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  “Do you want me to uncuff you?”

  She blinked. The cuffs added that extra kink she hadn’t had with him before. “No, they can stay.”

  His wolfish grin widened. “Good. Now let’s see about giving you some cock and filling you with my cum.”

  Well, okay then. That could work.

  * * *

  Cynthia woke in James’ arms. A smile floated over her lips. God. The man was fucking amazing with those cuffs. Not to mention he’d remembered her favorite brand of lube and brought some with him. Her ass was still sore from the riding he gave her.

  “I really can’t give you what you want, James,” she said more to herself than him.

  “What exactly do you think I want?” he rumbled, the sound sexy as hell even after the many times she’d heard it.

  “A family. A wife. Children. I can’t.”

  “Is that why you left me when I proposed?” he asked.

  “Yes. James, there’s severe mental illness in my family, and I’m a possible carrier.”

  He cupped her face, tilting her head to meet his gaze. “Have you been tested?”

  “Not yet, no. But the probability is high. And I love you too much to put you through a lifetime of caring for me if my mind decides to go that route.” She hurried the words out.

  “Haven’t you learned yet what you mean to me? A life without you is just a shell of an existence, love.”

  Oh lord. How could she deny someone with those kinds of words anything?

  “James, even if I’m not a carrier, my children could be.” She licked her lips. “I made a decision a long time ago I wouldn’t have children.”

  “Sweetheart, you might change your mind.”

  She shook her head. “I got my tubes tied. I didn’t want to take any chances. I wanted to have my reproductive organs removed, but my gynecologist wouldn’t do it. He said I was too young and might change my mind.”

  He cocked his head. “I could live an entire lifetime with you, and only you, and be completely happy.”

  Her heart melted. “Oh, James. Are you sure? I know you always wanted kids, a family.”

  He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “You are my family. It’s your smile that fills me with pleasure. It’s your hand I want to hold through the darkest and happiest times. Nothing and no one else matters more to me than you. As long as I have you, I don’t need anything else.”

  “What about kids?” She wanted to believe him, her heart almost broke with the sweet words he said.

  “You’re my mate. My other half. The only one I need.” Resolution deepened the lines of his face. “Children are nice and if you feel the need to increase our family, there is always adoption. But the reality is that all I need—today, tomorrow and always…is you.”

  He was right. She’d forgotten all about that. They didn’t have to have biological children to have a family. They didn’t need children at all. They just needed each other.

  Epilogue

  “So I guess I can’t quit, huh?” She grinned, sitting behind her desk glancing from Brock to Galvez.

  Both men shook their heads.

  “You’re stuck.” Brock’s eyes flashed black. “With me.”

  “Wheeler says you’re it and he’s not looking for someone else.” Galvez smiled. She’d recently started to speak to him more often, with less hostility. Their conversations mainly centered on Roxy, cases and her family, but it was better than the antagonism they had before. He admitted he’d been frustrated at her attitude toward him and with himself for not knowing about her sooner.

  “Besides, we just got a new recruit.” Brock winked and passed her a file.

  “Really? Who is it?” She asked, opening the folder to a photo of a woman. Clearly Latin with her brown hair tied back and her hazel eyes staring straight at the camera, unsmiling.

  “Katrina Mejia,” Galvez replied. “She’ll be good for this team.”

  She eyed the description of her new team member, something clearly missing from her file. “Doesn’t say what her ability is.”

  “She’d like to discuss that with you herself,” Galvez said, shrugging as if he didn’t understand what the big deal was. He stood to go. “Call me if you need anything.”

  Her cell phone rang as Galvez walked out of her office, which left her alone with Brock. She hit the speaker button and waited.

  “Hello, Ramirez.”

  “Hey, Boss lady. So glad you’re staying on board,” he said with an urgency not familiar with his voice.

  “Thank you, but I have a feeling that’s not why you called me.”

  She leaned in her seat and took a moment to just watch her man. He was so frickin hot her body heated with just a smile from him.

  “So, here’s the thing,” Ramirez said without his usual humor. “I want to know why Jane’s file begins on the day she joined the academy.”

  Cyn grinned. He was finally paying attention. “Sorry, that’s classified.”

  “Since when is someone’s file classified?” he growled.

  Uh-oh. Someone had his tail in a knot. “I can’t help you if you want to talk about Donovan, Ramirez.”

  He growled again, and she heard something break. “This is crazy. How is it that she has no family history? Nothing. How the hell am I supposed to find her?”

  “Ramirez, I’m sorry. I can’t tell you where Donovan is.” She smiled at Brock’s lifting of his brows. “But I can tell you that if you happen to be looking for her, the information on where to find it is right in that ‘fake’ file.”

  Silence. Then. “Shit! I didn’t even think of it. Thank you, Boss.” Ramirez’s voice returned to humorous. She kind of enjoyed that side of the shifter. It made their job not so…harsh. A bit of humor wouldn’t hurt. “There’s one more thing,” he said as she was about to hang up.

  “What’s that, Ramirez?”

  “Brock. He’s different now.”

  “Oh?” She watched Brock across from her, his gaze piercing and hot.

  “He isn’t withdrawn or looking like he’s missing half of himself anymore,” Ramirez said, the sound of things being tossed in the background. “I can see he’s happy. You did that. I just wanted to say thank you. I like this version of him better.”

  She didn’t realize how much of an impact she’d had on Brock’s life. “That’s really nice to hear, Ramirez.”

  “It’s cool. Thanks for the advice on Jane,” he said and hung up.

  He shouldn’t thank her yet. He still had to deal with Donovan and whatever mood he found her in. That would be interesting. Very interesting to hear about.

  “Want to go for lunch?” Brock asked.

  She nodded and stood. “Is this my employee asking, or my fiancé?”

  “I do not mix business with pleasure. It’s the fiancé asking. Though the employee has the hots for you too.”

  She laughed and grabbed his hand to follow him out of the office. Who said you could run from love? She must have been deluded to think she’d be able to stay away from him. Or that he’d let her. It took her ten years to finally realize: If you run from love, you’re asking for a chase.

  THE END

  About the Author

  New York Times & USA Today Bestselling Author Milly Taiden (AKA April Angel) loves to write sexy stories. How sexy? So sexy they will surely make your ereader sizzle. Usually paranormal or contemporary, her stories are a great quick way to satisfy your craving for fun heroines with curves and sexy alphas with fur.

  Milly lives in New York City with her hubby, their boy child and their little dog “Needy Speedy”. She’s aware she’s bossy, is addicted to shoe shopping, chocolate (but who isn’t, right?) and Dunkin’ Donuts coffee.

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  A Prowl on the Wild Side

  An Aesire Shifters BBW Standalone

  By Erika Masten

  CHAPTER ONE

  “Are you still having those nightmares?” he asked and then dropped his deep voice even lower to add, “Don’t lie to me, Vanessa.”

  Then stop using that tone with me, Jeremy, she said silently, interrupted in her moment of daydreaming. And stop staring at my ass. Not the prudent thing to say in this situation, Vanessa had to remind herself, and she did so with her big brother’s voice in her head. Aubrey would have been proud, of himself at the very least. The restraint was uncharacteristic for Vanessa.

  Standing at the window of Jeremy Koller’s private office, a dominating room of dark wood and stiff leather, the plump little assistant swept her long brown hair back with one hand. She turned her head only as much as she had to in order to glance over her shoulder at the man, who wore his thirty-five years with an austere sort of charm and good looks. He sat regarding her steadily, hawkishly from his kingly leather chair behind his enormous slab of a desk. It reminded Vanessa of a judge’s bench, and she felt her brow furrow at the idea, at the dynamic it symbolized. Dark-haired and hard-angled, firm in body and tone, Koller was surprisingly stern for a psychologist and unsettlingly intimate for a boss. How Vanessa had gone from managing his practice and his supervision schedule for the four student interns who worked out of his office to reclining uneasily on that uncomfortable leather chaise of his a couple of times a week after hours she didn’t know.

  Oh, wait. She was crazy. That was it. Not bat shit, white coat, talking to herself crazy, but just gently unhinged. Had been for as long as she could remember, or at least since her parents had died, and she’d only been four then. Nightmares had haunted her for twenty years, tormenting her with shadows of men in black suits. Not business suits. Tactical gear, she’d have called it now. They kept finding her wherever she hid. They kept asking where her parents were, where her brother was, so they could take her family away and hurt them. Strange, she thought, that she feared losing parents who were already dead. Strange that she and Aubrey were always children again in the night terrors.

  These days, though, Vanessa mostly just had recurring dreams about being an animal, a beast, a primal hunter stalking through trees and moonlit meadows. Granted she did sometimes wake up in the park or a neighbor’s back garden covered in grass and leaves from another naked sleepwalking session, and there were the full-sensory hallucinations now and again. So, yeah, crazy.

  “Vanessa,” Jeremy said in the cautioning tone of a disapproving father, which made their unorthodox counseling relationship and her sense that he had less than paternal designs on her even more distressing.

  “No, no nightmares,” she promised, and she was telling the truth, strictly speaking. The vivid dreams that let Vanessa’s spirit revel in the freedom and strength and sheer power she could never experience in her normal, sane day to day life didn’t feel like nightmares. And her bare, chubby ass hadn’t gone naked sleepwalking in almost two weeks. All these odd Freudian sessions with Dr. Koller and the constant nagging from her brother, Aubrey, to just live a quiet little life filled with gardening and baking and yoga were surely curing her bit by bit of her delusional nocturnal wandering. Or maybe it was just the extra deadbolts on the front and back doors of her townhouse.

  A hint of a chuckle broke from one corner of Vanessa’s mouth, where her musings had unconsciously coaxed a smile out of her. At this, Dr. Koller cleared his throat, demanding his assistant’s full attention. Though reluctant to turn away from the window, from the gold-tinged afternoon sun with its glorious heat penetrating her skin, Vanessa pivoted slowly to meet Jeremy’s steely gray eyes.

  Before he could ask any more of his emotionally invasive questions, Vanessa said, helpfully, “The front’s all locked up, and the last of the interns and their clients cleared out about an hour and a half ago. I think everyone was hoping to get a head start on weekend plans. It’s a quarter to six, so you should find the freeway traffic thinning out by now. I’ll let you get home.”

  Again, to what, Vanessa had no idea. There was no wife or girlfriend that Jeremy ever mentioned, not that he necessarily would have disclosed that to his assistant. Personal details, like the power balance in their (un)professional relationship, only flowed in one direction during their conversations. He didn’t seem like a guy who’d have had a dog. Canines would have been too unabashedly affectionate for him, she was willing to bet. Vanessa could picture him satisfied enough curling up with his abstract art collection and wine cellar in lieu of dealing with people or pets. Or a cat. Yes, if anything, Jeremy would have had a cat, just one single feline of the most disdainful and self-absorbed nature imaginable. And he’d have considered the narcissistic little bastard a model of self-actualization.

  Maybe that was what Koller found intriguing about Vanessa—assuming it wasn’t just a chubby-chaser fetish—the fact that she was very much like a cat herself. But not a house cat, a big cat like a lion. Confident and self-possessed almost to the point of absurdity, curious and bold one moment, happy to wile the day away dozing in the sun the next, mischievous, enigmatic…well, because Aubrey wouldn’t let her be anything else with his constant harping about being careful of strangers, cautious of her surroundings, blah blah blah. That was to be expected, she supposed, with a brother who made his living as some kind of hush-hush federal investigator. Everyone was a suspect to him until proven otherwise.

  Koller stood up from his desk as he took a breath to speak, and Vanessa anticipated him. “I’ve got to go, too, if you don’t mind. I promised to have dinner with my brother tonight.” To which Koller nodded, after a pause, almost as though granting his permission.

  Aubrey was the only male Vanessa could mention around her boss without raising his eyebrow and his subtle but cutting ire. Between the two of them, Jeremy and her brother managed to make dating too much trouble for Vanessa, generally, with overtime from one and an earful from the other whenever the rare suitor came within courting distance. Lucky for her she had a satisfying fantasy life, a side effect of mild derangement, she supposed.

  Feeling her mood lift at the very idea of leaving the office and getting out into the late afternoon bustle of the city, Vanessa beamed Koller her best, most innocent smile and hurried out to reclaim her purse from her desk. Every step in her heeled but otherwise modest loafers, down the corridor to the elevator and out the double-door, art nouveau entryway of the office building, lightened the weight on her shoulders—if not the rest of her curvy body. Again, Vanessa chuckled to herself, and she basked in the summer heat everyone around her seemed to find insufferable.

  Being on the thick side—voluptuous, plump, plush, chubby, heavy, Rubenesque, whatever—Vanessa knew she was supposed to be shy and self-conscious of her body. Fuck that, she thought, as she strode happily down the tree-lined sidewalk while unfastening the top button of her proper white office blouse. She swung her hips a little extra, too, liking the way her navy blue pencil skirt hugged her butt and thighs as she checked herself out in the reflection of a shop window. Who cared if her body confidence shocked a passing stranger she probably wouldn’t ever see again anyway? It just felt too damn good to have the weekend ahead of her, the sun on the apples of her cheeks, and the bristle of anticipation all around her as people left their offices with a hurried step and Friday night plans playing through their minds like a favorite song.

  Speaking of which…. Vanessa fished her cell phone from the side pocket of her purse and dialed her brother. Mr. All American Boy Next Door’s handsome, square-jawed mug came up on her screen while the call rang through. He had his phone set to play Flight of the Valkyries for callers while they waited. “Doofus,” she muttered to herself but smiled anyway. He was so in the right line of work.

  “Ah,
god, Vanessa, I’m sorry,” he said instead of hello, voice lilting sheepishly.

  “You forgot your little sister again.” She moped, but it was a mock disappointment in her tone. Sure, she was up for another Friday night of homemade spaghetti and the newest action movie DVD release with Aubrey. He was the one beating off Friday night dates with a stick, after all, not her. But Vanessa could also hear little broken bits of music as a street band warmed up around the corner and maybe a couple of streets over—salsa music, if she wasn’t mistaken.

  “I’m working a case right now, kid. Never can tell when I’m going to catch one I can’t walk away from just because it’s five o’clock, ya know?”

  “Kid.” She snickered. Aubrey was twenty-nine. Maybe being five years older had been a big deal when they were four and nine, but now? “Okay, fine.”

  “Tomorrow night?” he asked over the tinny connection. Seemed like Aubrey’s phone never worked properly.

  “Yeah. I suppose I can make do tonight with microwave Lean Cuisine and wine in a box in front of Friends reruns.” Vanessa was mostly teasing him, but it was partly true. She’d probably just eat something quick and easy in front of the television. Later. After she’d seen what that music was all about.

  And it was, as it turned out, all about a street fair. Great timing for Vanessa, who bristled excitedly at the energy and anticipation of the set-up process and the transformation of a commercial district into a huge outdoor party. Nine square blocks of music stages and spicy food stands sprouted up like flowers between cracks in the pavement as she prowled the thickening crowd in all its sensory glory. Passionate music, hot food, the bright colors of banners and stall signs and summer clothing, and dancing in the streets. Vanessa sipped on a virgin mojito lemonade and wove her way through the crowd with a smile on her face, a sway to her hips, and a lightness of heart that made it seem like a perfect evening, one where anything could happen….