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“Sorry, sweetheart,” I said. “It’s not you, it’s me. I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
Lucy pouted as she sat up. “Am I doing something wrong?”
“No, never.”
“I can suck you off.”
“It’s okay.” I leaned down and kissed her forehead, although the kiss felt awkward and stiff, as if I was politely greeting a distant relative and not someone whose body I knew intimately. “You’re always amazing. I’m just stuck in my own head today.”
I didn’t know why I couldn’t stop thinking about Amelia. It hurt to look at the girl with the ruined face. Her eyes were so bright through the swelling and bruises, but I still felt myself wince sympathetically every time I looked at her. And she’d been Brennan’s. She stillwasBrennan’s.
Maybe that was why. She was the last connection I had with my big brother.
“Shaw, don’t go,” Lucy murmured, her voice seductive. I’d almost forgotten she was there, and she ran her hands up my body, digging in her fingernails just hard enough to scratch my skin.
God, I was in her bed, and I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. Lucy hadn’t done anything wrong; she just wasn’t Amelia. I had to get over this damned obsession before my nuts burst.
“I’ve got to check on the pack,” I said. “Duty calls.”
“Check on me,” she suggested.
“I already know you’re perfect, Lucy,” I assured her. I kissed the top of her head and stepped away to pull on my boxers and jeans, ignoring the throbbing ache from getting so close but not being able to come. What the hell was wrong with me? Lucy was ready and beautiful and adventurous to a delightfully perverted degree. Maybe I should get Stone’s witch to check me for curses.
Lucy was lying back in her bed when I left the room, her arms tucked behind her head, which showed off the swell of her breasts and the moonlight falling across her dark hair and lovely face. She smiled at me as though she was trying to pull me back to bed. But I left, anyway.
I stopped on the front porch of her cabin. There were rows of cabins here for the single wolves. I should’ve moved into one, but Stone preferred for all of us to stay in the big house.
Losing Brennan had turned Stone not only into the alpha, but into a controlling asshole. He was trying to protect us the only way he could. One freshman psych class and anyone would be able to see through Stone’s behavior. But that didn’t make it any more bearable.
I sauntered back across the dark grass and through the house. It was dark and quiet now. When I stepped into the hallway, there was a wolf curled up at the door to Brennan’s old room. The dark gray wolf rose to his feet, his lips curling back in a snarl.
“Tell me how you really feel about me, Cole,” I said. Our emotions were always closer to the surface when we were wolves. Frenemies who were perfectly polite to each other in human form squabbled and snapped at each other when they turned into wolves.
“If Stone were here, he’d pet your head. Good doggie,” I added, knowing Cole wouldn’t understand my words in wolf form, but he certainly might remember them tomorrow.
Then there was a cry from inside the room. Cole and I exchanged a look, and I reached past him to open the door and push it open. The two of us rushed inside.
Amelia sat up in bed. She whirled to face us, her lips parting in surprise. Her son was still sleeping in the bed, but she rubbed her hand across her face as if wracked by pain.
“What’s wrong?” I asked her.
“Nothing,” she whispered. She rose from bed, and the sight of her in a baggy tee and leggings made me suddenly hard. I tried to push down the swell of desire and focus on what she needed now. She met me in the doorway, casting a glance back to be sure Dylan was still asleep. “Just . . . a nightmare.”
“I hear those are going around,” I deadpanned. Between Liam’s nighttime screaming and Stone’s own moments that we were all supposed to ignore, it was amazing anyone got any rest around here.
She frowned at me, still looking confused.
“Go on,” I told Cole, holding the door open for him. “You aren’t any better at talking to girls in wolf form than you are as a human. I’ll take it from here.”
Cole gave me that bared teeth look once more, as if he were assessing whether I was a threat to Amelia or not, then slunk out of the room.
“Want a cup of tea?” I asked. “Since Karissa’s not around to mother you?”
The tension around her eyes relaxed slightly. “I don’t want to leave Dylan in case he wakes up.”
“He’s safe as can be,” I promised. I jerked my thumb toward the door. “We can drink it in the hallway, if you want. You’ll hear him if he stirs.”
“Do you drink tea?” she asked skeptically.
