Gone with the Wolf - By Kristin Miller Page 0,13
he could trust into his inner circle.
Mother Nature certainly had a twisted sense of humor, matching him with a loose-cannon bartender…a human, loose-cannon bartender, no less.
“So you come back into town and decide to stop by my bar?” she asked, eyebrows pitching. “No offense, but you don’t look like my typical customer. Most of my patrons can’t afford the tie cinched around your neck.”
“This one?” Drake eyed his charcoal-gray, Italian silk tie lying against his pristinely white Forzieri dress shirt. The ensemble had been purchased by his stylist—she’d said it exuded powerful grace. He thought she was full of shit, but the clothes fit well, so he couldn’t complain. “This tie couldn’t have cost more than fifty.”
More like three hundred, but who cared?
“Is that so?” she said, a playful gleam in her eye.
Leaning over so that the swell of her breasts pressed against the bar, Emelia dragged a finger across Drake’s chest. He fought to keep his eyes off the plumpness of her breasts as his slacks tightened at the seams. She smiled, slow and teasing, as she spun small circles over his pectoral muscles. Drake’s mouth dried as blood froze in his veins. He couldn’t get their kiss out of his head, couldn’t forget the way her lips had felt brushing against his. She was so close. All he’d have to do is lean forward, drag his hands through her hair, and catch her mouth.
They weren’t in his building or on duty. They wouldn’t be doing anything wrong. He could kiss her, drive her crazy, pleasure her in the back room, and they wouldn’t be breaking any company rules. Hell, even if they were, he was the damned boss. If it meant kissing Emelia again, he’d rewrite the whole company-relations book to include a boss-secretary-Luminary loophole.
Emelia leaned farther forward. Drake’s breath sucked in as a hiss. She latched on to the bottom of the tie like it was a rein, gave it a commanding tug, then flicked it, whacking him in the nose. She laughed the way she had in the cellar, carefree and playful, her smile wide and bright like a Colgate ad.
The woman was trying to kill him.
“Very funny,” he said, as she went back to drying glasses. How could she be so unaffected by their closeness? “You’re right—bars aren’t normally my thing. This place has a unique quality about it, I’ll give you that. It stands out in this neighborhood like a gem.”
Just like its owner.
Something he said pulled down the corners of Emelia’s lips. For the first time since he’d seen her in the bar, she went rigid. “Yeah, well, if big businesses keep stepping in and shutting places like this down, there’ll be no personality left in Seattle. Everyone will walk around town like corporate drones with Palm Pilot styluses shoved up their asses.”
There came the surge of anger again. It flowed off Emelia in tangible waves. How could she be hot one minute, nearly scorching his skin through his clothes, and be as cold as ice the next? Was a big business threatening to shut down her bar? Was that the cause for her hostility? Whatever the reason, Drake had to diffuse the situation, especially if they were going to be attached at the hip for the next couple hundred years.
How would that work, anyway? How could he take control over a pack if he couldn’t produce an heir? And would Emelia want to be turned? Would she want to bond with him at all? There were too many questions and not enough blood flowing through his brain to think them all through.
“I think we started off on the wrong foot, Emelia. What do you say we start fresh?”
“Fresh?”
“Let’s pretend the wine cellar never happened.” How could he forget? “I’m not your boss and you’re not my secretary. What if I’m just a guy who walked into your bar?”
“You can’t hide who you really are.” Emelia slid a fifty-cent tip off the bar and dropped the quarters into a mason jar next to the till. “You can staple antlers on a dog, but that won’t make him a reindeer.”
Laughter erupted from Drake’s chest. “You say the craziest shit sometimes, you know that?”
“Haven’t you ever seen How the Grinch Stole Christmas?”
“Can’t say I have.”
She tilted her head and shrugged. “Sounds like you had a pretty boring childhood.”
Images of intense Alpha training—military-school-esque—in remote portions of the Sierra Nevadas flickered through Drake’s brain like an old movie reel. The laughter that had bounced through him moments