Wolf with Benefits

CHAPTER THREE

Ricky’s brother Rory Lee sat at his big office desk and looked back and forth between Ricky and Reece. “He’s useless to me,” Rory told him. “Useless! I can’t use him for that job tonight.”

Ricky Lee knew as soon as he saw Reece’s wounds that he would end up having this conversation with their eldest brother, Rory. It was something to be expected. Rory Lee Reed was the oldest and the most uptight of the three of them but Rory had always felt it was his role to take care of them—even when they didn’t need it.

Now, true, one could make an argument that Reece Reed always needed someone to take care of him because he seemed to stupidly stumble into deadly situations. But the truth was, their youngest brother knew exactly what he was doing and enjoyed every minute of it. And Rory enjoyed acting put-upon.

And what did Ricky enjoy? Well, as it turned out, Ricky enjoyed watching Rory get all upset while Reece willingly walked into stupid situations to get his ass kicked. It entertained him. Like NASCAR and good American beer.

Reece said something and Rory looked at Ricky. “What did he say?”

“You didn’t understand that?”

“With his jaw wired and his throat still recovering from that nicked artery? No.”

“I could.”

“Ricky,” his brother growled, “you’re irritating me.”

“Reece says he can do the job fine.”

“How? His jaw is wired shut! Because you didn’t keep him out of trouble like I told you to!”

“I’m not my brother’s keep—”

“Shut up!” Rory put his elbows on his desk and dug his hands under his baseball cap and into his hair. He scratched his scalp and made lots of snarling noises.

Poor guy. He took all this so seriously. The minutiae of it, anyway. Ricky and Reece only took their cases seriously. They cared about the clients, wanted to make sure they were as safe as possible. That was their job after all. Protection specialists. That’s what their business cards said. Honestly, the Reed boys couldn’t have a job more perfectly fitted for their natures. When their Packmate, Bobby Ray Smith, had been discharged from the Navy, he and his best friend, Mace Llewellyn, started this protection agency. Their older Tennessee Packmates and kin were none too happy about the idea but Ricky, Rory, and Reece all felt that it was getting a bit crowded in Smithtown, Tennessee, so they’d taken Bobby Ray up on his offer to start fresh in New York. It had been a good decision for all of them.

Llewellyn Security was doing really well, their business growing every day. Though most of their clients were shifters, they happily took on full-humans. Heck, money was money. And the more money they made from the full-humans and the richer shifters, the more they could help out those shifters who didn’t have the money to pay but desperately needed their help. The one thing Ricky truly loved about his kind, no matter the breed or species, was their willingness to protect each other. Sure, lions might fight wolves, wild dogs might fight hyenas, and bears might slap around everybody, but when their kind faced real danger from the outside world, from the full-humans or the full-human governments, they all worked together. It was just understood that all Pack, Pride, or Clan issues took a backseat to the survival of shifters worldwide.

Yet while the bigger shifter-run organizations like The Group or KZS handled big scale situations that might involve one or more governments, it was the smaller companies like theirs that handled individual cases. Because the less full-humans saw any evidence of the existence of shifters—the less full-humans had to die in tragic “accidents.”

Mace Llewellyn walked by Rory’s office. He was staring down at some paperwork and barely glanced at them, grunting out a, “Hey,” before walking on. It would have been meaningless if Reece hadn’t gurgled a return greeting at him.

Mace walked back several steps and slowly looked into the office until his eyes rested on Reece. “What’s going on with his face?” he asked.

“Jaw’s wired,” Ricky told him, not one for beating around the bush.

“Why’s his jaw wired?”

“Fight with Novikov.”

Closing his eyes and letting out a big sigh, the lion male demanded, “How many times are we going to have to talk to you about not fighting with Novikov before a big job?”

Reece gurgled something and Ricky translated, “He didn’t start it.”

“I don’t care!” the lion roared.

Ricky looked at Reece. “He doesn’t care.”

“Is something wrong with his ears?” Llewellyn asked. “Has Novikov hit him in the head so many times that he no longer understands English?”

“Just trying to be helpful.”

“No. You’re trying to piss me off.”

Maybe a little . . .

Llewellyn pointed at Rory. “Fix this, Reed. Fix. It.”

Once the lion stormed off, Rory glared at his two younger brothers.

Yeah, he looked mighty pissed.

“It’s no big deal,” Ricky said. “You just have to find one backup. I’ll still be there.”

That seemed to be something Rory might be able to tolerate until Reece’s eyes rolled to the back of his head and he passed out in the chair. Sweat beaded his forehead, and his entire body sporadically shook as it worked to heal itself.

The fever was actually a good thing for shifters. It allowed their bodies to heal quickly and with little additional damage. But healing shifters couldn’t be left alone. They had a tendency to shift to their animal form and back to their human form several times over. Nothing harder to explain to the general public than coyotes found hanging out in a restaurant’s cold storage or bears hanging out in someone’s pool. So Reece couldn’t go home alone and, at least in the beginning, Ricky couldn’t ask one of the females of the Pack to take care of him, because the fever could make a body a little . . . amorous. Now, if their baby sister, Ronnie Lee, was around, she could do it. Fever Love, as it was sometimes called, was never directed at one’s kin. But the other females in the Pack were fair game, and Reece had had enough trouble with them in his past. Which meant that Ricky would have to take his brother home . . . now.

Looking at Rory, his brother watching him with a slight sneer to his lips, Ricky argued, “I’m sure finding one more backup shouldn’t be too—”

“Get out.”

“But—”

“Pick up that idiot and get the fuck out of my office!”

Ricky shrugged. “All right.”

Standing, Ricky grabbed Reece’s limp hand and dragged him out of the chair and out of the office. He’d pick him up off the floor when they got to the elevator. Right now it was just kind of funny passing all those offices with his brother dragging along behind him.

That wasn’t a good attitude, was it? No. Probably not. Fun? Absolutely!

But not a good attitude.

The car pulled up to the front of a five-story brownstone in the heart of an expensive downtown neighborhood in New York City.

Toni stepped out onto the street and looked up at the building. She could only imagine how expensive this place must be. It wasn’t that her mother couldn’t afford it. She could. They could. Their mother’s career had been unbelievably lucrative over the years. But still . . . why? Why was her mother doing this?

“Are you giving me my cell phone back?” Oriana snapped.

The screen was cracked but it was still a workable technological instrument, which was why Toni immediately said, “No.”

“I’m telling Mom.”

Toni didn’t know why her siblings used that as some kind of threat. It was meaningless to her.

“Whatever.” She headed toward the house. “Get Zia and Denny,” she ordered Oriana. She didn’t look back. Didn’t check to see if her sister would do as ordered. No matter what they were arguing about, the youngest of their family would always be protected and taken care of. Even while the rest of them were yelling at each other like rabid rottweilers.

Toni walked into the house, horrified to find the front door open. This was New York City. One did not leave the door open in New York City.

Yet as soon as she stepped into the hallway, Toni realized how her parents and siblings could have become distracted.

“Holy shit storm,” Oriana muttered, standing beside Toni. She held Zia in her arms and Kyle held Denny’s hand. The five of them stood in the hallway and gazed up at the mile-high ceilings, and down at the marble floors. The staircase was made of mahogany and seemed to go on forever.

Toni walked farther down the hall and checked out one of the adjoining hallways. That’s when she realized that this brownstone had been opened up and was now connected to the brownstone next door. This place would easily fit her entire family inside it but still . . . why were they here? Why were they staying here?

A light breeze flowed in from the open doorway. Oriana sniffed the air. “Why do I smell dog?”

“That’s just us.”

“I know how my family smells.” And the “bitch” was implied. “This is dog.”

Thinking it was probably some stray, Toni lifted her head and sniffed. Spinning around, she walked back down the hall and out the door. She stared across the street. She watched children jump out of a big SUV, bags from a toy store in their hands. Screaming and laughing, they ran up the stairs of their own brownstone and inside.

But it was the adults following the kids inside that Toni recognized.

Snarling, she ran back into the brownstone. “Mom?” Toni called out. “Mom!”

“Upstairs! Come see, Toni! Come see!”

Toni raced up five flights of stairs and found her mother in an enormous room with a skylight. A bright open space that would be perfect for a practice room, something she was sure her mother had already noted.

“Isn’t this place amazing?” her mother asked.

Toni pointed at the window facing the brownstone across the street. “Are we here because—”

“Because I think a summer in New York City is just what this family needs. Everything we could possibly want is here. The classes, the training, the—”

“First off, Mom, what classes? The kind of classes these little brats want to take have already been filled for at least six months, if not at least a full year.”

Jackie chuckled. “Baby, come on. You forget what you’re dealing with here.”

“We still have to make calls, get recommendations from their Washington teachers—”

“I already have Jack on it.”

“Your agent?”

“Uh-huh. He’s already got the boys in some advanced classes at NYU. The twins in Berlitz at Rockefeller Center. Oriana will take her morning and afternoon classes with the Manhattan Ballet Company—”

“How the hell did he—”

“—Cherise will be studying under Herr Koenig.”

“I heard he’s an asshole.”

“A horrible asshole but a talented one who only takes the best performers as his students.”

Toni threw her hands up in the air. “Oh, well then . . .”

“Kyle will be taking master classes at the Steinhardt School at NYU and Denny will go to the School of Visual Arts.”

“How the hell did Jack—”

“He has the kids’ portfolios and recent video performances on file . . . just in case.”

Toni’s eyes narrowed. “Is he their agent?”

“No. He’s my agent. He’s just helping me out.”

“Right.” Toni studied her mom. “You didn’t mention Delilah.”

“She said she’d take care of it herself. She’s eighteen now. I can’t order her to go to classes.”

“And we can’t just have her wandering around on her own, Mom.”

Her mother waved away Toni’s concern. “She’ll be fine.”

“Mom.”

“She’ll be fine. And would you mind taking Freddy over to the hotel to see Irene before she goes back home?”

“Yes, of course.” If her mother didn’t want to discuss Delilah—and when did she ever want to discuss Delilah?—then Toni would ask her another important question. “And what about my job, Mom?”

Her mother blinked at Toni, her expression completely blank. “What job?”

“The one I was starting on Monday. Remember?”

“That little office job?”

“Yes, Mom. That little office job. The one I was doing part-time and had incredibly flexible hours so I could help with the kids? That little office job.”

“I’m sure you can find something here to keep you busy.”

“I’m not talking about something to keep me busy. I’m thinking long term.”

“Long term . . . to what? Being an office drone? You?”

“What do you want me to do? Sit around all day?”

“Find something you’re good at! Look for a real career. You have a college degree.”

“In liberal arts. Not exactly beneficial in this economy.”

“Oh, my God, baby. You worry about the most ridiculous things.”

“And you, Mom?”

“What about me?”

“Why are you here?”

“Do you know how much I can get done being in Manhattan for a few months? This will work out great for me.”

Toni walked over to the window and jabbed her thumb at the building across the street. “And those wild dogs have nothing to do with you moving here?”

“Can you think of a better neighborhood than one with fellow canines?”

“Not just canines, Mom. African wild dogs.”

“We’re all dogs in God’s eye—”

“Mom!”

“Oh, all right!” Letting out a sigh, her mother crossed the room and leaned against the wall by the window. She glanced down. “The Kuznetsov Pack lives there.”

“Mom . . . seriously? At this point it might be considered stalking.”

“I’m not stalking. Just making myself available.”

Toni glowered at her mother. “I can’t believe how sneaky you are.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You were planning this from the beginning. This was never just a little family getaway to Manhattan.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You just wanted to make sure the Kuznetsovs were still in town.” Toni glanced around the beautiful room. “This is their property, isn’t it? You rented from them.”

“Who else would I trust but another canine? And how dare you call me that, Antonella Jean-Louis Parker!”

“What are you talking about? I haven’t called you anything.”

“No. But you’re thinking it.”

Toni shrugged. “Maybe.”

Ricky looked away from the TV baseball game he was watching and up at the She-wolf standing next to the couch.

“Hey, Dee-Ann.”

Dee-Ann Smith. Ricky had grown up with her in Smithtown. She was closer to Rory’s age and to this day they were still best friends. Ricky, however, thought of Dee-Ann as more of a sister. She’d sewn up his head when Rory had rammed it into their daddy’s truck door. Sewn up his face when Reece had chucked a crowbar at him. And held his hand when, at sixteen, he was waiting to find out if his onetime girlfriend was pregnant. His girlfriend hadn’t been, and Dee-Ann had been the first to hug him, then punch him in the stomach, drive him to the local pharmacy, and buy him several boxes of condoms. Something that would have started all sorts of rumors in a little wolf-run town like Smithtown if it had been any other She-wolf but Dee-Ann. She was not a female anyone wanted to start spreading rumors about. She was not a female you wanted to ever notice you.

With eyes just like her father’s—cold yellow like many full-blooded wolves—she gazed down at Ricky. “Shame’s not a big thing in your family, is it?”

“Don’t know what you mean.”

She motioned to the dog kennel in the middle of his hotel room. The Pack had taken rooms at the Kingston Arms hotel, a shifter-run establishment, when they’d first moved to Manhattan with Bobby Ray Smith. A few of the Packmates had gotten their own apartments but most stayed at the five-star hotel. Why? Because Ricky Lee’s sister was mated to the lion male who owned the place. So even though their rooms usually went for several hundred to several thousand dollars a night for the general public, the Pack got their rooms for much, much cheaper.

“You put your own brother in a dog kennel,” she said.

“He wouldn’t calm down. Kept trying to rip the front door open. Look at this . . .” He lifted the arm that currently held a can of Coke and showed it to her. “Tried to take my dang arm off at the shoulder. I only got two, Dee-Ann.”

“You’re whining about that scratch?”

“I wouldn’t call it whining . . .”

Dee-Ann stepped onto his couch, resting her butt on the seatback, her hands clasped in front of her. “Did you hear from Sissy Mae?” Sissy Mae Smith, the Alpha Female of their Pack, Bobby Ray Smith’s baby sister, and Ronnie Lee’s best friend.

“Nope. Why?”

“Cousin Laura Jane is coming to town. To visit.”

“And?”

“Everyone knows how she broke your heart.”

Startled, Ricky looked at Dee-Ann. “Yeah . . . when I was eighteen. I’m pretty sure I’ve recovered since then.”

“I don’t know. Your sister and Sissy sure are worried.”

“Great. Just what I need. The pity of the idiots.”

Dee-Ann chuckled. “They do seem to be making a big deal out of it.”

“Because that’s what they do. Make a big deal out of absolutely nothing.”

“Yep.”

Ricky offered his can of Coke to Dee-Ann. She took it, took a sip, and handed it back. That’s when Ricky asked, “Is Laura Jane coming here tonight? Is that why you’re here? To give me a heads-up?”

“No. She’s not coming tonight.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Dee-Ann paused a moment, then added, “But your sister and Sissy Mae are coming here to talk—”

Ricky leaped off the couch and faced the She-wolf. “What do you mean they’re coming here? I thought they were still out of town.”

“Got in earlier today. Figured they didn’t call you because they wanted to make sure you’d stick around so they could sit down and have a real heart-to-heart about Laura Jane and how you really feel about—where are you going?”

“I don’t do heart-to-hearts, Dee-Ann,” Ricky told her as he grabbed his backpack from the floor and headed toward the door.

“What about your brother?”

“Babysit him until they get here. Ronnie Lee can handle him. He’s almost through the worst of it.”

Studying his brother, Dee-Ann’s head tipped to the side. “He’s trying to chew through the gate . . . with his human teeth.”

“Just deal with it!”

Ricky slammed the door behind him and started toward the elevators. But the doors were opening and he could scent his sister and Sissy Mae. Panicking, Ricky charged the other way and into the nearest emergency stairwell. The heavy metal door was nearly closed when he heard his sister yell from his room, “Reece Lee Reed! What the holy hell are you doing in a damn dog kennel?”

As Ricky headed down the stairs, he knew he was running away. Not from an ex-girlfriend that to this day his brothers still called, “Good Lady Self-Obsessed,” but from his sister and her best friend. He loved Ronnie Lee. Loved Sissy, too. But that didn’t mean he wanted to sit around with them all night talking about feelings. It would be worse now, too, because the word was out that Ronnie Lee was pregnant. That meant no more liquor for his baby sister, and, knowing Ronnie, she wasn’t about to let anyone drink around her when she couldn’t. She hated that.

A long conversation with a sober Sissy and Ronnie Lee was too horrifying for words. So when Ricky Lee finally made it out onto the street from one of the hotel’s side doors, he was simply relieved.

Ricky headed down the street, crossing in front of the hotel. He stopped when he saw an older She-wolf walking toward the hotel doors. She wasn’t from a Pack he recognized, but his momma had raised him right. So he pulled open one of the swinging doors, smiling at her as she passed, and tipped his baseball cap.

She grinned back and nodded at him, flashing a bit of fang as the universal shifter sign of, “I know what you are!”

Once the She-wolf had made her way inside, Ricky was about to release the door when another female caught it and held it open.

“Sorry about—hey!” He smiled in surprise at the She-jackal he’d met at the rink. Uh . . . Toni! That was it.

She looked up at him. “Oh . . . hey.”

“Look at that. Meeting each other again. Kind of random. Granny Reed would call that Karma. Actually what she’d call it is the devil’s work, but whatever.”

“Okay.”

He saw that she held the hand of another little boy. He raised a brow. “You sure have been busy.”

That’s when she smirked and gave a little shake of the boy’s hand. With big brown eyes, the boy asked, “Are you my daddy?”

Laughing, Ricky stepped back and allowed the pair to walk through. He started to follow, but saw one of the females from his Pack. She was on the phone and clearly looking for someone. On the tips of her toes, trying to look over everyone’s head.

“Good Lord,” Ricky muttered, “she’s sent out scouts.”

He instinctively crouched, the She-jackal taking that moment to look back. She stopped, turned, and gazed down at him. “Really?” she asked.

“One day I’ll explain it to you. I’m sure you’d understand.”

“Somehow I doubt it, but whatever.”

The little boy shook his head. “I’m glad you’re not my daddy.”

“That’s very wise, Freddy,” the She-jackal said in agreement. “Let’s be glad he’s not your daddy.”

Ricky saw that his Packmate was getting closer.

“I’d make a great daddy for any child, but I can’t discuss it now.”

“Because you’re running away?”

“Wolves always know when to run, darlin’.” And that’s exactly what Ricky Lee did. Released the door, eased away from it, and took off toward his truck.

The hotel door opened and Toni smirked at the full-human who answered. She began to chastise, “That took you long en—”

“Freddy!” Giving a very rare smile, Irene Conridge Van Holtz leaned down and picked up Toni’s seven-year-old brother. “How is my favorite brilliant boy?”

“My ulcer’s acting up.”

“You don’t have an ulcer,” Toni reminded him as she stepped past her mother’s best friend and walked into the four-room suite Irene Conridge shared with her mate, Niles Van Holtz, Alpha of the Van Holtz Pack.

“Based on recent research, there’s a seventy-three-percent chance I will,” Freddy informed her.

“Only if you keep worrying about getting one.”

Irene carried Freddy into the living room, closing the door with her foot.

“Where’s Uncle Van?” Toni asked, using Niles’s nickname.

“At Ric’s restaurant showing off.”

“That man does love to cook.”

“Although I normally don’t believe that sort of thing can be passed down, I must say the Van Holtz bloodline seems to prove me wrong.”

“You’re going to miss him while he’s gone.”

Irene sat down on one of the couches with Freddy beside her. Showing a rare moment of affection, Irene put her arm over Freddy’s shoulder. Irene must be in a good mood. Because even though she’d known seven-year-old Freddy since hours after his conception, she wasn’t known for her loving warmth.

To be honest, it was something that used to worry Toni. That Freddy would end up equally as uptight as Irene. Not a surprising worry. The reason the pair was so close was because they both loved science, and they were both prodigies. Irene had met their mother at a summer camp for gifted children. That was the same summer that her mother experienced her first shift. A sometimes harrowing event that could have exposed Jackie to the world if she’d been seen by the wrong people. Although most full-humans were considered “the wrong people,” Irene had turned out to be anything but. Instead, she’d been fascinated by the process of shifting and that there were others like Jackie. She’d kept her friend’s secret then and now, so it was no surprise Irene had found love with another shifter.

That fact was so very important to Toni. Because although to most of the world Irene Conridge Van Holtz seemed a cold, indifferent bitch—and most of the time she was—she had another side to her. The side that loved Niles Van Holtz. The rich and talented wolf had caught her heart and managed to hold on to it for more than two decades. Uncle Van loved Irene despite her flaws, and that showed Toni there was hope for her little Freddy.

If he had friends and love, he’d be okay. She just had to make sure to keep him out of trouble now. Not easy. The more brilliant Freddy turned out to be, the more issues seemed to arise that concerned her. It didn’t concern anyone else in the family. “He’s only seven!” they’d say. Or “He’s brilliant! Of course he’s being a little weird!” Toni’s concerns were often dismissed as those of an overprotective jackal sibling, but she knew better.

So when one of the bedroom doors opened and her brother’s little face lit up, Toni felt good.

“Miki!” he crowed, then charged off the couch, across the room, and right into the open arms of Miki Kendrick. Onetime mentee of Irene, brilliant scientist, another full-human mated to a wolf, mother to a beautiful little girl pup, and a still-off-the-grid secret hacker stalked by scary government types.

“There’s my handsome boy!” Miki hugged Freddy tight, giving him a smacking kiss on his cheek that had him giggling. “Did you have fun in today’s master class with us?”

“Yes. Although I realized you dumbed it down for the laymen.”

“We had to. Average nuclear scientists can’t always grasp what we’re talking about.”

“I liked when Aunt Irene made that one man cry.”

Toni quickly looked at her aunt, who stared blankly back at her.

“What?” Irene asked. “He started it.”

“There was mucus coming from his nose.” Freddy giggled.

“I thought I told you not to be a bad influence on my brother,” Toni reminded her aunt.

“I said I would not mock people in front of Freddy for merely being idiots. For instance, I didn’t say a word about the fact that the man wore black pants, black shoes, and white sweat socks. But I refused to simply ignore his opinion on the elements of—”

“I don’t care,” Toni cut in. Mostly because she knew that whatever her aunt was about to say, she probably wouldn’t understand. “Just don’t turn Freddy into Kyle, Part two.”

“How can I? Even my level of arrogance doesn’t quite reach Kyle’s. Although,” Irene added with that serious tone, “I think Mussolini’s did.”

“He’d make an interesting dictator,” Miki added.

And they both looked at Toni as if that information should somehow make her feel better.

Ricky knocked on the bulletproof glass of the thick security door and grinned down at the pup staring at him. “Hello, darlin’. Is Bobby Ray home?”

The pup stared at him a moment longer before turning and screeching, “Mooooooom! Wolf at the door!”

The pup’s mother didn’t show up at the door but the Alpha of the Kuznetsov Pack did. A wide smile on her face, Jessie Ann Ward unlocked and opened the door. “Hey, Ricky Lee.”

“Hey, Jessie Ann. Your mate home?”

“Upstairs in his lair. I think he’s avoiding the kids. They’ve been in overdrive all day now that school’s out. Is everything okay?”

“Oh, yeah. Just avoiding my sister and Sissy Mae.”

That made Jessie laugh. “Something I understand completely. Don’t worry. If they call or stop by . . . I haven’t seen you.”

“Thanks, darlin’.” He stepped inside and headed down the hall. “I see you’ve finally rented that place across the street.”

“Mhmm,” Jessie Ann grunted.

“Somethin’ wrong?” He leaned in and whispered, “You want me to go over there and give ’em a Smith welcome?”

Jessie laughed. “Don’t you dare, Ricky Lee Reed. They’re paying a fortune. I mean a fortune, just to stay there for the summer. But I think they have motives.”

“Something illegal?”

“No. Nothing that interesting.”

“Then it must involve Johnny.” The young wolf, Johnny DeSerio, was Jessie’s adopted son. An eighteen-year-old kid with a gift for the fiddle. Could play a mean “Devil Went Down to Georgia” while Jessie Ann sang. But a strong, street-smart boy, so Ricky didn’t know why Jessie Ann worried about him so.

“It does, but I don’t want to discuss it.” She glanced into the living room and giggling pups ducked behind the couch. “Too many big ears around here.”

“Not a problem.”

He kissed her cheek and headed up the stairs to the third floor, where the Pack had given Bobby Ray his own office, and there were bedrooms for visiting wolves.

The door to Bobby Ray’s office wasn’t closed, and Ricky walked in to find the strong, powerful Alpha Male of his Pack tickling the ribs of his baby daughter and blowing raspberries on her belly while the little darling just laughed and laughed.

“Well, hello, Daddy!” Ricky cheered from the door.

Bobby Ray froze in mid-raspberry, but Ricky Lee was dang impressed when Bobby Ray’s baby girl angrily barked at him for the interruption.

“Now is that any way to talk to your godfather, brat?” Of course, she might not remember he was her godfather—the girl had six of them. Smith males believing their all-important daughters could never have enough protection.

Bobby Ray stood, lifting his daughter with him. “Where’s her momma?”

“Downstairs.”

With that, Bobby Ray tossed the child to Ricky Lee, who easily caught her. Not surprisingly, Jessie hated when they did that, but the tomboyish little girl adored it. Laughing, she clung to Ricky’s neck.

“How’s my favorite girl? How’s my little vampire?”

“Stop calling her that.”

“Hey. It wasn’t my idea to name her after Dracula’s first wife.”

Bobby dropped into his chair. “It’s the price I pay for love . . . I married a geek. And,” he added, annoyed, “these dogs may run around calling her Elisabeta all day long, but to me she’s just my Lissy Ann.”

“I wouldn’t worry.” Ricky sat at the desk across from Bobby. “She’s a hearty little gal. Look at these little legs. Sturdy. She’ll be out huntin’ and campin’ with the rest of us before you know it. Won’t need any fancy tents or generators with her.”

Bobby shuddered a little, most likely remembering that joint Pack camping trip they’d taken with the wild dogs in Alaska. It had not gone well. No. Not well at all.

Putting his big feet up on his desk, Bobby studied Ricky a moment before stating, “So . . . guess you heard about Laura Jane.”

Miki sat on the couch, but unlike Irene and Freddy, she sort of flopped on it, her bare feet landing dangerously close to Irene’s thigh. How these two had become friends, Toni didn’t know, because although equally brilliant and both full-humans mated to wolves, they were still quite different as women.

“So what brings you here?” Miki asked, unaware of the way Irene moved away from her extremely tiny feet. Irene was not a big fan of feet . . . or of being touched by anyone but her children and Uncle Van.

“Freddy wanted to see you before you two left tomorrow.”

Irene’s head tilted to the side, her brain working. She said, “I thought you guys were leaving tonight, too.”

Toni kept her face blank and, after a moment, Irene sighed. “Don’t tell me that woman has decided to stay here.”

“That woman is your best friend and of course she decided to stay here. How hard can it be to move your entire family of thirteen to Manhattan at the very last minute?”

“When you have money? Not hard at all. But why?”

“Because of Johnny DeSerio.”

“Is he a mobster?”

Toni sighed. “Aunt Irene, we’ve had this discussion. Not everyone who is Italian is a mobster—”

“I know.”

“—or on a Jersey-based reality TV show.”

“That I’m still not sure about.”

“And he’s that young violinist she met at one of her master classes last summer.”

“Oh, yes. I remember. She’s been going on about him for months now. Did she finally snag him?”

“Before I decide whether to be morally superior,” Miki cut in, “what are we talking about your mother wanting to do with this person? Have sex with him or just—”

“No.” Nope. Miki was not like Irene at all. “She wants him as a student. Kind of like you and Irene. A mentor-mentee kind of thing.”

“Except Irene was my thesis adviser when I was going for my PhD. Are you talking about that?”

“No. But as an artist—”

“Please. No. No ‘as an artist’ discussions. I’ve had them for two days now with your family. I’m done.”

Toni had to laugh. Over the years, she’d learned to tune the “as an artist” discussions out. But those not used to it . . .

“How hard can it be to entice this boy into your mother’s tutelage?” Irene demanded. “She’s Jacqueline Jean-Louis, not some desperate wannabe who still dreams of having a music career.”

“I love how you manage to sound arrogant for other people. And I don’t think the problem is the kid. It’s his mother. She’s one of the Kuznetsov wild dog Pack and extremely protective of him. Word is she decked some teacher that tore into him after a competition. Her mate had to drag her off the guy. So Mom’s proceeding with caution.”

“Actually . . . that sounds like a solid plan.”

“Yeah. I thought so.”

Holding his goddaughter on his lap, Ricky asked, “Perhaps you can explain to me this obsession women have with talking things out? I mean, what is there to talk about?”

“You know how your sister is. She assumes you’re still broken up over being dumped by Laura Jane.”

“I was eighteen. She was nineteen. And kind of a,” he covered his goddaughter’s ears with his hands, “whore.”

“Now, now. That’s my cousin, Ricky Lee.” When Ricky just stared at him, Bobby shrugged. “Who is kind of a whore.”

Ricky dropped his hands. “She was seeing at least two other guys when she was going out with me. At the time, it broke my heart . . . but also at the time, when my momma didn’t make blueberry pancakes on Sunday mornings like she promised, that kind of broke my heart, too.”

“Not really a deep wolf, are ya, Ricky Lee?”

“Not if I can help it.”

“The worst part is that now I’ve got to call your friend tomorrow, Aunt Irene, and tell him I can’t take that job after all.”

Irene frowned. “My friend?”

“Mr. Weatherford. Who hired me to work in his office this summer.”

“Oh. Right.” Irene dismissed that with a wave of her hand. “I told him chances were extremely high you wouldn’t take the job and he should have a ready backup because he would probably find out last minute.”

Toni sat up straight. “Wait. You knew Mom was going to stay here for the summer?”

“No. Not at all.”

“But then why—”

“You always have to cancel your plans because of your family. Last summer it was because you went with Cooper and Cherise to Italy and then China for their concerts. The summer before that the entire family stayed in England because of Oriana’s scholarship with the Royal Ballet. And the summer before that—”

“Okay. Okay.”

“You always take these jobs and you can never actually do them—even though you so clearly want to—because of the loyalty you have to your family.” She shrugged casually. “When you think about it, you’ve given up your whole life for your family.”

“Isn’t that why that idiot you were dating last year ended it?” Miki asked. “Because of your commitment to your family?”

Toni gazed at the two women but didn’t respond. It wasn’t until Freddy put his hand on her knee and gazed up at her with those big brown eyes that Toni suddenly burst into tears.

“Well, you can stay the night if ya like,” Bobby Ray offered. “Doubt they’ll come looking for you here.”

“Why is that?”

“I tell Sissy that the Pack males hate staying here because the wild dogs get on their nerves.”

“But the wild dogs always have pie and brownies. And tons of action movies to watch. Why wouldn’t we stay here?”

“Because if the She-wolves think y’all hate it here, you might actually get some peace and quiet.”

“Then add in the fact the dogs never keep liquor around this place . . .”

Bobby Ray grinned. “Exactly.”

“She’s crying, Irene,” Toni heard Miki say, panic in her voice. “She’s crying!”

“Well, I don’t know what to do. She’s never cried around me before.”

“Um . . . Freddy, go into my room and get the box of tissues on the dresser.”

“And nothing else!” Toni managed to sobbingly yell after her brother as he charged into Miki’s room. “Just the tissues!”

Don’t worry. Toni had a very good therapist working with Freddy on his stealing issues, too.

“I’m so sorry, Toni,” Irene said, sitting on one side of her. “I didn’t mean to upset you like this. You’re not someone I purposely torment.”

“It’s all right,” Toni said, wiping her face with her hand. “It’s not your fault.”

Miki sat on the other side. “You should go back to Washington. Go tomorrow. Take the job. Your family will be fine here.”

“I can’t leave them,” Toni finally admitted to Irene and Miki—and to herself. “I can never leave them. Ever. First I’m the babysitter, then I’m going to be the spinster aunt, taking care of their brilliant kids one day. My small room filled with the knickknacks brought back by the children as they’ve traveled the world and lived their wonderful lives.”

Irene sighed. “Were you watching the original ‘Brideshead Revisited’ again?”

“I’m going to be the nanny. Left alone in her room, listening to the radio . . .”

“Will Winston Churchill be giving speeches?” Miki teased. “Come on, girl. Buck the fuck up. Your family can only get you down if you let them. Look at my friend Sara. She could have let her bitch grandmother totally destroy her. But instead, she just waited until she died, threw a party slash funeral, then her whole life changed for the better.”

“So you’re saying I should wait until my parents die?” Toni asked flatly.

“It’s a start—”

“No,” Irene argued. “Waiting on death is not an option. Especially since both sets of your grandparents are still alive. But you do need to start weaning your family off your proverbial teat as soon as possible.”

“Ew.”

“They shouldn’t be able to rely on you for their every need, Antonella.”

“Yeah, but—”

“No, buts. This is what I want you to do.” Irene put her arm around Toni’s shoulders. “You are going to stay here with your family this summer. I’m going to ask Ulrich to get you a job at one of his businesses. I know he can find you something. You will take the job and you will do the job. While you work, you will begin the weaning process.”

“They won’t like it.”

“I don’t care. I want you to be happy, and that means you cannot and will not continue to be the Jean-Louis Parkers’ gal Friday. Am I making myself perfectly clear?”

Toni nodded, sniffled. That’s when she realized Freddy hadn’t come back yet. “Freddy!”

Her brother charged out of the room with a box of tissues. She briefly thought about strip-searching him, but that seemed excessive. Instead, she yanked a tissue from the box and blew her nose.

“Now,” Irene continued, “because I know how your family can be . . . and by that I mean your mother . . . I’m going to stay with all of you for at least the next month.”

“Aunt Irene, that’s not necessary.”

“It’s not a bother. Actually, I think you’re doing a lot of people a favor.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, my sons will be in Van Holtz cooking camp somewhere in Montana for the next month. For the next two weeks, Holtz and Ulrich are going to be in Germany for that big Van Holtz family meeting and then when they get back to the States, they’re going to Montana for the last two weeks of the cooking camp.”

“What about Ulva?”

“Who?”

Toni smirked. “Your daughter. The one you keep saying is a product of Satan although you also say you don’t really believe in the Judeo-Christian belief system.”

“Oh. Her. The demon child is going with her father to Germany. Whether she goes to cooking camp, I don’t know. I don’t care.”

“So . . . who am I helping by keeping you here?”

“The Pack back in Washington. Apparently they find me a little terrifying and off-putting. I’m not sure why. I have no claws. No fangs. I guess, technically, I could set them on fire with that cream I accidentally made a few years back, but it’s not as if I’d ever do that . . . unless, of course, I had to.” She glanced off, shrugged. “But I haven’t had to . . . so why worry?”

Toni and Miki locked gazes, then quickly looked away because they didn’t want to explain to Irene why they were laughing. No. Explaining that wouldn’t really help.

Ricky looked at his phone, saw all the missed calls from his sister, and turned it off completely. He simply didn’t have the time or energy for this.

Ricky was a big fan of looking forward not back.

He adored his baby sister, he really did. But Lord, she could work an issue. Work it until it was nothing but a nub. Ricky already knew that’s where this was headed. Ronnie Lee would make the whole thing an issue, and Sissy would blow it way out of proportion for no other reason than Sissy liked to blow things way out of proportion.

Still, he’d worry about all that tomorrow. Right now he was going to sit on this couch in the wild dog’s big living room and watch the wild dog’s extremely big TV for a few hours. The house was quiet with most of the dogs bedded down for the night, so Ricky was looking forward to a little alone time.

Of course, that alone time lasted all of fifteen seconds before he looked over and realized there was a young wolf sitting next to him. Johnny. Bobby Ray tried to pretend he’d only adopted the kid with Jessie because his mate already had plans to do just that, but Ricky knew it was because the wolf liked the kid. True, he was in that awkward, not a pup but not a full adult either stage, which could make for some tough times, but the kid definitely had some promise. Lots of it.

And, just like Bobby Ray at that age, it seemed the boy was having some problems that at the moment Ricky Lee could easily relate to.

“Why,” Johnny asked Ricky without much preamble, “do females have to make everything so damn difficult? They ask you a question, you answer, they flip out.”

“Well—”

“I didn’t do anything wrong,” the eighteen-year-old went on. “Nothing. I answered a question. That was it. Now it’s being thrown in my face.” He pointed at himself. “I don’t need this. I don’t deserve it.”

Johnny relaxed back into the couch, and moments later, the wolfdog female he’d most likely been complaining about came sauntering through the living room.

Kristan Putowski, one of the oldest Kuznetsov Pack pups, waved as she walked by. “Hey, Ricky Lee.”

“Hey, Kristan.” Yeah. Kristan was a cutie. And when Ricky Lee was eighteen, he would have been all over that like a bad rash. So he understood what Johnny was going through. Especially when Kristan’s friendly wave to Ricky Lee turned into the middle finger just for Johnny.

“I’m not apologizing!” Johnny yelled after her.

“That ain’t subtle,” Ricky Lee told the boy once Kristan was out of the room.

“Subtle?”

“Yeah. Subtle. Can’t go around yelling at a female shifter. They’re mean, boy. All of ’em.”

“I’m not scared of Kristan Putowski.”

“Should be. It’s them friendly cute ones that’ll cut a man—and have no remorse about it.” Ricky leaned in a bit and lowered his voice. “Have you two . . . ya know?”

“What? No! Never! Kristan’s like a—”

“Don’t say she’s like a sister.”

“Why not?”

“Because that’s exactly what Bobby Ray used to say about Jessie Ann . . . and you saw how that relationship ended up.”

“Oh.”

“Besides, hoss, we both know you’d only be lying through your fangs.”

The boy sighed. “I put up with her. Okay?”

“Putting up with her’s good. Staying away from her’s even better. At least for now. Give it a few years. You’ve got a girlfriend?”

“I’m too busy for a—”

“Mistake number two.”

“When did I have mistake number one?”

“You need to get yourself a little girlfriend. Nothing you’re planning to make permanent. Just someone to keep you out of trouble.”

“I’m never in trouble.”

“You will be if you keep hanging around Kristan.”

“Yeah.” Johnny sighed, big hands combing through his hair. “I know.”

Toni dropped onto her temporary bed and blew out a breath. That’s when she saw the large TV with a big red bow around it, the DVD player, and the stack of brand-new DVDs.

Her father. He knew the one thing she loved to do after a long day of dealing with her siblings was sit in front of her TV and relax.

She was nearly across the room to see what DVDs he’d picked out for her when a familiar and very welcome scent caught her attention. She charged back across the room and threw the door open.

“Cooper!” Toni threw herself into her brother’s arms and hugged him tight. “When did you get back?”

“I came straight here from the airport.”

Toni pulled back and looked up at her brother. “Wait. How did you know we were here?”

“I got a text from Mom when I was waiting for my layover in Geneva.”

Sure. She texted Cooper in Geneva but not Toni a few city blocks away.

“I’m so glad you’re home,” she said. Not meaning their Washington house but back with the family. “You staying for long?”

“Well, when I got back into LaGuardia, I got a call from Aunt Irene, who told me very clearly that I was needed home because I have to share sibling duty before you snap like a twig.” He smirked. “Did you really cry?”

“Oh, God.” Toni dragged her brother into her room and closed the door. “I had a moment of weakness. Okay?”

“I didn’t know you had any weaknesses.”

“Very funny.”

Coop dropped his travel bag to the floor and took off his denim jacket. “What’s going on?”

“Just the usual.”

“Not that usual if I’ve got Aunt Irene calling me. She never calls me. I don’t think she ever calls anyone. Not even Mom.”

“She doesn’t like talking on the phone unless it’s actual business.”

“She doesn’t like talking on the phone or she’s worried the government’s still listening in to her calls?”

“Both.”

He nodded and dropped into a comfortable chair across from Toni’s bed. “Well, big sis, I’m here to help. You. Mom. Dad. Whoever. I’ll be especially efficient if you let me beat up Kyle and tell Oriana she’s getting fat.”

“No,” Toni told him firmly. “You can beat up Kyle, of course . . . he clearly needs it. But I’m working to ensure Oriana doesn’t get any eating disorders. So no comments on her being too skinny or too fat. You can, however, tell her that she seems dumb compared to the rest of the family and that her eyes are too close together.”

“Oh! And her nose is pinched?”

“Absolutely.”

The pair laughed and Toni felt so much better. Coop wasn’t only another sibling, he was one of her best friends. They were only three years apart, so Toni didn’t have to take care of him as much as she had the others, and that maternal thing had never really kicked in. Instead, they’d spent a lot of time getting into trouble and pissing off Coop’s piano teachers. Like their mother, Coop was another child prodigy. The first of the Jean-Louis Parker siblings, but not the last. Yet for whatever reason, he was also the most normal. He seemed to take after their mother the most, with very few signs of OCD, no extreme arrogance, and no penchant for setting fires.

Funny thing was, of all their siblings, Cooper had the most reason to be arrogant. Tall and incredibly handsome, with the body of an Olympic diver, brown eyes, and shoulder-length black hair that had hints of gray, white, and gold, Coop was an international superstar. Those who didn’t even like classical music came to see him perform. His concerts were always sold-out affairs no matter what country he was in, his audience always filled not only with the wealthy but the powerful. Dignitaries, royalty, politicians—all came to see Toni’s younger brother play piano. Then there were his CDs and DVDs, which had made her brother independently wealthy. And yet, at the end of the day, Coop was still a jackal. And that meant his family continued to be the most important thing in his life.

So when Coop was home, he helped Toni with the other siblings as much as he could. Just like their sister Cherise, who came four years after Coop. But his talent kept him on the road a lot and having him home was a wonderful treat for Toni. Because Coop got it. What was “it”? She couldn’t say . . . she just knew her brother got it. And she adored him for that.

“You tired?” she asked him.

“Wide awake. Why?”

“Daddy brought me a TV and a shitload of DVDs.”

Coop sat up in his seat. “You think he has Anne of a Thousand Days in that pile?”

Toni’s eyes grew wide. “If there’s a God in heaven . . .”

That was the other thing she liked about her brother. They both had the same taste in movies and TV. A geeky taste, but still . . .

Okay. So maybe this summer wouldn’t be so heinous after all.