The Cougar's Trade (18 page)

If Lola caught her trail of thought, she had no answers for the questions.

Agatha turned her hands over in concession.

“You don’t have to fix everything all at once,” Ellery said. “The tough stuff is already behind you. The commitment is there, you just have to shape the romance around it. There’s no time limit for that, and I don’t think Hank is the kind of guy who’ll change his stripes so quickly.” She scrunched her nose. “Or spots. Cougar cubs have spots, right?”

“
If you weren’t patient, I wouldn’t have given him to you
.”

Miles let out a breath. “I guess I was hoping for an overnight miracle.”

“With these guys, it’s easier to just take things one day at a time,” Ellery said. “I guess with Hannah, too. Obviously, forcing her isn’t going to work. We’re going to have to go with the flow and hope we don’t end up out of our depths.”

“Wise words.” Agatha rolled up her jacket sleeves and peered suspiciously into the desert. “I’m sorry to break up the party, dears, but you might want to alert your Cougars that there’s something coming out of that hellmouth.
Somethings
, rather. Perhaps we should cut them off at the pass?”

Both Miles and Ellery sprang to their feet and stormed through the front door, calling out their Cougars’ names as they went.

One problem at a time.
So many of Miles’s problems seemed to interconnect lately, but that was no different from being in the delivery room with a mother in labor. Everything needed attention all at once, and Miles had to learn quickly to prioritize which fires needed to be put out first.

Hank was a fire that would never go out, but he was a fire that needed to be fed, not extinguished. At the moment, she needed to worry about the destructive fires. The ones that burned and seared and left nothing healthy behind when they finally passed over. Maybe one day, she’d figure out how to use one fire to fight the others. Just not at the moment.

When Ellery and Miles ran into the house sounding the demon alarm, Hank had expected Miles to stay put there with Mom and let those equipped to handle the disturbance eliminate it. Apparently, expecting
anything
when it came to that woman was folly.

As he and his brothers nipped and pushed at the noncorporeal demonic entities and Ellery and Agatha used their magic to bind the things, preparing to fling them back through the hellmouth they’d emerged from, Miles jogged behind him tossing salt toward the things whenever they reared up.

Salt was merely a deterrent; it wouldn’t do a damn thing had those demons been inside flesh-and-blood bodies at the moment, but it did stun them momentarily—halt their passage. But she didn’t
need
to be there. Didn’t need to help.

The moment Agatha and Ellery had the things screaming back toward their hole, Hank burst from his cougar body and turned on Miles. “What the fuck were you doing?”

She gave him one of those doe-eyed cartoon princess blinks and clasped her hands together in front of her. “I don’t know what you mean.” Her eyelids fluttered and her gaze drooped ever so slightly before she raised it back to his eyes.

“There were more than enough people out there to get the job done. You could have stayed inside.”

“I recall there being an adage about more hands making work swifter.”

He raked a hand through his loose hair and tugged, and her gaze drifted again.

Idiot that he was, he finally understood what the source of her distraction was. Sighing, he cupped himself.

She squeezed her eyes closed tight and gave her head a small shake. “There was more than one, and it made sense that everyone who could help did help, especially with Hannah being…” She gulped. It didn’t really need to be said. They all knew Hannah was sticking to her guns. She’d already said the next time she came out of Sean’s house would be to go home.

“But sometimes, helping looks a lot like getting in the way.”

Her eyelids sprang up and her brow furrowed. “Was I in your way? Best I can remember, I was behind you the entire time. I never once tripped you up or anyone else for that matter. I’ve been mostly good at taking care of myself up to this point.”

“Letting yourself get kidnapped aside, you mean.”

She reached into her shorts pocket, drew out her fist, and flung a handful of salt at him before storming away.

Rubbing his eyes, he groaned. “That only works on demons.”

“You act like one sometimes.”

Was that an insult?
Miles
had insulted him?

By the time he got his eyes wide open, she was halfway back to Mom’s house. When he caught up to her, she was muttering to herself. Something about stubborn cats and how she wished she could turn a hose on one in particular. He shuddered at the thought, but a cold shower would probably do him some good.

She grabbed his pants from the porch railing and tossed them at him as he approached, before turning tail and stomping toward Hank’s house.

“What’s the hurry?” he called after her.

“Just giving you some space, Second. Probably won’t see any more demons tonight, so you don’t need me on watch with you. And I’ve got things to do.”

He jogged after her, pulling on his shirt as he went. “What kinds of things?”

“Calls to make. Arrangements to…well, arrange. You know, I
did
have a life back in North Carolina.”

He hooked an arm around her waist and tugged her against him as she passed the light post. “I never said you didn’t,” he said into her hair.

He heard the acceleration of her breathing, smelled the sweet tang of her sweat. Felt her body relax against him the longer he held her.

“You shouldn’t run from Cougars,” he whispered. “Instinct says we should give chase.”

“I didn’t…
run
, exactly.”

“You walked away from me. Briskly.”

“I had things to do.”

“I heard you.”

“So, let go of me. Let me go do them.” Her head drifted to the side as his thumb completed its travel down the arc of her neck. He put his lips where his thumb ended, right at the curve of her shoulder, and allowed himself one little taste.

Her resultant moan provoked him to take one more.

He pressed his hand inside her shirt against her belly and fitted her against him even more, letting her feel what she did to his body, learn the effect of being so near one’s mate without having consummated the joining.

“If me walking away from you turns you on, perhaps I should have done it sooner.”

He had no response to that, beyond skimming his hand up her belly and ribs for that reminder of what she
wasn’t
wearing under her shirt. The silky, warm skin of her breast teased against his roughened palm. Right then, he appreciated the unimpeded access, but morning and a shift in hormones might cause a change of mind.

“I need to use your computer.” She closed her fingers around his wrist and pushed his hand away from her breast.

“Why?”

“I need to have my apartment packed up and my things moved. I’d like to do it before my lease automatically renews, and I need to find a relocation service.”

“Oh.”

“I’ve never made a major move before.”

Common sense said he should let go of her and dig his laptop out of his pile of crap downstairs, but she smelled so good and she felt so nice. He wanted to keep her pinned against him—
beneath
him—and maybe use his fangs in the meat of her shoulder to remind her to stay very, very still. Forget about major moves. At the moment, he was opposed to her making even the smallest ones.

She cleared her throat and drummed her fingertips against his wrist. “Hank?”

“Hmm?” He let down his fangs and gave the delicate skin of her neck the slightest rasp, then licked it.

She dug her nails into his wrist. “Bad kitty.”

“Mm-hmm. So bad.” She’d have to learn that shaking off a Were-cougar wasn’t much easier than getting a comfortable cat off of her lap. Once a cat found a nice place to rest, it tended to want to stay there. Her hand fell away as his worked farther up her torso. He kneaded her high, firm breast beneath his palm and pulled her earlobe between his teeth.

“Hank.” The warning seemed especially halfhearted given the creep of her hands up his thighs and her little insinuating wriggles against him. “It’s getting late.”

“So late.” He gave her nipple an experimental tug between his fingers and drew another one of those sexy gasps out of her.

“I need to do this now. I’ll be busy tomorrow.”

“Doing what?” He could think of some things to keep her entertained, if she was really in such dire need of fun.

“I’ve got appointments. I’m supposed to go see people.”

“What kind of people?”

“Cougar people.”

Cougar people
. Right. And he was supposed to be doing Cougar things at the moment, specifically plopping his ass into his truck and watching the desert for demons that probably weren’t going to show up. Growling, he dropped his hands from her breast and waist and turned her around.

Before she looked up, she fastened his jeans and tugged up the zipper. “Less distracting that way. Don’t know how they stay on.”

“Swagger holds them up.”

She did that princess blink again, but unlike last time, her cheeks bore a red flush. “You’re being euphemistic, aren’t you?”

“You tell
me
.”

Her gaze flitted downward yet again, and right on cue, his cock gave a twitch of
hello
.

She closed her eyes. “Where’s your computer?”

“I’ll find it.”

“Thank you.”

“Gotta make me a promise before I give it to you.”

“You know, you’re the one who owes
me
a promise. But I’m guessing you’re asking me not to plot my escape or anyone else’s?”

He folded his arms over his chest and canted his head. “Tell me what you want, and I’ll try to give it to you. And I thought we were past that escaping nonsense.”

“I figured you’d want to beat the dead horse.”

“I’ll definitely be beating something tonight, but not that.”

“Another euphemism?”

“Would you rather I speak plainly?”

She pulled her lips to one side and gnawed the inside of her cheek for a moment before responding. “I think you speaking plainly might very well be worse. At least if you talk in veiled language, I can pretend you didn’t just tell me you’re going to go masturbate.”

“And if you can pretend that, you don’t have to be scandalized by my confession of it, right?”

She gave her head a slow shake. “You assume I’d be appalled at the thought.”

“Yeah. I think you’d fall over fainting if you walked in on me doing it. I’d have to clean myself up and fetch the smelling salts.”

“Why, are you that rough with yourself? I didn’t peg you as a pain slut, though I’m certainly intrigued. Tell me more. Do you self-whip, too? I hear it can be incredibly arousing for some people. I wouldn’t know from experience, though.”

“Say what?” It was like he was watching some foreign film that had been improperly translated and the dubbing didn’t quite mean the same thing the original dialogue had.
Surely
she hadn’t said what he thought he’d heard.

“Stop making assumptions about me. Just for future reference, I’m far more likely to sit and watch than to gape and clutch my chest. Now, can you make your bargain and give me the computer?”

Nope. He
hadn’t
been hearing things. She had to be fucking with him—she’d been around too many female Cougars and their tendency to incite was rubbing off on her.

She put her hands on her hips. “Well?”

What the fuck had he even intended to say? Something about…
oh.
He straightened up and jammed his hands into his pockets. “I was just going to say that if I give you the computer, you have to come out to the truck when you’re done.” He’d never realized how lonely it was to sit in the dark desert for hours on end until the one night he didn’t have to do it by himself. He didn’t even mind talking to her, but perhaps that was because she didn’t know enough about him to ask uncomfortable questions. He didn’t hold out hope that wouldn’t change.

“Might be late.”

“I’ll be up. Obviously.”

“Deal.” She held out her right hand as if to shake.

“Really, Miles? So formal?”

She shrugged. “Seems appropriate. Our relationship to date has been pretty formal.”

“You consider me grinding my cock against your backside to be formal? I’d hate to hear what your idea of casual is.” Or maybe he’d
love
to. Yeah, he’d love to see what kind of filth the cartoon princess had ping-ponging around in that pretty head of hers. “Tell me anyway.”

She gnawed on her bottom lip and put her hand out a little farther. “Deal?”

“Not going to tell me?”

Saying nothing, she kept her hand out.

“Okay. Have it your way.” He shook her hand. “There will be times when it’ll be impossible for you to be so silent.”

“If you say so.” She walked to the door, and he stood there like a dumbass, staring. She might have had a personality type that was exceedingly underrepresented in the glaring, but he was becoming less certain that it was so much less efficient than the loud, bossy types he’d grown up around. She had the exact opposite effect of most of the people in his life. When she wasn’t trying to be provocative, in general, she didn’t incite him—agitate him into perpetual motion. She made him want to rest. To think. Maybe that was just as important as acting.

And perhaps
La Bella Dama
thought he needed that. He’d certainly been avoiding doing much deep thought since the day he’d exchanged his passion for a position behind a band saw.

Obviously, Miles didn’t have much of a life if she could tie it off in less than an hour. Finding someone trustworthy to pack up her apartment in her absence was a simple matter of sending Ellery a text message. Miles didn’t have to trawl the Internet and vet scads of relocation companies because, as it turned out, Ellery knew a guy. A Werewolf kind of guy, actually. He was a member of the pack in western North Carolina, and some distant relative of the Wolf alpha, who through some complicated meandering on the family tree was Ellery’s brother-in-law. Or rather, he was her sister’s husband’s brother-in-law. Perhaps a genealogist could shake out the actual relationship titles, but it didn’t matter.