Молли Харпер - How to Flirt with a Naked Werewolf

“Yes,” they chorused.

“And you were wrong,” I said. “Wrong, wrong, totally wrong.”

“Yes,” they chorused again.

“OK, seriously, are you two about to jump out from behind my couch and yell ‘Surprise’?”

Dad chuckled again. “We haven’t heard anything about the Great North Woods. What’s it like up there? Do you have friends? How’s the job?”

“It’s good.” I sighed. “I love my little house. I have a lot of friends, and I love my job. I’m making some changes with the owner, Evie, to the menu, and they’ve gone over really well. My chocolate chess squares are a big hit.”

I waited a beat for my mother to lecture me on pushing poisonous sugars to the masses, but she was simply listening.

“Are you happy, baby?” Mom asked.

Well, until recently, I’d been peachy-freaking-keen. I murmured a noncommittal “Mm-hmm.”

“That’s what’s important,” Dad told me. “That’s all we want for you. We can work out the rest.”

How many times had I wanted him to say that? How much anger and anxiety could have been prevented if we’d had this conversation when I was a teenager, instead of a thirty-year-old? I sighed, feeling a little weight wiggle loose from my chest. There was still pressure there, from Cooper, from past hurts, but it was eased enough to let me breathe.

“I’ve got to go,” I told them, my voice thick. “I love you guys, I really do. I’ll try to come home for a visit soon, OK? Iloveyoubye.”

A few minutes after I hung up, the cell phone rang again. It was such a relief to see the caller ID and not feel that dread. I smiled. “Did you forget something, Mom?”

“What’s bothering you, baby?”

I opened my mouth to protest. “Nothing’s bothering—”

“I know this is probably a strain on the delicate peace we’ve just built, but honey, I know when something’s wrong with you. Is it a man?”

I hung my head. “How did you know?”

“Well, I’ve never heard that kind of hurt in your voice before. And you’ve never been in the kind of relationship where you could be hurt like that,” she said. “So it stands to reason that this is something new for you.”

“It sucks, Mom. It really, really sucks.”

“Can you tell me about it?”

This was new, too—Mom asking for information instead of demanding answers, which was good, because I was going to have to edit heavily anything I told her. I was not ready to tell my parents about the baby yet. For one thing, they might insist on coming up to visit, and I couldn’t have them traipsing through the complicated werewolf soap opera that had become my life. And second—well, really, the possibility that they might come to visit was reason enough. One good phone call isn’t going to make me that optimistic.

“I can’t talk about it right now, Mom. There’s too much going on. But I will, soon. I’ll call in a few days, OK?”

“I love you, Mo. I just want—I want you to be happy. You say that you needed to figure out who you were without us. But you’ve always known what you wanted, honey. And sometimes I made it hard for you to have that because I thought I knew better. And I’m sorry. I never wanted you to doubt yourself. You know what you want. You wouldn’t have traveled so far without knowing what you want. You’ve gone the distance. Now, maybe it’s time to sit back and let what you want come to you.”

“Thanks, Mom.” My forehead creased as I stared at the phone and wondered what exactly my mother had been smoking to bring out her logical side. “That’s oddly appropriate and well-timed advice.”

“Oh, honey, don’t be sarcastic. I’m trying here.”

“I’m not!” I exclaimed. “Seriously, that’s very helpful.”

“Really?” Mom sighed. “I’m so glad. Though, honestly, I don’t know why you sound so surprised. I’ve been giving you good advice for years.”

“Don’t push it.”

I WAS BAKING A THIRD batch of what Evie was starting to call my triple-chocolate “misery brownies”—a new bestseller for the saloon—when Oscar set up a howl and ran for the door. I jumped at the soft, insistent knock. I tried to control the pounding in my chest as I raced to the door, oven mitt still on my hand.

I yanked the knob (somewhat clumsily, given the oven mitt) and found my local forest ranger on my doorstep with a bottle of red wine and a pizza from Mama Rosario’s, the only decent place for a pie in a fifty-mile radius.

“Alan.” I sighed, instantly ashamed at the disappointment coloring my voice. “Funny, I didn’t order a pizza. Someone must have prank-called the ranger station.”

Alan laughed. “I hope you like pepperoni and sausage. And I hope you don’t mind me just stopping by. Mo, you—you just looked so sad at work this afternoon. I wanted to come by and cheer you up.”

It was galling how quickly that made me tear up. I smiled, opening the door and taking the wine, a nice table red, from him. “I love pepperoni and sausage.”

We sat on the couch, chowed down on the best pizza available in northwestern Alaska, and talked. But I couldn’t seem to get comfortable. I sat with my back against the armrest, my legs folded against my chest like a shield, as I sipped grape juice. Alan gradually slid closer across the couch, until he pulled my feet into his lap. He traced the bones of my ankle lazily with his fingertips. I pulled my feet under my butt and sat on them.

“I’m glad we did this,” he said. “We haven’t been able to spend a lot of time together lately, but now that you and Cooper—”

“I don’t want to talk about Cooper.”

Alan’s smile seemed to brighten. “Me, neither.”

Quicker than I could blink, Alan leaned in and brushed his lips across mine. I froze as his hands skimmed gently along my ribs, brushing the sides of my breasts before resting on my shoulders.

It would be so easy just to let him kiss me, to let him make everything all right for just a moment. I was tired of the constant, nagging loneliness. I was scared of being alone, of raising the baby by myself. Alan could take some of that away, even for just a little while. But it was so wrong. It was beyond betrayal to be kissing one man and knowing I was pregnant with another man’s baby. I was dizzy with nausea . . . and not because of the pepperoni and sausage. I whimpered and pushed him away gently.

“Are you OK?” he asked, his brows drawing together when he saw my pale, clammy cheeks.

“I’m sorry, I really can’t,” I told him. “With things the way they are right now with Cooper so unsettled, I just can’t. I couldn’t do that to him. I’m sorry, Alan. You’re such a—”

“Please,” he said, leaning his forehead against mine. “Please don’t give me the ‘you’re such a nice guy’ speech.”

“But you are.” I smiled and was relieved when he grinned back at me, kissing my forehead.

“Fat lot of good it does when I can’t find a nice girl who will have me.”

“It’s not you, it really is me. Look, I haven’t told anyone here in town yet, but I just want you to understand why I can’t—Oh, hell, Alan, I’m pregnant.”

All of the color drained out of Alan’s face, then it turned a sort of eggplant color and then back to bone white. “Oh,” he whispered quietly, gathering me close to him and giving me a squeeze. He rested his chin on my head. “What are you going to do?”

I shrugged. “I’m going to have the baby. And I think I need to stay here to do it.”

“Have you told Cooper?”

I shook my head.

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“That afternoon I slapped him in front of the grocery store.” I smiled despite myself. “Oddly enough, the slapping was not pregnancy-related.”