At some point between her hitting high speed and them hot on her trail, they’d each found time to pull on a pair of jeans. Pity.
Stubble covered Luke’s chiseled jaw while Evan sported a clean shave. Both drew her attention and all she could think about was the last time she had them between her thighs. A distraction. She needed a distraction but her eyes stayed glued to the men.
Muscles bulged. She watched on, wholly and completely mesmerized by their well-defined abs highlighted by perfect dips and swells made for licking.
Unable to do much else she balled her fists by her side, willing every pulsating nerve in her body to calm. The. Hell. Down.
She bit back a groan. Even the moonlight loved them, caressed them. She marveled at how the gauzy light played with the shadows over every inch of their muscles that flexed with each step they took, sparking a ravaging hunger within her. The way they stalked toward her… she all but creamed the small strip of silk between her thighs.
Strong legs encased in snug denim ate up the distance between them. The tight material hugged them in just the right way, defining the bulges that fueled her fantasies and long nights.
It took all she had to not wet her lips from the sudden urge for a taste… and so much more.
Whoa. Where the hell did that come from? Goddess, help her. Because on her own, she didn’t stand a chance.
She sucked back air and groaned. They’d left their low-slung jeans open at the snap. Cold-hearted teases, both of them! Lust tightened a coil of excitement in her belly.
So fixated on them, she’d forgotten all about the snow wetting her through the thin material of her gown. She looked up at Evan who now stood over her, his body within reach and her unable to act on the first instinct of having him so close. Now that was the real pity.
Evan raised his chin and sniffed the air, his response a sly, knowing grin, eyes ablaze. “Already that excited to see us. Something you want, sweetheart?” He kneeled. Hey! Who the hell was he to judge? His gaze glided up her bare legs and over her thighs, exposed from where her gown bunched up around her thighs. With a simple drop of her leg, silk-covered folds would be on full display. Should she? Did she dare?
Evan reached into the snow and coiled his fingers around her foot to help free her from the roots. Before she could say a word he stood, pulling her with him. In one swift movement he had her wrapped around him, her ass cradled in his firm grip.
She did the only thing left to do and locked her ankles. All thoughts of the cold no more than an afterthought.
An onslaught of sensations demanded her attention. “Have you been aching for your alphas, little witch? Divine dessert, our Ambrosia.” Luke spoke up beside her. No sugar coating. Just straight to the point. Probably thought he didn’t need to be suave with rosy words with how he was so used to getting whatever he wanted.
She inhaled to steady herself and settled in her resolve to get the hell away from temptation first chance she could.
This close, the heat of Evan’s body pressed against her like a full-body cocoon and played havoc with her mind.
Without thinking, she reached out and stroked a finger down his smooth jaw, her gaze locked on his full lips. One taste. Just one. She eased closer.
“Take what you want, sweetheart.”Yes. Just enough to dampen her need.
Fingers buried in the length of her long hair, holding her steady. Instead of finding Evan’s lips, she tasted Luke as he angled her face toward him and claimed her mouth with a possessive kiss. One stroke of his tongue along her seam and she opened. Every nerve ending in her core ignited with wild, untamed insatiable lust.
A mixture of pine and leather filled her, enveloped her. Evan teased her nipples into tight peaks through the silk of her gown with the tip of his tongue before sucking the extended buds between his lips. He pulled back abruptly and she gasped from the rush of cold air against her wet nipples. “We’re not leaving Sweet Briar without you.”
“Or before you realize you belong to us.” Luke completed Evan’s sentence, her head cradled in his hands, his lips next to her ear. “And how much we need you.” So comfortable in their friendship that neither had to worry about one taking advantage or hurting the other.
A small part of her mind surrendered to their demands while the other side fought, struggled against any binds that could drag her beyond any point of return.
Another set of hands slid beneath her gown and around the band of her panties. “I wondered if you had any on this time.” With his thumb buried in her beneath the slight strip of silk, Evan pressed the tender fold of her wet core apart, his hold placing him so close to her opening. One slip and she could find release.
The strip of her panties cradled between her folds, rubbing her clit, ratcheting her need higher. Hotter.
Her hips bucked involuntarily. With a whimper she reached behind her, seeking out Luke, who stood supporting her weight. In one slow pull, Evan produced the black lace, the proof of her excitement now dangling from his finger. Heat crept into her cheeks.
After her first encounter with her wolves, she’d never go commando again. “You won’t need these, sweetheart.” Then again, she was open to suggestions.
Luke plucked her panties off Evan’s fingers and shoved them into his pocket while holding her steady.
Alarms screamed in her head for her to stop. To demand they let her leave. Her thoughts purely on the need to shelter her heart from any more hurt.
Evan eyes sparkled with mischief as he wrapped her legs over his arms. Hiking her gown to her navel, he ran his nose along the crease of her inner thigh. First one side, then the other. “Talk about potions, this is my elixir.” His tongue made contact with her core. She cried out from the shock to her senses. With a tug on her legs, she pulled him closer, deeper. “Again, Evan.”
He obliged. Another stroke forced her back to bow. “Fuck, I can taste her need, Luke. She needs to come.”
Shafts of light caught the hungry flare in his amber eyes. Stunning. She didn’t need to be a wolf to sense the shift from human to instinct-driven animal. He had his mate right where he wanted her. In need for him.
Her heart expanded, contracted in a way that made her head spin. In the same breath, fingers of fire licked along the confines of her chest to bloom across her throat. That didn’t feel right. Was it their bond? Were they trying to re-claim her?
Panic forced her hands to rest on Evan’s shoulder and push, but she’d have better luck moving a two-ton boulder.
“Shh, little witch, what’s wrong. Tell us so we can help.” Power edged over her until her nerves stabled. Were they doing that? Alpha strength vibes brushed along her skin. Were they feeding her their energy? “Take a deep breath. Take from us, sweetheart. Fight against the elixir, don’t let it take hold.”
“This can’t happen, Evan. Luke.” She looked between the two. “I think I made a mistake.” Her breath came faster, the confines of her gown too restrictive against her chest. They were right. The bond wasn’t broken and the potions she drank warred inside her while all three of them were fortifying the bond by being intimate. Every minute she spent with them the unstable combination clashed within her, putting her in danger. What a mess and now she had to clean it up before anyone else got hurt. Or hurt further.
“Look at us, Ambrosia.” Luke’s tone brooked no resistance to his command.
She obeyed, and what she found pulled every emotion from longing to fear to the surface. “We’ve had a taste of what happiness is and we’re not about to let you escape. Now let us help.”
They were the problem.
“How long have we known each other?” Luke gathered her hand in his, peppered soft kisses on her palm, and let his lips linger longer than necessary. To all the goddesses, she loved the feel of his full lips on her skin.
How long had she known them? More like longed for them. Lusted for them. Longer than she cared to admit. On full display and ready to pass out, she found it an odd question to ask. Evan wrapped her
legs around his waist again. Her core nestled against rough denim. Their gazes met. “Four years, but what does that have to do with anything?”Surrounding trees started to sway. Or was that her?
Her lids dipped. “When we first laid eyes on you all those years ago, a young witch just coming into her power, Luke and I made a promise to each other that same night we’d find a way to claim you no matter how long it took.”
“We’ve shared women. We’re not saints, Ambrosia, but you…” Evan’s eyes lit from within and pierced the darkness. “Your soul called to our wolves and there was no one else but you. Just a matter of time.”
Her gaze darted between the two men and all sanity went to hell on a witch’s spell. Her stomach pitched and all cylinders clicked into overdrive to digest the words. “Four years. You waited four years?” She didn’t bother hiding the exasperation that sharpened her words.
“Not exactly. Maybe.” Was Luke blushing? She angled her head. In the low moonlight she couldn’t tell, but there was no hiding the sheepish look that passed over his face, which was funny given his bad-ass alpha status. He’d seen murder and witnessed more violence than any man should be subject to, but here he stood with fear in his eyes. Fear of losing her?
He angled her face with a finger beneath her chin and looked into her eyes, his steady gaze penetrating to her very soul. In a roughened tone he continued, “We kept an eye on you, made sure you were safe, but yes, kept our distance. Waiting.”
Evan took over. “We knew you weren’t ready for our kind of loving. You still had so much to learn about yourself and having two demanding men to deal with wouldn’t have helped while you settled in a new town. It wasn’t until we saw you at our last gathering. That night… the way you danced for us under the moonlight. And yes, we knew you were dancing for us.” Evan paused, “Damn, Ambrosia. Now we can’t go another day without having you. Not just in our arms…”
“But in our lives.” Luke finished for Evan.
Their gazes raked over her and pleaded understanding. Either man could have said everything in a dead tone, but their eyes revealed every emotion behind the words.
“Before our night together,” Luke’s fingers trailed a light path along the arch of her hip, slowly slipped over the dip in her waist until he settled on the bud buried between her wet folds. Her back pressed into his front. “We feared scaring you away and I admit, it kept us from you too long.” His thumb stroked over her wet opening, gathering her juices to swirl over her hidden bud and causing it to swell instantly.
“Tell us, Ambrosia, did we wait too long to claim our mate?”
CHAPTER SIX
Live wires sparked along her nerves. Her head rocked back, Luke’s question an echo of the fear buried in her heart. Without thinking of the consequences she rolled her hips and reveled in the all-consuming sensations that flooded her senses. The hard tips of her nipples pressed into the soft material of her gown. Evan trained his attention on them a split second before he wrapped his mouth around one—silk and all—and sucked.
His hard shaft, restricted by the confined of his jeans, pressed into her, the rough material on her bare pussy just as intoxicating as Luke teasing her clit.
Luke twirled his thumb along the nub, inflaming every nerve in her core until her channel flooded with hot liquid, wetting Evans jeans with her juices.
A whimper slipped passed her lips. Gasping, she arched her back, trusting Luke to keep her safe. “You know this is where you belong. Let your wolves love you.” Luke whispered the words close to her ear, each one more powerful than the next.
She burned with more than just desire. So hot tucked between her shifters, Mother Nature’s winter touch didn’t have a chance.
Still, she struggled between wanting what they offered, yet desperate to slip away in the cover of night. But they would find her, of that she was certain.
Evan must have sensed her hesitation. With a strong grip, he wound her legs around his thighs tighter. Stronger fingers pressed into her thigh. Such power. “There’s no room for fear, not with us.”
“You speak of belonging, of happiness, but it’s only pain and sorrow that I feel. Three months of ever-growing despair. I can’t live like this.” She couldn’t look at them. Both wanted too much.
She combed a hand through her hair and tightened her grip in the roots. She pressed against Evan’s chest and this time he let her slip from his grip. “Please just let me go.” With her feet firmly on the ground, her last words came out in a whisper, fear already carrying her away from them as fast as she could run.
Lights flickered into view in the distances and she picked up the pace.
She hit the back steps of her sister’s bar in a dead run that led to her attached apartment. Lights were on so that meant she was home.
“Honor.” She squeezed out her sister’s name between heavy pants, her hands braced on either side of the doorframe. Something told her she still wasn’t out of the woods yet. Not by a mile.
“Honor.” Hoarse from breathing hard, she called out again when she got no answer. “Honor. Where in the holy Hades are you, woman? Don’t you know how to answer a phone?” Her sister’s head poked around the corner. Ambrosia clutched her side, darted across the small living space and did a double-take at Sweet Briar Hollow’s alpha sitting beside her rather sated-looking sister.
Finally. She wondered how long it would take for one of them to make the move. They sat, naked but for the blanket that covered the essentials. At this point, it was the least crazy moment of the night and they were all adults.
The last things she had time for was a full explanation of why she was half naked, running through the woods like a crazed witch in the middle of winter. If she didn’t ask for one, they didn’t get one from her. Either way, her proof would show up any second on Honor’s doorstep and she needed to be out of here before that happened. From the disheveled look of her sister and the satisfied wolfish grin plastered on her new man candy, it was safe to bet her sister had her own explaining to do. It didn’t take a witch or a wolf to know some kind of bewitching spell work had gone on here tonight.
It must be the power of the full moon making everyone a little crazy. And horny.
She fell to her knees in front of Honor.
Honor squeezed her hands. “Whatever happens, you can count on me to help.”
“Oh Honor, I don’t know how much more I can take. One minute I was in the woods working my spell, the next, Luke and Evan are there. Naked.”
Understanding reflected back at her from both Honor and Jake. She bit the corner of her lip and pressed a hand to her forehead. “I tore my favorite gown, lost my panties, and I think…” She slapped a hand to her forehead and scrunched her eyes closed.
“I’m not going to ask what the hell you’re doing, or why I smell rose and lavender.” She cocked a brow and leaned in closer so only Honor could hear her next words. “The elixirs. They caused some strange things.” She waved a hand. That would have to wait. She pushed back and turned her attention to Jake, who sat quietly with a bemused grin plastered on his face. “Or why you’re naked, although that part is obvious.” She flashed a smile at Jake between gulps of air, and they both looked at her as if she had lost a few marbles between noon and now.
Her sister placed a hand on hers. “Calm down and take a deep breath.”
“Honor, you have to help me. I don’t know how it happened.” She shook her head and pressed a hand into her cheek when heat flushed her face at her lie. “Well, maybe I do. First, there were voices, then a fire and that was before I took the second elixir. After I did, nothing went as planned. They showed up,” no need to fill her in on who they were, “and—”
“I know. Ember called me. Told me about the black magick she threatened them with.” Her sister calmly retold the same story Luke and Evan had told her.
“So when I called you didn’t think to warn me? Tell me to get a move on and hurry before they found me?” They’d taken a vow to never hide anything
from each other. After tonight, all four of her coven sisters and Marabelle needed a tequila and lime dinner, and a long talk about what a promise really meant.
She looked between Jake and her sister.
“Sorry had a bit of something going on myself, but I think that’s settled. And you don’t have to worry about Jake. Your secret is safe with him for as long as you want.” She glanced at Jake and he nodded in response to her sister’s reassurance. At least she had that.
“Evan and Luke are worried sick. I knew we should have called them before filling you with those elixirs. I told Ember, but you know how she gets when trying to protect one of us.” Honor leaned forward until she saw nothing but the blue of her eyes. Whoa, that was different. Ambrosia mentally filed that new tidbit to ask about later.
Ambrosia nodded and pressed a hand along her abdomen to still the burn of unquenched lust.
“ARGH. Ambrosia, if I knew how deep your bond with Luke and Evan actually went…” Regret flitted across her face.
What could she say to make Honor understand the pain she suffered through; the magnetic pull on her soul that insisted she seek them out, and all because of the bond?
She’d wanted the elixirs. Because losing control left her aching and she didn’t know how much more she could take before something snapped. No two ways of seeing it. Honor didn’t realize how lucky she was to be outside the royal circle.
“Sweetheart, you know the power of love, or a bond, or whatever you want to call it. Magick can work if you have the spell right, but if you don’t or deep down your emotions are at odds, the effects can be lethal. You told us you didn’t want the bond. Tell me it was the truth.”Her sister was afraid for her and for good reason.
Everything made sense now. Why the elixir didn’t work—well didn’t work—the way she intended. And why she had no power over her deepest of feelings for them. No magick could break the bond of a true mating of the souls. Especially an elixir made to break an unwanted bond. When in fact, the opposite was true.
Jinxing The Alphas: A Paranormal Werewolf Romance (Hex My Heart Book 2) Page 4
