Weremones (36 page)

Adam moved when she moved. His blue eyes grew darker by the moment. She teased him, just by moving up and down against him.

God he was so erect. So big. She couldn’t stand it anymore. Raising to her knees, Diana speared herself on his thick sex. Shuddering as he slid inside.

With a growl, Adam grasped her thighs, striving to match her stroke for stroke.

God, the man knew how to work it. He swiveled his hips, gaining entrance to that special spot inside and rubbing over it again and again.

Diana’s nipples tightened even more, her body a flame that grew in intensity. He was the fuel making her burn bright. She ground down on him as he ground up.

The pace shifted, faster. His fingers grazed her abdomen and his thumb found her clit, massaging the little nub. Diana’s head fell back as the pressure below built. She felt him growing harder inside her body. His strokes delved deeper as she swelled around him.

Someone moaned. Someone growled. The world shattered into an explosion of stars and she locked up around him.

“Ahhh!” Adam’s howl cut off as he strained and shuddered against his climax.

“Mine!”

The word was a garbled growl, but she understood. Diana fell across him, sated.

The possessive didn’t even bother her.

He laid a hand over her behind, stroking her like a cat.

Finally, she managed to sit up. Her eyes felt crossed from all the pleasure. The faint trail of hair caught her attention and she followed it down. The dark curls of her sex mixed with the white blond of his.

She shoved away the half formed notion, already sliding into an exhausted healing stupor as she lay down beside him with a kiss on his chest.

When she woke, he was gone.

———

One week and four days later, Adam stood at Diana Ridley’s door, ready to settle in person what he’d only been able to hint at in snatches of conversation spoken in moments of stolen privacy.

Adam’s parents, proving what wonderful psychic parents they were, showed up at his door in time to make breakfast the day after the coyote fight.

Cheryl and Will spent the next week and a half proving what wonderful grandparents they were, taking care of things while Adam and his wardens facilitated moving the weres out of Anderson County.

He’d helped pack up and send off the four remaining coyote families, a werepanther that treed Chase for twenty minutes out of sheer perversity, and a family, of all things, of
wereraccoons
that everyone thought were hilarious until they changed.

As Mark so succinctly put it,
Dude. That is one freaky family.

Adam’s parents took the boys and Karen to Six Flags. Cheryl stuffed them with cookies that made Adam miss Diana all the more.

Will took everyone fishing, something that Adam had forgotten how much he enjoyed. Growing up, Adam had had a lot of great times with his dad fishing.

Watching Chase gripe and bait all Tank’s hooks because the snooty warden refused to touch something as disgusting as fish bait was priceless.

The boys loved their new grandparents and whined when they had to leave. Karen cried and hugged Cheryl like she’d never let go. Adam loved his parents all the more for the gift.

The only flies in the ointment, so to speak, were Brandon and Diana’s absence.

After fleeing the burning bar, Brandon went directly to the Ridley house and stayed there. Diana had taken two weeks off work to stay with the traumatized wolf.

Now, Adam was here to make things right.

He knocked on the door, wishing he felt the same freedom the boys did, to barge right in. He frowned at the furious barking inside.

The door flung open. Karen smiled bright as a new penny up at him. She cocked a fist on her hip and frowned up at him prettily.

“Why are you waiting outside, silly?”

She snagged his hand and tugged him inside by the arm.

“Cut it out Brandon!” She called over her shoulder.

The barking stopped and Adam caught sight of the dark brown wolf in the living room.

Brandon peered over the back of the couch, ears laid back with suspicion as he watched Adam. The wolf whined and broke eye contact, ducking back out of sight. But not before Adam saw the red collar.

He frowned hard. A small growl of displeasure escaped him.

“Calm down, Adam. You’re scaring him,” Diana said.

The sight of her made his mouth water, or it could have been the meat and cheese smell of lasagna coming from the kitchen.

“He’s not a dog,” Adam protested.

His fantasy woman walked past him to the kitchen. Her hips sashayed an invitation for him to follow. The wolf ran from the living room and followed on her heels. Adam couldn’t help but follow, too.

“You’re right. He’s not a dog,” she threw back over her shoulder. He watched the sway of her ass instead of the irritating collar.

“But the city isn’t goin to believe that he’s really a sixteen-year-old kid who prefers being a wolf. I thought the collar was appropriate. He liked the red one.”

Diana raised one delectable shoulder he’d like to nibble on.

“So, there you go. Tea?” She offered him a tall glass, already prepared and waiting for him. She’d known he was coming.

He cocked his head as he studied some indefinable change in her. She looked different. More serene, like the Mona Lisa. A woman with a secret.

“Did you cut your hair?” Adam threw out the question as he accepted the glass.

When in doubt, it was always a safe bet that a woman had had her hair done.

Diana laughed. The poor man really didn’t have a clue.

Karen, bless her, had kept Diana informed of all the goings-on while she tended to Brandon. She’d worried and fretted until he called each night to check on her and his missing wolf.

But she didn’t dare leave Brandon alone at first. All the boy
, wolf,
did was hide under her bed.

Adam didn’t understand yet how far the boy had retreated from the world. How much damage those monsters had done to him.

Selfishly, Diana welcomed the distraction from her own problems. Of course, Brandon had turned into another very delicate and odd situation to deal with.

Matthew, she finally decided, was a big boy, a man really. He was graduated from high school and starting college. His life. His choices. She had to let her son go.

Diana finally broke down and visited Laina, wolf in tow.

These days, Brandon didn’t stray far from her side. After lunch and a rather emotional let-it-all-out girl talk, Diana’s ex’s ex handed her a small envelope with MOM scrawled over the front in Matthew’s handwriting. The message inside was short and to the point.

I’m sorry, Mom. I love you. Matthew.

Diana clutched the letter to her breast and cried. Laina began to cry, then Sherry, Laina’s girlfriend started to cry. Brandon became agitated. Diana finally had to calm down and reassure him, scratching behind his ears.

By the time lunch was finally over, the women weren’t best friends, but they were amicable.

Diana felt good, better than good in fact. She gave Adam a small smile and decided to have mercy on him. She dished a portion of the lasagna she’d made for dinner and passed him the plate. She’d already enjoyed a share of the warm cheesy dish when it came out of the oven.

Who knew that wolven blood would speed up your metabolism? In the last week Diana had trimmed off nearly ten pounds without changing her eating habits. Okay, she’d sneaked some chocolate cake, but she deserved it with all she’d been through.

She cut Brandon a piece and took him out to the patio to eat it. There was already a bowl of iced tea on the lap tray she had set out earlier. Her neighbor was beginning to think she was weird.

Oh, well. At least Brandon was eating, instead of lost in the funk he’d started out in. Diana slid the glass door shut behind her and turned back to the wolf in a man’s skin in her kitchen. Adam stared hard at Brandon, hunched over his tray, nibbling at the lasagna.

“He needs to come home.”

Diana cocked her head. She realized where she’d picked up the mannerism and smiled to herself. Here we go, she told herself.

“He’s not human, Diana. Don’t pretend he is.”

She blinked, and then looked out at the patio where Brandon had abandoned the food and was nosing a ball around, lost in a private game of fetch.

“You’re kidding, right?”

She walked around the table to go nose to nose with the stubborn alpha male. “I know exactly what he is. And you, too.” Diana took a breath and ventured a guess. “I think maybe it’s you who are confused.”

She felt the anger and frustration, a tight knot inside. Adam shot up out of his seat and pushed past her.

He stormed into the dining room and stopped, struggling with his own inadequacies. He set both palms down on the smooth finish of the dining room table, letting the cool texture seep into him.

Adam sensed her behind him. He took a deep breath and confessed. “You’re right. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.” Frustration knotted and rolled in his gut.

“Every day, I wake up. The school calls because Mark or Rick have flooded halls or they’re charging ten bucks a peek through the glory hole they made in a locker into the girls changing room. I don’t know what to do with them most of the time.”

He took another breath and looked her in the face. “I don’t know what to do for Brandon. I thought I was doing right, letting him face them.”

Diana started to tell him it was okay. He kept on talking, laying his frustrations out.

“Half the time I want to deck, Chase. Then there’s Tamara. I didn’t realize anyone would be interested in her so soon. She’s barely moved down here and ... then there is you and Karen, and Tank. That’s a lot of psychics for one area.”

“Who’s Tamara?”

Diana set a fist on one hip and stared at him in the eye. She raised her eyebrows meaningfully, feeling the stirring of something she absolutely would not call jealousy.

Adam blithely continued unloading his problems. He ran his hands through his hair.

“A good alpha always knows what to do. The Canis Pater is supposed to have all the answers. I’m feeling my way blind in the dark hoping no one notices.”

His turmoil stirred inside Diana. Giving a huff, she gave up on finding out who Tamara was and slid her arms around him, offering comfort. These wolven of hers always seemed to need comfort.

“Adam,” she repeated his name when he didn’t answer the first time. “That’s what being a good parent is all about.”

He blinked and looked down at his little female. He took her arms being around him as a good sign and turned around to reciprocate. She felt so good cuddled up next to him.

She smiled the little smile up at him while he tried to make sense of her words.

She laughed. “That means you’re doing a good job, you great hairy beast.”

“But I haven’t fixed anything. I might have broken some things big-time.”

Diana shook her head. Lord, but the man was dense.

“You can’t fix everything. You love them through it. Brandon will get better,” she assured him. “Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or even next month. But he will. And when he’s ready, we will get him some real counseling.”

She shrugged inside his embrace. “The rest? We take it one day at a time.”

Adam grinned. She said
we
. A pair.

“One day at a time, huh?”

Diana nodded, noting the glint that came into his eyes.

Adam bent, taking advantage of her surprise. He swung his prize up into his arms, relishing the feel of her softness against his body. “Well, I have been feeling pretty frustrated lately. I was hoping you had a good answer for that, too.”

His keen nose picked up the instant her libido caught up with his. His hands were already occupied, so he used his mouth to silence the inarticulate sounds she made while gathering her wits. He didn’t want her to gather them yet.

Adam swept his tongue past her defenses and reveled in her taste. She melted against him, meeting him stroke for stroke, deepening the kiss before finally breaking away for a breath.

Diana’s senses reeled. A stereo of sensation, his and hers, filled her as he scooped her up and started up the stairs. She draped an arm over his shoulder for balance, burying her nose in his neck to inhale his incredible scent.

Still, she wasn’t going to make it easy.

“If you think you’re getting any more sex without a first date. You’ve got another thing coming, Sparky.”

“You know, I’ve always wondered what that other thing was.”

Diana smiled into his neck. He decided that he could definitely learn to love that smile. The realization gave him a jolt, sharper than the nip she took out of his shoulder with her little teeth.

He stopped in front of her bedroom door. She felt what he felt. Did she feel the same about him?

“Adam?”

He leaned his forehead against hers and sighed. Well, no sense doing things halfway.

“Diana, I still want what I wanted before.”

She stilled in his arms.

“A mate.” She said the words carefully and wriggled to be let down. He loosened his grip, allowing her to slide to the floor.

“Yeah.”

“For all the same reasons?”

He expelled a breath and moved to enclose her against the door with his body.

“I want you for all those reasons, yes.
Wait.
”

He stopped her from escaping under his arm. He ducked his head to meet her eyes.

“I want you for those reasons, yes. But, I want to for other reasons, too. I want to smell you, taste you, everyday. I miss you when you aren’t with me.” He touched his chest, pulling her trapped hand to his heart. “There is an emptiness here when you are gone.”

Tears sparked in Diana’s eyes. Adam panicked.

Oh, shit! He should have kept his stupid mouth shut! She sniffled. It was too much to hope she had a cold.

Diana nearly laughed at the panic on his face. She smiled through the tears. “That is the most beautiful thing anyone has ever told me. I missed you, too.”

She caught his head, bringing him down for another toe curling kiss. She had to catch her breath afterward. She was blindsided by what she felt from him. Hope and …