by Vivi Andrews
Her warm hand closed over his cock and a startled roar burst out of his mouth as sensation seared through him hot and hard. Her strokes were firm and—sweet holy fuck what was that twisting thing she was doing with her wrist right at the end of each stroke? His vision went black and he ground his teeth together, throwing back his head and digging his claws into the mattress on either side of her in an attempt to keep from coming all over her stomach. His spine tingled and his hips jerked. He needed to get inside her. Now.
He grabbed her hand, dragging it away from his cock, and pinned it to the bed. Shoving aside her thong, he stroked into her folds, finding her slick and hot. He drove one finger into her—she was wet enough it was easy going—and withdrew it to replace it with two. He scissored them apart, preparing her as quickly as he could, while his thumb found her clit and rubbed a circle that had her crying out and squirming beneath him. He wasn’t a small man, but she had better fucking be ready for him because if she made another one of those sounds he was going to lose his mind. If there was anything left of it to lose.
His fingers slid free with a squelching sound and he rubbed her moisture over his cock as he positioned the head at her entrance. Her thong shredded beneath his claws with an erotic ripping sound. An abbreviated thrust seated just the tip inside her and the sensation of her wet heat closing around him, milking him, was as close to heaven as a sinner like him was ever likely to get. He tore his eyes off the place where their bodies met to check her face and make sure she was with him. Her eyes were black with lust, mouth slightly open as she released breathy little pants and watched him entering her. Fuck yes, she was with him.
He thrust once, twice, working himself deeper. A third pulse seated him fully and he grabbed her other hand, pinning it beside her shoulder as his hips began to rock against her of their own accord. He wanted it to last. Wanted it to be good for her. Wanted to see and feel her come around his cock a thousand times before he came. But it had been so long and she felt so fucking good he was already on the brink.
She drew her knees up, bracketing his hips, and the angle brought them tighter together. He ground himself against her at the end of his thrust and she released a soft, startled cry a fraction of a second before he felt her tighten around him, her inner muscles clenching as she shuddered through her climax. It was all he could take. He slammed into her, pistoning hard, and on the third thrust his release exploded through him, wiping away all of existence outside of Grace’s body.
He lost himself in her, his arms buckling. He caught himself on his forearms to keep all of his weight from falling on her—but barely. His face mashed into the comforter over her shoulder, her rapid breaths stirring the air beside his ear. Her hands were light on his sweat-slicked back, stroking aimlessly.
Dangerous.
He’d lost himself in her. Lost the world around him. Even now his back was exposed. Anyone could attack them now. He would be vulnerable. Incapable of protecting her. He would lose her. Again. Just as he’d lost Ksenia and Micah.
Dominec jerked himself out of her body and her arms, stumbling away from the bed as his legs threatened to give beneath him.
Weak. She’d made him weak.
“Dominec?”
He couldn’t look at her. Couldn’t speak to her. She was his kryptonite. His Achilles heel.
Dominec swept his fatigues off the floor and grabbed the rest of his clothes from the chair beside the bed. He didn’t bother putting them on. Didn’t bother checking to make sure he had the room key. He wouldn’t be able to sleep here tonight anyway, not with the scent of sex saturating every centimeter.
Naked, he threw open the door to the hallway.
“Dominec!”
He didn’t look back. The door slammed shut, but he could still clearly hear her frustrated shout through the wood.
“It’s your room, dumbass!”
No. It was hers now. Every inch of him was hers now. He’d lost himself in her. And he couldn’t afford the loss.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Grace didn’t sleep particularly well after Dominec set the record for fastest walk of shame in history. She’d left his room and returned to her own, but unlike last time her sated glow hadn’t outlasted his departure.
The man had literally run from her vagina. It was almost enough to give a girl self-esteem issues. Except for the fact that it was Dominec—who wasn’t exactly a normal lover on the best of days—and he’d been very satisfied about two seconds before he went all Road Runner on her.
She’d spent most of the night tossing and turning as she tried to figure out what had set him off this time. So she’d been in no shape to drive the next day and it was Tyler behind the wheel when they rolled through the high gates of Lone Pine’s perimeter fence around two the following afternoon.
She had been tempted to blindfold Maeve and the twins—turnabout was fair play, after all, and the sight of Dominec in a cage still burned in her memory—but it would have been petty and pointless. Lone Pine was a sanctuary, accepting shifter refugees from all over the world. If Black Lake didn’t already know how to get through their gates, they hadn’t been paying attention.
And Grace had a feeling the wolves always paid attention.
With so many shifters coming and going from Lone Pine over the years, it wasn’t surprising that the wolves had already known who she was, but for them to know that she’d been sleeping with Kelly, when she’d hardly advertised the fact, still bugged her. Who had told?
Hugo? One of Kelly’s other lovers who had gotten jealous and run off to Canada? It was senseless to wonder and yet she couldn’t help dwelling on how exactly Black Lake gathered all its knowledge. They seemed to know too much for simply harvesting information from those who arrived asking for boons. Did they have spies actively going to other prides and packs? Were they buying and selling secrets beyond their own borders?
Grace had been turning the problem over in her mind all morning as Tyler drove. At least when she hadn’t been obsessing over what had happened with Dominec the night before.
The man really took commitment avoidance to a whole new level.
He was riding shotgun, gazing out the window and never even looking at her, never even acknowledging the connection that she felt humming between them like a live wire. He hadn’t said a single fucking word to her. She would be pissed if she wasn’t so fucking confused.
At least she had plenty of pride business to occupy her muddled thoughts.
Kelly, Zoe and Grace crammed into the second seat and the wolf trio occupied the third. The Archive had shifted in the car and now sprawled across the laps of the twins sleeping soundly, like a breathing blanket of faded auburn fur.
Grace had called ahead, so Hugo and a pair of other advisors were waiting for them when they arrived at the parking lot closest to the Alpha’s mansion. The pride was designed mostly for pedestrians, so the lot was a ten-minute walk from the towering house—but with an unobstructed view of it and the zig-zagging staircase leading up the hill.
Roman and Patch would be waiting at their castle on the hill, ready for the intimidating house to do its job and instill awe and respect into the wolfy visitors. Grace somehow doubted that River and Cadence would be cowed by the power of Lone Pine, but a girl could dream.
Everyone piled out and began the walk up to the house—once the wolves were settled, the rest of them would be debriefed. She half expected Dominec to pull one of his usual tricks and disappear into the shadows, but he walked along with the rest of the group, his gaze on her every time she glanced over, though he still said not a single word.
She resisted the urge to flip him off.
Barely.
Xander fell into step beside her, and she tensed, remembering the last time they’d seen one another. The awkward send-off. She braced herself for some bullshit drama, but he simply grunted, “Good trip?”
Grace nodded to the wolves. “We’ll see.”
Grace had kept Roman updated as much as possible, but they had been speaking in riddles and codes as a precaution. Now she was itching to demand an update on how things were progressing at the pride. She felt like she’d been on a different planet on the trip to Black Lake.
It was tempting to quiz Xander about what had happened while she was gone, but as much as she wanted to know how the prisoners were, how Mateo’s project to locate other prides and packs had gone, and how the plans for the mega-strike were progressing, wolf shifter ears were just as sensitive as hers and she didn’t need the blackmail patrol to know every detail of pride business.
So she held her tongue and trudged up the hill.
It was hours later, after her own debriefing and long after the wolves had been handed over to more tactful members of the pride to be pumped for information, when Grace cornered Xander in his office at the mansion.
The cell phone that linked her to the pride security network was back on her hip, making her feel whole again, but there was still so much she needed to know. They had only been gone five days, but a lot could happen in that time.
And it looked like a lot had. Even Xander—the impervious asshole from whom shit seemed to naturally slide right off—had circles under his eyes and a haggard weariness about him. He was, she supposed, good looking in the classic lion sense—strong build, strong features, hair of mutli-hued browns and blonds cut shaggy and just a little too long so it always seemed mane-like. He came from one of the oldest and most traditional pride families and had always acted like that made him God’s gift to lion-kind, but when he wasn’t being a total self-important, sycophantic ass, he could accidentally be a good lieutenant. They were close enough in age that they’d pretty much grown up together—bickering all the way—and they’d even earned their promotions to lieutenant at the same time, which had led to more competition than camaraderie, but if she needed to be brought up to speed, she knew Xander could do the job.
And she wanted something to take the flavor of their last conversation out of her mouth.
“You look like shit,” she told him as she kicked his door shut behind her for privacy.
Xander looked up from the papers he’d been going over on his desk and grimaced. “I fucking hate the prisoners,” he complained. “And actually doing all this paperwork I usually fob off on you sucks donkey dick.”
Grace flopped down on one of the two chairs facing the mahogany stretch of his desk. “I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen you actually using that desk,” she commented. His office was stylish and large, but rarely used. More for appearance than function—as most things were with Xander.
“Don’t get used to the sight. I plan to shirk the fucking paperwork again now that you’re back.”
No surprise there. “What did I miss?” she asked, done with small talk.
“You mean besides when one of the prisoners broke his own fucking arm so he could get taken to the infirmary to try to kill Dr. Russell because she’s a traitor to the Organization?”
Grace sat forward sharply. “Is she okay?”
“She’s fine. No thanks to the dumbass kids we had guarding the prisoners. Moira saved her and then the Hawk went ballistic. The kid who was supposed to be keeping the prisoner in line was useless. Of course, half the kids guarding the prisoners are fucking useless and yet we’re stretched so thin we don’t have any other options.” His eyes met hers. “I hope you’re coming back with good news.”
“I hope I am too. Has there been any progress on the Organization front?”
“A couple of the patrols beyond the perimeter fence have started reporting strange human scents in the area.”
“Hikers?”
Xander gazed at her steadily. “You want to gamble on it being innocent hikers?”
“So they’re watching us.”
“Scouting for weaknesses would be my guess. Planning their attack on us even as we’re doing the same.”
Grace eyed the calendar on the wall. How much time did they have before the Organization hit them here? The Big Bad had never come at them full force in a frontal assault—that wasn’t their style. They were more likely to go for kidnappings and preying on the weak or isolated. But it seemed like things were coming to a head now. Thanksgiving was in a few days. Would they strike before then?
Just two months ago everything had been different. They’d known about shifter disappearances in the south, but the danger hadn’t been at their door. Greg had still been Alpha. Patch hadn’t even been living on the pride lands full time. No one had known to call the bogeyman “the Organization” and Grace’s job had been standard border patrols, guarding against exposure to the humans and keeping the peace among the volatile shifters of the pride.
Two months and everything had changed.
What would life at the pride be like two months from now? If there would even be a pride left…
“Do we need to talk about what happened before you left?”
She tore her eyes off the calendar, turning back to Xander, and in her distraction it took her a moment to recall what he was talking about. Something in his expression clued her in. The discomfort. The awkwardness.
Shit.
“We can’t have things be awkward between us,” he went on when she didn’t speak. “We have to be able to work together without weirdness.” When she still didn’t speak, he rolled his eyes. “Patch said I have to talk it out with you, so I’m talking it out. What do I need to say?”
Gee, thanks, Patch. So much for just hoping she could forget that whole conversation ever happened. What did he need to say? “I guess I wondered why. Why me? Why now?”
“My folks are on me to breed.” At her raised eyebrow, he rolled his eyes. “I know. Crap timing, right? But they’re scared and that’s how they cope, by pretending if I just get married and give them grandbabies everything will be normal and okay.”
“Mine are the same,” Grace admitted. It was a little weird to have something in common with Xander.
“Yeah, well, you’re the only single female I spend any time with, so, you know.” He shrugged. “I tried something. No offense. I was surprised when you said no.”
“Of course you were.” She rolled her eyes.
He shrugged, the same cocky ass as ever. “I always thought you had the hots for me.”
“Not a chance.” Ew. But honesty forced her to continue. “But you’re a decent lieutenant when you aren’t trying to kiss everyone’s ass.”
He grimaced. “I’m too tired to kiss ass. I can’t remember the last time I had a full night’s sleep.”
“Go get some rest,” Grace said. “I’ll keep an eye on your prisoner situation.” She didn’t think she would be able to sleep anyway. Not with so many puzzles that needed working out clattering around in her brain.
Dominec and Kelly and the wolves and the Organization…there was too much. So she waved off Xander’s half-hearted protests and started out toward the secluded cabin where the remaining prisoners were being kept, using the walk to clear her head.
She made good time, stretching out her legs, so she was already halfway to the cabin when the distress call went out. Never a dull moment at Lone Pine.
Grace cursed softly, responded that she was on her way and ran.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Dominec was shadowing Grace—stalking was such an unnecessarily loaded word—when she suddenly bolted through the woods. She spoke into her phone as she ran, but he wasn’t close enough to hear what she was saying.
Whatever the problem, she was approaching it at full speed, not waiting for backup. Not taking a single fucking second to consider her safety.
Dominec snarled something uncomplimentary about stubborn ass lionesses who thought they were invincible and charged after her. She might feel safe on Lone Pine la
nd, but safety was an illusion, no matter where you were.
He paced her easily, not trying to overtake her, conserving his energy if he would need to fight when they got wherever the hell they were going.
There wasn’t much out here. A few scattered cabins were tucked among the trees, but this part of the pride lands was largely uninhabited. If she was heading toward the perimeter fence, she wasn’t taking the most direct route, but he couldn’t figure out what else she could be rushing out to.
Until she burst into a clearing ahead of him and the powerful stench of humans wafted toward him on the breeze.
The Organization prisoners.
This was where they’d been hidden after the riots.
Something violent and instinctive roused at the scent of them, but Dominec pushed it down, forcing himself to focus on Grace. She ran for the front door of the cottage, flinging it open and disappearing inside.
Another scent hit him—heavy on the air as soon as she opened the door. Blood.
Dominec scrambled down the incline to the clearing, forfeiting stealth for speed. He couldn’t see her. The scent of blood…
“Xander, urgent assistance required at the prisoner’s cabin. Bring Kelly and Brandt.”
Grace’s voice. Sharp. Businesslike.
His heart rate eased at the sound of her barking out commands, but panic didn’t entirely release its vise-grip on his chest until he saw her through the open door. He stopped on the step. Anyone inside could have seen him standing there, but no one paid him any mind, all eyes fixed on the drama inside.
Grace was kneeling beside a young guard on the floor, her hands red with his blood as she attempted to stem the bleeding from an uneven gash in his neck. Another guard sat beside her, eyes glazed as he watched her, his own hands painted red, with smears of blood across his clothes from where he’d tried to help his partner before Grace took charge.
