by Diana Seere
Sophia spread her legs and raked his chest, splitting open his shirt with a brutality that turned him on even more, his hair standing on end, every nerve ending lit. In the dim recesses of his polite, good-guy mind, he questioned the unprotected heady plunge straight into her wet pussy, but given the moans coming from her as he thrust hard into Sophia, he told his good-guy self to shut the hell up.
Her neck tasted like cinnamon and sweat, his hips moving hard, curling into her as his ass muscles flexed in an impossible rotation that felt so good, so right, as her legs wrapped around his waist, the angle making her arch and cry out.
“Harder!” she demanded, and as she drew more of the sexual animal inside him out, as if her body extracted his essence, he felt the shift abate, his vision going human again, the aching openness of his pores receding as hormones pushed him to new heights. His fingers tore her dress at the neck to free her breasts, his mouth taking in the pearly pink of her nipple, his bite making her inner walls clench and trap him, the journey in and out of her all the harder, tight and challenging.
He rose to the occasion, hammering home the pure energy of being bigger, stronger, different. His breath was like sandpaper against her skin, her hair like black licorice in the night, the rustle of leaves against the wind grown to waves crashing against a rocky cliff. As they made love with an unrelenting, unchained spirit that drove him to the point of madness, he exploded in her, lost to his own feral side, newly emerging and demanding he relinquish his soul.
Which he did.
Willingly.
Pouring it straight into Sophia, their heartbeats merging as he climaxed, the sound turning him inside out. She clung to him, her own orgasms pulsing through him in time to this exotic rhythm, his mouth against her neck, her hands digging and grabbing him, her body thrashing with pleasure until she began to pant, fast and furious, her throat making small sounds of submission, of satiety.
As Zach pulled himself up to look at her, their eyes met. He saw it.
Felt it.
The craving.
Already he wanted more.
A low, throaty chuckle rumbled under him, Sophia’s dazed look turning to one of amusement. The stars glittered in her eyes, reflecting in wide, dilated pupils so big they looked like black holes.
Which they were, in a way, he mused, joining her laugh. Because he had no control over her gravitational pull.
“Again?” she asked, the question purely rhetorical.
“How did you—how do you—” He cleared his throat, his cock wet and hard inside her, twitching in erratic patterns against her. Sophia tightened and he grunted, the feeling too intense, too much.
All of this was too much, yet not enough.
“I can feel it.”
He clenched, making himself jump against her.
“Not that,” she said in a sardonic tone. Her palm flattened against his heart, buttons from his shirt long lost to the thick brush surrounding them. “That.”
“My heart?”
“You feel it too. Don’t try to tell me you don’t.”
Zach went silent, listening inside himself for the craving. The strange beat. The pulse of connection to her.
And then he jolted and stared at her, sweat on his tense face, jaw tight as he frowned.
Because this conversation?
It had taken place without either of their mouths moving.
Sophia waited for the response that didn’t come.
He must’ve felt it. He must have heard their heartbeats drumming together. Or had she imagined everything, even their silent conversation?
Lilah had told her about the Beat and hearing Gavin’s thoughts, and Sophia wondered if it was romantic exaggeration, a young woman’s delusion that allowed her to accept the transformations that her life—and body—were going through. Lilah had become a werewolf and now was expecting not one but two babies. Shifter babies. The thought filled Sophia with a nameless craving she was afraid to admit to herself.
Was Sophia foolish to believe in the Beat? For a few moments she and Zach had seemed to share a pulse. Sophia had been a believer in the powers of sex for a long, long time. And LupiNex had proven there were unexplained mysteries of shifter biology they were only beginning to understand. But great sex could do mysterious things to one’s sanity. What was a fantasy, after all, but a vividly satisfying hallucination? Was the idea of carrying a child of her own so oddly tempting that it had distorted her reason?
Zach stroked her thigh, his eyes dazed, hungry, wild. “Sophia, I want you again.”
His raw need amused her. She herself wasn’t much steadier, but she’d had more experience. Her own rocky journey through puberty had become an annoying legend in her family. Her infamy would be even greater if it hadn’t been for her twin, Derry, whose sudden shifts and need for sexual release had been so severe that he’d been sent home from boarding school.
Twice.
In an effort to burn off the excess energy and teach him self-discipline, a distant cousin from Scotland had been flown to Montana to train Derry in boxing. A week later, Derry had shattered the elder werebear’s collarbone—accidentally, because Derry was at his heart a sweet guy—and the cousin had returned to Scotland.
Eventually, with time (and a few eager age-appropriate partners), they’d learned to control their natures without embarrassing the family. Not too badly anyway. Asher still complained, of course, but that was his way of showing he cared.
Asher. She’d promised him she could train Zach, and she would. He didn’t need to know about their slightly, uh, rocky start.
She got to her feet and brushed off leaves and debris. Her luxurious cabin was a short distance away, yet they’d just fucked right here in the dirt. Now that she’d had her physical needs met—somewhat—for the time being, she needed to get a grip on her own urges, already unruly because of the familiar autumn lust that struck before her winter rest. She’d assured Asher and Sam that she could help Zach learn self-discipline during this difficult adjustment. It was time she did that, starting with setting an example.
Fantasies about the Beat were a dangerous distraction.
She looked up at the moon and inhaled deeply. “I’ll bring you back to your cabin,” she said. “You’re still recovering from the tranquilizer.”
He got to his feet. “You’re not serious. The last thing I want right now is a nap.” He moved closer, trailing a fingertip up her arm, her bare shoulder.
Shivering, she nodded. “Nevertheless, you need to recuperate.”
A laugh broke out of him. “I’ve had more than enough of quiet time. I prefer this method of recuperation.” He tunneled his fingers through her hair, tangling at the nape of her neck, and pulled her close to kiss her. “Better than anything I got in Gavin’s clinic, that’s for sure.”
At the mention of her brother’s name, she hardened her resolve. “We’ll repeat our lessons when I say so, not when you’re feeling overwhelmed by pubescent urges.” Without smiling, she grabbed his wrist and pulled his hand out of her hair. “You need to learn control.”
“And you think you can teach me that?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“From what I hear, and from what I’ve seen, you’re the last person to teach abstinence,” he said.
“I admit, this went a lot faster than I’d intended,” she said with as much arrogance as she could manage. “But I’m not going to let it go any further tonight.”
“I wasn’t talking about tonight. Or yesterday.” He lifted an eyebrow and held her gaze.
She’d wondered if he remembered the time last year when she’d hit on him. Now she realized he did remember, was probably proud of it, and it embarrassed her.
If he thought he could have her whenever he wanted just because she’d wanted him once in the past, he was mistaken.
“You’ve got a lot to learn.” She stepped away, readjusted her dress, slipped her feet into her shoes, and finger-combed her hair. “Your first lesson begins n
ow. See that path?” She pointed the way they’d come.
“Yes,” he said. “But—”
“Right before you get to the house, take the fork in the path to the right. That leads to the quarters where you’ll be staying during your time here.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Did the serum give you the heightened senses the rest of us have?”
“Yes,” he said again. “But where is your cabin? I want—”
“Even in the dark, if you use your sense of smell, you will be able to retrace your steps to the bedroom Asher has given you. Tomorrow or the next day, perhaps the day after that, we will have another session.”
Frowning, he loomed over her. “Is that what this was? A session? You make it sound like some kind of therapy.” He said the word as if it tasted bad in his mouth.
“Exactly.” She gave him a teasing look, like a naughty schoolmistress. “You even have homework.”
“Homework?”
“Go to your room. Shift.”
“Shift? I thought you were training me on how not to shift!”
“I want you to learn to voluntarily shift. To become your animal self.” Her pink tongue poked out between her lips, licking them. She couldn’t help herself.
“And then shift back to being human. You need to learn, Zach, to do it at will.”
“I’ve never tried.”
“Why not?”
He didn’t have an answer.
“Well,” she said into his silence. “Now you have the time and the safe space to do it.” She paused, considering something. “I won’t sleep with you again until you’ve mastered it.”
“WHAT?”
“I’m here to teach you delayed gratification,” she said. “Delayed. Not denied.”
Moonlight shone on his face, illuminating the corner of his wide, sensual mouth as it curved upward. “Gratification?”
Her heart began pounding harder in her chest, already imagining their reunion. “Yes. Master voluntary shifting, alone, and you’ll receive a gold star.” His eyes raked over her body, his neck tight with barely restrained impulse. She could feel its power, how easily she could be consumed by him.
Wind rustled the branches of the trees over their heads. “Tomorrow,” he said in a low voice. “No later than tomorrow.”
Her toes curled in her shoes, but she only showed him a faint smile. “We’ll see.”
Chapter 5
Delayed Gratification was Zach’s middle name.
Old Zach, that is. Before.
Before, he was the poster child for holding back, for thinking long-term, for investing in the bigger picture. All his student loans were paid off quickly because he lived like a monk who took a vow of poverty for nearly two years. It’s not that he was a cheapskate.
He had a goal. A long-term goal to be out of debt so that when he found the right woman and it was time to start a family, they would have choices.
Increased choices were important to Zach even if it meant making short-term sacrifices.
Sophia’s idea of delaying his sexual needs felt like a slap, a rejection, a betrayal.
This was New Zach.
New Zach just wanted more. More of those lush curves that stretched down Sophia’s body from shoulder to calf, begging for his touch. More of that full, ripe mouth that offered promises of pleasures he couldn’t even imagine. More of those hands that grabbed his ass and drove him inside her, harder, at that split second when his orgasm burst out of him with so much more intensity.
More of the delicious curl of her lips in an amused smile.
More of those big brown eyes that looked into his soul.
Just… more.
She said he wasn’t being denied—just delayed.
As seconds ticked by, the path to his room like a walk through sexual death row, his cock rubbed against the seam of his pants, nearly making him groan. He hadn’t felt this sensitive, this eager, this horny since he was a young teenager.
What had Sophia said? “Pubescent urges”? Was she being literal? He had so many questions, his legs taking him forward to his room, his libido wanting him to stop, turn around, and run to chase her, catch her.
Devour her.
On halting legs, he continued, knowing that the second he walked into his room he’d unbutton his pants, grab his still-scented cock and beat off, the climax a biological necessity. A vision of her controlled face, chastising him—hell, denying him—made his blood race as he imagined all the ways he would convince her to give him what he needed.
And to give her even more.
He found the door to the hallway, then his room, walking in and looking around the space with new, frustrated eyes. Loathing himself, he did exactly what he’d imagined, stripping naked, barely turning on the shower spray before clutching the base of his shaft, one stroke making his thighs tighten, release imminent.
Pubescent urges, huh? Going through puberty again would be a form of torture. As he climbed into the shower, before the water even hit his chest, he stroked up once more and shuddered, his seed spilling out, rolling down to join the drops of water that splashed the floor, his body tense with relief, the paradox as bewildering as any other.
He stared down, his hand around his penis, the size difference between Old Zach and New Zach still surreal. As the water washed over him, he took deep breaths, the orgasm barely touching the craving for Sophia. Beating off did nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not one drop of arousal was exorcised.
If anything, he wanted her with an even greater compulsion, the difference between his hand and her pussy, between this empty shower and the delight of her enthusiastic body so great it only made him yearn for her.
Old Zach would have felt some measure of alleviation at whacking off. It took the hormones and gave them a release, which helped.
Now? No.
Skin throbbing as if his entire body were nothing but his pulse, Zach quickly finished the shower, tearing through the motions like a man with a mission. As he hurriedly dried off with the towel, he marched into his bedroom and came to a halt before the mirror.
A cart, much like a room service setup, rested against the end of his bed. Covered dishes dotted the top, laid out in a pattern. The scent of steak made him salivate as he recognized hunger—digestive, not sexual—and stopped what he was doing, pulling the lids off all the food.
Tenderloin. Lobster. Stuffed chicken breasts made with fresh buffalo mozzarella and asiago cheese. Without even bothering to unroll the silverware, Zach ate greedily using his hands, the entire tray emptied within ten minutes, all the way down to the monster-sized piece of caramel-drizzled vanilla bean cheesecake that was seriously out of this world.
Did shifters use magic when they cooked?
Unaware of how hungry he’d been, he was slightly soothed by the food. Stretching out on the bed, he took up the entire space, letting his thoughts settle.
Homework.
She gave him homework.
Zach was a fine student. One of the best, in fact. You didn’t complete a PhD in biochemistry at the University of Michigan without being diligent, detail oriented, and—
Oh hell.
Zach burst out laughing at the absurdity of realizing he’d graduated from a school whose mascot was—wait for it—
A wolverine.
Not even close to a wolf but still funny.
Snorting, he let the image roll over him, his stomach full and his heart heavy. A sudden flash of his studio apartment back in Boston made him yearn for normalcy. His pet cat, Lucy, had died last year. Aside from a few plants he’d never been very good at watering, there was nothing back home to worry about.
And no one there to worry about him.
He was an only child with no aunts, no uncles, no cousins. For fun, a few years ago, he’d done online genetic testing in an effort to learn from the raw data. A few fifth cousins living in the Netherlands had popped up, one in Slovenia, another in Belgium.
None in the US and none closer than fifth cousins.
> He might as well be the one to experience a lab accident so radical, he mused as he closed his eyes, willing his body to relax. It was as if he were disconnected from the world, tethered only by his own volition. If he had a connection to anything, it was work.
And look where that got him.
Sophia.
Her name whispered its way through his subconscious, his cock growing at the thought, all hope of relaxation vanquished.
Homework, huh? Shift on his own, in a controlled way, without her nearby to trigger the gnawing sexual need?
Zach could do that. He was a good student, after all.
Teacher’s pet, if he got this right.
How, exactly, did he make himself shift? At no point during his other experiences had he felt like he had any control. It just was. Making himself shift felt impossible, like forcing a sneeze or using the mind only to will an orgasm to occur. Sure, he’d heard of outliers who could do it, but…
He thought about Sophia’s scent, a musky, flowery odor that just made him horny, his erection standing tall as if trying to shake hands with the ceiling fan.
Nope.
He thought about being a wolf. Prowling in a pack, roaming through woods and prairies, hunting for rabbits.
Yuck. No way. Did shifters hunt for food? Were the Stanton family a bunch of predators, shifting at night, stalking smaller animals to devour them? Was that how this worked?
Questions. He had so many questions.
Too many.
“Shut up, Zach,” he chided himself. “No sex until you ace this. Don’t overanalyze it. Just do it.”
Great. Now he sounded like a sneaker commercial.
Fear made him hesitate. The first time he had shifted, nothing but pain came through, like a freight train hit him head-on, no relief in sight. Endless pain rippled through him for what felt like weeks, impossible to bear.
