Two.
Tom had nearly been killed. If Charles had sent Anna with any of Angus’s other wolves-and he might have-he’d have lost her.
Three.
Six vampires.
Four.
If Tom’s witch had been what she appeared, Anna would have been taken.
Five.
If he locked her to his side, he would lose her. She was not submissive, she didn’t need his care. Not that way. She needed him to stand back and let her fly.
Six.
And if he was going to do that, he was going to have to get control of his temper. Of Brother Wolf’s temper. Not just now, today-but forever. Leash his need to keep her safe so that he could keep her happy.
Seven.
Today, though, she wasn’t leaving his sight again.
The elevator door slid open.
ARTHUR Madden fussed with this and that, moving the place settings farther from the edge of the table, then nudging them nearer.
“My dear,” said his mate with amusement, “what are you doing? He may be the Marrok’s son, but you rule the British Isles. You outrank him-there is no need to be nervous.”
She didn’t understand. But he was used to that. His wife was human, and there was a lot she didn’t understand. He didn’t hold it against her. He wouldn’t explain that Charles was dominant, that even with the strength of all his wolves behind him, Charles still made Arthur back down with no more than a look. It meant he needed all of his defenses. It meant the dinner must be perfect.
He could trust his mate to make everything perfect.
“You are right, of course,” he said. “Dashed silly of me to make such a fuss.”
She slid under his arm, as slender as the girl he’d married forty years before. He loved her as much now as he had then, but her age made him sad. When they went out to dinner now, people thought them business associates-or mother and son. When she’d been young and beautiful, he’d never given a thought to her aging, and neither had she.
She smelled of roses. “It will all be fine,” she said. “I’ll entertain his mate, and you can tell him stories.”
He kissed her Saxon-sunlit hair, kept delicately tinted with dyes to the shade it had been naturally when he met her. “And how will you do that?”
“I’ll show her my needlework and talk to her about girl things.”
He turned and caught a glimpse of them in the huge gilded mirror just inside the entrance of the house. He wore a gold silk shirt that turned his hair a deeper shade of red-gold; his eyes were blue, and the black slacks he wore could have been the slacks he wore to his wedding all those decades ago.
Sunny’s deep blue shirt had long, flowing sleeves that showed off the strength of her arms without betraying how her skin showed her age. There was a softness under her chin and laugh lines around her eyes. His Sunny loved to laugh.
She was dying one day at a time. It would take a long while still, he thought, decades, as her skin grew less taut and her muscles stringy and slack. And he had to watch it happen.
She caught his gaze in the mirror. “You look gorgeous as always,” she said, hugging the arm that crossed over her shoulders above her breasts.
“I love you,” he whispered into her ear, nuzzling at the perfect hair, closing his eyes so he could smell her precious scent.
She waited until his eyes opened and she could look into the mirror and stare into them. Then she smiled the huge smile that had first made him call her Sunny. “I know you do.”
SEVEN
THEY were late. Sunny quit trying to contain her husband and sat down on one of the matching pair of Queen Anne couches and watched him instead.
He was magnificent. He’d scorn the comparison, but she always thought of him more like a lion than a wolf when he was in his human form. Even when he was in his four-footed form, he was tawny and gold.
He stood now, gazing out the window with his arms clasped behind his back, giving her a lovely view of his backside. She’d never told him, of course-he wouldn’t appreciate it-but she’d always loved his derriere.
She still couldn’t believe she’d managed to catch him, not even after all these years. He was everything she’d ever wanted: wealthy, powerful, honorable, and well-bred. He could not claim it, not now, so long after he should have been dead, but he was the younger son of a baron. He was smart and sweet-he still brought her flowers for absolutely no more reason than because he wanted her to have them. She loved to travel, and he could not-not being who and what he was. But he allowed her the freedom to do it on her own.
She still loved his backside.
She hid her smile and tried to look serious when he turned to her. He frowned, and she blinked innocently at him. She’d long ago learned that there were some jokes he could not share, and it didn’t do any good to try.
Finally, in a grumpy voice, he said, “I’m going upstairs to get some work done. If they get here, tell them I’m busy.” And he stalked up the stairs.
Sunny glanced at the delicate gold Rolex on her wrist and shook her head. They were five minutes late; patience had never been Arthur’s gift. She picked up the book she’d brought down-a mystery set in Barbados, her favorite place to be-and started to read.
The knock on the door was quiet, but not so quiet Arthur wouldn’t hear it. When he didn’t come down the stairs, Sunny set her book down and got to her feet. He’d come out of his snit soon enough. She knew her man: he couldn’t stand to ignore an audience for long. Until then it was up to her to make her guests feel welcome.
Nervously, she smoothed out her shirt. She’d heard stories of Charles Cornick, the Marrok’s hatchet man, but she’d never met him. She hoped his mate was friendly.
When the knock came a second time, she opened the door-and swallowed her smile.
The man who stood in front of the door was big. Not just tall, but wide. Obviously Native American, with his dark skin and black eyes. His face was still, she couldn’t read him at all, but he brought with him an air of grimness, like a dark cloak around him.
Nothing that she hadn’t expected from Arthur’s descriptions-and his nervousness-nothing unexpected, except that Charles Cornick was beautiful. Not by Western standards maybe, not with his broad and flat features and the amber earrings he wore-and how did a werewolf manage pierced ears?
A man might not even notice the attraction of all that muscle and warm brown skin, but she would bet that he never walked through a room without attracting the gaze of every female there.
Flustered, she jerked her eyes off him and met the eyes of the woman who stood beside him.
Anna Cornick was an inch or so taller than Sunny, which still made her a little shorter than average. She was thin, underweight even, though what flesh was there was hard muscle. Her hair was whisky brown and hung in gentle curls to her shoulders. Freckles dusted her cheekbones, and her eyes were a clear golden brown. She wore a white shirt with a silk skirt that hit her just above the ankles. She wasn’t traditionally pretty, but not unattractive, either.
Anna looked tired and outclassed by her more exotic mate, but then she grinned ruefully, an expression that took in Sunny’s uncomfortably strong, reluctant admiration of Charles and expressed sympathy for another woman caught in his spell.
It was a warm expression-and Sunny felt all the nerves Charles Cornick had called into being settle back down so she could pick up the familiar role of hostess.
“Hello,” she said with a big smile that wasn’t as difficult to summon as it had been a moment before. “Welcome.” She stood back and invited them in. “I’m Eleanor, Arthur’s mate-you can call me Sunny, everyone does. You must be Charles and Anna.”
“It’s good to meet you, Sunny,” said Anna, taking her hand in a strong grip. When her mate didn’t say anything right away, Anna bumped him with her shoulder.