Nightfall (11 page)
The one that was neither wolf nor man stepped back a few paces. Its chest and legs were more or less human, though thicker and more muscular than most men who weren’t professional bodybuilders on ridiculous amounts of steroids generally were. Its hands were tipped with claws that glistened with blood. Its face… its face was monstrous, neither man nor beast, and soaked with the wolf’s blood, and darker, more viscous things.
And as she watched, the animal faded away, the proportions shrank back down, and the sandy haired man who’d brought her to such incredibly passion stood before her. He was naked, and she saw that his wounds were completely healed. Not even a scar, even in the leg where she’d been concerned that he might have trouble walking. The blood, however. That didn’t fade at all. Now, a man stood before her, but his hands and his face were soaked in blood. And as she looked down, to where the wolf had been, she saw that the wolf’s body, too, had faded back into a human shape, this one of a naked woman.
“No,” she said, and she was surprised at how calm and quiet her voice was. Shock. She had to be in shock. The woman’s throat was a red ruin. Had he thought about tearing her skin apart, when he was between her thighs? “No. I’m sorry, no.”
“Roxie,” he said, and then seemed to realize what he must look like. He ran his hand over his chin, but managed to do nothing but smear the blood even worse.
“I’m sorry,” she said again. “No. I— no. This isn’t real. I need to go.”
Her knee was on fire. She limped hard as she pushed towards the door. She stumbled over her purse as she went, and picked it up almost automatically, throwing the strap over her shoulder.
* * *
He’d come to hate the man he’d been in his youth. Perhaps that was one of the costs of an unnaturally extended life. You lived long enough to regret the things you’d done so horribly wrong. The man in his youth would have taken her without waiting for her to ask. He certainly wouldn’t have taken her against her will, but he also wouldn’t have given her time to consider once she’d said “yes.” He wouldn’t have made it so easy for her to say “stop.”
But then, he’d gotten a woman killed by doing things his own way, and not respecting what she wanted. It wasn’t so direct as that, not really, but however he tried to dice his experience, the facts were that Miranda had been alive when she left him, and the next time he held her in his arms, she was dead. If he had been a better man, she wouldn’t have left him, and then she would still be alive.
He’d meant what he said to Roxanne. From what she said, she’d never done more than fantasize about bondage and pain and submission. She was giddy from a fairly stellar orgasm, if he did say so himself, and it wasn’t unlike being drunk. Saying yes to things was too easy in that state, and it was possible he’d hurt her in ways she wouldn’t realize until much later. It wasn’t safe, healthy, or even really fun, not once he knew that. If she’d had any experience with what she was asking him for, he might have been more willing to let things flow as they would, but he wouldn’t be responsible for her hating herself in the morning. She knew nothing about him, or about his world. To sate himself within her would have been amazing, but it wouldn’t have been right, and he’d worked too hard to regain his own self-respect to lose it for one night of passion, no matter how amazing it might be. One thing he’d learned in all his years on the earth was that patience was almost always rewarded. Provided you could be patient long enough.
So he’d waited until she slept deeply, and then he’d slid out of bed. He had no need for rest right now anyway, not with the moon still surging in his veins, powering his blood. The smell of her sex was heavy in the room, and every breath he took made his head swirl with her savory scent. His cock was granite-solid in his jeans, and he felt sure that focus would be impossible until he found some release.
He had thought for a moment of going down to the basement and continuing to work on the safe room, but he didn’t want to risk waking her with the sounds of construction. The house was extremely well insulated; that was something the pack had seen to in all of their houses over the years. Wolves were too uncommon now. Someone who heard a wolf howling at the moon reported it instead of just walking a little faster. Wolves howling inside houses caused big problems. And it also helped new wolves, who didn’t know yet how to ignore their senses.
She had rolled over on the bed, her thighs gleaming in what little light came through his tinted windows. He had no trouble seeing, of course. He had a crystal clear image of licking his way up her inner thigh, bringing her back to consciousness with his tongue already on her.
He’d shaken his head to clear it. Not yet. Another time, perhaps, if there was another time. Once he knew her history, had an idea how she would react.
Why was he so obsessed with this human woman? It made no sense. He needed to be planning to rebuild his pack, not sating his human needs.
But he couldn’t think past the needs of his swollen cock, so he’d gone into the master bathroom, and turned the shower on hot enough to scald. He’d slid out of his clothes and into the water with an airy groan of delight.
There was one slow moment where he pretended that he was truly there just to wash, and then he wrapped his hand around his cock. The first shuddering stroke almost turned him inside out. He could still taste Roxanne’s flavor on his tongue, warm and intense and incredibly strong. He could feel her as she fucked his mouth, urging him harder and faster as he swallowed wave after wave of her arousal. He leaned his forearm against the wall of the shower, resting his forehead there as he let his hand beat a more rapid rhythm over his body. His tension was so great that it was working against him; his thighs shook with the need to release, but he knew enough to hold it off for a bit. Now, it would be too fast, incomplete, unsatisfactory.
The shower had a seat in one corner; he let himself settle there, still stroking his cock, but freed from holding himself up, giving his other hand more freedom to explore. He tweaked the short nubs of his own nipples, biting his lip at the sharp sensation that caused, then reached down below his swollen cock to stroke his fingers lightly over his sack, gently drawing his balls down from his body. That almost undid him. He found himself arching off the seat, his breath fast and panting, fluid leaking from the tip of his cock and slipping down to better lubricate his movements. When his finger was good and slick, he slipped it back, gently, just to fill his ass ever so slightly. The sensation was overwhelming, deep, and bright. He let his eyes drift closed as his groin tightened. He let his hand become her mouth, devouring him, and light burst through him, sparkling in all the corners of his body.
He groaned as the orgasm came upon him, his body convulsing with the force of the release. He eased off the pressure until his shuddering pleasure had passed, and then he felt his body finally relax, his mind settling down out of the urgent pattern of need and want that it had been circling since the first moment he saw her.
He let the water soak him for a few minutes before he turned it off and stepped out of the shower. He toweled off. The basement called to him. Even with his lust sated for the moment, his wolf was still riding high, too large in his thoughts for him to really feel safe going back to sleep next to her. If the moon weren’t so close to full still, or if he hadn’t been through so much the past few weeks, or if the need to rebuild the pack hadn’t been so great—but if wishes were horses, his grandmother had always said, fools would ride. She was sound asleep. He felt sure that she’d never know that he left her, even for a moment.
He didn’t know when he’d fallen asleep down in the basement. He woke to the sound of someone prowling around the house, and the scent of an unfamiliar wolf. The shift came over him with ease, without him even thinking of it consciously. The thought had wandered through his mind that he needed to defend his home, and the wolf-form came to him without any more struggle than that. Roxanne’s scent was heavy on the air, but he didn’t realize it was her on his basement stairs until she screamed and ran. He’d found his human form again—that one had been more of a struggle, because he was catching the scent of a wolf now, too, a pale scent, but not one he’d easily mistake. But Roxanne was more important in that moment, and he was fairly sure even in his panic that defending her and defending the house would be the same thing. He called out to her, but she didn’t hear him in her fear.
He came into the living room and saw her facing off with the large wolf through the glass. He didn’t have time to shift fully once it leaped, and he got the best of it by sheer luck as much as skill.
And then he faced the human woman with blood dripping from his mouth and hands, like a goddamn idiot, like a pup who knew nothing about how to be a man and a wolf at the same time. No wonder she ran. He would have run, too, given half a chance.
He wanted to hit something, to tear something. But he had too much to do. He had to deal with the dead woman in his living room, but more importantly, he had to make sure Roxanne got home safely. If there was one wolf, there could be more. The dead woman smelled like a stray, but that didn’t mean she was working alone. More than once he’d used strays to do his dirty work, promising them a place in the pack if they proved themselves. Whoever was playing these stalking games with him was unlikely to see Roxanne as a pawn to be played, but “unlikely” and “impossible” were not the same. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
He washed the blood from his face and hands as quickly as he could, then found clean jeans, boxers, a shirt. He didn’t bother with shoes. She had to be on foot, and he wasn’t going to drive after her. He suspected that would feel like someone was coming to kidnap her. Besides, in a town as small as Sweetwater, a car on the streets at—he checked his watch—2:17am attracted a certain amount of attention, whereas someone walking through town was invisible. As invisible as one got in a small town, anyway.
He set off at a fast pace. Tracking her was easy. She smelled of panic and fear and sex. It was a very particular mix, and he hated the way it layered over her more earthy scents. It jarred with who she was supposed to be in a way that was deeply uncomfortable. But he did his best to remove all of those thoughts and focus on finding her, wherever she was.
He tried to push from his mind the last time he’d smelled pain and sex and fear all tangled together like this. The sacred occasion turned into a nightmare. He’d fought long and hard that night, and in the end, he’d escaped with his hide intact and his heart shattered. Another woman had died that night, and the pain of that hadn’t faded yet. He could push it out of his mind when he needed to, but it had become a part of him.
He’d still didn’t know why the other Alpha had come for him and his. If it were as simple as a territorial dispute, that was usually handled by the men, not by the wolves. If he had given someone slight, then the raid might make sense, but not the complete disrespect and disregard for traditions with which it had been handled. Was it possible that it was tied to that night of death so long ago? Could someone have tracked him down, followed him across the country to deal out death? He thought that everyone related to that night had died, except for him, but it was conceivable. It would explain the brutality, the apparent attempt to not just kill him, but to destroy him, and his legacy. And if that were the case if that was why this was happening, then Roxanne would be in danger. More danger than him, in truth.
He let his pace increase, moving into the best approximation of a wolf’s ground devouring lope that a man’s muscles could make. His feet slapped against the pavement softly, a sound he was fairly sure that only he could hear. She had moved quickly once she left, but he should still be on her within moments. He could follow her home from here, make sure that she got home safely.
He didn’t scent any other wolves in the area, but he hadn’t scented anyone in days before the attack on the camp, or today before the she-wolf had come through his back door.
He saw her now, about twenty feet ahead. He slowed, prepared to keep his distance, and protect her as well as he could from her. She was limping badly, but not as badly as when she’d left his house. Why hadn’t she called a cab?
She slowed to a halt, her head hanging low, and then she turned. Her eyes picked him easily out of the darkness. “I know you’re there,” she said, her voice full of the too flat tones of someone in total shock. “You might as well come out. I don’t think I’m going to make it home, anyway. Not without help, at least.”
