7
Mari drove faster than what could be considered sane.
For the first time, her wolf senses had come to her when she needed them, allowing her to navigate the twists and turns of the road with superhuman ability.
It seemed to her as if she’d driven into some kind of wormhole because she never doubted for a second she would catch up to Warner and Lenore.
Even if they traveled as the crow flies and she was bound to backroads and highways.
She let her body guide the path she took, not using her wolf sense, or even common sense. She didn’t scan the highways for a sign of him, she didn’t look for their motorcycles. All she did was drive. Even when darkness fell. Mari simply kept driving.
Until it was time to stop.
It hit her out of nowhere. She was on a heavily wooded, abandoned state highway. She hadn’t seen another automobile for hours. Nor were there any streetlights to guide her way. It was just her, the headlights, and the endless sky above and the road that stretched out before her in a gray ribbon.
But she knew the place.
This was it.
Her skin itched and burned, and Mari would swear she was about to crawl right out of it. Yes, right out of her skin. She wanted to shed it like a dirty shirt and leave it far behind.
This wasn’t something she’d ever felt before.
She left the Vette by the side of the road and Mari had to stop and breathe, to find her center before she did the same with her human form. Mari didn’t know what she was walking into, or what she was becoming.
She knew that it was different.
It was darker. And Warner needed her.
She trod through the dark forest, her wolf eyes burning as she began to see things not in their whole, real form, but as only heat signatures. And she was hungry for everything. She was driven to feel every sensation, fill every emptiness, to glut on anything she could dig her claws into.
Mari sensed him before she scented him. Before she saw him. Some extra sense more than human and more than wolf recognized him.
And suddenly, all of those feelings she thought she couldn’t control receded and she was grateful. She needed to be in control so that she was a help to him instead of a hindrance.
“Warner?” she whispered.
A dark shape moved through the trees. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“I shouldn’t be anywhere else.”
For every step she took forward, he took one back.
“Where are you going, Warner? I can see you.”
“I was hoping you wouldn’t follow.”
His words, in other circumstances might’ve been hurtful, but she wasn’t fazed.“Really? Then why aren’t you running? I’m sure I can’t catch you.”
“But can’t you? You’re here now.”
She caught scent of something that slithered inside of her and seeped into her bones. It made her want. It made her hunger. It made her need.
“Stop that,” he said.
“Stop what?” She took another step forward.
“Stop making that damnable scent.”
“I could say the same thing to you.”
“There’s no way this can end well,” he swore.
“Then I guess we have to put that part off as long as possible then, don’t you think?”
“I’ve been trying, woman.”
She laughed. “I know. But there are forces at work here that are older and stronger than we are.”
He took another step back. “That’s why we have to fight it.”
“I don’t want to fight it.”
He growled.
“Especially when you do that.”
“I’m scared, Mari.”
She stopped her advance. “I know. Me too.”
“Everything I know to do to keep you and the pack safe is wrong.”
He looked so lost. Not helpless, but… alone. So very alone. With no one to give him aid or succor.
Yet here she was and that was all she wanted to do.
“So maybe you should try something else. Something that goes against everything you thought you knew.” She licked her lips. “Maybe you have to surrender.”
He’d stopped backing away now. “I know how to surrender, Mari. How can you think I don’t?”
“Oh, I don’t know. When have you ever surrendered?”
“Let me count the ways. When I abdicated for Sterling both with the pack and with Arianna.”
“That wasn’t surrender, Warner. That was a sacrifice.”
“What’s the difference?”
“You knew the consequences. You knew exactly what lay on the other side of that.”
“What if I hurt the people I’m trying to save?”
“What if you hurt the people you’re trying to save by resisting? I guess it all comes down to you. You can only do what you believe is the best thing going on the information you have.”
“The information I have tells me that everything I know to do is wrong.”
“So let me help you, Warner. The information I have told me I needed to be with you. It told me how to find you. Because you need me.”
He sighed and his shoulders sagged. “I do need you, Mari. I need you more than I know how to say. I need you to be safe.”
“And I need to you to be safe. So stalemate, eh? Or you can just stop fighting it and let me be with you. So I can keep you safe and you can keep me safe.”
“I think you might be the Devil.”
“We don’t believe in that.”
“You said I should start something new. This. Here’s proof of the Devil,” Warner said dejectedly as he took a step toward her.
“How’s that?”
“I can’t stay away from you.”
Mari wanted to say that the surrender she was talking about wasn’t surrendering to her, but she wanted that, too. No point in lying to herself, or to him.
“I think you could if you wanted to, but you don’t want to.” At least, that was what Mari hoped.
“You’re right. I don’t want to. And that scares the shit out of me. It should scare you.”
“I’m not afraid. Maybe I should be, but I can’t ever seem to do anything I’m actually supposed to do. Even my marriage of convenience is highly inconvenient.”
His eyes began to change like they had in the cemetery, going from amber to a deep, blood red. Her heart began to beat faster.
“Is that fear?” His question was more like a plea.
“No.” She bit her lip for a moment, but then she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Her mouth fell open and she breathed deep.
“I want you to run, Mari.”
“To save myself?”
“No. Because I want to catch you.”
She was poised to burst into a sprint, but something told her that this wasn’t the right time. If he ran her down and ravaged her, even if it was what she wanted, he’d never forgive himself.
So she held out her arms. “Come to me, then. Come to me now.”
To her absolute surprise, he did. Warner closed the distance between them and they sank together to their knees. He buried his face in her neck and she could feel the tension still flowing through his body. He was a live wire and she knew he needed to be able to let go. At least for a moment.
“I’m here. You’re not alone.”
He turned his face farther into the crook of her neck and she stroked her hands through his hair and down his back, soothing him.
She wanted to touch him and be touched, but right now, this was all for him. This was what she could do.
“Mari,” he whispered. “Maribella.”
Hearing her full name on his tongue sent delightful shivers coursing through her. She tugged him closer, offering him anything he could think to want from her.
“It’s okay, Warner. It’s all okay.”
The stubble on his chin had gotten longer, sharper. He was getting closer to Changing. Mari was too enraptured to care. She was dizzy with lust, lost i
n a haze of desire just from his nearness and his touch was almost more than she could bear.
The animal inside of her wanted to feel it too.
It tore at the edges of her mind, ripped at the bonds that held it back. Mari didn’t want to share this with her wolf. Not a second of it.
Her wolf had never come to her when she needed it, so why should it get to bask in the spoils of flesh? It had never had to endure the taunts, the failure, the absolute and utter loneliness of being Maribella DeVaughn. It had stayed hidden, had locked itself away.
It wasn’t fair.
And Mari wasn’t going to let it away this one thing she wanted for herself.
Except as Warner pulled her tighter, as the low grumbling growl she knew to be a kind of purr seemed to be able to touch her physically, as the languid heat of desire became desperate, she began to wonder if she had a choice.
Her skin was too tight, her teeth too large, and her hunger grew. Even as he stripped her bare, and the friction between their bodies drove them both higher, she wondered if it could be enough to quench the fire that raged within her.
The more he touched her, the more her human thought receded. If anyone were to come upon them now, Mari would be hard-pressed (hard, oh so hard) not to tear them to pieces for interrupting their interlude.
And to whatever it was in Mari’s skin right now, that seemed a perfectly rational, reasonable response.
“I want you naked,” she growled.
“I am naked,” he said, as he pulled her to sit astride him.
“No,” she demanded, using that same voice of power she’d used on Rodrigo. “I want you naked. Take off your skin, Warner. Shed it all.”
He moaned into her ear, his cock swelling even larger against her wet, hot cleft.
“I’m a monster,” he whispered.
“I need a monster.” She looked into his red eyes and rolled her hips. “Goddessdamn, but I need a monster.”
He roared as the beast inside rose to meet her demands. And as he Changed, so did she.
But their Changes were not agonizing and alien or strange, they were seamless. They were all power and flame.
His teeth sank into her shoulder and a searing pain that quickly became bliss shot through her. She didn’t hesitate to crunch the meat of his shoulder between her jaws and they moved together in an ancient dance. Connected to the earth below by their paws kneading the forest floor, the sky above by the air moving through their lungs, fire was the spark between them, and water was mingling of their blood, but it wasn’t until their spirits touched when the heady orgasm took them both that some kind of bond had been sealed, stitched into the very fabric of time itself.
Yet, as the moment faded, Mari became aware of something else.
It wasn’t just her contrary beast.
It was darkness.
A darkness unlike any other.
No, that was wrong. It was similar to Warner’s darkness, this other thing that lurked inside of her.
As she lay on the bed of leaves, she put her hand to her shoulder where Warner had bitten her and when she drew her hand back, it was covered in blood.
Warner, still in his Changed form, padded closer to her. His nostrils flared, and he nosed the air.
The blood.
But she wasn’t evil. Was she?
His eyes narrowed and he focused on her with a singular intensity. She’d never been able to imagine what prey felt like, until this very moment.
Mari couldn’t help but wonder if that’s why her wolf had been locked down. Because it was something different. Something evil.
She moved slowly, deliberately. Mari reached for her clothes but found herself crushed to the ground by the giant snarling beast.
He growled right in her face and his spittle dripped on her chin.
“Damn it, Warner. That’s nasty.”
The beast, looking momentarily confused, as he wiggled his snout and licked his chops that she laughed.
He mashed his face against hers, growling again, and she laughed harder.
She supposed the sensible thing to do would be to be afraid. This beast that was atop of her, he didn’t seem to be Warner at all.
While that was okay when she was a beast, she was just little Mari now.
But it was funny.
“Get off. I have to get dressed.”
He growled again.
Then, pictures began to dance through her mind’s eye on a reel. She realized he was growling at her clothes. The wolf was mad at her clothing for daring to cover her body.
His long, purple tongue dragged over her wound where he’d bitten her. He lapped at her there and Mari wasn’t sure it was the best idea, but it did feel so good. She felt every swipe of his tongue not just on her shoulder, but right between her thighs.
In for a penny, she figured and she lay back and spread her thighs for him.
He growled while he tasted her, while he lapped at her and it was decadent to keep her human form while he was Changed.
She felt like a girl in a fairytale and while she knew fairytales weren’t real, it couldn’t hurt to let herself have it just this one time.
Mari had promised Warner she’d help him. Easing his body and his beast was help, right?
She shuddered with pleasure as Warner continued to lap at her. She kept waiting for her beast to try to resurface, but it was quiet. Mari might’ve thought strangely quiet, but she hadn’t heard from the bitch on the regular since… ever.
And yeah, she thought. It was a bitch.
Literally.
She giggled, and the beast stopped its ministrations, and she rose up on her elbows to look at him.
He growled at her again, and used one, massive paw to press her to the ground while he finished his meal.
Her last coherent thoughts were that this Dark Champion stuff didn’t seem to be so bad after all.
While they wouldn’t agree on meals, it wasn’t like he was Hannibal Lecter.
She giggled again. Or maybe it was.
He growled.
“Don’t growl with your mouth full.”
8
The dawn came quickly and with it, the harsh truth of what he’d done.
Mari bore a gigantic, puckered, angry scar on her shoulder. It spread from the ball of her shoulder all the way up into tender lines of her throat.
It was a mating mark.
He bore its smaller twin on his own shoulder.
He thought it was supposed to feel different. More.
Although, he wondered if maybe they’d broken each other. Maybe they’d felt all the sensations that there were to feel last night. Maybe their wolves felt everything for them.
Except the pain.
His whole body hurt. Even deep inside his bones.
Everything creaked and ached.
Normally, after a night sleeping wild, he’d run down breakfast. In his current state, Warner wasn’t running down shit.
And he wasn’t even actually hungry.
Which concerned him.
Mari stretched and reached for him. He lay back down and held her close.
This thing that had happened between them, he didn’t know if it was good or bad. Probably bad, given the state of things, but he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. Even though he knew he probably should.
She’d come to him.
She’d offered herself to him.
She’d wanted it as much as he had.
He remembered Lenore’s words about how he had to let her choose for herself. It didn’t matter if Warner thought he knew better. Or if he actually did know better. He couldn’t take away her agency.
He remembered last night when she’d demanded he give her the beast.
His cock stirred to life as he thought of it.
“Shut up and lie down,” he whispered. “Now is not the time.”
“Hmm?” she murmured.
He stroked her face and kissed the top of her head. “Shh. Go back to sleep. Everything is fine.”
>
But it wasn’t fine, was it?
Except when he looked down at her, sleeping so peacefully, looking like a delicate little frost fairy curled up on a pile of holly, he wanted to make it fine.
That’s really what Warner was wired for.
Not just War.
He was a fixer.
And he couldn’t fix this.
His ears perked as he picked up the sounds of something—no someone, in the forest. He lifted his nose to the air and realized it was Lenore.
She was back.
Hopefully, she had the answers they were looking for.
He was grateful when he found he hadn’t shredded all of Mari’s clothes. Her shirt had a rather artful slash across the back from his claws.
Although the jeans, he guessed, when he saw the shredded denim, those were going to be a problem.
“Mari, love. We have company.”
“No.”
“Okay. Be naked if you like. I’m sure Lenore won’t care.” He pushed an ice blond lock of hair away from her forehead. “I know I don’t mind.”
Bleary-eyed, Mari reached for her shirt and when she saw the slash, she arched a brow, but shrugged it on.
The jeans? She just looked at them, looked at him, and looked back at them with a sigh.
Seeing her sitting there in that shirt that he’d torn through like a candy wrapper to get at the tasty treat inside, well… it had him all kinds of hard again.
He’d hadn’t wanted a woman like this in… he couldn’t remember ever feeling like this. Ever being such a slave to his cock.
She sighed again.
“It’s really too bad we don’t have more time.” She raised her eyes to meet his.
She wanted him again, too.
He was starting to wonder if that’s all it would take to keep his darkness in check. If he could just lose himself in a haze of pleasure with Mari. If that was the key. If it was, he’d never complain about this gift again.
Mari crept over to him and crawled into his lap.
“Don’t start something we can’t finish,” he warned her.
She laughed. “We can always finish it. It’s just a matter of when and where,” she teased.
But that was when she did something even more devastating than not fearing what he had become.
Stealing the Heiress Page 6
