by Unknown
One trembling heartbeat shuddered past, and then he hauled her into his arms, crushed her to him. He slanted his mouth over hers, deepened the kiss, swamping her senses with hungry need.
Yes…the same firm, skillful lips.
****
The darker, primal side of his nature urged him to drag her to the floor, to ravish her then and there on the cold hardwood and claim her once more as his mate. The man in him—every bit as hungry and as possessive as the primal wolf—swept her up into his arms and carried her down the hallway to his bed.
Impatient hands stripped away the irritating barriers standing between him and her soft flesh.
His lips drank in her impassioned murmurs, her cries of delight. His hands explored and pleasured every inch of her body, memorizing every curve and every dip, every sensitive place that wrung another moan from her lips.
The stimulating taste of her, the exhilarating scent and enticing texture, were a heady aphrodisiac to his already overheated system, one he imbibed with insatiable abandon. He could make love to this woman— would make love to her, would love her—
for the rest of his life, and he’d never get enough of her. She gasped and squirmed beneath his lips, beneath his hands, his body. By no means were her hands idle, stroking him, stoking the desire raging inside him. She left a trail of fire everywhere she touched, and he happily basked in the flames. Her flesh was damp with his kisses, damp with her need 319
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for him. A thin slice of lightning danced above the treetops, lancing through the room, and his mark upon her flesh flashed before his burning gaze. That sight was more than his flimsy grasp on control could handle.
With a harsh growl, he seized her lips, and he sank himself deep inside her molten flesh. She closed around him like a tight, silken fist. So hot. So very wet. Her legs clamped around his waist, her hands clutched at him, pulling him closer. The scent of her need cloaked him, until he tossed caution to the wind and eagerly dove beneath the waves of passion to seek the deepest wells of her desire.
This was coming home for him. Here—in her—
was where he lived…not just the shallow existence he’d been passing off as life, but true heart-pounding, soul-binding life. He drove himself into her, over and over—unable to stop, unable to slow down—until she shuddered beneath him, sobbing his name. His release ripped through him as he poured himself out deep inside her body while his lips tasted the mark he’d placed below her ear. His soul reached out and touched hers, and together the two of them pulsed with life and glowed as one.
At length, once he’d recovered some slim grasp on his control, his lips savored hers, reverent and languid, before he moved to her side and pulled her into the curve of his body.
A long while later, as moonlight pushed through the angry storm clouds, turning the droplets of rain coursing down the windowpanes to liquid diamonds, Cam laced his fingers through JJ’s, resting their joined fists over his heart.
“So…only the males of direct decent are able to…to change?”
“Shift,” he corrected gently. “Yes…but not all of them. It seems to be a recessive gene.” Her questions had started soon after she’d 320
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gotten her breath back. They’d been tentative at first, but they’d come faster and with more confidence as he’d opened himself up to her completely. And they hadn’t stopped. She was, it seemed, a bottomless well of curiosity. He was just surprised and grateful she’d decided to keep an open mind.
“Are there many in town with this recessive gene?”
“Quite a few, actually.” She tensed in his arms, and he smoothed his palm up and down her back in slow, reassuring strokes. “It’s very important that we maintain anonymity, or, as I’m sure you can imagine, there’d be wide-spread panic.” At length, she nodded against his shoulder, rubbing her thumb along the ridge of his knuckles. He explained to her about the elders, the significance of The Circle he’d found her in that day. Then he began paving the way to explain the mark he’d branded on her body…a mark she still seemed oblivious of.
“Including me, there are ten in the current pack.” He rattled off a few names, some she was familiar with, and some he was sure she didn’t know. Her head snapped up, and she’d peered at him with a comical, wide-eyed expression when he mentioned Maggie’s awkward, gaunt husband Rich, and the handsome, laid-back, silver-tipped deputy, Austin Perry. “Until a few years back, Todd Connor was the pack’s Beta. After Todd died, Austin’s stepped into the role.”
Her brow puckered. “Beta…so that’s the hierarchy thing right? Second in command, so to speak?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“So, if Austin is the…the Beta,” she lifted her eyebrows on the word, and he nodded affirmation,
“then that would mean there’s an Alpha right? A leader?”
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“Yes.” His mouth kicked up at the edges. She was very quick-witted, had been following his explanations with intelligent, pointed questions.
“Who is the Alpha?”
He’d anticipated that question would come up sooner or later. He’d never felt as much pride in his position as he did in the moment when he answered,
“I am.”
“You are?” She stared at him for a long, silent moment. Admiration flickered through her eyes.
Something else flickered there as well, what it was he could only speculate given the mysteries of a woman’s mind. At length, she murmured a soft,
“Hmm.” Then she settled her head back on his shoulder, a soft smile curving her lips.
That small smile puffed his chest up, filling him with burgeoning pride. Then he remembered he had one point still to explain to her, and his confidence faltered. This conversation had gone so well, better, really, than he’d hoped. How would she react when she found out that he’d marked her as his, without her approval…without her knowledge? He drew a deep breath and prayed his luck would hold out.
“There’s something else I need to explain.” The tiny circles she traced on his chest with the tip of her finger were distracting, as was the lush press of her bare breasts against his chest when she squirmed around to looking up into his eyes again, but he firmly pushed his body’s reaction to the back burner.
It was crunch time now. All or nothing.
“According to legend…according to the elders, and some of the others in the pack, if a Werewolf is lucky, he’ll find his one true mate…a Lifemate.
When he finds her, when he imprints upon her, there’s no turning back, no…no second choice. He’ll be unable to take another as his mate, to love another. When he finds his female, the need to claim her as his own, to mark her as his will be 322
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undeniable…inescapable. He’ll be faithful to her until his dying day. He’d lay down his life for her.”
“Mark her?” She frowned, chewing on the edge of her lip.
“A mark…just like it sounds…he, well, he bites her.” Cam shot her a sheepish look. The ball of anxiety rolled in his gut. He couldn’t remember ever being this nervous in his life. “A Werewolf’s bite leaves behind a mark…a permanent, um, brand if you will. Each Werewolf’s bite is distinctive, the mark recognizable to all others in the pack.”
“So just by this mark, all the others know she belongs to him—is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes, but its more than that. This mark…it’s like a beacon to the Werewolf, it draws him to her, links them together in a way nothing else can. The sight of a Werewolf’s mark upon his female’s skin will drive him out of his mind with desire, with the need to claim her again and again. He becomes fiercely protective of her, single-minded in his possessiveness.”
“Maggie has one of these marks?” Following her train of thought, Cam nodded.
“She does…though I’ve never seen it, thank heavens.” He chuckled at the thought of skinny, quiet Rich saddling himself with the bossy, irasci
ble Maggie.
“And Ginny?”
“She bears Todd’s mark on her wrist, under that wide watchband.”
“Of course,” she murmured softly. “Does the mark hurt? I didn’t pay much attention before, but Ginny often rubs at that wrist, especially when she’s distracted.”
Cam peered hard at her, waited for her to connect the dots. “I’m told, at the moment the bite is given, there’s a sharp flare of pain…it fades quickly, then the pain is gone completely, but the mark 323
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remains. It’s permanent.”
One moment ticked by, and then another passed in silence while JJ absorbed all he’d told her. Her brow wrinkled, as though she were trying to pin down some elusive memory. Suddenly she reared back, her eyes narrowed to twin points of burning accusation. Her hand flew to the spot below her ear, and she scrambled from his arms, scooted from the bed. JJ leaned over his dresser, oblivious of the delicious view of her backside she’d unwittingly given him, and whipped her hair out of her way as she squinted into the mirror, tugged at her earlobe.
Her fingers traced the small mark—a shape similar to that of a butterfly, only with sharp edges—there below her earlobe, and her breath hissed out.
Cam climbed from the bed and padded across the room until he stood behind her. Guilty green met furious blue in the mirror.
“You marked me?” She whirled around, thumped her fist against his chest.
Even now, with guilt weighing heavy on his shoulders and her eyes shooting daggers at him, the sight of that mark sent raw need shooting through his veins straight into his groin.
“You marked me? You never asked me, never checked to make sure I wouldn’t mind?”
“I—”
Her fist pounded him again, cutting him off.
“You marked me…and you never told me?” Then she went motionless, her lips parted and her gaze grew distant for a moment. Her mouth fell open on a gasp, and she drilled a finger painfully into the center of his chest. “No wonder they all kept staring at me…at Maggie’s, when I pulled my hair up. They all saw it…and they all knew.”
“You are my mate, JJ,” he said simply. No apology. No regret. Had he been offered the chance 324
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to go back, do things differently, he’d have done everything exactly the same. Not having claimed her just wasn’t an option he could live with, wasn’t an option he would even consider. “I’ve given myself to you. All that I am, all that I have…it’s yours.” He’d spoken the words softly, meant them with every ounce of his being. Those words drained the anger from her face. He didn’t waste any time, didn’t give her a spare moment for second thoughts.
Instead, he swept her into his arms and carried her back to bed. He’d show her exactly what seeing his mark on her did to him, and when he was done, there wouldn’t be any doubt in her mind.
Being his mate was a very, very good thing indeed.
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Chapter 21
The Apostle slammed the car door and pounded his fists against the steering wheel, over and over.
How could this have happened? How could she have let herself be corrupted like this? She hadn’t heeded his first warning, had ignored his second. Now she was here, defiling herself with Cam…with his friend.
He’d been so sure she was pure of heart, free of sin. She’d been so damned sweet, so vulnerable.
She’d said all the right words, done everything right.
But she was just another one of them. Another sinner.
Satan was crafty, the true deceiver.
And God’s Apostle had come so close to falling from Grace.
His weak human self suffered, tears of rage welled in his eyes, burning his lids, coursing hot, angry trails down his cheeks. He’d succumbed to weakness of the flesh and let himself fall for her.
Pretty, helpless, sweet JJ Frost.
And she’d spurned him, giving herself to Cam like some common, lowly prostitute. Just like Lori.
JJ had been his test. And he’d nearly failed.
For a while, he’d actually contemplated setting aside his calling, thought he’d shown his devotion to God and already earned his reward. He’d even put off punishing that wrathful bitch Angie Berg. He’d assumed a woman— JJ—was his reward. He’d strayed from the word of the Lord. He’d been taken in by a harlot. A Jezebel. A Delilah. He should’ve known better. The only reward he should have wanted, the only reward he truly needed was God’s 326
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love, God’s forgiveness.
Angrily swiping tears from his cheeks with the backs of his hands, he leveled malignant eyes on the dark window at the rear of Cam’s house. Cam’s bedroom. Even now, the two of them were probably in there, rutting like disgusting, lowly animals.
That thought sent another cascade of tears—
tears of humiliation—to soak his cheeks. He really had cared about her. Why had she been so weak?
Why would she debase herself this way?
It was clear to him what he had to do. It broke his heart, but he would follow God’s will. After all, God had called upon Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac. The Apostle could do no less than sacrifice this woman who’d proven unworthy.
Resolve firmly in place, he sat up straighter in the car seat, squeezed the steering wheel in an unforgiving grip. JJ’s salvation lay between her and God now. He made a conscious effort to smooth his features and wipe the emotion from his heart. Even so, the cold rage of betrayal still chilled him.
Thou shall not suffer a witch to live.
Well, God would also not want him to suffer a freak…a Werewolf…to live either. Of that, he was now certain. As soon as he dealt with the prideful whore, he’d finish off the Devil’s spawn. He’d kept silent about that little secret, convinced himself that Cam and his kind had harmed none, had earned the right to be left alone.
Well, no more. When he finished sending God’s message about the sinners, he’d cleanse this town of those mutant freaks as well.
Calm now, he turned the key in the ignition and carefully eased the car from the road’s soft shoulder.
He had things to do, preparations to make.
The Apostle also had one more sinner in need of a guiding hand before he dealt with the Werewolf and the prideful whore.
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****
In the early hours, before dawn streaked the sky with warm colors, JJ tugged her clothing and boots on and slipped from the bedroom, leaving behind a warm, empty bed. Where had Cam gone? Maybe he’d gotten a call while she’d been asleep. The storm last night had been a nasty one. She wouldn’t be at all surprised if he had a grade A mess on his hands. At least the power had come back on in the wee hours of the morning.
She hadn’t intended to get up quite so early. In truth, she was still a little groggy around the edges, but she’d been too restless to go back to sleep, her head swamped with Cam’s mind-boggling revelations. She could barely wrap her head around it all.
She followed her nose, and the scent of coffee, to the kitchen. Bless his heart, he’d left her most of the pot. A speedy search of the cabinets yielded a mug and a sealed container of sugar. After stirring in the requisite mountain of sugar, she splashed a bit of milk into the mug. Smiling, JJ brought the mug to her lips, savoring the first long draw of caffeine like the addict she was.
Standing at the sink, JJ drained the rest of the mug. She had so much to do. Logically, she knew she couldn’t go back to her place, at least not to stay.
Cam was right. To stay there now, alone, was inviting trouble. Tomorrow? Well, she’d just have to take this one day at a time. JJ refilled her mug and took another sip as she enjoyed the view from Cam’s kitchen. The woods were pristine, as if polished fresh by last night’s downpour. Warm browns and vivid greens dazzled the eyes. Wild sprays of lilac clustered at one edge of the clearing, and she was reminded of the view from her attic
studio. She had to return to her place at some point. She needed clothes, and, hard as she’d tried to push the thought 328
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from her mind, she needed to clean up the mess in the attic, see what she could salvage.
That thought no more than shuddered through her, when movement at the edge of the woods separating her and Cam’s yards caught her eye.
Going up on tiptoe, she used her palms on the edge of the sink to push herself closer to the window.
What was he doing out there?
Cam rushed from the woods, obviously distracted. He dug in his back pocket with one hand, swiping the other palm over the side of his stomach, down across his hip, leaving behind a garish red smear across the pristine white cotton and faded denims.
JJ’s heart slammed against her ribs.
Blood? Why did he have blood on his hands? She scanned his body as he loped to his truck. There wasn’t blood anywhere else on him. He didn’t move as if he’d been injured. Whose blood, then, was it?
Cam dragged a big, black duffel bag from the back seat of his truck, slung it over his shoulder, and trotted back toward the same place in the woods he’d just emerged from moments before.
Setting the mug aside with an unsteady hand, JJ hurried to the back door and slipped outside. Why was he rushing around like that? It wasn’t like he was skulking around, and yet his very demeanor suggested he was in a rush, and, by the way he’d glanced at the house while he’d retrieved that bag, he didn’t want company. If she didn’t know better, she’d wonder what it was he was trying to hide.
But then, she didn’t know better, did she? That sly little voice in the back of her head slipped the question in through a crack in her guard. And it wasn’t done yet. Once it had managed to slice her with one niggling doubt, it seemed just a matter of time before others of its kind began scoring her self-confidence. Certainly, her confidence in the man 329
