by T. S. Joyce
Yesterday, she’d dragged fallen, dried-out logs back to the house with Buck’s old snow machine that Link had got working for her. She had plenty on the woodpile to last her for a couple of weeks, but if bad weather hit and she couldn’t get out onto the land to gather more, she’d be up shit creek. Between her survival books and Link’s infinite well of knowledge, she was fully aware that Alaskan weather wasn’t the most dangerous part of living here. It was being unprepared for the weather that could kill her.
Smoke blasted from the chainsaw as she cut the logs into more manageable pieces, and the sawdust, to her pleasure, came out clean and white. Green logs didn’t burn well, but this was prime fire timber.
Movement caught her attention, and she let the chainsaw idle as she straightened her spine. When she saw Link’s snow machine crest the hill, she turned off the saw and jogged out to meet him. Damn, he was a sight for sore eyes, up on one locked leg, other knee resting in the seat as he maneuvered around the big spruce by the road. But when he cut the engine and dismounted, he didn’t greet her like he usually did. Instead, he shook his head hard and rattled a long, loud growl, his lips curled back over his white teeth.
“Link?”
“Stay back.” His voice dipped and grew gravelly. “She’s going to kill us.”
“What?” Nicole held her hands out helplessly. “I won’t kill you.”
“Not you. The fox. The fox will kill us.”
“Vera? Link, I don’t understand. You said she loves you like her own brother. She won’t hurt you.”
Link leaned forward, hands on his knees and dry-heaved, and when he stood and linked his hands behind his head, she saw his eyes. They were pure white, and blood flowed freely down his nose, dripping from his chin onto the snow.
“Oh, my God.” Nicole approached a step, but he countered and backed away.
Link angled his face in warning, his eyes telling her to stay put. “You don’t want to touch me now, woman. Wolf is hurt.” A feral snarl left him. “Fuck you.”
“What?”
“Not you,” Link choked out, shaking his head again. “That part was for me. I did this.”
She didn’t understand any of this. Didn’t understand the conversation that was going on between Link and Wolf, and she couldn’t comprehend the reason for the gore on Link’s face. His nose didn’t look broken or even swollen.
“Tell me what’s going on, Link. Tell me right now.”
Link spat red in the snow and hooked his hands on his hips. “When you told me to fight, I did. I went and saw Vera. I asked her to try and fix me. Or if she couldn’t fix me, I want her to buy me time. I want more time.”
“With me, or more time to figure out how to fix the curse?”
“Either one. I’ll take anything.”
“And Vera’s medicine is doing this to you?”
Link waited too long to answer. The only sound was the pit, pat, pit, pat of crimson staining the ice near the toe of his boot. Finally, he dipped his chin once. “Vera has tried to cure a McCall before.” He strode around her and up the porch stairs to the cabin.
Stunned, she asked in a high pitch, “And?”
“And it didn’t work,” he gritted out over his shoulder as he disappeared inside.
“Wha—?” Nicole followed him in and closed the door gently behind her.
Link stood at the sink washing his face, but even from here, she could hear the constant growl in his throat. The unbalanced sound tore at her heart. He was in pain because she’d pushed him. He was worse now than she’d ever seen him.
“What do you mean it didn’t work?”
Link locked his arms against the counter, staring out the window with his back to her. His voice was hoarse and exhausted when he said, “She had a friend on the island where she used to live. She was banished there to try and fix the problem shifters, and one of them was a McCall. Eustice. My cousin. He tried to be good, like me. Vera can suppress animals, but with McCalls, it’s not just an animal problem.” Link turned and leaned his hip on the counter, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s a problem with the human side, too.”
“So putting Wolf to sleep like she did with the Silvers’ bears won’t fix you?”
Link shook his head, those blindingly white eyes steady on her. “Vera tried to suppress Eustice’s wolf, but with us, it’s different. One bad, unbalanced wolf in a pack can affect the entire dynamic. He can make an entire pack rotten. When she suppressed Eustice’s wolf, the poisonous side of his human half went unchecked, and he got head-sick faster.”
“What happened to him?” she asked in horror.
“He hanged himself.”
Nicole sank down into a chair by the table. It felt as if all the air had been sucked out of the room. It felt as if an avalanche had settled over her, pinned her body so tightly she couldn’t move to dig herself out. “Oh, Link. I don’t want you to take that medicine anymore. Not at this cost.”
Link pulled out the chair on the opposite side of the table and sat down hard. As he removed his winter hat, she stared in sympathy at his shaking hands.
“Vera is adjusting the serum as we go. She’s trying something different on me. She calls this one the McCall Reset. The idea isn’t to put Wolf to sleep, because I need him. The plan is to curb some of the traits the McCalls get in the final stages of madness, and to repair my fucked up DNA. She needs time to fix me though.” Link worried at a loose string on his discarded gloves and dipped his gaze. “Vera thinks you can save me.”
“How?”
“By being my anchor while go through the cycle of meds. Eustice didn’t have anything to live for. He gave up when it got too hard.” He inhaled deeply and locked eyes with her. “Vera wants to meet you.” Link slammed his hand on the table and snarled, “The fox hurts. You make us feel better.”
Vera stood and padded around the table, then slid over his lap, straddling him. Cupping his cheeks, she lifted Link’s terrifying gaze to hers. “Wolf. I love you.”
The snarl died in Link’s throat, and his eyes went round.
“I don’t want you hurting, but I don’t want you to go mad either. I don’t want Ian to put you down. You’re mine, do you hear me? I don’t think we can do this alone, though. If Link thinks Vera can help, then we have to do this as a team. We’ll do this one day at a time. Don’t look back, don’t look to the future. Just keep your eyes on me.”
Link nodded slowly, then eased forward and kissed her so hard her lips throbbed. Rough mate, but she couldn’t blame him. He was in pain, and she settled something in him. She understood his desperation to hurt less for a little while. Nicole yanked off her gloves and jacket, and Link pushed her sweater over her head as soon as he was able. His lips, hands, and teeth were everywhere, gripping, nibbling, caressing her skin until she was on fire. Link stood and took her with him. A long riiiip sounded, and before she could react to him destroying her jeans, he had them shoved down her hips and was spinning her. She gasped as her stomach dipped, and suddenly, she was staring at the woodgrain pattern on the table and feeling the chill of the cold surface against her stomach. The rustle of fabric sounded behind her, and Link gripped her waist. She arched her back and moaned as he slid into her from behind. He wasn’t slow or easy like he usually was, and she loved it. Loved the way he was teetering on the edge of control. Loved the way he couldn’t help himself around her. And that fucking sexy growl in his throat put her closer to orgasm with every slam into her. Gripping gently, his hand was in her hair, arching her back by another inch as she screamed his name and was consumed by an explosive orgasm.
Link’s warm chest brushed her back now as her hips jerked with each stroke. Damn, she was so sensitive to his touch now. As his body tensed and relaxed over her, his teeth grazed her shoulder blade, and she knew what he wanted, what he needed.
“Do it,” she gasped out. Fast, before I chicken out!
Link slammed into her and went rigid, groaning as warmth shot into her. His teeth sank into her back
so hard she was blinded by pleasure and pain. Gritting her teeth and closing her eyes, she swallowed her yelp of pain because this was important. Claiming marks were a big deal. They were a declaration. Link had bonded with her and chosen to fight to stay with her. He’d made the decision to go through unimaginably painful side effects just to get the chance at more time with her, and here he was, in this moment, claiming her. She would bear his mark forever.
Pride, pain, and joy surged through her as he slowed his movement and built the pressure in her middle gently. Her next release came easy with his hands soft on her hips. When he relaxed across her back, his heart pounding against her skin, he did something that felt so right she couldn’t move away if she tried. He began licking her stinging bite-mark. And that soft sound in his throat was back—the satisfied, happy one. The Link who had been bleeding and buckling in on himself outside was gone, and her caring mate was back. The relief she felt was mountainous.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I shouldn’t have come at you like that. Are you okay?”
She crossed her arms over the table and settled her chin against them. With a happy smile, she nodded. “Better than okay. You?”
Link sighed a relieved sound. “Well, I bit you so Wolf is practically throwing a fucking party. But yeah. We’re okay. You make things okay. Come here.”
Link slid out of her and turned her in his arms. And when her numb legs gave, he supported her against him. He hugged her tightly and rested his chin on her head as he moved from side to side in a music-less slow dance.
“Link?”
“Mmm?”
“I think you should stay nights here.”
He stopped swaying but didn’t respond, so she rushed onward. “Or if you can’t stomach sleeping in a place that isn’t your den, we can be together at your place. I don’t want to be away from you at night again. I don’t want to be away from you at all.”
Link’s heart rate settled under her cheek. “Vera said I should be with you as much as possible, but I was trying to give you time to be comfortable with this.”
“You think it’s all too fast?”
He chuckled, and the sound warmed her from the inside out. God, she breathed for his laugh.
“Too fast? Maybe for a normal couple with all the time in the world. But for me? No. It feels…painful…when I sleep alone now.” His voice dipped. “Nightmares. Tell her about the nightmares.” Link cleared his throat. “The medicine has some pretty gnarly side effects. I feel better around you.”
“Then you will? You’ll stay with me?”
Link nuzzled his cheek against her temple. “Silly woman, nervous I’ll say no. Can’t you see? Can’t you feel it? I belong to you.”
“No,” she murmured, laying a kiss on his skin right above his heart. “You bit me, Lincoln McCall. Now we belong to each other.”
Chapter Eleven
Why was she so nervous? Nicole clung harder to Link’s waist so she wouldn’t go flying off the back of his snow machine.
Link had talked about the Silvers and their mates as if they were family, and now she would finally meet them. Sure, she felt like she already knew them from everything Link had told her, but it was different putting faces to people who had already grown so important to her. What if they didn’t like her? She was a city-slicker from the lower forty-eight who was playing catch-up on survival training, while the Silvers’ mates were all Alaskan bad-asses. What if they took one look at her, measured her, and deemed her unworthy of Link?
“You smell like terror,” Link called over the roar of the engine, patting her hands where she held onto his taut stomach. “Stop worrying. They won’t bite.”
“Bullcrap. The Silvers are freaking grizzly shifters who can definitely bite, and Vera bit you like a hundred times.”
Link barked out a laugh and took another turn on the snowy road, adjusting his weight so they didn’t flip. “That was when she went straight fox and was out of control of her animal. She doesn’t bite anymore.”
Link pulled through a grove of bare, winter trees and passed a small homesteader cabin. There was a pen of cattle near it, a barn in the distance, and in a corral, two horses munched hay and watched them as they passed. Taking a well-worn road where the snow was packed tight, Link drove them another mile before he pulled to a stop in front of Vera and Tobias’s sprawling cabin that looked new from its crisp cedar logs to the newly stained floorboards on the wraparound porch. The windows didn’t have curtains, and from here, in the darkening evening, the glow from inside looked inviting and warm. The sound of muted, feminine laughter came from inside and calmed Nicole’s nerves a little. These were regular women who were managing lives with shifter mates, just like she was attempting with Link. Still, just for an instant, she wished she was charming and outgoing like her half-siblings.
Link helped her off the snow machine and hooked her hand onto the crook of his elbow as they tromped through the deep snow to Vera and Tobias’s cabin. The porch stairs didn’t even make a creak as she make her way up. “Your work?”
“Not this one. The Silvers helped Tobias build this house for Vera. She deserved a good home after living on Perl Island for so long.”
“Is Perl Island rough to live on?”
Link looked down at her and dipped his chin. “Perl is a place of nightmares. We call it the Island of Misfit Shifters, and Vera was the only female there for three years.”
“What was she doing there?”
“Clayton forced her to search for the cure to the McCall curse, but all she managed was to suppress some shifter animals. He had her Turned into a fox shifter against her will.”
“Clayton. You mean the Silvers’ dad did that?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s fucked up.”
She thought her family was messed up, but now she was feeling like she was in similar company. No wonder these people had all banded together. They’d gone and created their own family, and now Link was a part of it, and if she was lucky and they accepted her, someday she hoped to fit into their little band of outsiders, too.
“It’s fucked up, but Vera says she wouldn’t change anything. The fox gave her Tobias. Her years on Perl made her strong.”
And that right there was why she already had so much respect for Vera and the other women in this family. Every one of them was strong. They had to be to maintain a relationship with mates who, until a month ago, hibernated the entire winter. Vera kept Ian, Jenner, and Tobias from sleeping now, but Elyse, Lena, and Vera had all gone into a pairing knowing they would need to protect their mates’ sleeping bodies six months out of the year.
If Vera could fix hibernation, perhaps she really could help Link.
Link lifted his hand to knock, but the door swung wide open, blasting Nicole in the face with deliciously warm air.
Vera’s eyes zeroed immediately on Link. “Lincoln Dingleburger McCall. You didn’t take the medicine,” she accused.
“My middle name is Asher, and I assure you, I did take the medicine, and it sucked.”
Vera canted her head, her strange, blue and gold-colored eyes narrowing on him. “Where is the growling and the bleeding and the head-slapping then?”
“If you mean the side effects, he did his bleeding all over the ice in front of my cabin,” Nicole said helpfully, scrunching up her nose at the memory. “It’ll probably draw all the predators within a two mile range.”
“Huh.” Vera pursed her lips and leaned forward, sniffing Link. “You still smell broken.”
Link made a clicking sound and pushed past her into the house. “Let us in, woman. We’re freezing.”
He tugged Nicole’s hand, but Vera stopped her just inside in a gentle game of tug-of-war. She hugged her close and murmured against her ear, “Is he okay?”
“It’s touch and go,” Nicole whispered as she hugged Vera snuggly. “Thanks for trying to help us.”
“We’re going to be friends.”
Nicole laughed and gave her another squeez
e before she released her. “I’d like that.”
Link wore a tight-lipped smile, as though he’d heard every word of their whispered conversation. Of course he had—Wolf heard everything. He angled her shoulders toward the three giant mountain men gathering in the entryway, then introduced her to Ian, Jenner, and Tobias, one-by-one. And then she met Elyse with her honey-hued hair, green eyes, and long red scar down her cheekbone. Nicole did her best not to stare, because she knew what it was like to have a mark that drew people’s constant attention. Still, Link had told her how she’d gotten it. His brother, Miller, had marked Elyse with an ax blade because she’d fought like a demon to protect Ian while he was hibernating. Elyse had single-handedly waged a war with the McCalls, and when she’d called out to Link for help, he’d turned on his own pack to protect her. Nicole couldn’t imagine the pain Elyse had endured to have a mark like that.
Lena was next with her easy smile, dark hair dyed auburn at the tips. She wore a camera around her neck, as if at any moment, a picture opportunity would present itself.
“It’s so nice to meet you all,” Nicole said nervously as Link helped her out of her jacket. “Of course, I already feel like I know you from how much Link talks about you.”
“Well, Link has stayed quiet about you,” Ian said, clapping her gently on the back.
She gasped at the pain from her new bite and lurched forward. Link snarled and yanked her behind him as he placed himself between her and Ian. “Back the fuck off, bear.”
Ian looked face-slapped. “What did I do?”
“Ours. Touch her again, and I’ll rip your fucking throat out.”
“Wolf,” Nicole whispered, running her hands up the back of his sweater. “He accidentally touched the bite. I’m okay. Look.” She turned him slowly and waited until he ripped his furious gaze from Ian. “I’m really okay. He didn’t know.”
“Bite?” Elyse asked, hope infused in the word. She clasped her hands in front of her mouth as her eyes welled with emotion. “Did Link claim you?”