by Marilu Mann
“There was no will? No next of kin?”
“Well, it wasn’t like they’d planned to die.” She shoved away from the table and Micah cursed himself under his breath. Perhaps she really didn’t know what she was? Could it be possible? Could her parents have truly left a shifter child alone in the world? Where were her godparents?
Shifters always provided for their children. There was always someone who knew what they were, how to contact relatives, friends. They always had someone who would take care of the children if anything happened to the parents. Micah himself was godfather to several shifter children, responsible for their care should their parents die or need his assistance in other ways. It was the closest thing to a sacred duty to him.
“I’m sorry, Olivia.” Micah moved closer to her, wanting to pull her into his arms but refraining. Instead, he closed the distance with only his hand to touch her hair gently, relishing the feel of the soft strands that tangled around his fingers. “Where are the Decaturs now?”
Fear crossed her face quickly replaced by sorrow. “They’re dead. They died in a car wreck when I was thirteen. But they’d left a will. I lived with my mother’s sister and her husband. My Aunt Jill and Uncle Neal were my guardians until I was in college.
“They loved me, but it wasn’t the same. My parents,” she hesitated. “The Decaturs ’ death really shook them. I shouldn’t have survived, but I did. My therapist thinks that’s why…” her voice trailed off quietly as she pulled away from his touch.
Chapter Four
She shook her head quickly then stepped to his side and turned to face him. “I’m sorry. I overreacted. I guess you’ve got a close family?”
Micah took a deep breath. Olivia’s scent carried guilt but he didn’t know why. Instead of asking any more questions about her family, he let her shift the focus to him. “We grew up close, but we’re fairly scattered now. I have a large family, that’s for sure.”
“How large?” She moved to sit at the table again and he followed slowly.
“I have my mother, eight siblings and at last count-twenty nieces and nephews. My father died when I was a teenager, but my paternal grandfather helped rear us.”
She simply stared at him. He wasn’t sure if it was in awe or utter shock. “You have thirty people in your immediate family?”
“At last count. I’m sure there are more nieces or nephews by now or on the way. My siblings seem to enjoy large families. Only two of us aren’t married and procreating just yet.”
“I see. Well, thank you for answering my questions and for the stew. I really should go transcribe these notes so I don’t wonder what I chicken-scratched later.”
She stood up, stretching as she did. Micah watched her lean form move under the shirt. Her breasts. His hands ached from not being able to touch her. Still, he had to wait for that first move. Her ass swayed delectably as she exited the room.
Micah cleared the table, glad the seeming crisis had been averted but determined to find out more about Olivia’s childhood. If in fact she didn’t know she was a shifter, if that was why she didn’t acknowledge that he was, it might be interesting to introduce her to their shared world. But it was going to be hell on his hormones if he couldn’t act on his need for that sexy she-wolf.
Olivia headed back to her room full of information but she really needed to process her own reaction to her dreamy host. When he’d reached out to stroke her hair, she’d had to fight leaning into him. It just seemed like the right thing to do but there was no way she could do that.
If she let him know how much she wanted him, she knew he would respond favorably. There was no mistaking the interest in his eyes. Olivia closed her eyes as she shut her door behind her. Sagging against the wood, she released a gust of air.
“Olivia. You know why you can not have sex with that man.” Scolding herself did not help. She sat down to type out her notes, but opened up a second document on her computer to journal a bit about her reaction to him. As the first man in a while who had seriously made her want to get naked, Micah Keeps Vigil would have to be processed.
As she wrote about him, the words turned from clinical to personal to sexual. Soon she typed out an erotic fantasy where she was on her hands and knees with him pounding his cock into her as he called out her name.
“Olivia?
This time he knocked too. Olivia jumped as she realized the knock and her name were real. Slamming the laptop closed, she shoved back from the desk. Where had the time gone? Her clock showed two hours later.
“Olivia?” Micah’s voice carried through the wood. “I thought you might like to take an afternoon walk with me. I have to check some of the property and you might see a different variety of wildlife at this time of day. Would you like to go?”
He stood with one hand on the doorframe, filling the space when she opened the door. Ducking his head, he stepped across the threshold when she waved him in.
“I’d love to, Micah. Let me grab a sweater and then we can layer up for the outside.”
His approving chuckle made her belly feel toasty and warm. Once they were rewrapped for the weather, Olivia followed Micah out again in the afternoon for another walk on the snowshoes. She’d gotten the hang of them though she wasn’t quite as graceful on them as she’d hoped she’d be. But now that she was focused less on her face not being planted in the snow, she had to acknowledge the frisson she felt around this man.
As they walked up to a lake, she imagined she would feel little arcs of electricity when he would stop to point out various animal burrows, squirrel nests and the mistletoe in the tops of some of the trees. She allowed herself a moment to daydream about him holding a sprig of mistletoe over her head as he lowered his mouth down to hers for a deep, seeking kiss.
Micah didn’t just show her the animals. He told her about them. It was as if he knew them intimately-almost as if he understood their very nature. Olivia paid close attention to his words and to the man himself. She watched the fluidity of his walk, even on the ungainly snowshoes. He was definitely the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen in her life.
Her hands itched to roam all over his tall body. The thought of tracing his muscles had her biting the inside of her cheek. Not good to moan while hiking behind the man. She figured he had to weigh well over two hundred pounds, but she’d wager that not an ounce of it was fat.
She breathed deeply, the bite of the winter air causing her to cough. Micah glanced back at her, his concern fading to amusement. Olivia shook her head on a short laugh. “How cold do you think it is right now?”
“Now? Probably less than ten degrees. With the wind chill though, it’s probably eighteen or twenty below. Are you warm enough?”
“Well, my nose is getting numb, but the rest of me is warm enough.” She couldn’t stop the feeling of pure feminine pleasure that swept over her as Micah’s gaze moved from the top of her red hat to her booted feet. Her belly heated up even as her head reminded her that she could never indulge in that reality.
He tilted his head back toward the lodge and they started moving down the path. Olivia looked over to the side and stopped dead in her tracks.
“Micah,” she whispered.
He stopped, turning to look at her. Moving very slowly, Olivia gestured with one hand toward the side of the path. Micah moved back to her, staring into the woods. “Something moved. I think it was a wolf. There! Do you see him?”
“Yes.” His voice matched the quiet in hers.
Olivia stood mesmerized. She watched the edge of the woods where a wolf stood. Beside her, Micah was perfectly still. The wolf stood in profile to them, looking at them over his left shoulder for a long moment then turned and disappeared into the undergrowth.
Olivia took a deep breath then turned to face the man beside her. “Just how many wolves are there in these woods?”
“What do you mean?”
She noted that his voice sounded funny, but she plugged on. “Last night I saw the biggest gray wolf I’ve ever s
een in my life in the clearing around the lodge and now this white wolf in the woods. Are there more of them around?”
“Sometimes. Depends on the time of the month-I mean year.” He shrugged. “Let’s get you back to the lodge.” She noted that his voice sounded normal again.
He led the way in silence and they reached the lodge without seeing any other wildlife. Olivia shook her hair free of the woolen hat, laughing a little at the static, and hung the hat up on a peg just inside the door.
They toed off their boots, pulled off gloves and then Micah reached out to help her with her jacket. For just a moment, she thought about doing the same to him just so she could wrap her arms around his massive chest.
She wanted to nuzzle into his neck, smell his skin and feel his arms around her. She really wanted to rip his shirt off and see if his body followed through on the promise it seemed to be making. No! No ripping. No biting or clawing either. Remember Jackson? You could do to Micah what you did to Jackson.
Visions of the flashing lights and sirens from that awful night filled her mind. Shaking her head at her own wayward thoughts, Olivia went back toward the kitchen. Micah followed her on silent feet.
Scooping up her notepad, Olivia turned to find Micah leaning against the counter. His gaze lasered straight into her core, threatening another meltdown. She faltered. “I…I think I’ll just go upstairs and put some more of these notes into my computer.”
“You should take a warm shower just to make sure you don’t get a chill. Or you could join me in the sauna.” The lazy sensuality of his voice only added to the lava forming in her stomach. But she couldn’t let him know that.
“Maybe I will. Just not right now. I really need to get these images down on paper.”
Smiling, Olivia moved past him to the staircase. She could feel Micah’s gaze on her as she went quickly up to the hallway. When she gained the privacy of her room, she leaned against the closed door for a moment, trying to catch her breath.
“Sauna? Puh-lease! If I saw him naked in the sauna I’d definitely have to jump his bones.” Olivia laughed, pushing away from the door. “And that would be such a bad move.”
Her laughter faded as Jackson ’s face floated up in her memory. Her first lover, the man she would have married if she’d been able to keep herself from going wild at his touch.
Olivia swept a stray lock of hair behind her ear. They’d kissed before-even fooled around a bit and when he’d taken her to bed the first time, she’d been sure he was the man for her. She’d even accepted his marriage proposal. Then, one night, everything had changed. They’d been having sex and she’d gone crazy on him.
He’d forgiven her. Of course he’d also broken up with her. His words spoken with kindness but tinged with fear still rang in her ears. Olivia, I think maybe you need to see someone about this. It’s not normal to be so violent in the bedroom. I love you but I can’t deal with your aggression.
She’d had to agree when faced with the stitches on his cheek that mirrored the ones on his chest. And she’d had her acrylic nails removed and vowed never to wear them again. If only she’d known that uninhibited sex did that to her. Her therapist had suggested past sexual abuse that she’d buried, but Olivia knew that wasn’t it.
It was tied to the monster inside her. The one who had killed her parents. Enough! Slamming the door on those painful memories, she moved purposely toward the desk and her laptop, opening it and striking a few keys to wake it up. She paged through her notes from earlier then pulled up a blank document and started writing her article. She forced herself not to return to her earlier erotic journaling.
As usual, she lost track of time as she wrote. The light tapping on her door pulled her out of the story taking shape in front of her and back to the present.
“Yes?”
“I just wondered if you were ready for dinner.” Micah’s voice carried through the closed door.
“Dinner?” Olivia glanced at the clock on her laptop, shook her head and moved toward the door. “I’m sorry, I completely lost track of time.”
She also lost her ability to speak as she pulled the door open. Micah stood in front of her door in a blue denim shirt and jeans that hugged his hips and thighs. His hair fell loose around his shoulders and her mouth went dry as she let her gaze roam freely from the top of his head to his moccasins with a long pause at the hidden treasure behind his zipper. She finally raised her eyes to meet his gaze.
“Are you hungry?”
“Starving.” And for more than just food. Olivia knew at that moment she wanted desperately to make love to this man. The breakup with Jackson had been eight years ago. Surely she could control herself now? Lust surged up and overrode every piece of good sense she had.
The attraction raged between them. She could feel his arousal. She could definitely see his interest-hell, she could almost smell it. Smell it? That’s ridiculous, Olivia Marie. Get a hold of yourself. First you think the man smells like cookies and now you think you can smell his arousal? What is wrong with you?
She jerked her attention back to Micah with a faint smile. “I think I’ll take a quick shower, that is, if I have time?”
“Take as much time as you need. I’ll be in the kitchen.” He turned, somewhat reluctantly, she thought, then paused at the top of the stairs to look back at her. “Would you like wine with dinner?”
“That would be lovely.” She smiled at him, saw his mouth curve slightly in response, then moved to the doorway watching as he went down the stairs. Honestly, how can a man as massive as he is move so gracefully?
Olivia slowly closed the door and walked over to the armoire where she’d stowed her clothes. For some reason, she wanted to dress up a bit. Though Micah wore jeans and a denim shirt, she wanted to be a “typical” female and impress him. Knowing men were more visual than women, she’d definitely “dress to impress” tonight.
Pulling her favorite silk shirt out of the armoire, Olivia dug through her clothes until she found the slim black skirt she’d bought recently. She tossed them on the bed then dug through her lingerie until she had the pieces she wanted.
Taking the lacy bits into the bathroom with her, she raced through her shower, washing her hair and body quickly then smoothing her favorite lotion into her still-damp skin.
She made quick use of the hair dryer and diffuser, scrunching her curls and then swiping her mouth with her cherry lip gloss. She used a small amount of mascara on her lashes then pulled on the black lace thong and matching push-up bra.
Silently she thanked her best friend for talking her into buying the bra because tonight she wanted to make the most of what she had. Rolling thigh-high hose on, she smoothed her hands up her legs. Olivia studied her reflection in the full-length mirror, knowing what she’d see. A woman bent on seduction.
She ruthlessly shut down the memories of ambulances. This time would be different. This time she would control that savage thing that lurked inside her. She just hoped Micah appreciated the trouble she was going to.
Olivia stepped into her skirt, zipped it up then checked the appearance of the slit in the side as she took a step forward. Perfect. Just enough leg. She hummed her satisfaction, stopping when she realized it sounded more like a low growl. Get it together, Olivia, or you will have only yourself to blame-and you’ll have to satisfy yourself…again.
She pulled her blouse on and buttoned it with hands that shook slightly. She’d never allowed herself to even consider this-not since that night she’d terrified herself and her boyfriend. Micah-something about Micah made her crazy. That afternoon’s self-exploration hadn’t taken the edge off this attraction.
If anything, it had only added to it. Still, she’d have to keep her wild side in check. He didn’t look like the type to scare easily, but you just never knew. At least he was big enough to defend himself if she did get out of hand. Olivia glanced at the ever-present medicine bottle.
“No, no and no. I am not going to dull myself with that junk. Tonight I can ha
ndle this. I will not turn into some crazy monster woman.”
One last look in the mirror and she stepped into the heels that had cost her one and a half freelance articles. Sylvie, her best friend, called them CFM shoes. Olivia had only asked her once what that stood for, but once had been enough. “Come fuck me” indeed. She dabbed a small bit of perfume on her wrists, the base of her throat and between her breasts.
One hand on the railing gave her confidence on the sky-high heels as she descended. Mouthwatering aromas rose to greet her. She inhaled deeply and smiled. If she didn’t know better, she could swear that in all the many smells coming from the kitchen, Micah’s wove in and out. She shook her head. No way could she smell the man. She really needed to get that out of her head.
* * * * *
Olivia pushed her plate back with a sigh. “You’d better be right about me burning these calories off during the day or I’ll never fit into my clothes again!” She smiled at her dinner companion.
He leaned away from the table, rocking his chair back on two legs. A slow smile curved across his face as he nodded. “Shall we have coffee on the couch? I’ll throw a few logs on the fire if you don’t mind getting it? I take mine black.”
It felt natural to clear the dishes as Micah moved to the wood hopper to build the fire up again. Olivia rolled her neck then set the plates on the counter. She poured the coffee and turned back to find Micah right there.
“You move so fast and so silently. You nearly wore this coffee.” She looked at his hand now holding one of the cups. He’d grabbed it in self-protection. “I didn’t even know you were there.”
“Didn’t you?” His soft voice held a note of question. Olivia just shook her head and laughed at him. His eyes shifted color again. She didn’t know how he did that. She’d never met anyone with changing eyes. They seemed to catch the firelight, throwing it back at her. His eyes narrowed as his nostrils flared slightly. He leaned toward her. Instinct had her backing up until she hit the counter.