The Lycans Voted Her Queen novel · Chapter 2 of 24
Chapter 2: The First Ask
He waits outside all night while she delivers her friend's daughter, and at dawn in his truck she climbs into his lap and says this is not a yes.
"You may ask," I said.
He stood on my porch with the loaf in one hand and the cold coming off his shoulders.
"Miss Hartigan," Garrick Holt said. "Will you take the Queen's Chair?"
"No."
"Thank you for the answer."
He held out the bread.
"It's from my kitchen. It's the right size. I measured it against my hand."
I took it.
It was still warm, and it smelled like yeast and butter.
"You measured it."
"Hester said one hand. I didn't want to cheat."
I tried not to smile, and failed.
My phone buzzed against the doorframe, and the name on it made me stand straight.
Dottie's husband.
"Moira." His voice was ragged. "Her water broke. She's yelling for you."
"How far apart?"
"Six minutes."
"I'll be there in forty."
I hung up and went for my bag, and it hit me that my truck had a dead battery.
I had left the dome light on at the Hall on Tuesday.
Garrick was still on the porch.
"Creek Hold," I said. "Can you drive?"
"Yes."
"The law says you can't house me or feed me."
"A road is neither."
"Then it's not a gift, it's a ride. I'll pay you in coffee."
His beard moved.
I think it was a smile.
His truck was a green pickup so old the paint had gone chalky.
The seat had been shoved back as far as it would go.
I climbed up into it.
He drove the logging road with one hand on the wheel and the other on his thigh.
The engine filled the cab with a steady growl.
He did not talk.
I watched the pines go by in the headlights and was very aware of how much of the cab he took up.
The heater was on high.
I could smell him, pine smoke and clean cotton and something warm underneath.
When we reached Creek Hold, the porch light was on at Dottie's house, and her husband was walking in circles in the yard.
Garrick stopped the truck.
"I'll be here," he said.
"Men can't come in."
"I know. I'll be here."
I went in.
Dottie was on her hands and knees on the bed, shouting at the headboard.
"You took your time!"
"Six minutes apart is not a time I have to hurry for," I said, and put my bag down. "Let me look."
"I voted for you and you said no to a crown. I'm furious."
"You organized it."
"I'm a very good organizer."
She laughed until a contraction cut it in half, and I put my hand on her back and counted with her.
It was a long night.
It was also an easy one.
The baby was in the right place, and Dottie cursed steadily, and I said the same three plain things over and over.
At ten past five a girl slid into my hands, wet and indignant.
I put her on Dottie's chest, and Dottie cried and laughed and said, "Look at her."
I looked.
I always look.
I have never stopped finding it astonishing.
I washed up, wrote the notes, and checked the placenta.
Dottie caught my sleeve before I left.
"He's still out there," she said. "My husband looked. He's been sitting in the truck with the engine off since midnight."
"It's twenty degrees."
"He didn't go home." Her eyes were bright. "Moira. He's the biggest man in the Range and he sat in the cold for you."
"It's the law."
"It's not the law to turn the engine off and freeze."
"Go to sleep, Dottie."
I went out into a pink and silver dawn.
The grass was stiff with frost.
Garrick sat in the truck with his hands on the wheel, and his breath had fogged the glass.
He got out as soon as he saw me and opened my door.
"A girl," I said. "Seven pounds, two ounces. Both well."
His face changed.
It was only a small thing, a loosening around the eyes, and then he shut his mouth hard.
"Good," he said roughly. "That's good."
I got in.
He started the engine, and the heater roared, and my hands began to shake.
It was always like this after a birth.
I was too tired to sleep and too full of the night to be quiet.
My skin felt thin, my pulse was loud in my ears, and the cab smelled like him.
He drove down the logging road.
At the first pull-off, a gravel turnout with a view of the frosted valley, I said, "Stop."
He stopped at once.
The engine ticked.
Below us the whole Range lay in mist, with smoke rising from a dozen chimneys.
"Is something wrong?"
"No."
I unbuckled my seat belt.
"Moira."
"You sat outside in the cold for six hours."
"I wanted to."
"I know you did."
I climbed over the console, put my knee on the seat beside his thigh, and then the other, and settled in his lap.
He went completely still.
I was straddling a man who could have lifted me with one hand.
His thighs were like tree trunks under me, and the wheel pressed my back.
His hands hung in the air on either side of my hips, not touching.
"I'm not a prize," I said.
"I know that."
"This isn't a yes."
"Moira," he said, hoarse. "What is it?"
I kissed him.
His beard was rough and his mouth was hot, and for one second he did nothing.
Then a sound came out of his chest, low and helpless, and he kissed me back.
His hands came down on my hips.
They spanned my whole waist, almost, and pulled me in hard against him.
I felt him through his jeans, thick and rigid against my belly, and it startled a gasp out of me.
"Sorry," he said against my mouth.
"Don't be."
I rolled my hips and felt him jump.
"Oh," he said.
I did it again, slowly, dragging myself along the whole hard length of him, and his head fell back against the seat.
"You're so big," I said.
"I'll be careful."
"Don't you dare be careful."
He laughed, one startled breath.
I got my hands between us and fumbled with his belt.
The buckle was a slab of steel.
He lifted his hips to help, and I pushed his jeans down far enough, and then I had him in my hands.
He was heavy and hot and so thick that my fingers did not meet around him.
"God," I said.
"Moira."
"Hold still."
I wrapped both hands around his cock and stroked from the base to the head.
He shook.
A bead of wet came up at the tip, and I swept my thumb through it.
He swore, in a voice that rumbled the whole cab.
"Look at you," I said. "The king."
"Don't call me that."
"What should I call you?"
"My name. Say my name."
"Garrick."
His eyes went dark gold.
His hands slid under my flannel and found my waistband, and he pulled at the button with fingers that were too big for it.
"May I?" he said.
"Yes. Yes, please."
The zipper came down.
His hand pushed inside my underwear, huge and warm, and one thick finger slid through my wetness.
I cried out and rocked into it.
"You're soaked," he said, wondering.
"Yes."
"For me?"
"For you. Garrick."
He pressed a second finger in beside the first, slowly, and I felt myself stretch around them.
It was so good I forgot to keep stroking him.
"Don't stop," he begged. "Please."
I took him in my hands again, harder, and set the pace for both of us.
His thumb found my clit and circled it, rough and exact.
He watched my face.
"Look at me," he said.
I looked.
"Come for me."
It broke through me all at once.
I shuddered over his fingers, my forehead pressed to his, and I heard myself say his name over and over.
He followed with a shout, jerking in my fists, spilling hot over my hands and his shirt.
We stayed like that, panting, with the windows fogged white.
His hand was still in my pants.
My hands were still full of him.
He kissed my temple, then my cheekbone, with a care that nearly made me cry.
"This is not a yes," I said.
"I know."
"I mean it."
"I heard you."
I pulled back and looked at him.
His beard was wet where I had kissed it, and his eyes were soft and a little stunned.
"Then what was it?" he asked.
"Me," I said. "Wanting you."
Something moved in his face, and I saw him decide not to say a word that would spoil it.
He only took my wrist, turned it, and pressed his mouth to the inside of it.
"Ask me tomorrow," I said.
"I will," said Garrick.
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