A huge thank you to my editor Tex Beethoven for another amazing job and collaboration, thank you Tex you rock!!!
Book 1
Chapter 12
A little over 30 minutes after leaving the O'Connor compound Dante and Lily pulled up at their Cabin, welcoming the sight and the quiet. They shuttled everything inside, including all the food they'd brought from the Manor House so they would be able to feed themselves this extended weekend. They decided to change into something more comfortable, which for Dante was a tight white undershirt and some loose-fitting black basketball shorts, while Lily changed into pink tight yoga pants and a tight white tank top. She decided to tease Dante a little and went braless for the evening, showing off her large breasts to him a bit. It was getting close to dinnertime and they were starving, so they decided to spend some time cooking together.
The plan for this weekend was to be a normal couple and enjoy being new mates. As they started preparing food and cooking, they moved around the kitchen flirting with each other and talking, affectionately rubbing against each other and exchanging little caresses and touches. As they finished cooking dinner and filled their plates, they sat down and started to dig into the Chicken Parmesan they had made, enjoying a bottle of a nice Pinot Noir.
As they ate, they talked about their lives and how they'd each grown up. In some ways Lily had been like Dante: except for her immediate family she hadn't been especially close to anyone in the Pack, and had kept everyone at arm's length. She talked about growing up in the Pack and what her childhood was like living at the compound, and all the time she'd spent running through the forests in human or wolf form and exploring the mountains and how much she loved being out in nature. Then about going to law school at Columbia and how much work it had taken to graduate, and how stifling it had felt needing to remain in human form the whole time, sometimes for months on end. After returning from school around eight months ago, she had spent most of her time at the Cabin, enjoying being on her own and having a rather simple life for a while, intending to shoulder her adult responsibilities at some point but not yet, until Dante had appeared out of nowhere and changed everything. "Not that I mind dear, with you finally in my life everything suddenly makes sense."
Dante spoke mostly of his time in the military and of all the places he had been in the world, and the different bases he had stayed on during his various tours and missions with the Teams. He'd spent a lot of his time in the Middle East, but had visited some neat places when he had some time off between missions and during other downtime. He had visited Jerusalem and seen the Wailing Wall and Temple Mount, and described them to Lily. He described some of the ancient portions of Baghdad and other parts of Iraq and Afghanistan he had seen, including the mountains in Afghanistan. He had spent some time on the U.S. base in Cuba and talked about the Cuban food that he'd fallen in love with when he had gone into Havana. He had spent some time in South America as well as South Korea, and talked briefly about some of his experiences in those places.
When she was younger and before college Lily had spent some time in the Republic of Ireland with the original O'Connor Pack so she described Ireland to Dante, talking about the cities she had visited and their food and culture and dark beer so rich you could almost chew it.
Dante talked about becoming emancipated from the orphanage at 16 and spending the last two years of high school before heading into the service on his own and living in the rougher parts of Boston, and all the trouble that always seemed to find him and some of the close calls he'd had. She had seen the scars he'd suffered in Boston and carried for years until their magical disappearance the first time he'd met his wolf the night before last, so she could empathize with what he'd endured during that time.
They both absolutely treasured the time they were spending learning about each other and becoming closer and closer; it was very special and a perfect evening for them.
They cleared away the remnants of dinner and shared doing the dishes before heading into the living room to relax together. There was a decent-sized hearth where Dante spent a little time building a small fire for them to enjoy. It was dark by now and the evenings were cool in Montana, so the fire was nice and set a relaxed, cozy mood.
Dante stretched out on the couch facing the hearth, and Lily rested her head against his chest, snuggling in close as Dante wrapped an arm around her and softly began running his fingers through her hair, making her purr in contentment. During dinner he had explained to Lily that during his time in the Navy, thanks to his earning some college credits during his last two years of high school he was able to get degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, admitting he was a bit of a programming wiz and could do just about anything on a computer.
He wanted to talk to Lily about an idea and see what she thought. "I've been thinking about something I can contribute to the Pack as well as a way for me to start earning some extra income for us. I'm thinking of starting a security service. I could start with private and business computer and network security, basically to protect people from other people like myself. But eventually I would want to expand it to physical security as well. Business and personal home security systems and solutions, including designing safe rooms and other security needs, not just electronic ones. There is always a demand for security regardless of where people live, and between that and the IT security I think I could pull in a decent income for us as well as provide some job opportunities to anyone in the Pack interested as well."
Lily had given Dante all the time he wanted to talk and work through his thoughts as he spoke. She loved listening to his ideas and picturing their future life together and what they'd be doing. She responded softly, "I think those sound like terrific ideas sweetie, it would not only fill a real need in the Pack, since we don't have anyone that heads up something like that. We currently have to farm those things out, which is tricky because we mustn't allow any outsiders in the compound or even let them know where it is, and your plans would dovetail nicely into your duties as Pack Enforcer. Additionally it would tie in with Pack Security as well as your Alpha training to keep the Pack safe! I think it's perfect, and you should talk to Dad about it in the next few weeks. I'm sure you're going to be swamped for the first week or more, but when you start to hit your groove and get a bit more downtime you can start working on getting that moving. Do you have a name in mind?"
Dante smiled and kissed her temple, "Thanks my love, and I dunno, I just started kicking it around but maybe Silvrash Security or better yet,
