Werewolves in Love 1: Kiss and Kin (7 page)

Eventually, when she could breathe again and it felt like her mouth might work, she cleared her throat and whispered against his neck, “I thought I’d had sex before, but maybe I was wrong.”

He lay on his back with one arm flung across the carpet, his other hand roaming her back, and she heard his smile as he said sleepily, “I’d kinda forgotten about it myself.”

“What?” Her hand stilled on his stomach. “Do you mean you don’t—I mean, you haven’t been…”

With an odd, sardonic laugh he said, “I haven’t been a busy wolf lately, no.”

She kept quiet, so as not to let on how he’d flabbergasted her. Taran had had women, and spare women, stashed around the city as long as she could remember. He never had steady girlfriends, and he’d never shacked up with anyone, but the idea of an even temporarily celibate Taran just didn’t compute.

“Well,” she lightly, “I guess it really is like riding a bicycle, huh? Hey. You taught me to ride a bicycle, didn’t you?” Long, uncomfortable pause. “Not that we need to think about that right now. It’s kind of squicky to think about, isn’t it. I mean, you taught me how to ride a horse, too, and…wait.” She felt him shaking beneath her; she was pretty sure he was laughing. “Shit.” She sighed. Yeah, he was laughing. “God, I’m babbling. Make me stop babbling.”

“Okay,” he said softly, and rolled her onto her side, sliding his hand up into her hair and kissing her, slow and deep and gentle. She nibbled along his chin and jaw, because the feel of his stubble beneath her tongue made her tingle. He groaned contentedly and pulled her close, tucking her head beneath his chin.

“We need to get off the floor.”

She snuggled against him. “I don’t think I can walk yet. And I like the fire.”

“Okay. Couch then.”

“No, I don’t wanna get up…” she whined as he stood up, and she whooped in surprise when he reached down and scooped her up. He slid in under her on the enormous sofa and pulled a fleece throw blanket over them.

She lay warm and drowsy between Taran’s burning body and the blanket, and as her hand drifted lazily across his stomach, and his hand softly wandered through her hair, she remembered a game she had played with herself as a young girl. When she found herself somewhere she really wanted to be, or doing something she loved doing, or just feeling generally elated, she’d hold her breath and pretend that as long as she didn’t breathe, time would stop and that moment would last as long as she wanted. She distinctly remembered playing the game as late as the age of twelve, when Taran taught her to ride a horse. He was a twenty-two year old Army Ranger, home on leave, and her worship of him approached idolatry. She didn’t fall in love with him for another five or six years, but that afternoon at the stable in Sugar Land had been a harbinger of the longing she’d carried for him ever since.

“Lark?” he said quietly.

“What?”

“You okay?”

“I think so. It’s just weird.”

After a moment he asked, “Weird good, or weird bad?”

The big badass alpha sounded a little scared. She wanted to throw her arm around him and reassure him; but to do that would be to acknowledge his insecurity, and one didn’t do that with alphas. She certainly couldn’t tell him she loved him. So she said simply, “Weird good, of course, but still weird.”

“Okay. I just don’t want you to regret it.”

She laughed softly. “Never.”

She thought he’d fallen asleep when he said, “I’ve thought about this a long, long time.”

“I have, too. For years.”

“Really.”

“Yes, really. Why?” Rising up on her elbow to smile down at him, she ran a fingernail over his ribs till he laughed. “I told you there were things you didn’t know about me,” she said more seriously.

“Like what?”

“Like, you gave me my first orgasm.”

“Lark!” he exclaimed tenderly, and put a hand to her face. “Baby, I didn’t know you’d never—”

“Not tonight!” She laughed, dropping a kiss on his broad chest. She lingered there, distracted by the sweet salty flavor of the smooth brown skin, and her fingers skipped across the top of his washboard abs. She grinned as his cock, just below her hand, began to notice.

“Lark,” he said in a low voice, and grabbed her hand. “Your first orgasm…?”

“Oh, yeah.” She kissed his ear and slid her leg between his, his cock hard and hot against her skin like a curling iron. “I was sixteen or seventeen when I figured out how to masturbate. The first time I got off, I was thinking about you.”

“You’re making that up,” he breathed in an awestruck tone.

“Nope. I swear it’s true.” She nipped at his jaw again.

“God help me,” he groaned.

He rolled over on top of her, and for a minute she was squished into the crack of the couch. A second later, she was on her back, Taran braced on his elbows above her. She gave a throaty, contented sigh, dug her fingers into his biceps, and raised her hips to open herself to him, wrapping her long legs around his waist. He dove into her with a mighty groan, and when he began to move inside her, she threw her arms around his neck, crushing his mouth to hers, loving the feel of his tongue thrusting in her mouth as his cock thrust into her slick passage.

She didn’t come that time, but she didn’t care. She couldn’t help the tears. If he noticed them, he didn’t say so.

I have to tell her tonight,
he thought on the way home from work Friday.

She might go psycho on him at first, but once he explained it to her, made it clear she didn’t owe him anything and she could take all the time she needed, she’d understand. He tried to tell her last night. She’d want to know why he didn’t try harder. He’d never confess the humiliating truth—simple fear.

After years of silent yearning, his self-control had hardened into a barrier of tempered glass. Almost losing her put a sizeable chip in that glass, and the cracks had steadily spread. Last night, the flick of her tongue across his palm shattered the whole goddamned thing. He’d needed her too much, and for too long, to say anything to make her pause.

He wouldn’t apologize for what he couldn't regret.

As soon as he turned onto his street, he saw Nick’s Range Rover sitting in his driveway.

He hadn’t told his Alpha about last night; he didn’t know if Lark talked to TJ or anyone else.

Nick, don’t say anything. Help a wolf out, Alpha.

Surely, she’d understand. She acted as if she loved him. She could handle it. Together they’d figure out how to tell the family.

When he walked into the silent living room, he knew how badly he’d fucked up.

Nick stood looking out the sliding glass doors with his hands crammed in his pockets, apparently fascinated with something in the back yard. But Taran knew his best friend of twenty years better than that. The set of his jaw, his heavy-lidded gaze, his ramrod posture instead of his customary insouciant slouch all indicated the alpha’s anger.

Lark huddled in the love seat with her head down and her arms wrapped around her knees. She didn’t look up when he walked in.

After an agonizing minute of silence, Nick turned to him and said quietly, “I dropped by to talk to you about Kuba. Lark was here. As soon as I realized she was yours, I told her how happy it made me, for both of you. She didn’t know what I was talking about. Taran—what the fuck were you thinking, wolf?”

He cleared his throat, started to answer, and found he had no words. A dull roaring sound filled his ears. He stared at Nick, silently begging for a life ring. Nick returned the stare with an expression part ire and part sorrow. It seemed to acknowledge yes, he could see Taran drowning but no, he couldn’t—wouldn’t?—pull him out.

Taran turned to look at his mate. His mate, whose scent he still wore, whose skin he still tasted, who’d come so sweet and frantic in his arms only this morning and wouldn’t look at him now.

“Lark? I meant to talk to you tonight about this—“

“You claimed me?” She finally raised her head to look at him, her face streaked with tears. “You
claimed
me, and you didn’t tell me? You bonded to me without telling me. How long have you known I’m your mate, Taran?”

He’d expected anger, but the anguish in her voice stunned him.

“
How long?
” she shouted.

“Three years,” he said quietly.

“Three years,” she whispered. “Three years.” She nodded, looked up at the ceiling, back at him. “Three years. You’ve known for three years, and you never said anything. Three years you’ve treated me like you treated me all my life, either ignoring me or criticizing me, and you never bothered to mention that
I’m your fucking mate
.” Her voice got louder and harder with each word. She uncurled and put her feet on the floor, hugging herself tightly and leaning forward. In a voice so full of contempt he flinched she said, “What changed your mind, Taran? What made you decide it was time to fuck me?”

He gaped at her. “What are you talking about? That’s not what happened—”

“It’s not? You didn’t plan last night?”

“How could I plan that? You think I wanted that to happen?”

“What, you didn’t?”

“Yes! But, but—no, I mean—goddamn it, Lark!” He ran a hand through his hair, tugging at it in frustration as he began to pace. “I’ve thought about it for years, but I never did anything because—because it was
you
, and it seemed wrong, and I thought—I thought there was no way, I’m like your big brother, and half the time you hated me—”

“I never hated you—”

“And I’d never be able to explain it to Myall, or Mom or David, but then last night happened, and, and—”

“And and what?” she mocked.

He spun around to advance on her, pointing a finger. “I didn’t rape you, Lark. I asked you if you wanted to stop and you said no. You wanted it as much as I did, every time last night and this morning. You still remember this morning, don’t you?”

She blushed furiously. Belatedly he remembered Nick behind him, witnessing all of this. Lark sprang to her feet, arms still crossed tightly against her chest, hunching her shoulders the way she did whenever she got angry or sad or scared, just as she’d done ever since she was a little girl.

“No, I haven’t forgotten anything,” she snarled. “Have
you
forgotten all the times last night and this morning you could have stopped to say ‘oh by the way, Lark, you’re my mate, and now I’m bonded to you for life, and every wolf who sees you will know you belong to a wolf and if you don’t spend the rest of your life with me I’ll be alone and, and’—fuck you, Taran! I thought you
wanted
me!”

“Are you crazy?” he exploded. “Of course I want you! I’ve always wanted you!”

“Yeah, because I’m your mate! How long have you been waiting for a chance to claim me?”

Could she act any crazier? This made no sense at all.

“Shut the fuck up and listen to me! That’s what I’m trying to tell you—I never planned to claim you, I never planned to fuck you, last night just happened, and once it started I couldn’t stop it—I didn’t want to stop it—
neither did you!
I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t think of a way to say it, and I decided to tell you when I got home tonight.”

“Really?” she sneered. “Last night and this morning, even when we were making love, you never looked me in the eye—you’re telling me that was a coincidence? You didn’t want me to realize I could look you in the eye because then I’d know, and you didn’t want me to know!”

“I wanted you to find out the right way—”

“The right way was before you seduced me!”

“
Seduced
you?” he roared. “You think I seduced you?

I can’t stop, Lark. I don’t want you to.

I can’t believe you’re inside me.

As he remembered last night—Lark’s sighs, her moans and her kisses, her fierce satisfaction in knowing what she did to him—he almost wanted to throw himself at her feet and beg her forgiveness. He almost thought he’d do anything to make it right, to make it like it was this morning when they kissed goodbye after making love one more time in his bed.

Almost, but not quite.

An alpha didn’t grovel, not even to his mate, especially when he’d done nothing wrong and she was behaving like a spoiled child.

“You think you’re some kind of victim here? Grow up, Lark.” He hadn’t meant to shout, but he didn’t care if it scared her. She acted as if he’d forced her, or tricked her, into making love with him. Bullshit. They’d thrown themselves into the fire with equal abandon, and he wouldn’t let her forget it.

“You lied to me!” she raged. “You—you tried to trap me, you act like I don’t have a choice, like…like…you can just decide my future! I’m not ready for this, I didn’t…”

“What did you expect, Lark? Casual dating? A fuck buddy? Is that what you wanted?”

“No, you asshole! That’s not what I wanted! I don’t know what I wanted! I didn’t expect any of it to happen! I didn’t expect you to want me, and when you did, I couldn’t stop it, I just couldn’t…”

“Don’t you mean you didn’t want to stop it?” he shouted.

“Yes! That’s what I mean! I didn’t want to stop, I always wanted—but I never thought you’d—and then—”

“Lark, listen to me.” He took her by the arms and drew her to him, trying to calm her.

But she flailed at him, knocking his hands away. Her elbow caught his chin in a glancing blow and he staggered back with a shocked snarl. She stumbled and fell on the couch, one hand on her mouth and her shoulders shaking as she stared up at him with huge tears pooling in her eyes.

“I’m not staying here,” she blubbered. “I’m leaving. Now.”

“For God’s sake, Lark, get a hold of yourself! Drop the hysterical bullshit and listen to me. I’m not trying to push you, I’m not telling you what to do, I just—”

“Taran.”

“We need to discuss this like adults and you need to take responsibility for what happened. And you can’t leave as long as we don’t—”

“Taran!” his Alpha bellowed.

His head whipped around like Nick had jerked it on a choke chain.

“Go outside for a minute and let me talk to her.”

“This is my house, Nick,” he growled.

“I’m your Alpha, wolf. Get your tail outside.
Now
.”