Jenni floats back down to earth, and Quill withdraws.
He looks at her face and what she’s sure is a flushed body, and his smile is satisfied. But he doesn’t ask.
Quill can scent her pleasure.
Knee-walking between her legs he lays himself on top of her, carefully keeping his weight off with arms that easily hold him.
Her hands run down his broad shoulders as he moves in to kiss her.
Jenni feels his hardness breach her wet core, and her hips rise slightly to capture him.
“Don’t move.” His laugh is unsteady. “I won’t be able to last long enough for you to come again.”
“I’m going to come,” Jenni says against his neck, breathing in him and all the layered smells that come with it.
Desire.
Lust.
And a scent she doesn’t recognize.
Jenni stills, for the moment. Even as Quill begins to rock inside her, she badly wants to squirm beneath him.
“Tight,” he says, head dipping to her collarbone as he strains above her, trying to give her body time to adjust to his size.
“I haven’t been with anyone in a long time.”
His answer is a low growl that thrums through their bodies. “And I will be the only one.”
Jenni smiles.
Grabbing her hands, he tethers them gently above her head with one of his own.
Then he pushes in the rest of the way, meeting the end of her, and Jenni arches, gasping at the intrusion of his flesh in hers. The newness of it.
The rightness.
Quill withdraws then stabs inside her again, and she cries out. Jenni can’t help it—he feels so good, filling her as she’s never been before.
His throat works, and his jaw hardens as he begins to find a rhythm.
Ignoring his early words, Jenni’s legs creep around him, and he begins to lose control of his careful pace. Letting go of her wrists, his hands grip her hipbones.
Jenni grabs his shoulders, curving her body to meet his onslaught.
Jaw slackening, Quill begins a gentle pounding, and her breaths saw in and out as Jenni feels the building of that shining golden edge of pressure from deep within.
Her nails sink deep into his shoulders, and Quill tenses.
The orgasm strikes her lightning, racing through Jenni’s insides to her extremities.
She screams.
Quill arches his back, slamming into her in quick succession then holding gloriously still while hot jets fill her, bathing the mouth of her womb with his seed.
Jenni hangs on, shaking from the inside out, Quill gripping her body tightly against his.
After a frozen few seconds, Quill pulls away slightly, searching her face.
“My nose is telling me that scream was all pleasure.”
There’s a question in his voice.
“Yeah.” She’s kind of embarrassed, but Jenni couldn’t help a little verbal during the things he did to her body. God. And how her body responded to his.
Quill’s nostrils flare subtly. “Don’t be ashamed.” He disengages himself from her body and scoops Jenni, carefully setting her on his lap. He presses her hair away from her face, looking deeply into her eyes. “I just wanted to make sure I didn’t hurt you. You’re not one hundred percent healed.”
Jenni’s lips twist. “I feel pretty healthy.”
Underneath, she still feels strange for having just gone to town with a werewolf. But that tiny voice in her brain answers pretty fast on that one, You’re one too, Jenni.
Softly, Quill presses his lips to hers.
Laying her head against his chest, she threads her fingers with his. “Does this mean we’re mated now.”
He doesn’t answer for a long time. “I was already your mate.”
Jenni tips her head back. “So the male doesn’t have a choice?”
Quill shakes his head.
A strand of her hair dips forward, and he tucks it behind her ear, deep forest-green eyes vulnerable.
“The female has a choice, takes her beast longer.”
“That sucks.”
An abrupt laugh shoots out of him.
She grips his bicep, feeling the tension of the muscle beneath. “I’m not going anywhere, Quill.”
He nods, but not like he believes her.
“What?” She searches his eyes.
“You’re vulnerable to other males until your change comes and our beasts can…”
“Oh my God—our-our wolves have to have sex?”
Quill’s chin hikes slightly. “To complete the mating, yes.”
“And before that?”
His eyes slide away then return to hers. “In old packs, it’s a time for unmated males to claim a female, to fight to the death for her, if need be.”
Jenni leans back, her post-coital passion cooling. “Does that mean we have three weeks where some other Were guy can stake a claim to me?”
Quill’s exhale is sharp. “Yes, technically, but our pack isn’t run like that anymore. Hasn’t been since Laurent came through and killed practically everyone.”
“Oh.” Jenni is going to have a meltdown. Too much to assimilate. Her face jerks in his direction. “Right. So our pack isn’t run like that anymore. There won’t be any opposition from any of our guys.”
Quill’s lips twitch. “Males.”
Jenni waves that away. “Uh-huh,” she says distractedly. “But some other loose cannon could come along and—what? Scent me?”
Quill inclines his chin. “Yes, that’s accurate but not likely.”
“Why?”
He hesitates for a second. “He’d have to be Alpha and have a death wish.”
“You’ve explained, in great detail, that Were males are crazy asses in regard to females.”
Quill’s silence is answer.
“Shit,” Jenni breathes. “I’m worse off.”
He nods. “In a way.”
Jenni keeps her trembling lip tight against her teeth, but it pops out as she says, “Quill, what if some male like Bray comes and—” She can’t finish; fear swamps her guts.
Quill’s face darkens. “They would have to come through me, Jenni. No one will be able to do that.”
Jenni thinks she gets it. The scent she couldn’t recognize. “You’ve staked some kind of claim on me, haven’t you?”
“Yes.”
“That’s the scent I didn’t recognize.”
“Probably,” he admits.
“Sweet, deep—like earth after a gentle rain.”
“It’s a different fragrance for everyone…”
“But kinda the same, right?”
Quill pulls her against his body. “You’re safe, Jenni. If you hadn’t been willing to mate with me, I couldn’t have released the claim. You’re more protected.”
“And more vulnerable.”
“That too.”
Jenni can’t regret her and Quill. But things seem more complicated than ever.
She left the human world. One where the grim reaper had her number.
And entered the supernatural where death has been replaced by survival of the fittest.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Julia
I don’t want to let her go.” Julia trails a finger down Scott’s flank, causing him to shiver underneath her touch.
“Not our call, Julia.”
With a resigned sigh, Julia rolls over onto her back.
Scott gives her bare breasts a speculative glance then tips his head, laving a nipple with a care that makes her squirm.
“Beast,” she whispers, but not like she means it.
She and Scott made love two times. That part of their soul-meld was strengthening without the ongoing threat the spore had caused.
Now he bows over her body, wrapping her against him like it’s their first time together.
It’s not.
But it might be the first time in which Julia doesn’t have outright fear, circumstance, or some other calamity hanging or falling o
ver her head.
Scott lifts his head with a chuckle, and their eyes meet. His are just pools of shadow in his face. “Can’t distract you?”
Before she can stop it, another small sigh escapes. “I’m sorry, Scott—I just don’t want to lose anyone else.”
Scott flops back on their bed. The Region One meeting is long past and only they are sequestered in the royal chambers, as it’s called.
Folding his bent arm under his head, Scott addresses the ceiling. Actually, she captures all his thoughts inside her head like an echo of emotion. They speak aloud from habit, but all the flavors and nuances of his feelings, the ones that back his words, flow through their meld, and it’s better—and worse.
“Cyn’s not dying, Julia. She and Truman are going to see what’s there for them. She’s a Were now too.”
“I don’t understand why she doesn’t want to stay here.”
Scott shifts his head to look at her.
Julia drops her eyes.
“I know that you understand exactly what motivates Cyn to leave. And that you don’t want to say it aloud.”
He’s right. She doesn’t.
“You said so yourself that this place holds bad memories for Cyn. That you and Kevin—Caldwell—you guys were all “besties” in high school.”
Jason was a hell of a lot more that a bestie, but Julia doesn’t correct Scott.
She knows exactly what he means to say.
“Excepting you, there’s nothing but reminders here.”
Julia rolls toward him, her hair falling forward. She gives it a shove, and it falls over her shoulder, warming her. “It’s not enough. I think Cyn was just hanging around until I was okay and the spore was figured out. Now she can go anywhere.”
“She’ll visit.”
“We don’t text. None of the groups do.”
Scott’s face tightens. “Too dangerous. There’s a few humans that are too smart for their own good.”
“I miss being human,” Julia admits.
She sights his smirk in the semi-dark of the room and pinches his muscular bicep.
His twist of lips broadens to a grin.
“You’re human. Sort of.”
Julia huffs, rolling onto her back and crossing her arms.
“Better to laugh than cry, Julia. It is what it is. People move on. Supernaturals have more time. Cyn, you—hell, Truman too—you guys are still thinking like humans. You’re better about it, but once in a while you revert.” He snaps a finger against his temple. “That’ll always get you in trouble. Gotta start thinking like a supernatural.”
After the Hades event, pretty hard to deny what she is.
Julia’s hand goes to her flat stomach. “Do you think we…”
Scott sets his elbows on either side of her body. “A-plus for effort.”
His large hand covers hers, spanning her hipbones.
A lone tear swallows the moment as it rolls down her face.
Scott's expression sobers. “It’ll happen, baby.” Silence permeates, their thoughts becoming one. Then Scott adds, “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Julia replies softly.
“You want my baby,” he states as fact. And he should be able to. Julia’s wide open to the meld.
She nods as a second tear joins the first.
“But you wanted Caldwell’s too.”
Julia’s eyes hold his, miserable and indecisive. “I can’t erase him, Scott.”
“I know. I don’t have to like it, but I know.”
“Some of these firsts are just going to be hard, ya know?” She cups his jaw, the stubble sharp against her palm.
He turns into the gesture, kissing the center of her palm. “Intellectually, yeah, I get it.”
Julia can read his thoughts, loud and clear.
“It is unfair. And I feel bad that I’ve been a dick about it. I’ll be better, I’ll try to ease you into being my wife.”
Julia presses her lips to his and laughs that she surprised him a little.
He kisses her back, sliding his hand to her nape and drawing her close. “Yeah, you can still surprise me.”
“I adore you, Scott. And in case you’re wondering…”
“I’m not, actually.”
“In case you’re wondering,” Julia says, “I’ve loved two men and not even a little bit the same.”
Scott nods.
“The meld is an addition that can’t be compared. Just let me be sad sometimes and own this part of me that’s gone. That girl I was in Alaska who had simple dreams. Hopes and aspirations that were never meant to be, ones I never imagined would be ripped away in a night.” Her eyes find his in the near dark. “And the people who were a part of that are gone now. Except Cyn.”
He smooths back her hair, pressing a tender kiss to her lips. “Except Cyn.”
“Yes, except Cyn.”
Their fingers lace together.
“I know it’ll be okay.”
Scott’s smile is sly. “Especially if I knocked you up.”
Julia slaps his arm. “Perv.”
“You bet.” Scott gives her a kiss as fierce as the last one was tender.
“I love you,” Julia says breathlessly.
“I love you more.”
Julia feels his emotion and clings to it. Sometimes she just feels vulnerable. Right now, Julia believes her feelings stem from things finally being more normal. It’s an emotion sort of like waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Maybe that proverbial shoe won’t. Maybe they can just have a normal existence.
Yeah right.
“I can feel you thinking.”
“That sounds weird.”
Scott shrugs. “Normal for us.”
“Yes.”
He tucks her in against him. “Just sleep. Everything will seem better in the morning. It’s been a harrowing few days.”
Or years, Julia thinks drowsily.
She drifts off, thoughts of missing Cyn and moving on without her clinging to her consciousness.
Cyn
They’re crying like girls, and Cyn doesn’t care.
Finally, she pulls away from the best friend she’s ever had and glances down. “You’re still wearing those fugly boots.”
Julia laughs through her tears, kicking up the offending footwear happily. Today, she’s outfitted in typical Alaska wear: Xtratuf boots, Levi’s jeans, and a screaming tie-dye hoodie that says “Salty Dawg Saloon, Homer, Alaska.”
Cyn can still remember paying someone to go in there and buy it because they were underage.
Seems like forever ago now.
Like everything in this whacked-out scenario she calls a life.
“Aren’t you supposed to be dressed up, being all queenie and shit?”
“Nah, that’s not me.”
Scott rolls his eyes in the background. “No kidding.”
“Well, I for one, am going to love being somewhere to get a decent mani-pedi and hair job.”
Julia gives her a critical look, noticing how much of her dark-blond hair has grown out. Now only the tips of her hair are platinum.
“You were the only girl in our high school that was ultra-manicured, Cyn.”
Cyn gives a vigorous nod. “I know, and I miss it to pieces.”
A throat clears behind them.
Cyn takes a deep inhale through her nose, and her face reddens. She knows exactly who’s behind her—the former cop that was after them, Karl Truman.
Of course, Cyn can’t keep anything from him. He knows she wants to hop his bones.
But he’s older, all conflicted and shit because he’s technically fifty-one.
In human years.
Cyn’s actually having less difficulty with transitioning. The only thing that bugs her is the moving to the Northwestern.
She could date a Singer.
But somehow, that Lycan part of her is not having it. Her inner wolf wants Truman.
Unfortunately, she’s been told by Adi and a few others that since she doesn't always c
hange, she might not be “Lycan enough.”
The Singers claim that her blood gets in the way of regular shifting—or “heat.” Kind of crude, in her opinion.
Cyn thought it was a bit gross when she did change. She woke up all gored up, with crusted hair and bits of whatever she’d been rampaging around in the middle of the night still clinging to her skin like eye-booger sludge.
It was fucking gross.
No big if she can’t change every month, unless it means she’s got one foot in Singersville and another in Lycan. Not enough of either to fit.
And that wasn’t something she shared with Julia, though she suspects Jules is just being polite by not actually telling Cyn she knows how she feels.
Being a telepath and all.
Still, at least Jules maintains the illusion that Cyn’s thoughts are private.
Cyn turns her body a little, and Truman comes to stand next to her. “So this is going to suck, the dark-ages-communication thing.”
Julia nods. “When I can free up the guys, I’ll troop down there.”
The Combatant, Cyn translates then asks, “What if you get preggo?”
Julia snorts, tilting her head to the left. “So delicate with your wording.”
Cyn lifts a shoulder and doesn’t say what they’re both remembering—how they used to dream of having the babies of the guys they were with.
But Kevin and Jason are dead now, and Cyn’s had an easier time with that than Jules. Cyn’s kind of practical about stuff.
Those guys aren’t here anymore. But that doesn’t mean she and Jules can’t be happy again; it’ll just be a different kind of happiness. The kind they decide to make. The kind they grab because it’s what they’ve been given.
Cyn takes her best friend’s hand. “I love ya forever.”
Julia winds her arms around Cyn. “You’re kinda crushing my boobs, Jules.”
They break apart, laughing.
“Sorry.”
Cyn grins. “I’m just flipping you shit.”
Truman picks up their gear, throwing a backpack on and scooping hers up by a loop.
“Thing weighs a ton,” he mutters.
She and Julia smile. A girl’s got needs.
“ʼKay, I’m going now because my worthless makeup is going to run if I stick around looking at your dopey smile.”
Alpha Blood Page 22
