CHAPTER TWELVE

 

“So…” Jackson cleared his throat and could barely believe he was asking this. “How’re things going, uh, with my mom?”

It was two weeks into January and Jackson and Bauer had been working together almost every single day. Neither the topic of Elizabeth nor of Kaya had been brought up once in all that time and Jackson figured it was probably his duty as the oldest son to make sure things were going all right. To his knowledge, Bauer hadn’t spoken to either of his brothers about Elizabeth. He also apparently hadn’t spoken to anyone about Jackson’s relationship with Kaya. Because not even Elizabeth had seemed to notice anything amiss.

Jackson and Kaya had spent a glittery New Year’s Eve with the family, sitting on opposite sides of the living room and leaving at different times. They hadn’t kissed at midnight, but they’d more than made up for it when they’d gotten back to Kaya’s apartment afterwards. It wasn’t that they were keeping things a secret, necessarily. It was just that Kaya was still all mixed up about what they were even doing. She had it in her head that they were just regularly making out and falling asleep together. And apparently she didn’t care to explain that to the family.

Jackson, on the other hand, knew exactly what was happening between the two of them. According to him, they were in a full-blown relationship. Seeing one another almost every day, talking on the phone, texting, memorizing each other’s work schedules, seeking advice and comfort from one another, confiding secrets. To him, it was all very cut and dried and he would have told the family weeks ago, but he didn’t want to rush her.

He hadn’t rushed her in any regard and he had the satisfaction of knowing that it was driving her crazier than it was him. She was getting more and more impatient in their makeout sessions, getting naked faster, wrapping herself around him, leaving hickeys and bruises from her grip on his body. He didn’t mind in the least. Maybe it was very old-fashioned of him, but he wanted to stick to their original agreement. He wanted each progression forward with Kaya to symbolize his progression through his training, through his self-discovery. And though things were going well with Bauer—Jackson felt calmer and more at peace than he had in years—he didn’t particularly feel any closer to shifting devoid of the full moon.

He felt that if he could do that, train himself to be in complete control of it, then he’d truly be able to offer himself to Kaya in a real way. No reservations.

“Uh.” Bauer considered Jackson’s question about how things were going with Elizabeth and wiped sweat from his brow with a bandana. It was warm for January, though Colorado was known for having plenty of unexpectedly sunny days in all times of the year. “Good.”

Jackson sat on the steps and guzzled a bottle of water. “You gonna make me beg for details, here?”

Bauer chuckled. “Nah. We’re, uh, we’re taking things slow. Haven’t told the other boys yet. Have you?”

“Hell, no. That’s your job.” He tried not to think about what ‘taking it slow’ might mean.

Bauer chuckled again. “It’s new for me. This happiness thing.”

“For me, too.”

Jackson could feel Bauer’s eyes on him. “So, things are going well with your girl?”

Jackson nodded.

“Maybe you should bring her to a training.”

“You think?”

Bauer shrugged. “Probably couldn’t hurt. You’ve already told me that your full moon wolf, your most volatile form, was kind and calm with her. So, what do you have to risk? Besides, Sarah was a catalyst for Seth and Natalie was a catalyst for Raph. Figures that the girl you’re in love with might end up being a catalyst for you.”

Jackson had been retying his shoes but he froze halfway through the loop. He figured there was probably no reason for those words to completely shock him, but still, there was his blood running slickly through his veins.

Was he in love with Kaya?

He’d wondered the question before and figured that yeah, he was, in a certain way. But those were times when he’d barely known her, when he had simply wanted her from afar. Now, he was smack dab in the middle of a relationship with her and the phrase suddenly had a hell of a lot more meaning behind it.

This wasn’t just some cosmic pull he felt for her. This was a deep rightness he felt when he was in her orbit. This was a new thing. Much more human. Much more set in reality.

“I’ll ask her.”

“Ask her before the full moon next week. I think you’ve made great progress this month, Jackson. You’re calmer, more in tune with yourself, more aware of your surroundings, less caught in your head. Honestly, now that you’ve started really putting some effort into going about this the right way, I think you’re going to have at least as much control as Raph and Seth. If not more.”

Jackson nodded, a pleased silence passing between them. It hadn’t really occurred to him that he might actually ever be good at this shifter thing. It also occurred to him that many things in his shifter life were starting to change. He’d yet to tell his family about Ben and Shelly and the work they were doing with the shifter community.

In large part, that was because of Bauer. The last time that the concept of standing up for shifter rights had even been lightly touched on, he’d packed his bags and had been out the door. Now, of course he’d come back. But Bauer was just recently starting a relationship with Elizabeth and Jackson didn’t want to do anything to screw that up right now.

Besides, things had just started out at the farm. He’d kept his promise and brought Kaya out there with him last week. It was Jackson’s fourth time visiting the farm and the shifters there. It had been Kaya’s first time.

It was true that the shifters were less comfortable around Kaya and Ben, neither of whom were shifters themselves. But it was also true that Kaya had been so smiley and sweet as she talked with each shifter about their diet and advised them on what they should try to eat more of, she pretty much won everyone over. It had been strange to be out in public with her. None of the Durant family had been around so neither of them had seen fit to keep their relationship a secret. Ben and Shelly hadn’t even blinked when Jackson had slid an arm around Kaya’s waist, kissed her temple, held her close.

Because to Ben and Shelly, it wasn’t weird that he’d have a girlfriend. They didn’t know about his lifetime of self-recrimination and self-deprivation. They just saw two people who’d chosen to be together and were actually doing a pretty good job of it.

That was the other reason that Jackson decided to hold his tongue about his work with Ben and Shelly. Because it had become something that he and Kaya had together, between them. Their compassionate hearts were something that they both truly had in common, it was a basis for true connection, and Jackson was reticent to just put it out under the wilting sunlight and let the world have its way. For right now, he liked this private world he and Kaya were building.

Which was the exact opposite of how she felt. He knew that though she wanted to keep their relationship a secret, she really thought they ought to tell the family about the work they did at Ben and Shelly’s. And he wanted to tell the family about their relationship but keep their work at Ben and Shelly’s farm a secret.

Well, they couldn’t agree on everything.

“I’m gonna go.”

Jackson shoved up from the deck and held a hand out to Bauer.

“All right. Hey, before you go…” Bauer looked uncomfortable; he scratched at the back of his neck. “I don’t mean to be paranoid, but have you noticed anything out of the ordinary recently?”

“Like what?”

He looked even more uncomfortable. “I’m not sure exactly. I started getting this feeling a couple weeks ago. Like we’re being watched. But I’ve been all around this land and haven’t found hide nor hair of an intruder. It’s just that this kind of paranoia, it kept me safe for a lot of years.”

Safe and unhappy, Jackson amended within the confines of his own mind.

“You think it could be him? Race?”

Bauer shrugged. “He was released just before Christmas.”

“I haven’t seen him around town. The restraining order is still in place for sure.”

“I’m just saying stay sharp. You never know what a guy like that could be planning.”

Jackson’s stomach swooped and now he doubly wanted to get back to Kaya. They had plans to have dinner together. “I’ll be careful,” he promised.

They shook hands and Jackson jogged around the house to his Jeep. He slammed inside and just stared at the steering wheel for a second, trying to calm down the reaction that had exploded inside him at Bauer’s words. His need to get to Kaya and ensure that she was completely all right, not a scratch on her—that was one thing about being in love that he hadn’t expected. He suddenly felt as if he had so much to lose.

 

 

***
 

 

Bauer watched Jackson go and then went quietly back into the house. His mind turned over issue after issue, worries and anxieties rearing their heads as he showered off and changed into a clean set of clothes. He could smell something delicious that Elizabeth was making, but even that wasn’t enough to bolster his spirits.

“Who spit in your soup?” Elizabeth, peeling carrots at the sink, asked as he came into the kitchen with what he assumed was a pretty nasty scowl on his face.

“I’m hoping that’s just a turn of phrase,” he grumbled, eyeing the pot of soup bubbling on the stove.             

“Oh.” Elizabeth looked back and laughed. “Yes. Just an expression. Come over here.”

Bauer was agitated and worried but he couldn’t resist an invitation like that. He strode across the kitchen and slipped his arms around her waist, pressing his front to her back and nuzzling his face into her neck. She smelled so damn good.

And he didn’t mean just ‘good’ in a generic way. He meant that she smelled like goodness. Like a bunch of good things all wrapped up into one perfect woman. She smelled like  the earth from her garden, like the mint tea she’d made earlier, like basil and baking flour and just a hint of vanilla. She smelled like his sheets, which he knew was just her laundry detergent, but even so, the very idea of that had him hardening behind his jeans where he leaned up against her. She also smelled faintly like that old-fashioned flowery perfumed cream that he now knew she put on her face and hands before she went to bed at night.

For years, women had been completely separated from Bauer’s world. Not just a mystery—they were entirely separate from him. Mysterious creatures that had no bearing on his place on this earth. Sure, he’d had a few girlfriends when he’d been younger, but he’d had the same problems that the Durant boys always used to have: there was only so much closeness one could achieve when hiding who you really were. He’d never before let a woman in on who he really was. A coyote shifter.

Then, when his parents had died and Bauer found himself truly alone in the world, he was on the run after that. Moving from shifter safehouse to shifter safehouse, living in his coyote form more often than not. In the last safehouse he’d been staying at, there’d been a woman, a female shifter, who he’d started to look forward to spending time with. But he hadn’t been there more than a month when the government had raided the safehouse and every single one of them had been tagged and bagged, sent straight off to a shifter internment camp.

When that camp had burned down and Bauer had been presumed dead, he’d escaped into the dead of the night and decided that no relationship would ever be worth the cost of his freedom. Friendship became a pipe dream, and he honestly didn’t even consider the idea of a romantic relationship. All he had was himself. This went on for years. Until he’d mistaken Elizabeth’s house for a safehouse, considering all the wolf shifters he’d spotted going in and out. He hadn’t yet known they were her sons.

After he’d come to be with the Durants, everything changed. This was especially highlighted by the fact that he held a beautiful woman in his arms right now, his nose pressed into her hair, one of his hands smoothing up her stomach to cup her breast, his mouth opening against her ear.

She tightened a little and let out one of those gasps he’d come to greedily hoard, like a bear storing up food for winter. He thought that if push came to shove, he could live on those sounds she made.

The carrot and peeler that were in her hands clattered noisily into the sink and then she was turning in his arms to face him. He had her pressed up against the sink. She blinked those pretty eyes up at him, but her lustful look slid quickly back into a knowing one.

“Don’t try to distract me,” she said, slipping her arms around his neck. “I know something is wrong. Why don’t you tell me what it is?”

He opened his mouth to deny that anything was bothering him but he thought better of that instinct almost immediately. He sighed and ran a hand through his short, white hair. “It’s not easy for me, you know. To tell you what I’m worried about.”

“I know.” She fiddled with the collar of his shirt, smoothing it out. Since they’d proclaimed their feelings for one another, he’d started wearing button-down shirts to dinner. She hadn’t mentioned anything about it, but the first time she’d seen him do it, she’d smiled like a loon and kissed him very soundly. “You’ve spent a lifetime keeping secrets. Same as me. It’s hard to just suddenly let someone in to all your worries.”

Of course she’d instantly understand. She took the words right out of his mouth and knowing that she completely got what he was going through made it very easy for him to tell her the rest. He lifted her hand and kissed the center of her palm. He smelled the basil again, and heirloom tomatoes. He wondered what kind of soup she was making. “I don’t want it to be hard. Why shouldn’t I let you in? You’re my woman now. You’re the best part of my life. Secrets were what kept me safe when I was all alone.”

“Me, too,” she whispered.”

“But we’re not alone anymore.”

“Not even a little bit.” She rose up on her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his. He groaned and let his hands wander her body. He loved the feeling of her soft sweater moving over top of her even softer skin.

He tore his mouth from hers and put his chin on top of her head, looking out at the darkening backyard through the window over the sink. He squeezed her tight. “I’m worried about the boys.”

She stilled in his arms and he swept a hand over her back to comfort her.

“Not for any particular reason,” he continued. “But recently I’ve been getting a bad feeling. Like something is coming. I know how important it is to them to live normal lives. To not spend their lives running from the hypothetical, the way I did. And I respect them all so much for that. But it scares me, too. In so many ways, I just feel like these boys are sitting ducks. Waiting for somebody like that Race asshole to blow the whistle on them, get them investigated and carted away. I worry that whether they want to or not, we’re all going to have to run. I worry that Raph and Seth are probably going to have kids soon. And then we’ll have baby shifters to worry about. I worry that Jackson is working too hard, pushing himself to the limit all the time. I worry that—oomph.”

He cut off his speech when Elizabeth tugged his head down and kissed him good and hard. He got momentarily lost in the kiss as time and his equilibrium just sort of spun away. He only came back to earth when she slipped away from him and turned the burner off the soup. She tugged at his hand, leading him out of the kitchen and up the stairs.

The time he’d come to her room on Christmas was still the only time he’d been in her room. He’d meant it when he’d told Jackson that they’d been taking things slowly. Now, his heart thudded hollowly in his chest as she led him into her room, shutting the door behind them.

“Elizabeth,” he rasped.

“You worry about my sons the way I worry about my sons,” she told him, her back against the door and her eyes bright. “Do you know why that is, Bauer?”

He didn’t know why anything was the way it was at that particular moment. His skin was buzzing, his ears filled with cotton, his mouth dry. It was all he could do not to fall to his knees at her feet.              

“It’s because you love them,” she told him.

This was something that Bauer had suspected for quite some time. That his affection for the Durant family had grown into a sturdy love. But when she said it like that, so calmly, so certain, the final puzzle piece clicked into place. Bauer knew suddenly, with an alarming surety, that he’d found his place in the world.

“They’re my family,” he said in that same raspy voice. It was almost as if he were telling her and asking her in the same breath.

She nodded her head, her eyes shiny with tears that so rarely came to Elizabeth. She was the most stoic, level-headed person he’d ever met in his life, but she was crying now as she came to him, her hands going straight to the buttons of his shirt.

They undressed one another with a single-minded focus, not allowing themselves to get sidetracked with touching or kissing until they were both naked, panting, standing next to her bed.

Bauer’s eyes tracked down her body as his hands went to the back of his head. “Elizabeth,” he groaned, finding there were no words to describe what it was that he needed to say.

She was nervous, but not self-conscious, and let her eyes sweep over him just as he did to her. If they were different people, they might have apologized for their age, for the inexorable force that time exerts on a person’s body. But both of them could feel just how happy, relieved, grateful the other was to be there, in that exact moment, and they found that no apologies were necessary. Not in the least.

They crawled into bed with one another and naturally huddled close, searching out heat against the coolness of the sheets. Their search for heat turned into the roaming of strong, sure hands, turned into open-mouthed kissing, turned into moans, turned into exploration of secret places, turned into a passionate race to bring the other the most pleasure possible. When they finally came together—Elizabeth on her back and Bauer poised over top of her—they both knew, with an unusual certainty, that everything, everything, that it had taken to get to this moment, had been completely worth it.
 

 

***

 

 

“And probably nothing is going to happen. Bauer just thought that maybe I’m plateauing because we haven’t changed any of the factors. So, yeah. Inviting you is just changing a factor. That’s all it really is.”

“Jackson.”

“But I just really don’t want you to get your hopes up. It’s almost certainly not going to change much. It’s not like you’re in store for a big show. Most likely you’re just going to watch me meditate in my basement. The end.”

“Jackson.”

“Just because with Seth and Raph this kind of thing ended up working—”

“Jackson!”

Jackson finally cut himself off and turned to look at Kaya from where he sat at the wheel. He looked tousled, his eyes dark and his stubble a touch longer than normal. He looked nervous, she realized. The realization was accompanied by a squeezing sensation in her chest. She’d never really seen him this off-kilter and disheveled before.

Kaya leaned across the console and kissed his cheek, loving the scruff of his unshaven face. “It’s gonna be okay. If you shift, that’s great, if you don’t, that’s fine, too.”

He nodded, his eyes on the road. He’d picked her up from the mechanic because her car was still giving her some trouble. He’d asked her two days ago if she would be with him while he tried to shift without the full moon. After she’d said a vehement yes, he’d spent the next twenty-four hours attempting to talk her out of it.

“Kaya,” he said in a low voice. “What if I do shift?”

“That’ll be great! Just what you want, right?”

His eyes went even darker. “Do you have it on you?”

She sighed and reached into her pocket, pulling out the bear spray he’d insisted that she have on her if they were going to do this.

“Good,” he nodded. “Tell me how you use it.”

“I flip that and push this.” She showed him, keeping her voice in an exasperated monotone.

“Don’t roll your eyes. You might need it. I’m serious.”

“You didn’t hurt me at the cabin.”

“Yes, but that was my full moon wolf. This will be a spontaneous shift and I can’t know how it will affect me. If it even happens. That’s why we’re going to do it in my basement, where I can be certain you’ll be safe from me.”

Kaya frowned into the night as they drove through town. She didn’t want to push Jackson further than he was comfortable going. But she really thought him chaining himself up in his basement was pushing things too far. She knew, in her heart, that he wasn’t going to hurt her. But she supposed she could be patient while they did things his way for a while, while he learned to trust himself.

Although it seemed like they were only doing things his way these days. Over the last few weeks, Kaya had worn the sexiest lingerie money could buy. She’d smeared ice cream on herself and had him lick it off. She’d clawed and sucked and kissed and moaned and… nothing doing. Her virginity was still very much intact. She feared that she’d have to resort to begging. Not something that sat especially well with her personality. But what else was she supposed to do at this point? The man was locked up tighter than a steel vault! She wanted some ass and she wanted it now!

“What are you frowning about?” he asked. “Are you having second thoughts? Because we don’t have to do this. Seriously. I can drop you at your house. Or you can come over and we can just hang out.”

“Jackson,” she groaned, dropping her head in her hands with a little laugh. “Take me to your house and shift for me, you clit-tease!”

He barked out a laugh of surprise, his eyes widening for a second and then narrowing down into slits of male satisfaction. “Are you horny for me?”

She scowled at him. “Anyone would be after weeks of this torture!”

“Have I not been keeping you satisfied?” he asked, faux-innocently.

“No! You’ve been revving my engine with no finish line in sight and you know it.”

He laughed. “Well, maybe later tonight we’ll see what we can do about that.”

Her stomach flipped in a darkly excited way. She was very eager to move things along with Jackson. She’d never wanted anything the way she wanted him. Him and, ooh! Mexican food!

“Pull over! Let’s get takeout, okay?” She pointed out the window at one of their favorite restaurants.

He pulled smoothly into the parking lot and, to her surprise, took her hand as they walked into the restaurant. As they hadn’t told their families yet, they were a little stand-offish with one another in public. But it seemed that his resolve in that regard was thinning. They placed their to-go order at the bar and then stood off to the side to wait. The restaurant was crowded so he tugged her into his chest, his arms crossing over her front.

Kaya noticed a glance from many of the men in the bar, which was normal for her. But there was something uncommon in their reactions as well. They took lustful eyefuls of her, and then seemed to immediately glance away, like they couldn’t look away fast enough.

Kaya tipped her head back onto Jackson’s shoulder and looked up at him. “Are you scaring all the nice gentlemen in the bar?”

He glowered down at her, his eyes dark. “Trust me, none of these assholes are gentlemen. Do this many men look at you on a regular day? You know what? Don’t answer that. I prefer my blood vessels unpopped.”

He looked away from her, instantly glaring at someone else who’d deigned to glance Kaya’s way. She couldn’t say she hated it. Not one bit. She turned in Jackson’s arms so that her cheek rested against his chest. For the first time since she’d grown into her looks, Kaya felt completely safe in public.

Jackson’s attention eventually came back to rest on her. He played with her hair, fixing it one way and then the other. She’d left it down after her shower and it had dried in messy waves that he seemed to particularly enjoy.

Kaya felt so happy and content in that moment, waiting for good food, in the arms of the man she’d wanted for so long, about to go do something new and exciting together, that she felt she could almost drift right to sleep.

“Kaya?”

She stiffened like she’d been poked with a pair of sharp scissors. She’d know that voice absolutely anywhere. It had been stiffening her up since she was a little girl. Making her heart race in a bad way.

She felt Jackson’s muscles tighten as well and she knew that he also recognized the woman who’d just called her name.

Kaya turned in the circle of Jackson’s arms. “Mom.”

She was surprised to see her mother wearing the uniform of the waitstaff at the restaurant. She’d never, ever known her mother to be reliable enough to keep a job.

“It’s… good to see you,” her mother said in that raspy voice that showed just how many years she’d been smoking.

Kaya couldn’t say the same, so she said nothing.

“How are you?” her mother asked.

At that particular moment, looking her mother in the eye, Kaya was terrible. But in general, Kaya was living her best life. “I’m great.”

She couldn’t help but shrink back into Jackson’s arms again and his grip tightened around her shoulders.

The movement had her mother’s eyes glancing up at Jackson, narrowing for a second.

“Who’s this?”

Kaya had zero intention of introducing her mother to Jackson. First of all, they’d met before and her mother was a jerk for not remembering. Second of all, her mother hadn’t even called on Christmas. Why the hell should she expect to get an introduction to the people in Kaya’s life?

“Jackson Durant,” he said, leaning around Kaya and holding out a hand.

Kaya’s mom shook the hand, her eyes narrowing even further at the sound of Jackson’s last name. Natalie and Kaya had been disappearing off to the Durants’ house for so many years that her mother would have had to have been willfully ignorant for that last name not to ring some kind of bell. “Oh. You’re the oldest one, right?”

“That’s right.”

“A little old for my daughter, now, aren’t you?”

Instant fury threatened to engulf Kaya. She was seriously about to go down like a flaming barge filled with fireworks. There would be nothing left of this restaurant when she was done tearing her mother a new one for daring to have any opinion whatsoever about Kaya’s personal life.

But Jackson beat her to it. “We don’t think so,” he answered crisply, in a calm voice.

And it was the truth of those words that acted as balm to Kaya’s rage at her mother. She realized, all at once, that Jackson was being honest. He’d finally gotten over their age difference. The age difference that he’d been beating himself up over for years. The age difference that he’d used as a mortal weapon against himself. The age difference that he’d hated himself for. He was… letting it go. Moving on.

He was moving on with Kaya. Figuring out a way for them to be together. And that, more than anything, gave Kaya the resolve to get through this dumbass conversation with her mother. To move on from it like it barely mattered. Because it wasn’t important to her, not the way that Jackson was.

“Jackson!” the bartender called, holding up a bag of food.

“Our order is up, Mom,” Kaya said, stepping forward to get the bag. “We have to go.”

“Oh. All right. Well, if you come back in sometime—”

“Bye, Mom.”

Kaya took Jackson’s hand and didn’t look back. Tonight would not be the night that her mother spoiled. Tonight would be the night Kaya realized just how far Jackson had come.