Past My Defenses (Taming the Pack series) (Entangled Ignite) (14 page)

“Well, I take one running—if I’m wearing clothes. They’re the same thing, so either is fine.”

He dropped it into her hands.

Someone was running toward the house. Bizarre.

If he was about to face anyone, he’d need to start thinking…dampening thoughts right away.

“So, you met my sister?”

She was holding her breath after puffing on the inhaler, but she let it out in a long sigh. “Yeah, she might think I’m a tramp. I thought she was at first—so I didn’t put on any clothes.”

“What?”

Then the pounding started. The sheriff had arrived.

…

Dane left her there recovering from the hottest makeout session she’d ever experienced in her life. It wasn’t from being in heat—she’d been this way enough times to know that. It was her and Dane.

Wow.

Explosive.

She kept mentioning how long they’d known each other to remind herself that she shouldn’t feel
this
much for him. It was impossible. Maybe that’s why it was so hot.

Fanning herself ineffectively with her fingers, she dropped to her back and took deep breaths. It was good to know she’d have to be medicated to do the deed with him. She might need a third inhaler next to the bed. Her gaze drifted to the fridge. Or maybe an inhaler for each room.

If the police hadn’t stopped them…

Speaking of which, she could hear Dane telling the sheriff about her door. That was odd.

Then the footsteps came toward her, and she tipped her head backward to see Dane beside their local sheriff, Sheriff Terry.

“See, she’s fine. I was worried about her this morning, and she wasn’t answering the door, so I broke it in.”

“She doesn’t look fine,” the sheriff said. “She looks flushed, and she’s lying on the floor. Are you okay, Ms. Tucker?”

“Fine. Just overexerted myself…exercising.” Exercising her rights as Dane’s mate—that’s what she’d been doing—had nearly killed her, but what a way to go.

“I came over to ask you some questions and your door looked broken into, and your clothes were spread all over your room.” He grimaced. “I went in after seeing the door and your room through your window. Also, you didn’t answer, and you were the closest person to this morning’s crime scene. Anyway, I may have broken the door even worse.”

“It’s okay. She’s staying here anyway,” Dane said.

Vanessa glared at him. She’d never had a guy move her stuff to his place—ever—let alone after a few days. Well, sure, she was planning on staying with him, but he didn’t have to be so conceited about it. And her room
had
looked like she’d packed in a hurry. He’d gone through her underwear—underwear he was seeing for the first time. Okay, so he’d seen her naked, but not in leopard-print silk, which he now knew she owned. And they were missing, so he’d probably packed those and left all the sensible cotton underwear.

Men.

Arrogant men.

Alpha males.

She growled under her breath to go with the glare, but it just sent her a new whiff of tantalizing, wonderfully aroused Dane. They had to stop disagreeing or they’d get good and dirty on the floor here whether the sheriff was present or not. She inhaled deeply. Oh, hell, no more fighting…it would only lead to happy, happy places. Mmm. It wasn’t fair that he smelled so good. She’d never win an argument again. Well, technically, maybe they’d both end up winners—but that wasn’t the point.

“Your stuff is all here,” Dane said. He made it sound so logical, but she could hear the amusement underneath the layers.

She rolled her eyes.

The sheriff radioed in, “You were right, Travis. She’s here at the ranger’s house.”

“Yup,” he answered.

The sheriff cleared his throat. “She also appears to be fine.”

“Yup,” Travis answered again.

Dane reached down a hand to help her to her feet. His finger slid across her wrist as he smiled at her. Bad, bad Dane. There was a wolf in that smile. When he did pull her up, he pulled her a little harder than necessary, so she stumbled into him. Their bodies pressed against each other, and his eyes went dark as his pupils dilated. They were playing with fire.

And she liked playing with fire. Even if he only wanted her, he wanted her a lot. Wow, did he want her.

“Stop,” she whispered—without any real sincerity.
No. Stop. Okay, take me.
Pathetic.

Obviously, he felt properly chastised because he grabbed her butt before he went back to plating their dinner. She was going to need several cold showers a day if he was serious about holding her off until she was out of her fertile period. That was probably a good two weeks off. Although so far, his good intentions on that could barely be called intentions. They were more like nice ideas. If not for those sirens…

The sheriff asked her questions about seeing or hearing anything, and she had to admit that she’d taken meds and slept through the time Cheri had been murdered.

“Was she killed there?” Dane asked.

“No. Not enough blood, and the wounds looked too clean for it happening outside.”

“So, do you have a time of death?” Dane offered the sheriff a plate of ravioli, which he accepted with a smile.

“Looks to be between midnight and two in the morning. Travis managed to find the body around five in the morning.”

She’d seen the flare of Dane’s nostrils, and his jaw go firm when he realized that she’d been lying on her tile floor, completely unconscious, while Cheri’s body had been dumped.

They’d be talking about that. She might have managed to push off other conversations, but that one was going to happen, and he’d use it to build a case for her staying here.

“Travis has really been on top of this,” the sheriff said. “That boy deserves a raise. First to arrive at the car. He found her body. I don’t know how he is managing that. I know he’s good at tracking, and he was a friend of Cheri’s, but that’s still amazing.”

“Yes. It
is
,” Dane said, not making eye contact with her.

Well, chances were, a horde of Lycans had been out searching last night, and whoever had found the body had turned it over to Travis. It’d be hard to explain why you were out roaming the woods in the middle of the night if you weren’t with the police looking for a missing person.

“You’ll be staying here?” Sheriff Terry asked at the door.

“Yes,” Dane said.

“Probably,” she admitted. She’d be here, whether she was really wanted or not, good and protected. Caged—all over again.

Chapter Ten

The downside to dating someone with volatile emotions was when they went silent—when they shut off those emotions. When the sheriff had left, she went from testy and temperamental to quietly brooding. She could be thinking anything, and he didn’t know her well enough to stop her from doing something crazy and getting herself killed.

“Vanessa?” he tried again.

She was sitting in front of her laptop, scrolling through what looked like documents for her work, but it seemed to him that she was scanning it far too quickly to actually be reading it. It seemed like it was more of an excuse to avoid talking to him. “Hmm?”

“What are you thinking?”

“I told you, I’m just working on stuff. I was supposed to go in to work today, but things were too crazy.” She didn’t look up as she said, “It’s getting late, and you haven’t had much sleep. You should go to bed.”

“Only if you are.”

The smile didn’t go beyond her mouth as she said, “Sounds like we wouldn’t get much sleep if I did.”

Maybe he could prod a reaction out of her—anything was better than this flat shutout. “Are we saying because of your snoring?”

In the reflection of the laptop, he saw her roll her eyes. “I have allergies.”

No, that was a huge under-reaction compared to before. No good. He grabbed the computer chair she was in, spun it around, and leaned over her, his hands on the arms of the chair. “No.”

There was a spark of anger in her eyes, but then her gaze shifted away from his. It pissed him the hell off. He liked facing her head-on—like two opposing armies fighting for the same ground. Nothing felt like victory when your opponent retreated like they didn’t even want the land anyway. “No what?”

“No to whatever you’re thinking—to whatever you’re planning.”

“I’m just sitting here working.” Like hell she was. There was no way she was accepting all this without more of a fight. He’d seen the flash in her eyes and heard that growl when the sheriff was here. There was no wolf you’d be able to take from its den and fence in somewhere, without more of a fight than she’d put up. Which meant she was saving her energy for something else—something else that might get her killed.

She was back to pretending she wasn’t a wolf…just in a different way.

He shoved backward as he stood, and the chair banged off the desk behind her. “So, we’re back to treating Dane like he’s either an idiot or crazy. Because that worked so well for us the first time.” Then, in one of his prouder moments, he stalked off down to the mudroom. At least he wasn’t losing his temper with her. Besides, it’d been a while since he’d cleaned his guns…or tuned his bike. There were plenty of things he could do to stay awake.

…

Vanessa closed her eyes and sighed. That could have gone better. Then her eyelids shot up and went wide when she heard him unlock the gun cabinet downstairs. Okay, apparently that had gone worse than she’d even anticipated. Holy freak, Dane! She’d disarmed someone before—that one time in Reno, but hell, didn’t she have enough people trying to kill her? She spun in the chair to watch the top of the stairs. Her brain made a bunch of split-second plans. She’d have to move fast, disarm him, and then they’d sit and talk like a rational couple—or they’d fight and make out and she’d hide his guns.

Okay. So, maybe she hadn’t been subtle about her planning things. But people often had devious plans they hid from their significant others. It was part of being in a relationship.

And at least she wasn’t running away from him…or she’d at least come back here for her medication if she did.

Dane. We can make this work. I swear, we can.

She sat there, waiting, her heart pounding in her throat…and then she heard him set the gun on the mudroom’s table along with a box of items. He pulled one of the stools over to the table.

Oh. Huh. Hopefully this wasn’t a slow build to homicide.

She stood quietly and padded across the floor to the mudroom’s door. She wasn’t sure what he was doing, but she wasn’t about to let him play with guns when he was mad at her. At the very least, she wanted to make sure he wasn’t doing something crazy. She was the one in charge of bringing the crazy to the relationship. He was supposed to be all rational and crap.

She was halfway down the stairs without alerting him to her presence when the sneeze started to build. A few more steps and she could see what he was doing and hurry back upstairs. But that damn cat had been down here, and the whole place reeked of it. Lucifer was continuing to bedevil her. Evil, evil, evil cat. Spawn of Satan. She rubbed at her nose, wriggling it. Don’t sneeze. Don’t sneeze. Just two more steps.

The sneeze hit her with such force she almost fell backward, so she grabbed the railings.

“Bless you,” Dane said—flatly. “I’m only saying that because I was taught to be polite, though.”

Pulling her shirt over her mouth and nose, she walked down the remaining steps to find him cleaning his guns, without even looking up. Not that she wanted him cleaning his guns while staring at her, but having him this angry with her didn’t sit well. It hadn’t the last time either.

When they argued it out, she felt like this all might work. They were working on things that way. But when he was sitting there simmering…

She hadn’t even known Cheri despised her, and she almost didn’t care because Cheri was nothing to her. Dane was a far cry from nothing, and now he was so mad he wouldn’t even argue with her.

“Do you want me to return your key?” Her voice sounded small and weak, and she hated that. For all the deference that was bred into her, this caught her by surprise—this desire to have his respect and favor. He wasn’t Alpha, not to the rest of the pack. Yet she wanted to treat him like one.

“Don’t you dare, or I’ll go find a cat to rub all over you.”

She blinked back tears that she hoped were from allergies, not because her heart was so invested. This man wanted to cage her, and he wasn’t even part of that other side of her life, nor did she want him to be…for good reason. She liked being able to do spontaneous and possibly foolhardy things. Like tonight, she was planning to patrol around her house and try to catch whoever wanted to kill her before they found out she wasn’t still there.

The less he knew, the safer she could keep him—and besides, she didn’t have to answer to anyone.

She spun around and went back up the stairs. Instead of pretending to work, she closed her laptop, turned off the lights, and went to stand by the front window where she could stare out into the darkness.

Things were much simpler before Dane had come into her life. Now there were all these ups and downs.

Five minutes later, he put away the guns and quietly climbed the stairs. When he opened the door to the darkened house, he called her name.

“By the window.”

She turned to watch him make his way toward her without turning on the lights. He thunked right into the corner of the wall, making her laugh. The laughing helped him pinpoint her location, and he slid his arms around her in a gentle hug. It felt so good—so very good—until the tickle started low in her nose and her sinuses screamed out “nooooo.” She sneezed into shirt.

“Bless you. This time I’m serious. I’m done being an ass.”

“Take off your shirt.”

“Do you think that’s a good idea? I don’t know that it’s going to solve anything.”

She sneezed again. “I think it’ll stop me from spraying you with sneezes.” Gross. That last one had been really wet.

“Oh.” He yanked the shirt off and tossed it.

But then he leaned in and hugged her again, and she pressed her face into his warm skin. Mmm. Why did things have to be more complicated than this? When they were down to this basic level of need, they understood each other. Oh, wow, he smelled so good. Fir trees, cinnamon, and warmth. Sweet and spicy. She hugged him tighter.

“You can see in the dark, can’t you?” he asked.

“Mmm.” Every inch of him. Every gorgeous inch.

“And I know you can hear really well.”

She froze.

He laughed.

Well, since he knew anyway… “Jordan and Cheri weren’t matched. That’s why they weren’t exclusive.”

“Yeah, Travis told me.”

“He did?”

Dane threaded the fingers of one of his hands through her hair and massaged her nape slowly. She leaned into him. It was pathetic. He turned her into this dependent, needy thing. Only it didn’t feel that way, which was probably worse—her body and brain didn’t realize how pathetic she was being.

“Yep, Travis answered a lot of my questions. He was really helpful. Your taxpayer dollars at work right there.”

She laughed, but the deep breath that went with it dragged more of his scent into her. If she stayed near him much longer, she wouldn’t be able to leave him to go on patrol so she could catch her killer.

“Hey, let’s go to bed. I’m exhausted.”

She let him drag her to his room and even went through the motions of getting ready for bed. They took turns in the bathroom, and then brushed their teeth side by side like an old married couple. He’d packed her fleece pajamas and suggested it might be cold enough she wear a sweatshirt overtop them. Apparently he wanted as many layers between them as possible. She wasn’t sure whether to be flattered or frustrated.

When she was crawling into the giant bed, he said, “I might go sleep on the couch at some point.”

His words sank her heart, and she stopped and sat. It had seemed better between them, even though she’d accidentally spit on his hand while she’d been brushing her teeth. He’d laughed…and not in a homicidal rage sort of way. It had seemed better, and now he couldn’t even stand to be near her? His signals had to be a lot more obvious if she was expected to understand them. “You’re that mad?” she whispered.

Laughing, he leaned over and grabbed her wrist, pulling her toward him across the bed. “Not unless you mean mad for you. I’m not getting any sleep because I can’t stop thinking about you. I’ve reached zombie status.”

“Oh…I can sleep on the couch.” Well, that was much better. That would make it easier to sneak out anyway.

He stared at her, his lips thinning to a straight line. For a moment, she worried she’d said that bit about sneaking out aloud. Or maybe he already knew her that well. “I’m tempted to handcuff you to the bed.”

She grinned. There was a visual that could cheer her up no matter what was on her mind.

“Not for that,” he said, but his scent said he wouldn’t mind if it was for that.

“Either way, I can get out of handcuffs.” All she had to do was shift to her furry state and step out of them.

“Using what?” He glanced around the bed.

Apparently, he hadn’t thought it out. Maybe that was a good thing. He didn’t look at her and see the creature inside. She’d never been ashamed of having an altered state, but it might seem freakish to someone on the outside.

“Handcuff me to the headboard, and I’ll be out by morning.”

“Won’t that be uncomfortable?”

She snorted. “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve slept in handcuffs, but I won’t be.”

He pushed out of bed with a smile and went over to his closet.

“You don’t keep them beside the bed?”

“I keep them with my uniform, but I might need an extra set to keep there.” He threw a feral sort of smile over his shoulder. It made her heart speed up.

A minute later, he was back with a shiny silver pair of handcuffs. He slid the ratcheting arm on one side through and through while smiling at her. It almost undid her resolve. But she didn’t want to spend every day looking over her shoulder and every night here because he felt it was necessary. They should both be free to choose each other…not this.

“You ready?” he asked.

She could smell the scent of arousal pouring off him like waves. And she closed her eyes and took it in. This wasn’t fair. If they’d met a year ago, and he was a Lycan—things would be so easy. Maybe they’d be so easy it’d get boring, but did they need the added complication of a murderer chasing her? In a new relationship? No, she didn’t think so.

As she lay back with her hands above her head against the wooden spokes of the headboard, she said, “Most guys would be all over me when I’m like this—when I’m hot for sex.”

He frowned as he crawled across the bed. “You said that one night that I could be anyone, and that’s just…fantastic. Just what I want in a relationship. Being the right gender. I’m not even sure if two-legged is a requirement.”

She closed her eyes so he wouldn’t see the hurt in them. He made her fragile like this. She was vulnerable. She actually cared what he thought of her. Poor porcelain Vanessa. It sucked.

And she couldn’t run away.

She was caged.

“Hey,” he said softly as he leaned over her. His breath feathered across her skin. Mmm. One of his fingers stroked a line down her jaw to her chin. “Sorry. I just want it…right between us.”

She did too. Well, part of her did. Part of her wanted it right now, quick and dirty, and maybe even violent. She opened her eyes and met his gray ones as he slapped the handcuffs on. She sucked in a quick breath. Oh, yeah.

“I have a set of handcuffs I could bring over.” She liked the hungry look he was running across her. “You look part wolf.”

He grinned. “Because I look like I might bite?”

“Exactly.”

He leaned down and nipped at the skin below her ear. The moist heat from his mouth sent a shiver skating across her skin, and the momentary pain flushed her body with heat. Hot shivering… Mmm. If only they weren’t just playing. “You’d make a good Lycan…and I’d be a bad Lycan.”

His laugh was dark and deep and sent more of those heated shivers dancing. Tipping back, he flipped off the light. “But you’d know if I was a Lycan, wouldn’t you?”

She sucked in a deep breath before she answered. Phew. Wow. That was amazing and dissatisfying. She’d never been so gloriously frustrated. “Probably. Lycans smell different—wilder, but sometimes it’s easier to spot a Lycan among wolves than among humans.”

“So, I could be, and you wouldn’t know?”

“I’d know,” she said. For one thing, he wouldn’t be keeping his distance right now. The drive to procreate would overpower his hesitations. Scent-matched couples were excused from meetings with the pack during the female’s “time.” Last year when she was in heat, even without the scent-match, every unattached male had fought to go on patrols with her—which is how she’d ended up with Jordan and made that mistake that she was paying for in spades. The other males had literally started fighting each other—even the ones who really wouldn’t have been interested the rest of the year. Brawls had started.