Irene shuddered a bit merely thinking about it.

Van Holtz stepped closer, invading her personal space. “Are you cold?”

“No,” she answered plainly. “Just disgusted.”

“Why? Did you look in a mirror recently?” Farica commented.

Irene didn’t even blink. She’d been insulted by Farica before and she never worried about it. The woman had her own painful insecurities to deal with, lashing out at Irene gave her little satisfaction, and Irene refused to be baited. But Van Holtz turned on Farica Bader so fast, the woman took several steps away from him only to crash into his sister. The unholy smile on that woman’s face made it clear Carrie Van Holtz would happily throw Farica into a pool of sharks if the opportunity presented itself.

But Jaqueline, Irene’s self-appointed protector, moved forward, her hands curled into ready-to-fight fists.

With a sigh, Irene grabbed her friend’s arm and dragged her back. “Come on, Jack. I want to show you my new computer. In my office.” Irene walked off, Jackie stomping behind her.

She didn’t bother to turn around and look at Van Holtz or his sister. As with most human beings, she’d already forgotten about them as soon as she stepped out into the hallway and headed up the stairs to her office.

“Don’t ever speak to her that way again,” Van snarled. If they were on a hunt, he’d have Farica Bader on her back, belly exposed, with his jaw wrapped around her throat.

If she thought knocking down Irene would somehow endear her and her tiny Pack to Van, she was sadly mistaken.

“I didn’t realize you were so attached, Van.”

“I’m not attached. It was mean. Unnecessarily so. Do you beat up kittens, too?”

“How dare—”

Carrie stepped between the two of them. “Go away, Farica. My brother is not interested in you. And I’d hate for us to have to wipe out your Pack for, ya know, amusement.”

With a last glare, Farica turned on her overpriced shoes and stormed away to lick her wounds.

“Tell me you never slept with her.”

“Are you high?” Van slammed his now-empty champagne glass on another tray moving by. The fact that those trays were attached to actual human beings, he rarely noticed. “That woman wants one thing. And that’s to be marked and mated to a Van Holtz. I’d rather chew off my own arm.”

“I’m glad to hear that. But”—and Van knew he was about to have one of those painful conversations with his big sister—“I want to see you mated and happy one day to someone. Like I am. But preferably not to Irene Conridge.”

Van snorted. “Mated? With Irene? Wait. Let me rephrase that. Mated? With anyone? Not going to happen, big sister.”

“You have no intentionof marking anyone as your own?”

“Christ, what a load of shit Mom and Dad handed you. And you’ve bought into it. I thought you were smarter than that.” The idea that biting a female made her yours forever to the exclusion of every other pussy available seemed beyond ridiculous. Van didn’t believe any of those old She-wolves’ tales. He simply had too much sense. Not only that, but he’d never give up having access to an array of females. Why should he? If they were there, wet and ready, he would fuck them. He kind of saw it as his civic duty . . . yes, he was that good.

“To answer your question, no. I don’t plan to mark anyone”—he used air quotes here—“ ‘as my own.’ I have way too much sense to do that to myself.”

“Okay. But you’d get Dad off your back if you mated with somebody.”

Both siblings had noticed their father had been much less pleasant in the past year. Grouchy didn’t do his recent temperament a lick of justice. Constantly the man pushed Van, and Van didn’t know why. Maybe the old wolf wanted to retire. And that would be fine. Just hand over the business and the Pack and Van would be more than happy to take over. But life was too short and insane to start playing these barbarian games of the young wolf taking down the old. They were Van Holtzes, goddamnit. They were civilized, cultured, and damn good-looking. If the old man wanted a fight, go hang with the Magnus Pack or, even better, the Smiths. That Pack only bred Alpha Males and, not surprisingly, infighting went on constantly.

Van, however, liked his life just as it was. A wonderful business, the ability to shift into wolf whenever the mood struck him, the opportunity to travel whenever he wanted, and a plethora of available females at his disposal. Why would he change that for anything or anyone?

Actually, he wouldn’t change it.

“Well, whatever you do, maybe you should stay away from Conridge. She doesn’t exactly seem interested.”

“True, she’s resisting me. But I’ll wear her down. Like the time we ran down that elk in Canada. Took us two days but we did it.”

His sister sighed. “I’m starting to become concerned about your taste, little brother. She’s . . . odd.”

“She’s odd because she’s brilliant.” He motioned to the exit where the female had disappeared. “At this moment, she’s discussing things you and I could never even comprehend.”

“I absolutely could create a lightsaber.”

“You could not create a lightsaber.”

“I could too. It’s all science.”

“I thought being a Jedi was mystical?”

Irene snorted. “Mystical, my butt. It’s all about science.”