Wolves of Haven: Lone (18 page)

She continued to shake, her body
felt as if it was on fire, but mind numbingly cold at the same
time. She wanted to be in the dark confines of a closet alone, and
yet she wanted to hold onto the man holding her close, trying to
keep her from completely losing it.

Damian nodded his understanding and
carried her to the bedroom, grabbing two towels off of the vanity
in passing. “Very well,” he said, cool and collected. “Let’s get
ready for work. I’m sure that Inspector Asshole is just dying to
meet the man behind the bossy, ball breaking Lieutenant from
Boston. If he thinks you’re impossible to please, he hasn’t seen
anything yet.”

Absently she nodded; eyes clenched
shut, struggling to get the heat coursing through her body to
extinguish, to slow her racing heart, and keep Her in the darkened
recesses of her mind.

“Oh, I think you should know,” he
continued once he sat her down on the edge of the bed then
proceeded to dry off and get dressed, “that I told your family that
we are sleeping together, that I love you, and that I want your
father’s blessing to continue our relationship.”

And that was more than enough to
snap Akia back to reality.

Her eyes shot open, and they
instantly found his. “You did what?!” she shrieked.

A smile filled his face.

Mission accomplished.

“Never have the fires darkening
your beautiful ocean blue eyes been such a welcoming sight to see,”
Damian teased, slipping into his dress shirt.

Softly Akia growled under her
breath as she hastily dried off. “You are not funny, not in the
least!” she hissed.

“Oh I beg to differ,” he
retorted. “I think I am
hilarious.
Hurry up. I’d like to see the dumpsites before
lunch, and tonight we’ll talk more before
I
get a bite to
eat.”

She flipped him off then buttoned
her jeans.

Damian smirked and stepped
into Akia, pulling her into him by the belt loops. “What I plan on
eating is
you
, in
case you missed the underlying innuendo, so let’s not go to the
office angry just as we never go to bed angry.
Agreed?”

She tried to play mad, but she
couldn’t. He seemingly pulled her back before the darkness saw
light, and that she appreciated and needed more than he’d ever
know. “Fine, but if I find out you actually told my entire family
that we’re having sex, I’m kicking your ass,” she
warned.

He kissed her on the tip of the
nose, and she groaned; that was his way of saying that yes, he did
just that, and she’ll just have to live with it.

“I really dislike you right now,”
Akia groaned, pushing out of his hold.

Damian continued to smirk. “You’ll
really dislike me after I do this,” he said then grabbed her arm
and bit.

“Impressive work, Officer,” Damian
said, reading over the report Leclair put together cataloguing the
first victim’s activities prior to his death. “These stops along
the freeway, are you familiar with them?”

“Highway, Sir,” Leclair corrected.
“In Canada we call them Highways, and yes. If you like I can follow
up with the ferry routes along the Trans-Canada as well and see if
he utilized those means for his load since his log book had been
penciled in along the way and not completely accurate; in the
States he was out of hours a few times, and yet he wasn’t
fined.”

Damian nodded. “What was he
hauling? The report isn’t entirely clear.”

“Last trailer dropped was to a mill
on the mainland,” he said, reading through his notes. “A dry resin
component used for the manufacturing process at that mill; they
make kayaks and canoes. High end, handmade items,” he explained
when Damian snorted. “I can run background checks if you like.
There are only ten employees, and they are all related, so it
wouldn’t be hard.”

“That isn’t necessary,” Damian
assured him, trying to keep from making a face. The Officer was
very thorough, but too thorough and with way too many details that
are redundant. Akia used to be the same way, but after blacking out
most of her reports, only leaving the pertinent information in them
when he handed them back for her to redo, she quickly grasped what
he was trying to teach her. With that said, Officer Leclair wasn’t
one of his Officers, and this was only a stopping ground, thus he
wouldn’t bother with breaking out the black Sharpie and having him
redo the report. “Let me know what you find out from the harbor
masters or whatever it is you call them here.”

Leclair nodded. “Yes, Sir,” he said
then hurried to grab his jacket before hitting the road.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d
swear he has a crush on you,” Akia mumbled under her breath as she
looked through the report Damian blindingly handed back to her; he
knew she was there and waiting for it.

“Most likely,” he agreed. “I hear
that I am a hot piece of ass.”

She rolled her eyes then headed
towards the stairs to pay Connell a visit since Damian was annoying
her with his apparent enjoyment of the giggling, flirtatious women
at the station. It was dangerous for her to run around unchecked at
the moment, and she was hoping that her brother had something to
give her that would keep her focused on the task at hand and to
keep the fantasies of ripping the throat out of each woman that
touched what was hers from becoming a reality.

“Are you mad at me?” Damian asked,
following her down the stairs.

“Yes, you bit me,” she reminded
him, holding her hand above her head and flipped him
off.

He chuckled, shaking his head; she
was ridiculously observant when she needed to be, but a complete
airhead when it came to what was right in front of her of the
non-case variety. “Yes, I suppose I did. Maybe I was leaving you a
little something to remember that it’ll be my guest room you will
be sleeping in tonight if all goes according to plan.”

Akia shook her head; Damian was
being mentally exhaustive and ridiculously annoying for some
reason. “Are you trying to annoy me to death?” she asked before
pushing through the door at the end of the hallway.

Again, he chuckled. “No, not in the
least,” he assured her. “Just trying to remind you that I’m here
for you no matter what,” he said, resting his hand on the small of
her back now that they were out of view of the others. “There is a
method to my means,” he whispered, leaning into her as they walked.
“You know me so my methodology shouldn’t surprise you.”

That was an understatement. Akia
knew Damian better than he wished, but the one thing he wished she
knew about him she apparently had blinders on for.

“I suppose,” she huffed, waving her
rarely seen white flag of surrender. “It’s getting late. Did you
want to head back? I’m starving, need to shower, and you wanted to
re-walk the dumpsites before evening tide.”

“Sounds agreeable,” Damian said,
reaching around her and pulled open the door to the M.E.’s office.
“Did you want to eat in or go out? The intake operator was raving
about a small steakhouse not far from here.”

Akia shook her head. “She was
asking you out, and you were well aware of it, but if you want to
get dinner with her, by all means knock yourself out. I’ll sleep in
one of my brothers’ rooms.”

Damian softly growled under his
breath and closed the office door behind them. When he noted that
Connell wasn’t in there, he spun Akia around to face him. “Why do
you sleep in their rooms and not your own?” he whispered, his eyes
moving over her face many times.

“I don’t want to talk about it,”
she said, pulling away from him. “You know there are certain things
I don’t elaborate on, and family is one of them. It’s bad enough
that you’ve met them, have been hit on by one of them more than
once, another walked around completely naked in front of you, two
others got into a wedgie war at breakfast, and you informed my
father, and entire family, that we’re sleeping together. Yes, that
is just lovely. Thank you for that. I thought we agreed to discuss
these things, Damian. Wouldn’t you be pissed if I walked up to your
father and informed him I was sleeping with his son, who
coincidentally I was the boss of, and that we were living together,
hiding it from everyone, and that what we have will most likely,
that I will most likely, kill you?!”

Damian gave her a look,
trying to keep from smiling. “I wouldn’t suggest it, but I see your
point,” he said. “Let me ask you something,” he started, caressing
a loose curl from her cheek, tucking it behind her ear for her.
“Why do you think that what we have will most likely kill me?
That
you
will kill
me?” he asked with a smirk. “I’m armed.”

“Not always,” she said making a
face. “It’s complicated, Damian. And now of all times, I mean… This
isn’t the time or place to discuss it.”

“Will you discuss it with me or are
you just trying to distract me in hopes that I’ll
forget?”

Again, she made a mocking face.
“Not anymore,” she grumbled causing him to laugh.

Damian pulled her into him and
hugged her tight. “What am I going to do with you?” he rhetorically
asked.

“Get out while you still can?” Akia
offered, returning the embrace.

“Yes, exactly that,” he dryly
agreed, softly smacking her backside. “We need to get going.
Hopefully we’ll be able to pick up something now that the wind has
died down at the dumpsites. And then, if you’re good, or
exceptionally naughty, I’ll give you a foot rub,” he said in a
deep, overly suggestive tone.

She smiled despite herself; she
loved foot rubs, and they were always the start to an orgasmic
night.

“Do you think your brothers, uncles
and father will mind if we asked for privacy for a few hours
tonight?” he asked as innocently as possible.

Akia moaned. “A quickie is beneath
you, Captain Nikas, it truly is,” she purred before slapping his
backside as hard as she could, and he growled in return. “I highly
doubt they’d have a problem… That will be a problem,” she groaned,
just then realizing that Varg would not look too kindly on her
having sex with Damian in the house, and there would be bloodshed
as a result.

One of the doors on the wall of
refrigeration lockers swung open, seemingly on its own, before a
rolling aluminum tray slid out some.

Connell pulled his black satin
sleeping mask up and looked over at them. “Don’t worry about the
pissed off at the world Viking. We’ll take him for a run. You two
ready to grab a late lunch before checking out the dumpsites in low
tide?” he beamed with a smile before pulling the tray the rest of
the way out then rolled off of it. “So, what’s this I hear about a
foot rub?” he teased with a face-consuming smile before pulling his
shirt back on.

Damian looked from Connell to the
locker and back again. “Do you do that often?”

He shrugged. “I get overly hot, and
since I haven’t gotten to run thanks to all the assholes with guns
in the woods around the manor, I have to find a way to expend the
building heat. Not all us of can have mind blowing sex to get it
out of our systems and pull us back to reality, like some people I
know,” he said, giving his baby sister a mocking face.

Akia looked at her smirking brother
with wide eyes; there was no way she heard him correctly,
especially in front of Damian of all people!

“What?” Connell asked, cocking an
eyebrow, seemingly reading his sister’s mind.

Softly she growled under her
breath, and he laughed, mocking her by sounding like a cartoon
villain as he wagged his brows then his tongue at her.

Damian chuckled at the antics of
the two. He honestly had never seen siblings, especially those of
different bloodlines and generations, act in such a way. It was
refreshing yet a pang of jealousy stabbed at him because he’d never
experienced anything like that with his brothers. But that jealousy
was shadowed by happiness because Akia was home, finally, and a
side of her that he hadn’t seen outside of just the two of them was
finally being shared with others.

“Don’t encourage him,” Akia
hissed.