“Yeah, so it will be a lot easier for her,” Lexi said. “But she said she hasn’t been having any contractions and hasn’t dilated, so she believes she’ll be fine. She’s due in a couple of weeks, but they’re full term now, so if she has them early, they should be okay. They’re taking lots of extra gear for her so she will be comfortable—an air mattress, cotton sheets and sleeping bags, extra fleece blankets and comforters to keep her warm, pillows, and a waterproof tent. She loves to camp and hike, and she’s in great shape. They’re also bringing old quilts in case she does have the babies at the campout. If she feels uncomfortable, Aidan will take her home.”

  “She’s braver than me,” Kate said.

  Derek smiled at her.

  Kate blushed again.

  But Derek did agree. He would have preferred something closer to home if his mate was that far along.

  After they finished their drinks, they got ready to go home. Derek wanted to walk Kate back home. It was the gentlemanly thing to do, and he wanted to anyway.

  Cliff and Will asked, “Do we return home as wolves or humans?”

  “Human. We can return the board shorts to them tomorrow. We won’t shed in Mike’s car then,” Derek said. “Of course, Foxy will, but you won’t have three wolves that shed too.” Then Derek started walking back with Kate to her house.

  “You don’t have to come with me,” she said.

  He hoped she wasn’t saying she didn’t want him to see her any farther, but he wasn’t about to let her walk home alone after all she’d done for Foxy, not to mention he wanted to kiss her goodbye. “I want to. Thanks for taking care of Foxy. She looks great.”

  Kate smiled. “She needed the bath. I wasn’t sure she would want it. Some dogs don’t like to be bathed.”

  “She loves any attention she can get.” Since Kate had put on the brakes with him this week, Foxy’s bringing them together made him want to remind her of his schedule for next week, just because he wanted to see more of her but had to be out of town and didn’t want her to believe he wasn’t interested in seeing her during the week. “I’ll be going to Colorado Monday through Thursday with Rafe to that business conference. You wouldn’t happen to be free and want to join me, would you?”

  She chuckled. “I’ll be busy. But thanks for the offer. Maybe if I’m on a trip sometime, you can go with me.”

  “Believe me, I’m all for it.”

  “If I have more notice on a different trip of yours, I can work it out with Lexi.”

  He wanted to pump his fist in victory. “Okay, great. Or even better yet, we could skip the business trips altogether and just go somewhere for fun.”

  “Like that trip to Hawaii?”

  “Hell, yeah. Just the two of us. Though the trip is all-inclusive, I’ll add a bunch of extra excursions onto it. Like a snorkeling trip to explore the coral reefs and see the marine life, swimming in a pool with the dolphins, and trips to the other islands.”

  She smiled. “That sounds wonderful. What if you were still with Brenda?”

  “I doubt we would have stayed together long enough for me to have taken her on that trip or any other. I might have even gifted it to someone else. Just so you know, I’ve never offered to take any of my former girlfriends on a business trip with me.”

  “That’s good to know. Truly, I would go with you on the Colorado trip, but I have my own work cut out for me.”

  “Okay, well, the other thing is I have a roaring twenties ball to go to on Friday night after I return. It’s a different charity event.”

  “How many of these things do you go to?”

  “I don’t have any more scheduled for a couple of months, but these all seemed to come up at the same time. I would love to take you to it. I know I should have asked you earlier.”

  She laughed. “You were afraid I would say no, but I love themed dances. I’ll go with you.”

  “Hot damn!” He was so glad he’d asked her, and she’d said yes! “I’ll send you the invite as soon as I get home.”

  “You mean Brenda didn’t get it?”

  Derek smiled. “Nope. I had planned to give it to her Friday night at the gala, but then she called it quits on me. So that was the end of that. At the time, I thought I hadn’t seen the writing on the wall, but thinking back on it, I hadn’t given her the invite yet, and normally I would have asked if she would have liked to go. But it sounded like something I would like to do, even if she hadn’t wanted to attend it with me. Though I’m sure if I said I was going, she would have gone, just to make sure I wasn’t looking for her replacement. For some reason, I just held the invitation back.”

  “Oh, good, so she won’t be there because she won’t know you’re even going this time.”

  “Hopefully not.” Now he was really glad he hadn’t invited Brenda because the invite was truly going to Kate and it wasn’t a secondhand invite this time. He knew he would have a great time with her.

  “Do you know how to dance the Charleston?” Kate asked. “Lexi and I practiced dancing the period dances with Mike and Ryder while watching YouTube video lessons.”

  “I sure do. Rafe and his brother and their mates got me involved in doing the same thing—watching videos to learn how to do the dances in anticipation of going to this themed dance. We were sure laughing. Did you learn other dances?”

  “Yep, the Lindy Hop and the foxtrot too. We’ll dance the night away.”

  He was so glad, though he would have enjoyed teaching her how to dance to the tunes if she hadn’t known how. “We’ll have a great time.” Yeah, he’d made the right choice that time!

  When they reached Kate’s house, Derek waited to see if she wanted him to kiss her in case she still needed some distance between them. She smiled up at him, looking like she was expecting him to.

  He placed his hands on her shoulders and leaned down and kissed her then.

  She kissed him back like she was rethinking his going home with the dog and his bodyguards tonight. But he figured until the camping trip, he would give her the space she needed.

  “I’ll try to keep Foxy home. But it might mean you need to visit me more often.”

  She laughed. “Did you put her up to it?”

  He chuckled. “It was well worth the trek here, though I wouldn’t want her putting herself in danger. But seeing you tonight? That made the trip here even more worthwhile.”

  This time, he didn’t feel the need to have to see her on Thursday night before the campout. Everything seemed to be fine between them and he couldn’t have been more glad for that.

  He wondered if she’d seen the tabloids that featured him and Kate kissing when he’d won the trip to Hawaii for two and they were sitting across from a scowling Brenda and her date. “In with the New, Out with the Old,” the tabloid had said. He hadn’t planned to bring it up if it was something that would bother Kate. He’d told his staff not to mention it to Mike or Kate either! If she brought it up, that was different.

  ***

  It was finally Friday night, and the camping trip was going to be a blast. Just hiking, running as wolves, fishing, and visiting with each other around the campfire telling tales at night. No work. It would drive Kate crazy. Here she thought Lexi was the workaholic and she always—oh, wait, they were going to do a video for a commercial. Kate smiled. She knew Lexi wouldn’t stop working.

  At Lexi and Ryder’s estate, Derek drove up in his Land Rover and parked behind Rafe and Jade’s truck and Aidan and Holly’s vehicle. They were going in four vehicles because they were each taking their bodyguards with them. Kate was going to ride with Lexi, Ryder, and Mike, but Derek said, “Hey, Kate, since it’s just me, Will, and Cliff, we have plenty of room in the Land Rover if you want to join us.”

  Everyone was casting Kate and Derek glances, not saying anything, thankfully, just loading extra ice chests of food into Lexi’s and Derek’s vehicles. Kate knew they were all speculating about whether things were getting more serious between her and Derek.

  “Um, sure,” Kate said. “I’ll go with you.”

  “There goes my tent mate,” Mike said, sighing.

  “In your dreams,” Kate said.

  Mike laughed. Derek smiled thankfully.

  Kate climbed into Derek’s car. It wasn’t like she and Derek were taking a private drive to the campsite—not when his two bodyguards were sitting in the Land Rover in the back seat.

  Then the caravan of vehicles headed to the Sequoia National Forest to camp.

  Four hours later, they arrived at a beautiful campsite surrounded by redwoods that was situated near a river perfect for fishing. They all set up their tents first thing, and Kate was pleased with how much Derek wanted to help her with hers instead of just working on his own tent. She could do this on her own just fine, but she didn’t mind the help. She was glad she and he had separate tents for the campout when all their friends were here, watching everything they did and said. No way did she want to make love to Derek while trying to be quiet about it.

  After they put up her tent, she went to help him erect his, amused he was setting it right next to hers as if they were together.

  Kate heard Rafe and Jade’s four-year-old son, Toby, fussing because he had wanted to put up his junior-sized tent next to his parents’ so he could sleep there and not in their tent tonight.

  Rafe said, “Bears might come into the campsite, so you need to stay safe and sleep in our tent tonight. But tomorrow, if you want to take a nap in your tent, you can.”

  “I don’t need a nap,” Toby said.

  Kate smiled. She’d been over to Rafe and Jade’s house when Toby was taking one of those unnecessary naps!

  Still, the mention of bears coming into camp in the middle of the night seemed to convince Toby he didn’t want to sleep in his tent alone at night.

  After everyone’s tents were set up, they began rustling up some sticky chicken with barbecue sauce that Maddie had prepared for them the night before. They grilled the chicken over hot coals for dinner while they relaxed on camp chairs, enjoying the setting sun as it cast yellow, orange, and pink hues against the clouds. Now this was nice, Kate thought, a gathering of the wolf pack on a camping trip.

  The last time Kate had been camping with Lexi, it had been in a nice clean cabin. It was interesting to see how everyone would act toward each other on a camping trip. Everyone worked well together, some cooking, some getting more firewood, Rafe starting the fire. Kate thought it was so sweet of Maddie to send dessert with them and to also send breakfast for tomorrow.

  “This was a surprise,” Rafe said. “It appears Maddie wanted to make an impression. She made a great one.”

  “Oh, yes,” Holly said. “I can’t wait to eat the apple and blueberry pies.”

  “After dinner and the sun sets completely, are we going for a wolf run?” Derek asked.

  “Yeah,” Rafe said. “I think breaking up the pack would be a good idea, though I imagine no humans will be out and about stumbling around in the dark. But we should limit it to three or four of us in a group.”

  Everyone agreed with Rafe for safety’s sake.

  ***

  Derek knew who he wanted to be with on the wolf run and glanced at Kate. She smiled at him, and he figured that meant she was agreeable. He pulled out the thermos of mint lemonade Maddie had made for everyone and began pouring it into cups. Maddie had even sent sprigs of mint to garnish the drinks.

  “You should have brought Maddie with you,” Holly said, “for as much as she prepared the food for our camping trip.”

  “She doesn’t care for camping, but she loves cooking. She has to sleep on an ultrasoft bed at night, doesn’t like bugs, and loves the ocean breezes. Besides, when we’re gone, she goes swimming in the pool and enjoys relaxing on the patio,” Derek said. “She has run of the whole house then, and she loves it. When we’re away, she often house-sits and helps take care of the dogs.”

  “Okay, well, that’s good then,” Lexi said.

  When they went running as wolves after dinner, Derek and Kate went with Cliff and Will and were having a great time, smelling the scent of the redwoods, rabbits, and squirrels. They finally reached a river and drank from it. Then they were off and running again. About an hour later, they saw flashlights in the woods. Humans weren’t supposed to be out here.

  Two men were walking off-trail, and the wolves scattered, but not before the one guy said to the other, “Hey, did you just see a pack of wolves over in that direction?” He directed his light at the place where the wolves had been as Kate watched them, hidden in the ferns.

  “No. A whole pack? You had too much beer to drink.”

  “No, really. I know my dogs, and those weren’t dogs. There were five or six of them. When they saw us, they took off running.”

  Five or six of them? There were only the four of them if the man had even seen that many.

  “Well, good thing for us,” the other guy said, laughing. As if he didn’t believe his friend had seen anything. “Come on. Let’s do our business and get back to camp before the wolves attack.”

  “You joke about it, but I know what I saw.”

  Which meant the one guy might report it. Would anybody believe him? Hopefully not, Kate thought. Actually, if they did report where they’d seen them, they would have to say they hadn’t been on the human trails. The wolves were way off the designated trails, so the men could get in trouble with the park rangers.

  Kate had lost Derek and his bodyguards when they had all scattered to hide. But once they were out of the men’s sight, Kate and the others regrouped. They could still hear them talking in the woods, especially since they were speaking louder than normal. They were probably afraid the wolves were real and would come back to attack them unless they scared them off with their boisterous voices.

  Derek checked her over, and she did likewise with him, just a natural instinct, wolf greetings all around with Cliff and Will too. They heard the men noisily moving through the underbrush, headed back to the trail. Then the wolves loped through the ferns to their campsite.

  ***

  The others arrived right after Derek and Kate and his bodyguards did, and they all started going into their tents. Derek licked Kate’s face to say he’d had an enjoyable run with her as a wolf, and she rubbed her face against his to tell him she did too. Then they went inside their tents.

  After a few minutes, everyone emerged from their tents, dressed and ready to have some hot cocoa by the fire before they said good night—except for Toby, who had retired to his parents’ tent and fallen sound asleep.

  “We saw people in the woods off-trail,” Kate said. “One of them saw us.”

  “The other guy didn’t believe him. He said he’d had too many beers,” Derek said.

  “True. When we run tomorrow night, we’ll have to avoid that area.” Kate told them where they had been in relation to one of the trails.

  “Well, we didn’t run into anything. Too bad we all weren’t there to see the guys too. Then they would have really been impressed.” Lexi smiled.

  Derek got a text and looked at his phone. He was surprised to see it was from Brenda.

  Brenda: Hey, Derek, I’m going car shopping on Sunday. Did you want to go with me to check them out? You’re so good with getting the best deals on a car.

  Derek texted: You just got a car six months ago.

  Brenda: Yes, but I found something I really want.

  Derek: I’m busy.

  Brenda texted: What are you doing?

  Didn’t Brenda have a clue Derek wasn’t seeing her any further? He glanced up at the others, but they were talking about fishing tomorrow and what they could catch.

  “You can’t catch trout but an hour before sunrise or an hour after sunset.” Kate glanced at Derek, though she tried to ignore the texts he was getting.

  It had to irk her. It annoyed him for certain.

  “Right, so we can fish for the black bass and bullhead,” Rafe said.

  Derek texted: I’m camping. Got to go.

  Brenda: Camping? Where?

  Derek didn’t respond, turned off his phone, and tucked it into his pocket.

  “What did you add to the hot cocoa?” Kate asked Lexi.

  “Red wine and double chocolate.”

  “Hmm, it’s good.”

  “I’ll say,” Derek said. “Sorry about the texts. Brenda is under the assumption our relationship isn’t over or that she can change my mind.”

  “She’s more persistent than the others you have dated,” Rafe said.

  “Yeah, I agree. But there’s no going back to the way it was with her again.” Not to mention he totally planned to continue dating Kate after the campout if she was of the same mind.

  ***

  After drinking their cocoa, they finally said their good nights. Kate kissed Derek briefly and said good night to him like all the others, and then everyone retired to their tents. She didn’t invite Derek into her tent though. She didn’t know why she felt so vulnerable about showing affection toward him in front of her friends when she could do it at the charity events—except then, she was putting Brenda in her place.

  As soon as she pulled off her clothes and put on a pair of sweats, Kate was already thinking about Derek sleeping alone in his tent and how much she wished he was sleeping with her in her tent!

  Kate was quickly falling for the wolf. She almost wished she could go with him to Colorado and make wild and passionate love to him the whole time there—after his meetings, of course.

  She finally fell asleep, but later that night, she was awakened by the sound of scratching at her tent, and then she heard snuffling. Taking a deep breath, she smelled a raccoon. Great. She’d forgotten to spread chili powder outside her tent. She usually slept in a cabin and didn’t have any trouble like this. But she’d read that chili powder could help send raccoons packing because they didn’t like the strong chili odor.