While the Wolf's Away, page 9
“That sounds good to me,” Sheri said, her voice high and excited. “In the meantime, we want to help in the office, taking calls, whatever you need us to do.”
“And we could even go with any of you that have to go on an assignment, not only to learn the ropes, but in case one of you has to shift and we can do the driving or whatever,” Elizabeth added.
David smiled as if he’d been holding on to this news in order to surprise them at the perfect moment. “We’ll need a couple more desks to set them all up. We have that storage room we’re not using, and we can have one of the ladies at the front, fielding inquiries. They can swap off with each other whenever they want. Right now,” David said to Elizabeth and Sheri, “we juggle the calls among ourselves. But you can be dedicated to doing that for us until you have your PI licenses. And like Elizabeth said, you can go with us on cases to help get your feet wet.”
“Well, this calls for even more of a celebration,” Faith said. “Though I’m not sure you know what you’re getting into. The guys never get around to their paper filing.” She rolled her eyes playfully. “I help out there sometimes, but when the other pack members have kids of their own, I’ll be setting up a day care just for our little ones.”
“Uh, yeah, about that,” Gavin said, squeezing Amelia’s hand.
“We’re going to have twins in the new year,” Amelia said.
“Ohmigod, congratulations, you two,” Faith said, giving both of them big hugs. “Sounds like the day care will be full in no time.” The rest of the pack followed suit, and caught in the middle of all the good wishes for the parents to be, David’s warm presence at her side, Elizabeth felt an overwhelming sense of being home.
Slade arrived just as the commotion settled down. Elizabeth watched his eyes pan the room, only stopping when they landed on Sheri. The smile he gave her was full of possibilities, and Elizabeth felt a thrill of hope for her best friend. Could they both be so lucky as to have found their mates here?
“What’s all the cheering about?” Slade asked. “What did I miss?”
“More wolf pups on the horizon!” Faith said.
“You’re pregnant?” Slade asked, looking surprised.
“We are,” Gavin said, giving Amelia a hug.
Slade’s eyes grew wide. “Did you tell Mom and Dad yet?”
“I only just found out,” Amelia said, lightly stroking her still-flat belly. “I’ll call them after we’re through here.”
Slade smiled. “I’m going to be an uncle!”
“We all are,” David said.
Everyone laughed.
David leaned down and whispered in her ear, “And you’ll be an auntie.” His warm breath sent delectable shivers down her spine.
“I can’t wait,” Elizabeth whispered back, not exactly sure what she was referring to there.
David gave a husky laugh that shot another shiver down her spine, his eyes gleaming like he knew exactly what she meant.
***
It had been only a matter of time, David thought, before other mated couples in the pack had wolf pups of their own. Since Amelia was a royal, he’d really believed they would have had the kids sooner, but with her being a pilot, and working with her brother and parents in the business, he guessed that was why they had held off a little longer. He knew that Owen and Candice were holding off because Owen was more newly turned, and she wasn’t sure about the trouble she would have with being a wolf and having kids who also would have issues. During the full moon phase, she still had little control, and when the kids were young, if she changed into her wolf, her kids would automatically too. She could just imagine being at a store shopping for clothes for them when the urge to shift hit her. Though Faith had reassured her time and again everything would all turn out. She was proof that it could work out just fine.
Everyone must have been thinking the same thing, since all eyes turned toward Owen and Candice. They smiled. “We’re working on it,” Candice said.
David glanced at Elizabeth. She smiled and blushed, and he had the strongest urge to take her back home, lock themselves in his room, and lose himself inside her for the next couple of hours. Hell, the next couple of days.
Yeah, he could see making babies with her, but he really wanted to enjoy the freedom of being with her as a couple long before that happened.
Faith caught their smiles and chuckled. She reached over and patted Elizabeth’s hand. “Maybe you two won’t be far behind.”
Elizabeth said, “A mate comes first.”
David squeezed Elizabeth’s hand and smiled at her, trying not to let his driving need for her scare her away. She obviously still needed time.
He glanced around the room. Sheri was busy helping the kids put corn holders on their corn on the cob. One of them needed a refill on milk, and Sheri handled that, too, stepping right in to take on the role of a nanny wolf. He was happy to see her fitting in so well, though there was still the lingering worry over her family and Kintail. He’d need to find out if she’d let her family know she was safe, had left on her own terms, and was putting down roots in—Seattle.
“We thought we’d run in the woods after dinner if everyone would like to,” Faith said.
“Yes,” Amelia said. “I need to keep in shape before the babies come. I would love to.”
“We went running with David earlier,” Elizabeth said, “but I’m always up for another wolf run.”
“Me too,” Sheri said.
There was a resounding “Yeah!” from everyone else. That was settled, then.
They had string lights on the gazebo at Cameron and Faith’s house, and lights elsewhere to help light up the party area. The wolves could see well at night, and the sun didn’t set until later in the summer anyway, but even if the lights weren’t entirely necessary, David loved how they looked.
When dinner was over, they all went to their own cabins and stripped and shifted so they could meet up again at Cameron and Faith’s home. It was just easier that way, and once they were done with the run, they would all return to their homes, shift, dress, and have a drink before calling it a night—after the kids went to bed. It had become a tradition for them. Since the wolf pack was so new, they needed some traditions of their own. Like the dinner they’d just finished: every time a new single wolf or family joined their pack, they celebrated.
One by one, and by twos and threes, the wolves gathered. They all nuzzled each other, knowing one another by scent and learning Elizabeth’s and Sheri’s scents, if they hadn’t already. And now they would know each other by sight too.
Having Elizabeth by his side, running with his pack, was a dream come true for David. He nuzzled her and rubbed his body against hers in courtship, and she did the same with him. So far—and he hoped it would always be this way—she seemed happy to be here with him. It sure wasn’t the same as in the beginning when they’d run as wolves from danger.
Sheri chased around the pups, who delighted in it as if she were just one of the kids. Slade joined her, jumping and pouncing, much to the delight of everyone. David could sense the general speculation from the pack as the two of them romped around.
Then they all took off, Cameron and Faith in the lead, the kids with them until they began to explore, and the rest of the wolves following, keeping an eye on the pups.
David licked Elizabeth’s face and she licked his back. He could sense she was truly enjoying this—a whole pack that loved her, unlike what she’d experienced with her former pack.
Then he saw Sheri corralling Corey back onto the trail they were all trotting on, Slade nipping at their heels, and the pack sent up a racket of joyous yips and howls. Family was everything to them. Everything to David too.
He often wondered if his father had been a wolf from birth, instead of human, would he have been a better father? Or would he have been a lone wolf, not interested in raising a family, like he had been as a human?
Chapter 10
Elizabeth had had no idea how much fun the wolf pups would be while she was running with them and David through the woods. She hadn’t played with little ones in forever, her own pack not having had any for a long time, most of the young ones now in their teens. These pups yipped and woofed, tackling each other and tackling the adults, Elizabeth and Sheri too. It was like she and Sheri had never been strangers; they accepted them as part of the pack right away.
Her own maternalistic instincts came to bear, and she loved watching David hide behind a tree and then jump out to scare the pups. That led to a merry chase of all three wolf pups trying to catch David’s tail as they ran around and around the tree after him. He would make a good father, she thought.
Then the wolf pups were running off to tackle Owen, who good-naturedly chased them until they were tired of running. Then they licked his face, letting him know they’d had fun.
Corey was the wild pup of the bunch. She watched as he climbed to the top of some rocks and then tumbled down, while the other wolf pups, Nick and Angie, waited to pounce on him at the bottom. He popped right up, tussling with his siblings, and then was right back at it again, and Elizabeth could just imagine what he would be like when he became a teen. Wild, adventurous, getting into trouble, not with humans so much as just getting himself into hot water as a wolf because of his daredevil streak.
Corey reminded Elizabeth of a cousin of hers who had died in a plane crash in the remote area of the Northwest Territories before she met David and the others. Her cousin had been just like Corey as a kid. She still missed him. Once he’d become an adult, he hadn’t tamed down even a bit. She figured he wouldn’t have been happy learning she had rescued Owen and David, either. He might have been headstrong, but when it came to the pack leader, he had always done what he was told.
She loved the idea of growing with this pack, of all the new babies coming and helping to take care of them, of assisting with the older kids and the PI business. Having been isolated from her own pack and working in a dress store as a clerk, she found everything—she nuzzled David, making her thoughts on what “everything” entailed perfectly clear—way more exciting here.
After the run, they all headed back to the houses, shifted and dressed, then gathered back at the MacPhersons’ home for the traditional nightcap. Elizabeth loved every moment of it.
Back at David’s cabin, Sheri said, “I’m off to shower and bed.”
“Night,” Elizabeth and David said in unison, heading for the master bedroom.
“Night,” Sheri said, then disappeared into the bathroom.
“I was so surprised that Cameron wanted us to become PIs.” Elizabeth hadn’t wanted to upset the order of things after they’d only just arrived. But she was thrilled they would want her to be one of them. Not just a pack member or a love interest, but an honest-to-goodness private investigator.
David laughed. “Yeah, I thought you would like that.” He began to help her out of her shirt. “If the two of you, or just one of you, enjoy the administrative duties and aren’t interested in becoming a PI, we won’t be offended. We just want you to be happy.”
“Oh, believe me, we are. What a beautiful way to end what has been a lovely day. The pups are adorable too.”
He poked her hair behind her ears and sighed. “I know we should wait to consummate the relationship, but…” He made a sound, a rumbled half agony, half laughter. “I’m not going to lie. It’s going to be hard.”
“Hmm, we’ll see how it goes. I’ve only been here for a day. Before, being on the run like we were, dodging bullets and bad men and a rabid pack leader, staying in hotels and riding for hours in a car, which I had to drive lots because you all were shifting like crazy”—she smiled at the memory—“that’s not the same as living plain old workaday lives.” Even though the sex was great between them, there was more—so much more they needed to discover about each other to make sure they would be compatible for a lifetime.
Interests, hobbies, ideology, getting along with the other pack members. Normally, parents or other family members could be a problem in couple relationships. But in this case, David’s friends were his family, so if she didn’t get along with them—which she didn’t believe would be a problem—that all needed to be taken into consideration.
So far, though, even she had to admit everything had been good.
Elizabeth and David showered, and after toweling each other off, she dried her hair with her hair dryer and joined him in bed, sans clothes. She’d so hoped they would be back to this kind of closeness again, and she wasn’t disappointed. He wrapped his arm around her, caressing her bare skin, kissing the top of her head.
She couldn’t believe she was really here with him. It had been a long flight, and after having sex and a hot, soapy shower with him, two wolf runs, the pack celebration, and getting a job, she should have been exhausted.
She wasn’t. She didn’t think David was either.
Letting her fingers trace swirling patterns on his chest, she asked, “So when you were in the office, did you pick up any cases to work on?”
“Yeah.” He explained about Jimmy and his missing dad. “I checked with the local hospital and some farther away, vehicle accident reports, hotels he might have stayed at, but nothing.”
“If you need me to help, just let me know.” Wouldn’t it be amazing to help reunite a boy with his dad for her first case?
She felt his smile just before he kissed her head. “I will.”
Elizabeth closed her eyes and sighed. She was getting ahead of herself.
She was eager to start working on a degree to become a full-fledged PI, but she knew there was more to it than just jumping in headfirst. There would be requirements. School. Probably a criminology degree.
The thought doused a little of her happiness. She hadn’t been in school for years. What if she failed the classes? She would take them over again. Because the PIs were former police officers, they could probably help her study. The same for Sheri.
She and Sheri would get the ball rolling on that first thing in the morning.
“What are you thinking about?” David asked, his voice hushed as if he didn’t want to wake her up too much if she was already drifting off to sleep.
“About enrolling in college.”
He chuckled and pulled her on top of him, his arms wrapped lovingly around her. “I was thinking about this. About being with you when I’ve wanted this forever. To hold you close, to talk to you, and run as wolves, the whole nine yards. I didn’t expect to be also working with you, but I’m glad for that too.”
“Oh, I was thinking about that too.” She kissed his chest, rubbing her nose across his hard pectoral muscles, just as she might have in wolf form. “But then I was thinking Sheri and I need to get registered for classes. We’ll need to update the dates and things on our high school diplomas.” The longevity that came with being a wolf was absolutely a blessing, but it could be a pain in the butt sometimes too.
“Right. We can do that.”
“Good.” She sighed. “I dreamed of this, you know. I mean, not being a PI… That’s just a bonus. But of this. You. I’m so glad we did it.”
David stroked her hair. “We’d left things up in the air so much when you left us because you wanted it that way, thinking I might find someone else before you could leave Yellowknife. I worried you might find someone else too.”
“You were upset with me.” His hand paused on her head, just for a moment, but she felt it.
“I was.” The stroking picked up again, slowly, hypnotically, almost as if he were unaware he was doing it. “I loved you,” he said simply. “I understood you had to be with family, but some part of me feared you wanted to return to be with your pack and stay there. They had been your people for so many years. Not only that, but I was afraid I would bring you down.”
She frowned. “Bring me down?”
“You’re a royal. Your offspring would have your royal genes if you mated another royal wolf, and you wouldn’t have to be concerned about them having half human genes—or the trouble with shifting, once they’re old enough to do it on their own.”
She lifted her head, wanting to make sure he could see the truth in her eyes. “Sure. I would be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about it. We have a natural instinct to preserve our heritage, improve the line, and that’s both the wolf and human thinking driving that. But we also mate for life, so there’s so much more going on during the decision-making. Just meeting another wolf who is a royal is one thing. I’ve met them before. Single males who were looking for a mate. I wasn’t interested in them in the least bit. If I had mated one of them, we would have had full royal kids at some point, but I couldn’t have been mated to any of them and kept my sanity.”
David smiled, appearing pleased she felt that way.
“Anyway”—she rested her head back on his chest—“don’t worry about it. Because I’m a royal, I can help the kids learn to deal with it, and I can do the same for you and the other nonroyal wolves. I can do whatever it takes to help the pack work and have fun, with the fewest setbacks possible.”
Her body rose and fell with his sigh of relief. “During the new moon, you and I are going to eat out every night. Every day. We’ll go to the movies and—”
She turned a little again, bringing her mouth up to his for a kiss. “We are going to enjoy each other’s company to the fullest every day—new moon, full moon, whatever the moon may be.”
“Okay, if you insist.” He smiled that wolfy smile. “But tomorrow, you and Sheri need to find a couple of desks you would like for the office—shelves, whatever you’ll need, and we’ll purchase them from the pack fund. We want you to feel just as at home at the office as you feel with us after hours.”
She smiled. “Thanks. Is there a dollar limit?”
“No. If we look at the setup and we think it’s too much, we’ll say so, but find what you want to make it work and we’ll try and swing it.”
