Wheeler popped me on the butt. “You’re a handful, Miss Diva.”

“Mmm, that’s what I’ve been told,” I purred.

“But I can still make you blush,” he said sexily against my ear.

I smiled up at him. “As I can you.”

His eyebrows arched. “That so?”

I cupped my hand against his ear and whispered, “I saw what you were trying to hide on my white sofa. I watched you from my bedroom door.”

When I leaned back, his cheeks were aflame.

“Come on, lover.” I took his hand and led him down the stairs. The morning sunshine was past its glory and had faded from a deep orange to pale yellow.

“If you get the cat bed, then I’m putting my license-plate collection on the wall.”

My eyes widened and I turned to face him. “Your what? I don’t remember that in your last room.”

“I keep it in a box.”

I took his arm as we made our way to the kitchen. “Darling, you can put your dirty underwear on that wall and I’ll still love you. I might punish you for it, but I’ll still love you.”

“Mmm, punishment,” he said between kisses. “Makes me want to be bad.”

When I entered the kitchen, my stomach dropped. I recoiled and Wheeler hooked his arm around me.

“The surprise isn’t over,” he said softly.

Austin was sitting at the head of the table with his fingers laced together and his chin resting on them. He had an enigmatic smile on his face, and it had to do with the two strangers at our table. One was an older man in a short-sleeved flannel shirt. He had a short white beard and piercing blue eyes. The other was a dark-skinned man with freckles, and he had a friendlier expression on his face. Two empty plates sat before them, and the older man wiped his mouth with a napkin and smiled up at me.

“Who are they?” I asked in a low voice.

What made me nervous was that the entire Weston pack was in the kitchen, both standing and sitting around the table.

“The local Council. Feel like getting mated today?”

“What?”

“Feisty girl you got there,” the older one said. “Sure you want a wildcat like that?” He chuckled warmly and glanced at Austin. “How are things going with your woman? I still remember the day you signed the papers.”

Austin smirked and glanced at Lexi, who was sitting to his left with her chin tucked in the palm of her hand. “Can’t complain, Turner.”

Wheeler snatched my wrist and led me toward the table. The white-haired man threw his legs over the bench to straddle it, and I sat down next to him with Wheeler standing beside me.

“A pack witnessing a mating ceremony isn’t legal without at least two officials, so there’s me and Romeo,” Turner said.

I smirked, wondering if he was being facetious or if that was the other man’s name.

“Looks like we have a twofer. I have you down for an induction into a pack and a mating ceremony. What’s your name?” he asked, pressing the tip of his pen against a small book.