“Vance, please…” I opened my mouth and lapped at his throat, my tongue gathering his wild salty taste from the crease at neck and shoulder. “I need you.”
Along my side, his nipples beaded. The soft pelt of snow white fur coating his chest rubbed me with his movements, sensitizing my skin until the nerves jumped under the surface, making the slightest touch agonizing.
His needy growl rumbling above my head and vibrating under my cheek, Vance carried me out of the bathroom, determined tread quickly eating up the distance to the bedroom. “I’ll soon have your pussy sobbing around my tongue. If you must cry, let it be from the ecstasy I bring you.”
Before he’d spoken I’d known Vance was going to fuck me, but at his words, liquid, hot and slick, flooded my vagina. Wordless, my grip tightened. The muscles in my belly contracted and I bit down on the flesh under my mouth because I wanted this, wanted him so badly.
He howled, startling me, and I drew back, drew my mouth away. He pressed my face back against his shoulder, held it there while he shuddered. “Do it again. Mark me!”
Mark? Oh, the bite. I bit him, this time a little harder, pulling the flesh between my teeth and letting it go to snap back elastically. A curl of heat ignited in my core, burned its way up to the tips of my breasts, feeling so good I took my teeth to him again and again, each time biting down more until the taste of hot coppery life shocked me back to my senses.
Vance came to a standstill, taut body jerking convulsively. Groaning, he dropped me to the mattress, covered me with his body. One hand fisting in my hair to bring me under control, he took my mouth, licked his blood off my lips, and then plunged his tongue deep in a conquering kiss.
We fought for it, tugged and pulled at each other as we ate each other’s mouth, hungry and desperate for something elusive, just out of reach. My top disappeared. The tap pants seemed to dissolve under his sharp claws.
Claws?
I tore my mouth away, breathing hard, arms extended to hold him off. Vance pushed himself up, holding his body’s weight on his muscled forearms. His chest rose and fell as his breath sobbed out in short hot spurts, puffing in soft gusts against my face. I stroked his back, his chest, along his sides, ending with my hands palming the twin cheeks of his sculptured ass. His body twitched under my strokes, muscles trembling and clenching all along his long rangy length. We stared into each other’s eyes, his gone wolf white and wild. There wasn’t a hint of humanity in his blind stare and I quaked inside and out, coming to slow awareness of what I’d roused.
Deliberately, warily, he lowered his head, eyes keeping watch on mine. A tentative swipe sideways of his tongue across my mouth, a quicker one along my jaw up to my hairline turned cold as the room’s air touched the damp swatches. A bolder series of licks crossed the hills of my breasts, wetting my stiffening nipples, grew harder, longer as he trailed down toward my bellybutton.
He stabbed the tip of his tongue into the little cave, wriggled it about. The ticklish motion made me giggle and squirm. I froze when a warning growl rumbled at the top of my mound and the edge of his teeth scraped my skin. The threat of pain made me cream and I heard his sharp intake of breath, felt the outflow against my streaming pussy. His mouth took me and I arched under him, eyes falling shut as he nibbled and licked his way around my clit, sucked my labia in and mouthed them. I let my legs fall open, giving him more room between my thighs, sighing at the ripples of pleasure coursing through my body.
It was beyond good, so hot and slick, his tongue, stabbing at the stiff peak of my clit, swirling in the soft tissues of my opening. I couldn’t keep my hips still. They rose and fell beneath him, my body’s way of begging for more, for a deeper connection. Growls continually leaked out of his mouth, a sub-bass vibrato shaking the entire region of my mons and upper thighs.
It wasn’t humming. Not by a long shot. The feeling was heavier, deeper… like sitting on a washing machine during the spin cycle. It was purring. The unending tissue-deep thrumming moved in waves throughout my body, making me want to claw and tear at him. I wanted, needed to sink my teeth back in him and bite down hard. Instead, I pushed up off my heels, pressed my pussy to his mouth and warbled, “Lick me harder! Harder!”
Up until then, we’d been silent, wordlessly engaged. As if my break gave him license, he grew more loquacious, though his words emerged in a growl so low I could barely make out their meaning. “Cunt meat hot… dripping… sweet!”
He bit down on my clit.
Chapter Two
I came like a freight train barreling into the station half an hour late, no brakes and the whistle screaming. My heels thrummed the mattress, a manic beat that had no rhythm, as my hips rocked on his mouth, mashing his lips. My head thrashed from side to side as the orgasm cascaded over me, drowning me in pleasure and heat. In the midst of that sensual feast, what felt like a series of electric currents crawled over my skin, raising goose bumps and making my short hairs stand up on end.
I’d come hard and was worn out. It took major effort to drag my eyes open, but I managed to do so. Then I had to blink to clear my bleary sight. A second later I’d come up on my elbows with a shrill scream. Scant seconds after that, I was crawling backwards away from the huge wolf crouched between my legs, muzzle damp from -- God help me -- my spilt pussy juices.
The wolf snarled, baring fangs longer than my fingers. I’d seen them before when he tore out the throats of Bo and Ro Smith, knew they were sharp and deadly. Head lowered, he advanced. I screamed and threw a pillow at it. Hadn’t I heard a wolf lowered its head just before it attacked?
The pillow didn’t deter it, and neither did my screams, evidently. The wolf, white pelt gleaming, took another unsteady step toward me.
“V-Va-Vance? Th-that is you, isn’t it?”
The mattress was soft and I was thrashing about so much the animal had difficulty maintaining its balance. Short step by short wobbly step, it made its way to my side.
My heart pounded so hard my earlobes throbbed, my belly went hollow, and bile rushed to the back of my throat. I kicked out at it, tried to push it away. It snarled, snapped at my foot, and I yanked it back, out of the way. My knee rose when I pulled the foot close to my body and the wolf took advantage, pressing into the V at the top of my thighs. It stood over me, head higher than mine, its furred under belly visible in my line of sight.
The wolf’s erection was grotesquely huge, more like a towering obelisk than a penis. It resembled a canine penis, not a man’s. Rearing from a protective sheath, it was thick and wide at the base, slimming to a tapered wedge at the head, hotly red and slick. Already a knot was forming near the base where heavy furred balls hung between its back haunches. It wanted to mate me. Vance wanted to fuck me while he was a wolf.
A short while ago I’d thought I didn’t fear him. Minutes ago, I’d lain under him, waiting for his cock with bated breath, wanting him inside me so badly I’d shook with the need. Now, I looked from that cock to the wolf’s bared fangs and couldn’t do it. I knew it… he… was Vance, but I couldn’t wrap my brain around it enough to open my legs to a wolf. Sharp teeth, tender bits… the combination just screamed danger. I reacted accordingly. “No!”
I kicked out one more time. Not quick enough to connect. I didn’t want to hit or hurt him. Just enough to buy me time to scramble off the bed and up the hall to the bathroom. He flinched back instead of lunging. Obviously, he didn’t want to hurt me, either. I ran without looking back, making it to the bathroom with the feel of his hot breath at my neck. I slammed the door on his snout and turned the lock with a loud click. “And stay out!”
Fierce howls and growls shattered the silence as claws tore at the locked door. Horrendous thuds shook the wooden panel as Vance threw his wolf’s body against the barrier. Screaming myself, I fled to the shower stall and scrambled in, putting my back to the wall and cowering in the corner.
The terrifying cacophony went on and on. Heart pounding, I clapped hands to ears and hunkered lower, going down on my kn
ees. Rocking back and forth, that earlier sob rose up again, bursting from my chest with a clap of sound that echoed with raw, bleeding pain.
And then I was sobbing, the tears pouring from my eyes as I cried so hard my nose began to run. Acid burned my guts, pain sliced through me like a serrated blade, leaving me gasping. Moaning aloud, I wept inconsolably and swiped at my running nose with my forearm. Hurt and confused, I marveled that I’d cry for Vance when I hadn’t cried for my mother. What did that say about me?
Sadly, I think it said I’d gone way beyond trusting Vance to falling in love with him… or at least in lust. How could I not? He’d saved my life and then saved me again from his own people and I repaid him by treating him like a monster.
I was so angry at myself. I’d known definitively that he was as much wolf as man before he’d touched me that first time. We’d fucked all night long and not once had I pulled back or refused him. So why couldn’t I let him have me when he lost control and shifted? I wailed, crying harder when I remembered that I’d had the audacity to question, the night before, whether or not he loved me. “What about love?” I’d asked him.
“How can I explain werewolf emotions to you? I’m a wolf. I never would have been driven to mate you if we hadn’t been viscerally connected in some way. For me, my greatest need is to be with you.”
I’d been so secure in my ignorance, so supercilious in all my secular human superiority I hadn’t thought to question his phrasing. I’d blithely ignored the words “wolf” and “driven to mate you” and “viscerally connected.” Vance believed we were connected. He’d committed himself to me body and soul. And I’d just rejected him. Curled on the floor of the stall, I cried until I was empty of all emotion, scoured and scraped clean, all the built-up anguish dissolved in the wash of my tears.
Feeling broken and abandoned, like flotsam tossed ashore in the midst of a storm, I allowed myself to grieve for all the losses in my life -- for my mother and the lighthearted joys of youth, siphoned away by the long painful years of her disease. Only now could I remember I’d never begrudged her a moment of that time.
I mourned the loss of my dreams, slain by Patrick’s betrayal. Mostly, I regretted and admitted my cowardice in the face of Vance’s demands. I was ashamed of how I’d pushed him away. Yes, I’d been thrown off guard when I realized what he expected of me, but my overreaction hadn’t solely been about him being in wolf form. More than anything, I prayed he’d give me a second chance, the opportunity to explain my actions. With my luck, I wasn’t getting my hopes up. Recalling the way he’d attacked the door I’d locked between us, I despaired of him ever forgiving me.
* * *
I was concerned and doing a poor job of hiding my emotions. My enforcer, who was also my cousin, was never tardy, well aware how much I despised such untimely behavior. His lateness spelled trouble. Contrary to rumors we’d deliberately spread, Vance and I loved each other.
My mate whined and I reached down, running a hand along her sleek fur, petting and praising her in one caress. She’d picked up my worry. She sensed something was wrong, or might have been feeding off my strained emotions. I shored up my barriers, not wishing to disturb her further, not wanting to invite problems with her pregnancy.
My Mala -- frozen in her wolf form since our pups had quickened inside her -- reclined proudly beside me, her rounded belly the object of much adulation. Our healer informed us at least three pups nestled within. She whined again and I quickly sought to calm her. “Hush, my bitch. Do not allow yourself to be disturbed. I will be displeased if you become ill. Have patience, beloved. I know you love Vance, too. When Argor returns, I’ll have the lieutenant seek him out.”
She licked my fingers in acknowledgement and returned to watching the hall’s activities. The yearly Fertility Festival was in full swing. Unmated wolves frolicked joyfully under the full moon, sharing bodies. Yearling pups spilled and tumbled in a furry mass about the dais, wrestling and playing in childlike abandon.
Despite any real enthusiasm, my lips smiled and I waved at the children romping in fun on the mats. They needed to see their Alpha noticed and approved their mock challenges. For the babies, this Festival was a great excuse for a pack-wide gathering where they could practice and prepare for real battles without harming each other.
“Westyn, my Alpha.” Vance stepped from behind me, going to his knees and sweeping his hair to the side, offering me his neck in submission. “Forgive me for being late. I can offer no excuse.”
I came to my feet, startled that he could still do that to me -- come up on me without tripping my personal alert. At my feet, Mala raised her head, giving a couple of yips, her tail thumping the ground in happy greeting. “Damn it, cuz, if you do that in public you’ll give lie to the story of losing our challenge.” Slapping his exposed neck, I jovially inquired into his new status. “So, Vance, tell me what human tail is like. Does your bitch howl like our females do?”
While I was speaking, my enforcer shifted under my hand and the most Moon-cursed stench arose from his crouched body.
“What the fuck?” Stumbling back, I dropped my hand, eyeing him closely. Vance stank with the acrid aroma of another’s fear. Prey taint coated him from head to foot. He looked peaked, rocky. I’d never seen my den sib so unsteady. But his eyes -- wolf white and wild -- flitted about the room, refusing to settle on any one thing. When they finally met mine they were filled with a shamed dread that sent my heart bottoming out in my belly.
Adrenaline rushed through me. I felt my own eyes go white and blind with fury before my vision went the matte black, grays and whites of color-blind wolf sight. My bunched fists shifted into claw-tipped paws. Taking her cues from me, Mala lumbered to four feet, gravid belly heavy and unwieldy, blending her snarls of rage with mine.
I was going to kill that bitch. My intent was in my voice when I demanded, “Where is she?”
At my raised voice, the cubs broke and scattered, abandoning play for the safe haven of their mams and sires. I barely noticed the exodus, more concerned with the situation confronting me.
I didn’t know why Vance’s human had hurt and insulted him in a way no true mate would. Probably for some insanely human reason, she’d eviscerated his pride, shit on his maleness. My cousin was the proudest, most assured wolf I knew. I was just the titular Alpha of the pack, but Vance was the true article. I’d always looked up to him in hero-worship and to see him like this -- spirit broken and shoulders bowed -- told me more than I needed to know.
“How dare she insult the enforcer of the Forrester Pack?” My lips drew back, baring my fangs. Raising my voice, I decreed, “The human sow is meat on the hoof. I’ll see her blooded and ran for the hunt if there’s anything left of her when the unmated adolescents finish with her.”
Vance went even lower to the floor, tilted his head back to offer the soft underside of his chin. “Please, Alpha… if I must, I’ll beg for her life. She is my mate.”
Mala howled. I agreed. “Bullshit. We can smell her offensive fear on your skin. She’s marked you an abuser!” I kicked at his long carcass. “Get up! Cut out the submissive act. We both know better.”
“It is no act. I do not lower myself by submitting to you. You are my pack leader. I am happy to obey your commands.” He gained his feet in a fluid move I’d long admired, to stand before me the image of a mighty wolf, master of the woodland and top of the food chain.
I’d long ago made peace with the fact Vance was the better wolf. I had Mala to mate only by his good graces and because he never traded on the debt I owed him, I was willing to do practically anything Vance put forward. But it more than irked me he would remain loyal to the human bitch that’d obviously rejected him. “You saved her measly life and this is the thanks she gives?”
A slight smile stretched Vance’s lips before they twisted in a thoughtful pucker. “I startled her.” He ran his fingers through his thick snowy mane, giving a little laugh. “You know… in a way, this situation is my fault. I was so bu
sy fucking her I never got around to telling her that fucking her while in wolf form was part of the deal. She never agreed to it, but I’m almost sure -- once she has time to think about it -- she’ll accept me.”
I frowned at his weak excuses for her behavior. “She’d better. Not mating in your natural form would be as unnatural as teats on a bull. Almost as silly as humans never using any position but the two-backed beast -- missionary, I think they call it.”
Vance shrugged. “Humans will be humans.”
“Which doesn’t mean they’re excused from civilized behavior,” I shot back. “There are rules that must be followed.”
“As your enforcer, I’m well aware of that, but I’m telling you Ouida didn’t know she was breaking the rules. I didn’t get around to laying them out for her. I can correct this. I just need to --”
“Stop!” I cut him off with a chop of my hand. “You’re trying too hard to extricate her from the consequences of her actions. I have to consider you’re compromised.”
My cousin growled. “Damn straight, I am!”
Vance’s forceful response rode the edge of challenge and my gut tightened, hackles rose in feral reaction. Mala’s ruff stiffened. Whining, she came closer, hind legs lowered in stalking stance. She was reluctant to confront Vance, but her loyalty was to me and she’d act upon it, if called on. As if I’d willingly endanger my mate. I touched her head. “Stand down, darling. We’re just posturing.”
Vance’s mouth firmed. His eyes telegraphed his sorrow… and his determination. “I am not posturing. I cannot allow you to harm my mate. If it were me, threatening your mate, what would you be moved to do?”
I froze. “You can’t be serious! You would betray me for a human?”
Bunny Tails Splitting Hares Page 2
