First Awakening [Diablo Falls]

by Alexx Andria

  I groaned, my nipples aching to feel smashed against his chest, abraded by his chest hair. I started to tear at my clothes, desperate to be skin on skin. If I didn’t have him inside me this very instant, I would certainly die.

  “Lyric, no!”

  Beckham’s pained groan filtered through the dream state and I opened my eyes with confusion to find Beckham above me, panting hard. His eyes were black and his lips reddened as if we’d been making out for hours. I could feel the length of his cock pressing against my thigh, same as it had in my dream.

  I gasped, torn between my desperate need to feel him and my horror that I was no longer dreaming.

  “Goddamn it,” he muttered before descending on my mouth, his tongue stabbing against mine, conquering my lips with brutal force. It was an angry kiss flavored with anguish and desperation that tasted like ambrosia to me. His hand snaked between us, reaching beneath my sundress to find my aching slit. “I wish you weren’t wearing a dress,” he groaned as he slipped a finger inside me. I gasped against the penetration, grinding myself against him. “It’s too hard to resist you.”

  I wanted to beg him to take me, to claim me right there in the park. The threat of being seen only added more fuel to the fire eating me alive. I wasn’t myself right now. Never in my life had I been so devil-may-care about giving people a first row seat to the moment I lost my virginity.

  Yeah, been saving that particular moment. Not sure for when but I hadn’t wanted to lose my V-card to just anyone with a dick.

  And now I was practically hopping up and down on a man I barely knew but couldn’t get enough of.

  I hated this shifter shit but there was no stopping the train wreck between me and Beckham. All we could do was strap in and hold on for dear life because this train wasn’t stopping for no one.

  “Just do it,” I begged, reaching into his pants to grab his thick cock. Jesus, would that thing fit inside me? I couldn’t wait to find out. Would it hurt? I didn’t care. “I need you to fuck me, Beckham!”

  “I took my meds, this shouldn’t be happening!” he said, almost desperately even as he fumbled with his jeans to free his cock. “Oh fuck, I can’t stop! I’m sorry, Lyric!”

  I didn’t want apologies, I wanted him.

  Opening my legs, I shimmied out of my panties, grabbing at his perfectly sculpted ass to help him ram his length inside me. Goddamn, it was a brutal invasion into my most tender parts but I thrilled at the violence.

  I was slick and wet, hot and ready. He drove into my heat, parting my twin folds and pushing himself deep inside until he was fully seated, slamming against my fucking uterus. “Yessss,” I moaned like a whore in heat, my fingers flexing and squeezing that plump, firm ass with ecstasy. “Jesus, that’s amazing, fuck me, Beck, fuck me hard!”

  The thin string by which he’d held back his control snapped and he growled against the skin of my neck, biting me and I surged against him, a gush of liquid coating his cock as he drove himself in and out. His hips were a thing of wonder as he pummeled me without mercy. I cried out as waves of pleasure rippled around and inside me. My senses were wicked alive and I could only sob and babble as I clung to him for dear life.

  I didn’t care that we were in a public park, fucking like rabbits.

  All I cared about was the feeling of fusing with this glorious beast of a man.

  That building crescendo crested inside me, breaking something wide open and I crashed into the deepest, hardest clench of abject pleasure I’d ever experienced. My toes curled, my legs shook, and my womb contracted, eager for his seed.

  Nooooo, I dimly thought beneath the howling keen of pleasure erupting from my traitorous lips. There was no turning back from this moment. We were bonded. I knew it in my heart even as I didn’t want to accept it. We were pair bonded and we were helpless to ignore the signals our DNA had sent out without our permission.

  Beckham shouted a guttural moan that ended with a spasmodic jerk as he flooded me with his cream. Oh Jesus, I wasn’t on the pill or anything. I was going to end up with puppies or something. But I couldn’t deny the pleasure that continued to rock me to my core. My pussy clenched at his cock, milking every drop of that baby batter until he was exhausted and spent.

  And each contraction was a fresh wave of pleasure that left me weak as a kitten.

  Beckham rolled away from me, gasping and staring up into the green canopy, lost in the thundering of his heart and the same realization that’d knocked me on my ass, too.

  I could only imagine what a mess I looked. My panties, still hooked haphazardly onto one leg, my hair mussed and my cheeks flushed…but a part of me didn’t care.

  He was right about the bone-melting pleasure from fucking with your Fated Mate. Jesus. Nothing could compare to the sensations still rippling though my body like waves in an ocean.

  “What the fuck, Beckham?” I asked when I could finally speak again. “I’m not marrying you, no matter how good the sex is.”

  Beckham groaned and jerked his jeans up over his hips in an angry motion, muttering, “I’ll fix this,” and popped to his feet. “I…need to make a call.”

  He started to walk away and I realized he was literally being a fuck boy — getting off and leaving me behind — and I wasn’t having that bullshit.

  I yanked my panties back on and ran after him. Good feelings fading fast. “Hold up there. You’re not going to just take my virginity and then bolt. We have to talk.”

  “Lyric, don’t you realize what just happened?” he asked, anguished. “We’re fucking bonded! There’s no escaping each other now. We’re handcuffed to one another for the rest of our fucking lives!”

  I blinked back tears, hating that I felt his revulsion as if it were my own. “Yeah? Well, whose fault is that? Why didn’t your medicine work?”

  “I don’t know,” he snarled. “All I know is that one minute I was working on the case and the next I was drawn to this fucking park and found you on the ground, looking like a snack and I couldn’t resist. You were throwing off some major ‘fuck me vibes’ and when I tried to wake you up, all hell broke loose.”

  “Oh, so it’s my fault you had no control over yourself?” I shouted back, my hurt feelings turning to anger. “I was just taking a nap and then the next thing I know, I’m getting felt up by you.”

  Our energy sparked and crackled around us, creating swirls of color I could see as if they were painted by God’s hand. I blinked hard and they disappeared.

  Beckham pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look, it’s not your fault or mine. It’s the Fated Mate coding. Yelling at each other isn’t going to solve anything,” he paused to draw a deep breath before vowing in a more level tone, “I will find a way to fix this. There has to be a magical way to break a pair bond. I’ll just ask the witch who made my meds. She’s really powerful. She’ll know a way to break the bond.”

  “Good,” I spat but I wanted to cry. This was not how I envisioned losing my virginity. “I didn’t save myself to lose my V-card in a public park with a guy I barely know who apparently hates me.”

  “I don’t hate you,” Beckham said, his voice softening. My lip trembled and that seemed to stab a knife in his heart. He winced and actually reached for me. I went willingly into his arms even though I should’ve kicked him in the nuts. The chagrin in his voice was genuine as he murmured against my crown, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t want this to happen to you like this either. I should’ve tried harder to stay away.”

  “It’s not your fault either,” I said with a small hiccup, closing my eyes as I rested my head against his solid chest, inhaling deeply. His scent soothed me in a way that defied explanation. “Are we really just animals who can’t control their impulses?”

  “When it involves the pairing? It would seem so,” he answered wryly. “Are you okay?”

  “No,” I answered with a watery, mournful cry. “I’m the opposite of okay.”

  He understood, probably because he felt the same. Nothing was okay, the lid to my lif
e had fallen off and the contents had spilled all over the place.

  I’d lost my marbles but I guess the saving grace was that at least I wasn’t alone.

  Beckham

  My hands were shaking. I’d sealed the pair bond. How had this happened? After dropping Lyric off at her house, I returned to my motel room, trying to figure out my next move.

  If I didn’t find a way to break the pair bond and I just left town, an abandoned mate would slowly go insane or die. I couldn’t do that to Lyric but I also couldn’t settle into a Fated Mate pair bonding like it was no big deal.

  It was a very big deal – which was precisely why I’d been avoiding it.

  I called Roswald, desperate for help.

  “You got information for me?” he asked, going straight to the case. “You find the perp?”

  “No, not yet. I have some leads but I got a bigger problem and I need help fast.”

  The urgency in my tone got his attention. “What’s wrong, son? Everything okay?”

  “Everything is definitely not okay,” I answered, wiping at the sweat on my brow. “I can’t explain it and my head is spinning but I’m pair bonded to Lyric Johnson.”

  “That’s unexpected but welcome news! When are you bringing her back with you? Lotty will be so excited to welcome her into the pack.”

  “No! You don’t understand, I’ve been secretly taking magical pills to suppress the coding. It should’ve worked but this place is like a supernatural vortex. I need to know how to break the pair bond without hurting Lyric. She didn’t ask for this either. I can’t subject her to a life chained to my side.”

  I could feel Roswald’s consternation through the phone line. We’d never seen eye-to-eye on this particular issue. He always thought I’d get over my phobia of being pair bonded but I was more scarred than he could ever understand. I never wanted to be pair-bonded ever.

  And Lyric deserved far better than I could give her.

  “Can you help me or not?”

  “Calm down,” he retorted gruffly. “Where’s Lyric now?”

  “At her house. She’s only eighteen. She lives at home with her fucking parents. What a cruel joke. How am I supposed to have anything in common with someone who was getting ready to go to college in a month?”

  “Slow the fuck down, you’re spiraling and it’s unbecoming. You’re better than this,” Roswald said in a stern tone. “Look, when I first bonded with Lotty, I wasn’t excited about the prospect of settling down but look at us now. Practically connected at the hip. I can’t imagine my life without her.”

  Prickly sweat made me shift on my feet and fluff my shirt for some much-needed air. “That’s exactly what I don’t want. I don’t want to feel that connected to another person. I like my autonomy. Can you just find out why this happened, please?”

  “It happened because she’s your mate,” Roswald returned with a bite. “You are not your father. You’re a better man than he ever could’ve hoped to be. You need to leave that baggage behind so you can move on.”

  “I like my life the way it was.”

  “Grow up. Life changes. You of all people, should understand this.”

  Roswald had always been like a father to me, much more so than the man who gave me life. Somehow he’d known how to reach a broken kid with a chip on his shoulder and give him a purpose bigger than himself.

  But I didn’t think he could talk me down from this particular ledge.

  Roswald heard my stubborn silence and sighed. “All right, I’ll do some looking around. In the meantime, try to focus on the case. That should at least give you something to distract you.”

  I nodded, grateful to have direction. “Right, I can do that. And I’ll just keep some distance between me and Lyric to avoid any more complications until we can find a way to break the pairing.”

  “You know what happens if you spend too much time away from a pair bond, you’ll just hurt the both of you. You’re just going to have to bite the bullet until I can get back to you.”

  “I can’t be around her without wanting to mate,” I said, grinding my teeth. “And I can’t avoid her without driving myself and her crazy. This is a fucked up situation.”

  “Just make the best of it for now.”

  Not the best advice he’d ever given but we were out of options.

  “Fine,” I bit out. “I’ll be in touch.”

  I clicked off and flexed my fingers. I was on edge. It was already starting. The distance between me and Lyric was unacceptable. There was a reason new pair bondings spent nearly every waking moment together — one, it cemented the bond but two, it was nearly impossible to bear being apart.

  Swearing beneath my breath, I knew I didn’t have a choice. If I wanted to solve this case I was going to have to go get Lyric.

  I made the short drive to her neighborhood and saw Lyric standing on her porch, waiting.

  I sighed, knowing the bond was to blame. We were already connecting at an accelerated rate.

  She climbed into the Rover with a reproachful expression mixed with relief. “I just knew you were on your way,” she said.

  “Yeah, pair bonding is strong stuff,” I muttered, fighting against the urge to kiss her. I wanted to taste her lips again but I wasn’t going to give in. I had to fight this cellular assault against my free will with everything I had. I had to focus on something else. “We’re going to have a chat with the detective.”

  “I already tried, he doesn’t believe Rachel was murdered,” she said, but her gaze strayed to my biceps before skittering away as if caught doing something bad. “He thinks it was an animal.”

  “Yeah, well, he knew that you didn’t know shit about the supernatural world. That ain’t going to be the same when we both come at him this time.”

  She smiled as if she hadn’t thought of that angle and actually approved. “Yeah, that’s true. Let’s see if his story changes when he realizes that I’m onto the whole secret monster society.”

  “We’re not all monsters,” I reminded her. “I mean, I hold a dim view on vampires and demons but I’ve known a handful who were decent. It’s important not to paint with too wide of a brush in the supernatural community.”

  Lyric rolled her eyes. “No life lessons, please. I have a dad already and you’re not allowed to school me when you’ve been in my pants. Got it?”

  I laughed in spite of my burning cheeks. She had a point. “I can agree to that term but for both our sakes, let’s keep talk to a minimum regarding anything involving sex. It’s hard enough to keep my hands off you now that we’re bonded and I’m trying my damndest to be responsible.”

  She nodded, on board with that plan. At least we were agreed that neither wanted to be hitched to the other.

  We arrived at the station and with luck, Detective Hawks was in.

  He wasn’t happy to see me or Lyric again.

  Especially once he scented me on her.

  His gaze narrowed as it darted from me to her. “What the hell is going on?” he asked.

  “Can we talk someplace private?” I asked.

  Hawks scowled and jerked his head, gesturing for us to follow. Once closed in a room, he said to me, “Want to explain yourself?”

  “To you? Not really. I think you can put the pieces together pretty well on your own. I pair bonded to Lyric. That’s not why we’re here.”

  Hawks’ gaze settled on Lyric, confused. “You’re shifter?”

  “Apparently.” Lyric shrugged, just as confused. “It’s been a real pisser of a revelation, to be honest.”

  “I don’t understand. I didn’t scent the wolf in you the other day.”

  “I think it has something to do with why she hasn’t fully transitioned yet. For some reason, she didn’t Awaken with puberty.”

  Lyric scowled in my direction, displeased at being discussed so openly. “This feels like a gyno appointment with a full audience. Can we not talk about my personal business with a complete stranger? It’s bad enough that you know too much about me.
”

  “So what are you here?” Hawks asked, returning to me, even though his gaze kept straying to Lyric in a way that made a growl pop from my throat.

  He held his hands up in a placating gesture. “Sorry,” he said quickly. “Just trying to absorb this anomaly. I mean no disrespect.”

  I accepted his apology and the bristles that’d sprung from my arms settled down. Damn this pair bonding shit was a nuisance. “We want to talk about her friend Rachel. Now that you know Lyric is shifter, too, is there any way Rachel could’ve been killed by a supernatural?”

  Hawks’ gaze dipped, struggling with something but he shook his head. “Sorry, I—”

  Suddenly Lyric gasped and gripped my arm so tight she nearly left a bruise. “Are you okay?” I asked, worried.

  She recovered and drew a shuddering breath, glaring at thin air before returning too Hawks with a narrowed stare. “You’re lying.”

  “Excuse me?” Hawks said.

  “You heard me. You’re lying. Rachel just pointed a finger at you and that seems like a fairly damning bit of evidence. What did you do to my friend? Was it you? Did you kill her?”

  I felt Lyric’s building rage like a burning hot ember sizzling through my chest. I held a restraining hand on her shoulder before she leapt at Hawks and ripped a confession out of him, whether he was guilty or not.

  But I was intrigued by her reaction. “Rachel?” I asked.

  Lyric didn’t stop holding Hawks’ stare. “Yeah, she appears sometimes. Only for a minute but it’s jarring as fuck. However, it definitely gets my attention. He knows something he’s not telling.”

  “I thought you said she was shifter?” Hawks said, looking at Lyric with open doubt. “Shifters don’t have visions.”

  That seemed to throw Lyric for a loop. “They don’t?” At the shake of my head, she groaned and slapped her thigh with irritation. “Great, so I’m a freak of freaks. Fantastic.” She returned focus to Hawks. “Okay, back to you…why did my dead friend point to you? And if you’re feeling like being difficult, I’ll have my boyfriend (or whatever he’s called) chop your head off in the name of official business with the PCA and call it a day. Understand?”