Two days and sleepless, but satisfying, nights later, the birds sang their morning tunes through Charley’s open balcony door. She rolled over, draped an arm and leg over Wyatt. He’d yet to open his eyes. His lashes hit the top of his cheeks while his head rested on the pillow.
Charley ran the back of her hand across his face and breathed in the combination of morning, sleep and Wyatt.
He stirred under her touch, and his eyes fluttered open-the green of them penetrating her entire body. He closed them again as she followed a lazy path along his jaw line. The hint of a smile peeked out.
“Good morning,” he said with a sleep-infused warble.
She laid a kiss against his lips. “Mmm. Yes it is.”
“I don’t think you mean that just about me.” He remained still as she flitted her fingers over his ear and down the yellowing of his nose.
“Does it matter?” She inched her body closer to him.
“No.” He opened his eyes again. “Seems you get your way no matter what you do, huh?” One hand snaked under the blanket, pulling her hips closer to his.
Charley grinned against his lips. “You reap the benefits of some of my bossiness.”
The door to her room flew open. “Charley! Charley! Charley!” Chase ran in.
She pulled the covers over her breasts, tucked her back against Wyatt and flipped over so Chase would focus on her and not the naked man in her bed.
At the same time, Chase bounced at the end, up and down, with an excitement she didn’t understand but wanted to bottle.
Charley ruffled his hair. “Have you forgotten your manners?”
“I’m sorry. But I can do it.” His eyes lit with a fire she’d once seen in James’s face.
“Do what, buddy?”
Behind Charley, Wyatt leaned up and draped himself over her side. A heat rose to her cheeks, though why she’d be embarrassed, she didn’t know-she hadn’t been a teenager in hundreds of years, and everyone already knew Wyatt slept over, since they’d been prepping for the Friday night assignment.
“I can-” He blinked a few times, swallowed. “I-”
The doorbell’s chime rang through the house, a soft lilt of sound.
“I’ll get it!” Chase dashed away as fast as he’d come in.
Wyatt laid a line of kisses down Charley’s neck. “What was that all about?”
“I have an idea, but-” She turned to the clock. “Given it’s already ten, I’m guessing that doorbell means Maggie is here, and I think we’ll probably find out sooner than later.”
“Can she be ignored?” Wyatt’s hand inched its way down her thigh.
“No. Not if I want to spare James heartache.”
Wyatt stopped. “Fine.” His tone reflected hurt as he moved from her to the edge of the bed and sat up.
Charley followed him, still draped in the sheet. “Why are you getting upset that I care for my friend? I’ve already explained this to you.”
“Because I’m stupid and a guy.”
She chuckled and wrapped her arms around his neck. “You know I love you, right?”
He stiffened if not for just a moment. “Are you sure?”
“I’ve loved you for your entire life, Wyatt. If anyone should worry about being taken, it’s you.”
He turned so she fell across his lap. “What?”
“Maggie, remember? I warned you about her.” She ran a hand around the back of his neck, tugged. “It’s why I’ve spent two days hiding all your suits and ties and keeping you sequestered here so you’ll be in nothing but T-shirts and jeans-” She pounded her forehead against his chest. “Dammit. She’s going to like that even more. Do not… ever… take your shirt off around Maggie.” Charley’s chuckled bounced back at her off of Wyatt’s naked chest.
“I promise.” He leaned down as he lifted her up so she faced him, a grin across his face. His lips touched and melded into hers as if they should be one. He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. She closed her eyes with a sigh.
“I was thinking about something… uh… maybe weird,” Wyatt said.
The blank expression and timid eyes didn’t fit the Wyatt she knew. “What is it?”
“If you do that blendy thing with someone like James, can you stay you or is this it completely no matter what?”
“This is it no matter what… for me… because of how long I’ve been… me.”
“So it wouldn’t matter if I asked you to make me one of you instead?”
Charley giggled. “We’re not vampires.” She snaked a hand up his neck. “While we play good ones on TV-no need for makeup and all-we can’t make an existing being into one of us.” She winked at him. “We’re a genetic anomaly.” She laid her lips against him. “But I gotta say that offer was about the sweetest one ever given to me.”
He met her kiss with possessiveness. “Okay, so that stupid human curiosity out of the way, next question. Could you pass this gene down to one of our kids?”
Kids? So he’s in for real? She contained her excitement at the future by digging her nails into her palms. He hasn’t agreed to anything, Charley. Keep it under wraps. “I could, yes. But only after-”
“Right. Sunday. With me. I gotcha, and I’m totally good with that.” His grin reached clear to his eyes.
She leaned up to lay a kiss on his lips. “We’d better get out there.”
“Yeah. Though I’d prefer a replay of this morning.” Wyatt cocked his head at her before angling it toward the pillows.
Charley laughed and scooted away but tugged him by one hand to follow.
Charley, in her pajamas, walked down her steps, into her kitchen. Lily manned the stove, and Maggie sat on one of the bar stools.
“Maggie!” Charley called out, a smile in her voice despite the worry.
“Charley!” Maggie hopped off, kissed both cheeks and added a simple hug.
Charley held on, placed her lips at Maggie’s ear. She whispered while her smile remained plastered to her face. “You touch my man, I’ll rip your head off. You take Chase away, I’ll kill you.” Maggie’s twitch told Charley what she’d long suspected. “You hurt James again and you’re as good as dead, too. Got it?”
Maggie wouldn’t worry about Charley or James or any threat, only exposure. She nodded against Charley and drew back. Emerald eyes shone back at her, lit with excitement and not an ounce of fear.
As tall as Charley, as thin as Lily, and as sprightly as Chase, Maggie encompassed all their good parts and added sultry sexuality with one bad-ass attitude. Her hair matched Chase’s blue soccer ball-a bright extravagance that only she could pull off. The hint of electricity made her one of the most powerful shifters Charley knew.
Charley turned to Wyatt as he walked in behind her. “Wyatt, this is Maggie Reynolds. Maggie, Wyatt Moreland.”
“Wow,” Maggie said. “Dude, did she find a hot one.” Maggie sidled up to Wyatt and draped her arms around his neck. “Wanna take me for a ride, big boy?”
“Maggie!” Charley hissed.
She’d only ever listened to one person, and he despised her every breath.
Maggie let go, laughed and flipped back to Charley. “C’mon,” Maggie offered a light punch to Charley’s shoulder. “You said I couldn’t, so I had to.” Her arms raised and dropped like a bird’s wings.
Charley gave big mental kudos to Wyatt, who neither answered nor reciprocated her touch.
James slunk into the room without a hello, pain reflecting in the set of his eyes and hunch of his shoulders.
“Not going to say ‘hi’, James?” Maggie asked to his retreating back.
“No.” He disappeared around the corner through the dining room door, one of Lily’s breakfast sandwiches in hand.
Maggie turned back to Charley. “He can’t still be mad at me? Right?”
Charley rolled her eyes with a deep sigh. “Yes, Maggie. He can.”
Wyatt’s hands slid against Charley’s waist. “Time does not heal all wounds.”
Charley forced herself not to tense, to let the comment say only what it meant, and not to infer he harbored any ill will toward her. “So, Maggie. Let’s, ah, go find Chase.” She stiffened when Charley mentioned his name. “He’s yours, isn’t he?” She took a step toward Maggie and out of Wyatt’s embrace.
Maggie didn’t budge.
Eye to eye, they stood with Charley searching Maggie’s face for acknowledgement. She found none. “I don’t care why you did it, but that little boy has a family, and if you plan to take him away-”
“I don’t intend to.” Maggie didn’t back away. “I’m not Mom material.”
Undone by Maggie’s first-ever admission of personal fault, Charley softened. “I recommend you get to know him and become a part of his life. James’s too for that matter.” She walked into the living room, Wyatt right behind her.
Chase stood, surrounded by the guys-James and Stuart on one side, Cael on the other-playing one of many video games.
“Lookin’ good, there, champ,” Charley said.
The squeaky-clean cheeks and clean clothes reflected none of the ragged boy he’d been a few days before.
Chase turned the controller in her direction, his smile broad and filled with happiness. “Charley! Check it out!”
She gave him a thumbs up with a wink as he off-roaded a motorcycle built for speed and crashed through a brick wall only to rematerialize and start again.
Charley drew her gaze back to Wyatt. He fit with her crazy family-a natural extension. She wanted him to be a part of it with an intensity that could engulf her in an instant if she didn’t watch the spark that shot through her each time their eyes met.
She snuggled into Wyatt’s lap on one end of the couch, Maggie at the floor to her left.
As Chase crashed again, he bounded back to the group. “So, Charley, wanna see?” He grabbed a handful of fruit from the plate on the table.
“What do I want to see?” She crossed one knee over the other, leaning her elbows against the same. Wyatt’s hand trailed soft lines up her back.
Chase looked to Cael, who nodded at him. “I promise, little dude, she’s not going to be mad at you.”
Charley shook her head. “What’s there to be mad about?” She circled her lips with her fingers and made sure she plastered a smile to it despite the story she expected to hear.
“Wanna see me turn into a mouse?” Chase whispered directly at her, his grin as wide as possible on his tiny face.
Maggie gasped as James’s jaw clenched and relaxed in quick repetition. She switched her gaze from Charley to Chase. “Who taught you that neat trick?”
“Nobody. I did it all by myself.” He pointed to himself as he stood as tall as his eight-year-old legs could make him. Still, between the guys, he barely reached a quarter of their size.
“He’s not thirteen, Charley.” Maggie’s tone came through the faked smile.
“Don’t remind me. You tell me why he can already shift and has managed an animal’s form.”
Maggie’s eyes shone with interest, worry. “It’s not possib-”
“It’s very possible. That’s how we know he got away.”
The mood in the room mixed between Chase’s giddy excitement, Charley’s interest and reservation, Maggie’s concern, and James’s scowl. Lily continued her slice and dice in the kitchen and Cael sat back, his arm across the couch as if none of the events mattered. Stuart, who’d joined them, sat much like Cael as if he lived in Charley’s home. Wyatt wanted to be a permanent part of it.
With Maggie and Charley’s whispered conversation, which Wyatt heard and expected everyone around him did too, Chase dove into the mountain of snacks Lily had set on the table.
Charley’s body temperature rose beneath Wyatt’s palm. At a guess, he took it to mean irritation with Maggie. He pulled her back into his arms and added a quick kiss to the side of her neck.
“Ewwwwwww… get a room,” Chase said, mouth full.
Wyatt turned to Stuart as Charley did the same. The entire room erupted into laughter-Lily in the kitchen, included-though Maggie remained silent.
“I told you he’s been around a while.” Charley leaned back against his shoulder.
“Gimme five, Chase.” Stuart held his palm out.
Chase drew back just like Wyatt had seen kids do-an over-extension of force they’d exert just to see how hard they could hit. Since Stuart started the activity, everyone offered their hands for the same. He added his sting to everyone’s palm, but when he got to Wyatt, Chase stopped.
His hand remained in the air, the five on hold. “Do you like Charley?”
Charley giggled as Chase stared him down over her.
“I do, yes.”
Chase squished his mouth, tilted his face up toward the ceiling as if considering for a minute. “You told me to call her first when you found me, so you must like her a lot.” He tapped with his free hand against his chin, the other still raised in the air in preparation.
“I would agree with that.” Wyatt looked into the depths of the boy’s eyes. Despite his youth, a glimmer of understanding reflected within.
“You know this is her last year, right?”
Wyatt cocked his head at Charley’s gasp but kept his gaze on Chase. “I do.”
Chase bobbed his head. “She has to marry someone.”
Wyatt’s lips creased as Charley’s sigh blew through the room. He ventured a glance, noting she’d covered her face with her hands and shook her head. Kids just can’t keep secrets and love to share private business.
“Chase-” Charley started, but Wyatt shushed her with a finger.
“What’s she gonna do?” His little boy face sparkled with wonder.
“Let’s finish this five and see where it goes.” Wyatt bounced his hand in the air.
“Okay.” Chase slapped Wyatt’s palm with a sting that would last as it tingled from his palm out to his fingertips.
Wyatt turned to Charley, who peeked between her fingers. “Apparently, you need a husband?”
Instead of leaving the questions in the air like Chase’s hand, Wyatt shifted out from under her, stood, turned around, and knelt in front of her.
Charley’s eyes filled and shifted to a light purple.
Wyatt tucked a hand into his pocket, pulled out the box his mom had returned.
Metal clattered in the kitchen as Lily gasped.
Wyatt opened the box toward Charley. The stone matched that of the necklace he’d given her on the night of their dance sixteen years before, the one she still wore around her neck.
“Better late than never, right? Life’s too short to hold grudges, don’t you think?” She’d thrown tons of secrets on him and still he loved her, perhaps even more because of them. “I’m not letting you get away again.”
Charley squeezed her lips tight.
“Charley Randall, will you marry me?”