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“Not enough.” She glanced down, staring pointedly at the large ridge in his jeans.
He caught her face in his hand and pressed a gentle kiss against her lips. “Giving you pleasure is enough, for now. As much as I’d like to continue this, I need to research.”
“Right. Magic. Werewolf assassins. And who knows what else.” The more they knew, the better their odds of survival. She rubbed her hand over her face, trying to clear the sensual fog from her head. “I’ll make the coffee.”
…
Devlin was in a killing mood and doing his best not to show it. All he’d wanted was to take Zoe to bed and lose himself in her lush body. The way she responded to his every kiss and touch was the sexiest thing he’d ever witnessed. The scent of her arousal was distracting as hell.
But even more than that, he wanted to hold her, soothe all her past hurts. If her parents had still been alive, he’d have been tempted to pay them a visit. She’d given him the briefest glimpse into her past, but it was enough for him to understand her childhood had lacked any kind of security or love. It was amazing that she was as open and caring as she was. At least he’d been older when he’d been tossed out on his own. It was little wonder they both had trust issues.
Instead, he was sitting at the dining table, laptop open, scouring the werewolf closed social media groups and both pack and private email accounts for information.
“Find anything?” She topped up his mug before filling her own. They’d been at this for a couple of hours.
“Nothing useful.” He rolled his head from side to side to loosen the muscles. “You?”
“I don’t have your hacking skills. I didn’t find anything, unless you want to count gaming sites and fantasy groups. So many fantasy groups.” After returning the pot to the kitchen, she dropped into her chair and rested her elbows on the table. Dark circles had formed beneath her eyes. “I hate to admit it, but the only thing I’ve got is a headache.”
He’d been putting off his final move, hoping he could discover what he needed on his own. That was misplaced pride, coupled with a healthy dose of mistrust. He pulled his phone out of his pocket. Unlike the burner phones he used in most situations, this was the one he used for personal business and to keep track of the other lone wolves.
“I’ll put it on speaker so you can hear. If he’s changed his number or ditched his phone since we talked, we’re out of luck.” He should’ve dumped this one and gotten a new number as soon as he’d contacted the gray wolf. Technology made it far too easy to keep track of someone. For some reason, he hadn’t been able to break that tenuous connection.
He pulled up the recent calls. His thumb hovered over the entry. “Fuck it,” he muttered and connected. It rang once. Twice.
“This is a surprise. To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Another wolf attacked. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
“If that’s what you think, why call?”
“Curiosity.”
Kade snorted. “Yeah, you seem to be the curious type. Since we’re talking, I assume the idiot is dead.”
“You assume correctly.” He glanced toward Zoe. Death was commonplace in his world. Talking about it didn’t bother him in the least. It was all new to her. She was staring at the phone like it was a venomous snake about to bite.
“I have heard an interesting new rumor. Word is a mage is working with a particular wolf. Not a group of alphas, as first suspected.”
“A lone wolf working with a mage…” Devlin left the insinuation hanging.
“Fuck you. You’re the one with a woman. For all I know, she’s the mage and you’re under her spell.”
“Ah, hi. I’m Zoe,” she interjected. “What I am is a graphic artist and designer about four weeks away from losing her single-room apartment unless I can get back to work. If I was magic, I’d have better digs and way more money. Maybe slightly larger boobs. And I’d definitely stop all these crazy werewolves from trying to kill me.”
Devlin swallowed back a snort of laughter when the line went silent. He should’ve known she wouldn’t keep from adding her two cents to the conversation.
Kade cleared his throat and finally spoke. “Hello, Zoe. How did you and our friend meet?”
He forced himself not to interrupt or shut things down. They needed information. Instead, he paid attention to Kade’s voice—pitch, tone, even word choice. There were many ways to sniff out lies, even if the other wolf wasn’t in front of him.
“Devlin saved my life when I started to step out into traffic. I wasn’t paying attention, but it wasn’t my fault. He was rather rude about it.” She sounded more wistful than perturbed.
He no longer believed it was a coincidence he’d been there at that exact point in time, that he’d involved himself in the life of a stranger, a human. If he could go back in time, he wouldn’t change a thing because to not have Zoe in his life would be a tragedy.
“Convenient.” The skepticism was ripe.
“I think so. I’m glad I didn’t go splat on the pavement. We ran into each other again at a bar later that night. I accused him of stalking me.” She gave the basic rundown of events but made no mention of their deepening relationship.
