by Ana Raine
Jamie stroked my cheek tenderly, his lips inches from mine. “I can’t even begin to imagine what they did to you and I hope with time -- with time you’ll feel comfortable telling me. And I know it’s going to be hard, but I’ll listen, okay? I’ll listen to everything you say. But they’re not here and they’re never going to take you from me again. So if you’re going to close your eyes, you have to remember that you’re here with me. Not them.”
Even without saying anything, he knew.
“I know it hurts, Danny, and it always might. But I’m here. I’m right here with you.”
This was torture, absolute torture. My mind wasn’t cooperating with what I wanted to say, the thoughts rushing through my veins like a torrential downpour.
I had to say something. He was waiting for me to.
Chapter 3
I kissed him instead. My lips were cracked and I tasted the blood from the rabbit, but he just as feverishly kissed me back. He lowered me to the ground, positioning the blanket beneath my head once again because even with his needs persistent, mine were worth more.
His hand traced a circle around my nipple as his tongue pushed inside until I felt like he was going to consume my very breath.
With a groan, he pinched my nipple and twisted sharply until I arched my back to meet his touch.
“Do you need time?” he asked me patiently, although his eyes were ablaze. “It’s been a long time and you don’t know me anymore, not really.”
I had enough strength to reply. “I do, though,” I whispered into the crook of his neck. “I know you more than I know myself.” Because he wasn’t just my soul mate, he was my very soul.
“I need this with you,” he told me. “But not like this. When I take you, it’s going to be memorable, so you can know this isn’t a quick thing.”
And I actually whined, something I didn’t know I could do anymore. I was so used to being silent and taking what was offered, that even hearing such a noise escape my throat was startling to me. “Please,” I whimpered.
His expression looked broken. “Don’t worry, baby, I’m not going to leave you wanting. What kind of mate would I be if I ignored your needs?” And without another word, his hot cock was pressed against mine, trapped beneath the cage of our hands. The friction of his hands coupled with the way he moved his hips above me made me arch my back in absolute pleasure. This wasn’t what I had in mind, but Jamie looked blissful, his eyes half-closed as his mouth hung open in a silent moan.
“God,” he cried as he increased his pace, his other hand braced near my neck for support. I wrapped my free hand around his wrist and held tight as he continued grinding himself against me. “Keep your eyes on me, Danny.”
And I did, of course I did, because my mate demanded it of me. And because there was nothing I wanted more than to watch the red of his eyes all but explode as he reached an orgasm I hoped was as powerful as mine was going to be.
My legs trembled with the need to spill, my balls drawing up closer to my body as I shook my head from side to side. “Close,” I pleaded, trying my best to not hurry him. The thought of his dick pressed so closely to mine as he literally drew out my pleasure was too much to rush. “I can’t hold back much longer.”
“Then don’t.” His lips sealed over mine, stifling my screams as I gripped his wrist and let my orgasm rip through me. I knew he was chasing his own orgasm because his dick throbbed in my hand, and he was moving so fast I felt rug burn from the blanket beneath me. Not that I cared.
My mate was shaking as he lowered his head to my chest, but it was his heartbeat I heard echoing in my mind. Our cocks were trapped between our bodies as we gasped for air, dragging as much as we could into our lungs.
I turned my head to the side so I could bare my throat to him because it seemed like the right thing to do. Jamie must have been appreciative, because with a long sigh he stroked the sensitive flesh of my neck with the tip of a finger.
We were sticky, sweaty, and half-starved, but I’d never been happier.
My body still ached to be filled and used until I was utterly spent. But I respected Jamie more for having the self-control to recognize our mating should be special.
We took the blankets from the barn, but nothing else, and headed toward a lake he said he’d seen while hunting. The plan was to quickly bathe, see if we could find some more food, and then construct a more concrete method for returning his sister to his care.
My mind was buzzing with my earlier release, and I found myself thinking, even if Langdon Sr. were to shoot me now, at least I had had these moments with my mate. I knew Jamie disapproved of my thinking, but he didn’t say anything, at least not with words. His body language… now that was another story entirely.
The water was frigid as I dipped my toes in, but the temperature wasn’t deterring me. Jamie had told me he wanted us to bathe, so that was what I was going to do.
“Your lips are blue,” he joked as he quickly splashed water on his chest and stomach, erasing the signs of our earlier moment. I felt a twinge of regret at the loss. “Hurry up so we can get out and get dry.”
I did as he asked and was already on my way out while he was still working on sorting out his tangled red hair.
“You know --” he told me, teeth practically chattering, “-- you don’t have to follow my orders like you’re doing. My pack does, yeah, but you’re my mate. It’s different.”
I lowered my eyes to the blanket in my hand. “Do you not want me to?”
He just stared at me. “Those hunters aren’t in charge of you anymore,” he said almost angrily as he shook out his hair and climbed back onto the bank. “I want you to try and forget about their orders. You don’t have to obey me constantly. It’s not what I want.”
Not what he wanted. “I’ll try.”
He kissed the top of my head and started to wrap the blanket around my shoulders, but stopped so his gaze could linger on my nude form. My cock was already starting to fill, despite the chill. His stare was just too hot.
“I know you want to wait, but if you want to use me now, I’m okay with it.”
“No.” The blanket shut around me like a different sort of chaste cage. “I meant what I said. As much as I want to bring you to your hands and knees and pound into you --”
His comment had me practically throbbing with uncontrollable need.
“I’m waiting until we’re safe in my pack.”
I couldn’t help but feel there was more he wanted to say but held back. “If you change your mind, I’ll do whatever you want.”
“And what is it you want?” He’d let go of me so he could dry himself off.
“You.” I sighed. “Love. Peace. Safety.”
“Those are things I’m going to give you, Danny, I swear I will.”
We decided to abandon the clothes because they were too much of a hassle to carry with us. And in our human forms we were vulnerable and probably wouldn’t make it far in the woods without our heavy fur to keep us warm.
“My sister will be with the Hunters? You’re sure?”
I grew quiet. “I believe so.”
“Danny. Hey --” He cupped my face in his hands. “I just don’t want to waste time if you think they’ll have moved her by now. But I’m not going to punish you or anything if you end up being wrong.”
I swallowed my fear. “She’ll be with them. Langdon had decided they needed more money than what they were getting on hits. So the point was to sell you and her, but it would be months before they’d find a buyer.”
Whatever I said, it filled Jamie with a sense of dread. “If they find out who she is --” he told me, “-- then it won’t matter if she’s ‘trained’ or not. Alphas and their families are always worth a lot.”
The shame I had turned on my own and had been doing so for nearly ten years finally hit me. How he could even stand to look at me, knowing what I’d become… I sickened myself half to death.
All I wanted was to make it right. To be better for him and
for myself. “Master, I --”
“What did you call me?” His features twisted, but I wasn’t sure if it was disgust or confusion. “No, no, no, baby.” He held me close to him, our foreheads touching. “I’m not your Master, I’m your mate. I know it’s going to take a long time, maybe forever, but you’re going to heal, okay?”
I only nodded.
“Now say my name.”
I licked my lips, the dry parched things they were. “Jamie.”
“Yes, love, I’m your Jamie. And you’re mine.”
“How can you even stand me?”
Jamie was silent, so silent I thought perhaps he was reconsidering his promises of love and comfort. But then he snaked a hand behind my neck and whispered his confession. “Because I know what it’s like to be broken. They took you, do you understand? They dared take my mate away from me. And the years that followed until I knew you were alive, I kept my pack alive and offered sanctuary to wolves, but humans… I killed any who threatened what I had left.”
“And you’d kill again?” I said, barely above a whisper.
“I would.”
A sense of forbidden hope crossed into my mind because I was certain Langdon was coming for me. Langdon Sr. definitely, but his son wouldn’t forgive what I had allowed to happen. His claim on me was strong, almost as strong as Jamie’s. And I knew if it came down to sacrificing myself for my mate, I would.
“Are you ready?”
I nodded because there didn’t need to be words. Not right now.
Jamie slipped into his wolf, the transition smooth and effortless. It had always been like that for me too, at least the phase into a wolf was. Coming out of it was something else entirely. But I heard his voice in my head, the one he hadn’t really let me hear before, and it was guiding me to where we had to go.
My senses were on high alert, a colorful landscape of scents, most of them easy to ignore. We walked through the woods for hours, keeping as far off the trails as possible without losing sight of our goal.
I knew where the cabin was where the hunters had been staying and shared that image with Jamie. He was a good tracker, possibly the best, so our course of action was to go there. I doubted if the hunters would remain after allowing an Alpha to slip away.
But it was worth a shot, if it accomplished nothing but to but to at least get a fresh scent.
The day before, we’d been pumped with adrenaline as we desperately tried to get away from the hunters. If they had immediately followed us, they could have killed us while we slept, but Jamie didn’t seem concerned.
Being inside his thoughts, the ones he let me see, was refreshing. Where I saw things in black-and-white, he saw vivid color. The scents swirling together were overwhelming to me, but he welcomed them. A paw in the icy lake. A sniff of what remained of the leaves of a tree. The sun warming his fur.
There was a deep sorrow I wasn’t sure he’d ever shake and there was concern for his sister, but mostly there was peace. Absolute and calming peace.
You.
It was hard to believe I had any effect whatsoever on this Alpha, even with his voice insisting in my head it was true. Instead of raising my head to greet the wind the way he did, I bent my neck and trailed behind him. Being in his presence was something I couldn’t gamble. I had to do everything perfectly.
It took hours to trace back to where he’d freed me, but when we found the clearing, the only thing that remained were spots of crimson blood. The snow had covered most of it and our tracks weren’t visible.
I sent an image to Jamie, showing him the path Langdon and I had taken from the cabin. It was close, too close to continue as wolves. As humans, we’d be vulnerable, but as wolves, the hunters would have the upper hand. They had devices they used to track us down, some sort of scanner that measured the heat in our blood.
Although we were still warmer as humans than any human actually would have been, the scanners only picked up on large beasts. Wolves.
Jamie urged me through the woods to where we found another cabin. It was small, but there was smoke billowing from the chimney.
Stay.
I crouched behind the tree line and watched as Jamie stalked over to the cabin, his body changing as he walked without missing a step. I shivered in the cold as I took his lead and phased too. My fingertips were numb, but my face was flushed and my cock filled with blood at the sight of Jamie’s backside.
Some wolves were blessed with what others could only dream of.
Moments later, he returned from inside the cabin. “Danny,” he hissed at me, clearly displeased.
“I’m sorry, I --” I didn’t know why he was upset, but the furrow of his brow was what I was worried about.
“Jesus, you’re freezing.” He was still naked but didn’t seem to care as he unfurled the bundle of clothing he’d just gotten from the cabin and started to dress me. “You should have stayed as a wolf until I got back.”
“I didn’t mind, really.” He eyed me. “You’re precious, Danny. You’re my everything.” He rubbed my hands between his. “When we get back to my pack, they’re going to treat you like a Prince, the way a mate of an Alpha should be treated.”
Jamie pulled on the rest of the clothes as he pointed to a loaf of bread and peanut butter. “Make a sandwich, baby, we have to eat quickly and get going.”
Getting the shoes on was the hardest part as the hunters never let me have them.
“What did you do to the human who lives there?” I asked as I slathered on a generous portion of peanut butter and took a bite. Having actual food filled a void.
“Nothing,” Jamie assured me. “I was prepared to just knock them out if I had to, but it was empty. Must be hunting.”
I nodded. “Humans hunt animals all the time.”
He grunted in response and took the sandwich I’d made him, sinking his teeth into the bread and chewing vigorously. In less than five minutes, we’d each downed three sandwiches and were already back on the obscure trail through the woods.
As we walked, we shivered. Jamie pressed his body closer to mine, as though willing to take my body heat so he could have a reprieve. Or maybe he was hoping to give me his.
Give-and-take was still a foreign concept to me, one I was struggling with understanding. I’d lived more of my life free than captive, but somehow I barely remembered anything.
My voice was small, but I had to ask, “My family, what happened to them?”
He shielded his eyes with the back of his hand as he stared into the sky peering from the cluster of trees. “Dead. I told you.”
“But not Liam.”
“No.”
“Or my -- my aunt?”
“You sound unsure.”
“Liam I remember, somehow, but not the others.”
He made a noise and slapped the side of his neck. “That’s right. You probably have PTSD or something. I’m sorry, honey.”
I took his hand and rubbed my cheek against it so he would know he was forgiven. The slight gesture sent tremors straight to my cock.
“Your parents were already gone. They died when you were young, like five or something. Then you came to live with my pack and stayed with your aunt and uncle. Fiona lived, but barely. Your cousins and uncle Fergus… They weren’t as lucky.”
“How?”
“The hunters poisoned our water supply,” he said simply, but I could hear the pain behind his words and knew just how much it had hurt then. “We hadn’t even thought that was a possibility because most hunters come in guns blazing and just shoot and stab everybody they can get at it. But this group, your hunters, they’re smarter.”
They really were. Even Hunter, who seemed like an idiot most of the time, had more wits than humans usually did.
“Why do you think they did that?”
“They wanted something. Badly enough to not risk taking chances they wouldn’t get it.”
“What was it?”
“Other than us being dead?” He bit his lower lip and stopped wa
lking. “That’s something I’m still trying to figure out. I have theories, but it’s not something I want to share yet.”
I nodded in agreement and kissed the hand he’d placed on my cheek. “I understand.”
Jamie smiled, but it was slow and sad, like a burn growing hotter against the flame. “You’re mine,” he told me, watching my tongue caress the flesh of his palm. “And I see you, recognize you, but there’s so much pain that it’s like I’m talking to someone else. And I love you, need you, but I hope you remember who you are. This fiery, cutthroat wolf who fights for everything.”
I closed my eyes. The image he painted of me was there, however faint.
“Those bastards… They’re going to get on their knees and beg for forgiveness for what they did to you. I promise you that, Danny.”
I believed him.
We had stopped walking because just beyond the next bend was Langdon Sr.’s cabin. We stood sheltered in trees, hidden in a way even the most skilled of hunters couldn’t see us.
We barely moved, barely breathed, just stared at each other’s entwined hands. Finally, Jamie whispered above the sound of the trees. “Time to hunt.”
Chapter 4
This time, we were unhurried while we prepared for our shift. I began to remove my coats, but Jamie stopped me with nothing more than a slight narrowing of his eyes. Instantly, heat flooded down my spine and pooled in my stomach.
More than just our death could be beyond the safety of the woods, but an end to our time together in the realm of the living.
Reaching for the thick scarf, Jamie unwound it from my neck and let the fabric drop to the ground like a discarded snakeskin. He undid the buttons of my first coat, one by one, without ever removing his eyes from mine. The heat in his gaze was enough to bring normal men to their knees. I only remained upright because he willed me to. And the fact we knew that, understood and embraced it, made all the difference.
Next came my second coat, a pitiful thing with more holes than good fabric, but it had done the job. My long-sleeved shirt was next, but the wind hitting my arms was of no consequence.
