I watched him through slitted eyes, the way man watches a woman. I reveled in the sight of him with the shadows playing across his face, the brief bit of moon lending enough light that I could see the brief flash of tongue that played about my sex. He moaned with the pleasure of it and I imagined for a moment, I could have his tongue and his cock all at once. I panted, almost climaxing at the thought but not wanting to give in just yet. I wanted to be filled when that came, so I could feel the shuddering, twitching way his shaft moved when he came.
He peeked up at me, his face slick with my desire. "What are you thinking?"
A throaty laugh, low and grumbling escaped me. "You sound like a woman."
"Would you like that?" he said, waggling his brows. "I know how much I'd like to watch you moan and groan, spread beneath a woman's tongue."
"You would not," I said, aghast.
He slapped my ass and squeezed it, lifting the flesh so that it could spread the cheeks open for him.
"You're right," he said. "I don't want to share you. Ever. Not this way." He planted a palm in my navel, pinning me as his free hand roamed with wet fingers up to my stomach and onward to my breasts. He cupped one and thumbed the nipple. I tried to pull him closer, onto me so he could enter me, but the pressure on my navel increased, resisting.
"Don't move," he said.
Although I knew his human eyes didn't have the same night vision as I did, he was looking at me. Maybe trying to make out my own expression in the dark.
"I want all of you, Shana," he said with a whisper. "I want to wake each day to find myself buried inside you. Mouth, pussy, ass –"
"Surely not ass," I said, shocked but so deliciously turned on, I wriggled my ass closer to him, helpless to keep it still. He shifted, just enough to loom over me, with his body hovering over mine. The shadow he cast between us hid his face from me. I felt his shaft pressing into my belly.
"Oh yes," he said. "Does it shock you that I want it all and I want it all at once? My poor cock never knows what it wants most of you – it just knows it needs to be buried inside."
I hated to admit how the words flushed my skin with an electric desire. All of me. Yes. Each inch of me ached for his touch anyway. Still, I hesitated.
"Don't you trust me?" he said against my lips as his body finally touched down. The heaviness of his weight could be suffocating if I thought about it. Just like the weight of the pack and the fear of these hunters, I could drown in the anxiety of it all. Except he grounded me. His weight felt delicious, like something pinning me to earth when I wanted to bolt. He was right, I knew. I needed the release.
I was already straining for him with my hips again. My sex ached. My ass ached. My mouth opened of its own volition trying to show him how wide I wanted to spread for him so that he could give me all he had.
Still I couldn't say it. It felt deliriously filthy and my mind swam with lusty images. All fuelled by the feel of his body against mine. In my mind's eye, he was already ramming into me, taking me inch by inch.
"It's more than trust, isn't it?" he said and there was a note of sadness in his voice, although his hand still roamed my skin. Fingers found their way between my bottom. Scooped it up and slid down the crevice to my aching ass.
"Admit it, Shana. You can't give in because for you it's about power. You think it will make you my bitch." He growled this last but it wasn't an angry sound. "It's true, isn't it? He e eased his way over my body again, his breath causing gooseflesh to rise on my stomach. "Say it."
"No," I said. "It's not that."
He caught my finger in his mouth on the way down and sucked on it, then guided my hand to my clit.
"See for yourself how hot it makes you," he said. "Imagine it. The best of both worlds. Just like we are." He sounded drunk or drugged and I knew if I said anything, I would sound the same. Even so, I was astounded to feel how drenched I was when my fingers met my flesh, and he chuckled when I gasped.
By the time I was heeling my clit and spreading my folds, he had plunged deep inside with a thick finger.
"I want to wear you," he said. "On my face, my fingers, my cock. All your juices. All your smells. Mine."
"Yes," I groaned. He could have anything from me.
I could feel his fingers sliding from my pussy to my anus, pressing against it, circling, slick from the juices of my core, never once insisting on entry, only asking. Playing there. I felt myself throb each time he slipped over the centre. I throbbed all over, dammit. My own fingers had by now begun a frenzied work, strumming on my tissues like strings and my clit had grown hard and straining. I needed more from him and he was holding back, choosing instead to tease me with his tongue and fingers.
"You're a bastard," I said, my frustration making me squirm beneath his hand and tongue. Oh the delirium of it. I was aware that I was panting and writing beneath his tongue and the hand that was free was clenching in his hair. "Bastard," I said again. "Stop teasing me."
"Say it, Shana."
"All of me," I said. "Take what you want."
"That's not it," his voice was quiet, subdued. How could he be so calm and collected when I was a writing mass of limbs.
"What the hell do you want then?"
"You know." Two simple words, said as though it was a command of its own. It was true. I did know. It was the one thing I'd held back although I had given it already, he just had yet to hear it. It was such a simple thing, such an easy thing now I couldn't imagine what had kept me from telling him.
"I trust you, then," I said, gritting my teeth. I would have said anything in that moment, but I meant it and he knew I did.
He made a sound deep in his throat and before I realized what was happening, he had positioned himself over me, both elbows on other side of my shoulders. He smelled of heat and sex and lust. When his cock pressed against my sex, I opened for him, confused but too far gone to care. He plunged inside as easily as if I were a melting pot of hot oils.
"That's all I wanted," he said, thrusting deep. "Just to hear you say it. To know you would deny me nothing. That you trust me with every last part of you."
Then he said no more as we blended together, unable to stop the driving push to lose the separateness of our physical selves and create one complete body, straining for ecstasy of being whole.
In that moment, the weight I wore on my shoulders left me and I knew I could do anything with him at my side.
THE RUSE OF SANCTUARY
At some point during the night, Jeb and I had made our way back to the mansion and tumbled into a heap on the bed. I think we might have had some lazy sex once or twice and fallen asleep wrapped in each other's arms far past dawn.
Morning came far too early, and I pushed myself to my feet on the other side of the bed and scoured the floor for something to put on. It was only when I noticed the floor was empty of everything except one sneaker that I realized I hadn't been wearing anything when I had gone outdoors. I rushed to the closet to pull out a robe. It was a ratty thing from my days as a teen, and I threw it back into the closet in disgust because my father had taught me the influence of appearance on others. I grabbed a silky maxi dress out instead and smoothed it down over my naked hips.
Jeb slipped his hand beneath the hem as I strode past, and made a leisurely, almost drunken journey with his fingers toward my thighs. I slapped his hand away.
"There's no time for that," I said. "Can't you hear that racket? Somethings' going on."
He picked his watch up off the end table and peered at it, gathering his brows together as though the very act could gather his consciousness. I sighed, thinking he could have used some of Galen's early morning training sessions.
"Holy hell," he said and shot up to a full sit, the watch left thrown onto the sheets. "Six am. Four hours sleep." He fixed me with an exhausted look then moaned as he pushed himself out of bed. "We slept too long."
He started as frantic a search for his pants as I'd made earlier for mine. I pointed to the chair he'd fastidious
ly laid them across before he'd climbed into bed with me and he yanked them onto his feet and past his legs. One shake and they were settled around his waist and legs as though they'd been neatly pressed.
He followed me as I strode down the wing and made my way down the stairs, aiming for the direction of the noise. With each step the sound grew until I realized it as an incessant drumming combined with the sound of wooden sticks on metal.
"What the blessed fuck?" I said to him as the sound got closer. I noticed he had shoved a pistol into the back of his trousers. "You think we're going to need that?"
"You know me," he said with a grin. "Always prepared."
I couldn't have been more surprised to see Lynden standing on our front step next to Gerald, in animated conversation and sweeping his arms in a broad gesture at an RV and a motorcycle that stood just outside our gates. As I peered out over the property, I could just make out a man pounding on the gate with a bat and another sitting cross-legged on the pave, a tribal drum between his feet as he beat out a staccato and unnerving rhythm.
So. At least three people at the gates and half a dozen of my guards at alert. Add to that Gerald and Lynden who stood on the step and me and Jeb, and what we had was a hell of a party.
When he noticed me, Gerald spread his arms wide in a helpless gesture and jerked his chin at Lynden. I watched the boy from over Gerald's shoulder and noted that his jawline was rigid. Clenching his teeth.
"What's going on here?" I asked Gerald.
"Your guess is as good as mine," he said. The old silver hair of his had been pulled back into a ponytail this morning, and I wondered at what age this old man had decided to wear a man bun. "They came here about an hour ago asking for sanctuary."
"And Lynden wants to give it?"
"You were both –" he halted as he looked at both I and Jeb, "dead to the world?" The grin on his face indicated he thought it had been more than that.
I felt heat rush up my neck. "We were sleeping. It was a late night."
"No doubt," he conceded. "It was a rather trying time yesterday, what with the attack and all."
"So what of these people?" I said. "Does Lynden want to give them permission to stay?"
"He wants to be like his sister, I guess, and protect those shifters who need protection," the old man said with a shrug.
"Werewolves, then," I said peering out at the bedraggled look of them. I chewed at my bottom lip. Not the best time for this. Not the time at all.
"Your call," he said and I heard Jeb's agreement as he came up behind me.
"You're going to have to at least let them in and see why they need our help," he said.
I looked out over the grounds toward the gates. The one with the bat had caught sight of me and was pounding at the iron in earnest. It was too close to the attacks. Something about this didn't smell right. I let go a weary sigh. The nape of my nape prickled. I imagined the hunters that attacked us might have sent out wave after wave after a bunch of packs. Some sort of shifter apocalypse. I snorted to myself. Not likely, but they might have come upon these wolves. Still. A caravan? They weren't out there on a camping trip.
"Not all of them," I said. "Not yet. We should question them first. See what the hell they need saving from."
Jeb gave a short nod and I noticed as Gerald eyed him that something of annoyance crossed the old man's careful features.
"It's what you were telling Lynden, isn't it?" I asked him and he nodded.
"We're of the same mind then," I said to him with a thin smile. It was hard to look patient when I was so damned hungry and tired. I needed caffeine.
I stepped in my bare feet out onto the lawn. I swung my gaze left and right taking in the caravan that squatted in the curve of the driveway outside the gates. It was ragged looking and well used. I imagined it had come from some sort of redneck trailer park. I shuddered as I imagined the kind of shifters who might even now be dreaming of rambling over my property and into my community beyond.
When Lynden saw me, he rushed over to me. "Shana," he said. "I'm so glad you're awake. I didn't know what to do."
"You did the right thing," I said, placing the palm of my hand on the top of his head. "Dad would've been proud of you."
I looked down into the eager face so much like his mother's and felt a little squeeze deep in my chest. She had been a fine woman. Kind. That kindness showed through her son's eyes as he looked at me, hoping I would help those outside the gate. I would have loved for the woman to have been my mom too, but it was fate that made us step-relatives. Still, I'd been lucky to have her as a friend; her gentle spirit helped me smooth out some of my more rough edges. I wanted to help keep her spirit alive in her son--my half brother. He could use with a few self-esteem boosts now and then, as well as a bit of confidence to toughen that penchant he had for being too sweet.
"Have you met their alpha yet?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "It was just the man with the bat so far. They wanted to drive the trailers in, but I wouldn't let them until you said so."
"Smart," I said with a smile. "We should be careful. Don't you think?"
He waggled his head up and down. I put my hand over his shoulder and steered him toward the house. Just in case this was a ploy by those hunters, I wouldn't have my brother left vulnerable. Maybe giving him something to do would get him out of harm's way without worrying him.
"Why don't you go see if someone can get me some coffee," I said. "In fact, have them brew a large pot for our guests."
He gave me a suspicious look, but turned tail and headed for the house. I waited till the door had closed behind him before I stepped up to Gerald.
"I suppose we have no choice," I said.
He put his hand on my shoulder. "There's more," he said with a conspiratorial look in his eye, scanning over my shoulder to where Jeb stood.
"It's okay, Gerald. Jeb is one of us." When was I ever going to get to stop repeating those words to my council. "What is it?"
Instead of answering, he nodded at the envoy who was staring at us through the bars of the gate. He was a brooding looking man with lots of hair and even from the lawn I could see his scowl. I nodded at him and he walked back from the gates to the last RV, a broad thing that pretty much obliterated the drive behind it. He wrapped smartly on the door and a man poked his head out. The man who had stepped from it jerked his head toward the back of it, and the envoy cantered around and disappeared. Moments later, the roar of a gas engine rumbled across the breeze and a four wheeler came out from behind the trailer. I watched it as it sped toward the gates, hauling its own little trailer covered by a sooty and dirty canvas that was tied around it.
He halted the vehicle directly in front of the gates. My mouth went dry.
"Apparently this is the more." I said to Gerald without looking at him. He shouted to one of my guards to open the gate and I waited with my fists clenched at my sides, feeling the nails dig into the palms. I could taste the anxious tension in my jaw. Jeb's arm went round my midriff, but I could feel by the way they held me in a stiff embrace, that his other hand was ready to pull his pistol from his waistband. So. As ready and anxious as I was to meet our new guests.
The four-wheeler trolled forward, sputtering as it entered the gates and sputtering as it died a few feet from where we stood. The swarthy driver gave me a questioning look and I nodded. Jeb's hand left my waist.
I watched as the driver leapt from the vehicle and went around behind it to flip back the canvas covering. Even I was surprised to hear the gasp exit my mouth.
I couldn't help but find myself walking closer. If Jeb followed me, I wasn't aware of it. I crept near enough to smell the oil of the machine and the taste the sourness of death on the air as I peered down. Three dead faces met mine. All three men piled next to each other, their limbs tangled in death. All three faces lifted skyward. Divested of masks, I could see the fleur-de-lis tattoo on each of their cheeks, crisply black against the bloodless skin.
I whipped my gaze to the
face of the driver.
"What the hell is going on?" I demanded.
It was the man still standing outside the RV that replied. He shouted something that sounded like a demand for entry. I felt my eye twitch and my belly grow cold as he came toward me through the still-open gate, hands up. The guards leveled their rifles at his back as he strode forward, leaving the caravans unguarded. The tension in the air was thick enough to slice through. The only way someone would come to me with hands up was if they were an enemy and were surrendering. A growl ambled through my throat and hearing it, Jeb stepped away from me. From the corner of my eye, I saw he too had his pistol in his hand, leveled at the four-wheeler driver.
"You give the word," he said without taking his eye off the driver.
"Hold," I said as the man edged ever closer. Everyone froze but the man walking toward me and I could have taken a bite of my heart, it was so far up my chest. Soon, he was near enough that I noticed the markings on his face. My hand shot up, palm forward, halting him. Markings. On his face. Surely every one saw them.
My throat constricted even as I tried to swallow down the dusty air my mouth had become. Jeb, bless him, did the talking for me as I struggled to lubricate the words.
"No closer," he said.
The driver of the RV immediately fell to the ground and spread his hands sideways. Jeb's pistol had somehow gotten within an inch of the man's temple. I heard the click of the safety being disengaged.
The man walking forward halted.
"It's not what you think," he shouted at us.
"And how do you know what we think?" I said. "Is it because you tried to murder my pack?"
Rogue Breed (Rogue Huntress Chronicles Book 2) Page 8