Insatiable: Hunter's Moon Book 5

by Rice, Rachel E.

  Looking around for Devin only to discover that he had gone to his room. Devin carried a stack of books to the second floor pretending he would complete the assignment. There was no pretense with Hunter. Hunter annoyed with the limited selection of books, mumbled, “This can wait.” He could complete his assignments later. He had a problem with concentrating on things that didn’t interest him.

  His problem was he had read everything in the library twice, and that left him hungry for more books and unsatisfied with the ones before him.

  Gazing out the window, the outdoors called to him. That is where he found his fulfillment and pleasure. He wanted to be hunting, chasing dogs, fooling around with Devin, and riding horses, not shut up inside living someone else’s life.

  “You’re just like your uncle Lycell, impatient and headstrong. But you need a well-rounded education before you go out on your own, which I hope is not too soon,” Adrienne had said to Hunter.

  “Mother, why do I need to read these books? I’ve read them over and over and you keep bringing more and I digest them as quick as you replenish them. I know everything a man needs to know in a civilized society. I need to know something about being a werewolf. When will I get the chance to go out on my own, and have my own pack, and my own family?” Hunter had asked. Adrienne was shocked and dismayed that he’s thinking about leaving and creating a family. She realized then that he was growing up.

  “It’s a different world and werewolves will have to come from out of the shadows. You need to be educated first. Your father and I have plans for you and Devin.”

  “That’s why I want to see the world before you and father plan my life. I want to help with some of the responsibilities so father can stay here with you. I know you miss him when he’s away.”

  “I have plenty to keep me busy,” Adrienne had said to Hunter.

  Hunter paced the floor in the library worrying about the future and the future of the Samsa pack. In that way he’s like his father. He’s thinking of the conversations with his mother and how he wanted to meet others like himself because as his mother had said, “It’s a different world out there,” and he wanted to see it, feel it, and experience it.

  He’s growing every day and he’s almost the image of Wilder—tall, wide shoulders, ocean blue eyes, dark curly hair, and a face just as handsome as Wilder, but he has an impulsive nature, and he’s as reckless as his uncle, Lycell.

  Picking up the book once more trying to concentrate, that proved impossible for Hunter. He dropped it on the table. It became exceedingly impossible to focus knowing that his father and mother could be in danger and perhaps needing his help.

  Picturing something grim happening to his mother and father, caused Hunter unimaginable angst and feelings of helplessness. Wilder forbid him to follow after him. Hunter’s restless mind took flight thinking of what they were experiences and he couldn’t focus. He stirred in the leather wingback chair, standing and pacing again. His mind and senses converging on everything in the room.

  Hunter is quickly evolving into a matured werewolf. He didn’t understand it. He needed his father to explain what was happening to him. He had no doubt that the same was happening to Devin. But Devin wasn’t as observant and as sensitive as Hunter.

  Staring out the window, he saw beyond the ranch. He spotted a snow rabbit. His ears focused and he heard sounds of wolves howling, dogs barking, birds flying. He heard Robert’s footsteps returning from the hospital where Lycell and Drayton lay medicated until they are well enough to be brought inside the ranch.

  Turning rapidly with a jerk of his young fit body, Hunter responds to hearing Robert approaching. His eyes keen. His footsteps light and fast. He caught sight of Robert and he stood in front of him before Robert realized he was there, “How are they?”

  Robert turns and glances up in surprise. “They’re doing great. Lycell will be up and himself in about a week. Drayton, in a few days. I knew that werewolves healed fast but this is something unusual.”

  “There is one thing that can kill us and that’s to sever our jugular, in which case we will bleed out. That’s why we protect our neck at all times, and the only animal that can get to that vulnerable area is another werewolf, or men with guns.” He wasn’t saying that to insult Robert. He knew guns had their place in the world.

  Robert stood distracted. He had lost everything and here he is listening to Hunter explaining the long-lasting lives of werewolves. He wanted to scream for him to shut the fuck up, but he didn’t. That wasn’t a natural part of Robert’s vocabulary. He was a doctor and his mission is to save lives even if the lives are werewolves.

  “What is it, Robert?” Hunter said seeing that Robert was preoccupied with something.

  “You have most of your family intact and I have lost everything I want in life. I will never see Mena and my babies again.”

  Robert walked into the library and slumped down in a brown leather chair. Hunter followed. He had worked tirelessly night and day, with hardly any sleep, to save Lycell and Drayton. He was just plain tired.

  Hunter stared at him thinking and empathizing with him. “I’ll go and get her and bring her back to you. My uncles and father made you a promise, I will fulfill that promise.”

  “You can’t do that. You father forbid you to go because he doesn’t think you’re ready for that world. You have to listen to him.”

  “My father is just trying to protect me. He can’t protect me from life. I have to live. He forgot how he was at my age. I guess having his own children does that to you. Look how you are behaving. I don’t want to have any children. I want to see the world before I turn into an over protective idiot,” Hunter said trying to make Robert smile for a few minutes. He gave Robert a confident slap on the shoulder.

  “I got this,” Hunter said.

  For some reason Robert thought that Hunter was the only one who could bring his Mena back to him. He glanced up with a halfhearted smile. “If someday you do this, I will be eternally grateful. I appreciate the gesture but...” Robert looked around because he saw a shadow standing in the doorway to the library.

  “I’m sorry, Robert. I didn’t mean to interrupt you.”

  He stood, “No. No, you aren’t interrupting us.” Hunter turned with his mouth ajar. The young girl standing in the library is about eighteen. She has long auburn hair and green eyes which mesmerized him at first glance. She stood five feet five to his six two statue. Hunter has been growing at an alarming rate, and according to his werewolf’s years in his father’s book, he is nineteen. He remembered it was just the other day he was nothing but a pup.

  Since his parents had been away, he and Devin had grown and turned into teenagers in a matter of weeks.

  “Hunter, this is Heather, my litter sister.”

  “Heather, yes, like a flower. Remind me to show you some flowers on our ranch,” Hunter shot her a sensuous smile. Heather smiled widely at Hunter. She gave him a smile that sent his pulse racing. Hunter gazed intently at Heather. Robert looked at both of them not too amused.

  “I prefer to be called Katie. It’s my real name, and my mother’s name. My mother called me Heather because she didn’t like Katie as a name. She thought it was old fashion.”

  “Our father named her Katie,” Robert added.

  “Then Katie it is. Would you like to see the flowers now,” Hunter said as he placed his hand on Katie’s shoulder. He had never felt the attraction for a girl before. It was a strange and wonderful feeling. His heart raced and his breathing became erratic. He had the same adrenalin rush when he stalked a deer. But this couldn’t be the same thing, he thought. There’s something different about this overwhelming erotic feeling coursing through his body and stimulating his manhood.

  He had the same adrenalin rush when he stalked a deer. He didn’t want to chase her down. He wanted to make love to her. She wasn’t prey or food. She is a beautiful warm female and he wanted to touch her, hold her in his arms, run his fingers through her long silky hair, and kiss her.<
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  Robert’s glance wavered between Hunter and Katie. “She has to go back to Samsaville,” Robert says. He takes her shoulders and turns Katie around taking her to the door. “Katie is going to school to become a doctor. She’s helping me out until then.” Robert saw the attraction and he wanted to put an end to it. He knew about young werewolves, and how virile they are when they are developing, and how insatiable their appetites are for sex.

  “Why don’t you stay here on the ranch tonight? We have more than enough room,” Hunter said.

  “She can’t,” Robert said abruptly. Turning to Katie, Robert said, “Wait outside for me.” Katie turned and did as she was told.

  He spun around to Hunter, “For god sake, Hunter, she doesn’t know anything about werewolves. She thinks it’s something she sees in the movies. She’s impressionable. I don’t want her to find out by accident. I want to sit down with her and tell her about Mena and my children. Since our parents died, I have been left with the duty of being her father.” He met Hunter’s eyes. “It’s a serious job being a father.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with her knowing about us. We are just as decent as humans. After all we are half human.”

  “I’m not saying that Hunter. You have me wrong. I just want to give her a chance before she has to learn about how werewolves live.”

  “What is wrong with our lifestyle?”

  “Your mother is married to three werewolves, and she has off springs for them. Who knows what Bane has done to her?” Before Hunter could stop himself, he had collared Robert. Looking into Robert’s eyes he saw shock, and he realized what his father had been telling him all along. When it came to his mother and someone he loved, his emotions would take over his reasoning because of youth and inexperience, and he would make wrong decisions.

  Hunter dropped Robert’s shoulders. “I apologize, Robert. I know you’re right. I did mean what I said about bringing Mena back to you.” Hunter walked quickly out of the library to see Katie sitting waiting for Robert. He stood over her holding out his hand. “Do you know how to ride?”

  “Yes.” She glanced up at Hunter with her wide green eyes and he stared at her. A bright flare of desire took hold of him. That did it. She is the one; his young inexperienced mind thought.

  “Come with me,” he said.

  “Do you think I should?”

  “Your brother won’t mind.” Hunter was head strong. He wanted what he wanted and Robert wouldn’t dictate to him. Robert was just human after all and he was stronger, younger, and a werewolf who wanted a human female. Hunter and Katie headed for the kitchen as the cooks and helpers looked on. Robert caught them as they were going through the door to the outside.

  “Where are you going, Katie,” Robert questioned.

  “Hunter is taking me for a ride.”

  “You aren’t allowed to ride in a car.”

  “It’s not a car. It’s a horse and don’t act like a mother hen. I’ll be ok. Won’t I Hunter?”

  “I’ll take good care of her, Robert. Don’t worry.”

  But worry Robert did. He knew more about werewolves than Hunter knew about himself. He knew that once they mated then it would be for life. He wanted to stop them but he couldn’t. He hoped that Hunter would be a gentleman and not mate with his little sister. She’s so young and she’s falling in love with the first boy she’s allowed to be close to. He saw it in her eyes. He saw that Katie was infatuated with Hunter. He only hoped that Hunter felt the same way.

  As Robert debated with Katie, Hunter called to the stables and said to get two of the best horses ready.

  Chapter 3

  The groom stood patiently near the two horses. He handed Hunter the reigns when Hunter and Katie reached the stables, then he went back to his chores of pitching hay to the six other horses. These were Lycell’s prized steeds. He gave Hunter and Devin their offspring. Katie held the face of the brown and white faced mare. Then she stood looking into its eyes. She turned to Hunter’s beautiful black stallion. Brushing her hand along its body the horse calmed.

  “He likes you. I’ve never seen him react to a human like that.” Hunter gave away himself when he mentioned human. She had eyes only for Hunter and the beautiful horses.

  “Aren’t you a human? That’s a strange way to refer to people.” Hunter just smiled and

  helped Katie across the saddle, and took the reins of his horse and Katie’s, leading them out of the stall, and into the opening.

  “I can see you like horses, and especially this one,” Hunter said.

  “Yes I do.” Katie leaned forward and kissed the horse on its mane.

  “Do you want her? I’ll make you a gift of her.”

  “I can’t accept a horse. She’s beautiful and looks expensive, and I have no place to put her and if I did, I can’t afford to feed her.”

  “You can keep the mare here until you have a place. She has a colt.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. I may never be able to afford her, and I don’t want to take her from her colt. I’m going off to college for maybe six years if I’m lucky, or eight if I’m not.” Hunter jumped on his black mount, then turned and faced Katie with a closed smile.

  “How did you do that? You are so quick. I barely saw you.”

  “It’s all my pent up energy. And have you noticed my muscles,” he said bragging like a teenage boy trying to impress a girl.

  He looked at Katie smiling and showing his white teeth and leaned his long body into her and kissed her. She surprisingly kissed him back. Her heated kiss reached deep down in him, and he felt himself hard for the second time at being in Katie’s presence.

  Hunter couldn’t fathom what was happening to him, but it felt good. Too good. He placed his long tongue in her mouth and she began sucking it. It was his first kiss. A French kiss he and Devin had discussed at night when they couldn’t sleep.

  His first touch of a female’s warm soft lips. It was his first feeling of arousal just from a kiss.

  Katie pulled away from him. “This is your first kiss.” How did she know? He wanted this kiss to be matured, but he messed that up. Devin had said that it wasn’t cool to let a girl that he liked know that he was an amateur. That’s why it was important to practice first. Especially with girls he didn’t find attractive. But Hunter thought that was awful. Kiss a girl just to kiss her.

  “No. I’ve kissed many girls before you,” Hunter said trying not to disclose how inexperienced he really is. He had spent his few teenage years with his father hunting and learning to swim, learning about nature, but never learning the things that mattered, he thought.

  This is something he needed to learn because it is pleasurable as much as hunting and much more now that he had a chance to experience it. They don’t teach kissing in the books he was required to read by the old tutor. “That old man can’t remember when he had his first or last kiss,” Devin had said to Hunter. That’s why Hunter needed to get out into the world and learn about being a werewolf, and about being a human.

  Hunter would learn none of that in books. There were no books on sexuality in the library.

  He could see himself relaxing around the house with Katie enjoying her kisses. Going to the movies instead of hunting. Maybe he should consider going to college with her. Hunter’s life had changed with that one kiss. And Katie’s life had changed the day they set eyes on each other.

  When Devin had asked Hunter to accompany him into town for a date with the local girls, he didn’t have time to go into town and prowl for girls he was busy learning about nature with Wilder.

  There was a lesson about nature his father and mother had neglected to tell him about.

  Devin on the other hand had gone on dates with females, and brought back stories about how he had made love to two girls at one time, and watched as the two girls kissed each other’s bodies.

  Hunter thought Devin had made that up. He couldn’t imagine why it was interesting to see two girls kiss each other. Hunter didn’t understand the power of a
kiss by a girl he was attracted to until now. That profound need he felt made him understand that Devin had reported to him the truth—that there was more to life than hunting and fishing, exploring the forest, and living like his ancestors. There was another life out there just waiting for him, and it was as satisfying and pleasurable as any he had ever known.

  The two newly bound lovers rode in silence as Hunter revisited the feeling he received from his life changing kiss from Katie.

  When they stopped in a meadow near a lake overlooking pine trees, catching a glimpse of the snowcapped mountains, Katie said, “I kissed a boy once, but I never felt like this. Did you feel warm inside, your heart pounding, and an urge to be in an intimate way when you kissed your first girl?”

  “Not exactly, but I feel that way about you,” Hunter said smiling. Knowing full well that her kiss was the first and best feeling he ever had.

  “I want to be alone with you. I want to hold you in my arms and kiss you, but not from a horse,” Hunter said his blue eyes hypnotizing her. “Follow me,” Hunter said. He took her horse by the reigns. Without a thought, Hunter’s horse galloped for the shed Devin used when girls visited him and when he didn’t want Adrienne to see him.

  Hunter drove his steed fast and dismounted. He waited and helped Katie off her mare, then hitting both horses on their rear, and sending them trotting back to the stables. He rushed ahead of Katie into the small cabin.

  He left her far behind because he needed to start a fire to get it warm inside. This is his first date. He sought to make it comfortable before she walked inside. Scurrying around the room, he placed some of the books back on a shelf, and found a hidden vase with artificial flowers and stuck that on top. He wanted to make her day unforgettable.

  Surprisingly the bedding had been changed and new pillows were arranged on the day bed. There were new rugs on the floor. New paint on the walls. All the shelves contained books and gardening tools didn’t have a speck of dust. He noticed pictures on the wall. Pictures of flowers. Wild flowers. He had never been in the shed but he liked what he saw.