by Cougar (lit)
The shrieking man panicked, diving to the Earth, dragging me down by my muzzle.
The horses kicked into a trot and darted for the gate.
They were taking Jackal away.
No. I shook free of the gushing blood beneath the man's chin and raced after the mounts. And the game of chase began.
There was nothing like a chase to get my blood pumping to the point of euphoria.
The panicked throng of Prophets lured me through the gateway.
Not a problem. I could shred their asses anywhere. Heart pounding, nostrils flaring to take in every scent descending upon my senses, I pursued a horse, culled it from the pack, and tore the rider's throat out. One man after another. Over and over. Until my golden coat gleamed liquid red in the sunlight and the pack of Prophets dwindled to a few anxious fools scrambling to reach someplace they fancied safe.
My bloodied coat wasn't a problem. Being wet with blood had advantages. Lubricant. Slickened with the blood bath, I could slip from the struggling bastards' grasps.
A buzzing sound nibbled at my ears.
The annoying tone was too mechanical, steady. Like a motor.
A motorcycle.
Or more than one. The Guardians. Hopefully. I'd need help getting Jackal off the horse. Gods. To shift meant I'd be nude. With my clansmen around. So life had a way of making one pay for the borrowed power used to shift and perform miracles. I clawed at green grass, heading after the retreating horse haunches veering toward a line of trees.
Another man died.
And another.
My lungs began to burn.
But Jackal needed my help. Just keep going.
The zipping sound of the motor increased.
Neared. Who was it? I chanced a glance when coming back around a bay horse I'd separated from the pack.
Akita.
Cloaked in her black enforcer armor.
Loaded down with weapons. She'd use them if we could make the men stop running long enough to allow her to draw and aim. But riding a bike through the unforgiving forest required both hands. I was Jackal's only hope. So, I took out another Prophet.
The motor silenced.
Gunfire rattled off.
Men fell from horses.
And Jackal's horse raced off on its own to the left.
Into the forest. Akita could kill the other Prophets who could send reinforcements. Jackal needed me. I chased the terrified mount at a distance, hoping to shift back to human form when the animal calmed.
But a cougar chasing a horse didn't equate to reassured gelding. And I was running out of steam. I had no recourse but to take the mount by its throat, clawing, sinking my fangs into the soft sweaty hide covering its jugular to bring it to a halt.
Exhaling loudly, the animal braced its legs.
As if trying to delay its inevitable fall. All I could do was hang on with claws buried in its shoulders. Waiting.
The poor creature snorted and teetered.
Dear. Gods. It would fall ramming Jackal's neck and head into the ground beneath its massive body if I didn't do something fast. I released my jaw hold and claws to shift back into human form.
Horse blood dribbled onto my bare legs, forming rivulets that pooled atop the tops of my feet.
Jackal had a knife in his boot. I grabbed it and worked to saw the rope at his wrists. For some Gods-be-damned reason, the gelding kept its legs beneath him. Maybe the boon was just luck. I'll never know. But I finally sliced through the cord binding my mate's hands and legs together and slid him to the ground.
Still, the horse could collapse on Jackal. I leaned my back into the animal's heaving side and waited.
The animal had to collapse. And when he would, my force had to be enough to send him the other direction.
Jackal laid in a tousle at my feet.
The drug-induced sleep hadn't closed his eyes. What did he witness? Would he recall anything? I'd never been tranquilized before. Who knew what he'd say.
The horse snorted one final breath and began wobbling.
I shoved into its massive weight.
Chapter Nineteen
When in the hell will I be able to move again? Jackal seethed, trapped inside his body. Damn the irony of a Shifter unable to move. That's what made Shifters unique. My mate squatted at my side. Nude. Vulnerable. And all I could do was lie here and wait, staring up at her and the blinding sun breaking through the forest canopy. I can't even fucking blink.
"Jackal? Can you hear me?"
Gods, would she stop repeating the same freaking question? It was bad enough I had to hang in suspended animation, locked on horseback unable to even blink. But her fears had eaten away at my soul hours ago after the horse died. Scratch that. After she killed the horse. Tornado's hunch had been dead on. Sierra was a Cougar like her dame. And she was suitably nicknamed Kitten.
Lucky guess on my part. No hunch at all. Just a fluke. And all I could do was lie here contemplating life while I couldn't move my damned eyelids.
She gently petted my brow, staring into my eyes. "I don't want to be caught out here after dark without protection. I'll have to gather firewood soon."
Was that a warning? She must be talking more for her sanity than mine. Because, the Gods know, I'm going to be preening her tail for the rest of her life as soon as I can fucking move.
She ran the soft pads of two fingers down my neck to lock into the groove next to the jugular and held her breath.
Yet again. Feeling for my pulse. I'd have a bruise there if she didn't relax and give up on thinking I'm dying. I'm alive, Kitten. If only I could grab her, I'd never let go. Show her how alive I am. I stared into those pale blue eyes and watched her panic fade for a few moments.
She had saved me. In that moment, revealing something she kept from me. Why had she hidden what she was? We were closer than hiding such things as the point she was a Cougar.
Hell, I love her.
Didn't she know?
Maybe I should have said I loved her by now. But we hadn't been together that long. And if she still mourned for Rattler, I didn't want to hurt her by implying she needed to get on with life through a cruel and blunt declaration of my feelings.
She petted my cheek again, the glint of tears welling in her eyes. "I was going to tell you today that I'm pregnant."
Holy shit! Not the Gods-be-damned end of the Well of Immortality that should be leaking. I can't move. Damn it.
She sniffed back the tears. "I guess I should have last night. But I didn't think about it until we were exhausted." She poked me with a finger. "You really need to stop wearing me out. I need my brain to function at a certain level all the time! You know, I used to be Father's little genius. I could rattle off all sorts of facts, process them, come up with new ideas. Kind of like playing musical instruments. I just pick up a new one, and the music flows out of my hands. Father said I was his little Mozart." She snorted and slid her gaze to the surrounding wall of thick tree trunks. "But these days, I just don't seem to have the snap I used to have." Her gaze pinched.
What was she confessing? My kitten wasn't a failure. Hell, she'd taken out most of the Prophets on her own and gotten my big-ass carcass off a runaway horse. Those feats pretty much equate to success.
"I won't let you die like I did my parents." Her worried gaze locked back onto mine. "I can't. Gods, Jackal, my uncle died when Normals tranquilized him. Another Guardian just wasn't right when he came back around from the drug-induced sleep." She inhaled sharply and slowly opened and closed her eyes. "I don't want our baby to wonder what you were like. I can't imagine a childhood without knowing one of my parents. Please, come back to me."
Shut up! I can't take it anymore. Why won't my fingers, eyelids, or lips move?
She sank down, settling onto my chest, and curled her arms around my sides. "Come back to me, Jackal. I don't know what I'll do without you. It's different with you than it was with John. So damned different. I have to be with you. My Cougar doesn't want anyone else. We love you
."
My cheek twitched.
It's about Gods-damned time some part of my body moved.
With every miniscule movement of my body, I felt the keys turn in the locks freezing my muscles. Or her tears lubricated my creaking joints. She hugged me, her nose pinned against my ear, sobbing.
"It's alright, Kitten. I just need to sit up and stretch. Please don't cry anymore." I finally got an arm around her quaking shoulders.
"You could hear me?" Her words cracked. She sniffled in a deep breath and backed away enough to look into my eyes.
It was better she knew. No more secrets between us. I placed a palm against her damp warm cheek. "Yes, Kitten. We're having a baby, and I love you too." I mustered one of those believe me stares. "And as clearly as my thoughts are reeling combined with the amount of movement I have in my limbs, there isn't anything wrong with me. I'll be exhausting you by nightfall." I winked.
She sniffed back more of her worry and nodded. "You better," she warned.
After her endless fear-induced confessions, I didn't want to make her cry again. But there was no avoiding mating when a man's bundle of curves hovered without a stitch of clothing. Unfortunately, doing anything about the situation would be foolish. Out here. With nightfall approaching. And the curfew. We were deep in the wilderness without a ride back to the village. Who knew how long it would take to reach Death Summit by foot? To beat the curfew.
"Can you stand?" she asked, undoubtedly aware of the time constraints.
"I'll try."
We worked for a while to get my legs back to functioning sufficiently. And then I just felt normal again.
The sun hovered long past midday.
Time to go.
An hour passed before we caught the sputter of Akita's bike. Demon and Steel had joined her on motorcycles though. Not good with my nude mate tagging along. I had to hide her behind a tree before waving them down.
"Where's Sierra?" Akita demanded.
I didn't motion my mate's direction. "In the woods. She doesn't have any clothing."
Akita nodded and reached into her bike's trunk, extracting the wad of the clothes Sierra wore this morning. "I figured Sierra would need these. After she dresses, we'll give you a lift back to the village."
* * * *
That was the last thing I expected to hear when Tornado closed the door to his meeting lodge. Sierra sighed. Tornado should have been angry with me for lying to him about my Cougar. Or pissed I disobeyed Jackal after my mate gave a complete report of what he'd experienced. Even my confession of pregnancy revealed something else I had kept hidden. I guess the growing child should have been expected. Especially after Keezia's little tantrum. But I wasn't certain what was behind Jackal's capture. It could have been an angered Keezia driving the invasion to kidnap my Jackal. But Sessily? Who would have guessed she wanted me dead to release Jackal from his mating bond? And that she had opened the damned gate to allow the Bounders into the village that night…
And who would have guessed Tornado had been setting up a little system where I would teach the children to play the guitar? The sneaky bastard was really soft at heart. "So you tortured the Prophet until getting a confession, then you hanged him?" I asked the clan leader.
He nodded. "He deserved far worse. But nobody wanted to smell the flames eating away his stinking flesh in a bonfire. We opted for a more appealing mode of termination with the villagers in mind." His words held no sarcasm.
Maybe I'd somehow won his respect.
"Everything's going to be alright now, Sierra." Tornado paced between Demon and Akita, waving a hand for effect. "Sessily's gone. The Prophets are dead. Keezia will leave you alone." He stopped and faced me, feet spread wide to brace his weight. "You're family. And the clan protects family."
I could have cried in relief.
I could have hugged the man.
But I've just never been the type of woman to do such things.
Especially when I still had to wonder about the sisterhood crap. My alleged powers? And I was supposed to change the future with other sisters by joining some gathering? Not me. Not after finding a family.
"You and the baby won't be any safer anywhere else, Sierra," Tornado gently insisted.
"I'm not questioning that." I flicked a glance at Jackal's compassionate green eyes darkened in the shadows over my shoulder. "If I can't handle something, Jackal will take care of it."
My big mate winked.
"But I doubt the sisterhood will give up on my participation in their master plan."
"Don't worry about that," Tornado said. "If they come again, we'll send them packing. Besides, pregnant women shouldn't travel. Let Jackal take care of you."
I had every intention of relying on him for a while. "That's why I chose him."
"Well," Jackal rolled his eyes, "and because I'm hot as sin."
I can't believe he said that aloud in front of all his relatives. But he was right. "Yes, you are." He proved it later that night when the fire died down to a few low licking flames.
He stoked heat from my body with his lathing tongue like I was the log in the hearth mimicking the lodge's fire where he held me on his lap.
Gods, what I would do to have him in his Wolfskin. I slid my hand down his sculpted musculature of his chest and kissed his throbbing neck.
He groaned into my ear.
"How pissed do you think Tornado will be if I make you shift?" I gently suggested.
He snorted and moaned, leaning his head back so I could work the skin of his pliant neck with my lips. "Oh, about as pissed as clan leaders come."
"I don't care if he comes. Just you." I chuckled into his warm skin.
Jackal lost a laugh. His firm hand glided down my back to clamp around my hips and hold me in place as he bucked his engorged cock deeper into my mind-numbing G-spot. "Kitten, you keep talking dirty, and I'll be donning my Wolfskin with or without your permission."
Since I'm in control… "Don't you dare plant seed inside me until you're so huge I can't do anything but gasp for air and scream. The Gods know your Wolf cock is so damned enormous that I just can't think of anything else."
That was all it took to set off wiry wolfen hairs sprouting all over his body. I leaned into his shifting iron form while his yellow eyes watched me scrape my taut nipples against the coarse mussed hair blanketing his chest. Then I writhed agonizingly as his erection swelled inside me, locking its ribs into my soft aching tissue.
"Jackal!" I grabbed two handholds of his wiry Wolf hair at his shoulders and held on for dear breath.
His claws pressed into my ass cheeks as he held my quivering sex on his enormous shaft.
If only he would move before he grew sharp teeth and devoured me. "Please," I begged, leaning my forehead against his, staring into his observant eyes.
"Mine," he growled, pinned my crotch against his hairy waist, and rose to back me against the hard wall. "Sierra," he hissed and withdrew his erection with a jerk, all the way until only the thick rounded head remained inside my clenching muscles, and then thrust purposely like a beast with only one intention on its mind.
Releasing hot seed. I managed to match his gaze even though I could think of nothing but throwing my head back and grinding my hips, eyes shut, lost in the starfall of mating heaven.
It didn't matter how tightly my legs squeezed his dancing waist. He could pump so quickly that my teeth would chatter if I didn't let my jaw gape. Because of those glorious ridges rubbing the most amazing mindboggling friction inside my core.
And who wouldn't gape being taken so completely? In such a fundamentally raw fashion? This was the way sex was back during the dawn of mankind. Before cultures placed restrictions. Defined taboos. The way sex should be. Real. True to itself.
And there was nothing like sex with my Wolf.
Fulfilling.
So satisfying I could do nothing but scream at each successive wave of orgasm barreling through my soul as he used his cock to lay siege to my soul's castle.
Only Jackal remained. Strong. Potent.
Mine.
Leave it to Cougar to state the point.
He threw his head back and roared at the shadow-engulfed ceiling.
Pounding. Throbbing inside me. Coating my soul with warm precious seed.
Our hip thrusts became short and blunt. Erratic with of his erection's consecutive spasms. But he kept showering me with life. I'd take every last drop and give him all the children he could ask for. Give him a family I dreamed of having. And he'd teach the children to be as calm and rational as him. Together we would change the future raising a brood of Shifters that nobody dared cross. Because we are Shifters. And if the aliens wanted were-creatures on Earth, they'd get them. And more, creating their demise in the same breath. I didn't need a sisterhood to make me work for the freedom of humanity. No, all I needed was my Jackal.
Chapter Twenty
I smiled into Jackal's sparkling green eyes where I planted my chin into the soft muscle of his chest, lying atop his human body as he stretched out on the bed recovering from wild sex. It was mid morning. We'd gone for food and returned to fritter away the day. In our own way.
A knock rattled at the door.
Jackal rolled me toward the wall. "Stay here. I'll see who it is." He crossed the space, nude, and pulled the door a few inches to lock his sight on someone.
Who? At least, the person couldn't see me in the way Jackal blocked the view into our lodge.
"Akita's gone," Demon's voice announced.
Jackal cast me a glance over his shoulder and turned back to Demon. "What do you want me to do?"
"Did she say anything? Where she's going? Anything else?"
The sunlight hitting Jackal's face only showed his confusion. "What do you want, Demon? You can't chase after her."
Why would Demon follow Akita?
"Forget it," Demon snapped.
Jackal shut the door and turned to me, planting his palms on his hips.
The nude sight of him was truly sinful. But what in the world was up with Demon?
