“It feels wrong to talk about this with you.” She felt like she’d torn a hole open in something that no one wanted to look at, but now they had to because it was there in front of them.
“Who else are you going to talk about it with?”
“Doesn’t it hurt you? Or make you uncomfortable?”
“Less so than asking me to kiss you. At least this way, I know I’m providing for your needs.”
It all clicked for her then. That was how he made it right in his head, that was how he connected all the dots so sharing his wife with another male was okay. It was what she needed. An Alpha male always provided whatever his mate or any of those who were dependent on him needed. If they didn’t, it was like a physical pain.
A pain that would strike hotter and harder than any pride or sense of territory.
“I don’t know that I can live this way.”
“That’s why we’re here.”
Chapter Four
“So, I see you’ve met Antony,” Cassius whispered casually through the open window later that evening.
Marchessa blew out a puff of air and pushed her hair behind her ear. She’d been curled up in her room, alternately watching the dark water through the glass floor in the corner of the room and reading.
“So you’ve traded off?” He was lucky she’d caught his scent before he’d startled her. Otherwise, she might’ve had a fight or flight reaction and kicked his ass up over his shoulders for sneaking up on her.
“I’m disappointed that you’re not more surprised to see me.”
“If you want to surprise me, you should stand downwind.” She didn’t look up from the book.
“Such a chilly reception. After last night, I thought you’d welcome me back.” He wandered around the cottage and in through the door.
“So you two are just going to hand me off?”
“We had this discussion, Marchessa. It’s not like that. You chose to be here. You can choose to leave.”
“And if I told you that I wanted you to go? If I said I didn’t want you?” She needed to know her boundaries, but so did he. She needed space to think, to process. To understand what was happening to her.
“I’d say you were a damn liar.”
“Why? Because your proximity turns me on?” And it did. Christ, just remembering what it was like to be pinned beneath him, his cock thrusting into her, the plunge of his hips as he rode her… She shivered. “I didn’t say that it didn’t. But I don’t want what comes with it. This feels like a betrayal.”
“Antony said—”
“I don’t care what he said. When I met him, he smelled like—” she bit her lip, unsure of how she wanted to say this to him “—mine.”
“He is. As am I.”
“You’re not understanding me.” He wasn’t listening.
“I don’t think you’re understanding yourself.”
“What? Look, I don’t need your man-splaining. I know myself very well.”
“Then you should know that you don’t want to live without passion. And you don’t have to, unless you choose to.”
“Maybe I’m choosing to.” She didn’t believe the words even as they took flight from her lips. Marchessa would never choose to live a life without passion. But there was something about Antony. Something that marked him as hers and her as his.
Only it paled to some sickly, fragile thing, a wispy shadow when Cassius touched her.
And in that moment, it was him who was hers and him who owned her.
It made her wonder if all the other males in her life had been right. That she wasn’t an Alpha bitch at all, but just a bitch in heat who couldn’t control herself. That’s what Stefan had said to her when he’d found out about her affair with Woolven.
Maybe he was right.
She wanted both Antony and Cassius.
They both said she could have that, but it seemed wrong—false somehow. Like this was all some test. If she had to choose right now, she’d choose Antony. He was strong, solid and grounded.
Cassius was hot, wild and free.
Cassius was a fuck.
Antony was the kind of male one committed to.
But Cassius was kissing her neck, his fingers working their way between her thighs and she was slick and ready for him. Her whole body came alive when he touched her—including that wild part deep down inside that she tried to hide even from herself. That rush of power, of freedom, it was primal—an addiction.
She was too weak, too battered and he made it too damn easy to surrender.
“Why are you doing this to me?” she pleaded, clinging to him.
“Because you want me to.” His teeth grazed her throat, that place that was still tender from where he’d marked her with a mate’s bite.
Thank hell they were still in their human form, or there would’ve been no ignoring it. She’d have been bonded to him forever. That was the last damn thing she needed.
Only her body was telling her it was the first, the only, the always.
“Do you want me to stop?” He pulled back and searched her face.
She met his eyes, barely able to keep her own open. She was dizzy with lust. “Don’t stop.”
“You want me to fuck you like I did last night, take you hard?”
Marchessa shoved him onto his back. “No. I’m going to take you hard.”
He looked like the wolf that ate the rabbit, such was the predatory pleasure on his face. “Oh really? You want to be Alpha in the bedroom, too?”
“For right now.” She grinned. “No one said you could speak.” Marchessa pinned his hands above his head and pushed his t-shirt up and over so that she could wrap it around his wrists.
He rewarded her with a laugh. “What are you going to do with me?”
“I told you to be quiet. Every time you disobey me, the longer you have to wait to come.”
His eyes darkened. “What if I did that to you, pretty princess? What if I kept you on the edge and even when you begged me so prettily with your hot little mouth, I made you beg some more?”
“I’m counting on it.” She smirked.
Her walls clenched, thinking about it. She hoped he did the same thing to her. Hoped he’d play her body like he was the master of a well-crafted instrument, strumming all of her pleasures to volatile explosions.
Slowly, she dragged her nails down his chest and abs, down to where she pulled at the waist of his jeans. He looked so good in them, it was almost a crime to peel them off. But she wasn’t going to get what she wanted just looking at him.
She tugged at the denim and dragged it down his body, freeing his thick, swollen cock.
Marchessa didn’t know if a person could be addicted to cock, but she was, to this one. To Cassius himself. She kept saying she wasn’t going to do this, but for the second time, she couldn’t stop.
Didn’t want to stop.
All of the previous arguments and agreements she’d made with herself became so much flotsam in the sea of her desire. They were just words, flimsy things made of air and he was hot, solid, and ready to give her everything she wanted.
She held eye contact as she took him into her mouth, swirled her tongue over the proud crown of his cock. Marchessa liked watching his eyes, black glittering pools that promised she’d get exactly what she gave. She tightened her palm around his shaft stroking up and down as she worked the head. Marchessa alternated using her mouth and taking him deep to stroking with her hand.
Never once did she look away from him.
It was he who looked away first, he who tilted his head back while his hips thrust up toward the pleasure she offered him. She loved the feel of him, the slide of his shaft across her tongue, the way they fell into a synchronized rhythm of pleasure.
This made her feel powerful, evoking such things in him. Moving him to her desires. Taking him as high as she wished and holding him there, poised at the edge of something he wanted so desperately and it was all within her purview to grant or deny.
And
she chose to deny him that ultimate culmination.
Not because she was cruel—although she could be.
But because they both wanted more.
Just has his cock surged against tongue, she pulled back and licked her way up his insanely cut abs, darting back down to give the hard line of his obliques the proper tribute it so righteously deserved. Then up to his hard, flat nipple, she nipped causing him to wince, but pushing the hands he’d freed from their bonds through the length of her hair and guiding her ever closer to her work.
She paused at his throat and licked, flicking her tongue over the pulse there. She liked knowing his heart beat faster for her.
Marchessa shimmied out of her panties and pulled her t-shirt over her head, flinging it to the floor. Then she straddled him, his cock nestled against her slick cleft. She rolled her hips, teasing him and herself.
“I can’t get enough of your cock,” she said she against his lips, taking them just as she shifted to finally allow him entry.
He growled and thrust up into her, his face changing, nails elongating and digging into her soft, human flesh. But she liked it, wanted more of it. Marchessa loved the sharp sting of his claws tearing at her as she rode him.
Her own change was near, her wolf howling and demanded to make her presence known. Demanding free rein with her bite.
She leaned down and bit into the hollow of his throat, and just as she did, she felt his teeth pierce her flesh.
He topped her now, throwing her on her back, but then turning her over so that she was on all fours. He mounted her from behind and savagely bit the other side of her throat.
Vaguely, through the bliss, she decided he had another bite coming. But for now, she surrendered to him, to the sensation, to the bliss she knew only he could deliver her.
Being taken by him felt so right, so perfect.
Sensation built inside of her, tension like the electricity of a violent storm, her wolf rising to the surface and springing free.
They fucked like the animals they were, primal and dark.
When culmination came, it was accompanied by their duet of howls rising into the black night.
Chapter Five
She noticed that when morning came, Cassius was gone again. The space on the bed beside her had long grown cold and the warm scent of him was the same as the male himself, a memory.
Marchessa would admit that she felt like he’d abandoned her. She wanted to know what it was like to wake up with him.
A gentle knock on the door interrupted her thoughts.
“Marchessa, are you awake?”
Antony.
So that’s how it was to be? During the day she got Antony but the night belonged to Cassius? She stretched, her body aching in ways and places she hadn’t known were possible.
“Give me a moment.” She luxuriated into the stretch.
“We’ll have brunch at the resort if you like.”
Brunch. She liked the sound of that. “Give me bacon and I’ll follow you anywhere.”
“There’s a little pig, Big Bad joke in there somewhere, but I’ll leave it until you’re awake.”
She laughed. “I’m coming.”
“Dress casual. We’ll dine on the beach, if you like.”
Marchessa grabbed a white sundress, but reconsidered the Coach sandals. She decided maybe she’d go barefooted, as Antony had been the day before. She ran her fingers through her hair and used the en suite bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face.
Looking at her face in the mirror, she paused.
Her skin had a distinctive glow. The wildness that she always felt inside was in her eyes. Her hair was a wreck, all that salt and it fell in tangled waves. But she kind of liked it.
Yeah, she liked the wolf looking back at her.
Mostly.
She smiled, then bared her teeth at herself, then smiled again.
Marchessa wandered out into the main living area of the cottage and found Antony waiting for her with a steaming cup of espresso, which she accepted gratefully. It was hot, buttery and rich. Just the way she liked it.
“How did you know?”
“We’re civilized creatures, after all.” He smirked.
When she’d finished the coffee, he offered her his arm. She found that she rather liked his old school manners. Marchessa tucked her palm around his bicep. She liked that too. It was ridiculously big, and so hard and warm.
“You look beautiful today, Marchessa.”
“So do you.” His compliment bloomed like a flower inside of her, the petals filling up all the cold empty spaces with pretty things.
The smirk bloomed into a real smile. He was wearing another pair of white linen pants and this time, his shirt was a light blue. The contrast was gorgeous on him.
“I have a gift for you.”
“You didn’t have to,” she said automatically.
“But you’ll allow me to spoil you, won’t you?” His eyes were dark with something she couldn’t name.
If he’d phrased it some other way, she might have said no. She didn’t need to be spoiled. She felt she was already taking advantage of him by sleeping with Cassius. Which was stupid. The Alpha of the Rommulus pack being taken advantage of by anyone was a laughable proposition.
“If it pleases you.” She found herself trying to make light of the gift. There was nothing she could give him in return. Not even herself.
“Good. It does.” He handed her a robin’s egg blue box.
Tiffany’s.
She opened it and found something else much like a robin’s egg. It was a teardrop shaped aquamarine necklace on a platinum chain.
“It’s stunning,” she breathed.
“Then it will have found a good home on a stunning female. Allow me?” He asked permission, obviously to put the necklace on her.
She lifted her hair and his fingers grazed her neck, sending shivers of awareness down her spine. Marchessa could still feel the heat of his hands as they touched her, the warmth of his powerful presence.
The jewel hung cool and solid just above her cleavage.
“Do you like it?” He led her to the mirror.
Like it? How could she not?
“I hoped since it was the same color as the water, it would remind you of your time here.”
But she wasn’t looking at the necklace.
She was looking at the two of them standing together.
They looked so good, a complementary set.
Her fingers fluttered to the necklace. “Thank you.”
Expectation was suddenly heavy in the room, or maybe it was just in her head. He didn’t feel these things like this, didn’t want to know that she did. She cast her eyes down.
Then he did something unexpected. His hands were on her shoulders and he leaned forward and bused her cheek with a press of his lips.
“Does that suit you, Marchessa?”
“Very much,” she mumbled.
He led her outside and she followed him to the boat, allowed him to help her down into the craft.
Cassius probably would’ve suggested they swim.
The rebel in her would’ve wanted to.
But she was this person too. The one who liked the finer things in life. The one who wanted to be pampered, petted, and spoiled. Weekends in exotic places, brunch on the beach with bacon and bellinis.
She wondered how long she could keep this up.
No creature could have two masters.
Not that either one of the males were her master, but the duality of who she was. It was like burning the candle at both ends.
As the boat picked up speed, she turned her face into the wind loving the feel of her hair whipping around and all the scents she caught. Suntan oil, coconut, orange juice, the sharp tang of liquor, the water, and even the sun on the sand had its own unique smell.
She exhaled heavily and inhaled again. It was as if she were expelling all the bad thoughts, the uncomfortable feelings and drawing in everything that this place mad
e her feel. All that warmth, the freedom, and the terrible hope that lurked in the smallest change.
He docked at the Four Seasons and staff met them and escorted them to a picture perfect table right on the sand. Marchessa was handed a bellini and there was already a plate of various fruits on the table.
She could so get used to this.
“Thank you,” she said quietly. This was all so unexpected.
“For what?”
“For giving me here. This time. The necklace. For making me feel like I’m special. Like I have a say in what happens to me.” She’d never that feeling before.
“You do.”
She perused the menu for a long while, suddenly feeling shy. That was unlike her, but she didn’t know what to say to him.
His phone buzzed and he broke the silence.“Oh, my dear. I’m so sorry. I have to go back to Roluscany after our brunch.”
His expression was tight.
“What’s wrong?”
“Armand. He’s unhurt, but he was attacked. On the grounds of the estate.”
“That was a direct swipe at you, I’m sure. Do you have any idea who it was?”
“We’re currently having a small disagreement with Luc Ardennes. He’s insulted that Armand refused his offer of Sabine, his daughter, for a mate. Among other things.”
“Armand is your heir prima, is he not?”
“He is.”
“Then he gets to choose for love. Not business or lineage.” She shook her head. “Did Luc forget that part?”
Antony nodded. “Probably. He had to mate for holdings himself even as an Alpha. He’s insulted.” Antony shrugged. “Luc is always insulted. But this… if it’s him, there will be an unholy reckoning.”
Power reverberated in his voice and she shivered. “It sounds like there’s much more to it. I sense something else in your voice. What aren’t you telling me?”
“You’re intuitive.” He nodded. “The last time I attempted to marry was in the 80’s. Before you were born. Luc wanted her. I got her.”
“What happened?”
“She died. He blames me.”
“Is it your fault?” She bit her lip.
“Yes,” he admitted easily.
“What happened?”
Princess of the Pack Page 4
