Page 88 of A Wolf for Winter

“You’ll leave him alone,” Boar informed his father firmly.

“Or you’ll be going back to the manor by yourself, Dad,” Rose added.

Lilac stepped up to join her siblings, creating a wall between their irate father and him. It would’ve been borderline emasculating had the three witches not resembled a pack. That’s what they were—his pack, his family.

“My name is Allen Chase, sir,” he called over their heads. “Yes, I’m related to Lewellyn; yes, I’m a wolf shifter; yes, I’m madly in love with your daughter; and yes”—in for a penny, in for a pound—“I was sent here by the Coalition to protect your children.”

“And the Power of Three protects him,” Boar growled.

Stag looked into the determined faces of his children, then down to the magic they wielded in defense of their caretaker. The magic they were prepared to use against him. Taking a step back, he snuffed out his power, but his children didn’t relax. They wouldn’t, not until they truly knew he wasn’t a threat to their friend.

“Fine,” he spat. “For now, Lilac, you will remain in Annesley Valley until you are summoned. Then we will discuss your rash choices as a family when we’re all back together. Agreed?”

“I can do that, if you promise not to harm Allen in any way. You, or any other Hawthorne or our associates.”

“I promise,” he forced out.

“Thank you, Dad,” she said, nothing but heartfelt sincerity in her voice.

Her father deflated, but only slightly. He thrust a finger at Allen. “You might not be the Hall’s caretaker anymore, but you’re hers. For now. Understand me? You break her heart and I’ll break your legs. And that will only be the beginning of your suffering.”

Allen gazed down at his woman, knowing he didn’t need this witch’s permission to protect his daughter with his life. Their bond was something deeper than that. “Understood, sir.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Like the others, Lilac returned to her room to pack her belongings. Ran to her room, actually. She was full of jitters, the excited kind, and threw everything into her trunk without bothering to sort or fold. It was a delightful tumble of silks and wools and linens and her toiletries and makeup piled on top all pell-mell, and she didn’t even care. She had to sit on the lid to get the latches to close, though, but they managed in the end.

It was happening. Really happening. Lilac had fought for her freedom, for the future she wanted, and it was hers. Certainly, it was soured somewhat knowing that her mother and the rest of the robed elders of the coven might be in trouble in Redbud, but that would be handled imminently by witches far stronger than her. And she would certainly help, of course, but she would not be sucked back into the fold as Grandmother’s beautiful weapon. That beauty was solely reserved for someone else now.

Opening her bedroom door, she peered into the hallway. It was dark and quiet, the random sounds of her siblings packing occasionally punctuating the still atmosphere. There was no sign of her father—probably hitching the wether goats to the wagon outside. On the first floor, the massive hearth was muted with small orange flames that only just licked over the logs. The Hall was readying itself for another year of hibernation until the next Yuletide Gala.

Barefoot, she slipped into the hallway and closed the bedroom door behind her. Her feet whispered over the hardwood floor as she glided down the hall and rounded the corner to the stretch of wall inset with the big bay window. She cast glances over the balcony the entire time, not sure why she was worried about being discovered, for she had chosen this and had no regrets. She rounded the next corner and padded down the hall a few doors before stopping outside Allen’s bedroom. Pressing her ear against the door, she discovered him shuffling around inside. A twist of the brass doorknob later and she was slipping over the threshold.

He turned from the open suitcase, a rolled-up shirt still in one hand. “Lilac?”

Allen was dressed only in those plaid pajama pants, tiny beads of water still clinging to his blond hair from his shower. The rest of him gleamed in the warm yellow light of the desk lamp, every curve and angle in sharp relief.

Lilac shamelessly let her eyes roam from his firm biceps to the range of his shoulders and down the thick muscles of his chest. The ridges of his abdomen made her mouth go dry, and the sharp cut of his hips as they disappeared into the flannel sent an almost painful pang of longing deep into her belly.

“Lilac.” The heat in his voice dragged her eyes back to his face. His own gaze was like molten gold, the muscle in his jaw feathering as he clenched his teeth. “What are you doing in here?”

“You’re not mad at me, are you?” she said, suddenly unsure.

“I’m just trying not to rip that nightgown off your body and devour you, sweet girl,” he replied. His tone was light, but the way he looked at her was anything but. It was all-consuming desire, and yet he stayed planted where he was by the bed on the other side of the room. “I’m trying to give you a moment to tell me whatever it is you came in here to say, but your scent . . ..” His eyelids fluttered as he inhaled deeply, a ripple of pleasure visible across his chest and shoulders. “It’s making it very difficult for me to concentrate when I can smell how aroused you are.”

Her heart fluttered, growing wings and soaring heavenward. “I didn’t come here to say anything,” she whispered. “I came here to claim you.”

The shirt Allen held in his hand dropped into his suitcase with a thud.

Lilac shoved herself away from the door, nightgown fluttering against her calves as she flew across the room. Allen caught her, arms banding around her waist as he slammed his head down to meet her kiss. It was a bruising, savage kiss, a ravaging of each other’s lips. Allen met her passion with all of his, nearly crushing her against him as his hands roved over her body.

She was on fire for him, impatient for every touch. Her own nails dragged down the taut skin of his back, her fingers squeezing slab after slab of hard muscle, never satiated. They tangled in his hair, teased his nipples, slid down the ridges of his abdomen to slip beneath his pajamas and—

Allen yanked her hand back with a warning, “Not yet,” and guided it back to his face. She slipped it into his hair, grazing her fingernails against his scalp just the way he liked. The man and the wolf had that in common. He growled with pleasure.

Then Lilac tightened her grip, forcing his lips to abandon their ministrations to her shoulder and return to hers. She pressed against him, drunk from the heat of his skin searing through the thin cotton of her nightgown, and sought more of that heat from his mouth. She wanted his tongue plunging into her again and again . . ..

His fist gripped her wavy brown hair, keeping his plundering mouth fused against her, his other hand gripping her butt and keeping her hips fused against something else.