Chapter 4

Sterling - Chapter 4

The house, much too tame of a word for this place, was beautiful. She had put her hands in her pockets three times so as not to run her fingers over the soft looking couch or the wallpaper that was simple lines of gray over white. Pretty cut-glass window panes were in the doors that looked out over the expansive yard. Sterling told her several times already that he was having the place worked on a little at a time because he'd been out of work for so long. But she loved every bit of it just the way it was.

"Myra, she's a friend of the witch that I was telling you about, she did a lot of the work for me." She asked him how that had happened. "I was having some issues and she wanted me safe. So, she asked if I would hire Alta. She's a witch too. Anyway, she wanted to expand the kitchen and did it."

"Just did it?" He nodded and told her that she did it magically. "I see. And what about this room? Did she do anything to this one? I mean, it's beautiful. She must have excellent taste. This is just what I'd want in a living room."

"She would have gotten it from your thoughts." Marty turned and looked at him when he answered her. "You see, this room wasn't finished when I left here this morning. The doors to the back were glass, but not stained glass like they are now. There wasn't any furniture in here either. Just a big pillow chair that I would drag from room to room when I was in them. Nor any curtains or lamps. There was a shelf, but all it had on it was empty pizza boxes that for some reason I never got around to taking out to the trash cans."

"You're telling me that she went into my head, pulled out what I liked, and made this room to suit me? That's just insane. I mean, not to mention a little creepy." He grinned and nodded. "Why do you find that funny?"

"Well, you have to admit that it's certainly easier than going to the store and picking something out that you might not like but that's all they had in stock." She told him he was missing the point. "Perhaps. But I'm glad that you like it this way. I do as well. You have excellent taste."

"I don't like you." She moved into the next area, the dining room, and he marveled at the changes in this one too. "I suppose this didn't look like this when you left either."

"No, it didn't. There weren't any built-in cabinets. Not even a table and chairs." He opened the doors to one of the cabinets and took out a glass that matched the place settings. "This is beautiful. I'm assuming that you've either owned this before or you've seen it."

"My grandmother had a few pieces to this set. She always wanted to find the rest of it but it was out of our reach. Why are you doing this to me?" He told her that he wasn't, but he loved what she'd done for him. "This is insane. I feel...I'm not sure I need to give you any more ammo, but I love this place and how it's altogether beautiful. But the fact that someone has been in my head.... I don't like that much."

"She means well. And I think she wanted to make a good impression on you because you're my mate. Nothing nefarious or anything like that. Just making you feel welcome." It wasn't a great answer but it was a good one. "Besides, as I said, it's beautiful. I love the changes. And they're good ones too."

She made her way around the dining room. The cabinets were filled with the set that she had grown up using. And they looked brand new, not fifty years old like her grandma's had been. Picking up one of the plates, she ran her hand over the design.

"She told me that they were a part of a set that she'd gotten from saving stamps. I had to look that up when she told me, but apparently, you could save up books of stamps and trade them in for merchandise. She wanted these dishes, the entire set, but that fad went out of business, and there just wasn't a great deal of extra money then for luxuries like this." He asked her how many she had. "Ten of the plates and bowls, and she was working on the salad plates and cups when they were broken. My mom—she was a drunk and a drug addict—broke a lot of them when she went on a rage. I think she's dead now too, but I don't know. I've not spoken to her or even heard from her since I was about four."

"I'm sorry." She nodded and put the plate back in the cabinet. "I can talk to Alta and ask her not to look into your memories. I'm not sure what will happen. I just let her do what she wants and it works out for us both. But if they're disturbing to you, I can ask her not to intrude."

"It's all right. I was just.... It's been a stressful few months. And having lost my job to someone like Bethany just topped it off." When he pulled her into his arms, she let him. Leaning back against his chest, Marty felt better than she had in weeks, maybe even months. As they stood there, neither of them talking, she looked around the room again.

The large dining table had a dozen chairs around it. They were oak, and she would bet that they were old too. She smiled when she remembered where she'd seen this set. It had been on a television show about the rich and famous, and she had fallen in love with it. Mostly because it meant a big family, but it was a nice set. There was a placemat at each seat that looked like it was made of the finest linen.

"Mistress? There is a call for you on the house phone." Marty asked Alta who it was. "I believe it's one of the places that you applied for today. That man sure has a mouth on him. I've a good mind to seal it up for him."

"No, please don't do that." She stared at the woman. "Can you do that? I mean, really, can you seal up someone's mouth?"

"If they think they can talk to me that way, I will." Alta paused at the door and turned back to smile at her. "You don't let him talk to you that way either. There is no cause for him saying those things to anyone."

She went to the hall where the closet phone was and answered it. The man, she didn't know who, was speaking to someone in the room with him. Well, speaking wasn't quite right, but he was yelling obscenities at them. Marty told him to shut up.

"You will not talk to me that way, young lady. I've a good mind to have you arrested anyway. You've made my life a living hell, and I'm going to sue you for it." She asked him what she'd done. "You told my wife about Bethany. Do you know what she's doing to me now? My wife of twenty-three years is filing for divorce. And she'll get it too, thanks to you."

"I'm assuming this is Roger Dolan." He told her it damn well was and that he was pissed off. "Well, I think I figured that part out. How did you find me, anyway? Besides, even if I had thought of telling your poor wife, I don't know her well enough to do that. I'm not saying that I'm not glad that she knows, but I didn't do it. Perhaps you should talk to Bethany. She's just stupid enough to do something—"

"She's not stupid. She's delicate. And you'll not talk about her that way either. You should have been better at training her and perhaps she wouldn't have upset the Calhoun family. What the fuck were you thinking when you took that slice of pie from her and wouldn't let her serve it to them? And I found you by calling around. Someone saw you with them, and this number is the only one in the phone book." Sterling came to stand next to her so that he could listen in on the conversation. "Have you never learned that the customer is always right? That man has some large cash to throw around. Hell, his whole family is rich. And there you were treating them like some sort of shit off your shoes."

Sterling took the phone. "This is Sterling Calhoun." She heard Roger stutter and curse, then he asked if this was a joke. "No, no joke. Though I can see where you'd think it was. My brother related the entire thing to me. Not only did he say that Marty gave him the best service he'd ever had, but that Bethany, your bimbo, I guess, tried several times to take his food from him, and even changed his order around to suit herself. The lemons in his water, for one thing."

"She has this thing about lemons in her water. Why did he have to make a big deal out of that? Just take them off the glass and be done with it. There was no reason for him to make her feel bad." Marty laughed but stopped when Sterl put his hand over her mouth. "And the pie. She was just doing what the customer asked."

"Not true either, I'm afraid. Marty took the pie to the table only to have Bimbo try to take it back. She said that my sister-in-law could have it at the end of the meal, not the beginning, as she didn't like things messed up. In my opinion, I think I'd have just left that alone, but Bimbo wouldn't have it." Roger told him to stop calling her Bimbo. "Well, what would you call someone that singlehandedly pisses off enough customers that you might be out of business soon?"

"Mr. Mackey quit today, along with a few of the dishwashers. I don't even have enough people to work a shift, much less cook should anyone come in. And that's not my Bethany's fault. They said they wanted to work better hours." Sterling asked him if he believed that. "Yes. People are fickle, and my Bethany is a good waitress."

"You go on believing that. And so you know, I'm going to marry Marty, and if you call here and threaten her again, I will make it my personal business to see you rot in hell." He put the phone back on the cradle slowly. Then he picked it up with the receiver and jerked it from the wall. She was staring at him when he tossed it across the room and it shattered. "I'd very much like to kiss you. Not a quick gentle kiss either, but I'd like nothing more than to consume you with it."

Nodding, she watched him walk toward her. It was stalking, pure and simple. And when he put his hand around her waist, Marty went to him willingly. His body fit against hers like it was made for it. Then he lowered his head to hers and kissed her.

~*~

Her touch did nothing to soothe his beast at first. Sterl was afraid of hurting her, but more afraid of scaring her. As he pulled her body flush to his, he could feel his wolf snarl at him. It was as if he was telling him to take her. Mark her.

When he lifted his head, he looked down at her and realized that she'd felt him too…his wolf was making her very aware of him. The gentle touch of her hand to his cheek calmed him in ways that Sterl hadn't ever felt before. That single touch let him take a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"I'm so sorry." Marty asked him for what. "I don't want to frighten you again. Nor do I want you to be afraid of me."

"I'm not. You're calm now, right?" He nodded. "Roger, he pissed you off. To be honest with you, I had no idea you could get that angry. You seem so laid back."

He kissed her again and then backed away enough that he could hold her hand. They continued through the house, and Sterl felt like he was calmer than he'd been since...well, forever, it seemed. Pointing out some of the changes of the house since she'd entered made them both laugh.

"Have you ever just, I don't know, thought of something outrageous and then checked to see if it was there?" He told her that he was just staying here for the most part, and not living in the house. "Well, that's sad. You have a lovely home, and you should enjoy it to the fullest. I would."

"You can." Sterl watched her face to see if she believed him or not. "This is our home now. Yours and mine. I want you to think of whatever you want in here. Make it for us."

"I don't know. We've only just met, and it is your house." He shook his head and opened the door to the master bedroom. He knew the moment she walked in that she'd come to realize her dreams really were coming true. "Oh, Sterling. It's beautiful."

Sterl hadn't slept in this room, mostly because the stairs had made him ache. But even after he'd been well, it had seemed like too much effort to come up here when all he wanted to do was lay his head on a pillow. The big pillow really had been his only means of sitting, and most of the time sleeping.

The room was so different, had he not been in it before, he would have thought it was with a different house. Even the colors in the room were perfect. Not dark and somber as he might have done, but bright, airy, and not too girlish. The bedspread alone made him think of warm nights snuggled with Marty. He loved the entire room now.

There had been two smaller windows in the room when he'd last been in here. Sterl liked the longer floor to ceiling ones that were on either side of the large four poster bed. There was a fireplace too, with a mantel over it that was large enough to hold a great many pictures. Walking deeper into the room, he saw that not only had the windows changed, but the dimensions of the room as well.

It was bigger, and the ceiling was taller. The single closet was gone now, to be replaced with two larger walk-ins. There were dressers in them and a connecting door. He loved the shoe shelf, the sweater bins, and the staggered hanging areas for longer as well as shorter clothing that needed to be hung up rather than put in a drawer.

The bathroom was spectacular. The long double sink was the length of the room. All marble, he thought, and the colors were outstanding, with gold and silver streaks running through it. A shower stall that would easily hold two people, as well as a claw-foot tub to the right of it, looked shareable. He saw a towel warming rack on the wall, as well as a linen closet that was filled with fluffy cream and blue towels, and soaps as well as other sundries in baskets with the names of the items on them. He picked up a bottle of the bubble bath on the little dresser near the tub and smelled it.

"Raspberries. I love this smell. Do you use it?" She nodded as she sat on the vanity chair that was in the middle of the sink. He was reasonably sure that it hadn't been there when they walked in. "You love this house, don't you?"

"Yes. Very much so. But I think we need to talk about a few things. Like, what do you expect from me? And where do you think this is going to go with us?" He asked her what she meant. "Well, I looked you up. There is some information about you, but not a great deal. I know that your family is one of the richest in the country, and you have a bit more than your family."

"I've invested well. And I have a nice pension from the school where I worked. But when I was hurt several years ago, I decided to live as cheaply as I could. I didn't have to, but I didn't want to get to the point where I was dipping into my money when there wasn't really a need for it. I also bought other properties when they were empty, and have been renting out a few homes in town to a few families. I've been too busy to play with being retired, so to speak, but I've only just figured out that I need to do that more; have fun I mean. I want to have fun and do things with you." She nodded. "As for the money being mine, I want you to understand something. It's ours. Everything is. Not just the money, but the house, any stocks I have, homes that I have as well. I own a car, but it's small and doesn't hold a lot. I had a truck, but I sold it to Noelle for her shop to haul things in."

She got up and left him there. He followed her to the bedroom and watched her walk to the window. He knew what she could see. Or thought he did. When he'd bought the house, one of the things that he liked most about it was the fact that there was a large pool and pool house. He'd not used it as much as he would have liked, but he would with Marty around, he thought.

"My grandma was all I had in this world. She was all right…not very huggy or even one to say that she loved me. I know she did. But she wasn't one to show her love, so in turn, I wasn't sure how to either." He didn't say anything. His family was the hugging type. They told each other that they loved them and meant it. And even in public, he'd hug his elders. "I don't know how to love you, Sterling."

That hurt him. Not for himself, but for her. She'd been stifled, he thought, in showing people her love, because no one had done it for her. Walking to her, he thought of all the things that he was going to enjoy with this woman. Living a long and happy life, one full of love, and holding her and making sure that she knew she was loved was going to be a priority.

"When I was ten or so, Mom took me to school. I don't remember why. I think I might have missed the bus or something. Anyway, as I was getting out of the car, she asked for a hug. My friends were there, all of them, and I told her no. I think it was the first time I'd ever told my mom no for any reason." He pulled her into his arms and looked out the window. The pool was still there but it was larger, and had a patio surrounding it that was wider than before. "When I got home that night, she was in the kitchen as she usually was, but she wasn't making dinner but sitting in her chair. Just sitting there. When I asked her if she was all right, she looked at me and I could tell she'd been crying. I asked her what was wrong."

Sterl thought of her face, the way that it had been slightly puffy, her eyes red from tears. She had touched a soft white hanky to her eyes and just stared at him. He hurt then and even now, thinking of how she had stared at him.

"She asked me what I would have done had she not been there that day. I wasn't sure what she meant, so she explained. Mom told me how she'd gone to school one day, just like normal, but she'd not been able to hug her daddy. She told me how she'd been too busy to stop by his room to tell him she loved him or give him a hug. He was working that day and got hurt. When she returned home, he had passed away." Marty looked up at him, her own tears falling now. "Since that day, I have made it a vow that I will never, for as long as I live, not hug someone because I'm too busy or too behind. I will touch you as much as I can. Show you in ways that you cannot imagine how much I love you. How much I love having you in my life, being a part of it with me."

"You love me?" Sterl told her that he loved her with all his heart. "You really do. I mean, you're not just saying that to get into my pants."

"No. But if you'd allow me to, I'd love to get you out of your pants."

She stared up at him, and he was ready to tell her that he'd been joking, just trying to lighten the mood, when she stepped back from him and started to unbutton her blouse.

"I've never seduced a man before." Sterl nodded. It was about all he could do at the moment with the sound of her voice making him hard, the thoughts of what she was about to show him making his head spin. "I've heard that women do it. But I've never been the type that men wanted to see.... Well, see naked."

"I do." He smiled when he realized how desperate he sounded. Even his voice had a pitch to it he'd not had since he'd been going through puberty. "Are you sure about this, Marty? Once I have you, there isn't any turning back."

"Yes, I'm aware of that. I'm a little frightened of you, not as your wolf or even you. But men in general. I don't have much confidence that they'll do the right thing by me." He sat down on the bed when she told him to. "You tell me if I'm doing this wrong in any way. All right?"

Christ, he thought to himself. She'd not even taken her blouse off, and he thought that if she got any better, he'd be dead. There already wasn't any blood in his head, all of it was centered right around his cock and groin. Adjusting himself enough to let off some of the pressure he could feel building, he watched her fingers move over the rest of the tiny little buttons and hoped that he'd be able to survive this. Otherwise, he was going to disappoint a few people when he keeled over dead.

Her blouse dropped from her fingers to the floor. Then she moved to the button snap and zipper of her pants. Sterl's mouth was dry, his body going between hot flashes of need to chills from seeing her for the first time. And when she had her jeans off, laying them atop the clothing she was discarding, he tried to swallow again and nearly bit off his tongue when she opened the front of her bra and her breasts were exposed. Christ, he really was going to die right here and now.