Werewolves in Love 1.5: The Nanny Years Read online

  From the main house came a high-pitched sound, something between a shriek and a sob, followed by footsteps pounding up the stairs and a door slamming. Immediately Becca began to wail.

  Roman looked over at him with a “should I go see about that?” expression. Michael shook his head and waited.

  Cade walked out of the house and across the grass with an….odd look on his face. Stopping in front of Michael, he asked, “Where’s Felipe?”

  Michael gestured over his shoulder. “Back here. Felipe!”

  The teenager appeared in the doorway. “Hey. Y’all need me?”

  Cade nodded. “Yeah. Cash out your hand. You need to run an errand for me.”

  “Sure, Boss. What is it?”

  Cade took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair, tugging at his curls. “You need to go inside and keep an eye on Celine while she packs. She’s kind of upset.”

  “Cade, what the hell?” Michael asked. Felipe just stood there looking stricken.

  “And once she’s packed, I want you to drive her into town. I told her she could stay the night” – it was almost eleven – “but she insists she can stay with a friend. I want you to drive her, make sure the friend is home and Celine gets in all right. Also – there’s an envelope for her on the desk. I paid her through the end of the month and added enough for a plane ticket home. Go on, now. Go.”

  Wide eyed and pale, Felipe nodded and trotted off to the house. When he was gone, Cade dropped down beside Michael, holding out his thumb and forefinger. “May I?”

  “Of course.” Michael passed him the joint.

  Cade took a deep drag and didn’t pass the reefer back. “So. Did you know Celine has tattoos?”

  “Um, no. No, I did not. “

  “Well, she does. A moon and stars on her – let’s see – right tit. A crown with a banner that says “princess” on her hip, and--”

  “Which hip?”

  “Um, left. Then she’s got a big blue Celtic-looking symbol on the inside of her thigh – her left thigh. And a pretty little rose on her pussy.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  “On her pussy? Like, what – inside?”

  “Ok, not the pussy pussy. The mons pubis, technically.” He took another long drag. “Yep,” he croaked. “Right smack on her mons pubis.” That time he dragged the phrase out and then bit it off – “monnnssss PUBis.”

  They looked at each other and dissolved into helpless, choking laughter.

  “But wait, there’s more,” Cade gasped when they’d both caught their breath.

  “What else?”

  “Her clit’s pierced.”

  “Oh, fuck me!”

  “That’s what she said.”

  They spent another couples minutes laughing so hard they didn’t make any sound, which was just as well because Michael didn’t want all those idiots in the woodshop to hear what they were talking about.

  “Oh, oh shit,” said Cade as he struggled to stop.

  Michael thumped him on the back. “Oh shit’s right. They’re coming out. Quick.”

  They dove off the porch and around to the side of the woodshop, where they waited until Felipe and Celine got into the truck and left. Then they collapsed back down on the front steps.

  “Holy shit, Cade. Ho-ly shit. I thought – Jesus. I was halfway joking about the nympho thing. I mean, I figured she wasn’t as innocent as she seemed, but – shit. I never would’ve guessed this. Damn. Heh.” He lay back on the porch and stared up at the ceiling. “So, what --- did she strip for you, or what?”

  “Nope. She was waiting for me in my bed.”

  “Naked?”

  “Butt nekkid.” He said it in his best Georgia drawl, and they started laughing again.

  Michael stopped abruptly. “She looked good, didn’t she?”

  “Oh fuck yeah. But you know what really freaked me out?”

  “What?”

  “The first thing I thought wasn’t – ‘goddamn, she’s hot.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘goddamn, does her daddy know about all this?”

  Michael grinned at the ceiling. “So you turned her down and she started crying?”

  “No. Actually, she was sort of pissed. Said I’d been leading her on.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah.” He blew out a breath and shook his head. “I didn’t think she was the smartest female I’d ever seen, I figured she had some boundary issues, but – I dunno. Maybe she’s nuts?”

  “Who the fuck knows with females?” Michael sat up. “Shit. We have to hire another nanny.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Am I gonna tell PPC what she did?”

  “Hmm.” Cade was lying on his back now as well, and he closed his eyes. “I don’t see any reason to ruin her shot at another job – I mean, she took good care of Becca. She’s not dangerous, she’s just…weird as hell.” He was silent a minute. “I swear to God, Michael, I never did anything to make her think I wanted to fuck her.”

  “I believe you. It’s my fault. Should've gone with an old one.”

  “She slipped under my radar, too. That was just-- damn. That was just bizarre. Hey. Got another joint?”

  “Matter of fact, I rolled two.” He pulled the second one from his shirt pocket and lit it up.

  “I really did wonder about her daddy.”

  “You’ll never have to worry about something like this with Becca.”

  “No?”

  “No. We’re gonna raise her to think all guys are pigs, and sex is dirty.”

  Cade grinned and took the proffered joint. “Thanks.”

  “Just leave it to Uncle Michael. The next one will be perfect.”

  NANNY NO. 2 — INGRID

  Yours, Mine and Howls

  The Nanny Years, Part 3

  “So, where you wanna go tonight?” Michael asked.

  “I don’t care. We haven’t done Mexican in a while. El Rincon?”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Let me close it down here and tell Ingrid I’m leaving.”

  “She went out for the night. Sindri’s got Stinky Butt duty.”

  “Oh. Okay. Then I’ll tell Sindri I’m leaving.”

  ****

  Becca and Sindri were in the kitchen, she in her highchair and he standing on a chair spooning food into her mouth.

  When Cade walked in, Becca pointed at him and shouted, “Daddeh!” It reminded him of Timmeh! from South Park.

  He pointed right back at her. “Becca!”

  She always thought that was hilarious. Cade always thought it was cool to be announced every time you walked into a room.

  He bent down to collect a bunch of sticky kisses, said goodbye to Sindri, and went to join Michael.

  ****

  “So Ingrid’s made friends in town?” Cade asked his second once they were in the car and headed for Fremont.

  “Yep, looks like. You don’t mind her going out like that, with no notice?”

  Cade shrugged. “No. Technically, her hours are six to six. She just hangs out with Becca at night because she enjoys it and there’s nothing else to do. Did she have a date?”

  “No. Said she was meeting friends from church.”

  “Well, good. I’ve been afraid she’ll get bored stuck out here with us and Becca. If she makes friends, she won’t get lonely and quit.”

  “She seems happy enough. And Becca loves her. Course, Stinky Butt loves everyone.”

  Cade chuckled. At eighteen months, Becca was a loud, kinetic bundle of happy. Her new nanny was crazy about her and called her mi tornado.

  Cade – and Michael, too – had been hesitant to hire Ingrid Prieto at first. She was older and more experienced than the previous and disastrous Celine, but she was still hot, albeit in a riper, Earth Mother kind of way. He’d faced the same difficulties in attracting qualified applicants as he had the last time – not a lot of nannies wanted to live on a ranch with one little girl and a bunch of single werewolves, with the closest town thi
rty minutes away. They got applications from women too young or old to be hired by “normal” families – and the young ones tended to be way more interested in the wolves than in Becca.

  Half Irish, half Argentinean, voluptuous and statuesque, Ingrid had a master’s in childhood development and years of preschool teaching behind her. She hadn’t nannied for long, though. When Cade tried, diplomatically, to discover why she’d want to work on a somewhat isolated ranch when she’d lived in big cities around the world, she’d said something about needing to simplify and re-order her life.

  The thirty-four-year-old exuded calm competence, treating the wolves with a detached amusement and absolutely no flirtation. Less perky and more self-possessed than Celine, her hotness didn’t disturb the peace of the pack. Even if she turned out to have a wild side like the pierced and tattooed twenty-two-year-old Celine, Cade didn’t expect to find her naked in his bed at some point.

  Of course, he hadn’t expected it with Celine, either. He didn’t trust his once vaunted instincts like he used to.

  They got a table on the patio at El Rincon so they could smoke cigars with their tequila. The November night air was a tad chilly for humans, and they had the area to themselves.

  Michael knocked back a shot and motioned to Kelly, their favorite waitress, for another round. He took a deep drag on his cigar, stretching with a sigh. “This is good. I like moonless a lot more than I used to.”

  “Yeah. Moonless works for me too.”

  They’d started doing this a few months ago, right after Ingrid came to the ranch.

  Werewolves didn’t run on new moon nights, at least not in packs. It was a cultural, not a physiological, thing. Alphas could change any time they wanted to and while betas could only shift at night, they didn’t need to be able to see the moon to use its power. It was just that running on a new moon night felt weird. A moonless night sky was cold and unwelcoming, so they’d wait for the first sliver to show before they gathered again.

  Cade and Michael had started doing Big Boys Night Out on the first night of the new moon. It was nice to get away from the responsibilities of the Pack and the ranch – and, in Cade’s case, fatherhood – one night a month. Some of the Pack’s wolves lived in town. There was an unspoken rule – or, knowing Michael, maybe not so unspoken – that any wolves in a given establishment when Cade and Michael showed up would quickly clear out. “If I have to hang out with the guys on my night out, it’s not my night out,” Michael liked to grouse.

  ****

  They each put away three full orders of fajitas.

  “That’s almost as good as fresh off the hoof,” Michael grinned as Kelly started clearing the plates.

  “You would’ve preferred mooshi?”

  “Moo-- oh. Moo—shi. I get it. Funny.”

  “Do wolves really do that?” Kelly asked with a grimace.

  “What, take down cows in the field?” Cade asked.

  “Yeah. It just seems – I dunno, brutal.”

  “I don’t know if it’s any more brutal than a slaughterhouse, but it’s stupid,” Cade replied with a cocked eyebrow. “Cows belong to people, and people shoot.”

  “Oh, yeah. I wasn’t thinking.” Kelly grinned sheepishly. “There’s really no such thing as wild cows, are there?”

  “I took down a feral pig once,” Michael boasted. “Big sonofabitch. Tusks this long.” He held his hands out three feet apart.

  “Sure they were,” Cade said, and Kelly laughed.

  “I swear! Wandered into my grandmother’s backyard in Sugarland. He--”

  “Hi.”

  Michael broke off. The three of them turned to look at two young women who’d appeared behind Kelly. One was a tall redhead with great tits, the other a shorter brunette with even better tits. Both were dressed completely inappropriately for a southern Colorado November night, but they didn’t appear to be uncomfortable.

  “All right. I’ll check back with you all later.” Kelly hoisted the tray full of dishes onto her shoulders, stole a glance at the women, rolled her eyes and went back inside.

  He and Michael stood to greet the newcomers.

  “Hi,” said the redhead. “I’m Beverly, and this is Sasha.”

  “Hi, Beverly, Sasha. I’m Michael, and this is Cade. Please, have a seat.”

  They all sat.

  “So, um, y’all are werewolves?” asked Sasha.

  “Yes. Yes we are,” Michael replied with a small smile and a significant glance at Cade. “Who told you?”

  “Oh, well--” Sasha looked embarrassed.

  Beverly didn’t. “We were asking around. We’ve never met werewolves before – we’re from Iowa--”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Michael interrupted.

  “--and we were down here on a ski vacation, and we knew there was a pack here in Fremont so we decided we wanted to meet some. A guy in there pointed you out.”

  “So you’re both alphas?” asked Sasha.

  Michael point at Cade. “As a matter of fact, he’s the alpha. Of the Rocky Mountain Pack.”

  “And Michael’s my second. Can we buy you ladies a drink? Maybe you’d like to--”

  “We have a suite at the Canyon Jewel.”

  “--or we could do that. Michael?”

  “Yep. Let’s go.”

  ****

  They got an early start for home the next morning, pulling out of the Jewel’s parking lot before sunrise. Cade liked to be home when Becca woke up. He drove. Michael sprawled across the back of the Rover.

  “That was weird,” his best friend yawned.

  “Yep.”

  “Beverly sure was noisy. My ears hurt.”

  “For a while there I was thinking we’d get kicked out for sure.”

  “Right. Like you could get kicked out of any place in Fremont.”

  “Tourists don’t give a shit who I am. Hotel’s not gonna ignore a bunch of pissed off guests just so I can get laid.”

  They both reeked of women, tequila and cigars.

  “It’s been a long time since I shifted just because some female wanted to see me do it,” Michael reflected.

  “Me too.”

  “I feel kinda cheap.”

  “Me too.”

  They both said, simultaneously, “I like it.”

  Cade was laughing, so he didn’t register the Nissan Pathfinder sitting on the side of Highway 50 till they’d passed it.

  “Hey.” He watched the truck recede into the distance in the rearview mirror. “That’s Josh’s truck.”

  “Huh?” Michael sat up and looked out the back window. “Oh. Yeah, it is.”

  “What’s it doing on the side of the road?”

  “I dunno. Maybe he had to take a leak.” Thick woods lined Highway 50 for miles in either direction.

  “Maybe he broke down. We should turn around and see if he needs help.”

  Michael yawned again. “Fuck no. He’s a grown wolf. He can walk his ass to town or back home for help. Do the lazy bastard some good. I need a shower and some breakfast.”

  Cade laughed. “You’re right.”

  Becca was still asleep when they got home. Cade took a long, hot shower. By the time he got upstairs to Becca’s room, she’d awakened and Ingrid was changing her. An unfamiliar and nearly overpowering scent clobbered him before he reached the room, and it took him a second to realize it was coming from Ingrid. She’d never worn the cloying, floral scent before, and he hoped she’d just gotten carried away when she put it on. If she continued to wear so much, he was going to have to talk to her about it. It made his eyes water and his head swim.

  “Here, I’ll finish this,” he murmured, joining her at the changing table. “Why don’t you give me what you want her to wear. Morning, baby girl. How are you?”

  Becca pointed. “Daddy!”

  “Yep, that’s me. Did you have a good time last night?” he asked Ingrid as he dressed the baby.

  “I did, yes,” she smiled.

  “Do anything exciting?”
<
br />   “No. We just drank some wine, watched TV, had some girl talk.”

  “Still, it’s got to be a relief to get away from all this fur and testosterone, huh?”

  “Oh, it’s not so bad around here. I could get used to fur and testosterone. Isn’t that right, mi tornado? Give your Ingrid a kiss.” She scooped the wriggling Becca up. “Let’s go see what Sindri cooked for us, hmm? Some eggs? Would you like some lovely eggs and biscuit?”

  Josh stuck his head in the kitchen while they were eating breakfast.

  “Hey, Cade? Oh, I-- I’m sorry. I didn’t know y’all were…” He blushed and stammered to a halt, turning to go.

  “No, Josh, it’s okay. Come on in – what did you need?” Michael had issued such dire warnings about sniffing around Ingrid that the guys were terrified to so much as look at her. Ingrid, busy feeding Becca, didn’t even look up.

  “Oh, well, um-- I just checked on Snorri, and his hoof’s looking good. I think I’ll walk him around a bit this afternoon.”

  “Good. Oh, hey,” he added as Josh turned to go. “We saw your truck on 50 when we were driving home this morning.”

  “Huh? You did?” Josh looked down, fiddling with the coffee cup in his hands. He sighed. “It’s stupid. I ran out of gas on the way home from Stacy’s.” He laughed halfheartedly. “I had to run back into town and get a can.”

  Bullshit. “That’s embarrassing.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay. Well, let me know how Snorri does on that hoof.”

  “Will do, boss.”

  ****

  After breakfast, Cade tracked Michael down in the woodshop.

  “Josh lied to me this morning.”

  “No shit? What about?”

  “I asked him about his truck sitting on the side of the road. Gave me some bullshit about how he ran out of gas coming home from Stacy’s place. He was lying to me, Michael, I know he was.”

  “Why would he make up a story like that? What the fuck would he be doing in the middle of the woods?” There were no houses or shops anywhere along that stretch of highway.