She kissed him again, bruisingly, biting into his lower lip until she tasted blood. Hating him, and loving him more than life itself.
He gasped. His chest arched up as if pulled by invisible cords, and he sucked in a lungful of air. Bright, fresh blood welled from the wounds in his side and temple.
"Morgan!" she cried, searching for something to stanch the flow. But he didn't hear her. His eyes remained closed. Dark mist formed over his body, the telltale sign of impending Change.
She slid away from him just as the transformation began. It was neither swift nor smooth; midway through the Change, he hovered between wolf and man just as he had in her bedroom at Long Park. Only this time it was not by choice. His body could not complete the Change in its weakened state, so near to death. Blood continued to stain the snow.
Athena caught at his fur-mantled shoulders and shook him. "Decide, Morgan!" she shouted. "Live or die. Wolf or man. But if you choose death, I'll know you were a coward!"
His eyelids fluttered, revealing the alien yellow of a wolf's eyes. He shuddered violently, and the mist became like a choking cloud. The shape under Athena's hands finished its transition. The black wolf lay on its side, barely breathing.
She buried her hands in Morgan's fur, feeling for the wounds. Her fingers came away dry. No more blood. Bone and muscle felt firm and whole. His heart beat strongly under his ribs.
Without questioning the miracle, Athena let herself go limp and rested her head on his flank. She knew she had slept when she felt hands—human hands—in her hair, stroking it away from her face.
She blinked and sat up. Morgan lay beside her, his bare skin unmarked and his eyes free of pain. He let his hand fall and gazed up at her, waiting for her questions.
"I'm not dreaming?" she whispered.
"No." He smiled—that faint, almost imperceptible smile she had finally learned to recognize. "And neither am I."
She reached out, touching any part of him that she could reach. It was not her imagination. The wounds that had bled so freely were gone as if they had never existed. At first she thought even the blood-stained snow had vanished, but then she saw the dark blotch several feet away and realized that Morgan had moved both of them to clean ground.
It was daylight now, and the storm had passed, but the temperature remained below freezing. Athena felt as warm as if she and Morgan lay wrapped in blankets before a crackling fire.
"You healed yourself," she said in wonder. "How?"
"It is a dangerous thing," he said. "A great risk to take when there is no other choice. One of us who is injured badly—if we Change, we either die or heal ourselves."
"I thought you were dead." Her eyes welled with belated tears. "You weren't breathing."
"But I heard you." He caught a tendril of her hair and tucked it behind her ear. "You called me a coward."
Her fist bunched with the savage desire to strike the gentle mockery from his face. "Did you find that amusing? Did you enjoy making me think you were dead?"
"No. I had to convince Niall that I was."
Niall. Athena closed her eyes, and the tears spilled over. "He thought he'd killed you," she said. "When he said he was returning to Long Park, I knew something was wrong. I left Denver as soon as I guessed what he intended."
"You risked everything," he said. "You Changed, Athena. You brought me back."
Somehow that victory seemed hollow. Whatever Morgan said, she had not saved him. The admiration in his eyes, the pride in his voice made the coming trial that much more unbearable.
"Yes," she said. "I Changed."
"Because you feared for me. But you must have known it was Niall who was in danger."
She met his gaze, and she knew. She knew that Morgan understood the reason Niall had come back to kill him. Cecily's accusations hung between them, unspoken but impossible to ignore. Even now, after his miraculous reprieve from death.
Especially now.
"I will believe you, Morgan," she said. "Whatever you tell me, I will believe."
He looked away. "My great secret," he said. "It would not have mattered if I had remained among the wolves. But Harry and his people drew me back to men, where the past is never forgotten. Not even by the ones who lived it."
Then it was true. The horrible things she had refused to accept… some part of them must be true. But the question she knew she must ask froze on her tongue.
"I was in prison," he said, his voice without expression. "Niall discovered it. That was why he came back. To protect you."
Athena sat very still, afraid that if she moved her entire body might shatter like a figure sculpted of ice. "Cecily told me," she said. "She was the one who told Niall."
"About me. About what I am." He made a harsh sound under his breath. "It is true." At last he looked at her. "You didn't believe it until now. You had faith in me."
How bitterly he mocked himself. She recognized the contempt, the unrelenting self-judgment. Whatever he had done, his punishment had never stopped. He carried it with him always.
He would tell her everything if she asked. Every ugly detail of his crime and imprisonment, anything she might possibly wish to know. And he would hope, as he told her, that she would turn from him in disgust and horror.
"You should not have come back, Athena," he said. "Your brother would have been safe."
He spoke with such reluctance, as if he were revealing a great weakness—as if sparing a life were more shameful than taking one. In spite of what he had said earlier, he assumed she'd escaped Denver to protect Niall. And hadn't she? Hadn't she been equally afraid for both men, knowing that Niall didn't have a chance against a werewolf?
But she knew her brother. His ruthlessness, and his tenacity. He would have been prepared to face a werewolf… or a murderer.
"A man who killed his own father." Those had been Cecily's words. And Morgan admitted it. But he had not hurt Niall. Her heart filled with the conviction that he had deliberately allowed Niall to attack and leave him for dead, so that he would not be compelled to kill her brother.
She could think of only one reason he would risk his own life to spare Niall's.
"If you are a murderer," she said, "it would be easy to kill a man you hate."
He stared at her, stubbornly mute. He would force her to draw her own conclusions rather than do anything to clear his name, or his worth in her eyes.
So it was up to her. She must decide: whether to believe Cecily and Niall and Morgan himself, or look beyond the cold facts to the man behind them. The man whose goodness shone like the biblical light under a bushel. The man she loved.
Words were inadequate. Here, in the wilderness, the two of them sat in the snow unaware of the cold or the nakedness that would have killed a normal man or woman.
Here, human language had no power to express the feelings that crowded her chest and seared her throat.
But there was another kind of communication far more eloquent. Suddenly and most acutely she was aware of her nakedness in a new and tantalizing way—hers, and Morgan's.
Morgan seemed to read her thoughts. He tensed his muscles and tried to stand, but his knee buckled. He caught himself against a fir and leaned there, breathing hard. Athena bit back a cry of alarm.
"We are both weary," she said. "We need rest before… before anything else."
"Are you ill? Your legs…"
Naturally he would worry about her and not himself. "I am tired. My legs hurt, and we need time to recover." And to decide what to do. She left those words unspoken, but he heard them.
"I'll take you to the ranch."
So that Niall has another chance to kill you ? So you can run away for the last time?
"No. Not yet." She kept her voice tranquil, her expression calm. "I just need to rest. Somewhere quiet. Please, Morgan."
The muscles in his jaw flexed. "There is a cave not far from here. It isn't much better—"
"It will do" She started to rise and Morgan rushed in to support her. She felt th
e vibration of muscles under his skin as he tried to lift her. "I can walk," she insisted. "Take me to the cave, Morgan."
He withdrew instantly, and she realized he believed that she didn't want him to touch her. The thought sickened her, but she swallowed her protest and let him move ahead, forging through the snow at a pace too rapid for a weakened man to sustain. Even so, he glanced back at her every few steps to make sure she followed.
They hadn't far to go. His path led through the trees and to a granite escarpment that formed a stairstep of ledges up the hill, ending in an overhang crusted with icicles. Beneath was the dark mouth of a cave. Morgan entered, moved around inside, and emerged a few minutes later.
"It's safe," he said, addressing the air over her head, refusing to look at her body or into her eyes. "A bear denned here once, but not for a long time."
She nodded and stepped over the lip of the entrance. Morgan pressed himself against a rock so that she would not touch him by accident. Her feet shuffled among dried leaves and pine needles, redolent of several former inhabitants. It was a soft, warm, and comforting scent, like that of a well-worn nursery blanket. The roof of the cave just cleared the top of her head.
This would be the place. Here Athena Sophia Munroe would do something her former self could not have dreamed of, just as she had never dreamed of walking again.
She knelt on the mat of leaves and watched Morgan come in, hesitate, and settle against the curved stone wall near the entrance. "I can make a fire," he offered.
I'm not cold, she almost said, and realized her mistake. She needed to draw him close, but he was staying as far away as he could.
Was his self-contempt so powerful? Was it that he didn't trust himself with her? Did he no longer want her?
No. Not unless his body acted independently of his mind. She knew what she saw, what he tried to hide. He thinks you don't want him. Maybe he hasn't enough strength. Maybe this is wrong.
Wrong, yes, by the rules that governed people like Cecily Hockensmith. But not wrong for them. This was not only right, but necessary.
All the questions were silenced. She stood and walked toward him, each step taken with great care. He looked up and flinched as if she confronted him with a loaded rifle and death in her eyes.
She dropped to her knees before he could move. "Morgan," she said, and touched his arm. "I don't hate you. I could never hate you."
He didn't respond. She brushed his face with her fingertips. Every muscle in his body tightened.
"Whatever you may have done, Morgan… whoever you were in the past… it is not who you are now. I know you. Did you think I would stand as your judge, like Niall, and condemn you?"
His laugh was barbed like the new wire fences being strung across the prairie. "The saintly Miss Munroe, always so generous to the wretched."
The insult had no power to wound. She understood its source.
"Would a saint do this?" she whispered. She took his face between her hands and kissed him. His lips, firm and set, resisted for the space of a second. Then he groaned deep in his chest and pulled her into his arms.
Victory was sweet, but Athena knew at once that the savoring must come later. Morgan's kiss was urgent, almost ferocious, brimming with needs she could not expect him to control. Didn't wish him to. Not when she had the power to ease his pain for this little while.
She allowed her body to melt into his. He raised up onto his knees, taking her with him, so that their bodies touched along nearly every point: breast to breast, hip to hip, thigh to thigh. He was burning as if with fever. She felt the stiff fullness of him pressed to her belly and went hot and cold by turns.
Not fear. There was no room for fear. But this was the next great Change, the one that followed the transformation of her heart and her human body. This was the threshold from which she could not return to what she had been.
Morgan must not sense any hesitation or doubt. This was for him. Just for him. He'd have no cause to rue what they did together now, no matter how many other things in his past he regretted. This was their chance to make one perfect memory to last a lifetime.
Athena was prepared to accept Morgan into her body even without the sweet persuasion of kisses and caresses.
She almost wished him to pull her down and consummate the hunger they shared.
But he anointed the corner of her mouth with a whispered kiss, his tongue darting out to touch the rim of her lips. Its very delicacy was arousing. She opened her mouth, needing to feel some part of him inside her. He ignored the invitation and gently closed his teeth over her lower lip.
The sensation of his suckling was exquisite, tugging at nerves that reached deep into her belly. She closed her eyes and stopped resisting. When he had carefully explored every line and curve of her mouth, he bent his head to her shoulder and grazed his teeth across the sensitive skin at the juncture of her neck. There was no pain, only delight, but he soothed each nip with his tongue. His breath sizzled in her ear.
"Morgan," she sighed. "It is—"
He pressed his finger to her mouth and shook his head. She understood. There were to be no words, nothing of the human world to invade this oasis in the snow. Morgan lifted her against him and pulled her down again, warm skin on skin. Her breasts came to rest in the hollow of his shoulders. Effortlessly he positioned her, hands about her waist, until her nipples brushed his chin and then his lips.
Once before he had touched her there. What he had done in her room at the ranch was nothing compared to this. The very tip of his tongue teased her nipples to throbbing peaks, and then he took her into his mouth.
Athena had learned, long ago, that women's breasts were made to feed and nurture infants. Now she discovered that they held secrets of pleasure only a man could unlock. Morgan suckled her, kneading her flesh between his hands. He drew tiny circles with his tongue and drew his teeth to the very tip before filling his mouth with her. Athena let her head fall back, revelling in the body Morgan so adored.
This body, this woman's body so perfectly designed to fit his. And Morgan was determined to make himself acquainted with every part of it. Athena was not sure she could stand the wait.
He gave her no choice. His was a gentle tyranny of pleasure. When he had finished with one breast he moved to the other and gave it equal attention, drinking in her moans with quick kisses.
Then he slid her down, her thighs parted to either side of his hips. She did not quite dare to look between them. The sleek hardness of his erection pushed against her, the hot tip very near to the place that had become so wet and swollen. Already her body knew what it would feel like, how the delicious agony would be soothed only when he filled the hollow ache inside.
But his fingers found her instead, skimming between her legs until they found the hidden nub. His thumb stroked in a rhythmic motion while his other arm supported her even when her legs could no longer hold her up.
A little more, just a little more, and she would find her way to paradise. But it was too soon. This time, when it happened, she wanted him with her in every way. Blindly she reached for any part of him that she could touch and found the warm, ridged plane of his belly.
He caught her wrist and pressed her hand to his chest. He bent her back, and her newly supple body arched to lift her hips over Morgan's thighs, her knees to either side of his, her hair spread across the cave floor.
She was utterly exposed. Helpless, yes, but not in the way she had been in her chair. This was willing surrender, excitement, anticipation of inconceivable joys ahead.
It was not long in coming. Something slipped inside her, past the yielding gateway so open to Morgan's touch. She gasped in surprise.
He leaned over her and kissed her brow. "I am making you ready," he said. And she knew it was fingers that had found their way inside, preparing her, making her mad for a bolder penetration.
"You're so wet," he whispered, brushing her ear with his lips. "So eager to take me inside you."
The human words he had foreswor
n held an unbearable magic. Yes, she was wet, and ready, and eager with wanting him. But her mouth would not form the sounds to make him obey. She closed her eyes and endured with mingled pain and pleasure, and when the heat of his mouth replaced his fingers, she knew how naive she truly was.
His tongue followed the same burning path as his hands had done, teasing and suckling her, lapping up her wetness, thrusting deep only to withdraw again. Her body climbed to the precipice, leaving her mind still bound to the dull earth.
"No," she gasped. "Morgan, I want… both of us. Together."
The heat of his breath left her, and for a moment she was cold and bereft. Then his strong hands were parting her thighs, lifting her bottom, drawing her onto him. Poised, at last, to finish what he had begun.
"When I go inside you," he whispered, "there is no turning back."
She lifted her hand to cover his mouth as he had done hers, silencing him, feeling her wetness on his lips. Then he was inside her, as she had imagined, only a thousand times better. There was no pain, only the fullness of him stretching, filling, completing.
Morgan had known, the moment he had held Athena naked in his arms, the moment he had tasted her, that their joining would be unlike any he had felt before. It wasn't only the many years of enforced celibacy. It wasn't that his one time with Tamar had been so cold and bereft of emotion. No, it was so much more than that, more even than the desire he had felt for Athena almost from the day they had met.
Athena was his. He would be the first to possess her, to take the virginity she willingly conceded to him. She gave herself without reluctance or false modesty. The scent of wanting wreathed the cave, and the intoxicating flavor of his desire still lingered on his tongue.
He knew that this act of love was a gift of the moment.
After it was over, the questions would still be there—the questions and the doubts and the fears. And he didn't care. For now there was only one reality, and both wolf and man cried out to seize it for the first and last time. For a while he and Athena would grasp salvation in both hands.
TO CATCH A WOLF Page 29