by Lora Leigh
“Watch, Charity.” He had to fight for breath, fight to still the tremors that wanted to shake his body, the need for release that pounded through him. “Watch me take you.”
He slid home again. Not so slowly, but not so fast that she didn’t see, didn’t feel every inch of the cock taking her. He glanced up at her again, seeing the fascinated look on her face, the arousal tightening her features.
“Look at me, Charity,” he whispered. “Look, baby.”
She raised her eyes; they were wide, dazed, almost black pools of surrender as he pulled back then thrust easily inside her once again.
“Mark me,” he whispered, every muscle in his body tensing from need as he tightened his arms around her, pulling her closer. “Like I marked you, Charity. Mark me now.”
He thrust harder inside her as her lips touched his shoulders. He was close. So damned close he could feel the knot beginning to form, engorging, preparing for his release. His hips moved faster, thrusting his cock harder, deeper inside her as he felt the delicate scrape of her teeth, heard her whimper of nearing orgasm.
Her pussy rippled around him, contracted with deep hard pulls, milking at his flesh as though trying to suck the seed from his body.
“Now, damn you.” He couldn’t hold back, couldn’t wait. The swelling began, the pleasure tearing through him until he wondered if he would survive it.
Her teeth clamped down on the tight muscle. Not enough to break the skin as his canines had hers, but enough, just enough to release the primal urges tearing through him.
He gripped her hips, lowering her, laying over her, feeling her teeth bite down as he thrust into her harder, again, and again, until the swelling intensified, locking himself inside her as she erupted around him.
The heavy contractions of her orgasm timed perfectly with the first hard expulsion of his seed inside her gripping cunt. Aiden wanted to howl, and almost did as the pleasure overcame him, surging through his body, shooting up his spine and searing his brain with the rapture of it. He couldn’t stop. His hips jerked, her muscles tightened, and his seed spurted inside her again. It seemed never ending, the pleasure unlike anything he had known or imagined possible.
The engorged knot pulsed and beat as though it carried life itself. Caught in the vice of her spasming pussy as he collapsed over her, shuddering, his body jerking with each explosion of seed from his cock into her body. His breath sawed out of his chest as slowly, agonizingly, the pressure began to ease.
Sweat dripped from his body to hers. Her teeth loosened from his shoulder, her head falling back as she shuddered one last time.
“Mine,” he whispered, raising his head just enough to stare down at her, to spear her with the intent growing in his mind. “Mine, Charity. Always.”
She smiled, weak but filled with her own determination, her own stubbornness.
“Not yet,” she promised him softly. “And maybe, Aiden, not ever.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The sound was so soft at first that he was certain he was hearing wrong. There was a reason why the bathroom window was so damned small. So assassins couldn’t sneak in, and so Aiden had some small sense that he wasn’t totally closed in. That one concession made the necessity of bars on the windows and locks on the doors more tolerable. But even there the alarm system should have been in place.
His arms tightened around Charity, his hand going over her mouth to stifle any sound she would make as he pulled her quickly from the bed. Her body tensed but moved smoothly with him, as he pulled her to the floor while shoving his hand beneath the mattress for the automatic handgun he kept ready.
Grabbing Charity’s arm with the other hand he pulled her to the far side of the second entrance to the bedroom intending to get her into the living room.
He moved her carefully against the thick fireplace wall, sheltering her with his body and intending to rush her to the other side of the room when he first realized the true danger they were in.
“Coyotes,” she whispered. “I smell them.”
Surprise shocked his system. He had known the scent, knew well what he was dealing with, but he hadn’t expected her to smell the distinctive scent as well.
“They can smell me too, Aiden.” Her voice was only a thread of sound. “Leave me here and do what you have to. There’s no way you can hide my scent.”
“Shh.” Whoever it was had made it into the house. He had to give them credit for stealth.
He pulled her carefully away from the fireplace, pulling her across the living room and pushed her quickly behind the thick, oak bar stand between the living room and the kitchen before he moved silently back through the room.
The bastard was there for Charity, and he knew it. The scent of her heat was overwhelming, and would most likely block his own scent. He would need that edge to surprise the bastard and take him down. Aiden didn’t want the assassin dead. He wanted him talking.
He moved back to the far arch, crouching low and looking around the brick wall. There he was. Small, very small for a Coyote Breed and moving slowly for the bed. Aiming the pistol carefully, Aiden cleared his throat. Then all hell broke loose.
The windows in the kitchen and the living room shattered simultaneously as the whine of muffled shots began to hum through the room.
“Fuck!” Aiden began to fire toward the front window as he jerked one of the automatic rifles from the gun shelf beside him.
Charity. Fuck. She hadn’t made a sound and the bullets whizzing through the house were coming through the window directly behind the bar. He rolled across the floor, the automatic rifle returning fire as he fought to get back to the other room and pull her to safety. Son of a bitch. What happened to bulletproof windows?
As he neared the doorway, gunfire erupted from the arched opening into the bedroom. Cursing, feeling the heat of the bullets whining around him as he heard the compound sirens go off, he returned the fire as he scrambled behind the dubious protection of the end of the couch.
“Charity!” He screamed her name out as the house seemed to rock on its foundations.
He heard her scream his name as gunfire seemed to erupt everywhere. Smoke and dust filled the room, obscuring his vision, but not his senses as he heard the scuffle going on in the other room.
He was pinned down by the gunfire from the bedroom, firing back wildly as he fought to find any opening to throw himself into the kitchen.
“Fucking bitch.” The dark male curse sounded from Charity’s location. It sizzled in the air as Aiden threw himself from the protection of the couch, firing wildly into the bedroom and living room as he rushed to the kitchen.
A pain filled cry echoed from the direction of the bedroom doorway as he slid into the kitchen.
And then he saw it. The large male scuffling with Charity as another came through the shattered window. He aimed and fired seeing the flash of steel as it moved at Charity’s side.
An agonized scream echoed through the kitchen as Aiden moved to pull her from the clutches of her would-be assailant. She was moving fast, ducking then disappearing as he fired at the injured man.
She was too fucking fast. Like a whirlwind moving about the room as the shadowed figured began to twist within the dim, dust filled confines of the rooms. Such quick reaction and steady coordination could have only come from years of training. Who or what had trained her?
“Bastards,” she screamed as he saw her rise, a gun in her hand, firing behind him. The grunt of pain he heard as he ducked and rushed for her assured him she had hit whatever she was firing at.
He pulled her quickly to him, then behind him as he watched the window, training the gun at the now empty hole.
“Damn it, I don’t need a shield Aiden,” she cursed as he backed her against the counter.
The howling of the wolves, the gunfire outside, and the sudden silence through the cabin assured him the danger had moved and the Enforcers had made record time getting to the cabin. Unfortunately, the cabin appeared a little worse for wear.<
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“Aiden.” The door burst open as Stygian’s rough voice called out his name.
Lights speared into the room as he slowly relaxed his guard and stood up carefully among the shattered glass that littered the floor.
“Stygian, get a blanket for Charity and my pants and shoes from the bedroom. The room is filled with glass.” His feet already smarted from the nicks and cuts inflicted on them.
As Stygian rushed for the other room, battery powered lights lit up the cabin as it slowly filled with Enforcers.
“This one’s still breathing,” Styx called out as he found the Coyote Charity had shot. The sudden sound of a gunshot assured Aiden the Coyote wasn’t breathing any longer.
Aiden grimaced. He had hoped to keep at least one of them alive.
Behind him, Charity held to him weakly, her head lying against his back, her breathing rough.
“You okay?” he questioned her over his shoulder.
“Alive,” she bit out.
Aiden grunted. “Beats dead any day of the week, huh?”
She chuckled weakly as he felt her shake her head slowly against his back.
“Blanket.” Stygian rushed back into the room. He threw the blanket to Aiden, though he carried the jeans and sneakers Aiden would need.
Catching the covering, he turned and wrapped Charity in it quickly. She was pale, her eyes wide and dark, but she appeared relatively unharmed.
“Let me get dressed and I’ll get you on the couch.” He turned and grabbed his jeans and shoes from Stygian and quickly donned them.
Making certain the blanket was tucked around her, he picked Charity up and moved swiftly to the couch. First things first. He had to check her out, make certain she was okay, then he would find out just how the hell the Council’s mongrels had made it past the perimeter alarms, Enforcers and Wolves. He knew what they were after, now he had to figure out how to stop them. And figure out why the hell there had been no sign of them in town.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“You underestimated your enemy,” she muttered as he sat her on the couch in another cabin and straightened away from her. “Coyotes aren’t stupid, Aiden. Soulless, but not stupid. The very fact that you aren’t being watched should alarm you.”
He grunted, which did little to assure her he had taken the point.
“Where did you get your training?” he asked her then, ignoring her warning.
“Does it matter?” she bit out, chafing under his possessive attitude.
He stared down at her, his eyes flat and hard. “Do you want to answer me?”
“Army,” she finally answered him bitterly. “That’s where I received my scientific training as well. My foster parents were Army. Killed during a terrorist strike while they were overseas.”
Her upbringing as well as her training had been unorthodox. Her foster parents had been part of a unique group of scientists working in the Biological Warfare Studies group designed, supposedly, to find cures for some of the unique viral contagions that had cropped up at the time.
But he knew all this. Aiden wasn’t a stupid man, she thought. He would know all there was to know about her past. His next words confirmed that.
“They were good people. There was no mention of your training, though.”
She sighed wearily.
“They won’t stop trying to take me, Aiden. You know that,” she warned him again, unwilling to allow him to change the subject.
Dawn was peeking over the mountains outside and the entire compound was on alert. Enforcers were pacing nervously along the walls and calls had gone out to pull more in.
She stared up at him, seeing the savage determination in his expression, the stubbornness in his gray eyes. He was refusing to accept the danger she represented to the community Wolfe had slowly fought to make safe for their people
“Think about it, Aiden,” she told him firmly, aware of the half dozen Breeds, including Wolfe, who listened behind him. “The drugs were specifically designed to force ovulation and compatibility with your sperm. When their tests revealed the added Breed component in my blood, they checked their own records and matched it with you. They had samples of your sperm. They designed a drug that would enhance and would speed up the process my body had started…”
“Because we are mated,” he bit out triumphantly, as though the ongoing argument over the mating was behind her words.
Charity rolled her eyes as she pushed her fingers through her hair in frustration. Was he never going to give up? He was the most stubborn person she had ever laid eyes on.
“Listen to you. You did not mate me, Aiden. You marked me somehow. The drugs mated me, not you.”
His eyes flashed like a mercurial storm, the color twisting and surging within itself.
“Drugs created from my sperm. From my individual DNA,” he bit out arrogantly as though the fact that it was he she had mated with made him somehow superior to anyone else she may have been tested for.
And still, he missed the point. The danger she was bringing to the compound was her concern, not the damned mating, drug related or not.
“Goddammit, this isn’t about the fucking mating!” she yelled as she came to her feet, clutching the blanket tightly around her naked body as she faced him furiously. “Don’t you hear what I’m saying, Aiden? I’m a danger to everyone here. To everything Wolfe is attempting to build. You have to let me leave.”
Incredulity filled his expression. “And go where?” He spread his hands wide. “Where else would you be even reasonably safe, Charity?”
She would never be safe, and she knew it. But she wouldn’t hide behind the very people she had fought so many years to protect, either.
“And if they launch an all out assault?” she asked him loudly. “What the hell will you do then? They know you’ve fucked me…”
“I mated you,” he yelled back, his voice dark, wickedly sensual with its angry growl.
“They know conception is possible, Aiden…”
“By God, if you haven’t conceived yet it’s not from lack of trying,” he growled.
If she hadn’t needed to keep the blanket on her to preserve her modesty she would have pulled her hair in frustration.
“Are you trying to make me crazy?” she snarled. “Stop changing the subject.”
“There is no subject under discussion,” he informed her arrogantly. “You are my mate, and therefore part of the pack. You are safest here. When you are no longer so weak, you will realize this.”
She gaped at him for a moment in amazement.
“Get over the mating stuff, Aiden. They won’t stop. How many of your people will die before you hate me for it?” she screamed back at him. “Look at me, Aiden. I won’t allow it…”
“My mate. My decision.” He crossed his arms over his chest stubbornly.
“Drugs do not make a mate.” She wondered what it took to convince him of this. “Do you understand me, Aiden? Not. Your. Mate.”
“My mate. My woman,” he growled. “My child.”
The last word shocked her into silence, but only for a moment. “There is no child.”
“Yet.” Satisfaction glittered in his eyes.
“Ever.”
His brow arched slowly. “Do you think you can deny me, Charity?” he drawled sensually. “Already your body is hot, aroused. Any man in this room can scent your need.”
Her eyes widened as she swallowed tightly then turned and looked at the interested men watching the exchange with no small amount of amusement. She felt her face flush in embarrassment as her gaze went to Wolfe questioningly.
“You can?” she asked, humiliation crawling through her body as she faced the men.
Wolfe sighed deeply as he flashed Aiden a disgruntled look. “Charity, it is no different for Hope or Faith. The need is natural. And the scent is very elusive, though very pleasant. There is no reason to feel shame.”
“Why should you feel shame?” Aiden questioned almost angrily. “Does it shame you to be my ma
te?”
She was going to cry. Charity could feel the tears rising behind her eyes, the fear blooming in her chest. The need to do so made her furious. Damn him, damn him to hell for making her cry.
“Moron.” Her fist connected with his chest, bringing no more than a frown of confusion to his face and an ache to her fingers. “Are all male Breeds so damned stupid?”
Surprise marked Aiden’s face. “Charity, perhaps you need to rest,” he sighed. “You’re no longer making sense.”
“Because you’re crazy,” she accused him furiously. “Insane. Completely without a clue.”
She gave up. A strangled growl of fury vibrated in her throat, giving any breed alive competition in primal response as she stomped around him and headed for what was obviously the bedroom. The open door showed the inviting, turned downed blankets, but the fireplace between the two rooms was a dead giveaway. Thankfully, this one had a door. She slammed it hard.
* * * * *
Aiden grinned slowly as the door closed, cutting off his view of Charity and the furious twitch of her hips as she had stomped away from him. He turned back to his Pack Leader and arched a brow knowingly.
Wolfe chuckled, though he was careful to keep the sound low until they heard the bathroom door as well. Moving cautiously to the empty fireplace, Aiden checked to be certain she had gone into the other room.
“Has she conceived?” Wolfe asked. “Her scent has changed, Aiden.”
Aiden shook his head. “Armani is testing the samples now. We should know soon. If she hasn’t, then she is in full ovulation. Those Coyotes were too damned determined to take her, Wolfe. I tried to keep her within the cabin at all times. And the windows of the SUV were down for only a few moments while we were out. I have no idea how they knew when to strike.”
“The scientists would have some idea of the time table involved in this,” Wolfe sighed tiredly. “It would be that simple. She’s in grave danger, though, as your child will be if she does conceive. Those Coyotes got in too damned easy. We’ll have to increase our security both inside and outside the compound.”
