Belonging

by Shiloh Walker

  “It’s not enough,” Cori snarled, pressing fisted hands to her temples. “It’s not. The monster that killed Owen damn near killed Levi. His life is ruined—”

  “It’s only ruined if that’s how Levi decides to see it.” Kelsey glared at Cori and for once, the witch didn’t waste one iota of energy trying to temper her words to Cori. “Levi’s got the strength of a Hunter in him. I see it already. He can make a difference. He can save lives, more lives than he’d ever be able to imagine as a mortal. He can save others from Owen’s fate, from his own, but not unless he gets it in his head to try. And right now, he’s doing the same thing you are…lying in a bed, hating himself.”

  “I’m not lying in a bed,” Cori said automatically.

  “You might as well be. You might as well be lying under a bed, with the covers pulled up over your head and your hands clamped over your ears, so you hear nothing and see nothing. You’re hiding. You’re not a fighter, Cori, but I didn’t realize you were a coward.”

  “Man, and I thought you were smart.” Cori smirked at her. On the inside, she was appalled, couldn’t quite believe how bitchy she was being. The bitter anger inside her was pushing her, though. Pushing her harder, harder.

  Kelsey’s eyes narrowed. Her mouth compressed into a thin, tight line. Abruptly, she scowled. “Fine. To hell with it.” She stormed out of the room, leaving Cori alone.

  As the door slammed shut behind the witch, Cori turned back to the wall. Sometimes she thought the walls were closing in on her. Locked away from the sunlight forever and not strong enough to actually do anything good with what had altered when she had gone through the Change. At least not mentally. Cori wasn’t a fighter. She didn’t want to be a fighter. She just wanted a damn life.

  God, she ached.

  She ached with grief.

  Ached with loneliness.

  Ached with guilt.

  Ached with misery.

  * * * * *

  The dreams were enough to drive a sane man crazy. And he wasn’t too steady, even aside from the dreams. He fought the rising tide of exhaustion like a man possessed because he didn’t want to sleep. If he didn’t sleep, he couldn’t dream.

  He stayed clear of the bed, wouldn’t let himself sit. If he did, he was going to fall asleep and he didn’t want to sleep. Fatigue made him clumsy, though, had him stumbling into a wall and he slapped a hand against it to keep from falling. “Can’t fight it forever,” he muttered, grinding the heel of his hand against one eye socket.

  No. He couldn’t fight sleep forever but he’d fight it for as long as he could. Shoving away from the wall, he continued to prowl the room he’d awoken in, three days earlier.

  Three days. Fuck. Had it only been three days?

  Yeah. Just three. He’d missed Owen’s funeral. Slept right through it and that was an ache that wasn’t ever going to go away.

  So many of them…the girl, where was the girl? What had happened to her? Was she okay? Another gaping wound in his heart. If she’d gotten hurt because of him…or worse…shit, the guilt. Guilt. Grief. Driving him crazy. In the past week, his life had just gone straight to hell. It hadn’t looked that pretty before but now—he’d give anything to go back a week. Turn back time and get to Owen’s place, get him out of there before that—

  He stopped in his tracks, stopped in his thoughts. Couldn’t let himself think it. Couldn’t let himself know it.

  “Werewolf,” he whispered, lowering his gaze to his hands and staring at them. In a few weeks, the moon would be full and this time he would be the one turning into a monster.

  A week. If he could go back in time, maybe he could save his cousin from the werewolf who had killed him. Owen would be alive. So would the girl. And Levi could have his life back. Empty as it had been, he wanted it back. Wanted some kind of normal back.

  He stumbled again, this time onto the bed, but he wasn’t quick enough to catch himself and he ended up sprawled on the bed, half on the floor.

  “Get up.” But he couldn’t. His lids drooped and he swore. He couldn’t fight it any longer. His muscles were leaden, his limbs stiff. He managed to fumble his clothes off, though it took two tries to get his damn zipper down. He managed, barely.

  “No dreams this time,” he muttered, his voice thick.

  And then sleep came.

  With sleep came dreams.

  Dreams where he ran through the woods on four feet instead of two. Dreams where he raced and hunted and brought down prey. Dreams where he sank his teeth into flesh and gloried in it. Then there were dreams where things chased him, monsters that drew close to him, breathing on him with hot, fetid breath that stank of blood and death. Then he would turn on them and instead of them taking him down, he was the attacker. He was the one ripping, rending, tearing at their flesh.

  But not all the dreams were of the blood-and-gore variety. Some were of the flesh. Sweat-slicked, hot and hungry flesh and made the hormone-laden dreams from his teenaged years seem tame. Sex—the mind-blowing kind that made him forget anything and everything. Sort of like the sex he’d had in the alley with the woman whose face he still hadn’t seen.

  She was the star of those dreams. That slender, almost delicate body, her slick pussy, the way her cool skin heated more and more with every stroke until she was fire in his arms. Her soft moans, the way her skin smelled of vanilla, orange blossoms and pure woman.

  One of those dreams held him captive now. Groaning, he thrashed on the bed, the sheets tangled at the foot, all the blankets long since kicked to the floor. Burning, sweating, he rolled over and pressed his face against the pillow. He pumped his hips against the mattress, while in the dream, he was pumping her, fucking her hard, deep, as she knelt before him on her hands and knees with her ass in the air.

  Her skin was as cool as the night and moon pale. Slipping his hands up, he cupped her breasts and squeezed her nipples. She moaned and thrust those small, perfect tits into his hands even as she pushed her rump back against him, working herself up and down his rigid dick.

  “What’s your name?” he whispered, twining a hand in her hair and drawing her up and back. He wrapped his arms around her torso, pinned her against him.

  She wiggled and rocked, squirmed against him. “Fuck me, Levi…please fuck me…”

  He pressed his hand to her belly and stilled her movements. His cock jerked, swathed in the wet velvet of her pussy. Fuck her, fuck her, fuck her—his body screamed at him. His head echoed the screams.

  But his heart…in his heart, he kept hearing her voice, hearing the fear as she told him to run. He’d known she wouldn’t follow. He’d known she was afraid. He’d known she expected to die, but still, she’d tried to protect him. It broke his heart. That soft, sexy sweetheart trying to protect him. “What’s your name, sugar?” he rasped, bending his head and pressing his lips to her neck. Her pulse leaped against the fragile shield of skin.

  Going crazy—Levi knew he was going crazy. He shouldn’t be able to hear the rhythm of her heartbeat. Shouldn’t be able to so easily pick up on the rich, ripe scent of her body. That scent—it was fucking bizarre how acutely he could smell her. Smell lotion, shampoo and soap, little subtleties he’d never noticed before.

  “It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. Fuck me…please, I can’t…” She mewled in her throat and threw her head back against his shoulder. Her face…something familiar—

  His hands touched cool flesh.

  There was a startled gasp.

  Dream and reality blended. She wasn’t kneeling naked before him now, but she was here. Close…and then in his arms after he reached out, caught a slender wrist and jerked her up against him. She opened her mouth to speak—he even heard her soft squeal of surprise before he crushed his lips to hers.

  His tongue rasped against something sharp—fangs—and blood filled his mouth. She tensed. Her body went rigid against his and if he hadn’t caught the tantalizing scent of hunger, he would have thought she was afraid.

  When she tried to tear
her mouth from his, he fisted a hand in her hair and held her still, kissed her until she stopped fighting. Until she closed her hot little mouth around his bleeding tongue and suckled. Levi thought the top of his head was going to come off. His cock jerked against his belly and something wet and heated seeped from the head. Fuck her—had to. He was dying and if he didn’t bury his dick inside her…

  His hands encountered clothes. Hadn’t she just been naked?

  Dreams?

  Reality?

  He didn’t know where one ended and the other began. She whimpered into his mouth, arched up against him. “Levi, please…”

  Déjà vu. It rippled over him. Tearing his mouth from hers, he buried his face against her neck. “I can’t stop. Shit, baby, if you want me to stop, tell me now. Scream for help. Make me stop.”

  She shook her head, cupped the back of his head in her hand. “Don’t stop. Touch me, Levi. Please, touch me.”

  He did, but he wasn’t gentle. He tore her clothes away and once he had her naked, he rolled her onto her belly. Dark hair fell, hid her face away. He wanted to do something about that but then he made the mistake of looking down, seeing that perfect, tight ass lifting for him. Dipping his head, he caught the firm flesh of one cheek between his teeth and bit her. She jolted. He reached between her thighs and touched her, seeking out the slick flesh—she’d be hot, pulsating with need…

  But she wasn’t. Oh, she was wet. But her flesh was cool. Every touch of his hand made her warmer, though. Warmer and warmer, until he held fire in his arms. Pushing a knee between hers, he made her spread her stance and then he sprawled on his belly and nuzzled her pussy. She was perfect and sleek and wet. He pushed his tongue inside her and growled. She shuddered. With her face buried against the mattress, she screamed.

  Unable to fight it, unable to take the painful need that gripped his balls, he straightened and stared down at her. The long, slender line of her back undulated as she rocked back. He reached down, wrapped his hand around his cock, steadied himself. Mouth dry, heart pounding, he stared, watched as he pressed the swollen head of his cock against her, watched as pink, wet flesh slowly yielded to his. She cried out and tried to push back.

  He gripped one hip in his hand and grunted. Too quick, she was moving too quickly and damn it, he wouldn’t have it. This was going to last. Last and last and last… “Be still,” he growled.

  She ignored him and pushed herself down on him, forcing two more inches inside her. Levi spanked her. She tensed. Stunned. He could smell her surprise. Feel it as a hot, vicious punch of arousal slammed into her. He spanked her again and asked, “You like that?”

  She moaned and tried to rock back against him, but he wouldn’t let her. Gripping her hips with steely hands, he asked again, “You like me spanking you?”

  “Yesssss…”

  He did it again, staring down at her pale flesh, watching as it blushed pink for him. He’d never hit a woman in his life, not with the intent to hurt, and not with the intent to arouse either. Torn between shock and need, he lifted his hand and traced the pinkened flesh with his fingertips. “Did I hurt you?”

  “No, damn it. But you are now!”

  Startled, he jerked his gaze away from her blushing ass, tried to see her under the veil of her hair. “How am I hurting you?”

  “Because you’re not moving. Levi, please—” her cry bounced off the walls as he slammed into her.

  Deep, tunneling through the swollen, wet folds of her pussy until she’d taken all of him. Then he spanked her again, stopped to stroke her ass. “Should I do it again?”

  “Yes.” A harsh guttural moan and then she shoved back against him. “Fuck, yes.”

  So he did. Thrust, pause just long enough to spank that pretty ass, and then a slow, teasing retreat. His skin gleamed with sweat, his balls ached with the need to come and his cock swelled and ached with an intensity that damn near doubled him over. The sound of flesh slapping together, her broken moans, animalistic growls that rumbled deep inside him before escaping.

  It wasn’t sex. Something deeper, something so raw and primitive that he had no words for it. Sex filled a need. This created a need. A need for more. A need for everything. He reached up, fisted a hand in her hair, pulled her up. Banding an arm around her waist, he held her steady and rolled his hips against hers. She shuddered and pushed back with her ass, trying to ride him.

  “More…please, give me more,” she whispered.

  Levi slid a hand down her midsection and petted her, stroked the flesh of her pussy where she stretched so tight and sweet and wet around him. “I’ll give you more. I’ll give you everything.”

  He pinched her clit and she went wild, working her hips up and down, riding him desperately. He stroked his hand up, cupped her cheek and tugged, arching her neck. He bit her roughly, swore as he broke the skin and blood welled. “Shit…I’m sorry.” But even as he tried to ease his grip, ease some distance between them, she turned her head and pressed her mouth to his biceps.

  She bit down. Hard. Blood flowed but there was no pain. An icy flash, the whisper just before pain. She pressed her mouth to the wound on his arm and sucked on him. He felt each pull of her mouth with exquisite detail. Felt each delicate muscle in her pussy as she tightened around him.

  His head fell back and he roared, coming so hard that it left his vision blurred. Sagging to the side, he took her with him, still rocking against her. She clenched around him, wiggling, mewling in her throat. She drained him. Emptied him.

  And when she pulled her mouth from his arm and sighed, cuddled back against him, Levi felt complete.

  For a moment.

  * * * * *

  Was she real, or was he still dreaming?

  He closed his eyes and then forced them back open.

  Didn’t work.

  She was still there. Cuddling in his arms and stroking a hand down his biceps, with her face pressed against the pillow.

  “You’re the woman from the alley,” he said, not even considering the possibility that he might be wrong.

  He wasn’t wrong.

  Even if he hadn’t seen her face, she left his body burning in a way nobody else ever had. It was her. His body knew it.

  She was still for a minute and then she nodded.

  Reality came crashing down on him and he jerked away as though burned. He’d bitten her.

  The healed wounds on his neck throbbed. The memory of the agonizing pain burned through him, a nasty, ugly reminder. “Fuck, what have I done?” he whispered, reaching up and touching the marks.

  Through the bite. Through the claws. It’s like a virus, I guess would be the best way to explain it. But the blood mutates. It doesn’t work on everybody, but those who don’t Change usually die. The redheaded woman had somberly explained that to him a few days earlier, when he woke up in a strange place, a bandage on his neck and his entire body burning with fever.

  The redhead—she’d been familiar. The schoolteacher.

  You’re crazy, he’d told her. But he knew otherwise. Already his body felt different. He was stronger. Quicker.

  His hand shook as he reached up and brushed her hair away, staring at the mark on her neck. A drop of blood beaded there.

  “Fuck.”

  She glanced at him from under the fringe of her lashes, but he was so obsessed with the mark on her neck, he didn’t notice. “Stop panicking, Levi. I can’t be affected by your bite.”

  He tensed. “How do you know my name…and what do you… You know.” He narrowed his eyes, stared at her, though she continued to hide behind all that hair. “You know.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “Why won’t you be affected? Is there some kind of vaccine or something?”

  She laughed, but it was a bitter sound, one heavy with anger. “No. There’s no vaccine. But I can’t be Changed.”

  “Changed.” He snorted. Man, that was such a tepid word for what was happening to him. He changed his shirt. He changed shoes, underwear, women. Hell, a jo
b, or a car. But to change from human to a monster? “Why not? How come I got stuck with this mess but you can’t be?”

  “Because I’ve already got my own mess that I’m stuck with.”

  That voice. Shit, that voice was familiar. Disturbingly so. Why?

  “Look at me,” he demanded.

  She pulled away, climbed out of the bed. He grabbed her arm, but she pulled away, fluid and easy, evading him.

  “What kind of mess do you have? Why don’t you have to worry about turning furry in a few weeks?”

  “Believe me, I’d take furry any day of the week.”

  With her back still to him, she bent over.

  His mind went blank and he felt himself staring at her ass. Without realizing his intention, he reached out and grabbed her, pulled her back against him. She cried out and slapped at his hands, but then, as he pressed against her, she whimpered.

  “I’m starving for you,” he whispered, pressing his lips to her shoulder. “I want to take you over and over. I want to lick every last inch of you and cover you with my scent. Shit, what’s going on with me?”

  She sank down on him, her swollen sex stretching around him, her voice weak and broken. “It’s just the Change. The wolf inside you. That’s why you want me.”

  “No.” He closed his eyes and gripped her hips, lifted her up, eased her down, over and over, falling into a slow, easy rhythm. He didn’t need to possess this time, didn’t have to devour. He just wanted. He just craved. And he wanted her to do the same. “I want you. I’m always going to want you. Why don’t you run from me? You know what I am.”

  “Yes…I know.” She reached up with her arms, up and back, linking her hands behind his neck and holding him close as they rocked against each other. “I know.”

  “Who are you?” He needed to know. Needed to see her.

  She hissed as he surged to his feet. It drove her weight down completely on him. He gritted his teeth and wrapped an arm around her middle, striding across the floor. She panted and rocked, her movements hampered by the fact that her feet were dangling several inches off the ground and she was still impaled on his cock.