Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 55491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 277(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 277(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
“Yes,” she murmured, leaning her head down to kiss my forearm. “I’m yours.”
“I also love you.” I kissed and nibbled her shoulder. “Wolves mate instinctively. I knew you were mine by scent, but all the human emotions are there, too, Joy. I want you to know that.”
She turned in my arms to face me. Her blue eyes met mine. They were sated and satisfied, but I couldn’t miss her happiness. “I love you, too, Wes.”
I kissed her tenderly this time, cradling her cheek in my hand. “I can’t believe I get to spend the rest of my life with you.”
She kissed me back. “Ditto.” Then tears welled in her eyes. “I can’t believe I’m a mom!”
I went still. We hadn’t talked about her taking on Remy, too. “Is it okay? Too much? We can go slowly.”
She shook her head, her messy hair sliding against my skin. “No, I’m all in. Remy is mine. She seemed to know it from the start, too.”
I thought about that for a moment, realized she picked up on something wolf-ish before I did. “You’re right.” I remembered with awe. “She did say you smelled good the first time she met you. Then she said she knew you were human, but you were the good kind.”
Definitely the good kind.
“We were meant to be,” Joy said softly. “You, me, and Remy.”
“Always and forever.”
“You are my forever,” she said, which made me feel taller than a mountain. I pulled her closer, so she could lay her head on my shoulder and curl into me to fall asleep.
“You’re incredible.”
38
JOY
“I think she wants chaperones,” I told Wes as we drove toward my mother’s house.
It was four days after the Soraya showdown, and things had settled into a routine. A routine of being a family of three. Busy with Remy and my pottery during the day, nights spent in bed with Wes having sex. Talking. Learning about each other.
Remy didn’t mention her mother. Not once. All she knew was that she was gone, and that seemed to be enough.
“If this guy isn’t good for her, be prepared for me to kick him out,” Wes muttered, eyes on the road.
My lips twitched at how protective he was of Mom. She’d called the day before and asked us over for dinner. Dinner with Clyde. It seemed their date had gone well, and this was their second date.
With us and a four-year-old tagging along.
I thought it was cute. I’d known Clyde for a long time, unlike Wes, and wasn’t concerned he was going to mess with my mom’s emotions. He really did like her.
No man doggedly asked a woman out for years if he wasn’t truly interested.
“Just wait ten years,” I said.
He glanced at me and frowned. I thumbed over my shoulder to the back seat where Remy was humming to herself.
Wes downright growled now, catching on. “Fourteen? Not happening. She can date when she’s twenty.”
“What about full moon ru–”
His surprise braking and pulling the car over cut off my words.
I looked around. “What’s the matter? Did we hit something?”
He turned in his seat and set his forearm on the steering wheel. “Are you trying to have more consequences?”
I gulped, remembering it took two days for my butt to stop hurting after the last time, and that had been in fun.
“My quences weren’t fun,” Remy grumbled from the back seat. “I had to work at the ranch for the time everyone went lookin’ for me. I don’t like moving rocks.”
“You’re not supposed to,” Wes said.
I bit my lip. Wes decided Remy needed to be punished for her running off, even though the reasons were solid. She needed to know how dangerous her actions were. So he’d taken her to the ranch with him the other morning and made her move river rocks–softball-sized ones that weren’t too heavy–and put them in a pile by a nearby cottonwood tree. Then she had to move them back. Marina helped her for a little while. Then Johnny. It hadn’t been forced labor by any stretch, but to a little girl, it had seemed huge. It had been necessary.
It took her thirty minutes, but Wes told her that was the amount of everyone’s time she’d wasted when she’d gone off on her moon run. She owed them that time helping out.
“I’m not going to run off any longer,” she added, in case Wes was planning to add any more rock shuffling to her day.
“Good. Then you can tell Mrs. Wallace that you can have an extra cherry in your juice.”
“Yay! What’re we waitin’ for then?” she asked.
“Yeah, what are we waiting for?” I repeated, trying to look sweet and innocent.
I wondered that, too. Wes stared at both of us, then rolled his eyes. “Women.”
Before Wes could put the car back in gear, his cell rang. It came through the dashboard.