“Have you ever seen my brother angry?” he asked in that same casual tone.
“It’s quite the show.”
The clang of the door closing behind them was a death knell. Ian may not have changed skins, but he had changed facades—revealing the stone-cold killer underneath.
He was supernaturally strong as he slammed her up against the wall and held her aloft with one hand around her throat. She clawed at his hand, struggling desperately to release the death grip before he crushed her windpipe. Daphne kicked and fought, but to no avail. Even when her blows made contact, he swatted her away like a housefly.
Ian pulled another syringe from a pocket in his lab coat and she stopped fighting. The liquid inside was blue and glowed just like Konstantin’s eyes. Daphne forced herself to go limp and prayed her death would be fast—that her neck would snap before he could shoot the virus into her.
Her vision narrowed to two tiny pinpricks and the pressure on her chest didn’t hurt so much anymore. She didn’t want to die, but she didn’t want to be some mindless, slavering beast either. She thought about Bethany—her life unlived. So many things they’d both left undone. Instinctively, she knew Ian had done this to Bethany, too. He was the most likely avenue of infection, but what she didn’t know was why. Maybe it had something to do with Bethany’s faux accountant fiancé.
A black wall of fury crashed through the electric fields, the leaded glass and even the sigils that held the others back. Glass sprayed like meteors into the small space before crashing down into the control modules, embedding themselves in the wall.
Konstantin the beast filled the space, and he plucked Ian from her with all the ease of a ripe apple from a branch and held him aloft—an enraged roar rattling the very pillars of the facility.
Lights flickered and flashed, and surges of electricity scattered sparks and overloaded delicate machines.
Daphne hit the floor hard and scrambled for a weapon to defend herself as she coughed, choking as oxygen filled her lungs. She couldn’t see much but the hand she held in front of her and the giant, hulking predator shaking the project head like a ragdoll.
She watched as Ian turned his head to the side and offered his brother his throat.
It all clicked. Ian said he didn’t change skins, but he so obviously wanted to.
The infected and diseased throng didn’t rush for freedom like she thought they would. There were only three left, and they lay bloated and still, the virus unable to be fully transmuted by their decaying bodies. She couldn’t find Bethany among the ruin, and she was torn between hoping she escaped and hoping she couldn’t spread the virus.
Sirens blared and Daphne panicked. There was no way they could clear the blast radius in the five minutes before the containment protocol reached them.
The beast turned his head toward her, then back to the monster he held. He snarled, released him and charged toward Daphne.
He kept getting bigger. First, when he was closer to the glass, she discovered he was supernaturally large. Now, on the other side of the barrier, he was a behemoth.
I can run faster than that carrying both you and Bethany. Some primal thing inside her told her to trust him. She closed her eyes and held out her arms.
Konstantin’s beast swept her up like the villain stealing the maiden fair. His first leap was back to the enclosure.
“Bethany!” she cried, hoping he’d remember his words about being able to run with her, too.
The black—and-russet wolf Daphne had been looking for since her turn was there, and she stood, visible through the smoke. Konstantin, with one simple motion, put his fist through the wall, and the reinforced concrete shattered with the same ease as the glass.
Daphne coughed and spluttered, but held tightly to him as they burst out into the open fields of the Blue Ridge Low Country, and Konstantin immediately headed for higher ground. Bethany ran toward the fray of Aeternali troops, fighting men and beasts that erupted near the outer wall. One of which had to have been Bethany’s fiancé and Daphne prayed her friend knew what she was doing.
Explosions, gunfire and the unmistakable sound of an incoming jet split the darkness.
Chapter Four
Clinging to Konstantin as he covered miles of ground was like flying, Daphne thought. She’d swear they never touched the earth, and maybe even broke the sound barrier. He was careful, even in his haste, to make sure he didn’t scratch her.
Infect her.
For some reason, his caution made her feel guilty. She clung tighter, buried her face in his neck. His pelt was so soft it was like burrowing in silk. Daphne inhaled deeply, trying to calm herself and enjoy what it felt like to fly. They’d left all the destruction behind them, and Daphne had come close to dying, twice. Each second mattered. After all, when would she ever have cause again to be carried on the wind by a werewolf?
Part of her expected he’d have a musky animal odor, but he didn’t. He smelled of pine and burning leaves—her favorite scents. She inhaled again, comforted.
The most amazing thing was his heart. It was a steady thud against her, strong and sure—unwavering even as he pushed his body to the limits to reach safety.
It was easy to forget while she clung to him, muscles working in perfect form—adduction, extensor, reflex—that she was so very close to a predator’s maw with teeth meant for ripping and tearing flesh.
Daphne ran her tongue over her own blunt teeth. She tore flesh with hers as well, she reminded herself. She was no vegetarian. She was a predator, too. He was just higher up the food chain.
She didn’t know how far they’d gone before he slowed, the kaleidoscope of stars and sky carefully regaining their shape. Her feet were suddenly on solid ground, and the creature that held her once again took the form of a man.
“Are you hurt?” His supernaturally bright eyes pierced her.
“You saved my life.” She never could’ve fled outside the blast radius of the containment protocol without him.
“Yes,” he acknowledged, with no expectation in his voice.
“You didn’t have to do that. You could have run faster and farther without me.”
“I have told you the way of things among my people. The fact you don’t want me is immaterial to my duty.”
She bit her lip. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him. With his hands still on her hips, it wasn’t that at all. In fact, she imagined them everywhere—knew from their connection exactly what bliss he was capable of giving her. Daphne wanted to experience that.
But she didn’t want what came with it.
Daphne licked her lips and looked up at him—awestruck by his beauty. His strength. He was so hard everywhere.
All the time. She shivered.
“It’s not that I don’t want you, Konstantin.” She could envision him taking her right there. Laying her down in the grass with the moon overhead, the night sounds like an orchestra while he pounded into her.
“You don’t want my beast. Same thing. I am him. He is me.”
A loud howl that was not Konstantin’s split the silence and was soon joined by many more. She bit the inside of her cheek, determined not to be afraid. Konstantin was strong, and he’d already saved her once. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her. She knew it with the same surety that she knew the sun would rise in the east.
That foreign voice spoke in her head again. It demanded that she be strong on her own—that she be worthy of her mate.
And that she reach out and take him. Claim him. Mark him. Mine.
Yes, there was burning death on the horizon, smoke billowing into the sky miles away from where the research center used to be, and they’d had to run for their lives, but there was this voice in her head that wouldn’t let her stop thinking about sex.
She kept telling herself it was a high-stress situation. Bonding during these things was a normal, healthy reaction. That there was nothing more life-affirming than sex.
“Don’t be afraid, Daphne.”
“I’m
not. You’ve proven you can and will protect me.” She reached up and ghosted her fingers over his cheek. “If I was your kind, I’d be proud for you to be my mate.” Her words surprised even her, but they were true.
His long lashes fluttered down at the contact and he stood frozen under her touch—almost as if he were the one afraid of her. Konstantin Gevaudan was a man right out of legend. He’d lived four lifetimes and seen things Daphne could only imagine. He’d faced darkness and pain, was strong enough to put his fist through a blast door. Yet, just the feel of her small fingers on his beautiful face—the simplest of touches—showed he was vulnerable.
Strange guilt gnawed at her gut like a dog with a tasty bone. All creatures needed touch to survive. He should never be brought low by something so basic. Especially when it was such bliss to touch him. The texture of his skin, his hair—the heat of him that burned her straight through to the core.
She carded her fingers through his hair—just as soft and silky as his pelt had been. Daphne thought his skin had glistened like moonlight before, but it was even more appealing up close. Like marble and velvet, she stroked her hands over his shoulders, the broad plane of his back.
She knew it was wrong. She shouldn’t touch him like this because she couldn’t give him what he wanted—what he needed. Daphne knew now he’d never hurt her, but she was human, and didn’t want to be anything else.
A new voice growled in her head at the thought that some other female would have the right to touch him like this.
Mine.
No. But maybe she could offer him the same thing he’d given her.
“Tell me how to do what you did in the observatory.” The sound of her own voice surprised her, low and sultry. “When you touched me without any physical touch.”
His eyes opened and he focused on her with the same intensity as he had the infected when he’d silenced them. Her breath caught in her throat, but she didn’t look away.
“You have to let me in.” His hands were so hot that they burned her through her clothes. “When I’m inside you,” he said, leaning down close to her ear, “you’re inside me, too.”
His words were a trespass, forbidden and taboo. They thrilled her, sparked a throb deep in her belly and made her panties wet. She wrapped her arms around his neck, breath coming in hot little puffs. “Then be inside me.”
“We’re not safe yet, Daphne. And when we are, you’ll regret that choice.”
“That’s not for you to say.”
“I can and will choose for you when you can’t be trusted to make the best choice for yourself. Don’t push me on this.”
“If you’re mine, I’ll push you however I like.” She pressed herself to him, crushed the softness of her breasts against his chest. Part of Daphne couldn’t believe what she’d just said, and wanted to scramble to take it back. This new part of her that Konstantin’s touch awakened didn’t think it was bold enough.
“And you, do you belong to me?” He didn’t wait for her answer. “Let me explain something to you, little girl. You said you wanted it to stop. Those were your words. Make it stop. I can’t do that when you reinforce the bond between us. Every touch, every time you think about the things your brain doesn’t want, but your body does... It goes against everything I am not to give them to you. I have failed in every way possible. As a wolf, as a man and as a mate.”
“So give them to me,” she blurted.
“When I do, what happens when I can’t stop from biting you—infecting you?”
“You will stop because you know that’s not what I want. Because you excel and succeed at being a wolf, a man and a mate.” She rubbed herself more thoroughly against him. “I meant what I said, Konstantin. I’m a woman who likes hard facts and proof. You proved tonight the kind of person you are. I trust you.”
“The Beast of Gevaudan—”
“Is not you.”
“Then prove to me that you trust me and finish the rite. Accept that we are bound. That you are my mate.”
This was insane. She trusted him, she wanted him, but from her recent studies on werewolves, she knew this was for life. She felt different. Instead of the terror she’d known before, there was still fear, but there was something else, too. Something that fluttered in her gut. It was already done, wasn’t it?
Mine.
Yes.
“Without the bite?” His eyes darkened and she knew her words cut him. It was the beast who had saved her, carried her over those miles, broke through the wall, but it was the beast who didn’t rip out his brother’s throat either. “I wish I could make you understand.”
“Make me understand that my cock is good enough for a quick ride, but I am not good enough? I understand.”
She sighed. “You wouldn’t want to be human, would you?”
“No, I would not want to be human.” Konstantin paused, a strange look on his face. “Without the bite,” he conceded.
“What do I do?” The hard edge of his jaw beckoned her, and whatever he’d done to her had obliterated her impulse control. Daphne stood on tiptoe and kissed his jaw, and her tongue darted out to taste his skin.
She wasn’t a prude, but neither was she this aggressive. Maybe his beast brought out something animal in her.
“Say you’re mine.”
That was easy enough, until she opened her mouth to say it. They were just words. She found her voice. “I’m yours.”
His mouth crashed into hers and it was everything he’d promised his touch would be and more. It was like both drowning and surfacing at once. In that moment, she knew they were more than just words. They were magic, a spell... A curse. Daphne did belong to him, body and soul. He didn’t have to bite her to mark her—it was already there at the subatomic level.
“Tell me,” she gasped against his mouth, demanding the same words she’d given him.
“I’m yours, Daphne.”
Pride surged through her along with a certain sense of order, as if everything in the world had clicked into its rightful place. She couldn’t think about the rest of what that meant: with or without his bite, she wasn’t human.
She couldn’t think anyway, not when his hands were doing the most delicious things under her blouse.
Daphne didn’t speak French, but it was the language Konstantin thought in and their link allowed her to understand the lyrical stream of praise that filled her head. Poetry about the texture of her skin feeling like rose petals, the shape and weight of her breasts—that flared curve from her waist to the “fertile blossom” of her hips.
She might have laughed if she’d heard the comparison in any other context, but from him it was so sincere—old-world and honest.
“You are so beautiful, mon ange.” His accent became thick and pronounced.
Beautiful? She’d always thought herself rather plain and unremarkable.
“Déesse,” he murmured. Goddess. His mouth moved to her neck, his tongue laving at the delicate skin there.
He peeled her clothes from her as he would unwrap a gift, taking his time to explore each new tantalizing treat revealed.
She found herself on her back in the grass, the crescent moon high overhead and the dark curtain of his hair draped over her skin as he descended down her flesh—just like the fantasy he’d given her.
His touch was masterful, but reverent. As if she really were some kind of goddess and he her supplicant. Daphne was already so wet, but every caress drove her higher. When he finally dipped his head between her thighs, she was on the edge.
Konstantin knew just how to tease her, to keep her balanced on that precipice until he was ready for her to fly. He taunted her with his tongue, plunging between her wet folds and then back again to her clit. He lifted her hips, anchored her against his blissfully torturous mouth while she thrashed and cried out, begged for his mercy.
Her fingers dug into the soft earth beneath her, clawing at the dirt as if that would save her from the onslaught of sensation.
His hand replaced his mout
h, two fingers thrusting inside her while his thumb worked her clit. Konstantin shifted above her, his breath warm on her lips. “Taste how sweet you are.” His kiss was softer this time, but no less devastating. “When you’re wet and wanting—” he swiped at her lip with his tongue “—your scent tastes just like that.”
“You taste—” she gasped, her back arched and her hips jerked up to meet him “—scents?”
“Yours is like caramel. I can’t get enough.” He took one taut nipple in his mouth, tongue working the bud.
“Please, Konstantin!”
“Please what?” he asked her as if he didn’t know exactly what she wanted from him. “Please make you come?”
All she could do was moan and jerk her hips in time to the rhythm of his caress.
“Tell me. How do you want it, ma déesse? Do you want to come on my fingers, my tongue or my cock?”
“All three.”
“My little hedonist,” he praised.
Konstantin stopped taunting her and stroked her with intent. This time when she crept closer to the edge, he launched her into the stratosphere. She was soaring, wave after wave of ecstasy fueling her flight.
But he wasn’t finished. He hooked her legs around his waist and thrust into her wet heat—and she felt each glorious inch from his perspective as well as hers. The link between them hummed with his desire and she knew every thought he had about her—what he wanted from her.
She experienced each thing as he did—the way her shape pleased him, the sensation of her tight sheath tugging him deeper, even the soft sounds of her own cries. Even as she was fulfilled, his need ratcheted her own back up again.
His control was tenuous and there was part of her that wanted to see what it would take to break it.
There was something wrong with her that she’d demanded his promise not to bite her, but she still had the desire to see what would make him break it.
She would have turned away if not for the newly pulsing need in her core and his strong body powering into her, driving deep. Daphne couldn’t get close enough to him—for every satisfaction, there was another need.
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