“She started it!”

Darla walked back in, settling down in her chair and picking up the section where she’d left off. “It’s all settled.”

“Good. And how is Eustice?”

“He’s doin’ fine. Prison suits him.”

“I always thought so,” Francine muttered.

“They think some street dogs got into the jail somehow, so we’re fine.”

Janette rubbed her eyes. “How do they actually believe street dogs got into a jail?”

“Because no one wants to know the truth,” Darla explained. “They’d rather believe a roving band of pit bulls is sneaking into prisons to randomly attack mobsters than that humans are shifting to wolves and tearing him apart while in the shower.”

“That’s just sad. Full-humans are sad.”

“And how’s Travis?” Roberta asked, already forgetting what they’d done to protect one six-foot-five king of the jungle.

“Oh, he’s fine.” Janie gave a brief wave of her hand before returning to her sewing. “Complaining like a big baby. But from what I heard, he deserved what he got. What he said to his baby sister was wrong. And Sammy handled it just right. He’ll be a good Alpha. Bubba sees that now.”

“I told you that boy would be Alpha of this town one day. He’s smart, calm, and I like that mate of his much better.”

“And you’re going to tell Sissy what Travis did was wrong, right, Janie?”

Janie smirked at Francine’s question. “Actually, I told her she was ungrateful, and she should have left her big brother alone.”

Three of her sisters laughed, and Francine stared at her in disgust. “What is wrong with you?”

“I’m not making it easy on that girl. I will not have one of those daughters that sits around constantly talking about how great it was when she was sixteen. There is a whole wide world out there for her, and I expect her to go out there and get it. Nothing is going to hold my daughter back.” She smiled with pride, thinking how far Sissy had come and how much further the brat had to go. “Not even me.”

“Mitch. Wake up, darlin’.”

Oh, yeah. He could definitely wake up to that voice every morning.

Smiling, his eyes still closed, he reached for her, but Sissy laughed and batted his hands away. “You need to get up.”

“Why? Can’t I sleep a couple more hours? It’s not even light out.”

“That’s because it’s seven o’clock at night.”

Mitch forced one eye open. “Then why are you waking me when I just went to take a nap an hour ago?”

“Because you actually went to take your nap forty-eight hours ago.”

Now both of Mitch’s eyes were wide open. “What?”

“No need to yell. You needed thesleep, I’m guessing.”

“Are you sure?”

Sissy grinned. “Am I sure that you slept forty-eight hours? Yeah, I’m sure. Except for you stumbling to the bathroom a few times, you’ve been out cold. Thankfully, it was not due to blood loss this time.”

She patted his leg. “Come on. Time to get up. Your momma made you dinner.”

“I am up.” He motioned to the tent he was currently making with the sheets. “Time for you to get to work.”

“That’s charming.”

“I never promised you I’d be charming.” Of course, now that he thought about it, Mitch hadn’t promised Sissy anything. He hadn’t been able to. But now, that was pretty much over. O’Farrell was dead, and the bounty on his head miraculously gone—he would not ask about that. Some questions shouldn’t be answered.

But he’d still need to be careful. Of course, he was always careful. So at this moment, absolutely nothing stood between him and Sissy making this thing forever.

When he didn’t panic, try to make a run for it, or vomit, he looked at Sissy.

“Uh-oh. Why are you looking at me like that for?”

“We need to talk.”

“Can this wait? Maybe later tonight?” she asked hopefully.

“No. I want to talk now.”

Sissy glanced at the door, sighed, and sat on the bed. “Okay. Talk.”

“It’s about us and where we want this thing to go…”

And that’s when Sissy took her forefinger and made circles with it. She was telling him to hurry up?

“If you don’t want this, you just tell me, Sissy, so we can get this over with.” But as soon as the words were out of his mouth, he regretted saying them. He didn’t want this over with. He loved her. More than he had ever realized.

Sissy slapped her hands against her knees and stood. “I don’t want this thing over with,” she snarled. “But I need you to pick up the pace!”

“What the hell for?”

That’s when she stalked over to him and twisted one of his nipples, which hurt like hell.

“Ow!”

“Downstairs, there is a living room full of people waiting for your dumb ass to come down those stairs so they can all yell ‘surprise’ because it’s a God dang surprise party!”

“Party?”

“Yeah. Party. For you! There’s food—enough even for you—cake, and to my horror…a karaoke machine. And to bring home how much I love your Yankee ass, I am going to be doing my rendition of The Runaways ‘Cherry Bomb’ with Ronnie Lee on air guitar. But I can’t do a damn thing until you get that big cat ass out of bed and into the shower and then downstairs in the next ten minutes!”