Desires of a Full Moon

by Jodi Vaughn

Jayden wondered if the billion-dollar company was run by a werewolf as well.

  “Both, the envelope and the letter were clean. They are running diagnostics on the paper to find out what stores in Fayetteville sell that specific type.”

  Jayden nodded. Whoever had sent the letter knew enough not to leave any prints. “And then we can check to see if they have security cameras. Maybe they caught the perp on video.”

  “Or maybe someone remembers seeing him. I’ll take whatever I can get.”

  Jayden didn’t miss the deadly edge to Barrett’s voice. Barrett was taking this personally and for Haley’s sake Jayden was glad. The stalker needed to be caught quickly.

  “So you are going to tell me why you moved Haley into my house with you? Or do you want to play twenty questions?”

  Jayden cringed and gritted his teeth. “It was no longer safe for her to be in the dorm. Barrett, the stalker left that note while I was in her dorm room. He was on the other side of the damn door and I didn’t even sense it.”

  Barrett was silent for a beat.

  Jayden braced himself, ready to disobey Barrett’s order of making Haley return to the dorm.

  “You know the stalker is going to be pissed when he finds out Haley is gone. He’s going to get more aggressive.”

  “Or maybe when he realizes she has a boyfriend, he will give up.”

  “Boyfriend? Is that what you are, Jayden?” Jayden didn’t miss the edge to Barrett’s voice.

  “It’s what I want him to think. If he thinks Haley is in a relationship and sees us together, then he might give up. And then Haley can finally get her life back. Damn, man, she doesn’t even eat in the cafeteria because she’s too scared she’ll run into him. I can’ imagine having to live like that in college.”

  “This whole situation is fucked up.” Barrett sighed. “She can stay with you. But stay close and don’t let her out of your sight for a second.”

  The line went dead.

  Jayden shook his head. His Pack Master wasn’t one for small talk.

  “Was that Barrett?”

  He knew she was standing behind him before she even spoke. He could still smell her arousal. He gritted his teeth, reminding himself that she was off limits.

  “Yeah. There were no prints on the envelope.” Jayden didn’t turn around. He couldn’t face her just yet. If he did, his resolve might falter

  “Jayden…”

  He flinched when she touched his arm. She quickly pulled away.

  He turned. Hurt flickered across her face as she glanced away. His chest tightened. The last thing he ever wanted was to cause her more pain.

  “Haley, I…” He took a step toward her.

  She shook her head sharply and held up her hand. “I’m too tired to talk tonight. I’m going to bed.”

  He watched her disappear back into her bedroom. What the hell was wrong with him? He hadn’t been interested in sex since October, since that night he’d been beaten half to death. But one moment alone with Haley and he was ready to fuck for hours.

  Jayden pulled another bottle of beer from the fridge, making a mental note to buy something that wasn’t alcoholic. He went from room to room, checking to make sure the windows and doors were secure before heading out to the deck.

  Jayden flung himself in the lounge chair and took a long pull from the bottle. The icy liquid burned.

  Though they were in the city, the stars were out tonight, brilliantly lighting up the backdrop of the midnight sky. It would have been perfect for a romantic dinner and a glass of wine.

  “Who the hell am I kidding?” Jayden scrubbed his hand over his face. “I don’t do romance.”

  For years, he’d been satisfied having sex without getting involved in a committed relationship. Up until last year. When Jayden had seen how Ava’s love had changed Damon, he’d been hit with an unexpected dose of envy. Damon had never known what true love was until he met Ava. They had fallen in love and mated a short time later.

  He’d never really thought about finding a mate. But when he saw how Damon seemed more content and happier than ever, Jayden wondered if it being mated wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

  Mate.

  To willingly choose to forsake all other females and bind yourself to your mate until death was a difficult concept for him to grasp.

  After that night of torture, he hadn’t been able to bring himself to share a bed with a woman. Something had been stolen from him that night and he’d been struggling to reclaim the carefree life he’d once had.

  Jayden took another drink and let his eyes drift shut.

  Images of that night spilled out behind his closed lids. He remembered the stench of the room, stale urine and skunk, the typical telltale scent of red wolves. He’d gone into that filthy room in hopes of finding Haley. He’d been appalled when he found her, gagged and tied down to a filthy mattress that reeked of the rogue red wolf pack that had abducted her. She struggled with her bindings, trying to scream as a rogue wolf jumped on top of her and unzipped his pants.

  Anger didn’t begin to describe the emotion vibrating through his body at the scene. Jayden saw red, literally red as he growled and snatched the wolf off Haley. Before the wolf knew what hit him, Jayden was there behind him, his hands placed strategically on the top and bottom of the wolf’s head. He twisted, feeling the snap of the asshole’s neck under his palms.

  His rage had been so great that he hadn’t stopped. He twisted until he almost ripped the rogue werewolf’s head from his useless body. He would have pulled the guy’s head clean off if those other three red wolves hadn’t shown up and hit him in the head with a baseball bat.

  Lights exploded from behind his eyes until he was blinded by the illumination. The blow had made him dizzy, unable to fight and defend himself. The next thing he knew he was stripped naked and tied up, hanging from the ceiling in a different room.

  He grimaced against each slam of the bat against his body as the red wolf use his head as practice for his golf swing. Pain exploded throughout his head as he felt his eye socket shatter and his nose break in a snap. He could still taste the coppery acid as blood dripped into his mouth. He caught a blow against his ear, rattling his brain and making him momentarily lose all hearing on that side.

  If Jayden had thought that was the extent of their torture, he had been wrong. Red wolves were violent and deadly and everyone thought they had become extinct by killing each other off. The Arkansas Pack had discovered there was still a small sect of red wolves, and they didn’t follow Pack Law. And they certainly didn’t play fair in the rules of war. Red wolves loved torture and got off on inflicting pain on others.

  Jayden flinched as he recalled the feeling of cold wire being wrapped tightly around his genitals and thigh. Disgust and fear snaked up his spine thinking they were about to amputate his dick. He bit down hard, refusing to scream or to cry out. With every hit of the bat and kick in the ribs he’d only managed to groan out his pain. He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of screaming.

  “Scream for me, Were.” The red wolf’s rancid breath hit his nose as he smiled menacingly close to Jayden.

  “Fuck off.” Jayden spat out another tooth he’d lost to the bat. He knew he could regenerate another tooth. If he got out alive.

  “I bet I can make you scream. I bet I can make you scream like a little bitch.” The red wolf stood and rubbed the frayed end of an extension cord against Jayden’s bloody cheek. “I bet you‘re gonna scream now.”

  Jayden twisted in the air, trying his best to avoid the clamp being hooked to the wire around his penis. One guy wrapped him from behind, holding him still while the other snapped the clamp around the wire.

  He twisted and turned and fought upside down and in midair trying to knock the clamp off. But he knew it was useless. The red Were held the frayed part of the extension cord in front of his face, taunting him with the pain that was coming.

  Jayden watched wide-eyed as the other Were picked up the other end of the extension cord
and held it toward the outlet.

  “Did you think you could stop us from having that female? She’s ours now, and we’re gonna take turns using that tight little body until that pussy’s good and sore.” The Were grabbed his crotch and shoved it in Jayden‘s face. Jayden gagged at the rancid smell.

  “That little piece of tail in there is gonna be begging for us to pound her hard.” Both red Weres laughed. “But first, I wanna hear you scream.”Jayden bit back a growl. The sooner he screamed the sooner they would get to Haley. He couldn’t let that happen.

  “Go fuck yourself,” he sneered.

  The red Were growled. “Light him up!”

  Jayden had experienced broken bones, bruised internal organs, and even stab wounds during fights he’d gotten into over the years.

  Nothing would have prepared him for what came next. With the extension cord plugged into the outlet, the Were touched the frayed end to the wire around his penis.

  Hot angry pain spread from his dick to his balls before traveling throughout his entire body, making all his muscles contract uncontrollably. He wanted to scream, to cry out, but the muscles in his cheek clamped down, refusing to let the pain out as electricity racked his body. Pain, excruciating pain, beyond anything he’d every experience, licked through every muscle and organ in his body until he was sure his heart would stop. He couldn’t even breathe.

  If the electricity didn’t stop his heart, he was going to die from lack of oxygen.

  Jayden eyes popped open and he looked around. He was in Fayetteville, far from Louisiana. He sucked in deep breaths, the nightmare he’d relieved much too vivid.

  He swiped a hand across his sweaty brow and sat up in the Adirondack chair. Night had fallen and the only light came from the neighbor’s back porch illuminating the back yard.

  In the end, he had held out. He hadn’t screamed when they had tortured him. Not once. In between shock treatments he had tried to catch his breath so he wouldn’t suffocate with the next round of electrocution.

  He must have passed out from lack of oxygen because the next thing he remembered was waking up tied to a chair and hearing Ava’s voice. She had on a little red riding hood stripper costume and was trying to get him out of that strip club where he was tied to a chair.

  He discovered later that night that Haley had gotten out and was safe. That was all he had to hear before he passed out as the medical Werewolf Guardians worked on his broken body.

  He never told anyone about the shock torture he had endured. He hadn’t even told Barrett when he came to visit him in the infirmary.

  It wasn’t anyone business. And he wanted to leave it buried in the past. The funny thing about burying shit was, it had a tendency to sprout roots and want to push itself back up through the dirt like a weed.

  In the end it hadn’t mattered. He hadn’t managed to save Haley from being raped.

  Jayden stood and headed back inside. He tossed his glass beer bottle in the garbage can as he passed through the kitchen.

  He had tried to take advantage of her just minutes ago while she was vulnerable. That didn’t make him any better than those rogue red Weres

  He knew without a doubt that there was something wrong deep inside of him. Something that could never be fixed.

  #

  Haley looked up from sipping her hot coffee at the kitchen table as Jayden walked into the room. Dressed in jeans and a tight fitting T-shirt, his sandy blonde hair still damp from his shower, he looked like every red-blooded girl’s fantasy. Her heart fluttered against her chest and she couldn’t tear her gaze away. It wasn’t fair that he was so gorgeous without even trying, while she’d just spend half an hour trying to style her hair.

  “You’re up early.” Jayden looked at his military style watch before meeting her gaze. “It’s only six thirty.”

  “I wanted to look over my notes before class.” Haley swallowed.

  Jayden nodded and poured himself a cup of coffee. She waited to see if he was going to add cream. He didn’t. Figured. He liked his coffee manly, not with French vanilla creamer and sugar like she preferred.

  He frowned at her plate “Is that all you’re going to eat?”

  She glanced down at her half-eaten toast. “Yeah.”

  Jayden shook his head. “Get your stuff. We’ll go grab a real breakfast.”

  “But I need to look over my notes.”

  “Bring them. You’ll have time to look over them after you eat a real meal. You’ve lost weight and you need a good breakfast before your test.”

  She stared at him. How did he know that she had lost weight? After the notes arrived she’d lost her appetite. When she did manage to eat, it wasn’t much.

  She walked into the bedroom and sat on the bed, tucking her textbooks into her backpack.

  She grabbed her cell phone and tucked it in her jeans pocket and headed for the door. The mirror on the wall caught her attention and she jerked to a stop, looking at her appearance.

  She had chosen the silky peach top that dipped slightly between her breasts and jeans that weren’t so baggy. They weren’t tight-fitting, but they still hung lower on her hips and hugged her curves better than the bigger jeans she usually wore.

  She had even put on some eye shadow and lip gloss. The shadows under her eyes were still there, but lighter thanks to a good night’s sleep. She felt lighter too.

  Was it because of Jayden?

  “You ready?” Jayden called out from the kitchen.

  She grinned at her reflection. Was she ready?

  Hell, yeah.

  #

  Jayden leaned back in the booth of the busy little café and studied Haley over his coffee as she read over her notes before their breakfast arrived.

  He nearly had a coronary when he walked into the kitchen and saw her in those low rise jeans and peach shirt that flowed over her breasts.

  She was a natural beauty with her full lips and a complexion that didn’t need any makeup. Her full lips shone with that cherry lip gloss she’d put on. He knew it was cherry because he could smell it.

  And he wanted to lick it off.

  She had been trying to hide herself behind those baggy clothes. But today she wasn’t. She was even walking with her head up, instead of watching the ground.

  It was enough to make him smile.

  Haley looked up from her notes. A slow grin spread across her face and Jayden almost choked on his coffee as he felt his body respond.

  “What are you smiling at?” She cocked her head. “Do I have something on my face?”

  “What? No.” He cleared his throat as he shifted his weight in the booth. His jeans were growing tighter by the second “I was just noticing the change in your wardrobe.”

  She chuckled. “I didn’t think it was such a big change. I wore jeans yesterday.”

  “Jeans that are much too big. Plus the ugly sweatshirt.”

  “Hey! No making fun of the university. That will get your ass kicked.” She grinned.

  “Whatever.” Jayden grinned and looked away, both shocked and pleased at how good it felt to sit with her and share a meal. Made him feel almost alive again.

  “So what’s up with your wardrobe?” She pointed the end of her pencil at his shirt.

  He jerked his head towards her. “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve noticed all you ever wear are T-shirts.”

  “So?”

  “From that store in the mall.” She arched her brow.

  Jayden crossed his arms and frowned. “What’s wrong with that?”

  “Is that the official uniform for being a Guardian?”

  “No.” He glanced down at his bright blue shirt. “It’s just what I wear when I’m not working. Plus I thought I was blending into the college crowd.”

  Haley bit her lip and nodded before looking back down at her textbook.

  “Are you trying to tell me I need to get some different clothes? Are you sure you’re not trying to turn me into your guinea pig for some class project for your f
ashion course?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Look, you’ve got a great body. You need to dress it accordingly.”

  He fought a grin, pleased way too much that she liked his body. “Tell me, how would you dress me?”

  He watched her cock her head and study him. It made him feel a little like a piece of meat.

  “You need more button-up shirts that are tailored to fit you. Your jeans fit fine, but you should go with a darker wash with some whiskering effect on the front. If it were winter I’d tell you to wear scarves and layer them into your wardrobe. But we are going into spring, which will quickly turn into summer, so you could wear more shirts with patterns versus solid colors. And if you do go with a solid, you need to do softer colors. Not bright-colored T-shirts.”

  She crossed her arms and smiled, waiting for his rebuttal.

  “Button-up shirts are too dressy and scarves are for girls. I don’t wear patterned shirts because they remind me of Granny’s muumuus,” he snarled.

  “Okay.” Haley shrugged, took a sip of coffee and went back to studying.

  He fidgeted in his seat until he couldn’t take it anymore. “Are you trying to insinuate that I don’t look good in my clothes?” He’d never had a woman complain before. Hell, they were always trying to take his clothes off, not put clothes on him.

  Haley set her coffee down. “Jayden, would you dress a lingerie model in granny panties and an oversized bra?” She shook her head. “No, you’d dress her in the hottest lingerie that would best show off her body.”

  He didn’t know if he should be offended or complimented. He cocked his head, trying to figure her out.

  He leaned forward, his elbows on the table. Her breath hitched ever so slightly in her slender throat and he could see the pulse jumping at the base of her neck. Her pupils dilated. Pleasure streaked through his body hard and fast at her obvious arousal.

  He let his lips curve into a slow grin. “Okay, Haley. I’m willing to be your little experiment. I’ll let you strip me down and dress me however you want.”

  Her eyelids drifted over her eyes as her lips parted. He loved seeing that reaction.

  “How about we make a deal?”

  “What kind of deal?” Her raspy voice made his dick throb.