by Susan Hayes
Instead of taking her, he broke their kiss to give her an arrogant grin. “Not yet. You got a taste of me and now it’s my turn.”
“So that’s how it’s going to be?”
“Let’s call it a little inter-agency give and take.”
She laughed and unwound her legs from around his hips, leaving him free to move. He didn’t waste any time, kissing his way down her body, leaving no part of her untasted. When he finally arrived at the apex of her thighs, he inhaled once, parted her folds and ran his tongue the length of her pussy. Trina bent her knees, setting her feet flat on the bed and arched upward with a cry as sensations overwhelmed her. Drunk with need, she threw back her head and begged for what she craved. “Make me come, Jack.”
There was no hesitation and no time to brace herself for what came next, He didn’t take, he ravished, sucking and laving with mouth and tongue until she was trembling and breathless. When she was almost to the breaking point he withdrew, and she lifted her head, ready to protest the loss of his touch. The sight of him sheathing his cock in latex quieted her, her channel clenching in anticipation of finally being filled.
Jack wrapped a big hand around each of her ankles and lifted her legs, drawing them around his hips as he settled into the cradle of her thighs. His cock bumped against her hyper-sensitive clit, making her moan. He did it again, deliberately this time, rubbing the head of his dick back and forth until she was out of her mind with need. Just as she opened her mouth to demand he fuck her, he shifted his hips and entered her, stretching her wide.
Jack moved slowly, giving her body time to adjust, his eyes locked on hers the entire time. Once he was fully seated, he blew out a ragged breath. “Hang on tight, baby, this is going to get a little rough.” He paused for a second and then his mouth quirked up in a grin. “Or a lot rough.”
She nodded and spread her arms out on the bed, digging her fingers into the sheets as he started moving. “I like it that way.”
He took her hard and fast, powering in and out of her body so all she could do was hang on and enjoy the ride. The sounds of sex filled the room, the slick slap of bodies coming together as they gave voice to their mutual need. Jack kept up his pounding rhythm until she was lost to everything but the sensations pouring through her, and then he pressed the broad pad of his thumb into her folds, finding her clit and working it against her pubic bone until she finally erupted into an orgasm.
She was still lost in the thrall of her release when his cock thickened and he lowered himself over her. His knees were braced on the the edge of the mattress. His hands on either side of her shoulders. She thought he was going to kiss her. He didn’t. Instead, he dropped his head to her throat and sank his teeth into the side of her neck.
She yelped in expected pain, but all she felt was a rush of pleasure so pure and powerful she was helpless to do anything but ride another wave. This one took her higher, and she came at the same time he did.
Once she found the strength to move, she shoved at his shoulder. “What the fuck was that? You bit me!”
He raised his head to look down at her. That’s when she saw his eyes. They weren’t brown anymore. They were amber. The eyes of an animal… a wolf.
“Mine.” His voice was strange, like there were two beings speaking with one mouth.
That’s when understanding dawned.
She touched his lips. There was a trace of blood on them. Her blood. He bared his teeth for her, showing her his fangs. He hadn’t just bitten her. He’d claimed her. “You…”
“Are a werewolf. And you are my mate, Trina Thorn.”
So many questions tumbled through her mind, but the one that came out first was, “When did the DEA start hiring wolves?”
“We’ve always been in the DEA, they just didn’t know about us until a few years ago.” He grinned and his eyes changed back to their usual brown. “Plenty of wolves in all sorts of law enforcement agencies. Other kinds of paranormals, too.”
“Hiding in plain sight.” She nodded. It made sense. What better way to make sure your secrets stayed hidden than to be part of the investigations that might uncover something hard to explain?
“You’re taking this rather well.” He kissed her and then rose to dispose of the condom. She hadn’t found the strength to move by the time he returned, and he stretched out on the bed, carefully drawing her into his arms.
“Honestly, I’m sort of relieved. I didn’t understand why the hell I wanted to get naked and naughty with biker with a criminal record and a bad attitude. Now it makes sense. When a wolf finds their mate, both people feel it, even if one of them is human.”
“That’s right.” He nuzzled her hair. “And I did not have a bad attitude. I was playing a part.”
“You were an asshole,” she informed him. “One hundred percent. Possibly one-hundred and ten.”
“Okay. I was playing the part of an asshole. I’ve been Ramrod Steele for more than a year. After a while, the edges start to blur.”
“I know the feeling.” She’d only done one long term stint undercover. By the time it was over she’d needed to use every day of her vacation time to get reacquainted with herself. In fact, that was the last time she’d gone on vacation. After more than a year, Jack was going to need some down time. A lot of it.
“I bet you do. And that makes this even more amazing. I mean, what are the odds? Not just that two agents were undercover at the same place and time, but that they’d turn out to be mates?”
They both heard the sound at the same moment. The familiar sound of someone putting a key in a lock. The lock on their door.
Jack’s smile vanished in a heartbeat. He stiffened and growled just as the door opened to reveal Trixi standing there, a cruel smile on her crimson mouth.
“Someone’s been keeping secrets,” said in a sing-song tone. Then she was gone, the rapid-fire clack of high heels the only clue to which way she’d run.
Shit.
7
Jack
Fucking Trixi. The woman had been a pain in his ass since his first day here. What she lacked in education she made up in street smarts and cunning. She’d taken one look at him and decided he was her way out of this backwater town. He felt sorry for the girl she’d been once, but that was it. He couldn’t save her, he sure as hell didn’t trust her… and now he had to stop her.
All that raced through his mind as he leaped to his feet. “Stay here. Call your backup. Shoot anyone that comes through that door that isn’t me.”
“Got it,” was all she said.
He felt a surge of gratitude that the universe had sent him a woman as sensible and brave as she was sexy. That was his last thought before he let the change take him. Between one step and the next, he shifted and everything changed.
His senses sharpened as his viewpoint changed. He was lower to the ground, four legs driving him forward at speeds he could never manage in human form. Trixi’s cheap perfume was easy to follow, the reek of it so strong it stung his nose.
His room was on the motel’s second floor which meant she had to take the stairs. Those heels she wore were going to slow her down. Good thing, too, because he needed to stop her before she called Snarl and tipped him off. The whole club would scatter like cockroaches if that happened and hunting them down again would take time and resources.
The part of his mind that was still human had questions. Why the fuck was she here? How much had she heard? And how the hell had she gotten a key to his room?
Trixi had only made part way down the steps when he caught up to her. He launched himself at her back with enough force to send her crashing to the landing with him on top of her.
Her scream of surprise cut off as her head hit the metal deck and all the air left her lungs in a long whoosh.
Someone yelled, “Trixi! What the fuck? Since when does Rod have a dog?”
Well shit. Freak was here, too. Fucking fantastic.
At least Trixi wasn’t going to be a problem for a while. She’d smacked
her head hard enough to knock herself out cold. His nose told him she was still alive, just out of action. One problem down. One to go.
Then the shooting started.
Normally, staying in one place while getting shot at was a bad idea. In this case, it would have been the smart move because it turned out Freak was as bad at shooting as he was at everything else.
The third shot caught him in the shoulder, and he uttered an undignified yelp of pain. I hope Trina didn’t hear that.
He struggled to his feet as best he could on three legs. He was bleeding, in pain, and seriously pissed off. He needed to put an end to this before someone else got hurt. The motel wasn’t filled with the cream of society, but most of them were just folks trying to get by and didn’t deserve to get shot.
“Trixi? You okay?” Freak called out. Gravel crunched under his feet as he moved closer.
“Hey, asshole. That’s far enough.” Trina called from somewhere above him. Dammit, what was she doing?
“Yeah? You really think you have the balls to shoot me, Lily. I bet not.”
Jack limped forward just enough to get eyes on Freak. He was standing not twenty feet away, his gun held Hollywood gangster-style—one handed and with the grip parallel to the ground. He wasn’t even aiming it at anyone. Idiot.
“Bad bet.” A single shot fired and the gravel at Freak’s feet exploded upwards.
Freak shrieked as the rocks and debris hit him. Any other person would have taken the hint and surrendered. Freak just screamed in incoherent fury and opened fire without even trying to aim first.
Jack snarled and threw himself down the stairs, determined to take down Freak before he hurt Trina. He had to protect his mate.
He shouldn’t have worried. Freak was dead before Jack hit the ground. Trina was a hell of a shot.
One more thing he needed to do before the pain made him do something regrettable, like pass out. He shifted back to his human form and tried not to whimper when the change forced the bullet out of his wound. Fucking ouch.
The world went away for a little while, and when it came back again Trina was crouched beside him, pressing down on his injured shoulder to try to slow the bleeding. She was naked, streaked in his blood, and her expression was somewhere between worry and irritation. Damn, she looked good.
“You with me?” she asked.
“Yeah. Nice shooting.”
“Remember that the next time you tell me to take cover and hide, asshole.”
“Noted.” He eased himself to a sitting position, which at least meant he wasn’t lying on a bed of gravel anymore. “Trixi?”
“Found your cuffs in the beside table. I don’t want to know why they were there, but she’s cuffed to the railing. She’s not going anywhere.”
“They’re just for emergencies.” He gestured around them. “Like this.”
“Good. Though later maybe we can find another use for them.” She eyed his shoulder. “After you heal up.”
“I’ll be fine in a few hours. I heal fast. Did you call for backup?”
“My people are on their way.” She handed him his phone. “You should call yours.”
“Yeah. Then you and I are going to get dressed.”
She snorted. “That’s your biggest worry right now?”
“Well, yeah. No one gets to see your sexy ass naked but me.”
“Too late for that. Take a look around.”
Well, fuck. Doors were open all over the motel now and there were faces in a lot of windows. The braver ones were already gathering around them, including the motel manager.
Jack pointed to him. “You. Did you give that black-haired psycho a key to my room?”
The man gaped at him, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish.
“Answer the question, asshole.”
“Who the fuck are you? You’re not a guest here,” the manager spluttered.
“I’m Special Agent Trina Thorn, ATF. Now, answer the damned question.”
“Yeah. Uh. She said she was your girlfriend and uh… she thought you were cheating on her. Wanted to catch you in the act.” The big man shrugged. “I thought I was doing her a favor.”
“You nearly got two law enforcement agents killed. Good job,” Trina said, her voice as chilly as a meat locker.
“Uh. Sorry?”
“Want to make it up to us? Find us some blankets. I can’t leave the scene and neither of us are enjoying being on display.”
Jack winked at her. “You’re sexy when you get all bossy.”
She rolled her eyes, but her smile widened. “Glad you think so. This is my default mode. Lily the meek and sweet has left the building.”
He was good with that. Lifting his head, he scowled at the bystanders. “You’re all standing in the middle of an active crime scene. If you don’t get back to your rooms in the next thirty seconds, you’re going to spend the rest of the night talking to law enforcement.”
Ten seconds later they were alone.
“They’re all potential witnesses. They’re going to be answering questions for hours whether they’re in their rooms or not,” Trina pointed out in hushed tones.
“Yeah, but now they’re not fucking up the crime scene or trying to take selfies with the damned body.”
Sirens wailed in the distance. Both of them glanced up and then exhaled. Help was on its way. Of course first they’d probably end up cuffed and detained as potential suspects. Neither of them had badges or any ID in their real names.
It was going to be a long night.
8
Trina
It was well past midnight before the debriefings, explanations and statements were finished. By then, Trina was too tired to argue when Jack scooped her into his arms and carried her out of the DEA’s temporary headquarters.
Someone had cleared out their room at the motel and what little gear they had was packed into a couple of duffel bags in the back seat of a rental car.
“No bike?” she asked.
“Not tonight. I’ve had enough of motorcycles for a while.”
“I bet. So, where are we going? I believe someone promised me a long hot shower. I am so ready for that.” All she wanted was to be clean again. The dried blood on her skin itched, and she felt like it had been a month since she’d last seen clean towels.
“To the only decent hotel in town.”
She groaned. “The Montgomery?”
“Yup.”
“Unbelievable.” Two agencies had not only managed to infiltrate the same gang in the same town, they were all staying at the same hotel.
“Communication clusterfuck of the first order. Seems that your boss didn’t file out all the documentation required for this op.”
That was news to her. “Max is a fucking idiot. I hope they fire him after this. Now they know he lied to me about the plan just to get even because I wouldn’t sleep with him, it should be a no-brainer.”
“What? When? That son of a bitch. If I see him again, I’ll tear his fucking throat out.”
“No throat ripping. I think we’ve spilled enough blood for today.” She patted his thigh and tried not to overthink why his violent words made her all mushy inside.
“You’re mine, Trina. No one fucks with my mate and lives.”
Mates. Somehow she’d managed to ignore that little fact for the last few hours. “Yeah. About that. I know this isn’t something we have any say over, but as hot as the sex is, I’m not sure I want to spend the rest of my life belonging to Ramrod Steele. He’s a surly, arrogant, criminal and a total ass.”
“I’m not him.”
She nodded. “And I’m not Lily, hapless damsel in distress.”
“I figured that out when you shot the bad guy and took over my crime scene.” He turned and flashed her a grin that made her heart race. “I like Trina more than Lily. And as it happens, Mr. Steele is about to disappear. The bike club he belonged to is going down as we speak. Which means Jack Noble gets to go on a well-deserved vacation before he heads back to
work. I don’t suppose you’ve got any leave coming up?”
That was the answer she’d been hoping for. “I’ve got about two months’ worth of vacation time due me.”
“Two months sounds good. We can spend the first month in bed, and the second month lying on a beach somewhere.”
Her heart liked that idea. Her brain wanted more information. “And what happens then? You and I go back to work and what? Try to coordinate vacations every year?”
“Fuck no. That’s not how this works, sweet cheeks. Mates don’t leave each other, so we’ve got decisions to make. Option one, we both retire and do something nice and safe, like accounting.”
She snorted. “Fuck that.”
“Which leaves options two and three. That’s when one of us resigns from our current position and gets assigned to the other’s team.”
Angels didn’t sing, but something clicked deep inside her head and a little voice whispered yes. “I’ll resign. I’m done with assholes like Max.”
Jack laid a hand over hers. “Then I guess my next identity is going to be a married man.”
“You watch my back, I watch yours?” It was an appealing idea. Jack wouldn’t betray her. They were mates. She knew what that meant. She could trust him. Always.
He pulled into the parking lot before answering. Once the engine was off, he twisted in his seat to face her, “More like we watch each other’s backs, take down the bad guys, and fuck like bunnies. Sound good?”
It sounded perfect. “It could be you’ve found yourself old lady for your next adventure… if you can remember two little rules.”
Jake nuzzled his face into her hair. “And what are these rules of yours?”