He had to stand in the hallway a long time after he closed the door, waiting for his fierce hard-on to go down. He needed to talk to Dylan, but he couldn’t face his father with an erection that could stop a train.
Seeing the light go off under the door behind him and hearing the squeak of his bedsprings as Kim climbed into his bed didn’t help deflate him at all.
An hour later, Glory opened her back door to admit a moody Dylan Morrissey.
Glory had never met a Shifter who turned her on faster than Dylan could. So what if he was a Feline? Glory’s friends didn’t approve, but they could eat their hearts out. Dylan was tall, broad-shouldered, and temperamental, with the best ass she’d ever seen on any male, Shifter or human.
Glory let Dylan pace, happy he’d responded to the veiled invitation she’d thrown out when she’d talked to the human girl. Dylan didn’t always respond to hints; he did what he pleased. Damned alpha male.
“You’re giving me motion sickness,” she said after a time. “What have you decided to do about the little human? Let Fergus kill her?”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do about her.” Dylan finally stopped and rested his broad fists on her kitchen counter. “Liam just spent an hour talking me out of taking her to Fergus, which means I disobey Fergus’s direct orders. Fuck.”
If only.
Glory knew damn well Liam hadn’t talked Dylan out of anything. If Dylan thought the girl should go to Fergus, nothing Liam could do would stop Dylan from taking her there.
“Why do you think Liam’s right?” she asked.
Dylan’s hard blue eyes sparked with anger, though he flicked his gaze away before his dominant rage could fix on her.
“What makes you think I agree with him?”
“Because if you didn’t, you’d have her ass in your truck and be hauling her down to San Antonio instead of standing in my kitchen with me.”
Dylan slammed his fists into the counter. “I know that. But Liam…” He straightened up and shook his head. Glory glanced quickly at the counter, but Dylan hadn’t dented it. This time.
“But Liam what?” she asked.
“He cares about her.” Dylan ran his hands through his hair, mussing it in a sexy way. “I’ve never seen him like this. I thought he wanted to protect her because Liam always protects the weak. But it’s more than that. Let’s say I’m surprised he’s letting her sleep alone tonight.”
“You think he’ll claim her?” Glory started brewing coffee to cover her nervousness, not to mention her rampaging horniness. “She’s human.”
Dylan leaned his backside against the counter and folded his arms. “You know how high the ratio of males to females is in Shiftertown. It’s doubtful Liam will ever mate with another Shifter.”
Glory poured fragrant ground coffee into her coffee-maker and closed the lid. “You’d let him take a human as mate?”
“Never in the old days, but those days are gone.” He looked exhausted, Dylan who’d lived so long and seen so much. “She seems robust, and she’s not afraid of us.”
Glory snorted. “If she’s not afraid of you, it’s because she doesn’t know any better. Though I agree, she’s got spunk.” She admired the way the human girl had said what she’d really thought, though Glory would never admit it. In Glory’s experience, most humans she encountered either avoided eye contact with her, pretended contempt, or simply ran away.
“Another reason I don’t think Liam will claim a Shifter woman is because he thinks too much about the good of the clan,” Dylan was saying. “He pushes potential mates on other Shifters rather than claiming them himself. I asked him why, once. He said that Shifters lower in the hierarchy have more time to breed and raise a family, and that’s what Shifters need most. Cubs, not testosterone contests.”
“How self-sacrificing of him.”
“I also think he’s never come across a female who stirs him. For sex, yes. As a mate, no. But this one…”
“This one he’s not likely to charitably pass down to the next mate-seeking Shifter. She’s human; she needs his protection. And Liam is a protector at heart.” Glory smiled. “Like his dad.”
Dylan finally looked straight at her. He’d been sliding his gaze from hers, trying not to pin her with his angry uncertainty, trying not to demand submission. What a sweetie. He must know that if he wanted Glory to go down on her knees, she’d happily oblige.
“It’s my job,” Dylan answered irritably.
“No, it’s you. You’re one big protecting hunk of male. The only reason Fergus leads your clan and not you is because he’s a ruthless bastard. You don’t challenge him, because you fear he’ll retaliate on the innocent, Connor in particular.”
Dylan’s expression went harder still, and it was all Glory could do to stay upright in her high-heeled shoes. His eyes were tinged with red, a sign that he was ready to lose it.
“You only met Fergus the once,” Dylan said, tight-lipped.
“Once was enough. I never want to see him again. People respect you, Dylan. They fear Fergus. There’s a difference.”
She started to turn away, but a steel-strong hand clamped her arm. “What are you trying to do, Glory? Sow insurrection in my clan?”
Glory looked at him in surprise. “Insurrection? Are you kidding? What for?”
Dylan’s grip softened, but Glory saw he had to make himself ease off. “Then why are you so interested in me challenging Fergus?”
“Because you’re a better man than he is. I’ve always thought that, and I’m not the only one.”
Dylan closed his eyes. He clenched his jaw, a muscle twitching. “The clan’s survival is more important than me confronting Fergus.”
“I know.” Glory dared to step closer to him, now that his a wful gaze was shielded. “If we start challenging and fighting one another like we did before the Collar, we’ll be dead within a few short years.”
“I’m glad you understand.”
“See, sometimes I listen when you talk.”
Dylan opened his eyes then, the red gone, the beautiful blue so deep it made her heart ache.
“Glory,” he said softly.
“Yes?”
“Shut it.”
Dylan wove his fingers through her hair, loosening it until it spilled over his hands, and he covered her mouth with his.
Glory rose into the kiss, excitement pumping through her. No one could screw like Dylan could. And Dylan surpassed even himself when he was pissed off and warring with his dominant instincts.
She decided not to fight too hard when Dylan lifted her and deposited her on the counter. She wrapped her legs around his hips, unbuttoned his pants, and leaned back to enjoy herself.
Chapter Nine
Liam was wrenched out of sleep the next morning by Kim banging on the attic door and shouting his name. His instincts had him on his feet and wrenching open the door before his brain even knew he was awake.
He found Kim in the hall, her eyes blazing, in a big black T-shirt with a Guinness logo on it. Kim had obviously slept in the rumpled T-shirt, which she must have found in Liam’s dresser drawer. Liam knew she’d be warm and very naked beneath it, and then he realized he was naked himself, prepared to shift.
One part of him was shifting already. “Gods, Kim, why are you out here yelling like a banshee?”
Kim held up a small bit of satin fabric, her eyes wide with fury. “Who packed this? It was a man, wasn’t it?”
“Probably. Why?”
She shook the red satin patch. “This is a thong. Have you ever worn a thong? Do you know how it feels to have a string up your ass all day?”
Liam sensed the rest of his family listening: Connor sitting up in bed behind him, Sean in the hall below, Dylan behind him in the same clothes he’d worn last night, which meant he’d slept next door.
“What’s wrong with a thong?” Liam asked her. “I bet it’s sexy on you.” He pictured it, and immediately clamped down on his imagination. Gods.
“Oh, right,” Kim said. “I’m standing in a courtroom, trying to think on my feet while the prosecution is laughing its butt off at me, but that’s all right—at least my underwear is sexy.”
Liam leaned on his arm, trying hard not to laugh. He heard Dylan retreat, quietly, into his bedroom. Sean, too, departed, chuckling. Connor folded his arms around his knees, watching this female display in puzzlement.
“Why do you have them, then?” Liam asked.
“Friends buy them for me, all right?” Kim snapped.
“And you hang on to them?”
“I don’t want to hurt their feelings. They think they’re doing me a favor.”
Liam let his grin break through. “They think it’s a favor to let you…how did you put it…wear a string up your ass all day?”
Kim rolled her eyes. “Never mind. I’m taking a shower and going home. You got rid of the feral Shifter, so it’s not like he’s coming back. I’ll be perfectly safe.”
Liam felt Connor’s tension behind him, his troubled worry. Liam relaxed his stance to try to convey to Connor that everything was under control. Right. “Kim, love, I’ll make you breakfast, and you write out a list of what you need. I’ll send someone ’round to retrieve it all for you. Someone female this time. How will that be with you?”
Kim planted her fists on her hips. She shouldn’t have done that; the movement thrust out her br**sts and let the T-shirt outline her ni**les. “Are you still insisting that you won’t let me leave?”
“Not yet. It’s not safe.”
“It’s perfectly safe. The feral Shifter is dead, and you had the lock on my door fixed. Make your damn pancakes if you want to, and then I’m leaving. I won’t tell anyone what happened last night or repeat what you told me about the Collars. I know how to keep a secret, all right? And you can just get over it.”
She stomped back down the stairs and slammed her own door so hard the sturdy walls rattled. Liam sensed her beneath the boards at his feet—her rage; her frustration; her warm, pliant body filling out his shirt. Her closed door would be no barrier to him if he chose to charge in and confront her.
Connor was watching Liam with concern. “What are you going to do?”
He meant, was Liam going to subdue her, and would he hurt Kim doing it? Connor was young, still uncomfortable with his own instincts, not yet certain where he fit in the clan and pride hierarchies. Things were more difficult for him than they had been for Liam or Sean, because Connor had grown up a captive Shifter, and boundaries were fuzzier now than they’d been in the wild. Connor didn’t yet understand when you showed dominance and when you tolerated, and what you tolerated. Plus, he’d been raised by mateless males and had never seen an example of an intimate relationship.
Not that anything Liam had with Kim was going to be straightforward. Educational, maybe. Straightforward, no.
Liam tamped down his own instincts, dousing the pheromones that were putting Connor on edge. “What am I going to do?” He shrugged and headed for the attic bathroom. “What she asked me to. I’m going to make her pancakes.”
Kim descended to the kitchen, showered but still irritated. Liam’s friends had packed not only the underwear she never wore, but also her shortest skirts and lowest-cut tops, a garter belt, and a bunch of stockings. Nothing remotely comfortable, not even shorts and sandals for surviving Austin in the summer.
She paused at the kitchen doorway, surprise cutting through her annoyance. Liam in a tight T-shirt and jeans, spatula in hand, glared at a griddle full of pancakes. Behind him in the narrow kitchen, Sean scrubbed dishes in the sink.
