Taran stood watching her as she moaned with relief, rubbing at her chafed wrist.

"You know, you're as bada.s.s as TJ," he said with a small smile. "Just don't tell TJ I called her a bada.s.s."

"She's okay? She's not- She's not..."

"She's fine," Bryan answered. "I mean, she will be. She'll recover."

He explained how TJ had managed to crawl to a phone and call for help.

"Wow. That's incredible."

"So are you," Bryan said quietly, unmistakable pride in his voice.

"All right, I think we're done here," Taran broke in. "I'll send one of the Feds to pick y'all up at the house. See you back in town." As he shoved Wayne into the back seat, he said over his shoulder, "I think she's your girlfriend, B."

Taran drove away as Bryan pulled her into a tight embrace. She gave a small gasp of pain when her nose pressed into his chest, but then she wrapped her arms around his waist and laid her cheek against his heart. She hugged him with all the strength she had left.

"Your nose," he murmured in a weirdly shaky growl. "He broke your nose."

"I'm okay. I promise. He didn't really hurt me. I punched myself in the eye. I'll be fine."

He shook in her arms as she whispered slow, soft words of comfort. Gradually he stilled. The strange, pungent smell dissipated.

"Oh, Sara. Oh G.o.d. I thought you were dead. I thought-"

"Yeah, me too. But I'm all right now. You got here in time."

His chest rumbled with laughter against her ear. "No I didn't! You did it all yourself! You kicked his a.s.s but good, angel."

"I did, didn't I?" Now that it was over and she'd calmed down, she was a tiny bit awed with herself. "It's weird. I knew I was strong, but I never knew I could move so fast."

"Yeah, well," he murmured, "I never knew I could fall so fast."

She caught her breath at that. "What are you talking about?"

He rested his forehead gingerly against hers, careful that their noses didn't touch. "I'm talking about how I didn't know I could fall in love so quick. I can't believe I thought I could do my job and leave Luxor without ever seeing you again. I'm such a dumba.s.s," he muttered.

"You don't have to say you love me, you know."

"You have to say you love me, or my life's going to suck for a long time." He cupped her face in his hands and gave her a soft, slow kiss. "Well? Do you?"

"Yeah, I do. Of course I do," she whispered.

"Thank G.o.d. Okay, come on. Let's get back to your grandmother's house and wait for a ride. We need to set your nose, and I want to get you out of this place as soon as we can."

He took her hand, and they started up the gravel road.

"Bryan?"

"What?"

"Have you seen my car?"

Chapter Twelve.

"So you're definitely, definitely certain the FBI won't come after you?" asked Wendy.

"That's what Nick says. Bryan talked to him last night and he said everything's been taken care of."

"I can't believe you call the Houston Alpha by his first name."

Taran pa.s.sed through the tiny living room with another armload of boxes.

"Are all werewolves as hot as those two?" Wendy whispered.

"No," Taran said without a trace of a smile. "We're way hotter than most of 'em. But we all have really good hearing."

Wendy blushed ten shades of red.

She and Taran and Bryan had kept their presence in Luxor as quiet as possible. Bud Rice and his deputy didn't want anyone to know werewolves were in town. Besides the possibility of a riot, the two cops didn't want the whole town to know they'd almost done business with a gang of them-even though most everybody, including the ones who'd sat next to Grandma in church three times a week, knew about the Hedges family business and the bribes Wayne had paid.

Sara wouldn't miss small-town hypocrisies. Big towns had plenty of hypocrites, but the shopping was better and you had more places to eat.

She'd told Wendy everything. Her cousin's eyes had filled with tears when Sara described the years she'd spent terrified of people learning about her fae blood.

"I can't believe you had to live with that all those years. What kind of b.i.t.c.h am I if my own cousin couldn't trust me with something so important? I'm so glad you're getting out of this c.r.a.phole! I'm gonna miss you so bad I can't stand it, but at least I know you're not dead."

Then they'd cried some more, and now they sat on the floor of Sara's apartment as Taran loaded the last of her meager belongings into a small U-Haul. Another friend was taking over her lease.

"Are you sure you don't want to take any of your furniture?"

"Greta needs it more than I do. I'm gonna raid the Tupperware money and buy some more. I've never had new furniture."

"Why don't you just move in with Bryan?"

"He asked me to, but I think it's better if we take things slow. I need time to adjust, get back on my feet. I'll find a place close to his condo."

"But, Sara, what if he's the one?"

"That's just it. I'm pretty sure he is the one, which is why I don't want to mess it up by moving too fast. We're not dating other people, but we're not moving in together right away."

Taran came back in. "That's the last of it, Sara. Here's the key to the U-haul. Mauro's here, so we're gonna get on the road. You need anything else before we go?"

"No, I think that's it."

"Your phone charged up?"

"Yes, Taran, my phone's charged up and I've got your number in it."

"Don't get snippy with me, little girl." He grinned as he said it. Beside her, Wendy nearly swooned. "Bryan expects me to look out for you. All right. Mauro and I will be right ahead of y'all, so if you need anything, you call me. I already let Bryan in the car."

"Okay. Um...do I need to do anything for him? Can I drive straight through, or, or what?"

Taran grinned again. "If he needs to stop, he'll let you know. Just let him relax for a while-he needs it after everything that's happened."

"Okay. Thanks, Taran. See you in Houston."

He gave her a quick hug and left.

Wendy looked confused as she followed Sara outside.

"Why would Bryan need anything? What did-? Oh."

Her cousin stopped and stared at the tiny Miata, the backseat filled with suitcases, the front seat filled with Bryan.

"Yep," said Sara briskly, surprised at how comfortable she felt with the whole thing. "I mean, I gotta get used to it at some point, don't I?"

The two of them fell silent as they tried to think of how to say goodbye. They each took a deep breath at exactly the same moment, and for some reason it cracked them up.

"G.o.d, I'm gonna miss you," Wendy wailed, throwing her arms around Sara, who hugged her back just as tightly.

"You have to come visit me. Have to. It's a straight shot down 59."

Wendy released her and stepped back with a sheepish look on her face.

"Sara, the thing is...I know it sounds stupid, but I'm scared. You know? I'm scared to drive that far, to a city that big."

"I know. I know exactly what you mean, but I promise, it's like anything else that scares you. Once you've done it, you're not sure why you were so frightened to begin with. I swear you'd love it. You might get there and decide you don't want to come back."

"I know. That's one of the things that scares me."

Once Sara was in the car, with her seatbelt on and the top down, Wendy leaned in to give her one last, fierce hug and a kiss on the cheek.

"You're going to do like I told you, right?" Sara said.

Her cousin's face fell. "I don't know if I can, sweetie."

"Wendy, you have to. No matter what Bud Rice does, people are going to find out about Wayne and the werewolves, and sooner or later they'll find out about me. And when that happens, they're gonna start looking at you and Aunt Lydia."

She stopped, craning her neck to look all around them. Her condo was on the edge of town, and at eight-thirty on a Wednesday morning, there was no one about. Still, she was worried, for Wendy's sake, about anyone seeing them say goodbye.

"You have to act like you had no idea. You can't let them think you knew anything about me being fae, all right? Whatever they say, go along with it." She grabbed Wendy's hand and pressed it to her cheek. "Don't cry. I'm gonna be fine."

"But I'm not!"

"Yes you are. You're the next one out. But 'til then, you have to keep your head down and look after your mom. Promise me. I've got enough on my plate right now, I can't worry about y'all getting run out of town or killed."

"No, no, you're right." Wendy took a deep breath and nodded firmly. "If anyone ever finds out about you being fae, I'll say, 'Oh my G.o.d, that b.i.t.c.h is going to h.e.l.l! She's gonna burrrrn in the lake of fire! The Devil placed a serpent in our bosom, and she-'"

Sara laughed. "See? You can do this. Now give me one more hug. I love you."

"I love you too. Call me so I know you got there okay." She started to reach across to Bryan, then stopped and smiled nervously. "You better be good to my girl. I'll be checking up on you."

He just yawned. He was almost too big to fit in the seat, but he curled up tight and rested his head on the top of the pa.s.senger door, tongue lolling and tail wagging.

Both women laughed. "I think he's ready to go," Sara said.

Soon after that, she was on Highway 59, headed south to Houston. It was like she'd always imagined-except for the werewolf riding shotgun.

About the Author.

Kinsey Holley lives in Houston, Texas, where a lot of people know about her Secret Romance Writer Ident.i.ty. Hopefully those people don't include her mother or the folks she goes to church with. She's married to the Hub, mommy to the Diva, and works part time as a law librarian.

She enjoys reading SF, UF, history and romance and is addicted to pop culture and several television series. She dreams of moving to the mountains of Colorado, which she'd never really do because all her friends and family are in Houston and she loves them and besides, she can't imagine being more than an hour's drive from a beach. Besides her Werewolves in Love series, she's working on a Regency and a big, glitzy contemporary that she hopes will evoke comparisons to the s.e.xy melodramas of the 80s (Models! Rock stars! Monaco! Alexis Morrell Carrington Colby Dexter Dexter Rowan! No, not her...) Kinsey takes her mail at , lives at www.kinseyholley.com and ninenaughtynovelists.blogspot.com, and hangs out way too much at Twitter (@kinseyholley).

Pop round and say hi.

Look for these t.i.tles by Kinsey Holley Now Available: Kiss and Kin Yours, Mine and Howls Sometimes happily ever after is on the wrong side of death's door.

Yours, Mine and Howls 2011 Kinsey W. Holley Werewolves in Love, Book 2 Thirteen years ago, Ally Kendall died defending her young cousin from his werewolf stepfather.

She hasn't been the same since.

Ally returned from the hereafter with strange new powers, burdened with the secret of why and how she survived. She managed to sc.r.a.pe her life together and raise her cousin, but now he needs a pack to guide him into adulthood. That means pulling up stakes yet again and heading for Colorado to find the only werewolf qualified for the job. A werewolf, she discovers, who tempts her to give up control in a thousand sinful ways.

Cade MacDougall, Alpha of an unrecognized pack, has a tragic history, a sizable ranch, and a daughter who thinks she's a cat. Time to find a mate? Don't make him laugh. Until Ally shows up with a smokin' hot, preternaturally strong body that smells like mine, and introduces him to a nephew who holds the key to unraveling mysteries about Cade's family-and himself.

But Ally's holding something back. As Cade's enemies gather, the cowboy and his secretive new mate must come clean about their mysterious pasts...or else all hope of protecting their newly formed family-and their future-will be lost.

Warning: A s.e.xy, smarta.s.s alpha hero, a heroine who could kick his a.s.s if she wanted, heart-pounding action, and some serious werewolf cowboy lovin'.

Enjoy the following excerpt for Yours, Mine and Howls: "His daddy was an alpha! A real wolf! Not a drunka.s.s loser like you!" Humans could've heard the woman screeching in the next parish. Werewolves probably heard her all the way to Houston.

"You're a lyin' wh.o.r.e! The brat's mine! Where is he? Dylan? Dylan!" The werewolf, smashed on moonshine, couldn't change easily. But a drunken wolf on two feet could still tear a human apart.

"Get outta my trailer, a.s.shole!"