KNUD, Her Big Bad Wolf: 50 Loving States, Kansas Read online

  Instead, he said, “Why don’t you let me see these rules of yours?”

  He took the piece of paper out of her hand and then whistled when he saw the ten rules listed in a clean serif font. “Damn, this is like a real list. Like, a typed-out list.” He glanced over at her. “You were one of those kids, weren’t you? The kind who didn’t just do your homework, but liked doing it and asked for extra credit homework on top.”

  With a glaring smile, she answered, “If we were sharing personal info I’d tell you yes, I certainly was that type of kid because one - homework is an incredible tool for learning, and two - there aren’t a lot of stories going around about people who regret being too prepared for college.”

  “Okay, tell yourself that instead of admitting you didn’t have a life in high school.”

  Another glaring smile. “I suppose you were one of those quote-unquote bad boys who always farmed out your homework to your adoring fans.”

  “No, not always,” he answered. “Had to stop doing it in med school because the restrictions on testing software got too tight.”

  “Never more than 48-hour notice unless you’re drunk,” he read out loud before she could respond.

  He looked over at her. “I don’t drink.”

  “I know, but I added the drunk part for me,” she told him proudly. “Women often drunk dial my cousin Grace. It’s very cute.”

  “Cute,” he grunted, because that was the opposite of how Knight felt about it, and precisely why he never gave out his number to human women—well, at least not until he met the one standing next to him now.

  But he said, “Okay, I’ll sign off on that one. I’ve got this theory that people become who they really are deep down inside when they’re drunk, and I want to see if you shoot rainbows out your ass.”

  “Ooh, I’ve never been truly drunk before but if I were, I bet I’d definitely do that,” she answered with a laughing smile.

  Liking that she was slowly coming back to her usual wackjob base setting, he read the next rule out loud, “’No meeting each other’s family or friends.’ Copy that.”

  Even if she wasn’t human, he’d never introduce her to anyone in his family. But his wolf stirred inside his chest with the notion that his mother would love this woman. She was strong and funny with a huge dose of silly that Alisha would appreciate.

  “You like Michael Jackson music?” Knight asked her.

  She gave him a quizzical look. “Yes, I am a human being living on planet Earth,” she answered. “Why do you ask?”

  Yeah, Mom would definitely love her, his wolf practically sighed.

  Ignoring it, Knight skimmed through the remainder of the list. No sharing of personal details. No cuddling. No taking vacations together. No meals other than a very occasional brunch. No sleeping over more than two nights in a row. Always use protection. No fighting. Ever. No falling in love. Ever.

  He paused, tripping over those last words. An image of her carrying a cub she didn’t know was Jandro went off in his head for some reason.

  And she asked, “What?”

  “Protection…” he mumbled, grabbing onto the list item like a get out of jail card. “I’m not planning on seeing anybody else until we’re done with this arrangement. So maybe we could think about both getting tested and losing the wrappers?”

  There was also the fact that wolves were incapable of catching or passing on STDs, or getting any woman pregnant outside of heat. In fact, the only reason he bothered with wrappers in the first place is because they added an extra layer of “we ain’t making love here” to one-night stands. But obviously he couldn’t throw that argument into the ring.

  She tilted her head with a gentle smile of apology. “I’m sorry, but no. While it wasn’t specifically listed, I don’t think it’s wise for us to trust each other like that. Also, I do plan to eventually have children and I wouldn’t want to risk anything unfortunate that might interfere with my future fertility. Therefore, I think we should go on as we were before, safely, without risk of either of us getting hurt.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. Boundaries. Probably for the best,” he agreed, even as his wolf did something weird inside his chest at the thought of her protecting her fertility for the future family, she’d be starting with someone else. “I’ll um…bring some tape home tomorrow and hang it on the wall.”

  “Thank you very much,” she said, her tone as gracious as ever. “I appreciate it.”

  “Hey, Hot Social Worker?”

  “Yes, Buddy?”

  He tilted his head and asked, “What’s wrong?”

  She visibly swallowed. And for a moment he thought she just might tell him because her smile disappeared.

  But then like a grey cloud rolling away, it came back and she answered, “Personal details.”

  Yeah, he got it. Yeah…

  But then he spoke-signed, “L-heart?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m gonna kiss you.”

  And she nodded, the smile she seemed to barely be holding onto turning grateful as she said, “That would be lovely. Thank you.”

  So, he did, smoothing her perfect curls back with one hand so he wouldn’t get hair in his mouth as he captured her lips in a soft kiss. That was a lesson he’d learned the hard way the first time he tried to kiss her when she hadn’t straightened her hair.

  Getting to know her. Even as they set firm boundaries, he was getting to know her.

  He nipped at her sadness, sucking on her lips, drinking it down as if it could be extracted with a kiss.

  “Take the dress off,” he murmured against her lips. “Panties, too.”

  Her long-sleeved pink number disappeared a moment later, tossed to the floor like it didn’t cost more than the rent on his apartment. His mysterious rich girl was careless with her clothes. Another thing he’d discovered about her in their unprecedented two months of fucking.

  But after her panties joined the dress, instead of tossing her onto the bed as he usually did, he laid her back and pulled her legs up one by one to take off those ridiculous cowboy boots.

  “This doesn’t feel like level ten,” she said, her voice husky.

  “That’s because it’s not. We’re on level five tonight.”

  The leg he held stiffened. “I’d prefer level ten.”

  And he got the feeling this was true. She wanted the mean, do what I say, punishing version of him tonight. Had come here for it as an antidote to whatever had upset her.

  “Yeah, I get that.” Then he said, “And I don’t care what you want. Tonight it’s about what I want. And I want to make you feel good.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  Because he didn’t know how else to help her with whatever was upsetting her without talking about it. Because his wolf was too fucking sensitive when it came to her, and would never let his human take her at level ten in this state.

  But aloud he merely said, “Because I can.”

  Then he gently pushed her thighs open. And instead of diving right in like he usually did, he let himself openly admire what he saw. The flared hips, the soft pussy, the breasts he suddenly realized he’d never taken in his mouth.

  That was a mistake that needed to be corrected right now, he decided. He leaned over her, snaking his tongue around one dark nipple before pulling it into his mouth.

  No response at first. He could sense her resisting, wanting something else.

  “Please don’t be nice to me,” she whimpered. “I can’t take it. Not tonight.”

  He ignored her and trailed kisses over her tight belly, not stopping until he came to the place he was most familiar with on her body.

  Contrary to his wolf’s wishes, he’d never let her come on his mouth. At level ten, oral sex was all about the edge. Eating her out until she almost came. Holding her down until she calmed. Then eating her out again.

  But tonight he let his wolf have its way with her. Licking at her sweet slit, tongue delving in. Lapping at her for as long as it wanted. Until he bec
ame hypnotized by the nub at the top of her vagina, sucking on it a little too long. The wolf didn’t heed her cries of, “please don’t be nice to me,” didn’t feel the hands tearing at his shirt, begging him to stop because she was going to—

  He didn’t hear anything but her long moan as her acrid scent shifted. Her emotional pain lifting like something exorcised.

  Then, and only then, did the wolf give her back to his human who coolly grabbed a wrapper from the box on the nightstand before covering her with his body. But as much as he wanted inside her, his heartrate actually slowed as soon as he pushed in.

  And instead of taking her brutally as he usually did, he took his time. Bracing himself on bent arms he enjoyed the feel of her clenching around his dick while he moved his hips in slow, lazy circles between her legs. Reveled in the feel of the warm gasps in his ear as he took her quietly. No words. No commands. Just him slow grinding inside her.

  And instead of telling her to shut-up, he listened to her softly beg him not to be nice to her until her words eventually turned to babbling.

  Hot Social Worker had come into this arrangement clear-eyed, but he could tell she was the opposite of him when it came to dating. One of those women who held on to guys for months, if not years. Addicted to the long-term just like his younger triplet brother, Nago.

  Yet as she fell apart beneath him, he knew: no guy had done this for her. Slow burned her until all that High Media-gloss fell off and she completely unraveled.

  This sex was different. For her, but also for him. What he was feeling now was the opposite of the wired weirdness that overtook him when he just needed to fuck somebody. The opposite of how he felt when he stalked the clubs, looking for the right vessel to dump all that angry adrenaline into.

  Knight watched her, wanting her enjoyment more than his own. And he relished seeing her lose coherence. “What…you…doing. Oh…Oh! Good…good…feel…so good. Don’t…don’t.”

  “Your favorite TV show growing up,” he said quietly, reminding her to fall back on the Thunderpuffs safe word if she was serious about her “don’t.”

  But she didn’t say the safe word, didn’t make him stop.

  Instead, she held on to him tightly as he slowly burned her up. Until her breath caught on a sharp intake and she turned her head to look up at him, her eyes softening with awe. As if she were seeing him, really seeing him, for the first time.

  Right before she exploded around him, her sex squeezing so sudden and hard that it felt like she was yanking a simultaneous orgasm out of him. Whether he’d been ready to come or not.

  Yeah, tonight was different in all ways. He’d never felt so calm, so centered as he did in the moments when they floated down together, her legs trembling around his waist, her breath panting in his ear, the smell of her sex-soaked sweat now free of anger and sadness.

  His wolf lolled around his chest in a happy daze because he’d made this woman forget whatever had upset her. At least for a little while.

  And his human found himself asking her, “You feel better?” Voice soft in the dark.

  “Yes, I do feel better,” she whispered. She then carefully rolled out from underneath him.

  He almost said “don’t go,” but stopped himself when she criss-crossed her legs and hand-parted her hair. Braids. A signal that she’d be spending the night.

  “Thank you. I needed that,” she said, glancing at him a bit shyly, as she started plaiting her huge curls.

  “Me too,” he agreed, not realizing how true that statement was until he said it out loud.

  11

  I push past Chang and storm into my father’s dark wood-paneled office without knocking. Forget my brand, I’m ready for a very unprincesslike fight after what happened with Ethan.

  But then I stop dead at the sight in front of me.

  My father is seated behind his desk, and my mother is in his guest chair. It should look like a completely innocuous scene, but something trips inside my brain.

  This isn’t right…the strange growly voice tells me. Something isn’t right about this…

  “Layla, we were just talking about you,” my mother says with her usual cheery Texas smile.

  She looks genuinely happy in my father’s barrel-backed leather guest chair. A bright spot of color in her yellow tee and red jeans which I might have stolen if she weren’t so much shorter than me. But I don’t believe her. Why don’t I believe her?

  The answer plunks down like another piece of the puzzle I’m trying to put together. It’s what I don’t see that’s not computing. What I haven’t seen since I woke up.

  My parents are ridiculously mushy. The worst. Like the most affectionate people on the planet. Some of my earliest childhood memories are of my brother, sister, and I ewwing at all their kissing and canoodling. But they always laughed us off. And often my father would say something along the lines of, “You will have to forgive me, children, but I cannot keep my hands off your mother when she is in the room.”

  However, they’ve been in the same room several times since I came to. At the hospital, and when they installed me back in my bedroom here at the house. But I haven’t seen them touch each other. Not even once, I realize as I review the scenes from the weeks since I woke up. In fact, they haven’t so much as looked at each other with anything but irritation as far as I can remember.

  How many times had I knocked on this door to find Mom snuggled up in Dad’s lap like a teenager? Now that I think about it, I can’t ever recall coming in here and finding them on opposite sides of the desk.

  Yet my mother is sitting in one of the guest chairs like she’s, well, a guest. And for some reason, I sniff the air because there’s a weird acrid scent coming off her.

  She’s angry, the new internal voice tells me. She’s angry, just like you.

  Which raises a much bigger question than what happened between Ethan and me as Mom asks, “How was your visit with Carine in Dallas? We want to hear all about it!”

  I blink, suddenly remembering where I’d really been headed before I decided to hunt Ethan down on a whim. To see my personal trainer about slowly easing back into my gym routine, but this time with a mind toward my pregnancy.

  “I didn’t go,” I answer. Then I demand to know, “What is going on between you two?”

  “Nothing,” my father answers. “Why didn’t you go?”

  “I changed my mind,” I reply between clenched teeth. “As I’m sure Jared will soon report to you, I decided to go to Dallas Memorial instead to find out why Ethan hasn’t been returning any of my calls.”

  I watch my mom, not my dad, as I say this. Despite her chosen career path, she’s never been great at hiding her real feelings about a situation. Just like the internet memes of her eye rolls that started showing up after her detractors tried to come at her, horror is writ plain across her face. Even before she darts a glance over at Dad.

  “No, don’t look at him, Mom, look at me!” I say. “What is going on with you two?”

  “Nothing,” my father answers at the same time my mother says, “We didn’t want to tell you until you’d had a few more weeks to process what happened.”

  “Eva…” Dad starts.

  But Mom shakes her head and keeps confessing, “Also, I think we were both truly hoping your memory would come back, making another difficult conversation unnecessary. I mean, telling you once was hard enough…”

  “Telling me what once?” I demand, feeling more than a little alarmed. “What is going on, Mom? Just tell me, please.”

  “It is nothing,” my father insists. “Nothing to bother the children with—I told her that the first time.”

  “I’m not a child, Dad, and I want to know what you’re keeping from me. What’s going on? Why did you send Suro to threaten Ethan? What is the real story here—?”

  My mother’s face darkens and her head whips toward my father. “You threatened him?!?!” she asks. “After what happened in January, you actually went and threatened that boy?”


  Dad grits his teeth. Not answering, just liked he used to not answer when Mom’s PR team asked him to do…pretty much anything. My dad might very well be the worst arm candy in the entire history of ever.

  “I can’t believe you!” Mom whispers. “This is how we lost her the first time.”

  “Lost me the first time?” I repeat. “Mom, just tell me please. I am so confused and it’s not fair. If you know something about why I broke up with Ethan, why I went to Kansas, you have to tell me.”

  “Eva, do not…” my father intones, his voice on the very edge of a threat. “It will only make this situation worse.”

  But my mother is one of the very few people in the world who can stand up to an Alexei Rustanov threat…and live to tell about it.

  “You’re not talking to us,” she blurts. “You haven’t talked to us since early February when you moved to Kansas. And it’s not because you got too busy to call.”

  I shake my head. That makes no sense. I love my parents. Why would I…?

  But then the memory of a trembling Ethan comes back to me. I turn to my father and ask, “Are you the reason we broke up? Did you do something to make us split up?”

  “Nyet, exactly the opposite,” my father answers, swiping his large hand in front of him, like a lion, swatting flies. “You chose to break up with him. You chose it, and you did not want to listen to anything he or I had to say about it. Just because—”

  Dad breaks off, his face tightening. “You should not have broken up with him. He was a very good man who would not have left you pregnant next to a river.”

  But I refuse to take the new bait he’s dangling to distract me from the huge clue he just dropped.

  “Just because what?” I demand.

  My father folds his arms across his massive chest, muttering in Russian.

  “Mom?” I ask.

  Mom clears her throat and ignoring her husband’s dirty look, answers, “You and Ethan broke up…right after you found out he was one of several candidates your father vetted for the position.”