by Ravenna Tate
“Josh and Ricky had a history of forcing themselves on young women. What they did to Gillian wasn’t their first go-around.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No. Not even close.”
“Did everyone know?”
“Of course they did, but one of them was an Elder’s nephew and the other was a Council member’s son.”
“That doesn’t make it right.”
“No, it doesn’t. That show your friends described to us in the village, where Tommy Floyd practically hit his own son, was a mockery for the benefit of your friends only. He wanted them to believe the people in authority over there give a crap about what their residents do. The truth is that there is no justice or order. What Gavin said today at the meeting about the Elders and Council members from my village declaring this matter is closed? It’s crap. People in that village make their own rules.”
“Sounds like the Medina women would have been better off staying here.”
“Oh, I know they would have been. It was horrible when they first arrived. I’ve only told you a fraction of what went on. They were kept separated from everyone else. I’m convinced that most of the things they said about how they were treated here were forced out of them by our Elders.”
“Well, I know they made it up because I lived here, and I assure you, the Medinas were not mistreated in this village. Quite the opposite. They ran all over everyone, and our former Elders let them do it.”
“The women said it was Gillian’s fault their men were arrested by the FBI.”
“No, it was their fault. Long before Gillian found out what the men were up to in their business practices, the FBI and the SEC had files open on them. All she did was bring it to the attention of everyone in our village.”
Makenna snuggled closer to her mate. “And when the Medina women came to our village, they exposed Gillian to everyone.”
“From what we’ve heard, that group has done similar things before. They targeted her because she’s human, not only because she exposed the crimes of the Medina family.”
There was no reason for her to respond beyond a nod. What he’d said was true, and they both knew it. The meeting today wouldn’t stop that group. Even though she’d gone to the Elders in Stone’s village and identified the group members by name, if they wanted to start up again, they would. And none of the Elders in her former village would bother to stop them.
“I don’t want to talk about bad things any longer.”
The look he gave her nearly stopped her heart, it was so filled with desire. Her pulse raced, and her pussy was soaked within seconds.
“Neither do I.” Stone kissed her, sending waves of desire racing through her body. Making love with him the first time had been mind-blowing, and she had expected that heady feeling to abate with each subsequent encounter. It had not done so. If anything, she loved sex now, weeks later, even more.
They tried to be quiet, but right now Makenna didn’t give a shit who heard them. She could hardly help the things he did to her when he kissed her and touched her. His hands cupped her breasts, and she nearly lost her mind when he rolled her nipples between his thumbs and forefingers the way she loved.
“You know, the first time I saw you, all I could think about later that night was what these would feel like to hold.” He bent his head and licked the taut points, forcing loud moans from her. “What they would taste like.” Stone dipped lower and spread her legs. “What your pussy would taste like.”
“Oh!” She clutched at his head as he moved lower to run his tongue over her labia, back and forth, teasing her clit with each pass. “Oh, please!”
“Please, what?” That voice! It was filled with teasing humor, and she loved that as much as she loved what he did to her with his mouth and his hands. “What do you want from me, my love?”
“You know what I want.”
He moved away from her pussy and lay on top of her, kissing her like he might never do it again. Makenna wrapped her arms and legs around him, pushing her body as physically close to his as possible. Every cell in her ached for his touch. When he released her mouth, she was nothing but a quivering mass of need. She gazed helplessly into his eyes.
“Tell me.”
“Oh, Stone … please.”
“Say the words, Makenna.”
Determined to help her get over her shyness in naming body parts, and in asking specifically for what she wanted in bed, he’d begun making her tell him, in graphic detail. If she couldn’t or wouldn’t do it, he stopped. Literally. One evening he had even rolled over and gone to sleep until she’d woken him up, filling his ears with words that would make any alpha male blush.
Makenna knew he was doing this to help her, but she was out of her mind with the need to make love to him right now. Of course, that meant if she didn’t say what he wanted to hear, he might go to sleep again. His self-control amazed her.
“Lick me. Please.”
“Lick you where?”
Damn, infuriating alpha! Did Fiera and Gillian have to put up with this kind of frustration?
“Lick my pussy. Please.”
“That’s it? That’s all you want?” His sexy grin drove her straight to distraction and back. He was so gorgeous and so much fun.
“Stone, please … lick my pussy lips and my clit. Suck on my clit. Put your fingers inside me. Make me come with your mouth.”
The kiss he planted on her mouth forced more moans from deep in her throat. “That’s my girl. That’s what I want to hear.”
As he slid down her body once more, Makenna smiled. She’d never spoken like that in her life, and hadn’t been able to imagine doing so before she had met him. But if her mate wanted that from her, and if doing so brought such decadent, sweet rewards, she’d learn to do it. She’d learn to love it.
When he slid two fingers into her, Makenna’s pussy contracted around his digits and she cried out as a strong orgasm began. He licked her clit, sending his tongue over it in light, fluttery touches that only served to prolong the climax. By the time she was certain she couldn’t take anymore, he stopped, but only long enough to settle himself between her legs before plunging his cock into her soaked pussy.
“I was going to tease you some more, but I can’t stand it.”
So, she wasn’t the only one with a burning desire to fuck into next week. Makenna bit back a giggle at that thought, and instead reached up to clutch his arms, holding them as he thrust in and out of her with such strength and speed. She’d been a virgin the first time they’d made love, and he had been, too, but he’d known exactly what to do.
As the look on his face and his moans became more intense, he took on the appearance of his true lynx form, mixed in with the human characteristics. He never completely shifted, but she knew it was difficult not to. She had trouble holding back as well.
“Oh, Makenna! You feel like nothing I’ve ever imagined!” He pulled out, lay on top of her again, and kissed her with so much passion she was certain she’d pass out. His tongue and teeth teased her mouth until she writhed underneath his body, her moans begging him to put his dick back inside her.
“I want you on top of me.” He rolled them over, and she sat up, raising her arms in the air to stretch. Stone grasped her breasts, and she gazed into his handsome face, tears stinging her eyes.
“I love you so much.”
“I love you, too.” He moved his hands to her hips and lifted her up. “Lower that slick hole over my dick. I need to fuck you some more.”
What girl could resist an invitation like that? Makenna did as he asked, crying out again when he moved her up and down. Each pass massaged that sweet spot inside her, and she hardly needed to touch her own clit to bring on a second orgasm, but she did anyway.
“Oh, baby. Yes. Touch yourself. Oh my God that is so fucking sexy!”
To realize such a simple act gave her mate this much pleasure brought Makenna to new heights as his thrusting grew quick and deep again. His cried joined hers, and sh
e knew he was close before he came inside her. Once he finished, he pulled her down across his body and she wrapped her arms around him, listening to their breathing slow.
This was her favorite way to fall asleep, sated by sex and with Stone’s seed fresh inside her. Makenna couldn’t wait to be carrying his child. She’d never been this happy, and she just knew they were going to have a fabulous life together.
Chapter Three
As Stone worked inside his office, overlooking the Strait of Juan de Fuca that separated their stretch of land from Canada, his thoughts drifted toward Makenna, as they always did now. At least she was safe in the Benedict home. Even with Canyon and Luke away at work in downtown Seattle a few days each week, that home was never empty. And Leah could hold her own if necessary. She’d proven that during the past year, more than once.
The family business, of which Stone ran accounts payable, had its offices in Port Angeles. Stone had spent as little time there as possible during the past week. He was concentrating all his efforts instead on helping build the homes on the Benedict land.
He and Makenna had lived briefly in Cash’s house after returning from the cabin in which they’d been hiding, but he no longer felt safe there. It was on the other side of the village, close to where Arizona and Gillian used to live, and therefore was now too remote for these uncertain times.
Cash, Fiera’s father, had sold his home to Stone and Arizona before either man was mated. Cash had been living in the Benedict home since shortly after Canyon and Fiera had been mated.
Stone had asked Cash a few days ago if he minded whether he and Arizona donated the house to the patrols’ use. Cash had told him that was a wonderful idea. The home’s location would make a perfect guard post.
It was horrible that they even had to post patrols inside their village, let alone worry about where those men were going to take shelter or set up command. From the stories Stone’s grandfather and others near his age told, nothing like this had happened in over one hundred years.
The ringtone on his cell phone that signaled Makenna’s call brought him back to the present. “Miss me already? I’ve only been at work a few hours.”
“I always miss you. Leah and I are going into the woods to hunt for the last of the berries. She insisted I let you know.”
“Who’s coming with you?” Not that he didn’t trust Leah’s aim with a bow, but two women, even with weapons, would be no match for a group of males.
“Cletus and Patti.”
“My sister can’t shoot worth a damn.” Cletus was Canyon’s younger brother, but he was large, strong, and had a quick temper. He’d be able to fight at least three men on his own.
“No, but she has sharper hearing than all of us combined. If anyone is approaching, she’ll hear them long before we will.”
“All right, but don’t go too far from the village.”
“We’ll go as far as we need to go, my love, but I promise you we’ll be careful as well. There are thirteen people living on this piece of land now. We have to feed them with something. By next week, there will be no berries left, or the ones that are left will be too rotten to do anything useful with.”
“I love you, Makenna.” She was right, of course. “Please be careful.”
“I love you, too. We will.”
After they disconnected the call, Stone reflected they had all been concentrating on building the homes, but soon they’d need to go out and hunt in order to have enough food for the coming season. As usual, the women were the logical ones. But no male would tell them so.
Winter was closing in. He hoped the cold, rainy weather it brought would keep the leopards from planning anything massive. While the area rarely saw more than four or five inches of snow all year, the forest became perpetually soggy and windswept until late into spring.
Perhaps that would give the leopards enough time to calm down and realize that Josh and Ricky had brought their deaths down on their own heads because of their individual behaviors, not due to Gillian uncovering what the FBI and the SEC had already known about the Medina family business.
But that still didn’t resolve the larger issue. That didn’t change the beliefs at the core of this conflict. Gillian was human, and most of the leopards who lived in Makenna’s former village had taken the legend to extremes. They truly believed that because a human had mated with a shifter, that act had brought evil into all their lives.
Why else would Josh and Ricky have set out to kill her? And they had intended to kill her. Gillian had told them all what the two males said, and Stone and Makenna both agreed that had been their ultimate intention.
Despite the evidence their Elders had spoken of at the meeting last week, most of the leopards in Makenna’s village saw the deaths of two of their own as Gillian’s fault. They also still believed she was behind the fact that dozens of leopard men were now in a Federal prison, awaiting trial. It was due to her interference, not because those men had been breaking the law for years.
A passing ship caught Stone’s attention. It was usually soothing to watch them, but today its slow journey through the Strait reminded him of the time that had passed since the legend became part of their shared history. Over one thousand years hadn’t changed the ignorance of those who took it to heart. All those centuries had done nothing to quash the superstitious beliefs associated with that legend.
Stone didn’t know whether the legend was true or not, but he did know that Gillian was not any more the root cause of the Medina family business being corrupt than he was. And he also knew that her being human had nothing to do with Ricky and Josh acting like common criminals.
They’d been that way before they had ever laid eyes on Gillian. They had been older than she was, meaning they’d been that way before she’d even been born. So how in the name of all the stars could she be responsible for their behavior?
Thanks to Makenna’s revelation the night of the meeting, he now knew what Josh and Ricky had been like before, and that knowledge made it easier for him to stop blaming himself for the events of the day those two attacked Gillian.
But he still wished she hadn’t come to Makenna’s village with Canyon, Arizona, and Fiera to look for him. He needed to keep reminding himself that no one else had come to their village looking for Gillian. No one else had killed two patrols to get to her. Only Ricky and Josh had done that.
Even with all the recent events, there was still one mystery they needed to solve. The remainder of the clandestine group from Makenna’s village. The same people she’d finally caught about to paint slogans in blood on someone else’s door. Their Elders had the names of the group members, or at least the members Makenna had been able to ferret out. But they couldn’t act on them unless something else happened inside their village.
This group was known to embrace the beliefs that because the shifter’s illicit lover had been human, all contact with humans was to be avoided. They wanted none of the cats mating with them, or dealing with them in business and personal affairs. This put the Benedicts, especially, in the center of the controversy between the two villages. Luke and Canyon headed up a very successful stock brokerage firm that went back several generations.
Of course, the Medinas had businesses in the human world that also went back that far. They had arranged a mating with a female who had human parentage in her past. But the leopards in Makenna’s village seemed to be ignoring that little tidbit when it came to pointing fingers and assigning blame. Hypocrites, the lot of them.
Stone’s family and Arizona’s family also ran business that dealt with humans. It was unavoidable in this day and age, as far as Stone was concerned, although his beliefs were not shared by all shifters. Their ancestors have lived off the land, and some still believed it was possible to do. While Stone agreed with them in theory, he preferred having modern conveniences like electricity, a car to drive, a cell phone, and the Internet.
One thing was certain. There were no easy answers. His challenge now was to continue lif
e as he knew it, while protecting his mate and his friends. He was an alpha, after all. He’d been born into this, and he couldn’t imagine any other way of life. But that wouldn’t stop him from worrying about Makenna all the time.
****
“How is everything going?” Gillian asked the question with a tone in her voice that told Makenna there was something specific she was tiptoeing around. The two were sitting on the front porch, enjoying the cool breeze as they shelled walnuts. It was messy work, so they’d opted to go outdoors. Makenna had wanted to get to know Gillian better, and this gave her the perfect opportunity.
“Meaning?”
The grin told her Gillian understood she hadn’t been very subtle. “I’m losing my touch not being at work every day.”
“I doubt that,” said Makenna, wiping her hands on a towel. She turned to face Gillian. “I’m amazed you’re able to go back at all.”
“God, I’d lose my mind if I couldn’t.” The second she said it, her face took on a horrified expression. “I’m so sorry. I keep doing that. I just insulted you and every shifter female who doesn’t work outside the home.”
“No, you didn’t. I took no offence at all. I can’t even begin to understand the way you were raised, but I admire the education you were able to obtain. I wish that was pushed more on us. Was it difficult getting through law school?”
Gillian’s look of relief made Makenna happy. “Well, it’s supposed to be, but honestly I adored it. It was like I’d been born for those two years. Until I met Arizona, of course.”
“You sound conflicted.”
“Not about him. Not even close. He’s the man of my dreams, although I didn’t even know I had a man of my dreams before we met.”
The laughter that bubbled up wasn’t something Makenna could help. “Have you told him that? Because it’s adorable.”
“Yes. He knows it.”
“Does he support your going back to work?”
“Oh yes. He totally does, but I wonder whether I can do it all. Have a career and a family.”