She flattened her body on the bed and let her hands fall to her sides. Breathing heavily, she shivered multiple times. Her body convulsed. Her pussy ached, her lower lips swollen with need.
She had to tent the sheet with her hand finally to get it off her clit and her nipples. They all three hurt. Too sensitive.
And the pain in her belly grew.
A tear ran down her face.
What was wrong with her?
Still she needed to come. Badly. Like a drug addict. The pressure on her sex was intense. Her blood stayed in the vicinity, engorging her lower lips, her clit, and the hood too. Even her ass squeezed in on itself with the need to be filled.
It wasn’t as though she had a vibrator on hand. She hadn’t fled Cambridge thinking about sex toys.
Besides, as her breathing slowed to a manageable pace, she admitted to herself that nothing would work. This was Nature’s way of ensuring she stayed with her mates.
She didn’t need anyone to tell her. She knew it in her soul.
Finally, she rolled onto her side and curled into a ball again, willing sleep to take her away from her need to be fucked.
She lay very still for a long time, squeezing her thighs together and trying to relax her belly. Nothing worked.
Her swollen breasts throbbed. Even the slightest touch was too much.
She didn’t move. Her mind conjured up nothing but visions of her mates fucking her in ways they had not yet explored. Hard. Fast. Deep.
She needed them to take her roughly.
And they were two hours away, probably pissed. Possibly in as much pain as her. Was she a bitch? Maybe.
God, just let it snow. A blizzard of unbelievable proportions would be nice about now.
She no longer wanted to prove she controlled the weather. She wanted to prove she did not.
Chapter Eighteen
Corbin tossed the paper he was staring at on his desk and closed his eyes for the billionth time, regretting it instantly. He had accomplished nothing all day. He finally hauled himself up and strode across the room to his boss’s office.
The sheriff lifted his head. “Still no word?”
Corbin had told Sheriff Richards about his plight first thing that morning. Thank God the man was a shifter, or today would have been far more difficult to explain. “Nothing.”
“Go home. You look like hell.”
Corbin tried to smile. He did not succeed. He felt like hell. Several people had asked him if he was coming down with something. When he’d gone to the restroom, he’d seen a man with flu-like symptoms in the mirror. He did not have the flu. He had a broken claiming. “I’m going to do that.”
“Take tomorrow. It’s Saturday. You’ll need it. Go get her.”
“I can’t.”
“Why the hell not?” Richards frowned. “Who wears the pants in your house? Don’t be a wuss,” he teased.
“Oh, if only it were that simple. If you had to pick one of us to wear the pants, I guarantee it wouldn’t be me or Zach. And if I piss my woman off any more than she already is, I’ll regret it. She asked for three days.”
“Three days?” Richards lifted his brow and then whistled low and long. “Good luck with that. I’ll get someone to cover your shift until you can take care of um…business.” He waved a hand through the air as if to avoid stating the obvious. There was no way he didn’t realize the constant hard-on Corbin sported.
“Thanks. Later.” Corbin left, gritting his teeth all the way to his truck. His cock was so damn stiff, he thought it would explode. It was less than pleasant. And he hadn’t wanted to stand in the bathroom all day jerking off, so he’d fought that urge and ignored the stiff erection. Or tried to.
All he could picture was Laurie’s sexy naked body in every imaginable position the entire day. He even managed to conjure positions he’d never visualized before. And they were smoking hot and taking over his brain.
He eased into his truck, shut the door, and tugged on the seatbelt, wincing at the way it pressed against his dick.
He leaned his head back and closed his eyes in exhaustion. “Zach. I’m leaving work. Where are you?”
“At the lower lodge. I’ll leave soon and meet you at my place.”
“Okay. You…uh…have any problems today?” He couldn’t think how to ask the man if he had sported a hard-on similar to Corbin’s or not.
“If you mean, have I dealt with a line of people who wanted their money back for their season passes, not too many. If you’re asking about the blue balls, then yes. I’m about to pass out.”
Corbin chuckled into Zach’s head, though it was not funny in the least. “I’ll see you at home.”
He drove on autopilot, thankful the road between Sojourn and Cambridge had finally been reopened. It took some work, but a combination of salt and sand had cleared the ice, or at least made it less dangerous.
Corbin drove until he reached the long stretch of road where the two counties met. With a sudden rush of need, he pulled off the main road onto a gravel side road and turned off the car. He jumped down from the truck bed and wandered aimlessly across the thick brush toward the base of the mountain.
When he finally stopped, he looked around. Shift? He unbuttoned his uniform pants and lowered the zipper.
On second thought, he needed to come. Forget shifting. What he needed was release. He lowered his pants and underwear enough to allow himself to take his cock in hand.
The first stroke from base to tip made him groan. He reached out with his free hand and braced himself against the nearest tree. “Oh, God. I needed this,” he mumbled into the silence. He didn’t give a shit about the cold. He only cared about getting release.
He gripped just hard enough to speed up the process and thrusted up and down, letting his fist ease over the tip of his dick with each pass. He gathered the copious precome from the head and used it as lubricant to keep from chaffing.
His eyes fluttered closed, bringing up visions of Laurie kneeling in front of him. Her eyes were wide as she sucked his cock deep into her mouth and moaned around the shaft.
Corbin moaned too, gritting his teeth against the tightening in his cock. His balls drew up higher. He thrust faster. Harder.
“Oh, God.”
He stiffened his entire body as his blood raced to his engorged shaft.
He’d expected to shoot off in seconds. Instead he found himself on the edge of orgasm, not quite slipping over. He’d never had this problem in his life. Nor had he been this aroused. What the hell?
He thrust faster, loosening his grip. After a few minutes, he realized he was holding his breath. He gasped for oxygen and released his cock. He leaned against the tree, holding himself marginally upright with both forearms, his breathing heavy, his legs wobbly.
When he caught his breath, he cursed, tipping his head back and screaming his frustration. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
It took several long moments for him to recoup enough energy to move, at which point he glanced down at his semi-flaccid cock and groaned.
This could not be happening.
And yet it was.
»»•««
It was dark when Laurie managed to stretch out her muscles and flatten her body on the bed. Something had startled her from her reverie.
She heard voices and knew instantly Melinda was there.
She didn’t want to face her sister naked, so she dragged herself from the bed, pulled her T-shirt over her head, and stepped quietly across the hall to the bathroom. Flipping on the shower, she stood next to the glass door, leaning her weight into the frame.
She was exhausted and weak. She hadn’t eaten all day. Her body hurt—every muscle screaming. And still, she was aroused. Or at least horny.
Steam rose into the room, inviting her to step into the shower. It felt amazing having the water sluice over her sensitive skin. It didn’t replace what she really needed, but it was better than nothing.
After the longest, slowest-moving shower in the history of bathing, she st
epped out and wrapped her body in a large fluffy towel to pad from the room and face her sister.
Melinda sat on her bed. She had changed the sheets and gathered up the laundry in a pile in the corner. She smiled. “It smelled like sex in here. I hope you don’t mind me tidying up a bit.”
Laurie blushed, but Melinda was a welcome presence, so she ignored the sex comment. She stepped across the room and grabbed clean panties and a loose T-shirt from her bag. She didn’t have enough clothes to go much longer. She hadn’t thought hard before leaving Cambridge.
Without an ounce of modesty, she dropped her towel and shrugged into her panties, wincing as the cotton touched her skin. The shirt came next. And then she eased onto the bed to sit at the head as if she’d been sick for months and barely had the strength to move.
That wasn’t far from how she actually felt.
“You gonna talk to me now?” Melinda asked.
“Depends. You gonna lecture me?”
“Maybe. You done trying to prove a moot point?”
“Nope.”
“Then I’m going to lecture you.”
Laurie lowered her gaze. She was losing this battle, but she wasn’t one who enjoyed admitting defeat. “How’s the weather?”
“The weather’s fine. You think you’re God?”
“Nope.”
“Then come home. Your mates need you. From the looks of you, you’ve fared worse than them. You need them.” She waved a hand through the air in Laurie’s general direction. “Why are you doing this?”
“Because it’s the right thing to do.”
“Prove a point you can’t prove? So what if the weather doesn’t behave in your absence. What does that prove?”
Laurie shrugged.
“You know, Mimi thinks this is crazy, but she didn’t want me to come here either. She was of the opinion that we should let you play this out.”
“Smart woman.”
“I think you’re stubborn, and the spirits are going to be pissed off for your misunderstanding. Whatever they want, it isn’t this.”
“How do you know?”
Melinda hauled a leg onto the bed and twisted her body to face Laurie head on. “I’ve been in touch with my shaman side far longer than you. Most of my life, in fact. You’ve been dealing with supernatural experiences for less than two weeks.”
Laurie started to respond to that, and Melinda held up a hand.
“I don’t mean that to be condescending. It’s simply a fact. I’ve been watching the weird occurrences in a forty mile radius for years. People have come to Mimi with spirit sightings for longer than that.
“Granted, most of them were seemingly innocuous. Nevertheless, in recent history I believe the spirits have been there to guide us to help mankind. Warnings we need to heed. In neither my case nor Rebecca’s did it seem the spirits wanted us to leave. Especially separate from our mates.”
Laurie shrugged. “Perhaps they don’t want me there.”
“That’s what your gut tells you?” Melinda narrowed her gaze. “Look me in the eye and tell me you honestly believe the reason for the sightings you’ve had of dark smoke coalescing into a shape in front of your face is to tell you to get out of town.”
Laurie didn’t move.
“You can’t. None of the sightings have left you with the vibe that the spirit was angry with you, right?”
“They’ve left me with nothing. That’s the problem.”
“So you think you can play God and decide what you believe the messages may be?”
“Hardly. I’m just testing a theory.”
“Really? And how’s that working?”
“Not well,” Laurie mumbled.
“So come home.”
“I’ve come this far. I’d rather see it through.”
“You’d leave two men sitting on their asses in Cambridge in a completely frantic state to prove a point? For how long? Days? Weeks? Months?”
“I told them three days.”
“Three days?” Melinda raised her voice. “This being the end of day one?”
“Yes.”
“That’s insane. I know we haven’t known each other long, and it’s difficult for me to sit here in judgment of your choices, but Laurie, think about how much you’re hurting.” She paused. “Don’t deny it. I can see the pain on your face. You must feel like you’ve been through a tornado that picked you up, carried you two states away, and dropped you.”
That wasn’t a bad analogy. Laurie winced. “How do you know?”
Her voice rose. “Because that’s what you look like. You’re exhausted. You haven’t slept. There are bags under your eyes. I can smell your arousal, and I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with me being in the room.”
Laurie glanced away. It embarrassed her that her sister could scent her that way.
“It’s like the pheromones that fill a room when two people, or in this case three, need to mate. Except you already did mate, and now you’ve decided to play God and take that claiming and throw it out the window and pretend it didn’t happen. It’s too late.
“So imagine how your mates feel. They’re hurting too. Badly.”
Laurie bit her lower lip. Why did Melinda have to make so much sense?
Melinda opened her mouth to continue and then held up a hand. Her eyes glazed over slightly, a sure indication she was communicating with her mates. She smiled and nodded—comical since it was the equivalent of hand gestures while talking on the phone and driving. They couldn’t see her.
Finally she shook away the connection and met Laurie’s gaze again. “It’s snowing in Cambridge.”
“See?” She perked up, hopeful.
“Yeah. It’s fucking December. It snows most days in Cambridge. That’s why they built a ski resort there at the base of a mountain. Laurie, get your head out of your ass.”
Laurie flinched.
Melinda’s shoulders drooped. “However, it is snowing hard. It wasn’t in the forecast. And it hasn’t let up for hours.”
Laurie smiled, crossing her arms under her breasts and ignoring the pressure it put on her chest. She scooted back down the bed and lay flat. “I need sleep.”
“Seriously?”
Laurie closed her eyes and nodded.
“You know better than anyone you won’t be able to sleep one minute until you’ve been reunited with your mates. Don’t even fake like it’s all hunky dory.”
Laurie opened one eye and lifted that brow. “Hunky dory?”
Melinda ignored her. She stood and grabbed Laurie’s bag from the corner, stuffing her belongings into it. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“Home. Where you belong. Before things really get out of hand.”
“I can’t do it. I’m ruining both their lives with my presence.”
“Because you mated two men, and you happen to be of mixed races?”
Laurie shrugged.
“What year is this? That’s idiotic. Anyone who believes that shit needs to have their head examined, and you know it. Admit defeat. Come home with me.”
She lifted Laurie’s bag and set it on the bed. She pulled out a pair of jeans and socks and tossed them at her sister. “Get dressed. It’s fucking cold out there.”
The jeans landed on her belly. She winced but didn’t move. Instead she put her hands behind her head and feigned nonchalance.
“Girl, I will physically drag you out of this house and throw you in my car without caring a bit about your state of undress.” She put her hands on her hips. “Mom will gladly help. She thinks you’re cracked.”
Laurie felt cracked. She rolled her eyes back and stared at the ceiling. “What if I’m right?”
“About what? The weather?”
“What if I’m right about the town? What if they can’t accept the three of us as an entity? What if they get increasingly more violent? I would feel awful if anything happened to either of my mates or any other innocent bystander if those religious zealots tried to kill someone
and succeeded. Or worse, the jerks from the reservation stuck in a time long gone who want to keep the wolf line pure. That’s insane. They’re crazy. And crazy people do crazy things.”
“True. And their actions are on them, not you. All you can do is follow your heart and what Fate has arranged. Can you tell me you don’t love those two men with every fiber of your being?”
Laurie couldn’t move. Of course she loved them. Both of them. With every inch of her body.
“I’ll take that as a no. And would you deny yourself or either of them happiness because some other assholes are spouting religious nonsense at you?”
“Of course not. But I have to consider more than my own feelings. What about the Masters? What if they lose their livelihood because I came to town? How is that fair?”
Melinda rolled her eyes. “No one’s losing their jobs. The resort will not go under because one strange fundamentalist backward church thinks the races shouldn’t mix or consenting adults can’t enjoy sex with whomever they want. Purity of the white man? That’s rubbish. It’s a small handful of people who believe in that shit, and most of either town would never support it. You can’t let a dozen bigots dictate your life and take away your happiness.”
Laurie let that all sink in. “What about the weather. Why do you think the black smoky aura always comes to me, and it comes to me during a crisis?”
“I won’t deny the spirits want your attention. I just think you’re misguided when it comes to their intentions.”
“How do you know what they want?”
Melinda frowned. “Honey, you don’t. I never have. All you can do is follow your heart and your instincts.”
“Melinda, my instincts tell me to stay out of town,” she grumbled.
Melinda shook her head. “Okay, then maybe you shouldn’t follow your instincts this time. You can tell the difference between evil intent that involves real harm and a warning, right?”
“Probably.”
“So think about each sighting. Did you ever feel like the spirit was angry with you in particular?”
“No, but it sure is angry.”
“Well, I’ve had the same sensation. I know the spirits are angry with our entire section of the country for some reason. They’re trying to warn us. I know from the earthquake that the spirit genuinely wanted me to keep Rebecca safe. I did that. It worked. She’s alive, and she helped so many people the day of the earthquake, something she couldn’t have done if she’d been one of the victims.
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