Wolf Pack

by Bridget Essex

  There are no consequences to this right now, I realize. Right in this moment, right in this very moment, there's nothing but Kennedy and I, the quietness of the retreat center, the snow hitting the glass walls all around us, and the pine trees rising just beyond the glass walls, stately and still. There are just our two bodies, our two hearts pressed against one another.

  I want this. I want her. And she wants me. And, right now, right at this one, perfect moment...everything is right with the world.

  So we come together in this space, the two of us, with the light turned low overhead, with the two modern beds set up in the center of the room. I turn Kennedy, my hands guiding her hips, until her legs press back against the edge of the closest bed. Together we both fall onto the bed, Kennedy on her back, me on top of her, straddling her.

  We're both chuckling as we land, bouncing, on top of the mattress. But then I'm kissing her mouth again, capturing it with my own, lingering over her lips, her tongue, as I drink her in. I kiss her jaw now, tracing a pattern of kisses down her neck to her clavicle, trying a taste of her skin now, my tongue drawing a sweet, wet spiral over her right breast. Kennedy shudders beneath me, the laughter no longer coming from her mouth. Instead, she pants against me, arching up beneath me. I undo the button of her jeans, tugging down the zipper and then tugging the pair of pants off of her entirely, sliding the material over her legs, grabbing her socks with it.

  Wow. For a long moment I stare down at her, and then tentatively, cautiously, I begin to trace the muscles of her legs with the tips of my fingers. She watches me carefully from beneath hooded eyes, her elbows digging into the bed beneath her as she stares up at me, her breath coming out in long, sharp exhales.

  “God, you're...you're amazing,” I whisper to her, bending over her, bending my head down and capturing her mouth again. My hands trace her muscles, learning the sculpture of them as she smiles against my mouth, wrapping her arms around my neck and bringing me down until I'm lying fully on top of her, embracing her with my entire body as she wraps her legs around my hips, as her center presses against me.

  “So are you,” she whispers to me, then, her lips against my neck as I crouch above her, as I stare down at her, into her, gazing into her eyes as my fingers learn every inch of her.

  I want to watch her as I touch her, want to watch her reactions as my fingers connect with the very center of her. So I do. I trace my fingertips down the front of her belly, over her hips and between her thighs, underneath the fabric of her panties, smoothing my fingers against her center. She closes her eyes, gasping out, arching beneath me as I stroke slowly, gently, tantalizingly, her wetness.

  Out of her mouth, again, comes a low, deep growl. It's so animalistic in its intensity that, for a heartbeat, I almost falter in my touch. But I don't. The depth of the growl makes my skin shiver with excitement, makes me press down harder against her center as I rise above her, kissing her again, my lips finding new paths to trace now, as I kiss a patterned spiral down the front of her body, teasing her right breast now, as I kiss around the nipple. I lick it gently—it's so firm in my mouth, against my tongue, as she growls beneath me, her hands in my hair now, pressing down insistently, encouraging me to kiss her harder. And I do. I kiss her nipple, teasing it between my teeth gently now, and then I bite down, not too hard, but hard enough, as her hips buck up to meet my hand, my hips. I grind down against her with my hips, my hips at her center, and she wraps her legs around me, pressing herself against me.

  We move together, finding the rhythm that we both need, that we're both desperate for, in these moments.

  “I need you,” she whispers to me, her eyes glittering in the dim light. She wraps her fingers around my wrist, pressing my hand down harder against her. Desire roars through me as I curl my fingers, bringing them into her as she shudders against me, as she arches her back, her mouth open in a perfect expression of need. I love that I'm making her feel like that, and as I press against her, into her, I learn what makes her moan, what makes her growl, what makes her move against me in perfect rhythm.

  When she shudders beneath me, a sort of primal satisfaction uncurls in my belly. As I listen to her sweet, deep groan of completion, as I feel her shiver in my arms, I feel a type of peace descend over me that I haven't felt in...well.

  A very long time.

  “God,” she whispers after a long moment, as I press a soft kiss to her mouth, to her temple, to her jaw. “God,” she whispers again, curling her fingers over my shoulders, drawing me up to kiss her again, meeting her mouth in all its delicious heat and need.

  “That felt so good,” she whispers to me, catching my eyes, then, her lips glistening, her cheeks flushed. “That felt so good,” she repeats, her mouth turning up at the corners as she runs a hand through her hair, sitting up on one elbow. She doesn't say anything else, only expertly rises, pushing my hips down against the bed, moving against me until I'm beneath her, she's on top, and her wicked smile is making a shudder of delight race through me.

  We don't sleep tonight. At least, not for hours yet. There is a rhythm to be learned, from both of us. There are curves to memorize with fingertips, with kisses. There is love to be made, and—for the space of hours—not a single thought to be had.

  I feel everything, in this space. I think of nothing.

  And it's wonderful.

  As we move together, I'd almost say it's perfect.

  ---

  When I wake up, I shiver, pulling the blankets up to my shoulders as I sit up, the bed creaking gently beneath me as I sit back on one hand, blinking the sleep from my eyes. Outside, the dark storm clouds have cleared, and the moon overhead is making the snow glitter like a landscape sprinkled with diamonds. The pine trees ascend toward the sky like thin sentinels, the mounds of snow glittering at their feet. And it's so beautiful, out of doors, that—for a brief moment—it takes my breath away.

  I shiver again as a soft, cold breeze brushes over the bare skin of my shoulders. For a moment, I'm confused where the chill could be coming from, but then I get my bearings and take in the corner of the room. All of the walls are glass, and—in the corner—there seems to be a doorway of glass to the outside.

  That door is open.

  I stare at the soft drift of snow that's scuttled into the room, and I realize I must be dreaming. I don't know why—maybe it's the quality of light overhead, the moonlight dazzling on the snow outside. But this feels very dream-like. I pat the bed beside me, and I'm disappointed when my hand touches nothing but cool blanket, sheet and mattress.

  Kennedy is gone.

  I get up, wrapping the blanket around myself, putting on my boots and nothing else. I wrap the blanket tightly about myself, and I move toward the open doorway. I step down into the snow on the first step, delighting in the sound of the crunch it makes beneath my boot. God, I missed that sound. You never hear that sound in Florida, that delicious crunch that marks the beginning of adventures in the mountains, adventures in the great outdoors with the glittering cold and jaw-dropping beauty that will take your breath away.

  Everything here is so misty and quiet. I love dreams like this, beautiful dreams that are full of wonder and quiet peace. I don't have too many of them anymore...

  The great thing about dreams? I don't remember any of my regrets in them. They're perfectly regret-free.

  I take a deep breath then shiver, staring down at my feet standing in the snow. Odd. It feels very real. Very cold. I wiggle my toes inside my boots.

  I look down at the snow drifting in through the open doorway, down the two steps outside of the door, and into the yard that sprawls in front of the tall pines, the yard filled with glittering, sparkling folds of snow.

  But the perfect snow is broken by jagged tracks descending from the steps down into the yard. I gaze down at the footprints, drawing the blanket even closer, and then...

  I stare.

  Because the normal, human footprints change. Five feet from the door, the human footprints become...


  Well.

  Honestly? They look like the prints of a wolf.

  I stare at them, my breath coming faster, my breath coming out into the air before me like smoke.

  I crouch down on the doorstep, wincing as the cold breeze smarts against the skin of my legs. I stare very carefully at the paw prints.

  They're very large. I've seen the prints of large dogs in the sand on the beaches...but these? These prints are far too big. They can't possibly be dog prints, but they look like dog prints...just utterly enormous ones.

  Like wolf prints.

  I stand up again, holding the blanket in tight, cold fingers as I stare at the prints angling away between the distant trees.

  Because this is a dream, I'm currently experiencing what only makes sense in a dream: I want to follow the tracks.

  They're human tracks, the footprints in the snow, but they change into wolf tracks. And I want to see where they're going. Who they came from.

  I have a feeling, a very odd feeling, that the paw prints are going to lead me to Kennedy. And, even in this dream, I'm drawn to her. I want to find her.

  So I follow the foot prints.

  I pull the blanket as close about me as I can, my breath spilling out like smoke into the air as I walk down the steps, the snow crunching beneath the soles of my boots. I walk alongside the paw prints, and my heart is so light, so happy, that even though the snow is deep, and even though it is very, very cold, and I'm only wearing boots and a blanket...I'm warm from the inside out.

  And even though it's a dream, I can remember Kennedy beneath me, over me. The way her lips curled into a seductive, secretive smile, the way she captured my mouth with hers, the way her skin felt beneath my fingertips. I shiver a little, though this time, not from the cold, as I think of her muscles moving beneath my hands, as I think of what she felt like against me, in me. I reach up, brush my fingers over my hot cheeks, glance down at the prints in the snow.

  There was something about her. Something that marked her as so different from anyone I've ever experienced before. She's not a one-night stand, I think to myself, following the prints.

  I don't want her to be a one-night stand.

  I'm beneath the trees now, and I pause, considering that fact. That I don't want to love her and leave her. That there was something about her that drew me to her, that—I'm fairly certain—that there was something about me that drew her in, too. I don't believe in signs or fate or any of that stuff...but then I never imagined that I would have come to a yoga retreat, either.

  I turn all of this over in my head gently as I walk beneath the trees now, the moonlight spilling down between the pine branches overhead.

  Even though it's night, the moonlight makes it bright as day...

  And it's because of the moonlight that I see her.

  She's standing ahead of me, between the trees.

  Kennedy.

  She's perfectly naked, and even though it's quite cold out, I feel the heat of want pass through me, making me shiver, making my breath come out in a long sigh as my eyes follow the contours and muscles of her back, down to her buttocks and her thighs. Her long, red hair is cascading over her back, curling over her shoulders, and she turns in profile now...

  But she doesn't see me.

  Kennedy lifts her nose to the sky, pursing her beautiful, full lips...and she howls.

  The hair on the back of my arms stands up as I watch her howl. She howls, I realize, feeling my heartbeat stir a little faster, exactly like a wolf might.

  She sounds, actually, very much like a wolf.

  And, as I watch her...she changes.

  She bends forward, at the waist, her back arching, her head ducking down towards her knees. In one, fluid motion, she presses her hands into the snow, and then, it's all a blur, all of her. I blink, and everything seems to have gone blurry. That's what it looks like.

  But it's only a heartbeat that there's a blurred woman in front of me. And then no one woman at all.

  A great, white wolf stands in front of me, now, between the trees. She's tall—her shoulders are about the same height as my hips—and, God, she's beautiful. She has the type of raw grace and beauty that takes your breath away. I've never seen anything, I realize, more wild than this gorgeous creature, standing in front of me.

  It's a dream, so it makes sense to me, in that moment, that Kennedy would be a wolf. It makes so much sense. What else could she have been, but part wolf? There was such a wildness to her, in the very short time I've known her, such a great sense of ease in the woods. This is who she is, and I know her, standing there, watching the white wolf lift up her nose, watching her throw back her massive, shaggy head...

  And the wolf howls.

  The howl is not a mournful one, not the sound I'm used to hearing when they play the track of a wolf's howl on a nature documentary or in a movie...no, this sound is different. There are mournful notes to the wolf song, yes. But there's so much more to it. There is a great, wild, feral joy in that long note, a type of music that stirs something primal in my bones. It makes me happy to hear that sound, a raw joy rushing through me, too.

  She's beautiful, that wolf, with her head thrown back, her massive white tail dragging in the snow behind her.

  But then the wolf stops in her howl, the note trailing away into silence. She brings her head forward, her green eyes, flecked with amber, glittering in the darkness.

  She watches as, in the darkness, shadows begin to move.

  I lift my head, now, gazing up at the mountain's slope through the tall pine trees. And, racing down the slope toward us, are streaking shadows, loping across the snow.

  More wolves.

  These wolves are not white. They're gray and brown and black and every mottled combination of those colors. They are all as tall, and they're all different...but none of them are like this great, white wolf. The white wolf, Kennedy, stands a little taller, a little straighter and more noble than the rest. Like an alpha, I realize.

  The wolves race down the mountain, and they begin to lope and play around Kennedy. Some play with her, too, racing up to her and licking her snout, shoving their shoulders in affection against her. I'm very familiar with how dogs communicate, and these wolves are communicating in a similar fashion...but a much wilder way.

  I watch the wolves play together, Kennedy standing among them. For a long while, they play together, and I am so captivated by their dance that I simply watch them. Then, one by one, they race back up the mountain again, howls lingering behind them, growls and yips filling the clearing.

  When all the wolves are gone, Kennedy turns. Her amber-green eyes take me in, her snout lifting.

  My breath catches in my throat as she takes one graceful step forward, pressing her enormous paw into the snow.

  Then, the wolf is bending forward. She's lengthening, somehow, her body seeming to grow, right in front of my eyes. And then it's Kennedy standing in front of me again, naked, beautiful, glorious Kennedy.

  “Trish,” she whispers, her brow furrowed. She says nothing else.

  For a long moment, we stare at one another. And then I breathe out the breath I didn't even know I was holding.

  “You're so beautiful,” I tell her, my voice catching. I step forward. I open the blanket, and I wrap it around the both of us, wrapping her in my arms, the blanket draped around our shoulders.

  She stays perfectly still while I hold her for the longest time. And then slowly, gently, she raises her hands, pressing her hot palms against the skin of my lower back. She brushes her full mouth against my forehead. She brings her kisses down my nose, covering my nose, my cheeks, my jaw, my chin, my neck.

  I melt against her, her warmth cradling me close.

  The moonlight washes us in silence, the ghost of the wolf howls traveling away into the mountains, swallowed by the snow.

  ---

  I had the best sleep of my entire life, but—even then—when I wake up, I'm sore from the bottoms of my feet to the knuckles of my hands.


  It was a very...physical evening. And I'm...really not used to that.

  I stretch overhead with a wide, cheesy smile, arching my back a little and feeling satisfied when I hear a few “clicks” from my spine as I stretch. I roll over a little, my arm drifting over Kennedy's waist, curling my fingers over the graceful curve of her left hip.

  Kennedy is asleep on her stomach, her massive, red curls cascading over her shoulders, the pillow, and my shoulder, too. I rise up on my elbow, and I lean forward a little, brushing my lips to her forehead.

  She cracks an eye open, and slowly, lazily, she begins to smile.

  “Good morning,” she tells me, arching a brow and rolling over onto her side, yawning into the back of her hand.

  I glance behind her, at the sky that's just beginning to lighten, and I brush my lips against her mouth this time.

  “Good morning,” I agree happily.

  God, it's been such a long time since it was truly a good morning.

  “So,” says Kennedy, drawing out the word and glancing at me now with a furrowed brow. “Um...” She bites her lip a little, rolling onto her back now. “About last night...” She trails off, waiting, I realize, for me to say something.

  “It was wonderful,” I tell her, breathing the word out and feeling, deep in my gut, exactly how wonderful it was. It was so wonderful, in fact, that I'm having a hard time keeping a straight face, swallowing down the stupid, happy smile that I keep wanting to have.

  Because, I realize, dread beginning to creep up my spine...I'm not exactly certain that Kennedy felt the same way.

  Because she's staring at me, right now, with a look that doesn't translate as happy. It translates, in fact, as very unhappy indeed. Her brow is furrowed, her full lips are downturned into a frown...

  This can't possibly be a good sign.

  “Um,” I say, because I'm not exactly certain what else to say.

  A long moment stretches between us before Kennedy lies back down on the bed, pillowing her head beneath her right arm. A smile is beginning to steal across her face. “That's it?” she tells me, wrinkling her nose.