by T. S. Joyce
Blaire was ready.
With trembling fingers, she pulled at his belt. God, she was bad at this. It had been too long since she’d asked for this from a man.
He allowed it, even let off a soft, sexy noise deep in his throat when her fingertip brushed the head of his cock. His abs were rigid as she unfastened his pants and shoved them down his thighs. Was that a smile against her lips? Was he laughing at how clumsy she was?
Gentry rolled his hips against her so hard she could feel his erection through the thin material of her leggings. Nope. He wasn’t laughing. Maybe he was just happy she was telling him what she wanted? What if she wasn’t any good at this? Stop thinking.
Gentry cupped her neck with one hand and dragged her waist hard to him with the other. His kisses deepened, his tongue stroking into her mouth rhythmically. He ran his hands up her ribs, dragging her sweater with them, then pulled it over her head and threw it to the ground. And then he was back on her, kissing her as he unsnapped the back of her bra. At least one of them knew what they were doing. He made quick work of her boots and leggings next, peeling them neatly from her body, panties included. She’d worn black, see-through lace just on the off-chance boning would happen, but Gentry didn’t give a fig about her carefully chosen lingerie. Into the pile everything went.
He took off her shirt, so that was the signal, right? He was okay with getting naked? Seriously, stop thinking!
With a little growl of frustration with herself, Blaire shoved his sweater up his torso. She wasn’t as smooth, but she made up for that in sheer desperation. Sweater removed, she tossed the fabric and then lost her mind. With a squeak, she jumped up like a little flying squirrel aiming for a tree.
Faster than she’d imagined he could, Gentry caught her and wrapped her legs around his hips before he slammed her against the wall and kissed her breathless. He ground his hips, hitting her in just the right spot. God, he was right there, and it felt so good already.
His body was shaking now, too, and that low noise he made was back in his throat. When he spun her away from the wall and settled her on the floor in a rush, her stomach dipped like she was on a roller coaster. Geez, he was strong, and fast.
He grabbed her wrists in one hand and pushed them over her head as he trailed kisses down her throat. Teeth, teeth, Gentry liked scraping her with his teeth. Sexy, bitey man.
The full moon outside was casting everything in blue light, and when Gentry lifted off her and locked his arms against the floor, she got this incredible view of his body. Deep shadows adorned the ridges of his muscles, and the moonlight made his eyes look so bright and striking. Chest heaving, he dragged his hungry gaze from her eyes to her lips to her throat. His attention lingered on her breasts, and she could feel him right at her entrance, the swollen head of his cock dipping shallowly inside her.
“Fff,” she murmured, arching her back against the floor.
“Say it,” he growled. “Say something bad, just for me.” He trapped her in that blazing green gaze as he pushed into her by inches, stretching her.
“Fuck,” she whispered helplessly.
His body rattled with that sexy noise, and she wanted to feel the vibration against her breasts so, enticing him, she rolled her hips to meet his next stroke inside her.
Dominant lover wanted to keep her submissive, though. He wouldn’t release her wrists over her head. Instead, he got a smirk that she fell in freaking love with. Naughty man, the devil was in his smile, and she liked it. Liked the tease. Liked being at his mercy.
“Gentry?” she whimpered as he dipped into her shallowly again.
“What do you want, Trouble?”
“You. All of you. Everything. Please.”
Gentry rolled his hips hard, thrust so deeply into her she cried out with pleasure. Perfect. So perfect, and now he was sliding in and out of her hard and fast. He released her wrists and pulled one of her hands behind his head. Lowering down, he pressed her against the cold wooden floors with his body. Hot and cold. Heat on her front, cool on her back, fire in her middle.
“Gentry!” she cried out as he hit her clit over and over, filling her with a tingling sensation she hadn’t felt in so long. Had sex ever felt like this? Like desperation to go farther, go faster, go deeper with a man.
Something was happening. Something big that started in her chest and emanated outward. Her entire body felt like it was glowing from the inside out, and with every pump of his cock inside her, the sensation pulsed stronger.
He spread her legs wider and bucked into her deeper, and she was there. Too soon maybe, but she couldn’t stop what was happening. Blaire cried out and gripped the back of his hair hard, raking her nails against his scalp.
The rattle in his throat turned into a feral snarl that should’ve scared her. It should’ve terrified her, but Gentry had hit his stride, and orgasm ripped through her in that instant. Gentry buried his face against her neck and bit her, almost too hard, as he rammed forward again. Pulsing ecstasy rippled through her body in the moment he shot warmth into her. He reared back and bucked again with a grunt. His teeth felt so sharp. Pleasure and pain, and then flooding heat as he emptied himself inside her.
“Ow,” she squeaked as he worked his jaw, and Gentry’s reaction was instant. He released her and pushed up on locked arms.
“Fuck, I’m sorry.” His dick was still throbbing inside of her, matching her aftershocks, but there was horror in his eyes as he watched where she was covering her neck with her hand. “Let me see,” he said in a voice she almost didn’t recognize. It was too low and growly.
His eyes looked like two churning green flames as she pulled her hand away from her neck. He rolled his eyes closed and let off the most relieved sigh she’d ever heard. His body went limp as he rested his forehead against hers and hugged her tightly. “I’m sorry. That was too close. I’m sorry.”
“Too close?” she asked, baffled. They’d had sex. The deed was done. They couldn’t get much closer than they were right now, connected at the hips, him buried deep inside of her. Plus, she didn’t know how it was for him, but to her, it felt like their souls had met.
Gentry rolled to the side, bringing her with him, and hugged her tightly against his chest. He was quiet, but he seemed to need that right now. So she cuddled close to him, immersing herself in his abundant warmth, and waited.
“I’ve never done this with someone like you,” he murmured, his chin resting on the top of her hair. “It was reckless.”
It stung like a slap on cold skin. “You’ve said that before.” She was trying to keep the hurt from her voice and failing. “That was good for me. I don’t have a ton of experience, Gentry, but for me, that was good. It was special. I don’t jump into bed easily, so don’t hurt me. Or if you plan on it, let me have tonight. I don’t want to feel guilty until tomorrow.”
“That’s not what I mean. Blaire, you were amazing. That wasn’t just some casual fuck for me either. I wish I could tell you…”
And there it was again—the shut-down.
“Tell me what?” she whispered against his chest.
His heart was beating too fast against her cheek. He swallowed audibly. “Everything.”
“Why can’t you?”
“Because we’re different, Blaire. We aren’t the same, no matter how much I wish we were. There are rules.”
“What rules?” she asked, completely frustrated.
“Rules against us. Against this.”
“Against us hugging?”
“No, against us being together at all. Fuck!” Gentry released her and sat up, ran his hands through his hair and gripped the back of his neck. “The rules are there for a reason, Blaire.”
“What reason?”
“To protect me!” He gestured to her neck and looked sick in the blue moonlight. “To protect you.”
Blaire sat up and covered her chest. It was cold in here now that Gentry had stolen his warmth away. And if she was honest, she felt a whole lot more vulnerable right now
. She shouldn’t because she’d wanted this. She’d craved intimacy with him, and they’d connected on a level she’d never experienced. But she didn’t understand what was happening with Gentry, and she didn’t get the dynamics at play. “Is this you letting me go early?” she murmured.
“No.” He gritted his teeth so hard a muscle in his jaw jumped. He opened his mouth to say more, but froze. All but his eyes, which flicked to the window behind her.
The expression on his face said there was something there, watching through the cracked window.
“What is it?” she asked, too terrified to turn around.
“Get dressed,” Gentry said low.
“Oh, my gosh,” she huffed out as she bolted for the wall where her clothes lay in a pile. She wasn’t even into her sweater when a long, low howl lifted into the air.
Gentry wasn’t sitting anymore, but was instead leaned against the window sill on locked arms, glaring outside. He shoved off, shaking his head, and it was then that she could hear it. There was a rattling in his throat, but it was different than before. It was scary, and the moon was playing tricks on his eye color again. Something was happening with Gentry that she didn’t understand.
He stalked to the door as another howl lifted on the air to join the first. “Stay here. Lock the door.”
“You’re going to go out there with those wolves? That’s a terrible idea! We should call the police!”
“No police. That’ll make this so much worse. I’ll be back. Don’t let anyone in. No one but me.” His gaze lingered on her a moment more, and then he murmured, “Please trust me.” Gentry disappeared into the night, closing the door firmly behind him.
Trust me.
He’d just given her a half-answer on everything she’d asked, and he wanted her to trust him?
He’d just walked out into the snowy night…naked! With the wolves. Not just one anymore, but two!
With shaking hands, she dressed, shoved her feet into her snow boots, didn’t bother lacing them up, then bolted for the phone.
She dialed 911, but hesitated to connect the call. She just stood there, staring at the glowing screen of her cell phone. Why did this feel like jumping off a cliff and into a river she didn’t know the depths of? She could sink down and bob back up for air or slam into the shallow, rocky bottom. Doing this after he’d asked her not to felt like a betrayal, but she wanted him to be okay.
“Shoot,” she said on a terrified breath. Blaire bolted for the window, but Gentry was gone, and the howling came to a sudden stop. The song just disappeared like it had never been there at all.
Wolves, this place trashed, the mysteries that surrounded Gentry’s father, Gentry’s eyes, baffling answers, and someone like you, someone like you, someone like you.
Her head spun as she searched the night woods outside desperately for any sign of the man she was getting closer to and farther away from all at once.
Please trust me. His voice seemed to plead on the crisp wind.
Blaire deleted the emergency number and set her phone on the window sill. Calling the police would push Gentry away, and then she would never get answers. She would always wonder what if? What if she’d listened, what if she’d trusted him, what if she’d stayed in this and backed his play?
He hadn’t seemed scared, only angry, and he’d gone out into the night with an air of confidence. Was he crazy? Nah. Some bone-deep instinct told her that wasn’t it.
Instead, Gentry was dealing with demons she couldn’t see yet.
But she wanted to.
Chapter Eleven
Asher’s howl lifted again, calling Gentry’s wolf from him. He grunted in pain as he pitched forward onto his hands and knees in the snow. What was happening to him?
Another thirty seconds in Winter’s Edge, and he would’ve Changed right in front of Blaire. Fucking Asher was forcing a Change, but he shouldn’t be able to.
Gentry’s bones snapped, and he gritted his teeth against the pain. At least he was far enough into the woods that the night shadows hid him from Blaire’s view. God, he didn’t want to do this.
Roman’s howl lifted into the air, but his tone drifted right over Gentry’s skin. The second Asher howled again, though, Gentry cried out as the wolf ripped from his body.
Wolf came out pissed and charging the woods. Asher and Roman were calling for war way too close to his mate. They had almost exposed him to her, and way too soon. Wolf wanted Blaire, but he had to be a patient hunter, or she would run. She would get scared and wouldn’t understand she belonged to Wolf. He would never hurt her. Only protect her. Even from his own brothers.
He was going to bleed Asher for pulling that shit, and Roman for helping. Logic tried to keep quiet with his dislike for his brothers, but Wolf didn’t have those hang-ups. He hated them, therefore he would hurt them.
He sprinted through the fresh snow. He could smell them, scents that would never leave him. He’d grown up with them, would know them anywhere. Did they even remember him? Had they even cared when they left? Had they even thought about how destroyed he’d been when they’d turned their disdain on him and cut him off? Cut him out? Fuck them both.
Asher came charging out of the shadows, a beast of a wolf, thick-furred and black as tar. He was bigger than Gentry remembered, but it had been a long-ass time since he’d seen his brothers. Gentry was bigger now, too, and trained for this kind of brawl.
Neither of them slowed. They just clashed like two storms. Asher was a ripper now, a reaper, a titan fueled by bad blood, but Gentry had fury on his side. The fear in Blaire’s eyes flashed through his mind as he sank his teeth into Asher’s shoulder and jerked his powerful neck. When warmth sprayed across his face, he grew drunk with satisfaction. Bloodlust did that. Hatred did that.
Pain blasted through his backend when Roman joined the battle. The baby of the family wasn’t a baby anymore. He wasn’t some lanky pup. He was a monster, the same size as Gentry with gold eyes. His wolf was like the werewolves of legend. Blood-splattered teeth, hate in his glowing eyes, muzzle snarled up, the promise of death written all over his face. Good. Wolf wouldn’t have to mourn when he killed him.
He spun and lunged at Roman’s front paw, caught it in a blur, and snapped the bone with a hard bite. The yelp of pain echoed through the clearing, and with the sound came a tornado. That’s all Wolf could think to describe it. The snow around them shot straight up into the sky, creating a wall of white, and thick, black power pulsed against Wolf’s skin. It made him sick to his stomach.
Beside him, Asher and Roman froze, their attention on the dark shadow that was walking slowly through the wall of snow, hands out.
It was the woman from the store, the dark-haired one in the old truck. The familiar one. With every step of her approach, the sick feeling in Gentry’s gut grew until his legs buckled under him. His body was on fire, and it wasn’t just him. Asher and Roman were in the snow, writhing.
“Change back!” the woman screamed, her voice crackling with the power of the wind, but her lips hadn’t moved.
Agony ripped through Gentry, and he closed his eyes against the black magic forcing his Change into his human skin. Back to Logic.
Teeth bared, Asher was dragging his breaking body toward her by his front paws.
“Uh uuuh,” she sang softly, shaking her head as she took a step back.
Asher, Asher, Asher. Change back. The whispered words hadn’t come from her lips, but were bouncing around in Gentry’s head.
The last of the Change blasted through Gentry’s body, and he winced away from the view of Asher breaking slowly, bones snapping one at a time like dry twigs, and blood pooling in the snow beneath his body.
“Give in,” Roman yelled, completely human. “Asher!”
Asher imploded into his human self, and the snow wall fell to the ground around them.
Every cell in Gentry’s body was on fire, and he retched in the snow. He clenched his fists before he slammed them to the ground and tried to breathe through the
agony. “Who are you?” Gentry choked out.
“Can’t you feel it?” Roman asked from beside him. He was on his hands and knees, arm wrapped around his stomach, body trembling, eyes bright gold like his wolf wasn’t sleeping yet. He wore a full beard now and looked like a fucking bodybuilder. Roman was almost unrecognizable compared to the boy Gentry had known. “She’s a witch.”
“You’re welcome,” the woman barked out, eyes flashing with anger.
“For what?” Asher growled out.
“Look at you! Brothers, bleeding each other like animals.”
“We are animals.”
“Bullshit! That’s bullshit. Your father would be ashamed if he saw what you’d just done. You were going to kill each other!”
Asher tossed Roman a frown, but didn’t even bother to look at Gentry. “You knew our father?”
Pain washed across the woman’s face, and she stared off into the woods for a few moments before she answered. “I loved your father.” Her lip trembled, and her eyebrows lifted. “We weren’t allowed, for obvious reasons, but he was mine, and I was his. Losing him was the worst day of my life. But seeing you three, looking so much like him, going to war out here is a close second.”
“My wolf looks nothing like that asshole,” Asher ground out, his chin tucked to his chest as he glared up at the woman from his knees.
“Not your wolf, Asher Striker. Your eyes. You have his fire. He was always scared for you because of it. And you,” she said, arcing her gaze to Roman. “You have his build. Height, arms, hands, all the same. And it doesn’t matter how thick you grow that beard, boy. You can’t hide his face. He marked you up better than the rest. But you,” she murmured, blinking slowly and giving her attention to Gentry. “You’re the one he passed his wolf to. Can you feel him separately I wonder? Hmm, Gentry? Does he feel like a different creature living inside of your body? Your father struggled with the same, and your wolf is the spitting image of his. Get up, monsters.”