by Joey W. Hill
Rand huffed out a breath and eyed him, his cheek on the forest floor. The vampire looked a little too appealing, his eyes glittering in the dark, mouth in a firm line. He was like a live wire on Rand's back, energy vibrating from him.
"Thought you didn't believe in the owned-soul stuff." Rand decided to address his last statement, and underscored it by fanning out and wiggling his fingers above Cai's manacled grip.
Cai's eyes registered the motion, but he brought his attention back to Rand's face. "I never said that. I said that's what vampires believe about their servants. I've never had a servant, so it's all new to me." He leaned down and whispered against Rand's ear. His breath rasped, heated and rough. "Truth is, I'm starting to appreciate the idea more and more."
He straightened, stripped off his shirt and tossed it over a branch. Then Rand heard his belt clink as he removed it. Cai leaned down over him, wearing only the jeans.
"I want to fuck a beast, but only the kind with two legs, lots of hair and muscles, and tan, tan skin." Cai's lips moved over his shoulder, his back. The vampire wasn't going right for the ass or cock. Which made the sensations sliding along Rand's skin even more potent.
A fang slid over Rand's flesh, the tip a sharp prick on his shoulder blade. Cai paused, lifting his head. "While you're with me, we are a pack. I am your alpha, Rand. You decide it's done, you leave, that's the way you wolves are. But in my world, it's done when I say it's done. When the alpha says it's done. Kind of interesting, the way you and I straddle that line."
The vampire could do things with his hands and mouth that only demons could do, Rand was sure. It was the touch of his lips and the whisper of his breath at the right moment, along the column of his spine, his nape, his jaw. He'd never particularly thought of that as an erogenous zone until a fang with its threat of delicious penetration scraped against it. Cai was good at taking decisions away, making it impossible for Rand to do anything but what the vampire desired. That they both desired. Two sides of the same coin.
As Cai slid his cheek alongside Rand's, Rand turned the tables. He put his mouth over Cai's, not so much like a kiss, but as if he was covering Cai's mouth so he could bite his lips gently, above, below. In wolf form, he would do such playful nips when feeling like mating, or expressing affection. He'd put his leg over the neck of the wolf to reinforce it.
"What are you doing?" Rand murmured against Cai's flesh.
"We're in the forest and you were going to shift to wolf. Figured it would be too long before I'd get another chance at your ass."
Rand nuzzled his cheek, the bridge of Cai's nose, pleased when the vampire dipped his head to allow it. "I think you underestimate how good you are at this," Rand said quietly. "And how long it's been since I've been touched."
Cai's head came up, their eyes locking. The heat that gripped the vampire's gaze met a matching surge of need in Rand, so immediate and fierce, Rand knew it had to reflect on his face. "Take your pleasure now and later, vampire. I'll serve you."
There. He could actually feel it, every time he re-affirmed that thread of connection with Cai, a vibration between the two of them like a chord echoing in a vast, endless canyon of wants and needs. He wanted to test it, pluck it again, to see if he was right.
"I heard it said a lot at Greenwald's house. But in a moment like this, if I call you Master..." Rand paused and an inexplicable satisfaction expanded inside him, enjoying the truth. "Yeah. Your fingers grip me a little tighter, your body bumps mine, and your eyes, that blue gets even bluer. It's more than just what vampires are. It's what they need. Scary predators with no pack skills, but if they can own a heart, maybe they can drop some walls and open theirs."
It's not about the ownership, Rand thought. It's about someone willingly saying they belong to you.
Cai went even more still, yet Rand sensed the fire beneath, the furnace of emotions. The vampire stayed in that stasis for a few more heartbeats. The heat between their two bodies seemed to only increase, as did Rand's awareness of the angles and hardness of limbs, flesh and muscle, the straining need, held barely in check. The pleasure of being so close to the edge of decision.
Cai drew back, his hand sliding along Rand's shoulder, his side, to his hip, his fingers curling in. Rand could feel him teetering between withdrawal and doing what Rand had suggested. Taking what he wanted. Rand met those blue eyes again.
"Don't be a chickenshit," he said softly.
Cai grimaced, but rueful amusement was there. Then his face reflected another type of emotion. Determination.
"Stay still," he said roughly. "Don't you move."
Rand didn't, dropping his cheek back to the ground and closing his eyes. But he listened with all his senses, as Cai open his jeans and lubed himself up with his saliva, keeping one hand on Rand's hip almost the entire time, fingers gripping as he stroked himself. He brought Rand up onto his hands and knees, and rubbed his cock between Rand's ass cheeks as he played. He kept doing it, teasing Rand, making him wait, making him feel those rhythmic movements as he worked himself against him.
Rand's arm muscles quivered, his ass and thighs tight, his balls drawn up and cock aching steel. But Cai had told him not to move and Rand obeyed.
The truth was, it turned him on. The way Cai needed to take him over, and how Rand, powerful as he was, could prove that he was a match for the vampire, yet give him that gift. Both their natures taking them to this moment.
He sensed the vampire's arousal spiking even higher, merely from feeling Rand's struggle not to push against him, insist, turn the tables and demand. In another moment, Rand was going to turn and roll the male, because he didn't want to wait any longer. That was part of the charge for them. Knowing that line was there, and either one of them might cross it.
Cai slid the head of his organ down between Rand's cheeks and Rand forced himself not to lift.
"Think you're having some trouble with self-control, wolf. Let me help."
The vampire reached beneath him, gripped his cock in a firm fist, and used that hold to keep him still as he began to slowly push in, stretching him.
"Try to take me, hmm? Another day, that might be an interesting fight. Not today, though. Today this tight ass is all fucking mine."
Rand let out a groan as Cai finally pushed through, sinking deep. But he did more than that. He wrapped both arms around Rand, held tight. He didn't object to Rand putting one hand over his, clasping to hold on as they moved together, an endless rhythm that built and built until they were both gasping, groaning, straining together. Cai took it up another level, sinking his fangs into his shoulder. As desire coiled around the spear of pain, Cai's tongue slid over Rand's skin, his fangs withdrawing as he licked and soothed the way a wolf might.
"Come," he muttered against Rand's flesh, his fingers tight on his cock. "I can feel how much you want to. I want you to come while I'm hard as a fucking pipe inside you, feel your ass clutch me like you'll never let go."
Rand obliged with another deep groan, hips working underneath Cai's, the two of them as tight together as spoons. The friction was unbearably erotic but the closeness even more so, such that the movements were small but the reaction all encompassing. Rand exploded, spurting over Cai's hand, against his own belly and chest. As he smelled his own musk, and sensed Cai's need reaching the same precipice, Rand went with his gut and spoke in the vampire's mind.
Now, Master. I've got you.
Cai slammed into him, a convulsive, almost involuntary movement that got faster, a jackhammer style of fucking that took the climax Rand just had to a whole other level, his cock milking out another spurt of white cream and wresting a growl from his lips. He wanted to feel Cai's muscular body moving against his, sliding and demanding, for hours and hours. He didn't want their bodies to separate, because he wanted that internal connection to continue. It had expanded beyond a single tie to a full, thick ribbon that unfurled between the two of them, inside hearts and souls, covering and holding every pain and regret in stasis.
&nbs
p; He hadn't been so overwhelmed by sex since he was a teenager. Rand still had his fist knotted over Cai's on his chest, and was down on one elbow, reminding himself to breathe. Cai's mouth was on the back of his neck, his heart thundering.
"We can't..." Cai drew a shuddering breath. "We can't do that when we meet the Trads."
Rand managed a half chuckle. "I wasn't planning on seducing you while we were in the middle of a rescue."
Cai shook his head, and held Rand a little tighter. His face dropped, pressing between Rand's shoulder blades. Rand felt him draw an even deeper breath, a different kind of shudder going through him. A different wave of emotions starting to invade upon what they'd just done.
"I'm going in there pretending to be allies with them," Cai said, muffled. "Which means I have to act like a Trad. If you're with me as human, that means you're slave-bound to me. You hate me. I'd have to have sex with you in front of them, and you'd have to be detached...like I was forcing you. I would be forcing you."
He slid from Rand and sat back against a tree, stretching out his legs and adjusting so he could hitch the jeans back up. Rand turned on his hip. The vampire looked like he wished he hadn't said anything, that he'd let this moment be exactly what it was. But now Rand knew what had really driven the vampire. A need to be with Rand in a way that wasn't tainted by where they were going.
"So I go in with you as a wolf."
"No." Cai shook his head. "You don't go in with me at all. You stay hidden, keep an eye on what's happening, and be ready. If I can get them to trust me, we might get a window of opportunity to make a run for it, far enough to meet up with that backup before the Trads can catch up to us."
"I'm not letting you go alone."
"You aren't." Cai showed his teeth in a grim smile. "But it makes a hell of a lot more sense for you to be some wolf lurking in the trees around their camp, watching what's going on, than coming in as my abused slave, where both of us could get jammed up so neither of us could go for help."
"Will he go for your story? That you need safe haven from a Region Master?" Rand moved to sit shoulder to shoulder with him, drawing up his knees.
"Maybe." Cai reached down and plucked off a leaf stuck to Rand's hip. "Sorry about the sneak attack."
"I'm not complaining." Rand linked his arms loosely over his knees and propped his chin on one so he could look at the vampire. "What kind of reception are you expecting to get?"
"Oh, they'll throw a party, I'm sure." Cai grimaced. "I didn't tell Lyssa everything. Goddard had a female vampire. Not a captive; a masochistic made chick, one of the few willingly among the Trads. I planted a seed in her belly, because he told me to do it. I told him it wouldn't work, that I could only do it with plants. He didn't believe me. So a jungle grew up inside her, split her from the inside out."
Rand blinked. "It staked her?"
"Well, it was a woody plant," Cai said dryly. "Couldn't happen to a nicer vampire, promise. An army of harpies would be preferable."
Even so, his expression had darkened at the telling. Whatever his feelings about Goddard's mate, seeing her death had not been pretty, or brought much vindication before being replaced with a far more horror-stricken reaction.
Then the mask fell back in place and Cai spoke casually again. "I've said before this is a suicide mission. While I know you dig those, it will take both of us to get her out of there. Suicide-by-Trad is off the table until we save the girl. And if you die while saving her, then no one will ever know you got your heart's fondest wish."
Rand shook his head. "You like mocking the pain of others, vampire."
"Nope. I find my own pain just as hilarious. I'm equal opportunity." Cai sighed, then nudged him. "Go ahead and be a wolf. We'll get some more miles covered and see if we can stumble into the territory of your pack friend."
"Okay." Rand watched the vampire get to his feet. He could still feel Cai against him, hear the rough whisper against his ear. He curled his fingers around Cai's calf as he straightened.
"What?" the vampire asked, though his hand fell to Rand's hair, his shoulder, fingers curling in a brief stroke.
Rand shook his head. He expected the vampire could see what was in his head, the mix of emotions from what they'd just shared and what lay ahead. He'd simply wanted the contact, that one brief moment, to even things out.
And to remind Cai they stood at the starting line together.
It took several more hours, but then, between Rand's nose and Cai's night vision, they started to recognize some of the geographical features they'd discussed. Shortly thereafter, Rand came across familiar--and fresh--wolf markings. Fane.
Rand stopped, lifting his nose to scent the air. He yipped, a query. Cai heard nothing but silence in return, but like Rand, he sensed it when, a few minutes later, Rand registered that they were under scrutiny.
The big black wolf stopped again, only this time his body posture became stiffer, warier. Not openly aggressive, but prepared.
What's happening, wolf?
Not sure. Fane...feels different. Stay back.
Cai was tempted to toss out a comeback like who's afraid of the big, bad wolf? but from the wheels turning in Rand's head, Cai realized Rand wasn't worried about Fane hurting Cai. He believed the other wolf's wariness might be because Rand was in the company of a vampire, and Rand thought Cai hanging back might help the situation.
When Fane finally emerged, Cai wasn't as sure.
Fane was a gray and brown wolf. Not as big as Rand, but still a comparable size. He appeared when they reached a small open area of ground, where the wind moved the grasses so they threw finger-like shadows under the crescent moon. The same wind rippled over Fane's ruff, but otherwise, he remained stock-still. Though wolves used their noses more than their eyes, both senses seemed focused solely on Rand, not on Cai, despite Cai being visible across the clearing.
Cai squatted down next to a tree, attempting to look non-threatening. However, he watched the new wolf as closely as Fane was watching Rand. Rand's reputed friend was not projecting friendly vibes.
Rand moved forward a couple steps, ears pricked forward. Fane's tail and ears were straight up like a ramrod, and as Rand moved, Fane's lip curled, exposing glittering teeth. A rumble started in his chest.
All right, wolf. I'm being unobtrusive, but I'm not liking where this is going.
Handling this. Stay quiet.
I'm going to attribute that bossy attitude to your minimalist wolf speak and not you looking for an ass kicking.
Shut. Need focus.
Cai snorted mentally but subsided. For now.
Rand moved forward another few steps. His tail was lowered to a more horizontal position, his ears up but in more of an attitude of inquisitiveness.
Fane's growling increased, and his ears got flatter.
Rand wasn't a pussy, Cai gave him that. He curled his lip in return, offered a matching vocalization, though if Cai hazarded an interpretation, Rand's was more what the fuck, whereas Fane's was get the hell off my lawn.
Confirming it, Rand didn't press an attack, but instead sat down, then stretched out on his stomach. Though his head and shoulders were up, it was obviously a pose intended to telegraph that he wasn't here to challenge Fane's dominance. Cai recalled how Rand had done that with him in the study, and the feelings it had set off inside him.
Given the current circumstances, he didn't expect the other male to have the same reaction Cai had experienced. Fane remained wary and combative, but Rand taking the lower position seemed to reduce his aggression. He took another step into the clearing. Cai's muscles tightened, preparation if the male leaped onto Rand. He didn't think he'd moved at all, but Fane's gaze went to him, and that lip curled back again.
Yeah, you show me yours, I'll show you mine, and you can run back into the woods with your tail tucked between your legs.
Cai. Spread hands. Sit all way down.
The fuck I will.
Cai.
Cai did it. He'd already proven to Rand
how quickly he could leap up from that position, so it was more the principle of the thing than giving up a strategic advantage. Fane watched him a long minute, then his gaze returned to Rand.
Rand moved forward a few inches on his belly, and made another of those yip noises. Fane stalked over to him, and Rand cocked his head. When Fane stood over him, Rand touched his muzzle to the male's, a little nip at his chin, and then drew back. He couldn't pull off submissive, but Cai admitted he did a pretty good job of communicating non-threatening and hey, let's chat.
Then Rand bowed his head, a ripple moving over his body, that energy wave that preceded his shifting. Fane retreated a few feet, giving him the room, and Rand was there on the ground in his human form. He rolled to a one-knee position. "Come on, Fane. Talk to me. We need your help."
Fane backed up. For a second, Cai thought he'd just take off into the woods. He saw another shiver of energy go through Rand, and knew if that happened, Rand would shift, that blur of speed where flesh became fur, to give pursuit. But it turned out that wasn't needed.
Fane shifted, and now the two men faced one another.
Cai already liked Rand being naked so much of the time. Seeing two handsome shifters wearing only a wary, we-might-have-to-fight tense posture, was double the perk.
The other male was dark-skinned. He had thin dreadlocks and piercing dark eyes. His body was sculpted muscle, tight ass, semi-erect cock, probably from the mutual show of testosterone. He had long scars across his back, five score marks like a big cat had swiped at him. Perhaps a mountain lion.
Though they could converse as humans, it seemed a silent pissing contest was still in progress. Fane's brown eyes were sharp and aggressive, body angling as if he might shift again, for offense or defense.
"What's going on, Fane?" Rand said quietly. "I come as a friend."
"That remains to be seen."
Chapter Twelve
Though Rand knew it had triggered Cai's battle instincts, the brief confrontation, for the most part, was standard for shifters who hadn't crossed paths in some time. A way to confirm, "Okay, I'm still the guy you knew." Fane had a pack to protect, so unlike a human, he wouldn't accept Rand unconditionally on past experiences. Not after a two-year-plus disappearance from contact with any other shifter. A lot could change a wolf during that time period.