by JM Klaire
"The only thing that could have gone different was Thomas winning instead of Reine. But mom left. Thomas still ended up Alpha. Ziva still ended up the Alpha's mate."
"I don't know, Em."
"Did you know she was traded to her original pack, at five? Her village just gave her up."
"Yeah, Galen told me. Then that pack gave her to this one."
"I know it was a huge step back then, from slave to mated to the next Alpha. Could she be that ambitious? Even if mom had stayed, she'd still have been mate to the Alpha's brother. Maybe that wasn't enough?"
"I don't know."
"And what the hell does she have against Elam? If she and Thomas took him in as an orphan, why does she seem so hostile to him?"
"I don't know that, either. It's odd, isn't it?"
"Do you think she loved Thomas? Eventually? Or did she just see him as a way out of slavedom in a less progressive pack? Did she want Thomas when he claimed her? Like you did Galen? How are you and Galen, anyway?"
"That's a lot of questions." Kate laughed, pouring them each a second glass and tossing out the now empty bottle.
"I think she loved Thomas, yes. Watching her grieve, I think she loved him a lot."
"Is she grieving Thomas? Or her position?"
"Probably both, knowing her as little as I do." Kate acknowledged with a laugh. "But I do think she loved him. Whether she did at the claiming, or if it grew over time, I don't know. Hell, who knows what goes on in someone else's relationship?"
"How about yours?" Emma asked. "Do you love Galen?"
"I do. Very much. It has taken a lot of adjusting, and will take even more, when we leave. But yes, I love Galen. He is my mate."
"I don't want you to go, Kate. You're my only friend."
"Hopefully, if everything goes well between Elam and Galen tonight, we will only be moving next door, so to speak."
"That is still miles away!"
"I know. But my place is beside Galen. If you had asked me before we came here if I could see myself mated to a werewolf and being happy here, I'd have told you where you could stick that, but we were made for each other. I am very happy. We have this connection, you know? And damn, Em, the sex!"
Emma turned quite a few shades of pink, her mind immediately going to the cave where she and Elam had kissed. Where, if Galen hadn't come to tell them of Thomas's passing, she may have done more than just kiss Elam.
"I see that! You're blushing. What about you and Elam? The talk all over the pack, when it isn't about Thomas, or Elam's shape shifting, is Elam finally showing interest in a mate."
"He has said he wants me. As his mate, I mean." Emma blushed even hotter at her own words.
"How do you feel? About him?"
"The rational part of me is still rebelling against all of this. It still thinks it's going to wake up from this surreal dream, back at home, with my dad. It can't even imagine choosing a 'forever mate' in some hot guy I just met, regardless of how much his kisses make me melt, or the visions I see of our future when we touch."
"Wait! You see visions? That’s new. You're already connected, then. I don't see visions, but I hear Galen. In my head. Not my brain thinking 'what would Galen say,' but I can really hear him. His thoughts and things he aims at me. I can send him my thoughts, as well. Your connection is visual?"
"I guess. Elam said my mother's was the same. That she could 'see' things. Future things. Like how different choices would play out."
"Do you see it that way as well? Different choices playing out?"
"Just once. When Elam kissed me."
"What did you see?"
Emma told her everything, from her upcoming ‘heat’ to all the ways her visions had played out.
"I saw myself denying Elam, leaving here with dad in a year, not happy. And I saw myself giving in. Giving myself to Elam. Mating with Elam."
"Were you happy? With Elam?"
"Yes. But there was more. Pain. The pack dividing. Some kind of core change within myself."
"Emma, the pack is already dividing."
"Yeah, that was in both scenarios, come to think of it."
"Interesting. So what are you going to do?"
"I have no idea."
16
Emma woke from a heated dream, her blankets wrapped in confining ropes around her thrashing body, to find her hand between her legs.
She was rubbing herself furiously, trying to ease the ache of her heat by herself. It wasn't helping.
Her dreams had been of Elam. Of taking Elam, of letting Elam claim her as his mate.
She had no idea why she'd resisted him as long as she had. She'd known, as did he, that they would become one. Maybe she didn't appreciate her body choosing for her brain, or maybe she was scared to give in to feelings she'd never had before, or maybe it was just a virgin's caution, but she wished with all of her might that she had let Elam know that when the time came, she didn't want his best females guarding her in the cave.
She wanted him. She needed him. And, by God, she was going to go find him. Right now.
She slid out of bed rather clumsily, getting tripped up and caught by her own tangled sheets before planting both feet on the floor beside her bed and heading toward her front door.
She'd thought she still had time. Kate had only left a few hours ago, and she was to give Elam her answer in the morning as to who would accompany her to the cave- him, or a group of females, but she guessed from the animal, instinctive need raring through her that she was too late.
Her gait was unsteady crossing the living room she'd been meant to share with Kate. She paused behind the couch they had just been sitting on together a while before, and she gripped the back of it as a particularly strong wave of erotic need rolled through her.
She'd been horny before, of course, but she'd never felt quite like this. This was stronger than she was, this was biological, and animal, and well...heated.
She laughed at herself, having scorned the pack's 'fucking through their heat, like dogs' as she started tasting the feeling herself.
Elam had been right, if there were a pack of willing men just outside her door, she was almost convinced she would allow them plenty- again and again. And her heat was just beginning.
She eyed the arm of the couch that she was currently using to hold herself upright, and imagined herself straddling that arm- parting her thighs, hiking a leg up and over the arm of the couch, and riding the arm like it was Elam's cock, just long enough to come.
Just long enough to knock the edge off, a little, and allow her to go find Elam in his cabin and offer herself to him.
She somehow knew that it wouldn't help, and trying it would only mean that much more time passing before she could get to what she really needed- Elam. She used the back of the couch to push off, to propel herself to her front door instead.
She opened the door, flinging it wide, and instead of the expanse of open porch she expected to see, she saw him.
He was planted on her porch, his wide, naked back to her, his arms crossed over his chest, his feet spread apart, his naked ass staring back at her, guarding her cabin. The last remnants of rationality in her brain had her head swiveling, looking for the band of females he'd said he'd need to help him keep the throngs of wolves from her during her heat, but she only saw him.
"Elam..."
The heat in her words, combined with the wave of scent she'd sent his way when she flung open the door, reached him.
His body was already tense with need. Knowing she was inside, suffering, when he could help her, drove a spike through his very soul. He'd wanted to go to her, the minute his wolf became aware that her heat had begun in earnest, but she hadn't made up her mind yet, and he damn well wanted her to be sure, to choose him as he has chosen her, before he would ever take her, wolf or no.
He braced himself, waiting until she moaned his name again, before turning to face her. He was shocked breathless by what he saw.
"Emma, jeeze. You’re naked."
"So are yo
u!"
"I was in wolf form when I scented you, I didn't have time..."
"Where is everyone else?"
"Everyone else? What are you talking about?"
The sight of her before him was enough to drive all rational response from his mind. It was all he could do not to go to her.
She was beautiful, her fiery hair a disheveled cloud around her head, her full, ripe breasts rising and falling with her every breath. He followed the line of her body south, wanting to grip her where her waist nipped in, and run his palms over the flare of her hips before dropping to his knees in front of her to worship her body, to rub his face between her...
Her words pulled him back, but barely.
"You said there would be hordes of wolves when I was in full heat."
His throat tightened in pain, but he choked out a response.
"Do you want hordes? I can summon them. Whatever you wish, Emma."
"No! I'm just confused. I was headed to you. I want you Elam, only you. But you said you'd have to fight..."
"That was before. Things changed."
"Things? What things? Elam, I can't think right."
"That was before I was Alpha. Before I took you with me, hand in hand, to see Thomas's body. I'm sure your scent is driving many a wolf to find a mate tonight, but none will bother us here. I am Alpha, and you are mine. I know it, the pack knows it."
"I know it as well. I need you, Elam. Please."
"That is the heat talking, Em. I will guard you, don't worry about that. No one will bother you. But I don't want you to choose me in heat, and regret it later. Your regret would tear me apart. I will wait, Em. I will wait, however long it takes, no matter how badly I ache to come to you, to soothe you, to claim you. I will wait. Until it is what you want as well."
"You were just willing to summon hordes of wolves at my whim, if that was what I wanted, but you won't give me you?"
She snorted the words with equal parts sarcasm and wonder, but she was honored that he wouldn't take advantage of her just because he could. And right now, he most definitely could.
She let her eyes roam over the hard body she'd been seeing quite a bit of lately, had even gotten to touch in the cave before Galen interrupted them. She'd wanted him then, almost admitting it to him and giving herself to him then, and she was damn determined his honorable chivalry was not going to stand between her and what she wanted tonight.
She took the few steps needed to reach him, stopping just inches from his hard, sculpted body. The body she knew would give her so much pleasure, if she could only tempt him past chivalry, tease him past honor, drive him past protection and over the edge toward possession.
The wind picked up right then, caressing her skin with its warm breeze. It felt like a benediction, a blessing. It soothed her and encouraged her at the same time, feeding the flames already burning hot, but also arousing her confidence and urging her into unknown territory- seduction.
Emma had never seduced anyone, ever. But tonight she felt like her very life depended on getting Elam into her bed.
Her subconscious noted with some humor that the full moon shone huge and bright over his shoulder as they faced off, teasing her with the irony of every werewolf story she'd ever read. She took stock of every heightened sense she had in the heartbeat before she made her move.
It was the scent of him, stirred up and driven into her nostrils by the wind that sealed her fate.
He smelled like heaven. Peace, eternity, passion, need, forever, those were the words her brain used to try to categorize the various conflicting but complementary scents. But also twisted and tangled in his scent was coffee. Soothing coffee, dark chocolate, and weirdly- freshly cut summer grass. And under that, suppressed but growing was something darker.
Cinnamon, like he said he scented on her- but also musk and some scent her brain could only classify as sex. She'd never smelled sex, but somehow, maybe because he'd already named it, that was the word that jumped into her brain.
Sex.
Her brain focused on the word. It expanded in her conscience, flashing other words at her in quick succession- heat, need, now, mine. It started repeating on a desperate, escalating loop- mine, Mine, Mine, MINE!
His face looked almost pained as she focused on it. His breathing shallow, as if he was fighting the instinct to inhale her deeply. She felt a pang of insecurity, her human doubt coming to the surface. But then her eyes dropped, taking in the large, almost throbbing, very erect cock that was pointing straight at her. He definitely wanted her. But then he'd made that obvious since she'd come here, in word and in deed.
"There's no going back, Em. Be sure. Be very, very sure. If you come any closer, if you make the slightest move in my direction, there will be no going back."
17
His pained words brought her eyes up, from his twitching cock to his heated gaze.
She wanted very much to be a part of what she saw in those depths. Pain, pack division, soul changes be damned, she knew somehow that her life was entwined with his already. And she wanted her body to be entwined with his, as well.
She took the last step toward him, her naked body grazing and then pressing firmly against his as he stood guard over her on her porch, and she stated her choice.
"Kiss me, Elam. Make love to me, with me. Take me. Fuck me. Claim me. I am yours already, and I always will be. Claim me and mark me as such forever, and you will be mine as well."
"I have been yours since the very moment I saw you, Emma. I've only been waiting for you to take me as well."
His words were almost grunted, the last grip of his meager control released as he uttered them before sliding his hands into her hair and cupping her face. He aimed her lips to his, his slow, exploring kiss changing and growing into something wild and needy.
Her mouth opened under his, his tongue sliding against hers as he deepened the kiss and slid an arm around her waist, pulling her near.
He walked her backwards, back inside her cabin, slamming the door with his foot once they cleared the threshold.
He stooped low then, scooping her up. One arm against her back and one under her bent knees, he lifted her, carrying her through the cabin and into her bedroom. He laid her down in the center of her bed, and an odd thought popped out of her mouth.
"I 'saw' this happening in the cave."
"Oh, I'm sure I will have you there as well, sweet Emma. I plan on taking you everywhere you let me. Again and again."
He said that last bit with a grin, seconds before he parted her legs and kissed the sensitive skin on her inner thighs.
The feel of his mouth a few inches above her knee, teasing her flesh with his hot breath and soft, moist kisses was at once a totally new experience for her and at the same time, oddly a coming home. She knew she was exactly where she was supposed to be, that somehow this union, this very night, was where she had been headed her entire life.
Now that she was finally here, she wanted Elam, all of Elam, inside of her. Her heat was urging her on, she knew she'd only be complete once she and Elam were one, so she tried to tug on his hair, moaning her wishes as he continued to slowly tease her instead of taking her.
"Now, Elam. Please. I need you. Come up here and take me Elam, please. I need to feel you inside me."
"Funny, you don't sound like you've never done this before." He laughingly muttered the words against her skin, kissing his way up her silky thigh, aiming his mouth for the scent that had been driving him crazy for so long.
He wanted to kiss her there, to taste her, to drive her so wild for him that the little bit of pain she might feel when he slid inside her would be drowned out with need. He knew her heat was controlling her right now, but he still wanted their first time, her first time, to be something special for her, not just a heated, animalistic rutting.
"Relax Emma, let me taste you. We have all night. Hell, we have the rest of our lives. You only have one first time, I plan on making yours memorable."
He punctuated th
ose words by finally reaching his goal and sliding his tongue between her virgin lips. The moan she let escape above him was so innocently surprised, and at the same time so utterly erotic, he suddenly wasn't sure that he'd be able to take it as slow with her as he wanted to.
She let her thighs open wider for him, welcoming his mouth as it moved over her, kissing her where no one had ever kissed her before. Her hands, which had a moment before been tugging at him, urging him away from here, were now fisted in his hair for an entirely different reason.
He added his fingers to his tongue, spreading her lips gently and sliding back and forth over her wet slit, enjoying the heated moans he was causing to tumble from her mouth.
She started rocking her hips rhythmically, her body instinctively pressing for more, falling into a rhythm as old as time as she sought relief from the heat building inside of her. He responded by sliding one finger slowly inside her.
The sound she made as his finger entered her hardened his cock even more, becoming almost painful as it ached to be where his finger was.
She rocked her hips faster, harder as his finger filled her, sliding deeper, and his tongue danced slow circles around her clit. He licked her with the flat of his tongue one minute, and circled and teased her clit with the tip of his tongue the next, driving her higher and higher in her need.
"Elam! Oh, Elam! I'm going to come. I'm going to...Oh!"
He didn't stop what he was doing to answer her, he kept up the rhythm he'd found until her back arched, pressing her even more firmly against his mouth, and he felt her squeezing contractions around his finger as her orgasm took her.
As her waves slowed and stopped, he pulled his fingers from her, and started kissing his way up her body. He licked and nipped the flushed skin on her stomach, dipping his tongue into her belly button before exploring farther.
He grazed his teeth over the edges of her ribcage, her breathing still ragged, as his hand went on ahead, finding and cupping one full breast and teasing the nipple with his thumb as his mouth slowly followed behind.
He kissed the underside of her breast as he explored his way up her body, and then teased her nipple with his tongue before closing his lips around the tight bud and sucking on it.