Gage stood in front of me, his hair dishevelled and with his usual few days of stubble covering his jaw. He had apparently dressed in a hurry in jeans, an untucked tee, work boots and a padded vest, unzipped. He looked wild and unpredictable. I looked at him for a long moment while he coolly glanced over me from head to foot like he was making a new and not altogether pleasant assessment of me.
“What are you?” I said at last, suspending all that I knew for all that I didn’t.
I hadn’t expected him to answer my question with a question, but I should have seen it coming.
“What exactly are you?” he growled.
Eleven
We stood there on the doorstep staring at each coolly for a moment longer than what was really comfortable before I stepped back and let Gage step over the threshold and into my domain. My mind argued with my heart loudly over this one but my heart won out. I’d lived opposite Gage for months and he and Annalise were my friends – I thought they were my friends, at least – and we’d lived without incident for all that time so there was no reason to be afraid of him. My mind, however, was protesting vehemently – I didn’t know what he was and now I suspected, I wasn’t sure I should trust him. Even so, he was in my living room now and I owed it to him to listen to an explanation. The events of the past few days had taught me that much.
As Gage stepped forward, I took a step back, taking care to not turn my back on him. What if I turned around and he was something else? What if I didn’t even have time to turn around?
“What are you?” he said again.
I was tempted to repeat the question back at him but really, it was about time we got past that and got down and dirty with some answers. “Don’t you think you should be giving me some answers? Or do I have to go to the woods and wait for you to cock your leg against a tree?”
Gage looked at me, unblinking, and I saw his pupils’ contract into oval shaped slits. His jaw shifted, longer, lower, his bones seemed to slide under his skin and I caught the flash of his teeth elongating, filling his jaw, then, in the blink of an eye, he was normal again. If I was less sure of myself, if I didn’t know that other beings lived amongst regular people, I would be considering the question of my sanity.
“Werewolf,” he said at last, “but then you know that.”
Know was a loose definition of suspecting something that should be impossible, but then I was the lesson in impossible. There was nothing on earth that should mean the things I could do were possible and yet I could. But a werewolf? I should have seen it coming.
Gage skirted around me, circled maybe, like he was herding his prey and I sidestepped to keep a wide expanse of room around me, giving me room to manoeuvre. I didn’t want to get caught cornered. I shouldn’t be afraid, I told myself as my heart picked up a beat, not in my own home. Not of Gage.
“What are you?” he asked for the third time while sweeping a look that took me in from head to toe, a look that made my heart race.
“Witch.”
I didn’t expect him to smile; it was just a flicker of his lips turning upwards at the edges. “Thought so,” he said.
“You knew?” I asked, surprised.
He shrugged. “Could smell your magic.”
I knew magic could leak, for want of a better word, and others could see it if it was left unchecked but that it had a scent too? Ewww. I’d taken more steps back than I thought I had and my back bumped into the wall. I made to slide the few inches along the wall to the hallway but Gage was in front of me in a flash, blocking my route.
“Don’t be afraid.”
“I’m not afraid.” But I didn’t sound very convincing and my heart was clamouring.
“I can hear your heart race.” Gage’s face was inches from mine and I could smell the woods on him, the scent of dew-soaked grass, leaves and earth mingled with something... other. I held my breath as he dipped his head toward me and whispered in my ear. “I can hear your lungs shudder. I know you’re afraid. Don’t be.”
“Is this the part where I’m supposed to say ‘my, what big teeth you have’?” I asked, rolling my head to look him in the eye. There was barely any space between us and I felt my fear abate into something more... lusty. The danger I’d been in while running, the adrenaline of my magic, the proximity of Gage; excitement swam unabated through me.
Gage huffed a low laugh and the space between us decreased millimetre by millimetre until his lips were brushing on mine, teasing my lips until the blood rushed to them, parting and allowing his tongue to slide into my mouth to tangle with mine. I could taste him, salty and sweet and delicious. His arms circled me, pulling me to him until I was pressed against his body and I wrapped my arms around him, suddenly desperate to have him ever closer, his heat flooding me.
He slipped his hand down my spine back to rest in the hollow of my back, pulling me into him, before travelling back up my body as his other hand caressed my hair, coiling it through his fingers, before travelling down, brushing my collarbone and lingering at the first closed button of my shirt. Through his urgent kisses I felt the button pop off and then the next. In the distant recesses of my mind, in the parts that weren’t governed by desire, I registered the sound of buttons clattering to the floor. He wasn’t wasting time unbuttoning my shirt; he was slicing the buttons off and then pushing the shirt off my shoulders. He barely broke away to shrug his vest on to the floor then rip off his own t-shirt before landing kisses on me again, my mouth, my cheeks, my jaw, leaning in to trail down my neck to my breasts, the skimpiest of material left between me and him. I swear he growled, a guttural, animal sound, and I pulled him to me again, my hands running through his hair and he hoisted me up, my legs wrapped round him for purchase as he held me against the wall. I could feel him push against me, hard and urgent, and I couldn’t help arch my back and drive against him as he tore my bra so we were nothing but skin against skin.
I felt the wall slide from behind me as Gage tightened his arms about me and tipped us to the floor. With his body pressed against me, and a hand behind my back so I didn’t thump my body against the wood, he lowered himself so he was sprawled between my legs. He held me to him, the intensity of his kisses making me faint and desperate as one hand fumbled with the button and zipper of my jeans. I heard him curse as he tugged them open. I arched, my body aching for him. It would have been so easy to shuck off my jeans and take him into me right now, to bask in his urgency and desire, to feel his heat surround me, to take comfort in how much he wanted me.
I barely heard the loud banging at the door over the hunger racing through me.
“Stella!” yelled a female voice. “Stella, it’s me.” I gasped and my head fell back from Gage and I lay there on the floor under him, while we panted air into gasping lungs..
“Stella, I just came to check you’re okay. Please don’t be mad at me.” I could imagine Annalise peering through the window, trying to see if I was at home because where else would I be this early in the morning? Where else should I have been? Not out running through the woods certainly, not to face a wolf with... pink highlights. I was glad I’d moved the sofa so that it was blocking us from view.
Gage’s hand slipped upwards, trailing slowly up my body until he lay still, fully resting against me. While my breathing was becoming more even, he most definitely had not calmed down if the bulge prodding at my thigh was anything to judge by. I looked into his strange, animal eyes and saw my reflection, hair pooling behind my head, wild, flushed skin.
I was almost naked, on my floor, with my wolf-man neighbour.
I didn’t quite know what to make of that.
“Okay, Stella, maybe you’re not there, but just in case you are, I’m really sorry. I should have said something but ... so should you!” said Annalise, indignation etched into her last words.
She was quiet for a moment like she was waiting for an answer then I heard her stomp off the porch. I guessed she would walk up the driveway and be in her house within a minute, but it didn’t matter.
The moment was broken and she’d probably just saved me from doing something I’d regret. And really enjoy. Then regret.
Gage kissed me, long and slow without the fever of before and before I could change my mind – and part of me wanted to sink back into him and finish what we’d started – I had my hands on his shoulders and was pushing him gently, but firmly, off me. He was startled at first, confused even.
“We could continue this in the bedroom,” he whispered, his voice singing to the inner part of me that really, really wanted to. “Take our time.”
I hardly trusted myself to talk. “We can’t,” I said, my voice barely a whisper.
“We can.” He dipped his head to nuzzle the hollow of my neck, his stubble brushing against my cheek as he lifted his head to nibble my ear lobe.
“We really can’t.”
“We were about to,” Gage pointed out. Oh, as if I didn’t know that all too well.
I pushed him a little further up and all too late, as Gage gazed down at me, a smile broadening across his face, I remembered that I was completely naked from the waist up. He bent his head and before I could wonder what he was doing, he licked me, starting at my naval and running upwards, through my cleavage. My eyes widened in surprise. His tongue was rougher against my skin than a human’s should be, not that I had ever let a human lick me, and it was deeply, oddly, intimate. He kissed the recess between my collarbones and looked at me almost dreamily.
“You taste lovely,” he murmured, his words vibrating on my skin then he merely brushed his lips against mine and rolled off me to lie on his back on the cool floor. We lay there side by side, staring at the ceiling. Finally he turned his head to me, eyes flickering down and I groped the floor for my shirt, finally finding it under my fingertips and I eased it to me a fraction at a time until I could clutch a chunk of cotton. There was barely any point pulling it on now it was missing its buttons so instead I just held the shirt across me as I swung upright and rested my back against the wall, my knees self-consciously drawn to my chest.
“So a witch, huh?” Gage stretched out on the floor and crossed his legs.
I raised my eyebrows. “A wolf?”
Gage nodded.
“It’s you I hear howling in the woods?”
Another nod. “Or one of the pack.”
“Do I know the pack?”
“Annalise, for one.” Of course, the smaller wolf with the pink flecks. A dead giveaway. “You know others but it’s really not my place to say. They’ll reveal themselves if they want to.”
“And you knew what I was?”
“Yup.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?” I asked, confusion etched across my face.
“Wasn’t sure if you knew.” I frowned at him, so he continued. “I only get a hint of it now and then, not often but it’s stronger when you use it, like today.”
“Does everyone know?” What I really meant was: how many wolves in Wilding knew what I was?
“Some probably realised, like I did. That show this morning would have confirmed it.” Gage shrugged and I tried not to admire his strong chest, finely sprinkled with hair – fur? “I told you, you don’t have to be afraid of me. I won’t hurt you.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” I said at last and I really wasn’t. Not now, anyway. Earlier today was debatable. “I’ve never seen a werewolf before. I didn’t think they existed!”
“Just like witches are only in fairytales?”
“Touché.” Daemons and vampires were real, too. Why shouldn’t there by werewolves as well? Goodness knows what else was out there; I just hadn’t expected to meet anything supernatural in Wilding, which just goes to show how little time I had spent thinking about my new world properly.
“I still want to take you to bed.” He rolled so that he was sat facing me, looking like he couldn’t decide whether to reach out for me or keep his hands to himself.
I shook my head, slowly. “It’s not going to happen.”
“Today,” Gage finished, a hint of a smirk on his face as he looked over his shoulder, over the sofa. “Coast is clear,” he said, easing to his feet and holding out his hand so I could take it. He pulled me to my feet like I was made of nothing but feather light cotton candy and I had to quickly adjust my shirt so it wasn’t about to slide off and give him a full frontal. Again. “I prefer you without that.”
When I said nothing he just shook his head, almost sadly. “I’ll make coffee,” he said and loped out of the room and down the hallway, leaving me stood there, barely clothed and bemused, and wondering if I should throw him out rather than let him pad around my house like he lived here.
I stooped to the floor, and scrambled for the buttons he’d shed, and my ripped bra, and with them in one hand, my shirt held to me with the other, I jogged into my bedroom. I balled up the shirt and dumped it in a drawer, the buttons on top of my dresser and pulled out a new bra and a t-shirt. No buttons, thankfully. The bra I dropped in the bin. I remembered to zipper my jeans. There wasn’t much I could do about my flushed skin... or the memory, or the lust that was rapidly becoming placed with guilt when Evan flashed into my mind. Evan who had just gone off and still hadn’t sent word I thought angrily, not like that really justified anything at all.
When I finally had myself under control enough to go into the kitchen, I found Gage lounging against the counter. He’d evidently retrieved his t-shirt from the floor while I’d been in my bedroom because he’d pulled it on. He had set out mugs and found the creamer I’d started stocking and the sugar bowl. The pot was perking nicely filling the kitchen with the aroma of coffee grounds. I sat and waited and thought about all the things I suddenly wanted to ask him. All the things that would get my mind off sex anyway.
“What were you doing out in the woods?” I asked at last when Gage had picked up the pot and poured steaming liquid into my cup.
“Running,” he said, pouring for himself second. “We prefer the night and the early morning, when it’s less obvious. Though most people round here are familiar with wolves, it’s not something we go out of the way to advertise.”
“Why did you all surround me?”
Gage’s forehead creased. “We didn’t surround you. Approached you, I guess, because our otherness was attracted to your otherness. I did tell you not to go out at night.” He waved the spoon at me like I was getting a ticking off.
“Because of my magic?”
“Because we’re wolves and it isn’t always safe.”
“It wasn’t night, anyway,” I protested. “Just early morning.”
“Same difference.”
“I can’t stay indoors. I like running.”
“I’m not expecting you to. I’ve always made sure the pack respected your boundaries and that won’t change now. If any other packs join us, I’ll warn you, okay?”
“You can ask them to do that?”
Gage nodded. “I can for our pack and others have to ask permission to hunt our territory.” He thought for a moment. “Besides, you can clearly look after yourself. I’ve never seen anyone just disappear. How did you do that?”
It was my turn to look nonchalant. “I can just do it. I don’t know how.”
“There’s a lot we don’t know about each other,” he mused.
“You want to start a witch-wolf outreach programme?” I stirred sugar into my coffee and sipped it while it was still scalding hot. It concerned me that we had gone from being entwined on my floor to talking like nothing had happened in a few easy steps. I had expected to feel uncomfortable, awkward, but I just felt easy with him. Uncomplicated.
“I think we’ve said our hellos.”
“Is Annalise pissed at me?”
“Worried. She didn’t want you to find out about us. Thought it might scare you off and she likes you.”
“You can tell her I’m not going anywhere. This is my home.” And it was, I realised. I wasn’t giving it up, or going anywhere. Not anytime soon. I could, I would, have a life here.
&n
bsp; “She’ll be glad to hear that. I am.” Gage caught my eye and he held it until I broke away to gaze at my coffee. From under my eyelashes, I watched Gage raise his cup to his lips and take a swallow. I wanted to feel embarrassed that we’d nearly ripped each other’s clothes off and nearly had sex on my living room floor but I really couldn’t bring myself to be. But, my nagging conscience knew what we’d done wasn’t right and when I thought that, I thought of Evan and I jumped, tipping a dribble of coffee over me. Gage snatched a cloth off the counter and passed it to me and I dabbed at my jeans before I could. Shit. Shit. Shit.
I hadn’t realised he’d spoken until he said my name softly and I looked up, guiltily. He was standing next to me, close enough that I could inhale his earthy scent. “I said, why don’t you come out with me tonight? We could go to the movies again. Or out to dinner. A date.”
“I can’t,” I sputtered.
“It’s the daemon, right?”
I closed my eyes and nodded. When I didn’t speak, Gage sighed and moved backwards and took his seat at the table across from me again. He rested his wrists on the table, big hands surrounding the mug.
“You knew what he was too?”
“Of course. And he knows what I am too.” Gage seemed surprised that I’d asked that.
“He never said.” I felt bewildered. So that meant Étoile must have known too and neither of them had said anything to me. But I remembered Étoile had told me not to trust anyone; perhaps this is what she meant. It was all muddled in my head. They were so keen on me keeping myself safe and practising my magic, but neither thought it fit to mention that I was living next to wolves. Wolves who liked to roam in a pack throughout the woods.
“He should have. Or at least he should have taught you how to recognise others. You can recognise other witches, right?”
Unruly Magic Page 18