by Myles, Eden
“But you don’t want to.”
“I love the pack,” he admitted. “I love Roman.”
Hannah nodded as she considered that. “Do you think Fenrir will come back?”
Kevin took a deep breath, let it out. “Yes.”
Hannah squeezed his hands. “Can I do anything to help?”
“Yeah, but…you won’t like it. You won’t agree to it.”
“Try me.”
Kevin bit his lip. “I know you don’t want to hear this, sis, but the fact of the matter is, you’re a liability. And Fenrir knows you’re my one pressure point. Is there any way you can stay with Matthew for a while?”
“You mean run away…leave you alone to deal with this?”
“Well, yeah.”
Hannah swallowed. “You know I don’t want to do that. We stand together, or we don’t stand.”
“And I don’t want you to go. But will you? Will you do that for me, so I don’t need to constantly worry about you in addition to when his next attack will come?”
Hannah was stubborn, but sensible, he knew. It was what put her at the top of her class. After a moment of thought she nodded and squeezed his hands even tighter. “If it helps you with this, then yeah, I’ll do that. But what are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure,” he said, pulling his sister into his arms for a hug. “But whatever it is, I know I’ll feel better if you have Matthew with you.”
“You know I’ll do anything to help you—even fight werewolves.”
Kevin laughed, grateful that his sister was willing to be so compliant. He kissed her on the forehead, then ruffled her hair. “I appreciate that, I really do. But for the record, I don’t smell like wet dog!”
* * *
Chapter Twenty
His heart pounding with fear and anxiety, Kevin drove into the mountains. He’d given this a lot of thought over the last few days, had run more than a few scenarios through his head, and he kept coming back around to one definite point: he loved Roman and he loved the pack. He didn’t want to leave unless there was no alternative whatsoever.
He had to confront Roman, get him alone. The problem was, the only way he could do that was by visiting the mansion in the city, and that meant going through security. He didn’t want anyone knowing he was there. He needed the element of surprise.
With Hannah safely at Matthew’s place, he figured it was now or never. This being the weekend, the only way he was going to surprise Roman was by catching him at the lodge.
The ride up to the mountains seemed shorter than usual. About a mile before he reached the lodge, Kevin pulled onto the shoulder of the road, shut down the engine of his car, grabbed his backpack, and hiked the rest of the way in the dark. There was a half moon, which meant there was more than enough light for a werewolf to navigate by moonlight.
Ten minutes later, he spotted the lodge over the next rise and slowed, trying to get his breathing under control. Logic dictated that he ought to run away from danger, not go headlong into it. But love makes you do some pretty stupid things, he decided. His heart knew what it wanted, and it wanted Roman.
“I love him,” he told himself, shouldering his pack, and creeping as quietly as he could to the side of the lodge where the master suite was located. He loved Roman. He hadn’t realized it until he was talking to Hannah yesterday and blurted it out. He loved Roman, was in love with him. Otherwise, why would he be taking such a stupid chance?
He stopped and set his pack down, then looked up at the tall, two-story structure. A large, French-style window was open about twenty-five feet up to let the cool night air in. The lodge was made of imitation logs, and he knew he could scale them easily enough in his half-wolf form.
He stripped out of his clothes to keep them from shredding, then shifted soundlessly to werewolf form. Climbing arm over arm like a great ape, he scrambled up the side of the lodge to the window and climbed inside, balancing on the windowsill. The light, airy curtains fluttered around him and out the window like curious ghosts. There was a cross-breeze in the room, which worked to Kevin’s advantage; it meant he was downwind to the occupants in the room and his scent wouldn’t reach them in sleep.
He scanned the dark room, was surprised to find Roman sleeping alone in his vast, king-sized bed. It was a beautiful, four-poster affair full of veils, obviously an antique. The first time he’d been at the lodge, he and the pack had spent most of it running in the forest; he hadn’t had an opportunity to appreciate Roman’s talent at interior design.
Climbing soundlessly down to the floor, Kevin made his four-legged way to the bed and climbed over the antique steamer trunk at the foot. He paused as Roman stirred in his sleep and turned over. He was gloriously naked, golden tan and sleekly muscled, the white satin sheets bunched down low around his lean hips. His long black hair lay in spirals on the pillow around his head and the fur of his groin was a nest of darkness for the thick, lightly weeping erection that lay flat against his lower belly. He smelled like forest, and man, and lust. Kevin immediately felt his cock throb and spring to life.
He had to muffle a whine of desire. He licked himself between the legs, hoping to cool the lust building like a low-grade flame inside him, but it did no good. One look at Roman and he felt his resolve weaken. No! He had to set his desires aside. He told himself he was on a mission, that he might need to intimidate Roman as a way to protect Hannah and his own life. But as he crawled across the bedclothes toward his sleeping lover, his desire steadily mounted and his hunger increased.
Soon he loomed over Roman’s sleeping human form, drool dripping down the sides of his jaws. It was all he could do to keep from panting with desire and ravaging Roman where he lay, his lust was so strong. He imagined thrusting inside Roman hot, beautiful body while in his werewolf form while Roman scratched his back and ass with his fingernails. Never in his life had he felt so out of control.
He shook his head, forced himself to concentrate on the mission. Reaching out, he closed his huge, clawed hand around his lover’s throat—not tight, but enough to cut off Roman’s breathing.
Roman’s eyes were open. Kevin realized belatedly that they had been open for some time. He simply hadn’t noticed. Roman had also managed to subtlety moved his hand. Kevin could feel Roman gripping his balls tightly between his legs. His strength made Kevin go very still.
“Would be a shame to harm such beautiful things, Golden Eyes,” Roman said. “I find them quite pleasurable.”
He didn’t immediately release Roman, so Roman gave his testes a harsh squeeze. A pulse of pleasure and pain in equal measures surged through Kevin’s body, making him groan low in his wide, furry, wolfen chest. Slowly, Kevin let Roman go, removing his hand from his throat.
Roman loosened his own hold, but not by much. He caressed Kevin’s balls and said, “Shift so we may better speak, young wolf.”
Kevin obeyed. It was almost a relief to have been outdone by his alpha. Kevin realized that in his heart of hearts, he hadn’t really wanted to hurt Roman. He probably wouldn’t have been able to go through with it. “Fenrir attacked me and my sister yesterday,” he hissed. “I’m simply returning the favor.”
“I know,” Roman answered. “I sent him.”
Roman’s words confused him. “Why?” His heart thudded in his throat at the revelation.
“To discourage you from joining the pack. And I did not send him to attack your sister, only you.”
Kevin thought about that a moment. “And the dead man?”
“That, too, was sanctioned by me.”
“That makes no sense, Roman! Why invite me to be one of you and then try and drive me off?”
“Anya,” Roman growled, and Kevin saw real emotion in his eyes. Real fear.
“I don’t understand. Are you afraid of her?”
“More afraid for you.” Roman hissed air between his elongated teeth in frustration. “You have no idea how dangerous she really is. Anya is ten thousand years old, and her name isn’t Anya, anyway
, it’s Freki.”
“Odin’s wolf?” Kevin found the idea of a Norse myth come to life just a little hard to believe.
“The same.” Roman nodded. “She is Freki the Gluttonous—the ancient god-wolf turned woman who devours all those who cross her. She even devoured her mate Geri when he displeased her.”
Kevin sat back, trying to digest that. At first, he thought maybe Roman was pulling his leg, or that he was insane. He couldn’t seem to resolve the image of petite, blonde Anya with a demonic she-wolf, but the fear in Roman’s face told him he was telling the truth. He smelled like he was telling the truth. He smelled like fear. He went back over what Roman had said. “You commanded Fenrir to harass me? You’ve been behind this the whole time?”
“It was a necessary evil. Otherwise, you would have soon become Anya’s pet, Anya’s pawn, like the rest of us.” He sighed and shook his head. “Her instructions to me were to convince you to give up your human life when you joined the pack as the others have and live with us, be her wolf. I told her you were a Pedigree and Orphan, that you were too stubborn, but she refused to listen. I was right, of course. I knew, with a little encouragement, you would do no such thing.”
Kevin gave him a sidelong look. “Why are you telling me this now? What’s changed?”
“After you left us the last time, she started talking about forcibly abducting you. I can’t let that happen.” When Roman realized he wasn’t catching on, he added, “She wants you because you’re a Pedigree. You can give her a Pedigree child.”
Kevin narrowed his eyes. “I thought that was your job?”
Again Roman shook his head. He listened for a moment to make certain no one was lurking in the halls outside before saying, “Anya can’t carry to term, some physical defect, perhaps, or because she was the first, the Eve of our kind and she can only bear children with Geri, we aren’t sure…”
“What makes her think I would be any better a mate than you?”
“Because she doesn’t blame herself. She blames me. She thought if she could make you a permanent part of the pack, she could convince you to mate with her. She thinks you might be more viable than I.”
Kevin felt a surge of anger, but quickly stamped it out. “Well, she’s wrong. I have no desire to be her mate. And if do have children someday, it’ll be on my own terms. Have you talked to her about this…madness?”
“Anya cannot be reasoned with. The only things she respects are the taste of prey in her mouth and her own desires.” Roman’s eyes gleamed. “She has the bit in her mouth and she won’t let this go. She never lets go of anything she wants.”
Kevin swallowed hard. Then a thought more horrible than anything occurred to her. “Honeypot.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a term I hear a lot of cops at the club use. It means trapping someone by using sex.” Kevin glared at Roman. “Is that you, Roman? Are you Anya’s honeypot? Her way of entrapping me?”
Roman reached for Kevin’s arm, but Kevin yanked it away while steadily looking at the other man. “Kevin…”
“Answer the question.”
Roman narrowed his golden-yellow eyes. Kevin could smell the wolf strong on him, but whether it was fear or desire, he couldn’t tell. “I did as she bade me at first because that is always what I’ve done in the past. She is my mentor and mistress, and far stronger than I. But, Kevin, it became more after that. So much more.”
He wished he could tell if Roman was lying, but with few exceptions, Roman was a master of control over his emotions. As he started drawing back, Roman sat up in bed and clutched the back of Kevin’s head. His mouth came down in a savage, hungry kiss, his tongue tracing the seam in Kevin’s lips. Kevin opened his mouth to Roman’s kiss and Roman plunged his tongue inside, sweeping it across the sensitive roof of Kevin’s mouth, over his aching, elongated incisors, and soon they were tongue wrestling as Roman grabbed at Kevin’s arms, pulling him down and against the front of his body. His erection throbbed hot and strong between them. Roman rubbed it against Kevin’s belly.
Kevin moaned, said, “You used me, took advantage of my desperation…my need to be part of the pack. How do I know I can trust you?”
Roman drew back, licked Kevin’s lips, said, “Would I tell you all this, endanger my own life, if I did not love you?”
Kevin almost said something, but Roman kissed him again, a bruising, hungry kiss. God, the taste and scent and feel of Roman filled Kevin’s whole world. Kevin held Roman down, licked and bit along the curve of his neck. He buried his face in Roman’s hair and breathed in the loamy, wild forest smell of him. It wasn’t enough. Kevin wanted to eat him alive, plunder him from top to bottom. He forced Roman’s legs apart with his knee, rubbed his swollen testes against him. He growled low in his throat as he rubbed his scent into his lover’s skin.
Roman groaned in response and spread his legs far enough apart for Kevin to bump his hole with his swollen cock. The excitement of his arousal was too much for Kevin and he began thrusting wildly against the front of Roman’s body like an animal in heat. The angle wasn’t quite right, so Roman clutched his ass and positioned him correctly. Kevin thrust hard and Roman muffled a soft yelp against the sweating hollow of Kevin’s throat.
They fitted each other perfectly.
It was like heaven, like coming home. Kevin humped his lover frantically, driving himself deeper and deeper inside Roman’s body even as Roman grunted and his entire body bucked with the force of the impacts. He clutched Kevin’s buttocks, dragged his clawed hands down them, leaving deep grooves that healed almost immediately. “Bite me,” he hissed through long teeth, and Kevin bowed his head and bit the side of Roman’s neck. He held onto Kevin’s ass as Kevin’s thrusts became wild, bestial, the beast in him wanting to fill and claim every part of his lover, to make it his.
“Oh goddess…” Roman gasped out in delight. “Fuck me, my love. Fuck me hard.”
“My pleasure,” Kevin growled. He fucked Roman hard.
“Harder.”
He thrust in long, tempered strokes, dragging Roman’s hips up off the bed. He grasped Roman’s ramrod dick, stroked it so volleys of hot spunk immediately bubbled out the hole and spurted against Kevin’s chest. Roman thrashed on the pillow, tossing his head back. His eyes all but rolled up in his head as his seed jetted against Kevin’s chest, neck and chin. Moaning at the sublime pleasure of it all, Kevin licked the hot come off his lips. The taste sent Kevin over the edge. Leaning over Roman’s prone form, Kevin shoved himself deep inside his lover, shivered all over, and came, lunging inside and pulsing his seed deep within Roman’s body.
Finished, the wolf sated, as was the man, Kevin snuggled down against Roman’s warm, sweat-slicked body and breathed in the scent of his hair and pillow. “I still don’t trust you,” he murmured against Roman’s roughened cheek.
Roman put a strong arm around Kevin. “You don’t have to trust me to love me,” he answered.
He was right. Kevin loved Roman. There was no way he was leaving the pack or his lover. He could no longer bear to be alone as before. He didn’t care what Anya wanted, and he didn’t care how many werewolf warriors Roman sent after him to make him leave, Kevin wasn’t going anywhere.
Moments later, he heard footsteps in the hallway. Someone was headed for Roman’s room. Kevin stiffened and dug himself under the covers. A moment later, the door opened and Jonah poked his head in. “Sorry, Roman, but you should know that Anya is looking for you.”
Roman sighed. “Thank you, Jonah.” Then, to Kevin, Roman said, “Jonah and Toby are two of the only three werewolves who are truly loyal to me. Fenrir being the third.”
“Fenrir who tried to kill me,” Kevin muttered, not without hurt in his voice.
“He didn’t, though, did he?” Jonah said. He gave Kevin a look. “Believe it or not, Fenrir is good people. He’s loyal like the rest of us are to our alpha.” He quietly shut the door again.
“Go now,” Roman said, pushing Kevin away. His eyes wer
e yellow as the wolf took hold of him. “Wait for me to send word to you.”
“I don’t want to leave you,” Kevin said. “I could stay, fight Anya, if I have to.”
But Roman hushed him. “You have to go. You might even have to leave the city. It’s a possibility.”
“No,” Kevin said as panic seized him. “I won’t run, Roman. I’ll stay and fight for you and the pack.”
Roman gave him a hard, pleading look. “If you stay, Anya will entrap you. Cage you. Please go.”
“She’s just a werewolf.”
“No, Kevin, she’s much more than that.”
The urgency in Roman’s voice spurred Kevin to action. He kissed Roman one last time and quickly moved to the window. “You’re right, you know,” he said, and Roman looked confused as well as sexily disheveled as he sat up in bed. “I might not trust you, but I do love you.”
He dropped down to the ground below, picked up his pack and clothes, and fled into the forest.
* * *
Chapter Twenty-One
Wait for me to send word to you.
It was like something out of a Nineteenth Century romance novel, Kevin thought. He stood behind the bar at the Barracuda, shaking a martini mixer, and studying the hoards of eager young men dancing, hooking up, or hooting after the dancers onstage. He kept hoping to spot Roman somewhere in the crowd, but for the past week he’d been noticeably absent. Kevin had gone so far as to drive by the mansion a few times, feeling entirely like a stalker, but no one seemed to be home, and he hadn’t had the courage to knock on the door. He’d given thought to driving up to the lodge again, but a part of him was afraid Roman was right and Anya was just waiting for him to show up so she could…cage him?
“Man at the end wants a Manhattan,” Allison said, swishing by.
Her words struck a desperate pang in Kevin and he dropped the martini shaker onto the floor as he turned to find the gentleman in question. It wasn’t Roman.
