The Accidental Werewolf 2: Something About Harry (Accidentally Paranormal Novel) (29 page)

Guido, the hero of the night, received more than one kiss of gratitude from the women of OOPS, which he’d accepted humbly before heading into surgery. Except Nina. She’d slapped him on the back and told him the next time she said create a distraction, yell or some such shit. Don’t jump on a crazy bitch with a gun. Because she’ll use it.

Guido had shaken his head. He’d done it for a reason. For all the wrong he’d done, for all the money he’d taken from others when he knew he couldn’t provide the service he’d promised, had left him empty. Just this once, he’d wanted to do something selfless.

Yet, his simple act of loyalty had helped save the children, and that was something none of them would ever forget.

“I’m afraid to leave them,” Harry murmured against the top of her head.

Mara nodded, her throat tightening up. The sight of them vulnerable in sleep, the complete abandon as they sprawled out in all their innocence, made Mara send up a silent prayer of thanks: for friends like Nina and Wanda—for Marty and Keegan—and Guido, too. “Ditto.”

“I was so scared we’d never find them.”

His gruff confession made her smile. She loved that Harry wasn’t afraid to say it out loud. “But we did. That’s all that matters.” She squeezed his now-healing hand, tucking it close.

“You didn’t turn me.”

“Phew. What a relief, right? All that shift-shaming was wearin’ me down,” she teased.

Harry chuckled, pulling her from the entry to her guest bedroom and closing the door. He led her into the bedroom and patted the bed where he sat down, his eyes lined with weariness. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. How could you have known Leah was the one who’d turned you by scratching you? You have nothing to be sorry for.” Mara still couldn’t reconcile the Leah she knew and the one she’d seen waving a gun in her face tonight. It would be a long time before she was able to connect those dots. Her cluelessness. How completely unaware she’d been of Leah’s insanity.

Harry ran a hand over his eyes. “I didn’t even remember all the details of that lunchroom incident until Guido talked about it today. I knew Leah and Astrid were there, but . . . Right up until that point, I thought he was going to tell us it was—”

“Astrid,” Mara finished for him with a nod. “Me, too. She’s pretty moody and temperamental, very possessive of me. It made complete sense she’d be the culprit. Especially after she behaved the way she did when we told her we were pretend lovers.”

“Speaking of that,” he wiggled his eyebrows.

Mara fought a sigh of happiness, full of hope. “Not before we talk about a couple of things. First, I want to apologize to you for being so offended by the notion you didn’t want to be one of us. I get why. Because of Mimi and Fletcher. I realized it after I told you how old I was.” She turned to him, cupping his face. “You’ll outlive them. I wouldn’t want that for my children either.”

His hand circled her wrist, bringing her palm to his cheek and planting a kiss on it. “But being one of you tonight was a gift. If not for these ears that can hear Nina grousing under her breath here at the cottage when I’m at Pack, I would never have heard Mimi’s breathing. If not for my uncanny eyesight, I wouldn’t have seen those straws.”

Mara’s breath hitched on its way out. “If not for Leah, none of this would have happened.”

“But then I never would have known you fantasized about me all day long, if not for Leah.”

Her cheeks flushed. “Oh, stop patting yourself on the back. It wasn’t all day long. Couple hours, tops,” she joked.

“You liked me all that time, and you never said a word.”

She wiggled an admonishing finger. “Not true, Mr. Emmerson. I said a word, or ten drunken words to be precise, at the Christmas party last year. You just didn’t take heed.”

Harry scratched his hair and grinned. “Have I mentioned I’m not so good at hints—flirting—especially when they come from women as hot as you?”

She giggled, with ease, with joy. “So you thought I was hot, but never said a word either? You’re just as much to blame.”

“I suck at striking up conversation—especially with a woman.”

“Stalemate then. But look at us now, all small-talking.”

His face took a serious turn, but he put his arm around her, sliding her near. “What will the council do now, do you think?”

“What can they do now? Officially, there is no serum. If you did drink it, it clearly didn’t matter because you were already a werewolf. The only turn that counts is Leah’s.”

“Then they can’t still have a trial over a serum we don’t even know really works, can they?”

“I’m sure the council will investigate. It’s what they do. But they’ll never get the formula out of my head. I didn’t give some of the factors that Keegan pointed out the importance I should have, the serious thought I should have given creating a child in a cup, for gravy’s sake. I didn’t even know what I’d do if it worked. How I’d explain it to everyone. But the council’s right when it comes to someone getting their hands on it. Someone could really make a mess of things. Maybe sell it to someone. It’s unthinkable. So no more serums for brainy Mara. My baby-making days are over.” The words brought with it great sadness—the loss of a dream.

Harry kissed the tip of her nose. “I don’t think you should give up, honey. Maybe it would have worked. Maybe you can go to the council with the idea of a surrogacy plan in place for others just like you who want babies but haven’t found their mates. The idea that pack members pick out someone you have to live with for the rest of your life is nuts. I’m totally against it. But if you were up for it, I’d help you with all the details of surrogacy for paranormals. We’ll map out a, for lack of a better word, business plan, and present it. And maybe, if things go well between us, you won’t need to create babies in a lab,” he finished on a grin.

Her heart throbbed with excitement at the proposal Harry was making. “And Mimi and Fletcher? How will you explain what happened to you someday?” This troubled her a great deal.

Seeing him tonight when the children’s lives hung in the balance made her more sure than ever the next toughest road of all would be explaining Uncle Harry’s new lot in life.

He smiled, but it was tentative. “I can’t promise if there were ever a way I could change this, that I wouldn’t. The idea of being left here without the kids . . .”

Mara squeezed his hand. “No explanation necessary. I’d feel the same way.” And she would. To lose a child would be to lose the will to go on.

But Harry’s next request was simple. “Will you do it with me when the time comes? When they’re old enough to process it.”

“Why, Harry Emmerson, are you asking me to help you with a sensitive family matter that might not happen for
years
?”

Harry stared down at her, his gaze no longer playful, but very serious. “I think I am.”

The fluttering of her heart, the butterflies in her stomach were hard to hide. “Sure. I’ll help.”

“You know what that means, right?”

“I’d better put my speed-reading skills to good use and find a book on therapy for the family of a werewolf?”

“Nah. It means we’d better invite the Crypt Keeper, too. She’s a badass parent.”

Mara’s head fell back, her laughter ringing in her ears. “Point.”

Harry pulled her down to lie on the bed with him, tugging her to a sitting position on his hips. He began to unbutton the shirt the hospital had given her after a warm shower. “So you’ll show me?”

She planted her hands on his chest, her breathing labored when he pushed the shirt aside and cupped her breast. “Show you what, Harry, not Harold, Emmerson?”

“How to be a werewolf. You know . . . all the tricks of the trade?”

Mara flashed him a smile before gripping his wrists as his hands roamed over her breasts, his fingertips tweaking her hard nipples. “Only if you promise to do this in return.”

Harry groaned, pulling her forward, licking her nipple until heat pooled like lava in her belly. “Scout’s honor,” he teased, lifting his head and giving her body a shove until their lips were inches apart. “Open your eyes and look at me, Mara.”

She obeyed, finding his eyes were full of a million emotions.

Harry’s fingers stroked the back of her head. “I want you in my life, Mara. I want you to get to know Mimi and Fletcher better. I want you to help me get to know them better. I want
you.
Period. Any way you’ll have me. Before we go any further—before we do or say anything else, I need to hear you want that, too.”

In all of her wildest dreams, in all her fantasizing with Astrid about Harry, never had she ever believed any of it would come true.

And now it had.

Whatever it meant—whatever happened—she was going to go for it. No regrets. No waffling. No factoring in all of the things that had held her back before.

With one kiss, one searing, soul-offering kiss, she said, “
Yes.” Yes, yes, yes.

Harry captured her lips, slipping his tongue between them and stroking her mouth, groaning into it as he pulled her shirt off.

Her fingers found the waist of the scrubs the hospital had given him, pulling at the tie and slipping them down his rock-hard thighs. He was naked beneath, gloriously, fabulously naked.

As she tore her lips from his, she rolled down along his body, pressing her heated flesh to his, moaning her appreciation for the hard lines of his abs, the trail of hair leading to his cock.

Her hands found his shaft, hot, silken, stiff, and without hesitation, she let her lips skim the rigid line. Harry’s hiss and low groan made her nipples harden, scraping against the comforter as she settled between his thighs, kneeling there, encompassing his cock with both hands.

Harry’s fingers scored her hair, clutching fistfuls of it when she speared him with her mouth, letting her tongue slide along the heated column, cupping his balls, rolling them with gentle fingertips.

His hips crashed upward, his body tensing and flexing as she swirled her tongue around him, along the throbbing vein just beneath the head of his shaft. His knees rose up and Mara slipped her hands under him, cupping his ass, lifting him higher, driving him into her mouth over and over until he pulled away from her with a hiss of a groan. “No more!” he rasped out, grabbing at her shoulders, his fingers digging into her flesh.

He hauled her upward, rolling her to her back, taking her breath away with the force of it, driving his hands into her hair until her back arched and he was kneeling over her, burying his face in her neck, trailing hot, wet kisses along her neck, down over her breasts.

His teeth grazed her nipples, making Mara fight not to scream his name. Her hands clenched the bedding beneath her, tearing at it for the sweet agony he evoked as he slid down her body. Without the pretense of their last encounter, he spread the lips of her sex, wet, slick with a need so intense her heart surely stopped.

Harry ran the length of her slit, entering her with a digit, then two, driving into her and placing his mouth over her clit. He dragged his tongue over the swollen bud, licking, sucking, thrusting his fingers into her until the heat searing her veins exploded.

Mara jammed her hips downward, lifting them again and again until her orgasm tore at her, reaching deep within her, ripping it from her body with a scream she had to bite her tongue to keep from leaving her mouth.

Her chest heaved. Her hands went to Harry’s head, threading her fingers into his thick hair as she whimpered his name.

Harry slid up alongside her, turning her to her side and sheltering her with his chest. He raised her thigh high, hooking it around his thighs, spreading her, placing his hot cock at her entrance.

Mara reached a hand between them and stroked him, encouraging, silently begging before his first upward thrust into her.

He nipped at her shoulder, cupping her breasts, rolling her nipples between his fingers to hard peaks, moaning at how easily she accepted him.

Mara’s hands went up around his neck, arching into him, loving the feel of her ass against his hips, rolling with him when he splayed his large hand across her abdomen, cupping the heat of it, whimpering again when he let his middle finger slip into her wetness.

They rocked together, Harry deep within her, thrusting, stiff, hot, creating a fire so hot it consumed her.

Their thrusts increased, the spiral of desperate lust Harry evoked in her deepening, crawling its way upward until her body went rigid from the pleasure, tensing, feeling Harry tighten beneath her.

She ran her hands along his muscled arm, abandoning everything but the drive to find her release.

Harry’s body seized, his strong, warm arms tightening, his pelvis tightening along with hers until he took one last thrust. One last, silken, wet thrust, so deep everything stopped but Harry within her. His moan in her ear was husky and raw, her whimper of satisfaction mingling with his.

Harsh air escaped their lungs, rasping into the silence of her bedroom. Harry stroked the curve of her waist, tracing the indentation with his palm, soothing away the vestiges of her frenzied orgasm until she melted back against him.

Harry nuzzled her neck, the stubble on his chin from the long night, scraping her skin with delicious possession. “Werewolf sex rocketh,” he murmured, slipping his arm under her and turning her to face him.

Mara giggled, wrapping her arms around his neck and lifting her lips for a tender kiss. “I couldn’t say for sure, Harry Emmerson. I’ve never had human sex. But I think this’ll do for now,” she teased.

“For now? Fickle, aren’t we, Ms. Werewolf?”

She gave him a grin full of the devil. “You’ll just have to work harder then, won’t you, Mr. Werewolf?”

Trailing kisses along her jaw, Harry chuckled, a deep, contented rumble. “Always with the work. Why is everything with you people so much work?”

Her neck arched into his lips and she hummed her approval. “Something worth winning is always work, don’t you agree?”

“I’ll work hard, Mistress Mara,” he joked, pulling her hand to his thick shaft.

Giddy with joy, she giggled again then sighed. “I’ll count on it.”

“Uncle Harry!” a small voice cried out in the darkness.