He swore Emma was sitting on the edge of her seat in the front row, eager to get the bidding war started. The way she was eyeing him and smiling, he half suspected this was a matchmaking effort between him and her granddaughter, with Emma getting some work out of him at the same time. Every time he’d visited her over the last couple of years, he’d asked how Lori was, wishing he could see her and knowing she was avoiding him. And every time, Emma shook her head and said she just didn’t know what was wrong with her granddaughter. But he was fairly certain Lori didn’t make herself scarce because she despised him.
He was damn glad he’d caught up with her at Catherine’s house and wondered if the only reason she’d been there was because she hadn’t expected him to arrive. That was probably also why she had been braless, wearing such hot shorts, and barefoot. Now that she was around, he had no intention of letting her slip away again.
The bidding began then, and the whole affair was not as sedate as Paul had thought it would be. Women were shouting and laughing and cheering the bidding war on. For one hundred and fifty dollars, Widow Baxter bought one of the ranch hand’s services.
All the ladies teased her about what she was going to do with Howard Cooper. Paul wanted to give the omega wolves the benefit of the doubt because they might have straightened out. But the business with the woman at the grocery store this morning—combined with Howard’s comment about them getting into a bind with their boss and the barroom brawls Catherine had mentioned—fed into what Paul already knew about them. They were trouble and they hadn’t changed.
Allan was next up, and the bidding was going strong as he got into the fun of the auction, flexing his muscles and smiling brightly.
“Way to go, SEAL!” Lori and Rose shouted.
“Take off your shirt!” Emma shouted.
Catherine whooped and whistled. Paul had to smile at Emma and Catherine.
Lori’s face reddened a bit, probably because her own grandma had shouted out the recommendation.
Allan began unbuttoning his shirt slowly and the crowd went wild.
Paul laughed. He hadn’t thought that a honey-do bachelor auction would be anything like this. Then again, Emma was a wolf and they could change the dynamics of a situation in a heartbeat. The ranch hands made a big deal of jerking their shirts out of their waistbands and then starting to unbutton them.
A woman shouted, “Just the shirts, gentlemen.”
And that had everyone laughing.
Stripper music began to play, and Paul removed his shirt to the beat like the others did.
Clapping hands, wolf whistles, and shouts indicated the women were just as excited to bid for the SEALs as they were for the cowboys.
Paul tossed his shirt to Lori for safekeeping. When she grabbed the shirt and held it close, he smiled at her.
Allan went for two hundred and fifty dollars to a lady wearing a pink cowboy hat—Martha Madison, the only woman in the area who owned and ran a horse ranch. Paul wondered exactly what Allan was going to be doing at Martha’s ranch. Mucking out stalls? Or something a little more glamorous?
Catherine shook her head, disappointed she didn’t get to buy her son’s time, but she was eyeing Paul when the carpentry teacher went for three hundred dollars.
“New kitchen cabinets!” the woman who bought him shouted, in case anyone thought she was buying the teacher’s services for something other than his carpentry skills.
A few of the audience’s comments—“Yeah, right!” “Sure thing, Eula Mae!” “You just redid the kitchen cabinets last week!”—brought tons of laughter.
“Auction off the other SEAL!” Mike O’Keefe shouted from his wheelchair.
Paul gave him the Navy greeting “Hooyah!” and a thumbs-up as Allan quickly echoed his response.
Mike shouted the Army’s greeting back, “Hooah!”
A female Marine in the audience called out, “Oorah!”
Everyone was clapping and cheering.
Emma was waving her paddle, featuring the silhouette of a man and her number in the center of it, as she continued to bid for Paul. Lori was shaking her head, trying to get her to stop. Paul was smiling at the two of them, hoping that Emma wouldn’t pay too much for him because he would drop by her place for free to do whatever tasks she needed.
“Three hundred and fifty dollars going once.” The auctioneer paused as everyone became quiet. Emma looked eagerly at him, like she was just about to win the lottery and couldn’t wait to claim her winnings. “Going twice.” Another pause. The air sizzled with tension. “Sold to Emma Greypaw!” the auctioneer said, slamming the hammer down at the same time.
Emma whistled and Paul winked at her, making her blush. She was so cute and he dearly loved her. From as early as he could remember, he’d always loved her homemade apple pies and tortillas. Emma swore as soon as she pulled an apple pie out of the cast-iron stove, he was standing on her porch, eager to do a chore for her so she’d offer him a piece. And she had always given him an extra couple of slices because he was a growing boy.
Catherine began bidding for one of the high school seniors and missed getting him for seventy-five dollars. That seemed to be the going rate for the boys. The ranch hand, Jerome Huffman, started strutting his stuff and fetched a bid just fifty short of Paul’s highest bid.
The bank loan officer came next, but though he was smiling, he wasn’t outgoing and waited while low bids came in. Then he finally said, “I do windows,” as if that might help raise the money a bit, and it did.
Several women started bidding against each other to win the window-washing service for $150.
The last cowboy, Dusty Cooper, received a winning bid seventy-five dollars lower than Paul’s and slanted a glance at him, smiling but not in an altogether friendly way. If Dusty gave any of his pack members grief, Paul was dealing with it in a shifter way.
Michael’s Reflections was being auctioned off last. Paul hurried to get a paddle to bid for the oil painting that featured the lush, green woods and a beautiful gray wolf sitting and watching the river, just like he’d seen Lori do a million times. Lori was smiling at him. He ended up bidding five hundred dollars, way over the last bid of three hundred. He wanted to help the disabled vet, and he definitely did not want anyone else to have that painting of Lori. It wouldn’t mean half as much to them as it did to him.
With the bidding over, Lori and Emma joined him, Lori handing his shirt to him. He quickly pulled it on and began to button it.
“I can’t believe you paid so much for that painting,” Lori whispered to him. “It’s not even my good side.”
“All your sides are good,” Paul said and grinned, making Lori blush. He loved it.
Sales figures were tallied for all the auctioned items, and the women met with their honey-do bachelors to discuss the hours they’d be working that weekend. Lori was still shaking her head at her grandma and Paul.
Emma paid for Paul, then came and took his hand and smiled up at him. She was like the grandma he’d never known. “So, Mrs. Greypaw…”
“Emma, please.”
“Yes, ma’am. What would you like me to do?”
“You don’t have to start the job until tomorrow. Our lakeside cabin needs quite a bit of work done on it. Lori offered to show you all that you need to do. I made a list. She’ll be up there helping too.”
Pleasantly surprised to hear that, Paul glanced at Lori. She looked flabbergasted, her mouth gaping as she stared at her grandma. Paul smiled a little. This was the perfect way to get to know Lori again in a non-intimate way. Though he had to say she’d seemed very agreeable when he had kissed her.
“She’s always such a good granddaughter.” Emma patted Lori’s arm.
Lori almost appeared a little panicked. Maybe she was afraid Paul would kiss her again. But he had no intention of doing anything other than fixing the place up as much as he could
over the weekend. If it took a little longer, he would be fine with that.
He could work vacation time around it too, if need be. Maybe he and Allan could even come back to fix some things later if he and Lori didn’t get it done. Emma had offered to let them stay for a few days at the tail end of their vacation to go scuba diving anyway.
Lori stretched out her hand to her grandma, who promptly handed her the list.
“I’ve already paid for supplies at the hardware store. The place needs that one wall around the fireplace painted inside for starters, but you choose the color, Lori. I’m not very good at that.”
“Your house is lovely, bright, and cheerful. You are great at color coordinating things,” Lori said, contradicting her. Her chin was tilted down and she was eyeing her grandma with suspicion.
“Yes, dear, but so are you. I spent so much time fixing up my house over the past few weeks that I don’t want to try to figure out what to do with the cabin. You’ll do a lovely job. Let Paul help you decide, if he’s got any decorating sense.”
He smiled. No one had ever asked him if he had any “decorating sense.”
“The hardware store closes in an hour. Let’s go get what we need. We can meet over there.” Lori waited for Paul to agree.
“Sure thing. I guess I’ll be staying at the cabin for a couple of days,” he said to Emma.
“No sense in you driving every day from the Rappaports’ cabin on the other side of the lake. You can use either of the spare bedrooms. Lori always takes the blue room at the end of the cabin.”
Lori sighed dramatically.
“Oh, come on now,” her grandma said. “You don’t want to have to drive all that way back and forth to the cabin from our house in the country either. And you told me Carmen would take care of your jujitsu classes if you had to manage the bachelor while he did the work I need done. You know she could always use the extra money. I never saw a woman who could buy so many pairs of shoes a year.
“Besides, as long as Paul doesn’t wear face paint and scare you to death again, everything should be just fine. Got to run along. You two have fun while you’re at it.” She hugged the pair of them. Paul hugged her right back, making Emma smile. She took a deep breath and patted him on the shoulder. “If only I were a lot younger.” She paused, frowning a bit. “Did Catherine tell you about that doctor who is taking DNA samples of all the wolves he can find to see what’s causing the”—she glanced around, and seeing no one nearby, she finished—“change in their longevity?”
“I heard he was making the rounds.”
“Well, he’s already tested us, but you and Allan were gone when he came. I called him to let him know you and Allan are here for the next couple of weeks.”
“Thanks.” Paul wasn’t worried about it like some of his pack members were. If it was a sign of the times, so be it. As long as they didn’t face over-accelerated aging because they had lived so long. That would be the pits.
Then Emma headed for her car. Paul recognized it as the black sedan that had been parked at Catherine’s house that morning. So she had gotten a new car too.
“We better get to it,” Lori warned. “I’ll pick up some groceries after we go to the hardware store, and then I’ll meet you at the cabin.”
At the hardware store, she picked out a vivid, emerald-green paint that was brighter than what Paul would have selected. He was thinking more of a sage green for quiet, cool, and muted forest colors.
When he mentioned that, she considered the color swatch again. “The cabin has a lot of dark oak wood, so I want to go with something a little brighter.”
“We could paint a couple of pink palm trees on the accent wall. The green flamingos probably would disappear in that color of paint.”
“I couldn’t draw a straight line if I tried. What about you?”
“That and singing, no can do.”
He looked over Emma’s to-do list while the paint manager was mixing the paint. “Emma wants a new sofa and chairs?”
“Yeah, the old ones were recycled castoffs from forty years ago, so it looks like she really wants to spruce up the place.”
“The furniture store is closed by now,” he said. He hadn’t expected to be picking out furniture too.
“Which is fine. Tomorrow, we can paint, then return to town after lunch and find something that might work nicely for the living room.”
“Okay, sounds good.”
When they finished picking out the paint supplies, she asked, “Would beef ribs, parmesan noodles, and turnip greens be all right tomorrow for lunch? Chicken wings for dinner?”
“I’d love it.”
She eyed the list. “I don’t know. It looks like it might take longer to do all this. Well, I can finish up whatever she wants done that we don’t complete by tomorrow.”
“I’ll stay however long it takes.”
Lori glanced up at him. “She didn’t pay for that much time.”
It sounded like he was a bought man. “I’m willing to stay longer and help Emma with whatever she needs done. So we’ll need lunch for Sunday. How about salmon steaks? We probably won’t need dinner.”
Her mouth parted and he was reminded of just how kissable it was. “Um, okay. Breakfast? Forget it. I know what you like. I’ll meet you up at the cabin in a little while.” She gave him a spare key to the place.
He was going to ask if she needed any help, but he didn’t want to make her feel crowded. “Okay, good show. Meet you there. I’ve got to drop by the Rappaports’ place to get my bag.” Then he carried the paint out to his SUV and headed to the cabin. He’d decided that this wasn’t going to be a bad deal at all. He tended to be a workaholic, totally mission-oriented, so he’d work until everything was done. But what he wouldn’t give to have some playtime with Lori—swimming, maybe running as wolves. He’d just have to play it by ear.
When he arrived at the cabin, Allan wasn’t there. Paul carried the painting of Lori into his bedroom. When he had a chance, he’d hang it where he could enjoy it most.
He called Allan to let him know his schedule. “Hey, are you doing the job you were auctioned to do tonight?”
“No, I’ll be going to Martha’s ranch tomorrow. I’m out with one of the ladies who bid on me but didn’t win. So I’m buying her dinner. Consolation prize.”
Paul laughed. “I’m going to be staying the weekend. Emma has a list as long as Santa Claus’s. The jobs will take a couple of days, at the very least.” He grabbed his bag, got into his car, and headed over to the lakeside cabin.
“Do you need me to help with anything after I’ve done my work at Martha’s place?”
“Nah. I’ve got it.”
Silence followed, but before Paul could ask if he was still there, Allan said, “Is Lori going to be staying with you for the weekend?”
The tone of Allan’s voice said he believed more than work would be going on at the cabin.
“Yeah, to make sure I get everything done right.”
“Uh-huh.”
Paul chuckled. “What about you? Will you be okay by yourself?”
“With you not around, yeah. I’ve got another date tomorrow night. I sure like these bachelor auctions.”
Paul laughed. “Okay, see you later then.”
“Out here.”
Paul took the long road around the blue-green lake, noticing that the warm breeze had made the water choppy. The lake was thirty miles long and sixteen miles wide, so getting around it was a bit of a drive. When he reached Lori and Emma’s log cabin, he got out of his car and paused to enjoy the hilly woods and the view of the lake and mountains off in the distance. He took in a deep breath and first noticed the smell of pine trees, followed by Lori and Rose’s scents, though they had been left awhile ago. None of Emma’s, though; she must not have been there for quite some time. He also smelled Dusty and Howard Cooper’s scents,
which irked him right away. What had they been doing here?
Had Catherine suspected something about it? Paul hoped that neither of the ranch hands thought they had a chance with Lori or Rose. He reminded himself that what the women did with their time was up to them, but the thought of the ranch hands still bothered him. Particularly after he’d seen the way Dusty behaved toward the woman at the grocery store that morning. Paul didn’t like the idea that any other wolf had his paws on Lori or that these men had designs on Rose.
He hauled the paint supplies and his bag of clothes up the wooden steps of the deck to the main entrance and set them down. The sun would set over the lake in another hour and a half, and he was going to enjoy it. He hoped Lori would make it to the cabin in time to watch the sunset with him.
He unlocked the door and grabbed the can of paint, the bag of supplies, and his clothes bag. As soon as he stepped inside, he immediately took a deep breath and smelled the scents in the living room. Both of the Cooper brothers had been in the cabin. He growled a little under his breath. Then again, if the men had given the ladies any trouble, they would have said something to him. Wouldn’t they have?
Before Lori arrived, Paul dumped his bag in the green bedroom closest to hers. Then he moved the sagging sofa and matching sagging chairs away from the one wall they would paint. The rest of the walls were paneled in dark, reddish wood. Though the color was beautiful, he could see why Lori wanted something brighter on the accent wall that surrounded the white stone fireplace. He began taping the edges of the wood so they wouldn’t get paint on it. When Lori drove up, he went outside to help her carry the groceries up the steps.
“The Cooper brothers were here,” he said, as if she didn’t know it, and as soon as he said it, he realized he sounded accusatory.
He couldn’t help it. She and Rose didn’t have a pack to watch out for them. Packs served a purpose—in the wild, as protection for their members, and for lupus garous, to keep them safe from humans and from other wolves.