Ryenne woke up on Sunday morning to an email from Lucien. She squealed with delight and rolled around on the bed with her pillow.

“Ryenne, are you okay?” her mother asked, bursting into her room.

Ryenne sat up and attempted to smooth her wild hair. “Um, yes, I’m fine.”

“Really?” Her mother looked skeptical.

Ryenne held up her phone, unable to keep the smile off her face. “Lucien left Paris this morning. He’ll be here this afternoon.”  

Her mother smiled, too. “Oh, good. You’ve seemed a little off since your return. I hope having your young man by your side will help you out.”

“My young man? What century is this?” Ryenne snorted. “And I’m probably a little off because... oh, I don’t know, maybe because I’m now a shifter?”

Mom frowned at her. “Enough of your sass. Come have breakfast.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

After a delicious breakfast of homemade cinnamon rolls—there were benefits to staying with her mom—Ryenne went to her own apartment on the West Side to exercise, shower, and dress in fresh clothes. It was nice to be in her own space again, but she’d enjoyed the couple of nights at her mom’s. She’d been independent for a long time but she could appreciate being taken care of, even if only for a couple of days. She missed her mother’s cooking, especially since she didn’t cook herself. She realized she didn’t know if Lucien could cook. When he’d been in New York last, they’d spent most of their time in bed and eating take-out.

They’d spend most of their time in bed on this visit, too.

Her core throbbed at the thought. The past few days without a good outlet for her baser instincts had been awful, but in a few hours Lucien would be here and he’d scratch one of her three itches. And scratch and scratch and scratch. And he’d probably be able to help her with another one of the itches. He’d teach her how to get away with running as her wolf here in the city.

With a couple of hours before Lucien was due to land, Ryenne left her apartment and waited on the sidewalk for the ride she’d ordered from an app. Wearing her usual jeans and a tank top, she didn’t bother with a long-sleeved shirt to hide her weapons. Now that she was a weapon herself, she figured she didn’t really need stun guns and darts unless she planned to do battle.

During the long drive to the airport, Ryenne could barely sit still. She wished she could strip off her clothes and run as a wolf, but then she’d end up naked at the airport. Public nudity was still frowned upon in the U.S.

She caught the driver occasionally throwing glances at her in the rearview mirror. At least he didn’t say anything, but it left her feeling self-conscious and even antsier. The lack of weapons, especially without her dagger at her back, made her feel naked, too.

She reached the airport with time to spare. What had she been thinking, getting here so early? An airport, of all places. She couldn’t find anywhere here to run and get out some of her excess energy. Ryenne filled the time by prowling around International Arrivals, fast-walking whenever possible, avoiding the stares and glares of passengers looking for loved ones or transportation. Avoiding airport workers. Avoiding any men she might be tempted to pounce on.

Eventually, people entered the area from what she thought was Lucien’s flight. The wolf inside her was clawing to get out. When she finally glimpsed Lucien’s handsome face, her wolf lunged her forward. Lucien just barely had time to drop his bags and enclose her with his arms. People flooded around them, some giving dirty looks, some too intent on searching for their own loved ones to care. Her lips found his and she devoured his mouth, even giving little nips to his lips.

He pulled away with a dazzling smile. “New shifter urges, huh?”

She nodded with vigor. “I don’t know how I would have managed another day. In fact, I’m not sure I can wait ‘til we get home.”

He laughed and picked up his stuff. “Okay, okay, let’s see what we can do about it.”

She led him behind the escalators to what was meant to be a family bathroom. It was the only place she could think of where they could both enter without disturbing someone else, unless a family with a baby came along and really needed the space. But they would have to wait.

Right now, her wolf urges were so close to the surface, she felt she’d explode.

They dragged in his bags and she fell against the door, locking it, then jumped on Lucien, her legs wrapping around his waist and continued to kiss him with the passion she’d been holding inside since she last saw him. She leaned back just enough to reach the hem of her tank to pull it over her head.

“Hang on,” he said. “If you’re in this bad shape, we don’t even have time for that.” He stood her on the floor, unzipped her jeans, and tugged them down. While she stepped out of them, he opened his own jeans and freed his erection.

“Oh god, yes,” she murmured, grabbing his cock.

He sucked in a breath. “Come here.” Kissing her, he rubbed her clit and slid his finger inside her. She was hot and slick and ready. He lifted her again and she wrapped her legs around his waist, just as before, all without ending the kiss, all while clenching her walls around his throbbing erection.

He pounded inside her and it was like coming home. She had never felt so good. But it wasn’t about feeling good, it was about the wolf getting what it needed. She came the first time within minutes, but Lucien kept going, sliding in and out of her as she continued to clench her entire lower body around parts of his body.

Before she knew it, she had reached another climax, and he still didn’t stop.

“Are you okay?” she panted. “Do you need to stop?”

He shook his head. “I’m okay, keep going for as long as you need.”

“Okay.” The word was barely out of her mouth before she climaxed again.

A few minutes later, after a total of five orgasms, she finally felt sated. She slid off him and onto wobbly legs. “Wow,” she breathed.

Lucien zipped and buttoned his jeans and grinned at her. “I could get used to this.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Don’t know if I can. Whoa.”

“Are you tired enough? Can we go back to your apartment now?”

“Yeah, I think so.” She dressed and they left the bathroom and strolled hand in hand to find a car home.

***

When they got back to Ryenne’s apartment, they had a more tender lovemaking session in the shower, cleaning up from their previous bathroom activity and allowing Lucien to freshen up after his flight from Europe.

“We have to stop meeting like this,” she panted after the second orgasm under the punishing hot water.

Lucien smirked. “Do you have something against bathrooms?”

“Not when I’m with you. But what’s wrong with the bed? Or the couch? Or the kitchen counter?”

“Noted,” he said.

While they dressed, she glanced at the clock. “Shit, we’re going to be late.”

They took a taxi to her mother’s where Mom greeted Lucien with a big hug and a hand lingering on his shoulder.

Ryenne gave her mother a look and her mom smirked.

Lucien and Gavin shook hands and exchanged warm smiles.

“I’ll get us drinks,” Gavin said, going to the kitchen.

Lucien whispered to Ryenne, “If he were a shifter, he’d know how we spent our afternoon.”

“I’m sure he already knows.”

As if to prove her point, Gavin waggled his eyebrows at her.

“Oh, before I forget,” Lucien said, drawing a vial of a sappy substance from his pocket. “I have this for you from Pascal. He recreated the stuff from my wound and wants your opinion on his analysis to make sure he got everything.”

Ryenne’s mother took the vial from Lucien and examined it in the light streaming in from the kitchen windows. She nodded. “I’ll look at this in my lab tomorrow.”

Her mother wouldn’t let anyone but Gavin help her in the kitchen. She seemed to understand how much Ryenne needed this time with Lucien. So Ryenne took him outside to the tiny patio in the postage stamp sized backyard and told him her suspicions about why the Fangs wanted her mother. “For that gunk.” She told him about Scotty’s case with the sappy stuff in the shifter’s wounds. “The Fangs already have access to this stuff. Who knows how else they plan to use it? With this, they can pick off shifters as if they were human.”

Lucien nodded, his face grave. “At least now we have it, too. That will even up the odds.”

“But it doesn’t help the unaligned, innocent shifters out there,” she said.

He wrapped her in a hug. “You’re such a softie. Like a marshmallow.”

She pulled out of his embrace and slapped his arm. “Please.”

Gavin came out to call them inside for dinner. “She made steaks. She seems to think that’s what your kind need to eat.” He laughed.

They sat at the table in the kitchen, nice and homey. Her mom asked them questions about their time together in Paris, the non-Fang related time.

Ryenne stared at Lucien as he talked, watching his strong jaw move, the way his muscles contracted and relaxed under his skin. She couldn’t wait until they could run together as wolves. She just had to figure out where. Central Park had enough dark and forested areas that they could probably get away with it. And their heightened senses meant they could more easily avoid people because they’d smell and hear them before any humans saw them as wolves.

Suddenly, Lucien’s face froze and then she smelled it, too. There was a shifter outside the front of the house. Again.

It smelled the same as the other night.

“What’s wrong?” her mother asked.

She didn’t want to worry her, but there was only so much Ryenne could hide from her. “There’s a shifter outside.”

She and Lucien stood as in one motion.

“Friendly or a Fang?” Gavin asked.

“If it’s friendly, why does it keep lurking out there?”

They rushed to the door, pulled it open. No one was there. Ryenne heard footsteps pounding the pavement out of sight.

Lucien wrinkled his nose. “Fox shifter.”

That was a new one on Ryenne. Then again, almost everything was new to her.

Gavin and Mom had come up behind them. “What’s that?” Gavin asked, pointing to the railing at the top of the stairs, where a white envelope was taped. It was addressed to Ryenne’s mom.

Ryenne pulled it off and handed it to her mother. “Let’s go inside. We don’t need an audience for this.”

They went in and closed the door. Mom and Gavin returned to the kitchen but Lucien stopped Ryenne with a hand on her arm. “I still smell one.”

“Me, too,” she said, “but it’s different.”

“I think it’s a lion.”

“A lion in New York? Do you think it could be related to our case in Kenya?”

Lucien shrugged.

They rejoined the others in the kitchen.

“What is it?” Ryenne nodded toward the letter in her mother’s hands, her stomach in knots.

“Another letter from T.O.”

“What do they want this time?”

“To meet me and to give me information,” her mother answered in a halting voice tinged with fear.

“You can’t go,” Ryenne said, voice rising. “We don’t know who this person is or what their motives are. But the Fangs want you, and if this person is a Fang then the meeting is a ruse.”

“But if I don’t go, then I’ll never know the truth,” her mother said. “They claim to have information about your father. For fifteen years we assumed he was dead, but we never knew for sure. Now we have a chance to find out.”

“Not if it’s a trap!” Ryenne insisted.

“How else will we know?” her mom asked.

Ryenne turned to Lucien for help. “We can’t let her walk into a trap.”

“Not alone, at least. We can all be there.” He looked at Gavin. “You up for it?”

“Of course. Anything for Willow.”

“Where do they want you to meet?” Ryenne asked, resigned.

“In front of the Empire State Building at noon tomorrow.”

Ryenne and Lucien exchanged a glance. What an odd choice of location and time.

“It will be harder to keep track because of all the tourists, but at the same time, should be harder for them to hurt her,” Lucien said. “We’ll get there early, the three of us will set up at different vantage points, and we’ll keep Willow safe.”

“Maybe we’ll finally find out who has been sending you these letters,” Ryenne added. “I have a few choice words for them.”