by Paige Tyler
“I need you to take me hard and fast, Gage.”
He gave her exactly what she asked for, pounding into her with a powerful rhythm that threatened to break the bed.
On either side of her head, Gage’s arms were tense as he balanced above her in an effort to keep his weight from crushing her. She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him down even as she lifted her hips to meet his. Instead of feeling smothered by his big, muscular body, she felt protected by it. And that only made the orgasm rolling through her even more powerful.
She buried her face in the curve of his neck and dug her nails into the rippling muscles of his shoulders. She didn’t mean to hurt him, but she was too far gone to do anything about it. She cried out, squeezing him so tightly with her legs she had no idea how he could even keep thrusting. But he did, and it transported her to a world of pleasure she hadn’t known existed until tonight.
When she felt him stiffen above her, felt every muscle in that spectacular body of his contracting at once, she knew he was coming with her.
It was amazing. It was beautiful. It was perfect.
Gage rolled onto his side and pulled her into his arms. Mac snuggled up to him, throwing her arm possessively over his chest. This felt so completely right—like she’d won the boyfriend lottery. Gage was the guy she’d been looking for without even knowing she was looking.
She laughed at how crazy that was.
“What’s so funny?” Gage asked softly.
Since it might be a little early to confess she might be falling in love with him, she decided to fib. Men could get so squirrely about stuff like that.
“Nothing.” She traced her fingers over the perfectly sculpted muscle of his chest. “It’s just that was the best sex of my life.”
That hadn’t been a fib, though. Sex like that was probably illegal in some states.
It was his turn to laugh.
She tilted her head to look at him. “What?”
“Nothing,” he mimicked. “It’s just that you’re talking like the night’s over when it’s only just getting started.”
“Seriously?”
He rolled her onto her back, balancing above her. His eyes had taken on that smolder she was getting to be familiar with. “Seriously.”
That was when she realized the cock pressing against her was well on its way to getting hard again. She sucked in her breath as he slid his shaft up and down her pussy like a sex toy.
“Mmm.” She sighed. “And what do you have in mind this time?”
He gave her a lazy grin. “I don’t know. Maybe we’ll try out a half dozen different positions or so until you find one that’s your favorite. Then we’ll just stay in that one until you tell me you can’t come anymore.”
Fresh heat pooled between her thighs, and she bit her lip. “I think I can come a lot before calling it quits.”
“Then I guess we’re in for a really long night.”
Gage rolled off her and repositioned her on her hands and knees. His breath was warm on the skin of her lower back as he pressed a kiss to her bottom.
She buried her face into the bedding and moaned. “The longer the better.”
Chapter 9
Gage sat on the edge of the bed, watching Mackenzie sleep. He could tell from her slow, steady heart rate and even breathing that she was well on her way to dreamland. Not surprising. They’d gone at it for hours. She was sleeping the deep sleep of a well-satisfied woman. He only wished he could stay in bed with her. She’d worn him out, too.
After spending hours with her, rolling around in bed, on the floor, and up against the wall, he knew she was The One—period. He believed to his very core she was the woman he was supposed to spend the rest of his life with.
He glanced at the clock—0400 hours. He needed to move. Even though every fiber of his being demanded he climb into bed with Mackenzie, wrap his body protectively around her, and never let her go.
Perversely, that was part of the reason he had to leave. Mackenzie was in his life now and that meant she was in danger, unless he dealt with Hardy. Putting it off would only endanger Mackenzie even more.
He scribbled a quick note on a scrap of paper he found in her nightstand. Something about needing to get more condoms—and donuts. He didn’t think she’d wake up before he got back, but if she did, he didn’t want her freaking out and leaving the apartment looking for him. Or thinking he’d left her.
Gage dressed quickly and silently, then grabbed a copy of the apartment key Mackenzie had hanging on a hook in the kitchen. He checked his phone as he waited for the elevator and found that Mike had left a text with Hardy’s address. There were also notes about the layout of the place, like the number of guards and existing perimeter security systems. Efficient as always.
At that early hour, it took less than thirty minutes to get to Hardy’s residence just outside Southlake on a wooded section of Grapevine Lake. Gage stopped his car along a quiet lane near the shore. If anyone saw it, they’d assume it was a couple of kids making out down by the water. Few people, even cops, would get suspicious. Southlake wasn’t the kind of place where lowlifes hung out.
He weaved through the trees, letting his superior night vision guide him. Thank God Hardy liked his privacy. There were very few houses along this section of the lake. Not that Gage gave a damn. He would have found a way onto Hardy’s property without being seen if the man lived in the middle of a mall food court.
Gage found the perimeter fence quickly enough. It was an eight-foot high chain-link deal with a few sections filled in with older mortared stone. He prowled the length of it, checking for guards, cameras, and motion sensors. He found the only two cameras that covered this side of the property without even trying. They weren’t well hidden. It wasn’t difficult to stand out of their field of view since they seemed to be aimed to catch people on the narrow, paved pathway that ran just inside the fence. Apparently, security wasn’t too worried about someone hopping over the fence. But then again, who’d be dumb enough to trespass on property owned by Walter Hardy?
Next, Gage confirmed there were no passive infrared or microwave motion sensors, active infrared beams, or pressure pad sensors. He could have bypassed them, but it said a hell of a lot about Hardy’s arrogance. There was nothing to keep a person from slipping onto his property except a reputation for brutality and ruthlessness.
Gage had downplayed it for Mackenzie’s benefit, but he’d been worried about Hardy and what the man might do from the moment he’d learned his identity. Gage knew he was a powerful and dangerous man who wouldn’t hesitate to come after them if he believed they were responsible for his son’s death. By standing up to his thugs, Gage had hoped Hardy might back off. But from the bomb at the fake meth lab, it was obvious that plan hadn’t worked. Hardy was coming for Gage, and he didn’t mind killing the rest of the SWAT team to get him. For all Gage knew, the man intended to kill all of them anyway. Gage wasn’t going to let that happen.
There was a single light on in the back of the house. Probably where the security guard, or guards, stayed. Gage would hit that first. He’d do anything to protect his pack—and now Mackenzie. He didn’t want to kill Hardy in cold blood, but if that was the only way to stop the man and keep the people close to him safe, he’d do it without hesitation.
He only hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
Gage moved along the fence until he was in a dead spot between the cameras. He still didn’t see any guards, but he could pick up their scent. It was blanketed by the stronger smell of gasoline, which made him think they probably patrolled the property in a golf cart at night. Since both odors lingered heavily in the air, that meant they’d been through here recently.
He found a place where the fence was screened by the low-hanging limbs of a big tree and placed his hand close to the chain link, but not quite touching. He didn’t feel anything that indicated it was electrified.
Gage looked around one more time, then let the claws on his right hand extend to their full len
gth. God, that felt good. He hadn’t done it in a while. There wasn’t a lot of call for it in his day-to-day work. But he missed being able to let go and shift like that.
He slashed at the fence, sending pieces of chain link flying and opening a gap large enough for him to step through. Once he was on the other side, he listened carefully, but there still weren’t any sounds coming from the house.
As he crept slowly through the trees along the rear of the property, he considered what he knew about Walter Hardy.
He owned three different houses in the Dallas area, the other two being penthouse apartments downtown. He used one mostly for business meetings and for those times he stayed in the city. He’d given the other to his twenty-six-year-old son, Ryan, the presumptive heir to the Hardy name, fortune, and business.
There was no Mrs. Hardy so Gage didn’t have to worry about that. Ryan’s mother had divorced Walter and disappeared back to someplace in Eastern Europe years ago.
Gage kept moving toward the back door of the house, pulling on gloves as he went. He still had no idea what he was going to do once he got inside, but he didn’t want to leave fingerprints regardless.
He was about fifteen feet away from the back door of the house when it opened and a big man in dress pants, a white shirt, and a military buzz cut walked out.
Shit.
Gage thought for sure the guy had seen him, but one look at the man’s face changed his mind. He had that sleepy-eyed look of someone who’d just gotten out of bed. Probably a guard starting his shift.
Gage closed the distance between them, landing a solid right cross to the man’s jaw before he even knew what hit him. Gage caught the man and lowered him to the ground, then dragged him into the shadows of the trees. It wasn’t until he checked for a pulse that he realized the guy was one of the goons who’d come to the restaurant the other day. He didn’t bother zip-tying the man or stuffing something in his mouth. He’d be in and out of the house before the guy even woke up.
Gage darted a quick look around, then jogged over to the house. He tried the doorknob just to see if he’d get lucky. Well, damn, it was unlocked.
He quietly closed the door behind him, then soundlessly made his way through the darkened kitchen and down the hallway toward the room he’d seen with the light on—the one where the security guards hung out.
Their scent hit him before he even reached the partially opened door. Gage paused outside the room to do a quick recon. Two men sat on the couch, their backs to the door, their attention focused on the video game they were playing. They were so busy annihilating pretend monsters with their pretend weapons that Gage could have shot both of them and they never would have seen it coming.
Instead, he moved up behind them and punched one in the temple, bouncing his head off the other guard’s. Before the second guy could figure out what the hell happened, Gage hit him with a ridge hand strike to the side of the neck that knocked him as unconscious as his buddy.
This might take even less time than he thought.
Gage was heading for the steps when he almost walked into someone coming out of the bathroom. He recognized Roscoe Patterson’s ugly mug at the same time Hardy’s enforcer recognized him.
Patterson reacted faster than the other goons. Instead of reaching for a weapon he had no prayer of getting a hand on, he lashed out with a quick jab straight at Gage’s face.
If Gage hadn’t been a werewolf, the punch would have landed and probably made him see stars long enough for Patterson to go for his weapon. But Gage brought up his forearm, blocking the blow and connecting with the other man’s wrist hard enough to break something. Patterson didn’t even flinch. He merely shifted his stance and whipped out a knife with his other hand.
Gage jerked back, easily avoiding the blade, then caught Patterson’s arm just as he went in for another strike. The man’s eyes widened. That’s right, asshole. I’m faster, stronger, and a hell of a lot more dangerous than you are.
Gage delivered a jab to Patterson’s chin, following it up with an uppercut under the jaw, then a roundhouse kick that sent the man tumbling back ten feet to crash against the wall. Patterson slid to the floor, the knife slipping from his hand to land on the wood with a horrendous clatter. If the noise hadn’t been enough to wake up Hardy, nothing would.
Shit.
Gage bounded for the stairs, taking them four at a time. Hardy was probably on the phone to the cops even now. Wouldn’t that be ironic? A murdering scumbag calling the cops to protect him from another cop.
But when he reached the top of the stairs, it was to find Hardy bursting out of his bedroom, a gold-finished automatic in his hands. Before Hardy could pull the trigger, Gage closed the distance between them and wrapped his hand around the pistol, ripping it out of the man’s grasp. He shoved Hardy back into the bedroom with a growl.
Gage followed as the man stumbled back, continuing to push and shove until he’d moved Hardy all the way back to his bed and knocked him across it.
“You!” Hardy shouted. “I’ll have your fucking badge for this.”
He tried to get to his feet, but Gage pushed him back down. “That might be a bit difficult since I’m not wearing a badge at the moment.”
Hardy’s heart sped up as he suddenly realized there weren’t any other cops there shouting orders or waving warrants. There was just Gage—and the gun he’d taken from Hardy.
The fastest way to make his problems go away was to kill Hardy. And if Gage was smart, that’s what he’d do.
Hardy slowly inched toward the head of the bed. Did he have another gun in the nightstand? Gage hoped so. Because he couldn’t kill a defenseless man in cold blood. It just wasn’t in him.
He only hoped Hardy didn’t know that.
Gage found a chair and moved it closer to the bed, positioning it so that he could look Hardy in the eye while pointing the man’s own gun at him. Damn, a Desert Eagle Mark XIX, in titanium gold no less. He really hated it when scumbags carried such nice weapons.
“You tried to kill me and my team yesterday.”
Hardy eyed the gun as he shook his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I was at a meeting with the mayor all day yesterday. As a matter of fact, we spent some of that time talking about your out-of-control SWAT team. And about how you killed my son.”
Gage leveled the gun at the space right between the man’s eyes. “Do you think I care that you had one of your people set that bomb, or make the call to lure us there? You made it happen, which is all that matters.”
Hardy’s gaze nervously darted to the gun again.
“And as for your son, you know as well as I do that he signed his own execution order the moment he decided to kill innocent people.”
Hardy didn’t respond to Gage’s statement, but he didn’t deny it, either.
“You won’t shoot me,” he finally said.
Gage could tell by the man’s erratic heartbeat Hardy didn’t really believe that.
“I just walked into your house all by myself, put down four guards like they weren’t even there, then took this thing away from you like you were a two-year-old.” Gage gestured with the Desert Eagle. “Tell me again why I won’t do exactly anything I want?”
Clearly, Hardy had been under the assumption that if he held out long enough and kept the conversation going just a little longer, his men would come running to the rescue. The man had spent most of his adult life scaring the hell out of people, but Gage wasn’t scared, and Hardy knew it.
“What do you want?” Hardy demanded. “If you wanted me dead, you would have done it already. So, what is it? Money?”
Typical. The bastard thought all he had to do was wave a wad of cash in someone’s face and all his problems would go away. Gage bit back a snarl. “I don’t want your money.”
“What then?”
Gage stood up and moved closer to the bed, keeping the pistol trained on the bull’s-eye he’d mentally painted on Hardy’s forehead. He didn’t want to kill Hardy. Eve
n after what the man had tried to do to his pack, Gage couldn’t just execute him in cold blood. That would make him no better than Hardy. But he had to make Hardy believe he would kill him, so the man would be scared so shitless he’d back off.
“It’s simple really,” he said. “If you ever make a move against me or anyone close to me again, I’ll track you down, kill every one of your guards, then rip out your fucking heart.”
To make sure Hardy knew he meant every word, Gage jammed the bolt carrier back so hard he ripped it off the rails.
He tossed both pieces of the weapon on the bed beside Hardy. “Is that easy enough for you to understand?”
Hardy didn’t answer. He was too busy staring at the Desert Eagle Gage had just destroyed as easily as if it had been made of plastic.
Gage let out the same low-throated growl he used when he wanted to force a member of his pack to pay attention or behave. It had the same effect on Hardy.
“Do I make myself clear?” he asked.
Hardy swallowed hard. “Yes.”
“Then we’re done here.”
With that, Gage turned and walked out.
***
Gage walked back into Mackenzie’s apartment just before six a.m. Including the stop at the store for donuts and condoms—a purchase that had earned him one hell of a strange look from the cashier—he’d been gone for an hour and thirty-five minutes.
He didn’t hear any movement coming from the bedroom, so he left the donuts on the kitchen counter and silently made his way in that direction. The sun was peeking in the window at Mackenzie, who was huddled under the blanket fast asleep. She looked so beautiful it made his chest hurt.
Gage stripped off his clothes and set the economy-sized box of condoms on the nightstand, then climbed into bed. He pulled her into his arms and buried his face in her silky hair, breathing in her scent. God, she was like heaven.
Mackenzie mumbled something unintelligible and pressed herself back against him. He tightened his arm around her, holding her close. He hadn’t intended to do anything more than fall asleep with her, but she wiggled her bottom against his crotch, making his cock harden.
