Claimed by the Mate, Volume 1 (45 page)

The dream where he was happy. Finally.

Chapter 12

The full moon

She was killing him.

Slowly, but surely, Blaez thought as he lay on his back in the center of his bed, Kira and all that had happened between them in the two weeks since he'd met her were going to be the death of him.

Of course, said death had come with him walking slowly but assuredly directly along the path set for him. It had led him to her and he'd been being led by her ever since. The past five nights, since that heated kiss they'd shared in the kitchen after breakfast, had all ended the same, with moans of ecstasy, each of them being pushed to the brink of their control before diving off the cliff together into memorable climaxes, and then the emotions began. Like a bottomless pool Blaez felt like with each passing night he was swimming, no, treading water, toward an ultimate destination that he was previously convinced he did not want to visit.

“I want you to ask my permission to come this time,” Kira's voice sounded through the muddled thoughts of his mind.

A few moments ago he'd assumed she was asleep, half her naked body draped over half of his, her breathing even against his bare chest. Now, however, she was climbing on top of him, spreading her legs so that she straddled him, looking down at him with heavy-lidded eyes, flecks of gold—he'd only recently learned were there—sparkling in the dark room. Her hair was a wild mass around her face, just the way he'd come to like it. There were so many moments throughout the day, especially yesterday morning when they'd all gone out for a run, when he'd wanted to see her hair this way. Malec, who wanted to test the hour-long workouts he'd been having with Kira each day, had challenged her to a race. Blaez had followed along because he hadn't wanted to let her out of his sight. He watched her break out in a gust of speed, her long legs eating up the ground as if she weren't really touching it at all. Every part of her body had stretched and flexed and he'd had to slow down his own speed because the instant punch of arousal had taken his breath away. When she'd stopped, Malec beating her by a millisecond, if that much, she'd leaned over, hands on her knees, taking in air, before standing straight. Her signature ponytail had swung back and forth and Blaez's fingers had itched to rip the band that held it together free, to ruffle his hands through her hair before tossing her to the ground and fucking her right there where she stood.

It was like that more often than not as they'd slipped into a sort of routine, culminating tonight—the evening of the full moon—when they'd had an early dinner and all retired to their rooms without too much to say. Blaez had thought of going over a strategy but figured he and his pack had been together so long, they'd planned this place specifically for the day it was attacked, so they knew what to do and when to do it. More important, he was the one who needed to adjust his thoughts, because now he had someone else to protect, someone who meant more to him than Blaez ever thought anything or anyone ever would.

“Oh really,” he finally replied to her statement, his hands going instantly to her hips, where his fingers dug into the soft skin there.

“Yes, really,” she told him, reaching between them to grasp his hard cock, aiming at her pussy.

She would already be wet; she always was, a fact he also loved about her. No matter when or where he'd taken her, in the kitchen that day after her pancake breakfast or in the shower once more after yesterday's run.

“You know that's not how it's done,” he told her, his teeth clenching at the pleasure of feeling the tight, hot walls of her pussy sucking the head of his cock in slowly but surely.

“Someone once told me that I should take control of my life. I should figure out what I wanted and go after it,” she said, lowering herself down over the last inches of his dick.

She was settled in so tightly the plump lips of her pussy rubbed along his groin, his balls tapping against the curve of her ass. He wanted to sigh with that pleasure alone. Instead, he moved with quickness, holding her close and flipping her over so that her back fell to the mattress. She frowned up at him as he clasped her legs behind his back.

“Not fair,” she told him.

“No,” Blaez said, pulling out of her, then sinking back in slowly, tortuously to them both, he suspected. “Not fair. But good. Pleasure is good.” He was moving in and out of her, taking his time, savoring every single moment.

The sun had not completely set, but the sky had already begun its transition of colors, the dark orange melding into a purple-like explosion across the horizon over the mountaintops. In just a little while the sky would be full-on dark, alight only by the full moon. And then … Blaez didn't even want to think about what might happen.

So for now he was where he wanted to be, doing exactly what he wanted to do. When he leaned back, resting on his knees, his hands going to her thighs, lifting them so her ankles would disengage from behind him, and pushing them back so that her ass was off the bed, her pussy tilted, offering him an even deeper range inside, he growled. The animal within feeling every bit of its power and energy from the upcoming night.

“I'll always give you pleasure,” he told her. “Always.”

She'd been cupping her breasts, squeezing them in her hands so that her nipple was visible through her fingers, the dark circle of her areola a sharp contrast against the much lighter tone of her skin. He loved how she looked touching herself, but he felt jealous at the same time.

“Feed me,
lýkaina,
” he told her, leaning forward between her legs, his dick still pumping in and out of her.

She immediately followed his directive, which made Blaez even hotter for her. As his dick slid in and out, her arousal providing more than enough lubrication for the smooth entrance and descent, he opened his mouth, taking the nipple of the breast she'd groped once more, arching in offering to him. His tongue slid along the tightened nub seconds before his teeth latched on and he bit down. Just enough to hear her gasp; then quickly his tongue licked over the pebbled tip, his mouth opening wider to suck her deep inside. His thrusts continued inside her pussy, her walls hugging his dick so tight at some points he almost felt like he couldn't breathe. He definitely could not see anything other than her, the sultry tilt of her almond-shaped eyes, the slight parting of her pert lips. That was permanently emblazoned in his mind. As for when he opened his eyes, it was the heavy mounds of her breasts, moving with each thrust inside of her. Leaving one breast for the other, he continued to watch as he quickened his pumps, her breasts moving faster, the growl circling in the center of his chest coming louder. When he was finally able to pull his mouth from hers there was only one word he could say, and he meant it with every fiber of his being. “Mine.”

Settling her legs on his shoulders, Blaez continued to move inside of her, with quick, deep strokes that had every part of him, from his ankles to his spine, tightening in anticipation of his release.

“You. Every part of you. Everything you are. It's all mine. Just mine,” he continued, watching her through half-closed eyes as her head thrashed against the pillows.

“Blaez,” his name came as she panted, her fingers squeezing her nipples, probably as tight as he'd been biting them in the hopes of re-creating that sensation.

Kira loved the pleasure/pain stimulus. She loved being pushed to the point of almost no control, before he replaced it with a desire so phenomenal she'd had no choice but to submit. That thought aroused Blaez more than anything. How this feisty, headstrong, and independent lycan—who might be promised to someone else—had completely submitted to him and all the pleasure that he offered her.

“Say it!” he told her. “Say it or you don't get to come.”

She opened her mouth; only sound came out. A low howl that he'd never heard before. She snapped her lips shut, cutting it off, and Blaez wanted it back. He wanted that call that he sensed was going to be specific to him, to this moment of pleasure she was about to experience. He wanted it all.

“Again!” he yelled to her. “Again, dammit!”

He was holding her ankles now, working in and out of her so fast the slick sound of his skin slapping against hers echoed throughout the room.

“I…,” she whimpered. “I … can't.”

“Say it or it stops. The pleasure, the need, everything. Say it!”

“Yes!” she yelled as he'd begun to pull his dick from her sweet embrace. “Yes! I'm yours!”

“I want the sound,
lýkaina
. I want everything. Now!” he told her, feeling his own body tense knowing that he wasn't going to hold on much longer. She had that control over him whether she knew it or not. He'd always prized himself on being able to hold out until he was absolutely ready to offer his release. With Kira there had never been that sense. From the moment he'd jerked off in the open window to right now when the base of his spine was tingling, his balls drawing so tight he could barely speak, he realized she had something over him. Something pretty damned powerful that he'd never given anyone else.

She made the sound. A low and long howl that ran along his spine like a bow to a violin, creating a perfect melody and a perfect moment.

“Yes,” he sighed. “Yes,
lýkaina
. Come for me now. Come all over me.”

Her legs began to shake, her walls tightening around his cock with such fierceness Blaez could only throw his head back and growl with the extreme pleasure. In seconds he was following her lead, his own cum shooting in thick spurts deep into her pussy, his body jerking with the intensity of his release.

“You didn't claim me,” she said in the silence of the room minutes later, when Blaez had pulled out of her and rolled onto his back.

He didn't speak.

“I thought with everything in me that I was Selected for you,” she continued. “I spent hours in that library reading everything I could find on the selection process. That really old one that's written mostly in Greek—I used the site you bookmarked on the iPad to help me with the letters and I read most of it. It said that the alpha female would know. She would feel it all over the second her Selected alpha claimed her.”

Blaez tensed all over.

“But you didn't,” she said, her voice so quiet he almost hadn't heard her. “It was time; the full moon is up now. It was time,” she finished, and he knew she was looking toward the window.

Blaez didn't need to look; he could feel it. Like water filling an empty fountain, pouring in until he was full, his body and his mind in tune to the transition, to the night and all that would come of it.

“You will remain here,” he told her. “I want you safe.”

“I'm not claimed,” she said again, her voice a little more shaky this time. “I'm not part of your pack.”

He moved quickly again, rolling over until his face was hovering just inches from hers. “You are a part of me,” he stated vehemently. “Don't you understand that?”

She opened her mouth then, about to answer him, when her entire body stilled, her nostrils flaring. Blaez did the exact same thing, every part of him on instant alert.

“They're here,” he whispered.

*   *   *

Channing spread a map over the kitchen table, his long arms stretching as he used the salt- and pepper shakers to hold the rolling edges of the paper flat. The bottom half he secured with the silver holder that Malec kept his sugar substitutes in and a bottled water. When Channing stood back, he looked directly at Kira.

She was at the head of the table, her arms folded over her chest. Fifteen minutes ago she'd been lying in the bed, Blaez over her, inside her, and everything had been … Now she was here looking down at the layout of this property. She'd been calling it a fortress, but really, she had no idea. This house was not only huge; what looked like simple log walls were reinforced by six-inch steel slabs, the windows—that film over them that prevented anyone from seeing inside—covered in the thinnest bulletproof shielding there was. In fact, Kira doubted this particular product was even on the open market in the United States. Twenty feet out in all directions were motion and heat sensors. On their boat in Seattle they'd had cameras. Out here in the wilderness that wouldn't have been enough.

She felt him the moment he stepped into the room, coming to a stop just beside her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Phelan continue past them, going to the side of the table. He, Malec, and Channing now all looked at her. Kira knew what to do. She'd watched her mother do this so many times before. Closing her eyes slowly and taking a deep breath, she felt her mother's presence with her as surely as the other lycans standing in this room. She could almost hear her voice, strong, clear, concise, giving the pack instructions, fully confident that she was guiding them in the most effective way possible.

It's your turn now.

It sounded as if Tora were mindchatting with her, but Kira knew it went much deeper than that. Since the day her mother had died she hadn't heard her voice, could only hold on to those things she had said to her the day she graduated, three days before her mother's death. That she was doing so now meant something, and Kira completely grasped that meaning.

With a slow exhalation she rolled her head on her neck, lifting her shoulders slightly, hearing the crack of her bones, clearing her mind.

“They'll spread out. A simple circle formation is their favorite. Stalk, surround, attack,” she told them.

When she leaned over the table similar to the way Channing had, her hip brushed against Blaez's leg, the warmth from his body immediately transferring to hers, adrenaline sizzling through her like she'd received some sort of transfusion.

“Dallas is his second,” she said, looking up to Phelan. “He'll come in here.” Her finger pointed to a spot near the front door. “Penn will stay close to him. He's been—” She stopped, sighed heavily.