Shifter’s Baby (Alpha Fantasy Paranormal Billionaire Shifter BBW Romance) (22 page)

              Callie wrinkled her nose slightly and grabbed a can out of one of the coolers. She normally only liked craft beers, but she supposed in this instance she didn’t have to be picky. Her stomach growled slightly, and she glanced at the table, wondering when the rest of the food would come out.

              She didn’t have much else to do. Her mother and her new stepfather were the center of attention, congratulations and jokes being handed out one after the other, and Callie hung off to the side, wondering privately how long she had to stay before she could sneak back to the house and read…or maybe sleep.

              She was barely paying attention anymore when she was startled by a deep voice speaking right next to her: “You look entirely too bored to be at a party.”

              Callie looked up sharply to see Wyatt standing there, casually holding his own beer. She collected herself quickly and shrugged. “Not really my type of party.”

              “Oh? What is your type?”

              “Wine. Other college kids.” She realized she sounded more than a little snobby, and wished she had thought of a different way to say it. She could see from Wyatt’s raised eyebrows that he wasn’t impressed by her answer.

              “So, not good enough for you?”

              Callie shook her head. “That’s not what I meant. I just…I don’t really feel like I belong.”

              He shrugged. “You don’t. That doesn’t mean you can’t have a good time, right?”

              “I guess you have a point.”

              “Isn’t being in college all about trying new things, learning about different types of people?”

              Callie blinked up at him. “I guess you have a point.”

              He swung his arm out, gesturing at the large gathering. “So…here’s a different type of people. Something new you haven’t tried before.” He looked down at her, and Callie’s stomach knotted. His voice had changed slightly when he said the last sentence, and his eyes were roving over her face intently. She felt nervous suddenly, as if she were on the verge of something she wasn’t sure about.

              “How about I go grab us both a sandwich and another beer, and you tell me about college and Washington?”

              “You really want to hear about that?”

              “We’re family now, right?” He winked at her, and Callie’s heart sank. Of
course
. He was just placating her, like a sister. She felt stupid. Of course he wasn’t flirting with her. She took another sip of her beer, watching him walk away as he went to grab their food.

              A couple of the other girls approached him, and he started talking and laughing with them as he fixed the plates. Callie felt a flash of jealousy. They were both younger than she was, dressed in tiny denim shorts and ripped black tanks, with legs for days. Callie felt almost frumpy in comparison. One of the girls laughed loudly, almost theatrically, at something Wyatt said, clinging to his arm as she recovered. Callie bit her lip. It was beyond annoying. All of the girls seemed so desperate, as if their whole lives revolved around being an “old lady” to one of the club members. Callie remembered asking her mother if the term didn’t bother her, and she’d laughed it off. It was just a nickname, she’d said, just a silly pet name, like “baby”.

              For someone like her mother, who’d always gone to great lengths to avoid looking her age, it was odd that she was so comfortable with it, Callie thought.

              Wyatt had disentangled himself from the two girls, murmuring something to them, and he returned to Callie with two plates loaded with barbecue sandwiches, baked beans, and a salad. Callie reached hungrily for the food and took a huge bite. “Wow, this is amazing.”

              “Isn’t it? My best friend’s old lady made it. She’s a great cook. Some of the others made the sides.”

              Callie nodded, unable to speak between bites.

              “Christ, girl. Don’t they feed you at the bar?”

              Callie shrugged. “Not really. We don’t get much of a break, unless it’s slow. Even then, I’m not really a fan of the food.”

              “Yeah, Tucker’s cook isn’t much to talk about.”

              There was silence for several moments. “So, do you like Washington?” Wyatt asked finally, breaking the silence.

              Callie nodded. “It’s different. Much different from here.”

              “The weather?”

              “The weather, the people…everything. I like it a lot.”

              “And you don’t like it here?”

              “I don’t feel like I belong here.”

              Wyatt frowned a little. He set his plate aside. “You know, we aren’t bad people, Callie. I know you think my dad isn’t good enough for your mom, but he will take good care of her. The men here are good to the women they’re with. He’ll make sure she’s as happy as she can be.”

              “I know.” Callie glanced down at her lap. “I guess maybe I’m a little jealous.”

              “Of what?”

              “Your lifestyle,” she admitted. “You all seem so…free. You can do whatever you want. There’s no one stopping you, and if they do try, you don’t care what they think.”

              Wyatt looked down at her, his eyes serious. “Not whatever we want.”

              Callie could have sworn his eyes went to her mouth.

              “And sometimes we have to care what other people think.” He kept looking at her for a few moments, and then he stood up abruptly, taking their plates and striding off towards the crowd. Callie stayed put in her seat, her lips parted, trying to figure out what he could possibly have meant.

***

              She kept to herself mostly for the rest of the evening, watching the others interact and drinking beer. She was sure her mother had left the keys somewhere, but she might as well just start walking back to the house—the last thing she needed was to run into an overzealous cop. She stood and tossed her can into a nearby bag, and turned to begin the slow trek back to her house.

              She’d made it maybe twenty feet, just to the edge of the road where it started to fork off, when she heard footsteps behind her. A little on edge, she jumped and turned around, only to see Wyatt standing there. “Leaving already?” His voice sounded a little slurred, and she knew he’d probably been drinking as much as she had.

              “Just going home. I’m really tired.”

              He was so close to her. He took another step forward, and she took a deep breath. Her legs felt shaky suddenly, and while it might have been the alcohol, she didn’t think that it was. She took a step backwards, and then another, and she felt the thick trunk of a tree against her back. Wyatt was looming over her, and she put out her hand, pressing it into his chest. “Wyatt, what are you doing out here?”

              “I was thinking about what you said.”

              “What
I
said?”

              “That we do whatever we want. No matter what anyone else thinks.”

              “It seems like all of you do.”

              “There’s something I’ve been wanting to do, then.”

              He leaned forward, and before Callie could speak or move or think, his lips were on hers. They were softer than she’d expected, and while she’d have guessed that he would be a rough kisser, he was exactly the opposite. His mouth brushed against hers, the warmth of it tantalizing, and just when she thought that he was going to tease her forever, his tongue darted out and traced the seam of her lips. She tilted her head back, her mouth opening for him, and his tongue swept inside. One of his hands braced himself against the tree trunk, and the other went to her hair, running his fingertips through it as he gently explored her mouth.

              She would have kept kissing him forever. Her body felt flushed, her skin too tight, and she reached for his waist, pulling him against her. There was no part of her that wanted to stop, but suddenly he pulled back.

              “We shouldn’t be doing this,” he muttered, his lips reddened from the kiss. Callie thought she’d never seen anything so sexy.

              “My father would kill me,” he said, and he reached for her hand. “I’ll walk you home.”

              It seemed like such an innocent thing to say, after that kiss. Callie let him take her hand, let him walk with her down the few miles of road that led to her mother’s house. It took them some time to get there, and the silence between them was heavy. Callie felt as if her whole body was aching, and she realized that she didn’t care who Wyatt was supposed to be to her. She wanted him, and if the kiss had been any indication, he wanted her too.

              They reached the house at last, and Wyatt turned to go with a mumbled: “Good night.” Callie reached out and grabbed his arm, and he halted, his face almost irritated. “What is it?”

              “I don’t want you to go,” she said, and she took a step forward. “Come inside with me.”

              “Callie, we can’t. This isn’t right. We would both get into trouble.”

              And for the first time in her entire, rule-following, good-girl life, Callie said something she could never have imagined: “I don’t care if it’s right or not.” She took another step forward and grabbed his shoulders, leveraging herself up onto her toes so that she could press her mouth against his, desperately trying to break his resolve.

              It held for a few moments. He stood stone-like in her embrace, not even his lips giving way. Her body arched forwards, and he suddenly made a growling noise deep in his throat, and sank both of his hands into her hair, pulling her lips firmly against his.

              Her hands went to his waist, fingers sinking into the buttery-soft leather of his vest, and she whimpered softly into his mouth, the rush of sensation coming back all at once. His body was hot and hard against hers, warmth radiating off of him, and she pulled away from the kiss, breathless. “Let’s go inside,” she said, grabbing his hand. He followed her without a word, into the house and down the hall, into her bedroom.

              Seeing him standing there, in the room she’d slept in most of her life, was almost beyond belief. She’d never imagined that she’d have him here. Her hands went to his shirt, slipping under the hem, fingers caressing the smooth skin beneath it. His mouth was on hers again, his hands sliding over her hips and around to grab her ass, and it was as if both of them couldn’t touch each other enough. She slid his vest off of his shoulders, careful to put it on a chair, and the white tee shirt came off next. She flattened her palms against his muscled chest, tracing her fingertips over the lines of the tattoos across it, and he closed his eyes and sighed at her touch.

              “Fair’s fair,” he murmured after a moment, and with a grin Callie reached for the hem of her own black tank, drawing it over her head and tossing it to the floor. She heard Wyatt make an appreciative noise, and she silently congratulated herself for having worn the one nice, black lace bra that she owned.

              Truly, she hadn’t done it on purpose.

              His hands went to her waist, sliding up her ribs, reaching for her breasts. She sighed as his palms covered them, mounding them in his hands, and then he rubbed his thumbs over the nipples as they hardened beneath the lace. Callie moaned softly, her back arching as he took them between his fingers, rolling them as he watched the expression on her face.

              “You’re so beautiful,” he said as he reached for the clasp of her jeans, pushing the zipper down and working them over her hips. He knelt in front of her as he pushed them to the floor, and gently backed her up, until the backs of her legs were touching her mattress. Then, slowly, he hooked his fingers under the edge of her black cotton panties, and tugged them down.

              Callie moaned aloud at the first touch of his lips between her thighs. No one had ever done this to her before, and she’d always been too shy to ask. He spread her knees apart with his hands, his fingers reaching between her legs to open her up to him, and then his tongue darted out, stroking and lapping at her, and she sat on the edge of the mattress, letting her legs fall open for him.

              “You taste delicious,” he murmured as he slid his hand down, two of his fingers slowly working their way into her as his tongue changed speeds, flicking quickly one minute and the next traveling in leisurely strokes over her. She arched her back as she felt his fingers slide inside of her, and she felt her body tensing, her muscles tightening as the pleasure intensified. She’d never thought anything could feel so good. She felt his lips move over her clit, pressing down, and suddenly he was sucking it into his mouth, his fingers catching a slow rhythm inside of her, and she leaned back, collapsing onto the mattress as her hips ground against his face, her orgasm approaching quicker and quicker.

              She was almost frightened of it. She’d never felt pleasure so intense. One second every part of her body seemed rigid and tight, and the next she was writhing and bucking, her moans muffled as she turned her face into the covers of the bed to drown out some of the sounds. He never stopped, his hands tight on her thighs as he kept the sensations going for what felt like entire minutes, and then when she was finally limp on the bed, he pulled away and stood up.