Which meant so was he.
He knew it was all biology. That the hormones in his body were building to prepare him for something that would never happen as long as Luke had his way.
Was there a limit? Everyday Finn felt like he'd reached his, only to wake up the next day and realize he could take more, that he had to take more. The suffering was hard, but hiding it was becoming near impossible.
The walls felt like they were closing in on him. His workout pants and black t-shirt felt too tight. "I have to get out of here," he said, pulling the neck of his shirt out to allow some fresh air against his skin. He looked up to find every set of eyes staring at him with varied levels of concern and curiosity.
"I know what you mean," Frannie said quickly, opening the kitchen window. "We've all been cooped up here and while I am used to long stretches of time without real human interaction, we are running low on the basics. Food, toilet paper, coffee, vodka, all important things if I am going to keep my books flowing. Which, are the only reason any of us are even here right now."
Luke backed up so that he stood protectively in front of Finn. It almost annoyed him. What was there to protect him from in that kitchen? The most dangerous person to him was himself. Finn stomped away from the wall to the center of the room. "Let's go shopping," he said with mock enthusiasm.
Chapter Thirteen
Frannie flashed her member's card to the employee at the large, warehouse style entry way. The elderly woman's smile dropped the moment she caught sight of the remaining six of them. Luke, holding Finn's hand like he was ready to whisk him away at the slightest indication of danger. Daryl and Sorell both looked like they were casing the joint while Pippen and Conner's wary eyes searched every corner for signs of trouble.
Only Frannie seemed to be oblivious to the scene they were making. On second thought, Finn figured perhaps it had been foolish of them to all go together. It was too late now.
"Okay, round up," Frannie barked like a football coach. "If we go out in pairs and meet back here to load the cart we can get this done quickly. I know none of us is really loving it in this huge crowd, with too bright lights, and shitty piped in music but we all want to wipe our asses so this needs to get done. Daryl and I will take the fruits and veggies. You three musketeers will take bathroom necessities and, Finn, you and Luke check out the frozen foods. You look like you need to cool off."
Finn wasn't sure she was joking. He was still sweating, no doubt Luke could feel it in his clammy palm. They all nodded and turned toward their respective areas. "Finn," Frannie called, "don't forget my hot pockets. Or you're off the island."
"Are you gonna let me in?" Luke asked once they'd gone out of ear shot of the rest of them.
"On what?"
"What is going on with you. How many times do I need to tell you, I am interested in anything you have to say, or don't say."
Finn pulled his hand free, needing to let it air out a little. When would he stop sweating? "Nothing is going on. I just feel claustrophobic. I'm being smothered."
"Because of me?" Luke challenged.
"No, Jesus, not everything is about you, Luke." Finn rotated to stomp away from him.
Luke grabbed Finn's hand again, halting him on his way to charge forward towards the frozen foods. The rough touch sent a thrill through Finn that shot straight to between his legs. He did not want an erection in front of the juice and novelties section.
"You are causing a scene," Finn hissed between his teeth and pulled his hand free again.
"I don't fucking care, mate," Luke said, yanking Finn back flush against his body. "You are my mate, aren't you?"
This was not the time or place, but Finn could not ignore the dominance that laced Luke's every movement and word. His body responded to it on a level that needed little contribution from his mind. He licked his lips and nodded, quickly. "Yes, I am yours."
Luke crushed his lips with his own, claiming him in front of everyone, in front of the frozen orange juice and any shopper that happened to pass by.
And Finn let him. More than let him, egged him on, did everything short of yank his own pants down and bend over.
Someone cleared their throat once and then again, a little louder. With a growl, Luke pulled away, most likely to yell at whoever interrupted them.
A little old lady wearing a pink sweater, matching pink lounging pants and glasses that hung around her neck like a necklace stood a few feet away. She smiled at them sweetly. "I hate to interrupt, but I need some help grabbing a box of the shelf over there. You look strong enough to assist me," she said with a smile to Luke.
"Um," Luke stalled.
"Go on," Finn urged him. "She can't get it on her own. I'll wait right here." Finn leaned back against the freezer door, watching as the old woman took Luke almost to the other end of the aisle, pointing to something on the top shelf.
He looked behind himself and noticed he was right in front of the Hot Pockets. Smirking, he grabbed a few boxes.
"Hey, do I know you?" a man asked.
Finn had been so absorbed by replaying Luke's moment of dominance while clutching a stack of thin boxes that he jumped at the question. The other guy reached out, like he was ready for any boxes that were in danger of falling. Finn tried to place him.
He was disarmingly handsome. Like someone you expected to see staring at you from the pages of a cologne ad. He had dirty blond hair and looked up at Finn, beneath long, thick lashes with a smoldering gaze. His eyes were a shocking shade of green. Like a forest covered in a light frost.
"No, I don't think so," Finn said, not really reacting to the man more than simply noticing his features. Luke was down at the endcap of the aisle now, the little old lady looked to have enlisted his help for one more thing, maneuvering a box of some paper goods from the very top shelf. The combination of watching Luke's body do manual labor and knowing he was performing a kindness was too sexy.
"Really?" the guy moved so that he stood in front of Finn, obstructing his view. He stepped forward toward Finn and Finn straightened, taking a step back.
He brought a hand up and tapped his chin like he was thinking. Finn noticed his sleeve tattoo, the ink was startlingly dark, like it was brand new.
"Weren't you in my Intro to Counseling? With Paterson?"
Finn blinked.
"That dude is such a dick, am I right?"
Finn had taken that class, with that professor.
But then why didn't he recognize this guy? He'd really been self-absorbed in his own stuff. Finn vowed to observe more of his surroundings.
"I always sat in the back," the guy said, as if apologizing for Finn's lack of observation. He stepped closer and Finn backed away again. Poor guy, he was just trying to have a regular conversation from a regular distance, it wasn't his fault that Finn wasn't able to get too close.
"I sat in the back too," Finn said.
"I know," the guy looked at him from under his lashes again, a slight pink to his cheeks. "I used to watch you."
Finn stumbled a few steps. The guy's confession literally caught him off guard. He tried to find Luke but discovered the two of them had wandered out of the frozen food section. They were now on the other side of the main hallway and in the coffee and tea. It smelled great, but Finn didn't like not being able to see Luke. "I'm sorry, I was going through a lot back then. What's your name?"
"Christian," the guy said with an easy smile.
Finn froze. Now that he thought about it, this guy could play Christian in the movie made about his life. Like, he was the Hollywood version of him. But he wasn't Christian. "No you're not," he said before he could stop himself.
Judging by the way the stranger's easy smile fell, he'd assumed Finn would recognize the name as someone from his class and would be even surer that he should know him. This guy clearly didn't know Finn though, hadn't taken that class and most assuredly was not Christian McGannon.
He was the guy who had managed to silently separate Finn from his alpha.
>
"Well," the man smiled again, but this time it was all fangs. "That almost worked." He snagged Finn's wrist in a vice-like grip, forcing him to drop all of his Hot Pocket boxes on the ground.
The place where his palm touched Finn's skin seemed to tingle, not pleasantly, but in an inherently uncomfortable way. Like the feeling of when he used to put his tongue on a nine volt battery.
"Let me go," he ordered, but at the same time he was fighting this swelling feeling of wrongness. Like his body knew this man shouldn't be touching him. Like it was physically rejecting his touch.
"What are you going to do? You're barely upright. I can smell the mating hormone all over you. And something else, raw," he sniffed lewdly, "painful. That alpha lets you walk around feeling like that? Must be more sadistic than mine."
One moment, he was struggling alone against the stranger. But within the space of a blink, Finn was flanked by Sorell and Conner as Pippen lingered back behind the man.
The three of them didn't look scared or worried as he'd seen most of them look in the past. In this moment, they were a pack of predators, lean and dangerous, dark and ruthless.
"What is this?" the stranger said, trying to sound bored. Even Finn could tell he hadn't expected any resistance, much less a pack of it. "A pack of pups?"
Sorell flashed him a smile that was all false flirtation. There was a menace that danced behind his eyes something that hinted to a darkness lurking within his baby blues. "We don't bite," he said and then Finn noticed the knife he wielded. It wasn't overly large, but it looked sharp, deadly and well-used.
"Lucian know about you three? He'd be interested to hear about a rogue little pack of hooligans running around with his mate."
Everything in Finn rebelled at being addressed that way.
"But who will tell him?" Pippen whispered the threat so quietly Finn almost didn't hear the words. He heard the menacing tone though, that was not hard to pick up, especially since it contrasted so starkly against the shifter's higher pitched, melodic voice. Pippen shifted forward, something in his hand that he had pressed against the man's back.
Finn was amazed. The most aggression he'd ever seen from Pippen was when he dropped his waffle during breakfast once and had cursed. He didn't know this thin assassin who looked very comfortable about to take a life.
"Pippen," Conner said, "You're upsetting him."
Pippen's gaze flashed to Finn. "Sorry, boss," he said in his usual gentle Pippen tone. "What do you want me to do?"
The little shifter was asking him if he wanted him to commit murder.
had that in him? More importantly, he thought Finn should make the decision?
"I…" The stranger had said that the pack master would be upset to hear about the three of them.
He never has to know...
"Sorell, did you find the soap?" Daryl asked like a bull tripping into a very tense china shop. He was clueless as he barged between them. The stranger used the distraction to step away from Pippen's knife and toward Finn. He grabbed Finn, shoving him toward Sorell who had to move his own knife quickly so as to not stab Finn himself. The whole maneuver took half a second and the man was nearly out of the store by the next second's end.
"Come on, Grandpa!" Pippen squeaked.
"Who are you calling grandpa?" Daryl asked, still clueless.
Conner bristled as Daryl clenched his hands into fists and jerked toward Pippen.
"Stop." That one word, not even spoken at a conversation level, weaved through the five of them. Each shifter froze. Finn was trying not to faint. Luke took in the sight of Pippen and Conner, frowned when he noticed Pippen's knife, frowned deeper when he saw Sorell's. "What happened?"
"Some shifter just tried to kidnap your mate," Conner said slowly but confidently. "We stopped him. But then, your pa literally stumbled in giving him the distraction he needed to get away." He wasn't overt, but the distrust was there.
"I—" Daryl sputtered. "I did what?" He whirled around to where the stranger had sprinted away. It was almost comical.
Finn stopped listening. His ears felt like they were full of bees. His stomach clenched. The stranger had touched more of his skin when he'd shoved him and it had started a chain reaction inside of Finn's body. First, he'd been light-headed, then his breath had been short, now his skin burned and prickled, feeling like a living thing. An unhappy, writhing being that didn't want to be touched by anyone else. The wall he'd built to hide what he was really feeling behind, began to crumble, and once it started, Finn couldn't stop it. He caught Luke's eyes, confusion flashed behind them, then fear. Finn knew his own eyes would be wide with panic. "Help me."
***
Luke strode forward, brushing past the squabbling pack he reached Finn, pulling him close to him. It had been like being hit with a semi-truck, the rush of panic and pain. Desperation and need had slammed against Luke with a force that threatened to take his breath away. How was his Finn feeling like that? When had that started and how had he hid it? Those questions were all secondary to his primary mission of taking Finn away from this place of near danger and giving him what he needed, all that he needed.
"Sorell, find Frannie, finish up and go back to the house. No fighting," Luke ordered over his shoulder. He had Finn locked to his side, one arm protectively around his middle as he led him out of the store. He palmed Frannie's car keys.
"How will they get back?" Finn asked through pants.
It squeezed at Luke's heart that Finn could be experiencing so much pain and still worry about his sister and the pack. That was why Finn needed Luke, to worry about him. "They'll manage. How long have you been like this?" He didn't mean to put so much bark behind his question.
"Feels like forever. Weeks? Since that first episode at the pub. It's gotten worse."
"Why did you hide it from me?"
"I didn't want you to worry," he choked the answer out. His face was flushed, perspiration shone over his forehead. He bit his lip, obviously holding back a scream.
He didn't need to scream for Luke to know he was hurting. Luke could smell it now. It choked him, clawed at his neck and throat, made him desperate to stop it. He looked around them. He turned the car down an exit so suddenly the tires squealed. He maneuvered down a short road.
"You're going to the park?" Finn asked like he was in a daze.
"There's an access road down here, usually abandoned. It's where I parked whenever I wanted to shift and hunt in the forest."
"Hunt? Like for squirrels?"
"More like for deer."
Finn made a disgusted face—a mostly pained—disgusted face. "That's gross—ah!" He clutched at his midsection.
"What? What is it?" Luke asked frantically.
"I don't know, my insides feel like they are cramping up, clenching in on each other," he said through gritted teeth.
Luke drove a little further so that the car was surrounded by trees on three sides. He stopped just around a corner. "Get out."
Finn's hands fumbled at the seatbelt. Luke was already out of the car and wrenching Finn's door open. His claws distended and he cut the safety band, lifting his mate out of the car. He took him around to the front. There wasn't much time for the preliminaries. The wolf in him knew what needed to be done. It had known the moment he'd first been assaulted by all that his Finn was feeling.
He ripped Finn's loose pants down. He was aroused. Luke stroked him as he pulled his own pants down, bending Finn over the hood of the car. Finn moaned with each stroke. Luke let go so he could spread Finn's cheeks, rubbing the naked head of his cock against Finn's sweet opening. His precum jetted out, splashing against his hole. The noise Finn made was throaty and raw.
"Yes, finally," he moaned like a prayer.
Luke waited only a moment more, a moment for his fluid to help ease Finn, to sensitize his nerve endings so that he would feel only pleasure. Finn bucked his ass back. Luke smiled and then lined up. With one single thrust he entered his mate fully.
He felt like howli
ng, thought for a moment he actually had. Luke forced himself to calm down, to remain in control. He'd kill himself before he let himself hurt Finn.
"No, please, Luke, don't censor yourself," Finn said as if he could feel the hesitance in Luke's withdraw.
"I can't hurt you," Luke said and it sounded like a beg. "What if I go too deep? Too hard?"
"I was already hurting. This, this is what I need," Finn said, drawing the word need out like it was made of many more syllables. He stretched his back, pushing his ass back at the same time, swallowing the space between his puckered hole and Luke's cock.
Luke snarled, the exact noise his wolf wanted to make. He gripped Finn's waist hard, he'd have bruises tomorrow. Luke would kiss them and probably suck him off as an apology but right now, he could only slam forward, burying himself once again to the hilt. He kept a brutal pace, his balls slamming against Finn's cheeks with a beautiful slapping sound. He kept it up as he felt his mate tense and then heard him groan a release. Luke reached down to pump his mate's cock, not because he needed it to orgasm, he'd already done that. Instead, he gathered some of his seed on the tips of his fingers and brought it to his mouth, savoring in his flavor, pounding forward even harder and faster.
Then, he pulled out completely, grabbing Finn by the upper arms as he whimpered. He lifted him up and slammed his back against the side of his car as he entered him from the front. Finn latched his legs around Luke's waist and leaned his head back, seemingly content to be plundered.
Luke felt as if he was at his most basic level, hard, buried in his mate. His inner animal, his human side and his mate all in perfect harmony. It was an overwhelming feeling that he would never back away from. He felt his own release build, but unsheathed as he was, he was bound to swell inside of his mate's sweet hole. There was nothing to do now about it though. His vision flashed red as the head of his cock swelled, locking himself in place, ensuring every ounce of his seed would remain inside.
The pleasure was unimaginable. He could do no more than groan and growl as he emptied himself inside of his mate. Finn had begun whimpering. His cock was rock hard between them and he had come again, coating the front of them both with his fluid. He was still hard and moments later, was coming again, soaking them both. Luke lost count of the times his mate tensed and released. He let his body fall so that he was on his back, Finn at his front as they both rode the endless waves of ecstasy.
Wolf's Mate Mpreg Romance Box Set Page 11
