Love of the Wild (15 page)

Dak’s growl intensified until Jim too was vibrating with the sound.

A taste of blood lingered on Jim’s tongue for a moment. But then Dak took over the kiss, sliding in to take what he wanted, thrusting in lascivious mimicry of his cock stuffing Jim’s ass full of a beast-man’s desire.

Jim lost track of time and sense of place. Dak fucked him good and rough, and his kisses matched the ferociousness of the act. Jim’s ass was thoroughly abused, and he loved it. He couldn’t wait to see what else his mate would come up with. He’d hinted at outdoor sex and bathtub sex and hammock sex and….

“Stop thinking. Be here in the now with me.” Dak made his point by thrusting in hard.

Jim cried out. His prick was trapped between their writhing bodies, and Dak’s ripped abdomen was creating almost painful friction and pressure along his length. Jim was cast out of his fantasies back to the moment at hand—and he wormed his hand down to fist his cock and pump it, needing the fireworks of release and the cool waters of afterglow.

“My. Meat.” Growling fiercely, Dak gripped Jim’s hand and brought both of them above Jim’s head, holding him down. “Mine.”

“Please, please…,” Jim whimpered, damn near sobbing.

“Mine.”

Like a star exploding, Jim all but blew apart when the kiss along his neck suddenly became a bite. Sharper, deeper than a love bite. Fangs sank into Jim’s skin and flesh, drawing out blood and pain.

The mating bite
.

J
IM
TRIED
to
scream but his voice was hoarse. His arms flailed helplessly, then clung to Dak as if to an anchor in a stormy sea. He wasn’t sure if he longed to cry out in pleasure or pain. Both were present. There was physical agony, his body torn open, but there was such spiritual bliss flowing through him that his prick was so immensely hard it hurt more than the bite
.

“Oh God,” he managed to mutter hoarsely.

Then Dak reared back, throwing his head back and howling, the sound so profound Jim shook in its wake. Dak spoke words in a language Jim didn’t understand but he felt them all the way to his core.

“I love you too, Dak.”

Blood, saliva, and sweat trickled down Dak’s skin when he cast his wolf eyes down upon Jim again. Then he swept down and crushed his lips against Jim’s in a display of primal passion. Jim savored the tart taste of blood and Dak’s unique flavor on his tongue. Dak started his strokes again inside Jim, having stopped only to howl into the night. His thrusts grew, the sound of skin slapping against skin louder, and the pressure within Jim built and built.

Jim knew he couldn’t hold on much longer without passing out, whether he came or not. “Dak, need….”

Dak ground down, his hips shimmying in circles. Jim had known good lovers before, but Dak took the prize. Jim was shaking, and then shuddered some more when Dak dipped his head down to lick, suck, and bite Jim’s nipples. Dak rubbed his face in Jim’s crinkly chest hairs as he moved between the two pulsating nubs of flesh, and Jim groaned, arching up to get closer to that ravenous mouth.

When Dak found Jim’s lips again and entered slowly, teasingly, Jim was at the end of his rope. His hand snaked down to grip his cock, even that small touch hurting so good. Then big, strong fingers joined him, and together Jim and Dak brought Jim to the edge of delight.

“Come now, love,” Dak whispered against Jim’s lips, swollen with endless kisses and nips.

His body was Dak’s to command. Jim’s hips bucked up wantonly, of their own volition, needing, just needing. His balls drew up tight, and then a bittersweet surge of seed washed through his cock and out his slit. Thick, creamy ropes of cum landed between them, and Jim let out a sigh of relief
. God, that was mind-blowingly divine
.

His inner muscles continued to contract around Dak’s still-pounding cock. Jim wanted to be nearer to his mate, so he besieged his lover by keeping him tucked close, biting tenderly on Dak’s exposed neck and shoulder.

The act seemed to galvanize Dak, who trembled at the onslaught of Jim’s nipping and sucking mouth and his roaming, grabbing hands. “Mmm, my mate, yes, oh fuck, yes….”

Dak’s wanton declaration made Jim bolder, and he gripped tighter, bruising with his fingers and his teeth, marking his mate as best as a human could.

Then Dak’s hips stuttered, and he half groaned, half howled, then buried his cock deep inside Jim, holding himself still as a statue. Dak’s cock swelled in Jim’s ass, growing impossibly large and hot, or at least feeling that way. Jim was panting, and Dak held his breath as he came, spilling his cum within Jim’s willing body. Feeling the hot wetness, Jim closed his eyes and relished the sensation. No other lover had cum inside him. He’d always used rubbers.

With Dak, no barriers were needed between them.

With a sound somewhere between a sigh and a chuckle, Jim luxuriated in the balmy afterglow, letting the joy of orgasm bring his languid body the repose it craved, and his sated cock softened under his and Dak’s combined fingers.

Dak’s arm bracing him up shook, and Jim said, “Lie with me, Dak. Come over me. Hold me. I can take it. I want it.”

With a deep exhale, Dak let himself rest over Jim’s body, curling against him. His now limp cock slipped out of Jim, and Jim felt his hole dripping warm, sticky droplets in his crack, over his thighs, and onto the duvet.

Slowly, they returned to themselves, but neither inched away from the embrace. Not until Dak lifted his head, his black hair cascading around his face. Honey-golden wolf eyes shifted back to hazel human eyes as Jim watched.

Then Dak lowered back to Jim’s neck and licked at the wound he’d inflicted. There was no pain. Too many endorphins flooded Jim’s body for him to notice Dak’s saliva healing him, closing the wound, leaving only the mating scar. This Jim knew only because he felt Dak’s fingers tracing them, with no small amount of satisfied pride coloring his expression as he purred.

As worn out and satiated as Jim was, he had to ask. “When are you going to give me the other bite?”

Dak moved slightly off Jim’s body, lying on his side, tugging him closer. “It will take a lot out of you.”

“So… not now, then?”

Dak studied Jim carefully, his face seemingly unreadable, but Jim had learned to decipher the man’s sensibilities. Concern was what Jim saw. “Having just cum and mated, your body needs rest. Your body will adjust to the mating overnight. Tomorrow I will give you the immortality bite.” Then he bussed Jim’s cheek, closed his eyes, and went to sleep.

Jim stayed awake longer, listening to the night birds and crickets.

His body felt no different. Of course, he wasn’t a wolf yet. But apart from the thrumming of the still-lingering sensual ecstasy, he felt the same man as before.

Sighing, he closed his eyes and let sleep take him.

W
HEN
HE
awoke several hours later, dawn was making itself known by orange beams of light shining through the cabin windows.

But Jim barely had time to see that when two golden wolf eyes appeared in his field of vision, mesmerizing him utterly.
My mate
. The magnetic pull toward his mate was stronger now. The night had indeed brought them closer. Jim felt a need within and an answering one in the big man hovering above him.
We’re one
.

But Jim didn’t even get a chance to catch his breath when Dak flipped him over onto his stomach in a show of swift force and then climbed on his back, pinning Jim down with his mass and will.

Then Jim was bitten in the nape.

But this time it
was
different. Dak wasn’t biting him the same way as last night. More than blood spilling out, something was slipping
in
. A force. An energy. A power unlike any Jim had felt before. Intangible and incomprehensible; too large to grasp. His body floated on a red cloud of pleasure and pain, and his mind swirled with distant echoes of long past and flashing images that he had never seen.
My mate’s past, joining with mine
.

He groaned, unable to get away. This was not as consensual as the mating bite, Jim realized. Even though he wanted it, an alien power was being forced on him, into him. Was this how it had been with the first men to be turned into alphas, sired by their progenitor? Had it been this violent and brutal, a beast’s claiming, against a human’s will?

Yet… Jim wanted this.

Suddenly, he was loose. The piercing sharp teeth and the weight on his back left him bereft of contact as he swam in dizzying heights and somber lows, all at once.

Then a soft, tender touch by a trembling hand grounded him instantly. “Y-you have been turned, my love.” Dak sounded so sad, so unsure, that his voice cracked. It broke Jim’s heart, and then in the same breath refilled it with hope and love.

“Thank you, love,” he whispered, praying he was able to convey his gratitude and adoration with only a few words. “I’m a wolf. And I’m your mate. I love you. Hold me.”

Instantly, Dak exhaled, and then his warm, firm body came to rest next to Jim’s on the bed. Dak was shivering still.

Jim sought to calm him. “I’m fine. You surprised me, is all. It felt weird, an odd foreign emanation within. But I wanted this. Nothing has changed. Least of all my feelings for you.” Dak kissed his nape where the wound was already closed. This time Jim knew it wasn’t Dak who had done that. His own body, the wolf within, had. “How soon will I change?”

Dak kissed him again. “Full moon next.”

“Will you teach me to run in the wild?”

Relaxing again, Dak smiled against Jim’s skin. He felt it. “I’ll be at your side until the end of the world.”

Jim was reassured. A serenity seeded within him and began to grow. Come full moon, it would blossom. Jim was certain this was the same serenity that existed within Dak’s personality. Daniel had the same quality about him. Alphas apparently inherited characteristics from their sires. Even if Dak hadn’t been Jim’s mate, a part of Dak would always exist within him now.

At that calming thought, Jim let himself rest again, eagerly awaiting the rise of the silvery full moon.

“Y
OU
THINK
we’re a mismatched couple?” Jim asked, resting his head in Dak’s lap on the brand-new couch they’d gotten for the cabin.

“What?” Dak stopped whittling the piece of wood he was going to use as a porch post, only more ornamental. Jim wasn’t looking at Dak, but he guessed the man was frowning at the weird question.

“I mean, you could pass for a twenty-year-old hottie. I look my age.” Jim felt flabby and gray, even after being turned into a werewolf, though he did feel more limber and agile, and his muscle tone had increased. Not that he had done any actual shifting yet. Tonight would be his first full moon, the first time he would change naturally. Dak had told him that after the initial transformation, he would learn to control his nature. The phases of the moon would not force his metamorphosis. Dak would teach him this over time.

Dak grunted low, apparently dismayed by the topic. This was funny, since the man had barely spoken a word in the past two days. Dak had been honest about not engaging in a lot of idle chitchat. “We don’t spend much time in town. What does it matter how either of us looks?”

Jim peered up from the book he was reading—a how-to manual on writing—to study Dak’s face. Hazel eyes stared down at him, waiting for a response. “Could you make yourself look older? I mean, Daniel did when his children were old enough. He allowed himself to age physically to seem more, I don’t know, paternal, I guess.”

Dak caressed Jim’s hair gently, his face neutral, unrevealing. “I could. Is that what you want?”

Jim smiled a little, pining, and then shook his head. “No. I suppose I’m just wondering how much I will change over time.” He chuckled and brushed his chest hairs. “I mean, I still have gray hairs. Will they disappear? I’ve noticed a few scars I’ve had since I was a crazy kid hell-bent on daredevil stunts are now gone.”

“Lycanthropy is regeneration. You will heal. Well, some things will heal. There are individual variations. One of Daniel’s wolves got his appendix back after his first shift.”

“No shit? Wow.” He stared at the ceiling, pensive. He had already noticed so many things about himself since he’d been bitten. His muscles, joints, and bones no longer ached when he woke up in the morning. He was always full of energy—and perpetually horny. Jim hoped that part wouldn’t vanish as time went by. “Were you born a progenitor? Behind the Veil?”

“No.” Dak continued threading his fingers through Jim’s hair, and Jim felt like purring in contentment. “I remember it faintly, like a dream.” Jim saw Dak’s gaze turn inward, glossy as he reminisced. “I was a young hunter, a warrior of my people, and in training to become the next shaman of our tribe. We lived not far from the present-day Conxing, actually. There was a bonfire. Drums were played, and we were dancing.” He frowned, as if the memory was a bad one. “I woke up in the morning when the sunbeams hit my face. Everyone around me was dead. My family, friends, my whole tribe. Only I had survived.”

“Oh my God.” Jim felt a surge of sorrow and empathy for his mate, and he grabbed the man’s hand and squeezed. Dak smiled softly down at him.

“I burned them all and sent them to our ancestors and the spirits.” Dak sighed. “I was covered in blood. None of it was mine. I found no wounds. I was alone. I had nowhere to go. I sat down by the dwindling fire and waited for death to come to claim me so I could be with my kin. I sat there for days and nights, too many to count. I felt no hunger, no thirst, no need for sleep, not the cold winds on my back nor the sun scorching on my head.”

“You’d been turned.” Jim frowned. “Were you bitten?”

“No. I had changed. But I had not been bitten.” Dak looked up at the ceiling but it was obvious he saw beyond that. “When we’d danced by the fire, there’d been a purple cloud above us. Brilliant in its colors, brighter than the moon.”

That sounded eerily familiar. “
The Veil…?
”