by Nalini Singh
He reached out to run his hand over her thigh and the embers glowed a deep, hot red. “You have no idea how much I enjoy corrupting you.” A squeeze. “It’s going to make me crazy to think of you lying on those sheets, your skin creamy, your curves bitable. I’ll have to stroke myself to sleep, and damn, it’ll be a pale substitute.”
His sexuality was so raw, so honest, far more earthy than her own…but she was starting to believe she might just be able to handle it. It aroused her to lush readiness when he talked that way—and he knew it. “I did,” she murmured, deciding to torment him in turn.
“What?”
Putting down the tool she’d been using, she went to her knees, placed one hand on his shoulder and leaned in to whisper in his ear. “Stroke myself.” She’d been a mess of need by the time he’d walked her home the previous night.
His growl echoed over the stone walls. “Witch.”
She laughed, the sound soft, husky. He made her feel strong and wild and brave, her wolf daring to rub up against his own. She wanted, needed to take care of him in turn—it continued to frustrate her that he’d gone stubborn on her when it came to whatever it was that was putting increasing marks of strain on his face.
“Just tired from the late shifts. Don’t worry about it.”
She knew it was far more than that, but even a hint of confrontation on the issue made him shut down, and there was a point beyond which her wolf simply refused to push. It worried her on the innermost level, because their relationship could not survive if he wouldn’t share his problems—it would savage her to see him hurting without being able to do anything about it, make her feel useless rather than a partner.
Grace had no intention of permitting that to happen, and if confronting him about it wasn’t going to work, then she’d pet, adore, and persuade the truth from him. Submissives could be as relentlessly stubborn as any dominant—and this one was falling too hard for her man not to do everything in her power to rid the shadows that haunted him. “Vivienne told me there’s a fair not far from us,” she said. “Will you go with me?”
His eyes were ringed with a fine circle of yellow when he answered, and she knew the wolf was looking out at her. “If you promise to go necking with me afterward.”
The idea of necking with Cooper made the embers turn molten. Which was how she ended up walking hand in hand with him through the happy chaos of the fair that had set up about a half hour’s drive from the edge of den territory. He bought her cotton candy, and reminded of a childhood incident, she found herself telling him about her family, both the present and the past.
“I still miss my mama and papa,” she admitted. “I feel disloyal to Milena and James for it, but I think they understand.”
“Of course they do.” He hugged her to his side. “Just because your parents are gone doesn’t mean you’ll ever forget the way they loved you and how you loved them back.” Fingers playing with her hair.
“I didn’t understand for a long time that they were never coming back. When I did…I cried all night, until I made myself sick.” She reached up to link her hand with the one he had on her shoulder. “You understand.” He’d lost his parents, too, though not in the violence that had taken her own.
“Yes.” A rough agreement before he stole the last of her cotton candy and teased her into a smile, then led her to the dazzlingly lit up spokes of the old-fashioned Ferris wheel. “Having fun?” he asked as they slid into the gently swinging bench seat.
“Yes.” She snuggled into the heat of him after he pulled down the safety bar and their seat moved forward a spot. “Are you?”
“Yes, but I’m really waiting for the necking.” His fingers brushed over the delicate fabric of the fitted sunshine yellow cardigan she wore buttoned up over a white tank. “You’re cold.”
“A little. I should’ve brought a jacket.”
He held her closer as they slowly reached the top of the wheel, the view dazzling. Leaning down, he nuzzled a kiss above her ear. “Or we could make out right here, warm ourselves up.”
His caresses felt good. Possessive. Regardless of all else, Grace loved that about Cooper, loved that she didn’t have to wonder where she fit in his life. When he bit down on her lower lip, she bit back. His chest rumbled against her breasts. “Do that again.”
The low-voiced request made her blush—and tip her face up for another kiss. He gave her that, more, before running his lips over her jaw and down her throat. Grace was so used to his kisses that she forgot he’d never gone for her neck before. It shocked her when fear overwhelmed her in a brutal wave, her wolf telling her not to move, not to incite the predator who had his teeth so close to her carotid, her jugular.
He heard the rapid stutter of her heart, sensed her incipient panic, because he raised his head at once. “I’m not demanding submission.” It was an irritated growl. “When and if I ever do, it’ll be because we’re playing a bedroom game. Got it?”
Grace’s wolf quivered at the anger in his voice…but it was also aware of the protective way he continued to hold her. “How would you like it if an alpha wolf went for your throat?” she said instead of backing down.
Cooper smiled, slow and wide, because there’d been no fear in those words, only feminine outrage. If he had to make Grace mad to get her to forget the dominance imbalance between them, he’d frustrate, aggravate, and annoy her as much as possible. “I’d tell Hawke he wasn’t my type.”
A feminine snarl as the wheel began to sweep around at full speed.
Delighted, he tipped up her chin and nipped playfully at her nose. “God, I hope you make that sound when we’re naked.”
She nipped back. Hard.
“Ouch.” He rubbed his nose. “That wasn’t nice.”
Glaring at him, she tucked her head back against his chest. He allowed himself to grin, his wolf smug. Grace might not realize it, but they’d just taken one hell of a big step in their relationship. Pretty soon, he’d have his engineer snarling at him in bed while she raked her nails down his back.
Grumpy as she was with him, however, and given the failure of his earlier attempt, he wasn’t expecting her to remind him he’d promised to take her necking. Instantly aroused, he drove them deep into a secluded part of the forested territory around the den. “Come here,” he said once he’d brought the vehicle to a stop, his wolf in his voice.
Grace shivered and undid her safety belt, but instead of obeying his order, she slid back her door. “Outside.” A whisper.
It was cold out, and he didn’t like her being uncomfortable, but he had the sudden realization that his submissive lover was trying to set things up so she’d be far less likely to panic. Sliding back his own door, he walked out to meet her at the front of the car. Already, he could see nerves in her movements. Not giving her time to stew, he picked her up and perched her on the hood, moving to stand between her legs.
She gasped, went still, her hands on his shoulders. But then his sweet, sexy, incredibly strong Grace said, “Can I kiss your neck?”
He groaned. “Anytime.”
Angling her head, one hand cupping his nape, she brushed her lips shyly along the column in an intimacy he rarely allowed. The majority of dominants were choosy about who they permitted that particular caress. He knew that was why she’d asked. If she’d attempted to touch him there without permission, implicit or explicit, he might’ve reacted in anger—except of course, it was Grace. He would’ve done exactly what he was doing now and held her to him with a gentle grip in her hair.
Shuddering at the pleasure of feeling her tongue flick out to taste him, he let the wolf rumble in his chest, felt her arousal scent the air. “I want to lick you up,” he said, playing the fingers of his free hand over her hip. “Spread your thighs and suck and bite and taste until you come.”
A tremor rippled over Grace’s frame. “It wouldn’t take long.” The intimate whisper was a fist around his rigid erection.
Teeth grazed his throat an instant later.
; “Grace.” He fisted his hand more tightly in her hair. “You owe me two now.”
He felt her thighs tense as she squeezed, hazy brown eyes meeting his for a blinding instant as she lifted her head from his neck…to lean back a little, arch her throat in an act of conscious trust that humbled him. Shuddering, he ran a finger down the slender column. “Such pretty skin, so easy to mark.” He stroked again. “Should I suck hard, Grace? Leave a bruise no one will mistake?”
She whimpered but didn’t change her position, and that sound, it wasn’t one of fear-drenched submission.
“I think you like that idea.” Leaning in, he flicked his tongue over her pulse, drawing the erotic musk of her into his lungs. “What if I did the same thing to these beautiful breasts, hmm?” A brush of his knuckles over one ripe mound. “Those particular marks would be for my eyes alone. I’d lick at each until it faded, suck another.”
Her arms rose, one going around his shoulder, the hand of the other on the back of his head. “Stop talking.”
The breathless command made his lips curve. “But you like it.” Her arousal spiked with every one of his words. “When I have you open and wet under me, I’ll make it a point to tell you—”
Her mouth closed over his. Groaning, he held her in place, devouring her lips, sucking on her tongue, drowning in the scent of her until she pushed at his shoulders. “Air,” she gasped.
Flattening his hands on the cold metal of the hood, he heaved out breath after breath, his head hanging low. He wanted another kiss, wasn’t sure he could control himself from going further. Not with her so aroused and soft around him. But he knew she wasn’t ready, wasn’t at the point where she’d trust him not only in front of her, but at her back. He wanted everything before he tumbled her into bed, because there was no way he was going to be able to resist fulfilling his fantasies about watching her move against him as he mounted her.
Warm fingers on his nape. “Why did you shave off most of your hair?”
“Don’t you like it?” His wolf stretched out.
“I didn’t say that.” She continued to stroke him. “You look good either way.”
He wasn’t a vain man, but he enjoyed being petted by Grace. “For convenience.”
“I like the way the bristles feel.” Her cheek rubbing against his temple. “Did you really get this scar”—a single finger trailing over his cheek—“from fighting a rabid bear?”
“Yes,” he admitted. “I was young, a bit of an idiot.” A juvenile, he’d come upon the bear chasing two petrified young wolves. He’d thrown the pups onto a high branch and taken on the bear when it became clear the maddened animal wouldn’t allow itself to be led away from the children. “I managed to avoid getting bitten, but it clawed me. This wound and the one on my back didn’t heal right for some reason.”
“They only make you sexier.”
He arched his neck in a silent invitation, had the pleasure of feeling her suck hard enough to leave a mark. Possessive wolf.
“And,” she said, licking over the mark that delighted him on every level, “there were pups’ lives at stake.” Nipping kisses along his throat, the scent of peaches warmed against skin a sensual caress. “You’d do it again if necessary, wouldn’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess I’m still a bit of an idiot.” He held her face against him, hissed out a breath as she bit down over his pulse. “That’s three, bad girl.”
Her thighs squeezed…and this time when she tipped back her head, there was only anticipation in the arch of her spine.
That was when he felt it, the wild howling from his wolf that sounded the start of the mating dance.
Chapter 10
GRACE STARED AT the mark on her throat the next morning.
“Now everyone will know you’re mine.”
Shivering at the memory of the way he’d run his finger over the spot when they finally got home after making out like teenagers, Grace decided not to cover it up with makeup. She was proud to be Cooper’s. And it wasn’t as if her packmates had any doubts about his intentions, she thought with a delighted laugh, her entire body humming with anticipation for the night to come. The fact her wolf had accepted him at her throat…
Happy and excited and a little bit terrified—in the breathstealing way of a woman who knew a sexy, dangerous man would soon be in her bed—she went to work with a smile on her face, ready to handle the teasing.
What she was not ready for was for her brother and sister to turn up. The two took one look at the unmistakable mark on her throat and lost it, their eyes turning an identical wolf amber swirled with green.
“Are you insane, Grace?” Pia yelled, having dragged her out into the sunshine-drenched forest so they could talk without being overheard, her petite size no indication of her temperament. “The man is a lieutenant! Not only that, he’s a lieutenant with a reputation for being a total hard-ass. He eats submissives like you for breakfast!”
Slender Rev was more elegant in his choice of words but no less violent in his repudiation. “You need someone gentle, someone who knows to treat your wolf with care. Thank God we talked Dad out of coming with us—he’d be ready to spill blood after seeing that bruise on your neck.”
As she opened her mouth to point out that the “bruise” was a very welcome love bite and that she’d seen plenty like it on the throats of Revel’s various lovers, her sister went off again, so she folded her arms and waited. Pia would eventually run out of steam, or pause to catch a breath. Meanwhile Rev would wait for Grace’s reply to rebut her words. It was an aggravatingly familiar pattern—but she knew the doofuses were freaked out because they loved her.
Her wolf sighed in exasperation, put its head on its paws, and waited.
Except the pattern altered in a rush of fury as another man snarled into the clearing. “Are you all right?” was Cooper’s first question, his irises ringed with that distinctive feral yellow that said his wolf was riding him.
“I’m fine.” Shifting closer, she put her hand on his chest. “What’s the matter?”
“What’s the matter?” It was a snap of sound. “I get a report that two unfamiliar dominants hauled you bodily out of the den, and you ask me that?”
Suddenly infuriated, she narrowed her eyes. “Don’t you use that tone of voice with me.” She would not take it, not from anyone, and especially not from the man with whom she intended to share skin privileges both intimate and precious.
His response was to shove her behind the wall of muscle that was his body. “You”—his words were snapped out at Pia and Rev—“have three seconds to explain why you dared lay hands on her.”
“She’s our sister.” All black hair and wolf eyes, Pia was magnificent in her anger—she would also be mincemeat if Cooper took offense at her aggression. “And you have no right to use your position to force her to share skin privileges.”
Grace wanted to beat her head against a mountain of brick at that ugly statement from her generous-hearted, talk-before-she-thought sister. But she didn’t have time, because Cooper’s claws had shot out, a violent growl coloring the air. Slipping around his body and gripping at his arms with her own claws when he picked her up and attempted to put her back, she raised her voice to be heard over the cacophony of her siblings’ cries for her to get away, to run.
“Cooper. Cooper!” Twisting her head when she felt Pia and Revel move, she said, “No!”
They halted, unvarnished shock in their expressions. Grace never yelled. Not at them.
Satisfied she’d bought a fraction more time, her feet still dangling off the ground, she leaned forward and did the bravest thing she’d ever done in her life. She bit Cooper hard on the jaw…and got no response aside from a slightly irritated snarl, his gaze locked on her siblings. “Cooper,” she said, digging her claws deeper into his flesh, “you ignore me now and that’s it. We’re done.”
Her desperate gamble worked, his gaze ricocheting to her, the yellow so bright, it was a shocking kind of beauty. “They challenged me. Th
ey said I hurt you.”
“I know.” Allowing her own wolf to rise to the surface, to guide her, she held his gaze…and wasn’t afraid, not of his anger. Because even though she’d bitten him, clawed him, he held her with a gentleness that was a silent rebuttal to any accusation of abuse. “And I know I’m asking a great deal, asking you to go against your every instinct, but please don’t hurt them.”
His lashes came down, thick and straight and inky black. Lifted again. Yellow eyes stared at her, and she knew the wolf was listening but wasn’t convinced, especially when her siblings continued to yell in the background.
Blowing out a breath, she concentrated on Cooper and played her ace. “How will you face my mother if you send Pia and Revel home in pieces?”
A pause, then—“I’d tell her she birthed stupid pups.”
Dark growls from the pups in question, but she knew the danger had passed. Cooper’s response had been sharp, sarcastic. “Thank you,” she whispered, because it was a gift he’d given her, this dominant wolf whose instinct it was to respond to any challenge with a show of violent force.
His next words were subvocal, for her ears only. “I like your claws. Next time, use them on my back while I’m inside you.” Wrapping an arm around her waist after that wicked request, he tucked her to his side, ignoring her attempts to check what damage she’d done to his forearms.
“I should break every bone in your bodies for that display of insubordination,” he said to Pia and Revel, his tone so coldly harsh that her siblings went quiet at last, a little of the color leaching from their skin. “But,” he continued, “that would hurt Grace, so you get a single free pass.”
Grace met her siblings’ eyes. “You do it again, you deserve anything he dishes out.” The hierarchy existed for a reason and could only be bent so far. Cooper had gone well beyond what might be expected of him, and she wouldn’t ask it of him again.
“You’re mad at us.” Revel sounded lost.