Blood Law (33 page)

The
pack leaders shook their heads. “Rafe, you of all people know it cannot be
changed,” Damon said. Regret laced his words.

“I
slew my brother’s chosen one, it is true, but she was a Slayer! Our laws decree
we kill them, no questions asked. I have maintained that fact for almost
fifteen years. I refuse to pay the price Lucien demands. We are on the
precipice of extinction if we do not unite.” He looked down at Falon, who stood
calmly regarding them. “If we destroy our heroes and those who can do nothing
but strengthen the Lycan nation for generations to come, we are destroying
ourselves.”

“Rafael,”
Angel said. “Force a council meeting to order. Plead your case to the alphas
this time, as well as the Amorak. Only they can change our laws, as they
created them. They will reconsider. They must!”

Angel
was right. It was Rafe’s only chance to keep Falon alive. He looked the two
alphas in the eye. “Do I have your support?”

“I
never doubted you from the beginning, brother. I have your back,” Damon said.
Angel echoed his words and added, “I will spread the word. The council has only
the power we give them.”

“Thank
you.”

Falon
pressed against his leg. He looked down into her cobalt eyes and smiled. They
had a chance. For the first time since he brought her home, he believed they
had a chance.

“I’ll
demand the council. Now I need to get back to the compound before I turn into a
pumpkin.”

As
pack Vulkasin roared north to the Sierras, Rafael reclined in the captain’s
chair of the van and tried to sleep. But his mind raced with wild, wondrous
images of himself and Falon carefree and smiling, knowing the Blood Law no
longer mattered as they made love in an emerald green meadow, on the sunny
slope of a pond not far from the compound.

She
laid her head in his lap. He looked down into her big, soulful eyes, and
something so deep and so profound moved within him he could not put a name to
it. Emotion he was not aware he possessed rushed up into his chest, filling him
to whole, making it nearly impossible to take a breath. She was his. No man,
Lycan, or law could say otherwise. He would protect her with his life, freely
giving it if it would save hers. He knew she would do the same for him. She had
proved that tonight.

“Anton,”
Rafael softly said, “is the American River cabin stocked?”

“To
the hilt.”

“Take
me there.”

Anton
nodded and slowed to the shoulder of the highway. When Yuri pulled up with
questioning eyes, Anton said, “We’re going to take a little detour. Go on
ahead.”

AN
HOUR LATER, Rafael stood in the large shower stall of the cabin his parents had
built before he was born. It was a bittersweet reminder of them, but a place he
had always flown to when he was troubled or just wanted solitude. Tonight he
wanted time alone with Falon. He didn’t know when she would shift again—in the
beginning it was hard to control—but he wanted to be with her when she did. She
would have a million questions. He grinned as he lathered his belly and his
thickening cock. There was that, too. He wanted her. Was on fire for her. He
couldn’t wait for her to shift so that he could lose himself in her.

Just
as the gray fingers of dawn peeked through the tall, whispering pines, Rafael
shifted into his wolf form and lay down on the big bed beside his she-wolf. She
snuggled up to him, and in moments, they were both sound asleep.

PAIN
FLARED IN every inch of Falon’s body. Her bones cracked, her muscles ripped,
her organs stretched. Falon moaned and writhed on the bed as her body contorted
to take back its human form. She tried to calm herself, to keep her breathing
even, just as she had when she’d shifted into a wolf. Then, like now, she’d
been surprised by the pain, but she hadn’t panicked. She hadn’t been afraid.

Rafael
lay beside her, watching, waiting, comforting. She closed her eyes as she had
when she shifted into the wolf and just allowed her body to do what it needed
to do. She didn’t fight it; she allowed it to happen. When her body finally
stilled and her aches and pains subsided, she took a deep breath and slowly
exhaled. She wiggled her toes and her fingers.

Warm
lips pressed a kiss to her nipple. Her body immediately responded. She moaned
and opened her eyes to look into two deep aquamarine-colored ones.

“How
do you feel?” he softly asked.

She
drew his lips to hers and kissed him deeply. His warm, naked body slid against
hers, drawing heat in its wake. “Better now,” she said against his mouth.

He
dug his fingers into her silky hair, gently combing out the tangles. “Do you
want to tell me when you turned Lycan?” he teased but a serious tone underwrote
his casualness.

She
closed her eyes and tried to think. Really think. “I’ve always known something
was different about me. I never fit in and had unusual tendencies and later,
rages that I—I had difficulty controlling. There were the heightened senses,
the odd aches and pains.” She looked at him. “The urge to kill was the craziest
part. It terrified me that I could feel so—so vicious. It only happened a few
times in my teens, but when I was overcome with the feeling it was when I was
being threatened or witnessed someone being victimized.” She traced the line of
his full bottom lip. “But the night I met you, things really started to kick
in. New emotions, feelings, stronger urges. Latent powers.” She shook her head.
“Okay, not really new; it was just more of what I had been ignoring, because
it’s always been there; I just didn’t know what it was.”

“Tell
me what it,” he whispered as he stroked her neck with his fingertips, “is.”

Her
body ripened. It wanted him. Now. But she needed to clear the air first.

“Rafa,
about Lucien—”

Rafael
stiffened. She pressed her fingers to his lips. “Shh, let me talk; then we will
not discuss him again.”

His
body eased some. But his gaze remained fixed.

“He
bit my hand.”

“Where
was I?”

“It
was the morning I healed you in your wolf form. That morning he was at the
compound. He tried to kiss me. I—I was scared, angry, so I bit his lip. I
didn’t realize what the repercussions of that action was. I tasted his blood,
so I guess some of it got into me. He healed his bite mark on my hand saying I
would pay the price, not him. Not wanting to upset you, I didn’t tell you. Then
I scrubbed my skin so hard I bled. I was afraid you would be angry. I had no
idea what would happen, but I knew something bad would.” She swallowed hard.
“That morning, after we made love, and you marked me again, I fell asleep to
your licking. I was in such a contented sleep, I dreamed of you awakening me
and making love to me. But—Rafe, Lucien got into my head, not physically—and I
made him stop. He didn’t, we didn’t—” She took his angry face into her hands
and said, “You are still the only man who has completed me that way. There is
no other, and there never will be.” She kissed him deeply. While he did not
engage her, he did not push her away either. She sat back and looked at him.

“When
you said Edward’s last name was Corbet, I freaked out. My last name is Corbet.
And even though you said you could detect a Slayer, you missed Smythe, and
Lucien didn’t know with his chosen one. I-I thought I might be a Slayer. So I
went to the person who could tell me where I came from, if indeed I am a Corbet
clan Slayer. I was not running to the enemy, Rafa, I was going to find out who
I was and then come back to you and demand you hear me out, and Slayer or not,
accept me!”

He
smiled. “You are Lycan.”

“Apparently
so. Maybe that’s why my parents abandoned me. I would give anything to know who
they are.”

“There
are Lycans who go off on their own and take human mates. Children are born to
them and though still Lycan, they are not as powerful as a full Lycan.” He
traced his fingertip around an impudent nipple. “I suspect by your powers, you
are full Lycan.” He leaned toward her and licked the turgid tip. “There is much
you need to learn about your people—”

“Can
we talk”—she dragged his fingers from her neck to her breasts down her belly,
then lower to the warmth between her thighs—“later?”

Rafael
smiled and lightly swept his fingertips across her mons. She moaned and
undulated beneath his hand, opening for him. Ravenous hunger for him overcame
her. “You do not know how many times I woke, ready to take you while in my wolf
form.”

She
nipped his chin. “That could be interesting. Why didn’t you?”

“I
didn’t want to scare you.” His fingers circled her stiff clit, dipped into her
heat, then out, slowly circling her with her own moistness. She moaned and
closed her eyes. She lifted her hips to his finger. He cupped her heat with his
hand, rocking gently against her.

“More,”
she breathed. He sucked a nipple into his mouth then teased it with his teeth,
gently tugging. Falon moaned, arching her back, reveling in the sweet torture.
Wild, wanton desire caught fire in her belly. Low, primal sounds erupted from
her chest. Impatient with Rafael’s slow seduction, Falon pressed his hand more
firmly against her slick, swollen flesh.

“What
do you want, Falon?” he breathed, his breath scorching her skin.

“You.
All of you,” she begged. “Now.”

Rafael
nipped the underside of her breast and quickly kissed the sting away. In a
slow, scorching trail, he kissed his way down her belly to her navel. She
strained against his slow hand, wanting penetration. He tortured her with the
slick circling of his fingertips on her plump, juicy folds.

His
lips hovered above his hand. God, she wanted him to take her. “I love your
sweet scent,” he said, his breath caressing her flaming skin with each syllable.

He
slipped a long, thick finger into her waiting heat. Falon melted around him.

“I
love how your body responds to mine.”

Her
hands fisted around the sheets. As he hit home, his lips pressed against her
full, throbbing clit. Falon’s hips rose skyward. He took her into his mouth and
gently sucked to the languorous cadence of his finger inside of her. It was
pure, blissful torture. Her body writhed and bucked beneath his lips and hand.
Sensations, so much more than ever before, crashed against each other inside
her, igniting a feral fire.

“Rafa,”
she breathed, squeezing her eyes shut. She wanted to tell him there was no one
else for her, that there never would be, that only he would ever touch her as
he touched her now. But her body’s desperate hunger for his was too strong. His
slow, methodical seduction of her body trumped words of love and devotion. His
cadence picked up tempo, his lips sucked harder, the tension became unbearable.
In a defining cataclysmic moment, the dam broke. Air escaped her lungs, perspiration
erupted over every inch of her skin. Her body convulsed as an orgasm swept
through her. It liquefied—then it completely surrendered all to him.

Muscles
heavier than lead, eyes closed, Falon lay sprawled on the large bed, Rafael
still between her thighs. Gently he licked her as the shock waves continued to
reverberate in her body, though in time, they slowly receded. His fingers
massaged her pussy. And his tongue, God, his tongue . . . it slid and swirled
and prodded.

She
gulped for air, licking her dry lips. She wanted more of him. Now she would
take it.

Regretfully,
Falon pulled herself up and away from that wicked mouth of his.

On
her knees before him, she raised a brow. He smiled a slow, sated smile, his
beautiful eyes jade dark. He reached out and grabbed her hand, pulling her to
him. She came but shook her head and rolled him over onto his back. Her gaze
raked over his hard, muscled body, from his wide chest to his taut belly and
lower to his beautiful straining cock, and swollen balls. There was nothing
soft about Rafael Vulkasin. He was the epitome of alpha. And he had chosen her.

Now—she
looked down at his passion-strained face—she would choose him. She crawled
along his long legs up his thighs, dragging her female against his male. He
grabbed her hair, pulling her toward him, rising to take her.

“No,”
she said. “Your turn to be patient.”

In a
slow, seductive slide, she rubbed her slick cunt up and down his anxious cock.
Rafe strained beneath her, his hands fisted at his sides, fighting the urge to
lose himself inside her, knowing if he touched her, he would roll her over and
take her. Her musky scent mingled with his, creating an erotic perfume.

On
her knees, Falon held herself from him. His cock rocked against the inside of
her thigh. Her body quivered, her skin flushed roses. She cupped her breasts,
threw her head back, then, reverently, she lowered herself to his waiting
shaft. He grabbed her ass, moaning loudly as he filled her. She had no words to
describe the sublimity of him filling her. It was pure, unadulterated bliss.

THEIR
GAZES MET and held. This was it. The connection she had searched for without
ever realizing what it was she sought.

“Falon,”
he breathed. The muscles in his neck corded as he tried tamping down his need
for her, tried not to rush. But it was too much to ask. He moved boldly up into
her. “I’m sorry I doubted you.”