Every Night Forever Page 15

  Cairo took a deep breath. “It smells like muscle ointment.” That was a red flag in his mind that Grady’s men had been behind the fire last night. He wondered if there would be any DNA on the cigarettes.

  As he took in another breath, Mason barked sharply in alarm and the audible click of guns echoed around them. They’d been so entranced with scenting, they hadn’t heard the men approach.

  “Come out, come out,” Grady crowed from just outside the trees and Cairo’s hyena went nuts, desperate to get Alyssa out of harm’s way.

  “Run, Lys,” he whispered, shoving her hindquarters. She yelped in surprise and then growled, turning towards Grady. Through the trees, they could see him and several of his guards.

  Mason snarled softly and grabbed her by the scruff, dragging her backwards deeper into the trees. Her claws sought purchase in the soil but Mason was stronger. He saw Dante palm his cell phone quickly and they shared a look of quiet resolve before they stepped out into the soft light of the setting sun to face Grady.

  * * * * *

  Mason had to keep a tight grip on Alyssa’s scruff. Every time he loosened it slightly, she tried to get away from him. He knew that she was feeling helpless and wanted to help Dante and Cairo, but they would be furious if she risked her life to do it. And Mason couldn’t bear to see anything happen to her.

  He growled, wishing she would stop struggling. She whimpered and finally relaxed some, but he didn’t loosen his grip on her in case she was feigning compliance. They were secure in a densely treed section, out of sight, and he strained to hear what was being said.

  “You just couldn’t play along, could you, Stone? All you had to do was show up Friday night and go down, and I would have left you alone,” Grady sneered.

  “I don’t believe for a second that you would have been satisfied with one performance, Grady, and I’m no one’s puppet,” Cairo said, his voice taking a deep, savage tone.

  “Well, see, the problem is that now you’ve upped the game. You failed to show for the fight I scheduled, which means I lost a bundle. That’s twice now you’ve cost me money. So now I’m going to make an example out of you. I want the boxing world to know that if I tell a boxer to take a dive, then he better take a dive, or his family will suffer.”

  Mason heard Dante’s sharp intake and imagined that Grady or his people had pointed guns in their direction. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly, wishing he could do something without endangering his mate in the process.

  “You can threaten me all you like, Grady, but I should tell you that the police are on their way.”

  Grady snorted. “If that were true, they would already be here. No, I think you’re bluffing. Don’t you, boys?” The men with him agreed loudly.

  As if on cue, sirens filled the air. Dante really had called the cops. Mason had thought it was a bluff, as well. He heard the sounds of a struggle and one gunshot, and the sound of men running away. With a reprimanding growl, he eased off Alyssa’s scruff and they moved quietly through the trees until they could see what was going on.

  By the time they could see, Cairo had Grady on the ground in what looked like an incredibly painful headlock. Two men were unconscious nearby and Dante had a third on the ground with his arm twisted sharply behind him. With a sigh of relief, he and Alyssa moved from the trees and sat down several yards away to watch.

  The police cars pulled straight onto the grass and up to the trees. Uniformed men ran to aid his brothers, including Chief Layton. Dante straightened once the man under him was in cuffs and being shoved into a police car, and told the chief what had happened.

  As Grady was taken away by two officers, Cairo turned on his knees and held out his arms, and Alyssa loped towards him, landing in the safe cage of his embrace as he nuzzled her furry neck and held her close. “I’m so glad you listened to me, baby,” he said, his voice muffled by her coat.

  Mason snorted, knowing full well that if he hadn’t kept his teeth in her neck, she would have been right there with them, a snapping, snarling pissed-off female.

  Shouts of alarm filled the air suddenly and all of their heads whipped to the side to see Grady grab for one of the officer’s guns and snatch it, just as the officer was about to secure his hands in cuffs. The gun rose in slow motion, training on Dante.

  He barked and raced forwards, but Alyssa was closer and faster, leaping from Cairo’s arms and knocking Dante to the ground. A bullet fired from the gun and Alyssa yelped and tumbled off Dante as Grady tried to fire again, but was killed by the quick reflexes of the chief.

  Mason forced himself out of his shift and stumbled towards his sweetheart, tears clouding his vision. No! No, she can’t be dead!

  Her body twitched and then the fur began to recede as she shifted from her wolf form to her human form. A shallow, small mark on her hip was the only evidence that she’d been wounded. She winced as she sat up and shook her head.

  “Fuck, that hurt.” She looked down at her leg and gingerly touched the mark.

  “Are you out of your fucking mind?” Dante roared as he went to his feet, fear and relief twining in his voice.

  She trembled as she stood on shaky legs and poked him in the chest. “I’d do it again a hundred times, Dante. You’re mine. And no psychotic criminal is going to take you from me. You hear me?” she yelled back at him, tears choking off the last words.

  Dante grabbed her against him and turned, shielding her nakedness from the prying eyes of the police force with his body.

  “Thank you, baby,” Dante said in a rough voice.

  She cried openly now, her hands in fists against Dante’s chest. “I just got you; I don’t want to lose any of you.”

  Cairo pulled off his shirt and tossed it to Mason, who wrapped it awkwardly around his hips. When Dante had pulled off his own shirt and helped Alyssa put it on, the three of them held her tightly together and thanked their lucky stars that all four of them were safe.

  Chief Layton cleared his throat. “Does your girl need an ambulance?”

  “It just winged her. She’s going to be fine,” Cairo said, picking her up in his arms and carrying her towards the gym.

  Dante stayed outside with Chief Layton for another hour. The area was cordoned off and a patrol was going to stay overnight to ensure that none of Grady’s remaining men tried to get in and tamper with whatever was there.

  Mason tended Alyssa’s cut, which was already healing. She wouldn’t have a scar on the outside of her body, but he was sure that they would all have vivid scars in their minds to remind them that they’d almost lost everything. Not only Alyssa, but potentially each other.

  They headed home and stayed up for a long time, discussing their options for the future. The police had taped off the wooded area to gather evidence, but it wouldn’t stop the gym from opening once the repairs were made.

  Alyssa was inconsolable. She couldn’t hold them tightly enough. Mason knew then just how deep her love for them was. She was positively terrified to have faced the possibility of losing one of them.

  Adjusting her on his lap as he sat on the couch, he stroked her hair and cuddled her close. They’d been home almost three hours and she was just starting to calm down. Dante was on the phone with their parents and Cairo was pacing back and forth in front of the TV.

  “Well,” Dante said, slipping his phone back into his pocket. “They said they’re glad we’re all safe. Our dads said that closing the gym would be irresponsible, and I agree. When the cleanup crew is done in a week, we’ll open our doors again and move forward. Anyone object?”

  The three of them shook their heads. Cairo stopped pacing and said, “I’m going to drop out of the matches for good. The guy I was supposed to box next week was backed by Grady, who’s out of business now, so he’s going to drop out for sure. And even if he didn’t, I don’t want to compete against anyone that was working with that scumbag.”

  Alyssa spoke with a voice rough from crying. “Are you sure?”

  Cairo moved to the couch an
d dropped to his knees, taking her hands in his. Kissing her palms, he said, “I’m positive, baby. You don’t need to be at those events, and I’ve been thinking about retiring anyway. I get requests constantly from young boxers asking me to train them. I’ve got that training room on the second floor and I’m the only one who uses it. Seems stupid to let it go to waste.”

  Dante leaned over the back of the couch. “We could open the whole second floor up, redo it to make one whole training floor. We’ll never have fitness classes again, so that’s just empty space.”

  Mason smiled at his brothers, always amazed at how they never let anything get them down. “I’m sure some of the guys you boxed with would come in as trainers, too, Cai.”

  “Just no one who worked for Grady.” Alyssa shivered visibly.

  Cairo laughed, and they all joined in. Dante tipped Alyssa’s chin back and kissed her. Mason felt her sigh as her body responded to the gentle kiss. Pushing aside all the bad memories, they concentrated on Alyssa, ending the night on a positive note, one punctuated with cries of pleasure and whispered words of love.

  Chapter 15

  Alyssa and Dante sat at the dinner table on Tuesday night. They shared a bowl of ice cream together while Mason and Cairo slept in what she had come to refer to as the “big bed” in the master bedroom.

  “Starting tomorrow, I’d like to spend some time alone with you guys, one of you each night. The gym is supposed to open again on Saturday and I want to do this before we go back to work.”

  Dante swallowed a bite of rocky road. “For marking?”

  She nodded, swirling her spoon through the melting chocolate. “Yeah. I know it would be fine for all of us to be together, but I’ve always grown up thinking of it as something private. Plus, I’m pretty sure my wolf is going to want to mark and then make love, and that would make for a really long night.”

  He reached for her free hand with his own. “You don’t have to explain yourself, Lys. We know that there will be times when we’re alone with you for one reason or another. We shared our marking ceremony with you. Whatever you’re comfortable with, whatever makes your wolf happy, is okay with us.”

  She licked her top lip and caught a drip of ice cream. “We could still all sleep together afterwards.”

  “You like being caged by your mates?” He grinned, showing a hidden dimple in his cheek. He was so handsome, with his raven hair, brown eyes, and full mouth. The shadow of stubble from the long day accentuated the olive color of his skin, and her wolf murmured in agreement.

  “I love it.”

  The following night, she took Mason to bed. She’d never marked anyone before, but she knew the mechanics of it. He stretched out on his side next to her and she spooned against him, lifting his hair from his neck and holding him tight, with one leg thrown across his waist and her hand flat on his chest. Her fangs elongated as her wolf came to the forefront of her mind, and she licked a path from the crux of his shoulder to his ear, enjoying how he shivered slightly. Her lips traced back down the path, stopping halfway before she pressed a chaste kiss to the heated flesh and then sank her fangs deeply into his neck. He moaned softly, grinding his hard cock against her foot. When her wolf was satisfied that he was thoroughly marked, she pushed him to his back and straddled his waist, fisting his cock in her hands and shoving her body down on his with a growling shriek of pleasure. She rode him hard, claiming his body until his cock exploded inside her and his climax triggered her own.

  She collapsed on top of him, breathing hard and seeing stars, and he held her close until their bodies came down from the sky and their vision returned. She felt him reaching, and opened one eye as he fumbled on the nightstand before closing his hand around something and drawing it close. He flipped open a small box; inside was a diamond ring.

  She let out a small gasp and sat up. He joined her, pulling the ring from the velvet and picking up her left hand. “You’re already ours, love, and we’re already yours. We won’t wear wedding rings because it’s not traditional for hyena males, but the females each get a ring from their mates, chosen individually.” He pushed the platinum ring onto the index finger of her left hand. It was a butterfly made of diamonds, with marquis-cut stones as the wings and body.

  He touched the butterfly. “When I think about you, I think of how closed off you were when you first came to work for us. You were like a butterfly trapped in a cocoon, except you didn’t really want to be free. When you finally did crack that cocoon, when you let us get to know the wonderful woman inside, we saw that the beauty inside of you matched the beauty outside.” He cleared his throat as he paused, as if the emotion had grown too great for him. Her own eyes misted as she stared down at the ring and heard the meaning behind it. “I’m just so damn glad you’re in my life, Lys. I wasn’t really living until you loved me.”

  She hugged him tightly, letting her happy tears fall as he asked her if she would marry him and she promised she would.

  The following night, Dante’s marking went much the same way, as she marked his neck and made love to him. He proposed to her, putting a platinum ring on her finger that had four stones on top. They were each the same brilliant, round half-carat, representing the four members of their clan.

  The third night, as she lay in Cairo’s arms after they made love, he slid a band onto the middle finger of her left hand. It was a simple solitaire with a large heart-shaped diamond in the center. “You’re my heart, baby,” was all he said, and that was enough.

  She had three rings on her left hand, symbols of the very different men that she was now mated to. Mason’s sweetly sentimental ring, Dante’s thoughtful ring, and Cairo’s simple ring. She was all of those things that the rings represented: their butterfly, their fourth, and their heart.

  And they were everything to her.

  * * * * *

  The next few weeks were a blur. The gym was reopened after the fire, and the second floor was torn apart and remade into a training floor for boxing. A crime lab had been able to extract DNA from the cigarette butts belonging to one of the men they had arrested that night. He gladly rolled over on his friends, and another five men, all part of Grady’s crew, were arrested. Grady’s gym was shut down, and Alyssa felt like she could breathe easy for the first time since Cairo had been almost-drugged. It wasn’t that she worried for her own safety so much as she worried about them getting hurt protecting her, or going after Grady’s men and getting in trouble with the human authorities. With him gone and his people in jail, she locked the bad memories away into a dark corner of her mind and threw away the key.

  Cairo contacted five of his friends in the boxing world, three of whom had served with him in the military. They were eager to train others, and within a month, the gym’s membership had doubled just from the new boxers. They had lost some clients because of their problems, but had gained so many more.

  Alyssa was busier than ever as she dragged Dante’s filing system into the computer-age and finally got him organized. With the influx of new clients, she began opening the gym with Cairo instead of staying late with Dante, but two of the young men who were training with Cairo couldn’t afford the lessons, so they took shifts each day at the front desk in exchange for their training. They were sweet and silly, and looked at Cairo like he was their hero.

  Alyssa shivered and hugged her arms around herself as Cairo unlocked the front doors and ushered her inside. They’d come in early so he could put together some new piece of equipment, and rather than drive herself, she’d opted to come in with him. But what she really wanted to do was snag some precious alone time with him. Even though she worked the same shift as him, she didn’t see him very much because they worked on different floors.

  Stowing her things in Dante’s office, she pulled her panties off and tucked them in her purse, then headed upstairs. The second floor had at one time contained two separate, large rooms; one for group fitness classes and one for boxing. Now, two boxing rings sat on opposite sides of the floor, and the cent
er contained all manner of training equipment.

  She found Cairo bent over a pile of metal rods, reading an instruction manual.

  Licking her lips, she sauntered over to him, loving the way his muscles bunched under his tight shirt. He could rock cut-offs and look like a god, but he was wearing their new official uniform, a form fitting black top with the gym logo on the front, and black track pants. She’d gone to bed after making love to the three of them, thinking that she couldn’t wait to get him alone in the morning.

  When she first met him, he’d shaved his head. Now, he was starting to grow it out, and promised he’d let it get long enough on top so she could grip it with her fingers when he was eating her out. Just thinking about him between her legs, wicked delight in his eyes, made her hot and wet.

  She ran her fingertip across his shoulder and hopped up on the edge of the ring, hooking her arms through the bottom rope. Cairo lifted his eyes from the booklet, his dark gaze finally meeting hers.