“Stay out of this, Shelly. I didn’t challenge him. He challenged me. I can’t be cast out for defending myself. I’ll handle this.”

“Uncle Gray, please. It wasn’t Ricky.”

The hairs at the scruff of Gray’s neck bristled, his muscles tight, instinct pumping a heady mix of adrenaline through his body. “Disobeying my order is a challenge. And I accept.”

“That’s how you’re going to play it?” Rick asked, disgust thickening his tone.

“I did it.” Shelly jumped between them and shoved Gray’s shoulders. “You hear me? I did it. I disobeyed. I turned her. Not Ricky. Not Shawn. Me.”

“Shut up, Shelly.”

Gray blinked, the fast shift of emotion fogging his brain. “You? Why?”

Shelly huffed, tears glistening in her bluer-than-blue eyes. She stepped back, dropping her gaze. For a minute she looked every bit the teenager she appeared to be, despite her true age and the way her curves filled her brown and pink string bikini. “I wanted things to be normal. I wanted us to be a normal family. Like it was before Aunt Donna…”

Gray stroked her cheek. “How does turning Maizie make us normal, honey?”

“It was an accident,” Lynn said, walking up beside them, her black bikini top now tied in place. Joy followed close behind. “Okay, I admit Shawn got a little out of control, but when Maizie started to run he just couldn’t keep a hold on his instinct. Well you know how it is. The chase, the prey’s fear flavoring the air. With him losing it, Shelly got a little overexcited.”

Joy joined them, slipped an arm around her granddaughter. “The twins are still young, Gray. Their wolf instincts get the better of them sometimes.”

“I didn’t lose control, Gram.” Shelly shrugged out of the one-arm embrace. “And it wasn’t an accident. I wanted to turn her.”

Gray’s muscles knotted across his shoulders, a dull throb thumping in his head. He loved his niece, but she was becoming every bit as complicated as all the other females he’d known. “Shelly, honey, explain to me exactly why you wanted to turn Maizie Hood into one of us.”

“Because I love my family and I want my pack to stay together. You know she’s the one, but you love your precious guilt so much you couldn’t let it go and take her. And I’m too young to marry some stupid old dog because you couldn’t take a mate and keep this pack alive.”

“Never would’ve happened,” Gray said, his anger simmering.

“It would. You can’t disobey the laws of wolves, Uncle Gray. They won’t let you,” Shelly said. “Either some self-appointed stud would eventually come sniffin’ around and challenge you, or Rick would take a mate and they’d see him as the strongest mated pair and challenge him. Neither worked for me, so I did what I thought would be best for everyone. Including you, Uncle Gray.”

Gray snorted, shook his head, looking from one set of eyes to the next. “That’s what you’ve all been thinking? You’re worried some asshole’s going to come in here and fight me for all of you?”

They didn’t answer. Finally Joy spoke up. “You’re family, Gray. I know you and Donna weren’t natural mates, but she truly cared for you. You were so strong. A born leader.” She stepped in front of him, cupped his face, loving, maternal.

“You made your marriage work even when it was clear the bond wasn’t there. But since we lost her, you haven’t even tried to find your true mate. And when you pushed the Hood girl away too, we worried you’d never take a mate.” Her hands dropped to his chest. “We don’t want to lose you. Losing Donna was hard enough.”

“No one is losing anyone.” They’d have to kill him before he let someone separate him from Donna’s family-from his family.

“Right. Thanks to me,” Shelly said. All eyes riveted on her. “I did what you couldn’t, or wouldn’t. Maizie Hood’s your true mate. We all know it. You’re just squeamish about turning her because of some twisted loyalty to Aunt Donna. She shouldn’t have turned you. You weren’t meant for her, but her death led you to the person you were meant for. Now you have her.”

“I don’t have anything.” Rather than admit his guilt, he’d allowed Maizie to believe he blamed her for the accident. Now she was out there alone, her body changing. She was too angry with him to let him help. He didn’t deserve her.

“She’ll be back,” Joy said. “She’s pack now. Pack always finds their way home.”

“Only if they want to.” Gray turned and stormed back to the house, Maizie’s sad, wounded eyes flashing through his thoughts. Jeezus, he’d been an ass to let her leave like that.

He could fix this. He’d grab a quick shower, throw on some fresh clothes and go find her. He could explain why he’d spent the past twenty-one years blaming his loneliness and domestic imprisonment on a child.

Yeah. Then I’ll tell her it was my fault Donna ran off that night. Gray set the water temperature for the shower. Hell, if it weren’t for me her parents would still be alive. And last night never would’ve happened.

No. No matter how hard he tried or how much he thought he should, he couldn’t regret last night. It had been too perfect.

The warning beep sounded. A half second later the front, sides and top showerheads burst with steaming water. He stepped in, bent his head back and let the water cascade over his head and body.

Images of Maizie bombarded his thoughts, those pretty green eyes, the way they wrinkled at the corners when she smiled at him and turned a shade darker when she was angry. He could almost feel the soft touch of her kiss and her cloak of red hair slipping through his fingers.

The feel of her firm round breasts squeezing in his palms, the fast pucker of her nipples. His hand smoothing over her belly, slipping between her thighs to her hot wet sex.

Jeezus, she was amazing in bed. She didn’t just show up, she joined in, giving as good as she got.

His thoughts shifted, purposely remembering her eyes peering up at him with her pink lips wrapped around his cock. Her mouth was so hot and moist, his cock sliding through those soft lips, sucking him back in again and again.

Gray put his hand where her mouth had been, stroking his shaft. He was hard as stone with just the memory of her mouth on him. His balls tight, he brought his free hand to fondle them. A steady thrum of pleasure rippled through his body, his balls rolling through his fingers, muscles pulling the sac tighter. He gripped his shaft harder, pumping over the head and back, rocking his hips.

Thoughts and memories slipped through his mind, coming to the forefront then receding while another image took its place. Maizie, her ripe body pinned beneath him, his hard shaft slamming into her pussy, so tight and wet, rocking up to meet him. The walls of her sex squeezed around him, the sensitive head of his cock pushing through the muscles the same way it pushed through his hand now.

No. Not the same. His imagination wasn’t that good. He looked at his hand gripping his cock, water pattering over his fingers, keeping the taut flesh slick as he stroked. But what he felt was Maizie’s pussy squeezing him, her hot cream wetting his balls, her ass slamming into him as he pumped.

“What the fuck?” He stopped, his hands dropping, leaving his cock to wag in front of him. A heartbeat passed, and when the invisible muscles suddenly squeezed around him, he nearly came.

“Jeezus…” He pushed his hips forward, just as he would if Maizie’s pussy was there to beg him in. Hot moist walls hugged around his cock, stroking him, holding tight as he pulled back. He braced his hands on the shower walls, watching his hard penis as he drove his hips into thin air, but felt the unmistakable sensation of a woman’s pussy-Maizie’s sex-give way.

He pumped again, and then again. He couldn’t help it. The sensation was too good. Waves of pleasure rippled through his body with each thrust, humming over his skin, building in the tightening sac of his balls.