In Deeper (25 page)
Authors: Christy Gissendaner
Tags: #paranormal romance, #paranormal erotic romance, #erotic romance
There. She was starting to feel better already. She’d clearly been mesmerized by the lure of his bad boy aura.
Then she thought of her best friend Cari hitting it off with the man of her dreams, the hunky-fur hottie Kane Reese from the New York pack, and she suddenly felt wildly ecstatic for her chica-poo and horribly lonely for herself at the same time.
And her butt was still cold from the stone, even though she was standing.
Time to cheer up, Ash
! she told herself, forcing the cheer because it was mind over matter, damn it.
Time to laugh and dance and shake it off like a super-trooper
.
She lifted her chin and laughed. But then she stopped because she sounded quite loony laughing alone on the front steps of a mansion.
“Are you okay?” a woman asked.
Ashley flinched. A tiny mouse-like squeak escaped her lips before she clamped her teeth together and accidentally bit her tongue. Hard. She spun around and found herself staring up at Miranda Steel. Miranda was pretty, no two ways about it—svelte, red-haired, wearing a dress of beautiful green silk—and she watched Ashley the same way a person would watch a coyote that
might
be rabid but hadn’t started foaming yet.
“I’m peachy,” Ashley said, lifting her chin. “Just waiting for my pumpkin carriage to show up.” She looked at her bare wrist. “Those darn horse-shifting mice are never on time.”
That was it—that was her best make-nice routine, her most inane small talk ballroom joke. She and her friend Cari had never gotten along well with Miranda, who liked to be called Randi, Randi with an “i” not a “y”, because “y’s” were for cocktail waitresses like Ashley and not upwardly mobile wolves. Randi had always been more interested in finding male wolves that could help her move up in pack status. Ashley couldn’t care less about that kind of thing. In her opinion, humans were bad enough jockeying and constantly obsessed over power and position. Sadly, pack werewolves were even worse.
She was neither at the top nor at the bottom of her Miami wolf pack, free to roam around the great big middle of the pack and have some fun. She didn’t understand wolves like Miranda-slash-Randi who used their sex appeal—not for fun, not even to feel better about themselves by having men sniff after them—to achieve position and status.
Miranda didn’t smile at her offhand Cinderella joke. “Why aren’t you out running in the forest with the Wild Run?”
“Why aren’t
you
out there getting your fur freaky on? Hmm?”
The question clearly irritated the other woman. “I’m looking for Kane Reese.” She gave Ashley a significant look, as if to say between them: We both know Kane is son of the Alpha Rex and heir to the New York pack.
“What?” Ashley squawked. “You…you man scammer! You—” she struggled for an adequate term “—you man-poaching bitchface!”
Fury flashed in Randi’s eyes. She clenched her hands, and the black silk of her gloves groaned in protest. “How dare you? Are you drunk?”
“Not drunk enough!” That didn’t sound right. She tried again. “I haven’t been drinking!”
Mandi glanced at the empty champagne glass.
Heat crept up Ashley’s neck and burned on her face. “I mean aside from that one glass of champagne. Don’t distract from the issue. The issue is you setting your…
wicked scheming sights
on my best friend’s guy. Cari Lopez is meant to be with Kane. I don’t know what you’re all about, searching for him, but you stay away. They’re happy.”
“What are you? Jealous? Crazy?” Mandi shook her head. “I don’t know if you’ve had too much to drink or not, but maybe you should take it up with Martin Ortega before taking it out on me. It was Montgomery Reese, Mr. Alpha Rex himself, who set this up with our alpha. This will unite our packs, give Miami a far safer position politically, economically—”
“Spare me the civics lesson, grubby man-thief. Cari is Miami all the way, and so am I, so
Cari
would be perfect for New York and Miami alliances sealed by kisses or whatever.”
“Did you just call me a
grubby man-thief
?”
“Maybe.”
“Well
maybe
if you’d been more respectful of our alpha he’d have picked
you
for the honor.”
“Look, Mandi, I’d love to stand here and catfight with you all night, but I’m busy so…shoo!”
Miranda gave her a look that couldn’t seem to settle on anger or stunned disbelief. “You really are crazy.” She turned and started to walk away.
“And you can forget about Kane,” Ashley called after her. “Never gonna happen. Love and romance always win.”
The other woman didn’t look back. She only shook her head as she glided up the steps and vanished into the Brightwood Manse.
Well, that bit of unexpected unpleasantness was finally over with. Ashley sighed. Mandi must be all kinds of mixed up to think she’d ever have a chance Kane. Kane was for Cari. Simple as that. The story had a beauty that strummed her heartstrings like an over-caffeinated banjo player. Not that banjo players were all that romantic. But a powerful wolf falling for a woman way down the social ladder through the raw electric power of love? Love under the light of the stars and the leaves of the trees and climaxing with a wild run through the forest? That was so romantic it filled her throat with two truckloads of
verklempt
. She had to blink rapidly to avoid crying and messing up her mascara.
God, she really was pathetic. What would her bad boy Colton think if he knew what a creampuff she was? Who was she fooling? He probably already knew. She didn’t even bother to hide it most of the time. A ditzy creampuff, she knew what they said about her behind her back. She didn’t want to find out what Colton might say, and since he wasn’t here, it looked as if she never
would
find out. Bitter disappointment washed through her. She’d so wanted to run with him tonight…
The distant roar of a big engine snagged her attention. She craned her neck, trying to see down the seemingly endless driveway that vanished into the trees. Sounded like somebody driving hard and fast.
A large 4X4 truck shot into view. It raced down the long driveway, roaring toward the front of the Brightwood Manse. Toward
her
. The old truck was a faded reddish brown in the darkness, covered with primer spots, dents, and scratches. One headlight was out. There was a roll bar, and a winch on the front near the bumper. The big engine grumbled and growled like an angry wolf.
Colton Winter’s truck.
How could she forget it? She’d seen it often enough when she’d been in Colorado. She stood there, all deer-in-the-headlights, as she watched it tear along the driveway with her heart pounding and her stomach doing Ferris wheel turns.
The truck screamed to a stop in front of the wide marble steps leaving stripes of black rubber and plumes of smoke behind. The echo of screeching tires bounced back to her, so strangely unnatural in a night filled with the howling of wolves.
The driver’s door
clunked
as it swung open. Colton jumped out and ran around the front of the truck. The single yellow headlight briefly illuminated him, as if he stood too close to a stage light. He wore the boots she loved, brown and scuffed and worn, and also those faded blue jeans. No cowboy hat tonight, just his close-cropped hair. He hurried to the bottom step, then hesitated, watching her. He slowly ascended the stairs, his gaze locked on hers.
“Ashley,” Colton said, voice grim. “You’re in danger. Come with me.
Now
.”
Buy
Two Wild Wolves
here
http://www.amazon.com/Two-Wild-Wolves-Nights-Book-ebook/dp/B00MC7QEWM/
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