“You are such a tease. Just remember this next Christmas.”
“I’ll be ready. Next Christmas and beyond.”
She laughed and kissed him, and CJ was glad he’d convinced Laurel they were meant to be together. Haunted hotel and all.
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SEAL Wolf In Too Deep
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SEAL Wolf in Too Deep
Feeling useless, Paul Cunningham propped his broken leg on a few more pillows as he and his partner Lori watched from the deck of their lakeside cabin. Their best friend Allan Rappaport headed down the dock with his temporary police dive partner Debbie Renaud, both ready to do some more practice diving with each other. Paul’s leg was casted all the way up to his hip after a freak accident on a dive rescue mission.
“I still think Allan should ask the sheriff to make new assignments. You and Allan were raised as brothers, you’re SEAL team members, although you’ve left the Navy, and you’re used to working with other men, not women. And you’re both wolves, not that anyone on the force knows that, but it makes it easier to work together. This business”—Lori motioned to Allan and Debbie as they talked to each other on the dock—“is bound to cause problems.”
“Allan respects her work too much. It would look like he’s having trouble with her on a professional level. He won’t do anything that might jeopardize her career.”
Looking cross, Lori folded her arms over her expanding belly. Paul reached over and she slipped her hand into his. “They’ll be all right. Allan’s smart enough to know the boundaries between lupus garou and humans,” Paul said.
Lori squeezed his hand. “Watch the way she looks up at him. They’ve been together for only two weeks and she is so enamored with him. All smiles and sweetness. She adores him. He’s a SEAL and women just fall all over themselves when they learn that.”
Paul raised his brows at Lori.
She shook her head at him. “I know the two of you too well. Your SEAL status doesn’t affect me in the least.”
He chuckled. “As far as Debbie goes, she’s a smiley, sweet woman, Lori. You worry too much.”
Lori frowned and settled back in her chair. “You make light of this and it’s dangerous. He hasn’t dated any of the eligible women in our pack, and we have several. Sure, he’s nice and polite, but he’s not interested in any of them. Look at the way he helps Debbie with her dive checks. They look like they’re lovers.”
Paul smiled. He knew it wasn’t that Lori didn’t want Allan to care about a woman, but the woman had to be one of their kind, or it would cause all kinds of complications they couldn’t afford. “Come here.”
“Your leg—”
“Come on the other side.” She moved to his chaise lounge, and he snuggled with her. “He’ll be okay. We’re talking about Allan. In all our years of wolf longevity, how many times has he fallen for a human woman and not been able to let go of the notion?”
Lori relaxed then. “Never.”
“Right. Never. So they’re just working together, doing practice dives as a team so when they have risky dives to make, they’ll be working in sync with each other. And look, they didn’t have to dive here in front of us, knowing we’re observing every move they make. He could have taken her anywhere to practice diving with her.”
“True. But they won’t always be here under our watchful supervision.”
Paul chuckled. “Lori, you are a worrywart.”
* * *
The day was nice and hot, perfect for practice dives, if that’s all that was going on between Allan and Debbie. But Lori knew she wasn’t just paranoid. She knew Debbie was interested in Allan and he returned the interest right back. What was not to like about Allan anyway? He was sexy and fit and loved to do what Debbie loved to do—dive. They had an easy way with each other, like they already knew each other intimately, not like people who had just started to work together. No formality between them. No getting to know each other.
Paul was trying to calm her fears, but he too worried about Allan. How could he not?
Debbie was a lovely brunette, vivacious, something that totally appealed to Allan. She was definitely an alpha, ready for adventure. She loved the police work, loved saving people and animals, just like Allan. Worst of all, she was single.
“You need to talk to him,” Lori told Paul.
“He’s a grown man and knows what he’s doing.”
“He’s human, well, and wolf, and both are going to get him into trouble.”
“I’ll talk to him—but he’s going to wonder what all the fuss is about.”
Lori was certain he’d know just why they were concerned.
* * *
Allan was just as concerned about working with a human woman as Paul and Lori were, but he knew he could handle this. It sure was a hell of a lot different going on dives with Debbie than with Paul.
He was so used to working with Paul over the years that they just did everything in perfect sync—the hand signals, body movement, the awareness of their partner. Though some signals were universal, he and Paul, along with the other members of their SEAL wolf team, had developed some over the years that were distinctive to them.
Allan knew Paul and Lori were warily observing them. He had to admit watching Debbie swim was a hell of a lot more attention-grabbing than watching Paul. And when she smiled at him, she made him feel as though he was dating her and not just working a job. He had to remind himself to act professional and get the training done. On an assignment, they had to concentrate on the mission so they could get the results they needed—evidence from a crime scene, people or animals to safety—while ensuring they came out of it unscathed.
If he’d been assigned to a human male dive partner, no problem. But working with a single female, one who fascinated him like she did, he could see it would take a lot of diligence on his part to keep his mind on business and not on Debbie. If he could just become interested in one of the new single females in the pack, that would solve all his problems.
But when he swam next to Debbie in the clear blue lake, she fired his testosterone sky-high. That didn’t happen when he was around the single women in his pack. He hoped he could deal with this without getting them both into dangerous waters.
Chapter 2
Four months later
The tires of Allan’s hatchback slid on a patch of ice on the bridge just as he spied tires sticking up out of a deluge of water in a culvert. A rush of adrenaline poured through his veins, readying him for the frigid conditions and a rescue mission. In the cold of winter in Northern Montana, he and his dive partner were the first to arrive on the scene of the accident and had to act quickly.
Debbie was requesting emergency backup and an ambulance as she held on to the dashboard, looking just as alarmed when the tires lost traction on the ice. He worried that they’d end up down the embankment, crashing into the upside-down SUV.
Frantically, a woman jerked at the back door of the SUV without success.
As soon as he saw who it was, his heart took a dive. It was Franny White, wife of the new chef at their wolf-run Italian restaurant, Fame da Lupo. She didn’t go anywhere without her daughter. But the baby wasn’t in her arms and Franny was trying so hard to get into the backseat, he knew little Stacy had to be buckled into her car seat and submerged underwater.
“Cancel the call for the ambulance!” he said to Debbie, knowing that this was a risk he had to take. “Call this number!” He gave her the number for the medical clinic that catered to his kind, though Debbie would be clueless. “I know the woman—her baby is in the car. Just…call it.” He didn’t have time to make up a cover story.