The Art of Seducing a Naked Werewolf (Naked Werewolf 2)

“I’ll even let you do that stupid white-dove-release thing.”

Her eyes narrowed at me. “Well played, Margaret.”

After a little more prodding, Mom finally got into the truck and led the caravan of kids and aunts out of the valley. I looked around at the clenched, determined expressions on the parents’ faces as they waved good-bye to their departing children. And I felt a little twinge of emptiness.

Mo snickered and slipped her arm around my shoulders. “You know, for the alpha—”

“Don’t say it,” I warned her.

“Not that many people listen to you.”

“You can be such a bitch sometimes,” I told her.

She smiled sweetly at me. “I’m becoming more and more like you every day.”

Behind her, Cooper shuddered.

* * *

I MANAGED TO talk everyone into a sundown curfew. The larger, younger of us were running alternating patrols along the border to watch for an early ambush. I did a door-to-door check to make sure everyone was tucked away safely for now. As I slumped toward Mom’s house, exhausted to my bones, Rob and Jay kept yelling lines from 300 at my back, which made me think they weren’t taking the whole Gandhi approach very seriously. It felt like lights-out at a particularly violent summer camp.

Mo and Cooper had agreed to stay at Samson’s for the night. It struck me as sort of crappily ironic that our first night alone in the valley was so dark.

Nick had cooked, or at least warmed up something Mom left behind. Without speaking, we settled on the couch. I took his face between my palms and kissed him.

“Is this the part where you tell me it’s my duty to sleep with you because you’re going off to war and you could be killed?” Nick asked.

“That is so wrong,” I told him. “But yes, it would be a nice gesture.”

He pulled me into his lap, sliding his hands along my ribs

“Are you scared?” he asked. “About tomorrow?”

“I’d be stupid not to be,” I said. “I’m not thrilled that you’re going to be there, but given the Lassie conversation and Mo’s cast-iron-pan antics, I know it’s a waste of breath to try to push you out of harm’s way.”

“Damn straight.”

“I love you. I’m not trying to make this some dramatic good-bye moment. I just want to tell you now, while it’s quiet and we’re not facing certain ass-whooping, that I love you. I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you. I’m going to love you until the day I die.”

He pursed his lips. “Wow, you will do anything to get laid, won’t you?”

I laughed. “Thanks, I needed that.”

“I love you, too,” he told me, kissing me.

He pushed my shirt over my head, pulling my hair from its ponytail and letting it fall around us in a dark, shiny curtain. He took his time, touching me with an aching slowness that built a searing heat in my belly. His kisses consumed my breath, my fear, my worry. I eased his zipper down, and he moaned as my hand slipped around him. He pushed up from the couch, with my legs still wrapped around his waist, and carried me down the hall.

We’d never managed to make it to my room, in a bed, with the lights off before. It was sort of decadent and naughty, getting naked in the room where I used to have Smurf curtains. He trailed kisses from my neck to my belly button, taking the time to nip lightly here and there, leaving little marks behind. I tugged at his shoulders, bringing him back to eye level, so I could thread my fingers through his hair while he settled between my thighs.

When he reached for the condoms in my night-stand, I stopped his hand. His eyebrows arched. I’d told myself that I would know when I was ready, and I did. I wanted a baby with Nick. There were things in life I still wanted to do—school, travel, leading my pack. But I didn’t think Nick would let me get out of doing them. In fact, he’d probably drag me to whatever pipe dream I was shying away from if he spotted any backtracking on my part.

“I consider it a hopeful gesture,” I told him. “We might get pregnant, we might not. We might get through tomorrow only to get smooshed by a semi next Tuesday.”

“This is the worst declaration of hope ever,” he told me. “What’s next, detailed forecasts of my possible male-pattern baldness?”

I snickered. “The point is, I love you, and I don’t want to put any more restrictions on however much time we have left together, whether it’s hours or decades. I don’t care what tomorrow brings, as long as I have you.”

He smiled and kissed me, then slipped inside me without a barrier between us, skin on skin. I sighed at the warm intrusion as his fingertips traced the lines of my face. He rocked into me, and we settled into a soothing, gentle rhythm. This was different, quiet, better. And when we both were sated, he pulled my back against his chest and held me without speaking. And somehow I managed to fall asleep.