I draped my hand over his shoulder and bit his lower lip. “You always know just what to say to make a girl feel good, Mr. Wolfe.”
“I’m glad to hear it. So tell me, what do you need to do now?”
I shrugged. “Clarissa and her way-too-horny maid of honor sister seem to have this whole thing under control. Apparently I’m just supposed to get drunk and make a general ass of myself at the reception. Then, at some point tonight, I’m supposed to tear off my fiancé’s clothes and sit on his face.”
“Mmm. I like the sound of that.”
We arrived at the reception hall on the hotel’s lower level a few minutes later. Mercifully, the bride had chosen to hold a casual, buffet-style reception in a giant ballroom on the main floor that looked out towards the river. There were none of the pre-arranged tables where guests were forced to spend hours sitting with people they’d never met. There was no formal receiving line. The entire afternoon and evening would consist entirely of dancing, drinking, eating and enjoying life.
“If I really have to attend a wedding, this is the kind I’d choose,” I said as we made our way inside. “There’s food waiting, for one thing.” I pulled him over to a table where a massive number of hors d’oeuvres were on display.
“Agreed,” Tristan said as I stuffed myself with mini-quiches. “No awkward ‘what do you do for a living’ conversations where I have to announce to the table that if they piss me off, I’ll turn into a wolf and shred their fucking livers with my fangs.”
“Holy balls, I’d love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation,” I laughed. “You have to admit, it would make things interesting.”
When we’d grabbed a few more snacks and a glass of champagne each, we headed outside to an open terrace, where we had a view of the river and Chicago’s impressive skyline. “Soon that will be us,” Tristan said, pointing to the far end of the terrace, where Clarissa and James were posing for some informal photos.
“Strange thought,” I said.
“Is it? You can’t imagine marrying me?”
I threw him a smile. “That I can picture easily. It’s just that so much has gone wrong for us…” As I spoke the words, a knot of worry ravaged my insides. Suddenly, I realized that it was true. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t visualize a day when Tristan and I would actually cement our bond. It was like there was no way in the world that such a thing could even be possible.
“So much has gone wrong,” Tristan agreed, slipping his hands behind my waist and interlocking them, “that things can only go right from now on. You know that, right? Things have been so good since we came back from New Orleans. I don’t know why you’re so worried, lover.”
I nodded. “You’re right. It’s just that these horrible thoughts keep working their way into my mind…”
“Well, tell them to stop,” Tristan said, his eyes flashing a bright blue that told me his amazing wolf was nearby in full-on protection mode. “I’m here, and I love you more than any man should be allowed to love a woman. Never, ever worry that things will end between us. They won’t.”
I nodded, lacking the words to express my gratitude for his existence, and pushed myself up onto my toes to kiss his cheek. “You’re my favorite thing ever,” I said. “I don’t know how I lived without you all those years.”
“Ha!” he said. “You think you suffered? You’re just a baby compared to me. Have some compassion for the poor asshole who wandered the earth for two hundred years looking for you.”
“You’re right,” I laughed. “I’m a selfish bitch.”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far…”
“Ari! Pictures!” Clarissa yelled to me, interrupting our moment. She’d begun running around now, frantically gathering up the rest of the wedding party.
“I’ll be back,” I told Tristan in my best Terminator voice.
“I’ll be waiting.”
I jogged over to pose along with the bride and groom, following the photographer’s orders to look happy, then happier, then ridiculously, stupidly jubilant. We took a series of photos where the bridesmaids posed like Charlie’s Angels with Clarissa in front, pretending to wield some kind of badass gun. At one point we picked her up and held her horizontally, her long white skirt trailing on the floor below while we did our best to manage our lavender travesties.
I was just beginning to wish I’d had more to drink when the photographer announced that we were nearly finished. Looking around the large ballroom, my eyes caught sight of Tristan in a far corner. He was talking to someone I’d never seen before. A woman, dressed in a catering staff uniform.
Her eyes were bright enough that I could see them from here, her movements smooth and sensual, like those of a cat. I knew with no other information that she was a Lesser, like my former housemate Marcus. A human with the blood of a shifter, the kind who served the higher-ranking shifters in her district. She was whispering something in Tristan’s ear and passing him a small, folded slip of paper. From the look on Tristan’s face, something had happened, and it wasn’t good.
“Check it out, Ari—I think that chick’s giving your man her number,” one of the groomsmen joked as he caught me staring.
I shook my head. “I don’t think so,” I growled, a feeling of foreboding clawing its way through my mind.
“What’s going on, Ari?” Clarissa asked. By now the entire wedding party had probably figured out that something was wrong, and I knew all too well that I was probably white as a sheet. “Did Tristan do something horrible?” Clarissa looked like she was ready to race across the space and punch him in the jaw.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Um, excuse me, would you?”
“Sure. We have to move on to parent photos anyhow. Just let me know if you need me.”
“Thanks.” Barely registering what she’d said, I walked slowly towards Tristan, who was standing alone now, his eyes fixed out the window at the distant horizon. I could tell by his stance that he was on high alert. Something had riled him and the wolf inside him. I could only hope the beast wouldn’t make his presence known in this of all places.
“What’s going on?” I asked quietly when I was close enough to keep my words from the other guests. “Has something happened?”
He didn’t reply at first, but I could see his jaw tensing. His fingers were curled tight, his knuckles white. Reflected in the window, I could see that his eyes had brightened into the shimmering blue of his wolf’s. My lover was fighting the animal inside him—the question, of course, was why. All I could think was that he’d heard from the Seven, that they were going to punish him for proposing to me. That our wedding would have to be called off, or worse…
“Tristan?”
Finally he turned to me, relaxing his hands as his irises faded back to normal. “It’s okay, lover. There have been some problems down south. Hopefully nothing important.”
“Problems down south sounds pretty important to me. Tell me what’s happened.”
He cupped a hand around the back of my neck and kissed my forehead gently. I could feel the searing heat of his skin, of his breath, as he fought to settle the beast inside him. Pulling back, he stared at me for a moment. “You’re so fucking beautiful,” he said. “You know that?”
I smiled. “That’s not going to distract me from the fact that you haven’t answered me, Tristan. What’s going on down south?”
“Word has it that the Marquis is doing everything he can to see that Trick fails to win the Alpha Trials. Which doesn’t bode well for our plans.”
“I’m not worried about our plans, so much as about Trick,” I said. “Is he okay?”
Tristan nodded. “He’s fine for now. I just wish I could help him in some way. I’m feeling useless at the moment, which isn’t good for someone in my position to feel.”
“Can’t you send reinforcements or something? Help him win this thing?”
He shook his head. “It doesn’t work like that. The Alpha must win on his own. No outside help is allow
ed. But the Marquis, as you can imagine, isn’t one for playing by the rules.” He pulled his eyes away again, staring out the window into the far distance. “I have a bad feeling that even if Trick pulls this off, it won’t end well. If the Marquis is trying to win Alpha after all these years, he must have his reasons, and they can’t be good.”
“What reasons? What are you thinking?” I asked, laying a hand on Tristan’s arm.
He shook his head. “I don’t really know,” he said. “But that bastard never does anything without a nefarious motive. I’d guess he’s trying to get his chess pieces in position before he makes his next move. The question is what that move will be.”
“I wish I could get my hands on him,” I growled. “I’d like to rip that shit-head’s face off.”
Tristan chuckled, the round, beautiful sound rising up in his chest like music. “I love it when you get feisty,” he said, sweeping an arm around me and pulling me close. “Only my Ariana would think she could take on one of the most legendary shifters of all time and live to tell about it.”
I laughed, too. But the truth was, I would love to take the man on, to pay him back for what he did to Tristan so many years ago. Sometimes I even felt like I might be strong enough to do it. Maybe it was the Valkyrie blood that Kara had gifted me—or maybe it was as simple as my love for Tristan. All I knew was that for once, I wanted to be the one protecting him, instead of the other way around.
Then again, in a twisted sort of way, a part of me wondered if I should thank the Marquis. If it wasn’t for that horrible asshole, Tristan would have died well over a century ago.
And I would never have met my lover.
Chapter 7
“I think I need a drink,” I told Tristan as we made our way back towards the wedding party. But instead of agreeing with me, he took my hand and pulled me off towards a door leading out the far end of the ballroom.
“What are you doing?” I asked as I jogged along beside him.
“I need something far stronger than a drink,” he replied, his voice a low, sexy growl. An immediate shot of desire drove its way to my core.
“What exactly are you suggesting, Mr. Wolfe?” I asked.
“Just come with me,” he said, pushing the door open. He led us down a wide hallway lined with wooden doors. One by one he tried to open them until finally he found one that was unlocked. He pushed it open, pulled me inside and closed and locked the door behind us.
Inside was a large office with a solid oak desk at one end, complete with a computer and a large swiveling office chair.
Tristan pulled me to him and kissed me fiercely, his hands destroying the up-do the hair stylist had spent half an hour perfecting. Bobby pins tumbled to the floor, bouncing in ever direction as strands of my hair tumbled around my face, but I couldn’t have cared less.
Tristan left a searing trail of kisses down my neck to my cleavage, cursing my dress for its thick, unforgiving material before spinning me around. “Press your hands onto it, lover,” he said. “Grab hold.”
I did as he asked, grabbing at the edge of the desk to steady myself even as he ordered me to bend over.
He reached under my skirt—voluminous layers of crinoline and all—and yanked my panties down to the floor. I stepped out of them then spread my legs wide as my beast of a man stroked a rough hand over my folds, driving his fingers aggressively inside me. Then somehow he burrowed under my dress, his tongue greedily lapping at me, lips sucking greedily on my clit…all while my lover found a way to conceal himself completely under the long, full skirt of my lavender gown.
“Tristan…” I moaned, “what if someone comes in?”
“Tell them you needed some time to yourself,” he muttered against my clit, his lips driving me wild with each syllable.
His tongue lashed me, dipping hard inside my channel, rigid and delectable, even as the sound of someone turning the doorknob met my ears.
“Tristan!” I hissed, but he didn’t let up. Instead, he seemed to tuck himself deeper under my skirt, his mouth unrelenting in its mission. “I think someone’s coming.”
“That’s sort of the point,” he murmured.
A second later I heard the door open.
“Excuse me, Miss,” said a feminine voice from somewhere behind me. I turned to look over my shoulder, offering an awkward smile to a woman dressed in a dark blue business suit. “I didn’t realize there was someone in here.”
“It’s all right,” I told her, pushing my chest down towards the desk as Tristan wrapped his lips around my bud and sucked hard, sending me into paroxysms of pleasure. “I’m just…stretching my back…”
“Oh? Do you have an injury?”
“Yes…yes…ooooh…yeah,” I replied. “I…hurt it…a while…back.” I dipped my hips down slowly, pushing myself into Tristan’s mouth. I could feel his smile against me, but his tongue and lips never let up.
“Ah—well, I need to do some printing, but I’ll come back in a minute when you’re done,” the woman said. Her voice had changed, and I could only guess that she knew what was happening under my skirts.
Almost immediately I heard the door shut behind her.
I twisted around to see that Tristan’s black shoes were now jutting out from the sides of my dress, and I had zero doubt that my insane fiancé had pushed his feet out on purpose, just to show off what he was doing to me.
“Naughty man,” I scolded as he sucked hard, jamming three fingers deep inside me and pushing them apart to wrench my pussy open in a punishingly erotic way.
“Naughty girl,” he replied, flicking the tip of his tongue over my clit then swirling it over the knot of nerves.
Maybe it was the unexpected visitor; maybe it was knowing how much he loved pleasuring me. Either way, I convulsed with pleasure, my body succumbing to the orgasm I’d been fighting back. “Oh, fuck,” I purred as the sensation of heat drove its way through my veins, my hands grasping the edges of the desk so hard that I was afraid I’d shatter the wood.
“Good woman,” he whispered, licking me until my pulsing core had calmed a little. “That’s my Ariana. You come so beautifully for me.”
“I can’t help it,” I breathed. “The things you do to my body…”
“Good news, then,” said Tristan as he slipped out from under my dress. I turned to look at him as he licked his fingertips. “I’m just getting started.
He unzipped his pants, spun me around and pushed me up onto the edge of the desk, splitting my legs open and jamming himself hard inside me. I threw my head back and cupped a hand over my mouth to stifle a scream of bliss as he leaned forward and kissed the bare portion of my chest.
“I want to shred this dress,” he snarled as he nipped at my neck. “I want to get at your tits, lover.”
“When we’re back at the hotel,” I told him, lifting my head to look into his fierce blue eyes “I promise—you can take a hacksaw to this thing.”
“Good.”
He drove hard and fast inside me, his eyes locked on mine as my legs wrapped themselves around him. “You’re everything,” he said. “Do you know that? You’re my whole fucking life.”
As he said the words I knew his mind had returned to the incident at the hotel, that he was trying to pull us back together after our brief moment of torment.
“I know,” I said softly, pressing my lips to his, our tongues meeting in a sensual knot.
It took no time for him to explode, a hot flood of semen filling me in a torrent, but he pulled out and thrust hard again and again until I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him in tight, my legs wrapped entirely around him, trying to calm the beast that lived inside his body.
That was when the door opened again.
This time I was facing it and could see the shocked expression on the woman in the suit as she took stock of Tristan’s massive form, his pants half down as he stood balls-deep inside me, my dainty little heels crossed over his bare ass.
“Still stretching,” I said with an apologeti
c grin.
“Holy shit,” she said, scurrying out again and slamming the door.
“Stretching?” Tristan asked, pulling back to raise an eyebrow at me.
“You have to admit that it’s what your very sizeable cock does to me.”
He laughed. “Fair enough, lover.”
Chapter 8
At the end of the evening, a very tipsy Clarissa and a very sober James made their way quickly around the ballroom to say their good-byes to everyone.
“We’re going to Bali!” Clarissa told me as she took my hands and squeezed so tightly that I thought she was trying to break my bones. “For two weeks! No hos-tipals or subur…sub-rupia!” Her words were so slurred they were beginning to sound like another language.
“Okay, I think you mean hospitals and suburbia, Clar,” I laughed, pulling her in for a hug.
“Suh-BURP-ia!” she yelled into my ear, bursting into hysterics. She pulled back and looked me in the eye, temporarily getting hold of herself. “I’m married now,” she said. “I’m so screwed.”
I shook my head. “You’re going to love it. You’re going to have kids and be an amazing mother and do all the things you’ve ever wanted to do, and I’m going to come visit you whenever Tristan and I fight.”
“You two should get married,” she said, pointing first to me then to my secret fiancé, who was standing a few feet away, downing a quick shot of scotch. “You should get married. You’d be the best looking couple who ever was.” With that, she lost her balance and would have landed on her ass if I hadn’t still been holding onto her.
“I have a secret,” Tristan said softly, walking up to her and staring into her eyes, his irises brightening to a shocking lightness. I reached my left hand out in warning, but he stepped still close to her.
“What is it?” she asked, her words slurred. I knew then that Tristan could read exactly how much alcohol was in her system. He knew there was no way in hell she’d remember this come morning.
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