Chasing a Wolf: Moonbound Series, Book Four

T
he sex tent
…

Tomás Rivera shook his head and pulled out his weathered Huichol dictionary, certain his translator had gotten the words wrong. He flipped through pages and looked up the original words the Huichol kept repeating as they ushered him through the dark, dirt pathways of the mountain village.

“I think you’re translating that wrong,” Tomás whispered to the broad-chested man named Zolin, who’d met him in Choaca and guided him into the mountains.

Zolin grunted, pointing ahead of them. “Sex tent,” he repeated. “You’ll see.”

Nope, he hadn’t heard the man wrong.

“What the hell is a sex tent?” Tomás hissed out the side of his mouth as he smiled at the two half-naked men who had practically carried him through the village.

His translator pointed again. “The tent for sex.”

A chill went through Tomás’ body, even though the night was warm. He flashed a smile at an old woman who stood in the door of her dark hut, holding a child back from running up the mountainside with the rest.

Children skipped ahead of them, naked and laughing, picking yellow flowers along the path and tossing them at his feet. Far in the distance, drums rumbled and someone led a group in chanting.

He never should’ve turned down the second team member’s presence. There was the tiny problem with everyone, assuming he and Maggie would be the next to succumb to the lust bunny, like Rain and Nora had done, and Tomás had chosen to go it solo because he didn’t like Maggie that way.

A tiny part of him wouldn’t mind going in the sex tent with her—she would be an athlete in the sack—but it wasn’t like what had happened to Rain and Nora. That had been Fated. He definitely didn’t like Maggie that way.

The men dragged him around the corner, toward a large, chanting circle of people with a roaring fire in the middle. More drums joined in. More people began to chant, and then there was a woman singing.

Ceremony.

His father had told him, the mountain tribes were big on ceremony, but he hadn’t expected to be greeted with one. And certainly not one that involved a sex tent. Gods. There was that phrase again.

“You will wait here,” Zolin said. He parted the wave of people and walked into the center, circling the fire, and barked out several phrases in the Huichol language that Tomás didn’t dare look up. He still couldn’t spell things, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what they meant, anyway.

Two women followed Zolin out of the circle, both adorned with beautiful rings of flowers in their hair and around their necks, barely covering beautiful dark nipples and bare breasts. Another ring of flowers hung around their hips, but didn’t cover them below the waist, either.

Their flower rings moved in time to the drums and they circled him, taking his arms as the men had when they’d brought him up to the fire.

Zolin crossed his arms and followed. The chanting escalated, and the woman who had been singing began to careen her voice high above the group in beautiful, arcing melodies.

“What are they doing?” Tomás asked Zolin, but the man didn’t answer. Instead, he spoke to the dancing girls and they all moved farther up the mountain, past the crowd, to a dark, heavily-scented pool.

The girls stripped off his pants and boxer shorts before he could protest, and then moved to his shirt. He tried to find words of protest as they guided him toward the water.

“Zolin.” He caught the native man’s dark eyes. “What is going on?”

The translator nodded at the water. “They’re going to clean you. For the sex tent. You will see.”

“I’m sorry, but can you tell them I don’t need to go into the sex tent?” Tomás smiled at the lovely women who cupped flower petals in their hands as they washed him. They didn’t steer clear of his crotch, and it wasn’t long before he could feel some heat rising in his abdomen.

“Everyone goes into the sex tent.” Zolin moved to the edge of the water and dipped a toe in. “The water is warm for you. It comes from a heated spring that flows out of the volcano.”

Both the half-naked girls and Zolin made a swooping sign with their right hands and said a word Tomás didn’t recognize.

“What was that?”

“It was an honoring of the god who lives in the volcano,” Zolin said before they all made the sign again. “We do not speak his name.”

One of the girls slid open a vial and poured a viscous liquid across his chest, rubbing it in and beckoning the other girl to do the same. They slicked his body with the oil and the sharp scent of it overwhelmed him.

Tomás had to blink to keep himself focused. “They really don’t need to do this.” He tried to meet one of the women’s eyes, but they just continued to rub him with the slick, earthy liquid until they had finished his chest and abdomen.

He let out a howl as they moved down toward his hardening dick and grabbed their hands. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Now. Before we start with that. Will someone please explain to me…what the hell is going on?”

The two women gave Zolin a wide-eyed stare and he shooed them, coming down into the water. “These women have the very great honor of preparing you for the sex tent. You should not take away this honor.”

“I don’t think you understand why I’m here.” Tomás searched for his clothing, which held his translation book, and his maps. And his phone. “There’s been a big mistake.”

“No mistake.” Zolin grabbed his arm and pushed him farther into the water. “Wash yourself, in case Fate decides to reveal your mate to you tonight.”

Tomás almost shook his head. “Wait. My mate?”

“Wash.” Zolin pointed to the side of the pool that was covered in petals, which they apparently used in place of clothes or sponges. At least in this ritual.

Someone should’ve prepared him for this.

“I’m here looking for the men who helped a priest destroy a brothel in Guadalajara about thirty years ago.” Tomás picked up some of the petals and half-heartedly wiped at his skin. He didn’t dare touch his cock. There must’ve been some kind of aphrodisiac in the oil, because he was hard as a stone.

“Our chief may know something of this. You will see the elders after you go before the women.” Zolin tossed the vial next to his foot. “You must put this on so I can take you to the sex tent.”

Damn. There was that word again. Tomás needed to get out of this. He just wanted to get them to answer his questions. He poured some of the oil on his skin. This kind was sweet, and it made a heady mix with the woody scent of the last lather. “Where are your leaders?” Tomás asked. “I need to find them.”

“First, the sex tent. Then, you meet the elders.” Zolin gestured for him to follow and turned to march back down toward the fire. “We must know if your mate is in our village.”

“My mate?” Tomás laughed. “You’ve got to be joking.”

“I never joke.”

“Then you are mistaken.”

“I am never mistaken.” Zolin stopped halfway back to the fire.

Tomás looked around. The huts were empty and the path was wide. It seemed to be some kind of gathering place, and it was surrounded on all sides by giant, thick trees. He couldn’t see the women who’d been washing him, but he imagined they must’ve gone to prepare someone else. Hopefully, he wouldn’t have to join anyone in the sex tent.

If he hadn’t been alone in a strange place, he would’ve crossed himself. His family occasionally talked of Fate and mating, but Fated matches were rare in his pack, small as it was. He’d never even discussed it with his parents.

Tomás had long assumed he’d be the pack enforcer, as the alpha’s son, until he became alpha himself. When he had more responsibility, he would worry about a mate. Until then, the whole mate thing would make him run for the hills.

Only, he was
in
the hills. The mountains. The far-flung mountains of Western Mexico, among a people rumored to be some of the most magickal in the world, and they wanted to rub him down with secret oils and send him into a tent for sex.

Not for sex, though. For mating. That was way too much responsibility for a twenty-six year old single guy from Vegas.

“I can tell you a secret.” Zolin cast his eyes around the empty space as though afraid of being overheard. Surely, there weren’t many Spanish speakers in the area.

“What?” Tomás asked.

“I have not been in the sex tent myself.” He leaned in and whispered, “Because I have found my mate. But the men who have gone in have always come out more than satisfied with their result.”

“You say I’m supposed to find out
if
my mate is here?”

Zolin nodded. “Every visitor who comes to our village, whether wolf or man, is first invited to sit in the sex tent with our women. We must know if your mate is among us. Honor the magick.”

Tomás was tempted to roll his eyes.

“It is not like this in your village?” Zolin’s eyebrows tented.

With a laugh, he said, “It is
not
.”

“Well, we honor the magick above all. If Fate has a match for you, we would welcome you in to the village and make you one of our own.”

Oh gods
. Tomás tried to force a smile. “Sounds great.”

Zolin pulled him by the arm and they walked next to the fire, around to where the translator had stopped. He addressed the crowd again, gesturing to Tomás and then to his still-erect penis.

That oil was some kinda mojo. He hadn’t had an erection this long since he’d accidentally tried some of Tio’s Viagra.

Energy coiled inside him as they ushered him into the big, dark tent, past a row of completely naked women. Like his escorts, they wore flowers around their necks that hid nothing and, instead, made him look directly at each pair of breasts as he walked by them. He felt like Goldilocks, only his porridge was boobs. He rolled his shoulders and tried to relax, but every piece of him was hard and pulsing and on edge.

Had they given him some kind of drug? The air crackled with magick and he felt high on something. Once inside the tent, the low glow of a small fire lit the area from the center of the room.

Zolin escorted Tomás to a stump in the far corner of the sex tent. “Sit,” he ordered. “Here is more oil.” He pointed to vials along one wall and then glanced down at the bobbing erection between his legs. “Although it appears you may not need them.

“Will you tell me exactly what is going to happen here?” He shifted on the hard stump, little fibers of wood digging into his ass. He wished he’d brought a pillow. Sex on this thing would be a nightmare.

“The women are being prepared for the tent. We will bring them in, one at a time, then you will examine them and feel your magick.” He elevated thick, dark eyebrows. “Some of them are very beautiful.”

“Yeah, yeah, and then what?” Tomás waved, trying to speed up the process. He had a job to do.

“Then you will take a woman, if you choose, and you will become one of us.”

“And if I don’t choose?”

Zolin frowned. “This has never happened.”

With a long exhale, he looked around the tent. It was empty, save for the fire and the oils. He wasn’t certain that any actual sex would happen in the tent, because there was nowhere to get leverage.

He let his knees relax and waved at Zolin. “Fine. Prepare your women. I will examine them. Then, I need to talk to your elders.”

“Very well.” Zolin took the long piece of wood from around his waist and flicked it at Tomás. A few drops of oil came from the end and landed on his naked skin. Zolin hurried out of the tent and everything in Tomás’ world went pear-shaped. He couldn’t focus, he couldn’t think. All he knew was that his dick was enflamed and there was some kind of magick in the air.

He tried to shake himself out of the onslaught of whatever drug had just been sprayed on him, but he couldn’t keep himself fully in control. His erection nearly throbbed and he couldn’t have told the difference between magick and a hole in the wall.

Focus
. He looked around the tent again, but everything was wobbly. Zolin had closed the flap when he’d exited, and the light wobbled with the flickering fire.

Chanting rose to a crescendo outside. A rustle behind him made Tomás’ head whirl around. Something slithered under the edge of the tent. Then it rose to a full height beside him.

Tomás shook his head and glanced back at the tent flap, but no one had come through from the fire. Yet when he looked up, the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen hovered over him.

She had light, caramel-toned skin and long, thick hair that waved its way around her face and down the sides of her very naked breasts. Unlike the girls at the bathing hole, he didn’t need to use his imagination with this girl. Her erect nipples hovered in front of his face and he was tempted to take one of them in his mouth.

The young woman swayed from side to side in front of him, her breasts bouncing with each movement. Her eyes locked onto his, two golden pools of amber with dark, shuttered lashes.

“I am Tomás,” he said, extending a hand.

She didn’t respond. Instead, she looked behind her and put her hands on his shoulders. “It will be easiest if you do not speak.”

“Yes, yes, feel the magick and all that.” Tomás cleared his throat and closed his eyes, but he couldn’t focus on anything except how her perfect brown nipples begged for his tongue.

Something wet and hot and…tight…slid down his cock. Tomás’ eyes flew open as the other sensations whirled around him. Her thighs on his, her hands on his shoulders.

She groaned as she lowered herself even farther onto his erection.

Tomás grabbed her hips out of instinct, ready to pull her off.

The woman took his hands in hers and brought them up to her breasts, where she left them. He couldn’t breathe.

Between the drugs and the drumming and the tight grip of her riding him, he could only groan. The grain of the wood dug into his ass and he cried out.

She jumped off him, his dick popping out of her with a
thwack
. With a few steps backward, she raised her hands to her breasts. “Is something wrong?”

“No.” He stood, touching his tender ass. “That stool absolutely was not made for sex. It was not the sex stool.”

“It is the sex stool.” She dropped her hands from her breasts and Tomás’ mouth practically watered. She had so much grace, in every movement, like a dancer. And her long, dark hair swirled around her and occasionally veiled her breasts from his gaze. It was intoxicating.