When Tessa walked inside, she stared at the black and white tile floor and a line of refrigerators that stood against one wall with a few chairs for drawing blood nearby. The room was much smaller than she had expected, but then again, she might have known this was a small operation. Hardly large enough to warrant them capable to ship blood all over the state.
“What seems to be the—”
Before he had a chance to say any more, Paige grabbed the man by his throat, lifting him off his feet and tossing him a few feet away. Now that was what Tessa desired, real vampire strength. Her blood rushed and her heart pounded hard in excitement.
Paige gazed over at the man, stalking him now as he scooted away.
“What did I do? I swear I made my delivery on time,” the man said.
Paige lowered her hood. “That’s just the thing. What blood product did you send, because it didn’t taste anything like whole blood to me.”
“You didn’t give me enough time. I’d sent out a large shipment and I didn’t have any whole blood left. Blood substitute was all I had.”
“So you decided to send over a blood substitute? To a vampire?”
“I-I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to do.”
“You’re sorry,” Paige said as she toppled one of the chairs. “You’ve made my apprentice very sick, and now she’s underfed—if you catch my drift.”
“No, please. I swear I can give her what she needs tomorrow. I have donations scheduled.” He moved off the floor and showed Paige the refrigerators were empty.
Paige licked her lips. “I’m not sure if I can trust you now.”
“Please,” a voice behind them said as a woman walked forward. “I swear this will never happen again.” Her eyes darted from Paige to Tessa. “Ed give them what they want.”
“But—”
“We’ll need all of the whole blood you have it stock. Tessa needs a transfusion since she’s so underfed, and don’t you dare lie to me that you don’t have any here or I swear I’ll let Tessa drink you both dry.”
Ed and Jenna exchanged looks and he pulled out six bags that were in a refrigerator that was hidden behind a wall and filled a bag with them. “Here, it’s all I have.”
Tessa’s fangs extended and she made a move toward the woman, but Paige stopped her. “No. You can’t bite anyone without turning them. I’ve passed the gene on to you.”
“What do you expect me to do? I want warm blood.”
“As we all do, but it’s just not something either of us can do unless we plan to kill the victim, and I’m not angry enough at this woman to do that. Are you?”
“I’m just hungry, is all I know.”
“I can help with that another way,” the woman said. She pulled up the sleeves of her shirt. “You can feed off me if you will, but if you murder Ed, you’ll all starve, for sure.”
“No, Jenna. Don’t do it,” Ed muttered.
Jenna sat in a chair, and placed her arm on the board of the chair, tying a rubber band around her arm. “I’m donating my blood, Ed. So go ahead and draw it.”
Ed just shook his head, gloved up and chose a needle with four small tubes, the ends covered with rubber. He cleaned her arm with an alcohol patch and dried it off, then pushed the needle into her vein, releasing the rubber band and inserting the other end of the needle through the rubber of a tube. Tessa watched Jenna’s blood filling the tubes one by one, her mouth watering. When Ed finished, he handed the tubes over to Tessa, who drank the blood down like it was the last on earth that she’d ever taste. She welcomed the warm, metallic taste this time, and, indeed, it tasted nothing like that blood substitute they had delivered.
Paige replaced her hood. “It’s about time you understand just who’s in control now. You won’t be doing anymore shipments without my prior approval, is that understood?”
“But, I have orders to fill. If I don’t make my shipments my suppliers will come looking for me.”
“I guess you should have thought about that before you sent us a blood substitute ... Ed,” Paige sneered, disappearing out the back door.
Tessa took the bag now and was tempted to finish one of them off as her hunger was still out of control, but instead, she followed Paige out the door as Ed and Jenna held each other close.
As they drove back to Shadow Creek, Tessa asked, “Was that necessary?”
“Was it necessary if you ate tonight, or have enough whole blood for you to get over this bump in the road?”
“I mean demanding that they not ship blood to anyone without your permission?”
“You’ll see that what I do is in your best interest, Tessa, and I do have control issues. It’s just not something that I want to change.”
“I hope you haven’t scared them too much. What if they picked up stakes and moved on?”
“I’ve donated the money for them to set up shop to begin with. You have to understand that you can’t let humans take advantage of you like he did. He was paid quite well for sending that blood substitute. Ed had to have known that it wouldn’t be able to satisfy the hunger of a new blood. I’m surprised that you haven’t gone into brumation yet.”
“So I’ll actually be getting another transfusion?”
“You have to, otherwise you’ll never gain any strength. There’s no reason that a wolf should ever best you, even if he’s the alpha of his pack.” She chuckled. “Unless you want to be bested. Raphael is a mystery to most.”
“Is he, now? I suppose—and there’s something about him that just drew me near. Until he took me back to Shadow Creek. His friend Seth was very interesting, as well.”
“I’ve heard that they partake in ménages, too. I’m not sure what’s wrong with all these horny shifters near the Shadow Creek area.”
“Seth is human, though.”
“More human than most people around here would care for, but enough talk for now. “You’ll need to stay overnight at the main house for your transfusion,” Paige said as the Jeep came to a stop.
Chapter Ten
“Look, they’re back,” Katlyn said, pointing out Paige and Tessa who were getting out of the Jeep.
Brendan frowned, but drove over there and they piled out, too. Katlyn raced ahead of them. Brendan just wished that she would slow down. The woman acted like she wasn’t even pregnant, and now that they had found out during dinner that she carried twins, he was over the moon with happiness. He had misgivings about not knowing who fathered the baby, but now with two of them, it didn’t matter. Brendan did his best to control his emotions on the outside, but on the inside, it was much different. He shared Katlyn with Chase, but sometimes he wondered if she enjoyed fucking Chase more than him. It was unsettling to feel that way, and he was determined later to prove that he was twice the lover Chase was.
“What’s going on?” Katlyn demanded.
“Don’t worry, little mama,” Paige said. “The man at the blood bank sent a blood substitute instead of whole blood.. We have it all straightened out now.”
“Paige says I need a blood transfusion, that I’m undernourished,” Tessa said. “I’ll be staying at the main house tonight.”
“Oh, I had worried that something more was going on.”
“Oh, Katlyn. I’m just so happy to know there’s nothing wrong with me, besides being a vampire. I wondered why I couldn’t stomach that stuff,” she laughed. “I even wondered if I was manifesting all of my symptoms.”
“Not sure how you can do that with skin lesions, but okay,” Katlyn said.
“We’d better let them go on inside now,” Brendan said. “Now that there’s nothing to worry about, we can go back to our own cabin.”
Katlyn’s shoulders dropped. “I suppose you’re right. I’m just so relieved that Tessa will be okay.”
Brendan smiled, leading Katlyn back to the truck. He was relieved that Katlyn hadn’t demanded to stay with Tessa tonight. He had other plans. After he finally told her just why he hated Seth so much, he hoped that she’d allow him to make love to he
r, even if Chase would be there, too.
* * *
When they walked into the cabin, Katlyn excused herself to use the bathroom and Brendan raised a brow and asked Chase, “Is there any chance that you’d leave me alone with Katlyn tonight.”
“Probably not. Since when do you need alone time with her?”
“Since I asked you, is when, and I gave you privacy the last time, earlier.”
“What makes you think that she’s up for it again so soon?”
“The way that woman looks at us, I think she’s long overdue for more loving.”
“You know, Brendan, for the most part I have allowed you to take the lead and I’ve never been one to push my weight around. I accept that you’re the more dominate, or alpha so to speak, but I love her just as much as you do, and I enjoy making love to her, too. If you insist, I’ll let you go first.”
“It’s not about who goes first or last, it’s about giving our mate what she needs and satisfying her. Part of that means that we accept the children when they’re born, even if we don’t know whose baby she carries.”
“I know that. I’m not an idiot, you know.”
“I never said you were, Chase. It’s just if you could have seen your face when she said she carried twins ... it was priceless.”
“As if yours wasn’t? It’s safe to say that it was quite the shock.”
“For you more than me? What’s so hard to get? We had unprotected sex with Katlyn. You had to have known that there was the possibility that she’d get pregnant.”
“It’s not so easy for me like it is you, Brendan. You’ve been through this before.”
Brendan stiffened at the mention of his unborn child that never was.
“What does Chase mean, you’ve been through this before? You have other children?” Katlyn asked as she walked up.
“No. I don’t. The child died before he or she was ever born.”
Katlyn’s cheeks turned pink. “Oh, I had no idea. I’m so sorry for you. Was it with Wenise?”
Brendan whipped his palm through his hair. “Does it matter?”
“I guess not, but if she carried your child once, you must harbor some feelings for her still.”
Brendan pulled out a chair for Katlyn, waiting until she sat down before they joined her at the table. “I told you before, Wenise means nothing to me. I have no feelings for her.”
“Yes, but if she was pregnant with your child, it would only be natural if you did have some feelings for her.
Why was Katlyn being so understanding about this—or was she, as a pained look came over her face for a fraction of a second. “You asked earlier about why I hated Seth so much, right?”
Katlyn sat straight up now. “Yes. Are you ready to come clean.”
“Come clean?”
“Well, I had the feeling that you would rather I not know.”
“I didn’t think you needed to, but now I think you deserve to know the whole truth about who I really am, even though I’m not the man you think I am.”
Katlyn smoothed her hand on the table. “No? Then who are you, really?”
“I’ve done some things, made some decisions that hurt people, but that was never my intent. What I’ve realized was that I only ended up hurting myself. I haven’t always shared women with Chase.”
“So I’ve heard, but I thought you took Wenise in when she was pregnant.”
“I was seeing her before that and we dated for a time. I was younger then and I fell in love with her, and when she turned up pregnant, I acted like an ass and told her I was too young to be a father. I was just so scared at the time. Back then, the ranch was just getting off the ground, you see. After I told Wenise that I wasn’t signing up to be a father to our child, she quit talking to me. Months later, I finally came to my senses and when I found her, Wenise told me that a friend had taken her to a clinic in Dallas where she ended her pregnancy. I was livid when I found out that it was Seth.”
Katlyn’s mouth formed a big O. “No wonder you hate him so much.”
“Exactly. A few years later, Wenise was again pregnant by someone else and the man took off on her just like I had. When I found out, I insisted that she come to the ranch and stay. I just couldn’t bear for another shifter child to be discarded.”
“Brendan settled Wenise in a cabin and it wasn’t long before he found out that Seth was visiting her,” Chase added. “The two came to blows and Seth spent a few days in the hospital.”
“Is Seth Ivan’s father?”
“She says no,” Brendan said. “Jason Traxler is Ivan’s father.”
“So, the same man who Melody’s mother has been hanging around?”
“Yes. He’s not worth the air he breathes. He doesn’t support Wenise in any way and hasn’t ever supported his child in any way. The problem is that Ivan knows who his father is, and I’ve seen the little guy look devastated when Jason ignored him in town on one occasion.”
“He told me he didn’t know who his father is,” Katlyn said. “And that his mother chose a human over you.”
“In a way, she did, but we hadn’t seen each other more than socially in town after she got rid of my baby. I’ll never really forgive her for that, totally, even though I take full responsibility for it, too. If only I had come to my senses sooner.”
“If you had, I certainly wouldn’t be here now,” Katlyn said. “Life is full of what ifs and how comes. I have a few of my own. I’m not quite the angel you take me for. Sure, I hadn’t been to a club looking for a ménage before I met you, but I certainly slept around.”
“It doesn’t matter, Katlyn. What matters most is that you’re here with us now.”
“Yes, and I can’t even bear to tell my parents that I have two shifters for mates. I can’t even begin to think how that conversation would go.”
“Give it some time and you might get up the courage, but I’m not all that sure I’m ready to meet your parents yet, either,” Brendan laughed.
“Yes. They deserve to know the truth, but they live in Ohio, so it’s not like they’ll turn up on our doorstep. Unless I call and invite them here.”
Brendan smiled. He could tell by the look on her face that she very much wanted to come clean to her parents, so he said, “Katlyn, call them. There’s plenty of room at the ranch.”
“Like where, with Paige? I don’t want to serve them up to her.”
“You won’t be doing that and there are other places to fit them, you know.”
“Like another cabin?”
“Yes, or Tessa can stay at the main house while they’re here.”
“Only if Tessa wants to. I won’t have her feeling obligated to do that.” Katlyn got up and stretched. “I’m so tired,” she said as she began to pull off her black dress.
“Here, allow me to help you, Katlyn,” Brendan said, prowling over to pull off her dress and laying it over a chair. He gazed deeply into her blue eyes, his cock hardening against the fabric of his jeans. He loved how pink her skin became when he came near her, and he groaned when she unhooked her bra, releasing her breasts to be admired and touched, which he did without asking. His eyes drifted to her panties and he rubbed a finger along her crease until she threw her head back and he feasted on a nipple until a soft moan escaped her pink, full lips.
Chase came up behind Katlyn and yanked her panties down. Katlyn snapped her eyes open—at his roughness, no doubt—but licked her lips. She loved it. This woman never ceased to amaze him. Brendan pulled off his shirt and pulled off his jeans, too. Brendan loved seeing Katlyn’s eyes widen when she stared at his erection, and she pulled away from Chase and dropped to her knees. Before she did anything further, she looked up at him with all the innocence of a coy virgin, but then she grabbed his balls and brought him forward, her tongue flicking across the head of his cock. When his cock disappeared between her pink lips, Brendan had to hold back from losing it completely. He rocked his hips forward as Katlyn bobbed her head up and down, taking him in deeper. He loved this w
oman and what only she could do—drive him wild.
Chase joined them now, naked as well, and lifted a strand of Katlyn’s hair. He rubbed his cock with it until she turned to him, and took him into her mouth. When her hand wrapped around Brendan, he threw his head back, allowing her hand to work magic on him, and he heard her make sucking noises as she sucked Chase. Just when he thought he was too close, he pulled away, bringing Katlyn to the edge of the bed. Before he laid her down, he kissed her deeply, pressing his hard body against her much softer one. He moved his fingers up her spine and back down, gripping her soft ass and pulling her closer to him as he ground against her. Her breasts were fondled by Chase who joined them, and he pressed himself against her hip, rocking into her.
Brendan and Chase ran their hands over her body, avoiding where Brendan knew she wanted to be touched the most, up her back, down her front, teasing down her side until she jumped in response. Brendan then worked his fingers between her thighs, nudging her legs open as he sat her on the edge of the bed and eased her back with her legs still hanging off the edge. When Brendan looked over to Chase, it was like they had communicated without words as they both took turns kissing Katlyn, turning her head side to side with a finger until she began to laugh with a snort that was past adorable. Brendan kissed her neck, trailing his kisses down to her breasts. He avoided her nipples this time, taking each of her breasts in his hands, moving them slightly up and placing kisses beneath them. His fingers began to rub along the side of her mound and worked on the inside of one thigh, tickling and teasing until Katlyn choked out, “You’re driving me crazy. Please, I want to feel your finger.”
“Be patient,” Brendan said. He finally dropped to his knees and pressed his face against Katlyn’s pussy, inhaling her fragrance and pushing his tongue to now tantalize her clit that jumped when he touched it the first time as she thrashed on the bed in ecstasy. He worked his tongue harder, circling and finding all of the little places that made her cry out. He moved lower and began licking and sucking her vulva. He then lapped up her juices for a moment before he plunged his tongue inside her channel, which had her nearly coming off the bed. As he worked his tongue in and out of her core, he heard sucking noises coming from somewhere else and when he came up for air, Chase was on her face, pressing his cock in her mouth as she had her hands gripped on his ass. Brendan’s finger found her wet channel and he worked two fingers in and out until he felt her tighten.
Taken (M/F/M red-hot menage shifter romance) Standalone (Shadow Creek Shifters Book 2) Page 8