He reached for the shampoo, but she took it from him. “You first,” she said. He didn’t argue. She scrubbed his head and soaped every inch of his body, clucking over every cut and bruise, and even laughed a little when they awkwardly switched positions in the tiny tub so he could rinse. “You’re beautiful,” she told him when she was finished.
“I thought that was my line,” he laughed.
“It’s true. You’re beautiful. Not just your face and body, though they’re certainly not lacking. It’s in your soul, I think. It’s in the way you care for the people you love, the way you make them feel, the way you make me feel.” She handed him the shampoo and turned her back to him. “Tell me how you rescued Bobby.”
Marshall poured a little in his palm and massaged it into her scalp. “I heard you and I went because I felt the boy’s terror. It was the wolver who chased him up that tree who needed rescuing. The fool forgot he was twice as heavy as the boy which meant Bobby could climb twice as high. Just as I got there, a limb snapped and the fool fell. Broke both ankles when he landed.” He shook his head and water sprayed in an arc from his hair. “You sent me on a wild goose chase, woman. I ought to spank you both.”
His laugh turned into a choked sob and he turned her to him, holding her so tightly she almost couldn’t breathe. He buried his face in her hair, heedless of the shampoo’s foam.
“I thought I’d lost you, Lizzie. I thought I would be too late.”
“Shh, now, shh.” She rubbed her hands over his back. “You weren’t too late. You were just in time.” Her hand slid around to fondle him between his legs. “Now help me rinse my hair,” she said with a sultry laugh. “It’s time you fulfill your duty as the winner of the Chase.”
Chapter 41
The kissing started as he rinsed her hair and drying each other became an exploration of bodies with hands and lips and teeth and very little towel. She was wrapped around him by the time he carried her to bed; her arms around his neck, her legs around his waist. She needed him, wanted him, couldn’t get close enough to him.
She could feel the need in Marshall, too. He wasted no time when they fell to the bed. His mouth was on hers, plundering, demanding. His tongue danced over her lips and teeth and plunged inward to taste her tongue. Her mouth, as hungry as his, followed where he led. His mouth moved to her eyes, her cheek, her chin and moved to the lobe of her ear. Elizabeth moaned softly.
“The touch, Marshall,” she whispered, “I want, I need your Alpha’s touch.” It would be the final stroke in erasing Calvin Everest’s taint from her soul.
Marshall laughed; a joyful sound of victory that echoed through the cabin. He rolled with her, carrying her over his chest, ran his hands through her tangled wet hair and down her back to rest on the globes of her rear where he pressed her tightly to him.
Her body exploded with sensation, every inch of her burning to be touched. Her nipples tightened further and they ached. How they ached. She rubbed them against his chest, feeling each tiny hair send a fiery tingle that pulsed through her veins and lit up her heart. Her nipple found his and the connection was electric.
Her mouth traveled over his chin, the line of his jaw, his neck. She kissed, she licked, she nibbled and tasted the sweet flavor of the forest, felt sunshine through his skin, smelled the sweet, clean aroma of mountain air.
Her hips writhed against him, pressing herself to him, wanting more than this contact allowed. Fire was burning between her legs and only Marshall’s touch could quench it. She whimpered with frustration.
“Touch me,” she begged, “Please.”
Marshall pushed her shoulders back until she was sitting, her head thrown back, her breasts jutting forward. His hands sought them out, molding them, rubbing his roughed hands against nipples already over sensitized. She gasped when he rolled the pearled and constricted buds between finger and thumb, hissed when he released them.
“Please, please.” He knew what she wanted, what she needed. Why wouldn’t he give it to her? But all she could whisper was, “Please.”
He laughed, ran his fingers lightly down her ribs and circled her navel. She pressed against him and lifted her hips to force his hand to travel to the place where she needed him most. He ignored her and began instead to play with the triangle of curls at her mound. She whimpered.
At last, long last, he reached her slit and rather than finding satisfaction in that touch, her need flared higher. His finger began to lazily circle that heart of desire. He changed its speed, pressure and position until he found the place that made her eyes go wide.
Elizabeth moaned and moved against his hand desperate for more. Her breath was coming faster, her body beginning to sizzle. Her need for him was almost unbearable. His mouth caught hers and swallowed her cry of longing as he plunged his finger home. Faster and faster he pumped, the base of his palm pounding against her swollen and sensitive nub while his finger reamed her insides. And all the while, she was riding it harder and harder, wanting more. Another finger joined the first and then another and now it was his thumb that darted and played around her swollen nub. Beneath heavy lidded eyes she saw him watching her, smiling in satisfaction as she rode higher and higher through the flames until she thought they would consume her. And then they did.
Elizabeth‘s senses burst in a fiery red eruption, a release of cosmic energy. Marshall’s magic. Nothing mattered but this sweet release from the fires of her desire. It lit up her whole being with glorious sensations and left her whimpering and moaning as it passed. She collapsed onto Marshall’s chest.
She could have lain there forever, basking in the afterglow of such a stunning experience. But the Alpha’s touch had control and now that her own needs had been sated, temporarily at least, her attentions turned to Marshall.
Poor man! He’d fought a battle, raced to capture his Mate, rescued, okay, would have rescued a little boy, and killed the man who would have raped her and made her his slave.
She started with his eyes, those beautiful eyes. She kissed them and made him hold them closed as she kissed her way across his face. She laughed, deep throated and sexy, when she nibbled at his throat and his erection quivered. She pampered his chest with deep massage and turned her attention to his nipples and laughed again when he stiffened and groaned as she nipped him lightly with her teeth. She paid close attention to each muscled roll of the six-pack of his abdomen and grinned when he squirmed under the attentions of her tongue to his naval. The Alpha’s touch worked both ways.
She lingered at the base of his erection until she heard him curse. “Turnabout’s fair play,” she told him. When he groaned and swore again, she licked him like an ice cream cone, from base to tip, savoring the bead of moisture that collected there. And then she took him into her mouth. Even this was different from before. She could feel every small nuance under the velvet soft skin and she traced each vein and ridge with her tongue. She took him deeply in, riding him with her mouth the way she had ridden his fingers. Each tiny pulsation, each throb that made his erection jump, fascinated her.
Her own fire was building again. Moisture gathered at the crux of her legs, begging to be used as a lubricant for his entry. Her hips started to move in time to her mouth’s ministrations.
She felt his hands at her head, pulling her away from that which gave her so much pleasure. She fought the hands, refused to be lead away.
“Lizzie, Love. It’s time.”
He smiled and she gave in to him. Here in this bed, she always would. He shifted her, rose behind her and entered her in one quick thrust. A vulnerable position, this, and yet his great body covering hers made her feel safe.
The fiery pressure within her built again as he rode her with a force he’d not previously used. “Taking” crossed her mind, but only for a moment, and then her hips were rising to meet him. Thrust after thrust, she could feel him rising with her, a volcano about to erupt. His hand caressed her rear and slid to the front and found that sweet spot. His finger worked from the front while
his hips thrust from behind and she heard herself moaning as the conflagration rose and threatened to consume her. She was with him. He was with her. They were one.
Marshall’s head fell to her neck where it bent to the shoulder and she shifted her head aside. A burning passion rose within her and she pushed her hips harder and faster against him. Fire turned to inferno as he sank his teeth into her neck. She screamed as this conflagration of emotions burst from her.
She could feel him. Everything he felt as his own blazing fire shot forth, she felt within her. She felt his love and concern and his passion for this beautiful woman who was his mate. She cried out again as their shared ecstasy shot through her. The wonder and beauty of it brought tears to her eyes.
Elizabeth felt him lick the blood from her neck. She should have felt the pain when he pierced her skin, but all she’d felt was an all-consuming love for this man-beast who claimed her as his own.
She collapsed onto the bed, her head turned to the side, her arms stretched out and her hips still in position to hold Marshal within her. He covered her with his body, supporting his weight on his forearms and brought his head down beside hers.
“You’re mine now, lovely Lizzie. The Alpha has his Mate.”
His voice was as clear in her mind as if he’d spoken aloud.
“You’re a wolver, one of us,” he said and rolled them both to the side so that she was spooned against him.
He didn’t need to tell her. She could feel them in her mind. She felt their joy at the battle’s victory and their pride in their Alpha. She felt the women’s relief for the safety of their men and their pain and sorrow over the loss of a few. She felt the young women’s surprise as their bodies readied to be quickened with new life. But most of all, Elizabeth felt their happiness in having her for their Mate. She couldn’t have agreed with them more.
# # #
BOOKS BY JACQUELINE RHOADES
Thanks for reading The Alpha's Mate . I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you'd like to know more about me, Jacqueline Rhoades, and the books I've written, or read excerpts from my work, you can visit me at http://www.jacquelinerhoades.com
Other Paranormal Romances By Jacqueline Rhoades
The Guardians Of The Race
Guardian's Grace
Guardian's Hope
Guardian's Joy
The Alpha's Mate Page 30
