Second Chance with the Shifter (Stonybrooke Shifters)

by Leela Ash

  “Where did he go? If that's even true," Jax said, fixing a dark glare on the woman.

  “Well, we are preparing for war after all, so it makes sense that he would have plenty to keep him busy.”

  “War? Jonathan isn't into war," Jax said, shaking his head in disbelief.

  “Maybe not, but he needs to save his friend. They were both abducted not too long ago by a really mean group who call themselves the Phantoms. They think they are sooo badass because they can survive in the snow. They only do it because they eat anything, even people. They're trying to fatten up your brother's friend right now. Fortunately, Jonathan was smart enough to escape. His friend wasn't so lucky, so we're all going to retaliate and get rid of the problem once and for all. We want to keep things peaceful up here in the North. Believe it or not. It's all rather exciting,” she said, moving close to Jonathan and pulling a blanket around his shoulders.

  She touched his cheek, her beautiful face sparkling with excitement. She was toying with him, testing her power. He wished it wasn't working, but he could feel the yearning in his body, strong and prominent. It had been nearly a month since he'd had any kind of release, and this woman was dangerously close to opening a floodgate he would rather keep closed.

  “Please, go get my brother,” he said sternly, turning away from her.

  She seemed surprised, but somehow pleased at his rejection, and nodded, pulling her hand away and turning on her heel. He purposely avoided looking at her swaying hips and sultry, curvy body, and instead pouted at the wall.

  And then he was being pulled into a bear hug and the spicy scent of his brother was filling his nostrils. Jax opened and closed his mouth, almost ready to vomit from the emotional toll of what he'd just experienced.

  “I thought I'd never see you again,” he breathed.

  “Here I am,” Jonathan said with a wink. It was too good to be true. Maybe he really had died in the cold and it was all a dream.

  “I'm so glad you're here,” Jonathan exclaimed, hugging Jax again. “We need all the help we can get.”

  “You...wait, you mean in this war thing?”

  “Yeah!”

  “Jon, I can't...”

  “What?” Jonathan asked, his face falling in disappointment.

  “Look, I know it's important to you, but I have somewhere to go. A home. Somebody waiting for me. I just needed to know if you're all right. Al came by and told me about you and I had to see for myself. I missed you so much...”

  Now that they were together again, there were no words that felt sufficient enough to explain what he'd been through. The terrible guilt and misery he'd felt when he believed he was truly alone in the world. He had nearly killed himself in his grief, but somehow, he'd been brought to this woman's room and spared.

  “I missed you too,” Jonathan said. His face had aged considerably, and he looked much older with the scruff thick around his face. “Listen, we're still in the planning stages. Talk to your family; think it over. We seriously need the help. We could get killed out there, but I know how skilled you are. You could make or break this thing for us.”

  “Forget about it,” Jonathan begged, gripping his brother's forearm. “Just come back with me. We have everything you'd need. I swear, it's perfect.”

  “I'm sure it is,” Jonathan said, pulling gently out of his brother's grip. “But this expedition was my idea. I'm responsible for risking those men's lives. I can't just leave him there to die. Not when there's something I can do to save him. You can help me or you can go home; those are your choices. It's not safe for you to stay if you're not going to be a part of this. I'd rather you were safe anyway, little brother. You have no stake in this war.”

  Jax opened and closed his mouth in disbelief. He had finally found his brother, but after all this, he might very well lose him again in a needless battle to save one man's skin.

  “It's not just for me,” Jonathan said, lightly punching Jax on the shoulder. “I need to safeguard the future of the children in the community up there. It's a really solid place, you know. They're trying to start something special. Get a real society going again. Not like the turf-war cult hell down south. I'm behind this one hundred percent. Maybe when this is over, you and your family can join us. You'll know where to find me.”

  He winked at Jax and turned away, walking out the doorway. And just like that, his brother was gone again.

  Chapter 8

  “How did it go with your brother?” the sultry woman asked when she returned to her bedroom. Her voice brought another surge of longing to his loins as he remembered the way it felt when she was touching him in his sleep. But he was also angry and disgusted by her and refused to meet her gaze.

  “It's not really any of your business," Jax snapped at her. She smiled, a glow that radiated from across the room, and Jax darkened in response.

  “It must not have gone well," she said, coming toward him.

  “Please, just leave me alone," he said, looking her in the eye. “There is somebody that I love.”

  “Well, she's quite lucky. You're very handsome.”

  And with that, the smiling woman disappeared, leaving him alone in the room. He walked over to the fireplace cursing at himself for feeling such an intense burst of longing that he would have no release for. He pulled his clothes on, groaning in discomfort as they grazed his erection, and grabbed his backpack. He was going to head back home to be reunited with the woman he loved most. The woman who he missed so much that he almost resented loving her in the first place.

  ***

  The journey was long and grueling, just as he remembered it on the way there. Unfortunately, it was even harder with the harsh elements working against him. He dug himself a little hole in the snow, creating a wall where the wind was the fiercest and pulled half of the tarp over it. He put the other half of the tarp on the ground to prevent himself from getting wet, packing the snow tightly to create a firm platform. He was elated with the knowledge that his brother was alive, and happy that he knew exactly where to find him. But he was also worried that the pointless war he was fighting might leave him without a family left to speak of.

  He spent the next two weeks running as quickly as he could, heading back home to Layne. At night, he was haunted by thoughts of the seductress, and had to force himself to avoid the images of her face and the memories of the pleasure he felt during the sensual dream he'd had. He would force his thoughts back to Layne, the last sexual encounter they'd had, and try to keep himself from relieving the burning sensation in his loins. It would make him vulnerable if he did.

  Finally, after what seemed like years, the landscape began to look familiar. He followed the path that Al had created until finally he saw the familiar fence coming up in the distance. Before he could get inside, the door flew open and Layne was in his arms. Her intoxicating, rose-scented hair filled his senses, and she moaned immediately as he bucked his hips against her, pulling her pants off of her body and spreading her legs. He lifted her up by the waist and gazed into her sea colored, blue-green eyes.

  “I missed you so much," she whispered.

  “I missed you too," Jax whispered, pulling his throbbing member out of his pants and pushing it inside her with a hard shove. She had already been wet by the time she reached him, and threw her head back with a loud moan as the sudden impact made her knees buckle. He carried her inside, thrusting slowly in and out of her as they moved through the snow covered forest floor and toward the doorway of the cabin.

  They didn't make it to the bedroom. Instead, he pushed her against the wall and showered her entire body with hot kisses that made her moan and writhe against his body. He had been gone for far too long, and she had missed his muscular torso, and the feeling of his long, thick cock pushing intimately inside her.

  She gasped as he groaned loudly and came hard inside her, filling her insides with the hot flow of his orgasm. She hadn't come yet, which he knew, and he moved behind her, pressing himself against her backside and reaching a
round to cup her firm breast in one hand and slide his fingers inside her with the other. She leaned against him with a moan and he kissed her gently as his penis grew hard again, finally squeezing itself between her legs as it grew more swollen with anticipation.

  In a tangle of limbs, they fell onto the couch, and Layne wrapped her long, perfect legs around his waist as he rammed hard into her, sending a shockwave of pleasure through her whole body. She cried out, and he did it again and again, not giving her a break to catch her breath. She arched her back, her nipples pink and hard, and buckled against him as their hot fluids dripped between her legs and pooled on the couch beneath her. She shuddered as she felt him tense up, ready to come hard into her again, and she cried out loudly as she began to quake underneath his powerful body, giving in to the most intense orgasm she'd ever had in her life.

  They lay tangled on the couch together, Jax stroking her long, light brown hair lovingly, the light in his dark eyes glowing brightly. She cupped his face in her hands and kissed his forehead, and he smiled sweetly at her.

  “What color are your eyes?” she asked him.

  “I think they're green,” he said thoughtfully. “But I don't really know. They change sometimes.”

  “I hope our baby's eyes are like yours,” she said with a contented sigh.

  “What...?” Jax asked, sitting up and staring at her.

  “I think I'm pregnant,” Layne whispered.

  THE END

  Love and Survival in the Time After:

  Book 3

  Leela Ash

  Copyright ©2016 by Leela Ash. All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic of mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  CHAPTER ONE

  “They look bigger, right?” Layne asked, studying her reflection in the mirror. She cupped her hand over one of her breasts and Jax raised his eyebrow at her and laughed.

  “What?” she asked. “I look ridiculous right now, don’t I?”

  “I wouldn’t say ridiculous,” he said with a grin, tucking Layne’s light brown hair behind her ear. “Try the other one now.”

  She slapped him and shook her head, strutting out of the bathroom with a sigh.

  “Well if they are bigger you know what that means, right?” she asked.

  “More to love?” his deep voice rumbled into her ear, bringing his strong, masculine hands over the delicate mounds of her breasts and stroking her nipples with his thumbs. She moaned involuntarily and let her body lean back into his. He buried his head into her neck and kissed her gingerly, sending tingles throughout her body. When he pulled away, she sighed.

  “You’re such a tease,” she said, heading into the kitchen for a drink of water. She could feel him grinning behind her and shook her head, smiling despite herself.

  She had been nauseated regularly since Jax had returned from his perilous journey north to look for his brother, which had been a little bit difficult for their intimacy. The poor man had been treating her as if she were glass, not daring to go any further than a gentle kiss or a stroke here or there. She was sexually frustrated, but she appreciated his consideration. She hadn’t been feeling up to intensive physical activity, and if there was one thing their sex life was, it was intensive. Neither of them held back.

  Maybe if they were a little tamer, she wouldn’t be worrying about whether or not she was pregnant. She was eighty percent sure that she was. Still, they were both concerned. Any illness, especially now that civilization had been wiped out by the deadly virus, was extremely dangerous. Vaccinations were a thing of the past, and even though she was a chemist, she didn’t always have the tools she needed.

  There were a lot of potential problems if they were going to bring a child into the world. First of all, they would have to protect the child from all varieties of illness and disease. The baby would be vulnerable to the virus, and could potentially be taken from them before it even had a chance to live.

  What would she do if she lost her child? And more to the point, would it be selfish of them to bring a child into a cruel, upside-down world where it couldn’t thrive, and maybe wouldn’t even be able to survive its first day of life? The cabin they lived in could still be crawling with infection.

  And if it did survive, how would they socialize their child? How would they find other children for it to play with? What would they do when the child grew into a teenager and wanted nothing to do with its parents? What if it wanted to run off and join a tribe or found friends in the wrong places? Maybe they could go up north and network there, but she was really happy where they were.

  Jax hadn’t spoken much about the community up north, but they both knew it was better than the rivalling tribes down south. Still, he obviously hadn’t been particularly impressed. It was nice in the north, but it still had problems just like everywhere else.

  Layne sighed. It wasn’t the paradise they had been envisioning. There was too much work left to do, too many variables to think about. Maybe if things were still how they had been when she was growing up, she would be picking out names and daydreaming about what their lives would be like together. But they weren’t living in a time like that and might never be again. It almost seemed better if she were just sick.

  “Jax?” she called.

  “Yeah?” he replied, emerging from the bathroom with a comb, running it through his dark black hair. It had grown longer since she first met him, and she couldn’t help but feel that he was more attractive every time she saw him.

  “I’m not sure I can wait to find out for sure,” she said, furrowing her eyebrow.

  “What do you mean?” he asked, moving toward her and dropping his hand from his hair.

  “If I’m sick, it could kill me before we find out if I’m pregnant. It would still be a couple of months before I’m showing, you know? But if it’s an illness I might not make it that long. I think we need to act.”

  Jax sobered at the words and frowned. The only way to know for sure was to get her to a medic somehow, but she couldn’t make a journey like that with him, especially not if they went north like he would prefer. How could he leave her when she wasn’t feeling well? And if she was pregnant, he wanted to be there for her every step of the way.

  “I’m not sure how we can find out,” he said, furrowing his brow.

  “Don’t most tribes have doctors of some sort? I mean, many of them are pretty devoted to keeping as much of modern medicine alive as possible. They’re terrified of humanity reverting back into the stone age.”

  She was speaking from experience. She had been part of a tribe of doctors and idealists who had hoped, during the initial outbreak of the virus, that they would be able to fight the illness and save the world. Unfortunately, the majority of them were just egotistical crackpots who thought they knew more than they really did. It had been a dark period of her life, learning how hopeless it was to believe that she could make a difference. The apocalypse had struck, and she was completely useless.

  Jax would never be able to understand the helplessness she felt when she realized that her years of study and a lifetime of gifted intelligence still left her helpless and unable to provide relief for the suffering people around her. She thought she should have been able to figure out the virus, at least in time to save her ailing family. How had she been lucky enough to escape unscathed? And would her child be blessed with that immunity, or the genes of her vulnerable family?

  It was a lottery that she wasn’t sure she wanted to subject a child to. She was pretty certain that she would be able to find a way to terminate the pregnancy. Mandrake root would do the trick if she could get her hands on some, but she knew from the look in Jax’s eyes that he was excited about the possibility of being a father, and she wasn’t sure if she could dash that hope. And if she was being honest with herself, she was secretly thrilled at the pro
spects of motherhood. It would be nice to have a baby around. She hadn’t heard a child’s voice in years. They always seemed to bring hope wherever they went.

  She knew she had to get examined by a medical doctor to find out whether or not she was putting her worries in the right place. If she was sick she could deal with it, but if she was pregnant, she would have to make some preparations of her own.

  “There might have been doctors up north,” Jax said uncertainly. “But I don’t think you should travel that far and I’m not comfortable leaving you alone for that long. Especially if there’s something wrong. I think I’m going to try to find some help a little closer to home. Okay?”

  “Yeah…just be careful okay?”

  “Of course,” he said with a handsome grin. “I’m always careful.”

  “Okay. When do you think you should leave?”

  “As soon as possible. It’s still morning, I could probably leave right now once I get packed up.”

  “Okay,” Layne said, leaning against the table in the kitchen and trying to hide her displeasure. She watched him scurry throughout the cabin, packing quickly. His face was grim but determined, and she knew that he would do anything to keep her safe. It was a nice feeling, but she felt terrible about subjecting him to any potential dangers. Layne took care of herself and she always had.

  But it was true, she had been feeling a lot weaker than usual, and never knew what she might throw up. If she hadn’t been having irregular periods over the last few years, she would have been able to tell just from that. But she couldn’t. She had lost a lot of weight, been extremely active, and under unbelievable amounts of stress, so missing a period was a pretty common thing for her. And she was secretly terrified of contracting an illness she couldn’t handle. It would be better to get someone there to examine her, even if that meant that Jax could potentially be subjected to danger.