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  From the once-over Patrick gave Ollie while reaching for his zipper, the werewolf didn’t mind at all.

  Ollie smirked at him and arched off the bed to tug down his own jeans. Something in him grew hotter at the way Patrick’s nostrils flared as his gaze followed the movement of Ollie’s hands. Fuck. His cock sprang free and Ollie hissed as the cold air hit him, but as soon as his jeans and underwear were off, Patrick was there—naked this time—and covering Ollie’s body with his, hot skin against hot skin.

  “Can you come more than once?” Patrick asked and Ollie would have rolled his eyes if Patrick hadn’t made him shiver by licking over the mark he’d left earlier.

  “Yes,” he told him instead, tightening his grip on Patrick’s ass. “If you’re good.”

  The huff of laughter it got him amused Ollie almost against his will, but when Patrick lifted his head and claimed his mouth again in an aggressive kiss, Ollie had to give him one thing. Patrick might be a bit full of himself but not without merit. At least not in bed, and that was as far as the two of them would get to know each other, anyway.

  When they broke the kiss to catch their breath, Patrick moved down Ollie’s body, apparently intent on using his mouth and teeth to drive Ollie insane with want. Whether he was trying to prove a point or not, it didn’t really matter. Ollie inhaled sharply when Patrick sucked on his nipple, currents of pleasure spreading inside him. It only took a small arch of his hips to brush his erection over the hard planes of Patrick’s body and Ollie moaned again. He was so close to coming that it was ridiculous. He might be able to come more than once, but he didn’t want to do it so quickly.

  Patrick apparently didn’t want that, either. He pulled back and pushed Ollie’s hips down, keeping him in place with ease, even when using one hand.

  “Do you have lube?” he asked, rubbing his prickly chin over Ollie’s oversensitive nipple. It should have been too much, but, fuck, it kept Ollie right on the edge between pleasure and pain, and it was perfect.

  It took him a second to register the question, but then he nodded and scrambled from beneath Patrick to raid Trevor’s nightstand. He was sure his friend would have supplies at the ready, and he wasn’t wrong. He pulled out a tube of lube and two condoms then tossed them onto the mattress right next to Patrick’s knee.

  He didn’t miss Patrick’s here-and-gone grimace at the sight of the condoms, but Ollie didn’t care. Werewolves might be safe health-wise, but he still wasn’t going to be fucked raw a few hours after meeting the guy.

  Luckily, Patrick didn’t say anything, only tugged Ollie to lie down again and spread his legs wider. Then he moved down Ollie’s body and licked a stripe from the base of Ollie’s cock to the tip in one slow slide of his tongue, and, fuck, Ollie was rock-hard again. Everything narrowed to sensations. He closed his eyes and let himself drift in pleasure, not caring about the sounds he was making. There were no neighbors to annoy, as Trevor lived alone above the bar, and Patrick seemed to enjoy Ollie being vocal, if the way he let out a muffled growl around Ollie’s cock was any indication.

  Ollie missed the moment Patrick had reached for the lube, but he definitely didn’t miss Patrick’s finger brushing over his ass. Patrick moved slowly, circling around Ollie’s opening a few times before slipping the tip of his finger in and withdrawing. Then he did it again…and again, all without taking his mouth off Ollie’s cock.

  A string of expletives left Ollie as he clutched the sheets in his fists when Patrick pushed his finger all the way in.

  “Come on. Hurry up,” Ollie breathed out, looking down at the man taking him apart. He was done with slow. He wanted Patrick now.

  Patrick pulled back, which actually surprised Ollie a bit. He thought Patrick would make a point of prolonging it, maybe making him come first with his mouth before fucking him.

  “When I fuck you,” Patrick started before kissing Ollie beneath his navel, “after we both come”—another kiss on his sternum—“I want to stay inside you”—a kiss over his collarbone—“until I can fuck you again.” Then his face was right there above Ollie’s. “What do you say?”

  God fucking damn it. Ollie closed his hands around Patrick’s shoulders and willed himself not to come just from hearing that.

  “I say again, hurry up.” The words spilled out of his mouth without his conscious thought, but they were no less true. He was just glad he hadn’t started begging.

  Although he still might, if Patrick didn’t fuck him soon.

  Fortunately, it seemed like they were on the same page. Patrick finished prepping him a lot faster than he’d started, then he pushed inside, snapping his hips and perhaps, for the first time, breaking his control. And Ollie was all for that.

  His moan was loud enough that it might be considered a scream, but he didn’t care, riding the wave of pressure-pleasure-heat as it slammed through his body. He gave himself over to it all—the rhythm of Patrick’s thrusts, the way his cock pressed against Ollie’s prostate, the grip of Patrick’s hand around his erection. Ollie dragged his blunt nails down Patrick’s back and, a second later, Patrick was pushing his tongue inside his mouth, kissing him roughly and swallowing every sound Ollie made.

  And when Ollie dug his nails in at the small of his back, Patrick snapped his hips harder and let out a growl that seemed to reverberate through Ollie and push him right to the edge. One more tug at his cock and Ollie was coming, long and hard, and Patrick kept fucking him through it until he stilled above Ollie and let out a deep sigh. He slumped over Ollie but didn’t fall on him, which Ollie would have been grateful for if he’d had two working brain cells to worry about it. As it was, he was flying high, and being surrounded by Patrick only amplified the pleasure.

  Laughter bubbled out of Ollie as he came back to reality, and Patrick raised his head to stare at him.

  “Sorry, sorry,” Ollie said when he caught his breath. “I just… I realized I needed that.” It has been too long since I had sex that took me out of my head like this, he added to himself. Jerry, the guy he’d been hooking up with on his last cruise, had been hot and all, but the sex had just been okay. Now, he was spent and sated, and his overtired brain had shut up for once.

  Patrick didn’t smile, exactly, but something on his face smoothed out and relaxed. “Yeah.”

  It was as much of an admission as Ollie was probably going to get, but he heard the ‘me, too’ behind it just fine. He scratched Patrick’s lower back on instinct, intending it to be a simple caress in response, but Patrick’s nostrils flared and there was this glint in his eyes again that reminded Ollie of what he had planned.

  ‘I want to stay inside you until I can fuck you again.’

  That just might come true soon enough.

  Ollie wasn’t going to protest—quite the contrary. He might be sore as hell tomorrow, but he didn’t have to be at his sister’s place until tomorrow evening, so it was all good.

  He answered Patrick’s kiss with a happy hum and another scratch of his nails. It was time to have even more fun.

  Chapter Three

  Patrick woke up with somebody’s arm tossed across his chest and he went from half-asleep to wide awake in less than a second. Then he remembered—driving out, the bar, Ollie. He turned his head toward the man sleeping next to him. His face was partially hidden by his hair, let loose from the band at some point during the night. Patrick had a fleeting urge to run his hands through it, to brush it off Ollie’s face, but he discarded the idea with a grimace.

  He needed to leave, not pet someone’s hair.

  Slowly, he slipped out from under Ollie’s arm and sat up on the edge of the bed. He glanced down at himself, grateful they’d decided to at least do a perfunctory clean-up after their second round. He hadn’t planned to fall asleep, but apparently he’d been more spent than he’d realized. Now his muscles were loose and relaxed, and he gave himself a few seconds to marvel at the difference. He’d almost forgotten what it felt like not to be tense.

  Finally, he got up and dr
essed himself. His shirt had been laying with Ollie’s and as Patrick put it on, he caught small traces of Ollie’s scent. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but it didn’t matter. He would be driving back to his apartment to shower and change before seeing anybody anyway.

  He hesitated in the bedroom doorway, but when he turned toward Ollie one last time, the man was still sleeping. There was no use waking him up, since Patrick didn’t even know what he would say to him. And it wasn’t like they were ever going to see each other again, anyway—not with Ollie being on his way to somewhere else. It was best to avoid the awkward morning after, if possible.

  With that thought, he walked out of the room. When he left the building, he looked around out of habit but couldn’t see anyone. Five-forty-five on a Sunday morning didn’t attract crowds anywhere. Patrick breathed out in relief and headed for his car. The sooner he got back to Harrington Hills, the better.

  * * * *

  The following Saturday was the night of a Full Moon Run and, on Sunday, there was a big barbecue party for the pack at the sheriff’s family house. Patrick had planned to arrive with Adrian, Roy and Bill, but they’d gotten ‘held up’, which he’d learned by now meant they’d fucked each other stupid for too long and were running late. More and more he went ahead to the pack functions on his own and hung out with the three of them later, so today wasn’t that unusual, but there was still that initial tension in his back when he first got there—the moment of feeling out of place, of being an outsider.

  The feeling tended to vanish quickly these days, since one or more pack members would usually approach him once they’d spotted him alone. This time was no exception. Connor Warden saw him and waved him over to the small table near the playground, and Patrick headed his way. Connor was mated to the youngest Harrington—Jack—but he sometimes gave out the same outsider vibes Patrick was sure he did. That was what had first drawn him to Connor, and now he considered the man a friend.

  “Hey,” he said, putting his twelve-pack of beer under the bench before he sat down.

  “Hey, yourself.” Connor nodded at him. “You’re not one for sleeping in after the Full Moon Run, are you?”

  “It’s two in the afternoon,” Patrick said, but then he realized there were only a handful of people present so far. “Huh.” So maybe Adrian’s excuse wasn’t just about sex. He turned to Connor. “You’re not sleeping in either.”

  “I have a kid. There’s no such thing as sleeping in,” Connor told him in a gravelly voice, but his gaze immediately turned to the playground, where Patrick could see Connor’s daughter Rosa on the swing, with Jack standing by.

  It had taken some getting used to, watching same-sex couples with kids at pack functions like this. Fuck, watching same-sex couples at pack functions period. Patrick had seen his fair share of people being out in San Francisco, but those had all been humans. In his old pack, nobody was human or openly not heterosexual—and neither was welcome.

  Patrick had tried to challenge that, and it hadn’t ended up well for him. As the Alpha’s Son, he should’ve had better chance than others of being accepted as gay—or so he’d hoped. It had turned out to be one of many things he’d been wrong about.

  “You good?” Connor asked, and that brought Patrick back to the present.

  He had a new life now. He needed to focus on that.

  He met his friend’s gaze and nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just thinking.”

  “Wishing you were back in bed, enjoying your bachelor life?”

  He was sure Connor hadn’t meant anything by it, but Patrick still heard the innuendo and his mind flashed back to the last time he’d woken up with company. He blinked fast a few times, trying to banish the thought. Reminiscing about his recent hook-up at the pack gathering wasn’t a good idea.

  “Nah, I woke up early anyway,” he told Connor, focusing back on him. “I should’ve remembered that most people wouldn’t.”

  “They’ll get here soon enough.” Connor shrugged. “At least we have first dibs on some of the food.”

  Patrick grinned. “Now you’re talking.” Andrea Tomilson, the sheriff’s wife, was an amazing cook. Her marinated ribs were the stuff dreams were made of.

  As if on cue, the smell of roasted meat reached their table and Patrick’s mouth watered.

  “How about we go get some?” Connor suggested, getting up.

  “Perfect.”

  Connor whistled to get Jack’s attention and gestured to let him know he was leaving their spot. Jack nodded and waved him off then smiled at Patrick, who nodded and smiled back. Somehow, Jack was the easiest Harrington to deal with. There were times Patrick could almost forget the guy was a part of that family.

  Almost.

  “Come on.” Connor clasped him on the shoulder as he passed him, and Patrick followed him toward the back patio, where the majority of food was laid out.

  They exchanged greetings with everyone and made small talk as they loaded their plates. At some point he and Connor got separated, as the sheriff pulled Patrick into a conversation about his living situation—something the man did every time they met, since apparently the previous tenants of Patrick’s place had complained about the noise. And sure, the area wasn’t quiet. His patio faced the common space of their housing cluster and there were people of every age hanging out there, sometimes deep into the night. But that was one of the reasons why Patrick had picked the place. He didn’t want to live where it was quiet. He’d come to Harrington Hills to be a part of a pack, not act like a stranger who would happily avoid everyone forever. So, he assured the sheriff yet again that he was happy with his place, and, for some reason, it earned him a smile that felt…well, a bit like one a proud father would give his son, Patrick supposed.

  That realization made him hightail it from the conversation, excusing himself to go to the bathroom. He left his plate full of food on the small table by the door and went into the house, taking a deep breath of the cooler air inside. He was being ridiculous today and he wondered if it could be blamed on the full moon the previous night. He hoped it could and that the emotions would pass soon, because he’d been slowly settling in around here, his issue with the Alpha’s Son notwithstanding. The last thing he needed was to go back to square one, freaking out over every single interaction.

  After using the bathroom, he paused by the wall of photos in the hall. There were a few with only the sheriff and his wife, but most of them featured them surrounded by kids of various ages. And these were different kids, too. Patrick remembered someone telling him that these two had been foster parents for many years now. That explained it.

  He browsed the photos, trying to see if he recognized some of the kids. They should be adults by now, so there was a chance… Ah, there it was—Lily, the waitress from the diner. She had to be about sixteen in the picture, the black clothes and dark make-up completely opposite to the colorful image she presented these days with her purple hair and rainbow nails.

  There were a few others, too—the Morgan twins, who ran the local newspaper, Sylvia Talbot from the café Patrick liked to work at and Damien Shaw, who lived with his wife and two kids in the same complex Patrick did. A couple more people seemed familiar, but he couldn’t place them.

  Then his gaze fell on a photo in a thick red frame and he froze.

  Among four other kids, and standing to the side, was a kid with an all-too-familiar mop of curly hair. There was a scowl on his face instead of the smile Patrick remembered, but he knew he was looking at Ollie.

  The one-night-only, not-local Ollie.

  Patrick stared at the photo and replayed their conversations in his head, but he was sure neither of them had mentioned anything about Harrington Hills. Patrick had thought it would be easier that way, but apparently it had turned around to bite him in the ass.

  Then he remembered something else. ‘I’m on my way to spend some time with my family.’ That meant… Patrick turned to the door leading onto the patio, as if Ollie would appear right then and t
here. But the hall was empty and he could only see people mingling outside, their voices rising and falling, blending together.

  Ollie might not be here now, but Patrick would bet money he was somewhere in Harrington Hills at this very moment.

  Well, fuck.

  Chapter Four

  Ollie had forgotten just how much time his sister needed to get ready to go anywhere. He’d been playing with his phone for a good half an hour at this point and it was getting ridiculous.

  “Are you done grooming yourself yet?” he called toward the master bedroom.

  “Shut up!” Sylvia shouted back.

  A moment later, Desiree, Sylvia’s mate and wife, waggled into the house through the back door and gave Ollie an unimpressed look. “Are you both five?”

  “Nope. But the twins may turn five before she’s finally ready to go.”

  Nadia and Neil were running around the swings in the backyard. It was still weird they’d grown up so much from the last time he’d seen them. They’d been barely taking their first steps back then and now they seemed like they couldn’t stand still.

  Desiree rubbed her belly and looked down at it. “Make sure you won’t get the exaggeration gene from your mom and uncle, huh?”

  “Hey, don’t turn my niece against me so early,” Ollie protested, putting his phone away and standing up to stretch. Sleeping in a normal bed on dry land again took some getting used to.

  “How about you keep an eye on the twins and I’ll go corral Sylvia?” Desiree suggested, already heading toward their bedroom.

  “Deal.”

  That was part of the reason why he was here, after all—to help out with the kids as Desiree got closer to giving birth and Sylvia needed to put in long hours at the café. It was also the reason why he’d told his boss he wasn’t sure when he’d be able to go on another cruise. He wanted to stay in Hills as long as he was needed.