“Question number two, Julia.”
She flinched but didn’t turn around to face him. She slammed a skillet on the stove and tossed some strips of bacon down. His stomach rumbled loud enough for everyone to hear.
Gabby smothered a smile.
One down, one to go.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard you,” she growled at him. Growled.
Not cool, not aloof. She sounded mad. Her passion he could handle, but not her wounded, distanced behavior. The way she’d treated him this past month had driven him insane.
“Question number two, and this has several parts. When was the last time you saw your father?”
“As a cat or a man?” she asked nastily.
“Either. I’m not picky.”
She stabbed into the bacon with a fork and muttered under her breath. Grease spattered, the heavenly sound of frying pork mingling with a woman’s anger. “I saw him the day before he left us all for good.”
“Do you miss him?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Meghan and Jason,” he reminded her in a sing-song voice.
He winked at Gabby and waited for Julia to yell at him.
To his relief, she did. “You mangy, arrogant, flea-ridden cur. Who the hell do you think you are threatening my family?”
“Ah, Julia? You’re burning the bacon.”
“Fuck the bacon, and fuck you too!”
Gabby and he stared at Julia, shocked. He didn’t think he’d ever heard her say the F-word aloud before. “Nice language. Now, about the bacon?”
She whirled around and snatched the strips from the pan, putting them on a plate Gabby hurriedly retrieved and brought to the table. When Julia turned to confront him, he asked for coffee.
Her eyes turned molten gold, and he wanted her all over again. More, he wanted to soothe the hurt he could feel in her soul. “If you think for one minute I’m going to wait on you hand and foot while you order me around, you can go straight to—”
“Julia! If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like a cup too.” Gabby shrugged and gave her sister a pretty smile.
When Julia grumbled and turned around again, he and Gabby shared a conspiratorial smile. Keeping Julia off balance put her mind off her worries and on him. Anger he could deal with.
“I’m still waiting,” Ty said again.
“Yes, I miss him. He was actually very nice, unlike my mother, who lived in a constant state of depression.”
He wanted to see her face, but he didn’t want her to stop talking.
Bitterly, she continued. “He loved her, for all the good it did him. Her family wouldn’t let him stay with us, and Dad didn’t want Mom to suffer because of the clan council. They were even worse back then than they are now.”
“So Dad just left,” Gabby said.
“Yeah, one day he just left. He never came back. Then Mom left. She never came back either.” Silence weighed heavily on the room. “Happy now?”
He didn’t want to think about her tough childhood, but he needed to know. “Is that why you don’t want to mate? Because you’re afraid what happened to your mother will happen to you?”
Julia turned and watched him with a frown. “I’m not my mother. I want to mate. One day I’d like to have a child. But I’m afraid…”
“She’s afraid her child might be like me,” Gabby answered in a soft voice.
“That’s not true,” Julia denied.
“What does that mean?” Ty asked. Gabby seemed fine to him.
“That is true. Otherwise you and Ty would admit to the bond between you right now.”
Ty choked on the piece of bacon he’d been eating. Oh hell. Was that why he couldn’t think of anything besides Julia lately? Had he truly mated her, even accidentally?
Julia glared at her sister. “We had sex. So what?”
Obviously the vixen was worried. She’d mentioned sex in front of her sister.
Gabby shook her head. “If it was just sex, then why do you still smell like him? And he smells like you. Even under all that bacon, I can scent your bond.”
Ty should have been more worried about the thought of mating, but oddly enough, he wasn’t. A part of him had recognized Julia from the very beginning. He didn’t want to acknowledge the truth, but he couldn’t help himself. His animal spirit longed for her. He only wished she liked him half as much. Waiting for her to deny their connection, he watched her every expression.
Except Julia didn’t refute her sister. The emotions crossing her face didn’t look like out-and-out rejection. Worry, fear and longing flashed in her eyes before she shuttered her emotions and glanced away.
“Ty and I aren’t mated. You don’t want a wife, remember?” she said to him.
He hadn’t thought he’d wanted a wife, but an existence without Julia didn’t bear thinking about.
“Ty? God, we’re talking about my life here. Could you please pay attention?” she snapped.
“What was the question?” He liked triggering her temper. An angry Julia cared, and she turned him on like nothing could.
She threw a spatula at him he easily dodged. “I asked if you wanted a wife!”
“A wife?”
“To mate.”
“Why yes, I think we should. Thank you, Julia. I accept. Gabby, witness?”
“Witness,” Gabby repeated with a large grin.
“Tell me again, Ned.” Ned Williams Senior did his best to control his excitement. His son couldn’t possibly have seen what he’d thought. He sat with his boys and his brother, Gil, away from the house around a campfire. The distance was enough to soothe his need for space. He understood why Gil moved out whenever Tilda had guests. Christ, he couldn’t wait until her family left. The damn reunion was giving him an ulcer.
Ned Junior answered in a gruff voice, trying to convince him of what should have been the impossible. “I’m telling you, Dad, her eyes weren’t right. The pupils grew all weird, like a cat’s. And I’d swear her nose started to grow, like a snout on a dog or something.”
“Or a fox,” Bob said. “Seen a lot of foxes around here lately. Right, Dave?”
Dave agreed. “Yeah, and we normally don’t see many of them this early in the spring. Think we should tell Mama?”
Ned Sr. smacked Dave on the back of the head, hard enough to hurt.
“Shit.”
“Tell Mama. Idiot. Tell her what, Dave? That your oldest brother is so lovesick over that piece of ass he’ll make up any story to get her back? That her eyes went all animal-like? What a load of crap. Julia Easton told him no. And big, bad Junior was scared by a fucking girl.” Ned Sr. sneered.
Junior flushed, looking sorry he’d mentioned anything. Exactly what Ned Sr. wanted.
“Forget it. I don’t know what the hell I saw. But I don’t like that asshole Roderick. Why was he sniffing around you, Dad? You making friends with out-of-towners, now?”
Ned Sr. shrugged. “He might be a dick, but he knows who to root for when the game is on.” He went on the attack and changed the subject. “Not like you pussies, too busy hanging on to your momma’s tit, like those dickhead brothers of hers. Hell, you’re good for nothing but the garage and the mill. Why don’t you go back inside and bother your real family, ’cause it sure the hell ain’t me.”
He turned his back on them, waiting for his sons to leave. The younger two grumbled but left quickly.
Junior stayed behind. “You know something you ain’t saying.”
“Get on, boy. Your uncle Gil and I got things to talk about. Manly things.” He insulted Junior where it hurt most, pleased when his son turned red-faced and glared down at him. Still, Junior knew better than to confront the man of the house.
He turned on his heel and stomped away from the small campfire, back into the house.