“You’re lookin’ at me like I’m a ghost.” He kissed my eyes and my nose and then softly, tenderly, ran his tongue across the seam of my lips, before parting them and taking what he wanted.
I opened for him, returned each kiss with all the hunger inside, and when I was squirming under him, clutching at his thighs, he pulled back and grinned down at me.
I judged him. “Evil.”
His smirk was tantalizing. “Now tell me about Vegas. Who’d you bring home?”
And just with a thought of Josue, my libido died. From hot languid lover to father figure in seconds flat. “You’ll see tomorrow.”
“Wait,” he said as I pitched him sideways before I rolled up off the bed. “Let’s talk about something else.”
“Too late,” I announced, snorting out a laugh.
His face fell. “That was stupid.”
“You’re gonna like Josue,” I assured him. “He’s sweet. He insisted on bringing something for Turkey Day.”
“Shit, we’re having more company, aren’t we. What is that, five of us now, or six?”
I lost it. Six. Yeah, right. In his dreams.
“Oh no.”
I snickered.
“What’d you do?”
“I think we’re up to like twenty.” I cackled, head back, eyes closed, laughing myself silly.
“Twenty?” He sounded horrified, and that didn’t help me to stop laughing at all.
The unexpected banging on the front door, combined with the incessant doorbell ringing, got me back into my discarded pajama bottoms and T-shirt and down the stairs.
“Wait,” Ian cautioned sharply, his voice carrying after me. “Don’t open the door—lemme get my gun.”
“We both know that’s not Hartley,” I assured him, darting to the front door and hurling it open, ready to take someone’s head off. I was startled to find Cabot, Drake, and Josue—and a very angry, very puffed-up Aruna on my doorstep, holding Chickie’s leash. It was weird that they were all there at the same time since she and the boys had never met.
The werewolf got up on his back legs and licked me good morning, which scared the hell out of Josue—but not Cabot or Drake since they’d seen Chickie on a number of occasions—and then left me in a dead heat for the stairs where Ian now stood, squinting and shirtless.
“Damn, Miro,” Josue breathed once he’d recovered from thinking I was wolf food. “No wonder you didn’t wanna do me.”
“What?” Ian called over.
I waved a dismissive hand at him and tipped my head at Aruna. “What’s with you and the doorbell?” I asked because I knew the boys, even Josue, and they would have never been so insidious with the ringing. It was her.
“How dare you ask Janet to help you make dinner and not me!” She was mad, loud and shrieky.
“You told me you were cooking for your in-laws this year,” I volleyed.
“I know, but they don’t want me. They said I can’t cook traditional.”
“What? Yes, you can.”
“I know,” she agreed loudly. “But they don’t want the Indian girl cooking.”
“That’s crazy,” I told her.
“I know!” she almost shouted.
“You can cook anything.”
“I know!” she yelled, fuming.
“Chickie, goddammit,” Ian complained behind me.
“Wait, now,” I said to Aruna. “Just stand there a second all right?”
She huffed out a breath and crossed her arms but she didn’t move.
“Okay,” I began, turning to the boys. “Why’re you here?”
“To tell you that we’re gonna go with Josue to see Lillian since we know where her office is and everything, so you don’t have to.”
“Oh, nice, okay,” I said, my eyes slits as I regarded them. “You could’ve just called.”
“Josue wanted to see your place.”
“It’s nice,” he said, beaming at me, stepping in close, wrapping his arms around my waist and bumping his head against my chest. “But mostly I wanted to come over to say thank you for saving my life. I just love you.”
“Hands off the marshal,” Ian boomed from behind me. “Chickie, will you give it a rest!”
“You’re welcome,” I said, patting his back, looking to Drake for help and finding the same dopey expression on his face that Cabot, when I glanced at him, had on his. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I grumbled.
The other two boys moved in and I was the center of a group hug.
“Aww, that’s nice,” Aruna told me, leaning sideways to look at Ian. “You just let whoever comes in off the street hug your man?”
“I’m getting my gun,” he announced, then gestured at Chickie. “Can you please call—”
“He’s just happy to see you, you ungrateful piece of crap!” she snapped at him.
“Why’re you mad at me?” Ian was indignant.
“Janet,” she shouted. “You asked Janet to help you feed the horde, and not me?”
“I wasn’t even—I didn’t do—wait, what horde? There’s a horde now?” Ian sounded really confused and a bit incredulous.
She made a noise of disgust and directed her attention back to me, moving forward and scattering the boys until they all let go and she stood there in front of me, hands on hips, righteous anger rolling off her.