Tanner heaved himself to his feet, and he really did feel better, although the idea of shifting in front of Chase—in front of a naked Chase—was more than a little daunting.
But he stayed by me. The least I can do is not be weird about something that’s as normal to weres as nudity.
So Tanner took his courage in both hands and let the transformation magic roll over him, although he kept his back to Chase. But when he heard Chase’s breath catch, he peeked over his shoulder.
Oh my gods. Chase’s dick was hard! When he saw Tanner looking, he turned away and fumbled to pick up his shirt. Which meant he bent over. Which meant— Gah!
Tanner peered down at his own straining dick. “Um, Chase?”
“Yeah?” Chase’s voice sounded strangled. Probably the same as mine.
“You know that consent thing?”
“Yeah?”
Tanner peeked over his shoulder again. Chase was standing still, his shirt limp in one hand, the other fist clenched. He’s got freckles on his back. “Is it okay if I touch you now?”
Chase gripped the nape of his neck with his free hand, his blond hair shaggy enough after his shift to brush his knuckles. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea.” But he let his shirt flutter to the ground.
“Because you don’t want me to?” Tanner turned around and edged closer.
“No. I mean, it’s not that. Not that I don’t want you to.” He let go of his neck, but he didn’t face Tanner. “It’s . . . it’s because I want it too much. And you’re vulnerable right now. You just went through shift withdrawal, for Remus’s sake.”
“So is that a no?” Those freckles, scattered across Chase’s skin like stardust, lured Tanner closer.
Chase’s breath caught on a laugh. “I don’t think I’m capable of telling you no.”
So that’s not a no. “You know what I think?” The arc of his hand as he raised it toward Chase’s back wasn’t a simple arm movement. It felt . . . momentous. Inevitable, as if he’d started the motion almost three years ago when he’d first walked through the door of the Doghouse. Electric, as if his skin were still sparking with an incipient shift. Languorous, as if they had all the time in the world.
“Wh-what?”
“For the first time in my life . . .” Then his fingertips touched Chase’s smooth, warm skin in the center of a freckle constellation, right where the column of his neck curved into his shoulder, and Chase shivered like he’d just emerged from an unexpected dip in a creek. But he didn’t flinch or duck away from Tanner’s touch. He turned slowly, so slowly, allowing Tanner’s fingers to mark a trail from shoulder to collarbone to chest. “. . . I feel like an alpha.”
Tanner was mesmerized by the sight of his brown fingers against Chase’s paler skin. That’s my hand. I’m touching Chase. He glanced down and gulped, mouth watering. He’d seen Chase’s dick before, but it had always been soft. It had never been this hard, this thick, this hot. And when Chase rested his hands on Tanner’s hips and pulled him forward gently, so that Tanner’s equally hard but not as thick dick nestled up against it, Tanner was afraid he’d embarrass himself and come right then.
If he kept staring down at that, with both dicks seeming to stare back at him with a slightly cockeyed gaze, he’d definitely embarrass himself—if not by coming like an adolescent pup, then by blurting out something stupid like Chase, our dicks are watching me.
So he lifted his chin and met Chase’s eyes. Gorgeous blue-gray eyes that crinkled at the corners with Chase’s smile.
“Hi,” Chase murmured.
“Um, hi?”
“I have something to ask you.”
“O-okay.”
“May I kiss you now?”
Tanner clenched his own eyes shut. “Oh gods, please.”
Then Chase’s lips—his plush, perfect lips—were on Tanner’s. Tanner’s eyes flew open, but then he closed them again because gah, sensory overload! As much as he wanted to see what Chase looked like this close, he didn’t want to distract himself from the kiss. Of the feel of Chase’s lips molding to his, of the prickle of Chase’s scruff against his face, of Chase’s breath puffing warm against his skin.
Tanner’s dick pulsed—not coming, not yet, thank goodness, but definitely pushed toward it by the kiss.
Chase must have felt it, because he pulled away a little, just enough to disengage from Tanner’s lips. Damn it.
“I saw what Shirl put in that bag.” Chase’s voice, low and growly, sent a frisson down Tanner’s spine.
“You . . . you did?”
“Uh-huh. I’d like more with you, Tanner. More kisses. More skin.” Chase swiveled his hips, adding a little friction to the pressure on their dicks. “More everything. But I don’t want to push you. You’re in a fragile state right now—”
“I’m not that fragile.” Especially in my nether regions. “You don’t have to treat me like I’m broken.”
“You’re not broken. You’re one of the strongest people I know. You’d have to be, to endure what you did. But that’s my point. You did endure it. You’re still recovering—”
“Chase.” Tanner laid his fingers across Chase’s mouth. “Look down. I think it’s obvious that I’ve recovered.” Chase’s lips curved under Tanner’s touch. “I’ve wanted to be with you for years. I’m ready. Gods, so ready.”
Chase nipped Tanner’s fingers gently. “All right, then.” He cast a wry glance at their discarded clothing. “But I don’t want our first time to be in a cave that smells way too much of bear. Do you?”
Tanner blinked, realizing that he’d probably been wrinkling his nose. “That’s a good point. No.”
“So let’s get dressed.” Chase ran his hands from Tanner’s hips up his ribs—probably feel like a freaking washboard; good for abs, not so much for ribs—and rested them on his shoulders. “Then we can go back to the cabin.” Chase must have noticed Tanner’s shiver, because he cupped Tanner’s cheek. “We don’t have to do anything that needs condoms and lube—”
“I want to,” Tanner blurted. “I mean, I at least want to try. I’ll probably be terrible at it, since, you know, I’ve never done anything before.”
Chase’s eyebrows drew together, a tiny crease folding between them. “Never? Nothing?”
Tanner dropped his gaze from Chase’s eyes to his chin. “You’re my first kiss.”
“Gods, Tanner.”
Tanner’s gaze shot back to Chase’s eyes at the tone of his voice. Was that disgust? “I’m sorry?”
Chase laughed, although there was an odd edge to it. “Don’t be sorry. Hells, everybody should be allowed to approach sex at their own pace, and it’s not like I’ve got that much experience myself. But way to put the pressure on.”
Greatly daring, Tanner lifted on his toes—which resulted in a delicious slide of skin down there—and kissed Chase again. “No pressure. Anything you do—”
“You mean anything we do?”
Tanner smiled. “Yeah. Anything we do will be perfect. Because it’s you.”
Chase trailed a finger down Tanner’s cheek. “And because it’s you.” He cleared his throat and stepped away, the loss of his warmth making Tanner shiver again. “Now we’d better go before we end up thrashing around, lost in the woods for hours, instead of cuddled together in a nice cushy bed.”
Bed? Oh gods, a bed. Tanner’s eyes nearly rolled back in his head, because a bed. And not just any bed. A bed with Chase in it. A bed where they’d both be naked. A bed where they’d be free to touch, to kiss, to— He hunched over, his hands pressed to his groin.
Chase peered at him. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Tanner croaked. “Have you seen my underwear?” Or maybe a steel-belted thong?
Somehow, Tanner managed to wrestle his recalcitrant dick into his briefs. Once it was more or less contained, he was able to finish dressing with a little more dignity.
When they finally gathered their various bags, Chase stopped him at the cave mouth and tilted Tanner’s
chin up with one finger. He pressed a kiss—soft and warm, a promise rather than a demand—on Tanner’s lips. “For luck,” he said. “And because now I can.”
When they ducked outside, the sky above the treetops held only a memory of sunlight. But Tanner had no more trouble following Ted’s scent back to the cabin—especially since it was coupled with their own—than he’d had on the outbound hike. When they emerged from the trees, the cabin’s windows glowed with soft, golden light and smoke wreathed the chimney pipe. They mounted the porch, their steps echoing on its wide wooden planks. Chase exchanged a glance with Tanner, then shrugged and eased the door open.
“Hello?” There was no answer, so Chase smiled at Tanner. “Guess we’ve still got the place to ourselves, huh?”
They slipped inside and pulled off their boots. I can’t just bolt for the bedroom. That would be weird, right? So Tanner collected his bags and padded over to the kitchen. The stewpot was gone from the stove and a row of little bottles sat on the counter with a note from Ted: From Bryce for withdrawing? Tanner traced the letters, evidence that Mal must be okay if he’d had time to talk to Bryce about Tanner’s . . . escapade. He wandered into the living room, struck again by the charm of the cabin. “This place is so great.”
Chase strolled over to stand next to him. “Is your pack house a big barracks of a place too?”
“Yeah.” Tanner ran his hand along the back of the Mission-style sofa. “I think once wolves decided to stop wandering, they must have wanted to make a statement that they were planted.”
“Or else it was just alpha-assholishness, trying to prove who had the biggest . . . domicile.”
Tanner snickered. “That sounds more likely.”
“Anyway . . .” Chase nudged Tanner’s hip with his own. “Ted told me he and his husband are staying at the lodge tonight. I guess that means we won’t be—” Chase’s smile was slow and suggestive “—interrupted.”
Tanner swallowed, his dick perking up in his pants again. “I g-guess not.”
Chase set his handful of bags on the counter and snagged Tanner’s belt loop, drawing him close. When Chase kissed him, Tanner lost his grip on his own bags and they clattered to the floor. Something hard landed on his toe. “Ow?” Tanner glanced down at the bottle of lube, which had slid off his foot and rolled across the floor.
Chase laughed and scooped it up. “What do you say we find that guest room?”
Tanner nodded and matched his palm to Chase’s. Chase grinned and laced their fingers together, drawing him out of the kitchen and down the hall, past the open bathroom door to the back of the cabin.
To the bedroom.
It was a lovely room—that registered somewhere in Tanner’s Chase-befuddled brain—with its own little woodstove in the corner and French doors opening onto a deck.
The bed . . . Gods, the bed seemed about an acre across, its comforter and sheets folded back invitingly. Squat white candles sat on the nightstands on either side of the bed as well as on the dresser. Chase picked up a butane lighter and flicked it on. “Ted could teach brownies something about hospitality, don’t you think?”
He released Tanner’s hand to move around the room, lighting each candle. A thread of smoke rose from each tiny flame.
As Chase laid down the lighter and faced Tanner, his eyes glowing gold, Tanner knew he’d forever associate the scent of mint, vervain, and meadowsweet with arousal, breathless anticipation, and hope.
In the candlelight, Tanner was almost impossibly beautiful. But even though he gazed back at Chase with the unmistakable heat of want, the intoxicating smell of his arousal vying with Chase’s under the fragrance of the candles, Chase didn’t want to rush this.
This was his first time with Tanner, and it was Tanner’s first time ever. It should be special. And what a perfect place for it too. Chase’s first experience had been in the game room of the Doghouse during his own Howling, the night of his Bullpen twenty-oner. The place had been littered with empty pizza boxes and smelled of stale beer and were sweat. Since the residents weren’t technically supposed to have sex on the premises, it had been quick and furtive and awkward. The other guy hadn’t spoken to Chase or even looked him in the face ever again. But since his birthday was in June, it had only been a few days.
He didn’t want Tanner’s first time to leave him with any regrets. Only good thoughts. Chase walked toward him slowly, the way Tanner’s gaze devoured him making him want to howl in possessive triumph. He stopped in front of Tanner and took both his hands, kissing the center of each palm.
“Tell me what you want.”
Tanner’s glare was half-outrage, half-helplessness. “How do I know what I want? I’ve never done this before!”
Chase swallowed a laugh. “All right. Let’s start by losing the clothes again.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Tanner muttered. But he shucked off his jacket and tossed it onto the loveseat next to the woodstove.
Chase started to unbutton his own shirt, but got distracted by the sight of Tanner’s bare chest and belly. He was way too thin of course, but muscles still slid smoothly under his brown skin. Chase’s fingers twitched with the urge to touch. Which will happen a lot quicker if you get with the fricking program.
He didn’t bother to unbutton his shirt the rest of the way, just grabbed the back of it and yanked it over his head. He undid his fly and pushed his pants and briefs down, sitting on the edge of the bed to pull them off his feet, along with his socks. His cock was standing straight up in its nest of blond pubic hair.
The mattress dipped as Tanner sat beside him, his bare hip brushing Chase’s. Chase gulped, his gaze skittering to Tanner’s cock—uncut like most weres, more slender than Chase’s but almost as long. So pretty. Chase had always preferred dark hair to blond, considering his own coloring insipid. Tanner was so . . . so vivid. He tore his gaze away from Tanner’s groin and met his eyes.
A smile quivered on Tanner’s lips. “Hi, again.”
“Hi.”
“So. We’re on a bed.”
“We are. But we seem to be sitting up.”
“Isn’t that allowed?”
Chase shrugged one shoulder. “Allowed, but not optimal.”
“What’s optimal, then?” Tanner’s voice quivered with buried laughter.
“For a start, I’m told that one recommended position is perpendicular to where we are now.”
“You mean like this?” Tanner scooted back and swung his legs onto the bed behind Chase, then lay down amid the mound of fluffy pillows at the head of the bed.
“Mm-hmm.” Chase drew his knees up and crawled next to Tanner, looking down into his face, into his beautiful eyes. “That’s a start.”
“Now what?”
“Now I join you. Like this.” Chase flipped over onto his back to lie next to Tanner. The pillows floofed around his head so he couldn’t see Tanner’s face.
“So we’re supposed to lie next to each other and stare at the ceiling? Because I’ve got to tell you, this parallel arrangement isn’t cutting it.”
“No kidding. These pillows have to go.” Chase sat up and tossed two of the three pillows from his side of the bed onto the floor.
“Stop!” Tanner sat up too. “Those aren’t ours. We can’t just throw them on the ground.”
Chase took the opportunity to snag two of Tanner’s pillows too and send them after his own. “They’ll be a lot safer down there than up here. There’s a nice rug on the floor and they’re out of the way of candle flames and random body fluids.”
Tanner’s eyes widened. “B-body fluids?”
“Mm-hmm. Using somebody else’s pillow to prop up my hips seems a little rude.” He put his hand on Tanner’s chest and pushed him back down, then lay beside him again.
“I know I’m not very experienced, Chase, but even I know that there’s a bit more involved than this.” Tanner’s tone was tart, and it nearly made Chase laugh, but with his skin practically on fire, with his fingers tingling with the need to t
ouch Tanner all over, with his alpha side howling at him to claim, he was almost afraid to start.
Chase rolled onto his side and tucked one arm under his head. He reached over and tugged on Tanner’s shoulder until he was on his side too. “Is this better?”
“Getting there.” Tanner glanced down to where their cocks crossed. “But somehow I don’t think that lovemaking is only about two dicks passing in the night.”
Lovemaking. Tanner had said it, the thing that Chase was studiously avoiding. Sex—especially in were society—wasn’t a taboo between unmated pairs. But tenderness, gentleness, lovemaking? Well, those were another story. Those meant commitment. Those meant a loyalty that crossed pack lines. Those meant vulnerability, something an alpha—even a middle management alpha—was trained to avoid at all costs.
Chase stroked Tanner’s tumbled black hair off his forehead. “Are you sure about this? You know there can’t be anything more. You have duties. So do I. Our packs are nowhere close to one another, and their politics and economies are so different.”
Sadness flared in Tanner’s eyes for an instant before his lips firmed. “Why is everything about the pack, about politics? Why can’t it be about something more? About choosing what’s right for you rather than what will be most advantageous for the pack?”
“We’re weres, sweetheart. Supes. Our destinies were fixed before we were born.” Sad, but true. “Our calon is our fate.”
“Why can’t it be about how you feel? About how we feel?” Tanner placed one hand in the center of Chase’s chest. “About this—the heart, not the calon.”
Chase cupped the back of Tanner’s neck. “Do you want to stop? If this is all we can have, this night, however many days before we’re called back, would you rather get dressed and, I don’t know, eat something? Read a book? Pretend this never happened?”
Tanner frowned. “Are you crazy? Of course I don’t want to stop. But that’s the point, Chase. I don’t want to stop. I don’t think I’d ever want to stop. Not with you.”
Chase leaned forward and kissed the frown away until Tanner sighed. “Then for tonight, let’s pretend that we don’t have to worry about the future. We only have to think about now. And right now . . . I really want to kiss you some more.”
Howling on Hold Page 17
