by Ava Sinclair
“My biological father…” she guessed.
“Yes,” he said. “He wanted to find out what happened, and that’s how he found you.”
They observed the wolves in silence as they fed. Later, some of the bones of the deer would be gathered, with a few being left behind for the scavengers who relied on the wolves. Already the ravens were gathering, croaking their impatience from the trees.
“Wait here,” Lakota said. “I’ll be back to get you and we’ll go home.”
He stood, walked back through the trees, and this time when he reemerged, he was in his wolf form, joining his family to feed on the carcass. If it had been killed closer to home, the pack would have dressed it in human form for the meals they cooked in their houses. They stored lots of meat for winter in this manner, assuring sustenance when weather did not allow for hunting.
Lakota was the last to leave the kill. After he’d eaten his fill, he transformed back to his human form and dressed in some clothes that made up one of the many stashes he and the others kept throughout the woods. Carly was still sitting on the rock waiting for him.
“You took long enough,” she joked. “I was thinking maybe I should just walk back without you.”
She was testing him. He could tell, even with the joking tone.
He stood and took her hand, helping her up. “That, my little one, would be a bad idea unless you want to find myself across my lap again.” He led her down from the rock. “You’ll be going nowhere alone until I’m satisfied that Bruce Holder is no longer a threat to your safety.”
Carly stopped. “And exactly how long am I supposed to wait?” He could hear the impatience in her voice. “I’m not used to having one person tell me what to do every waking moment, let alone a dozen.” She paused. “I could really use a break. If I could just go back home for a while. I’d be careful, Lakota. I could hire a bodyguard.”
“No,” he said. “Your leaving now is out of the question. No full human is equipped to take care of you.”
She turned to him in exasperation. “If I don’t learn how to protect myself, how would I make it if we’re separated? Being so dependent is…”
He turned to Carly and took hold of her shoulders, turning her toward him. “Is it really so awful? I’m not keeping you under lock and key. You’re out in the wilderness, gaining information about the pack that you can use in the research you were planning to do.”
“Yes,” she said. “But I have to obey you every waking moment. I realized the other day when you were showing me how to follow trails and read deer rubs that I’m actually starting to think of you as a father figure. It… It makes me feel…”
Her voice trailed off, and now Lakota relied on all his senses to discern what she was trying to say. His noted the dilation of her pupils, the quickening of her breath and—most telling—the presence of hormones indicating an undercurrent of sexual excitement.
“Confused? Embarrassed?” he asked, and her response was to flush. Lakota put a finger under her chin and tipped her face up until she was forced to look at him.
“Why should I be embarrassed?” she asked curtly.
“Because the human world has taught you that a strong female should not sexually crave the domination of an alpha male. Especially not one who acts as her father figure.”
She backed away. “I don’t,” she said quietly. Turning, she crossed her arms and stomped ahead of him. “If you think that, you’re wrong.”
“Am I?” he asked. She didn’t answer, but only turned away, keeping her arms crossed angrily as she marched up the path ahead of him. They rounded a curve on the trail when he heard it.
“Carly, stop,” he ordered, but she marched on.
“I told you,” she shouted back. “I’m not used to having someone tell me what to do every…”
But he was on her now, pushing her aside as he stared into the trees. Now she heard it, too—the soft chuff-chuffing of a bear. This time it was not a large grizzly, but a smaller black bear. It had been eating berries on the side of the path when it caught the human scent. And while it did not charge, it held its ground in a defensive stance.
Carly did not note the difference. The sight of the bear triggered a barely repressed fear and she screamed, the sound sending the frightened animal running back into the forest.
Lakota turned, taking hold of Carly. There was not amusement in his eyes now.
“That’s why I expect instant obedience,” he said. “That bear wasn’t dangerous, but if it had been, you’d have almost walked into it.”
He pulled Carly over to the side of the trail, and reached up to snap a limber, low-hanging twig off of a tree.
“What are you doing?” she asked nervously, but Lakota didn’t answer as he pulled out a pocket knife and began peeling the switch. When Carly realized what he was doing, she tried to dart away.
“Another bad move,” Lakota said. He was on her in three strides and ignored her alternating curses and pleas as he worked her blue jeans and panties down to the middle of her thighs and guided her to a bending position over a rounded boulder. Laying the switch aside, he worked her jeans down and off, leaving her clad only in her long-sleeved t-shirt and hiking boots.
The sight of her toned legs and round bottom had an instant effect on Lakota’s cock, but he wasn’t about to allow his intentions to be deterred by the delectable sight of Carly’s shapely buttocks. He intended to teach her two lessons this time.
“Whether you like it or not, you answer to me now, little one,” he said as he picked up the switch. “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe, even if it leaves you in tears.”
He raised his arm and brought the switch down hard, and Carly howled as the blow left a burning line of pain in its wake. Lakota kept a hand on the small of her back, holding her easily in place. Carly’s position on the rock had her leaning slightly forward, and as the switch painted welt after welt on her nates, Carly began to kick wildly in an effort to get free. The sight of her plump sex between her legs was almost more than Lakota could stand, and even though she was sobbing for mercy, his heightened senses picked up the heady pheromones that told him that part of her was responding sexually to his correction.
There were nearly a dozen thin welts crisscrossing her bottom now, and he added one more for good measure before tossing the switch away and pulling her to standing. Lakota sat on the rock as he forced her to face him, waiting for Carly’s wails to subside before addressing her.
“That’s why you do as you’re told,” he said, pointing in the direction the bear had run. “You know better, Carly. So why don’t you tell me why you ran? Do you like putting yourself in danger?” He paused, gently pushing his fingers between her thighs. “Or was part of you hoping I’d stop you?”
“That’s ridiculous!” She spat the words through her tears, angrily wiping them away with the back with one hand as she rubbed her welted bottom with the other.
“Is it?” he asked. He took hold of her shoulders and locked his gaze onto hers. “I don’t have to touch a woman to tell when she’s sexually excited.”
His words seemed to shock her into momentary silence. “That’s a hell of a thing to say from a man who considers himself a father figure.”
“Well, maybe that’s because we comprehend two different things in the term,” he said. “As leader, I consider myself a father figure to the whole pack. And a pack leader can mate with a female he protects.”
The presence of pheromones in the air was heavier now.
“If you think I want you in that way…” she said, but her voice was quavering, her skin was flushed, and then her eyes widened as his fingers moved between her legs to reveal what she’d been trying to hide even from herself.
“You’re wet, Carly,” he said. “You want me. Admit it. You want me as much as I want you.” He paused. “I wanted you from the moment I saved you from Bear. I’ll fight any beast that tries to claim you. But I fear I cannot fight the one that longs to claim your body.”
It surprised him to find she kept herself shaved, and now as he slipped first one finger, then two, past the slick folds of her inner flower, her body seemed to draw him in, and she moaned as he probed her tight, hot pussy. Carly was whimpering as her hips followed the motion of his hand, even as she buried her face in his chest and fisted his shirt.
“No. No. No,” she said. “This is wrong.”
“It’s not wrong,” he said. “I am your kind. Even if you do not have the gift, we are drawn to one another. I am made for you, Carly. You are made for me. It was meant for us to get together, my little one. I was meant to guide you, to protect you, both as a father figure and as your lover.”
They fell onto a bed of pine needles by the trail. Lakota’s hands were everywhere, skimming her narrow hips, cupping her buttocks as she moaned and pushed against him. He could tell she was still conflicted even as her body seemed to act of its own accord. Her head was thrown back, her eyes closed.
He wanted to show her pleasure, to show her how good it could be with him, how right. The sweet musky scent of her body was driving him wild. He wanted to taste her. He pulled her t-shirt and boots off, leaving her naked. Her breasts were firm and full for such a small female. He bent his head now, capturing a nipple in his mouth, biting down on it gently. She arched her back into him, fisting his shiny black hair, and sought to hold him, to keep him from going lower. But he growled a warning and she released him, and his head moved down as he cupped her buttocks with large, possessive hands. Carly whimpered, but spread her legs nonetheless, and Lakota lapped at her labia almost hungrily, intoxicated by her passion. His cock was straining against his jeans almost painfully, and he was torn between the need to bury himself inside her and the heady thrill of tasting her. He latched onto her clit, suckling slightly as he plumbed her with his fingers. And she was lost to him now, crying out as she pushed against him, her denial drifting away on the wind along with her cries of passion.
He could wait no longer. He rose to his knees, looming over her as he unleashed his cock. It sprang forth, and she stared at it, wide-eyed. In its aroused state, it was larger than that of normal men. When she rolled away, at first Lakota thought Carly was trying to elude him. But then she lifted her hips and looked back with a gaze as hungry and feral as his own.
He gripped her hips, reveling in her acceptance, her invitation. The ass that bore the marks of his correction was tilted toward him, her bottom hole and glistening pussy clearly visible and offering the sweet promise of countless hours of pleasure.
But the first time, he knew, would be special. And as he slid into the narrow passage of her pussy, felt the walls grip and rhythmically caress his cock, he moaned his pleasure, his muscles rippling as he folded her into his embrace and began to thrust slowly in and out.
She was so sweet, so sweet. And her little cries of passion only heightened his excitement. Lakota had an arm around her chest and could feel her nipples hard against his muscular tricep. From what she’d told him about her life up to this point, she’d been a dedicated student not given to dating. And while he could tell she was no virgin, he sensed that her skill in this most intimate dance was one born of primal instinct more than practice. They seemed to fit perfectly together, despite their size difference. She was tuned to his rhythm, meeting him thrust for thrust. And when those thrusts became faster, almost savage, she not only took them, but maintained the rhythm, as she mewled softly, urging him on until with a cry he spent his hot seed into her.
Next to running wild through the wood in wolf form, Lakota had never felt so complete or true to himself.
When he slipped out of her body, he lay down, turning her to face him. He hoped he would not see hesitation, and relief flooded through him when he saw wonder in her eyes.
“I’ve found you,” he said. “My little one. My little mate. Do you understand now, that you can be both my ward and my one love?”
She nodded. “Yes,” she said. “I don’t understand it completely yet. But, yes…”
Chapter Thirteen
Carly’s head was spinning. As she rose from the ground, she realized her body was still tingling with a sensation that started when Lakota had plunged his cock into a body that had known what she wanted before she admitted it to herself.
Was this normal? No. It wasn’t. She’d had a few short-term partners, but sex had never been like this, had never made her feel as if every cell in her body was alight.
As soon as Carly was dressed, Lakota once again resumed his protective stance, slipping back into the paternal mode that brought her comfort while—she realized—inspiring an element of latent submissiveness their dynamic had awakened. She was six months away from her twenty-first birthday. Did her natural need to mate with a strong alpha male indicate that she was one of them? She tried to imagine changing, seeing the world through wolf eyes as she roamed the forest on padded paws. She did not know if she wanted this. Beside her, Lakota reached for her hand, squeezing it reassuringly.
She had questions for him, but as they walked it felt more natural to be quiet together, so she was silent beside him, just enjoying the feeling of being protected. It allowed her to really observe, being at his side. The wind was slightly cooler as the day progressed, and even though it was only July she could see the slightest shift in the color of leaves in the forest, could smell the change in the air that would indicate the coming of fall. She imagined snow filling the forest, locking them in, and worried. She could not abandon the human world forever, not if she was going to carry on her father’s legacy and protect the man she realized she was falling in love with, and his people—her people now.
“I need to go into the city,” she said. “I know you have the power to tell me no. And I understand why you’re worried about my safety. But if I need to stay with you, I have to at least pick up what I can from Doc’s office—his laptop. I want to continue Doc’s cause.”
“I’ve thought about that,” Lakota said. “And I’ve had the same concern. But I didn’t want to push you back into harm’s way for the sake of the pack. But you’re right. I think he intended to kill you, to make you disappear. He wants to end your work. If you start it up again…”
“I know. He’ll come after me. After us…” She sighed. “He has to know by now that I’m with you.”
“I’m sure he does,” Lakota said.
“He’ll come after me eventually,” she said. “But if I work from here, it’ll be easier for me to run the foundation. I can use a satellite phone, alert the former board members that we’re starting work again. I can’t see Bruce Holder going after any of them. It would be too suspicious on the heels of what happened to Doc, even if it couldn’t be proven.”
“I agree,” he said. “But still, the risk…”
“We don’t have a choice,” she said. “Helping Doc protect the land is what I went to school for. You speak of your legacy, but this is as much my legacy as yours.”
They were heading out of the woods now and walking up the hill toward the house. As they approached, Sam emerged from a nearby building and headed over.
“Hey, I was wondering when…?” The younger man halted in midsentence and stepped back, his nostrils flaring slightly. Then he stared hard at Lakota. “Really, Uncle?” he asked, then looked at Carly and scoffed. “Well, this explains a lot.”
The comment would have puzzled her were Carly not already gaining an awareness of the dual nature of the new men in her life. She understood that the smell of sex was clinging to both of them, and could understand Sam’s anger.
Placing a hand on Lakota’s chest, she looked up at him imploringly. “Let me?” she asked. She glanced up hesitantly, ready to obey him if he shook his head. But at his unexpected nod of assent, Carly turned to jog quickly after Sam, who was striding angrily toward the house.
“Sam!” she called. “Sam! Wait!” He glanced back and kept walking, but she caught up with him. “Sam, please!”
He stopped and turned. “Is it enough
that you drag us into your problems without acting like a bitch in heat?”
She stood there, stunned. “Is that what you think? Really?” She paused. “You blame Doc for your father’s death, don’t you?” When he started to turn away, Carly took hold of his arm and kept her grip despite the warning in his eyes. “Tell me, Sam. Please.”
“There were rumors that Bear wanted Dr. Fowler out of the way. My dad worried that he’d hunt him in the wild—just as he was hunting you. My dad warned him, told him to stay in the city. But Dr. Fowler…” He paused. “He’d set up a research station on another piece of land that wasn’t part of the foundation. He was trying to get a grant to study ptarmigan. He thought it would look good for the foundation. My father was in the city when Bruce Holder told him that Dr. Fowler needed to be careful. He told him grizzlies got hungry this time of year. My dad knew your Doc was out there alone. It was a remote area, and he was scheduled to be picked up by a floatplane at the bay…” His voice trailed off. “There was no way in, but for an animal…”
“Your dad went as a wolf to warn him,” Carly said, understanding now.
“Yes,” Sam said. “It was all a trick designed to lure us off the protection of the land. The target wasn’t your father. It was mine. Wolf hunts were legal there. My father was shot from a helicopter. I think Bruce thought the pack would blame your father. They didn’t…”
“But you do?” she asked quietly.
Sam squatted down onto the ground, and Carly leaned down beside him.
“Yeah,” he said. “I suppose I do. It’s just been hard. I was a late shifter. I counted on my father to be here to teach me. I hoped to take over the pack someday.”
“And who’s to say you won’t?” she asked.
“Right. Like that’ll happen if Lakota takes a mate.”