Maybe not exactly here, like this. But he knew with the way he felt about her, and the way she felt about him, they couldn’t have waited much longer. He couldn’t have been any happier to take the she-wolf in Ian’s cellar dressed as they were, knowing just how turned-on he made her when he wore his kilt.

He was proud to wear it, never thinking that it would turn his potential mate on, but damn, if she didn’t do the same to him, no matter what she wore or didn’t wear. He couldn’t stop thinking about her wearing that velvet robe and nothing else while she regally ate dinner with him.

He eased into her, savoring the feel of her wet sheath surrounding his cock, opening for him, caressing him, as her hands stroked his skin everywhere—back, arms, arse—making him hotter.

And then he was in all the way to the hilt and pulling out again, treasuring not only the sex, but that all this felt right—the mating, the joining, the change in pack leadership.

He would treasure his faux captive she-wolf forever.

He thrust more deeply into her as she took his tongue hostage and sucked. He loved when she did that. He ramped up his speed, kissing her back like there was no tomorrow, still reeling from the fact she’d said yes, and then he came in one euphoric, explosive moment.

Yet he continued to move against her, feeling sure she was about to come, until she exclaimed, “Oh…my…God.” And slumped against the sacks of grain, her orgasm clenching around his cock.

Now what were they going to do?

Chapter 19

Grant had moved so that he wasn’t resting on top of Colleen on the grain sacks, looking down at her, one elbow propping him up, the other hand caressing her hair. He seemed to be lost in thought after making such wondrous love to her.

Colleen had loved her past mates. She truly had. But being with Grant was a world apart from anything she’d ever experienced. She loved battling with him to be on top, instead of being with a beta wolf, where she had always been the initiator. She loved how passionate he was and how much he got into the role she and her friends were playing, in a good-natured, hot and sexy wolf way. She would cherish their first mating forever.

He looked down at her with such an intensely proud and loving expression that she smiled up at him.

“We have a problem,” he said, kissing her cheek, her brow, her lips.

“What is that?” She suspected he meant about telling the others that they’d mated, though she supposed they’d assume as much.

He played with a tie on her corset. “If we were at Farraige Castle, we wouldn’t leave our bed for a week.”

She laughed. Now that was the difference between the alpha and the beta. Her previous mates would have waited for her to say so.

“But here, we have a real dilemma.” He was smiling so broadly that she couldn’t wait to hear what he would say. “I’ve captured my pirate she-wolf.”

“Who says I haven’t held you hostage down here?”

He laughed. “Oh, aye, you have. And still do.”

She blushed as she felt his cock stirring inside her. “Insatiable.”

“Aye. But I don’t want to share my conquest with anyone else…at the moment.”

She sighed. “As much as I hate to admit it, I feel the same way.” She loved the intimacy between them and wasn’t ready to give it up. But they really did have to rejoin the party. Or…maybe not right away. She licked his chin. “I do believe we’re still in negotiations.”

And with that, they began to negotiate all over again.

***

When Colleen and Grant left the cellar, she had two bottles of wine in hand, ready to return to the outdoor garden room, but Grant escorted her out there, not wanting any of the other men to take her hostage if they were still playing the game.

“Seems like since you are my enemy, I should not allow you to escort me,” she said, snuggling close to him in the chilly wind.

“I’m protecting my investment.” Then he kissed her, waiting for her to enter the garden room and having a devil of a time not regretting that she was sleeping with the women tonight instead of him. The thought of waking next to her in the morning was what he truly craved.

“’Night, lass. But remember, if I catch you beyond the garden room…”

“You have such a one-track mind, Highlander. Did you know?”

“Aye.” He smiled.

The door opened and Julia said, “Good, you brought more wine. Should we take him hostage?”

Colleen smiled and Grant grinned, then turned on his heel and returned to the keep before they truly decided to do so.

He found Ian and the others sitting about the fire talking about battles they’d fought over the years when they spied Grant joining them.

“So tell us,” Ian said, “how did the terms of the agreement come out?”

“The lass knew she couldn’t get a better deal.”

The men all laughed. It seemed strange yet right to be here with his lifelong friends when he mated Colleen, just as she was with her best friend, Julia. And he suspected Ian’s extended family would be her friends as well.

He rather liked this ladies’ day and night out, as long as he was included.

Hoots and hollers and a few feminine howls sounded beyond the wall to the keep in the direction of the gardens.

“Sounds to me that the terms of the lass’s surrender worked out well for the rest of the lassies,” Ian said, giving Grant a salute with his whisky.

“Aye, only next time they have one of these parties, I want my brothers to be here, too. They have missed out and that won’t do. What is planned for tomorrow?”

“You do realize that this is supposed to be for the women only, right, Grant?” Ian asked.

“Aye, so as I said, what will they be doing tomorrow?”

They heard a bark outside. But it wasn’t one of Ian’s Irish wolfhounds. It was the bark of a wolf.

The men started stripping out of the kilts. Forget what tomorrow would bring. Tonight, they would chase the she-wolves in their own wolf coats.

***

Colleen thought the idea of running as wolves would be fun. Though she believed they’d slip out without the men knowing. But one of the she-wolves barked. Julia. Was she giving her mate a heads-up so he knew what they were doing beyond the castle walls? Probably. Colleen would do the same with Grant.

The other time Colleen had been a wolf in the Highlands, she’d been drunk and maneuvering cliffs. This time she had a nice buzz from the wine and was running with a she-wolf pack in an ancient forest. How cool was that?