Harem of Souls

by Emma Dawn

  I frowned. “Did he know about Gavin?”

  “Gavin, he fears. For if Gavin stays, he, too, could defy Vincent. Your power comes from your father and your mother, Rose. Vincent sent the grawks to kill you, and Gavin has been trying to take over your challenge to steal your way home. You have more than proven yourself worthy of returning to the land of the living. You did that much when you tried to save Kessler.”

  Her words were all truth, and it cut into me. The thing for me was that there was really no choice. I could have all five of my men with me if I stayed and fought for them? Damn straight, I was taking five over one, no matter how sexy of a beast Ivan was.

  “You’ve already decided, haven’t you?” She smiled.

  “Yeah, I have,” I said. “Wait . . .” she’d begun to fade and stopped when I called after her. “Wait, what about my sister?”

  “Dominque is safe. She is with her men. But if you do not stop Vincent, then Gavin will find a way back to the land of the living. You can protect this world and your sister’s by staying here.”

  Her words didn’t really sink in, not then. Not until later. “Thank you for your help,” I said.

  She bowed her head. “Thank you for being brave, Rose. A Rose in this world of thorns.”

  The Chalice faded and I was back in my body.

  I blinked. Stared at the wall of dirt across from me. A light filled the room, soft and diffused. Ivan breathed evenly against my back, his body warming mine better than any hot water bottle. I smiled, but it was a smile tinged with tears. I didn’t want to lose him. I didn’t want to see him die.

  Yet that was what the Chalice was saying. I had to face Vincent alone. Reality was, the only way Ivan would let me go was if he was hurt or dead.

  I rolled in his arms and he mumbled something in his sleep. I kissed the underside of his jaw, the stubble of his beard coming in raspy against my lips. “Ivan.”

  “Hmm.”

  “You don’t need to sleep.”

  I looked up in time to see his eyes open. “No,” he said. “But you did. Whatever you did to make this place drained you until you were nearly dead.”

  There was a moment where my vision blurred and I saw my body in a place I didn’t know. Dominique was there, holding my hand and the look on her face was plain as day. Something was wrong.

  I pushed the vision away. I had a job to do.

  But first . . .I had a wolf to love.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Me, Myself and Ivan

  I stirred and sat up in the bed, my hair touching the ceiling of roots and grass above me. I put my hands over my face and struggled to breath normally.

  “What’s wrong?” Ivan’s touch was gentle on my back. “You looked like you were about to cry.”

  “I just thought I saw something.” I made myself smile at him even though my lips were trembling. He frowned.

  “Not very convincing, Rose.”

  I turned fully toward him, very aware of the bare state of my body. I lifted a hand and brushed it under his chin, letting my fingers trail there along the stubble. “A very smart man once said we should live for the moment, and hang onto it. That we might not know when our time was up,” I said.

  He snorted. “Sounds like Mars.”

  I found a grin that didn’t shake on my lips suddenly. “It was. And I believe him, Ivan. I don’t want to miss my chance with you. I missed my chance with Liam and Kessler, but I think I’ll be able to rectify that if I’m brave enough.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m going to face the person who has made this world the ugly place it is. The one who controls the Chalice. But before I do that. I want . . .I want you. If you’ll have me.”

  He blinked a few times in what could only be called shock. “You still want me?”

  I laughed at that but reined the noise in, on the off chance the wolves had found our little den. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  “I’ve been less than pleasant. I’ve fought with you all the way here.” He grumbled and shook his head.

  “And you were dealing with a rather stressful situation. And I was accusing you of casting me aside. You thought I was like all the others. Now you know I’m the special flower, right?”

  His chest shook with silent mirth and his eyes no longer looked icy gray, but softer somehow. “Damn it, don’t make me laugh. Not now, not here.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we lost them all,” he said and his smile slid from his face. “It wasn’t just you, Rose. It was me too. I lost them. I was the leader of the pack. I should have been more prepared.”

  I had my suspicions about just why these things were happening the way they were, but I didn’t want to ruin the moment. I lifted my other hand and set it against his neck, right in the crook where it connected to his shoulder. “Ivan, from the moment I saw you, I knew I wanted you. And you’ve been steadfast in this journey, leading the way. You almost died right at the beginning with the grawks.” I shook my head. “I don’t understand still why you all would do this. What you get out of it.”

  His eyes dipped to my mouth and then back up. “I think I’m about to get exactly what I wanted out of it. You called to me from the beginning. I didn’t like it, didn’t like feeling that I had no choice. It’s why . . .”

  “Why you fought me.” I leaned toward him and he met me partway, our mouths crushing against one another. His tongue slid down the side of mine in a wet caress that he repeated on the other side and then back again. I pushed into him harder, my body wanting his touch. My heart wanting all of him.

  I’d given up on saying I didn’t love these men who had been so weirdly shoved into my life. I was here, they were here, and I had feelings for them all that couldn’t be categorized any other way but love. Love intense enough that I was sure if it was asked of me, I would lay down my life for them. I mean, assuming I wasn’t already dead.

  I smiled around the kiss and Ivan smiled back, but no words passed between us. They didn’t have to. We were together in that moment and that was all that mattered. His hands skimmed along my bare skin, raising it in anticipation of what he would do next. Of where he would touch me, taste me, or . . .he grabbed my hips, his fingers digging into the flesh almost to the point of pain but I liked it. The intensity of it made me groan and writhe as he moved me, adjusting me so my body was flush with his. With little head room, we weren’t going to be doing any wild cowboy style, or even the doggy style I’d thought for sure he’d go for.

  No, Ivan was more interested in rubbing his face along my chest, licking my skin, pulling the softer flesh into his mouth and sucking on it.

  Marking me as his. That thought coursed through me and I groaned, rolling to my back to give him better access. I wanted everything he was, everything he could give me.

  His hands swept in two different directions. One to my aching pussy, and the other up to my breasts. The dual direction of his touch set me on my heels as I tried to lift my body in two directions at once. Every touch of his set my mind on fire, dissolving any thoughts of danger or of what was to come.

  A very small part of my mind said that was a bad thing, that I needed to be ready for the challenge I had yet to face. But I shushed that part. I let my hands trace Ivan’s broad shoulders and back, following the lines of his body to his trim waist and narrow hips, then on to the curve of his tight ass. I dug my fingers into the softer flesh as he dipped a single finger into my hot, wet core. I couldn’t help the tensing of my inner muscles as if I would grab him and hold him there forever.

  His hand and mouth found my breast and he worked the nipples into tight, aching nubs.

  “Ivan.” I whispered his name and that alone sent a shiver through me. His touch was waking something in me, something I wasn’t sure I fully understood. Each stroke of his finger, each lick of his tongue, each kiss pressed to my mouth, brought that hidden part of me closer to the surface—something I hadn’t even known was there. And it made me immobile.
I wanted to move with him. I wanted to fuck him hard and imprint myself on him. But this thing inside me his touch was waking was shy . . .and I didn’t want to scare it away.

  My whole body shook as I pushed toward him, as whatever was inside me began to surge forward on the waves of pleasure that had begun to spiral through me. I pulled Ivan up by his hair, bringing his mouth to mine. I kissed him hard as I scrabbled to get him inside me.

  Frantic, I pulled at him until he pressed his cock to my center. There were no words, just this world of pleasure and the soft sounds that escaped our mouths. I wrapped my legs around his hips and tugged him into me, the pressure of his cock filling me.

  I couldn’t stop the little cry that escaped my mouth, but he caught it, swallowed it down and growled back at me. That growl shivered through my spine, touching places I didn’t think was possible in terms of heightening pleasure. Each thrust of his hips was matched by a growl that tugged at my innards. He slipped a hand between us and found my clit, soaked from my own desire.

  “Yes.” I groaned the word, the first truly coherent word I’d been able to find in how long? I’d said his name but that felt like hours ago. Our world seemed to have stopped as we found each other.

  His thumb pressed against my clit, rubbing it hard, demanding my body pay attention to him and what he was doing. I wanted to scream his name as the waves of sheer desire and lust rolled through me, growing with each pass, spreading through my limbs. His mouth touched down on a nipple he tugged at with his teeth, hard. That knife edge I’d been hovering on disappeared and I fell into the orgasm, tumbling through it as it swept up and over me.

  He didn’t let me go, didn’t ease off. Ivan kept up his pace, kept rolling my swollen and aching clit.

  “Enough,” I whispered.

  “Are you sure?” he whispered back.

  I blinked up at him. Trusting him. “Again?”

  He gave me a devilish smile. “Again.”

  Oh God.

  He carefully rolled me so my back was to him and he slid his cock between my cheeks to reach my pussy. His hands wrapped around me so they were on my breasts, massaging and rubbing them gently.

  “Work your clit,” he commanded.

  The way he spoke sent a shiver of need through me as fast and hard and I dropped my hand to the folds between my legs, finding my clit with ease. I worked it in a slow circle as Ivan kissed my neck, as his cock throbbed between my legs, hot and engorged.

  I threw my top leg back, opening myself more to him. He groaned and slid deeper into me, the tip of his cock almost touching my womb. There. There that deep inside me I felt the shifting of whatever I had noticed at the beginning. That part of me I saw now was wolf. That small aspect of my blood that allowed me to connect with Ivan. I rolled my head forward. Panting. Needing all of him.

  I worked my clit between two fingers, rolling and tugging it in the same rhythm that Ivan had on my nipples. “I can’t hold off.” I whimpered the words.

  “Me neither.” His mouth was on the back of my neck, grazing me with his teeth. My hips began to move of their own volition as the second orgasm reached for me. I reached for it, welcoming this pleasure before what was sure to be pain. Ivan’s breath hitched as he began to move faster with me. As he pushed harder into my core. The sounds, the smell, the feel of him with me was my entire world centered down to that moment. That moment with a man who was meant to be with me from the beginning. I arched into him, pushed and whimpered, as he helped me come to a crashing point that sent me over the deep edge of pleasure and tumbling through space.

  Ivan’s mouth on my neck, the feel of him in me, the nip of his teeth as he bit down. I had to bite my lower lip to keep from crying out, wanting this to last and last. And last it did as the waves of the orgasm rippled outward through me and kept on rolling, dancing along my limbs, shaking me to my core.

  I don’t even remember it being over. I just remember moving, and then not moving. Ivan was wrapped around me, his breath hot on the back of my neck, his hands still cupped around my breasts and his cock still deeply inside me. I couldn’t help but squeeze him with my inner muscles. He groaned and kissed the curve of my shoulder. “Rose.”

  “Yes?”

  “Much as I’d like have you ride me again, I think we have to figure out what we’re going to do.”

  He was right. And yet I didn’t want this moment to end. Because here, we were safe, here we were together.

  A part of me already knew what was going to happen. Ivan wasn’t going to make it. Which meant that if I didn’t figure out how to bring him and the others back, then this was my last few minutes with him.

  Who could blame a girl for wanting to stay a little longer in the arms of a werewolf who’d just fucked her senseless? Yeah, that’s right, nobody.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Losing to Win

  I talked Ivan into one more quickie. And I do mean quickie. He flipped me onto my back and drove into me fast and hard. Mostly because I demanded it of him. “Are you sure?”

  “Fuck me, Ivan. Fuck me good and hard so that every part of me knows you.” I lay there, welcoming him. He’d done me justice too. Someone bringing me to yet another orgasm even while we both knew it was about as quick as you could get.

  He kissed me after, and I held his head, cupping his face and kissed him back. Of course, it would have been nice to lie with each other longer, but there was to be none of that. Above us, the sound of muffled thumps rumbled down to us in our burrow.

  Silence fell on us as we strained our ears. The thumps had disappeared but I had no doubt, the wolves would be back. Assuming they’d left at all.

  I put my mouth against Ivan’s ear. “How far to the house?”

  He twisted around, a frown creasing his brow. “Fifty feet.”

  “Can I outsprint a few wolves?”

  He shook his head.

  I had to. Even though he’d said I wouldn’t be able to, I had to try. I had to get into that house and face Vincent.

  I kissed Ivan. “I have to go.”

  He grabbed at my arm and I shook my head. “This is the only way to save us all. I swear it.”

  His jaw ticked, and slowly he released me. “I . . .you’ve gotten us this far.”

  Faith, he had faith in me.

  I reached for the puddle that was my clothes and smoothed them back onto my body. Leather pants, corset top. Just like the beginning of the journey. I’d come full circle and was facing Vincent once more.

  Moving as slowly as I could, I crawled up the tunnel that led to the top of our burrowed-in den. The lip of moss I’d left open for air ventilation and viewing was still there. From it, I could see two figures to the right of the house.

  There were three more to the left.

  Ivan shimmied up beside me. He held up both hands twice. Twenty wolves then. And I could only see five.

  I frowned, thinking through the options at hand. I could manipulate the world. I could probably send them all flying but . . .with twenty wolves it would only take one to get through my defenses.

  Biting the inside of my lip, I mulled an idea over as it formed. There was no way to warn Ivan was I was going to do. Which meant I would have to do it and hoped that he forgave me later. I reached a hand out of the hiding spot and laid it on the thick moss. The ground shivered under my strength of my thoughts.

  Ivan put a hand on my back. “Run,” I whispered, trying to throw my voice, to put my power into it. I didn’t want Ivan to run, I wanted the other wolves to run.

  Ivan tensed but I shook my head at him. “Hang on, let me try this again,” I said.

  I focused on what I wanted to do, on how I wanted the words to sound in the air around us. The echo of my voice filtered out on the air, ghostly and haunting.

  Run away. That was my voice but the wolves didn’t know it. They only knew that the house they stood in front of was filled with evil and now a voice was speaking to them, possibly from the grave.

  The wolves scattered li
ke leaves on the wind. I pushed the lid off the den and bolted upward, Ivan beside me. We sprinted across the thick moss toward the decrepit house. I hit the stairs ahead of Ivan and it was only then I realized that he’d fallen back. On the top step, I spun around to see him facing not wolves . . .but grawks. Four grawks that still held onto the shape of their bodies, of the men I’d come to love. Kessler, Mars, Jessop, and Liam.

  “No!”

  “Go.” Ivan looked over his shoulder. “I trust you, Rose. I trust you. Save us all.”

  And then he launched himself at them, shifting midair, tackling Mars and Kessler to the ground. They would bite him, they would kill him, and then he would become one of them. Tears blinded me as I stumbled into the house. I grabbed the edge of the door and slammed it behind me.

  The house around me groaned and the weight of it coursed along my shoulders. Whatever evil was here, I wanted nothing to do with it. But I had to face what it hid.

  “Vincent, where the hell are you?” I barked the words, demanding an answer. Of course, he wasn’t going to make it that easy.

  I took a slow breath and thought about what the men had taught me. How to track, how to scent, how to feel the world around me. I put a hand out on the wall closest to me and took a long slow breath as I let my eyes wander the foyer. A scuff mark on the threshold between it and the room to my right, but the smell of . . .blood was what truly caught me.

  I took another breath, finding that hint of blood again. Not a lot. But it was there and I followed it. The Chalice had been injured . . . I wasn’t even sure if that was possible but it was the only clue I had.

  I followed the smell through the big house to a set of stairs at the very back. The presence of evil had not left me, but I wasn’t about to . . .the house groaned and a door slammed. I spun around, my heart pounding. There was no spit left in my mouth to so much as squeak at whoever was playing games. Except . . . the sound that came next was one I had grown to hate.