Horny, but happy at how things were progressing, Javier left Naomi's office and met up with Ethan at the shifter's private sports complex. The big bear shook his head in silent reply at Javier's questioning look. Ethan had gone to talk with some contacts he had in the shifter underground to see if anyone might have heard anything about Naomi's attack, apparently in vain. Damn. Another dead end to go with last night's visit to see Naomi's client. A total bust as it turned out the bamboozling uncle wasn't the car vandal. Javier, in the hopes of gleaning some clues, had left early that morning-reluctantly from Naomi's bedside-and slipped into her office where he copied her hard drive onto a USB memory stick. The amount of info to sift through proved staggering, but they needed to find out who threatened her. The most logical explanation remained a client of hers trying to hide something. Finding out who was a task he'd tackle later. Right now, he headed upstairs for a team me

Ethan kept peering in the rearview mirror at Naomi, curled up and sleeping on the backseat. It had taken quite a bit of convincing to get her to agree to leave and come with them to Toronto. She'd kept insisting she needed to stay and protect Chris, who in turn yelled she was treating him like a little girl. And then, it degenerated even further when she played the world's tiniest violin. They'd only managed to pry her from the doorframe, as she sang the refrain from "Cry Baby, Cry," by whispering in her ear that she couldn't play a crucial part in their plan to snare her assailants if she didn't come with them. "Are you going to use me as bait?" she'd asked with narrowed eyes. "Yes," Ethan had answered bluntly. "I'm in," she'd chirped. The process of packing her a bag and grabbing their stuff took some running around, but they finally got on the road to Toronto mid-morning and she'd promptly fallen asleep in the back of the SUV, using Ethan's sweater as

Just a week ago, had someone told Javier that having a woman mark him as mate would prove the most mind blowing experience of his life, he would have laughed. The moment it happened, though, he exploded, and not just with his cock. At the first taste of her coppery blood and the reciprocal pinch of her bite, something beautiful happened. He couldn't have said if it was the essence of his beast, his soul, or something else, but a part of him meshed with her, became inexplicably and intimately twined. In that moment, he knew her better than he knew himself, and the discovery of how much she'd had to fight to overcome her fear at joining with him did more than awe him, it made him love her with every atom of his existence. In public, Naomi exuded a tough, no-nonsense persona; however, just as he'd suspected, Naomi was in actuality a softy at heart. He discovered while she perhaps claimed she feared a life of chaos if she mated with one of her kind, she feared even more not having th

At brunch the following morning, Naomi, sore but happier-and more sated-than she'd ever imagined, ate her bacon while watching the people coming and going from the hotel restaurant. They hadn't left their room at all the previous day, much too occupied with other things. Really fun and sweaty things. However, if they were to draw the thugs after her, she needed to make an appearance and make a bulls-eye of herself. Not as much fun as making love to her new mates, but even she had to admit her men needed some recovery time so they could play later that afternoon in the scheduled lacrosse match. Ethan and Javier stood across the room talking to some team members, but they kept shooting her heated glances. She managed not to blush, but only barely as she remembered their promise before they'd come down. "After we win the game, we're going to order up a bottle of champagne," Javier started. "And pour it all over your naked, hot body," Ethan continued. "We're g

Two months later? Naomi kicked the stove as the flame on the gas burner sputtered then died. Again. Stupid thing would need replacing. Not exactly a surprise given the home they'd bought just down the street from her parents still resided in the seventies. But they'd gotten it for a great deal, and slowly but surely her men were remodeling and modernizing it. The master bedroom and bath were the first to get retrofitted into a decadent haven with the largest bed she'd ever seen and a walk in shower that could accommodate a hell of a lot more than just washing. The kitchen was the next room waiting for a makeover, not that she cared. She tried to do as little food poisoning as possible. A timer beeped and Naomi, her tummy in knots, peered at the result. Oh shit. Well that would make dinner interesting. Following the sound of grunting as her mates took on her five brothers in a game of lacrosse out back, she left the kitchen to exit onto her back porch. She paused for