by Elle Lincoln
“We don’t even need to undress you, all we need to do is watch you fall apart.” Liam leans in again, his breath washing across my skin and tightening my nipples to hard little points. “Again and again.”
“Tell me, little cub, how many times can you come with this?” Athos clicks on the vibrator again, the pulse emitting a beat that threatens to destroy me for the day.
Out here, they want to destroy me in the open as I sit in my truck bed where anyone can watch, can see the need that plays over me just by being in their presence. My body becomes heavy, and they haven’t even touched me. They stand over me, watching my chest rise and fall, observing my body disrupting the silk of my sleep set, the tank pulling taut across my breasts, the slight movement teasing my nipples just enough for me to want more.
“I—” My voice cracks as I watch Athos click through the settings before settling on one with a low tremble, the pulse rolling like ocean waves only to fade away before building slowly, ever so slowly.
“Now we know how to keep you quiet,” Liam notes, stepping to the side to allow space for Athos to move in. Once again, their legs straddle my own that hang over the tailgate, and the press of the soft fabric of their sweatpants draws my attention.
Down.
Down.
Down.
My gaze widens at the bulges in their pants, thick and pressing against the band where the heads peek through to glisten in the morning light. My jaw opens and closes as their arousal fragrances the air, teasing me with a promise to fulfil all of my darkest and wildest fantasies.
“Up here, little cub.” Athos tips my chin up, a sinful smile on his face, his eyes hooded with desire.
For me.
Liam’s hands move up my body, only touching me above the silky fabric. His fingers travel in gentle little circles, sliding closer and closer toward the apex of my thighs. Each touch is teasing, leaving me panting for more.
I can’t breathe, I can’t think.
If this is what them touching me feels like, then fucking me will destroy me. Leave me a panting mess that I will never recover from.
A soft touch grazes my nipple, spiking pleasure through my entire body and pulling a whimper from my lungs. Just that slight flick is almost too much.
“So sensitive,” Athos murmurs, rubbing the vibrator over my nipple. A click sounds again and the pulse shoots over my skin.
My arms fall back as my elbows slam into the truck bed. Athos follows me down as he moves the vibrator across my body toward my other nipple. A cry spills from my lips, my head thrown back, my eyes open and unseeing on the sky above me.
Athos tuts. Firm hands grip my hair, yanking my head to look into Liam’s eyes.
“Watch,” he growls. Liam’s playful tone is long gone, and in its place is that commanding voice Athos uses. Athos may be the alpha, but Liam hides behind jokes and laughter, his own power so much more than he allows the world to see. But here, now, those walls fall down as he watches me. His eyes devour me as though he’s been waiting far too long for this moment.
I want to touch him, so I go to reach out, only to have Athos remove the vibration and his hand to push my own back down. “Let us watch you.”
“I want to touch you.” I shake my head. “I need to touch you.” My voice is nothing but a breathless whisper.
“Do I need to tie your arms back, little cub?” The light in his eyes tells me he really wants me to say yes. His desire deepens with his words, telling me more than I bet he wanted to. The idea sparks an image in my head of me tied in this truck bed as he takes and takes. A shiver courses through my body at the mental image until it fades away.
But that would mean he’d leave me right now, and nothing in this world will take him away from me in this moment. “No.”
Disappointment flashes behind his eyes before it fades away. A twist to my nipple steals my attention, and a yelp leaves my lips as my head shoots over to Liam, whose hungry gaze is locked on the beading bud.
“We’ve waited a long time for you, Sabina.” Athos runs the turned off vibrator down between my breasts, leaving a trail of need in its wake. “We spent years wanting something we would probably never have, and then you just walk into our lives, stealing our attention. Your wild spirit calls to us, pulls us toward you. We are unable to resist you, unable to turn away from your lure.”
He dips the silicone beneath my shorts, pulling them down with the tip of the vibrator.
“Up.” Liam lifts me, allowing Athos to slide the shorts down over my legs, the silky material feeling scratchier than it should. But I know it’s just the need for them to touch me. Fill me. Ease this ache burning inside me.
Liam quickly pulls the tank top off after my hands slip from my kimono. I can feel my arousal dripping down onto the tailgate. They stand before me, eyes dark and needy, their chests rising and falling quickly as their fists clench and unclench.
“Touch me,” I beg, fucking beg.
A dimpled smile returns to Liam’s lips. “Fuck it.” His hands find my face, and in the next instant, his lips fall on mine. The soft press momentarily shocks me before his tongue dives between my lips, swiping my own, tasting me and fucking my mouth. My eyes flutter shut as his kiss devours me, playful just like him. His tongue dives deep before pulling away as his lips nip at my mouth.
Then he’s gone, and with him, my breath. My head swims and my eyes flicker open just as another set of hands pulls my face in his direction. Again, lips steal my own, taking them deeper, slower. The kiss is calculating and consuming. I whimper into his mouth as his tongue plunges in, rolling against mine and taking pieces of me with it.
Then he’s gone, my desire spiraling into an inferno. A moan of denial slips past my lips, but then gentle hands press me back, their soft calluses abrading my skin.
“Watch what you do to us, Sabina. Watch,” Athos demands, and my eyes fly open. I push back up onto my elbows, the hard metal pressing into my skin. His hand reaches to his heavy erection, but he doesn’t free himself, he only grips the weight tightly in his palm.
I watch the wet stain spilling across the fabric, licking my lips as he laughs.
“Do you need to come yet, Doll?” Liam’s hands spread me wider, his tongue darting out to his lips, telling me what he wants to do.
“Let’s make our mate come, Liam. I want her to scream our names into the forest for the entire pack to hear.” Once again, the clit shredder is in his hand, and he flicks it on, no longer waiting.
He presses the bulbous head to my opening as Liam’s lips wrap around my nipples, his teeth grazing the sensitive skin and drawing a moan from me.
Click.
I scream as he presses the head right to my clit, using my juice to swipe around the hood and draw the bundle of nerves out to play. The slow pulse slowly picks up, causing a low growl of need to slip past my lips. It’s too much. My legs try to snap shut, but powerful arms hold them open as I fall back onto the truck bed. Liam’s lips move up my body, nipping as he goes.
I try to hold back, but Athos spreads my lips, pressing the silicone harder into my flesh.
“Come for us, Sabina.” Athos leans over me, whispering, “Scream,” into my ear.
My skin cools as lightning zings over my body through every little nerve as each pulse inches me closer, closer. My breath whooshes out of my lungs as my desire tips quickly over the edge into the abyss where I blessedly float. Athos swirls the vibrator over and over, drawing out my orgasm and stealing each gasp from me until I’m far too sensitive to function and my body trembles.
Finally, he removes the clit shredder, and I lie there panting, my eyes staring above me to the clouds that dance in my vision. Still, I want more. My greedy body needs them to fill it. To take me further into something I’ve never felt before in this lifetime. Something I doubt I will ever be able to find again with anyone else.
“You better get up, the others are coming.” Athos pulls me into a sitting position while Liam replaces the tank on my torso. Lif
ting me, he places me gently on the gravel, then holds my shorts out for me to step into.
That’s why that was far too short and unfulfilling.
“I’m all wet.” I frown. It’s always fun in the moment, and then afterwards there is all this goo. Goo trails down my legs, goo in my shorts, goo on the bed of the truck.
With a smile, Athos pulls my shorts up, his fingers lingering on the skin of my belly. “Good.”
I wrinkle my nose at his smug look. “Good? I’m all drippy. I need a shower.” I grab my kimono, wrapping it around my body and yanking on the silk tie a bit too tightly.
“Not today you don’t.” Liam laughs, stepping back while adjusting his dick, but those sweatpants will never hide what he’s packing.
“Walk inside and allow yourself to drip down your legs, leaving it there for us to smell all day,” Athos growls, shooting desire back through my body in little aftershocks.
“That’s a bit mean, don’t you think?” I rest my hands on my hips, staring at him. His arms cross over his chest, his face serious.
“Foreplay,” he grunts.
“Foreplay?” I shake my head, really wanting that shower now that he told me no. “What happened to the no touching thing?”
A frown dips his lips before he shakes it away, ignoring my question. “Come on, little cub.” He lifts me up and walks over to the stairs where he deposits me.
“I can walk, you know.” His hands rest on my waist, his thumbs circling my hips with a lazy movement. These guys are quick learners. Finding what drives me insane. What makes me pant with need. One day, I’ll return the favor and make them beg for me.
“I know.” He says nothing more as two wolves dart out of the tree line, both dark and massive, their paws crunching over the gravel as they pad their way over to us. Liam walks around the side of the truck, that little box in his hands and the clit shredder put away. In his other hand are two spare pairs of sweatpants he preemptively throws at the wolves.
Christian and Nix shift, catch the pants, and slip into them quicker than I have a chance to ogle their bodies.
“Smells like sex.” Christian casts me an accusatory glance, but he won’t get anything from me. “You could have at least let us watch. Who knew Damsel was an exhibitionist?” He scratches his face, feigning a perplexed emotion. I know better, it’s all an act.
“No sex.” Liam whistles, literally giving it away.
“What happened to keeping each other accountable and not touching her?” Christian switches to anger, probably because he wasn’t in on it, his mismatched eyes never moving from me. A tic in his jaw picks up, his ire clear in the grinding of his teeth.
I look at Nix, hoping he isn’t as irritable, but his face remains passive. Thoughtful, even, as he assesses the situation. “We can talk about this later.”
“What couldn’t you tell me over the pack link?” Athos turns, shifting to the side so I can see the other guys.
“Alpha, we’ve found something.” Nix glances to me, then back to Athos, his hesitance penetrating me with a spike of pain. His look is full of mistrust.
Yet I’ve given them nothing but mixed feelings and mistrust. Questioning their motives while my body demands for them with a pull I can no more deny than the air I need to breathe.
“Speak, Phoenix.”
“You are going to want to take a look.”
“What is it?” Athos growls.
Christian interjects, “We found a cave, but it isn’t just any cave. It’s full of the scent of the gods. Recent. It also wasn’t washed away by the storms.”
“Here?” Athos jerks his head to Christian. “Impossible.”
“Possible.”
“Did you enter the cave?”
“A cave that smells like a god? Hell no. I don’t have a death wish.” Christian nods his head at me. “It also smells like Allen.”
“My dad?” I press against Athos’s back, my hands reaching to him in comfort. “Why would my dad’s scent be in a cave?”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you tell us, Damsel?” Christian takes an aggressive step forward, a flush working up his face.
Nix’s hand snaps out, dragging him back. “We found the cave on the land that was hidden from us, on our own territory.”
I rub a tired hand down my face, feeling as though they are truly angry at me over something I had no control over. Dad moved out here far before the packs moved in. When I was just a child. “I don’t understand,” I state slowly, hoping to get the point across that I truly don’t know what is going on here.
With a sigh, Athos turns, and my arms fall off of him. His expression appears clouded, and for a brief moment I feel the distance he’s choosing to put between us. “The problem here isn’t just the discovery of a cave, Sabina.” Not little cub, Sabina. I’m well and truly missing something here. “It’s that it smells like the gods and your father. Not only that, but all scents of his killer were washed away or magically removed, which is something we still don’t quite understand.”
“I caught that,” I snap, feeling angry for even allowing my walls to come down with him. I take a step back, further distancing myself from him.
“That land was there the entire time, hidden from us. There is but one being in this world who can achieve a feat such as that.” Sadness washes across his features. “A god.”
“I’m still not understanding why you are all angry with me.” I throw my arms up. I should have stuck to the purpose of why I came here, what my goal was, and figured out what happened to Dad. Yet the four distractions didn’t just knock me off course of that goal, they put me on an entirely different track and sped it up to launch me off a cliff into a world where I’ve been dropped and left to struggle.
My body yearns for them, my heart literally beats for them, and yet they are all standing before me wearing matching expressions of suspicion.
“Most people don’t take on a physical manifestation of their dreams. Who are you, Sabina?” Christian growls at me.
I hold up a hand, my neck prickling with danger. “Why are you all angry at me?”
“The gods left this realm millennia ago. Leaving the worlds to their own fates. Not even the fates themselves have stepped in. They gave us purpose and left us to that purpose, and we have worked toward that goal for a long time.” Athos is trying to ease the sting of their resentment, but it isn’t helping.
“You all think I knew, don’t you?” Dammit, this is why I don’t date. This is why I don’t allow anyone into my heart. I only get hurt. Then they die.
“It’s suspicious. You claim a curse hangs over your family. Your dad had the land hidden. He had you hidden. Why?” Even Liam sounds disappointed in me. “More importantly, was your dad, a simple human, working with the gods?”
I swallow down the emotion in my throat. I have no answers for them. Only the mystery of who my dad was. “I can tell you I knew nothing,” I plead. “Can’t you fucking smell emotions? Can’t you scent my pain? My truth?”
Athos grips my hand, probably feeling me inching closer and closer toward insanity. “The gods don’t just enter this world anymore, Sabina.”
I rip my hand out of his. “Take me to the cave.”
“I don’t think so, Damsel.” Christian glares at me.
I breathe deeply, turning on a heel and stomping back up to the cabin. Let them have the cave of mysteries. I have something better, something Ash alluded to.
Dad’s journal. I just have to find it.
Chapter 18
Flashes of light blink and shudder behind me as the guys all shift before taking off. Their forms move swiftly through the forest, leaving me alone for the first time. I pause on the porch, the planks cool beneath my feet, my hand wrapping around the railing. All around me, the sounds of the calm forest evaporate, leaving nothing but the eerie quiet of a predator lurking in the brush. Lycans. Not once in all my years visiting Dad did I wonder about what lived out here. Instead, I chose to weave mythical tales alongside the man w
ho meant the most to me in this world. I have an incredible relationship with my mom, but my dad was that sturdy, unemotional foundation upon which he built my younger years. Stories flit about my head with memories of Dad and I around the campfire. The humid summer night swathing us.
Looking over my shoulder at the firepit, I feel a wash of longing spread through me. I tilt my head down, watching as my feet press against the planks as reality crashes in around me. He told me. In his own little way, he told me the truth of the world in the tales he wove on the lengthy walks we took hiking through this very forest.
He knew.
Yet that doesn’t at all excuse their reactions, it doesn’t give them a valid excuse for treating me the way they did.
Turning around, I grab my cooling coffee cup and my phone before entering the cabin. The lock snicks with finality behind me, separating me from the guys. All of my childhood dreams and ambitions are coming to a close as my soul begs me to move forward with my life. I grip the phone tighter as I pad my way to Dad’s office bedroom and enter the code there.
“Why the codes?” I whisper, asking the ghost of my father. The door swings open to the musty bedroom, one I will never touch, encasing his memory forever in this compact square space. “What did you fear?”
No one answers.
Dad wasn’t the type of man who was afraid. He lived and saw obstacle courses. He took each hurdle with determination and as a challenge unto himself. He didn’t challenge others, but drove them to be better than the day before. Words spoken with intent to educate and encourage left his mouth in a voice wise with age.
A voice I’ll never hear again because my father, who feared nothing, feared something. Athos told me that first night that this cabin is impenetrable. The windows made of bulletproof glass. The codes on heavy steel doors. I haven’t even gone downstairs yet, but I’m sure that those truths apply down there as well—more of the same bulletproof glass and coded doors.
But one thing surprises me. No guns. If Dad feared shifters, then he would have done as Ash did and sent me a gun or had them here. Unless I didn’t look hard enough.
