Bound to the Prime (Bound to the Pack, #3) (8 page)

I smiled at his earnest excitement, he felt like he was saving the day with this information. I didn’t have the heart to tell him any cab service would be fine for this, and fortunately Kristen felt the same.

We were both happy to let him have his first moment of victory within the human world.

T
he doorbell chimes still hung faintly in the air when Dad opened the door. He must have seen us being dropped off at the curb and made his way here to meet me, meet us.

“Jenny!” He pulled me into a hug and it was as if everything bad that had happened to me lately was simply washed away. Dad’s hugs had that magical ability. Everything was alright when he was near.

“Hey Dad!” I smiled up at him as I stepped back, letting him look past me to Kris and Liam.

“Kristen, it’s been forever! How’ve you been?” Dad smiled at her and gave her a quick hug as well. She had practically lived here during high school and he had taken her in like an adopted daughter.

“Hey John! Eh, things have been better,” Kris smiled and shrugged as she stepped away. “One day at a time, you know?”

Dad grunted, nodded, and turned to Liam. “New boyfriend Kris?” He smiled and extended his hand towards Liam.

Liam glanced at the hand uneasily, as if it were a poisonous snake poised to strike. Steeling himself he brought his own hand up and enveloped my father’s as if it were a childs. Dad wasn’t exactly small, Liam was just gigantic.

“Actually Dad...” I began, catching his attention. “This is Liam. He’s Kris’s brother. And... he’s my fiance.”

Dad spun back to regard Liam, eyes now hard and appraising. “Hmm. Is that so?”

Liam’s smile faltered slightly under my father’s gaze, “Yes sir.”

“Where’s the ring then? I don’t see one on her finger.” Liam was confused at Dad’s words, he didn’t know human ceremonies very well.

“Dad!” I slapped his arm, causing him to let go of Liam’s hand.

“What?”

“It’s none of your business! Now, are you going to let us in?” I was going to get sick if I kept spending all this time out in the cold.

“Right, right. I’m sorry.” He stepped back and held the door for us as we passed into the warmth of my childhood home.

Walking into the house was like walking into a time machine. Little ever changed here, Dad found a setup he liked and he just ran with it. Forever.

All of the furniture was in a style popular more than a decade ago, though it was all in perfect condition. The electronics though, those usually changed every other year or so when something shiny and new came out. An enormous television hung from the far left wall, it was some new curved model that was so high definition it made the million dollar movie playing on it look like the stage at a school play.

The sound from the movie came at us from every angle, it felt as if we were in an actual movie theater. I could faintly hear music playing throughout the rest of the house. Dad had set up speakers in every room and had some elaborate system set up to play whatever he wanted in whichever room he wanted it to play in.

In all the years since Mom had passed away, Dad had been converting the whole house into his man-cave. His car was an old, run down beater that barely ran. But he’d be damned if a new toy came out that he didn’t have.

To each their own.

“You all look like you’ve had a rough few days. You hungry? I’ll whip up a quick breakfast.” Dad was observant and, thankfully, tactful. He didn’t ask the obvious question: Why were we here instead of at one of our own houses?

“Breakfast would be amazing Dad, thanks.” I walked with him into the kitchen, Liam and Kris falling into step behind. The sounds of the movie faded away and were replaced by some old rock music as we left the living room.

You never knew what he’d have playing over the speakers. It could be anything from classical to a pop music station playing songs that came out today, or anything in between.

Within minutes we were sitting at the table with heaps of scrambled eggs, toast, and corned beef hash. Quick, easy, and one of his staples. We fell into an amiable silence as we ate; it hadn’t really been all that long since my last hot meal, but it felt like ages. As the piles of food grew smaller, conversation picked up.

“So, Liam.” Dad seized on a momentary lull in our idle chatter to pin him down. “What kind of job do you have?”

Liam’s fork paused on it’s way to his mouth as his eyes widened slightly. He really wanted to ensure my father that he was good for me, but couldn’t tell him that he was an alpha werewolf. I could practically see his thoughts churning, searching for an answer.

“I, uh, work on the reservation.” Liam quickly shoveled some eggs into his mouth and chewed painfully slow, hoping to get more time.

“The reservation?” Dad perked up, he was, unfortunately, very curious about the topic. Rumors had run wild through the town for the past few years since the reservation had sprung up, seemingly out of nowhere. It had been wrapped in secrecy from day one, for obvious reasons. None of which he could know.

Kris came to the rescue.

“He’s senior management at the reservation. He isn’t really allowed to talk much about what that actually means though.” Liam shot her a look so full of gratitude it could have been a visual hug.

“That sounds important.” Dad perked up and smiled at Liam, who nodded. “I assume it pays well?”

“Dad!” I glared at him. Really!

“What? I want to make sure he’s good for you!”

“That’s for
me
to decide!” I felt myself blush slightly. Partly from embarrassment, partly from anger.

My father just chuckled at my reaction and held his hands up defensively. “Just pressing your buttons sweety, just pressing your buttons.” Kris barked out a quick laugh and Dad winked at her conspiratorially.

“Ugh. You two. I’ve been home for what, an hour? And you’re both already ganging up on me?!” I stood and began to collect the dirty dishes. “It’s just like old times.” I rolled my eyes to another burst of laughter from Kris.

Dad was laughing too, then did a double take of me. “You’re taller.
Much
taller,” he glanced down at my feet, examining my flat shoes. “What in the hell?”

“Growth spurt.” I answered evasively and moved quickly towards the sink.

“A growth spurt,” he replied flatly, “in your mid twenties. Right.”

“Dad, it’s nothing. Promise.” I looked at him and he nodded slowly. He knew
something
was up, but also that I wasn’t going to tell him.

Liam provided the perfect distraction in the form of a head to toe yawn and stretch. I felt myself yawning in reply, soon everyone was covering their mouths and stretching.

“Cut that out, it’s barely noon!” Dad stood and shook his head as he visibly held back yet another yawn of his own. “You all clearly need a nap or something. I’ll go get a blanket for Kris.”

“No need, I’m just getting over a cold, I’ve had plenty of sleep.”

“You sure?” He looked at her and shrugged at her nod. “Suit yourself. You two need some shuteye though.”

“We’ll get some, but we need to have a conversation first. Privately please Dad.”

“Seriously?” He looked around, taking us all in, and I nodded.

“Hate to see you go John, but love to watch you leave.” Kris grinned as Dad snorted.

“Thrown out of my own kitchen,” he snorted. “Fine!” I’ll be watching the rest of the movie if you need me.” After a nod to our group he made his way out of the kitchen.

After a moment I spun and shot a dirty look over at Kris. “Are you for real? I don’t know what was worse, you flirting with him or the cliche line you used.”

Kris just shrugged and grinned right back. “What? You know I’ve always thought he was handsome and he’s actually only a few years older than me. I’m closer to his age than yours.”

“NO.”

“Fine, fine. You can really take the joy out of life sometimes, you know that right?” Kris winked at me and I just growled back.

“So,” Liam interjected, “a plan?”

I signed as I nodded and made my way back to the table. We really needed to figure out a way to resolve what we were now calling ‘The Troy Situation.’ Unfortunately we had nothing to go on.

We didn’t know where he was, what his real goal was, or how to draw him out safely. All we knew was that he was coming for Kris and that he wasn’t afraid to ‘cheat’ by using guns or mercenaries.

After an hour or so of zero progress we felt we should sleep on it and come back at it with fresher minds. Kris decided she’d try to take a nap as well, even though she wasn’t particularly tired, and Dad offered the use of his own bedroom since he would be up and watching movies.

I shot another warning look at Kris before we walked away towards the bedrooms. She rolled her eyes but held up her hands in defeat as she stepped towards the master bedroom. I watched her disappear into the room, closing the door behind her, before taking Liam’s hand and opening the door opposite the one Kris had just entered.

My room was unchanged from when I had left for college. Posters hung on every wall like a shrine to each boy band or actor I had had an unrelenting schoolgirl crush on.

Pink seemed to ooze from every corner, threatening to drown me in embarrassment. It had never really been my favorite color and yet every relative had always assumed that, as a sweet teen girl, I wanted nothing more in life than pink
everything.

Liam grunted as he stepped into my room and closed the door behind himself. “This is
your
room?”

“It was my room a lifetime ago.” I felt defensive as I watched him move around the room. While it may have been from a long time ago this was still a part of who I was. Some of who I was was laid bare to his inspection.

He made his way around the room, glancing at the things he passed but not commenting on any of them. Eventually he reached the head of the bed and looked down at the obligatory pile of stuffed animals. My heart lept into my throat and threatened to choke me as he reached down and plucked up one in particular.

“Be careful with Bo-Bo!” I practically dove at his hands to retrieve one of my most valuable possessions; an extremely worn, and often repaired, stuffed rabbit. Of all the animals on the bed he had to pick the only one that mattered.

“Bo-Bo?”

I held the small bundle of fabric and stuffing gently and answered quietly, unable to meet his gaze. “Bo-Bo Bunny. My mother gave him to me right before...” I had been very young when she had passed, I could only remember faint images of her in my mind. “It was the last thing she gave me. One of my last memories of her.”

I had spent my teen years pretending it wasn’t all that important and had left it behind when I left for college since a ‘grown up’ didn’t have stuffed animals. I had secretly missed it every single day though and had almost asked Dad to send it to me several times.

I never had though, any time I had come close I would find a reason not to. It really came down to an irrational fear of having it stolen. As if anyone would take a ratty stuffed animal.

I felt Liam’s hand on my chin as he tilted my face up to his own. I expected to see him grinning or laughing at my foolishness, but instead found him looking at me with eyes full of understanding.

He brought me into his arms, wrapping me in a cocoon of love and warmth and I felt my own love for this wonderful man swelling within me. I had spent so much time and energy worrying about what a boyfriend would think of a ‘silly’ stuffed animal that I failed to realized that the
right
one wouldn’t even think twice about something that obviously meant a lot to me.

Putting one arm around him I reached up with the other and, standing on tiptoe, pulled his head down and kissed him. His arms tightened around me as I poured every ounce of the love I felt for him into our kiss, echoed by his love for me pouring into it as well.

It was as if all the emotions we felt for each other were shared at the point our lips met. Our souls intertwined and left my head spinning as we lost track of where one of us began and the other ended.

For a time we were two halves of a whole, made complete by the strength of our love.

Separating only long enough for a quick gasp of air from time to time we each continued to pull the other back into the embrace. It was a single drawn out kiss that lasted forever, or a heartbeat, time didn’t seem able to apply itself to us for that moment.

When our lips parted and we stood breathlessly in each others arms our eyes met and I found the desire that was threatening to overwhelm me mirrored back in his own gaze. Biting my lip I ran my hands up and down his sides slowly, my nails gliding across the fabric of the shirt he wore. His arms held me more and more tightly and he was even more out of breath now than after we had kissed.

“Jen... your father...”

“Won’t hear us since we’ll be
super
quiet.” I practically purred the words as I pressed myself against him. He groaned slightly as I moved my body slowly, suggestively, against his own.

I could feel his desire growing with my every movement, the bulge in his pants threatening to rip them apart if it wasn’t released soon. His hands started moving over my body, almost mirroring my own movements as he let go of his concerns and began thinking with his other head.

The one I wanted in charge right now.

“I knew you’d be on board.” I grinned up into his eyes then kneeled down slowly in front of him, dragging my hands down his sides to the waist of his pants.

Drawing my fingers across his zipper I felt him twitch and brought my face closer, nearly touching him with my lips. “Looks like you’ve got something trapped in there. Let’s set it free, shall we?”

I could hear him breathing heavily above me as I slowly, teasingly, undid the jeans to free his cock already heavy with desire. The pants fell to his ankles as I brought my mouth closer, letting the heat of my breath wash over his growing member.

I reached up under his shirt and traced the muscles with my nails, bringing them down to that heavenly ‘V’ which pointed right to the promised land. He growled softly as his hands found my hair and pulled me closer, unable to take my teasing.