Free Forever by Rebecca Royce Page A

V-neck. The Knox daughter, whichever one she happened to be, had cleavage to spare. Her arms were shapely and toned.
    But all of this beauty didn’t come close to her extraordinary face.
    High cheekbones framed pixie-like eyes. He was sure most people would wrongly describe them as blue, but they were really violet. A color now imprinted onto his soul. Her lips were full and red. She smiled so brightly he could see she had a mouth full of white teeth.
    Whichever Knox woman she was, she had just done him a huge favor. The sight of her near perfection, the most stunning example of womanhood he had ever seen, made his cock jump to life. That hadn’t happened in years.
    The startling sensation left him struck dumb in a muted mixture of shock and delight.
    Devin sniffed the air to take in her scent. Aromas didn’t come to him naturally anymore. He had to work at achieving their knowledge. But this time he didn’t mind needing the time. She smelled like woman, Wolf, and cherries—a heady combination to say the least.
    “I’m Lena Knox.” She pointed at his house. “You live there.”
    As a Werewolf, she of course knew he’d been on the porch across the street. Unlike his damaged senses hers worked fine.
    Lena. He searched his memory. No, he hadn’t known Lena. He’d known some of the girls but she hadn’t been one of them. Probably too young to remember him….
    “I know you speak because you said you wanted to talk about the swing.” She smiled again.
    He had to say something. “I’m Devin Owen. I guess I do live across the street.”
    For ten years he’d lived wherever the war sent him, and then for five years he’d lived in a Dragon prison. Now? Yes, he supposed he lived in his parent’s house and he was lucky to get to do so. Most guys who came home didn’t have anywhere to call home anymore. Forty years old and back where he grew up, before the war he would have been horrified by the idea. Almost everything about his life had changed.
    “You guess? Are you not sure where you live?” Her tone was teasing. He tried to remember how he was supposed to act when someone did that.
    “Um.” He scratched his head. “No, I’m sure I live there.”
    Her face fell. “Are you okay?”
    “What? Oh, yes, I’m fine.” He took a step back from her. Between the beard, the leg, and his general lack of social skills, he must seem deranged. “Sorry to bother you. It’s just your swing…it squeaks.” He took another step back. This had been a bad idea. Why had he come over here? Two more steps away. “So does your door.”
    “Yes, everything squeaks, and I have no idea what to do about it.” She turned her head slightly to give the house a forlorn look. “Did it wake you? I know you were sleeping over there on your porch.”
    Two more steps away. Damn, if he wasn’t running away from a woman too young to have to have known him before he’d gone to war.
    “Sorry to bother you,” he called over his shoulder as he rushed as fast as his leg would let him back into his parents’ house.
    Getting inside, he closed the door behind him. He. Had. Just. Run. From. A. Female. They should have just left him in prison to rot.

    ***

    Lena sighed as she walked quietly back into the house. The squeaking swing had worked. It had annoyed him to death, as it should have, since it made her crazy. She couldn’t believe ten minutes had gone by before he’d woken up.
    Another minute and she would have stopped before it frayed her nerves.
    Her mate. Devin Owen. She’d managed to get his attention, which was the only reason she’d squeaked the swing for so long and worn the stupid outfit. He’d taken one look at her and run away. She pushed out the old battered kitchen chair and sat down. It wobbled. Nearly everything in the house was almost broken. Her father was too sick to mend anything and the money was all gone.
    But she’d been so relieved her mate had come home. Even if he had no idea they were, in fact, mated. At