“Oh.” Demetria snorted. “Like all jaguars look alike.”
They laughed.
Then Everett got a call. Looking at the caller ID, he quickly said, “It’s Leidolf. Putting the call on speaker.”
Demetria smiled. So the red wolf leader wasn’t as hard-nosed as he appeared to be.
“What’s your address? I’m flying out tomorrow to see the boy,” Leidolf said, not asking, but acting like a real alpha wolf.
Everyone smiled. But how would he react when he learned they were jaguars?
Wade motioned to Everett to give the nursery as the address.
Everett did, and Leidolf said, “I thought you told me you were from Dallas. Why are you near Houston now?”
“We’re here trying to learn what we can from my half sister.” Everett explained how the discussion with her about Henry had led them to Devlyn and then eventually to Leidolf. “We got a lead on a Cameron MacPherson and his Arctic wolf pack, but no idea where they are located. Do you know of them?”
Silence. Then Leidolf said, “Yes, but I’ll discuss it with you in person. So you’re not with a wolf pack?”
Everett hesitated to say, as if not wanting to scare Leidolf off. “No, we aren’t. We’re just…family.”
“And you feel safety in numbers.”
Everett looked like he was about ready to contradict Leidolf, but Demetria said, “We can meet you, just the two of us, if you’d feel more comfortable with that.”
Everett smiled at her.
Like a typical alpha, Leidolf said, “No problem for me. I’ll be there at noon. I’ll rent my own car, so no need to pick me up at the airport.” Then he hung up.
“Yes!” Demetria said. “I think he knows a lot more than he’s saying.”
“To fly out here, I’d say so,” Everett said.
“So does he know about us, or does he just think you’re a scaredy-cat wolf and not with a pack?” Maya asked, a teasing glint of the devil in her eyes.
“If so, he’s going to be one confused red wolf,” Everett said. “I’m going to call Dr. Denali back and let him know that we’ve got a lead on an Arctic wolf pack so his brother has another clue for his private investigators.”
While Everett was making the call, Maya said to Demetria, “You know this could be a good time for the two of you to take a break. It might be a while before you find the boy’s family. I can babysit him. I wore him out anyway.”
“Sure, we’ll take you up on that. Just a walk in the gardens so we’ll be close by in case the boy shifts.” Demetria smiled at Everett as he glanced in her direction, looking as if he was surprised to hear her agree with the suggestion. Then he ended the call with Dr. Denali.
“Okay, Rafe Denali is having his men search for a Cameron MacPherson who might have established another PI shop somewhere in the States.”
“You would think that with a background in investigative work, Cameron would have been able to locate his son already,” Wade said.
“You would think so. Who knows what lengths the woman, and I’m sure her accomplice, took to cover their tracks.” Everett glanced at the wolf pup sleeping in Maya’s arms. “Okay, let’s go.”
He and Demetria grabbed their jackets, pulled them on, and headed outside. The nursery was closing, and the last customers were leaving. Connor was carrying the toddlers on his way back to the house. “Best way to wear them out,” he said, smiling.
Kat was locking up the garden shed and hurried to join him. “Did you have any luck with the calls you were making?”
“We might have a lead about an Arctic wolf pack that’s newly turned.” Demetria pulled a scarf around her neck and shivered.
“Oh, that’s great news.” Kat caught up to Connor, who had stopped to talk to them.
Demetria motioned to the house. “Maya’s watching the wolf pup.”
“Still a wolf then,” Kat said.
“Yeah, but we’ve got a red wolf coming from Oregon tomorrow to talk to us about this Arctic wolf pack. That might give us a real clue to where the boy’s family is.” Everett zipped up his jacket.
“Did you tell him what we are? He’s going to get quite the shock tomorrow if you didn’t,” Connor said.
“We didn’t, but another wolf we talked to might have told him,” Everett said.
“Oh wow, he’s really coming here?” Kat took one of the toddlers from Connor.
“Yes, hope that’s all right,” Everett said.
“Sure. Great. Our first wolf man. Should be really interesting, but most of all, maybe you’ll get somewhere with the case. Got to take the little ones inside now. Have a nice stroll.” Kat walked off with Connor.
“So what are we going to do if Leidolf knows of the family and wants to take the boy with him?” Demetria was worried that he might insist because he was a wolf and knew the family, while Demetria and Everett were jaguar shifters. “He sounds like he has a personal stake in this. Why else would he fly all the way out here?”
“I agree that it could be a concern. It’s our job to take care of this, or it will be a concern if not taken care of.”
She looked up at him. “You mean with this new ‘shift’ in our world, we’ll be just as ready to protect wolf shifters as our own kind? That should be interesting. Especially when it will take time for everyone in both camps to know the other exists.”
“How would you like to be part of a new team that specializes in all shifters? We’ve got hands-on experience right up front.”
She let out her breath, her eyes steady on his. “There might be a need for it.” She wondered if there might be more to Everett’s offer than a strictly business arrangement.
He pulled her in close. Yeah, like this.
“There might. Then again, there might not be. Still, we’ve already located several wolf packs and made first contact. If any of them discover jaguar shifters causing trouble or in trouble, who do you think they would call?” Everett asked.
“Us, because we’ve made first contact.” She smiled. “I don’t know if my director would go along with it.”
Everett’s breath was frosty in the chilly night air. “My director suggested I head the team. But I would love to work with you, and we can do this together. We could be the first to teach jaguars in the field how to deal with wolf shifters, once we get the hang of it.”
“We might even have a unified force, with some wolves on the team eventually. Wow, the possibilities are limitless.”
Demetria shivered and Everett wrapped his arm over her shoulders, pulled her even closer, and walked with her down one of the lighted paths. “So what do we call it? United Shifters Task Force? United Shifters Command?”
“I like task force, but it seems like it would be for one job only. Like a police task force. Command sounds powerful. What about United Shifters Force? The USF.” She snuggled closer to him. This is what she liked even more. Being close to him, sharing the same heat, connecting. She wished things had ended differently for them last night. She wished she’d been more with it and had thanked him better for taking care of her mess. Well, if she was wishing for things, she wished she had seen him in the morning after she’d had a chance to look more presentable.
“Sounds good to me, although the directors might not go along with our idea,” Everett said, looking down at her.
“Sure they will. They already have two experts in the field.”
“You want to shake on it?” Everett smiled, looking really happy and snuggling with her in a sweet way, but not pushing the dating issue. Maybe he was afraid she’d fall apart like she did at the movie.
“No. I want a kiss to seal the deal.”
He pulled her to a stop next to a fountain shut off for the winter and ran his hands down her arms. “Demetria—”
“Unless you’re afraid I might bite again.” Or get upset again.
He laughed. “No way.” Yet he seemed hesitant.
“Don’t think. Just do it.” Then she took his hand and kissed it.
He leaned down to kiss her mouth, the kiss nothing like a handshake kind of a kiss, brief and to the point. His mouth pressed hard against hers, his tongue seeking entrance, the chill instantly abating. He wrapped his arms snugly around her as if he were a bear shifter and not a jaguar, hugging her to his body, saying he wanted her, wanted the intimacy between them, just like she wanted all of it with him.
Demetria was ready to yank off her jacket because her body was already so hot. Instead, she ran her hands underneath Everett’s jacket and warmed her fingers for a minute while he continued to kiss her. Yet despite how she’d wanted this, how she’d needed this, tears filled her eyes. She couldn’t help it. She had to quit feeling like she was betraying Matt by kissing his best friend. If Everett had asked her out first, things would have been so different now. Yet she felt guilty that she’d even think that.
She pulled away and smiled, her eyes misty with tears, looking quickly away so Everett wouldn’t see them. She loved Everett’s kiss and knew he felt something for her, so why couldn’t she let the past go?
When they separated, she took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. “Okay, good. I’ll let my boss know I have a new job.” She wasn’t going to ask. She would tell him. If her boss didn’t go along with it, she’d just put in a transfer to Everett’s branch. She might be a super professional in any job she was committed to, but after she saw the way Everett had handled everyone—the teens, Howard, the wolf-shifter boy—she wanted this new job that would take her in a totally different direction.
Everett seemed to like the notion. Even better.
“So how do we handle Leidolf, since he doesn’t know we are jaguar shifters? What if he wants to take the boy with him?” Demetria slipped one of her cold hands into Everett’s jacket pocket as she held him close and they continued to walk.
“He can stay with us and help to find the boy’s parents. Or he can return home to his pack. He’s not taking the boy anywhere unless the boy’s mom or dad is with him and the boy shows us that they’re indeed his parents.” Everett wrapped his arm around her shoulders and sauntered around the loop through the garden that would eventually take them back to the house.
“I believe we should meet with him alone, not with your family present. Don’t you agree?”
“I do to an extent, though if we have any trouble with Leidolf, Wade can give us backup since he is a JAG agent. Maya can take the boy out of the picture so we can deal with Leidolf alone if he becomes unreasonable. I don’t want the boy to be upset.”
“Do you think Leidolf will become unreasonable?” Demetria wondered how the wolf pup would even respond to another wolf if he didn’t know him.
“He might. He seemed pretty hardheaded when we first talked to him. Though it’s understandable if he’s trying to protect a pack he knows personally. It’s a real toss-up how he’ll feel about us when he actually sees us and can smell what we are, if he doesn’t already know.”
“Okay. Maybe we should wait before we decide to form our own team and offer our assistance in any other mixed shifter cases. We need to successfully resolve a case first.” But new team or no, she definitely wanted to see more of Everett. She tugged at him to walk faster and go back to the house, since she was getting chilled.
“Are you kidding? We’ll do great.”
She hoped so. “About…the room arrangement.”
“Yeah.” Everett let out his breath. “I’ll keep Junior with me so you can get a good night’s sleep.”
She sighed.
“What?” he asked. “Wait… Hell, yeah, us together?”
Ohmigod, she couldn’t believe he was really willing to do this. Or that she was. “What will we do with Junior?”
“Maya and Kat will take care of him, or one of them will. They’re great with kids of all ages. They’d do it in heartbeat. Why do you think Maya wanted to give us a break by sending us out here to walk in the dark so we’d be cold and have to snuggle a bit?”
Demetria smiled, then she frowned. “Maybe we shouldn’t…rush this. Maybe we should wait until we find the pup’s family first.”
“Rush it? We’ve known each other for years. No way are we going to wait to find the pup’s family first.”
She smiled as she watched the brick path they were walking along, no longer feeling the cold.
“I sure as hell am not waiting another couple of years.” Everett squeezed her tight and relaxed his grip, but still kept her tucked securely under his arm.
She laughed. “If we stayed in the same bedroom, it might cause some speculation.” She looked up at him, hoping he didn’t care. This felt right between them. That was one of the reasons she’d always wanted to meet Tammy at her house first, not somewhere else. She had hoped Everett would be there. She wanted to be with him, hoping they’d both give up the ghost and start seeing each other.
“Don’t worry about that. No matter what we do, they’re already speculating,” Everett said.
She raised her brows.
He pulled her to a stop again and smiled down at her. “What do you think the guys were talking about when we were cooking dinner? Us. A surefire mating, just because they got caught up with their mates on a mission.”
Demetria groaned and began to pull away, but Everett pulled her tightly again. “I told them no way that would happen to us. Not on a mission.” He kissed her forehead. “Not that I said anything about this to them, but it wouldn’t happen that way. Because I’ve wanted to date you from the first time I saw you visiting Tammy, Demetria.”
“But I was seeing Matt.”
“Yeah. You and Tammy left to have lunch with some other Guardian agents, and when she came home, I subtly asked about you. She said you were dating Matt.”
“Hadn’t he told you?”
“Well, sure, but not by name. You can’t imagine how disappointed I was. After he was gone…you didn’t date. I was afraid you weren’t ready. And then after the movie the other night…”
She sighed and rested her face against Everett’s chest. “I didn’t go out without anyone else because I was hoping you’d… We’d… Well, I felt the same about you. I was afraid you felt we shouldn’t date because of Matt. About the other night…I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to be. The movie affected me too.”
“About us tonight, I don’t know. I mean, if we were alone…”
“We will be. Probably the only chance we’ll get for quite a while if we don’t find Junior’s home soon.”
Maybe she was pushing it too fast where he was concerned. “But your family. You know, I’m not used to that. It’s just my mom and me, and I’m on my own, so I don’t have to even worry about what she thinks.”
“Do you want me to ask her for permission to date you first?” He fumbled to get his cell phone out.
She laughed. “No.”
“We could get a hotel room.”
She laughed again. “As if that wouldn’t cause all kinds of conjecture!”
He smiled.
She loved when he smiled at her like that. “All right, if they’re guessing already about us…”
“They are. They’ve already warned me it’s a done deal. No backing out of it now. I mean, if you’re really afraid of letting anyone know, I could wait until Junior is asleep and then slip into your guest room to see you.”
“No. I’d rather someone look after him, to make sure he doesn’t get scared or in case he shifts.”
“All right then. We could wait until Maya goes with Wade to their home on the other side of the property and just ask Kat.”
“No, Maya might be the one who’d like to take care of the pup. We’ll let the ladies decide.”
Everett breathed in a sigh of re
lief. “Is it time to go to bed?”
She laughed. “Come on. Let’s visit with the others before we retire to bed at a decent hour.”
“Don’t be surprised if what I consider a decent hour seems rather early to you.” He kissed her again with the same passion, his lips pressing hotly against hers, his hands stroking her arms, his tongue seeking entrance.
She opened up to him, their warm breaths mingling in the frigid air, and they kissed again, their tongues sliding and caressing each other. She groaned, not wanting to stop. She knew even if nothing came of this, they were making love to each other tonight. And it was way past overdue.
Being the practical person she was, she reminded herself that her fantasies about him would probably make the actual experience pale in comparison, but she was ready to give it a shot.
When they returned to the house, they were surprised to see Kat and Maya wearing their jaguar coats while they supervised the play between Kat’s toddlers and the wolf pup. Even though he was older, the wolf pup was gentle with them, and they were learning how to play with him right back.
Along with Demetria, Everett smiled to see the shifters playing, his arm around her shoulders as if to show his family a change in the dynamic between the two of them. Yet, since Maya had orchestrated their walk alone through the garden, had she already known a change was coming?
Wait until they told them they needed a puppy nanny so they could do the naughty.
Not that they would come right out and say that, but the jaguars would all know.
Demetria should probably tell Everett first that her mother was downright furious with him, but she figured he’d know that soon enough.
Chapter 11
Everett couldn’t have been more thrilled that Demetria wanted to sleep with him. And more. Between playing so late on his video game, having to take care of Tammy and Demetria, and then his mom calling so early about the wolf pup this morning, he hadn’t gotten much sleep. So really, bedtime needed to be early. Not just because he was dying to go to bed with Demetria. How would it look if he went to bed with her later, at what she thought was a decent hour, and in the middle of lovemaking, he fell asleep? Or he could barely stay awake?