One Very Special Woman Read online

  Merek gave her an assessing look. “You brought us here for a reason,” he stated.

  Ebony smiled at them both. “I think this is where the wolves come to shift and run in their animal form. I’d like to see you both as wolves.”

  * * * *

  Merek knew Ebony had a definite destination in mind when he’d tapped her arm to signal that they should swing around the cabins and head back toward the front of the conference center grounds. She’d ignored him and although he’d touched her very gently, he knew she would have noticed. Despite that, he was still surprised at her request. Her father was a wolf and she’d been brought up as much with a wolf pack as with humans. At least, that’s what he’d thought. Maybe that was something he should have checked.

  “Were you brought up with your father’s pack, or just in the human world?”

  “Both. We lived in town because Dad and Mom both worked there. But we spent most of the summer with the pack. Mom teaches elementary school and both our parents always wanted us to know our complete heritage.”

  Now Merek was even more confused. “So why do you want us to transform for you if you know what wolves look like?”

  “Because I don’t know what you and Ben look like yet.”

  Oh. Okay. He could deal with that.

  “You’d better keep a watch out that we don’t frighten any runners or walkers, though,” said Ben sitting down and undoing his boots.

  Hmm. Merek didn’t really want strangers seeing him naked. Usually he transformed in his home on the pack lands and walked outside in wolf form. He didn’t shift in front of people all that much. Oh well, everyone at the DADISP was supposed to be familiar with wolves so he’d better copy Ben and get undressed.

  It was just a shame Ebony wouldn’t be getting naked as well. He wouldn’t mind sucking her delightful breasts again. She hadn’t left the nipple clips behind last night, so it was possible she was wearing them. Even running his hands over her silky-soft skin would be wonderful. Merek sighed mentally and concentrated on getting undressed. A giant erection wasn’t what he needed right now either, although he really hoped she’d let him fuck her tonight. The first step in his plan was a success, though. She’d agreed he could have the last dance with her. Hopefully he could leverage that into getting her to go home with him and Ben again.

  He piled his clothes on the grass beside Ebony, removing his jeans last, and only after he’d looked in every direction to check they were alone. He stepped away from her and transformed then stayed where he was looking at her.

  Ben was at his side, in wolf form as well, and he wondered what she thought of them. They were quite ordinary brown wolves, both of them, although his coat was a little longer than normal, and Ben’s did have a faint sheen of red to it, although not as obvious as in his hair.

  Ebony stood up and came across to them stroking their fur. “I thought you might be redder than this, Ben. Dorothea said that at the shape-shifter clinic one of the nurses there has really red hair and his coat as a wolf is red as well. Not brownish red, she said, but traffic light red. He can’t ever run in the wild because he looks like a person wearing a costume. Well that’s what she told Ivory and me anyway. But you are really almost brown.”

  Merek stayed still, loving her gentle hands on his fur and waiting patiently for her instructions. What he didn’t expect was when she swung a leg over his back and sat on him. “Walk forward slowly,” she ordered, her fingers digging into the ruff of fur and fat on the back of his neck.

  Her weight was a definite force on his back, but she wasn’t really heavy, as such. Not that he was in the habit of giving people wolf-back rides. He wondered if the wolves in her father’s pack had taken her for rides in the past. Or maybe even her father had done it. But he focused on walking slowly and smoothly so she would neither be frightened nor fall off. After a few minutes she patted his side and he understood he could move a little faster, until he was running across the grass. When they reached the other side, of the grounds, she bent down and kissed his ear, then climbed off.

  Merek stretched his back and watched as Ben nudged her and whined.

  “Of course I’ll ride you as well. Take me back to the tree please.”

  They ran back together and Merek had a vision of them running around the pack lands like this. It was something he’d never thought of before. But he’d enjoyed giving her a ride and planned to do it again. As well as fucking her, of course.

  While he and Ben were getting dressed, Merek kept flicking his gaze to Ebony. She was silent and thoughtful, but happy as well as far as he could tell. “What are you thinking?” he asked as he pulled his shirt on.

  “I would recognize you both in a wolf pack unless you deliberately tried to disguise yourselves. You’d need to cut your fur though, Merek, and Ben, you’d have to dye yours. Although I suspect your eyes would still give you both away.”

  “Did your father take you for wolf rides?” asked Ben.

  Aha. His thought exactly. It was amazing how much he and Ben thought the same. It was one reason why they would be able to share a woman, because so often their thoughts and plans were very similar.

  “It started as a bit of as joke, and became a holiday tradition. Dad’s getting too old to do it now, though, so I enjoyed riding on you both. Thank you for changing for me.”

  “What would you like to do now?” asked Merek. What he’d like to do was take her back to the cabin and fuck her, but he suspected that wouldn’t be her answer.

  “Ivory and I agreed we ought to mingle. We’re meeting at the sports court at three.”

  Merek pulled his cell phone out of his pants pocket. Well fuck. It was ten to three already.

  * * * *

  Ebony hadn’t had a lot of time to talk to Ivory, as their main efforts had been directed at ensuring their dance classes went smoothly. But when Ivory had suggested they spend the afternoon mingling with conference attendees, she’d agreed with relief. She felt mean not dancing with half the men who asked her, but there were only so many dances in a night, and she wasn’t prepared to go to the lengths of some old-fashioned parties where men were limited to half a dance each. That just seemed plain weird.

  But sitting in the sunshine watching volleyball for an hour or so sounded like the perfect way to spend the afternoon. Besides, she’d put her swimwear on under her clothes and was even ready to consider relaxing in the hot tub for a while.

  Ivory was sitting on a blanket under a tree, with half a dozen men and Dorothea. Ebony went across and joined them, Ben and Merek following her and sitting behind her. Ebony hid her grin. They were welcome to stay as long as they didn’t get possessive. She liked being with them, and she’d sure as hell enjoyed the sex last night, but she wasn’t ready yet to sign up with them for a permanent relationship. She needed to know much more about them and to watch their characters to ensure they were the people she thought she knew.

  However, she was willing to admit none of the very nice men who’d danced with her last night had made her pulse flutter at all, whereas Ben and Merek made every pulse point in her body do a whole lot more than just flutter.

  “Ebony, my name’s Thom. I’ve been trying to convince Ivory to come with me to my pack and teach the men to dance. We’ve had no females born into our pack in almost twenty years and there’s far too much testosterone floating around. I’m really concerned the men will degenerate into fighting and feuding if I can’t civilize them. I hadn’t even thought of dance, but after sweating through your classes this morning it seems to me the perfect exercise. Unlike other so-called manly pursuits, there’s a good mix of athleticism but a man also needs control and manners to succeed at this sport as well.”

  Dorothea spoke, which was good because it was something Ebony certainly couldn’t answer off the cuff. “I’ve suggested martial arts. Not the smash-’em-up kind but the varieties which insist on control and the use of body, mind, and spirit in unity with each other.”

  “Some of the Korean ones wo
uld be good. Most of them are based around the value of inner peace, with force only justified in defense,” said Ivory.

  Ebony was thinking hard. She preferred that idea to going somewhere to teach dozens of men something they likely wouldn’t be particularly interested in. The fact that the dance classes here were crowded was probably because the men wanted to impress the lady who’d taken their fancy. Whereas for the men in Thom’s pack, there was a drastic shortage of woman to impress.

  “Tae kwon do, aikido, or even gatko would work,” she said slowly trying to think of any others.

  A lot of conversation broke out around the topic of martial arts, but Ebony wasn’t listening. For the first time she was thinking about the men here from their point of view instead of hers. She was loving being important and the center of attention instead of pretty much a second-rate citizen, for the first time in her life. No matter what the government might say, a huge percentage of the world believed women were not equal to men. For some people that idea was based on religion. For others it was cultural. For a third group it was old white men determined to hold onto their own power at all costs, which meant passing the baton of money and authority only to other slightly less old white men. But that was all immaterial. Here she was surrounded by two hundred male wolves representing dozens and dozens of different packs, where their future was dependent on them finding and wooing a woman who was prepared to love a shape-shifter.

  How hard it must be for so many of these men, grown up in a world where males were king and considered superior to females in every way, to have to stop and relearn everything they thought they’d ever known. Only by accepting a woman and treating her respectfully would their species survive. She really needed to honor every man here. He was a leader of his species. Kind, honorable, and prepared to change to save his people. Yet she personally could do so little. She could make a difference in one man’s life, or possibly two men’s. But that wasn’t enough to save even one pack.

  Wolves had to be very careful. They couldn’t stand on a street corner and announce their shape-shifter status. For a start, most people didn’t believe such a species existed. But tragically, of those ones who did believe, far too many saw them as an evil to be gotten rid of, a horror to be destroyed and hidden.

  It was an important lesson Thom had just taught her. How stupid was she not to have figured it out for herself long ago?

  * * * *

  Ben was starting to feel as if he was six years old again and his birthday couldn’t come soon enough. All he wanted to do was hold Ebony in his arms and demonstrate his love for her and his desire to cherish her to her in a way that she couldn’t ignore. But first they were surrounded by a large group all talking generally. Ben could see Ebony was touched by Thom’s story and he was suddenly terrified she’d choose to go with him because his need was so much greater than Ben and Merek’s. Jasper’s pack had women in it. Certainly not fifty percent, but some at least. Thom’s pack was on the verge of self-destructing for lack of females.

  Then Dorothea, Ivory, and Ebony went and sat in a hot tub. They all had swimwear on under their clothes. Ben was seriously tempted to jump in wearing his jeans. But fear of being banned from the convention made him rethink that plan and although he ran back to the cabin and threw his clothes off, by the time he returned wearing his board shorts and flip-flops, and carrying a towel, the tub was crowded with people and he had to sit on the bench outside and just watch Ebony from there. He couldn’t even feast his eyes on her beautiful body because the tub was so full of people all he could see were her shoulders and head.

  His only consolation was that the three women made it quite clear anyone who followed them back to their cabins would not succeed in dancing with them at the Boot Scootin’ Bonanza later today.

  All three of the dance classes today had included practice of the Texas Two Step, the Cowboy Cha-Cha, and the Boot Scootin’ Boogie, so he was feeling reasonably confident of not making a fool of himself tonight. Although it seemed strange and awkward to walk around with his hands on his pelvis or his thumbs through his belt loops. Did real cowboys actually do that?

  Well at least he’d look the part. He had jeans, a western shirt, a string tie, a Stetson, a belt with a large buckle, and of, course his own boots to wear. And Ebony was his for the supper dance. Well, his and Merek’s.

  Ben spent most of the night watching Ebony, while trying hard not to look like he was stalking her. He even danced a couple of the line dances just to help the time pass more quickly until supper. And he had to confess he enjoyed the stomping, kicking, and clapping even when he couldn’t see his woman. But the best part of the evening was supper. Today the food was set up on long tables down one side of the room and everyone walked past filling their plate then sitting or standing on the other side of the room. But he managed to tuck Ebony between him and Merek and talk to her. She looked stunning in her skin-tight jeans and a denim shirt. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail with a strip of leather and she danced every dance even though her boots had reasonably high heels.

  “How can women dance in high heels? I find it complicated enough in flat shoes,” he asked.

  “Have you heard of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers?”

  “In the old movies? I mean, really, really, old movies? Sure.”

  “Well if you notice, Ginger does every dance step Fred does, only backward and in high heels. Sorry, it’s an old joke, but women learn to dance in heels, and on the tips of their toes, what we call en pointe, as well as on the soles of their feet.”

  “That’s another thing, why don’t ballerinas break their toes doing that?” asked Merek.

  “Some do. But the toes are padded, and the shoes have a shank that helps distribute the weight. Also women learn over many years how to dance ballet properly.”

  And that was the end of that conversation. The music started again, Ebony’s next dance partner arrived, she thanked him and Merek, and was gone. Now Ben had to wait until Merek claimed the last dance with Ebony. Would she come home again with them tonight? Or was last night a one-off occasion?

  Chapter Five

  Apart from the half hour of bliss sitting beside Ebony over supper, and the extremely brief touches of her hand during the last dance, which was another line dance, the evening had been one of trying to be patient for Merek. He knew he had to be fair to everyone else at the DADISP. With only around sixty women for almost two hundred men, he had no right to monopolize one of them as yet. Not until she agreed to let them claim her.

  So he spent the time mentally polishing his plans for the evening. He had devised an entire scene that wasn’t BDSM, but would still give her a taste of what it meant to submit to a Dom who would always ensure her pleasure was paramount in everything they did. Before he could chain her to the wall and teach her the sublime delights of paddling, whipping, and subspace, he needed her to agree to double penetration. The only way the three of them could be a true family was if both he and Ben could possess her simultaneously. He expected she would have already thought through the issue. Surely she wouldn’t have agreed to date two men even once without being mentally willing to consider double penetration?

  Once again he had plans A, B, and C all set up ready to go back in the cabin he and Benedict shared. If she refused to come home with them tonight, he had a plan G for Garden worked out. If that failed as well, likely his balls would burst from repressed tension. Or maybe he’d just have to start again tomorrow.

  The moment the dance ended he bowed and took her hand. “Will you come home with Ben and me tonight, please?” he asked.

  “I’ve been looking forward to it.”

  “Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. Tonight’s exit procedures are the same as last night. Ladies leave first and only then may the men depart. Tomorrow night we’ll be enjoying a traditional barbecue out in the gardens. I look forward to seeing you all again at seven tomorrow. Goodnight.”

  Merek politely clapped after Dorothea’s speech. He h
ad to admire her prowess at planning such a huge event and having the personality to keep two hundred male wolves in line as well as all the women and the conference staff. Yet she seemed to do it effortlessly. He’d never seen her sweaty or harassed looking. She was always smiling and calm. Or maybe she was only stressed on the inside and the outside was just a façade.

  Merek walked Ebony partway to the door, careful not to approach the security guard there too closely. He noticed that once again Ebony didn’t have a purse or a sweater or anything. Last night, of course, she’d had an entire roll-along suitcase, but this time he wondered what she did with her keys and her cabin swipe card. Even a cell phone. He’d never seen her carrying a purse in the afternoons either. Most women had tiny over-the-shoulder bags, but not Ebony. That was really strange.

  When he and Ben reached the foyer, he noticed that a lot of the women were waiting. Last night there’d been some. Tonight it looked like half or even more than half. Most of the wolves had evidently been busy choosing women. Or maybe the women were planning to take several different men for a test drive. Well, he couldn’t blame them for that. There was no divorce in shape-shifter marriages and a week didn’t leave a lot of time for a trial marriage.

  Shit! He really hoped Ebony didn’t want to try out anyone but him and Ben. There were so many more things he longed to do with her, to show her, to teach her. He wanted to watch her come as he brought her endless orgasms with his hands, his mouth, his cock, and his toys.

  She left with him and Ben straightaway, and once they were outside the building he tugged her tightly against his side, his arm around her waist. Ben matched him on her other side, tucking her closely between them.

  “Why don’t you carry a purse?” he asked her straightaway.

  She laughed softly. “It’s an old habit. As a girl I always wore jeans because I liked to dance, and climb trees, and dresses were nuisance. Jeans have pockets so I didn’t need a purse. Later on I started to teach dancing, and a purse would have been easy to steal while I was busy with the class, so I always locked everything in my car, and just tucked my car keys inside my bra. Now I almost never even think of a purse.”