Zurlo, Michele - Riley [Daughters of Circe 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (16 page)

Riley moaned, thrusting her hips to the rhythm his tongue set, and he groaned. This wasn’t working. He couldn’t forget all the things he stood to lose. With one hand, he loosened the fly on his jeans. His cock seemed to always be at the ready around Riley. This time presented no exception.

He wrapped one hand around his thickness and stroked it hard. He buried the fingers of his other hand inside her hole. She screamed and bucked.

“Don’t stop. Oh, god, Soren. Please don’t stop.”

He mumbled assurances against her wetness, but she couldn’t have deciphered anything. The vibrations caused her to cry out. Sensing she was close, he pumped his fingers faster. She fell over the cliff screaming out her climax.

Waiting to bring her down gently was not an option. He ripped his mouth away and sucked his fingers clean. She made a short sound of protest, but she broke off when he lifted her body and impaled her on his cock.

She gazed up at him, her eyes wide and unfocused. He shoved her against the side of the seat and pounded into her, his speed blurry to even his own eyes. She hooked her ankles behind him and held on for dear life. The waning pulsations of her orgasm flared to life as she came fast and hard. Another scream ripped from her depths. Her pussy clenched around him, tight to the point of pain, but he didn’t stop or slow down. He couldn’t. Suddenly, nothing was more important than coming inside her.

He wanted to say her name, but his change was too close. Feral growls, long and loud, resonated in his chest and echoed through the valley. Riley clawed at him, scratching long gashes on his arms and shoulders. She bit into his thick pectoral muscle, stopping just short of drawing blood.

By chance, he met her gaze, and he saw that the light brown of her eyes had transformed to silver. Her hips, once passively accepting how he battered her with his thrusts, pistoned to the same rhythm. He hadn’t thought the transformation would be this fast. He had bitten her to make her strong enough to survive after he took her power. If she were merely a witch or a human, such a thing would kill her. His heart soared, and his orgasm blindsided him, slamming against his body like the waves of a monsoon.

Riley screamed again, and he fell to his knees. Gravel from the side of the road ground into his skin, and he managed to catch Riley before he dropped her on her ass. She buried her face in the pieces of his shirt she hadn’t shredded to ribbons. Sweat soaked her skin and the perfume of her body had subtly changed to something that called every lupine instinct of his to the surface.

“No one would ever accuse you of having finesse, Soren, but you are one fucking hot stud in the sack.”

He hadn’t expected her to say something like that. Caught by surprise, he laughed. Such a light feeling seemed wholly foreign to him. He let it run its course, and then he smoothed back her hair and kissed her forehead. “I take it I didn’t hurt you.”

She laughed weakly. “No, you didn’t hurt me, but I did lose count of how many orgasms you gave me. I’ve missed you so much.”

“Didn’t Teigh take care of you?”

Slowly, she peeled herself away from him and stood up, her muscles obviously sore. “He isn’t you. And you aren’t him. I miss him, Soren. I miss him and I miss Caiden. I can’t stand being away from any of you. It tears a hole in my heart that you can’t fill by yourself.”

He closed his eyes against the pain. Not only did he hate hurting her, he hated the blow he was about to deal to Teigh and Caiden. “Riley, I can’t help the way things are. In a perfect world, we would all be together. But this isn’t a perfect world, and I am far from a perfect person. I’m closer to a monster than anyone you know.”

One warm, trembling hand caressed his cheek. “You aren’t a monster, Soren. If you were a monster, you wouldn’t care about what your demons are forcing you to do. I can see how it hurts you, and it kills me that I can’t do anything to help you.”

Pressing his lips to her palm, he kissed it and used it to smother anything he might have said in response.

* * * *

Riley had no idea how to contact Caiden. Every time she had been transported to his magical world, the journey hadn’t been planned. Sex seemed to play into it, but so did sleep. No matter, she would have Soren as many times as she could seduce him. According to Teigh, it would transfer a bit of his power to her each time she milked an orgasm from him.

He lumbered to his feet and straightened his jeans. With a tug, he ripped his shirt from his frame and tossed it behind the passenger side of the seat. “I guess that’s done for.”

She snagged it and held it up. The pale yellow glow of the dome light showed rips and tears in the heavy flannel. Riley felt heat creep up her neck. She hadn’t realized she’d been so rough. “Sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”

A small, predatory smile turned up the corners of his mouth. “I came over you.”

She took heart from the return of his inherent cockiness. Little particles of energy zinged through her body, heating her from within. It wasn’t the kind of heat that made her want to throw him to the ground and ride him hard. She knew she had absorbed Teigh’s power. She knew she siphoned a bit of Caiden’s with every visit. And now she had enough power to take some of Soren’s.

The little demon who held him in its thrall only an hour before now danced and hopped with anger. Its lips moved and its face contorted with rage. She could see the outline now without having to concentrate. Soren seemed to ignore it for the longest time. Finally, he cocked his head, listening to the damn thing.

The thing spoke rapidly. Riley caught a few words. She didn’t recognize the language, and so it made no sense to her.

After it finally calmed down, Soren focused his attention back on her. “Where are they, Riley? You have to take me there.”

She gestured to the woods that began a half acre from the road. “I’m pretty sure we go that way. But, Soren, I’m starving. Don’t you have any food? On a good day, it’s a three-hour walk. Sometimes it’s taken five or six hours to get there.”

Shade or Torrey usually changed into a wolf and let her ride on their backs, shortening the trip to about an hour. Riley didn’t volunteer that information.

Soren lifted his gaze and stared at the waxing moon for the longest time. At last, he nodded. “We’ll start the journey now. I’ll hunt for you later when I sense something you can eat.”

That wasn’t quite what Riley meant. Given the stale odor of fried foods, she really wondered if he had any leftover fast food available. Cold fries would get her excited right about now. She might even sink to stripping the meat off a cheeseburger and eating the remains. Raw meat didn’t appeal to her in the slightest.

“Soren, I’m a vegetarian.” He
knew
she was a vegetarian. She would have said more, but his lips pressed together, and she knew better than to push her luck.

“Riley, I’m a wolf. I can bring down large or small game and cook them over a fire for you, but I have no fucking clue how to find edible leaves and shit like that. You’ll eat meat or you’ll starve.”

She looked him up and down, striving to throw the most contempt she could muster into that look, and then she stalked off toward the trees. With every step, she took stock of the situation. No flashlight, no hiking boots, no jacket, and only a vague sense of the direction she had to take.

She lifted her hand to finger the bandage on her neck. Too bad he hadn’t bitten her all those years ago. Turning into a wolf right now would improve her vision immeasurably and heal the gash on her neck. It throbbed with the promise of transformation. All this time, she had wondered how Torrey knew her change was imminent. Now she knew the power of instinct yielded that knowledge. Perhaps she could use her emerging powers to find Torrey faster. The moment any of them scented Soren, they would come out guns blazing, so to speak.

She paused at the tree line. “I don’t suppose you have a flashlight.”

Although she couldn’t hear him due to his graceful, lupine movements, she knew Soren had caught up with her. She could sense his power and his presence. That was new.

He handed her a jacket, a canteen, and a flashlight. “I came prepared.”

Narrowing her eyes at him, she bit back a retort about not bringing food. Low blood sugar could make her a bitch in the best of circumstances, which this was not. She snatched the jacket from his hands and jammed her arms into the sleeves. Being hers, it fit perfectly. He could raid her hall closet, but not her pantry?

She snatched the flashlight and canteen, also from her hall closet, and pointed the flashlight at his face. He winced and pushed it down, but she did have time to notice he had put on a fresh shirt. “Are you going to shift? Do you want me to hold your clothes?”

“Not yet.” He looked over her head, but she read his face in the ambient light.

“I’m okay with you shifting. I trust you.”

His jaw tightened and the vein at his temple ticked. “Your trust is misplaced.”

She slipped her hand into his and pointed the beam of light into the woods. It didn’t go very far, but she reasoned that Soren would smell or hear anything dangerous. She just had to watch her footing. He didn’t resist when she dragged him along.

They walked in silence. Riley had no idea how much time had passed. Her stomach interrupted the quiet with a loud groan. Soren glanced down at her and sighed. Without another word, he stripped naked, throwing his clothes into her arms as he took them off. She watched as he unceremoniously revealed his bulges and sinews, and her pussy throbbed in appreciation. He threw her a frustrated look and shifted into that beautiful white wolf that saved her from a mugger. That incident seemed to have happened so long ago, but only a few days had passed.

She waited, alone with only a flashlight for company. The thick cover of trees blocked out the moon’s pale light. She supposed the fact that she could make out the top branches meant the werewolf blood running in her veins was gaining potency. She shone the flashlight around to illuminate the area in which they’d halted. A tree had fallen nearby. She took a chance and sat on it.

Time passed. She shifted in her seat, hoping and praying that Soren could find her again. She was seriously screwed if he couldn’t. She had no idea where she was or what might be nearby. Beating back her nerves, she took a defiant sip from the canteen. Maybe she would stumble upon a stream before she died of dehydration or exposure.

Waiting patiently wasn’t working out for her. Restless, she gathered twigs and made a pile. Maybe she could choke down some meat if it was cooked. There was no way in hell she was going to eat raw meat. The man was insane for even bringing up the idea.

She knelt down and braced the flashlight between two of the larger sticks so that it cast a pool of light on her pile. Picking up two likely candidates, she rubbed them together the way she’d seen people do on television. The outer layers of bark cracked and crumbled and fell away. She kept at it.

Soon, the one she held vertical broke into two pieces. Disgusted, she threw them back into the pile.

Awareness prickled at the hairs on the back of her neck. A chuckle drew her attention to the area just outside of the dim light. She aimed her best glare in that direction. “All right, let’s see you light a fire without matches.”

Soren stepped closer, but he avoided the pathetic ray from her flashlight. She could barely see his outline. He held something out to her. “Hold this. Don’t set it on the ground.”

She took it from him, completely forgetting to consider what it might be. Soft fur brushed her palm. She screamed and let it fall.

He caught it. “Riley, if you set it down, then bugs and things will crawl in and eat the meat before you can get to it.”

“What is it?” She crossed her arms over her chest and unsuccessfully suppressed a shiver.

“Rabbit. Either hang on to it so I can start the fire or eat it raw.” He leaned closer, and the sweet, musky scent of him invaded her senses.

Normally, she would hold her nose and tell him to hit the shower. When she had stayed with him before, she hadn’t liked the way he smelled sometimes. Now the odor permeating from him after his shift drew her closer. Her panties became uncomfortably damp, and she knew he scented her arousal.