Cougar Desires [Cougarlicious 3] (Siren Publishing Classic) Read online

  Cougarlicious 3

  Cougar Desires

  Gwen Ford has just about given up on meeting a man, any man, much less the younger one that she and her friends had agreed to hunt for. She agrees to go out with her son to meet people and get out of the house on a Friday night when she meets the man who is happy to make her a cougar. Too bad he’s one of her son’s best friends.

  Jaxon Stanopolis recognizes his mate as soon as he holds her on the dance floor. It does not matter to him that she is 14 years older than he is. It does not matter that he is her son’s mentor at the fire department. Nothing matters to him except claiming his mate.

  Will she give into the attraction she feels? Or will she allow her son to keep her away from the man of her desires?

  Genre: Contemporary, May-December, Paranormal, Shape-shifter

  Length: 23,070 words

  COUGAR DESIRES

  Cougarlicious 3

  Cooper McKenzie

  EROTIC ROMANCE

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Erotic Romance

  COUGAR DESIRES

  Copyright © 2013 by Cooper McKenzie

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-62740-609-3

  First E-book Publication: September 2013

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All cover art and logo copyright © 2013 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter to Readers

  Dear Readers,

  If you have purchased this copy of Cougar Desires by Cooper McKenzie from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

  Regarding E-book Piracy

  This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

  The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

  This is Cooper McKenzie’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. McKenzie’s right to earn a living from her work.

  Amanda Hilton, Publisher

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  For those who have stuck with me through good times and bad.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  About the Author

  COUGAR DESIRES

  Cougarlicious 3

  COOPER MCKENZIE

  Copyright © 2013

  Chapter 1

  With a sigh of depression mixed with resignation, Gwen Ford closed the door and twisted the deadbolt into place. It was just after nine o’clock on another Friday night, and she was home and headed for bed.

  Alone.

  Again.

  The weekly boots and BBQ party at the local cowboy club had been fun, but except for the older gentleman whose grandson was the same as age her son, not one man gave her a first look, much less asked her to dance. Though he admitted to having a pocket full of condoms and several little blue pills, Gwen turned him down as gently as she could. Her desires lay in meeting someone younger and more vital.

  After another circuit of the room with no other requests for a dance, or more, she had finished her second beer, climbed into her sensible little econo-car, and come home. As she drove, she berated herself for turning the older man, whose name she had already forgotten, down.

  Just because the thought of sleeping with someone her father’s age weirded her out was no reason to turn down sex, no matter what package it came wrapped in. Besides, the old man had had pharmaceutical backup and she had been without a man between her legs for a long, long time.

  But Gwen could not do it. She did not want an old man who required medication to find his happy. She did not want a random one-night stand with a man who would probably forget her name before the sun came up. She was not even sure she wanted a man her own age who may, or may not, be able to get his junk interested in playing more than once a week. Maybe like her BFF Kimber Jordan had proposed at their last semi-annual Girls’ Weekend, she should be looking at men a few years younger. Or maybe even more than a few.

  But what would Grant, her twenty-two-year-old son, say about his mama becoming a cougar? How would he feel if she dated someone closer to his age than her own? Would a younger man even be interested in her with her generous curves, sagging breasts, and wrinkles?

  The words of the last man she had dated twice over a year before came back to haunt her yet again. “Men don’t like fat chicks. We want Barbie dolls, not Raggedy Anns. Call me after you lose weight and get in shape. I might be interested then.”

  The thought of calling that immature forty-five-plus-year-old little boy, who had only his own pleasures in mind and was so shallow he refused to look beyond the flesh to the heart, sent a shiver of revulsion through Gwen.

  Her next Girls’ Weekend with Kimber and Stacy was only a month away. At their last gathering, Gwen, Kimber, and Stacy Covey, the third member of their merry band, had agreed to try being a cougar and looking at younger men.

  They also agreed to open their next weekend to include the younger men they would be dating at that time. But Gwen had not met anyone. Hell, she had not even been looking. The only reason she had gone out tonight was that she had promised Kimber and Stacy just the day before that she would do a better job of putting herself out in the world to at least try and meet a man. They had both found their men who were indeed younger and, from the pictures her friends had e-mailed her, hotter than a July day in Houston.
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  So when would it be her turn?

  Needing some food to counteract the effects of the beer, Gwen headed to the kitchen. She jumped when she rounded the corner and just about ran over her son. She kept forgetting she no longer lived alone. Grant had moved home a few weeks earlier after having been away in Dallas for six months at Fire School.

  She had agreed to his temporary return while he waited to hear about his application to the federal wildfire fighter’s program. While she applauded his goal to become a wilderness firefighter and move to the Rocky Mountains, he was her baby and his choice of careers scared the bejesus out of her. But she kept her opinions to herself. He was a grown man, and though living at home, he was on his own.

  “Oh, shit,” she squealed. Her heart racing, she sidestepped to the left and then to the right. Grant mirrored her moves, causing her to giggle as nerves and silliness bubbled together and mixed with the beer.

  “Mom, stop,” Grant said.

  He gently wrapped his hands around her upper arms then danced her in a circle. Once they had traded places in the doorway, he brushed a kiss on her cheek.

  “There,” he said. Releasing her, he took a step back then turned and walked away.

  “There, indeed,” Stacy muttered to herself as she continued into the kitchen for a snack.

  She was not surprised when, while she was opening cabinets and looking inside for something good to pop out at her, he reappeared wearing a concerned frown.

  “Where were you?” he asked, leaning against the doorjamb in the pose that so reminded her of his father questioning her after returning late from a date.

  “Out,” she said, opening the refrigerator and looking at the contents.

  Salad stuff, bottled water, juice, three kinds of soda, two bottles of beer, and leftover roast pork from last night’s dinner. No chocolate, pasta, or other food that would give comfort to a bruised ego. Instead of food, she pulled out a bottle of water before closing the door, though she stared at the beer for a long moment wondering if she drank enough and fell asleep, would she wake up in her own version of Oz? Where men were gorgeous, virile, and looking for a woman like her. Or maybe she would land in the middle of one of those ubermasculine action movies where everyone wanted her, as their partner and more.

  “You’ve been drinking.” Grant sounded shocked.

  “Yes, I have.”

  Opening the bottle, she tossed the cap into the recycle bucket. Taking a swallow, she headed to the covered porch that looked over the backyard. She settled in the rocking chair she had bought before Grant had been born. The chair had been relegated to the porch a few years earlier when he declared he was too old for the chair to remain in his room.

  Once seated, she lifted the bottle and drank deep while Grant pulled another chair around so they were knee to knee. “What’s going on?” he asked, looking so much like his father that her heart hurt. His concerned expression broke down the mother barrier and had her do what she had always vowed not to do, dump her troubles on his shoulders.

  “I’m old and fat and don’t want a man who is or looks like he is old enough to be my father,” she said as she blinked back tears of sadness and self-pity.

  “You need to date someone younger,” Grant said. “Why don’t you come out with me tonight?”

  The two beers she had drunk earlier must have hit her harder than she had thought. “Out with you? Won’t that be a little weird to be at a bar with your mother?”

  She tried to tell herself this was yet another of Grant’s hard-to-understand jokes. Jokes he found hilarious but she rarely got.

  Instead of laughing and agreeing, he looked deep into her eyes, his eyes full of concern. “Dad’s dead and gone. You are not that old, and you look years younger than your age. If neither of us says anything, I bet people will think you are my older sister and not my mother. I’ll even be your designated driver so you can get completely shit-faced if you want.”

  Gwen blinked then swallowed hard. Surprisingly, the pain that normally came with discussion of her widowed status did not stab through her. Maybe because Grant was right. It was time to stop thinking of herself as Charlie’s widow and start thinking of herself as Gwen, a woman very much alive and desirable.

  Deciding she had to try, Gwen took another swallow of her water. “But what will you do if one of your friends wants to take me home?”

  “Mo-om,” he sighed. “I really do not want to think of you and any of my friends that way, even though it’s none of my business. How about if tonight we limit you to drinking and dancing, but no disappearing with any young hard bodies, okay?”

  Gwen giggled, surprising them both with the sound as it had been a long, long time since there had been anything to laugh about in her life.

  “Sorry,” she apologized. “I don’t think disappearing without you will be a problem.”

  “Good, come on,” Grant said, standing and offering her his hand.

  His smile made Gwen wonder if going along with his suggestion was such a good idea or not.

  * * * *

  Jaxon Stanopolis’s sensitive hearing picked up the chiming of the front doorbell over the laughter, talking, and music of the typical Friday-night crowd. He froze when he felt something in the universe shift. Looking across the bar, he saw Grant, his friend, fellow firefighter, and one of the bar’s semiregulars, follow a woman into the bar Jax had never seen before.

  She was average. Average height, average weight, and a face that was pretty but not overly memorable. She had pulled her brown hair into a clip at the base of her skull. Unlike the younger women in the bar, she did not appear to have much, if any, makeup on. Her denim skirt and red tank top were too big, hanging on her body without giving a hint to the curves hidden beneath. Curves he grew more curious about with every second. Her looks may not be memorable, but he knew he would never forget her.

  At that moment, his cougar sat up and sniffed the air as if testing for a new scent in the wind.

  Jax ordered his cougar to settle down before forcing himself to concentrate on the order that he was filling. There would be time later to greet the newcomer. Since he had known Grant when the younger man had joined the fire department six years earlier, it should be easy enough to wangle an introduction.

  Something about Grant had drawn Jax in at their first meeting when the younger man had been just a sixteen-year-old boy with a desire to volunteer with the fire department. Over the past six years, Jax had mentored him even though he was only seven years older. They had grown and matured together.

  Looking at the woman who now followed his friend through the crowd, Jax had a hard time believing the two were together. He watched as they crossed to the large table in the back where most of the crowd Grant ran with had settled in for the evening. The woman stopped several feet from the table, looking uncertain and uncomfortable. When she said something to Grant before turning away, he grabbed her arm and stopped her.

  Jax’s cougar howled in anger at Grant’s actions, but he was too busy to leave the bar. And Samo, the bouncer, was busy at the door. So he continued to watch, prepared to leap over the bar if necessary, as the pull toward the woman grew stronger with each heartbeat.

  After an intense conversation where Grant did most of the talking, the woman finally sighed and nodded before she sat in the chair Grant held for her. He then leaned over her shoulder and apparently introduced her to the others at the table. As Jax continue watching, the crowd of twenty-somethings, who had been growing loud and rowdy, immediately settled down and grew quiet and serious. Who was this woman?

  When Grant came to the bar, he ordered a soda and a single bottle of beer. This was yet another first for the young man who normally ordered beer by the pitcher then shared it with the table.

  “New lady?” Jax had to ask as he set the drinks in front of the man.

  “Old lady,” Grant answered with a grin. Lifting the glass of soda, he drank half then handed it back to Jax to be topped off.

  Jax frow
ned. Surely he would have heard of Grant getting married even if he had not been invited to the wedding. “Yours or someone else’s?”

  “Mine. Come over when you get a chance and I’ll introduce you,” Grand said, tossing money on the bar for the beer.

  Jax watched as the man sauntered to his table and handed the bottle of beer to the woman. Then he forced himself to walk to the other end of the bar where Kristy, one of the waitresses, had been waving for his attention for several minutes.

  His cock remained half-hard and interested as he forced himself to remain behind the bar for another hour until his normal break time. Only then did he fill his oversized travel mug with soda and cross the bar to where she sat.

  She looked bored as she peeled the label off her now-empty bottle of beer. He saw why when he stopped behind her. The rest of the table, including the man she had come with, seemed to be ignoring her.

  Jax knelt in the space between her and Grant and then tapped the young man on the shoulder. “Introduce me,” he said when Grant twisted in his chair and looked up at him.

  “Oh, yeah. Sure,” Grant said then patted the woman’s arm to get her attention. “Mom, this is Jaxon Stanopolis, firefighter, bartender, and the man who helped train me for Fire School. Jax, this is Mom. Just call her Mom. Everybody does.”

  Jax frowned at the rather disrespectful introduction. Before he could respond to the introduction, Grant had returned to his conversation with the pretty blonde on his other side.

  The woman, Mom’s falsely bright and obviously forced smile wavered when she looked at him. Blinking, Jax picked her hand up from the table and wrapped it his own. He sucked in a sharp breath as fire raced from her touch up his arm. After spreading through his entire body, the heat rushed back to start a bonfire in his cock and balls. At the same moment, his cougar leapt to attention and roared. Then his wild side demanded he drag her out the back door and claim her immediately if not sooner.