisted that all Enforcers receive advanced training in hunting and tracking.
Normally he just shrugged and got on with it. He was generally pretty even-tempered, but today he was on his last nerve, and not in the mood to put up with any of their crap.
“Enough!” Roared Don.
The two younger wolves immediately hushed. Don quickly veered to the side of the road and slammed on the breaks. They all shot forward in their seats and were thrown backwards with resounding thuds.
He gripped the steering wheel tightly. “Felicity get in the back seat.” He ground out.
She went red but quickly complied. Mal moved over to give her some room. They cast each other inquisitive glances.
“You two behave like kids again and I’m turnin’ round and tellin’ Adam and Acksel that you ain’t fit to be Enforcers. Understood?!”
They were wide eyed and a little dumbstruck, but on noting the murderous look on Don’s face they quickly mumbled that they did.
After a couple of deep breaths he started driving again. He was being an asshole and he didn’t give a fuck. He was having a bad day.
It was that damn little witch’s fault. His beast bellowed at him furiously for that. Don flinched a little, it had been a hell of a long time since he had been out of synch with his wolf. It was a little jarring.
He knew there were some shifters who were never genuinely at peace with the beast within. Hans Lucas sprung to mind. However he and his wolf since their very first shift had pretty much always been in harmony. Not an easy feat. But now they had found something to disagree on, Kayleigh Lewicki.
From the moment she turned her luscious smile in his direction he had been hard. Painfully hard. It had been over twenty years since he’d had such a visceral reaction to a woman. Not since Melinda.
It scared the fucking hell out of him.
Just looking at her made his damn wolf pant like a dog in heat. His heart had sped up and heat had washed through his entire body. Not forgetting the almighty bulge in the front of his jeans.
She wasn’t even his type. He always went for small, petite, dark haired women. Just like Melinda. They were the closest he could get to her.
Kayleigh wasn’t exactly tall but she wasn’t small, sitting down it was kind of hard to tell, but at a guess she was five foot seven. And she was by no means petite either. His wolf growled at him for that. Okay, okay down boy! So she wasn’t petite, she big and curvy. Boy was she curvy!
Unobtrusively he pushed his palm against his groin, praying the other two wolves didn’t notice. He was about to spend a week alone with them, the last thing he wanted was to start the week with them snickering at his erection. He wasn’t so comfortable with his pack mates that he could laugh that off.
He should stop thinking about Kayleigh. He had to stop picturing her honey blonde hair and how much he wanted to comb his fingers through it. He had to stop imagining her dark brown eyes looking at him with love and lust. He had to stop remembering her glorious scent, the soft aroma of honeysuckle. He just had to stop. Full stop!
He just hoped he’d managed to keep it together with her. He had thought he was acting normally, but given that he was inwardly struggling with his wolf at the time he wasn’t the best judge. His animal had felt an immediate affinity with the young woman and was pissed at the man for not actively pursuing her. By which he meant throwing her over his shoulder and running all the way back to his cabin.
When the subject of her fiancée arose... his wolf had gone nuts. Well nuttier. He had an urge to track the man down and challenge him to a fight to the death. Yeah, when he really liked a woman he did kind of turn into a caveman. It had just been a long time since he had felt that way about any woman...
It didn’t matter how he felt. For one thing he wasn’t looking for a woman, he had nothing to offer a woman long term. He doubted Kayleigh was the type of woman who would settle for a one night deal. He sensed a bit of tenacity in her that, whilst he found it really hot, meant
she wouldn’t take no for an answer. For another she was already taken.
That last part really riled him up but nevertheless it meant she was off limits. It wouldn’t be too hard to stop thinking about her. He’d spent the last twenty years mourning the only woman he ever loved, he could easily get over a chance encounter with a pretty witch. Right?
Of course he could. He was 40 years old for god’s sake. He wasn’t a horny young shifter, he’d spent years learning how to control his primal urges, actually getting to the point where he wasn’t forced to shift on the full moon. That took discipline.
That was another problem. His age. At a guess she was 21 or 22. He was almost twice her age, and old enough to be her father. She deserved better than a jaded old heartless wolf like him.
Speaking of his wolf... the animal was whining pitifully at him. Don rolled his eyes. The wolf would just have to deal with it. There were plenty of keen women out there who would freely warm his bed for a night, and definitely wouldn’t expect a lifetime commitment. When they got back from the trip he would take a trip into Darlington and find one and make his wolf forget that Kayleigh even existed.
The beast huffed at him doubtingly. Well he can huff and puff all day long, it didn’t matter how darn sexy Kayleigh was the man wasn’t changing his mind! No siree!
Chapter Three
Kayleigh slammed the door behind her and leaned against it. She’d had a bad day... sort of. Nothing really bad or out of the ordinary had actually happened.
Winston the nudist bull shifter had turned up and given a show to the ladies from the suncrest nursing home who were there for their bookclub. He had trirf to shock them but in truth the ladies thought it was hilarious. They were all octogenarians, they’d seem penis’ before, it was nothing new to them! Although they did marvel at Winston’s enormous testicles, and the fact that he didn’t seem affected by the cold. It was pretty damn cold out there and the only concessions Winston had made to the weather were a pair of workers boots and a scarf.
A fight had also broken out in library between the two Lucas twin sisters, Gwen and Britt, who were both convinced that Darryl Tanner was their true mate. It was a shame Darryl never set foot in the library, he would have loved to have seen it.
Then of course there were the incessant questions from Mrs Martin about her engagement and ultimate wedding. Mrs Martin kept asking her where the ceremony would be, who the bridesmaids would be, would she have a band at the reception, did she really think it was appropriate to wear white... Each question made her heart constrict just a little more.
All in all her day was pretty normal. So why did she feel so twitchy and out of sorts?
“Greg?” She called out tentatively. “You home?”
The apartment was dark but sometimes if Greg was so caught up playing a video game he wouldn’t even bother to get up to pee, never mind to turn the lights on.
No answer. She sighed in relief. She didn’t really feel like talking. All she wanted to do was put on her nightshirt and crawl into bed with a good book. No scratch that, a deliciously smutty book. They always made her feel better.
She moved to the bedroom and began slipping out of her clothes. She remembered the first time she read an erotic romance. She was 12. Her mother had left her home alone for a few days whilst she went to Vegas with her latest boyfriend.
Sadly mom had forgotten to pay the electric bill, again. So there was no TV, no heat, no hot water... she could have just gone round to the neighbours but she refused to admit defeat. She dug out her mother’s Grimoire and found a spell she could just about manage to create heat. She burnt half a loaf of bread trying to make toast and set the curtains on fire but she got there in the end. She lit dozens of candles and curled up on the sofa in her duvet.
She didn’t know what else to do for entertainment without the TV, she’d didn’t have many toys when she was a baby so her mom had always just stuck her in front of the TV. So she hunted round the apartment until she found a few books in her mother’s bedside cabinet, as well as a long pink vibrating appliance that she wished she hadn’t seen at the time. It wasn’t a big deal to her now, she owned her own now...
She picked the book with the funniest looking cover. A half naked young woman was suspended by rope in a barn, with a naughty look on her face, whilst a surly looking cowboy was watching her whilst holding a riding crop. Reluctantly, with no other option Kayleigh started reading. From the first page she was hooked.
She devoured all the books her mother owned that weekend. Then as soon as she could she went to the local library and applied for a member card. The librarian thought it was a bit odd that a 12 year old girl was reading erotic romances but didn’t like to say anything when confronted with Kayleigh’s determined little face. Over the years the two of them actually became friends and the librarian started recommending books to Kayleigh, she was a big a fan of the genre too.
That was what started Kayleigh’s obsession with erotic romance. She was now 22 and had demolished hundreds of books. But as much as she loved the stories she was a realist, she knew that the passion she read about in those books didn’t happen in real life. Well not very often anyway. At least she knew that the passion in those books would never happen to her. Although she’d always really hoped...
Sigh. But anyway, coming home to a new book was the highlight of her day. Well apart from one other thing. Meeting Don had been a little ray of sunshine.... no, no, no, no no! That was a bad way to think.
Kayleigh went into the bathroom naked. She looked in the mirror and surveyed her body. Hmmm not bad, even if she did say so herself. She started removing her contact lenses and make-up. Did Don think she had a nice body?
Okay so Don was totally hot. Smouldering even. And yes she always had a thing for older men. Probably something to do with her mom’s boyfriends showing her more affection than her mom actually did. Yeah, total daddy issues.
Her mom Cora had totally been convinced that Kayleigh had actively tried to steal her boyfriends, particularly her favourite boyfriend Tim, who preferred Kayleigh’s company to Cora’s. Kayleigh was 14 and just wanted to go to the zoo to see the baby hippo...
Her mom turned a bit cold after that, she looked at her daughter askance and rarely brought her boyfriends home again. Her mom thought she was a deceptive little temptress. Kayleigh thought her mom was whack a doodle.
But since then, right or wrong, she certainly had a thing for older guys. She liked men who were more experienced. Which was why she chose a guy twenty years older than her to lose her virginity to. If it was going to be a painful experience the least she wanted was someone who knew what he was doing.
She also liked men who were firm with her. She was the first to admit that she was just a tiny bit pushy and sometimes could be kind of loud-mouthed. So the last thing she wanted was a guy who would let her just walk all over him. She wanted some backbone damnit!
She frowned thinking of Greg. At 27 he was the youngest man she had ever been with. When they first met he had been very assertive and that turned her on no end. Hey, she knew what she liked and she wasn’t going to apologise. Over the months they had been together he seemed to have mellowed. She was starting to wonder if his forcefulness at the start of the relationship was just down to his anger over his last girlfriend cheating on him. Then as time wore on he got over her and reverted back to his normal easy going personality. Hmmmmmm.
Kayleigh pulled an oversized t-shirt over her head. It had a picture of a wolf howling at a moon and her thoughts immediately returned to Don. She wondered how old he was. Late thirties at a guess. Not that it mattered to her, she’d had older. Not that she was planning on having him or anything.
Although she imagined he’d be a pretty damn fierce lover. No, she mentally slapped herself. She was not the sort to cheat. But that surely didn’t stop herself having a little fantasy did it?
Don was sex on legs, and she did always have a fantasy about having sex with a rough older Texan. Not to mention
she and Greg hadn’t had sex since before the night he proposed. He’d been too tired from working long hours or too drunk to perform. So it wasn’t really a surprise that she was really horny.
She could just imagine Don’s rough calloused hands reaching between her legs, parting her folds and pushing his thick fingers... she felt herself moisten excitedly. Perhaps she should find her own vibrating appliance...
Swiftly she smeared cold cream all over her face and donned her thick glasses. She unpinned her hair and brushed it through. It stuck out at odd angles after having been curled around her head all day. She laughed when she saw her appearance. From sex-bomb to frumpy in a few short moves. If Don could only see how frightful she looked...
Kayleigh turned out the bathroom light and quickly made herself comfortable in bed. She was just reaching for the bedside table when she froze.
A key was rattling in the door. Swiftly she turned out the light, took her glasses off and snuggled under the covers. Phew! That was close. A few minutes later and... not that she was doing anything wrong. She had happily been enjoying self-orgasms since she was 15! She just didn’t really want her boyfriend, no fiancée, to catch her masturbating, anymore than she would want to catch him doing it. There was such a thing as being too close...
She closed her eyes and evened out her breathing, pretending to be asleep.
She felt the bed dip slightly. “Kayleigh, you asleep?” Greg whispered.
She concentrated on breathing in and out. She heard a loud sigh before the weight was lifted from the bed. Gentle footsteps retreated to the bathroom, the sound of the humming bathroom light and of Greg gargling were slightly muffled. She listened as the light was clicked off and once again the bed dipped as he spread himself over it. She felt the heat of his body inches from hers.
Within a few minutes his rhythmic snores reverberated throughout the small room. She blinked open, watching his chest rise and fall for a few seconds.
She shouldn’t have pretended to be asleep, but part of her was kind of worried that Greg might have wanted sex. As guilty as she felt about it she was riled up thinking about Don. She didn’t want to have sex with Greg whilst thinking about another man. That was way too icky. Thinking about Michael Fassbender was one thing, he was a movie star and therefore unattainable. But thinking about a living, breathing man from the same town as them... that wasn’t right.