Молли Харпер - The Art of Seducing a Naked Werewolf

Suddenly, I felt really bad about hitting him.

“Someone owes someone an apology,” Samson sang under his breath.

“I do. I’m sorry,” I said. Nick beamed at me. “This is great.”

“I think I hear Mom calling me!” Samson announced, scrambling to his feet.

“Did that seem sort of abrupt to you?” Nick asked, staring after Samson as he ran toward home.

Without Samson there as a buffer, Nick suddenly seemed too close. What little emotional space I’d been able to put between us had sort of been shredded by the whole naked-assault-victim vulnerability thing. I stepped away and took the portable monitor. “So, show me how to work this.”

Nick was in full professor mode, taking fifteen minutes to explain how the little monitor could bounce among the various feeds and wirelessly upload clips to my office computer. I thought I was going to have to start fanning my face to keep from bursting into flames. Curse his sexy brains!

Using the toggle thing, he scanned past the signal coming from my mom’s front door and did a cartoonish double-take. “What the?”

Nick squinted at the screen, aghast at the image of what appeared to be a dozen or so of my male cousins, lined up in front of my house with their pants around their ankles and their bare asses aimed directly at the camera. There were enough full moons to orbit Jupiter.

“You really shouldn’t have shown Samson where the cameras are,” I muttered.

“How did he organize that so quickly?” Nick asked, nodding toward Samson’s naked rear at the end of the butt-cheek chorus line.

“Well, when properly motivated, Samson can do just about anything. We’re fortunate that his main interests are food and pranks.”

“I mean, I can see grabbing one or two guys, but so many? He could take over the world,” Nick marveled.

I snorted. “As long as the world’s governments could be cowed into submission by a bottomless army, yes.”

He shuddered. “Well, there’s an image that will never leave my head. Thanks for that.”

“I do what I can.”

* * * FULL-BLOWN WINTER CLOSED in on the valley like a fist. The temperatures dive-bombed below freezing, putting us all in instinctual panic mode. And even though we spent the better part of the year preparing our houses, putting up food, winterizing our vehicles, I still ended up scrambling around, helping my aunt Doris patch a weak spot on her roof, helping Samson with last-minute runs to the bulk warehouse store in Burney for toilet paper and batteries. Clay and I took a day trip to a big pharmacy in Burney, where we could stock up on Billie’s meds. When the snow blew in and covered the valley in a fluffy white blanket and I finally had a chance to stop and breathe, I sort of collapsed and slept for two days.

Weeks passed, the holidays came and went, and even with the relative quiet, I was scared to relax into the season, to give myself downtime. I used pack morale as an excuse. Werewolves tend to get sort of restless when we’re boxed in. Little disagreements over a poker game or the last buffalo wing can turn into full-on duels to the death if you’re not careful. So, I spent a good portion of my day sending my family members on random errands, finding some weird chores that needed to be done, or sending them on extra patrols around the perimeter. I organized checkers tournaments, darning bees, Scrabble nights. I basically became the pack’s cruise director.

The pathways between Grundy and the valley were kept warm. Mom worried too much for Mo to drive the baby from Grundy, so she phased every few days so she could run over and visit Eva. Neither snow nor sleet nor an act of God would keep my mother from snuggling that fuzzy-headed baby.

Eva seemed to be on some sort of mission to work her evil/cute baby magic on me. Ever since she’d started toddling around on those chubby little legs, she’d been targeting me, the least enthusiastic baby person in the room. I think she enjoyed the challenge, which proved that we were related.

Eva would tug on my pants leg until I picked her up. And then she’d basically stare me down with those big blue-gray eyes of hers, daring me not to snuggle her. It was like facing down a tiny, diapered mastermind.

And of course, I caved. I snuggled her. I babbled. I read her Where the Wild Things Are until I was hoarse. I actually found myself watching my language. Shudder.

Every once in a while, I’d bury my face in the talcum-powder-scented fluff on her head and have a little “maybe I am ready for a baby” twinge. And then I would slap myself. Because my smart-ass karma combined with my genes might create some sort of evil superbaby. I just wasn’t ready. Imagine baby-proofing for that.

Being around Nick so much wasn’t exactly helping my hormone surges. He’d bought a snowmobile, so he could visit every other day. He’d stopped the interviews, but he still liked hanging out with Samson and Pops, whom he was determined to win over. I wasn’t sure what he was doing with his research, but Nick told me he was working on something that wouldn’t result in me kicking his ass, so I was happy.

Mom was already a fan, but he met some resistance from some very unfriendly uncles. But I think that was more traditional “we don’t want you sullying our little girl” hazing than anything else. Clay usually made some excuse to get out of their card games, but I think that was mostly because of the “I want your woman” vibe Nick was still giving off.

Nick stayed in Samson’s guest room most nights, which had me worried. Samson seemed to think of him as some sort of human chew toy. For instance, just the other night, I’d come home to find Samson in my mother’s living room, holding Nick upside-down in some half-nelson wrestling hold.

“Hey, Midget, Nick won’t tell me whether he has sisters. I figure, he’s pretty, he would have to have pretty sisters.”

“You’re a sick man, Samson,” Nick said, his face reddened by the sudden flow of blood to his head.

“But you laughed, so what does that make you?”

Nick deadpanned, “Humoring you.”

“Samson, put him down!” I cried.

“But he’s so light and portable,” he said, jiggling a bemused Nick.

“When you wonder why we don’t introduce humans to our pack’s secrets, this is why,” I told Nick.

Samson jostled Nick again to get his attention. “OK, Dr. Werewolf Whisperer, you told me you could get out this. Now, the rules are: One, no punching me in the junk. And two, see rule one. Let’s go.”

“This is not healthy.” I sighed, shaking my head. “Even for werewolves, this is messed up.”

Nick grinned at me, bent at his waist, and did some weird finger-strike thing against the back of Samson’s kneecaps. Samson yowled and dropped to his knees, bringing Nick’s head precariously close to the floor. Nick stopped short of cracking his skull by catching himself with his hands. He sprang to his feet and put Samson in a headlock.

I think Samson was more shocked than strong-armed.

“Never fuck with a guy who worships at the altar of Vulcan martial arts,” Nick told my cousin as he administered a merciless noogie.

“Seriously, you Vulcan-nerve-pinched him?” I barely suppressed the grin that threatened to split my cheeks.

“Awesome!” Samson exclaimed, shaking Nick off like a troublesome Pomeranian. Nick was flung ass-over-teakettle onto the couch. “You’ll have to show me how to do that sometime,” Samson said before he wandered into the kitchen looking for food.

Nick hopped up from the couch. He was warm and slightly sweaty. I could feel the happy thrum of his heartbeat under his skin. I cleared my throat and stepped back from him before I did anything drastic. “You in one piece?”

“It’s kind of fun. I never had a big brother growing up. I always wanted to be hung upside-down by my ankles.”