Four months before Kukunniwi…

The answer to Jandro’s question was no. Sure, Hot Social Worker was…well, hot. But she was also complicated. And he didn’t do complicated—or dates for that matter. So Knight sent the kid off with his hot social worker and didn’t think about her again.

Until a month later when he walked into RAWKUS, a new club located about a ten-minute walk from his building. RAWKUS was one of those venues where the latest dance hits played so loud, anyone who didn’t possess supernatural hearing had to practically hug to be heard over it. Technically, the place was new. But save for the décor and music, it could have been a clone of every other club he’d ever walked into looking for human pussy.

And when he propped himself up against the long chrome bar to make a preliminary scan of the club, he quickly found plenty of candidates to take his mind off the shitty day he’d had. His DTF-radar went off all over the place as hotties in high heels and tight dresses started filling up his visual inbox with come-hither glances. That was expected.

What he didn’t expect was to recognize one of the few women who weren’t looking at him. She was on the dancefloor in a long-sleeved, green-sequined minidress and yellow cowboy boots. And his wolf stood up inside him, remembering her in an instant even though her massive tumble of curls had been straightened into long, sophisticated waves. It was Hot Social Worker.

She danced in a circle with a much shorter, heavily tattooed woman who appeared to be mixed race—if her dark skin and almond-shaped eyes were anything to go on—and a slightly shorter black guy. A boyfriend? No, Knight decided after a few more minutes of watching them all dance together. They were all having too much fun, doing a bunch of old fashioned early century dances like the Soulja Boy, Stanky Leg and Single Ladies. Honestly, the guy seemed more interested in krumping that getting with either of the women he was dancing with. And, when a clean-cut guy tried to approach Hot Social Worker, it was the shorter woman, not the man, who dead-eyed him away…

She smelled good, remember? his wolf suddenly reminded Knight out of the blue.

Because she paid to have a scent specially designed to match her body chemistry, his human answered, resisting the sharp tug of attraction. Plus, she was here with friends. Going after a woman with a dancing cock-blocker by her side seemed like a stupid move, given how badly he needed a release for the red anger tonight. Much better, easier, and less complicated options were throwing him “what’s up” looks from all over the club.

As if to prove his point, a blond wearing a simple red bodycon dress and a matching pair of heels appeared in front of him, blocking his view of Hot Social Worker and her crew.

Knight scanned her up and down, liking what he saw. Short, sleek, and sexy with her tight curves on full display—not covered up in some weirdly cut minidress.

She scanned him right back; her eyes slathered with permanent eyeliner and sexual intent. Exactly his type. A bad girl with big girl panties. Not the kind who’d whine afterwards when it was time for her to bounce.

“Hi, I’m Riley. Can I buy you a drink?” she asked, leaning in close. She didn’t know he had wolf hearing and even if she did, she might have leaned in anyway just to have an excuse to push her rack into his lower chest

“Yeah, you can by me a drink,” he answered with a cocky smirk.

But as soon as she moved out of his line of sight and stepped up to the bar to order, his gaze wandered right back to the dance floor. And his wolf startled when he saw the social worker wasn’t dancing with her friends anymore.

His eyes darted around until he found her talking to some blond guy off to the side of the dance floor. Despite their stark color difference, the guy looked like her somehow, expensive and beautifully designed. He was dressed in a double-breasted leather suit jacket that would have passed muster at the hottest nightclubs from New York to Tokyo. Guy was some fancy shit.

Perfect match, he thought. But for some reason his normally quiet wolf had begun a low growl in his chest.

“Hey, hey! Did you hear me?”

With effort, he dragged his gaze back to the bad girl at the bar. “What are you drinking?” she asked, sounding more peeved than sultry now. He got the feeling this wasn’t the first time she’d put the question to him.

“Uh, get me a mineral water,” he answered, his eyes going back to Hot Social Worker. Fancy Shit was leaning in closer than he needed to. Trying to talk. But her face was tight like she didn’t want to hear whatever he was attempting to tell her.

“Seriously? Water?” Bad Girl asked. “Are you, like, a recovering alcoholic or something?”

“Yeah, something like that,” he answered since it was easier than explaining what all kinds of fucked up he really was.

“Oh, cool,” she said, like alcoholism was nothing more than the latest trend. “In that case, we don’t need to get a drink. We can just get out of here. I live in the building across the street if you want to come back to my place.”

Excellent. A quick fuck. No bullshit small talk required. This was exactly what he wanted.

But then Fancy Shit put his hand on Hot Social Worker’s shoulder and she immediately knocked it away, taking a step back from him.

Knight pushed off the bar, barely hearing the offended “Hey!” that followed him, as he stalked across the club.

“…let’s not cause a scene, love,” Fancy Shit was saying as Knight approached. The guy didn’t speak High Media like she did, but he had a classic English accent to make up for it.

However, Hot Social Worker didn’t seem all that impressed by his accent or his reasonable tone. “If you didn’t want a scene, you shouldn’t have—” she started to say before cutting off with an abrupt, “Oh, hello there!” when she saw Knight standing there.

She turned away from Fancy Shit to give him a winning smile. “How nice to see you again,” she said even though it was obvious to Knight that she didn’t remember his name.

Fancy Shit visibly startled but recovered enough to ask Hot Social Worker, “Is this a…friend of yours?”

No way to miss how he said friend—like he was attempting to inject humor into the awkward interruption because there was no way Hot Social Worker and the hard ass standing in front of them could be friends.

Well, okay then. Without a single fuck given, he stepped in front of the wealthy Brit and asked Hot Social Worker, “You sick of talking to this guy yet?”

Her eyes widened at his question but instead of giving her any time to come up with a gracious High Media answer, Knight pulled her onto the dance floor.

Like, a heat-seeking radar, the heavily tattooed woman she’d been dancing in a circle with earlier, started toward them. But Hot Social Worker raised her hand, as if to say, “It’s okay!” and the tattooed badass stood down.

Then as if pre-ordained, a Latin song with a sick club beat came on.

“I love this song!” Hot Social Worker cheered.

In response, Knight spun her under his arm before guiding her through a set of sexy Latin dance moves. Nice. Just the excuse he needed to touch her without having to discuss it first.

“Where did you learn to dance like that?” she asked breathlessly when the electronic DJ’s algorithm faded the club-thumper into a slow song.

Knight pulled her in close for an easy side-to-side sway. “My dad,” he answered. Not providing additional details because personal info wasn’t required for one-night stand negotiations.

“So…you’re Latino?”

“And some other stuff.” He didn’t bother to ask about her background. Thanks to advents in cellular-level dermatology, with the help of skin lighteners and darkeners, anyone could look like any combination of races these days if they had enough money. And again, he didn’t need any of her personal details to bang her.

“Well, I’m glad I ran into you…” she said smiling up at him. He had to admit that ever-present smile of hers was a fucking stun gun. Full of white teeth and soundless-laughter. Better than any of the other “come hither” looks he’d gotten tonight.

“…because I’m still wondering why someone working out of an Urgent Care would be listed as Jandro’s primary doctor. That doesn’t make much sense, considering the higher cost of being seen there as opposed to a pediatrician’s office.”

No, it didn’t make much sense. Which was why as soon as Jandro was placed in a foster home, the she-wolf social worker at WCH would make damn sure his record was expunged from the human data system. As if he’d never been there at all.

But obviously he couldn’t tell her that. So instead of answering her question, he asked, “You want to come back to my place and do this or what?”

“Do this…?” she repeated as if his relatively low form of speech was a foreign language. But then her eyes widened with sudden realization as she said, “Oh my gosh, are you…,” he could almost hear some teacher telling her to substitute a pause as opposed to using a filler word as she struggled to come up with the rest of her question, “…coming on to me?”

“Yeah,” he answered, his tone frank because he’d thought that much was obvious.

“You’re requesting a date with me?” she asked carefully, as if she were trying to process the completely foreign concept of dating someone who wasn’t a fancy shit while putting the question to him.

“No,” he answered just as carefully. “I don’t want to date you. I want to get with you.”

“Oh,” she looked from side to side. And she appeared to be speaking over a bunch of small explosions going off in her head when she said, “Am I to understand you are requesting a one-night stand with me?”

“Yeah, I want to have a one-night stand with you,” he answered about ten times faster because apparently, he wasn’t nearly as confused by this concept as she was. “I want to take you back to my place and bang. So are you down for that or what?”

“Oh, my….” she said. And swear to God, she actually placed a hand over her chest like she’d never been so shocked in all her life. Real talk, it felt like he’d just asked a Jane Austen novel to hit and quit it.

“Listen, if you don’t want to do this I can find somebody else—” he started to say, already scanning the bar for the Blonde DTF he let get away.

But then Hot Social Worker cut him off with an, “Oh, no, please don’t do that. My answer is a resounding yes! I would LOVE to go back to your place to participate in a one-night stand. Thank you so very much for the invitation!” That declared, she clapped her hands together like a seal. “Let’s go!”

And then—what the hell—she ended up pulling him out of the club.