by Morgan Fox
Folding her arms over her chest, she stared up at him. His dark eyes shimmered with flecks of gold. “How is that exactly?”
Walker eased closer, eradicating all distance between them. “My grandfather was a lycan, remember.”
She arched a brow. “So your family divulges all the secrets of our kind, but then strips you of the power of the wolf.”
“Pretty much,” he said as his arm wrapped around her and pulled her close. “However, if they’d told me what it was going to feel like making love to my mate, I think I would’ve considered other options.”
His lips came down on hers, and his tongue dove deep into her mouth. She suddenly forgot everything around her but the man holding her. The comfort and warmth she found in his touch had her body humming with renewed life. She’d dreamed of finding a man that would possess her heart completely, one that would never want another as he wanted her. Lucky for her, that man seemed to be Walker Helmsley, the one who captured her heart long ago and apparently never released it.
Breaking the kiss, Walker gazed down at her. His lips glistened with the wetness he’d explored in her mouth. “I suggest we take care of business here immediately so I can get you back to my room.”
Her face warm, she smiled and nodded, then turned to lead him to the stairs that would bring them up directly into the morgue. The last storage container was not a place for bodies to lie, but for those who needed entrance into the secret lair. She gently pushed on the door and partially opened it. Using her lycan senses, she couldn’t smell or sense anyone in the room except the dead. She quickly opened the door the remainder of the way and crawled through the opening. Walker did the same.
Once she stood and inhaled a lungful of air, she caught his scent immediately. “He’s been in here,” she mumbled.
“Who?”
Gazing back over her shoulder, she told Walker, “Lance Hickman. He’s been in here, and recently, but I don’t know why.”
She didn’t want to think that while she’d been making love to Walker, Lance suffered so much that her men had to kill him. She took another intake of air and waited for his scent to draw her toward a covered gurney, but it didn’t. Instead, it led her into the hall and in the direction of the main lobby. As she and Walker rounded the corner, her eyes locked on Lance’s. His sun-tanned and well-defined naked body had her gasping. He was aroused, and suddenly so was she.
Lance stared back at her for a long moment, his crystal-blue eyes brightening to an intense shade of gray as he growled, “You!”
Her eyes rounded, and she swallowed hard. “Mr. Hickman.”
Licking his lips, Lance took another step toward her. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
She felt Walker close in behind her, but there was something about Lance that told her he wouldn’t hurt her, something that told her to let him close the distance between them.
She placed her hand on Walker’s chest, stopping his movements. She felt his heart pounding violently against her palm.
Lance growled at Walker, and it was a possessive growl that had Silence wondering if it was such a good idea to have both men in the same room with her. Suddenly, she felt as if the flesh of her body was squeezing too tightly over her bones, suffocating her. The hair on her body stood on end, tingling from her head to her toes. She’d felt the pull of her wolf begging to come out and play. Her wolf was alarmingly attracted to Lance, and that was a dangerous mix.
Walker might own her heart, but whether she wanted to admit it or not, Lance seemed to entice her wolf. With the full moon approaching, she didn’t think she’d have the strength to deny her wolf’s attraction to Lance. Looking into his eyes, feeling the energy pulsing out of him, she knew he desired her and planned to take her. Surprisingly, she didn’t want to stop him.
Chapter Six
“Walker, stop!” she ordered.
“Send him away,” Lance said, growling at the man that smelled too much like the woman he planned to claim. The moment his eyes opened, desire fueled his thoughts and primal instincts called to him, telling him to take her. He wanted to have her, own her.
The woman he was desperate for took a small step toward him. “Lance, I’m Sheriff Silence Foster. We need to talk,” she told him. “Now may not be the time for this.”
His gaze moved back to hers. Blood surged so hard and fast through his veins the pounding left him close to deafness. “Now is the perfect time.” His cock swelled at the need charging through him, and he inclined his head in the direction of the man she called Walker. “Send him away before I kill him.” Walker stepped forward as if he thought his size would intimidate him. The pretty boy wouldn’t stand a chance. He’d easily tear his throat out with one little flick of his powerful hands and claws. Whatever was happening to him didn’t seem to matter anymore. He embraced the change and now craved it more than anything. He growled low in his throat. “I suggest you tell your little pet to leave before he finds himself a permanent guest of the morgue.”
Silence inclined her head in Walker’s direction. “Please let me handle this. Stop interfering. You are only going to make things worse.”
Walker locked gazes with her. His expression of astonishment revealed that he couldn’t believe she wanted him to leave. “You honestly think I’m going to leave so he can fuck you?” He gripped hold of her arm. “I might not be a full lycan, but I can smell what’s happening between you two, and I don’t like it.”
“Walker, please,” she begged.
“What’s going on in here? Oh my God,” muttered another woman who looked like the one he desired.
Silence met her twin’s gaze as more men piled into the room. All looking as menacing as ever, but Lance didn’t care. He wasn’t threatened by anyone or anything. Nothing would stop him from claiming this woman and having her the way the urges running through his body commanded of him.
“Shadow, please take Walker with you and show him where he can be of help. I’m going to talk with Lance.”
The room erupted in argumentative conversation, and Silence placed her hand up to make them stop. “Everyone, please leave us. I’ll be all right.”
“The hell you will,” Walker said with a growl. “I’m not leaving this room.”
“Fine,” Silence said and reached for Lance’s hand. The moment her skin touched his, he felt the impulse to rip her clothing from her body. A jolt of power liquefied his body, igniting something deep and feral within him.
She’s perfect, and she’s mine.
“Come with me,” she told him, pulling him away from Walker and the others.
“Silence, wait,” Shadow called after her, but she didn’t stop. Instead, she pulled him into a room down the hall and closed the door behind them.
The second they were alone, he crushed himself against her, pinning her to the door. He found her mouth and kissed her as if his life depended on it. He moved his hands all over her body, frantic to undress her.
To his relief, she didn’t fight him. The impulse he had was too strong. The electrifying power blazing between them was overwhelming.
He’d removed her shirt and bra in record time and went to work on her body. “Oh God,” she cried out as his mouth clamped down on her nipple, sucking gently at first and then harder until the peak was painfully erect and she was clawing at his shoulders and neck.
Lance was a man consumed by instinct. The only thing he knew was that he wanted this woman, needed her, and apparently she needed him, too.
He bit her nipple, his teeth sinking softly into the tissue of her breast. She hissed, pulling at his hair and clawing his body. Then he felt his nails lengthening into claws, his teeth turning sharp, but the panic he’d felt earlier wasn’t there. Now all he experienced was the raw urge to mount his bitch.
“Take off the rest of your clothes,” he said with a snarl.
She did and was naked before him in seconds. He knelt in front of her, inhaling Walker’s scent. He gazed up at her. “I know you let him fuck you. I can smell h
im all over you.”
She swallowed, her eyes widening.
“I bet he didn’t fuck you like I’m about to do.”
He took hold of her wrist and forced her onto her hands and knees, taking his position behind her ass and spread legs. His cock teased the entrance of her wet pussy, and then with a gasp, he shoved his way into the depths of her cunt. His chest tightened as he began to pound away at her pussy, fucking her as only an animal would.
He gripped her hip with one hand and wrapped his other in the long, golden-blonde strands of her hair, using it like a leash. He wanted her as rough as he could take her, almost as if he were punishing her for fucking another. He’d take her so good and hard he would strike the memory of the other man forever. She’d crave his cock from this day forward.
Sweat poured from his brow and chest as he slammed his dick repeatedly inside her pussy. The slick wetness enveloped his cock. His claws dug into her hip, keeping her at the perfect angle. Her wild pants of arousal were driving him mad.
She bucked her hips, and he knew she was close to release. He could feel her tender pussy squeezing his cock even tighter. Just as he surged his hips forward, the wetness that surrounded his cock grew thicker. She cried out, and he took hold of her hair and yanked her back so that he could fuck her with her back pressed against his chest. On their knees, he wrapped his arm around her waist, anchoring her to him. A wild impulse begged him to taste her. Suddenly, he sank his teeth into her shoulder—the one opposite from where he’d noticed she’d been bitten before.
As he fucked her, driving his cock deep into her saturated cunt, he kept his teeth locked into her flesh. She cried out, again and again as the connection between them seemed to explode. Then in a blinding flash of fury, lust, and need he came, filling her pussy with his release.
A feral growl tore from his chest as he unclamped his mouth from her flesh. Slowly, easing his cock out of her, he sat back on his heels. His breaths came fast as he tried to regain himself. The primal urges he had faded, and his sanity returned.
He looked up to see Silence gathering her clothing and covering her body. A sudden pang in his heart told him he might have been too rough on her, but he couldn’t help it. The rage inside him commanded him to do it.
Holding her gaze, he asked, “Tell me why I just did that to you?”
With her bra and panties on, she turned away from him and began buttoning her shirt. “You were attacked. Do you remember anything about that night?”
The yellow eyes of demons flashed in his mind. “Yes, a little, I mean, I remember a wild dog in the road and I tried to avoid hitting it. When I did, I crashed my truck.”
She slid her legs into her pants. “Do you remember anything else?”
I remember snarling fangs and yellow eyes. I remember death breathing down my neck. “You should just tell me if you know anything. I really don’t have the patience for anything else. I know you know something. Why else would you have come in here and let me fuck you? I’m normally not the kind of guy who does one-night stands, and I’m certainly not the kind of guy that goes around threatening to kill people.” He rose to his feet and yanked a sheet from off the bed and wrapped it around his waist. “I feel like I’m being possessed by something, so if you know anything, please tell me.”
Silence turned and faced him. The expression in her eyes was painfully serious. She moved to stand in front of him, but didn’t touch him. He was glad. As much as he enjoyed her caress, there was something about her that made him lose all traces of sanity.
“Lance, you were attacked by werewolves. You were left for dead, but you didn’t die, and now you’re one of them.”
It wasn’t exactly what he had expected her to say. He turned away from her and ran a stiff hand through his hair. He felt different, stronger, more sexually energized than he’d ever felt, but was that evidence enough that he’d been turned into a mythical creature?
No.
“Look, I appreciate that you’re trying to find humor in my situation, but I’m actually pretty serious about understanding what’s truly going on here. Something’s not right, and judging from your uniform, you’re law enforcement, so I could really use your help.”
She nodded. “As I’ve told you already, my name is Sheriff Silence Foster. You met my twin sister earlier, Dr. Shadow Foster. We are both werewolves. I’ve lived in Silent Falls my entire life. I was named after this town, and I protect the human population from anything that goes bump in the night. That’s why we brought you here to this clinic rather than having you shipped off to the main hospital thirty miles north of here.” She held up her hand as he began to interject, but he thought better of it. Her look was so cold and threatening. The heat of passion no longer filled her blue eyes. “I know this all sounds insane to someone on the outside, but what I’ve told you is true.”
He leaned against the table to his side, his fingers squeezing around the metal. He didn’t want to believe her. He’d prefer that he’d inhaled some chemical warfare shit that gave him wicked inhibitions, but were only temporary. What she was telling him seemed not only surreal and impossible, but permanent.
“Silence, what you’re saying is a bit difficult to comprehend.”
She nodded stiffly. “I realize that, but if you haven’t noticed, while we were in here fucking like animals, the world around us is falling apart. Those lycans that attacked you, for whatever reason, want you back. I won’t let that happen.”
He glanced at her from over his shoulder, his stomach knotting and twisting at the reasons she would try to keep him safe. She didn’t know him, didn’t owe him anything. “Why not just give me to them? Why keep me hidden and protected away?”
“We protect our own, Lance, and whether you like it or not, you are one of us now.”
“You mean a werewolf or ‘lycan’ as you called those trying to get to me.”
“Yes.”
Guilt rocked his gut as he stared at her, flashes of the moments he’d possessed her body so vivid in his mind it was like he was taking her all over again. “Not that I really want to believe any of this, but I have to know one thing. Why was I so compelled to be with you? Why couldn’t I resist the urge to have you? Why did you let me?”
She sucked in a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “I’ve heard of things like this happening to others in my pack, but never has anything like that happened to me.” She swallowed and took a step closer to him. “The wolf is what happened to us, Lance. We’re connected on a primal level, and no other will ever be able to do to me what you just did. I couldn’t have denied you even if I had another choice. I wanted you as much as you wanted me. All I wanted was for you to possess me, claim me. The instinct to be submissive was too much to ignore.”
He cupped her face in his hands. “Is Walker your lover?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Even with him standing beside you, you wanted me?”
She nodded.
“The wolf instinct is that powerful?”
“Yes,” she whispered again. “I’m afraid that if the need ever rose again where our wolves desired each other, no matter the circumstance, I’d never be able to resist. You now own a part of me that no other can.”
“Does that mean you own a part of me now?”
She nodded. “Yes, Lance. We will forever be connected.”
He kissed her softly, and as he slowly pulled away, he caressed her bottom lip with his thumb. Even though the heat of the wolf was not fueling him, commanding him, there was still a part of him that was jealous in his need to have her. “Good. I scored big finding you. You’re hot,” he teased her, and she smiled. Holding her gaze, he cringed as a sharp pain stung his heart. “I’m sorry if I hurt you.”
She glanced down for a moment, her hands pressed flat against his chest. “You didn’t. That’s the one nice thing about being a wolf. We like the rough stuff.”
He brushed his fingers over the soft skin of her cheek and whispered, “That might be a g
ood thing.”
She arched a brow. “Why do you say that?”
“Because we’re about to walk out of this room with everyone on the other side of that door knowing we just had sex.” He paused. His hands cradled the back of her skull, fingers weaving through her silky hair. “Especially Walker.”
Chapter Seven
“Are you out of your mind?” Shadow’s telepathic link to Silence was exceptionally strong and sounded as if she was using a bullhorn to communicate her thoughts. Damn the strength of their psychic bond. The intense invasion into her mind had her automatically raising the shields she’d learned to build over the years to block her thoughts. Telepathy was powerful among lycans and especially so between twins. Shields didn’t always work.
Sharing a psychic link with her sister had come about much earlier than it did for most lycans. For them, the connection began even before birth—a supernatural connection that only twins possessed. Even though Shadow was questioning her about her actions, Silence knew that her sister already understood better than anyone else what had just happened to her.
Her gut churned, and Silence was unwilling to speak on the topic of her and Lance. At the reminder of the man that had ruled over her wolf in a heated instant, she immediately looked around to see who was present in the room. Her eyes settled on the surrounding faces.
Still wearing his deputy’s uniform, Gavin’s familiar brown eyes softened as he glanced down, and his broad shoulders slumped forward when he turned away. He was the closest thing to a brother she’d had, and he was clearly displeased with what had just occurred, but judging was not something he ever did—at least not with her.
Seeing his posture shift and his inability to look her in the eye told her all she needed to know. He was disappointed. However, as a lycan, he understood the unrelenting power a wolf possessed over its mate. She knew that, but it didn’t strike the guilt she felt over her present situation.
The muscles in Declan’s jaw ticked as he held her stare before casting his aqua-blue gaze in another direction. His soot-covered, white T-shirt clung to his defined chest and looked as though at any moment the muscles of his body might burst through the seams.