by Erica Woods
Vulnerable. She looked so vulnerable.
She’s fine.
Lucien might not have said anything, but the cold bastard would keep his silence unless something needed to be told.
‘She’s fine’ didn’t count. Not to him.
Know she’s fine.
If her injury had become infected or re-opened, I’d have scented it.
“Ruarc . . .”
Hating the stark vulnerability in her voice, I leaned down and kissed her. Kissed her until she melted beneath me, until she arched her back and sweet moans spilled from her lips like drops of the sweetest honey.
Mine.
I drew back and looked down at my half-naked female.
Air was sucked from my lungs at the sight greeting me, leaving them straining.
I couldn’t stop staring.
My mouth watered at the thin, lace panties barely covering her mound. Black. And so thin I could scent her arousal; the sweet fragrance of my female.
Proof that she wanted me.
A deep, savage snarl rose from the deepest recesses of my beastly soul, and if I’d doubted for a second Hope was made for me, that doubt would have vanished at her reaction.
She shivered.
Fucking shivered, and her lips parted on a moan.
This time, I was the one incapable of forming words. All I could think about was getting to that soft, hot flesh and making her scream my name.
Can’t think. My female . . .
Her taste was so close. Her mound, waiting. Waiting for my tongue. But . . .
Couldn’t move. Couldn’t bring myself to remove that last piece of clothing shielding her.
Don’t wanna scare her.
Somehow, Hope knew. With a nervous half-smile, she lifted her hips, telling me without words that it was okay.
Half a second later her panties lay shredded on the floor.
I parted her legs and just stared. Pink and flushed.
Perfect.
A fierce surge of possessiveness made my breath catch on a snarl.
No one else would ever see this. No one!
I ignored the part of me that knew I’d have to share. It was possible I’d be beating up my pack brothers on a regular basis, but it would be worth it. Was no doubt in my mind they’d all agree it was worth it.
She’s worth everything.
I breathed deep, took in her sweet scent, the slightly spicy undertone of her arousal. She smelled like desire. Like warm, hot female. Like coming home at the end of a battle. Like Hope. My Hope.
My balls ached to empty inside her. The steel my cock had become threatened to shred my pants. Wanted her. Wanted her so badly it hurt.
Want to see her convulse with pleasure, to know it was me who gave it to her.
I don’t know how long I stared at her core, fighting the urge to bite her soft thighs, to mark her as mine and bind her to me for all eternity—with or without her permission.
She looked so soft. So inviting. So mine.
But when I drew a deep breath through my nose, eagerly taking in another lungful of her perfect, female scent, I caught the beginning rise of the only scent that had the power to stop me in my tracks. The only scent that could kill my desire at this point.
The scent of fear.
I pulled back. Looked up. Froze.
What the fuck?
Her face was ashen. Big eyes wide with emotions I knew all to well. Terror. Anguish. Fucking regret.
Already she regretted this. Regretted me.
Should have known.
I wasn’t right for her. Was too big. Too ugly. Too scarred and savage and hard for someone like her. Someone so perfect.
“Sorry,” I muttered and leaned further back.
My chest was splitting. Ripping straight down the middle and exposing the useless muscle pumping acid into my blood.
But I’d gladly accept that pain if it meant my heart would fall out and stop. Fucking. Aching.
“R-Ruarc . . .” Hope’s voice was barely audible. A whisper of a thin sound among the rustling of sheets as she covered herself up.
Hiding. From me.
“Don’t.” My tone was too harsh, but I couldn’t help it. My female was scared of me.
I’d failed her.
My stomach heaved like I was going to be sick. Thick despair clawed at my throat, and I could no longer look at her. Couldn’t bear to see disgust twisting her face or fear shining in eyes that had been so trusting, so welcome only minutes before.
“It’s not y-you, Ruarc.” Her voice broke. “It’s . . . it’s them.”
My head snapped around, took in her too-pale face, the nightmares swimming in her eyes. “Who?”
She shuddered—at my too-soft voice or the expression on my face. Her throat worked as she attempted to swallow. To speak.
“Who?” I demanded. Was ready to fucking murder.
“The men who . . . who had me.”
The men who had her?
My world went black. She said something else but I couldn’t hear it over the roaring in my ears.
Rage licked up my chest. Wrapped around my heart. Burnt.
Took all my effort to keep my body still. To not explode out of my skin and rip the room to shreds in my fury. They hurt her. They did something to her, something that made her fear—
A loud, furious snarl.
Mine.
A roar.
Still mine.
Words refused to form on my tongue. My jaw clenched too tight for me to speak. Fangs had already descended, my beast howling for blood while rage blazed through us both.
Several seconds passed. I pushed. And pushed. And when the words came, they were warbled. Distorted. Ugly. “What. Happened.”
I couldn’t look at her. If she cried I would lose it. If I caught a glimpse of pain on her face, I would shed my human skin and go on a rampage unlike anything this world had seen since the Beast of Gévaudan.
“They would—” Her voice broke again, a soft sob escaping. The rage I felt in that moment flayed skin from muscle and stripped tendons and tissue from bones. It left nothing untouched, nothing alive. It burnt through me, maiming and destroying and annihilating, until all that was left was a smoking carcass and a few, brittle bones.
If I turned to her, if I showed her how close to the edge I was . . .
She’d run screaming from the room.
“Tell me.” It was a command. Harsh and brutal and with edges that cut.
Couldn’t help it. Was fucking wrecked.
Another sob.
Fangs pierced my bottom lip.
“They would . . . they would look at me. They’d look and scare me, but nothing else, okay?” Her voice rose at the end, shrill, like she was trying to convince us both it hadn’t been that bad. That it wasn’t enough to send me into a tailspin of murderous rage.
“They’d what?”
Another sob.
Another hole in my lip.
“They’d spread me and . . . look,” she whispered.
And then it clicked. Her sudden fear. Her frozen body. It’d all happened when I stopped to memorize the beauty laid before me.
They’d forced her legs apart and splayed her open for their own amusement.
I pushed my rage down. Further and further, until it was buried in a red ball of destruction I would unleash when I was far, far away from my female.
When the lithbhárs who hurt her was within my grasp.
It took all my concentration and all my willpower to hide away the lethal fury riding me. When my claws retracted and my fangs shrank enough that I could run my tongue over them without cutting myself, I turned.
The sight greeting me pushed at my straining control until my whole body shook.
Hope’s face was buried in her hands. Her shoulders were shaking. What little I could see of her face was pale, almost translucent. The fragility of her human state hit me straight in the chest, made me that much more aware of the grave responsibility I would gain if she becam
e my mate.
When. When she became my mate.
I wanted this female. Wanted her with a fierceness bordering on the irrational. In the short time I’d known her, she’d come to mean everything. If she’d let me, I’d mate her right here, right now. And as soon as she was ready, she’d be mine. Consequences be damned!
“My Hope . . .” I tried for a croon. It came out sounding like rusted nails.
Her shoulders continued to shake. The soundless sorrow sent shards of silver spikes through my heart. The trauma she’d been through was peeking out in bits and pieces, shredding me more each time.
At some point she’d have to let it all out. Grief, anger, and sorrow. And I’d be there.
Every step of the way.
I’d stand guard while all her demons were expunged and her tormentors lay rotting in the ground. Preferably in pieces. Having died in agony. Dreadful agony. They would scream, and beg, and plead, and I’d tear them apart with my bare hands, slice them from hip to sternum, rip away arms and legs while they cried—
Claws shot from the tip of my fingers and sliced holes in the mattress.
I growled at my own carelessness and turned my thoughts away from her tormentors.
Several deep breaths later—after my claws had retracted and I was once again in control—I scooped Hope into my arms, settling with my back against the headboard and a heap of warm, shaking female in my lap.
I ignored her sobbing protests and lifted her chin. “Look at me,” I demanded, annoyed when she kept her eyes squeezed shut. “Look. At. Me.”
I felt like an asshole when her eyes flew open at my harsh tone, but needed her to see. To understand. “One day you’ll tell me,” I said, voice dark with promise, “and then I’ll kill every last one.”
My words did not stop her eyes from leaking, so I growled to show her just how serious I was. The tears slowed to a trickle, and my chest puffed up in satisfaction.
Until her big, wet eyes pierced me with accusation.
“D-don’t g-growl a-at m-me,” she cried, and I winced, rubbing a hand over my chest.
How the fuck did I fix this?
“Don’t cry,” I commanded, each tear another shred to my aching heart. She’d break me. If she continued this way, she’d fucking break me.
“I c-can’t help i-it!”
With a muttered curse, I tilted her face up and kissed her. I made her sorrow mine. Kissed her face. Tasted each tear. Claimed the anguish making wet trails down her cheeks.
The salt on my tongue would serve as a reminder. A promise. And one day I’d look back at each of these tears. I’d remember the way she looked right now; the misery stark upon her pretty face. I’d remember, and I’d hunt down all those responsible.
I’d hunt them down and make them pay.
Tear by tear, they’d pay. Piece by piece. Scream by fucking scream. And when they were nothing but charred remains, their existence long forgotten, I’d spend the rest of my life erasing their memory from my female’s tender heart.
Her tears finally slowed. I kissed away the last one, nuzzling her neck for good measure, and waited.
“You . . . you aren’t repelled?”
Her voice was small. A little broken. A lot damaged. And her question was pure nonsense.
“What?” I felt like yelling at her, but didn’t want her to cry again.
Wincing, I held my breath until I was sure she wouldn’t start leaking again.
“Because of what they did . . .”
Had to bite back a curse. “Never. Why’d you think that?”
“You just . . . when I told you . . . you were so angry. You couldn’t even look at me.”
Shit!
I kept messing up. “Was angry. Scared of losing control. Of hurting you.”
She stared up at me with wide eyes. Still not understanding.
“You’re mine,” I growled, willing her to understand. “Thought of you hurting makes me want to destroy the world.”
Her eyes filled with tears again, but the tremulous smile trembling on her lips made up for it. “That’s . . . that’s one of the sweetest things anyone has ever said to me.”
I grunted. “Dumbass people.”
“Who?”
“Everyone you’ve been around.”
Her smile grew. “But not you,” she whispered.
“Not me,” I agreed with an arrogant snort.
I would take care of her. Cherish her. Love her.
Kill everyone who’d ever hurt her.
Just had to figure out who they were . . .
48
HOPE
Warm, soothing light teased my closed eyelids and spilled across my face in a comforting kiss of heat. Throwing my arms over my head, I stretched, calves tightening and back arching off the mattress.
Why did stretching in the morning feel so incredible?
I blinked my eyes open, reveling in the morning sun streaming through the closed window, and rolled to my right.
The spot Ruarc had occupied during the night was empty, but not yet cool.
He must have just left.
A smile broke free.
He’d held me all night. The heat from his body had chased away the ice eating away at my soul. The strong arms engulfing me had kept even the most daring nightmares at bay. And his hot fury had calmed the bitter shame that had curdled in my stomach after I’d freaked out on him.
Thought of you hurting makes me want to destroy the world.
My smile grew so wide it hurt.
Those words . . .
And before that, before things had gone wrong, and before he’d said the words I’d never forget, he’d been kissing me. Touching me.
My whole body had been flushed with sensations I’d never before experienced. Everything had felt hot. My skin had felt so sensitive that each brush of Ruarc’s big, calloused palms had made my breath catch and my stomach contract with something too hot, too electric to be called something as simple as pleasure.
I sat up, wrapping the blanket around my shoulders to ward off the morning chill. The faint scent of pine cones and wild, earthy power hung in the air. My eyes drifted shut. Ruarc always smelled like forest mixed with something elusive, with words that couldn’t possibly be a smell, and yet . . .
Wild. Power. Male.
Those were the words that popped into my head every time I caught the slightest hint of his scent.
I padded to the bathroom on bare feet and took a quick shower, surprised to catch a whiff of Ruarc’s lingering scent when I descended the stairs. It was almost as though some of what made Ruarc, well, Ruarc, had attached to my skin, making a home within my body.
Not that I was complaining. I loved the way he smelled.
“You’re looking particularly pleased with yourself this morning, love,” Jason said. He stepped into view just as I hit the bottom of the stairs, his smooth, whiskey voice a caress up my spine. “Did my sweet, little human have some fun last night?”
“Jason!” I felt myself blush. “What—uhm, good morning?”
A charming grin curved his lips and lit up his eyes. “Where’s my morning kiss?”
“M-morning k-kiss?”
He cocked his head. “We are dating now. Didn’t you catch that during our chat last night?”
“Oh! Uhm . . .”
“Is my blushing flower a little shy?” Both his brows rose, leaving him looking like a faintly startled caricature of himself.
The ridiculous image stole a giggle straight out of my mouth.
“Ah, that’s better.” He stepped closer, forcing me to tilt my head if I wanted to keep watching him.
Which I did.
His cheeky grin made me wary, but at the same time butterflies danced in my stomach, flapping their wings in joyous excitement.
One hand snaked behind my back, fast—too fast for a human—and buried in my hair. A gentle pull later and his mouth hovered above mine. Our breaths mingled, his smelling faintly of mint spice.
“G
ood morning, sweetheart,” Jason whispered, mouth brushing mine in a faint caress.
A small, startled gasp tore from my throat.
The space between us disappeared, and then he whisked my breath away with a kiss so tender I thought my heart might break.
It had never occurred to me that he’d be like this, all soft and gentle and heart-wrenchingly sweet.
He pressed featherlight kisses all over my mouth, lingering at one corner before giving my bottom lip a slow, tormenting lick.
Heat flared in my belly.
I pressed closer, spurred on by a deep, masculine groan. That sound, that deep, male sound gave me the courage to wrap my arms around his neck and cling to him, my body folding into his. Soft where he was hard. Yielding where he was unwavering.
Through all of that—the way I pressed myself against him, the frantic way I clung to him—the kiss stayed the same. Just a tender press of lips, soft sighs, and the occasional provoking lick of his tongue.
The heat in my belly spread. Everything tingled. A deep arousal ignited in a sudden wave of burning passion. A passion I’d only just begun to recognize with Ruarc.
Just as I thought I would lose my mind, Jason pulled away. His eyes were heavy lidded, a flush creeping along his cheekbones. Lips that had just been teasing mine were slightly parted, allowing room for a few heavy exhales.
“And that’s how you say good morning,” he said, the rough quality of his voice telling me he’d been just as affected by our kiss as I had.
I couldn’t reply. Couldn’t do anything but stare up at him while I tried to push my brain into gear.
His low chuckle sent shivers up my spine. The sound was heavy with masculine satisfaction, filled with need and want and all things carnal. “We better go, love.” He reached up and reluctantly pulled both my hands away from his neck.
My thoughts came slow, like they were covered in syrup and stuck together. “Where are we going?”
Another grin cascaded over his face. “Breakfast. Let’s go.” He pulled me against his chest and whispered in my ear, “Before I devour you where you stand.”
I pressed my thighs together. “I . . . But . . . What?”
“You see, love, there’s this one thing I can’t stop thinking about, one question burned into my mind.”
I shouldn’t ask. I knew I shouldn’t ask. “W-what question is that?”