Cimmerian Shade: A Limited Edition Paranormal Romance & Urban Fantasy Collection

by Kiki Howell

  I jumped down and Tysen caught me around the waist before my feet hit the ground. Slowly he set my feet on the ground, our faces close together. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered, his fingertips pressing slightly into my sides. He backed me up a step and then another until my back was pressed against the tree. He leaned forward until his lips were right next to my ear and asked, “How many times did you pretend that it was me you were fucking, instead of him?”

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat and whispered, “Every time.”

  He pressed his erection against me and growled into my ear. “Say it.”

  Years apart and yet I knew exactly what he wanted. I knew how he thought. It didn’t feel like it had been years or even months. “I’m yours,” I purred and ground against him.

  He captured my mouth with his and ran his hands up my back, underneath my shirt. The skin on skin contact was amazing and I needed more.

  “Clothes,” I rasped and tugged at the hem of his shirt.

  “We’re outside,” he reminded me.

  “Then fix that,” I ordered.

  He carried me into the house, his mouth never left mine and I had to break away to undress. He on the other hand raised his shirt up and over his head slowly, giving me ample time to appreciate his stomach and chest before landing on his face.

  “You’re perfect,” I whispered.

  His right hand slid along the side of my face, cupped the back of my neck and pulled me close. “That’s my line.”

  Our mouths met in a torrent of lips and tongue, tasting each other and familiarizing ourselves again to the other. My left hand gripped him and slowly began to stroke him. He cupped my breast and tore away from my mouth to suck on my nipple, making me cry out. He picked me up and tossed me into the center of the bed, making me giggle a bit as a wide smile splayed across my lips.

  He nudged my hips apart with his legs and leaned forward, ready to take me into ecstasy.

  “Say it,” I ordered him, turning my hips so that he could not enter me yet.

  He smirked, but then stared at me seriously. “I’m yours. Forever.”

  I smiled up at him and then he plunged into me, burying himself and slapping our bodies together.

  “Yes!” I screamed.

  His hips moved faster than a human could as he moved in and out, rubbing my clit at the same time.

  The pressure built, his rhythm remained steady, and I became wetter and wetter.

  “Tysen!” I screamed as I orgasmed, the pressure releasing and my orgasm rippled through me harder than ever before.

  Tysen didn’t let up, only pausing to flip me over and shoved my head down with my hips up and legs spread to give him complete access. Orgasms shuddered through me one after another and I dripped down my legs and onto the bed.

  He pulled out and dropped down, burying his face in me and licking the wetness that had gathered. “God, you taste amazing,” he growled and licked me until I orgasmed again.

  “Inside,” I begged and angled my hips towards him.

  He chuckled and slapped my butt playfully. “I’m Alpha here.”

  “Then take charge,” I snapped.

  He chuckled again, flipped me over onto my back, gripped my hips, and plunged into me. “Better?” he asked.

  “Yes!” I screamed and raised my hips up into him.

  Harder and faster, he screwed me until I thought I might lose myself in euphoria. He grunted and then yelled my name as he finished.

  “Tysen,” I whispered as I pet his hair with his head lying on my chest.

  “Yes?” he asked and began to draw circles on my stomach with his fingertip.

  “Did you sleep with anyone while we were separated?” Part of me didn’t want to ask, but I needed to know. It wouldn’t change anything, but I needed to know.

  He leaned up onto his elbow to look at me, his nostrils flared as he tried to gauge my mood. “No, I haven’t slept with anyone, but you.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “I had hope that you would come back to me,” he admitted. “I was willing to wait for you, but had planned to come try to convince you to be with me soon.”

  “Are you upset that I slept with someone else?”

  “It would be a lie to say that I wasn’t upset, but I’m not upset or mad at you,” he explained.

  “I missed you so much,” I whispered. Tears lined the bottom of my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. I hadn’t realized how much I missed him until we were back together. It was like I had been alive, but not awake at the same time.

  He smiled and kissed my lips lightly, barely touching them together. “I was always here for you. You only had to call.”

  After cuddling a bit longer, we met the pack at our favorite pizza place to catch up. The pizza place was a hole in the wall with dark lighting and the best deep-dish pizza in the state. The pack sat at two tables, five of us at each one. I was seated between Tysen and Orin, the latter poking me every few seconds.

  “Orin,” I growled.

  His hazel eyes glittered with mischief and happiness. “Don’cha try an’ stop me, girl. I’ve got years of pestering to make up for.”

  “That’s not all my fault,” I reminded him. “You left the state.”

  “You pestering my mate?” Tysen asked.

  I looked over nervously, wondering if he would get territorial with his pack over me.

  Orin scoffed. “Yeah. Do you blame me?”

  I felt like my back would snap from the tightness.

  Tysen’s scowl turned into a smile and he draped his shoulder around me. “Not one bit. She is incredibly fun to pester and tease.”

  “So, when’s the next pack camping trip?” Ben asked. He’d gained a bit of gray since I last saw him.

  Tysen tugged me. “What do you think? You up for another camping trip?”

  “As long as we avoid caves,” I mumbled.

  Everyone laughed and Tysen placed a quick kiss to my temple.

  “What have you been up to?” I asked Orin.

  “I started selling my carvings,” he explained. “They were such a hit with the museum, that they asked me to make small versions that they are planning to sell as keychains.”

  “That’s amazing!” I exclaimed and patted his shoulder.

  “Here are your pizzas,” one of the workers said and he and four other workers set our eight pizzas on the table. Tysen grabbed three slices and set them on my plate and then eight slices on his. As soon as he was done filling his plate, he nodded once and everyone else filled their plates.

  One of the perks of being the Alpha’s girlfriend, or mate now, was being able to eat first. If I hadn’t been, I was certain they still would have let me get my food first. Otherwise, I may not have gotten food to eat. I bit into the pizza and moaned, making everyone look at me.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled in embarrassment. “I haven’t had this pizza in years.”

  Tysen smiled at me and stole another piece before it could be taken. “Then I’ll get you an extra slice.”

  “Maybe we should buy one to take home,” I suggested.

  Tysen laughed and kissed my cheek. “Whatever you want.”

  We finished our food and Tysen bought us an extra pizza to take home. Tysen carried me into the house and into bed, my body tired for no apparent reason.

  “It takes time to adjust to the mating bond,” he explained as he covered me up.

  “But everyone is here and...”

  “They’ll be here tomorrow as well. They all agreed to stay one more day to spend time with you.”

  I smiled happily and curled up with my blankets and went to sleep.

  Chapter Four

  BEING WOKEN TO the scent of bacon and the laughter of your favorite people is the perfect way to wake up. After freshening up, I hurried downstairs to the kitchen where everyone was laughing as they made breakfast.

  Lucas was closest to me and hugged me tightly before pushing me towards Tysen who stood at the stove cooking. Ty
sen turned, a happy smile on his face and the smile changed into the one he wore when he saw me. “Good morning, beautiful mate.”

  I stood on tiptoes to kiss him and then snagged a piece of bacon off the plate before he could stop me. “Morning handsome.”

  “So, are you ready for today?” Ben asked.

  “Today?” What was today? Was it someone’s birthday? I was really bad about dates. It wasn’t an anniversary since we just got back together.

  “Yes. Today will be the first pack outing with you as an official member of the pack,” he explained.

  Oh! “Pack outing? What are we doing?” I asked.

  “You’ll have to wait and see,” Tysen said and winked at me.

  Winks were never good. Winks meant it was something I either hated, didn’t particularly like, or would sigh about. It was hard to tell with him which type of wink it was. Unless there was a new type of wink. Could there be a new wink?

  “A hint?” I requested.

  “The whole pack is going,” Tysen answered.

  I groaned and sat down at the dining table to wait for them to finish cooking food. “You’re a butt.”

  “So childish,” Marco teased.

  “‘So childish,’” I repeated in a mocking tone.

  After breakfast, we drove in two separate cars to the county fairgrounds. I had completely forgotten that it was time for the annual County Fair. I loved going to the fair, but hadn’t been in years. We climbed out of the car and I latched onto Tysen’s arm in excitement. “The fair!”

  He linked our hands and beamed proudly. “I knew you would like the surprise.”

  Orin draped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me away from Tysen. “I bet I’ll beat you in the goldfish bowl toss again.”

  “You’re on!” I said loudly, accepting his challenge.

  “Come on, kids,” Tysen said with a laugh. I thought he might act territorial with us being mated so recently, but he didn’t seem to mind Orin’s arm around me or that he had stolen me from his side. That was something I was incredibly grateful for.

  After paying to enter the grounds, the men argued over how many tickets to purchase. Orin made his purchase first and linked arms with me as we headed towards the fish bowls. “Time to see who the winner is.”

  “Don’t cry when you lose,” I ordered him sternly.

  He tilted his head back and laughed loudly, a sound I hadn’t heard in too long. He handed enough tickets to the carny for both of us and then took aim with his ping pong balls. I picked up my first one and aimed carefully before tossing it up in an arc. The ball pinged off one of the fish bowl rims and bounced across a few more before landing inside one of the bowls.

  “Whew!” I yelled happily.

  “That hardly counts,” he scoffed. He tossed his and it went straight into the center of the middle fish bowl.

  My jaw dropped. “What?”

  Tysen used his finger to push my chin up and close my mouth. “You’ll catch flies like that, sweetheart.”

  “Did you...he...how?”

  “Your turn,” Orin reminded me.

  I growled and tossed my next ball. It bounced all the way across the bowls and off the other side. He tossed his next one looking smug and confident, but his second ball also bounced off the table.

  “Ha!” I said happily.

  “Don’t act so smug yet,” he reminded me as he held up the last ball.

  I picked mine up and exhaled slowly. “Be the ball,” I whispered.

  Some of the pack behind us laughed at my comment, but then everyone was quiet when I threw the ball. It arced up into the air and dropped down, straight towards the bowl. This was it, I was finally going to beat Orin! A gust of wind blew through the grounds and blew my ball off course and off the table.

  “No!” I exclaimed and let my shoulders sag forward.

  “Oh, tough break,” Orin commented.

  Tysen hugged me in consolation and kissed my cheek.

  “The Gods interfered,” I muttered.

  Tysen chuckled and kissed me again. “Yes, they did.”

  “Alright, it’s all down to this,” Marco commented. “Orin’s toss will determine if we have a winner or a tie. Will he continue his domination or will he fail? Will this be lost to a draw with no winner?”

  Orin growled at Marco and tossed his ball. It went right into the center of the bowl, but the wind blew through again and blew it out of the bowl and off the table.

  “Yes!” I screamed happily and leapt up into the air. “Yes!”

  “No!” Orin yelled. “That’s not fair! It was in...”

  “That’s what she said,” I mumbled.

  All of the men laughed, even the carny, at my stupid joke.

  “Time for your next challenge,” Tysen told me. “Clown water balloons!”

  Our group went to the booth which had enough seats for all of us to sit around it and play at the same time. We had to wait for the group that was currently there to finish. I took the time to look around at all of the people around us. There would be thousands of people who visited the fair this weekend. There would be people who drove hours to come and others who drove minutes. There were people of every race, including elves, werewolves, and many more groups in disguise. I always wondered how they could stand to pretend to be human, the werewolves aside, the rest were not human at all. Did it bother them that humans were the dominate race and basically controlled that they had to pretend to be human? It would bother me.

  The group finally finished and we all took our seats.

  “You’re going down this year!” Tysen informed me from the other side of the booth.

  “No pouting when I win again!” I ordered him and then blew him a kiss and gave him a wink.

  The carny for the clown water balloon game was a gangly man with dark skin and gorgeous green eyes. There was something otherworldly about his eyes, but I chose to avert mine and not ask in case he was in hiding. “Everyone ready?” the carny asked.

  “Yes!” we all yelled at the same time.

  A crowd had gathered upon seeing our group take the seats and taunting and teasing each other as we prepared to play the game. The crowd was smiling and laughing, but everyone quieted down due to the serious expressions now on our faces.

  The bell rang and I held down my gun’s trigger, aiming for the clown’s mouth which would fill with the water and fill up the balloon. The person to get their balloon to fill first and pop would win. I had won every year for four years.

  “What? Mine’s not working!” Marco yelled in dismay.

  “Ha!” I yelled back, focused on the mouth as it continued to fill.

  People were commenting behind us about how into the game we were and how funny we were. My balloon popped and a bell rang and lights flashed, declaring me the winner. I set my gun down and stood up with my arms raised in victory. “Yeah! Reigning champion! Woohoo! You can’t defeat me!” I started doing my victory dance and everyone laughed around us.

  Tysen handed me the stuffed bear I had won. “Congratulations.”

  I hugged the bear and skipped towards the next game. “Thank you.”

  I stopped in front of the milk bottle toss game where they had a beautiful unicorn plush for the winner. “You want it?” Tysen asked, his breath tickled my ear as he asked.

  “The unicorn,” I whispered in reply and pointed at it.

  “Okay.” He rolled up his sleeves and handed the carny some tickets. “We’re going for the unicorn,” he informed him.

  “You’ll need to knock down two sets of cans and that will cost you another set of tickets,” the carny explained.

  Tysen handed him the tickets and then tossed the first ball in the air and caught it.

  “Don’t break anything,” Marco warned him.

  Tysen rolled his eyes at him and then said, “My mate wants the unicorn. I can’t disappoint her.”

  “How many unicorns have you given out so far?” Orin asked the carny in charge of the game.

&n
bsp; “None,” he said smugly. “No one has been able to knock down even one set of cans.”

  “You’re about to give out your first unicorn,” Tysen informed him confidently.

  “Is this your first date?” the carny asked Tysen.

  “In a sense,” he replied with a smirk at me.

  “Alright, give it a go,” the carny said and stepped out of his way, looking confident that Tysen would fail. A couple other guys stopped behind us.

  One of the guys said, “There’s no way he is going to knock down any of them. I tried four times today and couldn’t knock down a single one.”

  Tysen turned and winked at me. “This is for you, baby.”

  He threw the first ball and it knocked over the first set of six cans, the ball hit the back of the tent hard, spinning in place, but didn’t go through it.

  “Wha...” the carny stared in shock.

  Tysen picked up the next ball and tossed it in the air and caught it again while smiling at me. “You remember the first fair we went to when I played this for you?”

  I nodded my head. “You won every single stuffed animal for me.”

  “What did you guys end up doing with them?” Marco asked.

  “We kept two and then gave the rest to an orphanage,” Tysen said.

  “Come on, babe. Just one more,” I reminded him.

  He turned and threw the ball, knocking the other set down and then threw the third ball into another set and held out his hand. “One unicorn, please.”

  The carny handed him the unicorn with a look of disbelief etched onto his face. The two guys who had been talking behind us walked up to the booth to try again.

  The guy who had been positive Tysen couldn’t win picked up a ball and threw it at the cans. It hit the cans, but did not fall down. “What the hell?” he growled and grabbed another ball.

  “It’s all in the wrist,” Tysen teased the guy.

  “It also helps to have some power behind your throw,” Marco said and then winked at the guy.

  I reached for the unicorn, but Tysen held it up above his head and pointed at his lips. I kissed his lips and then he handed me the unicorn, which I smothered against my chest. “Thank you.”

  He draped his arms across my shoulders and we went to the next game where some of the guys were competing in a tiny car race. Orin, Ben, and Lucas were incredibly focused on their game, not even bantering as they raced.