by Michelle Fox
The way he took her was rough and without pretense. There were no gentle caresses now, but fingers digging into her skin with bruising force, his thighs forcing hers further and further forward as he plunged deeper and deeper inside her.
It still wasn’t enough. Audrey wanted more. She thrust her hips up to meet him, pounding him right back, giving as good as she got. They bucked against each other like carnal beasts. Her good hand scratched a trail down his back and he howled as she felt wet blood slick her fingers. She’d broken his skin.
Tao dropped her legs so he could lean over her. He kissed her, his mouth hungry and demanding on hers. Then he began biting her neck, first tiny little bites that were weaker than a mosquito’s bite. As he moved to her shoulder, he used more force. Audrey gasped as pain and pleasure collided in her nervous system.
She pushed against him, suddenly scared. “Tao?”
He was either ignoring her or beyond hearing as his teeth sank into her deeper than before.
She swatted his shoulder, irritated now. “Tao!”
He bit her harder and pinned her hands over her head. Then he lifted his head and said, “I have to bite you, baby. Be strong. It’ll feel good if you let it.” His words were thick and almost slurred. She realized why when she caught sight of his teeth. His canines had grown longer and sharper. He had the face and body of a man, but the teeth of a wolf.
Oh my God.
He ground his pubic bone into her, distracting her with a well-timed assault on her core. Her body convulsed and pleasure once again became the dominant sensation relayed by her nerves. “Come for me, baby.”
It felt like his words sank into her flesh and zapped through her body. A strange, electric sensation, but not unpleasant. In fact, she rather liked it,
Tao circled his pelvis again. “Come for me baby, let me hear you scream.”
I’m going to come, she realized as her body obediently launched itself to the precipice of another climax. Holy shit. All he has to do is say the word and I’m a goner.
“Now, baby,” he said almost roaring. His voice vibrated through her the same way a freight train shakes the ground.
Her back bowed and his fangs clamped down again on the soft flesh around her collar bone. She jerked as the pain registered and then screamed as it blended seamlessly with the pleasure of her orgasm. She was coming, hooked on his fangs.
Tao came with her, his muscles contracting, his arms taut and his shaft pistoning in and out of her. He bit her again on the other side and she shuddered with pleasure as his fangs slid through her skin.
That’s gonna leave a mark, she thought. But then, hadn’t that been the whole point? To replace Nick’s bite with Tao’s?
***
They lay side-by-side on the bed afterward, completely spent. Tao tucked Audrey under his shoulder, pulling her body alongside him as if he didn’t want to lose contact. After a while, he roused himself and went to the bathroom to retrieve a wet washcloth. He gingerly pressed the nubby terrycloth against the bites on her collar bone.
“There’s more blood than I expected,” he said, frowning. “I’m sorry.”
She grabbed his hand and held it in place over one of the bites. “Don’t be. I wanted it. You wanted it. No regrets.”
“You were in pain.”
“Not for very long. You made it right, just like you promised.” She pulled him back beside her and tossed the washcloth to the floor. “Thank you.”
He wrapped an arm around her, “Really?”
“Yeah, really. That was amazing even if it had some werewolf weirdness.” She snuggled into him. “And I’m glad it was you.” She left the ‘and not your brother’ unsaid, but the thought lingered in the air, unspoken.
“I just wish the circumstances were different.” He kissed the top of her head.
“Me too.” What would it be like to date Tao? To be brought together by mutual attraction instead of mutual need? Would he have even slept with her under different circumstances? Maybe, she reasoned. After all, his last girlfriend had been a big girl. The real question was, did they have a future or was this just a one hell of a one-night stand?
Audrey caressed his shoulder, spinning little circles with her fingers. “Can I ask you something?” At his grunt of assent, she said, “What happened with that other girl?”
Tao frowned. “I told you. She ditched me for another guy.”
“But why?” She looked deep into his blue eyes. How could anyone have ever walked away from Tao? He was sweet and sexy as hell, a combination no woman took for granted.
He shifted on the bed and wouldn’t meet her eyes. “In the end, I wasn’t what she wanted. I was just a walk on the wild side for her. I didn’t mean anything.”
At the bitterness in his voice, Audrey snuggled up close to Tao, wrapping her arms around him and squeezing. “I’m sorry.” She paused for a second and then asked, “What do you mean by walk on the wild side? She wasn’t a werewolf?”
He heaved a sigh. “No, she was a wolf. The thing is Audrey, I’m not a normal werewolf.”
She bit back a giggle, not wanting to be rude. Was there any such thing as a normal werewolf? Considering their very existence went against the grain of nature, she doubted it. But she kept her opinions to herself, wanting to give Tao the freedom to speak his mind.
“See, most werewolves are born like every other baby. We start out as human and don’t change until puberty.”
Audrey’s ears perked up and she started mentally rummaging through everything she knew about canine physiology. Nothing Tao said correlated with her Master’s Degree in Biology. Probably because actually shifting form at puberty wasn’t a common phenomena. The closest comparison she could come up with was a caterpillar changing into a butterfly. “Okay. So adolescence really brings out the beast in you werewolves.”
He pulled away from her and sat up, clasping his hands in front of him. Audrey sat up too, worried by the grimness of his expression.
“You could say that, but see, me and my brothers, we’re different.”
“How?”
“We were born as wolves. Wolf-born they call us.”
“So you’re not just bigger than other werewolves,” she said slowly.
He nodded. “We were born backwards.”
“What does that mean?” She blinked as she figured it out. “You became human for the first time at puberty, is that it?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh.” Audrey sat back, trying to picture what it would be like to be born an animal and then suddenly turn into a human just as your hormones spun out of control in the throes of adolescence. Wow. That must have been pretty awful.
He ran a hand through his hair and sighed again. “There’s more.”
“Okay, so tell me.” She moved to sit in front of him on the bed and took one of his hands in her good one. When he remained silent, she gave him a little shake. “I can take it, Tao.”
He bowed his head, still uneasy about meeting her gaze. “We have powers that normal werewolves don’t.”
That made her eyebrows go up. Powers? Okay. “What does that even mean?”
“Did you ever think about what makes werewolves possible?” He pulled a hand away and gestured to his body. “I’m not science. I’m magic. More magic than the other werewolves in the world.”
“So you’re like a super wolf?”
He shrugged. “Kind of. We each have our own abilities. Mine is supposed to be strength.”
“And Nick’s is the bite?”
“Yeah.”
“What about your other brothers?”
Tao pursed his lips. “Kai, he’s easy, he’s a wolf shaman.”
Audrey furrowed her brow. “Like a medicine man?”
“Sort of. He has real power. Like a wizard.”
“Are you saying there are wizards too?” She felt a brief flutter of panic in her chest at the idea that the craziness she’d seen so far didn’t start and end with werewolves. What else was hiding out there? H
ow had all this magic gone unnoticed? She loved to read urban fantasy and paranormal romance, were those books fact or fiction? She was starting to think they might be more real than she ever imagined. Maybe those authors were all secretly the werewolves and vampires they wrote about.
That’s insane.
Yet, now I know it’s also possible.
Audrey gulped as her mind boggled.
“Maybe. We don’t really track anyone else, but werewolves have spiritual and magical leaders.”
“Okay, so that’s Kai the werewolf wizard. What about your other brother?”
Tao waved a hand.“No one notices Leo. He’s a hider. Someone who can be lost in plain sight.”
“Well that could come in handy I guess.” For all sorts of illegal activities, but she didn’t say that last part.
“He doesn’t really seem to care one way or the other. Mostly he just keeps to himself.”
“How many other wolf-born werewolves are out there?” Was there someone else who could bite like Nick? The thought made her shudder.
Tao looked at her then, his eyes a deep, solemn blue. “None. It’s just us.” He gestured to himself.
“What do the other wolves think of all this?” She found all this fascinating, particularly from an evolutionary point-of-view. He was talking about species differentiation within an established pack, where some members are strong, bigger, faster than their peers.
“They were afraid of us and many still are. We were born backwards and we have powers no one else does.” He snorted. “They wanted to kill us when we were born.”
“Oh my goodness,” Audrey’s eyes went wide. She knew that animals born markedly different were usually killed. Genetic mutations and evolution probably appeared equally aberrant at birth. “What happened?”
“The pack’s shaman said we were pieces of the Great Wolf’s spirit brought to life. She told the pack if they harmed us, they would all die.”
“And they believed her?” It all sounded pretty woo-woo to Audrey.
“She was …” He trailed off, looking for the right word. Finally he said, “Formidable. I remember her, she could look through your skin and see your soul. She was the one who told mom what we were.”
“So she stood between you and the pack?”
Tao nodded. “For a time. She died when I was about five. Our mother protected us after that, fighting or chasing off any members of the pack that tried to mess with us. Once we started shifting, the pack slowly came to accept us.”
“Your mom sounds like a strong woman.” Audrey tried to picture herself in his mother’s shoes, taking on a whole pack of werewolves and failed.
Tao gave a small smile. “Yeah, she was pretty awesome.”
“Was?” Audrey narrowed her eyes at the big man, picking up on a note of sadness in his voice.
“She died last year.”
“I’m sorry.” She laid her good hand on his arm.
“That’s when everything got really bad. Nick lost it.” Tao’s lips thinned in a grim line. “He became aggressive. He bit someone and brought them onto pack land. It was a bad scene.”
“And now he’s here, still biting people.”
“Yeah.” Tao pulled away from her, avoiding her touch.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
She reached for him again, relieved when he let her hand rest on his knee. “I know, but I can see how painful this is for you and I wish I could make it better.”
He covered her hand with his. “Meeting you has been a definite positive.”
She flushed. “Really?”
“Yeah, really.” He cupped her face in his hand, his thumb caressing her cheek.
“I’m glad we met too,” she said softly. Turning her head, she kissed his palm.
Tao leaned in then, threading his arms under hers to lift her on top of him as he laid down. They rested against each other. Audrey closed her eyes, lulled by the steady thump-thump of Tao’s heart. The moment felt perfect. They had their challenges ahead of them, but just then, nothing mattered except holding each other close. Before she knew it, she drifted asleep, her dreams running with wolves.
Chapter Fourteen
Audrey woke up the next morning feeling languorous. Her body hummed with satisfaction. Tao slumbered beside her and she studied him. I can’t believe last night happened.
She traced the curve of his shoulder with a finger, causing the big man to wake with a start. When he saw her, a slow, lazy smile spread across his lips. “Hey, gorgeous.” He reached up and touched her shoulder, mirroring her caress.
“Morning,” she said. “Sorry to wake you.”
“That’s okay. If you’re up, I want to be up.” He took her good hand and kissed it.
“Are you hungry?”
His stomach growled. Loudly. With a laugh, Tao said, “Apparently.”
“I’ll go make breakfast. How do pancakes sound?”
“Amazing.”
She started to leave the bed, but he pulled her back. “First, I need a snack.”
Audrey giggled as he nuzzled her shoulder, then her neck and worked his way up to her mouth. Seizing her lips with his, he kissed her until goose bumps tweaked her skin and made her nipples taut.
“Tao,” she moaned, the sound of his name slightly garbled since they were still kissing.
“Hmm,” he murmured against her lips.
She broke their kiss. “You won’t get breakfast this way.”
“Breakfast can wait,” he said, his voice rough with desire. “Right now, I need to be inside you.” He yanked the sheet off and revealed his body. His shaft stood at attention, hard and throbbing.
Audrey kissed her way down his chest, relishing the way his hard muscles quivered at her touch. When she reached his cock, she kissed the head. She opened her mouth wide and, locking eyes with Tao, she swirled her tongue over the top of his shaft.
“So you’re not hungry?” She tickled him again with her tongue. “You sure you don’t want to eat? I could go into the kitchen right now and whip up a fluffy batch of pancakes.” She punctuated her words with little flicks of her tongue.
Tao moaned. “You’re all talk.” His hips bounced gently. “Suck me, baby. Show me what else you can do with those lovely lips.”
A tingle went through her at the command in his voice. He was so dominant in bed and she loved it. Tao knew exactly what he wanted. More importantly, he knew what to do with a woman’s body. He’d made her scream the night before. A lot. No man had ever done that.
Audrey obliged, finally swallowing his shaft with her warm, wet mouth. His cock swelled as she sucked, circling her tongue around and around.
Eventually, he pulled away. When she frowned at him, he held up a hand and said, “I want to be buried in you when I come.” He patted the bed, motioning for her to lie down.
The second her head hit the pillow, he was shoving her legs wide open and centering his cock at the entrance to her wet passage. There was nothing gentle about his movements. His hands were hard on her skin, fingers digging into her hips as he grabbed her like she belonged to him. He was claiming her like a caveman or, more accurately, like a dominant werewolf.
When his cock finally thrust into her, Audrey whimpered. It felt so good to be filled up by Tao. She couldn’t tell where he ended and she began.
“You’re perfect, baby,” he panted. He leaned down and teased one of her nipples with his tongue.
Despite the pleasure overloading her system, she arched an eyebrow. “Perfect?”
He nipped her breast in response. Then he said, “Yes, perfect. Exactly what I want, what I need.”
The bite registered as intense pleasure instead of pain and Audrey found herself winding her hand in his thick hair and holding him in place. She wanted more bite, she realized. The harder, the better. Scooping up her other breast with her good hand, she offered it to him. “Make me feel perfect, Tao.”
“You want it rough?”
She nodded and he gave a...well, wolfish grin was the only way she could describe it. Then he was on her breast, teeth scraping the nipple. He seemed to sense where the line was between too much and not enough. No matter how he tugged or used the edges of his teeth on her tender nipples, it never crossed the line into actual pain.
She thrashed back and forth as pleasure assaulted her from all sides. Her breasts throbbed, heavy with desire. Her core fluttered, wrapping itself around Tao’s hard length.
Suddenly Tao slowed down. Audrey mewled.
“Too slow for you, baby?” His gaze met hers, his blue eyes dark with passion.
“Faster,” she urged. She reached for his hip, intent on pulling him deeper inside her, but he caught the wrist of her good hand and quickly pinned it over her head. With careful gentleness, he captured her injured hand as well.
“Tao,” Audrey whined. She could feel the pleasure fading to an ache instead of racing toward an orgasm. “Don’t tease me, it’s cruel.”
He laughed, a rich deep sound. “Teasing makes it better.” Tao leaned down and kissed her roughly for a moment. Then he whispered in her ear, the heat of his voice making her shiver. “Teasing makes you scream.”
“Please, Tao.” Audrey wiggled her hips, hoping to shake Tao’s control.
“You’re so sexy when you beg.” He thrust into her and then pulled out, circling her wet cleft with the tip of his cock, but not plunging inside.
Audrey lost any lingering shred of dignity. She begged, pleaded and even threw in a threat or two. The threats made Tao laugh and he rewarded a few of her more strident pleas with a succession of rapid strokes. Those would get her all worked up and then he’d stop again. She twisted her body, straining to free her hands, which he kept firmly above her head with one large hand. Fearing for her wounded hand, she didn’t struggle too hard, which was doubly frustrating.
“Take me, Tao.” She writhed under him.
“I am taking you, baby. At my own speed.”
She huffed and a low growl emanated from deep in her chest. Her eyes widened at the unexpected sound, but Tao nodded in approval.
