by Mina Carter
His heart pounded in his chest as adrenaline surged through his system. Letting loose the darkness within, he fought her with everything he had, taking and giving blows that would have felled lesser creatures as they both looked for an opening to end the fight. Needing a larger area to battle in, they’d moved away from the others.
Twisting to the side, he blocked a lash of her heavy tail with an upraised arm and slammed a hook into her unprotected ribcage. She cried out, lurching a little to the side as pain twisted her strange features. Slithering backward, she gulped air as much as he did, strain showing in little lines around her mouth. A strange expression crossed her face as she looked at him.
“No one hasssss ever lasted sssssso long againssssst me,” she said, staying out of his reach. “McCauley said you were nothing, less than nothing, a coward and mongrel who had gained your posssssition through trickery.” She tilted her head to study him curiously. “But I think not. You fight too hard to be a coward and too well to be a tricksssster. Does the title mean that much to you?”
“No.” He’d altered his jaw enough to speak but the wolf was still heavy in the rough tones. “The title… being master… that’s nothing. She, though, is everything. My love, my life, my everything. And I’ll be damned if I let you or that asshole hurt even a hair on her head.”
Her gaze slid past him to where Jacob stood over Cyan, and something flickered in the back of her eyes. Need… or longing perhaps. “Thissss is why you fight so hard? All thissss, for a woman? You love her that much?”
He just looked at her. “Always.”
The lamia nodded and then shivered all over. As she did, the scales receded from her skin, darkness and shadows wreathed her lower body for a moment until she stepped forward, legs where the tail had been a moment before. Bruises on her face and holding a hand against ribs he’d felt crack under his fist, she nodded. “You are not what I was told. My deal with McCauley is null and void… I do not deal with liars.”
She turned to go, all but disappearing into the darkness of the gallery before pausing for a second to look over her shoulder. “You are a rare man, Veyr of the pit. I sssshall tell my sisters of you. Our kind will not bother your city again.”
“Thank you.” He nodded, offering a smile as he folded his wolf back within. “Should you ever need help, though, you are welcome.”
Her eyes widened a little at his offer. Few would be crazy enough to offer aid to a lamia, but she had proven she had honor. Inclining her head in thanks, she turned and disappeared into the darkness of the catacombs.
“Wait… what… What are you doing?” Jacob’s face was the picture of incredulity as he peered into the darkness. “Mia! Get your ass back here and finish the job you were paid for!”
Veyr grinned and stalked forward, his gaze latched onto the former alpha. His body should have ached from the numerous bruises and wounds the snake-woman had inflicted, but he felt none of them. Instead, he focused on the hand Jacob had on the back of Cyan’s neck, and all he felt was rage.
Jacob had plotted and schemed to take his title—to take the power and position of Master of the City. Those, he could forgive the guy for. It wasn’t like the role had a retirement plan. Most were killed when they got too old and slow to hold on to power. But Jacob had gone one step too far. He’d threatened Veyr’s woman, put his filthy hands on her. Threatened her life.
Now he would pay with his own. It was the only way Cyan and Lily would be safe.
“You’re a dead wolf walking, Jacob,” he growled. “Get your fur on and face me like the alpha you pretend to be.”
Jacob growled, his lips peeled back from his teeth. His grip tightened on the back of Cyan’s neck, making her squeak in pain again. The scent of her blood blossomed on the air, sending Veyr’s fury ever higher. Around him, the low growls of his wolves joined in. Of the hyenas there was no sign. Veyr didn’t need to look for them. The scent of their blood in the air told him his wolves had handled it.
Now he would handle Jacob. Permanently.
“Take one more step,” Jacob snarled, shaking Cyan like a rag doll. “And she dies.”
Veyr pulled up short, watching his enemy warily. He’d part shifted, the fingers around Cyan’s throat tipped with deadly claws. It would take less than a second to rip her throat out, a wound she wouldn’t be able to shift fast enough to heal. Veyr’s heart pounded in his throat, fear for her rolling through him. He was more scared now than he’d been when he faced off against the deadly lamia.
“That’s better. About time you learned to listen to the voice of your master.” Jacob’s voice swelled with his wolf as he leaned down, Cyan flinching as his mouth, lips pushed forward and stretched around the lycan fangs that punched forward from his human jaw, got close to her throat. Fear rolled through Veyr. He had to get her away from Jacob, but how?
In the end though, his mate did it all by herself.
“Master? Do me a favor,” Cyan hissed, fire in her eyes as she looked up. Catching Veyr’s gaze, she winked and then surged to her feet, throwing her head back. Hard. The back of her skull slammed into Jacob’s nose, making him recoil. While he was distracted, Cyan tore herself from his hold to throw herself full length on the floor.
The whole movement took less than a second, but that was all the time Veyr needed. A howl of rage and retribution tearing from his throat, he leapt, covering the distance between himself and his enemy in two bounds. Somewhere between the first and the second, his wolf tore from him, exploding from his human form like a nightmare version of a jack in the box with fur and teeth.
Massive paws hit Jacob in the middle of the chest, knocking the smaller man to the ground. He screamed, twisting to get his hands around Veyr’s throat, trying to both keep Veyr’s teeth away from his throat and to strangle him. The air swelled around them, shift magic shivering over Jacob’s skin as he called on his wolf.
“No.”
The single word from Veyr’s partially changed throat held all the power of the master, the alpha of all alphas in the city, the alpha all wolves bowed to. With one word, he forced Jacob’s wolf back down inside its human cage. Jacob’s eyes widened, fear stark in their depths.
“Nononono…” he whimpered, frowning. The air tingled as he tried to call on the change again. But it was no good. No matter how often he called, his wolf was bound by Veyr’s, his change no longer his own.
His skin paled and then flushed red and purple with rage. “You can’t do this to me. I am pureblood! You should be bowing at my feet, begging me to be allowed to live,” he spat, hatred in his eyes as he raged up at Veyr. “I swear, as long as I live, you mutts will never be safe. I’ll always be out there, and one day I’ll be back. I’ll slit your throats while you sleep. I’ll slit that bitch daught—”
Veyr snarled and struck, massive jaws clamping around Jacob’s throat. His fangs sank deep into soft flesh and hot blood spurted to spray his fur. Shaking his head, he tore Jacob’s throat out, spitting the warm gobbet of meat on the floor next to the dying man.
Standing, he folded his wolf back inside to look down at Jacob, his gaze dispassionate as the wolf scrabbled at his ruined throat. He felt Jacob call for the change one last time, and once again, he denied him the shift that would save his life.
“Threaten me, threaten my mate,” he said as Jacob’s struggles grew weaker. “But no one ever threatens my daughter. Not while I am master.”
Turning his back on the dying wolf, he lifted his arm as Cyan reached him, pulling her close into his side. Safe. Secure. Loved.
“My love,” he murmured, brushing her nose with his. “What say we leave Jace to take out the trash and go and rescue Margarite from that daughter of ours?”
With that, Veyr left his enemy in the dirt and walked out of the catacombs with his lady on his arm.
Master of the City.
Always.
Epilogue
“She go down alright?”
Cyan turned from the mirror as she heard Veyr in the
doorway. Rubbing at her hair, still damp from the shower, with a small towel, she took the time to appreciate her mate.
Not the tallest of wolves at court, nor the broadest, but he was plenty tall enough for her and the carved muscles on his lean physique made everything feminine within her sit up and take notice.
“Sleeping like a baby… literally.”
He lounged in the doorway, arms folded, and his eyes light with the amber of his wolf. The look froze her in her tracks, her hands stilling in her hair as she clocked the heat in his gaze. A shiver rolled down her spine, the light wrap she wore after her shower suddenly feeling too heavy, too tight and scratchy. All she wanted to do…all her wolf wanted to do…was strip the damn thing off and arch her back, displaying herself for the virile male who watched her.
“Strip.”
The word was an order, as though he’d read her mind, and backed with the power of his wolf even though he didn’t need it. Not with her. Never with her. She was his. His mate. The master’s woman. The master’s lady.
She dropped the towel to the floor, her hands already on the satin belt around her waist. They shook as she undid it, slowly unlooping the thin tie and sliding it through her hands to tease him. A small growl trickled from his lips, filling the silence in the room, but she ignored him. Ignored the warning in favor of teasing him further.
Sliding the belt free, she dropped it to the carpet unheeded. She kept her eyes on him as she flirted her hands along the edges of the satin robe. He stalked forward a step and stopped. Her gaze roved over him, picking out the swiftly fading bruises and wounds from his battle with the lamia.
Like all wolves, he healed quickly. Any trace of his battle for the master’s position would be gone by the morning. Only the wounds on his soul would remain, and those were hers to deal with. Whatever he wanted, whatever he needed, she would be here.
Like right now.
Lust and arousal filled the air as he took another step forward. The look in his eyes was not that of a civilized man. It was a look from the most primal part of his psyche. A look that claimed ownership over her, lusted after her, and intended to have her.
She hooked a finger in the satin and parted it. Cool air washed over the skin revealed as she slid her hand down her body. His amber gaze followed, heat building with each sliver of skin exposed. Biting her lip, she fought down the shiver and shrugged her shoulders to drop the satin off them. The fabric whispered over her skin, catching on stiff nipples before slithering away to the floor.
Proudly she stood before him, naked as the day she was born, and her head raised in challenge. She was no mere member of the pack to offer him submission. If he wanted her, he would have to take her.
His lip curled back from his teeth, growl intensifying, and then he was there. Three steps brought him just in front of her, so close that the heat of his body beat against hers, an inferno of need, lust and desire. Two more, and he’d backed her up against the dressing table.
His mouth crashed down over hers without preamble. A hard and dominating kiss, it seared her soul as he parted her lips and with a hard thrust of his tongue claimed her mouth. The moan broke from her before she could stop it, clinging to him in need as she kissed him back.
“Moon’s teeth, Cyan,” he broke away to gasp, lips barely brushing hers. “I’ve never been more scared in my life.”
“Shhh,” she soothed, hand smoothing over his broad shoulders and then down his sides. “It’s all over now.”
“I know.” He pulled back to look down at her, and his eyes blazed amber. “But I was so scared I was going to lose you. I can’t lose you. You’re my everything. My sun, my moon and my stars… you’re everything to me, Cyan. I love you. Never doubt that.”
“I won’t,” she whispered, parting her thighs so he could settle between them. “I don’t, and I never will.”
He rumbled in the back of his throat, catching her lips in a torrid kiss again. She whimpered, hips rocking against his. He was hard already, the thick bar of his cock pressing against the lips of her pussy, right where she needed him.
Heat flooded her system, surging through her veins, settling in her core in a hard tight knot of desire. She wanted this, wanted him, in the most primal way possible between a man and a woman.
“Fuck,” he broke away to swear, hand sliding between them as he fumbled with his belt. “I need you. I need to know you’re safe, unhurt… Mine. I need your pussy wrapped around my cock. I need you screaming my name in pleasure as I fuck you.”
She moaned, sound escaping before she could stop it. “Oh yes. Oh god yes, please.”
Fabric tore, and his cock slapped against her. Hot and hard, it left a smear of pre-cum against her soft belly. He reached between them, sliding strong fingers between her pussy lips only to find them already slick with arousal.
“Shit… You’re already hot and wet for me.”
“What do you expect? All these muscles on display for me… All hard and strong and sexy. You want me to not be turned on?” She chuckled. “I was planning on jumping you as soon as you got back in here anyway.”
His lips quirked, amusement in his eyes. “Really now? Jumping me? Need I remind you who is in charge here?”
She laughed, a retort on the tip of her tongue, but he thrust two fingers deep in her pussy. She gasped in pleasure instead. “Oh god.”
“That’s better,” he murmured and he kissed along the side of her neck, pumping lazily with his fingers. “Although ‘master’ is fine.”
She couldn’t answer, just moaned as he twisted his fingers and rubbed against her g-spot. Her limbs were weak, liquid heat flooding her entire body. He upped the ante and pressed his thumb against her clit, rubbing the two sensitive spots in unison.
“That’s it…” he urged. “Just let go. I want to feel you come over my fingers. Want to watch your face as you do.”
The shiver started at her toes and worked its way up her entire body, kissing every inch of skin on the way. It centered in her loins, her pussy tightening and clenching greedily around his fingers. Needing more. Wanting more. Trusting him to give her more.
He did. His movements speed up and then he claimed her mouth again. His tongue thrust against hers, mimicking the movements of his fingers, and she couldn’t resist the siren call of her orgasm any longer. With a muffled cry lost into his mouth, she let go and allowed the waves to crash over her.
It hit hard and fast, a scream breaking from her as ecstasy tumbled through her system, shattering against the inside of her veins and breaking into thousands of pieces. Each tumbled and broke until it felt like her whole body was a mass of pleasure.
He pulled from her as she gasped and shoved her thighs farther apart. Leaning back, her spine arched and head dropped back as she presented herself to him. His purely masculine growl made her shiver, need building within her even though she’d only just come.
“Fuck, you’re gorgeous.”
His warm breath washing over her nipple gave a half-second’s warning before his tongue rasped against it. Leaning back on her elbows, she bit her lip to contain cries of pleasure as he nibbled and sucked on the turgid peak. Her pussy throbbed, aching to be filled as need built again. This was what it was like with Veyr, what it was always like. She could never get enough of him, and now she ached to be filled by his cock.
“Please… Now.” She half whimpered and half begged. He chuckled but didn’t let up his torment of her beaded nipples. Sucking on one, he rolled the other between his fingers and then pinched lightly. Her gasp filled the silence of the room, barely fading away before his cock at her slick entrance tore another from her lips.
Everything in her went still at the feeling of the broad head pressing against delicate tissues. Slowly, maddeningly slowly, he pressed forward, watching her eyes as her pussy stretched around his thick cock.
She mangled her lower lip between her teeth, fighting the urge to cross her eyes in pleasure as the wide head of his cock parted her ever further. He w
as huge, gifted some might say, in the cock department.
Big as he was, she’d never struggled to take him though, not when she was as slick as she was now. He pushed more and she snarled, “Are you fucking me, or tickling me? Get on with it, Master.”
Something dark and dangerous flared in his eyes, but the quirk of his lips warned her a half second before he moved. Slamming forward, he filled her to the hilt in one hard and fast thrust. She whimpered, eyes crossing this time, as her cunt clenched tightly around his cock.
He swore, his control written in hard lines throughout his big body.
“You little minx,” he gasped as he looked down at her. Then he pulled back and thrust into her again.
Conversation ended, their dialogue no longer in words but in movements and actions. The slide of skin on skin, the wet pump of his cock in her pussy, the slap of his balls against her ass as he pulled her knees up to hook them over his elbows.
He drove into her repeatedly, the dressing table slamming into the wall so loudly any guard in the corridor outside had to know what they were up to.
She didn’t care. Let them listen. Let them know the master was fucking his lady. Hard. Just as she liked it.
Dark waves of pleasure rose again, and she moaned, clinging to him. She held on for the ride as his rhythm sped up. He growled, clawed hand raking the dressing table by her hip, the other hard around the back of her waist as he pulled her into each thrust.
She turned her face, burying it against the side of his neck, and savored each long slick slide, his cock so big it pressed against every nerve ending she had and then some. She would never tire of this, being taken by him.
Then, somehow, impossibly, she was on the precipice again. A chasm of pleasure opened up beneath her feet, and she tiptoed to the very edge. Just one more thrust and she would fall over into a maelstrom of bliss. Already the waves rose, reaching greedily for her, and she had to pull away, to hold them off while she waited for Veyr.
“Oh god, Veyr, please… I’m gonna come,” she warned him, her voice soft and breathy.