He grinned sheepishly. “He said he got sick of seeing me and Bo sneak up on the other shifters to accidentally touch ‘em. We weren’t hurting ‘em, just checking to see if it was our mates, right? Then one of the maids stabbed Bo in the gut with a knife, and one of them hit me real hard with a cooking pot—I still have a divot, see?” He parted his hair with his hands, though I could see no such thing. “Anyways, Alpha Brand told us off and said Bo and me shared a thread between us that reached all the way out to Western.”

  To Occidens. “That’s… amazing,” I finally said, when I realized he was waiting for my reaction. “Your mate will be a very lucky female.”

  “Or male, I guess,” he added. “You know the moon has Her ways.” His tone was mysterious and a little ridiculous, and I was winning my battle not to laugh until he added, “But if the moon wants to stick a pecker in my butt, she and me’s gonna have words. It’d take some real strong magic to make that seem like a perfect fit.” He slapped one hand over his butt and kept picking spinach with the other.

  I left the garden laughing, but it didn’t take long for my good humor to fade.

  Julian was the one who needed to answer some questions now. When I got back to the cabin, Bo had returned, and the two of them were talking quietly just outside.

  So I went inside alone, my thoughts whirring. The weakness I’d felt healing him had diminished, though the spearing sensation in my heart kept me from being able to sleep, even when I was bundled under my quilts. I waited for Julian to join me, though I hadn’t invited him. Of course, he was a gentleman.

  And I was an old, exhausted woman. I fell asleep and dreamed of my wolf running around the sun while Julian’s ran around the moon, at opposite sides of the sky, unable to meet.

  Chapter 15

  Zinnia

  The next week was simultaneously one of the most and least satisfying ones of my entire life.

  I was within arm’s reach of Julian every evening for dinner, but the boys were there as well. I tried to come up with excuses to be alone with Julian again—to heal him, I assured myself. It couldn’t be because I wanted to fuck him into the ground again. It absolutely had nothing to do with the way he’d woken up every part of me below the neckline, like he’d knocked down a wasps’ nest of want that I was in no way prepared to face.

  Julian’s face, whenever I caught him looking, seemed to mirror my desire. But he never touched me. After the third evening, I knew for certain he was avoiding me.

  After the sixth, I wondered if this was some sort of sexual torture. I’d read some deliciously smutty novels with something called edging in them. It had sounded like a nightmare. Living it was worse.

  Although maybe this wasn’t that? That edging had featured a lot more physical contact.

  “I should have said yes when Ida offered me a vibrator twelve years ago,” I grumbled to Urchin.

  “Ssssss.” She slid across the floor, ignoring me as I shook my hands out. Well, my right hand. I’d fallen so out of practice with pleasuring myself, I could only just make it happen with my right one, and that wrist kept getting sore after only one unsatisfying climax.

  “Miss Zinnia? You ready?” Leroy’s voice pulled me out the cabin door and into the weak, early morning sunlight. He stood in his cut-off shorts and ragged t-shirt. I’d had to patch it two days before, after he tore an enormous hole in the front, but the thing was almost too small to bother with.

  Maybe I’d make him a new one. Julian hadn’t made any noises about leaving yet. Maybe I’d have time to make both boys some new clothes.

  I had a quick thought about also making some new ones for myself. When it had just been me alone, it hadn’t mattered how I looked. But maybe a new dress, or prettier clothing of some kind, would get Julian’s attention.

  “You’re up with the birds,” I complained, as Leroy darted past me.

  “Nah, I’m up with the snakes.” He grabbed Urchin off the ground where she’d slithered out behind me. The snake had curled around his feet on our second day out in the garden, and the two had bonded. He had an affinity for all my animal friends, and had helped me dropper feed some orphaned rabbits we’d found outside the garden. He’d even asked about Marta, but I’d explained she was probably scared to come back for now.

  “Hey, pretty baby!” He wrapped Urchin around his arm and dropped a kiss on the tip of her tail, then grinned at me. “What? Early morning’s the best time to pick vegetables, you said so.”

  “I did, didn’t I?” I sighed as he bounced on his toes. “Let’s get to it, then.”

  Leroy was obsessed with the garden, and he’d asked to come out with me every morning. He peppered me with questions from when to plant every kind of crop imaginable, to how to keep pests away. I wondered if he could tell how much I loved having someone to share my knowledge with.

  A half hour later, we were in the back part of the garden. Urchin was wrapped loosely around his neck, and we were side by side, pulling the last of the winter onion crop. Leroy was almost breathless from asking questions about root vegetables.

  “You can’t love gardening this much, Leroy,” I laughed when he finally took a breath. “You could take a day off, go train with Bo.”

  My eyes went to the pine forest, where I could just make out Julian’s voice. Leroy had confided that until this week, he’d trained with Bo as well. But it seemed that even if Julian didn’t want to be in my presence, he also didn’t want me left alone. I was certain Leroy had been assigned my guard, but I worried that he was missing out on his training.

  “Ah, thanks, but I’d rather pick a million onions than feel Sergeant’s teeth on my a—pardon, my butt, because I fucked up again.” Angry shouts in the distance had us both frowning now. “Pretty sure Bo’d say the same.”

  I hadn’t had a moment alone with Julian to tell him what I thought about the way he spoke to the boys, especially Bo. I didn’t know if it was even my place to remark on it, but the pain in their eyes when he disapproved of them, or spoke harshly, had me grinding my teeth.

  I turned back to Leroy, who was still working. His hair fell over his face as he pulled another onion free of the dirt and added it to the top of his already-full basket. “Miss Zinnia, what kinda onions grow best up in the Northwest?”

  I tried to picture my family’s garden, but couldn’t. Those memories of my small pack were all indistinct now. “I… don’t know, to be honest.”

  “Can we look it up somehow?” I had an old stack of books and almanacs he’d been leafing through after dinner.

  I nodded. “You know you don’t have to learn everything all at once.”

  “Beg to differ, ma’am. I won’t have the magic you got, so I need to know everything I can if I want to earn my place.”

  I frowned and straightened. “Earn your place? Who’s made you think you have to earn your place?”

  Leroy scratched his nose, smearing it with dirt, then patted Urchin’s head with one gentle finger. “Well, no one has to say it. But you can’t be a good mate if you don’t have something to offer, right? Like, being able to hunt or fight, or build furniture even. I tried the furniture back at Alpha Brand’s, but he says me’n Bo aren’t ready to be around tools. We, ah, had a ‘unfortunate incident’ in his workshop.”

  Oh, I would definitely be asking Ida for that story.

  We finished with the onions and carried them to the fence line. The sun was higher now, and the shade of the orchard called. “So you think you have to have something to offer to… your future mate? Or pack?” I leaned against the oldest apple tree, the roughness of the bark on my shoulders reminding me of Julian’s beard a little. I missed him, and the thought made me angry. I knew he was avoiding me, but not why.

  Did he not think I’d earned the right to his company? Magic crackled in my fingertips, and I tried to breathe easily. My magical well had refilled, and I was more than ready to repeat our garden moment, if the asshole would come back around.

  Leroy had been sucking at his lower lip, staring up at the circling hawk. “Well, both, I reckon. If Bo’s Alpha, he’ll be important all on his own. Powerful. I ain’t got that goin’ for me, and I know I’m not the sharpest nail in the box.” He laughed self-consciously. “And you can see I ain’t much to look at. I need skills, Miss Zinnia. Gardenin’ and anythin’ else I can learn. And I need ‘em before we get to Western.”

  I didn’t know where to start. “Leroy, you’re not stupid,” I began, but he held up a hand.

  “I wasn’t fishin’ for compliments, ma’am. I know my own self. I was the dumbest kid in my grade, failed every test, pretty much. The letters dance around on the page when I try to work out words, right? Sure, I can do math sums in my head, but once they’re written on a paper, they may as well be … what did Sergeant call ‘em? Egypt writin’.”

  “Hieroglyphs.”

  “Yeah. See, you know stuff. You’re smart, and pretty, too.” His eyes twinkled, and the glint in them promised that he would be a charmer someday.

  “You said you’re unattractive. Why would you think that?”

  “I got eyes is why?” His grin was weaker this time, and when he stroked Urchin now, it seemed like he was seeking comfort. “I seen enough mirrors to know what’s what. But even my name is stupid.”

  “Leroy?” I had to admit, it had sounded a little odd the first time I heard it. Very Southern.

  He grunted once, then wandered over to the pear tree where we’d found a nest with robins’ eggs inside. He went up on tiptoe to check on them, tapping Urchin with a quiet, “Don’t get any ideas. They’re Miss Zinnia’s friends, too,” before he walked over into a patch of sunlight, pulling his long hair away from his neck so Urchin could feel the warmth on her scales.

  “Your name’s not stupid, Leroy. It means king, you know. The king.”

  His smile was forced. “Guess my mom had big ideas for her only son. I wonder what she’d think of me now.”

  I stood, marched over to him, and took him by his shoulders, staring up into his sweet, angular face. “She would love every single thing about you. You’re kind and gentle and more fun to talk to than anyone I’ve met in my life, Leroy… What’s your last name?”

  “I hate it even worse.” He shrugged. “Bates. The other boys used to tease me somethin’ awful about it. Callin’ me Master Ba— Well, you can guess.”

  I could indeed. “Why not change your name?”

  “I plan to. Someday, I’m gonna take my mate’s name if she’ll have me. I hope she’s named something pretty like you. Zinnia Star. It’s the prettiest name I ever heard.”

  I smiled at his blush. Cupping his cheek in my hand, I wished, not for the first time, that he was my own. “That’s the nicest compliment I’ve ever had. Thank you, Leroy.”

  “It’s just pure truth, ma’am. You’re pretty, too.”

  Julian’s voice cut through the hum of the bees and the soft shush of the wind. “Stop flirting, boy. You’re wanted down at the stream.” He was at the garden gate, but his voice had more than a hint of anger in it when he barked, “Now.”

  “Oh, shi—sugar,” Leroy said, putting Urchin down and backing away like I’d sprouted horns and a tail. “Uh, sorry, Miss Zinnia. Alpha’s orders.”

  I waited until Leroy was far enough away not to hear, then rounded on Julian. “What do you think⁠—”

  Somehow, he’d closed the distance between us silently and lifted me to his face, his lips centimeters from mine. “Are you healed?” he demanded.

  “Do you just want healing?” We both went silent. I swallowed and asked, “We don’t have to have sex for me to heal you. You don’t need to avoid me, Julian. If you don’t want me⁠—”

  He blinked. “Where in the hell would you get that kind of idea?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe because you haven’t come back for seconds? Not even a midnight quickie,” I snapped back. “What was I supposed to think?”

  “That I wasn’t a complete asshole.” He pulled me even closer, his breath ghosting over my lips. “I’ve been going crazy waiting for you to heal.”

  Waiting? For me? I tried to make his words make sense. “To heal from⁠—”

  He pulled back slightly and gestured at his crotch. “It was your first time.”

  I bit my lip to keep from laughing hysterically. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding me? You thought you broke my vagina? You’re big, but not ‘takes a week to heal’ big.”

  He cringed as the laughter won, and shook his head. “Not that. It drained you,” he said, once I quieted down. “There was pain. I was afraid.” There was something he wasn’t saying, but I couldn’t figure it out. I stopped trying when he rasped, “Please, let me touch you again. Let me make love to you. You don’t have to heal me.”

  As if I would pass up the opportunity to do both. “I don’t have to fuck you either, silly man, but I’m going to.”

  “Make love,” he corrected, his eyes darkening. “Will you let me apologize… on my knees?”

  My knees went weak. He sank to his own at my whispered, “Yes,” his hands pulling my loose-fitting sweatpants down as he went.

  Before I could draw a single breath, he had his face buried in my mound, his beard rasping my thighs, his hands reaching around to pull my legs slightly apart. I felt exposed and protected at the same time. Vulnerable, yet like some sort of goddess he was paying homage to.

  Something soft shushed along the grass at my feet, but the sound was lost under my cries as his tongue pressed against me, flicking like a snake.

  Oh no. Like a⁠—

  “Ah! Get it away!” he screamed, pushing back from me.

  I landed on my butt in the dirt, my sweatpants tangled around my ankles, laughing helplessly as Urchin slithered on the dirt near Julian’s bare feet. I broke into laughter as he crab-walked backward, until I saw that he was ruining a newly planted row of butterbeans.

  “Don’t move, you goose. I’ll put the snake away.” I yanked my waistband up into place, then carried her to the gate, where I slid her through a small crevice, whispering for her to go home.

  When I got back to Julian, the embarrassed flush visible above his beard had me giggling again. I crossed my arms over my chest, enjoying the way his eyes automatically dropped to my breasts as I squeezed them together. Apparently, even in an old work shirt, he wanted me. The mood was well and truly broken, though.

  “You owe me a story, Alpha Rain. What made you so scared of snakes?”

  He shook his head. “Snakes are horrible. Slithery, sneaky things. Crawling into places where they shouldn’t be, lying in wait.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. “I’m waiting.”

  Finally, he exhaled heavily and lowered himself to sit, patting his legs. I crossed to him and slid down on his lap, loving the groan he gave as I shifted, his erection pressing against my backside, his scent surrounding me.

  “I wasn’t afraid of snakes when I was young, but that may have been because I never saw one. One of the Alpha Mothers had used her magic to keep them out of our compound. Then I traveled to Northern. There aren’t many reptiles up in Canada, but after the battle, when I went down to Southern…” He shivered. “There are more venomous snakes inside that pack’s borders—my pack’s borders, now—than should be allowed in a whole country.” He pursed his lips in disapproval. “One of the new mates, who came from a small pack in Louisiana, said she raised them back home, to eat. She kept going on about how their meat tasted like chicken and how we could raise them to feed the pack. I didn’t try to talk her out of it, which was my mistake. Bo and Leroy heard her and thought they’d surprise me with a snake farm.”

  “Oh, no…”

  He nodded grimly. “Oh, yes. Somehow, they got hold of fifty snakes—I swear to the moon, some of them were fucking anacondas from the swamps! They gave them to me like a gift, wrapped in fucking birthday paper, two years back.”

  “What happened?”

  “I dropped the damned box in the middle of the Pack House. The snakes got loose and hid in the walls. In the damned walls! Every time I turned around, one was slithering into my bed, my bathtub, the dining hall. It’s like they’re attracted to me. Like they know. I never knew what fear was until I held those snakes…” He shivered again. “Even thinking about it makes me feel sick.”

  “Aw, poor baby,” I teased, knowing he was telling the truth. I was sitting directly on his lap, and he’d gone as soft as I’d ever felt him. “Maybe I can make it better?” I slid my top and my pants off, then helped him get naked and pushed him down into the dirt. A frown flickered across his brow, but I smiled. “I’m fine, I promise.”

  He sighed. “I’m sorry I kept away. I never want to hurt you.”

  “Close your eyes,” I whispered, not only because I needed him to focus on me, but also because I’d just spotted another garter snake sliding down one of the rows of snap peas. “Just feel.”

  He did, and so did I. I took the next hour to explore every part of him in full sunlight. I memorized the way his hair curled on his chest, the salt-and-pepper trail that led to his abdomen, and below. I traced the remaining tattoos on his chest and stomach, wondering at the power and skill—and love—his sister must have put into the markings. Everything had a price, and the protection she’d given him had taken a heavy one.

  We’d all paid it, for years. But now, maybe, we could take a little of the cost back, and spend it on an afternoon of bliss.

  The bees buzzed around my head like a living crown of velvet and pollen, and the wind blew the scent of the cherry blossoms around us, perfuming the place where we lay. I was already slick, and lowered myself slowly onto him, taking him inside before I went still. “I don’t want you to come,” I instructed.

  “At all?” His groan was heartfelt.

  “Not for a while. I had an idea. I think it’s my, ah, orgasm, that sends the magic into you. So you don’t need to come as often.”

  He grunted, moving inside me deliciously. “I’m not so old that I can’t come more than once.”

  “I’m not so young that I’m going to give up the chance to have as many as I can squeeze out of you,” I teased back. “I have no idea how many times in a row I can come. Don’t you think I deserve to find out?”

 

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