by Mina Carter
"Aye, I am,” he agreed. “Lycaon."
Penny gasped as the same three-note melody as before echoed through the room. “How did..."
"How did I know?” he asked, his head tilted to the side as, with rough movements, he removed the manacles from her slender wrists. Stunned, Penny let him.
"It's a standard keyword for wolf chains.” He shrugged and stepped back, giving every evidence of departure.
"Hey! Where are you going now?” Confusion colored her voice as she rubbed at her wrists, smoothing the sore spots where the heavy manacles had pressed.
He looked back over his shoulder, hot silver eyes flicking once over her naked body. “You need to mate, and I'm not watching as you fuck someone else. See you around, Penny."
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Chapter 3
Penny watched frozen as Cade headed up the stairs, only spurred into action as the door slammed at the top. He was right, she needed a mate. She knew, on an instinctive level, everything he'd said—about going feral without a mate, without sex—was true. He hadn't tried to push her into sex, assuming she already had a boyfriend, which meant he wasn't just interested in sex. But she didn't have a boyfriend, so now she was up the creek without a paddle.
She needed a mate, and she needed one fast. If she didn't have sex by the time the moon had risen, her body would force a change and send her out into the night looking for one. And it wouldn't be picky about who. Or what. She shuddered at the thought. It could be any male; full wolf, human, even a vampire if one was unlucky enough to cross her path. As long as it had a cock, the heat wouldn't care. Closing her eyes, she realized her last chance at anything close to having some sort of choice in all this was about to walk out of the door upstairs.
"Wait,” she shouted, fear lending wings to her heels as she took the stairs two at a time.
"Yes?” he asked, his hand stilling on the handle of the back door as Penny appeared behind him in the basement doorway. He didn't turn, his head down and his broad back turned to her as he waited for her to speak.
"I don't have one,” she admitted in a low voice.
"You don't have one what?” His back was still turned, his head down.
Penny gritted her teeth. “I don't have a boyfriend,” she said, a flush building over her cheeks. He was going to make this hard. Okay, she could handle that. She had to handle it, anything was better than the picture he'd painted. But she'd never asked a guy for sex before, not in so many words anyway.
"I see."
Penny bit her lip, watching his turned back for some sort of a reaction as she padded over the tiled floor on bare feet.
"Uhm, so, I was thinking...” She trailed off, instead reaching out to touch his shoulder.
He turned, faster than she could see or react to, her hand suddenly engulfed in a hard grip as amber eyes blazed down at her.
"So, you want me to service you, is that it Penny? No safe little human boyfriend for you to pretend with so you want the big, bad rogue wolf to fuck you? You want me to fuck you?"
Her eyes widened as she reared back, surprise in her eyes at his crude words. Surprise swiftly followed by arousal, a wet heat flooding her body at the sensitive apex between her thighs.
"You do,” he murmured, a hint of triumph in his voice. He pulled her hand closer, running his lips across the inside of her wrist. Not touching, not quite, instead inhaling the scent of her skin. Penny's heart stuttered in her chest, an erratic rhythm that matched her breathing as she watched his amber gaze deepen.
"I can smell your need. You need it, and you need it bad, don't you Little Wolf?” he whispered, drawing her into his strong arms, his free hand winding into the thick hair at the nape of her neck. He held her still and looked down into her eyes. “Why did you let it get this bad, Penny?” he demanded in a low voice, “You could have any man you wanted, human or wolf, so why?"
Penny shrugged, heat and chills chasing over her skin wherever he touched her, shivering as his hand swept along her arm and down her bare back. He pressed her naked body against him from breast to thigh. She didn't need any encouragement, arching her back and rubbing against him eagerly. She didn't want to talk, the moon was rising outside, and she needed him to touch her, get on with it.
"You planning on talking all night?” she bit out, “Not exactly the big bad wolf you promised, are you?” she challenged, a challenge that got a swift reaction.
"So you just want to screw? We can do that,” he said, his voice low and dangerous. Penny squealed as she was lifted suddenly and deposited on the counter behind her. She gasped as the sensitive skin of her backside hit the cold marble, the contrast between the warm male body in front of her and the chill against her ass made her squirm.
Roughly, he shoved her thighs apart, stepping between them to press the hardness at the front of his jeans against her needy flesh. His large hands swept up the outside of her thighs as his lips descended, claiming hers. A fierce kiss designed to punish, but for what Penny didn't know and didn't really care. She moaned as his tongue swept out to brush the full curve of her lower lip, demanding entrance to the silken recesses of her mouth. However cool he appeared, the intensity of his kiss was evidence of his need and she relaxed, allowing him entrance past her lips.
Sensation, pleasure coursed through her as he explored her soft mouth, one hand hard in her hair as he drank from her, taking what he wanted. Not that Penny wasn't taking as well, matching him kiss for kiss, using her tongue to duel with his and challenging the dominance he was trying to assert. Which surprised her. She'd never considered herself particularly dominant, but not submissive either. Yet one more way she didn't fit into life as a Wolf.
His other hand swept up her back, fingertips brushing the sensitive skin over her spine. A touch so light he only just stroked the tiny hairs along the skin. An electric shiver shot through her, her back arching in response to offer her bared breasts up to him as the soft flesh pressed against the hard muscled wall of his chest.
"God, you feel good,” he whispered, his voice ragged as he dragged her closer, kissing her as though he wanted to crawl inside and take up residence. The tension between them mounted, each kiss, each caress driving the heat between them higher.
"Less talk, more kissing,” she ordered between hot, open mouthed kisses. She couldn't believe this was happening. When they'd told her about a female wolf's Heat phase she'd been so adamant she wasn't going to be forced into screwing some guy just because of a biological urge. But now she was actually here, experiencing the all consuming need for the first time, she understood the warnings. The alternative was so hideous she didn't have a choice in the screwing part.
But she could decide on who it would be with. Of all the people she could have picked from, human or wolf, her dream team so to speak, Cade would have topped the list. She'd always found the lone wolf disturbingly attractive. Desperate to touch him, feel his skin under her hands, she pulled at his t-shirt. The fabric, although sturdy, wasn't proof against a heat-driven werewolf, and the sound of tearing cloth filled the room.
She breathed a sigh of relief as his skin was revealed to her, satin smooth over the heavy steel of his muscles. Tearing her lips from his she explored the curve of his jaw, running her cheek against his and reveling in the difference between his stubble roughened skin and her smooth cheek.
It was a very lupine gesture as her eyes opened in the increasing darkness of the room, their normal human green now a startling emerald, as though lit from within as her wolf rode her.
Cade sucked his breath in at the sight. He'd always found Penny attractive. More than that, she fascinated him on a very primal, masculine level. There was just something about her, an indefinable quality that would have had any male wolf sitting up and taking notice. Something Cade was sure his father had taken into account when he'd bitten her. It was what had kept him returning to Roakestown these last six months. He hadn't been able to stay away, even though his plans had been to collect his stuff and
get as far away from the place as he could. Particularly when Big Jimmy had taken over.
But he hadn't been able to. She'd cast a subtle lure over him, keeping him coming back for more. Watching her from afar as she adapted to life in the pack, each moon getting more confident in herself, in her wolf. So he'd kept coming back, knowing, like every other male wolf in the vicinity, that she would go into heat soon. That period once a year that a female wolf was driven to mate, needed it more than she needed to breathe. Hell, he'd been surprised there hadn't been a queue forming, ready and waiting for her to make her choice. Not that Big Jimmy had planned to let her make that choice, that much had been obvious, and Cade was glad she'd had the guts to escape before the Moon Madness hit.
But it wasn't that quality that was calling Cade at the moment. It was the deliciously curvy body pressed against him, and the rising scent of her arousal. A scent that plucked at his self control in ways he hadn't experienced since he was a cub. He wanted her, pure and simple. He'd sworn he wasn't going to make a play for her when he found her. But that had been when he'd assumed she had a human lover. Finding out she didn't have a lover at all, human or otherwise, had completely swept away his good intentions. So when she'd touched him, he'd caved in.
She was in heat, and she needed a mate. The plan she'd had was suicidal, and there was no way Cade would allow her to risk going feral. It would break his heart to have to hunt her down and put her out of her misery. However, he was more than happy to see to her more physical needs. Looking the way she did, that wasn't going to be any sort of hardship. Just doing his duty for the community, he told himself, by stopping a female wolf going feral. Yeah, right. And the fact you've always had the hots for her doesn't have anything to do with it then?
Penny's hands swept over his bared shoulders in appreciation, her lips moving along the side of his neck and finding the line of his collarbone. She alternated kisses and tiny nips that drew low growls from deep within Cade's chest. “Playing with fire there, doll."
She chuckled and nipped him again, the playfulness of the wolf coming out. And then bit him again, a little harder. Hard enough to mark the skin but not break it. Penny soothed the small hurt with quick brushes of her tongue.
"Yeah, yeah,” she threw back, mischief twinkling in her eyes. “Who's afraid of the big, bad wolf?"
Cade couldn't help himself, a laugh rumbling through his big frame at her irrepressible manner. Even on the run from a psycho Alpha, she still had that spark. An attitude he'd found so fascinating.
Something he knew Jimmy would beat out of her if he got her into his clutches, something Cade couldn't, no, wouldn't let happen.
"If I'm the big bad wolf, then you get to be the little pig...” he replied, catching her at the nape of her neck again and kissing her deeply. “Which means I get to eat you all up..."
Penny's answer dried in her throat at the sensual promise in his voice. He slid down her body, stopping to nip at her chin before drawing the tip of his tongue down the centre of her throat and lower. The warm brush of his tongue across her skin, like the stroke of warm velvet, stole her breath away. His mouth closed over her taut nipple, sucking the sensitive flesh into the warm cavern and suckling hard. Her hands drove into his short hair, holding him to her. She moaned and arched her back, offering more to the touch of his lips. He moved from one breast to the other, making sure both were well attended to until Penny was ready to scream in frustration. Pleasure whirled through her like a raging torrent, the pull of his mouth on her breasts pulling the tension at her core, as though there was a direct line between the two.
But before she could marshal herself to say anything, direct him to where she needed him most, he trailed kisses down the taut skin of her stomach. Penny sucked her breath in sharply as his hands urged her thighs further apart. His hands stroked in, gentle fingers opening her dewy folds to him. The first touch of his tongue against her was electric, wringing a moan from the depths of Penny's soul. Then he opened her further to his lips and tongue, sucking and kissing. Long slow licks of his tongue followed by swift hard suckling on the tender nub of her clitoris almost sent her through the ceiling. Oh god, that felt so good! Penny's head dropped back, her hands tangled in his hair as she held him to her, urging him on silently.
He didn't disappoint. No one gave oral like a wolf and, as Penny was rapidly finding out, there was no wolf quite like Cade. His clever tongue swirled and teased until she writhed on the counter, desperate for the climax he withheld from her. He pulled away just as she reached the edge, the pause interminable before he touched her again. Teasing her until Penny thought she was going mad.
"Cade, please,” she moaned as he pulled away and left her teetering on the edge again. Far from helping her in her time of need, he was driving her mad instead. He pulled away again, the rumble of his laugh vibrating against her skin and making her eyes roll back in her head.
"Please what Penny? What do you want?” he asked, his voice silky in the encroaching darkness.
Penny almost howled in frustration.
"Come on Cade, you know what I mean, what I need!"
"Then tell me,” he ordered as his tongue swept over her. “Tell me what you want me to do to you."
"Just fuck me,” she commanded, a demand that would have made her blush to even think about before. Not now. Not with the scent of aroused male and sex swirling in the air around her. Her inhibitions disappearing as the moon rose outside.
He stood in front of her, white teeth flashing in the shadows. “Your wish is my command, little Wolf,” he breathed, the whisper of his zipper loud in the silent room. Penny smoothed her hands down his sculptured torso, reaching lower as he released himself from the confining denim. His hardness filled her hand.
"Oh God...” Cade's head fell back to bare the strong line of his throat in the pale moonlight filtering through the window. “Th—that feels good.” he managed as Penny stroked him firmly, feeling the length and breadth of him. His size took her breath away, and she chuckled, suddenly feeling a little nervous. “Big bad wolf indeed.” She swept her finger over the sensitive head of his cock.
"Oh yeah, I'm bad...” He looked down again, his eyes bright in the darkness, alive with heat and need. He ran his hands over her hips and pulled her to the edge of the counter. The perfect position for him to run the hard head of his cock against her sensitized flesh.
"Prove it,” she challenged, a verbal gauntlet.
He held her eyes as he dipped his knees, the swollen head of his erection pressing against her soft, feminine flesh. Penny's breathing caught as he pushed and her body yielded, stretching to accept him.
Slow by deliciously slow inch he pushed inside her. Stretching her, filling her until, with one last push, his hips met hers, the two of them locked together as they stared into each other's eyes. It was the most erotic thing Penny had ever experienced, watching the changes in his eyes as he slid within her. She watched his eyes darken and his nostrils flare, visual reactions to the sensation as their bodies joined. Then he was deep inside her, his cock pulsing as they stilled. A moment's pause as their eyes caught, held. As though each recognized something in the other.
"You feel good.” His voice was more a groan than a whisper. He covered her lips with his own, and slid out of her again. His next thrust wasn't as slow, a long slide into her as he seated himself to the hilt again. He held still as a muscle in his jaw pulsed. He was fighting for control, Penny realized with a shock, still reeling from the power in his thrust and the sensations spiraling through her. She smiled and rocked her hips. “And that, what's that feel like?” she murmured, a siren's whisper in the silence.
His eyes snapped open, the hot look in them all the answer she needed. He didn't answer but moved instead, his hips setting up a hard fast rhythm. His hard cock pressed into her needy body with a power she found breathtaking. She clung to him and wrapped her legs around his lean hips. Hard pleasure radiated through her body from where their bodies were joined, sensations t
hat quickly built into a maelstrom, an electrical storm that surged through her body, lingering under her skin as he held her tight in his arms.
Then time slowed, Penny hovering on the edge. Just one more good hard thrust and she would come undone. She lifted her lips from his shoulder, catching his eyes with hers. Then her body stiffened, tension and need became ecstasy as she cried out, coming hard around him.
"Fuck!” He cursed, the sound making her pussy clamp tight around him, milking him as she climaxed. She could feel the trembles of his big body as he held on, trying to delay his climax. His hips pounded against hers, the movement growing shorter, more powerful. He threw his head back and howled, thrusting deep, his body rigid as his cock pulsed deep inside her.
* * * *
It was a cloudless night, perfect for running. High and fully risen now, the moon shone down brightly through the window of Penny's living room. A bright banner of silvery light sliced across the darkness of the room and fell across the two naked bodies lying entwined on the sofa.
A very uncomfortable, very lumpy sofa that was doing its best to drive a spring into one of Cade's kidneys. He grimaced as he tried to shift position without waking the woman dozing across his broad chest. Cade wasn't the ‘cuddling’ sort but, with Penny ... well, with Penny all bets seemed to be off. He wasn't reacting as he usually did with women, which was to leave as soon as he could. Often as soon as they'd dropped off to sleep. But this time, he had no itching drive to get away. In fact, right at this moment he couldn't think of anywhere he'd rather be than here with his arms wrapped around the curvy figure half lying over him.
He reached out to brush a lock of her dark hair, darker than he remembered it, back from her temple. A grin spread over his face. She'd been insatiable. Cade had needed every trick in the book to satisfy her heat-driven desire, that and the stamina of an Olympic athlete. He wasn't complaining, there was nothing like a female Wolf in heat, and he'd kept up with her, not needing to cry off for a rest.
