I flushed in embarrassment at his words, seeing nothing but dirty laundry and even dirtier dishes piled everywhere. Dead flowers on every inch of table-top. God, I was a wreck. “We’ve been grieving,” I said sharply, more sharply than I’d anticipated. “I haven’t had time to keep house.”
He nodded, and placed his hand on one of the wooden beams scattered through the large, messy living room and I flushed uncomfortably. Perhaps he hadn’t been talking about the state of the house after all. As Jackson’s gaze moved over the furniture, I snatched up a dirty sock laying over the arm of a chair.
“Is it just you that lives here?” Jackson said in that mild voice, glancing around the house.
I knew what he was doing – mentally sizing up how many wolves were in the pack. My house was large, and my family had lived here for three generations. We had plenty of bedrooms, but not all of them were filled. “Just me right now,” I said lightly, keeping the control in my voice. “I sent the others away while I…recovered. Our alpha died recently, and it’s left us all in a turmoil.”
Me especially.
Jackson moved forward, his fingers brushing against a dried rose, hanging over the edge of a crystal vase. “I remember.” He glanced back at me and his face was so serious that it made me wonder if the boyish smile had just been my imagination. “You said someone had left you a message?”
I nodded, swallowing hard. The visual was still fresh in my mind and still creepy. I pushed ahead of him. “In here.”
He followed behind me as I headed into the kitchen, and stopped as I skirted the large drying puddle. “He’d been through my house, grabbed all my lingerie, and, well, made sweet love to it.” If I squinted hard, I could still see the heart drawn in the mess. “I think he was trying to tell me something.”
“Either that or he’s real lonely,” Jackson drawled.
My mouth twitched at that. “I think he wants my pack more than me.” I crossed my arms over my chest, so I wouldn’t rub my arms. “He doesn’t like that I told him no.”
Jackson nodded, then motioned for me. “I’ll get started on changing the locks, Ms. Savage.”
Ms. Savage. I wondered briefly if he thought I was the widow of the old alpha. That would be the natural thought. Sisters sometimes took the alpha female’s place, but that was a rarity. He must have imagined that I was grieving for more than just my alpha. I chose to let him think that for a while longer, but offered, “You can call me Alice, if you’ll be joining us.”
The smile returned, and with it, the dimples that fascinated me. “We’ll be staying,” he agreed. “Thank you, Alice.”
“As long as you won’t disrupt my pack, that is,” I stressed, trying to put my foot down. It was hard to judge a new alpha. I knew where to step with Cash, but this man was a stranger.
The smile disappeared again, and he nodded. “Of course.”
I nodded and exited, all too glad to get out of the room.
Chapter Four
Two hours later, I cleaned out Joanne’s old room, my thoughts astir, while Jackson worked on adding deadbolts to my front and back door and Dan put out the fire. Since we lived out in the country, it wasn’t out of the ordinary to burn trash. Maybe a little weird at three in the morning, but the neighbors thought we were weird anyhow.
And so I readied a room for the newest member of the pack. Partially because it kept me busy, and partially because it allowed me to hide from Jackson’s too-knowing gaze. Dan was a sweet, quiet boy from what I could tell. He dropped his gaze every time I looked at him – appropriate around a new alpha. But I didn’t know how to act around Jackson.
As if my thoughts had summoned him, Jackson strolled down the hall and into the room a moment later. A tool belt was slung low around his waist, and I found myself staring at it. It emphasized the lean lines of his hips and his ass in the jeans, and I flushed bright red when he caught me looking.
He didn’t say anything, though. Just glanced past me, at the sheets I’d tossed down onto the twin bed. “Dan will need to shower before he heads to bed,” Jackson said, with a nod at the window, where I could clearly see the wilting teenager dumping the ashes out of the barrel outside.
Poor kid did look dead-on-his-feet tired, but wasn’t complaining. I liked that about Dan. “He can sleep here. It’s not Joanne’s room any longer. She left us about six months ago.”
He nodded at me. “I’ll change the last set of locks while you get him comfortable.”
“Thank you,” I murmured, then glanced out the window one last time to see Dan trudging up the steps. “I’ll show him where the towels are.”
As Dan showered, I cleaned out Joanne’s old room for him, and I heard Jackson working on the doorknobs. He hummed to himself as he worked, a faint sound that I barely caught over the drum of the water in the shower.
“Thanks for taking us in, Ms. Savage,” Dan said a few minutes later, as I piled blankets into his pajama-clad arms. “It’s been a while since we ran with a pack. Been just myself and Jackson for about a year now.”
“Alice,” I corrected, but didn’t add anything to that. The kid was a goldmine of information, as long as I could keep him talking. “And I’m glad you’re here too.”
I wasn’t lying, either. So far I liked Dan a lot. He had a honest, open face and a polite demeanor. Nothing like my rowdy boys, Spence and Len, who were constantly into mischief.
“Jackson likes you too,” Dan offered as he made the bed.
“Of course he does,” I retorted, heading for the door of the room. “He’s the alpha. He likes what I come with.”
“No, I mean he likes you.”
“Oh?” I lingered in the doorway a minute longer. “What makes you say that?”
He gave me a sweet, tired smile. “Because we’re still here.”
Interesting. Did that mean Jackson was choosy or was Dan just seeing things through rose-colored glasses? Who knew. I shut the door behind me so the kid could sleep. Jackson still worked on the front door, testing and jiggling the door handle. I moved behind him, arms crossed, and watched him work for a few minutes.
Jackson stopped working as I stood behind him. “It’s late,” he said, glancing up at me. “If you want to go to sleep, I’ll finish up here.”
Sleep? With a stranger changing the locks on my door? With another stranger asleep in the hall? With Roscoe still out there? Knowing he could break into my house again? With my pack scattered to the four winds? Sleep seemed the furthest thing from my mind. “It’s not that late.”
“It’s three in the morning.”
Okay, so it was a little late. I gave a small shrug. Now that it was just the two of us, my body was locking up into all kinds of tension.
What if Jackson wanted to assert his place in the pack…tonight? With me? Make his alpha-ness known? Claim the alpha female?
Uh oh.
I yawned really loudly. “Wow, it is pretty late,” I said, doing an about face.
He gave me a skeptical look. “I’ll shower after this if you leave me a towel. And then I’ll come to bed.”
Uh oh again. Of course he expected us to share a bed. If nothing else, we had to be united in front of the pack. That meant one bedroom, one couple, one set of leaders…an icy chill went down my spine. I couldn’t back down, though. Like it or not, this was what I had bought into.
So I said, “I’ll leave out a towel. Just come to bed when you’re ready.”
He turned back to the door, his humming now silent. That didn’t make me feel any better. I ran a hand through my messy hair and headed up the stairs, to my bedroom.
And found the biggest, thickest, most concealing pair of pajamas I owned and dressed in them. I even tucked a pair of mismatched slipper socks over my toes. If I’d had curlers and a clay facial, I’d have armed myself with those too.