“No one?” she asked challengingly, and he snapped his teeth at her.
“No one,” he agreed, something so aggressive in his posture that a part of her shivered.
“But if I told you to stop?”
“I would,” he said immediately. “If you tell me no, if you look at me crossways, I would slink off to lick my wounds in the corner and howl my sadness to the skies. Tara, you must believe that I would never hurt you, not a hair on your precious head.”
“That's all I needed to know,” she said firmly, and she leaned down to kiss him again.
It was as if she had let a demon off the leash. He rose up and dragged her up on the bed, and before she could speak, he pressed his weight down on top of her. He supported himself with his arms so that he would not crush her, but pinned underneath his bulk, she had never felt safer or more aroused.
“You must tell me,” he warned her. “I want you, and then you went and stared me down as if I were a little yearling cub. That's no laughing matter when you are playing with the leader of a pack.”
“Oh, is it?” Tara asked, her voice soft and full of laughter. She never acted like this, and though a part of her was shocked at how she was acting, another, far larger part had been freed by the happenings of the evening. The marks over Mads' chest reminded her that life was short, and if hers was going to be, she wanted this.
“You must be very sure to tell me no when you need to,” he whispered in her ear, “because for me, all I can see now is you, and how much I want you, and how much I want you to want me...”
She would have replied, but suddenly there was his mouth in her ear, and his tongue tracing maddening sensations over the sensitive flesh there. She whimpered, and she would have thrashed if he hadn't been holding her down. His breath was hot in her ear, and she could only sigh and press up against him.
His mouth was on hers again, and this time there was no timidity to it at all. His tongue swept between her lips, claiming her with a brutal rhythm. There was something primal to it, and a part of herself that she had never known existed woke up, wanting more.
“Please,” she whimpered, pushing up against him, and his answering laugh was ragged.
“I would give you everything if I could,” he said softly, and the honesty in his voice made her long for him.
There was a certain restraint in his motions, and she knew that he would never hurt her, but still she needed more. She realized that her nails were pressed hard into his shoulders, and on impulse, she raked her nails down his back. That simple motion made him groan and now she could feel his cock press against the tender skin of her belly, hard and wanting. Some part of her was embarrassed that she was being taken in her flannel pajamas, and another part of was too maddened by desire to care.
“More, I need more of you,” she whispered, and his responding groan made her pull him even closer.
She felt his body rock against hers, and then he pulled away. She made a mewling, wanting sound, but then he fisted his hand in the front of her pajama top, tearing it away as if it were paper and leaving her nude from the waist up.
“Oh...” she said softly, and when she would have gone to cover herself, he took both her hands in one of his and pinned them above her head on the bed.
“Never think that you are less,” he whispered softly. “You're beautiful to me, and by god, I want to see all of you.”
Tara held herself still as he brought his mouth down to the curve of her breasts. She was small on top, but her nipples were deliciously sensitive, and when she felt the dampness of his mouth on her skin, she arched up to meet him.
“I can smell you,” he growled against her soft flesh. “Do you understand me? I can smell you, I know how much your body wants me....”
Another savage pull and her pajama pants were off of her as well. Now she was completely naked underneath his weight, and she couldn't resist lifting her legs and wrapping them around his hips. She relished the rough texture of his jeans against the sensitive skin of her inner thighs, and when she used her strong legs to pull him close, he bit down gently on her nipple, making her wail.
Mads' laugh was more a moan of need, and he bit her again, this time on the curve of her breast. They were light and gentle, and she had the idea that he could have broken skin if he wished, but instead, his bites were just hard enough to make her entire body vibrate with pleasure.
No one had ever given her sensation that was this intense, and it was like her entire body was lit up with pleasure.
“Now, now please, I want you,” she whimpered, and she felt a deep shudder wrack his body.
“I can't wait,” he groaned.
With a few deft motions, he opened his jeans and pulled out his cock, and Tara whimpered. It was dark and thick, and she wanted it with an animal longing that shocked her to her core.
He pressed her to the bed again, and this time, she knew that there was nothing in the world that would stop them, nothing that could keep them apart. His weight coming down on her felt like heaven, and when she felt the head of his cock sliding against the damp lips of her sex, her belly twisted with heat.
“Are you ready?” he whispered in her ear, and she could only nod and hope that it was enough. His bites, his smell, his strength and his passion all conspired to prepare her for him, and still he was careful about it.
With aching care, he stroked the length of his cock along the lips of her sex, wetting it, and making her body yearn for him.
Tara's hands trembled as she took his face between her palms, looking him deeply in the eye. She had never felt so close to a lover, so much as if he were a part of her.
“Don't make me wait,” she said softly, and the sweet plea in her voice made him shake.
“At this point, I couldn't if I tried,” Mads admitted.
He pressed the head of his cock into her, but when she whimpered, he hesitated. She shook her head frantically. She was tight, it had been some time, but this was an ache that she craved, one she would bear because she simply could not do without him for another moment.
Bracing her heels on the bed underneath them, she lifted her hips to his, and that was all it took. He sunk into her, closing against her so tightly that for a moment, she couldn't breathe.
“Please, please, please,” she heard herself whispering, and it was like she had broken something inside him. He thrust into her hard, pulled out halfway and then pushed in again, pushing her into the bed.
He was saying something, but she couldn't hear him. All she wanted was more of the sensation that he was giving her. She tightened her legs around his hips to draw him even closer, and then he was moving, each smooth, hard thrust driving her harder and harder.
She knew that he was going to climax before she did, and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, holding him close.
“Do it,” she hissed, “I want to feel it...”
With a loud groan, he spilled inside her, marking her in a way that felt entirely new and completely right.
She sighed softly, her body still thrumming with desire, and she loosened her arms, planting a soft kiss on his head. She started to say something, but then she yelped when he pulled out and slid a firm hand down her belly.
“Mads?”
“Oh, I'm sorry, did you think we were done?” he asked with a sly smile. “We're not.”
She meant to protest, to tell him that he didn't need to, that it was fine, but then his fingers slid between her legs, and almost before she knew it, she was spread wide for his touch. He was gentle but there was a demand to his motions that made her own climax something inevitable and perfectly real.
He thumbed her clit harder and harder, and her hips thrashed. She knew that she was going climax, and some part of her fought it. It was too much, it was all too much, and she nearly sobbed with it.
“Let go,” he whispered in her ear. “Let go, and let me take care of you like this.”
That was all it took. His fingers and his words drover her over the ed
ge, and her body lit up with fireworks. She clung to him, knowing that she must have left deep scratches in his arm, and she cried out her release, the aftershocks rocking her body.
When she came back to herself, he was holding her naked body closely, as if afraid that she would disappear.
“Is... do you want me?” she found herself saying, and cringed. It was needy, it was strange, and she had only known him for a few hours, but he nodded.
“More than anything in the world,” he said. “Now it is best if you sleep. We have a long journey in front of us.”
She did as he said, snuggling her head against his chest, but she couldn't help but wonder if there was something else there. Despite everything they had been through together, there was still so much she did not know about this man, and when she slept, her dreams were troubled.
Do you like this book? Be sure to check other books in this series
Dreams of a Restless Sleep - Volume 2
The Wolf Released - Volume 3
Hunting Hearts (Trilogy Bundle)
New Beginning
Synopsis
A heavily pregnant Erin tries to keep a grip on her sanity as the world around her ceases to make sense. Sean, the father of her unborn baby, is gone. He left amid utterances that he was a werewolf and cursed. Erin dismissed his words as madness but now as her due date approaches, she finds her home under siege. At night, she listens in terror to the sounds of shrill howls that circle her property.
Erin is all alone and something or someone is lurking outside in the darkness. Is she in danger or has she been driven to the brink of madness? What if there was some truth to Sean’s curse?
Erin looked down forlornly, hoping to catch a glimpse of her toes, but her spherical stomach impaired her vision. Sighing, she carefully maneuvered herself over to her sofa and sat down.
She was two days into her maternity leave and just a week away from her due date and she was restless. Being alone in the house made her fitful and anxious. Each time she tried to sleep, a noise or feeling of unease would wake her. Exhausted in her final stages of pregnancy, Erin felt as though she were constantly sleepwalking, losing her connection with reality.
The sound of her phone ringing startled her, the harsh shrill causing Erin to get a grasp of her senses and focus. Pushing through the fog of fatigue, she answered the call.
“Hello?” Her voice was hoarse and questioning when she spoke.
“Erin?” came her mother’s familiar voice.
“Hi, Mom.” Erin audibly sighed. As much as she appreciated the daily calls from her mother to check in on her, what she needed was her physical presence. Someone to help her move around now that she had almost doubled in size.
“How are you today?” her mother asked anxiously.
“Tired,” Erin replied bluntly. “The same as every day.”
“It will soon pass.”
“And then I will have a baby to keep me up at night. A baby screaming and crying in the night with only me to take care of it.” Erin held back tears as she shifted uncomfortably on the sofa. Her tiredness combined with her elevated hormone levels were making her exceedingly emotional. Sometimes she’d sit and sob over the most trivial of issues. The fact that she was alone was really starting to worry her.
Sean had said that he’d return. Erin had pushed him away, she knew that, but he’d vowed to come back and he’d seemed resolute in his promise, but that was almost nine long months ago. She’d heard nothing from him, and it wasn’t as if she could call him up. Sean existed in the shadows, without a cell phone, without an address.
In her weaker moments, Erin regretted sending him away, regretted judging him so harshly when he had told her his delusions about being a werewolf. Sean was clearly crazy, but at this stage she’d take crazy over nothing at all. She needed help, needed a second pair of hands, but the father of her unborn child was long gone and likely not coming back.
“You need to stay strong,” Erin’s mother instructed through the phone. “You need to stay strong for your baby.”
Anguished tears were streaming down Erin’s cheeks. She felt so unbearably alone, even though another life was growing within her. It had been two short days since she’d left the comfort and familiarity of the office, yet she felt like she was sinking. Sleep continued to elude her.
Erin didn’t feel safe alone. She’d taken to leaving lights on at night, to bolting her front door shut and checking it repeatedly before she slowly heaved herself up the staircase, the staircase where it was likely her child had been conceived.
Everything felt so long ago, as if it had occurred in another life. Erin struggled to remember how it felt to be in Sean’s arms, to feel the power of him inside her. Now all she knew was discomfort and exhaustion.
“I’m so tired,” Erin admitted desperately to her mother.
“You still can’t sleep?”
“No,” Erin sighed deeply.
“Why not?”
Erin didn’t want to admit the real reason she was being kept awake at night, as she feared it would make her as crazy as Sean if she was to say the words out loud.
“The baby keeps kicking,” Erin lied.
“It will all get easier, I promise.”
“Can’t you just come and stay with me, until the baby comes?” Erin pleaded as she entered into her daily dance with her mother, when she begged her for assistance and the older woman refused to come over, always offering the same pitiful excuses.
“I’m in no state to travel,” Erin’s mother answered softly.
There was some truth in this. Erin’s mother had been extremely fragile when she had last seen her, her skin thin and stretched too tightly over brittle bones. Her hair had grayed and thinned away, becoming wispy and ethereal around her head, making her dark eyes appear even darker, like bottomless pools surrounded by a glacial pallor.
“But I need you.”
Erin sensed that while her mother was fragile, she could be more than capable of traveling if she decided to. The older woman was weak and feeble but not completely incapacitated. Erin knew that there was another reason for her absence, something she wouldn’t discuss with her. Erin had an uneasy sense that it was all connected to Sean and his werewolf fantasies.
As Erin became increasingly tired and her body ached unbearably, she found herself wondering if perhaps there was some truth to his claims. The sounds she heard at night certainly made her to believe so. But she knew it was all impossible. There was no darkness, and it was impossible for a man to become a wolf. She just needed sleep to help her gain some clarity, that was all.
“I’m sorry I just…I can’t be there.” Erin’s mother always sounded pained when she relayed this.
“I could come and stay with you?” Erin suggested, hope rising in her voice as she did so.
“No, no,” her mother replied a little too quickly. “You wouldn’t be safe here.”
“Why not?”
The elephant in the room dared to step forward, trying to jostle its way in to the conversation. Sean. The werewolves. Her mother. Somehow it was all connected. But for some reason, Erin was only being fed half of a story.
“Mom, why can’t I come and stay with you? Why won’t it be safe?” Erin demanded, wincing as, within her stomach, her unborn baby kicked out at her.
“Has the father returned yet?” Her mother tactfully changed the subject.
“No.” Erin cast her eyes down sadly at the floor. For months she had expected Sean’s return, but he never came. She found herself wasting countless hours wondering what had become of him. Wherever he was, whatever he was doing, she had no way of knowing. Dwelling on it all was pointless.
“I’m sure he will soon.”
“I doubt it!” Erin declared coldly. “He’s been absent for the better part of nine months now. I’ve not seen or heard a word from him! If he thinks he can be a part of his child’s life after not being around for the pregnancy, he’s mistaken!”
Her baby kicked, as if
in protest to the words, and Erin leaned forward in pain, rubbing a hand over her stomach.
“Are you so sure you’ve heard nothing?” Erin’s mother asked. The question caught Erin by surprise.
She’d definitely not heard anything from Sean in the conventional sense. There had been no letters, no calls, no emails or texts sent by him. A shiver ran down Erin’s spine as she thought about the noises that kept her up at night. How could her mother even know about them? And more worryingly, how could she possibly attribute them to Sean? Once more, Erin felt like she was being shut out, denied all the facts, making it impossible for her to piece together the puzzle of her life.
“I’ve heard nothing,” Erin replied, her voice level and menacing. “The father has not been in touch, not at all.”
“I’m sure he will return.”
“How can you say that?” Erin almost screamed in to the phone. “You don’t know him; you don’t know what sort of person he is! He’s a vagrant, a drifter with grave mental delusions. My child would be better off never knowing their father, just like I was!”
“Sweetheart, I’m just trying to make you feel better,” her mother replied simply, and Erin felt her anger immediately thaw at the logical basis of the comment.
“Sorry, Mom, I’m just on edge.”
“I know.”
“All these thoughts about darkness that you used to talk about, it worries me. I can’t sleep…” Erin’s voice trailed off as she noticed that outside the sun had set while they had been talking and the street beyond her window was now covered with shadows.
“Try not to worry, it doesn’t help the baby.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Erin cleared her throat and straightened up as best she could. “But all those things you used to say to me, about my being drawn to darkness?”
Erin couldn’t help but inquire some more. The sounds that haunted her nights and kept her awake made her fearful that there had been some truth to her mother’s laments and that something dark and sinister now stalked both her home and her unborn baby.
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