Frozen Alaska

by Katherine Rhodes

  “We can’t see the stars in the day,” I said.

  “I don’t need them when I have the sun and the moon in my arms.”

  I stilled. He was dead serious.

  “Delia, I screwed up. I screwed up in ways I hope you’ll forgive me for. Can you let me explain? If you still want to go, I’ll take you to the airport myself tomorrow morning.”

  Nodding, I really hoped I didn’t want to leave.

  “For the past twenty years, I have been trying to fix the absolute mess my parents left me. When they died in the wreck, they were so heavily in debt that even after the large life insurance policies were paid out, and the bank accounts drained, I was in a deep, deep hole. I have been until last summer, dependent on the help of the pack to keep my house and start my business.

  “I had a sister. She was only five. I needed to provide for her, and providing had a cost. Everything I’ve thought about for the past twenty years had a dollar value attached to it. Food, power, housing, schooling. How was I going to pay for any of it?”

  He laced his fingers with mine and absently rubbed a thumb over my knuckles.

  “One of the things that the St. Terese pack prides itself on is the ability to provide for their mates. Nothing is left to question—you need, you get. And I couldn’t see myself doing that for you.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but he put a finger on my lips. “Please. Let me finish. Please.”

  I nodded.

  “I couldn’t see how I could give you everything you needed, everything you wanted, everything you deserved. To fill each need, to provide when I was barely keeping the power on. It was…is why I’m willing to let you go. I’m not rich, not even well off.”

  The desire to argue with him about this was nearly overwhelming, but I could tell he wouldn’t let me. I sat down on the mattress instead and he followed me.

  “I was going to let you go, and when I was stable again, find you. Hope you still loved me. Hope you were still willing to make a life with me.

  “But Addi and my sister…” He looked down at our hands, still twined together. “Well. Cora and Addi got through to me that in ten years, in fifteen years, you’d have another life you didn’t want to leave. Children. A home. A career. And they finally made me realizes that providing didn’t need to have a dollar sign in front of it. I didn’t need to spend money to give you what you need.

  “We’d never talked about us, about you and me being a unit and going forward together. Even though I wanted you here, I was letting things get in the way. Stupid things. Things that a mated couple would work on together. I was just so damn terrified of not having the money to keep you happy, I never thought about what you thought you needed to keep happy.”

  He was chewing the inside of his lip, and paused for a moment.

  “What do you need me to provide for you, Delia?”

  Holy shit, he’d gotten it.

  I launched myself at him, tackling him backward to the mattress, laughing and planting kisses on cheeks, his forehead, his nose.

  “Laughter, loyalty, love,” were my murmured answers. “Life, together. Figuring this shit out. The chance to spend a dozen lifetimes with you. To explore and discover the world. The chance to have our own family. To grow old and happy with you.”

  He started laughing, and held me off him for just a moment. “I really screwed up, didn’t I?”

  “You’re lucky my friends like you, or else you would’ve been torn limb from limb for this.”

  “I can see them doing that.” He let out a breath. “I’m serious, Delia. I don’t have a lot of money.”

  I folded my hands over his chest and stared down in to his eyes. “I do.”

  “I don’t—”

  “No, shut up. I’m rich. Filthy rich. I don’t care about your money. I have enough for our great-grandchildren to never have to work. So clam it. We’ll be fine.”

  He stared at me. “You’re serious.”

  I nodded. “You can hire all the help you need next year for the tours. I’ll—we’ll pay back all the debts you owe to the pack, and we can pay it forward.”

  “You are serious.”

  “As a heart attack. As long as you can make me laugh and love me, I don’t need anything else.”

  “I do love you. More than life itself.”

  His eyes sparkled like the sun on the water. I took a deep breath.

  “I want to be your mate.”

  My heart froze in my chest for too many beats.

  “What?”

  “I’m serious. Again.”

  “You want to be my mate? Despite me screwing this up and being broke?”

  She smacked my chest lightly. “What did I just say?”

  When I had scrambled last night to get my apology together, I had not expected it to end like this. I was merely hoping she’d give me a chance…

  “Does your wolf not want me?” Her voice was soft and sad.

  I grabbed her wrists. “He wants you. So much I’ve had to back him down to not mate you. It’s not him. It’s me. I was just asking for a chance to make this up to you. I didn’t think you’d be this willing to forgive me.”

  “What’s there to forgive? You figured out the only thing I needed: you.”

  I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her down to me. “God, what did I do to deserve you? You’re amazing.”

  “That’ll fade when we have our first real fight.”

  Our laughter shook the truck.

  I brushed some hair from her face. “I am sorry, Delia. I was a complete bonehead. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t hurt me. You scared me. I didn’t really want to leave. I love it here, and I would love to call this place home. I want to travel the world, but I always want a place that’s home. Where I can sit and watch television with you.”

  “Somewhere we can stay in bed all day.”

  Her voice fell to a whisper. “Somewhere we can take the truck and the air mattress and make love under the stars.”

  “Or under the morning sun…”

  This time, the kiss did more than give her chills. I felt every part of her relax into me with a sigh. I rolled us to our sides, and I found the bottom of her shirt, and tugged it up, looking at her for permission.

  She did one better. Delia pulled it up and over her head, and tossed it behind our heads.

  The buds of her nipples were so clear through her bra, I didn’t even take it off before I pulled one into my mouth and nipped carefully.

  She pulled my shirt out of my pants and yanked it up. I let go of her peak just long enough for her slip the shirt over my head. My shirt wound up next to hers and her hands wound up all over me.

  I looked at her and ran a hand over her cheek. She nuzzled it, and then kissed me, hard. Her tongue delved into my mouth, possessive and demanding. She tasted so good, like coffee and sweet cream, and I helped myself to her.

  “You’re over dressed,” I whispered as she pushed her hands below the waist of my jeans, grabbing my ass.

  “You too,” she whispered.

  I wrapped my hands around her plump breasts, and trailed my fingertips over the satin of her bra. I found the edge of the cup and slipped my hand in, pushing it down and popping the pale, soft mound out. I teased the tip with my thumb as we still plundered each other’s taste.

  When Delia moaned deep in her throat, I dropped my mouth to the delight in my hand and suckled at the hard peak again. The same throaty moan slipped out again and I was shocked my erection didn’t rip a hole in my pants.

  Wanting to feel every silky inch of her body, my hand made a slow path to her other breast, and lifted it out of the satin cup.

  “Sweet Christ, Jason, just take my bra off.” The request was tortured and humorous, and one was I gladly complied with. I used a hand to reach behind her and unfasten the hooks and dragged my fingers over her body as I peeled the damn thing off.

  “Oh, God, yes…”

  Her arousal tickled my nose, and I
felt myself twitch. My wolf was scratching at me, telling me to hurry up. But the last thing I was going to do was hurry. She wasn’t leaving. She was mine.

  With a subtle motion, she let me know that her other tit was waiting for my mouth. I kissed a trail over to that hard peak, and feasted there.

  “Get naked, Jason. Please. Let’s just—”

  I unsnapped her pants and pulled them down her legs, and she followed suit. Her hands guided my bottoms down and off and we both threw the clothes to the top of the bed with the rest of what we had been wearing.

  She propped herself up and I wondered where she was going for just a moment until she spun on her hip and laid back down. Her mouth was now perfectly in line with my cock.

  But she didn’t take me in me her mouth, not right away. She tickled the fine hair on my thigh and moved her fingers across them to where my balls were waiting for her. Wrapping one hand around my shaft she moved toward my body and ran her tongue over the skin of my scrotum—and sucked one of my balls right into her mouth and teased it.

  “Oh, shit,” I managed breathe.

  I could feel her smile, and her leg slowly raised to a bent position, assailing me with the scent of her sex.

  I could take a hint.

  My thumbs found the sweet, hot lips that hid her clit from me and stroked them, deliberately and carefully. As Delia changed sides on my scrotum, I licked a slow path up her slit, and I could feel my dick jerk hard in her hand as she let out a groan. Her sound went right to the base of my erection and I moaned into her pussy.

  She shivered, and I slipped a finger into her wet channel. Hot and welcoming, I circled around her walls and withdrew just to slide back in with two fingers.

  “Oh, shit…” she breathed, popping me out of her mouth.

  “Suck me, baby,” I managed, pushing my hips at her. “Get your mouth around my cock.”

  No words were wasted. She slipped her lips over the head of my erection and drew me in, dancing her tongue around the sensitive flesh.

  I moved my fingers in and out of her pussy, her scent overwhelming me. I delighted her clit with licks and flicks of my tongue, both of us moaning as the pleasure suffused us.

  She was going to come before my cock sunk into her welcoming pussy. Thing was, I was probably going to come before that as well.

  Jason tasted so good to me. His thick cock pulsed with energy, and offered me tastes of him with teasing drops of his precum.

  I wanted all of his cum. I wanted to taste him, fully.

  Sucking him in deeper, I was proud of how far I was able to take him before I had to cover the rest of him with my fist.

  There was no way I could fit all of him in my mouth.

  And that was wonderful.

  He was doing his best to distract me, too, with his thumbs, fingers, and tongue all over my pussy. He’d never made it a secret that he loved the way I tasted, and he was having a feast on me.

  Our motions and moans bounced back and forth, echoing each other, bringing each other higher and higher and—damn.

  I wanted this. I wanted this every day of my life. Laying with my soulmate, my true mate, bringing each other pleasure. Naked under the stars, or the sun, or the blankets, or the shower head. Whatever.

  Just with him.

  My mouth slid up and down over his cock, when I could manage to concentrate long enough, and I could feel him twitch, and his length became a little harder. Which meant he was going to come soon. I added just a little teeth to my last suck and my other hand found the balls that nestled there. I petted them, and rolled them a little—a shot of desire powered through me, making me yelp, squirm, and want to come—then sucked hard on his shaft. I teased his tip and I felt his hips pop toward me.

  “Shit,” he hissed.

  His cum raced up his cock and I swallowed every drop, as his teeth scraped across my clit, and my own orgasm wracked my whole body, curling my toes. I was utterly boneless as I gave his cock one last little lick and fell away.

  “Are we always going to end up sixty-nine’ing?” I asked, staring up at the sky, gently stroking his thigh.

  “I sure do hope so,” he mumbled.

  As he spun on the mattress to set us right again, I laughed a little. I really didn’t have a problem with sixty-nine’ing. It seemed to be our thing.

  He lay on his side, propped up on his elbow as his other hand gently stroked over my breasts, one then the other. “God, I love you. I can’t believe I almost let you go.”

  “I can’t believe I almost went.”

  “Stay with me. Always. We’ll figure this out.”

  “There is nowhere else I’d rather be.”

  His hand was warm as he followed patterns only he could see on my skin. I turned and lay on my side, and just smiled at him.

  Chewing his lip, I could tell he wanted to ask me something. I wasn’t going to press, though. He was thinking hard, and my hand on his thigh met the resistance of his once-again-hard cock.

  Just being there with him was all I needed.

  He pulled in a deep breath. “You really want to mate with me?”

  I simply nodded.

  “My wolf is howling for me to take you, right here. Right now.”

  I nodded again.

  He closed his eyes for a moment and when he snapped them back open, they were glowing, yellow, full of desire, want, need.

  Sitting up, he coaxed me to roll to lay on my front, and as I settled, his hands were instantly all over me, massaging, feeling, trailing, touching. Using my arms as a pillow I watched him. He was so intent on me, on touching me, nothing else seemed to matter at all to him.

  And I found my body responding to his attention. I tried to just relax, but every touch shot right to my sex. There was no relief from him, and my hips started to move against the air mattress, trying to find something to push against.

  Jason’s hands found the globes of my ass, and his possessive hands massaged them, grabbed them, delighted in them.

  “You are so damn sexy,” he breathed.

  Before I could reach a hand out to grab his erection and play a little, he moved behind me, spreading my legs. His hands scorched my flesh as he moved them to the apex of my thighs, and the seam of my legs on either side of my pussy.

  A hiss escaped me…his touch wasn’t careful, but demanding and hard. I could feel the wetness on my legs, the want that trickled out, making me ready for his cock.

  Wrapping his hands around my hips, he pulled my ass into the air, and nudged me wider. His slightly roughened hands traveled up and down my spine and the mere intent of his motions had me trying to press back against him, trying to find his dick to impale myself on.

  “Impatient, love?”

  “Yes, damn it. Please…” I wasn’t above begging at this point. Every nerve ending in my body was humming or screaming for release.

  He dragged his shaft through my soaked slit, teasing me a little more. I was dying, slowly.

  Finally, though, I felt him fit the head of his cock against my channel and press in, one agonizing bit by agonizing bit. He pressed forward, until his erection was seated completely inside me.

  We exhaled at the same time, feeling complete. Whole. I knew that from that moment forward, I would always feel bereft of him, and never be fully happy unless he was inside me, possessing me.

  Jason started to move, pulling his hips back, pulling his cock back out of me—and then pushing forward again, filling me. It was a slow, lazy rhythm at first, just for us to enjoy the sensation of being together. Of fucking. Of sex. Of making love.

  His magical hands followed a path down to my breasts and each thumb found a nipple, stroking over them, then pressing his palms to them. His hands plumped them, enjoying their weight, and the sensation trickled down my spine.

  “Ohhh,” I breathed out, the sensation of sexual satisfaction landing once again exactly where we were joined. “Yes.”

  Jason’s hips started to thrust faster, harder. Our joined bodies heated, and
I could feel both of us rising through the lust, heading for our climaxes. One of his hands left my breast and found my clit—dusting his finger over it.

  Almost unthinking, I shoved my ass back against him as he pushed forward. We crashed, and the lazy lovemaking was gone in that instant. He grabbed a hip, and started thrusting, harder, faster—even deeper.

  “I’m coming,” I breathed, his cock hitting a deep, tender spot inside. “Oh, God, Jason, make me come!”

  He growled. Honest-to-God growled. His body leaned forward and covered mine, and I felt the scrape of his teeth against my skin, just at the joining of shoulder and neck.

  His hot breath scalded my skin. “You want this?”

  “Yes, please. Mate with me, Jason. Make me yours.”

  “Mine,” he growled.

  His hand let go of my breast, and I could feel his arm across my back. A moment later his arm appeared in front of me as he sank his fangs into my neck. He clamped down hard, and our lovemaking became animalistic rutting. I grabbed his wrist and brought the intentional wound to my mouth.

  I didn’t care what he tasted like—but I was delighted to find that he was warm like wine and chocolate as I swallowed the offering of his blood.

  The climax ripped through both of us, tearing primal screams from both of us, freezing us in place while our brains and bodies tried to process the shock of pure, sheer bliss that flooded both of us.

  His cum raced into me, bathing me as my own walls clamped down possessively on his cock. We weren’t locked together, but there was no hope of moving for long seconds as the pleasure rode us both hard.

  “Jason!” It was a scream so powerful the sound ripped out of me.

  “Delia.” His voice was harsh and low but a scream nonetheless, as he pumped the rest of his orgasm into me.

  I was pretty sure we both blacked out for a few seconds, because the next thing I knew, we were curled together on our sides, spooned, his now-softening erection still twitching just a bit inside me.

  A thin sheen of sweat coated both of us, but I didn’t care. I snuggled back against him—and I could feel far more than just him, physically. I could feel his thoughts swirling, his exhaustion, his satisfaction.