Claimed (The Circulate Series)

by K. R. Smith

  Flint Riverclaw stood in the hallway of my apartment building.

  With his height and broad shoulders, he practically filled the entire doorway. I stared at the Native Alaskan man, in bewilderment. What the hell was he doing here?

  “Er, hi…” I uttered out, in shock.

  He looked me up and down in my business suit, complete with stockings and high heels. Whereas, he was wearing the same clothes I remember him in, the flannel shirt and jeans. It was like he hadn’t gone home yet, since the hotel.

  But how did he track me here? I took the piece of paper with my name and address, home with me. Did he somehow find out my information, from my credit card details left with the hotel?

  His dark eyes pierced mine, as he asked in his deep voice; “Jessica, how are you?”

  “Er, um… I’m fine.”

  Then he gave a knowing look as he said, “the shaking is worse, isn’t it.”

  It was more of a statement than a question. But how would he know that? And why the hell, is he wearing that knowing look? I was about to demand that he explain himself, when he spoke again.

  “Can I come in?” He asked politely. “We have things to discuss.”

  “…um, OK…?” Helplessly, as if I couldn’t say no to him, I stepped aside.

  As he came in, I caught another whiff of his delicious deodorant or whatever it was, he was wearing. My eyes drifted closed for a second as I held my breath, before I closed the door. But my hand remained on the doorknob, in case I had to make a quit getaway, from my own apartment.

  Flint stood in my living area, as he looked about my home. He looked like a giant, in the confines of my personal space. I even caught him sniff, as he glanced about.

  “You have a cat?” He remembered.

  “Yes.”

  “He’s hiding in the bedroom.” He looked towards the doorway. “The animal is going to have difficulty with my presence, while I’m here.”

  What the…? How does he know where Fritz is hiding? Besides, it sounded creepy, the way he was sure the animal would be frightened of him.

  Then Flint saw how I was standing by the door, and he nodded towards the four seated dining table, “perhaps we should sit down.”

  I must admit, by showing up out of the blue like this, seriously had me spooked.

  “Please,” he said softly, making his deep voice sound even deeper.

  Nervously, I came to stand on the other side of the table. I watched him walk up and sit down at the chair across. He was so big, he even dwarfed my furniture.

  “We should talk,” he nodded towards the chair I was standing behind.

  “Talk about what?” I asked warily.

  “Please,” he repeated.

  Again I felt like I couldn’t say no to him, so I pulled the chair back and sat down.

  Just then, he reached across the table to rest his large, warm hands, on my smaller, trembling ones.

  To my amazement, my shaking immediately stopped! His body heat travelled up my arms, across my shoulders and warmed me all over. I looked on with wide eyes, as he smiled kindly.

  “I’ve missed you,” he began.

  “I’ve um, missed you too.” I admitted.

  “I know, shaking is one of the symptoms.” He said mysteriously. “How is your diabetes?”

  “Um, it’s OK.” I lied.

  “Your sugar level has been up and down, hasn’t it?” He guessed again.

  What the hell…? Who IS this guy? Is he stalking me?! Sharply, I pulled back my hands.

  I asked accusatorily; “Flint, how did you find me?”

  “I arrived in Seattle this morning, after driving here.”

  My eyes bulged, “you drove here from Anchorage?”

  “When I woke up in the hotel room and saw you were gone, I rushed to Anchorage Airport. However your plane was taking off and I just missed you. So I hopped in my truck and drove here.”

  I scoffed back, “if you were at the airport, why didn’t you just fly here?”

  “I don’t like to fly,” he said simply.

  “So you’ve spent the last three days, driving here?”

  “Yes.”

  I folded my arms as I sat back, to openly examine him; “why Flint?”

  “Jessica,” he took a deep breath, as if he were about to announce something important; “we are mates.”

  “We’re what?”

  “We are mates.”

  “Oh sure!” I cracked up laughing. “So, do you do this to all the girls?”

  “No,” he answered, “in the past if I’ve been with a woman, it’s been different. We can hold ourselves back.”

  “You can hold yourself back? But not this time, not with me?” I asked, sceptically.

  “With you it was different.” He explained. “I tried to hold myself back, but the way we connected, and how you opened yourself up to me? I couldn’t hold myself back from completely being with you.”

  His words made my face flush, as it unnerved me how he sensed I had opened myself, more than I had with any other guy.

  “Jessica,” he took hold of my hands again, “you are carrying my child.”

  “I’m what?”

  “You’re pregnant.”

  “Sure I am!” I burst out laughing, whilst pulling my hands back a second time.

  “You are.”

  “Um Flint, not to downgrade your manhood or anything, but I’m on the pill.”

  “It doesn’t work on my kind,” he said.

  “Your kind?” My eyebrows rose. “So you hopped into your truck and drove from Anchorage to Seattle, to tell me that I’m your mate because I’m carrying your child?”

  “When one of us takes a mate, it usually results in pregnancy immediately. But even if you weren’t carrying my child, we would still be mates.” He continued.

  “Oh that’s right, because you didn’t hold back?”

  He looked me in the eye to say, “I couldn’t hold back, because I fell in love with you.”

  “So explain to me why I’m pregnant and the pill doesn’t work on ‘your kind’?” I crossed my arms again.

  He closed his eyes as he sighed deeply, “I have to show you something.”

  “Oh yeah?” I asked uneasily. “You can’t just explain it to me?”

  “Very well,” he spoke with his eyes closed, “I will tell you first.”

  “OK,” I waited for it.

  He opened his dark eyes, to meet mine; “I am a Lokoti Werewolf.”

  “You’re a Lokoti what?”

  “I am a Lokoti Werewolf.”

  “Oh, is that a name for an ice hockey team, or something?” I frowned in confusion. “You play sport, is that it?”

  “You do know what a Werewolf is, don’t you?”

  “Something dog-like, with claws?” I shrugged. “Like in the movies, ‘The Howling’, or ‘An American Werewolf In London’, or some such?”

  “They’re more like North American Werewolves or European Werewolves, I am a different kind of Werewolf.”

  “Right! Of course you are! You’re a Werewolf!” I spoke with false bravado. “I have a one night stand with a guy, who drives down from Anchorage to Seattle, to tell me that I’m his mate and that I’m carrying his child, because he’s a Werewolf? Thank God for this Flint, otherwise I would have been worried you were a crazed stalker!”

  He looked on in amusement at my sarcasm, as he sat calmly.

  I carried on, “does this mean that I’m carrying a baby Werewolf?”

  “Our son will be born human.” He declared. “However after his tenth birthday, if I or one of the pack should die? Then he would turn on the following full moon, to take his place among the ranks.”

  “A pack…? Oh great, there’s a PACK of you? Wonderful, so you’re not alone in thinking you’re a Werewolf? That’s fantastic! Do you have club meetings?”

  “We hunt together on a full moon.” He snickered at my way of putting it. “When the tribe is threatened, we fight together to remove the threat.
”

  “Great! Just like a gang of bikies or something...” my bravado dropped as did my head, when I almost banged it maddeningly on the table, “…please say that you’re not in the mob?”

  “We don’t participate in organized crime.” Flint frowned upon the idea. “Our existence is kept a secret, protected by the humans in the tribe.”

  “If this is such a secret Flint, then why the hell did you just drive all the way from Alaska to Washington, to tell me this?” I raised my head to look his way.

  “Because we are mates and you are carrying my child.”

  “And that means?”

  “I came to bring you back to Lokoti Tribal Lands, to live with me.” He said seriously.

  I burst into laughter, “oh right! So I just pack up my place and quit my job and put my apartment on the market? Then I hop into your old, blue, pick up truck, and let you drive me all the way back to Alma?”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t wake up, so we could have talked about this in Anchorage.” Flint tried to take my hand again, but I moved away. A hurt expression passed over his face, but he continued as if he were being patient with me. “If we hadn’t of separated, you wouldn’t be feeling so unwell. I could have driven you back to tribal lands with me then.”

  “Oh you could have?” I looked on like he was a loon. “So this is the way you induct people into your pack; you have a one night stand with someone, you follow them interstate and then you try to drag them back?”

  “Jessica, please -”

  “You said in the bar that you were concerned about my safety and that you would see me to the airport, so I could go home!”

  “I did, as I did not foresee myself mating with you.”

  “Would you please stop calling it that! It was just sex! And I’m NOT pregnant! I’m on the pill and have been for ten years! I’m NOT pregnant, I’ve never been pregnant and I never will get pregnant! I’m NOT your mate!”

  “Jessica, listen to me -”

  “Man, I thought you were a nice guy, Flint. My previous memories of that night were also nice. But your behaviour right now, by following me home and saying I have to come back with you? It makes you sound like a FREAK!”

  “Jessica, I understand your surprise, I do. It’s because our customs would be seen as unusual by outsiders, couplings between a Lokoti Werewolf and mate, are usually with Lokoti women. I did not plan for this to happen -” he spoke and he would have said more, but suddenly I stood up and left the table.

  “Right, that’s it.” I defiantly walked into the kitchen to pick up the phone again. I held out the handset, so he could see it. “Flint, I have to ask you to leave and never come back, or I’ll call the police.”

  He slowly stood up as he tried to hold my gaze, “you are afraid of me.”

  “Damn straight!” I shouted. “What did you expect?!”

  “If I showed you my Werewolf form, then you’d believe me. But it would also frighten you further. I don’t want to do that, because your heart is racing too fast as it is. Please tell me what else I can do?” He pleaded.

  “Walk out that door and don’t come back again!” I pointed the way.

  He sighed heavily as he shook his head. Then to make matters worse, he started to take off his shirt and then his t-shirt, as he kicked off his boots. He’s undressing in my living area… why, is he going to force himself on me?

  “What the hell are you doing?!” I screeched. “Right that’s it! I AM calling the police!”

  I turned away so I could dial 911, but it didn’t work. I tried again, but I saw my hands were shaking so badly, I kept hitting the 2 instead. I took a deep breath to try to calm myself, as a little more slowly I pressed the keypad. But I could barely hold the handset properly, because I was shaking so much!

  “9-1-1, what’s the emergency?” A female voice, greeted.

  Suddenly the line went dead, when a clawed hand, hit the ‘end call’ function on my electronic phone!

  I screamed as I dropped the handset and leapt backwards in fright!

  It was a large man’s hand, with unnaturally long, sharp nails, connected to an impossibly large, muscled arm; which was attached to an impossibly large, muscled torso. His muscle bulk was huge! Then my eyes moved past the bulky neck, to the human head whose mouth had sharp, elongated teeth, jutting past his lips. They stopped at his waiting, glowing turquoise eyes; before swinging down again to see the monster, standing in my kitchen in just his jeans. Oh yeah, the nails on his bare feet, also looked long and sharp.

  Glowing turquoise eyes…? Then that means that night in the hotel room, I wasn’t imagining things! I recalled how sharp his teeth had felt, as I remembered all the growling noises he had made. Right now, he or it, was panting, as it stood in the entranceway of my kitchen.

  Holy shit, I screwed a Werewolf! Or one screwed me, depending on how you looked at it. I had sex with a Werewolf, albeit it was good sex but nonetheless it was sex. Now this Werewolf is claiming that I’m his pregnant mate?

  As cool as a cucumber, the monster used its clawed hand to pick up the handset from the floor, and put it back on the phone. But it wasn’t the only thing to fall in the shock of the proceedings, as my trembling legs gave out.

  My racing heart, shallow breathing and shaking limbs, couldn’t take anymore of this. I felt my legs collapse from underneath, the same time a curtain of darkness dropped over my eyes. Then so did I, onto my linoleum kitchen floor…

  …

  …I don’t know how long I was out for, but I felt that I was lying somewhere soft and warm. With my eyes still shut, I realized I was lying on top of my bed with a coat over me. I think it was a man’s coat, as it was big and smelled like Flint.

  It smelled like Flint? The tall, Native Alaskan, who was a Lokoti Werewolf…? The monster that was in my kitchen entranceway…?

  My eyes snapped open and the first thing I saw, was Flint’s human face gazing down in concern. He was dabbing something cool and wet on my forehead, like a damp face cloth. He smiled warmly, as if to reassure, but his smile didn’t last long.

  “Jessica, you are very weak.” He said gravely. “Before you, there has never been a case of a Lokoti Werewolf apart from his mate for so long. Your heart rate and your blood pressure are too high.”

  I believed him, since I felt light headed and dizzy. It was like the time I accidentally dosed myself too high with insulin. The walls of my bedroom looked like they were moving, as if everything was swaying. Were we having an earth quake or was it just me?

  “C-c-call an ambulance…” I couldn’t speak properly, “…m-m-m-my doctor’s n-n-number is on my diabetics c-c-c-card, which is in my p-p-purse.”

  “I can give you something that will heal you immediately.” He said calmly. “You have to trust me, Jessica.”

  But all I could do, was stare up at him, dazed. I was too weak to panic, which could have been for the best, especially with what happened next.

  Flint was already sitting topless on the side of my bed, when before my eyes his muscles expanded, to look a hell of a lot bigger. The nails on his hands turned longer and pointer as did his teeth, which protruded from his mouth. His dark brown eyes glowed a turquoise colour, with his black pupils disappearing.

  Then I watched him raise his right arm and use the claws on his left hand, to put a gash in his wrist.

  When he moved his wound to my mouth, fear took hold. Oh shit, he’s trying to feed me his blood! He’s trying to turn me into another Werewolf!

  “Nooo…,” I rolled my head away, “…please don’t, Flint!”

  “My blood won’t turn you into a Lokoti Werewolf, Jessica.” He spoke in a thunderous voice. “Only Lokoti are born with the gene, to become one of us. But my blood will make you strong.”

  Using his claw-like left hand, he raised my head to press his bleeding right wrist, against my mouth.

  At first I refused to let it past my lips, so instead the warm, thick blood, started to trickle down my chin.

  “No har
m will come to you as my mate.” He growled softly, as his way to cajole. “Now drink and heal.”

  Then I don’t know why, but I believed him. Against my better judgment or even my control, my lips parted. He gently pushed his wound into my mouth, as I lay there, staring up into his glowing turquoise eyes. I felt his blood pool inside, until I had no choice but to swallow, or choke.

  Flint sat patiently, as I swallowed reluctant mouthful after reluctant mouthful. As I did, he ducked his head to tenderly run his nose over my forehead. Was he sniffing my state of health? He did say that he could do that.

  However after my fourth time, I realized what he was talking about. I DID feel stronger. My racing heart started to slow, as the dizziness subsided. I felt my arms and legs, stop trembling. When I tried to sit up, Flint wouldn’t remove his arm.

  “Just a couple more mouthfuls,” he insisted, as he watched my return to health.

  Reluctantly, I kept drinking, expecting myself to gag at any minute, but I didn’t. This bloodletting didn’t taste as bad as I had imagined it would. However, I certainly didn’t want people to ever find out, that I drank blood!

  I noticed as we were doing this, the Lokoti Werewolf started to get turned on.

  He kept sniffing around my face or neck, as he ran his clawed hand, over my suit. I lay still, almost afraid to move. His glowing turquoise eyes, tried to hold my human blue ones, as I felt him hoist up my skirt. Then the heat of his hand felt good against my skin, as he stroked my inner thighs.

  My heart started to pound in excitement, rather than fear. His claws managed to tear the tops of my stockings, along with my underwear, but leave the skin unharmed. The ruined garments lay in disuse, on top of the bed. Then my eyes almost popped out of their sockets, when I felt his clawed hand separate my moist cheeks, to rub my clit.

  Somehow his long, sharp claws didn’t hurt, instead they tantalized… how was he doing this? He used the pads on his fingers to do the massaging, but I felt the edges of his unnaturally long nails, touch my sensitive area. It even felt ticklish, adding to the pleasure.

  Although the trembling had subsided, it was like I had lost control of my body. I felt my yearning, cry out; ‘more! more!’ the wetter I became. I grabbed hold of his hugely muscled torso, to try to pull him over me. I heard him undo his jeans as he moved on top and then I felt him push himself inside.