He pushed his fingers into the thick hair at Trace’s brow and tugged enough that he felt the wolf’s cock jerk against his leg. Images flashed in Cameron’s mind of that shaft sliding past his lips and over his tongue. He called up the salty wonderful taste of Trace’s skin – his come. Cam sighed as the bigger man kissed his cheekbones in a surprisingly gentle way.
‘I think we cancel each other out, Lightning Boy,’ the wolf said, and swiftly spun him and pinned him to the wall, facing away.
Cam pressed his face to the cool white plaster and managed a gasping, ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean if I tried anything dangerous you’d just fry me in my boots.’ He kicked Cam’s legs apart and there it was again, the insistent drive of a hard member to the crack of his ass. Cam felt a shiver roll through him. God, how he wanted this to pan out. God, how he’d missed contact – touching and kissing and fucking. Being close to another person.
‘And if I accidentally fried you in your boots –?’ he started, feeling nerves curl around in his gut like oil smoke.
‘I’d wolf out on you. Probably take off before you could do it. See, we tend to know things are coming before they come … Heh. So to speak.’
‘Then …’ Cameron let the word peter off, imagining himself pinned under that intense purple gaze.
‘Then we should just shut the fuck up and fuck.’
Chapter Thirteen
He expected it all to happen right there. Against the wall. Like some porno prison movie that, at this point, he’d probably pay to see. But no, the wolf looped an arm around Cam’s waist and hauled him into the nearly monastic room.
‘The good father had me bring you food, by the way. So when we’re done, you need to eat. You’re light as a feather.’
‘I –’
‘Hush,’ said Trace. ‘It wasn’t an insult.’
Cameron pressed his lips together as he was dropped and rolled to the bed. Then the man was covering him with his body, the heat of him a blanket, and kissing him. Kissing him! Energy tickled at Cameron’s toes and he felt that stab of anxiety.
‘Don’t worry. It’s fine,’ Trace said, teeth on his earlobe. ‘You can’t hurt me.’
He crushed his mouth down on Cameron’s mouth and their tongues tangled for a minute. A long and blissful minute that made Cam’s blood leap and his stomach swirl with desire. He was totally consumed by his attraction and it was so, so good.
‘Electricity can hurt anyone,’ he mumbled, shoving his hand between them to find Trace’s belt buckle. He tugged until the leather and the metal obeyed his fervent wishes and came undone. His fingers stumbled over the button, the zipper, but finally he was touching hot skin. A peppering of hair under his palm as he slid his hand down further to grip the large, willing cock that awaited him.
He shivered.
‘I can sense it coming.’ The wolf laughed. ‘And if you keep doing that, it won’t be the only thing coming. Come on now, Cameron. Let’s get your clothes off.’
Cameron thought the moment would never pass. The clutch and wrestle with pants and clothes. But, finally, they were bare. Belly to belly, chest to chest, cock to cock – which was the part that might make him lose consciousness before anything happened.
‘Have you changed your mind?’ Trace almost leered in the meagre light still shining from the bathroom. His eyes were wild and hungry and Cameron felt his dick jerk in response to the lust he saw there. His body was heavy with lust but his heart felt light as dandelion fluff.
‘No.’
‘Then why do you smell so nervous?’
Cameron shifted and watched the wolf blink slow and lazy – the friction had done him in for a heartbeat.
‘Because I am nervous. It’s been … for ever.’
Trace grinned. His hands began a seeking slide along Cam’s skin. His fingertips travelled: knees and thighs, belly and hipbones, ass and flanks, and finally – finally – he gripped Cameron’s cock in his big, hot hand. ‘You’re vibrating,’ the wolf said.
‘You just touched me everywhere. I’m dying over here. Of course I’m vibrating.’
‘Yeah?’ Trace chuckled, his hand working up and down the length of Cameron’s cock.
‘Yeah.’ The word was a puff of breath – a secret prayer.
Trace kissed down his belly, briefly flicking his tongue into the shallow divot of Cameron’s navel. The heat of Trace’s mouth made the heat of his body seem tepid.
Trace flicked his tongue over each uprising of hip bone, kissed right above Cam’s cock but didn’t touch it. Cameron thought his breath would freeze in his chest and he’d simply stop breathing. Just the barest hint of wet tongue at the top of his shaft before Trace laughed softly and kissed all along one thigh down to the knee.
‘Jesus.’
‘Not even close,’ Trace whispered. His big fingers curled against Cam’s skin to hold him.
Cam fought the urge to thrust up and beg with his body. Finally, he sighed mightily. ‘Please don’t make me expire before we can actually fuck.’
‘Who knew we’d be here when you rolled into town yesterday? Right. Here …’ A single finger pushed against Cam’s hole and he hummed softly. The finger worked inside him and flexed even as that tongue dragged along the very top of his cock again.
‘You’re driving me insane.’
‘No. I’m getting ready to fuck you.’ Trace’s breath slid along the fragile skin on Cam’s groin. His thighs erupted in pebbled skin and the fine hairs on his body tingled. This was electricity that had nothing to do with Brother Lightning. This was connection, physical and otherwise.
Cameron surrendered then, letting his body absorb every touch and every nuzzle. When Trace’s mouth slid down his cock and he felt that tugging rush of a mouth sucking on him, Cam curled his fingers into the cool, plain sheets. Outside rain tapped the window. Not a brutal storm, a gentle drizzle.
Trace cupped his balls and squeezed just hard enough to keep him on the edge of breaking. He arched up to push himself deeper into the wolf’s mouth. He let out a growl and moved a bit lower so his lips brushed Cam’s pubic hair. Then he growled again and moved up Cam’s body, shoving his legs high and leaning his full weight on Cam’s body. One rough and rushed kiss and Trace pushed a few fingers deep in Cam’s ass. Judging him ready, he ran his cock along that tight hole. Inch by inch he forced himself into Cameron, and when he was fully seated deep inside, he stilled, kissing Cam full on the lips.
‘Here we are,’ he said, his voice caught somewhere between man and beast. The roughness of that sound seemed to scrape against Cam’s skin.
‘Here we are,’ Cam gasped, wishing beyond all wishes that the man would simply fucking move. His cock was trapped against his belly and the friction and heat of Trace hovering over him was maddening. Cameron’s body had become one big pulse. One big, needy, thumping pulse.
‘No more talk. Shut up and kiss me.’
So Cam did, craning his neck to get at those soft, full lips. Tongue clashed with tongue and Trace was moving. Slow and sure and with great deliberation. Cameron’s hands plucked and pulled, hovering around Trace’s body and feeling every inch of skin he could reach.
‘Behave now.’ Trace laughed and caught his hands, pinning his wrists above his head. His free hand moved between them, stroking up and down Cam’s erection. He moved restlessly, trying to reach out for more friction but flee from it. It was all too good, this moving together, and he wanted more but didn’t want it to end. Ever, if he had his way.
‘I am doing my best.’ Cam dragged his teeth along Trace’s jaw before licking at the salt on his neck. He’d use whatever he could reach to get his contact. He’d cheat if he had to. Moving his wrists just enough to fight against the wolf’s grip, he arched up to get Trace deeper, to create more pressure on his blissfully tortured erection.
‘You’re not behaving very well at all,’ Trace said, capturing Cam’s lower lip with his sharp teeth. The spiky, insistent bit of pain had Cam’s cock rock hard. He
was so on edge he was making nonsense noises but Trace didn’t seem to mind; he licked along Cam’s lips and ate up every crazy noise he made.
‘I don’t want it to end,’ Cameron confessed as he thrust his body up. Trace’s hand gripped harder on his cock and Cam felt the reward of not just being full but being touched.
‘It’s going to end. Pretty soon, I bet. But – if you can …’ Trace shook his head.
‘What?’
‘Nothing. Later. Just shut up and let me fuck you, electric boy.’
Somehow when Trace smiled it was all OK and the questions bled away, though something in his gut told Cam he might not like what the wolf had been about to say. Instead of fighting it, he gave in and arched up hard. With every driving thrust and every squeeze on his cock, Cam got closer to coming, until he seemed to exist in some surreal space caught on the verge of orgasm.
When Trace’s teeth pressed against his skin, hard enough for Cameron to see small white stars in the nearly dark room, he came. His body jolted up under the bigger man’s in a nearly mortifying need for contact. His belly warm and sticky with come, he moved up hard and fast and felt the wolf’s body go rigid. Cameron kissed him roughly – his jaw, his neck, his collar bone and finally his lips – anywhere he could reach. Trace hissed and then slid into him deeply once more, in a surprisingly tender thrust, and he was coming. Clutching at Cam’s wrists with his hand, his cheek pressed to Cam’s cheek.
‘Jesus,’ Cam said again.
He went to kiss Trace and the wolf moved his head. It was a subtle movement, but Cam caught the dodge and his heart broke a bit. But there had to be a reason; he’d try to let it go.
‘You OK?’ he couldn’t help himself from asking.
‘Fine,’ Trace said. ‘But you – you need to eat. And then I’ll take you to the mystery spot.’ The wolf tried on a laugh at his comment but it sounded taut and rough.
‘OK,’ Cam said, playing along. He didn’t want to be hurt or shocked, so he pushed both feelings aside and let Trace go when he sat up. ‘I am hungry.’
The wolf smiled. It was a forced smile, and Cam felt a knot in his throat. A knot of stupid emotion he should not be feeling. It was just fucking. Nothing more, nothing less. ‘Great. Let’s get you some food. Father Finn makes a hell of a turkey club.’
Father Finn did make one hell of a turkey club, and after hours of unexpected nap and then the first fuck he’d had in what felt like ages, it was just what Cameron needed.
‘Let’s take that walk. No one’s out there now. It’s not far.’
Outside, the first bites of fall were in the air. The breeze stirred, kissing cool lines along Cam’s skin. He almost shivered from the brisk air, but it faded. ‘So you saw one of these things?’ His flashlight beam bounced along the dark path. He assumed Trace didn’t really need one.
‘I did,’ Trace said, clomping along the path. He was big and noisy and Cameron smiled, trying very hard to imagine the shifter being quiet and stealthy like his animal spirit.
‘And was it just a glimpse or was it … more tactile?’
‘What’s that mean? More tactile?’
‘Did you touch it? Did it touch you? Did it … eat your chicken?’ Cam sighed, not knowing what else to say.
Trace snorted. ‘Eat my chicken? Is that a sex joke?’
Cameron almost choked on his own spit. ‘God, no! Sorry. It’s just the second lady I met today, she had a chicken in her aviary –’
‘Ah, poor Molly,’ Trace said, nodding. ‘Yeah. It ate Mathilda.’
‘So you all know each other?’ Cam asked. A spark of jealousy ignited in his belly. They all had a place to call home. They all knew each other. It was a community, a family of sorts. He could barely remember the feeling of community.
‘Of course.’ The wolf stilled. For a brief and shining moment, he took Cam’s hand. He helped him over a fallen log but then – almost hesitantly – let Cam’s hand go. He cleared his throat. ‘We live in a small, secret town designed to draw in shifters and special types. We’re cloaked magically to be forgotten. We have to take care of each other. Know each other.’
Cam wished for his hand to be back in Trace’s bigger one. Had it really only been a day since he’d rolled downhill into town? It seemed like much longer when he thought about it.
They finally arrived at a small gazebo. Cam could hear the falls rushing, and if he shut his eyes he could feel a mist on his face. This had to be the place.
‘Here it is. I was out here a few weeks ago and heard something in the woods. Right there over the railing, in the wood. I assumed that it was an animal.’
‘Assumed?’ Cam asked. ‘Wouldn’t you – you know – know?’
Trace laughed. ‘Well, for one thing I was in human form, so not really. I have a heightened sense of smell and sight and, yes, hearing, but not like that. Not like I can hear a noise and go “oh, that’s a raccoon”. Secondly, I wasn’t really paying attention, to be honest.’
‘Ah, I see. OK, so you hear a noise and … what?’
‘And I looked up. Didn’t see anything, so I went to the edge and looked over. There’s really no drop at all from the gazebo to the ground. What? Two feet? Father Finn said this was out here when he arrived. We assume it was someone’s favourite place to sit at some point.’
‘I’d imagine so.’
The wolf curled his fingers to the rail and leant over just a bit. Cam caught the change in his expression in the torchlight.
‘I almost let it take me,’ Trace said, so softly Cam questioned if he’d heard it. ‘It reached out and I could feel it. The moisture of its skin and the heaviness of its presence. The wrongness of it. And I almost let it take me. I almost just gave in.’
It dawned on Cam that what he’d taken for coldness, for standoffishness, was in fact grief. He had been Trace’s first, to hear him talk, since the man he’d loved and killed. There was a lot of pain tucked inside the large, powerful man before him.
‘But you didn’t,’ he said.
‘No.’
‘Because you’re not ready to give up?’
‘Because I’m a coward.’ Trace’s eyes turned to Cam and there was that brief flash of animal shine. ‘Nothing more, nothing less.’
Chapter Fourteen
Cameron stepped toward him but Trace moved away. Fuck. How had he not seen the grief for what it was before? How could he be so stupid? There was a big difference between haven’t gotten any and having the last person you were with be the man you loved – and killed.
‘Why?’ he asked. But he already knew.
‘Because it’s been a long, lonely life.’ The wolf barked out a laugh. ‘Not to sound like some cheesy country song or anything.’
‘You just sound honest,’ Cam said, wanting to reach for him again, but putting his hands in his pockets instead.
‘Well, that is honest. I’m a coward, wanting to run from a life full of …’ He shrugged, but it was barely visible in the meagre light from the flashlight. Cam had let it point to his feet to allow Trace some semblance of privacy. ‘Nothing.’
‘Life can change,’ Cam said, not wanting to sound too hopeful. Hopeful for himself or the other man, he wasn’t sure. If he was brutally honest, most likely for both of them. And some sappy part of his dented bruised heart said maybe – just maybe – together.
He shook it off. Stupid wishful thinking.
‘Not usually. Not enough to … Anyway –’ Trace changed directions ‘– I didn’t let it take me. I just stood there and watched.’
Cameron was starting to understand why this man had hidden himself away. Living in a hidden town, concealing himself further in the basement of a church rectory. Having as little contact as possible with people.
‘What did it look like?’ he asked.
‘Like hell.’
Cam waited, wishing it had been a week or more since they’d met so he could reach out and take Trace’s hand. Offer some comfort.
‘Meaning?’
‘I
t was big. Bigger than the gazebo. It had tentacles, I noticed that, especially with all the talk that came from what happened at The Den when that band of crazies called up the thing from the floor. Concrete everywhere. I had to help them clean that up because Father thought it was the right thing to d –’ He caught himself rambling. ‘It was big, with tentacles, but it had this hook it looked like on first glance. But it wasn’t a hook so much.’
‘What was it?’ Cam pressed his belly to the railing to try and stave off the feeling of nervousness that had settled in the pit of his gut.
‘It was a stinger. Like on a scorpion. That’s when it happened,’ Trace said. His face was almost eerie in the torchlight.
‘When what happened?’
‘When I had that urge to just let it take me. One good hit from that stinger, and I bet you dollars to donuts I’d be toast. Accelerated healing powers or not. Sometimes dead is dead.’
Cameron shook his head and bit back his worry. He reached out and took Trace’s hand. ‘Please don’t talk like that.’
It was a risk, to admit to the easy way he’d taken to this man. Especially after so many years alone. It was a big risk and a lot of fear.
Trace looked at their hands. It was only his silhouette in the darkness, but Cam could see him do it. He gave a rough laugh – more of a growl. ‘This isn’t love, Lightning Boy. It was what it was. I hope I didn’t make you think that I was up for anything but a fu –’
The gazebo started to rattle and sway under their feet and Cameron cried out as the boards shifted and his left foot was suddenly lower than his right. Their hands were still entwined, but now it was Trace trying to keep Cam standing. The world shook harder and Cameron panicked, running from the gazebo on stumbling feet. Trace followed suit in the gloom. The moon was bright, so he saw how easily and gracefully his lover moved when he had to. Trace reached for Cam and Cam heard himself say, ‘It’s happening again, isn’t it?’
There was a great cracking sound as Trace closed the gap between them, but the earth seemed to roll underfoot and the cracking turned to a rushing sound – like high wind whispered past the ear – and Cam felt a great thud that shook him to his bones. He barely registered the branches that gripped at him and the twigs that snagged at him as the sapling buckled him. It was a tree he’d heard, he realised wildly, and it had hit him.
Beast in Me (The Divination Falls Trilogy) Page 8