The Lion's Surprise Baby by White, Jade, Shifters, Simply (1)

THE LION'S

SURPRISE BABY

A PARANORMAL PREGNANCY ROMANCE

 

 

JADE WHITE

 

 

Copyright ©2018 by Jade White

All rights reserved.

 

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About This Book

 Warning: This is a sex fueled paranormal romance featuring a curvy heroine and a hunky werelion. Please only read if these themes interest you. Only suitable for adults.

 

It had been a long time since Tara Phillips had slept with a man but a passionate night full of adventurous sex was just what she needed.

 

And it was just what she got when she met the smooth and handsome property developer Brenton Morgan whilst on vacation in California.

 

It was supposed to be a holiday fling which was why Brenton never revealed his secret shape-shifting lion side to her.

 

However, what was meant to be just one night would become much, much more 9 months later and life as they knew it would never be the same again...

 

Warning: This is a sex fueled paranormal romance featuring a curvy heroine and a hunky werelion. Please only read if these themes interest you. Only suitable for adults.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                         

ELEVEN

 

HAPTER ONE

 

“Are you glad you changed your mind about coming up?”

 

The insanely beautiful, excruciatingly handsome, breathtakingly muscled, long-haired man standing naked in the hotel suite with a huge erection as heart-stopping as the rest of him need not have asked the question. Tara Phillips was more than glad she had reversed the decision she had made after dinner at the hotel cafe and taken up Brenton Morgan on his proposition.

 

  Looking at him in the low, dimmed and golden glow to which he had set the lights, his clothes at his feet, his erection fully clad in foreskin and descending towards his knees, and a smile on his shockingly boyish-handsome face that was a promise of everything he was about to do to her and how well he was going to do it, Tara was surprised both that she had initially turned down the offer and that he thought he had to ask if she were sorry. This was going to be one of those things that one would regret not doing.

 

It suddenly struck Tara that she was quite out of practice for this—about a year and a half out of practice. That was how long she had been a widow, and at the moment she was feeling every day of it. What she felt was not so much the grief as the gap—the eighteen-month gap in her sex life since George died. She understood that it could take a long time to grieve, to mourn, to get over the loss.

 

And for the last year of that gap, she had been mobile, traveling around, spending a week here and a couple of weeks there, and not wanting to form any intimate relationships. But her traveling was nearing its end, and now she felt ready. She had not been sure she was ready at first, but at the last moment she had reconsidered. Now, here she was—and there he was; all two hundred pounds of him packed into the awesome muscularity of that frame, and all nine and a half inches of him hanging down there, or so she guessed. And all of him was now stripped bare and about to come right at her after a widow’s “time out” of a year and a half.

 

Ready or not, Tara thought with a gulp, here he comes.

 

Tara was ready. She had to be ready. No way did she want to back out of this now.

 

She was sitting up against the pillows and headboard of the king-size bed in his suite. At this moment, Brenton was more naked than she was. She still had on her bra and panties. Brenton had shed everything. She sat perfectly still, like a little animal knowing that a predator had its eyes on her.

 

He climbed up onto the bed and began to move up the bedspread on all-fours, the predator closing in, not for the kill but for the conquest. That was the look that fixed itself on Brenton’s face—a look of conquest. Watching him crawl his way toward her, Tara knew she was about to be claimed, possessed—taken.

 

Brenton drew close to her, putting the rock-hard pillars of his arms on either side of her, enclosing her with his muscles. He brought his face to hers. The waves of hair that wreathed his head and fell upon his broad, sinewy shoulders were the color of golden straw, a subtle contrast to the sandy brown hair that tumbled onto Tara’s own shoulders.

 

His blue-green eyes shone like jewels into her own hazel pupils. He abruptly seized her mouth in a kiss that cut off the gasp of her reaction. Once their lips were together, she had no other reaction but to feel the tension flow out of her like water running into the drain of a warm bath. As he broke the kiss, she knew she was definitely ready now.

 

He ran the tips of his fingers over her shoulders. Tara had not neglected herself during her travels. She had conscientiously booked hotels that had gyms where she could work out, and she had used them as well as the swimming pools. She was almost as lean and tight and perfectly curved as she was on the night of her and George’s wedding. From the simmering smile on Brenton’s face, she could tell that he approved. His fingertips came to her cleavage, and traced the line where her bare skin left off and her bra began. His eyes lifted to hers again.

 

“Take off this f…ing bra and these f…ing panties,” he said, except he did not censor himself. He used a form of the word for what he meant to do to her. Brenton was going to be that kind of lover, the kind who brought the language of the bedroom with him to bed. Inside her chest, Tara felt her heart turn molten and pump fiery blood to her breasts, her loins—all of her. Brenton had been a gentleman at dinner at the hotel cafe. He would not be one now. Tara moved her hand to the hook of her bra, but at the last second Brenton took her hand and stopped her. “Never mind,” he said. “Let me.”

 

Tara relaxed as much as she was able to under the circumstances, and relinquished control to Brenton. Quickly and confidently, he released her breasts from her bra and tossed it over the side of the bed onto the floor. Then he did something that neither her boyfriends nor her husband had ever done. He backed up on the bed, took her by the thighs, and pulled her down from the headboard and pillows until she was lying prone. This time, she gasped audibly. Then she tingled all over as he continued a  move that she had never experienced, and lowered his face to her waist—and took the waistband of her panties between his teeth.

 

Her eyes widening and her breaths deepening, Tara propped herself up on her elbows to watch Brenton pull down one side of her panties with his teeth, then the other. He worked his way down, from side to side, stripping away her final piece of clothing with the bite of his incisors, until he had her silken undergarment down to her knees. Then he sat up on his own knees and swiftly pulled her panties the rest of the way down her legs, and sent them the way of her bra, rendering Tara at last as naked as he.

 

Brenton slid his hand up between her thighs, an unspoken command for Tara to open her legs for him, and she did, showing him her sex. His eyes appeared to sparkle all the more brightly in the low lighting of the suite. His smile broadened. His fingers reached the pink flower that awaited him at the junction of her legs. Brenton pulled open the petals of her flower and found her opening glistening for him. “Mmm, good and wet,” he said. “I’ll bet it’s tight in there too.” With his free hand he brandished the long, thick club at his own crotch. “Of course it’s always tight for me,” he added, and Tara knew it was no boast. “That’s why I like it good and wet, like this.”

 

Tara smiled an intoxicating smile at him. She felt giddy at his approval. She inhaled through pursed lips at the feeling of his fingers moving up from her entrance to her pubic hair, and sifting their way through it. “Nice muff too,” said Brenton. “Thick and soft. I love humping a soft muff. It’s going to be so good when I’m in you. But first…”

 

He descended on his elbows and lowered his face to her most private place. A new sensation, one she had gone without for all these months, washed over her; the feeling of his lips and tongue coming into play on her womanhood. The tension drained out of her body once again, and Tara fell back onto the bed, totally enjoying her helplessness against what Brenton was now doing between her legs.

 

She moved her head back and forth at the edge of the pillows, rocking from side to side with the licks of his tongue and the audible slurps of his mouth on her lady parts. He was sucking her deeply and drinking her nectar, filling her with delight at being sexually consumed. Tara reached down to his head and passed her fingers through the long, thick mane of his hair as he had done with her bush.

 

She gave out long, low groans of appreciation at the way Brenton ate her out. He was well- practiced at the art of orally pleasuring women, she could tell, and was bringing his full experience into play now. His tongue entered her channel and he French-kissed her sex, making her quiver. He sucked her folds, one at a time, then both together, then licked up and down between them, making her rise and fall on a series of waves of joy. He slid his tongue up between her folds and found her pleasure button.

 

A shock of delight surged through her, and Brenton seemed to sense it, for he flicked at it and teased it with the tip of his tongue, causing Tara’s whole body to vibrate. She clutched at his hair as if she were holding on for dear life, and felt as if she did not grab something the pleasure would make her go flying from the bed.

 

This went on, for how long neither of them cared, until Brenton took his mouth from her sex with a few final, savoring licks. He gazed up her body, at the dreamily ecstatic look on her face, and again used his bedroom language: “You taste f…ing good.”

 

Tara replied only with a long sigh, her body relaxing for the moment. She knew this would be only a fleeting respite.

 

“Lie there just like that,” Brenton said. “I’m going to feed myself to you.”

 

Her pulse quickened again with her understanding of what he meant. She spread her arms and lay otherwise still, letting him climb up her body and straddle her bosom. She took in the feeling of his full, round balls settling on her upper chest. With one hand Brenton lifted her head. With the other he moved the end of his erection to her face and pulled back the ample foreskin, exposing the round, blunt head and the eye that presented a bead of salty male sap. Tara put forth her tongue and licked the sap from his tip, and her eyes twinkled up at him, telling him that she liked the taste of him as well so far.

 

In the next moment she tasted all of him. He slid his length and thickness into her mouth until his instincts told him she had as much of him as she could take without gagging. In the back of her mind, as his pulsing head reached the back of her mouth, Tara was aware once again of how experienced Brenton was. He knew what to do with a woman. Now it was her turn to show him that she knew what to do with him.

 

All of her own bedroom instincts returned. She reached around his hips, grabbed his buttocks, and held on tight as he began to pump his hardened meat in and out of her mouth with exactly the perfect stroke. Brenton threw back his head and growled, “Yesss…grab my ass. Grab my ass just like that… Mmm… Uuuhhh…”

 

Tara synchronized her squeezing of his butt cheeks with the stroking of his tool between her lips and over her tongue. She was getting the full taste of him now, and had she not had her mouth full, she would have told him he was as delicious as he found her. She felt the parts of her being that she had put to sleep so long ago coming fully awake with the pumping of Brenton’s maleness in her mouth.

 

 It was everything she had missed. It was everything she had almost forgotten how much she loved. Every perfect stroke, in and out of her mouth, back and forth, brought it all back to her. Brenton and his delicious, hard, thick erection were putting the last pieces of her life back in place. And from the way it throbbed on her tongue, Tara knew in what other place his own piece most wanted to be.

 

But that was not to be—yet. First there was one thing more. He slipped his length from her mouth and stared down lustily at her, commanding, “Suck my balls.”

 

Brenton leaned forward, braced himself with his hands against the headboard, and raised himself up higher on his knees, letting the man-fruits behind his member loom roundly into Tara’s face. He inched them closer to her, and she began by swirling her tongue broadly around their full and tender contours. They were soft and warm and lightly haired, and made her feel wonderful to put her tongue to them. “Suck ‘em!” he groaned loudly.

 

And Tara obliged. She took one fully into her mouth, to which he grunted, “Yes, suck it!” She caressed it with her tongue, then released it and did the same favor for the other. “Damn!” Brenton grunted on. “That’s it, suck ‘em!” And he hurled curses of rapture toward the ceiling, letting Tara consume the fruits of his sex as he had done the flower of hers. They were fleshy and delectable, and Tara squeezed at his buttocks while feasting on them, sending surges of pleasure into him to match the pleasure she took from him.

 

Carefully, tenderly, Brenton pulled himself back from her mouth and climbed back down her body. He spread Tara’s legs wide and positioned his moistened club of fleshy wood at the opening where he had licked and sucked. He moved the head of it up and down between her parted folds and over her pleasure button, sending Tara once again into waves of bliss. She moaned up at him, and in a smoldering voice he said down to her, “You want this in you? Hmm? You want me to stick this big hard piece of meat in you?”

 

Desperately, Tara intoned, “Yes…yes…” Oh, he was so wonderfully dirty-minded, more so than any other man she had ever known.

 

He continued to torture her sweetly, with the swiping of his hard-on up and down her glistening, quivering sex. “I knew you wanted to get screwed tonight. Tell me you want me to screw you. Tell me.”

 

Through a thickening fog of desire, Tara made herself moan, “Yes…please…please…”

 

Brenton obliged her. After one more sweep of his tool along her folds, he slipped it through them and all the way into her. He growled the “F” word yet again, filling her depths with his hardness. The sound of his voice mingled with her longest moan yet. Fully sheathed inside Tara, he lay atop her and completed his conquest.

 

He pinned Tara down by her wrists, making her the helpless captive of his hard, deep thrusting. Her barely restrained cries were not protests; they were pleas for more, for all that he had. And he gave it to her—every inch went into her with every thrust. It felt so uncannily good, it was all Tara could do not to scream—not that she could have screamed, with his lips hungrily and wetly capturing hers, and his tongue  exploring her mouth where he had just been with what was now ramming hard and deep within her sex.

 

He banged Tara in a way that let her know what his tool and her opening and passage were meant for. He screwed her in a way that said to her that she was meant to be mounted by a body just like his and plunged into by a mass of meat like the one he gave her now. Tara bent and flexed her legs against his thighs, moving with the rhythm of his fast, hard, almost brutal humping.

 

He tore his lips from hers and belted out a chorus of insanely ecstatic profanities, pounding on and on inside her. Tara imagined his length and thickness ramming its way in and out of her wet, tight, slippery tunnel. Her mind was as full of him as her sex was. Every stroke pushed her further towards a precipice of ultimate pleasure. Tara felt as if her soft skin were melting against the hard muscles of his body that pinned her down.

 

His muscles were as amazing as what was drilling her so hard and fast inside. Brenton felt like one enormous erection, lying atop her and pounding furiously inside her passage at the same time. That was what he became in her mind: one huge, breathtaking, conquering erection, pressing down on her, filling her with flesh and ecstasy.

 

Brenton’s instincts were unerring. He knew exactly how to bring it all to the perfect finish. With every stroke inside her, he now began to hold his crotch against her mound and move himself in circles against her tender little love handle. Tara whined and whimpered, knowing even in the frenzy of this hot and unbelievably wondrous humping what Brenton was doing to her.

 

He was bringing ultimate pleasure to her two ways at once, both by drilling like a madman and sending his blunt head reaching for her womb, and grinding against the control switch of her womanly bliss. Going at her this way, he was propelling her to the ultimate destination. She almost howled, “Don’t stop…don’t stop…”

 

He answered only with incoherent, sex-drunk groans and banged and screwed away at her with relentless force. She clenched her body around him and he sensed her reaching the finish line. She howled out one more last, long howl, and he sensed a lightning bolt strike inside her. Tara’s wet inner passage throbbed against the throbbing of his shaft, and her body spasmed under him.

 

 He had done it—climaxed her, created an upheaval of ecstasy in Tara’s body. Now he slammed himself into her one more time with all his might. Tara’s body shuddered and she nearly sobbed out loud; the bed shook, and Brenton let himself go. A massive surge of creamy whiteness surged from the tip of his man-club and flooded her womb. It felt to Brenton as if it would pour out of him forever.

 

When he was spent, he practically crashed on top of her and she whimpered one last time from the weight of his muscles hitting her. They stayed that way, Tara delirious under him, Brenton delirious on top, and did not move for a long while. At some point Brenton rolled off her and to one side of the bed and they lay silently beside each other for a time, naked and spent—for the time being.

 

Brenton was the first to find his voice. “Damn, that was a good lay.”

 

Tara only sighed. The way Brenton talked about sex would have turned her off, coming from any other man. From him, for some reason, it gave her a feeling like lightning flashing inside a cloud; she felt lit up inside. She did not even want to move, as if she could preserve the post-coital feeling in her body forever.

 

He looked over at her and played at her nipple with his knuckles, feeling it start to harden at his touch. “You okay?”

 

It took her a second to answer. “I’m wonderful.”

 

He shifted on the bed, lying on his side now, still rolling his knuckles over her nipple. “That lay was wonderful,” he said. He leaned over and kissed his way along her shoulder. His lips on her skin made her feel as if little sparks were going off inside her. “I knew you’d be good to screw.” The flash of lightning inside Tara went off again. But Tara’s silence began to concern him. He lifted his head and looked into her dreamy expression. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

 

“I really am,” Tara said softly. “It’s just…like I said before. It’s been a long time. And that was really intense for my first time after…you know.”

 

The name George hung unspoken in the air. Brenton did not want to speak the name of Tara’s late husband. Somehow he feared it would break the spell, and he most definitely did not want the spell broken. He had not even gotten started on her yet, and he wanted nothing, not even the ghost of the man she married, to get in the way of all the sex he had in store for her. He simply replied, “I understand. Come here.”

 

Brenton pulled her into an embrace and a long, lingering wet kiss. She returned the kiss and they wrapped themselves up in each other’s nakedness. He slid his hands down her back and squeezed at her bottom. She gave herself into his kiss, sucking on his tongue, for a long time.

 

Slipping his lips away but keeping her close, Brenton said, “I want you a lot more, Tara. I want to do it a hell of a lot more.” He pecked at her lips for emphasis. “I want to be on top of you and in and out of you all night. Longer, even.”

 

“We’re both supposed to be checking out tomorrow,” she reminded him.

 

“And you’ve got another week before you go back to work, right?”

 

“I do. I wanted to spend it at home, settling in and getting used to being back before going back to work.”

 

“I want you to change your mind about that,” he said.

 

“Just like that?”

 

“Tara,” said Brenton, stroking her hair, “I want to spend tonight changing your mind. I want to be so damn good banging you tonight that you couldn’t possibly say no to coming back with me to the place I was telling you about, and staying with me—under me, in my bed. Say yes; that’s all you’ve got to do. You thought I banged the hell out of you just now? Just say yes and let me take you to my place. I’ll give you whole days and nights of what I gave you just now. You’ll see.”

 

She eyed him with both desire and amazement. “You can really do that?”

 

Wickedly, he replied, “My hard-on comes back fast and often, and I don’t get tired. Not from screwing.”

 

“That’s not what I mean. What about your own work?”

 

“I’m my own boss, just like you with your partner who’s been taking care of your travel agency for you while you’ve been gone, remember? I make my own hours. I work when I want. I’ve got enough money and enough business, and enough people working for me, that I can do that. I hardly ever blow off work like that, but to get you in bed I will.”

 

“And this place you want to take me…it’s really nice?”

 

“So nice, I keep it just for myself instead of selling it. I keep it for family get-togethers—and play time. When I get you there and we’re in bed, where we’re going as soon as we get in the door, I promise it’ll be play time. For days.” And he kissed her again.

 

“You can really do it that much?” Tara asked.

 

“The men in my family are like that,” Brenton replied. “A whole family of the hottest, horniest bastards. Stay with me tonight; leave with me tomorrow. I’ll take care of transportation, food, everything. You won’t have to do a thing—well, almost.” He grinned lustily and irresistibly at her. “What do you say?”

 

“There’s not much I can say to that,” she replied.

 

“How about, ‘Yes, Brenton, I’ll go with you to your place, and we’ll get into your bed and your shower and your hot tub and your swimming pool and lie out on your lawn and do all kinds of hot, nasty, sexy things to each other for days and days. Please say yes, because it feels like it’s going to come shooting off me like a rocket down there.”

 

Tara peeked down the musculature of his body and found him as hard and thick and stiff as a totem pole. She rolled her eyes back up into his. She wanted to ask him to let her sleep on it—but it was clear that it would be a very long time before getting to sleep tonight. The only possible answer passed her lips: “Yes.”

 

He smiled broadly, a positively electric smile on a face so unspeakably handsome. He pulled her close and planted a long, hard kiss on her, and they rolled back and forth on the bed, clutching at each other’s body, and the huge pleasure pole between Brenton’s legs pressed urgently against her stomach. She was sure he was about to pin her down on the bed for another round. Instead, he pulled out of the kiss and said, “Hold that thought.”

 

Tara blinked, mildly confused. “What…?”

 

“It’s no problem. It’s just I get so hot and worked up, I have to pace myself a little. I’m going to duck into the bathroom and splash some cold water on my face, and I’ll be right back.”

 

She sighed and nodded. Perhaps a few minutes more of anticipation—but just a few—would not be so bad.

 

Brenton climbed from the bed and stalked his way towards the bathroom. He turned and showed himself to her in all his naked male glory, and she rose up on her elbows to admire him again. “Don’t expect to get to sleep for a long time,” he told her, echoing what she had just told herself. He pointed at the totem pole between his legs, then pointed directly at the place on her where he would soon plant it. They exchanged sexy grins across the space between them, and Brenton turned around and hurried into the bathroom.

 

Once behind the bathroom door with the light on, Brenton hunched over the sink and studied himself in the mirror. He felt his features shift and flow, and the reflection looking back at him changed. The eyes became greener; the pupils turned to slits. The nose and mouth turned to a furry snout, and long whiskers grew from it. The ears grew pointed; the long hair turned to a longer, thicker mane.

 

Brenton looked into the reflection of his partially transformed self in the glass. No, he thought, that’s not what she wants. She knows nothing about that, and she won’t. She’s just human. We don’t show this to them. She wants what she just got.

 

He shook his head hard, as if to shake out cobwebs from his brain, and his features and hair morphed back to the way they were. That’s more like it. He ran some water into his cupped hands and splashed it onto his face, then dried himself with a washcloth. His pole throbbed and nagged at him from his loins, urging him to finish this business and return to the business he wanted.

 

In a moment, Brenton was on his way back across the suite to the bed, where he found Tara again sitting up against the headboard, this time tucked under the sheets. Only her breasts were showing, and he wanted them well enough—but under those sheets lay what he wanted more. With quick strides he reached the bed and slipped beneath the covers with her. He pulled Tara to him again and kissed her fiercely. He moved her hand down between his legs to let her grasp the throbbing, demanding erection there.

 

“Feel that? You’re getting it all damn night long,” Brenton said. “Lie back and open those beautiful legs.”

 

Powerless against her desire and not wanting to resist, Tara did as he said. At once he was on top of her and slipped it back into her, and the air was filled with her moans and his curses, and the bed shook with the force of Brenton’s continued humping, pounding conquest.

 

 

 

TWO

 

The first tinge of light outside the window of the suite told Tara that it was nearing dawn when Brenton finally rolled off her one last time and fell asleep. After the hours of mad, pounding, delicious sex he’d given her, Tara was too wired to sleep just yet. Her entire body felt like a mass of post-coital tingles. The sheet under her was damp and her inner thighs felt coated with warm syrup—which, in fact, they were. His syrup. The wonderful stickiness of an incredibly hot, unimaginably beautiful, phenomenally horny man. Tara could not sleep just yet. In the dimmed light of the suite and the first faint light of approaching morning, she needed to lie beside him and look at him, and wonder how it was possible for any living creature to be so beautiful.

 

He could have been a model for one of the brochures at her travel agency. He was actually more stunning than any model Tara had ever seen in any photograph or commercial. He could have easily modeled for a living. The camera would have loved him almost as much as her body did. In fact, when she first saw him, she actually took him for a model. Her memory rolled back over the hours to late in the afternoon of the previous day, when she sat alone in the outdoor cafe of the hotel. That was when she first spotted Brenton—and he first spotted her.

 

After the collision with the drunk driver that took George from her, Tara had, in her own thinking, put herself away on a shelf. She took a little time off from work, but then she went back just to fill the days with something besides the memory of George, the years they’d had together, and the years they’d looked forward to having. The trouble was that her memory of George was intertwined with her business, and there was one simple reason why. It went back to the time they were dating and very serious about each other. It went back to a question that George asked her early on. It kept reverberating in her brain:

 

“Do you ever go to any of the places you send other people to?”

 

Somehow, with George gone, that question took on an ever-deepening meaning. It became more than just a question. As with any business, the travel agency that she owned and operated with her friend Felicia Mackey consumed a great deal of time—time to set it up, time to run it, time to care for all the myriad details of it. There had been time in Tara’s life essentially for two things: business and George. And the business side of it was taken up with sending other people on trips, for pleasure or business or both; trips to distant places to see and do and experience beautiful things.

 

 In a way, for years Tara had lived vicariously through her customers, listening to them talk about places they wanted to go, showing them pictures of how it would be when they got there, hearing their accounts of other places they had been and how they looked forward to seeing other places. It was George, a lawyer whose life’s work consisted largely of asking people questions, who put to her the question that would not go away.

 

She certainly meant to go to many of those places. She had gone into this business because she wanted to see those places herself as well as help other people get to them. But as a business owner she never seemed to have the time. When they began the relationship that would become their marriage, George, a rising associate in a corporate law firm with an eye on a partnership, and Tara, promised themselves that they would find the time to pack up and go, and make their life together an adventure.

 

They had every intention of doing it. They talked about their itinerary, adding places they would go and revising their route and their schedule. It was their promise to each other, a promise as real as the vows they had made on their wedding day.

 

All it took was one fool who’d had a few shots too many and had thoughtlessly put himself out on the road to end the promises. And when George was gone, Tara had put her heart away like a plane in a hangar, like a boat in drydock, never to fly and never to sail the way she and George had wanted.

 

But going back to work, and being surrounded by posters and brochures, and hearing her customers talk about all the places they wanted to go, had made Tara think how wrong it all was. George would not have wanted her to put her heart in the hangar. He would not have wanted her to put their dreams in drydock. George would have wanted her to fly. He would have wanted her to sail. Even if it was without him.

 

And his question from their earliest times together hovered over her: “Do you ever go to any of the places you send other people to?” Not going to any of those places, or putting off going to them, seemed like a long litany of broken promises. She and George had put off fulfilling those promises. Now George would never have a chance to make good on them. But Tara could still make them good. Tara could still go.

 

So she had a long talk with Felicia, and laid out all her feelings about her life and her loss and what she thought her future would be. They agreed that Tara would not sell her half of the business; they had worked too hard for it and with the money and insurance that George left her, Tara was basically taken care of and would not suffer from  the time off. She would simply go, and when she returned she would find Felicia and the business waiting for her.

 

With those reassurances, Tara put life as she had come to know it on hold, packed her luggage and her passport, closed up the luxury apartment that she and George owned that was now an empty home without him, and made for the airport. She would be gone for a year. She would spend that time crossing Canada and Europe. And then she would return, full of promises made real.

 

Tara had just returned to the United States and checked into a hotel in Santa Monica, the next to last leg of her year of journeying. She would spend the night there, then return home for a week of unpacking and unwinding. Then, in the middle of the following week, she would return to the agency and resume her life. Sitting in the outdoor cafe of the hotel in the waning hours of the day, sometime between lunch and dinner, Tara swirled her screwdriver in her glass and looked out across Santa Monica Boulevard to the piers and the beach and the expanse of the Pacific.  She contemplated all the places she had been and all the things she had done. She felt contented in a way she had never felt in all her life; a way that she never thought she could feel without George. And she imagined George would have been pleased to know it.

 

That was when she spotted the incredible-looking man with golden-straw hair down to his shoulders and a tight pullover shirt that left no question as to the muscularity that it covered, sitting across the cafe, sipping on a Bloody Mary.

 

She actually blinked when she saw him, to convince herself that he was not a hallucination; he was that gorgeous. And she could have sworn that somehow he sensed her reaction to him, for as soon as she stilled the blinking of her eyes she found him looking up and over and directly at her. He sent her a smile as warm as the Southern California Sun. And she blinked again, and returned a sheepish smile to him, and turned away, mildly embarrassed, to look at the ocean again.

 

It had been a year and a half since George died. The first six months were filled with the initial grieving, and the process of sorting through George’s things and deciding what to dispose of and what to give away—this with the help of Felicia and some of the other people at the office—and then going back to work and trying to get on with a semblance of her life. Then came the decision to live the promises she and George had made themselves, which sent Tara on a year abroad. A year of seeing other places where she had never been and the people in them.

 

A year of seeing so many men -- handsome men, athletic men, exotic men, the men of so many cities and so many countries. She had accepted the invitations of a few of them to have  a meal or see a show or visit an interesting place. She had danced with them. She had let them kiss her. She had been tempted more than once to let them do much more than kiss her.

 

They had certainly wanted to do more, and they were so gorgeous that the temptation was very real. But Tara was a widow and she never felt ready. While she was on her year of excursions she felt as if George were still with her somehow. It would have felt like infidelity in a way. This time was a time meant just for her, and for the spirit of what she and George had and what they’d wanted. So Tara let the temptations remain nothing more than that. She always walked away, always moved on to the next place.

 

Soon she would be on her way back home, to whatever might await her there. Perhaps after a while the time would be right to let herself be more than tempted by someone. After a while—but not now. Her journeys were ending and it was time for whatever came next.

 

That was when she heard the voice of the waiter over her shoulder with an ahem: “Excuse me, ma’am…?”

 

She turned back around and looked up at the tall, pleasant-looking young man holding up another screwdriver. “Um…yes?” Tara responded.

 

The waiter said, “The gentleman in the corner over there asked me to bring you another of whatever you were drinking. I remembered it was a screwdriver.”

 

Tara’s eyes widened. “The gentleman…?” The waiter stepped slightly aside, giving Tara a better vantage of the cafe. She looked over and thought, No, it couldn’t be…

 

But there, where she had found him, sat the utterly stunning man with the long golden-straw hair, flashing her that same smile and holding up his own glass in a toast. Tara stopped breathing for a second. Oh my God, it is.

 

Without question, the vision of long-haired male perfection was more beautiful than any other man she had seen on two continents. And now he was sending her another drink.

 

Seeing no reason not to accept the gesture, Tara said to the waiter, “Tell the gentleman I said thank you.”

 

“Yes, ma’am,” said the waiter. He handed her the drink and then pulled something from the pocket of his vest to give to her. With drink in one hand, Tara took and had a look at the other thing: the business card of a real estate company, Herald Real Estate Development. Their logo was a shield with a profile of a lion’s head. Well, the card befitted the man who carried it, who had quite a luxurious-looking mane.

 

The waiter said, “Mr. Morgan said to make sure you looked at the other side of the card.”

 

Shrugging with her face, Tara turned over the card. On the blank side was written, Mind if I join you? —Brenton Morgan.

 

She looked over again at the hunk with the mane. Again across the cafe came his solar smile. Tara straightened up in her seat and looked back up at the waiter. “Hold on a minute,” she told him. She reached into her little clutch purse and took out her own business card holder, which she had gotten into the habit of carrying when she and Felicia opened the agency. Taking out one of her own cards and a pen, she wrote on the back of it, All right. Just that, nothing else. She handed her card to the waiter and said, “Give him this.”

 

The waiter nodded and walked across the cafe to give Brenton Morgan her card. As the waiter left to tend to other customers, Tara watched Brenton read her answer. Then he looked back up at her and fixed that smile on her one more time. Tara kept her perfect posture, though her heart was fluttering, and watched him get up from his table and walk over to her side of the cafe. She noted the confidence in his long, fluid strides, and her heart fluttered a little more.

 

And then, there he was, as big as life and as beautifully male as any dream, pulling up a seat on the other side of her table and sitting down. He absolutely radiated gorgeousness. He offered her his hand and she took it. She found it as smooth and strong as she could possibly have imagined. “So which one are you?” Brenton asked. “Felicia Mackey or…?”

 

“Tara Phillips,” she replied. “You saw…”

 

“…the two names on your card, yes,” Brenton replied. “You didn’t write which one you were. It’s nice to meet you, Tara.”

 

“Nice to meet you too,” Tara said back, not believing how casual she was being in the face of this incredible specimen of a man. She felt somehow as if she should not be so casual at the moment, sitting with this impossibly perfect creature. She had been a little nervous at first with all the other men she had met over the last year, but with this man of all men, she felt as if she should be completely intimidated by the way he looked and the total confidence with which he carried himself.

 

 Somehow, she was not. Perhaps traveling alone all this time had broadened her horizons, made her feel more sure of herself deep down inside. Perhaps that surety, which she had not known was there, was coming to the surface right now, just when she needed it. For whatever reason, Tara felt an almost unnatural calm in the presence of this Brenton Morgan. She wondered how long it would last.

 

Spontaneously, surprising herself as much as Brenton, Tara began to chuckle softly. Brenton found he liked the sound of that. He looked forward to hearing her make other sounds later in the evening. But first things first…

 

“Did I say something funny?” he wondered aloud.

 

“No, it’s not that,” Tara replied, chuckling on and waving off the question. “It’s just, swapping business cards gets the first question that people always ask out of the way…”

 

Instinctively, knowingly, Brenton joined her in voicing, “What do you do?”

 

Now they both laughed, out loud this time. Brenton definitely liked the sound of it.

 

Composing herself, Tara continued, “I thought it was funny because I’ve been away for the last year, traveling—Canada, Europe. There are places where that’s not the automatic first question. In some places they ask you about your family first, or where you live, not what you do for a living. I feel right back at home now. I guess I’m a natural born American.”

 

“Nothing wrong with that,” said Brenton. “My family’s fine, by the way.”

 

Tara smiled, her laugh having subsided but the warmth of it lingering. She remembered a time, a year or more ago, when she wondered if she would ever laugh again, and other times since then when she wondered if the sound of her own laughter would ever be a common thing in her life. Somehow it felt all right, it felt good, to laugh with Brenton Morgan, whom she had known for only a few minutes and likely would never see again after tonight. And she felt good about it. It was good to feel good with someone, even like this.

 

“So,” she said, “real estate, then.”

 

“Yes, real estate,” replied Brenton. “It’s the family business. We’re all in it. We’re developers, mostly—buying land, building things on it, selling it or renting it out. Or buying properties, fixing them up, reselling them—you know, flipping.”

 

“And your whole family does this?”

 

“Yep, all of us. And it’s done well for us. Really well. We own properties up and down the coast. That’s what I was doing here in L.A., looking for new properties.”

 

“You must be doing really well if you can afford to buy property here,” Tara observed.

 

“Always looking to do better,” Brenton said.

 

“So you’re visiting here, then, like me,” Tara observed. “But you’re really from…” She looked down at his card, which she had put down on the table next to her glass. She read it again and looked back up at him. “Napa? Really?”

 

“We go back a long way in the Napa Valley. It’s not just wine up there, you know. People do a few other things too,” he said with a charming grin and a twinkle in his eyes.

 

From the look of you I can just imagine, thought Tara. But aloud, she said, “I’ll bet you’ve bought and sold a few vineyards up there, though.”

 

“The vineyards tend to run in families, like our own business,” replied Brenton. “And they go back for generations. But yes, we’ve done a little vineyard business. We’ve traded all kinds of properties. We’re really good at it.”

 

You must be, Tara thought. Again aloud, she said, “That must be nice, having a family tradition. It must make you feel secure, in a way, knowing there's something you share with your family that gives you a good living that you can pass on. My family…let’s just say we’re not that entrepreneurial. We’ve always been employees, always worked for other people.

 

To my family, that’s just the way you live. You sign over your life to other people, work for them—live for them, practically. Your life isn’t really your own ‘til you get to be a certain age and you’ve traded it all for a pension and a retirement package; then whatever’s left is yours.”

 

“You sound like you never appreciated that,” Brenton observed.

 

“I appreciated some things about it,” said Tara. “There is something stable and secure about it; you always know where the money is coming from and how you’re going to live, at least at a certain level. And that’s attractive for most people. But…”

 

“But…” he encouraged her.

 

“But you don’t really own your life,” Tara said. “Someone else does. And your whole life is about what they want and what they need, and your time belongs to them. It’s never about you, not until most of your life is behind you. I mean, don’t get me wrong; it’s a living. You keep yourself fed, you keep a roof over you, you know what the future is, unless you’re laid off or fired, of course. But…”

 

“But it’s not a life,” said Brenton. “It’s a living, but it’s not a life.”

 

Tara sighed, pleased that he seemed to understand. “To my family it’s a life. To them it’s what life is about. That’s the way you’re supposed to live, or so they see it.”

 

Brenton nodded. “What did they say when you wanted to go into business for yourself?” He could already guess the answer, but he wanted to hear it.

 

“They said everything to talk me out of it. They had every argument in the book: how often small businesses fail, and all the competition out there, and how hard it is to get another job and get back on your feet once you’re out of business. They talked about retirement and safety nets and health insurance, everything that people warn you about when you try to do something different from them.

 

They were scared for me, I know. But I think deep down they were also scared for themselves, because they knew they’d never take a chance like that; they’d never try to live any other way from the way they’d always lived. They didn’t want me to do anything they’d be too afraid to try.”

 

“But you did it anyway.”

 

“I did it anyway. And I was scared, because they’d taught me to be scared; because they’d drummed it into me that there was one way to live and nothing else was safe, and what you needed most was to be safe and secure. I was scared, but my friend Felicia and I, we still did it, scared as we were. And we worked long hours and gave up a lot of things.”

 

“And you got to be successful travel agents.”

 

Tara sighed again, but this time through a smile. “We did. We got customers, and we got more customers, and we got repeat customers, and we made it work.”

 

“Good for you,” he said warmly.

 

Brenton’s approval and appreciation made Tara feel good—as good as she felt when she first took off on her year of excursions, as good as she felt when the plane touched down at LAX and she knew she was at least back on the soil of home.

 

“You like real estate, I guess,” Tara said. “You like the life you were born into, I can tell. You’d never want to strike out from your own family, like I did from mine.”

At this, Brenton leaned back in his seat with an expression that Tara could not quite read. It made her curious to see him this way.“What is it?” she asked. “What did I say?”

 

“About ‘striking out from my family’—don’t be so sure.”

 

“What do you mean? Are you saying you’d consider leaving real estate? Do you mean you’ve been thinking about trying something else?”

 

“I’ve been giving something else a bit of thought. I wouldn’t leave the family business completely, not necessarily. But there’s…something else that’s been on my mind, yes. Something else I might want to try.”

 

Now Tara was really curious. “What?”

 

Brenton paused, considered, giving her the most thoughtful look he had yet given her in the very short time of their acquaintance. “I don’t know if I should tell you.”

 

Tara arched her eyebrows intently. “Oh, now I have to know. Tell me.”

 

“Promise you won’t laugh.”

 

She straightened up in her seat, guessing. “Modeling, that’s it. You want to try modeling. And I can totally see it. You’ve absolutely got the look. You could be on the posters and brochures on my walls. I can see a picture of you on the beach with a surfboard…”

 

He shook his head. “Not modeling,” he said.

 

She rolled her eyes, then returned with, “Acting, then. This is L.A.; you’re not just here to scout properties. You’re looking for auditions, agents, that kind of thing. Or acting classes. You want to be an actor.”

 

Brenton chuckled, shaking his mane of hair. “Acting, that’s good, but no. Acting is kind of close—but no, not acting, not exactly.”

 

“What, then?”

 

“You promised you wouldn’t laugh.”

 

Tara held up a hand, half-solemnly. “I promised, I won’t laugh. Just tell me.”

 

He frowned slightly, a look that Tara was not accustomed to seeing on him in the few moments of their acquaintance. The frown relaxed, but his expression remained just as serious. Finally, he put the word out there: “Politics.”

Tara jerked her head back a bit, thoroughly surprised. Of all the things he could have said, that was one of the things she had least expected. As if to make sure she heard him correctly, she returned: “Politics?”

 

He nodded, confirming. “Yeah. I’ve been thinking about going into politics. I know a lot of people in a lot of places with a lot of money. And I’ve been thinking about ways I could maybe make a difference. I’ve been thinking about trying my hand at politics. Local office at first, but then…well, I’d start locally, anyway.”

 

From his look and his tone Tara could see he was serious. He meant it. And this put him in a completely new light from her first impression of him. Now she was ever more curious. “You talked about making a difference. In what way t would you want to make a difference?”

 

Brenton cast his eyes away, out to the ocean. “Look around, Tara,” he said. “This is a beautiful place, isn’t it? Southern California. Los Angeles. People all over the country wish they were where you and I are right now. It’s almost always warm, almost always sunny, it’s right on the ocean. It’s full of the most beautiful people in the world. It’s full of people’s dreams. And it’s in trouble.”

 

“Trouble?”

 

“Trouble. The same trouble that every place is in. Trouble from the changing climate that a lot of people don’t seem to want to admit people are responsible for, or don’t even want to believe is really happening. Trouble from what people are doing to the ocean and the air and the land, and what they're doing to animals, to wildlife. In the future, this beautiful place where everyone wants to be—it might not be like this. It might be totally different. It might not be so nice anymore.

 

 This place and every place else, People started the trouble; people caused it. And only people can stop it.” He looked back at her, deadpan serious. “That’s why I’ve been thinking about doing something besides my family business. We all have to be a part of stopping the trouble somehow, or it’ll never end. And there won’t be any more Californias. There won’t be anyplace good and beautiful at all. People will use them all up without thinking or caring until it’s too late and it’s all gone. And that’s why I’m thinking about running for office.”

 

Tara took all this in and weighed it silently. Brenton was a completely different person from who she first took him to be. Traveling across half the civilized world as she had done had given her an appreciation of how things and people can be very different from what one thinks they are, but even so, to hear such a profound and moving speech from a man who had caught her attention with his pure physical beauty was a surprise. A deeply fascinating, intriguing surprise.

 

“What are you thinking?” Brenton asked.

 

“I’m just thinking about everything you said, and how I wasn’t expecting to hear you say it. It’s true, isn’t it? I’ve thought about it too, all the beauty in the world, and how people think we can just take from the world and take more and more and think there’ll always be more to take. And all the species of life dying off… You know, Felicia and I have kind of a sub-specialty in our business: ecology tours. You know, like tours of nature preserves, or tours of places where the forest or the animals are threatened, things like that.

 

 A lot of good people go on those; a lot of people who are out there trying to learn about it, or trying to do something about it. Or trying to see something before it’s gone. I just never talked to anyone about this outside of business. And I certainly never met anyone who’s running for office about it. You really want to do that?”

 

“Yes,” said Brenton meaningfully. “I do.”

 

“And your family…they’re business people. You know business people are usually the ones most against protecting the environment because they only think about their profits and their shareholders. And they buy off politicians to keep the regulations off them. Does your family have a problem with you going into politics and maybe going against their interests?”

 

Brenton looked long and hard at her, and Tara had the distinct feeling that she was being scrutinized and sized up, assessed and judged. She sensed that he was searching for something in her, but she had no idea what it might be. The look that he gave her, a look of probing and studying, made her feel anxious for a reason she could not name. She was ready to beg him to answer when he finally did.

 

“Tara,” Brenton replied, “my family and I have talked about this. They’re as concerned about this as I am. And for a long time we’ve thought about having someone in the family out there in the legislature, at the Capitol—maybe even in Washington, trying to make a difference about this. My family cares as much as I do, because it’s the future and we’re going to have to live in it, and our cu—our kids are going to have to live in it.

 

And we want it to be good and fit and decent for them. So yes, we have talked about it, and when I decided it was time for someone to stop just talking and do something about it and I was going to be the one to step up, they supported me. And they do support me. They’ll have my back about this. We’ll use our money; we’ll use our friends’ money and our donors’ money, and we’ll do everything to make this happen. And I’ll put business aside as much as I have to for it, because it’s that important to us.”

 

He had caught himself during a part of his answer. He had almost referred to his family’s posterity as “our cubs,” but he stopped himself in the nick of time. With luck, he thought, Tara would just assume he was going to say “our country.” Let her just assume that, he thought, and we’ll be good.

 

“Wow,” said Tara. “It sounds like you have a really great family.”

 

“We are a great family,” he agreed. “And a big family. A lot of aunts and uncles, a lot of kids. You should see us all; we’re really a sight.”

 

If they all look like you, I’ll bet they are, Tara thought. “Well, it’s good that they all believe in what you want to do.” She paused, then smiled, a look that Brenton found strangely mischievous.

 

“What are you thinking now?” he asked.

 

“It just occurred to me,” Tara replied, “if you’re really going into politics, you might want to change your image.”

 

“My image?”

 

“I mean, there’s nothing wrong with the way you look. God, no, not a thing.” She eyed him appreciatively, nodding and inhaling a sharp breath. “It’s just…you look like what I first thought you were interested in being—a model, an actor. You don’t look like a politician. No offense, but this isn’t the 1700s, you know. Long-haired legislators don’t really work today. Male ones, anyway.”

 

Brenton chuckled at that. “Yeah, I get that. I’ve thought about that. Everything’s always about looks, isn’t it? ‘Dress for the job you want.’ Being a professional isn’t just an attitude, it’s a look. I’ve thought about cutting all this off. I wonder if I’d even recognize myself if I did. But it’s a sacrifice. To get one thing you give up something else. Sacrifice my look for an office—a hell of a sacrifice.”

 

“But if you could actually make a difference the way you want to…”

 

“…it’d be worth it. And if I didn’t win I’d just grow it back.”

 

“You’d win,” Tara said without a trace of a doubt. “If you talked to the public the way you talked to me, you’d win. I know it.”

 

“Thank you, Tara,” he said from the bottom of his heart to the gleam of his smile. “That means a lot. Thank you for that.”

 

Tara felt as if a million tiny fires were breaking out all over her, up and down her skin. His sincerity was the equal of his beauty. She could very well be sitting with a future senator, even a president. What a president Brenton would make. What a lucky woman his First Lady would be. She checked his hands—no ring lines on his fingers. He was all that and single too. How had he managed to go unmarried?

 

She looked into his eyes and saw the reason. They were blue-green pools of sex. Brenton was a lover, not a mate. He was not a man for the altar, but for the bedroom. She sensed he had been in many beds, and had taken many women to his. She tried to imagine how it would be to go to bed with this most amazing man she had ever encountered.

 

How would it feel to be naked with him, to be crushed in those arms and kissed by that face? How would it feel to be pressed under that body and be entered by whatever lurked in his khakis? Would he do it hard, roughly and aggressively? Would he be slow and sensuous and deliberate? Would he be both ways? Was she prepared to find out?

“It’s getting on to dinnertime,” Brenton said. “As long as we’re here, how about getting a bite to eat?”

 

“All this time we’ve been talking,” replied Tara, snapping out of thoughts that she preferred not to express, “somehow I managed to forget I’m hungry. Let’s ask for a couple of menus.”

 

The next time the waiter passed by, they made their request. In a couple of minutes the young man returned with their menus. They ordered appetizers, dinner, and more drinks. They talked more about Tara’s travels and her business, and Brenton’s business and his family. Now and then, they even found something funny. Brenton liked the sound of her laugh better and better. And he wanted more and more to hear the way she sounded when she was under a man with his member inside her, and the way she sounded when she came.

 

Over a pair of hot fudge sundaes for dessert, Brenton said, “So we’re both checking out tomorrow then.”

 

“Tomorrow,” Tara replied. “Then it’s back on the plane and back to Chicago.”

 

“Feeling good about that?” he ventured.

 

She considered the question. “I’m feeling good about it in a way, yes. I’m looking forward to seeing Felicia and the office and the staff, and all my friends, sure. And getting back into the routine of work. But you know, it’s the end of the trip. You know that feeling you get when the trip is over. You’re glad you went, but you’re a little sad you’re going back. You think, maybe if I could just go a little longer…”

 

“I know that feeling, yeah. You want to hold on to how it feels to be traveling. That’s why people buy souvenirs, huh?”

 

She grinned. “That’s why.”

“One thing’s for sure,” Brenton said. “I don’t want this evening to be over. I don’t want this night to be over. I’d like it to go on.”

 

“‘Go on’?” There seemed to be an implication in the phrase. Tara wanted to be certain the implication was real.

“Yeah,” said Brenton, licking at a spoonful of whipped cream in a way that seemed more than a little suggestive. “I’d like this to go on. ‘Til morning.”

 

Tara’s eyebrows raised. There it was. She had not imagined the implication. She repeated, “…’til morning.”

 

With another lick of cream, he said, “I’ve got a nice…big…suite.”

 

“A suite?”

 

“Yep. On the top floor. It’s really nice. And it’s just me up there. We could keep each other company. If you’re interested.”

 

Now Tara’s heart was doing more than fluttering. It was flitting around inside her like a bird in a cage with a cat sitting outside the bars and licking his chops. She knew what she wanted to say, but instead she answered, “I don’t know, Brenton.”

 

“Do you like me?” he asked. “I like you,” he added.

 

“I do like you, Brenton,” she replied, the feeling of leaping and flitting around inside her still going on. “It’s not that.”

 

“What, then?” he asked. “Is it because it’s been such a long time?”

 

“It has been a long time,” Tara replied, now feeling shy and awkward.

 

“I understand,” he said.

 

“And it’s not just because of how long it’s been. It’s because…” She suddenly couldn’t find the words.

 

“What?” he encouraged her.

 

“…because we’ve only known each other for a few hours,” she finished. “And tomorrow morning I’ll be going back to Chicago and you’ll go back to Napa, and we’ll both go back to our regular lives, and it’ll be just…something that happened.”

 

“Something damn good that happened,” said Brenton. “I promise you that.”

 

“I know it would be,” said Tara, again without a shadow of a doubt. “But it’s not something I’m really used to.”

“You mean, you’ve never met a guy and gotten right into…”

 

“No,” she cut him off. “Not really.”

 

“Not really?” Brenton wondered. “Or never?”

 

“Hardly ever,” she admitted.

 

“But you have.”

 

Now she had a squirming feeling inside; a feeling of strongly conflicting impulses. She felt as if she could twitch and squirm right out of her seat. With a helpless sigh, Tara admitted further, “Not that much, no.”

 

“Not even with your husband?” Brenton braced himself for her answer. Bringing up George was a calculated risk on his part. The next few seconds could backfire on him, and cost him what he’d wanted since the moment he saw her.

 

Tara’s shoulders slumped. “With George, yes. George was one time I did.”

 

“And you didn’t regret that, right?” Brenton suggested.

 

“No, I didn’t,” Tara conceded.

 

He reached across the table and took her hand. “And I promise, you wouldn't regret this. You won’t be sorry.”

 

Of all the sure things the two of them had said since Brenton sat down with her, Tara knew that was the surest. She had every belief that he would make her feel the very motions of the Earth that he wanted to protect. And yet…

 

Gently, she drew her hand back and away and looked up at him with regret darkening her eyes. “Brenton,” she said sorrowfully, “I can’t.”

 

“Why not?” he asked, with palpable disappointment.

 

“It’s me,” Tara replied. “I don’t mean to judge. I’d never judge you. But…it’s not my habit. Yes, I’ve done it that way, but it was never my habit. And now, after such a long time…I don’t think I can.”

 

She could tell how heavy Brenton’s heart was. It was all over his wondrously handsome face and it settled over his shoulders. “I understand,” he said. “And…I’m sorry if it felt like I was pushing you. It’s just…it is what I do. I never waste time. But if you’re not ready for it, I understand. I wish you were.”

Sadly, Tara said, “Maybe I should just go. I’ll pick up half the check.”

He raised a hand to say it was all right. “I’ve got the check. It’s the least I can do for the time we’ve had. I’ve got it.”

 

“Thank you,” she said.

 

“Thank you,” said Brenton. “For the company of someone really beautiful and really nice. I did have a good time. And listen, my cell number is on my card. If you change your mind later tonight…use it. No matter what hour. Use it. I mean it. Okay?”

 

Tara nodded, sad at their parting but relieved at his understanding. “Okay.” She got up, picked up her purse, and put her napkin on her chair. “Good night, Brenton.”

 

“Good night, Tara. And…good life, huh?”

 

She nodded sweetly at him. “Good life.”

 

And with that, Tara turned and made for the exit. Brenton could not watch her leave. The stirring, throbbing hardness in his khakis was protesting enough already. If he watched her leave, it might split his zipper. He just sat glumly and thought, Damn, adding a few more words, including the one for what he’d wanted to do to Tara tonight.

 

Tara got as far as the door from the cafe into the hotel lobby when she found she could not walk another step. She turned back and looked at him, sitting by himself where he’d been sitting with her. She had actually turned him down, the most heart-stopping man she had ever seen in her life, who clearly wanted to fly her over Santa Monica Pier.

 

She multiplied this night by so many other nights and so many other men across two continents for an entire year. She had said no to all of them. Finally, on the last leg of her journey, here was the most exquisite and in his own way most fascinating one of all, and again she had said no. How many more men would she turn down? When would she finally be ready? If not tonight—when?

 

It was then she found herself walking again, not into the hotel lobby but back the way she’d been.

 

Suddenly, Brenton sensed her presence at his side and looked up into her gently smiling face. At once his zipper was in jeopardy again.

 

“Was there something else?” he asked.

*

And that was what brought Tara to where she was now, lying not in her own bed in her own hotel room, but in his bed in his suite on the top floor, naked beside a sleeping and naked Brenton, smelling the scent of his sex, feeling the stickiness of it between her thighs and the wetness of it on the sheets under her—and wanting more.

 

She reached over and lightly brushed the back of her hand across his mesmerizing face, which was now shadowed with a rough, unshaven growth of fuzz. He took a deep breath, coming out of sleep, and focused his newly waking eyes on her. He smiled. “Hey,” he said.

 

“Hey,” she answered.

 

“How long were you watching me sleep?” Brenton asked.

 

“Just long enough to remember,” Tara answered.

 

“Remember the six times I was on top of you last night, you mean?” He rolled his eyes up and down again, and corrected himself. “No—the four times I was on top of you, the one time I had you ride me and then flipped you on your back, and the last time when we were lying like spoons and I stuck it in you from behind.”

 

Amazed, she said, “Six times…”

 

“Yeah—six great times. And a hell of a lot more where that came from.” He took her by the hand with which she had brushed his face, and kissed it. “Come here,” he said.

 

He was good at saying what he wanted, she had to grant him that. Tara slid across the sheets and into his arms. He wrapped her up and put his mouth to hers. He kissed her deeply, a kiss that made his intentions between now and checkout more than plain. The squeeze of his hands on her bottom underlined his point.

 

Raining more kisses and licks on Tara’s lips, Brenton suggested in a way that was more than a suggestion, “I love a good suck the first thing in the morning. And you’re very good at it. How about climbing down and giving us a good suck to get started?”

 

More than happy to oblige, she parted her lips from his and began to kiss a trail down his body, moving the sheets aside, to where he wanted her to be and where she wanted to go. He shifted onto his back and opened his legs, and his morning wood sprang eagerly at her. Just as eagerly, Tara slipped her mouth over it. She felt a tensing and releasing up and down his body. And with the slipping of her lips and tongue up and down his long, thick, uncut tool, Tara heard him make sounds of appreciation.

 

She could have sworn he almost sounded as if he were purring.

 

THREE

 

In a very real sense, Brenton and Tara started the morning with a bang. After a wet and explosive climax, Tara lay in his arms with her head on his chest, stroking his moist, flaccid, and ample thickness and the plumpness at its root. She enjoyed the rising and falling of his pecs against her cheek and the caress of his hand on the softness of her bottom. And in a somewhat absent voice she said, “I’m going to have to change my plane reservation if I’m going up to your place this morning.”

 

Brenton cursed and chuckled. “Seriously? You’re playing with my piece after a hot lay and you’re thinking about your plane reservation?”

 

“It’s a practical consideration,” she said, enjoying the feeling of his temporarily shrunken hose between her fingers. “I’m a travel agent. I think about these things.”

 

“You’re a very beautiful travel agent,” he replied, leaning forward and down and kissing the top of her head. “And the last week of your trip is gonna be the best part.”

 

“Really?” she said, teasingly. “I’ve been to an awful lot of places and seen an awful lot of things.”

 

“Well,” he teased back, “you’ll be seeing a lot of the Tower of Morgan this next week.”

 

She actually giggled at that. She had not giggled that way since she was in high school.

 

He added, “I know you’ve been spending some time on planes lately, but I’ll bet there’s one thing you haven’t had -- or had done to you -- on a plane.”

 

Startled, she rose up on her elbows and gazed at the shamelessly naughty look on his face. She could tell he wasn’t kidding.

 

“On a plane?” Tara said.

 

“Yes, on a plane. I took a private jet from Napa down here. That’s how we’ll be going back to my place.”

 

“You own a jet?” She didn’t suppose she should actually be surprised. He was wealthy, after all, but still…

 

“No, I chartered a jet. And I know the pilot really well. He’s discreet and looks the other way when I bring female passengers with me on his jet. As long as we keep the passenger section neat and leave it the way we found it, he doesn’t care what I do or who I do it to. So between here and Napa we’ll be having ourselves some aerial maneuvers. Naked aerial maneuvers.”

 

Tara didn’t know whether to laugh or scream with excitement. She never had the chance; in another second he wrestled her into a clinch and a kiss.

Several long kisses later, they came up for air and she asked him, running her fingers along the perfect lines of his face, “Tell me more about this house of yours.”

 

Fingering her nipple, Brenton answered, “Oh, the house. You’ll like the house. It’s set back at the end of a long private road and it’s partly enclosed by a forest, and there aren’t any other properties around, so we’ll have plenty of privacy. Which is good because I’ll be giving it to you outside by the pool and in the grass every day.” He planted another hard kiss on her, making her toes curl. “And inside there’s everything you’d want. Fireplaces—in the stair hall, and the library and the living room and the master bed suite. You like getting it next to a fire in the fireplace, don’t you?”

 

Thinking back to some nights she’d had with George on little getaways to the country, but not wanting to bring up his name, Tara replied, “I like it by the fire, yes.”

 

“Then that’s definitely on the schedule,” Brenton said, pinching her nipple and lighting up a spark inside her.

 

Remembering another detail from her travels, Tara asked, “What about working out? Do you have a little gym there, or anything?”

 

“Not exactly a gym,” he replied. But I do have a room with weights and benches and floor mats. And I’ll be doing daily push-ups on the floor mats—with you under me.” And he melted her heart with another torrid kiss that made her wrap her arms ever more tightly around him and beg him for more, which he obliged.

 

At the end of that simmering kiss, Tara said breathlessly, “You really can do it, can’t you? A marathon of sex for a whole week, I believe you can actually do it. Brenton, I’ve never met a man like you.”

 

He gave her a look as if to open up her soul with his eyes. She felt somehow as if she were looking into a deep pit of mysteries that she might never understand but could not resist exploring. After she’d explored half the world, suddenly Brenton had become another world to explore. “No,” he said, “you haven’t. You’ve never…ever…met a man like me.”

 

Brenton wrestled Tara onto her back and moved himself half on top of her. He kissed her deeply, again and again and again, and she moved her arms up and down his back and squeezed and pried apart his buttocks, responding to the moist fire of his mouth on hers. “You’ve never met a man like me,” he repeated. “You’ve never been screwed by a man like me. And you’ve never had a man screw you as much as I’m going to. I’m going to be in and out of you more than you ever thought was possible.”

 

Tara could do nothing but surrender and submit completely. She had no power and wanted none. She wanted him to possess and plunder her and she knew he would do just that. It was all she could do to gasp for a quick breath between one kiss and the next. She was being enveloped, consumed, and smothered in his desire. And she welcomed it.

 

Brenton lifted  his lips from hers and looked down at her with that same mysterious, serious gaze. “I want you, Tara,” he said. “I want you so much. The more I’m in you, the more I want to be in you. I love feeling you respond to me, feeling you come, having you make me come.” He licked her lips and sucked her lower lip. She reveled quietly in his ardor. “There’s so much sex I want to give you,” he said. “All you have to do is lie with me and take it.” Again, he kissed her. “I want you, Tara,” he said again.

 

“I want you, Brenton,” said Tara, giving herself into the next kiss.

 

With an effort, he tore himself from her body and pulling of the sheets, got out of the bed got up and stood  up by the bed. Tara gazed curiously up at him, her eyes inevitably falling down the muscular cliff of his torso to his crotch, to his other mane, the mane of his pubic hair, and the massive totem of flesh extending from it and seeming to reach for her the same as his arm did. “Come here,” said Brenton.

 

Tara picked herself up off  the mattress and he suddenly swept her from the bed and into his arms, holding her there. She gave a little yelp of surprise, which he answered with yet another kiss. “I want your gorgeous boobs and ass in the shower before we get breakfast and check out,” said Brenton. And he carried her off to the bathroom.

 

What happened in the shower was hotter and steamier than the water. They lathered each other up and rinsed each other off, and Tara paid special attention to taking his hard totem and round, plump sac in a slippery, soapy grasp. She took a special delight in the way his member bobbed up and down as she slid her fingers down and off of it. His tool was so stiff that it would slap against his crotch and abdomen, making her want to play with it all the more.

 

Brenton let her go on playing with him while he turned off the water. Then he backed her up against the shower wall and passed his hand up her inner thighs, silently commanding her to part her legs. When he had her legs open, he returned the favor she was giving him and slipped two fingers through her pink curtains and into her sheath. The pleasure of it would have made her groan more audibly if at the same time he did not take her mouth in a sucking kiss that muffled her reaction.

 

He kept his fingers in her and moved them in circles, making her dizzy with pleasure, then pulled them out and slipped three fingers in, bringing a cry from her that echoed from the shower walls. Tara’s cries of delight were further muffled by his long, hungry kisses in the midst of penetrating her deeply with his fingers, pulling them back and slipping them in, over and over. Finally she was so consumed with pleasure that she could make only low, incoherent noises. Knowing what he was doing to her and loving it, Brenton let the thrusts of his fingers go on a while longer—until he had another idea.

 

Pulling out his fingers and letting her tremble there for a moment, Brenton dropped to his knees in front of Tara’s dripping-wet pubes and petals and put his mouth where his fingers had been. At once, he drank of the mix of water and Tara’s nectar while drinking in the sounds she made: “Ooohhh…Ooohhh…” He licked and sucked at Tara’s sex like a big cat drinking at the edge of a pond. Then he moved his tongue into her, and Tara grabbed at the soaking locks of his hair, quivering at his wet, hungry probing. She leaned her head back against the shower wall and let him send his tongue deep inside the walls of her sex, and the sounds of her moaning vibrated in the wet, steamy air.

 

Brenton took his fill of her, then pulled out his tongue and kissed her lady parts passionately. Then he rose back to his feet, moved the bluntness of his man-pole into Tara’s opening, and slipped it all the way in. Holding him close and surrendering to the quick, deep thrusts of his thick cylinder, Tara gasped and whimpered, “Yes, Brenton, yes… Do it…do it…don’t stop…please don’t stop…”

 

He kissed her savagely and hammered his piece in and out of her, grunting into her mouth, “I won’t stop…I’m not stopping. You feel too good. Uuuhhh, you feel so damn good…” Their hearts pounded together and Brenton pounded inside her, never slacking for a second. He sucked at her lower lip again and grunted further, “I'm gonna make us come together. You want that? Huh? You wanna come together?”

 

Tara whimpered, “Yes…”

 

Brenton moved one hand down below to find her little pulpy knob and start to strum at it while pumping his hardness inside her. Tara understood what he meant to do and let him carry her along for the ride. It was a sweet, hot, wet ride, with Brenton pleasuring her sex two ways at once. Their breaths became ragged. He never slowed his pace and never let up with the strumming of his finger, until the moment hit. He threw back his head and cried, “I’m coming, baby! Are you coming? Are you coming?”

 

And Tara half-screamed, “Yes…!”

 

The feelings overwhelmed both of them: the inferno of ultimate pleasure lighting up in them like a wildfire, the wetness of their flesh moving together, the dam-burst of his white rapids into her womb. The shared orgasm made them lock their bodies into a single trembling, slippery mass, until the tremors of their release subsided and they slid as one down the wall and onto the shower floor. Brenton crumpled on top of her and they became a tangle of naked flesh. Brenton kissed her and fed her his tongue, and they panted in the aftermath of their climax. He cursed, sweetly and profanely, between kisses, and they lay together, wet and spent, with Brenton’s custard leaking from her pink pastry.

 

Eventually they gathered themselves up from the shower floor and got themselves out of the bathroom with a couple of towels. They stood by the bed, toweling each other off and losing themselves in kisses and caresses. “This is how it’s gonna be all week long, baby,” he promised her between kisses. “I’m gonna be in and out of you for days and days.”

 

“Yes, Brenton,” she said. “I want you. I do. I want you.”

 

“You’re getting me,” he said, slurping at her mouth. “Every inch of it, day and night. It’s gonna be so good, just wait.”

 

“I can’t wait,” she said, dropping her towel and throwing her arms around him. His erection sprang back to life against her stomach.

 

In a move like a tango on a dance floor, Brenton spun her around. “Get your ass back on that bed,” he said, moving her back down onto the sheets across the mattress. He threw himself down on top of her, wrapped her legs around his hips, and slipped back into her for yet another long, urgent drilling and another gusher from his balls into her depths.

 

Afterward they lay across the bed, spent and happy. “You were talking earlier about practical considerations,” he said. “Here’s one. Give me a list of everything you like to eat—besides what you had when we woke up.” And they both chuckled at that. “I’ll call ahead to this market I know and put in an order that’ll have the refrigerator filled. That way all we’ll have to do is fill the bed, and I can concentrate on filling you up.”

 

She looked over at him, totally awed at his seeming ability to get hard and screw at will—and the amount of will he seemed to have. “You are so wonderful,” Tara said.

 

“You haven’t seen ‘wonderful’ yet,” Brenton replied, and kissed her lustily.

 

FOUR

 

Somehow, they managed to pause from sex long enough to dress and go down to the lobby for the continental breakfast, then return to their respective rooms to pack. Brenton met Tara at her room, and together they went to the lobby to check out. Then it was off to the airport. The private jet and the pilot were waiting for them and their bags on the tarmac and Brenton introduced Tara and let her climb aboard first.

 

As she boarded, she just caught from the corner of her eye the sight of Brenton nodding and winking at the pilot. The pilot gave Brenton the thumbs up and Brenton put his index finger through a circle made with the thumb and index finger of his other hand, the gesture for what would be going on once the pilot got them in the air. Tara smiled and climbed through the hatch, knowing full well that once they were on their way Brenton would be boarding her and passing through her hatch.

The main passenger section of the plane had individual seats with tables, and a sofa with seat belts. Tara and Brenton strapped themselves in on the sofa for takeoff. Once the pilot sent word back on the intercom that they were at cruising altitude and it was all clear to remove seat belts and move about the cabin, the next things to take flight were their clothing, onto the floor. Brenton leaned back naked at one side of the sofa, one foot on the cushion and the other on the floor, presenting his member, which stood at full attention, ready for her.

 

 Licking her lips with relish, Tara descended face-first between Brenton’s legs and swallowed all but the base of his erection, and fondled his sac of berries while sucking at his length. Brenton shut his eyes and poured out appreciative profanities at the way she worked at him with her mouth, and so began Tara’s initiation into “the Mile-High Club.”

 

In all her life, Tara had never felt so free, so liberated. Ever since Brenton first took her to bed, she had felt as if a profound and deep change were working inside her as surely as what she now held in her mouth had worked so many times in and out of her. Loss, grief, and sorrow had put shutters around her mind, veils and curtains around her life. She had felt as though her heart were frozen in a glacier and her life were a territory around which high and impenetrable walls had been constructed.

 

Slowly, ever so slowly, in her travels, in the places she had been and the experiences she’d had, all those things had started to change. She had grown freer to smile and laugh. The lifting of her depression had made her feel free to move and to express. And finally, at the end of it, there was Brenton, as if the universe had sent him to her at exactly the time she needed him.

 

In bed, in the shower, and now here, thousands of meters over the Earth with him, Tara felt as if she hardly needed a plane to take flight after all this time. Brenton had set her free to fly. The shutters opened up wide.

 

The curtains and veils were drawn away. The glacier melted and the walls started to crumble and fall. And it was all because of this man, this almost inhumanly beautiful piece of muscular, long-haired perfection wrought in the form of a sexy, sweet, dirty-minded man.

 

Tara sucked Brenton’s erection with long, slow pulls and slides of her mouth, and fondled his man-pouch with warm and tender squeezes. Groaning and cursing on at her oral pleasuring, Brenton stroked her head and sifted his fingers through her hair. With every sweet suckling, he felt Tara thanking him for wanting her, expressing her gratitude for taking her out of the last vestiges of her grief and making it all right to let herself live fully again.

 

While groaning and grunting F-words at her, in the ecstasy-lit caverns of his mind Brenton thought, Damn, woman, you’re sucking me so good, you’re gonna suck the cream right out of me. Oh, damn, nobody’s ever gone down on me like this. All the dozens of women I’ve taken to bed, humans and my own kind, I’ve never been sucked like this. Yeah, don’t stop. Suck it…swallow it….

 

And she did. She feasted on his hard meat, then lifted his legs higher for a helping of his soft meat. He was choice and succulent and she was sure she would never have enough of him. But eventually Brenton needed her another way, and he reared up on the sofa and gazed down lustily at her. “Lie down, baby,” he said. “I’ve got to get back in you.”

 

They swapped positions, Tara lying where he’d been with legs parted, and Brenton climbed onto the sofa where she’d been, raking her up and down with his eyes, admiring the roundness of her breasts and the bright pink flower spreading open for him under her bush. He fingered her petals and bud, loving the way she grew wetter at his touch. “You are so damn beautiful,” he whispered. “You make me crazy from wanting you.”

 

 He brought the head of his big, moistened piece to her flower and began to tap it against the petals, teasing her with anticipation. She made cooing sounds of delight at the way he tapped her threshold, until at last the teasing was too much for either of them to bear, and Brenton slid his full length home into her and lay down on top of her.

 

Tara wrapped him up in her arms and legs like the manly gift he was, and the joining of their bodies through their sex became the gift that kept on giving. Brenton rocked vigorously on top of her and stroked and pumped hard inside her, giving her all that he had and making her love every thrust. Their moans were drowned in the wet press and slide of long, luscious kisses.

 

Tara clenched and relaxed her legs about his hips, in time with his smooth and steady strokes, and her tight wetness enveloped and sheathed his urgently pumping hardness. They propelled themselves onward through bodily joy even as the plane’s engines took them through the sky. It was a flight outside and a flight inside, and they both hoped never to come in for a landing.

 

Somewhere in the clouds, their moment neared. His voice half a moan and half a whisper, Brenton breathed hotly in her face, “I’m gonna come, Tara… Hell, I’m gonna come…”

 

Still squeezing him between her legs and rhythmically tightening and relaxing her fingers on his broad, hard shoulders, Tara breathed back at him, “Come for me, Brenton…come for me…” Another few minutes of thunderous thrusting did the job. Tara, her eyes shut with the building pleasure, felt him ram his length hard into her and hold it all the way in, and knew the moment was here. She trembled and tingled all over with the ultimate pleasure that she sensed igniting inside him, knowing that as far inside her as he could go, Brenton was giving her a series of thick white globs of seed. Her womb was becoming a pool of Brenton’s semen.

 

She sighed a long sigh of bliss, accepting the fullness and completeness of the most wonderful gift he could give her. And a look of contentment beyond measure lit her face as he came to rest atop her, putting his head and his mane on her shoulder, and mumbled post-orgasmic curses in her ear. Tara held him there, petting and fondling him, letting her contentment become his.

 

After a while, they lay close together on the sofa, arms and legs entwined, taking each other’s mouth in an unending succession of kisses and stroking and kneading each other’s bottom. It was bliss in the wake of bliss.

 

“We can stay like this for a while,” he told her. “When we’re getting close to Napa the pilot will tell us. Then we’ll have to get dressed and buckle up.”

 

“Until then we can stay ‘buckled’ this way,” she grinned at him.

 

“That’s the spirit,” said Brenton, and kissed her. “We’re not even getting started. We’re gonna be like one body, every day, all day long. I don’t want you to hold anything back from me, Tara. Not for a minute, not one time. I want you to love my body, just like you’ve been doing. Put your hands and your mouth and your tongue all over me. Lick me and suck me. Let me eat you out and get inside you for days and days. Never hold anything back.” And he pulled her into a searing kiss.

 

“I won’t, Brenton,” Tara said, kissing him along his neck and shoulder. “Just be as wonderful as you are right now.”

 

“I will,” he said, squeezing her bottom. “You make me feel like I can do it forever.”

 

They lay that way for the rest of the flight. Pressed warmly against him, Tara saw in her mind the way it would be in the days before her. Brenton would make her feel as he said she made him feel—as if his soaring sex would go on forever.

_______________

 

The house was everything Brenton said it was, and more: a small estate, a “McMansion,” lying at the end of a long, wooded rural road in the Napa Valley wine country. Only minutes after they arrived in Brenton’s two-seat roadster, which he had left at the airport, a minivan from the market that Brenton had called pulled up to the front of the house as if on cue. They had obviously timed their arrival for Brenton’s plane’s landing and the time it would take him to reach the house. They were ready for him—not the same way that Tara was ready for him, but ready in the way they needed to be.

 

Brenton let the market delivery people in and set them to the task of filling the refrigerator, pantry, and cabinets for the week, while he continued showing Tara the interior of the house, which looked like a spread from Architectural Digest. It was filled with the best of everything, even when Brenton, who was himself the best, was not present. He took her to the far side of the spacious living room, where the entire wall was glass and had a sliding door, looking out on the back of the property, and stood behind her and folded her up in his arms. Tara was treated to a view of marble decks and an expanse of green grass, with sumptuous looking furnishings.

 

“Over there,” he pointed to a place where deck furniture and a diving board were visible, “is the pool area, where I’ll screw you in the sunshine after we have a swim. And over there,” he pointed to another, raised place that was done in stained wood, “is the hot tub, where we’ll sit and soak some nights between  screwing times. And you can see the lawn, where there’s a lot of space to roll around in and I’ll screw you in the grass.”

 

Leaning back against him, Tara felt the power and passion coiled up in his muscles, waiting to be released at a moment’s notice. “You have it all planned out, don’t you?” she said.

 

“Damn right I do,” Brenton said, kissing her neck. “Don’t expect to wear a lot of clothes for the next week; you won’t need ‘em for what I’ve got in store.”

 

Tara did not respond. She only sighed, her body humming inside.

 

A voice came from behind them: “Mr. Morgan, we’re all done unpacking.”

 

Brenton released Tara and they both turned and faced the two delivery men. “Thanks, guys,” he said. “You don’t mind seeing yourselves out.”

 

“No, sir,” said the young man who spoke. “Thanks, as usual.”

 

“You bet. Thanks,” replied Brenton.

 

The second they heard the door close behind the grocery workers, Brenton grabbed Tara into a sizzling kiss. “Upstairs,” he said. “Bed. Now.”

 

He led her to the stairwell and they ran eagerly to the upper floor.

_______________

 

As Tara could well have predicted, Brenton’s master bedroom suite was as luxurious as his suite at the hotel, if not more so. The most she saw of it for hours, however, was the ceiling—eclipsed by his model-perfect face and straw-blonde locks looming over her in various expressions of lust, ecstasy, and orgasm.

 

That, or his mighty pillar descending upon her as he straddled her and fed it to her along with the pouch of succulence behind it. Tara did as he had asked her aboard the jet, and let his body and his loins become her world, a world to which she was ever more thrilled to belong.

 

They left the bedroom twice, to prepare meals. It was only hunger for something besides each other’s body and privates that got them up. Tara donned only Brenton’s pullover shirt, which Brenton found so sexy that it was all he could do to stop himself from grabbing her, wrestling her back onto the bed, and shagging her until they both passed out.

 

Brenton remained nude, having no use for clothes when it was only the two of them, and treated Tara to the sight of him preparing first a late lunch, and later dinner, stark naked in his five-star kitchen with the polished marble island counter in the center. He wickedly promised her that he would put her on top of that counter and give her a wicked drilling, and also give her a deep and nasty pumping against the stainless steel refrigerator; but they would have to look forward to that. For now, he wanted her upstairs in his bed and bath. Tara was ready for him wherever he wanted her.

 

They took their late lunch, and later dinner, in bed, and between lunch and dinner they were each other’s dessert. They devoured each other in bouts of oral sex and Brenton topped her for an energetic shagging. After dinner, as night fell, they lit candles in the suite and laid out pillows and quilts next to the fireplace, where Brenton built a roaring fire. Then he slipped under the quilts with her and while the logs burned beside them and lit them with a dancing glow, he slid his own log into Tara’s wet, pink chute and filled her with his whitewater rapids. After this they fell asleep by the light of fire and candles in their own glow of satisfaction.

 

Sometime in the night Brenton stirred awake. He looked over at Tara sleeping beside him with the most contented expression, and wondered if perhaps she might be dreaming of him. After last night and this day, he thought, her sleeping mind ought to be as filled with his body and his sex as her waking hours had been. The wood surged between his legs again and he thought, Damn, I want to wake her up and bang her senseless. And he would have done exactly that—if another urge had not taken him over at that moment.

 

Brenton leaned over and kissed Tara’s forehead, the softest kiss in the world, careful not to wake her. She mustn’t awake yet. She might find him missing and come looking for him, and she mustn’t find him during what he needed to do at this moment.

 

Carefully, he slipped out from the quilts and left Tara sleeping there. Again, not bothering with clothing, he padded his way out of the bedroom and downstairs to the glass door letting out onto the deck and into the backyard. The deck lights had come on automatically and lit both his way and the sensuous movements of his muscled frame, even as with every advancing step his body transformed.

 

 He started out walking on two legs and by the time he reached the edge of the deck by the grass, he was walking on four. His entire body morphed from biped to quadruped. Fine, tan fur broke out all over his muscled flesh. He grew a tail. Hands and feet turned to mighty paws. His long, golden brown locks grew many times longer and filled out into a full, thick mane. His head, face, and ears morphed from man to big, predatory cat. What had left the bed suite was a man. What stepped out onto the grass was a lion.

 

Brenton in lion form purred at the feeling of the grass under his massive paws and the night air on his tawny fur. He stalked across the cats like the “king of the beasts” he was, showing huge fangs in the parted jaws of his lion snout. He walked to the center of the yard and sat himself down on his hind quarters, and peered up at the star-strewn carpet of the night sky, appreciating the splendor of the Milky Way presiding over the spread of thousands of points of light that glinted and twinkled in his lion eyes.

 

He enjoyed his times in this, his other body, and they were necessary. His dual physical nature required times of releasing his human body to this one. Becoming a lion for part of the time was as necessary to his well-being as abundant sex. As much as he needed food and air and water, Brenton needed to feel himself penetrating a female, and he had done plenty of penetrating since he was fifteen, first with females of his own kind, but soon developing a taste for human sex.

 

For years he had moved back and forth from female werelions to female humans, from one bed to another, from his own bed to others’. Sex embodied his very being, and in countless times with dozens of partners he had never had a bad lay. But then he had also never had a lay with any other female quite like his times with the one now sleeping by his bedroom hearth. When he first spotted Tara Phillips, he somehow knew he was going to find her an especially delightful bedmate, but even he was unprepared for how good his human body and hers were together.

 

He would be sad, very sad, at the end of this week when they had to say goodbye. But in the meantime, he would give her the full measure of his relentless and insatiable sex drive and make her even happier than her late husband did before releasing her back to her own human world.

 

Emitting low growls into the night, Brenton fell to one side onto the grass and rolled about as he wanted to do with Tara, twitching and kicking, enjoying the full pleasure of being a lion and the mighty power in his lion body. He filled the nostrils of his lion snout with the smell of the grass and the night air, and let the side of his nature that was in every way a wild, predatory animal take over. The only vestige of his man self now was the thought of the woman he had left sleeping in the house, the things they had done to each other, and the things they would yet do for days to come.

And he growled and snuffled and kicked and tossed, reveling in the beast that he was now and the beast he would be when he put his human body down on top of Tara Phillips again. Just wait, Tara. You think I’ve been a f…ing animal so far? Just wait ‘til I get back between your legs…

 

A little later, a human Brenton returned to the master suite and found Tara stirring awake. She reached dreamily for him and snapped to alertness when her reaching hand found nothing but quilt beside her. She reared up, searching for him, and found him standing proudly naked with a growing erection just a few steps away. “Brenton?” she whispered. “Are you okay?”

 

He took his hard-on in one hand and shook it at her. “Lie back down and see for yourself,” he said. Smiling in the candlelight, Tara settled back onto her pillow and reached a hand up for him as he stepped over to her. He slipped back between the quilts, kissed the hand that he offered her, then gathered her up into a tight embrace and a deeper kiss.

 

“I want you, Tara,” he whispered back to her. “I want you, all of you.” He kissed her again. “Damn, I want you.”

 

“I want you, Brenton,” she replied, submitting to him.

 

Brenton wrestled Tara onto her back and put the log that he’d brandished a moment ago deep inside her again. She sighed loudly at the penetration and received his urgent, animal humping once more. And on they went into the night.

 

 

 

 

 

 

FIVE

 

 

       One morning, Felicia Mackey received a most startling text message on her phone.

 

Felicia was sitting down to breakfast at her apartment in Chicago when the message came. She was pleased to see that the message was from her friend and business partner, Tara Phillips. An African-American woman with straightened hair and a smiling personality, Felicia had been Tara’s primary support system through the bereavement and grieving.

 

 She had understood when Tara wanted to take an extended time-out. Not only had she not resented it and not felt as if she were being left “holding the bag,” but she had risen to the challenge of keeping the business going while Tara was gone; risen to it and welcomed it. Granted, it was not at all easy running a travel agency in these times when people could more easily book their passage and accommodations online.

 

But Tara and Felicia had persevered and made a go of it by becoming experts in specialty packages like their popular ecology tours. Tara had made a point of sending E-mails, photos, and selfies of everything she’d done and every place she’d seen at every leg of her journey, and Felicia had enjoyed both running the business on her own and living Tara’s long trip abroad vicariously with her.

 

All the same, she was excited about having her partner back and returning to business as normal. She had been planning to give Tara a welcome-home lunch when she got back into town, and looking forward to having a long girl-to-girl sit-down to talk about everything that went on in the places Tara had been, and everything that had been happening at home.

 

Which was why the content of Tara’s message had so startled her: Sudden change of itinerary. Everything’s fine, just not coming back till next week. Spending this week in Napa instead of home. Tell you more later, he’ll be waking up soon.

 

The plan had been for Tara to come home today. Felicia was going to pick her up from the airport and help Tara get back to her own place, and Tara was going to spend this week settling back in and return to work next week. It was not only the abrupt change in plan that made Felicia’s mouth drop open, flabbergasted. It was of course the last line of that message: Tell you more later; he’ll be waking up soon.

 

Felicia’s eyes bulged as much as her mouth hung open. After a moment of just staring at her phone while her breakfast got cold, Felicia blurted out, almost cackling from the implication of it, “Girl, you are not…!”

_______________

 

But of course Tara was. And so was Brenton. Oh, was he ever—constantly.

 

This last part of Tara’s long sojourn away from home was proving by the day to be the least restful—wonderfully and erotically so. Brenton made good on his word and then some. He wore no clothing and kept her wearing none or very little. He was a kissing, groping, humping, pumping mass of pure, raw sex. He had her everywhere, all the time. And Tara was as totally amazed as she was elated.

 

While she wondered how it was even possible for such a man to exist, she shoved the question aside every time he moved her down onto her back, or turned her on her side to lie with her like spoons and enter her from behind, or put her on top of him for a deliciously bumpy ride, or backed her up against something for a hot bout while standing up, or sat down in a chair with his pole pointing straight up and had her bring herself down onto it.

 

 She began to measure time as the interval from one orgasm to the next. He truly never quit, and Tara took her ultimate delight in knowing he never would.

 

The days and nights wore on that way in sexual abandon, each day burning off more time until the inevitable Sunday afternoon when Tara would have to leave this place where she had found such happiness—and leave him. It was the beginning of Thursday night when they cuddled together in the hot tub, watching the last of the sunlight recede in pinks and violets over the horizon. Brenton sat behind Tara in the perfectly warmed, churning water, and spooned her breasts and fondled her down below, his maleness pulsing as hot as the water at the small of Tara’s back. At the thought of one more day going away, Tara sighed, “Oh, Brenton…”

 

“What is it, sweetheart?” he asked solicitously, licking and nuzzling at her ear.

 

“Tomorrow is Friday,” she said.

 

“Yeah,” he said, sucking her earlobe. “Thank God it’s Friday.”

 

“Ordinarily I would think that,” she said. “But…”

 

“But what?”

 

“It’s the start of the weekend. And you know what happens Sunday.”

 

“I know what’s gonna happen every day as long as you’re here,” he said, sticking his tongue in her ear to suggest what he’d be sticking someplace else.

 

“But after Sunday I won’t be here, Brenton. I’ll have to go.”

 

He turned her around to face him, putting her thighs across his lap and his arms around her shoulder. “Don’t think about that,” he said, and kissed her lips.

 

Tara fondled the big, muscle plates of his chest and kissed him back. “We have to think about that,” she said. “In a few days this is going to be over.”

 

“It’s not over yet,” Brenton said, “and we’ll make the most of it. Baby, I’m gonna sex you so much more these next few days. Just think about that.”

 

“Oh, Brenton,” she said, “you’ve been something I thought I’d never have. This has been something I thought I’d never do. I never saw myself just letting myself be picked up in a cafe, spending the night with a man, and then changing all my plans to run off with him to a place like this and let him have sex with me morning, noon, and night. It’s not as if I’ve lived like a nun, but I’ve never done anything like this.”

 

“Then it was high time you did,” he said, “and I’m glad I got to be the one you did it with—and the one who did it all to you. And I’m not finished with you yet.” He kissed her hard to drive home the point.

 

She caressed his face, his hypnotically beautiful face. “You’re incredible,” she told him. “What are the odds that after going across half the world and back again, I’d end up in exactly the right place at exactly the right time to meet you?”

 

“Hell of a lottery you hit there, isn’t it?”

 

Tara chuckled. “You’re definitely the jackpot.”

 

He kissed her, a kiss more steamy than the water in which they sat. “Powerball,” he said. “Or power balls.” And with a wicked look, he moved one of her hands under the water to fondle the part of him to which he had so sexily referred. And she laughed a little louder. “See?” said Brenton. “That’s the way you ought to be. Not sad about thinking it’s going to end; glad that what’s still coming up will be so good. And it is coming up. Feel that?”

 

He moved her hand a little higher to stroke the erect lividness above his sac, and kissed her with his tongue slipping into her mouth. At length, at the end of the kiss, he said, “Don’t be sad, baby. Not while we’re still together and we both want me in you so much. As a matter of fact, how about we climb out of the water and towel off, and lie down on the deck? I’m good and hard and we could both use some more humping.”

 

Brenton took her mouth in another lingering kiss and stood up in the hot tub, bringing her up with him. He crushed her in his arms, kneaded her bottom, and started to hump her abdomen, pressing his slippery erection against her soaked skin and making her as wet inside as she was outside. He bombarded Tara’s mouth with kisses, groaning at her, “Come on, baby, towel off with me and let’s have another lay. You get me so damn horny…”

 

“Oh, Brenton,” she breathed back at him, as helpless against him now as she had been all week. “You make me think you’re more than just a man. You’re like something that someone made up; like this walking fantasy. You’re like…a man and a beast. This big, stalking beast that came out of some jungle. And I’m like your prey that you hunted down and carried off and…and…”

 

Suddenly, everything changed. They were standing in and soaked with hot water, but suddenly it felt cold. Brenton actually froze in place. He stopped kissing her, stopped fondling and groping at her. He drew himself away and held her at arm’s length. Bewildered and unnerved, she looked him up and down and for the first time saw his member starting to hang soft and flaccid without his having come inside her.

 

And on his face was an expression she had never seen him wear in all the hours and days they’d spent together. It was a look as frozen as his body had suddenly become, a cold look that Tara could only describe as dread. Taking his hands from her, Brenton backed off to one side of the hot tub, fixing her with that wide-eyed and unnervingly dread-filled look.

 

For a moment Tara could not speak. She could only watch him watching her with that expression she did not understand. She made herself ask him, “Brenton, what is it? What’s the matter?”

 

His voice sounded as suddenly cold as the rest of him. “Why did you say that?” he asked grimly. “What made you say that?”

 

“What?” she wondered aloud, starting to feel frightened. “What did I say?”

 

“That thing just now—that thing about me being like…like a beast, from the jungle. Like…like I was an animal and you were my prey. Why did you say that?”

 

“Brenton, I was just talking. I was just trying to find the words to say how you’ve made me feel. I was trying to tell you how much you excite me. That’s how I feel, Brenton. You’re exciting. I didn’t know it was even possible for a man to be as exciting as you; that’s all I meant to say. The way you have sex, the way you can do it all the time and not get tired of it and be so…so incredible every single time… Brenton, there are nineteen-year-old kids who aren’t as good as you. That’s all I meant. Why are you so upset? I was saying how wonderful you are.”

 

“That’s all it is?”

 

“Yes! That’s all it is.”

 

“Are you sure?”

 

“Yes! Brenton, I’m sure. Please…will you please tell me what’s wrong?”

 

Gulping, scratching his fingers through the locks of his hair, Brenton sat down on the edge of the tub. Looking up at her with a worried expression, he said, “So, then…I’ve never hurt you. Or scared you. Never, right?”

 

“Brenton, no, you’ve never hurt me or scared me. My God, I never thought it was even possible to feel as good as you make me feel. Please tell me why you're acting this way.”

 

“I never want you to be hurt or scared with me, Tara. Because I’d never, ever do anything to hurt you. Tara, I’ve been like this with every woman I’ve ever met. Aggressive, demanding, dominating, taking what I want when I want it. And I want it a lot. A hell of a lot. You’ve seen that.”

 

Tentatively, she stepped through the water and sat down on the edge of the tub beside him, and put one arm around his shoulder. “Yes, I’ve seen that. And it doesn’t scare me. Brenton, I told you it excites me. It thrills me. You’re like this…adventure, this ride that doesn’t stop. And I don’t want it to. Brenton, if I hurt your feelings, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Is it because I compared you to an animal?”

 

Brenton hung his head and took on another expression she could not read. “The truth is, Tara, I am like an animal inside.” And he shut his eyes tightly, regretting the choice of words and needing to walk it back. She mustn’t have even the slightest glimmer of suspicion, not now, not ever. “I mean, I feel like an animal inside. When I’m naked with someone, when I’m screwing—God, especially when I’m screwing—that’s how I feel. Like a wild animal, like something out of control.

 

I am a beast, Tara. I’m a horny, rutting, screwing, coming beast.” He looked up soulfully at her, seeming as if he would melt into tears and making her want to cry as well. “This is how I am,” he said, touching his fingertips to her face. “It’s how I am and it’s what I do. I can’t change it. But I only wanted both of us to feel good. I swear, Tara, that’s all I wanted.”

 

“I know, Brenton,” she answered softly. “And I have felt good, every time. I do feel good with you. I’m sorry if calling you an animal upset you.”

 

“Don’t you be sorry,” he said, finding it in himself to pull her close again and put her head on his shoulder. “Don’t you ever be sorry for anything. You’re too good and too beautiful to be sorry. And I want you so much.”

 

“Brenton,” she said, “instead of staying out here on the deck, what if we go back up to the bedroom and be by the fire again tonight?”

 

“That sounds perfect,” he said. “As perfect as you.”

 

Brenton kissed her once more, the sweetest, tenderest kiss he had yet given her in the days they had known each other. He helped her up out of the hot tub, and they went to the deck chair nearby on which they had draped their towels. They toweled each other off, then carried the towels back into the house and upstairs.

 

From that time on and for the rest of their time together, there was a subtle but definite change in their relationship. It was still all sex, all the time, and it was still just as intense, but the character of their sex was different. It started by the fireplace in the master suite. After building the fire and closing the damper, Brenton lay down on the quilts before her, majestically erect, and offered himself to her.

 

Without his saying a word, Tara sensed what he wanted, and lowered her face to the junction of his massively muscled thighs for a long and sensuous sucking. As Tara took his wooden length into her mouth, the most wondrous and remarkable thing happened: she sensed him submitting to her. She could tell from the way he responded to her. He still uttered his passionate and intoxicated-sounding F-words, but there was something in the flexing, clenching, and relaxing of his body that told her he was entering a new zone of sensuality that was unfamiliar to him.

 

She could hear in the way he called out her name in a delirium of pleasure that something had changed for him. And it made her want to pleasure him all the more, for his rapture became hers. She now thrilled not just to the act and the perfection of his body and his totally carnal nature, but to the sensation that she was giving him a kind of pleasure that was new to him. She wanted to give him as much of this transforming joy as she could, and she could tell from the feverish tone he took as she sucked him on and on that she was doing just that.

 

Much as he wanted her to go on forever, there was still the ultimate ecstasy that they both desired. Brenton dragged himself up on one elbow and drunkenly said, “Sweetheart, lie down, please.” Tara climbed out from between his legs and put herself down next to the fire, holding out her arms to him. He moved atop her and kissed the mouth that had sucked him with such sweet tenderness, and moved his piece into her.

 

The coupling that followed felt magical for both of them. His every move in and out of her, their every breath and every pulsation of delight that rippled through their bodies felt synchronized. Between kisses and curses, he moaned tenderly at her, “Tara, sweetheart…you feel so good. You feel so good, I’ll never get enough of you. I’ll never do it enough, baby. I’ll never get enough…”

 

And Tara caressed him up and down and ran her fingers through the cascade of his hair, and grabbed handfuls of his heaving buttocks, filling up her senses with their rising and falling and with the slowly quickening stroke of his tool deep inside her. She wished for him never to take it out, just to hump her and come in her again and again, forever and ever. Their sex was bonding them in a way that was beyond words and beyond bodies.

 

The pace of his thrusting quickened; they both felt the time getting nearer. He got up on his knees while keeping himself inside her and began to buck back and forth that way, driving himself on and on through her petals and into her passage. He tossed back his head and made sounds as if he were dying and coming to life at the same time, and used his thumb on her passion bud to bring her along with him.

 

 She responded, her ecstasy rising with his, until they were consumed together from the inside out in a glowing nimbus of joy. His seed surged forth and he held his crotch tight against her mound, keeping his full length sheathed in her until he had given her every last drop of his offering. Then, still moaning and still lodged inside Tara’s quivering tunnel, Brenton dropped to all-fours and kissed her deeply, pouring all his affection through the kiss and into her soul.

 

They curled up together on the quilts, saying everything they needed to say to one another without words, but with looks and touches and kisses. It was a communication of bodies and spirits in which no voices were needed. The feelings passing between them through fingers and lips and flesh said everything.

 

With the ebbing of the fire in the hearth, the light of the moon through the windows illuminated the suite in an ethereal glow. Brenton picked Tara up from the quilts and pillow by the fireplace and carried her over to the bed, which they had not bothered to make since they arrived at the house. They slipped under the rumpled sheets together. All through the night they continued to talk in touches and caresses and kisses, and Brenton mounted and entered her repeatedly, filling her with his maleness and his seed, and with them his deepening sense that their bodies were perfect together. His every plunge and stroke into Tara’s tight, wet depths told them both that by joining in sex they were truly joining in being.

 

The first rays of morning found Tara and Brenton curled up together again in a tangle of linens and limbs that spoke of an entwining of both bodies and hearts. For these next few days, the last that they would spend together, the two of them would reach one another on a level that neither of them had ever reached with another person in all their lives, and they would be grateful.

 

In Brenton’s dreams, a lion roared with pride and passion at his most perfect mating. Meanwhile, in the innermost reaches of Tara’s body, something was happening. Another transformation was occurring, a transformation as profound and powerful as what had taken place all night long between the lion man and his lover.    

 

SIX

 

Sunday afternoon could not be avoided. It found Tara and Brenton sitting in the airport near the metal detector, squeezing out the last few minutes of their time together—after everything they’d spent the morning squeezing and rolling and thrashing out at his house. Brenton held her hand and felt more than capable of doing plenty more of the same, and Tara knew it and wished there were time.

 

Slumping those wonderful shoulders that Tara had clutched in ecstasy so many times, Brenton said, “It’s a good thing they don’t have a wood detector. I’d start a panic in here.”

 

The remark caught Tara off guard and she broke into a spasm of embarrassingly raucous laughter. Futilely covering her mouth and glancing around for other people’s reactions, she choked, “Don’t make me laugh like that! It’s too embarrassing!”

 

“Yeah?” he said with a cocked eyebrow. “I could make you do some other things a lot more embarrassing.”

 

Her laughter carrying over, she gave him a mock slap on the arm. “Stop it!”

 

Brenton smiled, pleased at having momentarily relieved her melancholy and his. “Okay,” he said. “I’m sorry. But I like your laugh. I'm going to miss it.”

 

Recovering her calm, Tara sighed, “I’m going to miss everything about you.”

 

Brenton watched her calming down, hoping the please don’t go in his eyes was not too obvious.

 

Wistfully, she told him, “When we met, I was at the end of a long trip and feeling that letdown you feel when the trip is over. You made me forget about all that—and missing George, and everything else. Now I really do have to go back to my life, and I feel like I’m leaving a part of my life here with you. A really good, really wonderful part. Thank you, Brenton, for this week—for everything. I’ve never had a time like this. It was so special, like a long dream. I hate waking up from this.”

 

He replied, “Yeah. Goodbyes have never bothered me—‘til now. This is the first time in my life I hate saying goodbye. When you get back to Chicago, do me a favor, huh?”

 

“What?”

 

“Don’t get so busy that you forget to enjoy your life. I think you learned that this year, with all your traveling, and this week we did everything we did: Life is meant to be lived. It is. You’ve got to live while you’re alive. You’ve got business and responsibilities, but you’re important too. So live.”

 

“I will,” said Tara, taking his hand. He held on tight, his grip again saying without words, please don’t go.

 

For a moment they looked down at the armrest where his hand held hers. Then Tara looked back up at him and asked, “What will you do now?”

 

Shrugging with his eyes, Brenton said, “Go back home and relive every hour we spent together and everything we did in bed. And everyplace else.”

 

“You know what I mean,” said Tara, giving his hand an admonishing squeeze. “What are you going to do? What’s next for your life? I think you should follow up on your idea about running for office. I really think you should.”

 

“Yeah,” he said, “I’ll bet a lot of these middle-aged status quo types would love that.”

 

“You could teach them a thing or two,” Tara said firmly.

 

Brenton did not respond to that at first. He looked out into space very thoughtfully, as if he were pondering something very profound. Oh, I could definitely teach some of these old goats a thing or two. I could especially teach them about some things out there that love to have old goats for dinner. What would they think if they knew who—and what—was really running against them?

 

He snapped back to attention at her call of, “Hello? Still with me?”

 

“Yeah, still with you,” he said.

 

“Well? A younger man with a younger mind and younger ideas—I think you’d have more than a chance out there. I think you could win some people away from those ‘status quo types.’ I think you could get people on your side. And even if you didn’t win—which I think you would—you’d get valuable experience for the next election. Brenton, I remember how I felt listening to you talk about what made you want to do this.

 

 Remember back at the cafe at the hotel, when you told me about how you saw California being ‘in trouble’ and that you thought the whole country was in the same kind of ‘trouble,’ and how you didn’t want to see a time when there’d be ‘no more Californias’? I believed in what you were saying. I believed in how important you knew it was. And it made me want to see you up there, giving your acceptance speech and ready to get to work for everyone. If I could have voted for you then and there, I would have done it on the spot.”

 

Touched as deeply as it was possible for him to feel, Brenton said, “You would?”

 

“Yes, Brenton, I would.” And she held his hand a little more tightly. “And to tell you the truth…I think it was part of what changed my mind that night. Remember when I said no at first and I was ready to walk out, but I didn’t? I think part of the reason I didn’t was that I couldn’t just walk away from this incredible-looking man who seemed to care so much about the world. If you were that passionate about the environment and your political ideas…”

 

“…how would I be between the sheets?” he finished for her. “Well, I guess you found that out.”

 

She grinned, almost laughing again. “I’ve lost count of the number of times I found that out,” she said.

 

Brenton looked off into space again, thinking. “Well, let’s see, when I’ve got time for nothing but that, my average is about eight times a day, maybe nine, not counting times waking up with a boner in the middle of the night, and you’ll remember there were a few of those, and whole days of not getting out of bed…”

 

Tara took her hand away, crossed her legs, and covered her mouth, her eyes darting nervously around the airport again. Brenton went on, “…and times when I get so worked up that I don’t even get soft after shooting the wad, so I just go from one time to the next. So…multiply that by how many days…?”

 

Now she squeezed his arm, embarrassed but squirming  inside from something other than embarrassment. “Ssshhh!” Tara whispered sharply at him. “People can hear!”

 

He gave her a rakish look. “So, let ‘em hear. That’s another problem with people; they’re too damn scared of…”

 

Squeezing his arm again, Tara chided him, “Brenton, please!”

 

Brenton relented. “Okay, I’m sorry.” He realized he truly should not talk about how sexually prolific he was, anyway. He was fortunate that she did not question it, but only enjoyed it; that she accepted him as just a very hot and freakishly sexual man, and that except for that one time at the hot tub, he had never given her any reason to suspect he was anything else.

 

But remembering that time at the hot tub put him onto remembering how his pouring out of his heart changed his pouring out of his sex, and the way they were from that time to this morning. After so many years he had spent screwing women’s brains out for pure pleasure, his time with Tara had turned to something else, something that he’d never had before. And the more he thought of it, the more Brenton wondered how he could possibly let her get aboard a plane back to Chicago, leaving him—and leaving his bed where he still wanted her.

 

“I want you to do your campaign,” said Tara. “I want you to go out and tell people how you feel and what you want to do, and ask for their vote, and keep asking ‘til you get it, and not stop ‘til you’re elected. I want to read someday about you being elected to the California State Senate, and being governor, and going to Washington. I think the country needs people like you. I believe in you, Brenton. I do.”

 

Brenton was speechless now. He looked at her and had no words to say. Any words he might have tried to say were drowned in a melting feeling he suddenly had deep inside. So many females in his life had told him so many things, but never from any of them had he ever heard the words that Tara had just said to him: I believe in you. So any words now just utterly failed him. He did not even want to reply to her in words. He wanted simply to carry her out of this airport, back to his car, back to his house, and back to his bed; to tear off their clothing and plunge himself into her and let her know that he would never, ever let her go. Her business be damned, his business and his political ambitions be damned; he wanted to keep her in his bed forever.

 

But instead, he only said, with considerable effort, “Thank you, Tara. That means a lot. It really does.”

 

And then over the airport speakers came the announcement of her flight.

 

Her melancholy starting to creep in on her again, Tara stood up. “Well, that’s me, I guess,” she said.

 

He stood up with her. “Yeah, I guess so,” he replied, sounding every bit as sad as she.

 

As one, they called each other’s name:

 

“Brenton…”

 

“Tara…”

 

So many words welled up in each of them, too many to say. They just stood there, looking at each other, until Brenton broke the sudden silence: “To hell with all the other people. It’s a f…ing airport; this is what people do at airports.” And he grabbed Tara and sizzled his mouth onto hers with a kiss so torrid that they could both imagine it being felt clear across the Napa Valley.

 

 He locked one arm around the small of her back and the other around her shoulders, and she threw her arms around his neck, and the power of their kiss roared in their ears like the engines of a jet. They kissed as if they would kiss for a thousand years, until the announcement of her flight repeated, and they slowly, slowly pulled apart.

 

“Come back to Napa. Any time,” Brenton said.

 

“Come to Chicago. I’ll be there,” Tara answered.

 

Reluctantly she stepped back and picked up her carry-on bag from the floor beside her seat. Walking backwards at first so as not to let him out of her sight, then walking forwards while looking at him over her shoulder, Tara made her way over to the metal detector where he could not follow. Soon she was on the other side of it, heading for the gate of her flight. When she looked over her shoulder again, he was still standing there. He had not even moved. He had not taken his eyes off her.

 

With a final wave, she stepped through the gate, just catching sight of him waving back.

 

Brenton stayed in the airport waiting area and walked to the windows. He picked out her plane and stood transfixed, watching it. He watched it pull away from the gate and taxi down the runway. He watched it lift off and disappear into the blue California sky.

 

And something happened inside Brenton, a feeling such as he had never imagined having in his life. If he could have described it, he would have compared it to a long, deep crack opening up in his heart; a crack from top to bottom that would never close up again.

_______________

 

And so, after a year abroad and a week in Brenton Morgan’s bed, Tara Phillips’s life returned to something like its normal shape. She went back to work and resumed her routine, and enjoyed it. She was happy to be with Felicia again. The two of them had a sleepover and talked about everything—especially Brenton. Felicia’s eyes lit up with wonder and a bit of sisterly envy at Tara’s story of the uncannily beautiful and perpetually aroused man who invited himself to her table at the hotel cafe and had whisked her off for a fantasy beyond anything that Tara had ever imagined.

 

And Felicia saw in Tara’s own eyes a faraway look that said that a part of Tara was still at that house in Napa, that some part of her had never left him and perhaps never would. Tara could do nothing but sigh and nod with that distant expression when Felicia told her, “Girl, you’ve got to get that man to come to Chicago.”

 

Tara found too that she enjoyed her work even better, talking to customers about their dream holidays, their excitement about the places they wanted to go, and the trips they had planned or postponed for years, now that she had taken time out from her regular life to live out the dreams that she and George once had. Tara felt as though she related to them better now, having done as George once suggested and actually gone to some of the places where she sent others for a living. Being better traveled herself made her a better agent.

 

It was the nights that were difficult. Tara had expected to return home to the apartment where she and George had lived together and settle into the bed they had shared, and have nothing there but her memories of him. She had not counted on returning home after spending a week with a man who was a fantasy made flesh, to a bed where she no longer had a husband and was no longer with her living fantasy.

 

She had laid her grief for George to rest, but Brenton was fresh in the memory of both her mind and her body, and she had never felt her bed so empty nor felt herself so alone in it as she did now, with Brenton neither beside nor on top of her. She would lie alone in the dark, or in dimmed lighting as she’d been for night after night with Brenton, and she would try everything to get to sleep; but sleep took its sweet time finding her while she craved Brenton’s body.

 

And crave it she did. She craved his face and the infinitely sexy light in his blue-green eyes. She craved his lips on hers and his tongue in her mouth. She craved the spectacular muscles of his arms and his pecs, his abs and his legs. She craved the roundness and firmness of his buttocks. And she craved the fantastic thing between his legs, which grew hard and stayed hard; the way it tasted and the way it filled her mouth, the way it slid between her breasts and in the cleft of her buttocks, and most especially the way it worked in and out of her inner channel so deeply for so long. Tara missed the stickiness he left between her thighs and the moisture that he left on the sheets, and the smell of his perspiration and seed that hung in the air and made such a delicious scent of musk in the lingering hours that they spent tangled in the sheets.

 

Night after night Tara called the memory of Brenton to her bed, and night after night the memory appeared naked, erect, smiling an effortlessly seductive smile at her bedside. She reached out to him and he took her hand and climbed onto the bed, and onto her. He took command of her body and served up his body to her as he had done for all those days and all those nights.

 

He gave her the same kisses of moist fire that he had given her for all that time, and caressed and spooned her with the strong, smooth hands with which he had possessed her for so many hours. He whispered and grunted and moaned all the deliciously profane things that he’d said to her for day after day, night after night.

 

You want my body, don’t you, baby? Tell me how much you love my body. Tell me how you want to touch me and kiss me and lick me and suck me all over. Yeah, sweetheart, you want to put me in your mouth, don’t you? And you want me to put it in you…yeah, you want this thing in you so much. Tell me how much you want me to stick it in you. Tell me you never want me to take it out. Mmm, you want me to do it and come and never stop. You want to own my body, like I want to own yours…

 

When sleep did come, Brenton was there, doing all the things she wanted, making her do all the things he wanted. In her dreams, she rolled and thrashed with him and bucked and arched her back under him, and felt his entire body become one huge throbbing when he held himself inside her and poured himself into her when he came.

 

And when she awoke alone, with no Brenton sleeping temporarily spent beside her, a pang of inexpressible longing cut through Tara and made her want to cry. She would lie there in the first light of morning, stroking the pillow and sheets where she wished he was  lying, and she would stifle a tear. The only thing worse than missing Brenton, she knew, would be never having had him at all.

 

A couple of weeks after her return to Chicago, there was one day when something that Tara always expected and always got on a particular day of the month did not arrive. She dismissed it at first. She assumed she was simply late and nothing more. The only trouble was that Tara was never late. She had never been late for one month since she was a teenager. It just never happened. Certain things always happened when they were expected: the chiming of Big Ben, the eruption of Old Faithful—Tara Phillips’s period.

 

Her immediate reaction to this disruption of her schedule was denial. Since it never happened before, it could not be happening now—except it was. There was no escaping the pure, flat fact that it wasn’t happening. And with it not happening came the further fact of what was most likely to have stopped it. She did not want to put together the words for it, not even in the privacy of her own thoughts. It was something that could not be—or something that must not be.

 

And yet, sitting in bed alone at night after her scheduled arrival failed to appear like a plane not landing on time or a train not pulling into the station when expected, Tara saw no other choice but to think the unthinkable. When the memory of Brenton came to her, wondrously handsome and muscular and naked and erect as ever, she was sitting up with her knees folded and her arms wrapped around them, as if to make a fortress of her body. And her beautiful Brenton gazed his soulful, sexy gaze at her, and ran his fingers through her hair, and stroked her folded arms and legs, and whispered in her mind, Tara, baby, I want you. What’s wrong?

 

And Tara, with a tear in her eye, looked into the handsome face that wasn’t really there beside her, and half-whispered and half-sobbed in a painfully real voice, “Brenton…I think you got me pregnant.”

 

 

 

SEVEN

 

Pregnant.

 

There, she had actually said it. Tara had actually, if only in a hushed tone, put out into the air the word for what her every instinct now told her that she now was. Her imagination could not even make Brenton look as shocked as a man must look at hearing such a thing. The image of him popped like a soap bubble in her mind, leaving her alone both in her bed and in her head.

 

Tara put her forehead on her upright-bent knees around which she had wrapped her arms and took deep breaths, trying to still the racing of her heart. The way she had folded herself up was just like…and the word for that only made her heart race so fast, it felt as though it would trip and tumble over itself. The way she was sitting was so much like…a fetal position.

 

Oh, wasn’t that just perfect, now? A fetal position for someone who was very likely at this moment the bearer of a fetus.

 

How could this possibly have happened? Tara felt like a naive fool even for letting the question enter her panicking mind. She was sitting with legs folded up and locked together and arms wrapped around them, and the voices of every older female member of her family now crowded into her mind, intruding into her thoughts. If you’d only kept your legs together back in California, you wouldn’t be in this situation now.

 

Tara felt a flash of anger at that, and dispelled the intruding voices with another whisper, this time hard and harsh: “Oh, just shut the hell up, all of you!” And in the wake of it came a pang of guilt, for one of those clucking hen voices was that of her own mother.

 

Keeping one’s legs together and pretending there was nothing between them was not the answer to sexual responsibility, no matter how judgmentally people with their small-minded fear of anything sexual argued that it was. People had bodies and genitals. Sex was natural and pleasurable and nothing to be ashamed of. And damn it all, it was fun. Having fun was nothing to be ashamed of, either. The only “shame,” if that were the word for it, was in not using the readily available means to ward off the consequences. With adult fun came an adult need to anticipate the consequences.

 

And with that came another question echoing in Tara’s mind: Damnit, Brenton, couldn’t you at least have used a damn condom?

 

In response to that one, her mind rolled back to that last conversation she had with him when he took her to the airport and they sat waiting for her flight. He had actually started to do the math for all the times he had done it to her from that first night at the hotel to their week together at his house. To cover his seemingly superhuman ability to screw, how many boxes—yes, boxes—of condoms would that have taken? He would have had to take advantage of his fortune and buy condoms by the gross.

 

He would have needed to keep dresser drawers or closet shelves full of boxes of condoms. The idea of that actually almost made her want to laugh. She could actually picture it, and it was almost funny. It made her breathtakingly beautiful Brenton seem like a caricature of a perpetually horny man. Yes, he could have used condoms—enough condoms for the incredible figure that the math suggested for how many times he’d had her on her back with her now-locked legs folded up around his spectacular male nakedness. But Brenton was too much of a carnal, sexual animal to do it any other way but au naturel, and pump into her every drop of his thick and generous seed.

 

That left it to Tara herself. She was every bit as responsible for her likely condition as Brenton was, after all. What would it have taken for her to use a diaphragm and some spermicide, or even to have gone back to her prescription and returned to using the pill?

 

The fact was that after George died she had shut herself down physically as well as emotionally. With the store closed for business, so to speak, there was no need to keep any inventory. Between George and Brenton, there had been opportunities, but she had not pursued any of them. She had never felt a genuine desire until that time at the hotel with Brenton.

 

Of course, between the hotel and the ride on his chartered plane from the airport, they could have detoured to any drugstore and she could have refilled her prescription. They could even have bought a morning-after pill to cover the previous night. But they hadn’t done any of that. They had just boarded the plane and she had let Brenton board her. No, this was as much on her as it was on him.

 

It came to Tara that as shocking and daunting as her predicament was, she did not regret one bit of the way it happened. It was an accident, but it was not a mistake. The mistake would have been not to spend that night at the hotel and the week that followed with Brenton. The mistake would have been not to accept the gift of his phenomenal body and the instrument of rapture that hung between his thighs.

 

Nothing so astoundingly, beautifully masculine, given to her for hours on end day after day, could possibly have been wrong to enjoy. And enjoy him she did, head to toes and all over, his cascade of hair and his champion muscles and his prodigious prong—she had enjoyed every last inch of him, every last time.

 

About that there was no mistake. If she’d had that time to live again, Tara would not have changed one single thing. She would have taken and worshipped and satisfied her craving for Brenton’s body every bit as much as she did. She would have done everything to him, and let him do everything to her, just the same. She dismissed out of hand the idea that the virtual two-person, week-long orgy of her time with Brenton was a mistake.

 

All that remained, then, was to decide what to do about the consequences. A decision had to be made. There could be no ignoring it, no sloughing it off. She had to do something.

 

With a gulp, Tara arrived at the next daunting thought. She did not have to go through with being pregnant, if pregnant she was. She'd had the choice to let herself get that way. She also had the choice to stop it.

 

Hardly aware that she was even doing it, Tara unwrapped her arms from around her legs, lowered her legs, and let her body come to rest on the bed. It was not a tranquil rest by any means; it was a disconnection, for the time being, of her body from her mind. It was an uncoiling of her body and a coiling of her mind deep into itself.

 

Tara turned her thoughts inward, to the deepest parts of herself, a place deeper than body or thoughts or anything else. She went into the core of her being to ask herself whether she were even capable of doing the thing she had just contemplated. Could she not have the baby? Could she simply stop it?

To ponder the question, Tara had to banish all other voices from her mind. Her mother and the other older women in her family could not exist for her now; they could have no place. There could only be Tara and the idea—and the decision. Could I really do that? Could I really end this? Am I capable of that?

 

Tara had proven herself capable of a number of difficult things in her life. She had shown herself to be brave enough to leave the stability of being an employee and become an entrepreneur; brave enough to own her own life instead of leasing it out to someone else in exchange for a paycheck and benefits. And she had made it work. But now she had to decide the course of another life, a tiny little life growing inside her. She had to decide whether that little life would even have a course at all, or whether she would cut it short.

 

The choice presented her with the quagmire of morality and guilt and social and cultural pressures, and everything that had been put upon and expected of women for thousands of years. Before her were the questions of whether her body were her own, or whether she was now just a vessel and incubator for the baby, and even whether Brenton, having created this little life with her by the enraptured joining of his body with hers, had any further claim on her body and her life now—and what claim he had on the life she was carrying.

 

There were all the objections that anyone could possibly raise to terminating the pregnancy. Some of them were superstitious and irrational and hypocritical. Some of them were arguments that claimed to be about the rights of the unborn, but which Tara knew very well were about churches and political factions and outside authorities wanting to assert their control over her body.

 

There were those to whom a pregnant woman was not even really a person; she was just the bearer of a baby. They claimed to be advocates of life, but they were really just advocates of birth, who declared that a woman’s only real purpose for existing at all was to bring forth children. And once the child was born, they didn’t even necessarily care anything for it. All that really mattered was keeping women in their ordained place.

 

Tara considered all of those things, and all of those people, and decided they were not worth considering. With a hard frown, she muttered, “You can all just go to hell.” It was not their body that would have to endure the rigors of pregnancy and birth, and it was not their lives that would be transformed forever if she did so. This was her body and it was her life, and she was a person; a whole, thinking, feeling person, not just the carrier of a fetus. So they could all take their fear and their superstitions and their cherry-picked verses from holy books and their assumed authority and dominion over women and go to the hell of their choice; this was about Tara, and Tara alone. Her body, her life, her decision.

And yet, it was still a decision that would affect that little life that she and Brenton had made; a decision that would determine whether it would even be a life at all.

 

She rested her hand on her stomach, imagining what she knew must be growing inside her, and remembering again how it got there. Brenton. He’d had a part in the beginning of this. Shouldn’t he have a part in the ending—or whatever came next? Shouldn’t he know that he had created another little Morgan? Tara thought she should tell him. He deserved to know. He even had a right to know.

 

What she reflected upon now was not just the sex itself, raw and savage and delicious and passionate and relentless as it had been. It was not just what Brenton did, or how he did it, or how much and how long he did it. All of that had been an odyssey of erotic joy, but that was not what Tara considered now. It was who Brenton was, the kind of person he was, beyond the all-consuming erotic physicality of him. It was not just the body, but the whole person, the whole man—the humor, the warmth, the kindness. She remembered the look in his eyes when it was not just desire but appreciation.

 

She remembered the way he touched her when it was not just arousal and not just the rapture of oral sex and copulating, but the quiet, soft tenderness of the times in between. She remembered his kiss, not just when the two of them were preparing for or consumed in the act, but in the quieter times, when they just lay together, communicating with fingers on skin and on the parts down there.

 

 And she recalled the way he spoke to her, not only the deliciously dirty and filthy, sexy things he grunted and moaned when he was on top of her, but the way he spoke of his own dreams and his own thoughts—and the way he listened to her when she talked. After all that, did Brenton not deserve to know that he had given her a child?

 

Brenton was pure, unadulterated sex. He knew no such thing as “enough”. But there was no question in Tara’s mind or heart that Brenton was good. He cared about the world around him. He was sweet and he was kind. Would it not have been wrong to keep it from him that he might be a father?

 

Tara sighed, warmed by the memory of everything that Brenton did and everything that he was. She had spent these long moments pondering the full meaning of her missed period, something that had never happened to her until now. She still believed she knew what it meant, but it was still just the unusual behavior of her body’s cycle.

 

She had not taken a test, nor seen a doctor. It was just something she had decided was true. The next thing to do, actually, was to make sure it was true. No matter how hard and flat a fact it had become in her mind, she had to make it real by confirming it. At least get a test first, she told herself. Get yourself a test and know for sure.

 

One final realization came to her. Whether or not she told Brenton, she could not be in this alone. Tara was a smart, mostly level-headed, competent, generally responsible woman, but she could not face or go through a thing like this alone. She would need help.

 

Felicia. Tomorrow she would tell Felicia.

 

EIGHT

 

Sleep came with great difficulty that night. Directly in the morning, Tara got herself up and over to her bedroom desk to pull up a search engine on her laptop. She entered Brenton Morgan Napa California and held her breath for the results.

 

The links came up immediately: Napa Realtor for County Legislator. Local Real Estate Developer Enters County Legislative Race. Herald Realty Exec Runs for Legislator… It was in the papers. He was doing it, just as he said he would. Brenton had announced his candidacy and was running for office. For a moment Tara actually forgot her dilemma and smiled at the page of links on her screen. She was proud of him.

 

She brought up some of the articles from the links and read the reports of his early bid for County Legislature. She skimmed the pieces to find his quotes; she wanted to read his words. His position statements appeared in text and reminded her of the things he said to her in person the day they met. He was running on a platform of responsible use of land and water, business and job growth balanced with conserving resources for the future. He favored development of alternative energy sources, reduction of carbon emissions, urban agriculture, and training workers for new and emerging industries.

 

He was a friend of wildlife conservation. Tara looked at videos from local TV stations in Napa for interviews with him. There he was, just as personable and charming and almost as gorgeous on camera as he was in real life—with a difference. She immediately noticed the haircut. They had talked about this at the hotel cafe, how the image of him with his beautiful straw-blonde locks tumbling over his shoulders was not the image that a politician wanted to project.

 

Brenton had cut his hair. It was still luxuriously thick and golden, but the sexy cascade of gold over his shoulders was gone. He’d made the sacrifice, but it was such a shame. It almost broke Tara’s heart to see him that way, except that even with his locks shorn away he was still the same vision of ultimate male sexiness that she’d lain with. He looked somehow like a tamed animal, a beast that had taken on at least a surface appearance of civilization. But he was still Brenton.

 

His smile radiated from the screen. He looked fantastic in a suit. And she thought of all the women in Napa—and not a few men—who would envy her if they knew how many hours and days she had spent with a nude, long-haired, and aroused Brenton Morgan, and everything he had done to her with his clothes off. Which brought her back to the present, and the reason she was watching him now.

 

“Oh, Brenton, what am I going to do?” Tara wondered aloud. Here he was, embarking on his great ambition, wanting to help the world, wanting to make a positive difference. As a political candidate, Brenton would be watched. Not just watched, he would be scrutinized. Everything he did, every place he went, everyone he was seen with, would be weighed and judged. And people, she knew, could be very judgmental.

 

 People often deliberately looked for things to hold against someone, and when they found it they could be callous, harsh, mean, vicious. Any little flaw that anyone found in him could be magnified into something gigantic and ugly. Any little mistake he made, any little thing that could be taken as an imperfection of character, was apt to be blown up to many times its natural proportions.

 

Sitting at her desk, eyeing her computer with a blank expression where there had been a frown, Tara touched her stomach again. Well, here was something that many people would take as a mistake, all right. Here was something that many of his prospective constituents would call a major flaw in character. He had bedded a woman to whom he wasn’t married and made her pregnant with his illegitimate baby.

 

To many people it would not matter that this was the twenty-first century; it might as well have been the seventeenth. Having gotten a woman pregnant out of wedlock would be inexcusable in a would-be public official. They would brand him as irresponsible at best, and a cad, a bounder, and a man-slut at worst. There would go all of his political ambitions, and there would go everything he wanted to do for his community, his state, and the country. A reputation for shagging women and leaving them pregnant would be the undoing of all of it.

 

And yet, Brenton deserved to know. There were so many things at stake: his future, her future, the future of the tiny life inside her—assuming she actually wanted to have it, and she still wasn’t sure of that. It was all tangling up in her mind now, and the only way she could untangle it was to talk to someone. She had to get to the office. She had to talk to Felicia. Just getting it out in the open with one person who'd understand, with her best friend, could make all the difference. Further resolved to tell Felicia and share the whole thing with someone who could help her sort it out, Tara put the laptop to sleep and rose from behind the desk. She had an important day ahead of her.

_______________

 

When Tara took Felicia aside at the front office and asked her to join her in the back office, Felicia could tell something was up. She just wasn’t expecting it to be this. When she gave Felicia the news, Tara thought her friend’s eyes would come popping from their sockets and hit her square in the face. Felicia had to sit down. Tara, not wanting to sit behind the desk but needing a seat of her own after saying that out loud to someone else for the first time, pulled up another chair and joined her.

 

“For real? For sure? Definitely?” Felicia asked anxiously.

 

“It must be,” said Tara. “It has to be. I’ve never been late, Felicia. Never, ever, ever. Not once, since my very first cycle. I’ve always been like clockwork. The only thing that could possibly make me late…is this.”

 

“But you haven’t taken a test or anything, or been to a doctor yet.”

 

“No, not yet. I just noticed this last night.”

 

“Then you can’t really be sure.”

“Yes, I can, Felicia,” Tara insisted. “I’m just never late; I never have been. I must be pregnant. If I’m not pregnant, there must be something else wrong with me, and I really don’t think there is.”

 

“Then you’ve got to take a test and see a doctor, and find out. You haven’t had a physical since before you went away, right? So, you’ll take a pregnancy test and go to a doctor. You’ve got to do that before you do anything else.”

 

“I know, I know,” Tara said, sounding as if she could melt into tears at any second. “But I just know I’m right. Brenton got me pregnant, I know it.”

 

The genuine sympathy in Felicia’s voice belied her words, which might have come in a very different tone from someone else. “Oh, Felicia, honey…neither of you was using anything all that time?”

 

Tara shook her head. “There wasn’t a chance to use anything. It was right upstairs to his suite, then right out to his place on the plane. And you know, I’d stopped filling my prescription after George died and I didn’t see any need to fill it again because I certainly wasn’t sleeping with anyone else…”

 

Felicia put a comforting hand on Tara’s knee. “I know. I can see that. I get how it happened. But still…oh, Felicia…”

 

Tara looked almost as ill as if she were in the throes of morning sickness—to which she expected she could look forward to now. “I just don’t know which way to go, Felicia.”

 

“Well, you’ve got to tell him, that’s all.”

 

“How can I tell him? Do you know what that will do to his life, to his plans?”

 

“Never mind his plans!” Felicia argued. “What about you? Is he gonna carry this child? Is he gonna go through everything to have this child?”

“Right now,” Tara admitted, “I don’t even know if I’m going to go through everything to have it.”

 

Felicia bit her lip nervously. “Could you really go through with that?”

 

“I spent all last night asking myself if I could go through with not having it, and I don’t know,” said Tara. “And if I do…stop it…it’ll be gone without Brenton even knowing it happened. He could go on never knowing he was going to be a father. I don’t know if I could do that to him or to…” She touched her stomach, indicating the other affected party.

 

“That’s why you have to tell him,” Felicia pressed. “One: It doesn’t matter how much of a player a man may be; I don’t care how much he likes to sleep around without protection and not care what happens. If he’s gonna be a father, a man wants to know it. Two: If you really stop the pregnancy without telling him, you’re gonna have to live with it, and I know you—you can’t do it. It’ll eat you up inside. Honey, you need to tell this man what he did, and you both have to figure out what you’re gonna do.”

 

Tara looked off, feeling sicker by the minute. Everything that Felicia just said, while in her own words, was everything that Tara had told herself in the sleepless hours of the night gone by. True as it was that it was her body and her choice, the choice did not exist in a vacuum. There were other factors that made it truly less of a choice than it seemed to be.

 

“If I tell him,” said Tara, “we’ll both have choices to make. He’ll have to figure out what to do about his own life and his own plans, and how this fits in with all that. There are things he wants to do, things he wants to accomplish, things he wants his life to be about. He might not be able to do any of that if it gets out that he made a baby with a woman he’s not married to. The public seems to like him now. But if people knew, they might turn away from him. Or worse, the people he’s running against could smear him with it, ruin his name. That would humiliate him. I don’t want him to face that. It would break his heart, and that would break my heart.”

 

“Well, it’s not like he was married and slept around behind his wife’s back. He was single, you were single, you were attracted to each other. These things happen.”

 

“I don’t think anything ‘just happens’ in politics, Felicia. The public is weird about people in office. They want politicians to be these spotless people—or not show that they have any spots. They’re fickle, and once they stop trusting they might never trust again. I don’t want that to happen to Brenton. He’s doing so well up to this point. Let me show you.”

 

Tara got up and stepped behind the desk. Felicia got up with her and stood at her shoulder while Tara brought up the news videos that she’d watched earlier in the morning. Felicia looked at the male magnificence that had taken Tara to bed, and blinked, and blinked again. In response to Felicia’s gasp, Tara said, “Believe me, out of those suits he only gets better. Imagine what you’re looking at now, wearing long hair and nothing else, and hung like a zucchini.”

 

“Damn!” Felicia said, slack-jawed. “No wonder you couldn’t keep your clothes on with that! And he had you on your back for a whole week…”

 

“On my back, and standing up, and every other way you could think of.”

 

“Damn!” Felicia repeated, at a loss for any other words.

 

“See?” said Tara.

 

“It’s a wonder you could even get up again after going a couple of rounds with that.”

 

“There were times I thought I’d never get up again and I didn’t care.”

 

“I hear you. Wow. Damn…”

 

At length, Felicia managed to tear her eyes from the gorgeousness on the computer and sit back down. Once she was seated again, she had another thought. “Tara, what if you don’t tell Brenton he’s gonna be a daddy, and what if you do go ahead and raise the baby on your own. What will that do to your life? Have you thought about that?”

 

Tara stared out into the air, seeming to look at nothing but really looking out into the future. “I have. Eighteen years at least, Felicia. Eighteen years of taking care of a child. Getting him—or her—through being a baby and going to school, and getting sick and getting him or her through all the things that kids do and all the things they go through, growing up. My God, being the mother of a teenager. A teenager. Do you remember what you were like when you were a teenager? I remember what I was like. Getting a child through childhood and then that. And the tiredness and the expense and…everything.”

 

“Mm-hmm. And all that, by yourself. With no man, no Daddy around. Just you. That’s the biggest thing anybody ever does in their whole life, Tara. And it’ll be just you doing it.”

 

Tara snapped out of it and looked at her with, one should pardon the expression, an expectant gaze. “Well, I’m sure I’d have a little help, wouldn’t I, Auntie Felicia?”

 

“Oh, you know Auntie Felicia would be on the job. But I’d be backup. You’d be the mom. If you’re gonna go this alone, you’re gonna have to be ready to be the mom.”

 

Tara slumped her shoulders and slumped backwards in the seat. “I know. Just me—from a widow to a single mom. Oh, Felicia, I’m already tired.”

 

“And there’s one other thing,” Felicia said. “And this is the big one.”

 

“What?”

 

“You know what. Kids ask questions, Tara. They look at what’s going on around them and they ask questions. Little Him or Her is gonna see other kids with moms and dads, or other kids with two parents. And Little Him or Her is gonna start asking where Daddy is. And who Daddy is. And why Daddy isn’t here. What are you gonna say?”

 

“Please, let’s not get that far ahead yet,” said Tara, shutting her eyes and rubbing her forehead. “I’m not even at the point of knowing whether it’s really a him or a her.”

 

“Not to mention, when Brenton finds out one day, he’s gonna want to know why he was never in the loop. He’s gonna have a few questions too.”

 

Keeping her eyes closed but unable to shut out all the questions and all the complications, Tara wearily said, “There’s just too many things going on, too many sides to all of it. I can’t deal with it all at once. All I can do now is deal with the part that’s happening right now and sort it all out as I go along. The whole thing is too big to do anything else.”

 

“Okay, well, here’s the part we’re going first. Lunchtime today, we’re going over to the drugstore and we’re buying you a test. And later today we’re going back to your place and you’re taking the test and finding out for sure, even though like you say, you’re never late and it must be. You need a test. Then we’ll just start from there.”

 

Tara opened her eyes again, but stayed leaning back in her seat as if she could just go to sleep and forget it all. In the same weary voice, she said, “Yes, that’s what we’ll do. We’ll take a long lunch and we’ll buy me a test. Meanwhile, this is just between you and me.”

 

“Definitely,” said Felicia.

_______________

 

As Tara expected, the stick of the pregnancy test produced a blue plus sign that confirmed the reason why she was late. At the end of the day, Tara and Felicia settled down in Tara’s living room, Tara on the sofa and Felicia on a seat facing her opposite the coffee table, and pondered all the many ramifications of what Tara knew all along and what her test had verified. If this had happened with George, Tara would be surprised (especially at the failure of the birth control pills that she would still have been using), but happy. Now all she could feel was a cloud of uncertainties swirling over her head.

 

“There’s another thing we didn’t account for,” Tara said. “I don’t even know if Brenton wanted kids. We never talked about it. We never expected this to happen. We just enjoyed doing what you do to get kids. This is probably something that was never in his own plans, just like it was never in mine. Or it may be something that he didn’t want until a few years down the line, after he’d done other things. If he knew about this, it would turn his life upside down just like it’s going to do mine.”

 

“Or maybe,” Felicia suggested, “you’re not giving the guy enough credit. Look, he’s a rich guy, right? Rich from real estate. He’s got plenty of money. So what if he’d just roll with this and decide he wanted it? What if he didn’t look at it like a burden on his life at all? He might at least want to help you provide for it. He might at least want to give you some support—as in child support. And he might call out fathers’ rights. There is such a thing, you know.”

 

“I know. But he has a right to do all the things he wanted to do and be all the things he wants to be.”

 

“He can still do all those things and be a father. Look, I know you’re thinking about your body and your choice as much as you’re thinking about him. And I know you think you’re protecting his future. But don’t you think you’re taking all the choices for yourself and not giving him any?”

 

For the first time Tara became defensive. An edge crept into her voice. She straightened up on the sofa and glared at Felicia. “Are you trying to say I’m being selfish?”

 

Felicia held up her hands, trying not to start a quarrel that neither of them wanted. “I’m saying… All I guess I’m saying is you’re maybe not looking at the big picture in all this.”

 

Tara’s defensiveness melted into something more like despair. “The picture is too big. There are too many things.”

 

“Then you’ve got to do what we were talking about. Don't try to take on the whole thing at once. Take it on one piece at a time. And you have got help and support right here, you know. I’ve always got your back, no matter what you decide.”

 

Tara was grateful for that, at least. “I know,” she said.

 

“So you’re calling your OB-GYN in the morning, like we said.”

 

“First thing,” Tara replied.

 

“Okay,” Felicia said. “You gonna be all right now? You need anything else?”

 

“Just a little more time to myself, to think,” said Tara. “I’ll see you in the morning—after I call the doctor.”

 

“Can I say just one more thing?” Felicia asked.

 

“Of course. What?”

 

“I understand everything you’re thinking about, and I get your reasons for not wanting to tell Brenton. I don’t really agree with them, but I know you’re trying to look out for him. I just don’t think this is the way to do it. And keeping this a secret, that’ll only be good for so long. Things like this come out. They always come out. Something always makes them come out. A secret like this—it never stays a secret. That’s all I’m gonna say.”

 

Tara simply answered, “Okay.” She had no comeback to that. She had nothing else to offer in the way of an answer.

 

Felicia got up to leave and Tara saw her to the door. At the door they hugged it out, the long, deep hug of best girlfriends and surrogate sisters who would always be there for each other. Tara permitted herself a tear and accepted Felicia’s reassurances of things being all right, no matter what. And Tara let her out, leaving herself alone in the apartment again.

 

Well, she was not exactly alone, after all. For the next nine months she would not be alone in her own body, and for years to come after that she would not be alone in her own life. She settled back down on the sofa, in silence, and sat there again under the brewing storm of her uncertainties, wondering when her skies would ever be clear again.

 

So much to think about. So much to plan. Just so much.

 

Felicia had been right about one thing. Tara knew she could never go through with terminating the little life that Brenton had made inside her. All questions of morality and superstition and everything else aside, she simply could not bring herself to do such a thing. Whether it was wrong for the world or wrong for society or wrong for womanhood itself was not the point. It was wrong for her. She couldn’t do it.

 

Tara Phillips was going to be a mother. And whether he knew it or not, Brenton Morgan was going to be a father.

 

 

 

 

NINE

 

Daniel Adam Phillips, conceived on a Thursday evening, was born on a Thursday afternoon, nine months later.

 

It was the policy and practice of the hospital that the staff were not to show any bias or favoritism towards any baby in the nursery over any other. And it was a sensible, practical, and necessary policy. However, where baby Daniel Phillips was concerned it went quietly out the window. During her maternity stay, every nurse on the floor quietly and discreetly came to Tara and told her in glowing terms that Daniel was the most beautiful baby they had ever set eyes on in their lives.

 

Being Daniel’s mother, Tara naturally agreed with them. Why, after all, would a mother not think of her own child as the most beautiful thing that ever lived? And yet some nameless instinct told Tara that this was not the nurses’ imagination nor her own natural maternal bias. Not that she had spent her whole life in the company of infants or seen hundreds of them the way the maternity staff had, but Tara had a feeling deep down that there was something particularly enchanting about her little son.

 

 Somehow, he seemed almost preternaturally beautiful. She chalked this up to the feeling she had upon meeting Daniel’s father. Brenton had that same magnetic quality of handsomeness and attraction about him; he was a natural head-turner and a natural inducer of mesmerized stares. So yes, Tara thought, this was only her seeing Brenton in their child. He was just like his father.

 

That, however, did not quite explain the reactions of others to Daniel. The nurses who crowded around the maternity ward window just to look at him, and who practically fought for the privilege of picking him up and holding him and carrying him to see his mother, had never met Brenton. They seemed to be responding to Brenton’s son almost as strongly as Tara had responded to Brenton himself.

 

Felicia, too, was instantly wrapped around the little boy’s tiny fingers. Her face would light up at the sight of Daniel as if she and not Tara were his mother. She had to be coaxed to hand him over to Tara when she came to visit them at the hospital. Tara would watch Felicia cradling the little bundle of beauty in her arms and beaming pure love at him from her smile.

 

Tara had a strong inkling that Daniel was going to be a very popular boy growing up. He was going to take after his father. He was going to be more handsome than it seemed humanly possible for anyone to be. He was going to be very strong and athletic. And he was never going to have trouble getting a date. Tara was going to raise a boy that everyone either wanted to be with, or everyone just wanted to be. She could tell she was going to have her work cut out for her.

 

But her immediate task, for which she was grateful, was just to accept into her life this little gift from the most amazing week she had ever spent; to welcome him and hold him and love him with all her heart. And as he looked up at her with a rounded little facsimile of Brenton’s face and a sparkle in Brenton’s blue-green eyes, Tara’s heart felt as though it were expanding outward to wrap up the little boy in her love.

 

 This was a piece of Brenton that she would always have. He would be her life and her world. In all her life, Tara was never more sure of anything than that she had done absolutely the right thing in having him. As Brenton had shown her all the passion in the world, Tara now poured all the love in the world into her son.

 

Tara soon learned that the seeming enchantment of Daniel was not limited to her and the hospital staff. One day when the weather was nice, she took him for a brief visit to the office and all work and all business were forgotten in his presence. Employees got up from their desks for a look and did not want to go back. Customers got up and crowded around and appeared to be dazzled at the sight of him.

 

One customer even gave Tara a business card and offered to put him in commercials, swearing this baby could sell anything. Tara believed him. Whenever she would take him on a little outing, people passing nearby in her building, on the street, in the park, or in the market would stop and look and admire him as if they had never seen a baby in their lives. It was enough to make Tara feel flattered and vain, and she was not even the one they were admiring. She wondered at times if people were as enraptured with Brenton when he was a baby and what his mother did about it.

 

There were times she thought she should call Brenton, or E-mail him or text him, and tell him what they had made together and what she had brought into the world from him, and she felt guilty that she did not. She remembered everything that she and Felicia had talked about when she first thought she was pregnant, of which Felicia reminded her on occasion. Brenton should know that he was the father of this little thing of wonder that struck such love and adoration in the heart of everyone who saw him.

 

 Tara felt as though she were cheating him, depriving him, robbing him of what was his. But time and again she thought of the life that Brenton had imagined for himself, and that being the father of a child out of wedlock had no place in that life.

 

When Felicia brought up the subject again, as it did one day at Tara’s apartment while Daniel was taking a nap, the inevitable question was, “What if Daniel didn’t have to be a child out of wedlock? What if Brenton decided he wanted to marry you?”

 

And the inevitable answer from Tara was, “He shouldn’t have to feel obligated to marry me. We were only together for a week. We didn’t make any commitments. We didn’t pledge to be together forever. We went to bed together and we understood that it was going to be over and we were both going back to our own lives. I didn’t expect anything else then and I don’t expect anything else from him now.”

 

Felicia argued back, “Maybe you didn’t make a commitment then, but guess what: lying in that crib in what used to be George’s den, that’s a commitment. Brenton ought to have a chance to commit to that little boy just like you.”

 

Tara was adamant. “I don’t believe marrying and staying together just for a child is right. I don’t think it’s good for anyone, not for the parents or the child. It’s not about just committing to the child; it’s about committing to each other. Brenton and I didn’t have that. We had sex. Being together just for Daniel and not because it’s what we both really want, I don’t see how it could work in the long run. Brenton’s life is where he is; my life is here. And having just me in his life, I think it’s better for Daniel than having his father one minute and not having him the next. It’d be like pulling the rug out from under him.”

 

“It’d be better than never knowing his father at all,” said Felicia.

 

“I can’t do it,” Tara insisted. “It would disrupt everyone’s life. I’ve had my life changed completely from what I thought it was going to be, once when George died, then again when I got pregnant. I don’t want any more disruptions. I just want my child and my life, and everything in its proper place.”

 

Felicia always relented, for Tara was after all the mother and the final decisions, right or wrong, were hers. “If you say so,” Felicia shrugged. “All I’m saying is, a father’s got a place in a boy’s life. That’s all.”

 

Daniel was an unusually quiet child. He did not seem to cry as much as one would expect a baby to cry. He had an unusual tendency to sleep all the way through the night, which Tara found peculiar. She had expected to go through what she had heard so many other parents bemoaning, the long sleepless nights of a crying baby and the need to get up and feed him in the wee hours. She had even braced herself for the complaints of other people in her building about the noise.

 

Strangely enough, Daniel cried very little. He did make noises during the night when he was hungry, but they were not the usual infant cries. They were odd sounds, which Tara compared to something between a wail and…a howl. No, not a howl, but something else; a sharp, keen, rasping kind of cry, with almost a kind of a hiss behind it. This worried her so that she took him to the doctor to have a full examination to determine exactly what would cause Daniel to make that kind of noise instead of crying.

 

The doctor could find nothing wrong with him at all, nothing unusual to speak of, and advised Tara not to worry about it until something else out of the ordinary happened. Tara wondered what could be more out of the ordinary than a baby who hardly cried, and did not sound like a baby when he did.

 

Daniel was also a very grabby and very physical sort of baby. He liked to grab and pull on everything in sight: people’s hair and fingers and clothing, and everything else that came within reach. Amazingly, he would grab and pull the cushions from the sofa with a strength that Tara did not necessarily think a baby of less than one year old should have. He would grab Tara’s shoes when she took them off. He would grab carpets and pull them along the floor. Tara had to get rid of the potted plants in the living room; he would pull on them and turn them over, spilling plants and soil everywhere.

 

When she put him on the bed, he would grab and wrestle with the pillows and pull down the sheets. This behavior so drove Tara to distraction that she soon bought him an entire menagerie of stuffed animals and created a penned-in area of the apartment for just them and him. She would sit fascinated and watch him wrestle and roll around with his stuffed giraffes and buffaloes and deer and antelopes—wrestle with them and bite them all over. Tara did not know why, but seeing him in play this way unnerved her as much as it entertained her. It was as peculiar as the sounds he made.

His favorite stuffed toy, the one he did not bite, was the stuffed lion that was just as big as Daniel himself. When he could not sleep, when he sat up and made his non-crying noise but was not hungry, Tara settled him down by bringing him the lion. This one plush beast, Daniel would grab and hug tightly in his arms, and he would curl up with it and drift off into a peaceful nap or a night’s calm sleep. Tara was relieved that the lion always worked. She hoped it would continue to work until Daniel got bigger. It made her little man that much less of a handful.

 

Tara’s research before he was born told her that a child usually began to walk between the ages of nine and twelve months. Daniel was on his feet two months early, another unusual thing. Now he was both grabbing and walking.

 

This changed the nature of their playtime, for as soon as he gained the full use of his legs, Daniel took to running and jumping and climbing. When he wanted to be picked up and held, he would run to Tara. When they sat playing on the floor or on Tara’s bed, he would lunge at her and tackle her and they would roll about in a mock wrestling match. When he grabbed a toy and Tara played with him by trying to snatch it away from him, it became a tug of war. Sometimes she would let him win, only to start snatching at the toy again and resume the little mother/son “conflict.”

 

Sometimes she would get the toy away from him and he would throw himself at her, and they would struggle for possession of it until she allowed him to wrest it from her grasp or she ended up snatching him and smothering him with hugs and kisses, turning Daniel into a squirming, kicking, giggling mass of little boyhood. Playing with her child made Tara feel at least a little like a child herself. And perhaps, she thought, that was one of the reasons people became parents. Perhaps that was one of the things that parenthood was for.

 

And then, late one afternoon just a short time after Daniel’s first birthday, when Tara entered the den with a bottle of milk for Daniel and marched towards the playpen where she had left him, Daniel was not there. Just a step away from the bars of the playpen, she halted in her tracks and looked down into the spread of toys on the mat, where her son should have been—and did not find him. What she found made her drop the plastic bottle onto the carpet. A myriad of emotions, none of them good, froze her in place: confusion, disbelief, shock, horror, absolute and total incomprehension.

 

What lay on its side, looking up innocently at Tara, was not a little boy. It was not even human. It had tan-colored fur all over, and four legs and four paws, and a twitching tail. It had puffy rounded ears sticking up from the top of its head—a head that was not that of a year-old child. It had a snout and whiskers, and eyes of a shape that was not human, but a blue-green color that Tara knew very well.

 

Tara felt as if she leapt out of her body and leapt back in again when she heard herself scream: “Daniel!”

 

As if in response, the lion cub in Daniel’s playpen stood up and reached up with broad lion-club paws, supporting itself leaning against the bars of the playpen, still peering up into Tara’s face with eyes the same color as Daniel’s eyes—and his father’s.

 

Clutched all over by horror, Tara staggered a step away and looked frantically all over the den at all the places where Daniel might be, wondering desperately how he might have gotten there, terrified that he might not be there at all, terrified that someone, for some reason, had broken into the apartment and taken her child and left this…creature…in his place. She looked under George’s old desk, and in the space between the bookshelf and the wall.

 

She dashed to the closet and flung it open to find nothing but Daniel’s clothes and some boxes of diapers and other baby supplies. She dropped to the floor and looked under the crib and under the little sofa where George sometimes sat, and she sometimes sat with him. Mad with growing confusion and fear, she crawled up onto the sofa and sat, panting, crying, looking over at the animal in the playpen. And she sobbed out her little boy’s name: “Daniel…”

 

Then it happened. The lion club, its eyes still fixed on her, let out a sound that was as familiar as the color of its eyes, a sound that she had heard so many times when Daniel was crying—which she now recognized as the plaintive mewling of a baby lion. Tara’s mouth dropped open with the realization that Daniel’s training pants were lying on the mat in the playpen, ripped and shredded to pieces—because the lion cub had torn and clawed its way out of them.

 

No sooner did this realization hit Tara than she watched, dumbfounded, as the cub blinked at her and changed its form. The fur disappeared, the tail contracted, the paws turned back to little boy hands and feet, the head morphed from feline to human. What stood leaning naked against the playpen bars was now once again a one-year-old boy.

 

Tara’s mind went tumbling back across the space of a year and nine months, and she relived as she had done so many times the days that she spent with Brenton, whose eyes were just like the eyes of the child staring so innocently across the room at her, no doubt wondering why his mother did not come and pick him up and feed him. She lived again those sweet but carnal days with the man who gave her a child. And as much as she tried to swat away the reality of what she had just seen, it kept coming back and connecting this moment with that time a year and nine months ago.

 

Tara had never ceased to marvel at Brenton’s ability to be hard and screw and come like nothing human. But until now, seeing their child morph from lion cub to human boy, the true reason had never entered her mind. How could she ever have thought of it? No reasoning human being would ever think of such a thing. Brenton could do it like nothing human—because he was nothing human.

 

During that night in Santa Monica and that week in Napa, she had shared the bed of something that every faculty of human reason said should not exist.

 

TEN

 

The horror hit Tara like a sudden, brutal punch in the stomach. The next thing she knew, she was half running, half staggering for the bathroom and slamming and locking the door behind her.

 

She hunched over the sink, in the grip of dry heaves, body shakes as if she had a raging flu, and ragged, choking breaths; and stared into the mirror at a face of blind, hysterical fear. Her arms trembled so furiously, braced against the porcelain of the sink, that she was afraid they would snap like kindling. The sight of herself and the image seared into her mind of what she had thought was her baby in the playpen overwhelmed her, and she exploded into tears. “My baby…!” Her sobbing almost turned to wailing. “My baby…!”

 

Tara could no longer stand up, even leaning against the sink. She crumbled inside and crumpled outside, sinking onto the bathroom floor and sitting there in a pitiful, sobbing, choking heap, wishing she could just tear her body to pieces for real to match the way she felt. She leaned back against the cabinet under the sink, raised her eyes to the bathroom ceiling as if to call out in despair and fright to a higher power, and from somewhere deep in the pit of her stomach, her soul, or both, came a scream.

 

 It was the shrill scream of a woman feeling herself on the edge of madness, and it reverberated against the bathroom walls in a way that felt like tiny hammers in her ears and all over her skin. She screamed again, and again, until she feared the neighbors banging at her door, or worse, calling 911. What would she tell them if they did? What could she tell them? Having as much of an answer to that as to what she had found in the playpen, she crumpled all the way down onto the floor and lay there in a quivering, sobbing ball.

 

All that she could think of was Brenton: his charm, his kindness, his sensuality, the unimaginable pleasure that he had given her—and the gift with which he had unknowingly left her. The fact that he had done it without knowing began to stir other feelings in Tara. He did not know that she had left California with his child, and she had not told him—but there were other things he did know and had failed to tell her.

 

What kind of man was he to do that to a woman and not tell her? Evidently, he was not a man at all. Or he was something other than a man. Still, he had not uttered a word of it, and had left her to wonder now what it was that she had carried and borne and loved and cared for—and now sat in the den of her late husband, changing back and forth from her baby to… Tara could not even think of the words for what Daniel had become. It was something impossible turned to reality. And Brenton never told her.

 

She dragged herself up on the palm of her hands and lay there, shaking again, this time not with terror but with fury. If Daniel had become that, then his father must be able to become the adult version of that. He was a creature who had bedded her under the pretense of being a man. How dare he? Who in the hell did he think he was? A snarl as bestial as what she now knew lurked inside Brenton curled Tara’s lips: “You bastard. You inhuman bastard. You slept with me and used me, and left me with…with…”

 

Tara could no more form the words than she could summon the thought. Her anger still seethed and boiled inside her, clenching her teeth, wetting her brow with perspiration, reddening her skin. She was so enraged that she could have torn Brenton apart as if she herself were the thing he was. She actually imagined digging fangs and claws of her own into his flesh, ripping away at him, punishing him for daring to push himself inside her and make her pregnant with…with…

 

Again, her thoughts failed her. Pregnant with what? Sitting inside the playpen, knowing or comprehending none of this, likely wondering in his infant way where Mommy was and what had happened to her, was the most beautiful child on Earth. Beyond the door that Tara was now ashamed to have locked behind her was a little boy who effortlessly made everyone who saw him fall in love with him. A few steps away in the den was innocence and joy and love, and total beauty. It was Daniel. It was her baby.

 

She scrambled to her feet, feeling wobbly now after all the emotions that had come blasting out of her. Tara steadied herself against the sink again, this time to run some water and splash it onto her face. Looking at herself again in the mirror, she saw how livid and red she had become, and though her skin was gradually returning to its normal hue, she was still angry.

 

It was a somewhat less boiling anger, but it still bubbled hotly inside her and she could feel it was not about to go away. She still felt taken and used under false pretenses by something that—and she still could not believe the idea of it—was not really human. Again, the question churned and seethed inside her: How could he do this to me? How DARE he do this to me?

 

But she restrained her feelings, putting a chain on them, ironically, as one might chain a wild beast. There was no place for these feelings right now. The pang of shame that she felt on realizing she had locked the door came back to her. She was a mother and had fled from and locked the door against her one-year-old boy. It was a blind, instinctive, panicky thing to do, and after all a very human thing to do. But she had done it all the same. She had run and hidden from her own baby. Leaving aside the question of what the hell kind of father Daniel had, what kind of mother was she?

 

Tara was a shocked, scared, confused, and very angry mother, that’s what she was. But now she would let none of that keep her from her child. Screwing up her courage, she unlocked the bathroom door and headed back for the den.

 

She was at the threshold of the den when she suddenly stopped again. She raised a hand to her mouth to suppress a gasp. What would she find when she went into that room now? Would it still be her little Daniel, or would it be what Daniel had become? With a gulp, she realized that what he had become was still a baby—a cub. Small, helpless, uncomprehending, innocent—just a cub, needing attention and comfort, needing love.

 

Oh my God, Tara thought. What was she going to do? Could she love that the same way she loved her human baby? What would she do when it got bigger? How would she keep him from changing from boy to cub? How could she keep this from other people?

Shaking her head, unable to deal with all the questions and all the uncertainties, Tara pushed them aside in favor of the one thing that was certain. In that room was her baby, and he needed her, now more than ever. She stepped into the den—and there he was, perfectly human, sitting up straight, as beautiful and angelic as ever. He looked at her with wordless questions in his eyes, and somehow his expression began to melt away all the tumult of emotions with which Tara had bolted and run into the bathroom.

 

She stepped closer to him and saw that his face was wet and slightly reddened, just like her own. As she neared the bars of the playpen, he cast the blue-green jewels of his eyes up at her and let out the sound of his lion-cub mewling once again, and for the first time the sound of it made Tara’s heart fall to pieces.

 

She leaned over the bars and reached for him. She hesitated only a little, wondering if he might change right when he saw her hand coming for him, and wondering what the triggers might be for making him change, and if she could learn them and predict when it would happen. What if he transformed while she was holding him? How would she handle that?

 

Somehow it didn’t matter. Her baby had been crying and she, his mother, had actually run from him. Tara made herself a vow that she would never, ever let that happen again. She tousled the straw-blonde hair of his little boy head—hair of the same color as his father’s—and rubbed the soft roundness of his little boy cheek, and felt the unique connection that exists only between mother and child, regardless of what she now knew her child was.

 

“Daniel, baby,” she softly said to him, “Mommy’s sorry. Mommy didn’t know. I didn’t understand. Daddy never told me.” She looked down at the boy who was now comforted by his mother’s voice and touch, and while the thought of Brenton and what he had not told her still made her angry, it did not make her as furious beyond reason as it had a moment ago. At the touch of her child, the greater part of what Tara felt was love.

 

“Come here, sweetheart,” she said, picking him up from the playpen and resolving not to put him down even if he did change. If she had to learn to handle a lion cub, so be it; nothing was going to stop her caring for and loving her little boy. To her relief, he stayed human and let her carry him over to the sofa. She sat him down there and went to the closet—keeping watch on him from the corner of her eye—and took another pair of training pants from a box inside it, and went back to the sofa and put the little garment on him.

 

Then she sat on the sofa and put Daniel in her lap and hugged him to her bosom, and Daniel curled up in her arms, and Tara was surprised at the wonder and astonishment that she felt when Daniel, snuggling contentedly against her, began to purr.

 

Yes, he purred, not like a human boy, but like a lion cub. He purred in her arms. Tara leaned back on the sofa, keeping her warm little ball of purring love close against her, and let out a long, puffing breath. “Oh, Daniel,” she said, “what am I going to do? What is Mommy supposed to do now? I wasn’t prepared to be your mommy, I know—but I’m totally not ready for this. My baby…my little darling. What is Mommy going to do?”

 

In spite of the warmth and love she now radiated at her child, Tara set her jaw into a frown, her question already answering itself. She knew what she was going to do, all right. She knew exactly what she was going to do.

 

As soon as Daniel settled down into a nap, she was going to get on the phone and make a call to California.

_______________

 

Napa County Legislator Brenton Morgan left his office at the end of the day, jumped into his car, and drove home expecting another uneventful evening. The evening didn’t really have to be uneventful. There were possibilities in town—very appealing, female possibilities. There was the receptionist for the editor of the local paper. There was the hostess of his favorite restaurant, but she was likely to be working. That one lady bartender at the sports bar he sometimes frequented was always good company, as was the female trainer at the gym.

 

He pondered these and other prospects, and by the time he had gone through them all, he found himself pulling up in his driveway. Strolling the short way from car to house, he supposed he could just call someone. There was always someone to call. But it was looking more and more like the uneventful evening he’d expected on leaving the office. He somehow was not in the mood for company. He didn’t know why.

 

Since starting the campaign that won him the Legislative seat, Brenton had grown to enjoy quiet, privacy, and solitude more than he ever had in the past. Part of it was that when he was campaigning there was so much time spent knocking on doors and talking to the people behind them, making appearances, giving speeches and interviews. Even though he had delegated most of his business responsibilities, the campaign had kept him as busy as the realty firm did.

 

Then, having won the election, he’d had to learn the ropes of local government and how to execute his new office, which took a good deal of his attention as well. He had never had a problem balancing work life and personal life, but his work life was a different thing now than it had previously been and he seemed to enjoy having a quiet personal life into which he could retreat.

 

And it was not as if he had actually become celibate. Brenton knew he was in no way capable of just not having sex. He’d still had females, his own kind and humans, in his bed in all the time since he announced his candidacy, and he still enjoyed sex as much as ever. But for some reason he could not name, he did not seem to be as sexually active as he was accustomed to being.

 

Or perhaps the reason he had grown a little less active was that he could name the reason, and she was a couple of thousand miles to the east.

 

Many were the times he had thought of calling Tara, or E-mailing her, or texting her. And many more were the times, lying naked in bed or standing in the shower or stretched out nude on the deck in the sunshine, when he had given himself a good and enthusiastic stroking off to the memory of the days and nights they’d spent together.

 

Somehow he had made a connection with Tara that was even more gloriously physical than anything he’d had with any other partner; a connection that went beyond the joining of bodies to the genuine joy of another person. He had enjoyed not just sex with Tara, but Tara herself. It wasn’t that he had not enjoyed any of his other partners; he could hardly sleep with someone he did not like. But there was something about Tara, some inexpressible quality, that set her apart from anyone else. And there were times when he missed her. After just a week with her, he missed her.

 

So why did he not just call her, or just get in touch? Perhaps it was the distance between Chicago and Northern California. It was not as if he objected to long-distance relationships as such; he simply found them impractical and did not like having to wait between times being with someone while planning out their schedules over a gap of not just time but miles, and he didn’t appreciate the travel time involved.

 

Where Tara was concerned, that was ironic in and of itself, considering what she did for a living. Or perhaps it was that the distance between the places where they lived compounded the differences in their lives. When two people did not live in the same place, life itself became an obstacle. Having roots in different places meant coming into contact with different people all the time, people who could pose a considerable distraction from a faraway partner.

 

Chicago was a distant place filled with thousands of other men who might catch and hold the attention of a woman like Tara: handsome men, sexy men, interesting men, exciting men; men who would not be a couple of thousand miles away, but perhaps just a few blocks. Men who could more easily and readily find their way to Tara and to Tara’s bed, or more easily bring her to theirs.

 

Brenton and Tara had not made any commitments to each other, after all. They had gotten together and slept together and enjoyed each other, and understood that at the end of the time they shared they would return to their respective lives and pick up where they left off, separately. It was entirely possible that Tara had found another partner or partners in the year and nine months since they last saw each other—possible and, for a woman as attractive and ambitious as she was, probable.

 

 It was even possible that she had found herself another George with whom to make a new life. The thought of Tara possibly having a new husband filled Brenton with a melancholy like the feeling that she had described to him at the end of her year-long trip. It took him back to the day he saw her off at the airport, and the way he felt telling her goodbye, and the poignant feeling of that last kiss before she boarded her plane for home.

 

Sometimes in Brenton’s heart the feeling that he’d had that day but not expressed would echo like a voice in the hills: Please don’t go… He had never felt that way with a woman until that day, which may have been the reason he never voiced the feeling. It was something strange and new to him, for which he was not ready. And perhaps she would not have been any more ready for it than he was. So he kept it to himself and lived with the strange and unfamiliar ache in his heart from watching her plane fly away.

 

One thing that time and distance would never change was the memory of having Tara in his bed, and beside his fire, and practically everywhere else in his home and on his property. They had christened the whole place with ecstatic and euphoric sex that Brenton would never forget. Sometimes, lying in bed alone, Brenton would wonder if Tara were thinking of him, remembering him, recalling and reliving the joy that she took from his body and from having him inside her. He knew she would never forget him as he would never forget her. But there were moments by himself, naked and restless under his sheets, when he would call out in his mind, Tara, are you thinking of me?

 

He would probably never know. It had been so long now, and their lives had surely moved too far apart. They were in different places and on different pages; their time together was now a sweet but bygone thing. If Tara had found herself a new George, or whoever, Brenton sincerely hoped she was happy—though, as much as it was a vain and narcissistic thing to think, he knew that no other man, certainly no human man, would ever please and satisfy her in the same way as he did. He could live with the fact that he had given her a kind of ecstasy and carnal abandon that was not humanly possible.

 

All of this passed through Brenton’s mind as he went upstairs and stripped off everything but his briefs, and carried his phone back downstairs and out onto one side of the deck opposite the hot tub, where he had a garden enclosed by a high wooden fence. This was where he sometimes went just to sit and think, and sometimes to morph into his lion body where he was doubly sure that he would not be seen, even with the general seclusion of his house.

 

There was a bench in the garden, surrounded by flowers and small evergreens, where he sat himself down just to contemplate things. After a while, he thought, he would let his human body go and have himself a roll in the grass; and later he would go back inside and broil himself a nice, thick steak from the freezer, the perfect dinner for a hungry and somewhat horny man-lion.

 

And that was when the phone rang.

 

Brenton’s heart quickened to see the name on his phone screen. “Hey!” he exclaimed, his face lighting up, and tapped the phone to answer. “Tara! Hey, I was just thinking about you! It’s been—hell, almost a couple of years now!”

 

“I know,” came her voice from the phone. “Brenton…there’s something I need to talk to you about.”

 

Brenton knew from the tone of her voice, which did not at all match the pleasure and enthusiasm of his own, that something was wrong. In fact, it sounded very wrong. “Tara, are you okay? Tell me what’s going on.”

 

And she told him.

 

Up from the wooden fence enclosing his garden came an eruption of shocked, horrified profanities, shouted at the top of his lungs. He leaped from the bench and paced the stone paving of the garden, clutching the phone in a vise-like grip in one hand and clenching and unclenching a fist with the other. His entire body felt like a knot of alarm that would at any minute snap open into panic. It was all he could do to hold his human shape and stop himself from morphing to lion form and shredding the briefs that were the only stitches of clothing on him.

 

Grasping at his rationality like a man grasping at straws, Brenton muttered as he paced: “He’s a year old. None of the doctors who looked at him so far would have found anything strange because the mutation doesn’t kick in fully ‘til the first birthday; he would have passed for a completely human kid. He just changed for the first time today. That’s good; nobody knows.” Fear put an urgent, fraught edge in his voice. “Only you saw him do it; that’s good.”

 

“What do you mean, ‘That’s good’!” Tara cried. Then, her voice lowered noticeably, and Brenton guessed it was because she was trying not to wake the baby. “What do you mean, ‘That’s good’? Brenton, you never told me anything about this—about this part of you! I didn’t know! I didn’t have a clue this was going to happen!”

 

“Yeah?” Brenton shot back. “Well, you never told me a thing about you being pregnant! My God, Tara, what the hell! You left here pregnant with my cub and never said a damn word to me about it! Not a phone call, not a text, not a frickin’ thing! Tara—holy crap, Tara! You had my cub and didn’t tell me! What the hell is that?” And he went on, pouring out his shock and pain and outrage and more, in words increasingly foul and profane to suit his feelings.

 

“Don’t you dare talk to me that way!” Tara half-shouted back, still trying to be careful of the sleeping Daniel. “Don’t you dare act like you’re the only one with a reason to be shocked and scared! Brenton, I walked in on what I thought was just my baby in his playpen, and he was…was…!”

 

“Showing you who he really is! Tara, damnit, that’s my cub!”

 

“Stop calling him that!”

 

“That’s what he is, Tara! He’s what I am and you never frickin’ told me!” And he returned to his torrent of angry, stricken, frightened curses.

 

In a tone measured carefully to stop herself from screaming into the phone, Tara demanded, “Brenton, why didn’t you tell me anything about this?”

 

Sitting himself back down on the bench to stop himself from kicking the wooden fence, Brenton answered, “What the hell was I supposed to say, Tara? How the hell was I supposed to tell you what I am? What would you have thought? To get you to believe me, I would have had to show you. And what do you think you would have done then? You're a human woman, Tara. You’re not even supposed to know anything like me exists. What I am is supposed to be just a myth or a fairy tale to you. What would you have done, there in my suite or here in my house, if I’d shown you what I am?”

 

“So you just kept quiet about it, and let me believe you were just a man, that I was sleeping with just a man.”

 

Feeling almost crazy, he rustled his fingers hard through what used to be his long hair. “Tara, we were just supposed to be going to bed together for a week. We didn’t make any commitments or promises, we were just hooking up and enjoying it. There was no reason to say anything, and I sure as hell wasn’t looking to get you pregnant.”

 

Tara almost had nothing to say to that. It was nothing she hadn’t thought herself. “Brenton, how is this even possible? How can you even be…that?”

 

“A werelion, Tara. That’s what I am. I’m a werelion.”

 

At the sound of the actual word, Tara took the phone from her ear and buried her face in her free hand, muffling her whimper at having to choke back tears of further disbelief.

 

“Tara, are you still there? Tara!”

 

His voice shouting at her through the phone made her put it back to her ear again, though her voice was still shaky. “I’m here, Brenton. I just can’t believe this. Brenton, do you have any idea how I felt when I first saw Daniel…that way? I thought someone had done something with him, and I didn’t understand what…that…was doing there.”

 

“Don’t call him ‘that’. He’s our son. He’s my cub.”

 

“I can’t even believe the words we’re using. ‘Werelion.’ ‘Cub.’ I thought I was the mother of a beautiful, normal, human little boy. Brenton, how did you get this way? How is this possible?”

 

“It’s not unnatural, Tara. We’re as natural and real as you. It’s just a genetic mutation some people have. There aren’t as many of us as there are of you; we’re rare. And the way you’re acting is the reason we avoid letting you know we exist.”

 

“‘The way I’m acting,’ Brenton? Really? Brenton, I don’t understand what my own child is. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with him. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do when he…changes…or how I’m supposed to take care of him when he’s that way, or even when he’ll do it. I’m afraid to leave my apartment and go to work—or go anywhere—or leave him with anyone. Do you see what you’ve done to me, Brenton? Do you see what you’ve done to me?” Tara’s temper was rising. She was starting to speak through clenched teeth.

 

“Tara,” replied Brenton, “what I see is that my cub is two thousand miles away from me, surrounded by nothing but humans, and I’m as scared as you are. You’ve got to get him the hell out of there. You’ve got to bring him to me. Now.”

“Brenton,” Tara snapped, “I don’t know how to handle him! I don’t know what to do when he changes! Do you think I have any idea what to do with a…” she lowered her voice, again incredulous that she was actually saying it, “…lion cub?”

 

And at this, she actually did break into tears. Brenton could hear her voice cracking over the phone and knew she was starting to cry, and it twisted a knife in him as badly as the knowledge that she’d had his cub and kept it from him.

 

“Tara,” he said, “just hold him and pet him and love him. He knows you’re his mother. He won’t hurt you, I promise. He knows your voice and your touch and your scent; he won’t hurt you. He’s still your baby.”

 

And her voice cracked even worse: “My baby…my baby…”

 

“Tara, you should have told me,” he said. “Damnit, I could have helped you. I would have gone to you, I would have brought you to me. It didn’t have to be like this. I would have told you everything then and there. I would have helped you through it, let you know what to expect. Yeah, it would have still been a shock, but it wouldn’t have been like finding out the way you did. Tara…damnit, you should have told me.”

 

“Brenton, you had your life and I had mine. They weren’t the same thing.”

 

“The minute you knew you were pregnant,” he said, “it wasn’t just your life and my life. It was his life. He can’t be there, Tara. It’s not safe for him or for you to have him there. Daniel has to come to me. He needs to be here with me.”

 

She balked, “You expect me to take him on an airplane?”

 

“Not an airliner,” said Brenton. “Not with the public, no. I’m gonna call the private pilot who took us from LA to Napa. I’ll send him for you; he…knows about me and my family. We trust him and so can you. I’ll tell him what’s going on; he’ll come and get you and Daniel. Tara, you have to do this. You have to do this for Daniel. Drop everything else and bring him here.”

 

Tara weighed all that for the implications. She noted the pause when Brenton explained about the pilot “knowing” Brenton’s family. That probably meant the pilot was just like them. Brenton was sending a werelion to get her and Daniel and bring them to the other werelions. Or at least that was her very strong hunch.

 

Brenton asked, “Tara, are you listening? Do you understand?”

 

Wiping her tears and calming herself as best she could, Tara answered, “I understand. Mostly.” She put an edge on that last word. Brenton still had a lot of explaining to do when she saw him.

“All right,” said Brenton. “I’ll let you know when I’ve set it up with the pilot and when he’ll be at O’Hare. I’ll pay him whatever it takes to get him over there and get you and Daniel back here tonight. And then…we’ll talk.”

 

The edge crept back into Tara’s voice with her reply: “Oh, you'd better believe we’re going to talk.”

 

“Okay,” said Brenton in a measured calm. “I’ll get back to you in a little while. Just get yourself and Daniel packed and get ready.”

 

“I’ll be ready,” said Tara, flatly. “Just call when it’s all set.” Unable to say another word for now, she ended the call.

 

In his garden, with the sun going down, Brenton sat in silence. He put the phone down on the bench carefully, resisting the urge to slam it and break it after the thing he’d just learned.

 

For the past year, he’d had a cub living in a world where the little werelion-to-be was surrounded by unsuspecting humans. The thought of it—of all the things that humans are, and all the things that humans are capable of being, and his cub being in their world with only his equally unsuspecting mother to look after him—made his blood run cold.

 

At least it did, until his heart began to race once more and it heated up again. How could this be happening? How could any of this have happened?

 

And Brenton threw back his head and shouted at the deepening blue of the sky and the awakening stars: “I got her pregnant! Goddamnit, I knocked up a human! I got a human woman pregnant!”

 

He cursed at himself and he cursed at the stars and his voice broke into near-sobs of fear and pain and anguish, and Brenton could no longer hold his human shape. He stood up from the bench and his body morphed and shifted to a two-legged, humanoid lion form. His sprouting tail split open the back of his briefs, and with his slashing, flailing claws he turned the rest of his briefs to shreds.

 

Roaring out his pain, roaring on and on, he sank to his now fur-covered knees and sat hunched over, his body and tail quivering at the dreadful thought of his cub being out there in Tara’s world, and all the things that could happen to him—and all the things that could happen to Tara because of him.

 

And all the things that could happen to Brenton himself, and his pride, and their people, because of a little werelion cub, thrown to the human race. It was unspeakable—unthinkable.

 

Brenton roared again with all the breath in his quasi-lion lungs. He would never let any of it be. He would never let any of it happen—not to Daniel, and not to Tara.

ELEVEN

 

Brenton thought of everything and had it all covered. The pilot came to O’Hare and arrived at Tara’s apartment in a car that Brenton paid for. Tara had her bags and Daniel’s packed when the pilot arrived, and with Daniel sleeping in a sling against her bosom, she climbed into the car with the pilot, and off they went back to the airport and from there on a night—time  flight to Napa. The flight was the most nervous, anxious trip that Tara had ever had in her life.

 

 Hugging her sleeping baby close to her aboard the plane, she was terrified, frightened to death that he would awake, and on awakening he would change again to the other thing that he was; the other thing that his father was. And there she would be, holding a lion cub in her arms, beset with his paws and his snout and his little lion fangs, and she feared it would be all she could do not to melt down or spin into another panic.

 

And perhaps he would sense her apprehension and fear and start to claw at the baby sling, ripping away at it the way he had done his training pants in the playpen. What if she couldn’t control him? What would she do then?

 

Tara felt different claws slashing away at her at from all these thoughts: the claws of guilt. What kind of mother was she, after all? What kind of mother fears her own child? What would that do to her, and to her relationship with her baby? Would she end up rejecting little Daniel, who was the most innocent thing in the world and not responsible for any of this? Would she be afraid to touch him, afraid even to go near him?

 

Brenton’s words over the phone returned to her: Just hold him and pet him and love him. He knows you’re his mother. He won’t hurt you, I promise. He knows your voice and your touch and your scent; he won’t hurt you. He’s still your baby.

 

She continued to hold him close, fearing to let him go as much as she feared what might happen while she held him. Tara’s tears flowed freely again. She softly sobbed at him, “I’m sorry, Daniel. Mommy’s sorry, baby. You didn’t do anything wrong. You’re Mommy’s perfect boy. Mommy just didn’t know. Mommy doesn’t know what to do about any of this. Oh, baby…my baby. Mommy’s so sorry…”

_______________

 

Brenton was waiting for them at the same airport where he and Tara had said their goodbyes. He greeted them and while the pilot took Tara’s and Daniel’s baggage to Brenton’s car, Brenton sat with Tara and his cub in the same waiting lounge where he and Tara sat the last time they saw each other. Tara did not take Daniel from the sling, again for fear of waking him, but Brenton sat beside them and looked at the sleeping child. Tara watched Brenton’s reaction and saw that handsome face melt into the warmest, purest love she had ever seen anyone show in her life.

 

“My God, look at him,” said Brenton, captivated and humbled. “Look at that face. Look at those little hands. He’s incredible. He looks too perfect to be real. I can’t believe that. And he’s really ours. We made this, Tara. We made him. Can you believe he’s real?”

He looked up into Tara’s eyes and saw the layers of meaning in his question. Can you believe he’s real, indeed. Brenton saw in her eyes and on her face what he had heard on the phone, the struggle that Tara had been having these many hours with the “reality” of her child. He was sorry he asked the question, and returned to gazing in wonder at the little boy cuddled up in the sling.

 

“Even his name is perfect,” he said. “Daniel. Oh my God, I just realized how perfect that name is for him. Daniel—like ‘Daniel in the lion’s den’…” Too late, he shut his mouth, regretting the words as quickly as they escaped. He looked back at Tara apologetically.

 

“Can we just go to your house now, please?” Tara asked.

_______________

 

With no time to buy anything and no time to prepare for the arrival of his son, Brenton had improvised sleeping arrangements. They would have to embark on a major shopping trip tomorrow to get things for Daniel’s needs and comfort, but for now he had taken a coffee table from the living room and set it up in the master bedroom suite where he expected he and Tara had likely made up for the boy. He emptied out a large drawer from his bureau and set it on top of the table with pillows and sheets and blankets, creating a makeshift baby bed.

 

 It was the best he could do at the moment. Resigned to the situation, Tara let Brenton take the child from the sling and hold him. She watched Brenton sit down with him on the foot of the bed and cradle his son in his arms. On Brenton’s face was the same look he had worn at the airport: an all-warming, all-possessing love; the love that only a father can see when looking on an infant son.

 

Daniel yawned in his father’s arms and peered sleepily up into Brenton’s adoring face. Brenton returned a Christmas morning smile to his cub. “Hey, little guy. Guess who I am. I’m your dad. Yeah, you’re mine. You’re my little cub. God, you’re so perfect. How did I get to be the dad of anything as perfect as you?

 

How is that? I know I wasn’t there when you were born. I wish I had been. I wish I’d been there for your first breath. And the first time you opened your eyes. I didn’t get to see your first step. I wish I did. And I didn’t get to see you change for the first time. Yeah, Dad missed all that. I’m sorry, Daniel. I wish I knew; I would have been there for all that…”

 

Tara, standing nearby, took in this entire scene, watching and listening. Brenton was right about that much, at least. By not telling him that she was having his cub—no, his baby—she had cut him out of all those moments and so many others. She felt guilty about that too, a different guilt than the way she felt about her reaction to Daniel’s change. She was sorry now that she had not given him a chance to be a part of the first year of Daniel’s life. Brenton, she could see, would have been the most loving and doting of fathers. He still would be that kind of father now. It almost made her want to cry again.

 

But Brenton still had some things to answer for. They were still going to have some words, and they were not going to be as sentimental as the words being said from father to son at this moment.

 

Daniel made a sound at Brenton, a noise like the sound he made when he cried, but softer. Brenton’s eyes actually lit up all the more brightly to hear it. “What’s going on there?” he asked. “What’s that about? Do you know I’m Dad? You know, don’t you? You know me. I think I know what you want.” He looked over at Tara. “Can we get him out of his clothes?”

“Is he wet? Did he poop?” Tara asked. “I’ll get a fresh diaper…”

 

“No,” said Daniel. “It’s not that. I think it’s something else. I recognize the way he feels now, from holding my nieces and nephews when they were little. We need to get him out of his clothes.”

 

“Oh no,” said Tara, feeling as if a stiff breeze could knock her over. “You don’t mean…”

 

“Yeah, there’s a feeling that little cubs give off. He needs to be ‘changed,’ but not like that. Let’s put him down on the floor and get him out of these things.”

 

Forcing her apprehensions to one side, Tara went to help Brenton, who left the bed and put Daniel down on the bedroom carpet. They slipped him out of his human baby clothes and Brenton sat himself down in front of the little boy, who got down on his all-fours. And Tara, on her knees beside them, watched while Brenton fixed his eyes on Daniel’s identically colored pupils and said, “Okay, little guy. Show Dad what you've got. Come on.”

 

For all her misgivings and anxieties about the nature of her baby and his father, Tara had a sensation of seeing something magical in what came next. Staring at Daniel, Brenton began to purr. She realized it was the same sound that she imagined hearing him make at times when they were in bed, which she had dismissed when she heard it then. It was one more piece falling into place now. He was purring, this time at his little boy.

 

The sound of his father’s purr seemed to cast a spell over Daniel. The baby boy started to purr back at him. “That’s it,” said Brenton. “You can do it. Do it for Dad. Come on…” And he resumed his purring, encouraging the lad.

 

A second later, it happened. The little boy’s body morphed and shifted, human limbs and head transforming to feline, fur growing all over and a tail unfurling at his bottom. As easily as taking a breath, Daniel presented himself to his delighted, beaming father as a lion cub. He sat down on his little lion hindquarters and raised his paw at Brenton as if to salute him.

 

Brenton clapped his hands and laughed, a loud and hearty laugh. “There! That’s it! That’s Dad’s boy!” He touched the extended little lion paw in a gesture like a high-five. “Look at that! Look at Dad’s boy!” Still sitting on the floor in front of Daniel, Brenton peeled off his shirt and tossed it to one side, rendering himself nude from the waist up, and released his upper body, head, arms, and hands to lion form, his mane cascading over his shoulders the way his human hair once did. In a rumbling lion version of his human voice, he chortled, “What a boy! Look at that! What a boy Dad’s got! Come here, son…”

 

He reached out his lion forelimbs and paws and scooped up little Daniel. The cub squirmed and made little cub growls and snarls at his father, showing his little cub fangs. “That’s Dad’s boy!” Brenton rumbled at him, pulling him close. And he chortled more deeply as Daniel pawed at his face and arms, his growls melting back into purrs, playing with his father for the first time.

 

Brenton held Daniel against his chest. Daniel rubbed his snout and jaws against his father and purred and yowled at him, squirming a bit in Brenton’s arms before his whole little cub body settled down except for the excited twitching of his tail. “Oh, you're a scrappy one, aren’t you?” Brenton said, almost drunk on a father’s love. “You’re gonna get into all kinds of trouble, I can tell. You’re gonna be just like Dad when he was little. Yeah, you’re gonna be a little handful. Dad and Mom are gonna have to be running around behind you, getting you out of all kinds of stuff. You hear that, Mom? We’ve got ourselves a handful here. Mom…?”

 

Curiously, Brenton noticed that Tara had not made a sound through any of this. He shot a glance over in the direction where she had been sitting, calling to her, “Mom, did you hear me? We’ve got…”

 

He stopped in mid-sentence at what he saw just a few steps away. Tara was still there—sprawled out on the carpet where she had fainted dead away.

12

 

“Oh, crap,” said Brenton to the purring Daniel, “I think this was too much for Mom.”

 

He put Daniel back down on the carpet and shook the digit of a lion paw at him. “Stay right there and don’t move, son.” Whether or not he could understand his father’s words, Daniel started to feel tired again. He yawned widely, toppled over onto one side, flexing his paws and twitching and thumping his tail.

 

Brenton morphed back to human and, not bothering to put his shirt back on, went to Tara’s side. He picked her up from the floor, carried her to the bed, and gently laid her down on one side of it. Then he returned to Daniel and picked him up. Daniel squirmed a bit, but did not resist. He let Brenton carry him to the pillows-and-linen-filled drawer on top of the coffee table and set him down in it.

 

Now shaking the finger of a human hand at the cub, he said, “Be a good boy for Dad and stay there. Daniel settled himself down in the makeshift bed with his tail on the pillows where his head should have been, and looked, blinking, at Brenton. He was a good boy; he did not move.

 

Climbing onto the other side of the real bed opposite where he had put Tara, Brenton tenderly took her hand in his and began to stroke and rub at it. Softly he called to her, “Tara…wake up, Tara. It’s all right. It’s okay; wake up, please. Tara…?”

 

Tara inhaled and stirred. She blinked, slowly coming awake again. Her eyes focused on Brenton. She felt her hand in his, felt his insistent touch. Suddenly, as if jolted by the touch of a live wire, Tara pulled her hand from him and bolted upright on the bed. She fixed him with a wide-eyed, frightened, almost panicked look, and gasped out, “Brenton! Brenton, oh my God! Daniel changed again; I saw him change! And you…you…I saw you…!”

 

She scrambled backward against the headboard and kept her eyes on him, nervously. “Oh my God, Brenton, you did it! You changed! You turned into…you had a…” She started to gesture wildly at her head and shoulders. “You had…your head was…and your hands, and your body… You were…”

 

“I know,” Brenton said. “That’s what I am. What else I am. That’s what we are, Daniel and me. Tara, I won’t hurt you. Daniel won’t hurt you and I won’t hurt you.”

 

All at once Tara’s mind went flying and tumbling back in time, to a moment when she and Brenton were getting out of his hot tub. She returned to a moment when she told him, You’re like…a man and a beast. This big, stalking beast that came out of some jungle. And I’m like your prey that you hunted down and carried off… Once again in her mind’s eye she saw the way he reacted to that, the way he backed off from her, nervous and skittish, and she recalled how she could not understand him suddenly being that way after they had spent days being as intimate as two people could possibly be.

He had said to her, The truth is, Tara, I am like an animal inside… He had told her that he felt …like a wild animal, like something out of control. I am a beast, Tara… This is how I am.

Tara looked at him now as if she were seeing him for the first time, which perhaps in a way she was. “You almost told me once,” she said. “There was a time when you almost told me—when I said you were like some incredible beast.” She leaned back and shut her eyes and a tear squeezed itself through one eye and traced its way down her face. “That one day, I half-guessed the truth and didn’t even know it, and you almost told me.” She opened her tear-filled eyes to him again. “That’s what that was, wasn’t it? Me almost guessing the truth and you almost telling me—but you didn’t.”

 

“No, Tara, I didn’t. I couldn’t,” Brenton admitted. “I couldn’t tell you at first because you wouldn’t have believed it unless I showed you, and then you would have been terrified of me and we would have both been in trouble. And I didn’t tell you then, when we were here, because we’d been in and out of bed and everywhere else for so long, and been doing everything.

 

I couldn’t tell you what you were sleeping with because I didn’t know what the shock of it would do to you, except it wouldn’t have been anything good. And then we would have been in probably worse trouble because you would have known that the man humping you for days and days was…” he finished carefully, “…what you just saw. There was no way to tell you. And neither of us knew it would come to anything like this.”

 

He glanced over his shoulder at Daniel, still in lion cub form, who had put down his head on his forepaws and still twitched his tail, oblivious to everything. “How could we have known? All I knew was what the truth would probably do to you.”

 

“I’m surprised it hasn’t driven me out of my mind now,” Tara said.

 

“I think neither one of us gave the other enough credit,” Brenton replied.

 

Tara felt deathly tired. Everything she had been through today was catching up with her and the change of time zones was not helping. “I made the best decision I could, Brenton,” was all she could say.

 

The expression that Brenton gave her then told Tara that he was restraining his feelings, that he had been in a turmoil of his own since her phone call and was barely holding it all in. It came to her that she had as much to answer for as he did, and she was in no shape to answer for it.

 

“That was your best decision, for what’s been almost two years now? Your best decision was not to tell me you were pregnant, to keep from me that I was going to be a father? Not to tell me that you'd had my cub? That was really your best decision? Tara, look, let’s just try for a minute to look past the fact that I missed the first year of my cub’s life, which is hard as hell to do, I don’t mind telling you. Let’s just try to look past the fact that there were all those moments I didn’t get to be a part of, that I didn’t get to see; things I would have loved to be there for.

 

I’ll never experience any of that, but put that to one side just for a minute. Tara, damn it, I could have helped you. Do you really think my political career mattered more to me than being Daniel’s father? Do you really think my damn campaign meant more to me than being there for him, taking care of him—taking care of you? Seriously? You actually thought I was the kind of insensitive jackass who would put running for a little public office ahead of being a father? Damnit, Tara, what did I do to make you think that about me?”

 

Tara opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out. She only looked away. All the arguments that Felicia had made with her were now returning to haunt her, and Brenton’s pain was piling on top of them. And none of the arguments that she’d made back to Felicia seemed equal to the task of defending her now.

 

Feebly, Tara said, “You told me the way you wanted your future to be, Brenton; what you wanted your life to be. I wanted you to have that. I wanted your life to be the way you saw it. Being a father was something you never brought up. And I didn’t know what you really are.”

 

“And you thought I couldn’t change, is that it? Tara, the world is full of men who became fathers by surprise, and they stepped up and dealt with it. Yes, I knew what I wanted from my life and I knew what I wanted from my future. But Tara…hell, if I’d had any idea that I was about to be a father, I would have changed anything I had to change. I would have stepped the hell up, Tara—if you’d given me a damn chance.

 

Damnit, you didn’t even give me a chance. And now I’ve been a father for a year and I didn’t even know it.” He lowered and shook his head, and grabbed up handfuls of the bedspread in hands that Tara feared would morph into paws and rip the fabric to pieces any second.

 

“So,” she said. “There was something I didn’t tell you. And there was something you didn’t tell me.”

 

“They weren’t little things, Tara,” said Brenton. “Being a father is the biggest thing in the world.”

 

“So is being not really human,” said Tara.

 

Brenton frowned at that, a look of both anger and frustration. “We both screwed up.”

 

A silence fell between them. Tara looked over at the drawer on the tabletop, where Daniel had morphed to human and somehow fallen asleep again in spite of all the tension in the room. Being very small and understanding nothing was a blessing that Tara and Brenton both almost wished they could share. Brenton got up and went to Daniel, and tenderly changed the little boy’s position so that his head rested on the pillows, and drew covers up over him. Looking over at Tara, he said, “There’s just one thing we did right.” He looked down at Daniel. “One good thing we did.”

 

Tara exhaled, feeling completely drained. “I can’t talk anymore tonight, Brenton. I can’t say another thing, not after all this, since this afternoon. Part of me is still trying to believe all this. I can’t go on talking now.”

 

“Yeah, we probably shouldn’t talk anymore,” said Brenton, his shoulders slumping. “We should both get some rest. The thing is, tired as I am, I don’t want to go to sleep.” He reached over and brushed just the tips of his fingers over Daniel’s hair. “I’m exhausted and I don’t want to sleep. He’s a year old and this is the first time I’ve seen him, and if I go to sleep I’ll have to take my eyes off him. I don’t want to stop looking at him. I just want to watch him, and just be his dad. That’s all I want now.” He glanced back over at Tara and found her watching him watch Daniel. “You can go on to sleep. I’m just going to sit up with him for a while—just sit and be his dad.”

Tara finally permitted herself to yawn softly, and put her head down on the pillow at her back. She curled up on the bed, shut her eyes, and became still. Brenton felt relieved, in a way, to see her going to sleep. Tomorrow would be an even bigger day than today had been, for all the shock and upheaval of it. Tomorrow they would go shopping for things for their son—and Tara would have to start to learn to be his mother all over again.

 

And Brenton would have to start to learn from scratch, a year late and totally unprepared, to be his father.

 

Brenton did not care. The fact remained, however he had discovered it, that he was a father. And lying in a ridiculously contrived excuse for a bed next to him was the most beautiful and wondrous thing he’d ever set eyes on in his life.

 

Quietly, he stepped over to his desk on one side of the room and took the leather chair from it, and wheeled it over beside the table where Daniel slept. He went to the light switch and dimmed the lights. Then he sat himself down in the leather chair and settled into watching his sleeping son.

 

He did not know how long he sat there, just watching the little boy, imagining all the things they would do together, all the things he would teach Daniel, all the places they would go—and all the years of watching him grow up into a strong, proud young lad, and a strong, proud young lion. He took a moment to gaze over at the sleeping Tara. What would he do about the confused human woman he’d gotten pregnant?

 

How would he help her to be Daniel’s mother, to learn how to accept what she and Brenton had made together? He had no doubt that Tara’s love for their son would remain constant, no matter what. But she was still human, and Brenton could imagine nothing more challenging, even intimidating, than having to raise a werelion cub with a human mother. How had he gotten himself into this situation?

 

You frickin’ idiot, you did it by keeping her right where she is right now, in your frickin’ bed, he admonished himself. Right over there is where this probably happened, you horny bastard.

 

He watched Daniel for a while longer, resolving to stop bashing himself for the perfectly natural thing he’d done and enjoyed: for it had given him the precious thing now lying in front of him. He would not have changed a thing, even if he could.

 

After a while, Brenton stripped down to just his briefs, the way he’d been when Tara called him to tell him that he was a father. Not wanting to disturb Tara’s badly needed sleep, he went to the closet and pulled out one of the quilts under which he had mounted her by the fireplace. He spread it over the bed, covering Tara, and climbed under it himself. Lying in just his briefs beside the still-clothed Tara, Brenton turned up the corner of his mouth in an ironic smile at the thought that this was his and Tara’s very first time going to bed and doing nothing but sleep.

As he descended into the deep fog of sleep himself, Brenton’s last thought was, Yep…we’re parents, all right.

_______________

 

The first time Tara came to this house, it had felt as though she were living out a fantasy. Being back here again now felt like a fantasy again—but a fantasy of a very different kind.

 

She and Brenton woke to the sound of Daniel mewling, and found him sitting up in the drawer. They found he had wet the sheets—they had neglected to put anything on him after he morphed out of his lion cub shape—and took the sheets to the washer and the boy to the bathroom sink for a wash-up. Brenton did not have a bathtub, just a spacious shower in which he'd done the deed to Tara both standing up and lying down. But the bathroom sink was plenty roomy and they had no trouble making it a bathtub of sorts. Bathing accommodations for their son were among the things they would have to investigate.

 

After the bath, they dressed Daniel and took him to the kitchen, where they let him play on the floor with some of his toys that Tara had managed to pack. They prepared breakfast for themselves and Tara heated some milk for Daniel—until they looked down at him and found him pulling at his clothes with hands beginning to morph into paws and a face and hair starting to shift from human boy to lion. Brenton responded immediately, pulling the clothes off the lad and letting him complete his change. He had Tara hand him the bottle and put the cub on his lap and began to feed him.

 

Tara sat down at the table and watched Brenton feed the little lion. She looked sad and lost. “How do we know when he’s going to do that?” she asked. “How will we be able to take him anywhere? We’re supposed to go shopping for him today. We can’t leave him here by himself. How can we take him with us when we don’t know when he’s going to…”

Brenton cut her off. “We can’t know when he’s going to change—yet. We have to teach him not to just do it whenever he feels the urge, that there’s a time and a place for it. It’s like potty training, something he has to learn and we have to help him with. He’ll get it.”

 

“My God,” said Tara. “Potty training and…shifting training. How am I supposed to deal with this?”

 

“It’s not just you,” said Brenton, carefully negotiating the angle of the bottle in the cub’s mouth while Daniel sucked hard at it and pawed both the bottle and Brenton’s hand. “It’s something we both have to deal with. We’ve been doing it for thousands of years—my people, that is. We’ll get it. And you’re not the first human woman to have a cub with one of us. I promise, you’ll get this.”

 

“Other human women have been through this?” Tara asked incredulously.

 

“You’d be surprised. Humans have been having cubs with us all along, all through the ages. It’s something we keep quiet, just like we keep quiet the fact that we even exist. Naturally, people in general don’t usually get to know about it—or us.”

 

“And now I’m going to have to get to know about it—about you, about your people, about how to raise my son when I don’t even know anything about who he is. I don’t know how I can do this, Brenton. It’s having to learn things I never thought I’d have to know about my own child. And it’s like having to learn my whole life all over again. How can I do this?” She folded her arms on the table and put her head down on them. “I just don’t know.”

 

Brenton pulled himself up from the floor, cradling cub and bottle in his arms, and took a seat next to Tara. He pulled the nipple of the bottle from Daniel’s little fangs, making the cub mewl and paw and twitch his tail at him in protest. “Ssshhh,” he said to Daniel, and rested the bottle on the table, then reached over to touch Tara’s arm. “Listen, I know this feels overwhelming,” he said, “but other human women have gotten through this. You will too. You’ll do just as well as they did—better, even. I’ll start calling around to the rest of my pride. They’ll be shocked, of course, but they’ll come running. And they’ll bring things. We probably won’t even have to go shopping; I’ll bet they’ll bring everything we could need, and stuff we wouldn’t even think of.”

 

Tara looked up at him from her folded arms. “Your pride,” she said, gravely, apprehensively. “You’re going to have your pride come over. I’m going to be in a house with a pride of…lion people.”

 

“Yeah,” said Brenton, matter-of-factly.

 

Somehow, Tara managed to rise up on her elbows. “A pride of lion people,” she repeated. “A pride of werelions.”

“That’s right,” Brenton said.

 

“Brenton,” she said, “I’m not even used to my lion son and his lion father. Now I have to deal with a whole pride of you?”

 

“There’s nothing to be scared of,” Brenton assured her. “They’re my family.”

 

“And what will they think of me?” Tara asked.

 

“The same thing any family thinks when one member has a surprise baby. They’ll be surprised and curious. If you’re thinking they’ll attack you, Tara, they won’t. They’ll want to know everything about you, naturally. And they’ll be a little cautious around you because you’re a strange human coming around the pride. They’ll be cautious and protective. And they’ll have as many questions for you as you have about us. That’s just to be expected. Obviously we don’t just go revealing ourselves to humans all the time.

 

They’ll have to get to know you and you’ll have to start getting to know them. But I swear, there’s nothing to be afraid of. And one thing’s for absolutely sure: They’ll love Daniel the second they set eyes on him. They’ll love him and welcome him and they’ll all want to pet him and pick him up and play with him. There’s nothing to worry about.”

 

Tara looked ready to keel over from her seat. “‘Nothing to worry about.’ No, there’s nothing to worry about, just a lot of lion people coming over, suspicious of me and wanting to pet and paw my lion child.”

Brenton said firmly and confidently, “Tara, it will be okay.”

 

“Well, you know what?” Tara replied. “Before they all come and want to look me over, I want to know everything about them first. Before you get on the phone and call the pride and tell them to come and meet our child, I want you to explain to me everything about your family and your people and how you got to be the way you are and just how it is that you live with us, because there are still a couple of million things I don’t understand about any of this.”

 

At Daniel’s insistent squirming and pawing, Brenton took up the bottle and began to feed him again. “All right, that’s fair. You’ve come into this whole thing blind, you feel like you’re in over your head, and you’re right, there are things you need to know. So I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you everything about us. And maybe it’ll help you calm down enough to meet my family and not be scared.”

 

Tara rolled that last part around in her mind. And not be scared. Not the least of the challenges she would now be facing would be not being scared. She sat upright at the table and let Brenton begin to talk.

 

“We’re not supernatural creatures,” Brenton began. “We weren’t created by magic; no one put a curse on someone thousands of years ago and created us, or any of that stuff you’d see in a movie. We’re as human and natural as you are. We’re…humans with a difference. The difference is in the DNA, the genes. We’re a mutation. If you had all the same genes working that we do, you’d be a werelioness and we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. We’ve existed for probably as long as humans have.

 

No one knows just what happened, genetically, to make certain humans able to shift into a lion body. But physically, we’re two creatures in one. We think there may have been times, back in history or before history, when humans might have worshipped us. Mostly, humans have been afraid of us, and we’ve had to hide from you because there are billions more of you than there are of us. The mutation is very rare; only a small number of people have it, relatively speaking. So we’ve had to learn to live either separately from you or secretly from you. And we’ve had to learn to protect our own.

 

“A werelion family is called a pride, just like a real lion family. There are prides in different parts of the country. We mostly live in rural areas, or areas where there aren’t big cities. There are other prides in California, and prides in some other places, mostly where the winters aren’t that harsh. Humans come into contact with us all the time and don’t usually know it, unless it’s someone who’s proven we can completely trust them—or a human who becomes a member of a pride because they’ve mated with one of us.”

 

Brenton paused at that, to study and measure Tara’s reaction. For a moment, the only sound was Daniel sucking at the bottle. Tara looked as if she were not even breathing as she listened to him. Brenton decided to take that as a positive sign. At least she was listening and she was calm—at least outwardly.

 

Brenton decided to go on from there. “We usually live in places where there are forests, or open fields with not a lot of people around and not a lot of roads going through, where we can feel safe taking our other shape when we want to or need to. Psychologically we have a need to be lions at least part of the time; it’s not good for us to stay human for too long. But we have to train our cubs carefully to know when it’s safe to change.

 

There’s nothing more dangerous to us than being spotted by a human when we’re in our other shape. That’s why a lot of us go into real estate or become property owners. If we have land of our own, or places of our own, where we can control who gets to be there or we can create safe spaces where just anyone can’t see us, it’s better for our health and our safety. That’s why I bought this place. It’s a safe space for me, and it’s a safe space for my pride to visit.”

 

“Your pride…the other werelions in Napa. They’re all your family.” Tara sounded almost as if she were in a trance.

 

“We settled here a long time ago,” Brenton continued. The Napa Valley Pride, the Morgan Pride, we’ve been here for generations. Not as long as the wine growers, but a long time. The main pride is mostly females, just like a real lion pride. They live in the main family compound, not far from here. Most of the male members of the pride leave the compound, also just like a real lion pride. It’s really usually no more than three older males who stay. The rest of us leave. Some of us have gone to other places, to join other prides or start their own prides. I like it here, so I stayed here.”

 

“And you…your people…you’ve lived this way for hundreds—thousands—of years?”

 

“We go back about as far as humans do. Not all of us go into owning and trading land. You’d be surprised at where some of us live and what some of us do. There are some of us who live in cities, but they have kind of a secret life and secret places they go, where they know who they are and who everyone else is, and there aren’t any humans, or there are at least very few humans. It gets to be like a club, with secret memberships and codes and passwords—kind of like speakeasies back when humans prohibited alcohol. And some of us even go into law enforcement…”

 

Now Tara seemed to come back to full attention, stiffening in her seat and widening her eyes as if suddenly jolted with electricity. She grasped the edge of the table and exclaimed, “What? Law enforcement? You mean like…police…FBI? Cops?”

 

“Yeah,” said Brenton. “There are places where werelion cops and law enforcement people look out for other werelions. They help when one of us gets into trouble, and they help us…cover our tracks when necessary. They make sure that information about us doesn’t get in front of the wrong eyes or into the wrong hands. They’re some of the most valuable members of our community. There have been times when we would have been in the worst kind of danger without them.”

 

“Oh my God…” said Tara, breathlessly.

 

“Like I said,” Brenton told her, “we take care of our own. We have to. We look out for others to keep ourselves and all of us safe. The only reason I’m telling you any of this now…is Daniel.” And as if he understood what his father was saying, Daniel pawed at Brenton’s hand and twitched his tail. “Because of him, now these are things you have to know. Tara, there’s no choice now. You have to learn to trust us, and we have to learn to trust you—for Daniel.”

 

Tara tightened her grip on the edge of the table. Brenton noted her knuckles clenching and turning pale. “Trust you? You’re asking me to trust something I didn’t even know existed until yesterday, something that’s against everything I’ve ever thought should be real.”

 

“Something that our son happens to be,” Brenton reminded her.

 

“Our son,” she said. Now it was more than her hands shaking. “There in your arms is our son. My baby. And I don’t even understand how that’s possible.”

 

“I know it’s a lot to have to take in and a lot to have to deal with. But this is reality for both of us,” Brenton said, trying to be as calming as possible and stop her from flying over the edge of sanity, let alone the edge of the table. “Tara, you know me. After the time we’ve spent together, you know me. That one week, we made each other happy. We were good together, and you know I’d never purposely do anything to scare you or hurt you or do you any kind of harm. You know that. What I’m telling you is that our son needs to be here, with his own kind. He needs me, and he needs his pride, as much as he needs his mother. We have to find a way to pull together and make things work—for him.”

 

“That’s what you’re really telling me, isn’t it?” Now Tara was starting to break into a sweat. “You’re telling me you want me to join your pride—to live with you, and your family, to be a part of a group of people who aren’t even…”

 

Now Brenton’s patience began to slip. “Not even human? Is that what you want to say, Tara? Not even human?” Daniel stopped suckling on the bottle and looked up at Brenton, pawing at his chest and mewling loudly, seeming to sense his father’s growing upset. Brenton put the bottle down on the table and paused from addressing Tara long enough to stoop and let Daniel down onto the floor.

 

The cub sat there, still gazing intently at his father. Brenton returned his attention to Tara. “Not even human—that’s what I am to you now, isn’t it? So what if you take Daniel home, back to your human world? How long do you think the two of you will last, with you not knowing a damn thing about how to care for him or what to do with him?

 

How long do you think it’ll be before other humans find out about him? And what do you expect to happen to the two of you then? I can guess what’ll happen, Tara, and it’s nothing good. See, you may not know a lot about us, but we know all about you. We know what humans are like. We know the way you are. We know how you feel about differences. You can’t even live with the differences between yourselves.

 

We know the fear and the superstition and the prejudice about anyone who doesn’t look the same way someone else does, or talk the same way, or believe the same stupid crap, or love who they’re told they’re supposed to love. And we know what your fear and your superstition and your hate can do—the violence, the murder, the slaughter. Would you actually expose our son to that?”

 

Tara snarled at him as if she were a lioness herself. “So humans are the most awful things in the world, that’s what you’re telling me? Well, you didn’t seem to mind how human I was when you had me in your bed!”

 

“Okay—okay, yeah, I took you to bed. And you didn’t mind when you thought I was just a man. But now you know what I really am, so I’m a monster now? Tara, to your people, our son, the beautiful little boy we made together—he’s a monster. And when they find out about him, they’ll come after him and you, and your lives will both be over. Is that what you want for Daniel? You’re his mother. Think of him. Think about him in a world full of scared humans that you can’t protect him from. I’m asking you, please don’t do that to him. Please help me protect him.”

 

Tara wanted to say something, say anything. She wanted to scream at Brenton, to curse him, to tell him she hated him. But nothing came, neither screams nor words. She opened her mouth, and all that came forth were sobs. Her shoulders shook and she broke into tears.

 

For all his anger at the way she reacted to everything, Brenton could feel nothing for Tara at this moment but pity. No, that was not completely true. There were other things he felt—not mere pity, but genuine compassion. That—and more, something that he had put away almost two years ago when he put her on a plane back to Chicago, not knowing he was sending his cub home with her.

 

He reached across the table and took her by the hand. “Tara,” he said, “what we did, sleeping together, we did because it was what we felt. We didn’t think; we just went with our feelings. And we both made mistakes. I never contacted you again because I thought it was just something we did, and I thought you’d moved on. And you never got in touch with me again because you thought we didn’t have any place in each other’s life.

 

 We were both wrong. But Tara, we’ve got Daniel now, and I’m glad. I wasn’t looking to be a father, but I’m glad I am. There’s nothing I want more in the world than to be Daniel’s father, and take care of him and love him and raise him. He needs us, Tara. There’s nothing more important than that.”

 

It was at least encouraging to Brenton that Tara did not tear her hand away from him. It was encouraging enough that he came around the table next to her, and pulled her gently up from her seat and took her in his arms. And he held her and let her cry on his shoulder, and with the clasp of his arms he assured her that he would not let her go.

 

They stood there together with Brenton’s arms locked around her until they felt a rustling and a pushing at their legs, and heard sounds of purring and growling coming up from down on the floor. They pulled apart and looked down to find Daniel nudging at them with his head and rubbing the side of his jaw against them, and pawing at their trousers. The little cub looked up at them and made a mewling growl, and Tara gazed down at him and sobbed a bit more.

 

They ended up both sitting on the floor with him, and Daniel put his paws on his mother’s bosom and nudged at her face with his head. In spite of everything she had felt talking to Brenton, in spite of wishing her little boy were still just a little boy, something in Tara’s heart could not help but melt at the cub asking for her attention.

 

“Pet him, Tara,” Brenton said. “Pet him. Hold him. He wants his mom.”

 

Tara petted Daniel. He purred loudly and climbed into her lap. She instinctively put her arms around him, and he squirmed, still giving loud purrs, and twitched and thrashed his tail. And even though everything that Tara had ever thought of as human had been called into question, somehow in the creature purring in her arms she sensed her little boy. The birth of a child changes everything about the mother’s world. Tara’s world was now changing in ways she never could have imagined.

_______________

 

Brenton called the rest of the Morgan Napa Pride, and Tara sat in the living room playing with Daniel, who had finally morphed back to human and let her put his training pants on him. As she played with her son and was grateful to bond again with his little human self, Tara listened to the phone calls between Brenton and his family, and heard through his reactions and the sounds of voices coming out of his phone how startled and excited they were, and how excited he was about their excitement.

 

 Part of it, some of the part that she could hear, was Brenton trying to explain how it had all happened, and that he now had both the cub and the human mother at his house and had done his best to explain everything to her. And Tara could imagine the things they must be saying about her and little Daniel and the whole situation.

 

She had the distinct feeling that she was being judged, in a way, which stung at her heart when she remembered the things that Brenton had said only a short while ago about the way humans feared, judged and hated what was not like themselves. Well, Tara was nothing like these lion people.

Were they judging her out of fear, acting every bit as human as humans acted? What would she face when they came, as he knew they would? Their fear? Their anger? Their wish to take her little boy away from her?

A part of Tara now felt as protective as a mother lioness. She felt as if she could face down or fight a whole pride of lions if they tried to take her little boy. She would fight Brenton himself if it came to that.

 

Tara held the human Daniel in her lap on the living room sofa and tousled his human hair. The prospect of meeting Daniel’s father’s family had clarified one thing for her, at least. This was her little boy, and nothing would ever come between her and her child. Not even the creature that he was inside.

 

Soon, the house was full of them, a dozen people in all, a couple of senior men and ten women of a variety of ages. They all had thick hair of the same color as Brenton’s, and they all had those same sparkling blue-green eyes. And they had a quality about them that made Tara think the word “pride” was exactly the right name for them. They carried themselves with a dignity that seemed noble, almost regal in a way.

 

 Brenton, for all his dazzling manly beauty, seemed to be the one most like a “regular, average” person in the family. They all looked amazing. Even with the lot of them in their human form, Tara sensed she was in the presence of something more than mere humanity. She felt almost humbled at the sight of them.

 

The most impressive of them all was Brenton’s mother, the matriarch of the pride. Brenton’s father, Tara learned, had died some years earlier, but Sylvia Morgan had kept a firm hand on the leadership of the family, and Tara could sense how they all deferred to her even when she was not directly asserting her authority. The rest of them let Sylvia be the first one to approach Daniel. Tara stood by and watched as her son, sitting innocently on the floor, came face to face with his grandmother for the first time.

Sylvia, clad in an off-white, bare-shouldered gown that flowed all the way down to her ankles, crouched down with a motion as smooth and elegant as a ballerina and sat on the floor in front of her grandson. Tara watched, fascinated, as Sylvia touched Daniel under the chin and purred at him, and the boy calmly looked into Sylvia’s eyes as if he had known her from the moment he came into the world.

 

“Hello, my darling,” said Sylvia. “You’re even handsomer than your father was when he was a cub. You are the most beautiful little boy in the world.”

 

At this, Tara looked over at Brenton and found him wearing the biggest, warmest smile she had ever seen on him, the smile of a proud father basking in his mother’s approval of his son. Tara could not help but be touched.

 

Tara returned to watching Sylvia and Daniel, and saw Sylvia morph her head, shoulders, and arms into those of a strong, noble lioness. This was the third werelion that Tara had seen morphing, and it chilled her to see it. She wondered if she would ever grow accustomed to this. Sylvia purred again at Daniel and rubbed her lioness paw against his chin. The most astounding thing happened next. The little boy morphed, not to a full lion, but to the shape of a humanoid infant with lion’s fur and head and paws, and his tail split the back of his training pants and came curling out. He sat, rubbing his head and the side of his jaw against his grandmother’s paw, purring loudly.

 

Tara put a hand to her chest, feeling the quickened beating of her heart. She sensed that Sylvia was reaching Daniel in a way that only one of his own kind could reach him, and she could not help but feel envious, jealous of this budding relationship between her child and his grandmother, this instinctive bond that Tara might never be able to share.

 

If there were any hostility towards her from Sylvia or the other women of the pride, Tara could not sense it. If anything, they seemed terribly curious about her. They asked her to tell them in her own words how she had felt about discovering what Daniel was, and by extension what Brenton was, and they did not give any sign that they were offended when Tara answered them honestly.

 

Some of them told Tara that they had known other human females who had slept with werelion males and become pregnant, and that there was help for human women in Tara's situation. They told her that they could put her in touch with women who had been through what she was experiencing, and that there were even small groups of human mothers of werelion cubs who corresponded with each other and sometimes met in person, traveling from other cities and other parts of the country to share their experiences face to face and introduce their cubs to each other.

 

 Tara, though she did not say it, was still having difficulty with her son being referred to as a “cub”. She accepted the kindness and concern of Brenton’s family, but she found that even now there was a part of her that could not quite commit to this new world into which she had been thrown.

 

The pride was generous. The whole thing became an impromptu baby shower. They brought a crib and a playpen, a carriage and a stroller, and baby blankets and toys, either new things or things that they had saved from their own cubs who were too big for them now. Tara received all the gifts with appreciation, and Brenton watched her reactions to his family’s generosity and kindness. He sensed that her gratitude was sincere enough, but that her heart—her human heart—was not one hundred percent in it.

 

From her face and the sound of her voice and the way she carried herself, Brenton sensed that Tara was still not completely prepared to try to integrate her human life with the future she now faced as the mother of a werelion cub. And how could she be? Only a morning ago, Tara had thought her life was one thing and that her child was one thing. Without warning, she had been thrown into the deep end of an experience for which no human could possibly be prepared.

 

It was a wonder that she was taking it all as well as she was doing. Brenton had an undeniable feeling that deep down, Tara could not help herself. She could not help but resist the whole idea of her life being taken over by something that her experience as a human being had taught her was a myth. They were still going to have problems. There would be no avoiding it.

Brenton’s family also brought lunch and dinner. And when the meals were done, after Tara put Daniel to bed in his new crib, they said their goodbyes for now and saw themselves out, and Tara thanked Sylvia one more time before they all left. Once they were gone, the house was quiet again, and Tara wanted nothing more than just to go to bed.

 

Once again, Tara and Brenton went to bed and only slept. Brenton wore only a pair of briefs to bed, and even with his shorter hair he was still the magnificent hunk of maleness whose constant ravishing of her had given Tara their son. Seeing him climb into bed that way was such a temptation. There was an undeniable part of her that would have loved to have him again.

 

 When she had him before, it was after a year and a half of no sex. Since the last time she saw him, it had been even longer than that since she’d last known the pleasure of a man’s body, and on some level she ached to have Brenton join himself with her again.

 

For all the things they had said to each other since she told him about Daniel, Tara found her desire for Brenton was still there. But it was subdued now, buried under things she could not move aside to reach it. So she kept to one side of the bed and let Brenton keep to the other, and they both dropped off to sleep.

 

But Tara had set her phone to vibrate and wake her a few hours later, and she had set a plan for when it did. She had arranged for a taxi to meet her at a specific time at the end of the private road from the house that let out onto the main road to the highway. In the still and the dark, using the flashlight app in her phone, she crept out of bed and silently dressed herself and Daniel, taking care not to disturb him too much and letting him stay half asleep while she did so.

 

She packed all the clothing for the two of them and all the food and supplies that she could get into one suitcase and one carry-on bag, and put Daniel in the sling to carry him. And ever so carefully, she took the bags and the baby and crept with them out of Brenton’s house and into the night.

 

 

THE FINAL

 

Tara did not draw another easy breath until she finally reached the end of the private road. Only then did she permit herself to relax, just slightly. She had been anxious every step of the way from Brenton’s house, walking along that road in the night with forest thicket on either side of her and only the flashlight in her phone to light her way. She was a woman alone with a baby, out in a country area in the dark. There could have been dangerous things in the forest around her, things against which she and Daniel would have been defenseless if they had come out onto the road. There could have been coyotes or cougars…

 

The rich irony of that thought suddenly hit her. She couldn’t suppress a smile and almost wanted to laugh. Cougars! Really—cougars, of all things! After the things I’ve seen in the last couple of days, cougars are nothing!

 

She set her bags down on the shoulder of the road and lifted the hand in which she’d carried it to the top of little Daniel’s head. The blackness of the forest blackened the road on the side where she stood and on the opposite side, stretching out along the asphalt before her and behind her. Tara knew the taxi would be along soon, but even so, it would not be soon enough. Her boy was out like a light, which was good. Now if only he would stay asleep until they were on the plane, or better yet until they reached Chicago.

 

She repeated that last thought in her mind: Until we get to Chicago. And what would they do then?

 

“Oh, Daniel, baby, what will we do then?” Tara whispered. “We’re going to have to have a plan and we’re going to have to do it fast. We can’t stay in the apartment; it’s too risky. We’ll have to move out. We’ll have to find someplace else, someplace better for you. Definitely someplace out of the city, out of the way. I don’t have as much money as Daddy, but I’ll have to get us a place at least a bit like Daddy’s house. Someplace off the main road, where there are trees and bushes around and no one can just come looking and see us.

 

And we won’t be able to be around people a lot. Mommy will have to start working at home. That’ll be hard at first, but I’ll sell the apartment and get us some extra money. I’ll have to find some way to explain it to Felicia, work out something to do with the business. But Mommy will find a way, sweetheart; I promise.”

 

She held the sleeping lad in the sling a little tighter and shut her eyes, still whispering on. “And putting you in school—I don’t think we’re going to be able to do that. That’s another thing we can’t risk, having you around other kids all the time.” Her voice cracked at that thought. “Oh, baby, I know it’ll be hard because you’ll want friends, other kids, someone to play with. But Mommy will have to homeschool you and work at the same time. I know it won’t be easy and there’ll be times when you won’t like it.

 

And we’ll have to find some way to teach you to handle your changes. There’s so much Mommy doesn’t know about when you change and why you change, and how to make you change back when it happens. And I’m still not sure I know how to handle you when you’re the other way, so one of us doesn’t hurt the other. There’s so much Mommy has to figure out.” Her voice cracked again, harder, but she swore to herself that she would not cry. She would need to dig down deep into herself, deeper than she’d ever gone before into her heart and her soul, to find the strength she needed to care for herself and her little boy.

 

“We’re going to make it, Daniel, I promise,” she said. “We’ll figure everything out, a piece at a time. No one will find out and no one will hurt us. And no one will take away Mommy’s boy. I promise, baby, it’s you and Mommy. You’ll see…”

 

And Tara rocked the sleeping Daniel from side to side, drawing strength just from having him in the sling against her and in her arms and knowing she would make good on her word to her sleeping lad, and protect him from any person or any thing that ever came near them. She was his mother, no matter what. Her baby was her life. Nothing else mattered more than her little boy.

 

In that strange way that a person senses he is not alone, with that peculiar sense that tells someone that he is being watched, Tara felt suddenly wary and alarmed, as if little strikes of lightning were dancing up and down her skin, tingling her body with the sensation of being watched. She opened her eyes and took in the darkened roadside again.

 

Tara listened closely, sharply, and picked up the faintest sound of twigs snapping and tall grass and undergrowth rustling in the darkened forest on the other side of the road. Did she really hear it, or was it just her maternal protective instincts kicking into overdrive, magnifying any slight, tiny sound into a potential threat? She peered across the road into the blackness under the trees.

 

In the cloak of ebony before her, lights appeared. She squinted at them. Could they be only fireflies? They did not move, nor wink on and off, the way fireflies did. They just hung there in the dark—hung there, glowing blue-green…

 

Blue-green!

 

Tara’s eyes widened. Her mouth dropped open, but she was afraid to utter a sound. Blue-green lights, shining in the forest in the dark!

 

The words, “Oh no…!” scratched and crawled their way up her throat, but never made it to Tara’s lips. Before she could give them voice, there was a definite rustling in the undergrowth on the other side of the road, and now the blue-green lights did move. They came with the shapes of creatures half-human and half-feline, out into the open in the starlit night. The figures stood, sleek and sinewy and fur-covered, their tails curling behind them, and did not make another move.

 

They only stood and watched. Tara was paralyzed in their gaze. Her every instinct told her to break into a run, but to where? Back down the private road? Into the forest? There was no place to go, and any place she tried to go, the creatures across the road were fast enough to reach first and cut her off. And she was carrying Daniel. What if in her flight from the creatures watching her, she fell and hurt him? The word, “Please…” almost formed on her quivering lips.

 

And then, from behind her came a voice: “Tara…”

 

Afraid to turn her back on the creatures, but knowing whose voice it was at her back, Tara spun around anyway, and there at the mouth of the road he stood, in the form of a two-legged, thick-maned lion clad in a loincloth. She gasped out his name.

“Brenton…”

 

He made no move towards her. He only looked at her with a sadness in his lion eyes and shook his lion head, making his mane ripple. “We thought you’d probably try something like this,” Brenton said.

 

Tara begged him, “Brenton, please just let me go.”

 

“Where? Back to Chicago? With my cub? With my son?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“I told you how it’ll be for the two of you if you take him back there. And you know it’s true. I can’t believe this is really what you want to do, Tara.”

 

“It is!” she almost shouted.

 

“Why?” he nearly roared. His voice trailed off into a lion’s growl.

 

“Because I’m a human being and I live a human life!”

 

“Our son is not human.”

 

“Part of him is! The part of him that came from me is human! And I need him with me, in my world, my human world! Just let us go!”

 

Brenton shook his head again, harder, still growling. “Your human world,” he said. “Just what world is that? You spent a year of your life traveling through other countries, living with people who spoke different languages and had different ways, having everything be new to you, and that didn’t bother you. You liked that. You enjoyed that. You weren’t afraid of that.

 

But you’re still afraid of us. You’re still afraid to try to get to know us, to be with us. You know it’s what our son needs, and we’d never do anything to hurt him, and we only want to help you because you’re his mother. We can accept you, but you still can’t accept us. My God, Tara, you’re right about how human you are. I’ve never met anyone so human.”

She flashed her temper at him. “Don’t you dare mock me!”

 

“I’m not mocking you, Tara. But I’m disappointed. I’m disappointed as hell. You know this is wrong, but you won’t think clearly enough to see it. You’re thinking through fear, Tara—though fear. And your fear will get you and our son killed.”

 

Tara practically snarled at him, “I will protect him!”

 

“There’s too much fear out there, just like yours and much worse,” Brenton warned her. “There’s millions of humans out there, just as scared of our son as you are of us. There are more of them than there are of you, and their fear is bigger than you are. You can’t protect him from your kind.”

 

“He’s half MY kind!”

 

“That won’t matter. Stay with us. You’ll both be safe with us—with me.”

 

Tara stood straight and clutched Daniel in a fierce grip. “What are you going to do, Brenton?” she asked. “Will you force me to stay? Hold me prisoner?”

 

“No, Tara, we won’t. We won’t force you to do anything. We’re asking you. I’m asking you—please. We’re not monsters, Tara. What’s waiting for you out there, Tara—that’s who the monsters are. Millions of monsters. I’m begging you, please don’t risk our son’s life. If you leave here with him, you’re as good as throwing him to the monsters.”

 

Tara was unmoved. “My car is coming soon. You can’t let the driver see you.” She looked over her shoulder at the other werelions still standing across the road. “You can’t be here when the car comes. You have to leave.”

 

Brenton said, “Tara, for the last time, please don’t do this.”

 

“The car is coming, Brenton,” she repeated.

 

Brenton slumped his man-lion shoulders and bowed his head. He made a sound that was both a growl and a deep, rumbling sigh. He looked up again and past Tara to the rest of his pride. He gestured for them to return to the concealment of the darkened forest.

 

Once they were alone, he burned into Tara a look of anguish and sorrow such as she had never seen in all her life. “You’re making a mistake, Tara. You say you love our son, but you’re putting him and yourself in the worst kind of danger. It’s wrong, and nothing I’ve said to you and nothing I’ve tried to do for you seems to make any kind of difference. You refuse to see how wrong it is.

 

But I know one thing, Tara. One day you will see what a mistake you’ve made. One day you’ll see the danger you’ve brought on Daniel, which you won’t be able to get him out of. All I ask is one thing. Keep my phone number. Keep my E-mail. Always have a way to get in touch with me. And if you ever need me, use them. Use them and I’ll be there for Daniel—and you. Promise me, Tara. Go if you have to, but promise me.”

 

Shaking but weary of the confrontation, Tara replied simply, “I will.”

 

“Then I’ll go. Remember what I said. And take care—of both of you.”

 

Brenton turned his back and lashed his lion tail in despair and frustration, and started to lope away into the forest bracketing the private road through which he had come, following her discreetly that way instead of following her openly on the road itself. At the edge of the dark thicket, he turned and looked her way one last time, shining his lion eyes at her. Then he stepped back into the dark and disappeared.

A few minutes later, the taxi came and Tara quickly bundled herself and Daniel and her bags into it, and the car took off down the road into the night.

 

When the taxi was out of sight, Brenton stepped out of the thicket on his side and the rest of the pride emerged on the other side. All but one of the pride stayed where they were. The tall, lean, sinewy female figure of Sylvia crossed the road and joined her son.

 

“I couldn’t convince her,” said Brenton. “She’s too scared. She can’t think through her fear. I couldn’t get through to her.”

 

“She can’t think clearly now,” said Sylvia, touching her paw to Daniel’s shoulder in the way of a mother comforting her son. “This is all still too new to her. We’ve changed everything she thinks about the world, and probably herself, in one day. She’s a human being. She can adapt, but not as quickly as she’s being expected to adapt now. When she’s alone and she’s calmer, she’ll think more clearly.”

 

“And meanwhile, she’ll have my son out there—with them,” Daniel snarled.

 

“Yes, son, there is a risk,” said Sylvia. “But we’ve talked about what to do.”

 

“The people you know in Chicago, and around there.”

 

“Yes, my darling. They know about her and Daniel. And they’ll be watching her. She won’t know they’re there, but they’ll be watching. And if anything happens, they’ll be ready. They’ll step in and they’ll call us.”

 

Sylvia, Brenton, and the pride all looked off down the road in the direction Tara’s car went. Sylvia said, “No matter what, that little cub is Morgan Pride. And we will always take care of our own.”

Brenton said nothing. He only flared his lion nostrils, feeling more helpless than a lion should ever feel.

_______________

 

And so, in that same airport waiting area where she had been twice before, Tara sat with Daniel, awaiting the boarding of the flight for which she had just purchased a one-way ticket. The baby, of course, was flying free. And soon, it relieved her to think, they would both be free—in the air, thousands of feet above Napa and flying away, free of the strange and alien world of men and women who become beasts. Free forever, to live as humans in a human world that made sense.

 

Holding Daniel in her arms, Tara rested his little head on her shoulder. Everything would be all right now. She would give her son all the love he would ever need. She would do everything that a mother was meant to do for her baby. And she would watch him grow into a beautiful little boy and a good, strong, proud young man—a man who would, she expected, look just like his father.

Yes, just like his father—two ways. Both as a young man and as something else. She imagined the way Brenton must have looked as a young lion just coming into adulthood, just getting his mane, strutting up and down on grass in the sun, knowing he was turning the head of every little lioness who came near him.

 

Tara frowned, quietly alarmed and stricken with worry. Where she was taking him, wherever they ended up, there would be no young lionesses for him to impress. There would be no young male lions with whom he would compete for their affections. There would only be other boys—human boys, who spoke and acted the way human boys did. Human boys who taunted and bullied and fought like human boys whenever they perceived that some other young person was in any way different than they were.

 

What if they taunted and bullied Daniel? What if they chased him, and hit him, and fought with him? And what if, one awful day, they pushed him too far and Daniel slipped? What if he forgot himself and turned on them with not a human boy’s anger—but the wounded fury of a cornered lion? Tara imagined her son’s claws and fangs coming out, and someone getting badly hurt—or worse. What then?

 

Daniel himself could end up hurt. And what could she do for him? Take him to a doctor—a human doctor? What could a human doctor do for someone like her son? Her heart froze at one thought she had never considered. What if a human doctor took or otherwise acquired a sample of Daniel’s blood? That physician would find himself or herself testing not the blood of a human boy, but of something not truly human, with proteins and chemistry never seen in any human being. How could Tara protect him then?

 

And exposure need not even come from a fight, or from injury or accident. One day, perhaps one day soon, Daniel might be taken ill, sick with something that no medicine that Tara gave him would help. What would she do if she had to take him sick to a doctor—or check him into a hospital? She held him tighter, as if to hold at bay all the awful things that could happen. But no embrace from her could hold off all the things that could possibly go wrong in the days and years to come. Tara’s skin turned pale and cold as a thousand dreadful possibilities went spinning through her mind and she had neither the insight nor the imagination to address any of them.

 

Brenton had told her that there were places out there in the human world where his kind recognized each other and met in secret. Perhaps she could find them, turn to them for help. Perhaps they could help her with his training, with his socialization, give him the exposure he needed to others like himself—playmates, friends, advisors. But how would Tara find them? And even if she could, how could she approach them? And would they even trust her, a human with a werelion child? What would they do? Would they try to take Daniel from her, even as other humans might try to hurt him or worse?

 

A whole life filled with strange, frightening, inhuman uncertainties closed in around Tara’s thoughts. She felt her mind spinning with dark ideas that she never imagined she would have to think about. Now, as much as she feared anything else, she feared getting on the plane.

 

And that was when Daniel opened his little eyes and yawned—and began to purr.

 

Tara broke out into a cold sweat. Oh, Daniel, no. Not now. Baby, don’t do that now!

 

She pulled the blanket in which she had wrapped him in the sling up over his head, hoping it would somehow block or muffle the sound he was making. But she could still hear it, and worse, she feared that anyone sitting down near her or passing by her would hear it too. The curiosity of a passerby or an onlooker was the last thing she needed. Curiosity—someone else’s— might very well kill the cat.

 

Anxiously, Tara snuck a peek under the blanket. Her pulse spiked and a hot flash of dread lit up in her at finding Daniel’s little human boy face morphing into a whiskered lion cub snout, and his little human boy hands shifting into lion cub paws. She did not know what she feared more: someone seeing what was happening under the blanket or someone seeing the mounting fear that she knew must be breaking out on her own face. With a gulp, clutching for dear life onto her calm demeanor, she picked herself, her carry-on bag, and Daniel up from her seat and headed for the exit.

 

On the walkway between the airport building and the parking lot, Tara pulled her phone from her carry-on and hit the speed dial. The call was received immediately, and she said, “Brenton, we’re at the airport here in Napa. Please come and get us.”

 

“I’m on my way,” said Brenton.

_______________

 

The wait was not long. Brenton arrived quickly. As soon as he was there, Tara gave Daniel to him. He waited outside with the cub while she went back into the airport to cancel her flight and retrieve her suitcase. Then, bundling the suitcase into the trunk and taking back Daniel, she climbed into the car with father and cub in the parking lot. Brenton had not even started the car when Tara simply said, “I was wrong.”

 

Not that he disagreed, Brenton asked, “What makes you say that?”

 

“You know I was wrong,” she replied. “There were just…things I thought about, things that occurred to me at the last minute. Thinking about getting on the plane with Daniel and the two of us going off by ourselves…I knew I was wrong. The world is full of single mothers, Brenton. They’re scared because they’re taking on the most important thing in the world and they have to do it by themselves. It’s just them and the baby. But Daniel and I…it’s not just us. It’s me and him and…everything that goes with him. I was wrong.”

 

Instead of hitting the ignition button, Brenton exhaled heavily and leaned back in the driver’s seat, looking as if the weight of the world were suddenly flying from his shoulders. He did not look at Tara, at least not at first. He only said, “I’m glad you can see that.”

 

There was a beat of silence. Then Tara, sounding meek and crestfallen, said, “I know how angry you are at me. Angry and hurt. You have a right to be.”

 

Brenton said, “Angry? Hurt? You think so?”

 

“I said you have the right to feel that way. I said I was wrong.”

 

A hard edge came into Brenton’s voice, and a hard look into his eyes. “Tara, do you know what I went through when you got into that cab? I went back to the house and I was fit to tear the place to pieces. I felt like sinking my claws into everything I saw. I felt like tearing everything apart and throwing it all over the place. I wanted to turn everything over and break it. I was ready to go through every room and trash the whole place, wreck my own home, wreck and break everything I saw—because it wasn’t going to be a home, not the home I wanted.

 

I wanted my cub in my home, where I could take care of him and keep him safe. I wanted his mother with us. And it wasn’t about to happen. You know what I did instead, Tara? I just went in the house, and fell on my knees on the floor, and ripped up the carpet, and sat there roaring.

 

I roared my lungs out because if I didn’t roar I’d break down and cry. My cub was gone, and you were gone—out there, where I couldn’t look out for you, where I couldn’t protect you. Tara, I know you were scared the hell out of your wits, but even you have no f…ing idea what it’s like to be a father and not be able to take care of your family. I felt like the most f…ing helpless, worthless creature on the face of the Earth. And now, after all that, you call me to come and get you, and you tell me you were wrong.”

 

A single tear rolled down Tara’s face. “What else do you want me to say, Brenton? I was wrong. I’m sorry.”

 

“Yeah, I’m sorry too, Tara. You’re sorry for your mistake. And I’m sorry for mine.”

 

Tara was suddenly puzzled, bewildered. “What mistake?”

 

“A mistake I made almost a couple of years ago, right here at this airport.”

 

“I don’t understand.”

 

“Tara, there was that one day, when I brought you here after a whole week we spent alone, naked, doing everything in bed and all over the house. I brought you here and put you on a plane to go back to Chicago—and I didn’t want to do it. I wanted to tell you I didn’t want you to go. It was only a week, but it was a f…ing incredible week and I didn’t want it to be over. I didn’t want you to leave. I wanted you here with me.

 

And I should have told you then and there, ‘Tara, don’t leave. Stay here. Stay with me.’ If I’d just told you, maybe you would have gotten on the plane anyway. You had your life to go back to and maybe you would have just gone. But at least you would have gone knowing how I feel. And maybe you would have changed your mind.

 

Maybe you would have come back to me—especially when you knew you were having my cub. This whole thing, this whole nearly two years we weren’t together and I didn’t see Daniel for the first year of his life—it could have all been so different. And this whole couple of days would have never happened. It wouldn’t have been like this—if I’d just asked you to stay with me.

 

“I want you here, Tara, you and Daniel. Here, where I can take care of the two of you. And love you.”

 

Tara blinked, disbelieving what she had just heard. “Love…?”

“Yeah. I love our cub. And…I love his mother.”

 

There it was. He had actually said it. The words hung in the air, in the dark, inside the car. For a moment there was no sound except for a tiny, soft purring from the sling against Tara’s bosom—where her heart was beating in a way quite unlike anything she had ever felt before.

 

“You love me,” Tara said.

 

“I love you,” Brenton said back. “Human as you are, scared as you are—I love you. I do. And I want you. Do you think you can find it in yourself to stay with me, and trust me, and not be scared? And maybe even love me?”

 

He reached over and took her hand. Tara shook her head at him, tears streaming from both eyes now, and said, “Yes. I trust you. And I love you.”

 

And now she had said it back. And she meant it. A lightness came into Tara’s heart, a lightness that she had not felt since that panic-stricken time at the apartment in Chicago when she found a lion cub in her child’s playpen. All the fear, all the dread, just floated away, carried off by love.

 

Brenton sighed, expelling the last of his ordeal—and hers—in a long breath. He brushed the tears from Tara’s face, and leaned over and kissed her. Tara returned the kiss.

 

“Let’s take our little guy back to the house and get him into bed,” said Brenton. And he hit the ignition and peeled the car out of its space, and the newest lion pride in Napa was on its way home.

 

Tara sold the travel agency to Felicia, who was overjoyed to know that Tara was doing the right thing by her baby and his father. She sold the apartment where she had lived with George, and Napa became her home. Eventually, she thought, she would start another career. The idea of travel writing, a spinoff of her former business, appealed to her. When she and Brenton were off visiting the places she would write about, they would have the pride to look after Daniel. His grandmother would love that. After a few years he would be old enough to travel with them.

 

Tara and Brenton raised Daniel together, with the help of the pride, and Tara found that werelions that she was not sleeping with were really not that frightening after all, once she got to know them. They were, in the end, only human.

 

 

Message From The Author:

 

Hiii

 

Hope you LOVED the book and if you want to check out my other releases  then just check out my Amazon author page at the link below!

 

 

 

Jadey x

 

P.S

Turn the page to discover a hidden bonus book that I threw in for you as part of your download. It is a bestseller too!

 

 

BEAR MY BABIES 

A PARANORMAL PREGNANCY ROMANCE

 

 

JADE WHITE

 

 

Copyright ©2016 by  Jade White

All rights reserved.

 

About This Book

 

Billionaire WereBear Thomas McMillian was desperate for a bear baby of his own but so far in his life he had found it impossible to impregnate a female human.

So Thomas sought the expertise of fertility doctor Melissa Rancic who specialized in helping shifters like him reproduce.

However, when Thomas set his eyes on Melissa he realized she was the woman that could help him in more ways than one.

He realized that she was the one who was going to bear his babies and he was going to stop at nothing to make it happen...

 

HAPTER ONE

 

Thomas McMillian tried very hard not to stare at the breasts before him. The fertility doctor leaned back in her chair with a pen in her mouth as he explained his situation. Melissa Rancic was just the right amount of nerdy that made her hot. She had her glasses in a pocket protector sticking out of her white coat.

“Believe it or not, Miss Rancic, there are many women out there who wanted to give me a child. Those who knew the child would be different. I’m not sure all men who come in here have had that option, but I’ve not been able to get any of them pregnant, which is why I think it’s me.”

She nodded and crossed her legs as she leaned forward. “Your parents, one of them was a human?”

He ignored the hem of her skirt riding up and exposing more of her thigh. “No they are both were-bears. Proud of it, too, there’s just not any of us around. I think we might be close to extinction in North America. I’m not sure, though. What’s the issue, are my boys not swimming?” He truly hated to even say those words. It certainly made him feel like less than a man that he couldn’t get a woman pregnant. If it was because he had an actual medical problem, he would have a hard time dealing with that.

“I think it’s possible that humans and members of the supernatural cannot procreate. The human body is simply not set up to house a supernatural child, so it doesn’t allow the body to become pregnant. It’s basically the same reason animals couldn’t mate with humans for offspring, the genetics are all wrong.” She stood and crossed the room.

He looked her over. She was about his age, maybe a year younger, so twenty-nine. Her body was curved in all the right places and her red hair fell in soft curves over her back. She stopped when she reached a counter and turned around to lean on it.

“So you’re basically telling me,” he said, “I have to find another were-bear, or I won’t be able to have a child?”

“Not necessarily.” She moved back across the room quickly and sat back in the chair. Her eyes sparkled with excitement.

“Explain.”

“I’m working on an experimental process that will help women like me, human, start to produce the means necessary for carrying a paranormal child. It’s in the very early stages, and you’d have to find a woman who was willing to undergo something without knowing the exact affect it would have on her body, but I truly believe it will work. It would be huge if I could pull it off; all the medical journals in the paranormal world would publish me.”

She was no longer with him. Her eyes had glazed over and she stared off into the distance. He cleared his throat. Her eyes focused back on him again.

“So I have to find a lady willing to go through experimental treatments to figure out if her body could potentially carry a paranormal child of mine. She wouldn’t know what it was doing to her body, and she wouldn’t know if it was really going to work.”

“That’s right.” She smiled at him and re-crossed her legs.

He could tell from the way she tapped the pen on her leg she was nervous what his answer would be. “What about you?”

“Me?”

“Would you consider doing it? Would you consider going through the process of trying to change the chemistry and make up of your body to carry a paranormal baby?”

Her mouth opened and closed several times without any sound coming out. She didn’t have an answer for him.

Nodding, he started to stand but she reached out and pushed his arm.

“Wait. I’m sorry, you caught me off-guard. I would do it, I would undergo the treatment to give some parents a child to continue their line, sure. If that was their only chance to have a baby, I don’t think I’d hesitate.”

“I’m going to have to think about it.”

Her face fell, but she nodded. “I understand. We can talk in a few days and I’ll see what you’ve decided.”

“You come highly recommended in New York, although I suspect it’s because you’re the only doctor in the city who knows of the paranormal world. How is it that you came to be that one doctor?”

“I suppose if you’re going to trust me, then we should have some sort of open communication between us. I discovered your world by accident.” She’d moved over to the couch that lined up against the far wall of her office.

He assumed the story would be long since she was getting comfortable.

“I was a younger doctor then working emergencies. It had been one of those days where I worked back-to-back twelve hour shifts and the morning had finally come. Driving home, I went through the back side of town and came upon a wreck. There was a lady half hanging out of a van. Someone had hit her and ran, her husband was in the street and waved me down. I told them to calm down, I was a doctor and I could help. He asked if I had worked with shifters before and I had no idea what that meant. At that moment, she screamed in pain so I let it go and rushed to her. Her bottom half was shifted only. The pain she was in had caused her to lose her ability to control it. I was shocked, but she was hurt badly and I had to stop the bleeding.”

“I don’t understand. Was the van hit only on the driver’s side?”

“No, she was in deer form when she was hit. He had moved her from the road and into his van having missed her being home at the right time. He’d had to move her out of the road, but it was hard to help her because the wounds were pretty severe. I had to force her to turn all the way human which was difficult for her, but she did it. Of course after that, I couldn’t practice regular medicine. I quit my job at the hospital and opened a fertility clinic.” She smiled and fiddled with the end of her skirt.

“You didn’t freak out? Your whole life you’d believed one thing and then something else happened and you didn’t freak out?”

“Well, I left out the part about the month long drinking and pill stupor I went on. Of course I freaked out, and I ended up in a facility.” She whispered the word facility. He watched her eyes lower to the floor. It wasn’t that he blamed her for freaking out. Had he not been born a were-bear, he doubted he would have believed it either.

“You wouldn’t be human if it didn’t affect you at all.” He was starting to like Melissa. He’d called her Miss Rancic because that was how she introduced herself, but in his mind he was thinking of her first name. It was more innocent. He noted it was strange for him to like someone right away. He usually took a while to warm up to anyone female or male. She was just easy to talk to.

“Okay, so we need to do some general questions and figure out the science of it all.”

“How many women have you tried to impregnate?”

The question took him off guard, he wasn’t sure he wanted to tell her. She’d asked so casually, and sat with her pen poised above her notebook to simply log the number as part of a statistic. Finally, he cleared his throat and sat up a little straighter as he counted in his head.

“Seventeen,” he finally said, not sure if he was a number or two off.

“Okay.” She wrote without a word, but her eyes had widened. He knew that was a large number for most people, but it was over a bit of time. He had a feeling she was shocked by the number. He wondered how innocent Melissa was, and what her sheets looked like. Shaking his head, he cleared all those thoughts away and waited for her next question.

“These are women you’ve tried more than once with?”

“Most of them, yes.” He smiled, remembering some of the more adventurous ladies he’d bedded.

She stopped and looked at him. “Women you’ve had one night stands with agreed to get pregnant?”

“Yes, I wouldn’t sleep with someone without telling them what they were in for. What kind of person do you think I am?” He’d had one night stands in the way that the women just were with him for one night, but he’d never tried to make a baby with someone he didn’t know. The good thing was he didn’t have to tell her how many people he’d slept with that he hadn’t tried to make a baby with, and he was happy about that.

“I didn’t mean it like that. I’m sorry.”

“All but three of them I tried several times with.”

“This was over the course of weeks, or months?”

“I had two serious girlfriends. One when I was twenty-one and one when I was twenty-seven. The first and I tried for two years, with the second a year and a half.”

“These women aren’t in the picture anymore. Would either be willing to try the treatment to help you now that we might be able to help you along?”

“No, they aren’t in the picture,” he said loudly and felt himself flush with heat.

“Moving on, tell me about the positions you mostly tried in.”

“Is that necessary?” he asked, suddenly not wanting to reveal every bit of his sex life to a stranger.

“Yes, I need to know everything.”

“I’m not telling you details, I’m sorry.”

“Fine, I’ll use my imagination.”

He watched her and caught the red that flooded her cheeks. Smirking he sat up in the chair.

“Oh you will, will you?”

“Please Mr. McMillian, give me more credit than that.”

“Isn’t there a way you can just type up a questionnaire of all the things you want to know, and just let me fill it out at my leisure?” he asked.

“I suppose that I could do that.”

“All right then, you do that while I think about whether or not this seems like something I can do. Tell me Miss Rancic, do you make a lot of money working here?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I’m just curious.”

“I love my work, Mr. McMillian, that’s all that matters to me.” She crossed her arms and stomped a foot.

“Okay, I’ll talk to you soon.”

He smiled to himself as he walked out of her office. A plan was forming in his mind, but he needed to know more about the redhead before he put it into place. She was pretty, smart, and willing to do the treatment. There wasn’t really anything else he needed in a good candidate.

Walking downstairs, he got into his car and told the driver to take him to his P.I., Blair. If anyone could help him find out some information, it was Blair Schmitt.

***

“So you want to know if she needs money.” Blair cut the end of a cigar and offered it to him. Thomas waved it off and looked around the office.

“Yes, if there’s a chance she would accept a lot of money to bear a child for me. I think I have a good shot, because she’s really into her research and wants to see this happen.”

“Is she hot?”

“Not that it matters, but yes she is.” Thomas thought about her pretty face and the excitement she had for her job. There was no denying she was sexy.

Blair Schmitt wasn’t a real private investigator, but he was a rich business man who loved to find things out about people. He was also one of the only other were-bears Thomas knew was in the area. They’d been friends since grade school and he could always count on him when he needed to know something. In the past, it had been information on a potential client, this would be something Blair would jump all over. He did the side P.I. stuff just for the fun of it. He would trail someone and do extensive research on them just for fun. He fancied himself a modern day Dick Tracy and even had the hat.

“That makes it better.” He wiggled his brows and typed furiously into some database he had while holding the cigar in his mouth.

“How long until you’ll have some information?” For a brief moment, he felt a little guilty for digging up information behind her back, but he just had a feeling she was the one to help him. He needed some kind of assurance she would have no choice but to accept a hefty offer of money.

***

Melissa was excited at the prospect of finally being able to study her theory. Mr. McMillian was easy to look at so she’d just blabbed her whole life story to him right away. Usually, she was pretty reserved with those sorts of things. Something about him just made her want to open up, she’d have to be careful with that in the future especially when she met the mother of his future child.

“Who was that gorgeous specimen?” Tilly rushed into the room clutching a clipboard. Her assistant was the only other person who worked in Melissa’s office. She lived for the clipboard and always had it whether she had something to give to Melissa or not. She was also completely man crazy and was always willing to talk about how good looking someone was.

“A client, Tilly, what’s going on?”

“Nothing, I just needed to gush to you about Mr. Handsome out there. Whoo girl, that smile.”

Tilly had been a good friend of Melissa’s for a very long time. She was the opposite of her in most every way and they’d always just clicked.

“He wants a baby,” she laughed as Tilly fanned herself with the clipboard and started typing the things she’d written about Thomas in the computer.

“I’d be happy to help him with that.”

Tilly didn’t miss a beat. It was safe to say Melissa was the more reserved of the two.

“Calm down, you horn dog. You’re married. This is our chance, it’s a chance to use what I’ve spent the past three years working on. We can finally see how it works and if it will be successful.”

“Did you tell him the risks?”

“I didn’t.” She felt a bit ashamed. “When he picks the right girl, I’ll talk to them both and tell them what the risks are for the baby and for her.”

“You will?” Tilly raised an eyebrow.

“Of course I will!” Melissa tried to look appalled. She would never willingly let someone do what she wanted them to do without telling them that there was a risk of losing the baby and there was a risk of some pain.

“He asked if I would do the treatment on myself,” she said quietly, but Tilly heard her.

“What did you say?”

“I said I would, of course, give someone a chance to have a baby that was a part of their line, their heritage. I’d never thought of it until he asked me. Once we prove this works maybe I could be a surrogate for a paranormal family, think of the possibilities.”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. You have to prove it works and get Mr. Dashing to find a good candidate.”

“He said like seventeen people or something had tried with him.”

“I don’t doubt it looking at him, honey. You know, you could do with a good bed partner, maybe you should consider why he asked if you would do it.” Tilly started to walk out of the room.

“Don’t be silly. He was accessing the risks through my willingness to do it,” she yelled after her and went back to typing in her computer. The truth was she wasn’t sure why Thomas had asked that question, and she also wasn’t sure when she’d stopped calling him Mr. McMillian in her head.

This was something she’d dreamed about for a long time. It was going to be amazing to be recognized for her work. She’d not told him she hadn’t been able to save the woman. It wasn’t something she was medically able to do at that time. It had tortured her for a long time, but she thought if this was something she could do successfully, then she could really make a difference in the paranormal world.

She didn’t realize it had gotten late as Tilly moved about turning off the lights and getting the building ready to close up. She’d been lost inside her head thinking about the possibilities. Luckily, she hadn’t scheduled any more appointments for the day, so she was able justify not keeping her focus on work.

“Are you going to your mom’s tonight?” Tilly asked.

“I am. Probably need to stop somewhere and get dinner.”

“Go ahead, I’ll close up.”

“I love you, Tilly.” Melissa shut down her laptop and headed to her car. She really hoped her mom would be having a good evening.

***

Thomas sat at his kitchen table waiting for a phone call from Blair. It was getting later and he thought Blair would be a lot quicker than he was. He was eating some take-out leftovers and having a glass of wine while reading one of the many magazines he kept meaning to cancel the subscription for.

The knock on the door took him off guard. No one ever came to his apartment unannounced. He slowly walked over and peeked into the hall to see Blair’s distorted face looking back at him.

“Let me in, I have news.”

“What the hell? Why couldn’t you just call me?”

“Because this is much more dramatic, don’t you think? Do you have a nice scotch?”

Thomas got up and went over to fix a drink, mostly because he wanted to know what Blair had found out and if it would be to his advantage. Once he’d gotten his drink and taken a sip, Blair pulled out a folder that looked really thick.

“Is that all the information about her?”

Blair blinked and stared at the folder. “Oh no, I have another meeting after this.”

“You’re a strange person, Blair.”

“So here’s what you need to know. Her mother is currently very sick and she’s paying for her treatments because the insurance isn’t cutting it. She’s also going through a messy divorce with a fairly crazy man who is costing her a lot of money as well. Throw in lots of school loans and the cost of living and it’s a mess. It’s great news!” Blair beamed.

Thomas gave him a scolding look.

“Okay, well, it’s not great for her, but it does mean she needs money and that means you will be able to entice her.”

“Yes, now you just have to help me figure out a way to offer it without letting on that I know, and without it seeming really unsavory.”

“I feel like no matter what you do, it’s going to be unsavory. Hopefully, you’ll get some weird and kinky make a paranormal baby sex out of it.” Blair wiggled his brows and plopped down on the couch.

“You’re no help at all,” Thomas said and sat next to him to think.

“Hey, I found all the information you needed, I’d say I’m heaps of help. Personally, I think you’re brave wanting to have children at all. What a crazy responsibility, and you can’t sleep with whoever you want. No, thank you.”

“Actually, this will be an arrangement where we aren’t in a relationship. I can actually sleep with anyone I want to.”

“You truly think a chick is going to allow you to impregnate her and not want a relationship?” Blair had stood up and bent down in his face.

He pushed him back, almost causing him to fall over the coffee table. “Yes, I do. When you establish the rules early on, then it can be successful. Like any good arrangement, you know what the expectations are going in and you don’t get hurt. Piece of cake.”

“Oh, that’s brilliant.” Blair laughed. “I’m taking bets on this at our next cigar party.”

“That’s really mature, Blair.”

“It’s perfect; this will be the most fun I’ve had betting on someone’s life.”

“You realize how insane that sounds?”

“I do, but don’t worry, I’m going to take a gamble and bet that it will work out just the way you think it should.” He was counting numbers on his fingers with his tongue out. Thomas just let him do his thing.

“Thanks, buddy.” Thomas got up and fixed a drink, hoping his college buddy would leave soon. He was always too much to handle after a certain time of the day.

 

 

HAPTER TWO

 

Thomas stared at the phone on his desk. He didn’t know if he should ask her over the phone—it seemed impersonal. He just felt like since there was money in play asking over the phone would be an acceptable way to do it. It would save him from having to look at her pretty face when she turned him down flat. He didn’t think she could afford to, but he also knew everyone in the world wasn’t so easily swayed with the prospect of more money no matter how sick a loved one might be.

Finally, he picked up the phone and called. Her assistant answered.

“Hello, may I speak to Miss Rancic please? This is Thomas McMillian.”

“Oh, yes you can, hold on a second, honey.”

The phone clicked and he nervously waited.

“Mr. McMillian.” She sounded happy to hear from him, but he was sure it was only because she was excited that he may have found a partner to help her with her research. It was really now or never. He didn’t want to scare her with too much money, but he also didn’t want to low ball her, so he had thought carefully.

“I’ll cut to the chase Miss Rancic, I’m prepared to offer you a lump sum payment of $50,000 to be the one to carry my baby. I realize this may come as a shock, but I think you are the perfect candidate and no one else will do.”

That last part was improvised. He waited a long time because she didn’t say anything. For a moment he thought she’d dropped the phone, but finally he heard her clear her throat.

“I’m sorry, you want me to do what?”

“Carry my baby. It’s a great way for us both to get what we want. I mean if that’s what you want, to use your body for science. I’ll pay you for the effort and toll it will take on you, of course.”

“I do want the science to work, and I really need to do the research, I’d just not thought about doing it myself, for you.”

The way she said “for you” made his body tingle a little.

“I know. Think about it, take a week. Once you’ve thought about it for a week, we’ll have dinner and a conversation to decide. No hard feelings if you decide not to, but I can’t think of anyone else in the world who would be more perfect.”

“You don’t even know me, Thomas.” She lowered her voice and the way she said his name caused a small chill to run up his back.

“I know you’re passionate about our world, and that you’re beautiful. What more could I want for my child?”

“There would be a moment when we’d actually have to have sex for this to work. You realize that don’t you?” She choked on the word sex.

“I know where babies come from Melissa.” He chuckled.

“Yes, but I’m being serious. That’s why I thought you could pick someone you were intimate with. I’m certainly not ready for a relationship.”

“Right, because of the divorce.” He cringed at the mistake. He wasn’t supposed to know that about her.

“How do you know that?”

He thought quickly. “You introduced yourself as Miss Rancic, but your business cards had a different last name.” He was proud of himself for thinking quick on his feet.

“Oh, yes, well, I don’t really like to talk about that.”

He couldn’t believe that worked. “We don’t have to have a relationship if you’re not ready for one. You can be as involved or uninvolved in the child’s life as you want to. No pressure.”

“I’ll think about it. I have a patient coming in, so I have to go. A week.” She didn’t say goodbye, she just hung the phone up. He took that as a sign she would think of nothing else for the week so at least he’d get an answer. Now it was just a matter of waiting.

He found it difficult to get anything done the rest of the day. It was a very busy day and his assistant had come in three times already and talked for at least a minute before he actually heard her. There was something seriously wrong with him. His phone rang and he jumped before almost dropping it trying to answer. It could be her, with her decision!

“Big brother!” It was his brother, AJ, and he couldn’t help but be a little bit disappointed.

“Little man, to what do I owe this pleasure?”

“Two weeks from today is Leona’s birthday party at Mom and Dad’s. While I know you loathe them, your niece has asked for her favorite uncle to attend.”

“I’m her only uncle, and since she’s barely three, I doubt she asked for me specifically.”

“Well, I’m asking. You can’t say no to me and it would mean a lot to our parents and Emma if you came.”

“I’ll be there. Can I bring a guest?”

“Only if she’s not incredibly slutty. It’s two weeks from tomorrow and don’t buy anything for Lee that makes noise. That crazy-eyed doll you got her last year finally stopped talking. No more of that.”

“I don’t hang around sluts.” Thomas pretended to be hurt. “I’ll get her something that only makes a little noise.”

He hung up the phone before his brother could protest. He knew the person he wanted to bring, but it would depend on her answer. His brother was the perfect son. He had gotten lucky and met another were-bear in college and had three perfect little daughters. Emma was the perfect daughter-in-law and their whole little family made Thomas feel completely inadequate.

***

“Are you going to do it?” Tilly sat across from her eating some noodle and meat mash up she’d created from leftovers at her house. She always had the weirdest lunches.

“I don’t know, Tilly. He gave me a week. It’s only been two days. A baby is a big commitment. I can say it’s for science, but if I carry something for nine months then I am sure there will be an attachment on my part.”

“Of course there will be to the baby, and probably its handsome daddy, too. You’ve had a hard road with men, and you’ve certainly not been treated the way you should. There’s honor in the were-bear culture. I think he would treat you like a princess and you could do a lot worse.”

“I’m not ready for that type of relationship, but think about how many doors this will open if it’s successful? I won’t even have to tell him about the effects on me.”

“No, you can’t go into something like this with dishonesty. You need to tell him all the risks that are involved.”

Melissa knew she was right, but she didn’t want to tell him. It was only a possibility that anything would happen to her, and he might not do it if he knew the risks. She clearly had a lot more to think about than she thought she did. The good thing was lunch was over and they were going to have a very busy day.

Before she went to greet her next patient, she checked her phone to see five missed calls. Nathaniel was at it again. Her ex was constantly trying to be in her life despite the divorce being final. They were still entangled by debt and his inability to let her go. That was another thing that gave her pause on the baby side of things, he would be completely unavoidable while she was pregnant. The money could help her get rid of him because she could pay off anything in both their names and get him off of her credit once and for all. She really needed to sleep on it for a few days. If she didn’t have work, that’s what she would do.

The day was over quickly and she was excited she could mark pelican off her list of shifters to meet. It was amazing to her how many species there were. The couple was having trouble conceiving due to the female only having one ovary. It was a problem that occurred within human women, but was treated a bit differently in the supernatural world. Melissa was thrilled she would get to help them.

“Tilly, you want to go to dinner? I don’t want to go home in case Nathan is waiting for me.”

“That man is still stalking you?” Tilly walked around turning off the lights.

“I don’t call it stalking so much as annoying me by showing up and calling me every hour, sometimes twice.”

“What exactly is your definition of stalking?” Tilly asked, her voice high pitched like it got when she was trying to make a sarcastic point.

“Just go to dinner with me, please?”

“Okay, but you need to establish some boundaries with that man.”

They went to a smaller Italian place close to the office. It was a place Nathaniel wouldn’t go to because he owed the owner some money. She really had picked a winner for a husband. He owed money all over town. Nathan wasn’t good with money, had a gambling problem, and a drug problem. He was pretty much the perfect storm of dysfunction and it was the reason her credit was so terrible.

She was not expecting to see Thomas at the restaurant with another woman, but right when they were getting settled into their seats there he was in a corner booth with a blonde. She couldn’t tell if the girl was pretty, but she assumed she was. There was a tiny spike of jealousy that moved through her before she could stop it, but she held her head up and smiled at him. He smiled back and raised his wine, causing the woman to turn around and give her a once over. She was beautiful, as Melissa had suspected.

Tilly turned at that moment to see what she was looking at and gasped loudly. She kicked Tilly under the table. Thomas was still smiling and there was no doubt he’d heard Tilly’s shocked inhale of breath. So much for being cool and acting like it was no big deal.

It was still better than dealing with Nathaniel, who was calling her at the moment. He was more than likely at the apartment they used to share and wondering where she was. It was her own fault for allowing him to come around at all. He made her feel weak and, sometimes, she was a little scared of him. It would be nice to have someone to take care of her. She found herself staring over at Thomas but shook out of it when the waiter showed up.

“I’m not going to say a word,” Tilly said, but it was obvious she was dying to give Melissa her opinion.

Once their food came, she busied herself eating pasta and talking about work. She noticed when the blonde went to the bathroom and Thomas rose from the table. He was coming over.

“Ladies.” He smiled as he stood next to the table.

“Who’s that blonde lady?” Tilly asked immediately and stared up at him.

Melissa’s face felt hot as the blood rushed to her cheeks. “Tilly,” she tried to say under her breath.

“That’s Cherie, she’s an actress. Had a commercial for some type of powder you add to water for fiber or something recently. Nice girl.”

“How’d you meet her?” Tilly wasn’t going to stop.

“I met her a little earlier at a bar we both go to, and decided to have dinner.”

“Well, you’d better wear protection.”

Melissa was horrified with her friend. Why she would say something like that was beyond her. It hadn’t been long enough for her to make her decision, and she knew what Tilly was implying.

He was speechless, opening his mouth to speak and then closing it again. His date was returning to the table, so he nodded at them both and walked away. Melissa wanted to sink into the floor.

“I can’t believe how embarrassing you are.”

“What?” Tilly smiled. She’d never had any problems embarrassing her friend. “Now he’ll be thinking of you while he’s banging her.”

“That’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard.”

She could never stay mad at Tilly for long, but the whole thing made her feel like she was crazy. It wasn’t like she had any claim over the man but part of her still felt betrayed he was on a date when they were making such an important decision. Her phone rang again. Nathaniel’s messages were probably getting angrier.

“Can I stay with you tonight? I don’t want to put you out,” she asked, ashamed of her situation.

“Of course, we can have a slumber party with the girls and watch Disney movies.”

“Sounds perfect.” Melissa would deal with her crazy ex another night. Tonight she just needed a break and to clear her mind.

***

A week was over before he knew it. Thomas paced in his office, not really wanting to call her first thing in the morning. That would seem a bit desperate. It was hard but he resisted the urge, she would just be getting to work and starting her day.

“Janet, bring me some coffee, please,” he called out to his assistant, “and a donut or two.”

“Is everything okay sir? You don’t eat donuts.” She had a point.

“You’re right. Bring me an oatmeal with fruit, a banana, and some yogurt.”

He was a healthy eater unless he was stressed. After he finished eating, he settled back into his chair and tried to decide what to do next. His phone started to buzz and he saw it was a text from Melissa. She asked if he was available. After thinking really hard about what to say back to not seem too eager, he settled on 'I am available' and waited.

“Hello,” he answered on the third ring.

“Mr. McMillian?”

“Call me Thomas, Miss Rancic, please, I think we’re past the formalities.”

“Okay, then call me Melissa. I’ve decided to accept your offer. I wouldn’t even take the money if my ex-husband hadn’t buried me in debt and my mom wasn’t really sick. I can’t afford not to take the money, but it makes me uncomfortable because I would do this for you for free. I’m thrilled that I’ll be able to see if my research will work and the possibility of it helping other people in the future. There are some risks to the baby that we’ll need to meet to talk about, and, of course, we’ll need to set up a timeline. Can you come in for an appointment sometime this week?”

“Melissa, I think we can go out to dinner to talk about these things. It seems a little too formal to have an appointment and talk about something so life-altering. Let’s plan for dinner tomorrow night.”

He was thrilled she wanted to do it, his mind was racing with the possibility of having a son or daughter sooner than he thought. In his culture, a were-bear was only as good as his offspring. That had been drilled into him from the beginning.

His parents were raised by very strict rule followers, but they were the last of the were-bears in each of their territories. No one in his family knew why the population had dwindled so, but his mother told him every year they knew of less and less.

“Thomas?” Melissa had been talking to him and he’d completely zoned out.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

“I said I think I can do it artificially if you don’t want to have sex in order to plant the seed.”

“That would be more difficult for you, and probably not as efficient, correct?”

“Yes, but it’s a possibility.”

“No, we’re both adults and we’re both mature. We can do it the natural way and not develop any sort of feelings or obligations, can’t we?”

“I think so.”

He truly wasn’t sure he could sleep with her and not become slightly more interested, but he would do it for the sake of their child. A relationship might not work out and then the child would have parents that didn’t get along. It was really the perfect plan. He’d slept with Cherie a couple of times that week and he wasn’t really into her like that.

“Okay, well then, it’s settled. We can meet up for dinner in two nights. I have some work obligations the next couple of nights. I’m very happy you’ve decided to do this for me. Let me put you into contact with my accountant so he can set up your payment.”

After he gave her the information for his accountant and hung up, he was both thrilled and nervous. This was happening and soon he would have a child to carry on his name. AJ had been given their father’s name, Abraham Joseph, since he was the first and Thomas had been given his uncle’s name. He’d never met his uncle, only knew he died before he could have children to carry the name on.

His dad had always put pressure on him to live up to his name. It was interesting that more pressure wasn’t put on AJ since he actually had their father’s name, but he’d always sort of skated by.

That’s why Thomas ran McMillian’s Company and AJ got to be an entrepreneur. Now he had to find a way to tell his parents he was going to have a baby with a human woman and she was going to have to take fertility treatments with unknown consequences to make it happen. It wouldn't be easy. He needed a drink.

***

Melissa hung the phone up and waited for Tilly to stop screeching her excitement before going to get her lunch from the refrigerator. She really hoped she was making the right decision for herself and her research. She found herself wondering if his work commitments were dates with other women. That was something she was going to have to reign in fairly quickly if she wanted to make it through nine months.

“Hi, sweetheart. Tilly.” Melissa looked up to see Nathan walk into the break room with a brown paper bag. “I thought I would come and have lunch with you today.”

“Don’t call me sweetheart, what do you want Nathaniel?” Melissa wasn’t in the mood for him today, or any day really.

“I need some money.”

“Of course you do.” Melissa rolled her eyes. It was a reaction she couldn’t help when it came to Nathan.

“You need to quit calling Melissa every few minutes, Nathan, it’s not healthy,” Tilly said out of the blue.

“You never have liked me, Til, and I think it’s good that we can still have an amicable relationship even though we’re no longer together.”

“Amicable would be you giving her space to breathe, amicable would be not calling her all day and coming by asking for money. Why don’t you get a job, Nathan? She carried you the whole time you were married, and now she’s not responsible for carrying you anymore.”

It was true, everything Tilly was saying, but it wasn’t good to point it out to him. His face was turning red and Melissa could tell things were about to turn really ugly for everyone involved in the room.

“Tilly, why don’t you go check the appointment book and see who is coming in next?” She gave her a nervous smile and jerked her head to the door.

“Fine,” Tilly huffed and walked to the door.

“You know you’re lucky I didn’t sue you for alimony, Melissa. I still could if you aren’t careful. You owe me this for agreeing to the divorce, for allowing you to make a fool out of me.”

Melissa knew he was bluffing, he didn’t have the money to sue her for alimony, and he had a record so it would hardly stand up in court that he’d use whatever she gave him to live a clean and respectable life style. It was a huge joke that he would even say something that stupid, but he was good at making threats.

“How much do you need Nathan?”

“Just three hundred. I got a good investment deal going, I’ll pay you back.”

“I thought you might use it to pay the motorcycle off that's in both our names. There aren’t that many payments left, but this month is way overdue.”

“I’ll use the money I make back to pay it, promise.”

Melissa sighed and walked over to her purse to grab her checkbook. She knew better than him doing anything but buying drugs and booze with the money, but it was easier to just give it to him then listen to his threats and yelling for hours. One day, maybe soon, she’d get away from him. She certainly couldn’t let him know she was going to have any money from Thomas. He’d try to take it all. Some things would get paid off, and he just wouldn’t know about it. It would be a nice change for the phone not to ring night and day with people trying to get paid.

 

HAPTER THREE

 

Thomas had been putting off calling his mother to tell her the news. It was the day of his dinner with Melissa to discuss all the ins and outs of their plan. His mother was a strong believer in fate and always thought he’d meet a nice were woman to settle down with despite there being a shortage of them in New York. He’d once asked her if there wasn’t some type of network or association that kept up with the bears in the world and she’d gone really quiet.

Later, his father had told him they’d fallen out with the elders due to something his father had done when he was younger. Neither one of his parents would tell him what that was, so it was another reason he assumed they never heard or met with others of their kind. Maybe they were the outcasts, cut off from the society they’d once belonged to.

“Mom,” he finally called and she answered on the first ring, of course. It had been a couple days since they talked so she was probably worried about him.

“Tommy, are you okay, are you sick? Why haven’t you called your mother?”

“I’m fine, Ma, I’ve just been busy with work.”

“Work, work, work is all you men ever do. You need to find a hobby or settle down and start a family.”

He took a deep breath. His mother knew nothing about his inability to get a woman pregnant. He’d been able to keep it a secret from her for a while and there was no reason to tell her now.

“That’s actually why I’m calling. I’ve met someone who wants to have my baby.”

He held the phone away from his ear while she screamed for his father and then squealed into the phone.

“Tommy, that’s incredible! Are you getting married, are you going to bring her to meet us, is she too young for you? Don’t answer any of that. Oh honey, I’m so happy!”

This was his chance to tell her she was simply going to have his child. There wouldn’t be a wedding or a relationship. It would just be a baby. He couldn’t bring himself to do it though. It was too much to throw on his mother, she wouldn’t approve one bit.

“I knew fate would bring another bear into your life, you just had to be patient.”

“Mom, she’s human.” That part, at least, he could be honest about.

She didn’t say anything and just breathed heavily into the phone for a minute. “I suppose,” she started quietly, “if there aren’t any bears you’ll have to make due with a human woman.”

“I think you’ll like her, Mom, she’s nice.”

“Well, I should hope she isn’t mean, son. We shall see, bring her to your niece’s birthday party and I’ll decide then.”

After that statement, there was no way he was going to tell his mother she was just going to have the baby and move on. He’d simply have to find a way to tell his parents they split up after the baby was born.

“Okay, I will see you then.”

“Mr. McMillian, Mr. Blair Schmitt is on the phone for you.” Janet poked her head into his office.

“Tell him I’m in a meeting.” He knew Blair would just keep calling if he knew he was in his office.

“This is the third time he’s called, sir.”

“Fine, put him through, and Janet, see if you can make reservations at the Owl and Pond for seven tonight will you?”

“Hello, Thomas, nice of you to answer me.”

“Blair, what do you want that you had to call three times?” Thomas asked when his friend yelled obscenities at him the minute he answered the phone.

“Just wanted to let you know that Melissa’s ex-husband had lunch with her at her office today. I saw him go in with a bagged lunch. Or I suppose it could have been a bag with his sperm,” Blair said thoughtfully. “Either way he was there with her.”

“One, why the hell would it be a bag of his sperm? And two, are you spying on her, Blair?”

“Just a bit.”

“Why are you spying on her?”

“For the bet, of course. The stakes are high. I have a lot of people making bets on dates you fall in love or everything falls apart.”

“Stop spying on her, you lunatic!”

“I’m a P.I., Thomas, it’s what I do. You can’t ask me to stop working a job can you?”

“I most certainly can. I’m the one who asked you to do it. You aren’t even a real private investigator.”

“That hurts, man. I’ll see you at the Owl and Pond tonight? Don’t worry, I’ll hide behind my menu and then a plant strategically placed near my table.”

“Blair, if you show up tonight, I will fight you. And stop flirting with Janet for information on my schedule, you freak.” He seriously was going to have to put a restraining order on him.

“Fine, just fine. You’re no fun at all. I’ll find something else to do, but there is something you should know about her ex-husband.”

“Really?”

“I don’t know that I want to tell you now that you’ve hurt my feelings.”

“Blair,” Thomas yelled, his patience growing thin.

“He’s Nathaniel Burr and he owes a lot of people money. This includes my drug dealer and some other very bad people. If they wanted to hurt him, they might try to get to Melissa since she’s still in his life, you know.”

“I’m not touching the fact that you have a drug dealer, Blair, but is he dangerous?”

“Yes, so be careful.”

“Okay, thank you, and stay away from us tonight.”

“You’re welcome, and I’m glad you can see how useful I can be.”

Thomas hung up, not sure how to take the news that Melissa’s ex-husband was such a bad guy. He wasn’t worried about his safety. He could take care of himself. He wondered how the guy would take someone he clearly still wanted to be around having another man’s baby. He was worried about Melissa’s safety.

“Reservations are confirmed, sir.” Janet popped back in and gave him a thumbs up.

***

Melissa had spent a pretty long time getting ready for the dinner. She felt silly since it was a business meeting more than it was a date, but she figured she might as well look good. They were going to a really expensive restaurant, according to his text, and she didn’t frequent those that often. She’d stopped by to check on her mom and found the nurse reading to her.

“Mel, you’re so pretty,” she said.

“Thanks, Angela. Has she spoken any today?”

“A little, mostly to tell me she was hungry, but her voice is gone and she’s incredibly weak. It’s few and far between.”

“I’ll be back to stay tonight,” Melissa promised and hurried out the door to wait for Thomas. She’d told him to pick her up at her mother’s house. It would be easier. By the time he’d arrived to get her, she was feeling pretty nervous.

“You look lovely.” He climbed out of the back of a car. That wasn’t something she’d really thought of. This was a very rich guy, and of course he didn’t have to drive himself around.

“Thank you, I’m excited to try this place. I’ve never been.”

He held the door open for her and she climbed in. Smoothing her dress before he got in, she nodded at the driver. The whole thing was completely bizarre to her. She knew he had money, but she’d never really stopped to consider how much money he might actually have.

The restaurant had a long line outside of it, and her stomach growled in response. She wished she’d had the foresight to at least grab a small snack. To her surprise, when they exited the car he led her right to the front of the line and stepped in front of the first person waiting.

“McMillian, Thomas,” he said and took her hand.

The host led them right inside to a table that was already sat with waters and a small ring of candles. It was a gorgeous restaurant and for a minute she forgot to sit down. He stood behind her having pulled the chair out and she just stared at the paintings on the wall. He cleared his throat and she shook out of it.

“Sorry.” She took her seat and he pushed it gently beneath her.

He ordered for both of them and she just let him, being too overwhelmed by the menu to decide what she wanted.

“So how was your day?” He smiled at her.

It was such a handsome smile and it made his eyes crinkle in the corners. She hadn’t noticed that before. It was nice.

“It was busy as usual. Mom wasn’t talking too much. She was having one of her internal days.”

“Internal days?”

“That’s what I call it when she goes into herself. It’s not that she can’t talk, she just doesn’t want to. Her illness makes her weak and the words are too hard to get out, so she keeps to herself.” She hadn’t even meant to start talking about her mother, the words just sort of spilled from her.

“That must be hard.”

“It can be, but she has good days, too. I look forward to those.”

“I can imagine.” The waiter came and brought a bottle of wine, pouring both of them a tall glass. “You know what I like about our arrangement? There’s no pressure. I’m not trying to impress you and you’re not trying to impress me. We’re just two people planning to have a baby without all the crap that comes along with it. We won’t grow to resent each other. We’ll just be parents.”

She tried not to think of how hard it had been to choose an outfit. He wasn’t trying to impress her so she could simply relax now and just talk about the deal.

“I guess we should get down to talking about the baby now.” She took a sip of her water and cleared her throat. It was true she was stalling, but she had to tell him and it was now or never.

“Okay, I’m all ears.” He smiled and unnerved her even more as she searched for the right words to tell him about the risks.

“There are some risks to the baby involved in being carried by a human mother. I can’t know all of them because it’s never been done before, but there are some things you need to know.”

“What type of risks? Death?” He leaned forward, alarm showing on his face.

“No, with miscarriages it’s the same risk as if I were carrying a human baby. This is more to do with its supernatural abilities. For example, the baby might not be able to develop as fast or exactly the same as a pure-bred shifter would. There could be some delays or possible problems with their gifts.”

“Okay, so they might not be able to shift right away, is that what you’re saying?”

Melissa knew it was a lot more complicated than that. The baby could have issues where it only shifted half its body or some other strange scenario. The chances of that happening were very low, so she debated whether she should tell him the whole truth, or just wait and see what happened. It was a hard thing to predict, and it was hard to know if the defect in the shifting would hurt the baby somehow. A baby who ended up somehow deformed in some way would have special needs and then they would be signing up for a completely different job raising it.

“Yes, or at all. There’s a risk this baby would have your genes but remain mostly human so it wouldn’t be able to shift at all. This isn’t something I can gauge. Once I am further along in the pregnancy, there are tests I can run, observations I can make, so we’ll know more, but until then, I don’t have an answer.”

He was quiet for a minute. There was a possibility if he thought the baby wouldn’t be like him that he would change his mind and not want to have one. She had gone over the way the dinner would go in her head several times and that was her least favorite outcome. She had started to get used to the idea that a baby was happening, and felt she would be disappointed if he backed out.

“Okay, so there’s a chance, but there’s also a very good chance he or she would be completely normal, as well,” he said.

“That’s true.” She smiled, liking that outcome much better. It was good to be optimistic, but she had to be realistic. They were messing with something they’d not messed with before. There were all kind of unknowns.

“Then it’s settled, we are destined to bang.”

She choked on her wine and coughed, grabbing a napkin to put over her mouth. Her cheeks flushed and she tried to catch her breath.

“I was just kidding. I’m sorry I choked you to death.” He had reached across the table and put his hand on hers while she flailed about.

“It’s okay,” she managed to say.

“I was trying to lighten the mood of a very serious moment and I probably should have just left it alone.”

“You just took me off guard. We wouldn’t start trying until the treatments had around a month to work and then we’d only really need one good time because I would be so fertile from the treatments.” It was hard to talk about having sex with him in such a clinical way, but she had to try.

“That’s great. I like knowing a timeline for things to happen. It will allow me to be a lot more prepared.”

“Happy to help.” She smiled and was happy the food came so they could be distracted getting ready to eat, putting on condiments and arranging their plates.

The food was really delicious and she was happy to talk about lots of other things.

“Tell me about your family Melissa, brothers or sisters?”

“No, just me and Mom. Dad took off when I was three and she raised me by herself while trying to clean people’s houses. She worked her ass off so I could go to medical school. She’s all I have. How about you?”

“One older brother, the golden child. He can do no wrong. He’s got three little girls now that give him a fit. You’ll get to meet them all in about a week, my niece’s birthday party.”

“Oh, we’re doing family occasions together?”

“We are indeed. They are going to want to meet the mother of their new family member. Especially one coming from me instead of AJ. Don’t worry, they’ll love you.”

Melissa wasn’t so sure; she wasn’t their kind and the circumstances by which they were going to have the baby weren’t necessary something a parent would be thrilled about.

“They know about the arrangement?”

“They will. I’ll tell them before you have to meet them.”

“What do they think now?”

“That I’m seeing a human girl who wants to have my child.” He gave her a guilty look and dove into his pasta.

“Thomas, that’s terrible.”

“I’ll tell them, I will.” She couldn’t help but melt when he pouted like a scolded child, but she was still completely worried about meeting his parents now. A thought hit her.

“Are you scared of what they’re going to think?”

“What? No!” He was talking through a mouthful of food.

“Yes, you are, you liar. You’re worried they’re going to think we are messing with nature or something like that aren’t they?”

He shook his head fast, throwing pasta at her as some of it had hung out of his mouth. She didn’t hesitate in throwing a piece of bread at him immediately. It bounced off his head. He got a mischievous gleam in his eye as he picked up some asparagus.

“Thomas, I’m sorry. It was a reflex. You’ll get us kicked out.”

He launched the asparagus and it went down her dress. It was warm and gooey causing her to squirm uncomfortably. She started laughing and couldn’t stop as she tried to pull it out of her cleavage. They’d drawn attention to themselves now and she had to excuse herself to the bathroom. There were several disapproving looks as she made her way through the tables.

When she returned, he’d ordered dessert and a giant piece of chocolate cake with lots of decorations sat on the table.

“We can call a truce over dessert.” He smirked and handed her a fork.

“I can’t believe you threw asparagus into my dress in such a nice restaurant.”

“If you knew me a little better darling, you wouldn’t be a bit shocked.” He winked at her and took a giant bite of cake getting a lot of it on his face. He was becoming too adorable. She needed to be really careful.

Once they’d eaten enough cake to feel both gluttonous and not wasteful, they left. The car ride back was mostly silent. She could still feel some of the food inside her dress.

“I should make you pay the dry cleaning bill,” she joked, breaking the silence.

“Take your dress off and I’ll take care of it.” He wiggled his brows at her and she giggled but quickly turned away. There was no flirting allowed in a business arrangement. He noticed the change, but was nice enough not to comment.

He walked her to mother’s door and she stood beneath the porch light, not really sure if they should hug or shake hands. It was an awkward moment of silence.

“I had a great time, Melissa. You’re really a joy to be around.”

“I feel the same way, Thomas.”

She thought for a minute he was going to kiss her, but he took her hand and kissed it instead. Then he smiled and went back down to the car. She watched him go for a second, but wanted to get in quickly just in case Nathan was lurking about. He’d not come to her mothers in a long time, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t.

Her phone was off and she didn’t really want to turn it back on knowing he would have called a million times by then. She decided to deal with it in the morning and went to bed instead. She’d need to be up early anyway, and there were a lot of things to process after that dinner.

She was going to need to try a lot harder not to be attracted to Thomas or she was going to get hurt. They had established the rules, and the best thing for the kid they would be bringing into the world was to stick with them. She could do it, because she had to.

 

HAPTER FOUR

 

“Melissa,” Tilly called from outside the door where she was getting everything ready. “Are you in here?”

“Where else would I be? Come in.”

Tilly walked in to see a long line of needles and other equipment set up. “You have an appointment for you on the schedule and you have me marked down to assist. Have you lost your mind?”

“Surely you didn’t think I’d be able to give myself these shots did you?”

“Oh, you know I’m not good with needles!” Tilly tried to leave, but she reached out and grabbed her arm.

“Listen, I really need your help and I know you can do it. Just pretend you’re injecting a piece of fruit.”

“Fruit doesn’t move about and squeal.”

“True, but I’m a tough piece of fruit, Tilly. There’s only seven shots.”

“Seven.” Tilly’s face went a bit white and she leaned on the counter for support.

“Let’s try a small one first.” She rolled her sleeve up and sat down in the chair pointing to the first needle Tilly would need to use. Watching her walk over to the needle and dramatically pick it up, she rolled her eyes. It wasn’t that hard. Tilly was approaching her with the needle and she was shaking, visibly.

“This is not easy for me.”

“Okay, you know what, you’re going to stab me or yourself. Call Dr. Martin. I’ll wait.”

Dr. Martin was a younger fertility doctor who would come in from time to time to assist her with a troubling case or if there were too many appointments at one time. He was reliable, and could hold a needle straight. He did mostly house calls and weekend work, so it was good that she could call him when she needed him. Tilly called him Dr. Dreamy Eyes, but not to his face.

“Said he could be here by twelve.” Tilly came back in. “What will we do for lunch?”

“We’ll just have it now so I’ll be ready for him.”

They got their lunches heated up and sat across from each other in the breakroom. “I’m sorry I couldn’t do the shots for you.”

“It’s okay Tilly, I didn’t realize needles bothered you as badly as they do.” She thought her friend was going to melt into the floor. It would have been funny had she not really needed her help.

“I’ve never much cared for them since I was a little girl.”

“Well, I can’t have you passing out on me. Dr. Martin will be quick with them. Hopefully, he won’t ask too many questions.”

“He will because he really likes you.”

“Dr. Martin? He does not.”

As if on cue, the handsome curly brown head popped into the room with a bright smile.

“Good afternoon, Melissa. I hear I’m needed to give a patient some shots.”

His bright blue eyes twinkled as he walked toward her. She had to admit he was handsome, but he was so young.

“I do, Bruce. The shots are actually for me.”

He rushed over and put his hand to the back of her head concern in his eyes. “Are you sick, Melissa?”

“No, I’m fine.” Melissa couldn’t help but blush under his touch. “I’m actually going to help a client have a baby.”

His face fell as he looked to Tilly in disbelief. She just shrugged at him and then he turned back to her. “Not a were-baby?”

“Yes, actually, Bruce, a were-baby. I’m finally going to get to try out some of my theories on a human being able to support a supernatural fetus. It’s very exciting.”

“It’s stupid, not to mention dangerous.” Bruce stood and started to pace the room. “You don’t know what you’re doing to your body by putting those things in there. What’s even in these shots you’re planning to take?”

“Tilly, will you go mind the desk? This may take a bit longer than I originally thought.” She could tell her assistant did not want to go out, but she did finally get up and leave. Melissa closed the door behind her.

“You know I’m right,” Bruce said as he sat down at the table across from her.

“There’s some risk to my plan, I know that. I’ve been studying Brennan Thomas and her work. She’s successfully added were DNA to a human to help with healing. It was controversial, but it worked for her. This is something that’s being done, and can be done. It just needs a subject to see what tweaks need to be made.”

“Why does that subject have to be you, Melissa?” Bruce stood and walked over to her taking her shoulders in his hands. She tried not to look into his gorgeous eyes as he gently shook her. “Look at me, please. I care about you. I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

She broke free from his hold, mostly because she was being sucked in to his concerned face. Maybe Tilly was right about him liking her, but she couldn’t get distracted by that now. She had to start somewhere with her research, and it might as well be with her.

“I’m doing this, Bruce. I need help to do it, but if you’re not comfortable, I can find someone else to help me. I would never want to put you in a bad position.”

“Oh no, if you insist, then I’m monitoring you.” He pulled his phone out and dialed someone, never taking his eyes off of her. “Richard, clear my schedule today, please. Something has come up that requires the rest of my day.”

“Thank you, Bruce.” Melissa smiled, but she knew he wasn’t happy with her. “Let’s go ahead and get started.”

They walked down the hall to exam room one where she’d set everything up. There were seven needles lined up on the table, each of them with something different in them. She wasn’t sure what a combination of all of them would do so she’d chosen the exam room with an attached bathroom just to be safe.

“So many?” Bruce looked at her in alarm. “What’s in them?”

“Various parts of the were DNA that make up the reproductive system. There’s shots specific to male and female anatomy. Some of them are simply their basic structures to help my body absorb what makes the were-bears so unique.”

“Wait a minute, you’re going to conceive a bear? That’s going to be a huge baby.”

“I think that given what I’ve seen, the baby will grow according to what the mother can handle. The baby won’t be any bigger than a normal human baby.

“You think?”

“Yes, Bruce, I think. I know there are a lot of risks involved in this. I’m not going into it blind, but I am doing it, so you’re just going to have to trust me.”

“I don’t like it, but I’ll try and trust you.”

“So the first four can go into my arm into the vein. Two in one and two in the other. The next two are intramuscular shots so my thighs would be the best place, then the last can go into my hip. This helps spread out everything through my body and helps me from being really sore in one spot.”

She was happy she’d shaved her legs that morning as she removed her slacks and coat. At least she could leave the tank top beneath her coat on for a little coverage. Bruce was a professional, but that didn’t make her any less apprehensive about being in her underwear in front of him.

“I’ll try to go quick with them,” he said as he rubbed a cotton ball with alcohol on her arm.

The first shot stung a bit, but it wasn’t too bad. The second one made her arm go numb for a couple of seconds. That was something she kept to herself. The third one hurt, badly. She tried to mask the pain, but it felt like fire was spreading through her arm and a light sweat broke out all over her body.

“That one hurt you, you need a break?” Bruce was very observant. It’s what she knew made him an excellent doctor.

“Just a minute.” Finally, the pain subsided, but it was still there. She wondered if it would hurt as it spread through her blood stream. He switched back to the other arm for the next one and it didn’t hurt, then the two in the thighs were painless although she felt a bit dizzy. She chalked it up to taking so much into her body at once.

The one in her hip felt funny—it didn’t hurt, but it was thick going in. She could feel every bit of the liquid as it entered her body and started to move up, which was strange.

“That one was a weird one,” she remarked as she pulled her slacks back on.

“How so?”

“It feels thick moving through my body. I can feel it.”

“That doesn’t sound good. You don’t think it will clog anything, do you?”

“No, I think it’s okay. I’ll let you know if anything feels different.”

“Yes, you need to lie down and wait for twenty minutes then I’m going to check all your vitals. How often do you plan on giving these shots to yourself?”

“The three in the hip and thighs are daily. I did it that way so I could do those on my own. The rest are just weekly. I won’t need your help except for on Thursdays.” Her head felt a little fuzzy.

“Melissa, today is Tuesday. Are you feeling okay? Your cheeks are red.”

Her stomach did a flip and the sweat was back, only this time it was significantly more. As much as she didn’t want to be sick in front of Dreamy Eyes, she didn’t have a choice. Managing to get up from the exam table, she stumbled toward the bathroom. He grabbed her before she fell into the door and steadied her in front of the toilet.

“Out,” she managed to say as she motioned for him to leave her alone and everything she had eaten came out violently. Her whole body trembled as she sat on the floor waiting for the nausea to pass. There was no way to know which shot made her sick although if she had to guess, she would go with the thick one. Of course it would be one she had to take every day.

“Melissa, are you okay?” Bruce was right outside the door. He’d heard her throw up, which was a bit embarrassing.

She started to say she was fine when she started to throw up again. This time wasn’t as violent, but it felt like her stomach was caving in from the cramping. She waited a few minutes to see if she would be sick again and then slowly stood up. Her body was weak as she washed her hands and rinsed her mouth out. When she came out of the bathroom she could walk, but very slowly. He led her back over to the table and helped her lay down, rushing out of the room.

When he came back, he had water and crackers. She didn’t think she could take any of either thing, but after some encouragement, she managed to swallow some water. It felt good on her throat, which stung, and she tried to nibble on a cracker. He started to check her vitals and attached a blood pressure sleeve to her arm.

“I’m fine. My body just isn’t used to it yet.”

“I’m still making sure. Something that makes you that sick that fast is not good for your body. I know you know that, but I’m just making sure you are thinking of these things.”

“You can go, Bruce. Tilly can take care of me,” Melissa said weakly, her body just felt really heavy. There was a throbbing in her head that pinged with every heartbeat.

“I’m not leaving until this whole thing has passed and then tomorrow I’ll be here when you give yourself the shots again. You need another medical brain helping you with this if you insist on doing it.”

Melissa didn't have the strength to argue with him. The ferocity she had experienced from being sick in combination with the newly-inserted medication had zapped everything out of her. He was right about having another medical doctor around while performing the trial phase of her research. He would be able to offer her insight on what she didn't notice by having an outside perspective. The more collective research she could obtain, the better prepared she would be to perform the procedure on the next patient. Melissa had been researching this method for so long, putting in countless hours, she refused to let stubborn pride take away an asset.

“Could you grab a blanket out of the supply closet for me? I'm going to lie down until the symptoms pass.”

Melissa’s eyes were already growing heavy with every passing second. As much as it pained her to shut her business down for the day, this experiment was much more important. Not only to boost her medical career in the shifter community but it was also going to provide her a baby. She was already attached to the idea of having a son or a daughter to call her own. A little sickness wasn’t going to stop her from the rewards. And at the moment, the best thing she could do was take care of herself so she could obtain what she was willing to endure this much pain for.

Bruce’s footsteps faded out of the room as he went to retrieve the blanket she had requested. Melissa was almost asleep when she felt Bruce drape it over her prone body.

“Thank you,” Melissa said slightly slurring her words. “I’ll call you when I wake up so we can discuss my vitals.”

Bruce let out a huff. “Melissa, get some rest. I’ll be right here when you wake up. There is no way I would leave a patient under these conditions. I’m appalled you would think I would leave you.”

Melissa fell asleep as her protest died on her lips. A weight had been lifted off Melissa’s abdomen, or at least that’s what she felt like when she woke up forty-five minutes later. She didn’t feel a hundred percent better, but she was able to sit up without running to the bathroom to dry heave. She was going to call that progress.

Bruce was right by her side when she started to stir from her vomit-induced nap.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, rubbing her back in big, strong circles. Melissa was amazed how sore her body felt, the heaving must have done more to her than eject her lunch.

“I’m better,” she said throwing him a shaky smile.

“I’ll be right back. I’m going to get some more testing supplies. I want to run all of your vitals. Don’t get up until I get back. I don’t want you falling.”

Melissa nodded her head as he sprung up and quickly left the room. Right when he was out of sight her office phone rang. Tilly came inside the room with a gigantic smile plastered on her face.

“Your baby’s daddy is on the phone.” She wiggled her eyebrows, making Melissa chuckle. The movement caused her stomach to quiver so she quieted down quickly.

“I’ll take it in my office.”

Bruce was not going to be happy. He made it clear he wanted her to stay where she was, but she was feeling better. Besides, Tilly would be right next to her if anything went wrong on the tiny trip it would take her to get to her office. Bruce would just have to get her vitals there. She would be more comfortable anyway. It was a win for everybody.

Melissa stood up and her stomach sloshed around. Melissa froze as she waited for it to calm down. Tilly came over and helped her pull up her trousers after several failed attempts. The little effort she was expending to get dressed was making her weak. Tilly helped her shrug on her coat and wrapped an arm around Melissa’s waist as they slowly walked back to her office.

“Are you going to be okay?” Tilly asked when Melissa all but collapsed into her office chair.

“I’ll be fine, Tilly. This treatment is going to take some time to adjust to. Even regular fertility treatments are hard on women when they first start out. My body will find its balance soon. It may take a while, but it will come around.”

Tilly stared at Melissa as if she was trying to assess her symptoms just with her eyes. “I’ll be right outside the door if you need me.”

“Thanks. Can you let Bruce know where I am when he comes back?”

“I’ll let Dr. Dreamy Eyes know.” The sparkle came back in Tilly’s eyes banishing most of the worry that had been there since she walked into the treatment room.

Melissa ignored the sweat coating her body, and the nauseous feeling that overrode every other emotion she could have been feeling. She was afraid Thomas would pull the deal if he knew the toll it was taking on her body. She wasn’t lying when she told Tilly it took time for women taking regular treatments to become accustomed to the hormones being injected into their body. Melissa was tripling the hormones and adding cocktails of her own into the mix. She was positive her body could deal with it. It just needed time. She was going to endure whatever these treatments had to offer.

Melissa sucked in a deep breath as goosebumps sprouted on her sweat-chilled body. She could do this, she thought as she lifted the phone.

“How are you doing? I thought I would have heard something from you by now. Today is the day you started your treatments right? Or did I get the timeline mixed up?” Thomas asked when she picked up the phone. His nervous rambling was adorable.

“Sorry, I got busy with other patients. And yes you’re correct; I started the first series of shots today.” Melissa pressed her fist into her stomach, willing it to stay still.

“How did it go?” Thomas asked, making Melissa smile at how eager he sounded. It seemed she wasn't the only one attached to a baby that hadn't been conceived yet. “Wait, did you say shots? How many shots are we talking about?”

“It went great. My body accepted the hormones with no discomfort at all.” Melissa heard the insincerity in her voice when she lied. She could only hope Thomas didn't pick up on it. “I had a series of seven shots today.”

“Seven?” Thomas yelled over the phone. The back of Melissa’s eyes started to throb from the noise. She slouched down in her office chair, unable to stay upright.

“Yes, seven. It’s not as unusual as it sounds, Thomas. And it won’t be every day. I will only need seven shots once a week. I only need three daily.” Melissa’s mouth started to water as she held back the sickness taking over.

“Melissa, I didn’t realize how intense this was going to be. I knew you were going to have to go through some things to make it possible to conceive, but I don’t like the amount of pain you are putting yourself through.”

Melissa would have felt warm and fuzzy if she didn’t feel like death warmed over. Thomas cared for her well-being. That was a trait were-bears were known for. She knew their future child would have one amazing dad. His concern for her gave her more resolve to go through with this.

“Honestly, Thomas. I’m fine. The only discomfort I felt was the needle. I’m not going to let our child down because its daddy doesn’t like shots.”

Thomas sucked in a breath over the phone. He was quiet for a moment. “I can’t believe I’m going to be a daddy. Thank you so much for making this happen, Melissa. I wouldn’t want this to happen with anyone else. I’m going to tell our child, every single day, how brave its mommy was to bring it into this world.” His voice had an air of serenity to it.

“And I will tell our baby what a caring daddy it has.” Both of them were silent as the absorbed their statements to each other. Melissa’s body shivered as her stomach protested the drugs. She knew she needed to get off the phone soon, but she liked talking to Thomas. “Did you talk to your parents about me?” she asked, laying her forehead on the cool wood of her desk.

“I didn’t get a chance to talk to them yet. But I will, I promise. I’m so excited about this Melissa. I will tell them soon.”

“I’m excited, too. I want to remind you, though, there is a chance I won’t conceive or a miscarriage is always something to keep in mind.” She hated to have to be the downer on the conversation, but she was already misleading him on the treatment; she couldn’t, without extreme guilt, not remind him of what could happen.

“Nah, our child is going to be a fighter just like you are,” Thomas said, making Melissa half smile against her desk.

“I have a meeting I need to get to. I’ll call you later. Have a good day.”

“Talk to you later,” Melissa told him, closing her eyes as her body trembled.

She hung up the phone and remained in her position on her desk, willing her body to be the fighter Thomas assumed she was. She felt like she’d pulled that off pretty well; as long as he never saw her after a few shots, she’d be okay.

“I thought I told you not to move,” Bruce said from somewhere inside her office.

Melissa didn’t pick her head from her desk to see where he was.

“I needed to get up,” she said forcing herself off her desk so she could look at him. Bruce stared at her, concern and worry marring his handsome face.

“I don’t like this, Melissa. I don’t like this at all.”

“Bruce, I respect you as a colleague and a friend. I would appreciate you being a part of this, but if you can’t, I will understand. Like I said, I’m doing this. This mild reaction will not deter me. If you want me to find someone else, I will.”

“You call that a mild reaction? I’ve never seen someone vomit with so much force before.”

“Bruce, I don’t want to argue about this. Are you in or are you out? If you can’t do this, there will be no hard feelings.” Melissa’s tone had as much authority as she could infuse into it. She felt kind of bad because he was just being a concerned friend.

“I’m in,” he said after glaring at her.

As mad as he was at Melissa’s decision to continue going through the treatment, Melissa was stunned by the gentleness he used when checking her vitals. He wrote everything down on a chart he had in a file he had brought with them.

“Can I copy those?” she asked, clicking on a file in her computer where she would be storing her data.

Bruce extended the file toward her. When she moved to grab it from his outstretched hand, her body surged. Melissa shot up from her chair and stumbled to the bathroom outside of her office, passing a stunned Tilly on the way. Tilly followed her, stopping Bruce from entering the bathroom.

Tilly held Melissa’s hair back as she purged what little she had taken in after her first vomiting session. When her body was spent of all energy from dry heaving into the toilet, Tilly helped her lean against the wall.

“Are you okay? I mean really okay? None of this fake ‘I’m fine’ stuff.”

“I’m fine, Tilly. I promise. This is a lot for a body to handle. I’m strong though. I’ve got this.”

Tilly kissed her on the forehead before helping her back to her office chair. Bruce was inside her office, pacing the floor. When they walked in, he rushed to help.

“Don’t say anything,” Melissa said, holding up her hand as she tried to suppress the tremors running through it.

Bruce pursed his lips together, but kept quiet. The three of them were all silently staring at each other when Nathaniel walked into Melissa's office.

“Hey, sweetie. I need to drop by your place when you get home tonight. I have some stuff I need to get,” Nathaniel said.

As always he was in his own little world where he only cared about himself. Any other human being would have noticed the tension in the room, or that Melissa was as pale as a ghost.

“Are you really that oblivious? Can’t you see that she isn't feeling well?” Bruce said, stepping in front of the desk blocking Nathaniel from looking at Melissa.

Melissa felt awful and she wanted to fall back to sleep more than anything else. She was not in any condition to deal with Nathaniel and his request. She needed to get rid of him as fast as she could, and she knew the only way to do that was to let him have what he wanted.

“Bruce and I will be working late tonight at the office. I’ll call you when I’m on my way home and you can stop by.” Melissa had every intention of sleeping in her office that night. There was no way she could handle Nathaniel. She would just turn her phone off and deal with him in the morning when she felt better.

“You don’t need to cater to his needs,” Tilly said, moving to stand beside Bruce, officially blocking Nathaniel’s view of Melissa.

“This is between me and my wife. You two have nothing to do with this.”

“Ex-wife. And you need to get out of here. I told you to stop coming in Melissa’s office. This is a medical building. We have to keep a professional atmosphere. Remember the success of this business is what keeps you out of any more debt.”

Melissa watched Tilly’s back as she yelled at her ex. Her whole body shook from the anger pouring out of her. Tilly said just the right thing to get his attention. Nathaniel was stupid, but he wasn't that stupid that he would ruin a place of business that made money he could spend.

“I’ll see you tonight, sweetheart,” Nathaniel said before turning around and walking out of her office.

“You’re not going to your house tonight,” Tilly said. Both she and Bruce turned around to stare at Melissa.

“No. I just said that to get rid of him,” Melissa admitted.

“You can stay the night at my house again.”

“No. I’m going to sleep in the office tonight.” When Tilly and Bruce opened their mouths, most likely to argue, Melissa stopped them. “I’ve slept on that couch almost as much as I’ve slept in my own bed. I need to be near the medical equipment so I can check my vitals. I want to document everything during the treatment. I don’t want to bring any of it home because I’m not feeling well. It makes sense to just stay the night. Now both of you get out of here—I have data to enter.”

Tilly and Bruce turned to walk out the door, but before they disappeared from her view, Melissa’s guilt set in. “Thank you for helping me out. I couldn’t have done it without both of you.”

Tilly turned around and shot her a wink. “Anything for you.”

Bruce didn’t turn around, but Melissa saw him nod his head indicating he heard her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

HAPTER FIVE

 

Thomas reclined in his office chair, putting his hands behind his head grinning widely. He had single-handedly landed one of the biggest clients McMillian ever had. For months, Hilary Dalton kept him and the company on the edge of insanity. She refused to give them her answer on which company she was leaning toward. Thomas had just hung up with her personal assistant telling him that Hilary had just signed the papers making McMillian and Company the chosen one to launch her new scent.

With Hilary Dalton as a client, McMillian and Company would be sky-rocketed into a whole new level of clients. Thomas’ grandfather, Bill, had built the company from the ground up. His grandfather had noticed so many good causes being ignored because they didn’t have the exposure they needed. With that very thought in mind, Bill created McMillian and Company to help get them the publicity they needed. Every year, their fundraising events became more lucrative and extravagant. People looked forward to what they would do next.

In the beginning, his grandfather only took on charities with worthy causes, but as their parties started to attract more high level celebrities at their events, the company expanded to take on other facets of the business. McMillian’s received a new slogan, We don’t just do parties; we throw extravaganzas, pushing the limits of what they could do. And they did.

They were now the most sought-after company, but with Hilary’s business, they would be able to grow the company even further by taking on celebrity-endorsed products. This was all Thomas needed to create another branch of the company. He thought once his father saw the numbers after her campaign was successful, he would come around and be okay with it. His father did everything from home and that was the only reason he was able to get something like this past him.

Janet walked into his office and surveyed Thomas’ posture. “I’m going to guess that was the phone call you’ve been waiting for.”

Thomas ran over to Janet and swung her around the office. She squealed and swatted him until he put her down.

“Hilary signed the papers today. They just faxed them in. We did it. This is exactly what I've wanted to do since I started.”

Janet patted him on the cheek and clucked her tongue. “Now that you’ve got the Dalton account, does this mean you’re going to stop stressing so much? The last time you ate this much junk food was when your parents came to stay with you while their house was remodeled.”

Thomas tensed. Sure, obtaining Hilary’s account was a big deal, but the stress wasn’t coming from the New York socialite. It centered around the curvy doctor that would be carrying his child in less than a month.

His parents were a constant stressor to him because they expected so much. Thomas and his dad butted heads on almost everything. When he told his dad about his plan to expand the family business to include product launches, his father vetoed the idea as soon as the proposal was finished. Thomas refused to let his father deter him from expanding. With the new branch focusing on product introductions, McMillian would be the biggest company in its field, and Thomas wanted to make that happen.

He had been secretly working on getting the branch started under his dad’s nose. Hilary’s account was the clincher. There was no way his father would be able to stop what Thomas had in motion. When Hilary’s newest scent hit the market, McMillian would have others clamoring for them to take on their product releases. Sorry, Dad.

Melissa coming into his life couldn't have happened at a better time. He had been trying to have a child for so long, he was starting to feel defeated. That was the reason he made the appointment with Melissa in the first place. He was desperate. She was his last ditch effort.

His father was going to be furious when he found out what Thomas did without his knowledge. By having a child, it would smooth over some of the drama he just created. Well, maybe it would.

Not that he was having a child just to alleviate his family drama. Seeing his brother, AJ, and his kids pulled at his heart. He wanted to have someone to love, and help steer toward the right path as they grew up to be an adult. The thought of pushing a stroller put a smile on Thomas’ face. Melissa was just the icing on the cake. She was smart, beautiful, and would make an amazing mother to their child. He just needed to keep reminding himself that she was the mother of his child, and only the mother of his child.

They had both made it clear that their child was going to be their top priority. He had seen enough nasty custody battles that he was positive he never wanted to be a part of one. Not that he thought Melissa would ever do that to him. Melissa was also in the middle of an ugly divorce. A relationship was the last thing she needed. Thomas would have to keep his resolve strong when it came to the sexy Melissa.

He picked up the phone and dialed her before he realized what his fingers were doing. Her assistant, Tilly, answered on the second ring.

“Dr. Rancic’s office, how may I assist you?”

“Hey, Tilly, it’s Thomas. Is Melissa around?”

“Um, she’s indisposed at the moment.”

The hesitation in her voice was something new to him. Every time he spoke with her, she was one of two ways. And flirty or inquisitive was not at all what Tilly was giving him right now.

“What’s going on?” Thomas asked.

Tilly was quiet for a second and he was able to hear Melissa over the phone connection even though she tried to muffle it.

“Tilly, would you be able to move my appointments to the end of the week? Bruce will be here and we will be together all day.”

Thomas smile fell from his face. Bruce? Who was Bruce? He didn’t care, remember? That was what he’d just told himself.

“Will do. Thomas is on the phone. He was just asking for you.”

“Oh, I'll get it in my office. Just send Bruce in when he gets here.”

Thomas waited on the phone while the two women had a conversation, ignoring him as he listened in. When he got the confirmation that Hilary was officially a client of McMillian and Company, his first thought was to call Melissa and tell her the good news. His parents were not going to be happy when they found out what he did behind their backs, even though it was going to bring in a massive amount of money. He wasn't sure how AJ would react, so Melissa was the most sensible person to share the news with. Of course, she didn’t know much about the company so she might be indifferent.

His successes would now be linked to her life. She was going to be a part of his life. Even after their child turned eighteen, they would still be interconnected. Graduations, wedding, grandchildren and more. He wasn’t going to let Melissa struggle financially now that she was such a crucial part of his future.

He would have padded her bank account the moment she agreed to carry his child, but he recognized the stubborn tilt of Melissa’s chin. She wouldn’t accept anything that felt like charity to her. Thomas already decided when their child was born, he would pay her a monthly allowance to allow her the luxury of not worrying about paying her bills so she could focus on helping him raise their child. It wasn’t going to be easy to convince her to take the money, but he wasn’t going to play fair either. Using their child’s comfort and needs as an excuse was something he wasn’t afraid to employ.

“Hi, Thomas. How are you?” Melissa said. Her voice sounded tired and he instantly worried about her well-being.

“I’m fine. How are you? You sound tired.” He winced as soon as the words left his mouth.

“I’m a little tired; the hormones are messing with my sleep schedule. My body is trying to get used to it. Is there something you needed?”

Thomas bit his tongue, not wanting to scold her on the importance of taking care of herself. She was a highly-educated doctor. Surely he could count on her not to do anything that would hurt herself and her chances of getting pregnant. When she conceived, that would be a different story. Holding his tongue would go straight out the window as soon as she showed him a positive pregnancy test.

Thomas stopped himself from telling her about landing Hillary’s account. Her exhausted tone and Tilly lying to him about Melissa being unavailable threw him in a dark place. He felt childish for calling her to tell her his big news. Why would she care about his business venture? They weren’t together.

He went back to his usual, casual demeanor. “I just wanted to see when you wanted to get together. We still have some things we need to discuss before c-day.”

“C-day?”

“Conception day. I was going to call it hot, sweaty, bear-sex day, but I felt c-day was more appropriate over the phone.”

Melissa started sputtering over the phone before breaking into weak laughter.

“This is progress. Last time I mentioned making a baby, I almost choked you. Now you just started speaking in tongues. Pretty soon you’ll be able to talk about it without a blush.” Thomas rocked in his office chair picturing Melissa’s pink-stained cheeks as she tried to come up with a retort.

“I did not speak in tongues,” she retorted with a chuckle.

“I’m pretty sure you were inarticulate for a good thirty seconds.”

“Whatever. I’m not sure when I’ll be free, but you’re right, we do need to meet and go over the specifics. Why don’t I call you later when I can look at my schedule?”

“Melissa, you’re looking lovely. Are you ready for our fun-filled day?" Melissa chuckled on the phone as the man Thomas assumed was Bruce spoke.

“Oh, I can’t wait. I’ve been thinking about it all day,” Melissa replied. Thomas thought he heard a bit of sarcasm, but that may have just been wishful thinking.

“Call me when you aren’t busy,” Thomas said, hanging up before she could respond.

Thomas pushed out of his chair and walked around his office. Why was he bothered by it? Melissa wasn’t his. She could do whatever she wanted. Of course he wouldn’t stop her from dating, but he’d need to meet the man hanging around his child. That would come later though, so thinking about this Bruce now was silly. His intercom beeped on his desk and Thomas stalked over to it.

“Yes,” he said harshly.

“Hilary Dalton is here to see you,” Janet said, unaffected by his rude behavior.

“Send her in, Janet. Thank you.” His voice was more calm. He would have to apologize to Janet later or she would let him have it.

Hilary waltzed into his office, her designer perfume that hadn’t even hit the market floating around her. She was sin on heels. Her tight purple dress hugged her as if it were her second skin. The black heels she balanced on were high and lethal-looking. Hilary pushed back her straight blonde hair over her small, boney shoulder. Her brown eyes sparkled under her perfectly-applied make-up as she walked over to Thomas, who was now sitting behind his desk.

Thomas allowed his eyes to wander over Hilary’s super-model body. She was perfection, and she knew it. Thomas personally handed over their bid for her account. He nearly tripped over his tongue when he saw Hilary in person for the first time. The magazines and TV shows she graced didn’t do her justice.

Hilary showed interest in Thomas when he walked in her office, at least he thought she did. The feeling was mutual, but Hilary didn’t act on it. She watched him like a predator as he gave his presentation. Her brown eyes roaming over his body without a care that others were in the conference room with her.

After his pitch, Hilary stayed while the others filed out. Thomas took his time packing up his stuff, letting her take the lead.

“I’ll let you know our decision after we’ve heard the other pitches,” she purred

Thomas and she locked gazes. She had a tilt to her lip showing him she knew exactly what she was doing to him. He had given her the power, and she was wielding it like a pro. Thomas wasn’t an idiot. He refused to mess up the possibility of landing her account by asking her out. He stood back and waited until the right moment came.

Hilary showed up at his office almost weekly. Each time, her dresses became shorter and tighter. She would flounce around telling him about the other options she had to help launch her perfume. Thomas would discuss them with her as his eyes wandered over her body. She would pretend to listen to his advice as she eye-humped him.

Everything would change now. Hilary had signed her launch over to his company. They would work out the details and then they would hand everything over to their team of people to polish it, only showing up if there was a problem, or to the benefit itself.

Hilary no longer needed to toy around with him. The game had just taken an interesting turn.

“I got your papers,” Thomas said, leaning back and allowing his eyes to land on her breasts. The dress was pushing them out, and he was going to appreciate its hard work.

“I know,” she replied with a smirk.

“Are you going to go out with me now?” he asked, no longer beating around the bush. She was gorgeous and he wanted her, and the way she acted around him she wanted him just as much.

“I don’t know. Should I?”

Hilary would be the perfect solution to his Melissa situation. They both knew that they weren’t in it for the long haul. Thomas and Hilary would have some fun getting the sexual tension that had been built up between the two of them since the moment they met out of their systems and go their separate ways. He could tell from the way she played with him that she understood what they would be doing.

When one of them decided it was over, they would walk away. No hurt feelings. And Thomas was more than ready to start enjoying her company. He needed someone like Hilary. Melissa was messing with his head. He didn’t want a relationship, especially with her, and obviously she didn’t want one either or she wouldn’t be hanging out with Bruce.

With his decision made, Thomas got up and walked around his desk until he was in front of Hilary. Her eyes landed on the spot below the button on his pants, making blood rush there uncontrollably.

“I’ll make reservations. My driver will pick you up at seven next Saturday.” He decided to take the decision away from her.

Hilary’s tongue darted out and ran across her painted red lips. He watched as her pupils dilated at his alpha tone, showing him that he made the right call. Hilary was the type of woman that was always in control. From her response to his demand, giving up some of that control seemed to be exactly what she wanted.

“See you at seven. Make it a dark restaurant,” Hilary whispered, getting up slowly allowing Thomas a perfect view down her dress.

“Done.”

Hilary smiled at him, flashing her perfect white teeth before turning and walking out of his office, her ass swaying the whole way. Thomas knew that because he watched it until it was out of sight.

***

Melissa pulled off her lab coat and hopped up on the examination table. Bruce had his back to her as he got everything ready. This would be the second round of the seven injections, and she was apprehensive about the reaction she was going to have. She let her gaze land on his taunt ass before turning bright red. The hormones were doing their job. In just the short week she had been taking the injections, her sex drive had doubled. She found herself checking out males constantly, something she was impervious to before.

Her mom worked hard to keep a house over their head and food on the table. Melissa saw what her dad did to their family and the brunt her mom experienced when he left them. Melissa didn’t have a good male role model growing up. It had been just her and her mom. When she went to college, she threw herself into studying, wanting to make every house her mother cleaned so she could raise her worth it. Medical school turned her into a zombie as she ran off little sleep trying to cram everything she possible could into her over-worked brain. The hectic nature of her life didn’t change after her internship, thanks to her discovery of shifters and her stint in the institution to get her head back on straight. As soon as she got out of the institution, she learned everything she could about the shifter community, basically taking medical school over again. And the topper of everything was her mom’s cancer diagnosis.

She had a couple of boyfriends, but most of them didn’t hang around long enough. Her busy schedule didn’t leave much time for them, and they normally faded away. Nathaniel was the only one to stick around, and that was only because he convinced her to give him more of her time than she really could. He could have ruined everything she worked so hard for. Thankfully, she pulled her head out of the clouds before she allowed him to kill her dreams. She started studying fertility and after the deer incident, she pushed herself to research everything she could about shifter reproduction. Now she was actually able to test the theory on herself.

With that as her life resume, Melissa felt her lack of awareness in the opposite sex was reasonable. Thanks to the hormones she pushed inside of her body daily, she was on light speed to squeeze in all she’d missed. Speaking of squeezing, Bruce had to have the most squeezable butt she ever seen. Her mouth watered as she continued to stare at his ass and the way it filled out his slacks. She’d noticed him before, but now she was really noticing him. It was almost too much for her, her hormones were way ahead of her brain and it was making everything fuzzy.

“Melissa?” Bruce turned around his forehead scrunched with concern.

Melissa’s eyes flew up to meet his face hoping he hadn’t seen her scoping out his goods. “I'm sorry what?” she asked as her body heated with embarrassment.

“I asked if you experienced any other symptoms this week with your injections.”

“Not many from what you saw the last time. I have gotten to a point of only vomiting once after the injections, but I’m not as tired after. I still get really tired upon injection, but it’s only lasting an hour or two the last couple of times. I’ve been having some trouble falling asleep, but other than that, nothing else to report.” Melissa dropped her gaze to her lap.

As a colleague and doctor, Melissa shouldn’t have been embarrassed to admit her over-active sexual thoughts to Bruce. He was assisting her in what was technically her first human trial on the research she had dedicated her life to. Every symptom and side effect should be meticulously documented as medical proof that would later be turned into a medical paper. Knowing all of this, Melissa wasn’t able to form the words 'I’ve been super horny lately' to Bruce. She vowed she would document her symptoms in the data sheet she was keeping. Using medical terminology of course. She was a professional after all.

“I want to try anti-nausea medicine before we do the injections,” Bruce said, pulling out a prescription bottle.

“Already ahead of you. I took some earlier. It should be fully in my system.”

“Smart and beautiful,” Bruce said as Melissa pushed down her pants.

She blushed at his comment, his tight ass flashing through her brain.

“When I’m on my knees vomiting my lunch, I won’t seem as smart or as beautiful,” she joked as Bruce swiped her skin with the alcohol swab.

His hand stilled on her skin, the cool pad causing her lower half to break into goosebumps.

“Why are you doing this, Melissa? I understand having a willing human as a test subject is every researcher’s dream, but I don’t get why you would put yourself through this. Especially being the first subject. Things can go terribly wrong.” Bruce stood up to his full height.

“I am fully aware things can go wrong. We’ve talked about this before. I want to do this. So if you could get on with it.”

Melissa felt instantly guilty for talking to Bruce the way she did.

He was just trying to be a good friend, but she refused to listen to him pleading with her to stop the injections every time he came to her office. She thought she had cleared that up last week. Apparently not.

“Ready when you are,” Melissa said, trying to make amends for being so blunt with him.

Bruce let out a frustrated breath and punctured her skin, pushing the hormones into her body. As the liquid burned though her veins, Melissa focused on her breathing. Her skin turned clammy as pain assaulted her.

“Damn it, Melissa,” Bruce hissed through his teeth. “This is ridiculous. Your body is not acclimating at all.”

“I just finished my first week, Bruce. I need more time. Can you just finish this, please?”

“Did it hurt you this much the first time?” he asked as he the plunger moved down under his thumb.

Melissa gritted her teeth. Her body felt as if the blood had been replaced by liquid magma. She was unable to answer Bruce as all her concentration was focused on not screaming. This was worse than the week before, and Melissa was afraid that next week would be worse.

“Melissa, you need to breathe.” Bruce broke into Melissa’s thoughts. “All right last one,” he said.

She jumped up as soon as the shot was pushed in and ran to the bathroom, almost not making it in time. She wasn’t sure why sometimes the symptoms were worse than others. Sometimes the throwing up wasn’t as violent. Sometimes she wasn’t tired and then there were times like this. Once she’d gotten rid of everything in her stomach, she got up and slowly walked back into the room with Bruce collapsing on the chair closest to her.

Melissa wanted to curl into herself as the medicine took its place, but moving was not something she was capable of doing at the moment. Bruce must have recognized her inability to make her muscles cooperate. He lifted her up and carried her into her office and placed her on the couch.

Melissa vaguely recognized Tilly talking as she tucked a blanket around her.

“Call me if anything changes,” Bruce said to Tilly before Melissa let the darkness take her away from the pain.

 

 

HAPTER SIX

 

“Hon, are you feeling all right?” Tilly’s voice filtered into Melissa’s brain as a warm hand touched her chilled shoulder.

“What time is it?” Melissa asked trying to sit up. Tilly helped her.

“It’s after 5:30. You’ve been asleep for six hours. Bruce called to check on you. He told me to wake you up and make you eat.”

Melissa’s stomach made some very unique noises at the mention of food. As to what those noises meant, she wasn’t sure. The mention of food should have made her feel ravished, but at the same time she remembered the last time she had these injections. Projectile vomiting was not on her list of things to do today. She did a mental check in of her body going through each part. There wasn’t any part of her that wasn’t sore, but that was to be expected with the treatments she was going through. Hopefully, her body would start getting used to it after some time.

“Bruce told me to start you off easy to see what you can handle. I brought you some broth.” Tilly handed Melissa a Styrofoam cup.

Melissa tentatively brought it to her lips. The fragrant soup filled her nostrils making her stomach sound off again. Tilly smiled at her as she chomped on her sandwich. When Melissa sat the cup down, Tilly handed her a sandwich as well.

“You seemed to handle the broth like a champ. Now put some real substance in you.”

Melissa accepted the sandwich and scarfed it down. Her appetite came back with a vengeance. There was a fear that it would make another appearance but once she’d chewed it up she felt a lot better.

“That was so good. Thank you so much.” Melissa said guzzling a bottle of water.

The warm, filling food was making Melissa sleepy again. She wasn’t sure how that was possible since she had slept most of the day, but she recognized her body was adjusting to its new hormone state. If she was going to stay healthy and get through this with as little risk as possible, she needed to listen to her body and give it what it needed.

Melissa yawned as she snuggled into the blanket wrapped around her.

“Do you want to come to my house tonight?” Tilly asked her as she cleaned up the dinner trash.

“No. I'm going to sleep here tonight. I brought extra clothes just in case this happened. I’m so tired, I’m going to go right back to sleep.” Melissa plumped up the pillow and sunk into the couch.

“I'm worried about you, Melissa. You were as white as a ghost when Bruce brought you in here after the injections."

“I’m fine, Tilly. I know you love me and you’re worried, but really, it’s okay. Now get out of here so I can get some sleep.”

Tilly leaned over and pulled the blanket further up Melissa’s body. “Your cell is on the table. I charged it for you. By the way, you and I are going to have a serious talk tomorrow. When I turned on your phone, there were twenty-seven missed calls from Nathaniel. Melissa, this is getting out of hand.”

“Can we talk about it later?” Melissa whined.

She left her cell off for that exact reason. She was surprised Nathaniel hadn’t shown up already. She had been avoiding her phone for days since Bruce and Tilly kicked him out of her office. Tilly was right, she needed to do something with Nathaniel, but it was useless to think about it tonight with her head in sleepy land.

“Yes, we can talk later. And don’t think you are going to get away with it. I’ll let you sleep. Call me if you need anything.”

“Will do.”

Tilly flipped the light switch, bathing Melissa’s office in darkness. The full moon shone through the window giving Melissa some light. She listened as she heard Tilly leave the office and lock it behind her.

As tired as Melissa’s body was, she couldn’t drift off to sleep. She grabbed her phone and dialed Thomas. She promised him she would call him about a time they could meet up and discuss the schedule. Her stomach flipped around at the thought of having sex with Thomas to create a baby. Their baby.

If someone would have told her months ago that she would finally get the nerve to leave Nathaniel and agree to become impregnated by a were-bear for $50,000, she would have thought they needed to be institutionalized. Now here she was with the means to pay off her mother’s medical bills, and finalize her divorce. The weight Thomas had lifted from her shoulders by helping her financially was something she would be forever grateful for. The fact that he was also giving her a baby made him one of the greatest men she had ever known.

Her body felt warm and fuzzy as she dialed her bear savior wanting to talk to him just to see how he was doing. Normally, they talked every day. He would call and ask about the injections and she would give him the watered-down version. Their conversations didn't last more than a couple of minutes and were very clinical, but for some strange reason, Melissa looked forward to them.

She felt bad that she had to let him go so quickly today. He seemed lighter and he sounded like he wanted to tell her something. In fact, Melissa tried to remember the whole conversation, but she was pretty sure he told her that he had some good news. Maybe he told his parents about the arrangement and they took it better than he expected.

Melissa pressed the speed-dial to Thomas' cell and laid back down on the couch.

“Hello,” Thomas answered, but Melissa could barely hear him over the noise in the background.

“Thomas, can you hear me?”

“Hold on,” he yelled over the noise. The loud clatter of people grew softer and almost completely muffled. “Sorry about that. What do you need? Is everything okay?”

His voice was slightly slurred and Melissa wondered how much he had been drinking. Being a shifter, Thomas’ body processed alcohol faster than humans. For him to be slurring his words he must have been doing some impressive drinking.

“Everything’s fine. I told you I would call you later to set up a time we could meet and talk about.”

“C-day.”

Melissa smiled. The way he said c-day, she was certain he was grinning.

“Yes, c-day. If you’re busy, I’ll let you go.”

“I’m just out with some of the people from the office. We are celebrating.”

“What are you celebrating? You told me earlier you had some good news.”

“I landed the Hilary Dalton account. McMillian and Company will be throwing the biggest product launch party ever for her new scent she created.”

Even though Melissa didn’t have much time to watch TV or read magazines that weren’t medical-related, she knew who Hilary Dalton was. Everyone knew Hilary Dalton. She was, at the moment, the biggest name out there. She had her hands in everything from hotels, TV, make-up, clothing, and from what Thomas just said, perfume, as well. She understood why landing the account would be such a huge accomplishment.

“Congratulations. That’s amazing,” Melissa said, feeling some weird form of pride.

She quickly justified it by the fact that he was going to be the father of her child. Of course she would want success for the man they looked up to. Melissa wondered if Thomas would be working closely with Hilary. She was on everything, so Melissa knew how extremely gorgeous she was. Melissa looked down at her blanket covered body and realized there was no comparison.

Hilary was a busy woman. She secretly hoped that Thomas would be working with her personal assistants and never really have any contact with the beautiful Ms. Dalton. She couldn’t understand where the jealousy was coming from. Maybe the injections were not only messing with her libido but also doing a number on her other emotions. If she was this bad now, how bad would she be when she was actually pregnant?

“Thank you. I’ve been working hard to get this account.”

“Hey, Thomas, come on man. We’re doing shots.” Melissa figured it was someone from his work, and she didn’t want to keep him from his party.

“Go on, I’ll talk to you later. Go celebrate.”

“Why don’t we go out to dinner tomorrow? I’ll pick you up at seven thirty,” Thomas said before yelling that he would be right there, and not to take the shots until he got there.

“See you at seven thirty,” Melissa said, hanging up the phone.

She tossed and turned on the couch, trying to find a comfortable position. Melissa would choose the couch over her bed any day of the week. When she first sat on it in the furniture store, she knew she had to get it. For some reason tonight, she just wasn’t singing its praises. The whole Hilary Dalton thing threw her off. What if Thomas decided he wanted someone like her to be the mother of his child?

Melissa rubbed her hand over her not-so-flat stomach, which was a little smaller than normal. The injections suppressed her appetite and the constant nausea was turning out to be an amazing diet. Melissa pictured a baby growing inside of her. She was already altering her future planning to include the child she hadn’t even conceived yet. The thought of losing those plans made her eyes well up. After hours of tossing and turning, sleep took mercy on her and she drifted off.

***

Melissa’s day was chaotic. Because she had to reschedule all her appointments, her normal patient flow had increased. The sleep she got the day before renewed her, and she felt better than she had in the past week. Maybe her body was finally adjusting to the treatments. A girl could dream.

Tilly threw her another sandwich in between patients. Melissa was fairly certain she hadn’t sat down once today, and she could barely remember if she'd stopped to pee. Swallowing the last of her sandwich, she knocked on the door and entered her patient’s room. A newly-married were-giraffe couple.

"Mr. and Mrs. Sampson. Are you ready to find out what you’re having?"

The couple nodded their heads vigorously. The Sampsons were pregnant with their first baby. Today they were going to find out the gender. In any other situation, an ultra-sound tech would perform the procedure, but being this was a paranormal office, Melissa had the pleasure of doing it, and she wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

“Butch thinks it’s going to be a girl. My mom and I are betting on a boy,” Mrs. Sampson said as she shifted on the bed to get a better look at Melissa.

“Well let’s find out.” Melissa squirted the jelly on her Mrs. Sampson’s belly and swirled it around. The baby was a mover, turning this way and that. It took a while for her to get the money shot she needed. “It looks like we have a winner. Butch, congratulations. You’re going to be the daddy of a precious little girl.”

The couple squealed happily and hugged each other. Butch swung Melissa around the room after she cleaned up his wife. She exited the room, giving the couple privacy. Melissa thought about her soon-to-be baby. Seeing the Sampsons’ reaction made her even more ready to get started.

Melissa pried off her shoes when she entered her apartment, and headed straight toward her shower, shedding her clothes as she went. Thomas texted her the restaurant they were going to and told her he’d pick her up. She had an hour to get ready. A thrill went through her body as she washed up. She’d been looking forward to tonight. Throughout the day, Melissa had assured herself she had nothing to worry about with Hilary. It wasn’t like the two of them saw each other regularly. Besides, she was his client. Thomas was too smart to get involved with someone he worked with.

She also decided she would tell Thomas about how her ex had been behaving. For some reason she trusted him, which was a good thing, being that he was going to be in her life if the pregnancy resulted in a baby. It was only fair that Thomas knew about Nathaniel’s temper and who he’d been involved with.

With the Hilary account on her mind, Melissa took extra time getting ready. She tamed her red hair in big fiery ringlets, letting it fall down her back. She took her time getting her eyes to do the perfect smoky effect, and then ran to the back of her closet. Because of the extra weight she had lost, she had the nerve to slip into a tight-fitting, black dress that she was normally too self-conscious to wear.

She pulled on a pair of short black pumps and went to double-check herself in the mirror. Pulling out the only lipstick she owned, Melissa swiped it across her lips and went downstairs. She was excited to see Thomas. With their busy work schedules, they hadn’t seen each other since their dinner. Tonight was going to be interesting, since the subject was going to be scheduling the time they would make their baby.

Melissa spotted Thomas as soon as she made it downstairs. He was leaning against the wall of her building, his hands in his pockets. Melissa’s mouth went dry at the sight of him. His tall frame demanded attention, and his rugged face required it.

He shrugged off the wall when he saw her come out of the building. Melissa waved shyly at him. It was dark, but she was certain his eyes widened when he saw her. She did a tiny happy dance in her head. She made the right choice by dressing up tonight.

“Melissa, you look amazing,” he said. His voice deeper than it was on the phone.

For a moment, Melissa was positive he was going to kiss her. When he held out the crook of his arm for her to take, she felt a sliver of disappointment race down her spine. She took his proffered arm and walked with him to his car. They made small talk on the way over, and he held all the doors for her as they made their way into the restaurant.

Neither of them said another word until they sat down at the table and ordered their drinks. Why was she fantasizing over something they’d said wasn’t ever going to happen?

Melissa watched him over her menu as he conversed with the waiter, and was shocked when she realized she liked him. She wasn’t sure when it happened. It had only been a week and a few short phone calls, but that didn’t seem to matter. Her body and mind were accepting him as the man that not only was going to be the father of her child, but the man she wanted to have a life with. It made no sense to her at all, and until she was off the hormones, she couldn’t trust her body and the emotions it thrust on her. Yet there was something there.

She hid behind the menu as she tried to process what she had concluded.

“So what did you decide?” Thomas asked, making Melissa almost drop her menu.

Was he a mind reader?

“Excuse me?”

“For dinner. Their chicken is really good here.”

Melissa’s heart slowed down when she realized he wasn’t a mind reader. Thank goodness for that. She also made a mental note to study if there were paranormals out there that could step into another’s thoughts.

Thomas was right: the chicken was incredible. Throughout the meal, he had Melissa laughing so hard people around them were giving her dirty looks. Thomas gave them back, raising one perfectly-shaped eyebrow at them as if daring them to say something.

When he mentioned one of his co-workers getting so drunk the night before, he hit his head on a bar stool and then got right back up to dance, Melissa snorted, causing him to throw back his head and release a belly laugh.

“That is so exciting about the Hilary Dalton account! Do you think you’ll get to meet her?” Melissa asked without thinking.

Why would she bring up a young beautiful woman she couldn’t compete with when was having a great time with a sexy man who wanted to have a baby with her?

“Actually, I have a date with her this Saturday. Do you want me to get you an autograph?”

Damn that man. In one statement, he ruined a perfectly good meal. The chicken she just finished now sat in her stomach weighing more than it did when it was on her plate. Thomas took a drink as Melissa tried to school her features and not show the hurt his words caused her.

“I don't really know who she is, but I bet Tilly would love an autograph,” Melissa forced herself to laugh as she willed the tears burning the back of her throat to stay where they were.

***

Thomas was having a great time with Melissa. When she stepped out of her building wearing that little black dress, he had to discreetly adjust himself before walking over to her. The little nerdy doctor had legs for days, and curves he could sink his teeth into.

During dinner, he kept reminding himself about how bad it would be to get involved with Melissa. He didn’t want any drama involved with his child. Even though his dick was more than happy to dismiss his desire for a conflict-free life. He had to stop himself on several occasions from asking about Bruce and what he was to her.

He refrained from calling Blair more times than he was comfortable to admit just to get him to tell him who Bruce was. Blair would have delighted too much in it anyway, and Thomas was always happy to withhold pleasure from his friends.

Dinner was more fun than he had ever had with a woman. The slight bruising under her eyes showed she was tired, but even that couldn’t take away from her beauty. He wondered if he could convince her to have sex more than once just to make sure it would take. He immediately squashed that thought in his mind, telling his dick to stop trying to take control.

After his comment about Hilary, he watched her shut down. Her face lost the glow it had on it all night as she laughed and seemed to enjoy the night. He wanted to switch the subject with every intention of bringing the glow back to her face.

“So how are the treatments going? I know we talk about them over the phone, but it never feels long enough to know exactly what’s going on.” Thomas figured steering the conversation back to their inevitable encounter would help her forget about Hilary.

Her reaction to his date was something he hadn’t expected. When she talked to Bruce while he was on the phone, she had no problem talking about her date while Thomas waited on the line like some lovesick cub hoping the girl he liked would pay attention to him. In fact, if he wanted to point petty fingers, her conversation with Bruce led him to ask Hilary out on a date to begin with. He knew he was being ridiculous—Bruce could just be a colleague.

Thomas wasn’t certain he would have asked Hilary out if Bruce hadn’t picked the exact time to show up in Melissa’s office. He had been crazy for Hilary the moment he met her, but he knew it was just for fun. When Melissa came along and agreed to carry his child, suddenly fun didn’t seem so appealing.

“The treatments are hell. They make me sick to be honest. My body is getting used to the daily ones, but there are two I need once a week, and on that day, I'm super tired.” Melissa’s tone came out clinical. Her eyes were darting around the room, no longer making eye contact with him.

Thomas blinked, surprised by the way Melissa turned on him. They were having a good time laughing and joking. In the past three minutes she had checked her phone five times.

“Am I boring you?” he joked as she went for her phone for the sixth time.

“Should we schedule the conception day, now? I promised Tilly I would meet her for drinks tonight and it’s getting late. I don’t want her to bail on me when I took the time to get dressed to go out with her tonight.”

He had a feeling she was just saying that, but if she wanted to go, there was no reason for him to try and stop her.

“Do you actually know when an ideal date would be yet based on the treatments?” he asked her leaning back in his seat.

“Not necessarily.”

“Then we’ll have to wait to pick a date then.”

“I suppose we could do tentative.” She pulled out a thick black notebook from her bag and flipped to a month. It was currently August and she’d turned to November.

“That long huh?” He stared at the page.

“Yes, we need to give the treatments at least that long to get into my system. I think the first weekend of November will work for me, how about you?”

She’d gotten colder and was speaking to him as more of a professional than a friend or future lover. She’d said a month and now she was pushing it way further away. Part of him knew she was just mad about Hilary, but he’d hoped they could get started a lot sooner.

“I’ll pencil you in,” he said with a wink, although even that small joke felt wrong.

They decided to call it an evening and he walked with her quietly back to his car. The driver was listening to some loud music and started when they got in. He was probably surprised they were back so soon.

“So November is the time then.”

“Yes, I’m sorry I acted weird just now. We’re going to have to get used to each of us dating other people, you know.” She smiled and this time it was genuine.

He felt a little more relaxed. “Yes, we are. It’s okay. I shouldn’t have dropped my date into conversation like that.”

When they pulled up outside of Melissa’s apartment, she started to say something. She looked over and saw a truck sitting on the street and her face fell. “Well crap.”

Thomas had a bad feeling as they got out of the car and walked together across the street.

 

 

HAPTER SEVEN

 

Melissa realized when she saw Nathaniel’s truck that she hadn’t even mentioned him to Thomas. Well, this was going to be interesting, she thought as her stomach flipped. They’d been having such a good time, she hadn’t really wanted to. Now he was going to get to see the crazy first hand, and she wasn’t sure if she was ready for it.

He wasn’t outside when she stepped out of the car, so that meant he was waiting outside of her apartment door. Just perfect. Thomas was talking about dating one of New York's royalty, and now he was going to come face-to-face with her dating standard. She wondered if she should have Thomas walk her in or if she should ditch him before they walked into crazy town. Nathaniel would get himself killed trying to fight the were-bear, and him seeing her with another man would put him in a getting killed kind of mood.

As they walked toward the front of her building, she found herself slowing down. Thomas noticed and put a hand out, touching her arm.

“What’s going on?”

“My ex-husband is kind of a huge dick. His truck is over there, so he’s around here somewhere and you’re about to meet him. I hate admitting that he’s always been one, but he’s been almost unbearable since we started the divorce proceedings. Maybe you should just go. He still…”

She didn’t get the next word out because she saw him running at them full speed with a crazy look in his eye bellowing, “Get away from her. That’s my wife.”

His hand swung around without any real direction and Melissa screeched as Thomas caught it quickly in front of his face and it cracked loudly. Nathaniel yelled something as his face contorted in pain, but there was just a ringing in her ears blocking his words. She was going to watch her idiot ex get killed because he didn’t know what he was up against. What an amazing ending to her night.

It was a very drunk Nathaniel that tried to hit Thomas again. The smell of alcohol assaulted her nose. She wished he would have learned from the first time he’d almost broken his hand swinging at Thomas, but no, the fact that he would even try again stunned Melissa. Her chest tightened and she started breathing heavily not really getting much air to her lungs. This was not happening. Not right now.

“Listen, buddy, you need to calm down. You can keep trying to hit me, but you’re not going to get a punch in, I guarantee it. I don’t really want to hurt you if I don’t have to,” Thomas was saying as Melissa tried to pull air into her constricted lungs.

Nathaniel let out a scary laugh and ran at him again. This time Thomas put him on the ground and held him down by his neck. It would have been funny if Melissa wasn’t in the middle of a panic attack. Nathaniel tried to get up, still fighting strength he couldn’t possibly defeat.

“Nathaniel, just stop fighting. What are you even doing here?” Melissa wheezed, finally finding her voice and tried to figure out how she could take control of the situation. There were people watching now, so of course, someone probably called the police. This was her nightmare.

“Are you going to calm down?” Thomas asked. He was so calm and hadn’t even broken a sweat as he held Nathaniel down without any effort.

Nathaniel nodded so he let him up, and when Thomas turned around to see if Melissa was okay, he leaped onto his back. Not wanting to miss a chance at taking Thomas down with his back turned, Melissa saw a gleam and realized Nathaniel had a knife. The tightness in her chest and ringing in her ears came back as she yelled to let Thomas know.

She didn’t have to worry about Thomas though, he flipped Nathaniel over his shoulder and back onto the ground like he weighed nothing. Melissa was having a hard time breathing again, but this time Nathaniel stayed down. The knife in his hand hung limply at his side.  He’d exhausted himself and when Thomas let him off the ground again, he backed up to his truck he spoke hoarsely, glaring at them.

“This isn’t over.”

Melissa didn’t say anything as she watched the truck drive away, making sure that this time he really was done with the fight. As soon as the tires squealed down the road, Melissa ran from Thomas, wanting to put as much distance between them as she could. She darted across the sidewalk and into her building. If she hurried, she could get to her apartment before he saw where she went. She wasn’t in the frame of mind to talk to him. She was so embarrassed about Nathaniel’s behavior she just wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Why did it have to be tonight?

Of course, he was too fast. He was a were-bear for crying out loud. As she was fumbling to get her key in the door, he came up behind her, caging her in between the door and his hard body. Ignoring him, she flung the door open and went inside, still hyperventilating except now she was also crying. This night was getting even worse than she thought it could. Her chest constricted painfully and every ounce of oxygen she pulled in was with pure determination on her part.

“You need to try and calm down Melissa, it’s over now.”

He thought she was over-reacting. She could hear the condescension in his voice. Nobody understood the inability to stop her anxiety when it took her this far. Damn it, Nathaniel always gave her panic attacks. It was like just being near him and his over bearing ways triggered them. She attempted to get her breath taking large gasps, but nothing seemed to help. Black spots dotted her vision, alerting her that she was about to pass out.

“Just breathe and sit down.” Thomas led her to the couch and helped her sit. He went to get her some water as she wheezed. Between crying, being embarrassed, and not able to catch her breath, she started panicking more and the cycle continued becoming more volatile.

“Can’t control it, sorry, Thomas.” She managed to get short phrases out between breaths and then he was back in front of her. She desperately wanted to explain this was out of her control. He’d sat beside her on the couch and he had both her shoulders in his strong hands.

“Look at me.”

Melissa managed to look at him and tried to concentrate on his eyes. They were full of concern. She thought maybe her breathing was starting to calm down and then he kissed her.

For a while, he simply held his mouth against hers and waited. Her breathing calmed down to a normal speed, although it was faster than her normal breath because he was so close. He moved to open his mouth and the tightness in her chest started to break away. Pushing his tongue inside her mouth, his hands came to her sides and she found herself wrapping her arms around his neck. Her heart stopped trying to beat out of her chest and the hormones she’d been putting into her body sprang into action, warming her belly and lower from the desire he was spreading through her. Then he pulled away just as quickly as he started it.

They simply looked at each other for a few seconds before he stood and moved all the way across the room.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t know what to do. I was worried you were going to pass out or something.”

“No, that was apparently what I needed to calm down,” Melissa said, feeling her lips tingle from the kiss and her thighs tingle from the need.

“We might as well have some physical contact before we make a baby, right?” His smile seemed forced and she wondered if he regretted his actions. It frustrated her how much that thought saddened her.

“Yes, maybe you’re right.” Melissa smiled. It was apparent the kiss had been a lot hotter to her than it was to him. He’d just been trying to get her to calm down. It was okay, she could totally blame her hormones for wanting him to take her on the couch, the floor, the table, the wall, or any other surface they could find.

“I have a late night meeting tonight to talk about Hilary’s campaign. The guys at work and I get together to have drinks and a think tank. I can cancel if you need someone to stay and guard you from that crazy man.”

At the mention of Hilary, she was brought back down to reality a bit. Oh yes, the hot rich woman with the model’s body he was seeing. She wanted to ask if Hilary would be there, but she held her tongue.

“No, he won’t come back. He’s a one desperate show a night kind of guy. I can lock up tight and he’ll never get in. If he comes back and makes any noise for any reason, my neighbors will call the police. Besides, I promised Tilly I would go out with her, remember? All dressed up and all. Go to your meeting and thanks tonight, for everything.”

“Right, Tilly. I forgot. I’ll just be going.” He watched her face, his smile getting wider before he moved away from the couch and toward the door.

She walked back to her bedroom and waited until he’d left before going to deadbolt the door. A nice, long, hot bath was just what she needed and she was going to have bubbles, candles, music, and wine while she still could.

***

Thomas dropped his driver off for the night and took the car back out to the office. His favorite nights were boy’s nights. It was exhilarating when they thought of things to improve the company and it was relaxing when they just shot the shit. It was really good for work morale, but it was good for the men he worked with to see him in a light other than boss. He didn’t know many companies where you could get together after hours on purpose and be excited about it.

His mind went to Melissa. As it always did. He’d really been worried about her when he’d kissed her. Her face had a sheen of sweat on it, and her skin was pale. She had no idea he already knew about her ex, but seeing her reaction to him he figured he didn't know everything. He worried about her and fingered his phone, wanting to send her a text just to see how she was doing. Hopefully, she wasn’t lying and really did go out with Tilly. He knew she would be taken care of if she was with Tilly and not at home alone where her psycho ex could show up. Even though she said he was a one performance night kind of guy, there were always times when a crazy and desperate guy would try again. His lips tingled when he thought of the kiss.

It had been a spur of the moment thing, but once he was kissing her, he enjoyed it. He enjoyed it too much. She tasted sweet and her vulnerability from having a near panic attack warmed him. She trusted him, and allowed him to calm her down just with a single touch. A touch he couldn’t wait to do again. November wasn’t going to come soon enough. That damning kiss wasn’t supposed to happen though, but he found himself wondering why not? They were going to have sex in a couple months and he couldn’t even kiss her without freaking out? Maybe now that it was out of their systems for the moment, they could go back to living normally until it was time to start trying. Fat chance, he thought, ready and willing to do it again and sooner better than later.

He was the only one in the parking deck, his shoes echoing as he walked and it was kind of an eerie sensation. No, it wasn’t the shoes, it was a feeling. He was being watched. Instantly, he looked around, but he didn’t see anyone. If that idiot of Melissa’s had followed him, he really was going to hit him. Weres of any kind normally didn’t go after humans because the strength difference didn’t make it remotely fair, but if Melissa’s ex kept it up, he was going to see what it felt like to mess with a paranormal.

It wasn’t until he almost made it to the door to the elevator that two large men in suits stepped out in front of him. Not the ex, but good enough. The fight with Melissa’s ex, and the kiss, had his adrenaline pumping, and these two looked like the perfect way to expend some of it.

“Hello, gentlemen, can I help you with something?” He didn't try and hide the sarcasm as it dripped off every word.

“Stop what you’re doing.” One of the guys brought a knee up into his stomach, surprising him with the move, and his words. It knocked the breath out of him, but he didn’t go down. He wasn’t going to let a human take him down. The guy brought both his arms down on his back and that put him down.

“What the hell?” Thomas roared as he started to see red. His inner-bear growled inside, wanting to end them.

“What you’re doing is unnatural. Stop what you’re doing or there will be consequences,” the other suit said.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Thomas managed to get some words choked out. That fucker really had caught him by surprise. He thought about just letting his bear out to scare the hell out of them, but refrained. Something told him not to, like maybe they’d let out something worse. He wasn’t sure where that thought came from, but he’d always had a good sense about danger and he trusted his gut.

“The baby, the abomination. Stop what you’re doing and tell Miss Rancic to stop, too, if she knows what’s good for her.”

The two men disappeared and Thomas tried to catch his breath. He was completely taken off guard. Who the hell were those men? Could they have been were-bears? Their strength and the knowledge of what he was scared him. Thomas’ mind was spinning as he walked into the building. No one even knew what they were trying to do. His baby was supposed to be a secret, so the fact that someone had come after him was even scarier. The thought that his baby was being threatened pissed him off.

“You all right, Tommy?” One of his business managers, Saul, came up to him. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m okay. Just got startled in the parking lot. How’s it going? What’d I miss?”

“We were just talking about Hilary’s can.”

“That’s not very nice guys; she’s our biggest client.”

“It’s okay, Thomas.” Hilary turned the chair at the head of the table and looked at him. I was talking about my can with them.” She winked and stood up, walking over to him. Standing on her tiptoes, she kissed him on the cheek and walked over to the coffee.

“I didn’t know you would be here.” Thomas was shaken from the men and what they knew. He wasn’t in the right frame of mind to deal with Hilary. Especially when he looked at her and felt a sliver of guilt because of how he was starting to feel for Melissa. You shouldn’t be feeling anything for Melissa, he reminded himself.

“Saul invited me. He said you guys were brainstorming ideas for my release, who better to help you brainstorm, right?” She winked at him before sipping her coffee.

“Yes,” Thomas’ voice put on a flirty edge. “I just think now I’ll be completely distracted the whole time.”

“Not on my dime.” Hilary smiled and went back to sitting at the head of the table.

“So why were you talking about your can?”

Hilary grinned and turned to the others in the room. “Saul.”

Saul’s ideas were all focused around Hilary’s ass and how it could sell perfume that smelled terrible. After he finally convinced him that was inappropriate, Thomas got on a roll and they brainstormed and actually started having some great ideas. He tried to put the incident out of his mind for the time being, knowing he would have to come back to it later.

About an hour and a half passed and everyone decided they would need a break. Hilary decided to leave, but not before she sashayed up to him and fixed him with a sultry look.

“Can’t wait for Saturday.” Her finger trailed down his shirt until it reached his belt buckle before pulling back.

Her perfume lingered long after she left, and he had to make himself close his mouth. The things he wanted to do to that woman. A thought struck him and he couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it before. Hilary was pushed out of his mind as he pulled his phone out and dialed Blair.

“Talk to me.” Blair was in the middle of a busy bar or somewhere where there were a lot of people. “That’s okay honey, you can keep your top on.”

“Where are you?” Thomas asked, laughing.

“A bar mitzvah.”

“Well that makes no sense.”

“What’s up man?”

“Didn’t you say that Nathaniel Burr was in with a bunch of bad people. Could he have mob ties?”

“Maybe, I’d say that’s why my dealer hasn’t broken both his legs.” Blair never missed a beat.

“Shit, I think a couple of them might have paid me a visit today.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry about it. Enjoy your strange party; I’ll tell you more later. There’s another phone call I have to make.”

He rang Melissa, hoping it wasn’t too late. On the one hand, he was worried about her safety, and on the other, he was just mad.

“Hello.”

Thomas smirked. He knew she was bluffing when she mentioned going out with Tilly. A strange warmth flooded through him when he realized she got all dressed up for him. What the hell was up with that?

“Why did you tell that animal we were going to try for a baby?” He decided to curb that train of thought and go for something that he could actually resolve.

“What animal?”

“Your ex-husband, Nathaniel Burr. I know all about him Melissa. I know about the people he was around. Is still around. The people you were around. I know about the mob, the drug dealers. Why would you tell him?”

“What makes you think I told him anything, Thomas?” Her voice had hardened. He’d made her angry. Good, that made two of them.

“He sent two goons after me today to tell me to back off. Called the baby an abomination. Our baby. I can only imagine those have to be some of the people he would hang around. I really hope you are trying to get away from him. I know we don’t have a say in who we’re dating, but my child will not be around someone like that. I just don’t get why you would confide in him like that.”

“Listen, I am very much trying to get away from him.” Her voice sounded harsh as if she was pushing every word through clenched teeth. “Just because you’ve been around for, what, less than two months, you think you know my life? If you don’t think of me any better than that Thomas, then maybe we shouldn’t be doing this at all.” She hung up.

He stared at the phone for a minute, not sure what to do. What if he’d been wrong? Was it possible he jumped to the wrong conclusion? Who else would come after him like that, though? It didn’t make any sense. Who else would have known about Melissa’s research and their baby?

“Ready to get back to it?” Saul came out and clapped him on the back.

“Actually, man, I think I’m just going to call it a night.”

Thomas didn’t think he could come up with anything else for the evening. He was too consumed about what was going on. He needed some time to think about everything before he jumped to any more conclusions.

***

Melissa trembled and clenched her fists as she sat on the couch. She couldn’t believe he’d said that to her. Who did he think he was? He didn’t even ask if she’d told anyone he just started in on her. Of course she hadn’t told Nathaniel her plans. He’d have an absolute shit fit, and she was not ready to deal with that. He was her ex and refused to accept it. Telling him would be a disaster.

There was one person she could call and ask to know for sure if Nathan had been behind whatever happened to Thomas. It wasn’t really a phone call she wanted to make, but she would for a little peace of mind. Then she could tell Thomas off for calling and yelling at her without any proof. The thought of sticking it to Thomas made her determined to make the call.

It rang four times before he finally picked up. “Marco?”

“Holy shit, Melissa? I didn’t think I’d ever hear from you again since you and Nate are on the outs. How are you?” Hearing Marco’s voice reminded Melissa of the good times she had when she was with Nathaniel.

“I’m fine, listen, I have to ask you a question.”

“Anything, babe, what’s up?”

Sweet Marco, a mutual friend of hers and Nathaniel’s, and a complete criminal. He always treated her with respect, and never let Nate get too far out of hand when she was around. She couldn’t condone what he did, but she would always trust him to have her back. Marco had been there for her more than once, and she wouldn’t forget it.

“A friend of mine had two big guys come after him tonight. Would Nathaniel do something like that? Does he have anyone left who’d come after someone for him?”

“Melissa, Nathan is in jail right now. He went on a big drinking binge and drove when he shouldn’t have. The dumbass drove into a store front. I don’t think he could have orchestrated anything like that from the drunk tank. I know he doesn’t have anyone on his side anymore. He’s pissed off everyone we know and some we don’t.”

“Okay, that’s what I needed. Thank you, Marco.”

“Melissa, don’t be a stranger. Just because you’re a fancy doctor and no longer with Nathan doesn’t mean you can’t come see your old friends.”

“I know, Marco, talk to you later.” She hung up knowing she wouldn’t. That part of her life was over and Thomas had been wrong about who was after him, but now she was a little worried. Someone had threatened not only her research, but her unmade baby. She needed to get some more answers before she talked to Thomas. There was no point in telling him about it right away; she was still mad at him. She would let him know eventually. And she would make him grovel for yelling at her.

As she sat on the couch, she thought back over her time with Nathaniel. Marco had always been in the middle of it when anything bad started to go down. One particular time started playing over in her mind, and though she didn’t want to remember, it came to her in vivid detail like a movie. A movie where she lost the remote and couldn’t pause it if she wanted to.

Melissa sat on the couch watching day time television and smoking a joint. She wasn’t long out of medical school and her new husband had convinced her to take some time off because he had a business opportunity that would set them up. Of course, that was selling coke and she had an inkling it was something like that. She just pretended to be dumb. It was easier that way.

Nathaniel excited her with his bad boy ways. She knew it wasn’t good for her, and she knew it was lazy to not immediately start a residency as a young doctor. However, this was more fun at the moment. She had never done anything so reckless before. Always the good girl. Nathaniel made her feel special, and not as if she always had to do the right thing. He was freeing.

“Where is she?” Nathaniel was drunk again—she could tell by the slur in his voice. It wasn’t even two o’clock in the afternoon yet. She braced herself for what she knew was coming next. It was never pretty when he was day drunk. These were the times she didn't feel so special.

“She’s just chilling with Vivian.” Marco was trying to calm him down. Marco was her savior, and she knew she would never be able to repay him for what he had done for her. This was not the first time he’d been in the middle. There was never a good reason for Nathaniel’s anger, it just came randomly and he suspected she was wronging him somehow. It was always her fault.

“Melissa,” he bellowed as he ran into the room. “What the hell are these?” He held up a pair of men’s swim trunks.

“It’s a pair of shorts,” Melissa said calmly, not getting up off the couch. He grabbed her by the back of the neck and pulled her up to standing.

“What are they doing in our house Melissa? Are you screwing around on me again?

“They are probably one of your crack head friends’ shorts and I haven’t ever screwed around on you.” She was still speaking calmly and quietly. Sometimes it would calm him down, sometimes it would set him off. It was always a gamble when he was in these moods.

“You’re so smart, Dr. Melissa. You think you’re so smart.” He sneered in her face.

Marco walked in and looked between the two of them. Vivian hadn’t taken her eyes away from the television. “Listen, Nate, man, let’s go smoke a joint and hang out for a little while.”

Nathaniel turned all his anger on Marco, pushing him hard and knocking him into the wall. Vivian was suddenly off the couch and in his face. “Why are you pushing him Nathaniel? Get out of here with your drunk ass.” The two men started to fight as per the norm, and Nathaniel was punched in the nose. This was the first time it actually came to blows. Melissa heard it crack and blood splattered onto her, pulling her out of her shock.

She ran out of the house.

The neighbor was screaming at her and she could hear the men fighting in the house. Vivian was yelling at her to get back and control her man. She just wanted it all to stop. He was such an ass when he was drinking. Why was she doing this to herself? She was a doctor of medicine. Nathaniel was fun, but really, he wasn't what she needed and she knew it. She knew it the moment she laid eyes on him. The police showed up and walked up to her, looking at the blood on her shirt.

She convinced them it was from standing too close and sent them in the house. Marco was busted for coke and Vivian was busted for weed. Nathaniel was taken in because he swung at the officer when he walked up to him. The whole day was a huge mess. Melissa sat outside the house for a long time just thinking about what her life had become. And how disappointed she was in herself at that very moment.

Shaking herself from the memory, she realized that even then she knew he would never change. She’d loved him a lot in the beginning. When he wasn’t drunk he was attentive, and made her feel so loved. She had never had anyone treat her the way he did, but she also had never had anyone treat her the way he did when he was drunk. Over time that love had slipped away because of the way he treated her when he was in one of his moods. She was better than that. Getting up from the couch, she decided it was time to put herself to bed. Thomas accusing her of talking to Nathaniel, and her trip down memory lane, was all she could handle for the night.

HAPTER EIGHT

 

Melissa hadn’t slept much that night. Her brain wouldn't allow her to drift into oblivion even though she had begged for it. It refused to give in to her needs, and when she threw off the covers in the morning, coffee wasn’t going to make a dent in her tired state. She sort of stumbled through her morning to get ready hoping that auto-pilot would get her through the day. Auto-pilot didn’t seem to be very observant as she walked all the way to her office door with her key in her hand as ready as she could be to start the day.

Without her body firing on all cylinders, she pushed her key into the lock and struggled with trying to open the door. Her brain would not register the destruction before her until she pulled the key out and noticed what she had been missing. Her body went numb as she surveyed everything before her. The glass on her front door where her name should have been was completely bashed out. The large front windows Tilly took pride in keeping crystal clear every morning to allow the sun to shine through had been shattered. The entire front of her building had been battered in some shape or form.

Across the front of her pretty white office was spray painted in menacing scrawl was, “stop messing with nature.” It was pretty clear whoever had done this was against her research, but why? And who?

Her stomach pitched forward as she stood and stared at the mess in front of her. Her eyes started to prickle with tears as the numbness started to fall away. She desperately wished it would come back and shroud her from the emotions bombarding her. All of her hard work was inside this office, and someone wanted to ruin it. Someone had ruined it. Saying her life’s research was messing with nature felt like a giant slap in the face. Clearly, they didn’t realize the happiness she had brought to the paranormal world. The happiness she was on the verge of bringing to another species if her trial worked. Her unmade baby was not messing with nature. She was going to bring something beautiful into this world and these people were insulting her.

The total destruction wasn’t all clear to her from the outside. She could see that they decided to take their little spray painting spree on the inside to ensure their message was received. She could see graffiti all over her front office as well, so she knew going in would be bad. With a shaky breath, she took out her phone and called the police, the tears starting to fall. Why did this happen to her? Somehow she managed to get through telling them what had happened through her sobbing. The operator tried to get her to calm down, but she wasn't witnessing her life’s work in ruin. She hung the phone up and waited for Tilly so they could go in together. There was no way she would be strong enough to do this on her own. She needed her friend more than ever.

“Oh my God, Melissa.” A male voice from behind her startled her. She hadn’t realized she’d just been staring at the building shutting off the world around her. All anger from his phone call the night before was forgotten as she ran into Thomas’ strong arms.

“It’s awful. Why would they do this to me?” she murmured into his shirt. She buried her face into his hard chest, wanting to block out everything she had seen, everything she had yet to witness, but knew there was really no avoiding it.

“This Nathaniel's doing?”

She felt his chest rumble as he spoke, but she didn't move away as she answered him.

“No, I didn’t tell him anything, Thomas. You need to believe I would never put our future baby in harm’s way. I spoke to a mutual acquaintance last night and he said Nathaniel couldn’t have sent those men after you. He’s in jail at the moment, and out of favor with everyone.” She was getting angry again, but she still couldn’t remove herself from his comfort.

“Okay, it’s okay. I believe you, and I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions. They caught me off guard and I wasn’t thinking clearly. I’m sorry. We’ll figure this out. It has to be an enemy of the were-bear community, or shifters in general. I’m so sorry Melissa, this is all my fault.” He was still holding her and she looked up into his eyes.

“No it’s not. This is my research and my facility. You’re just a part of my bigger picture. This isn’t your fault. I’m making someone, or a lot of someones, very angry by helping shifters conceive. Now that they somehow know I am willingly subjecting myself to having a shifter baby, everything will be focused on me.”

Thomas’ jaw clenched as he took in her face. He finally pulled his gaze away from her to survey the damage over her head. He didn’t move to release her, and Melissa decided she wasn’t ready to move just yet.

Tilly arrived at that time, jamming out in her car, the bass rattling her windows. She hadn’t even looked their way and now sat putting on her makeup her head bobbing to whatever song she was listening to. Melissa decided to just let her continue to enjoy her morning, it was a friendly gesture to delay the misery she’d be walking into. Besides, she didn’t want to move from Thomas so she wasn’t going to break from him just yet. Once Tilly exited her car and turned around, she just froze with her mouth hanging wide open, her freshly applied lipstick shining in the morning sun. Melissa would have laughed at her comical face if it had been any other circumstance. Melissa reluctantly broke free of Thomas and ran to hug her friend.

“Melissa, what the hell? Who the hell did this? Was it Nathaniel? I’ll kill him!” Tilly’s eyes were burning with anger as took in what had been done to the building.

“No, it wasn’t Nathaniel, but we need to go in and see how bad it is. I didn’t want to go in without you.”

“Let’s do this. Have you called the police?”

“I did. They dispatched someone who should be here any time.”

The two locked arms and walked toward Thomas who moved out of their way so they could go in. His forehead creased with worry as he looked at the two women. “Be careful of the glass,” he said, following behind them.

Melissa’s heart sank when she walked inside. She knew she should have suspected the worst, but seeing it in real life broke her. Behind Tilly’s desk in big letters was the word UNNATURAL written in red spray paint, the drips making it look as if the words were bleeding. Her desk was completely gutted and files were strewn everywhere. The vase of flowers she kept there had been thrown against the wall. All the magazines in the waiting area were shredded and the furniture had long slash marks in it, making it impossible to salvage. Every piece of her office had been vandalized somehow and this was just the front room. Melissa didn’t want to go any further, afraid to see what she would come across.

“Are those your important files?” Thomas asked.

His voice sounded as if he was talking through water. She kept her research locked up, but now she was terrified someone had gotten to it. With that in mind, she ran back toward her office and threw the door open to find a similar scene. Things were everywhere, her safe was bashed in, but they didn’t appear to have gotten into it. She was thankful she splurged and paid for the best safe when she ordered it for her office. It had been battered, but it put up one hell of a fight and seemed to have won.

The police lights bounced off her walls as she looked around, lots of her personal possessions she had collected over the years were destroyed. Pictures of her patients as they found out they were pregnant. Frames holding the babies she had helped come to term were crushed. The whole thing seemed very personal and she was feeling very violated. It was almost as if she had been attacked physically.

The whole situation was unreal to her. She turned around, her arms limp to her side as she took in everything. Melissa rubbed her eyes, willing herself to wake up from the nightmare, but as much as she rubbed, she knew it was reality. Going back into the front, she saw Tilly was talking to the police on one side and Thomas was talking to Bruce on the other.

It took her mind a second to realize Bruce was just as real as the destruction around her.

“Bruce!” Melissa exclaimed. He abruptly stopped talking to Thomas, who was in the middle of what seemed to be a heated conversation, and walked to hug her tightly. “What the hell happened here? Was it Nathaniel?”

Ugh, she was never going to live down her life with Nathaniel. She had a feeling every time something bad happened, he would be the first person they would connect it with. Wasn’t she allowed to have one mistake in her otherwise pristine existence?

“No, it really wasn’t,” she said, trying to keep the annoyance out of her voice.

Her office had been violated. Her personal possessions destroyed. Couldn’t they give her some slack? Thomas walked over and both men looked at each other. She watched as they assessed each other, and wondered if they were going to whip out their dicks and perform a measuring contest. Seriously, did they not realize it wasn’t the best time to play “I’m the better alpha”? There was a whole lot of tension, and even the police that were wandering around taking pictures kept throwing the two men looks, waiting to see if they were going to have to jump in to split them apart. Melissa knew the reason Bruce was posturing up. He was her friend and trusted colleague, and he didn’t think she should be hurting her body to have Thomas’ baby, especially when they weren’t even a couple. Bruce had seen firsthand what the treatments did to her body as he pushed the plunger down. She knew it upset him that she continued to take the treatments when it was making her physically ill. She wasn’t sure what Thomas’ issue was, and at the moment, she didn’t even care.

She felt like she was an outsider as she turned away from Bruce and Thomas and watched police poke and prod through her office. The police went around looking at everything and she sank down on the tattered couch out front as she waited to be useful. An officer came to talk to her and she had to concentrate really hard to focus on what he was saying. Her brain was begging her to shut down and process everything at another time. She wanted to listen, but knew she couldn’t.

“Any reason someone would want to harm you or your business?” one of the faceless officers asked her.

“I think from what my walls say they don’t like that I do fertility treatments to help women have babies. Some people think it’s unnatural for doctors to interfere in what they feel is God’s work. I don’t know who would go to this extreme though. I’m not sure who would be capable of this. Most don’t even realize this is a fertility clinic. It is one of the reasons I chose this location because it is hidden away for the most part.”

“Do you have any security cameras?” he asked.

“No.” Melissa said, staring at one of the bigger rips in her couch.

“All right. We’re going to go around and ask people if they saw anything. Maybe check if there’s any footage around that we can use. If we get any leads, we’ll give you a call.”

“Okay, thank you, officer,” she said dejectedly.

Melissa knew they weren’t going to find the person who did it. She had seen her share of crime shows on TV and knew how unlikely finding the suspect or suspects in a case like hers was. It didn’t seem like they really could with no leads and not really knowing what time the vandalism occurred. She really wanted them to find the people that tried to destroy her livelihood, but she knew it wasn’t possible. At the moment, she felt powerless to an unknown assailant and she wasn’t sure how she was going to regain any power to make herself feel normal again.

Thomas walked over to her, standing over her with a concerned look on his face. “I already have a clean-up crew on their way and a contractor coming to fix up this front door.”

Melissa nodded her head, not sure how to use words at the moment.

“Oh Mr. Fix-it,” Tilly cooed from the other side of the room earning a glare from Melissa. Of course Tilly would never forget how to speak in a crisis.

“You didn’t have to do that, Thomas.” She finally found her voice, afraid if she didn't speak up, Tilly would say something else to try and mortify her.

Melissa was grateful, but a little embarrassed he was taking care of everything. It really wasn’t his place to do anything. It wasn’t like they were a couple and he felt responsible for her happiness. It made sense that he would want her to be safe since she was about to become the mother of his child, but to fix things in her life that had nothing to do with the baby seemed wrong to her. She had already got her hopes up the night before when they went out to dinner, and she was embarrassed how crushed she was when he mentioned going out with Hilary. She wasn’t going to allow herself to feel warm and fuzzy for him again just so he could stomp on her feelings with some supermodel blonde on his arm. No, she had learned the hard way the only person she could depend on was herself. She was perfectly capable of calling a fix-it crew and putting her office back into order.

“Nonsense,” he said, dismissing her need to put distance between them.

Melissa wondered if he really was as clueless to her desires as he was acting.

“Really, my insurance company should be taking care of this. It’s the reason I pay them for things like this. I don’t need your crew.” She tried not to let the anger of her office being destroyed and her weird jealousy cloud her voice, but she had a feeling she wasn't as successful as she wanted to be.

“My crew can work with your insurance company. Truly, it is no problem. It will all work out; let me help you with this.” He put a hand on her arm. Melissa opened her mouth to argue some more, but he cut her off. “I don’t want you to stress out about anything, you guys take the day off and let my crew handle it.”

She wanted to tell him no, but the concern in his eyes was her undoing. They both stared at each other, and at least for Melissa, the rest of the world, especially her destroyed office, faded away into the background. He looked so warm and inviting to her. Why did he have to have Hilary for a client? she thought as they were lost in each other’s eyes.

“We can do your shots at my office today instead, okay, Melissa?” Bruce said, breaking her out of her stare down with Thomas.

Thomas blinked and stepped back half a step as if he had just realized they weren’t alone. Melissa silently cursed and thanked Bruce at the same time for ending the spell she had been stuck under. Thomas had Hilary so there was no reason for her to pretend he was going to be something he wasn’t. They made the terms of the agreement, and if she thought about it hard enough, she would remind herself why wanting Thomas to take care of her was a bad thing. She just had to think, really hard.

“Okay,” Melissa nodded to Bruce, ignoring Thomas and Tilly. “Let me go get everything we need. Then I’ll meet you at your office.”

“I can help you,” Bruce said moving as if he was going to follow her back into the exam area where she kept her injections.

“No. You go open up your office and I’ll be there in a little while. I need a moment to get my head straight.”

“Are you sure?” Bruce asked, still not moving to leave.

“She said she needed some time. She’ll meet you at your office when she gets her shots.” Thomas moved so he was standing front of Melissa, blocking her view from Bruce.

After a moment, Melissa heard Bruce move away, his footsteps heading toward the shattered door.

“I’ll see you at my office,” he said as one final jab before he left.

 

HAPTER NINE

 

This was not over. Thomas watched Bruce walk away, his face hard, and there was nothing he could do about it. He couldn’t follow him out and find out what his relationship with Melissa was. At the moment, making sure Melissa was okay was his main priority. He knew how her anxiety would overtake her, and he didn’t want her to go into another attack. Bruce would have to wait for another day.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about the relief he felt when he realized that Bruce was a doctor. A doctor that had been assisting Melissa in her injections. The jealousy he felt was unwanted when he heard them on the phone talking about spending the day together. He had thought he heard sarcasm hinted in her voice, but the heat the jealousy caused wouldn’t let him think straight. He still wasn’t happy when they embraced as soon as she noticed he was at her office.

The moment he saw Bruce's arms wrapped around her, a primal urge to pull her away from him and claim her as his swarmed him. He had to stop the bear inside of him from turning loose. It was obvious Bruce cared for her in more than just a friendly way. In that moment, he decided to he was going to start taking care of her the way he should have the second she agreed to have his baby. He wanted to wait and ease her into his help, but that option left the building as soon as her arms accepted Bruce.

When he mentioned that his crew was coming in to fix her office, he expected resistance. He saw it in her eyes when she told him she didn’t need him to help her, but he wasn’t backing down. When she agreed to let him help without much of a fight, Thomas realized how much this break-in had messed with her. The normal self-assured, independent doctor was reduced to a scared, lost little girl. He didn’t like it, and he was going to fix it as fast as he could.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Melissa move around the wreckage and go toward the back of her office. He turned to follow, but not before Tilly shot him a saucy wink. He smiled at her and threw one back at her. At least he knew he had Tilly on his side. As he followed the steady clip of Melissa’s heels, his eyes strayed to the mess around him. When he re-read the message left on the wall, he saw red. Someone was messing with the wrong bear. He had waited too long and wanted this baby too much for someone to threaten what they were doing. Melissa was giving him a child. The one thing nobody else was able to do. And nobody threatened his child.

Melissa stopped in front of an overhead drawer and leaned her forehead against it. Thomas watched her shoulders drop in defeat. Without thought of what he was doing, he walked over to her and placed his hands on her shoulders. Her body tensed under his hold. After a second, she exhaled loudly and leaned into his chest allowing herself to be held up by his strength.

Thomas’ heart sped up as he held her. The urge to pick her up and throw her over his shoulder until he got her somewhere safe took hold in his head. He wanted to take care of her and the thought terrified him.

“I set up dinner with my parents on Friday. They would really like to meet you.” Thomas’ bear sat up and beat its chest wanting him to say so much more. He needed to get himself in check before he did something stupid.

Melissa’s head nodded on his chest, her hair rubbing against it and as embarrassing as it was his body started to respond to her closeness. He needed to get laid so he could get these thoughts he shouldn't be having out of his head. His date with Hilary needed to hurry up and get here. He tried to convince himself his reaction to Melissa was purely due to the fact he hadn’t been with a woman since they started this whole baby thing.

“I think we should have sex on Wednesday,” Melissa said, shocking him out of his thoughts of Hilary.

His body seized up for a second as her words settled in his head. “I thought we were going to wait a while?” Thomas wanted to smack himself on the forehead. This is what he wanted and he was trying to talk her out of it.

“Thomas, you had two men attack you last night and warn you off our plans. My office has been demolished, and from what they painted on the walls, they are not okay with us doing this. I’m not sure who is doing this, but I have a feeling they aren’t going to stop their threats. I would like to get started as soon as possible. Time is no longer on our side.”

Melissa sounded weary and Thomas’ arms wound around her waist pulling her as close as he could.

“I have a date with Hilary on Thursday.” Why did he say that? He couldn’t believe how bad he was handling this whole situation.

After he spoke, it was Melissa’s turn to stiffen. He silently cursed himself for telling her about Hilary. And he mentally slugged himself in the nuts when he held his breath, hoping she would tell him not to go and stay with her. This girl was getting to him in the worst way, and for the moment he didn’t want to fight it. He was putting the ball in her court, and hoped she would take it.

“That’s fine. It’s not going to take two days of intercourse to get me pregnant. I will take my major injections today and give it a day to take its course. They make me sleepy for over twenty-four hours, so I will be completely recovered by Wednesday. One or two ejaculations should be sufficient and then you can go on your date with Hilary.”

Thomas looked down and scowled at the top of her head. Her answer shouldn’t have disappointed him the way it did. His bear was slamming against his senses to claim her as his, and she was basically telling him to date other women. Her clinical tone set him on edge. She was exasperating.

His arms fell to his sides and Melissa stepped away from his body leaving a cold spot where her body heat no longer resided. She turned around, her eyes shut down of any emotion, blocking him from finding out what he wanted to know.

“I think we should do it in a hotel. I was going to suggest my office so I have all the equipment readily available, but that’s too clinical for me.” She smiled at Thomas, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

Thomas crossed his arms over his chest so he wouldn’t grab onto her shoulders and shake some sense into her.

“A hotel?” he asked, his voice gruff.

She nodded her head, her eyes drifting away from his face, no longer making eye contact. “Yes, a hotel. There won’t be any distractions and we can get it done with quickly. It also provides amenities such as a restroom and shower. I know a couple that have vacancies.”

Thomas stopped her before she could keep talking. He was angry with the way she was planning on making their child. He knew they agreed on just what they were doing, but he didn’t like it. His hand reached out and gently grasped her chin, lifting it so she had to look at him.

“I’ll take care of the hotel. I will pick you up at five on Wednesday.”

Her eyes widened as he spoke. She nodded her head and he felt a sense of victory run through him.

“Get what you need and I’ll walk you to your car. My crew should be here any minute.”

“You don’t have to wait for me,” she stared to protest.

“Melissa, get your stuff,” he told her, pinching the bridge of his nose. She had him all over the place and he needed to stop letting her get to him.

She turned around and unlocked the cabinet in front of her. She pulled out seven vials and syringes. Thomas took in everything she was doing for him, and his heart softened. The vials were big and some of the liquid looked thick and had to be painful when inserted. He felt guilty. They talked every day and she explained to him what she was doing with the injections, but seeing it firsthand made his stomach churn at the pain she was subjecting herself to. He also realized she wasn’t being completely honest with him about how brutal the treatments really were.

“Melissa, I’m sorry,” he whispered, the anguish in his voice apparent.

She turned to him, holding the black padded bag her she had placed everything in for transport. “What are you sorry for? I’ve already told you this isn’t your fault.”

“This is my fault,” he said, running his hands through his hair in frustration. “You are doing all of this on your own. All I have to do is get you pregnant. You are the one sacrificing everything.”

Her eyes softened and a small smile appeared on her face. “Thomas, I want this baby just as much as you do. Parents sacrifice for their children. I don’t mind the pain because I know it’s going to be worth it when I get to hold our child.”

Thomas’ heart beat hard in his chest. He wouldn’t have been surprised if it leaped out of his chest and fell into her hands. She was dangerous. Everything she said to him was perfect, and he was afraid he was going to do something to ruin it. He needed to keep his distance.

“You are already an amazing mother to our child. I appreciate you so much.”

The wonder in his voice made her smile notch up, taking his breath away.

“Thomas, your crew is here.” Tilly broke into the bubble they had surrounded themselves with.

Melissa blinked, the smile disappearing from her face. “All right. I’d better go get these shots in. I know Bruce has patients today and I don’t want to disrupt his schedule anymore today. I guess I’ll see you on Wednesday.”

It was Thomas’ turn to smile at the pink in Melissa’s cheeks when she mentioned c-day. As much as she pretended he didn’t get to her, every once in a while and maybe a couple of flushed cheeks and he knew the truth. She had an amazing poker face, but even the best couldn’t hide it all the time.

It took more willpower than he wanted to admit walking away from Melissa when he walked her to her car. Tilly was ordering his crew around like a drill sergeant. Thomas was confident the office would be in pristine condition soon enough. He couldn’t resist pulling Melissa into one more long hug before letting her get in her car and back away. He could have asked her if he could come along on her trip to Bruce. It wouldn’t have been a crazy request; she was doing this for their baby. The question was on the tip of his tongue, but he was able to hold it back long enough to get her away from him.

Thomas climbed in his car and backed up while dialing Blair. Melissa may have been convinced that her ex wasn’t behind the threats, but he wasn’t going to be positive until he had some proof. And God help the person that was doing this to them. He would make them regret it.

“What’s up? Did you fall in love yet? I need to get to the sheet to find out who picked today.” Blair answered the phone with the background noise that sounded as if he was in a construction zone.

“Where are you?”

“Spying on a pretty lady I met last night. I want make sure she wasn’t lying about some of the things she told me.”

“Well, you’re going to have to put it on hold. I need you to track down Nathaniel and make sure he doesn’t have any connections that he could pull to destroy Melissa’s office.” He didn’t mention the men threatening him the other night. Right now, protecting Melissa and getting some answers was all he was worried about.

“What happened?” Blair asked, the squeak on the phone letting Thomas know he was sitting up from whatever hunched position he was currently in.

Thomas laid out the details of Melissa’s office and explained what Melissa had told him about Nathaniel being in jail.

Blair whistled loudly. “That’s pretty crazy stuff. You guys are going to be head over heels in love with each other sooner than I thought.”

“Shut up, Blair. Just call me when you find out anything about her ex.” Thomas hung up the phone before Blair had a chance to stop cackling like a hen and answer him.

He pulled into his parking garage determined to get some work done for the day somehow. He was surprised to see Bruce waiting for him outside his building.

“Listen, Thomas, can I have a minute to talk to you about Melissa?”

He wasn’t sure what exactly Bruce could want to tell him, but something in Bruce’s eyes told him this was something he was going to want to hear.

“Yeah, man, come on up to the office.” Thomas led the way through the building and up to his office. “Can I get you a drink or something?”

“No, this will only take a minute. I want you to know about the risks associated with what you’re doing.”

“Melissa told me the baby might not make it, and he or she might not have the gene.” Thomas wasn’t sure how much Bruce knew about the paranormal world.

“This isn’t about the bear baby—yes, I know what you are. I know about all of it and sometimes I think it would be easier if I didn’t know. I’m talking about the effect it’s having on Melissa.”

Thomas straightened. “What kind of effect?”

“Every time she takes the full treatment, she’s violently ill for hours, having to go to bed and cancel all her patients for the day. The treatments change her body in ways we haven’t even started to study, and I’m worried about how bad the after-effects will be. I care about Melissa, but I’m not telling you this because I’m jealous. I’m telling you this because I want you to understand what you’re asking her to do. I don’t think I would be a good friend if I didn’t.”

“Why hasn’t Melissa told me this?” Thomas was angry; he didn’t know how sick she’d been. He was angry with her for not telling him.

“Because she wants to do it. She wants her research to work and she values that more than her own health. It’s hard to talk her out of something once she decides it’s what she wants to do.” He smiled.

Thomas could tell Bruce did genuinely care for Melissa. He decided he wouldn’t mind terribly if they got together and Bruce was around his kid. The fact that he was looking out for her was enough to stifle the jealously Thomas felt toward him.

“Thank you for telling me, Bruce. I’m definitely going to talk to her and take into consideration everything you’ve told me.”

“Okay, then I’ve done what I can.” Bruce reached out and shook his hand. “I have to get back to my office before Melissa gets there. I’ll see my way out.”

Thomas sat for a long time trying to figure out the best approach for the situation. He was really upset she hadn’t been honest about what the shots were doing to her body. Maybe he’d been too quick to okay an experimental process because he wanted a child so badly. He really needed to talk her and figure out what the best choice for her would be, he’d never be able to live with himself if she was permanently hurt because of him.

***

Melissa pulled into a random parking lot and screamed into the interior of her car. Too many people were around her at her office for her to be able to have the mandatory melt down you are allowed to have when your life was violated. Tears tracked down her eyes as she punched the wheel, making the horn sound off, scaring the hell out of her.

The moment she noticed her building had been vandalized, she had been holding off a major panic attack. It was pulling on her full force, trying to get her to break. Melissa focused on her breathing, willing her body to calm down. Thomas’ large arms surrounding her filtered into her head and her lungs started to expand. She focused on picturing Thomas. His strong warm body protecting her. The clean scent that seemed to always surround him. After a moment, the panic started to ebb and she was no longer shaking.

Why did he have to be so amazing? He swooped in and saved the day without her having to prompt him. Melissa would have to remind Nathaniel multiple times just to take out the trash, and in the end most of the time she would end up doing it. Thomas just took charge, knowing exactly what she needed and helping her get it.

He acted as a band-aid the entire morning. Soothing her and making everything seem like it would be all right. That was until he mentioned his date with Hilary.

“I’m so stupid,” Melissa moaned into the empty car.

She hadn’t been lying to him about wanting to get started on making the baby immediately. These people, whoever they were, meant business. Melissa was afraid to push it any further. Besides, when Thomas held her, she stupidly thought they were a united front. Making a baby with him while he was being attentive seemed like the right choice. But right after she mentioned them making a baby, the old fashioned way, no less, he mentioned one of the people she would never be able compare to.

Melissa’s head dropped to the headrest as tears streamed down her eyes. “Please let this be because of the hormones,” she said out loud. This connection she felt toward Thomas needed to stop immediately. He was going to be with Hilary and she was going to be with herself. Melissa knew she needed to stop herself from forming any more of an attachment to Thomas. If she didn’t, she would be miserable the rest of her life. Anything she had to share with him in the parental way would be awful if she didn’t get a handle on her emotions.

With her resolve in place, she started her car and drove to Bruce’s office. The one good thing about the injections was she would be sleeping it off all day and wouldn’t have to deal with any Thomas turmoil for the moment.

Bruce’s secretary, Glenna, a pudgy, middle-aged woman with no sense of humor, greeted Melissa when she walked in. Melissa felt a pang of resentment that his office was intact while hers was in ruin. She adored Bruce, but she preferred the home-like feel of her office to the modern feel of his.

“He is with a patient. He wants you to wait in his office,” Glenna told her, going back to her computer before the words left her mouth. It had taken Melissa a while to calm down in the parking lot so she’d missed an opportunity where he had a lull.

“Thank you, Glenna.” Melissa plastered on her biggest fake smile and walked toward Bruce’s office.

Inside his office was exactly like his waiting room. Everything was chrome with sharp angles and odd splashes of color. Melissa longed for her office when she sat on what had to be the world’s most uncomfortable couch. Bruce entered a couple of minutes later, and really it wasn’t a minute too soon. Her legs were starting to cramp from the uncomfortable position she was sitting in.

“Was that him?” he asked nonchalantly. He would have pulled it off too if his hand wasn’t pressing a little too hard when he was swabbing her skin for the injections.

“Yes. He will be the father of my child. And honestly Bruce, I don’t want to hear it. My morning has been awful. My office is in shambles. If you could cut me some slack and inject me so I can go home and go to sleep, I would really appreciate it.”

“Melissa, we need to talk about this. You can still pull out of this. You aren’t pregnant yet.” He abandoned his pretense of getting her skin ready for injection.

“Well, that won’t be true on Wednesday. I need to get these injections, Bruce. I’m already running late on when I should’ve taken them. This needs to be put in the data as soon as possible.”

“Wednesday! As in this Wednesday?” he asked shooting off of the couch.

Melissa envied the fact that he was no longer on the torture device he called a couch.

“Yes, this Wednesday. As in two days from now. Can you please just get on with it?”

“Melissa, I’m going to ask you one more time. You aren’t going to need me after this because these treatments won’t be needed once you’re pregnant. Are you really sure about this?” His eyes searched her face.

Melissa placed her hand on his. “Yes, I want this. I already love this baby. Bruce, I appreciate your concern but this is what I want.”

Bruce exhaled and continued getting her ready for the injections. His jaw clenched as he inserted the first shot. Liquid fire coursed through her. As many times as she had done this, she was still surprised how painful it was. She gritted her teeth as he continued to inject her.

Once the injections were over, she ran to his bathroom and heaved until there was nothing left. Because of her office being destroyed, she had forgotten to take the nausea medicine she had been taking, not that it was really helping. It was more reassuring herself that she was trying not to get sick by taking them. Once she was spent, Bruce helped her up.

“I’ll drive you home,” he told her leading her out of his office.

“But what about my car?” she asked leaning heavily on him.

“I'll take you home in your car, and Uber back to my office.”

“Thank you. I need to enter all my data before I go to sleep,” Melissa said as she tried hard not to fall asleep in her car.

“I'll enter everything for you. I brought my medical bag. I’ll take your vitals and have it ready for you when you feel better.”

“Thank you so much, Bruce.”

True to his word, he helped her get situated on her couch before taking her vitals and entering everything in. Melissa tried to thank him again, but fell asleep before the words left her mouth.

HAPTER TEN

 

Thomas paced in his office the day after Melissa’s break-in, waiting for Blair to call him. He picked up his phone four times, putting it down with more force each time. While he was waiting, there was something he had to do he’d been putting off.

He dialed the office and then cursed himself for being a coward. He was only calling the office hoping she wouldn’t answer. Letting it ring three times, he was about to hang up when Tilly answered.

He put on a braver voice than he actually felt like projecting. “I need to speak with Melissa immediately.”

“She’s not here yet, sugar,” Tilly said. “Why do you sound so serious?”

“I have been informed the shots she’s taking are making her really sick. I don’t want her putting herself in danger because of me. If the shots are hurting her, I’m going to ask her to stop doing them immediately.” He was proud of himself for getting all of the words out, but knew he wouldn’t have been as easy going with them if he was talking to Melissa.

“Okay, Thomas, look, I’m sure you have the best intentions for Melissa in telling her to stop, but I’m not going to let you talk to her.”

“Why wouldn’t you let me talk to her? Is she there?”

“For a couple of reasons. One, Melissa wouldn’t be doing this if she didn’t want to. She knew what she would be putting her body through from the beginning. She knew even better after she took the first shot. You telling her to quit now is just really harsh. She’s already dealt with it this long and you’re close to trying to conceive. I don’t know why you think that would be helpful.”

Tilly sounded mad at him. He’d thought it would be the best thing for Melissa to stop something that was hurting her, but now he really wasn’t sure. “I just don’t want her to suffer for this and then have something go wrong. I couldn’t stand it if I was the reason she was caused grief.”

“You know what, Thomas, you’re a good guy. Melissa is lucky you’re going to be the father of her child, but that stubborn little thing isn’t going to quit. If you tell her she should, she’s just going to get mad at you and you don’t really want that, do you?”

“No, I don’t want her to be mad at me. I’m still going to be worried.”

“I’m taking care of her, and if there’s something you need to know, I promise I will tell you. So just trust me, okay?”

“All right Tilly, you take care of her for me.” Thomas felt better after he hung up the phone. Tilly was probably right about Melissa getting angry if he tried to stop her from taking the treatments. He went back to trying to work on some things that had piled up on his desk.

Janet buzzed his intercom. “Ms. Dalton is here to see you.” Janet’s voice was professional and she knew how hard Thomas worked to get her account. With all that known, he still detected some annoyance in his secretary’s voice.

“Send her in,” Thomas said, trying to dispel his nervous energy.

As much as he enjoyed talking to Hilary, and by talking he meant flirting with her while he stared at her magnificent body and thought of all the things he wanted to do with her,  he was on Janet’s side of not being overly excited at Hilary’s arrival.

She strutted in in a short red dress.

“Hello, I wasn’t expecting to see you until our date.”

Her lip pushed out and her eyes squinted for a split second before she went back to the wide-eyed Hilary he was used to. “Are you not happy to see me?” she asked, coming around his desk and leaning against it inches from him.

“Of course I’m happy to see you,” he said, letting his eyes travel up her revealed legs. “I just wasn't expecting you that’s all.”

“I wanted to see you. I missed you,” she said, trailing her fingernail down his chest. “Did you miss me?”

“Of course I missed you.” Thomas leaned back in his chair. Hilary had always been forward with how she felt about him, but the way she was acting was different. She had a hint of desperation on her, and it made Thomas uncomfortable.

Some time ago he formed a habit that he really wished he wouldn’t have done. Since talking to Melissa daily and wondering about her throughout his day, he'd picked up the habit of comparing every other woman he met to her. If that wasn’t bad enough, none of them were even close to meeting the standards he had witnessed in Melissa.

Because of this new habit, he wasn’t sure if Hilary had always been desperate or if he was just seeing it now because of Melissa. Or maybe this was a new habit that she discovered.

“I was thinking why don’t we go out for lunch. I can give you a preview of what will happen on Thursday.”

Thomas opened his mouth to take her up on her offer when his phone rang. Blair’s name popped up on his screen, and he lunged for it, dislodging Hilary’s hand in the process.

“Hey!” she yelled at him. She stood up straight, looking down her perfectly pointy nose at him.

“I’m so sorry, Hilary. I have to take this.” Thomas answered the phone, his hand on her thigh keeping her from storming out of his office. “Blair, give me a second,” he said into his phone before placing it on his leg.

“I really need to take this call. It’s very important. I’m really looking forward to Thursday, and I want to take you up on your offer for lunch, but I have to play boss man right now.” Thomas didn’t feel as bad as he thought he would when he lied. And a small portion of him felt he was lying about Thursday, also.

“Your loss. I’ll see you on Thursday.” Hilary leaned over, giving him an unobstructed view of her cleavage before brushing her lips over his. She turned and sauntered out, her ass moving like a swing in a wind storm.

As soon as she was out of sight, he pulled the phone up to his ear. “Talk to me, Blair.”

“Who were you talking to? If that was Melissa and you are keeping your love from me, I’m never going to help you again,” Blair huffed into the phone.

Thomas rolled his eyes. If Blair kept this up, he was going to ask Janet if she knew some other P.I. he could use.

“You have no claim on anything Melissa and I do. And we are not falling in love. I told you, this is a business transaction. We will both treat our child with the love he or she deserves, but nothing will come of us. I will respect her and appreciate what she has given me and nothing more,” Thomas said, hearing the exasperation in his voice. How was it he was so annoyed and it wasn’t even lunch time yet?

“I heard a woman’s voice. I wish you wouldn’t have muffled what you two were saying.”

Thomas cut him off before he could keep badgering him. He wanted to know what Blair had learned in his shoddy detective work, but he also knew he wouldn’t get anything out of him until he gave Blair what he wanted.

“Yes, o great detective. You did hear a woman’s voice. It wasn’t Melissa’s voice though, it was Hilary Dalton. We were confirming our date for Thursday. Now, will you please let me know what you found out?”

“Hilary Dalton, yuck, why would you go out with her when you have Melissa?”

“Are you serious? Hilary Dalton is gorgeous. And for the last time, I don’t have Melissa.”

“I don’t like her. She seems so fake when she is on TV. I’ve heard she treats people horribly. Now Melissa, she is a class act. She has been through so much in life she would appreciate you, and never stray. You’re an idiot. I don’t even want to tell you what I found out.”

“Blair, I swear to everything holy, if you don’t start talking…” Thomas growled the last part, letting Blair fill in the blanks.

“Fine. Melissa, the astute woman you should be with, was correct. Nathaniel has been in jail. He can’t post bail, and from my sources, every phone call he has made shows he has nobody. I’m surprised he hasn’t called Melissa to bail him out. Whoever threatened you and messed up her office has nothing to do with Nathaniel. Do you want me to do some reconnaissance and find out who is behind this?” Blair’s voice perked up at the thought of doing real P.I. work.

Thomas was still pissed about his Melissa comments, so he decided to withhold some of Blair’s joy. “Not this time. I’ll see what I can find out, and if I need you, maybe I’ll give you a call. Thanks for checking that out for me.”

Blair hung up sounding dejected when he told Thomas good-bye. Thomas leaned back in his chair as he tried to think of who would do this to him. He got frustrated and left his office to get some air. He also needed to book a room for the next day. That got a smile on his face and when his shoes hit the sidewalk he felt a lot better.

***

When Melissa walked into her office the day after the vandalism, she was even more shocked than when she saw the destruction. Thomas’ men did a fantastic job.

The office now sported a fresh coat of paint, and carpet. The destroyed furniture had been replaced by similar yet more expensive looking pieces. Tilly’s desk sported a bright bouquet of flowers, and her new double-paned glass windows sparkled.

“Tilly, this looks fantastic,” she whispered, unable to talk around the lump in her throat.

Tilly smiled and clucked her tongue before she rattled off the clients Melissa would be seeing that day. Melissa walked into her office and gasped. It was perfect and organized. All of her shattered picture frames had been replaced and everything looked like it should have. She cringed when she noticed a new couch in her office. The old couch had been destroyed, and now it was in furniture heaven. Melissa walked tentatively over to the new couch and sat on it. The material allowed her to sink into its fluffiness, and she sighed with contentment. She shouldn’t have doubted Tilly. This couch was incredibly comfortable, and she was looking forward to taking many naps on it.

Her day went by quickly as she took care of her patients. At the end of the day, she and Tilly were sitting on her new couch.

“Tilly, I can’t thank you enough for what you did for me. The office looks better than it did before the break-in.”

“Hush, I love this place, too. Besides it was fun ordering all those men around.”

Melissa laughed. She looked around and noticed something she hadn’t before.

“Are those security cameras?” she asked as she stood up to inspect the tiny ball hanging from the ceiling.

“Yeah, he had them installed; isn’t that crazy?” Tilly said, joining her.

“That man is too much.” She remembered something she had to tell Tilly when she thought about Thomas.

“I need you to move my last couple of patients to another day.”

Melissa damned her red cheeks knowing Tilly was going to pick up on it.

“Why would I need to do that?”

“Thomas and I are going to try and conceive tomorrow, and I want to be able to go home and shower.”

Tilly screamed shrilly. “What?! You have to tell me everything,” she demanded.

“Can we not do this here?” Melissa pleaded.

“Fine. Meet me at my house and we will have a girl’s night.”

Melissa smiled. A girl’s night sounded perfect. Tilly was her best friend and maybe she could get some of her nerves calmed by talking it out with her.

“Deal. I’ll get the food,” Melissa told her. “Bruce and I did the injections at the crack of dawn this morning so we’d be ready for tomorrow.”

“I’m telling you that man would do anything for you,” Tilly said and Melissa ignored her.

They locked up the office and Melissa went to go get food and change into more comfortable clothes. She had a feeling it was going to be a long night.

“I brought pizza and ice cream,” Melissa yelled out to Tilly where ever the hell she was. Tilly never locked her door so Melissa knocked once and walked in.

“I'm in the kitchen. You can put everything down in the living room, we'll eat there.”

Melissa moved into the living room and sat everything down. She curled up on Tilly’s big green recliner and waited for her friend.

Tilly came in with two glasses of wine. Melissa took one and followed her to grab some food.

Once they had gorged themselves on food and ice cream, Melissa was back on the squishy recliner as she sipped her wine.

“So are you ready to knock boots with that sexy man?” Tilly asked bringing Melissa back to reality.

“Actually, I'm nervous. It has been a long time since I’ve, well, you know. What if I don’t remember how to do it?" Melissa chewed on the side of her cheek. It was true she hadn’t been with anyone since Nathaniel, and they hadn’t been intimate for a while.

Tilly laughed and leaned over on the couch so she could look at Melissa. “It’s just like riding a bike: once you've done it, you'll never forget.”

“I hope so.” Melissa’s voice showed just how insecure she was feeling.

“So it’s a little different than before. Women are more independent and can take charge in the bedroom. I just finished reading a great book. Do you want some tips?”

Melissa was on her second glass of wine, and the way Tilly’s eyes gleamed with mischief she wanted to know what kind of tips her friend had for her. “Lay them on me.”

“Yay! Okay, like I said, I was just reading a book and the woman took complete charge in the bedroom. She tied him up and poured hot wax on his body as he writhed around. I swear that scene had me so hot. Then she started giving him a blow job and right before he came, she stuck her fingers you know where. He said it was the greatest sex he ever had, and they lived happily ever after. Oh and then I read another book.”

“Wait. Hold on. No more,” Melissa sputtered, trying to get words out. So tips from Tilly were off the table. Tilly’s eyes still hadn't lost the gleam in them and Melissa realized her friend had an arsenal of advice she was ready to unload on her. “I’m scared, Tilly. I don’t really know what’s going to happen when the baby comes.”

This was a true fear Melissa had been having but she also knew it would get her friend off the topic of the weird books she had been reading.

Tilly smiled at her and leaned over even further to pat her leg. “It’s going to be fine. Especially with him being a were-bear and all. They are amazing parents, and they are loyal.”

Melissa took a large gulp of wine. “You know about the loyalty of other species?” Melissa stared at her friend. Tilly never really talked about the shifters and the nature of their work, and as long as they’d been best friends, she’d never asked her why.

“I know all about the shifter communities,” Tilly said, pulling back from her leaning position and looking down at her empty wine glass.

“You know, we’ve never talked about how you found out; you know all about how I know.”

Tilly finally lifted her head and met Melissa’s eyes. “I’ve known about shifters since I was four years old. My parents are cougars,” Tilly admitted.

“You’re a shifter? I had no idea.” Melissa slumped down into the chair, her mind reeling.

“I’m not a shifter, my parents are.”

Melissa shot her a confused look. Maybe Tilly wasn’t able to shift even though she had two shifter parents. If that was a possibility, Melissa realized the chances of her baby being able to shift into a bear was even less than she had first predicted.

“I’m adopted,” Tilly told her.

Melissa’s shoulders dropped from relief. Her baby still had a good chance of being able to shift.

“When I was little, my real mom left me in front of a hospital. My adopted shifter mom found me when she got off her nursing shift. She and my adopted father were having a hard time conceiving, and she felt I was put in front of that hospital for a reason.”

“Oh Tilly, that’s such a beautiful story.” Melissa sniffled into a napkin she was holding.

“Melissa, that’s why I’m so dedicated to you and your research. Not that I’m not thankful every day that my parents adopted me, but more and more shifters are having trouble conceiving. A lot of the species are getting really close to extinction. With your research, you will be able to bring clans back from the brink of losing everything. My parents still continued to try for a child when I was younger. Not because I wasn’t enough, but they loved me so much and they had so much more love to give, but it wasn’t in the cards for them.”

Melissa wiped the tears rolling down her cheeks. Tilly was such an amazing friend.

“Being raised in the shifter world, I adapted pretty fast, and now have shifter-dar. I knew Thomas was a bear the moment I spotted his wide shoulders as he signed in.”

Melissa let out an un-lady-like snort. “He is pretty obvious if you know what you are looking at.”

“I know I’m looking at one of the hottest men I’ve ever seen when he comes in. I also know I’m looking at someone who has feelings for you.”

“No, it isn’t like that. We swore we would remain platonic; that way, no more drama would be forced on our baby,” Melissa explained, ignoring the flutter in her stomach when Tilly mentioned he had feelings for her. “Besides, he’s dating Hilary Dalton. There is no way I could get him away from her. She’s gorgeous.”

Tilly let out another one of her screeches. “Oh, My. God. Hilary Dalton. I love her. Do you think he could get me an autograph?”

“I already asked him.”

Tilly sobered at Melissa’s words. “That’s why you are a better person than Hilary Dalton. You think of people’s happiness besides your own. And if you want to believe it or not, I see the way Thomas looks at you. I can promise he’s not thinking of Hilary when you are around. Besides, you’re going to give him something nobody else is able to. You are going to ensure his clan has at least one more descendant, hopefully allowing them to keep their line going. Hilary has nothing on you.”

“Ahh, thanks, Tilly.”

“So your mission is to knock his socks off in bed tomorrow. Get him so hot and heavy for you while you two make your child he won’t even remember another woman’s name. Especially Hilary.”

Melissa laughed as the fluttering in her stomach started again. She was going to have sex with Thomas tomorrow, and they were going to make a baby. Tomorrow everything was going to change. Once the deed was done, Thomas would be cemented into her life forever. The weird thing about it was instead of sending her into one of her panic modes like it should have, it brought her a sense of security. There was really no way she would be able to sleep even if the weird medicine coursing through her veins wasn’t already making it hard.

HAPTER ELEVEN

 

Melissa threw the door open when Thomas knocked on it a little too hard. She cringed as it banged into the wall. She was a little nervous. Casually, she tried to lean out and grab it to pull it back to her.

“Hi, come in. I just need to grab my overnight bag.” She’d packed everything she needed to get ready after the deed was done.

“Okay,” he said to her, rubbing the back of his neck.

He walked into her living room and knocked over a vase, catching it before it shattered on the floor. Melissa walked into her room thinking maybe she wasn’t the only one nervous about tonight. The two of them had decided after they tried for the first time, they would go and meet each other’s parents.

It seemed like a great idea, but now she was kind of wishing they were just staying in the hotel. He was going to stay overnight and she was going to go back to her house. That way it didn’t look like they’d just rented the room for sex; she wasn’t sure why she cared because that was exactly what they’d done.

They got into the car without saying much to each other. She couldn’t tell if he was nervous too, but he was a little quieter than usual. They checked in and walked to the room together. It was such a strange situation for Melissa that she really wasn’t sure how to act. Once they were in the hotel room, she went straight to the bathroom and laid out all her things. She was dawdling. It was now or never. She needed to pull on her big girl panties and just get it done. Or should she say take her big girl panties off? Now she knew she was really nervous, making stupid jokes was her way of coping.

With a deep breath, she came out of the bathroom dressed in a pair of leggings and a large shirt. She didn't know how clinical he was going to want to make this. And she didn’t want to be embarrassed by wearing something overly sexual, although her panties and bra were a light green set that matched, just in case.

When she packed the clothes she was going to wear, she was going to go for something more fitting, but the thought of him comparing her to Hilary had her grabbing the baggiest shirt she owned.

Thomas’ eyes roamed over her body and he smirked at her. He sat on the edge of the bed in a pair of jeans and t-shirt. There was a bucket with champagne sticking out of it. Melissa’s nerves shot through her. This was really going to happen.

“Are you going to stand there all night?” he asked.

“I don’t know. Are bears that well-endowed that you can reach from here?” She wanted to smack herself on the forehead. What the hell Melissa? she told herself, get it together.

Thomas threw his head back and laughed. Her body tingled from the sound. She liked it when he let loose and laughed. She wasn’t sure how many people got to see this side of Thomas but she liked that she was one of them.

“Sit down, Melissa, I’ll get us some champagne.”

She didn’t move toward the bed until he got off of it and his back was toward her. She ran into the bed and jumped under the covers bringing them up to her chin. He turned around with two full glasses of the bubbly amber liquid and laughed again. She was annoyed that he seemed to be so in control.

She knew he was nervous when he picked her up from her apartment, but now he was laughing like it was no big deal. She wanted to throw him off his game. In a bold move, she tugged off her leggings and threw them at his face. He wasn’t able to protect himself because his hands were full. He shook his head dislodging her leggings from his face. He looked down at the ground and his eyes widened when he realized what she threw at him. Thomas crawled onto the bed, not getting under the covers. Melissa went to lean in to him to kiss him. She wanted to get this over with and she figured the faster the better.

Thomas reached over to hand her the glass of champagne and his elbow collided with her nose.

“Owww,” she cried, jumping back and causing him to spill her drink over the comforter.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry.” He rushed to the champagne pail and grabbed some ice, holding it to her face. The melting ice dripped on the already-soaked comforter made her legs instantly chilled.

Melissa climbed out from under the blankets and ripped the comforter off the bed, throwing it on the floor. She leaned over to inspect the other blankets, relieved when she saw that they were dry.

“I leaned into that,” she told him as he came over and stood beside her.

“I’m sorry; let me see it.” Melissa spun around and almost tripped over her feet. Thomas held onto her shoulder so she wouldn't fall.

She tipped her face down to the floor, hoping to find a hole big enough to jump into. He put his finger under her chin and lifted her face up so he could see her.

“It’s a little red, but I don’t think it is going to bruise.”

“It will be fine,” she whispered, his tone and touch was doing all sorts of things to her body.

She had been thinking about sex with him all day. Well, since the moment he asked her to be the mother of his child, her body was on overdrive. She hated to admit how much she wanted this.

“This isn’t going very well, isn’t it?” He laughed and pulled her down on the bed before sitting next to her looking down at his hands.

It was a vulnerable look for him and she softened a bit more. She had been thinking about how awkward this was for her and really didn't think too much about him.

She wondered if he was having such a hard time because he was with Hilary and he felt like he was cheating. She instantly scratched that off the list. He didn’t have to ask her to be the mother, she gave him the option of asking someone else. The fact that he declined that offer, even with the possibility of having Hilary, melted her fractured heart. She may not have him as the man in her life, but he would always be there for her and the baby. He was such a handsome man and any woman would be lucky for just one night with him. She was going to get to create life with him.

“All right, let’s do this,” she said, moving so she sat up on her knees on the bed.

Thomas jumped off the bed quickly, moving to take off his shirt. His movement caused her to tumble over and hit her back on the floor.

“Shit,” he mumbled bending down to look at her. “I’m usually really good at this part. I don’t know why I keep screwing up.”

After she jumped back up, Melissa reached out her fingers and touched his face. “I’m nervous, too. Maybe we should try another time.”

Thomas took her hand and pulled her up until they were standing in front of each other.

“No. I really want to do this. I promise I’ll stop injuring you.”

Melissa laughed and held out her hand, her pinky extended. He looked down at it and chuckled before linking his pinky with hers.

They both moved a couple of steps from each other so they could watch what the other was doing.

He pulled off his shirt and she did the same. When his pants came off, her eyes were glued to his every movement. It was slow and methodical, but she was excited to see everything he revealed to her. Her body smoldered when she got her first real look at his defined, tan abs. When his pants hit the floor, she had to lock her knees to keep her from melting into a puddle on the floor. She almost wished for it to be dark so she could hide herself a little more; he was perfect and she felt unattractive in front of him.

He took in her matching underwear and she saw his erection jut out from his black boxer briefs. It’s now or never, she thought as she crawled onto the bed and propped her head on her arm so she could watch him.

He’d had his back to her as he folded his pants and put them over a chair, but when he turned around, his eyes raked her body from top to bottom. A sense of pride took over her as he took her in. The look on his face shifted to a lustful, sexy haze and she breathed in deeply. He wanted her.

Crawling on top of her, he held himself up with his arms and looked down. She could feel his hard length through his boxers and a tingling spread from between her legs and through her stomach. He just may have been able to reach her when she stood by the bathroom.

“You’re a beautiful woman, Melissa. I’m so happy you’re going to let me make a baby with you.”

She was about to agree with him, but her throat stopped working when he moved up and ran his lips over her neck, barely touching her skin but it heated up. Her whole neck felt alive as he started to kiss it softly and moved up to her ear. He pulled it into his mouth for just a minute and positioned himself between her thighs. He pressed himself into her and the pressure building between her legs had her pushing back up into him.

“Let’s try that kiss again. Your nose is safe,” he whispered, his lips millimeters from hers.

“It’d better be. You pinky promised. I don’t want my child’s father to be a guy that goes back on his pinky promises.”

He laughed, a low sound that rumbled through her body. His face moved from hers as he licked her collarbone, making her shudder.

Moving back up to her mouth, he pressed his lips to hers, rocking into her. His tongue played with her lips, teasing the seam but not yet seeking entrance. She started to breathe heavier as her arousal heightened. The hormones were working and she’d been ready for him since before they were in the hotel. His hand slid down her side and scooped beneath her, pushing her body up into his. Opening her mouth, she allowed him to take her completely, both of them pressing against each other, tongues intertwined. She wrapped her legs around him and felt how hard she’d made him. They both moaned as they continued to rock into each other, both of them trying to get closer.

He pulled away from her lips and stood looking into her eyes as he slid the boxers down his legs and sprang to attention. It was impressive to say the least, and she bit her lip as he slid her panties down as well. He crawled back up on the bed and undid her bra, laying between her legs so his hardness wasn’t touching her yet and taking one breast into his mouth.

She arched her back, pressing her wetness against his stomach and moaning softly. He sucked and played with the nipple, running his tongue over it as his other hand squeezed the other breast lightly.

He switched, paying both of them equal attention, then moved back up to her mouth, his cock now fully erect dragging over her sex and eliciting a hiss from her.

“Are you ready for me?” His voice was low and husky. She was more than ready for him. It was all she could do not to scream.

“Yes, I’m ready,” she managed to say through heavy breathing and he took her mouth again as he drove into her. He held himself inside and kissed her, letting her walls adjust around him. He was thick and filled her in a way she hadn’t been. She arched her back and took him in deeper, causing him to moan. It was the sexiest sound she’d ever heard and she found her hands wandering to his ass so she could press him in further. Then he started to move. Slowly, he pushed inside of her and pulled out. It was amazing and his mouth continued to pleasure hers as he drew the pleasure from her stomach into a hot pulsing feeling inside of her.

“Please, Thomas,” she said. She needed it harder and faster, but she didn’t want to tell him that. He understood and drove into her faster, moving his mouth back to her neck. She screamed, clawing at his back as he continued thrusting into her. Her body clung to him as her orgasm crept up on her.

“I want you to come for me, Melissa. Show me how good it feels.” He reached down and circled her clit with his finger. Her body lit up with electricity and shattered around her as the powerful orgasm crashed into her.

She did as he asked and screamed out his name as she pulsed around him. Her body went limp and her back hit the mattress as she let go of him. Thomas leaned down and sucked one of her nipples into his mouth as he pushed in and out of her. His pace started to become erratic and Melissa knew he was about to come. She grabbed onto his face and kissed him hard. The moment their tongues met, he stiffened around her and moaned inside her mouth. Melissa felt him release inside her and she moaned with him.

Thomas collapsed on top of her, making her already-panting breath rush out of her.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, rolling off her. Melissa missed the heat of his body immediately. He reached out and grabbed her around the waist, bringing her to the side of his body. She exhaled and they both stayed quiet as they let what they had just done sink in.

***

Once she felt refreshed, Melissa stepped out of the shower and got dressed. It had been nice with Thomas. She couldn’t lie to herself; it had been mind-blowing. Even with a sore nose, it was still the best sex she had ever had. Now she had to worry about making a good impression on her future babies’ grandparents.

Getting dressed, she pulled out the makeup bag she’d brought with her and applied just enough to make it look like she tried. When she came out of the bathroom, he was sitting on the bed dressed and waiting. She’d let him have the first shower while she lay with her legs in the air. She figured it couldn’t hurt.

“Shall we?” he asked and stood holding out is arm. She took it and they went downstairs to get in the car. Avoiding eye contact was hard, but she did it. They’d just had sex and it was all she could think of. No matter how hard she tried to keep telling herself it was just for the baby, it had just happened and she couldn’t stop thinking about it. She would though, when they got to her mom’s house.

They pulled up and Melissa had tried to explain to Thomas how she could be sometimes. He put a hand on her knee. “However she’s acting today, I’m sure I’ll love her.”

His smile was genuine and she knew he meant it. The nurse opened the door and Melissa tried to judge the type of day her mother was having by her face, but she couldn’t.

“Hello, Melissa, sir,” she said, nodding at Thomas.

“This is Thomas. Is she okay to take visitors today?”

“She’s going great, watching her programs. Come on in.”

They walked through her mother’s quaint house. It was where she grew up, and knowing Thomas lived in a big mansion made her a little self-conscious about it. She shook that thought from her mind as they entered the living room. Her mother was sitting on the couch watching television with a blanket she was knitting. She looked up and smiled. Melissa’s anxiety melted, she was having a good day.

“Hey, Mama.” She moved into the room and took a seat in the recliner gesturing for Thomas to sit on the loveseat.

“Hey, sweetheart, who’s the babe?” She winked at Thomas and Melissa saw him blush. It was a nice change for someone to make him squirm.

“Mom, this is Thomas. I’m working with him in my fertility research.” She would tell her mother later about what that research entailed. To be completely honest with herself, she wasn’t really sure how her mother would react and it was better that she did it when they were alone. To his credit, Thomas didn’t even bat an eye.

“You have a very smart daughter, Mrs. Rancic.”

“Well, I know that’s true, Thomas. She’s one of a kind.” Her mother smiled and then launched into a bit of a coughing fit. Thomas jumped up and ran to get her some water. After she composed herself, she looked up at him and tilted her head from one side to the other. “I like you.”

That was it. Her mother went back to watching television, and after they politely watched it with her until it was time, they saw their way out. It was a good visit and Melissa was thrilled it went as well as it did. She was still very nervous about meeting his family.

They pulled up to a large home with a screened-in porch and large shuttered windows. The yard was massive and there were trees lining the driveway all the way down. It would have been an amazing place to grow up with all the playing she could have done. She tried to picture a smaller version of Thomas climbing the trees while he and his brother played hide-and-seek. She was excited that her future child would have a place to go like this where they could play and enjoy their grandparents. A thrill ran up her spine as she remembered Thomas’ heated hands on her body as they attempted to create a life.

“Are you okay? They can be a little much, so don’t be intimidated by them.”

She looked at him and smiled, not wanting him to know what she was thinking about.

“They are going to love you, don’t be nervous.”

Melissa chuckled a little but let him think that was the reason she shivered.

“All right. Let’s do this,” she told him, trying to portray confidence. “Thank you for being so great with my mom.”

“I liked her. She has spunk and she thinks I’m a babe.”

“'Well, she’s on a bunch of pain pills. I wouldn’t value her opinion.”

Thomas grabbed her hand and led her up the driveway. “You know I’m sexy. You can’t tell me that sex with me wasn’t an experience.”

Melissa felt the heat of his palm touch hers and she had to fight to contain herself. He was right it, was definitely an experience, but she wasn’t going to let him know that. “Oh yeah. The best sex I've had was when I got my nose elbowed and fell to the floor.”

“Next time I won’t harm you.”

Melissa stopped just when they reached the porch and stared at him. What did he mean by next time? Before she could ask, the huge wooden door flew open and a short, thin woman walked out onto the porch. She had Thomas’ eyes and the same little smile he had when he was taking things in. She looked Melissa over and then surprised her by pulling her into a hug.

“When my son falls in love, it’s a good day for all of us. You’re so pretty! I’m thrilled to meet you, Melissa. My name is Alma McMillian, please come in. Son, wipe your feet.” With that, she turned around and hurried back to the kitchen.

Melissa turned to look up at Thomas completely confused. “I might have told her you were my girlfriend and we loved each other. I’m sorry, but my mother still scares me and it will be easier this way.”

She was shocked and a little angry that he would put on such a fake show. It was hard to know what to say to him when she was going to be forced to pretend they were together and in love. Great, she thought, the pressure had just been increased significantly. Whatever she was cooking smelled heavenly and Melissa’s mouth watered.

“Unky Tom.” A tiny girl with blonde hair and a frilly pink dress came running up and wrapped herself around Thomas.

“Rosy, you big sweetie,” he said scooping the little girl up. “Where’s the birthday girl?”

Another little girl with blonde hair with a similar face came running from the back somewhere. “Tom Tom,” she screeched and he scooped her up, too. Melissa’s heart fluttered a bit. A lady who looked younger than her came walking up next, feeding a bottle to a small baby in a bright pink blanket. She looked exhausted.

“Hello, Thomas, wait until you see the spread Mom put out for this kid’s birthday. We’re eating dinner and then going out there to eat dinner again,” she said. “Hi, I’m Emma, AJ’s wife.” She stuck a hand out just beneath the baby, not able to extend it any further and Melissa shook it. Melissa’s eyes held the babies for a second, thinking that in a few short months she could have a baby of her own. The thought was surreal.

“Nice to meet you.”

“This is Leona,” Thomas said, pretending to bite the little girl before he put both girls down. “This is Piper,” he pointed at the baby, “and Rosy,” he put his hand on the smaller blonde’s head. “My brother is around here somewhere—AJ—and my father.” He smiled, obviously proud of his nieces as they ran in circles around his legs.

“Girls, go play outside until dinner time,” Emma said and the two little balls of blonde and pink sprinted toward the back of the house. They went into the kitchen to see if Alma needed help, but she ran them back out to the living room where Thomas’ father sat watching television.

“Dad, this is Melissa. Melissa, this is my father, Harold Macmillan.”

Melissa reached out and shook his hand, smiling warmly. His father returned the handshake but not the smile, and she felt a bit uncomfortable. They all sat on the couch and watched the war program he was viewing until Alma called everyone in for dinner.

AJ joined them and Melissa was amazed at how alike he and Thomas were. They looked the same and had the same mannerisms. There was no denying the two were definitely brothers.

“So Melissa, Thomas tells us you’re a doctor. A fertility doctor at that. Very impressive what you’re doing for the shifter community. What clan is your family from?”

Alma choked on the tea she was sipping and Melissa caught Emma elbowing AJ. There was clearly something going on that she wasn’t aware of. It made her unclear of how she was supposed to answer the question.

“Melissa is a human, AJ,” Thomas said. “She’s not from any clan.”

“Oh, my mistake,” AJ said, looking at his wife accusingly.

They’d kept him out of the loop apparently. Melissa felt the tension around the table as everyone fell quiet except the little chatter boxes at the kid’s table.

Alma finally broke the silence. “Melissa you get to help lots of people conceive and give them a great gift. Are you present for the births?”

“No, I’m usually not there for that part of the fun.” Melissa smiled. “They always bring the babies to see me and give me pictures for my office. It’s great to be a part of their lives.”

The rest of the dinner conversation went by without incident. Everyone avoided the subject of Melissa being a human and she was fine with that. She had always thought weres could smell others of their own kind and hadn’t realized that they really couldn’t tell the difference.

“Okay, now it’s time for the second course. The birthday girl’s spread,” Alma said, getting up from the table. “Emma, will you take our guest out while I have a word with Thomas?”

“Of course, come on, let’s go get sugared up.” She linked arms with Melissa and led her after the three little girls who ran as fast as they could toward the back door.

***

Thomas followed his mother into the kitchen, carrying plates and setting them in the sink. “What do you think of Melissa, Mom?” He’d not been able to really get a read on how she was feeling and that wasn’t usually the case with his mom.

“I like her honey, but I’m worried. I’ve been thinking and there isn’t really anything safe about one of our kind having a child with a human. It’s possible there can be complications and it’s not really a natural way to do things. It was always forbidden when there were still plenty of weres around and I think it might have been forbidden for a reason.”

“I don’t think this kind of old school thinking applies now that there aren’t that many of our kind. You and dad haven’t kept in touch with anyone and I’ve never met another were-bear that wasn’t our family or Emma.”

“That’s true. It’s just a mother’s intuition. I have a feeling there was a reason the elders of our kind banned human and were mating, I just don’t know what it was. I remember hearing that it was dangerous for the human and most of the time they didn’t survive childbirth. My mother didn’t talk about such things because there were plenty of us around, so it wouldn’t be an option. So that was never confirmed to me.”

“I appreciate your concern, but I think we’re going to be fine. When this baby is brought into this world, it will be by someone who does this for a living. She knows fertility and babies of our kind better than anyone.”

Thomas’ head reeled at what his mother had said. Surely Melissa wasn’t in any sort of danger by having their baby. Her drugs must have made it easier for her to deliver. Fear coursed through his veins at the thought of losing Melissa.

He thought of all the problems they'd had to overcome so far, and wondered if he shouldn’t have dragged Melissa into the mess he had. They were always going to have stigma attached to them. It was too late to turn back now.

“So she's pregnant?”

He smiled at the smile on his mom’s face. It was nice to see she was truly excited to be a grandma again. Who knew, maybe they would be able to produce the first new boy for the MacMillians. He knew his dad would really like that.

“We most likely conceived our child early this week. Congratulations, you are going to be a grandma, probably soon!" As open with her as Thomas was, he wasn’t going to tell his mom that they had sex only hours before coming to dinner. There were some things parents didn’t need to know.

“If you say it will be okay, then I will believe you. I don’t think I’ll stop worrying about it though. That’s my job.” She reached out and touched his face. “I can’t wait to be a grandma again.”

“I know, Mom, you’re good at that.”

“Worrying, or being a grandmother?”

“Both,” he answered, hugging her tightly.

They went out to the backyard to join the party and Thomas felt a little guilty for not mentioning the men who tried to attack him. He didn’t think they would come after his family, but since he didn’t know that much about them, it would be a good idea to be cautious. He’d let his brother know at least.

Melissa sat on a chair with Rosy and Leona flitting around her. They’d braided her hair in several different braids and had picked small flowers from the yard to place in it. He couldn’t help but laugh.

“Girls, you made her look even more beautiful. I didn’t think it was possible.” He crouched down in front of Rosy who threw her tiny arms around his neck.

“She’s a princess,” she said and spun in circles so her dress flailed out around her.

“You’re the princess, sweetheart,” Melissa said and stood, giving Leona and then Rosy kisses on their heads.

She really was beautiful. Thomas’ heart beat a little faster as he watched her skip through the yard with his nieces to get some cake. She was going to be a wonderful mother.

“That’s a good woman you have, brother.” AJ came up and clapped him on the back.

“I need to let you know someone isn’t happy we are using treatments to make this baby. They trashed her office and I was attacked by two large men in suits at work. Someone is trying to get us to stop. I don’t think they’ll come after Mom and Dad, but I’m not sure if it’s a were thing or just a political agenda.”

“Are you serious, why didn’t you call me?” AJ puffed up his chest, his protective big brother instincts kicking in.

“I’m just not sure what’s going on, but I need to get to the bottom of it before she shows she’s pregnant. I’m worried they might try to hurt her or the baby.”

“Anything you need, brother, you call me. I don’t care what time. I need to know about stuff like this.”

“You got it.” The two hugged and went to enjoy some cake with the rest of the family.

Thomas felt a little better about the situation now that AJ knew what was going on.

Thomas came up to Melissa, who had wandered over to where his parents were sitting watching everyone. He sat next to her and she leaned her head on his shoulder with a wistful sigh.

“I love it here,” she said to nobody in particular and it made his heart beat rapidly in his chest.

“Now that you secured the Hilary Dalton account, will you be able to take some time off?”

Melissa, of course, didn’t know not to mention the socialite in front of his dad, but Thomas closed his eyes as he felt the anger push off his dad.

“Why would Hilary Dalton be a client of McMillian and Company?” Harold roared from his place next to his mother. He’d been mostly quiet the whole time they’d been there.

“Because, Dad. I've expanded the company to include product launches. Hilary is now our biggest client in that department, but after her launch, I can see that branch becoming one of our most profitable branches.”

“I told you no when you pitched it to me. Are you deaf?  Do I need to take my father’s, your grandfather’s, company back so you don't run it into the ground? I can’t believe you would do something so disrespectful. I knew you wanted to rebel against me, but I never thought you were going to go behind my back and purposely disregard me.”

Thomas was leaning toward his dad, and he noticed Melissa leaned into her chair as she stared in horror at them yelling at each other.

“Enough,” Alma yelled over their shouting. “We have a guest. This is something we will discuss later.”

Thomas looked around and noticed that everyone was staring at them.

“Who’s ready for cake?” he said, putting the fight away for his niece.

“I am!” both girls cried and the adults laughed, breaking the tension.

Once Melissa and he had filled up on cake, they said goodbye to everyone. Melissa had to promise Rosy three times she’d come back before the little girl would let her leave.

“You are really good with them,” Thomas said as they got back into the car.

“I love kids, always have.” Melissa beamed. “I'm sorry I brought up the Hilary account. I knew that your father didn’t want to expand the business, but I didn’t realize he didn’t know.”

Thomas grabbed her hand over the center console. “It was going to happen eventually. I’m glad it is out in the open now. My mom told me she would work on him tonight. Don't worry about it.”

“I still feel awful. The day was so perfect. I adore your family and I don’t want to be the one to cause a rift.”

“Hush, you’re fine. Besides you’re a part of our family now. And you’re going to be an incredible mother to our baby. Maybe it’s already starting to form in there.” He looked at her stomach.

She blushed and put a hand across her abdomen. “Maybe so.”

When they got to her apartment, he looked to make sure there weren’t any men in suits or suspicious cars outside.

“It was a really good day, Thomas. I think we can do this friends-having-a-baby thing. It might not be that difficult. You’ll have to tell your mother the truth so she doesn’t wonder why we’re not getting married or living together, but I think we can do it.”

“It was a good day. Let’s get through this part first. So what’s the next part? I don’t really know how this whole thing works.” He smiled and got out to go open her door. He really connected with her at his parents. He loved seeing her interact with his nieces.

“I’ll let you know. It’s about a week until my next period and then of course you don’t really take a test until two weeks after that so we can check in periodically, but there won’t be any news for a little while.”

“If it didn’t take?” He knew he didn’t mind trying again, he’d be happy to try again at that moment.

“Then we’ll plan to try again.” She smiled and turned to walk in the door. “Talk to you soon.”

“Good night, Melissa.”

HAPTER 12

 

“I think we should use this picture because it shows off my good side, don’t you?” Hilary was talking to him, but he was only half listening. He looked up and nodded, the picture looked the exact same as one she’d already shown him. They’d met up for dinner after work and he’d been distracted the whole time. He told Janet to tell her he was busy, but Hilary ended up showing up at his office, making her impossible to get rid of. He had noticed that Hilary had been showing up more and more and it was starting to grate on his nerves.

He was thinking about Melissa and wondering what she was doing. They talked every day just like they had been, but he noticed that conversations were becoming more intimate as they talked about their future plans and past failures. She was the first person he wanted to ask when he needed advice, and the first person he wanted to tell good news to. She seemed to be on the same wavelength because she would randomly call him up just to tell him about something that happened with one of her patients throughout the day.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t tried to focus on his relationship with Hilary, Melissa made it clear when he dropped her off after meeting his parents that a friendship was still all she was willing to give him. But even so, he couldn’t give his full focus to Hilary when he realized how much Melissa fit into his world. He couldn’t even bring himself to have sex with Hilary. This was not like him at all and he had a feeling that it was all Melissa's fault.

“You’ve barely touched your meal, Thomas,” Hilary said, knowing this was his favorite restaurant. “Is everything okay?”

He’d not told her about the baby. He felt that conversation would be better to have when the baby was confirmed. They weren’t exclusive, at least they’d not talked about being exclusive.

“No, everything is fine. I’m going to eat. I was just listening to you.” He smiled and started to cut into his chicken. Something caught his attention outside the window. A guy in a suit and sunglasses peering in at them. It was one of the guys who’d attacked him in the parking garage. He jumped up from the table and ran toward the front door. The guy didn’t run, but he started walking briskly down the sidewalk into a crowd of people. He took out his phone and snapped a picture of him.

“Stop, hey you, stop.” Thomas was yelling and running. The guy was getting further away somehow and then he lost him completely. It was like he just disappeared. Surely, he wasn’t losing his mind. He sent the picture to Blair and asked him if he was able to get anything from it. Blair texted right back saying he was on it. He went back into the restaurant and walked over to a pissed-off looking Hilary. She waited for an explanation.

“I’m sorry. A friend of mine had her office vandalized and I thought I recognized one of the people who did it outside. I lost him,” he said resuming cutting up his chicken.

“Oh that’s awful. I’m sorry you didn’t catch him.”

He was a little surprised by her understanding, but wasn’t going to question it. This was the first time Hilary allowed him to talk about himself. They finished up their meal and Hilary leaned back in her chair, sticking out her chest. He felt one of her feet traveling up his leg.

“So I think it’s been long enough and we should go to my place for a little dessert.” She made her voice low and husky.

There was no denying how sexy she was, but he was still holding back. He chalked it up to not being honest with her about making a baby. It had to be the reason he wasn’t all over her all the time as attracted to her as he was. His inner voice laughed at him. He flipped it off.

“I don’t know, Hilary,” he started to say, but she stood from her chair and leaned over so he could see down her shirt.

“Your loss, Thomas. There are many men who would be lucky to be in your position. I’m not about waiting.”

With that, she walked out of the restaurant and didn’t look back. He was shocked but not surprised that she was fed up with him. Relief flooded his veins. It was a cowardly way to get rid of a female, but at the moment he felt like he was granted a reprieve. He paid for their meal and went to take a walk. He’d go the long way back to his apartment so he could do some serious thinking.

As he walked, he wasn’t really paying attention to anything around him. His thoughts were once again on Melissa and the possibility that she was already pregnant. A thrill burst through him. The sidewalk wasn’t as crowded as it usually was and he wondered where all the New Yorkers were hiding. He turned down a side street and heard his phone beep. He hoped Blair had something for him. Stopping for just a moment to check it, he turned just in time to see a car speeding toward him. His phone clattered to the ground as he jumped out of the way just barely missing getting hit. He couldn’t shake the feeling someone was going to end up killing him before the day was over.

***

“What a day,” Melissa exhaled into her car as she finally parked in front of her apartment. A hot bath and her bed were calling to her. She leaned her head back on the headrest trying to get enough strength to walk the couple of yards to her apartment. She wondered if she was experiencing the first signs of pregnancy or if it was the shots she was injecting into herself.

The extra money in her bank account had just lifted a huge weight off her shoulders as she’d been able to pay some of her mother’s bills and pay her nurses for the coming months so she didn’t have to worry about somehow scraping it together.

Bruce came over the day before and injected her. He had acted distant when she told him they had started to try. At first she wasn’t sure why he couldn’t be happy for her until she realized that Bruce had feelings for her other than being her colleague. Her stomach felt icky as she explained to him that he was never going to be anything to her except a friend. He left dejectedly after she told him she would find someone else to assist her in the last portion of her research.

Melissa brushed away a lone tear that was tracking down her cheek. Bruce would have been the perfect guy for her, but her heart just wouldn't let her have feelings for him. She knew she was making a mistake in letting him go, but buried deep within the corner of her heart she hoped that someday Thomas would realize what a good couple they would be.

“Idiot,” she hissed in the empty car before grabbing her purse and stepping out of her car. That bath couldn’t come soon enough. It was impossible to be around Bruce without leading him on. He was such a good guy, and she knew the flirting would continue. There was no way she could do that to him when the feelings just weren’t there.

When she entered her apartment, she had a strange feeling that made the hair stand up on the back of her neck. Someone was in the apartment. She turned to run back to her car, but someone slammed into her, pushing her into the door. She screamed in pain and tried to fight but they had her hands locked behind her and their leg was in between hers making her unable to move.

“Shhhh... baby, it’s just me.”

Some of her fear dissipated when she heard Nathaniel’s voice. The putrid smell of alcohol rushed past her nose, but even in his drunken state, she knew he wouldn’t go any further than handling her a little rough. He usually punched a hole in the wall or broke a bunch of her stuff, but he never hurt her severely.

“Nate, what are you doing? Let me go so we can talk.” She tried to twist her wrists to get out of his hold, but they didn’t budge. He had a tight hold on her.

“Shut up,” he yelled at her as he grabbed a fistful of hair and started to drag her toward her bedroom. Melissa screamed and writhed around trying to get out of his hold. For the first time, she was really scared he might truly hurt her.

He turned her head so she had to really look at him. Forcing his mouth onto hers, he kissed her hard. It didn’t feel very affectionate. He turned her body over and put her arms above her head. He climbed on the bed beside her.

“I just need you to listen to me for a little while, Melissa. I don’t know why you’re screaming; I’m not going to hurt you.”

The way he said he wasn’t going to hurt her was cold and it made her feel like he meant the exact opposite of what he was saying. His eyes were hard as he looked into hers. She’d never seen him the way he was in that moment, and it was really scaring her.

Her door burst open and Nathan looked up, distracted. At first Melissa thought Thomas had come to save her, but when she got a look at the hulking man blocking her door frame she noticed the only thing he had similar to Thomas was his size. No, he was wider than Tomas.

The large man assessed the situation, his eyes locked on Nathaniel’s hand tangled in her hair.

“What the fuck do you want?” Nate put Melissa’s body in front of him as a shield.

The larger man bellowed loudly and ran toward both of them. Melissa was disoriented when she landed on the floor. Another sound caused her to turn the exact moment Nate crumbled to the ground, knocked out cold.

“Thank you,” Melissa wheezed out, a panic attack knocking at her lungs. The man reached down to help her up, but when she stood, he didn’t stop there. He threw her over his hulking shoulder and ran out of her apartment.

“What are you doing?” she screamed, beating on his muscled back, hurting her hand. “Let me down.” She beat at him with both fists and every corner he turned she hit her head on a wall as she struggled. She wondered why there was never anyone in her building to see when she was in trouble.

He didn’t say a word as he threw her into the back of an idling black SUV. She reached for the door only to find the child safety lock had been engaged.

“Let me out of here!” she screamed, beating at the window as the SUV burned out into the street. She was thrown into the side of the van hard as they took off. Searing pain split the back of her skull before blackness took her over.

***

Thomas was pissed by the time he made it to his apartment. The fact that someone had tried to run him over couldn’t just be a coincidence. That was what he tried to tell himself the whole way back. Janet was going to give him grief when she found out he needed a new phone. He had been doing so good taking care of his phones.

Normally he lost or crushed one every other month. The disadvantage of being a were-bear. He realized he hadn’t had any mishap with his phone since he met Melissa, because some days that was his only connection to her. Now some crazy driver ruined his record. And now he wouldn’t be able to find out what Blair might have discovered without going to his office.

Because Thomas was fuming about his phone, he didn’t notice Hilary leaning against his door until she spoke.

“Hi,” she waved at him, and if he wasn’t mistaken, she looked nervous.

“Hey, Hil. I thought you were done with me.”

He usually wasn’t so harsh, but he had almost been run over by a car, and he lost his phone.

“Can I come in and talk to you?”

He opened his mouth to tell her no, but she stopped him by putting her hand up. “I haven’t been exactly honest with you. There are things I need to tell you.”

Thomas felt all of his energy seep out of him. He unlocked his door and motioned for her to come in.

“Would you like something to drink?” he asked, getting a bottle of water out of the fridge.

“No, thank you.”

She sat on his couch and patted the cushion next to her. He sat down on the recliner facing the couch and as far away from her as he could be without being rude.

Her face scrunched together and she pursed her lips together. “Really, some human doctor?”

Thomas’ eyebrow shot up with surprise. “What do you mean by human?”

“Exactly what I said.”

“I'm still not following.”

“I'm a were-bear. And I really thought you were going to be the one. Do you love her?”

“I do.” Thomas was stunned how fast he answered, but he wasn’t surprised by the answer. He did love her. Now it was a matter of figuring out if he loved her as a friend who was giving him a child, or a romantic partner. That was what confused him.

“Well, at least you’re doing this for the right reason.”

“I’m sorry, I’m still not following you.”

“Listen, Thomas. You’re in some serious trouble. When my parents found out you were a successful were-bear, they wanted me to get to know you and eventually marry you, extending the were-bear lineage.”

Thomas leaned back on the recliner. He whistled at the revelation she just shared with him. “Whoa. I hope I didn’t get you in trouble with your parents. I really liked you. Melissa kind of snuck up on me.”

It was true: he really did like her and that was the reason he’d wanted to take her out. His emotions had been so confusing lately it was hard to figure out what he was feeling. He felt bad he’d been leading her on. It was dumb to think he could focus on more than one woman at a time, even if he wasn’t romantic with both of them.

Hilary smiled at him and shook her head. “It’s not me that is in trouble with my parents, it’s you and Melissa. As you are aware, it is against the were-bear law to impregnate a human. You are in a lot of trouble with the higher ups.”

“What are they going to do, fine me?” Thomas was getting upset at how his life choice seemed to be getting Melissa in more trouble than he thought he was worth to her. If he had to pay some sort of restitution, then he would gladly do it.

Hilary let out a laugh and it sounded ominous. “If it were just a fine, I would pay it for you. By impregnating a human, you could be punished by death. And as for Melissa and the baby, a witch doctor will be called in to remove the baby, and erase her mind of you. Which is probably best for Melissa.”

“Death? What kind of backwards justice system do we have? And are you telling me there are a lot more were-bears in New York?”

“There’s a whole community of us. Your father had some kind of falling out with the council and that’s why you’ve never heard of it. It’s a lot to explain, just trust me, you are definitely in a lot of trouble.”

“What do they care who I impregnate? It doesn’t sound like it should be anyone’s business but my own.”

“Humans can’t normally handle the birth of a were-baby and die during delivery. That is why it is forbidden. They are afraid that a human will grieve the loss of their daughter for having a were and out us to the rest of the world. We would be in danger if the world knew about us.”

“Bullshit. I don't care if it is the master bear or whatever the hell he is called. Nobody is going to touch Melissa or my baby. Where have these elders been? From what I’ve been taught, we are a dying race; there shouldn’t be a council out there to tell me what to do. What if you’re making it all up?”

“I promise it’s true, for whatever reason your father had a falling out with the council. It’s not even something he’s shared with your mother. She never knew there was a governing body and a large population of us in New York, but your father does.”

“Why wouldn’t he tell me?” He was completely blown away that his father would keep something like that from his family. Especially if there were other were-bears out there he could have mated with.

Thomas launched out of his seat and started pacing the floor. He had enough money to take Melissa and disappear forever if he needed to. His brother would just have to own up and start taking care of the family business.

“I need to go get Melissa. I need to get out of here.”

Thomas searched for his phone so he could call Melissa and tell her he was coming to get her. He cursed when he remembered it was crushed.

“Yes, that’s probably a good idea.”

“Can I borrow your phone? I need to call Melissa and mine got smashed when I almost got ran over after you left me at the restaurant.”

“What? Thomas, they aren’t going to stop. We need to get you out of here. I’ll drive you and we will go pick up Melissa. There is a place in Chicago that may be able to help you two.”

“Thank you.” Thomas wanted to talk to Melissa immediately, but he figured they would be at her apartment soon enough and he could talk to her then. He needed to have her safe by his side, and after this she was going to be his and he would protect her for eternity.

“Why are you helping me?” he asked as Hilary got off the couch and they walked to the door.

“I liked you, Thomas. You were always nice to me. I also like that you were true to Melissa. There were many times you could have had sex with me, but you didn’t. There aren’t very many men out there that are faithful to the ones they love. I hope to find that someday.”

Thomas put his arm over her shoulder. “You will.”

Thomas let go of Hilary so he could lock his door. He heard her scream, and when he turned around to see what was happening, he saw the two men that threatened him earlier that week. One of them had his arms wrapped around Hilary as she clawed at her captor.

“What the fuck do you want?” he asked; his bear was begging to be released, and he was about to give it its wish.

He felt his body start to shimmer as his muscles and bones stretched and popped.

“None of that,” the other one said pulling out a Taser that he didn’t see.

He heard Hilary scream his name before everything turned black.

THE FINAL HAPTER

 

Pain shot through Melissa’s head. She moaned as she tried to rub the aching knot. Her arms wouldn’t move and Melissa started to freak out. She cracked her eyes open but shut them quickly the harsh light hit her hard, making her head hurt even worse.

She rolled her head back and forth as she tried to remember where she was. Her memory slowly started to come back to her.

She remembered Nathaniel trying to pull her into her room by her hair. But then a big man came to her rescue, or so she thought, because he pushed her into a car. She realized she was tied to a chair of some sort when she tried to move. Slowly she opened her eyes again and realized she was in some sort of cave. The lights that had been so blinding were hundreds of candles surrounding her. There was a lady who knelt at her feet, looking up at her. Her face was covered in strange makeup with bands under her eyes. Her hair was long and matted, and she wore a strange dress that appeared to be made of burlap. In one hand, she held a rattle of some sort she was shaking at her and the other held a bowl of a steaming liquid.

“The witch will now determine if the human has indeed conceived a child due to her encounter with one of our kind,” a deep voice said before the woman at her feet stood and started walking around her in circles.

Looking around she realized the room was full of people watching and Thomas was tied up across from her. He was unconscious with his head down against his chest. Melissa felt a spike of fear. What could these people possibly want with her?

“What are you doing?” she asked the woman who was now shaking the weird rattle over her stomach.

There was no answer as she started chanting something low in her throat Melissa couldn’t understand. After a few minutes, she walked around her one more time and nodded to the man who’d been talking. He was reading from what looked like a scroll.

“The witch has determined the human is with child.”

Melissa couldn’t believe it. She was pregnant! How could they already know? There was a mix of joy and terror she couldn’t tell apart.

The man continued, “Now the witch will remove the child in question.”

The woman moved back over her stomach and poured the liquid from the bowl on her stomach as she continued to chant. The momentary joy turned to all pure terror. Why would anyone hurt a baby?

“No!” Melissa screamed. “Please, why would you take the baby?”

There was nothing she could do as she fought to free her hands. The liquid was warm and she wondered if it was going to sink into her body. There was a small pain that shot through her as the witch started to shake her rattle over her again chanting louder now.

“Why are you doing this?!” Melissa screamed and was once again met by silence. Another pain went through her abdomen and she struggled to get free.

“Thomas wake up! They’re taking our baby!”

She saw his hand flinch and thought maybe he would wake up. She wasn’t sure what he could do, seeing as how he was tied up as well, but she was becoming desperate.

***

Thomas felt his head pounding and realized he’d fallen asleep in a chair of some sort. He opened his eyes to the bright lights of dozens of candles.

“What the hell?” he asked out loud as he tried to stand and found he was unable to move as he was tied down.

Taking in the sights around him, he started to remember what had happened. There was someone who hit him hard and Hilary had been there. She was a were-bear! She was warning him of something, what was it?

He looked over and saw a woman crouched down in front of Melissa who was also tied to a chair. She looked terrified and the woman was shaking something over her stomach. Everything came back to him; the men who tried to warn him, her place being trashed, and Hilary’s warning about the baby. They were trying to take the baby.

“Stop,” his voice barely came out when he tried to yell. “Don’t take the baby!”

Melissa looked up, realizing he was finally awake and she yelled at him. “It worked. They want to take it from us.”

She was crying so hard the words were choked out, but he understood. His chest tightened as he realized they were trying to get rid of the baby. Someone leaned down to him.

“Don’t worry, Thomas, it doesn’t hurt them. It will be like the baby was never there, wiped from existence. It’s nothing sinister and it’s to protect her and you.”

“That’s bullshit,” he yelled at whoever was talking to him. He was restrained too much to turn and see.

Thomas was panicking, and something was keeping him from shifting. If he could shift, then he could break the restraints and be free.

“You’ve drugged me,” Thomas said, still trying to free himself from the chair.

“It was necessary, Thomas, please just calm down and let this happen.” He recognized the voice this time. It was Blair. The shock he felt hit him in the chest. His best friend and the person he’d trusted to help him figure out who was coming after him was the enemy.

“Blair, how could you do this?” he asked.

Melissa screamed and he yelled in frustration.

“Listen, I didn’t know this was against the rules. Had I known, I wouldn’t have let you do it. Now that I know, you have to do this or they will kill you.” Blair was speaking quietly. Thomas couldn’t wrap his head around anything that was going on.

“Then let them kill me!” Thomas yelled suddenly. “If they won’t take my baby, then let them kill me.”

“Thomas, you need to rethink what you’re saying. You don’t understand, they’ll just kill you and then take the baby,” Blair said. “I’ve found out a lot about our culture this past week. I didn’t even know there were this many of us in New York, and now that I know what they’re capable of, I know you don’t want to cross them.”

Thomas felt completely helpless as the witch chanted louder and Melissa cried. The were-bears standing all around in the candlelight were completely quiet as they watched, making him wonder what kind of strange rituals he didn’t know about. If his parents knew about these kinds of things, was it the reason his mom had tried to talk him out of it? There were so many questions he had and overall he was just filled with sadness that he’d never get to meet his child.

He dropped his head to his chest thinking he’d never felt like less than a man. Not being able to protect his family was the worst feeling and Melissa was his family. He loved her, truly loved her, and if they somehow got out of it, he would tell her exactly how he felt.

The light shone in from the door that blocked the entrance to the cave. At least he thought it was a cave judging by the rock they were surrounded by. There was a small party walking in, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. Thomas was facing the door, but Melissa couldn’t see people had come in. The witch hadn’t stopped yet, but she was looking that way, which alerted Thomas to the fact that they might not have expected anyone.

“Stop this ritual immediately,” a loud voice boomed over the whole cave, echoing off the walls. Hilary stepped forward and stood in front of the rest of the crowd that had interrupted the ritual and Thomas realized his parents and brother were with them.

“The old way of our people is dying. This woman has found a way that a human body can sustain and deliver a were-bear. She has created advanced technology that may help us save our race. As I’m sure my brothers and sisters know, the were-bears are starting to become extinct. Our small gathering here is the last of our kind in the northern states and the rest of the country and world are dwindling in numbers.”

“What does that have to do with our tradition, Allen, our values?” One of the men separated from the rest of the ground and walked toward him.

“They are outdated and we have to start looking toward the future, looking toward preserving our race. This is not the way we should act in the face of a new discovery. This is not how we should act. We should embrace these changes as medical miracles and see it as a way to make our race stronger.”

“This is your doing, Hilary?” the man asked, looking up at her. “You’ve run to your father because you’ve got a thing for the were-bear who impregnated a human?”

“My half-brother is part human. He is proof that it is possible to successfully bring a were-baby into the world, and now that Miss Rancic has found a way to make it safer, there is no reason it shouldn’t be allowed.”

A loud gasp went through the crowd as everyone started mumbling to each other.

“As the acting leader of the New York were-bear community, I declare this ritual to be barbaric and forbidden.”

Thomas realized Hilary’s father had a lot of pull in the were-bear community and that by revealing their family secret, they had exposed themselves to ridicule. They’d done it all to save him and his child, and he couldn’t be more grateful. Blair cut his ropes and let him up.

“We’re going to talk about this later, Blair,” he said and ran to Melissa. “Babe, are you okay? Look at me.”

Melissa looked up her eyes swollen from crying and smiled at him. “I am now.”

“I’m so sorry to put you through this.”

“This isn’t your fault.”

He helped her stand up as his parents rushed over to both of them.

“I’m sorry, Son,” his father said. “I knew the society existed, but I didn’t know they still went by the old book. I certainly didn’t know they kept tabs on my family. There’s a lot we have to talk about. I should have been more honest with you. I should have let you in on my past. Your mother, too. She didn’t know everything until today.” He looked at his feet.

Hilary’s father walked up and put his hand on his father’s shoulder. “Abraham and I go far back, but we had a falling out when we were younger. Your father didn’t want to take a leadership role in the society and struck out on his own. The elders who are never present for the ceremonies still keep tabs on all were-bears in the area and they were not keen on your situation, Thomas.”

“And you somehow convinced them otherwise?”

“No, Hilary came to me and told me what was going on and I contacted your father so we could attempt to stop it. I will have to deal with the elders in a separate conference. I hope they will see that Melissa’s research is as valuable as I see it.”

“Dad, this is a lot for me to take in,” Thomas said, having not let Melissa go since he’d helped her stand up.

“For now, you just need to get her out of here so she can get some rest,” AJ said. He’d been quiet through the whole ordeal and Thomas wondered if he knew about the society and his father’s falling out with them. “We’ll all have to talk about all of this as a family, but for now, you two need to get out of here and celebrate.”

He grinned really big and Thomas realized he was right. Getting Melissa the help she needed at the moment was all that was important.

“What did you do?” He grabbed the witch who’d hovered nearby. “What do we need to do to make sure she’s okay?”

The woman pushed him away from her easily and glared. “Listen to me bear, I was called here to do a job. It isn’t my fault that job happened to be erasing a fetus. The were-bitch will be fine. The baby hadn’t been erased yet and the liquid on her stomach was only the beginning of a very long ritual I still had better be paid for.” The last part was yelled as she looked around her. She sat down in the chair Melissa had been in and crossed her arms.

The crowd of were-bears appeared to not know how to act, some had left, others milled about in smaller groups whispering to one another. Thomas decided he had no desire to know the people in the society or be a part of it. Once they made their way outside of the cave, his mom pulled them both into a tight hug and squeezed.

“I’m so glad you’re okay. Melissa, you’re going to be a great addition to our family. When can we plan the wedding?”

Thomas could tell that Melissa didn’t know how to answer, and he hadn’t had a chance to tell her how he truly felt, but he hoped she felt the same way.

“Immediately,” he said as he pulled Melissa to him. “I love you and there’s no reason we shouldn’t be together.”

Not caring his family was around, he bent down and pressed his lips to hers, giving her the first real kiss they’d shared, delighting in the gasp that came from her as she wrapped her arms around his neck. The two melted into one another and when they parted, his parents and brother were trying to look anywhere but at the two of them.

“I love you, too, Thomas.” She smiled and grabbed his hand. “Now please take me home.”

***

Nine months later, Thomas stood outside the glass looking down at a small little boy wrapped up in a blue blanket. His tiny features were scrunched up as he slept, having had a big day. He was perfect. His father stood beside him holding the very expensive cigar he’d bought for the occasion. Abraham was more excited than Thomas at the fact that he had a grandson. He’d bought cigars for everyone and called everyone they knew to let them know that Joseph Rancic McMillian had arrived and he finally had a little boy to spoil.

“Not that I don’t love my girls,” he was reassuring AJ who had come up to look at is nephew.

“I know you do, Pop.”

Thomas was happy. His wife had done extremely well with the delivery and everything had gone perfectly. It was hard to believe they’d almost lost him and the hell they’d been through to get to this point. He told his father and brother goodbye and went back into the room. Her mother had been feeling well enough to call, but they didn’t want to get her out of the house and into a contaminated environment. He could tell she was sad her mother couldn’t be there.

He was almost back to the room when he ran into someone he hadn’t suspected.

“Blair, I don’t want to see you today,” Thomas said as he tried to brush by him.

“Listen, I know you’re mad, but I didn’t have a choice. Those goons that came after you and destroyed Melissa’s office, they threatened to trash my employee’s houses. Not mine, my employees. How low is that? Anyway, I had to go and tell them what I knew and participate in the ceremony to keep them from doing it. I do have some compassion for my people, man. You have to understand that.”

“They tried to erase my son from Melissa’s womb,” Thomas said quietly since they weren’t alone in the hallway.

“I didn’t know that’s what they were going to do until you two were brought in. I couldn’t go against all those people. I had been trying to think of some way to cause a diversion or bust you out when Hilary showed up. I promise, I’ve never been happier to see someone in my life. We have a date later.”

“You’re going out with Hilary?” Thomas was more amused than anything.

“Yeah, if that’s okay. She thinks I’m a good guy because we’re friends. Dude, I am really sorry for everything. I called off the bet even though I was totally right and would have won. I felt like that was the best thing to do.”

“Because it’s a happy day and because we’ve known each other for so long, I’m going to forgive you, Blair.”

“Cool, now can you tell me what Hilary likes in bed? Is she more slow and gentle or rough and tumble?”

“Bye, Blair,” Thomas said and made his way back to his wife’s room.

“Honey, are you sleeping?” he said quietly as he walked into the room.

“No, I was just lying here thinking about how crazy life has been these past few months.” She smiled up at him obviously exhausted, but she looked happy.

“Now we have a perfect son who is going to be so incredibly loved and spoiled.” Thomas bent down and kissed her softly on the lips. He was truly content. “We just have to figure out if he’s a bear or not. The change won’t happen until he’s much older.”

“You’re forgetting, Thomas. His mother is a doctor who specializes in the paranormal fertility world. I can tell you what he is as soon as I get back to work.” She grinned at him and pulled him down for one more kiss.

“You amaze me every day, Mrs. McMillian. I love you very much.”

“I love you very much,” Melissa replied.

The nurse brought in a very fussy infant and Melissa cooed over him while she fed him. Thomas watched in awe as their miracle ate and then fell asleep on his mother’s chest. He had the perfect family.

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