Kiss and Kin: A Sexy Shifter story

  Brotherly love? Oh hell no…

  A Sexy Shifter story.

  On the surface, court reporter Lark Manning looks like the luckiest girl in the world, blessed with great friends and a wonderful family. Underneath, she harbors a hopelessly unrequited love for the sexy werewolf everyone thinks of as her cousin. Taran rarely notices her except to condescend or lecture. He’s treated her the same way since she was eight years old, and there’s no reason to think he’ll ever change.

  Taran Lloyd, a detective in the Houston Police Department’s Shifters Investigations Unit (SHIU), lives for those rare moments he gets to spend around Lark, torturing himself with what he can’t have. Kin only by marriage, she thinks of him as her big brother. He couldn’t bear her pity—or her disgust—if she learned he wants her for his mate.

  When weres from a rival pack attack her, Lark screams out the first name that comes to mind—Taran. Only this sexy alpha can keep her safe until they find out who wants her dead, and why. But keeping her safe means keeping her close. And the closer they get, the harder it gets for these not-really-cousins to honor their commitment to keep their paws off.

  Warning: Contains a heroine with the world’s worst poker face, a hero with more honor than sense, and explicit shifter sex that makes you wish werewolves really were part of the gene pool.

  eBooks are not transferable.

  They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

  577 Mulberry Street, Suite 1520

  Macon GA 31201

  Kiss and Kin

  Copyright © 2009 by Kinsey Holley

  ISBN: 978-1-60504-612-9

  Edited by Angela James

  Cover by Natalie Winters

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: June 2009

  www.samhainpublishing.com

  Kiss and Kin

  Kinsey W. Holley

  Dedication

  I sat on the porch drinking champagne with my two sisters-in-law one night and said, “Y’know, I think I could write a paranormal romance.” They said, “Of course you can.”

  I wouldn’t have started, and I couldn’t have finished, without them.

  I had this fantasy that one day I’d get published, and we’d sit on the porch and drink champagne to celebrate, and when the book came out I’d dedicate it to them. We’ve done the champagne, so here’s the dedication. To Vickie and Wendy.

  Chapter One

  Lark inspected her reflection in her antique full-length mirror. Applying final touches to her makeup, she pursed her lips and smudged her gloss just a bit. She pulled her auburn chestnut hair into a carefully messy chignon, touchable stray wisps framing her face the way Taran liked it.

  Dressed in a purple lace bra, boyshorts and four-inch stilettos, she struck a little pose. Which dress to wear?

  They both showed off her legs. The chic black cocktail number featured a fun little twirly skit, and she fancied herself a fun twirly kind of girl. On the other hand, she liked to look like a bad girl sometimes, which she did in the lavender sheath with the plunging neckline and the slit up to mid thigh.

  She held up each dress beneath her chin, one at a time, and eyed herself critically. Lavender, black. Lavender, black.

  She heard Taran getting ready in the bathroom, but when he suddenly appeared behind her—a werewolf could move so swiftly and silently it seemed he teleported—he wore nothing but skin. Taking a hanger in each hand, he tossed the dresses aside. He laid a large, warm hand on her stomach and pulled her tightly against him while his other hand cupped her breast. His thumb rubbed circles around her nipple through the thin lace.

  “What are you doing here?” he growled softly. His stubble tickled her neck as he nuzzled. It made her laugh.

  He rolled her nipple between two fingers and she sighed, reaching back to run her fingers through his dark gold hair. His other hand now cupped her mound, barely touching, and she ground her hips, silently urging him to press harder. He chuckled.

  “I’m trying to choose a dress,” she smiled. “Which do you like?”

  “Neither,” he replied. “I vote for naked.” He nipped her shoulder and slid his hand inside the boyshorts.

  Their gazes met in the mirror, the only way she could maintain eye contact with him. Lust glittered in his eyes, making them shine like emeralds. Her dark blue eyes melted in submission. In heels, she stood almost as tall as he did, but she looked petite against his much larger body.

  “I can’t go to dinner like this, and neither can you,” she murmured.

  “True.” He ran his tongue lightly down the back of her neck. “Anthony’s has a dress code. Reservations at eight, right?”

  “Yes.” She shivered.

  She gasped as his middle finger sank into her folds and stroked.

  “So…” he smiled against her neck, “…I’ve got ten minutes to make you come. I can do that with one arm tied behind your back.”

  He took his hand out of her panties, spun her around and pinned one of her arms behind her. She moaned in anticipation as his mouth came down on hers, and she woke up.

  Damn it. Shit. Damn, damn, damn, shit.

  Lark rolled over and slammed her head into the pillow.

  She couldn’t even manage a decent sex dream about him—she always woke up when it got to the good part. Her subconscious just rolled its eyes and said, “This is too farfetched for me to handle, kiddo. Dream about someone in your league—like George Clooney, maybe. He’ll ask you out before Taran notices you’re grown, much less shows any interest.”

  She showered, trying not to think about Taran as she did it.

  ***

  Detective Taran Lloyd yawned with boredom as he stood by the bar and observed the patrons of Le Monde on a typical Saturday night. A pricey club, it attracted an affluent crowd, and a mixed one: humans, werewolves and other shifters, people who looked a little more than a little fae. The only thing they had in common was a willingness to pay five bucks for a bottle of domestic beer and seven for well drinks—or the ability to find someone who would do it for them.

  He grimaced. He’d like a drink himself, but regulations prohibited drinking on duty.

  The intimate nightclub featured wood-paneled walls, polished hardwood floors and a lot of recessed lighting. Music loud enough to dance but not too loud to talk, waitresses pretty but not too sexy, bartenders fast but friendly—if not for the fact that three women reported missing this month were last seen here, it would’ve been a great place to bring a date.

  He tried to remember the last time he’d gone on a date.

  “Detective?” Daniel Denardo, the HPD Shifter Investigations Unit’s rookie, interrupted Taran’s musings.

  “Yeah, Danny?”

  “What are we supposed to look for here?”

  Taran smiled wryly. “If we get lucky, some guy will pick up a chick, throw her over his shoulder and run out, and we’ll arrest him. But I don’t think we’ll get lucky. So we hang around and watch, talk to people, ask if anyone saw the women, noticed unusual behavior, that sort of thing. I’d rather no one know we’re cops yet.”

  As soon as he said it, he
noticed Lark across the room at a banquette with another woman and four slimy-looking wolves in suits. Taran automatically considered any guy with Lark slimy-looking. These wolves looked like Eurotrash. Eastern European wolves ran drugs and weapons in and out of the country, and SIU suspected they’d expanded into the sex trade. Rich European werewolves frequented Le Monde. Apparently Lark did, too.

  She sauntered toward the bar.

  “Shit,” he muttered.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I’ll be back in a second. Why don’t you mingle.”

  “I can do that,” Denardo replied cheerfully.

  “What are you doing here?” he growled softly.

  Those words, that voice, just hours after the dream, freaked Lark right the hell out. She started so violently her perfectly chilled Cosmopolitan sloshed the front of her dress. Her nipples stood at attention. He didn’t even notice.

  She grabbed a handful of napkins. “Damn it, Taran, what—”

  “Quiet,” he said fiercely as he stole her breath with a smile. He never smiled at her like that. He rarely smiled at her at all. She stared up at him, dumbfounded. He clamped a meaty paw on her elbow and dragged her away from the bar toward an empty table.

  The dark blue pinstriped suit, a fitted European cut, and the custom-tailored, crisp white dress shirt looked great on his long, muscular frame. Taran didn’t live on his detective salary alone.

  “Act like we’re having fun.” Irritable as always, he still wore that stutter-inducing smile. It stopped short of his luminescent green eyes. “Why are you here, and who are those wolves?”

  “None of your business…” she grinned gaily, “…and I don’t know.”

  A few golden strands of hair drifted across his eyes. He wore it halfway to his shoulders; HPD grooming regulations exempted werewolves. She always itched to brush his hair aside. One day she’d do it, just to watch him react.

  ”I’m serious, Lark.”

  “You’re hurting me, Taran.”

  He let go instantly but continued to stare at her, knowing she’d answer him.

  She heaved a dramatic sigh. “I’m here with my friend Eloise, who’s into some Euro werewolf whose name I don’t remember, and he’s with his bros, and they’re all creepy and boring, and one of them keeps trying to pick me up, and after you replace the Cosmo you made me spill, I’m going home. This just is not my night.”

  “Are you driving?”

  “No, I’m talking to you. Why? Do I look like I’m driving?”

  He didn’t laugh. He never laughed.

  “El drove. I’ll take a cab home. Where’s my cosmo?”

  His sharp cheekbones and strong chin, and the pale, thin scar scoring his left cheek from his ear almost to his mouth, gave him a look of menacing power. That disappearing smile, though, made him look like a fallen angel. A hulking, six-foot-six fallen angel who could change in five minutes in broad daylight—the mark of a powerful alpha wolf.

  “Don’t tell anyone you know who I am,” he ordered. “I’m working a case.”

  “What kind of case?”

  No reply.

  “Fine, whatever. I won’t tell anyone I know you.”

  He nodded and turned to go.

  “Um. Hello?”

  He turned back. “What is it?”

  “You owe me a drink.”

  He pulled a ten from his wallet and held it out, staring at her eyes as he did so. She snorted at the cheap shot power play, but it worked—a human couldn’t maintain eye contact with an alpha.

  She looked at the bill in his hand. She didn’t take it. Instead, fueled with courage from her first cosmo, she put her hand on his outstretched arm and leaned in, her head grazing his cheek. Their bodies almost touched. A werewolf’s normal body temperature was one hundred five point three; for the millionth time in ten years, she fantasized about snuggling up to his warmth.

  Her pulse hammered in her throat as she whispered, “Taran? If you want people to think your cousin is a hooker, you could at least pretend I’d get more than ten bucks. Otherwise, go buy me a drink, you lazy bastard.”

  He growled low in his throat. She peeked up at him. Taran meant “thunder” in Welsh. It fit him when he looked like this.

  “Wait here,” he snarled before stalking off to the bar. The crowd parted for him by instinct, like zebras at a watering hole when the lion drops by for a drink. He returned with her cosmo.

  “Thank you, cuz,” she cooed sweetly to his shoulder. New drink in hand, she steeled herself for another excruciating twenty minutes with Eloise and the Euro cheese. Would he watch her walk away? As if.

  Taran rarely saw Lark without friends or family around. When he found an opportunity to watch her walk away, he took it and he savored it, because he liked the way it hurt.

  The killer dress, long sleeved and stretchy, cut low in back, clung to every inch of her. It hugged her beautiful ass and stopped short of her knees, which meant twenty inches of leg still showed. His mate had legs like a fucking racehorse.

  Did she know he hated the “cousin” crap? Sometimes he was tempted to think she did it to torment him, but he knew she didn’t. Unlike many beautiful women, Lark didn’t tease. If she knew how he felt, she’d react with disgust or pity. Disgust would make family functions uncomfortable, and alphas didn’t tolerate pity.

  Her scent, her laughter, the caress of her hair against his cheek would torture him for hours. He used to turn to other women whenever he needed to ease this blissful pain.

  That didn’t work anymore.

  “Wow.”

  “Uh? Oh—I didn’t see you come back,” he said, turning to Danny. “Wow what?”

  “The girl in the green dress. I mean, look at those legs.”

  “Those are my cousin’s legs,” Taran said dourly.

  “Oh, um—sorry.” The brunet beta instantly dropped his gaze.

  “It’s all right.” Taran sighed. “I know she’s hot.”

  “None of my cousins look like that, that’s for damn sure.”

  Taran smiled tightly. “We’re not actually blood. She’s my brother’s cousin.”

  “Oh, right. You and your brother have different fathers.”

  “Yeah. Myall’s dad is human. Lark’s his niece. My mom and stepdad raised her after her parents died. Myall thinks of her as a sister.”

  “So you think of her as family, too.”

  Taran nodded. “Yeah, a little.”

  No. Not at all.

  “She play basketball?”

  “Soccer and volleyball,” replied Taran softly.

  “Beach volleyball?” Denardo leered. The smile faded as he looked at Taran’s face. “Just a joke,” he muttered. “How tall is she, anyway?”

  “Five ten.” Ask me anything. Her favorite color is purple, her favorite food is Mexican. She’s scared of roaches but pretends she’s not. Great dancer, lousy singer. She’ll laugh at the dumbest movie and the stupidest joke. Likes kids and rain, hates cats and golf. She’s twenty-six. Her shampoo smells like apples and she thinks I’m an asshole.

  “All right,” he said. “Let’s start mingling around here.”

  She returned to find El laughing uproariously with her new werewolf boyfriend and his pals. Lark suspected El wouldn’t drive herself—or Lark—home tonight.

  “There you are!” El shrieked. To the werewolves she said, “Y’all excuse us a minute. Come on, Lark.”

  Lark shrugged and belted half the cosmo before setting it down to follow a weaving El.

  “What d’ya think?” El asked when they reached the bathroom. Lark noted the slurred speech and droopy eyelids. Definitely not driving.

  “About who? Your Russian guy?” She stared at herself in the mirror as she waited for El to finish. I should wear more makeup. She liked her dark blue eyes and snub nose well enough. She considered her brown hair, with its auburn highlights, her best feature. Thick, straight and glossy, it fell to just below her shoulder blades. She wore long bangs in front, parted
on the side. It’s an okay face. I need more makeup.

  “Dominik is Czech. He’s loaded.” El giggled. “I’ll probably go home with him, if that’s cool with you?”

  “I only came out tonight because you didn’t want to go out alone!” Lark said, exasperated. Dominik apparently didn’t care enough to pick Eloise up and take her out.

  “Please don’t be mad, Lark.” El pouted. “I really like him, and I don’t want to be alone tonight.”

  Lark didn’t blame El for being a ditzy narcissist—she couldn’t help it, not with all that fae blood. It made her annoying but irresistible to all three species of sapiens.

  “Whatever, El. That’s fine.” She’d already planned to cab it.

  As they walked back to the table, Eloise looked over to the bar. “That’s your cousin the cop, isn’t it?”

  “He’s not my cousin,” Lark responded reflexively.

  “He is so hot. I know that guy he’s with.”

  “You do?” She wouldn’t look in that direction; she didn’t want Taran to see her watching him.

  “I don’t know his name. He’s a friend of Luc. You remember—the French wolf? We went to Vegas a lot.”

  “Luc with the Ducati?” Lark wasn’t a fur chaser, but she loved fine motorcycles.

  “Yeah, he took me out on it a few times. This one time we rode to Austin…”

  El talked all the way back to the table, promptly ignoring Lark once they got there. Lark drank her cosmo and ignored the other werewolves. She people watched, trying to guess couples on first dates, couples just hooking up, couples breaking up. When she got bored, she Taran watched. He never glanced in her direction, so she felt free to spy until a flock of geeks descended on a table and blocked her view.

  The werewolf who’d tried to buy her a drink—Sergei/Stefan/whoever—offered her a chair at one point. She declined. A little later, she thought maybe she’d reconsider.

  The whole world listed to the left sharply and suddenly. She grabbed the edge of the table and swallowed hard. The music got both louder and harder to hear. The room began to spin very fast, like in a movie where the camera pans around and around until the viewer gets sick and dizzy.