by M. L. Briers
He pushed the seatbelt back against the frame and then eased it forwards. Hey presto, like bloody magic it worked for him. Dee would have released her hold on the belt but his hand kept hers securely against it. Of course it wasn’t the damn seat belt she wanted to get away from, it was him.
The excitement that washed through her at the feel of the backs of his fingers as they brushed against her shoulder, then her breast, and she fought the urge to gasp and sigh simultaneously, unsure what that would even sound like, or if it was possible… Then down over her stomach, her hip, they hesitated for one long moment and then they were gone, but his hand was still caging hers and that meant that tingling awareness of him, of them, was still there.
The click of the metal, signifying she was locked in place, sounded like a gun going off as time stood still for her. There was no space between them inside the car, at least none that she could find. He felt so close, too close, and yet not close enough. Then he released her hand and the spell was broken.
“I could have done that…”She blurted out. Suddenly released from his touch was like a wakeup call to her inner shrew.
“What are the odds?”He tossed out, grinning wildly to himself, even though he physically ached with the need for her that just that brief and normally harmless contact had caused. “Besides, I wanted to get home before morning.”He growled out. Smug now, there was a self satisfying assurance about him that told him that his mate was already feeling the pull of mating for him.
“Need to pee up a tree and mark your territory before dawn?”Dee hissed. She was feeling a little more than antsy, and he looked smug. Not that she was looking at him, she could just tell.
“There’s only one thing I need to mark…”His sexy, growly voice was back with a vengeance and bits of her were curling again. Damn it… that wasn’t right, he was playing dirty…
“If those fangs have an urge to come out, we’ll stop and get you a chew toy.”She hissed. Folding her arms across her chest, she felt the jolt from her erect nipples hit its intended target deep inside her, and she wanted to moan with the ache that it created.
Aidan grinned widely as he forced the keys into the ignition and started the engine. He put the car into gear and then paused for one long moment, scenting the air a little too dramatically.
“You do know I can scent your arousal.”He growled out and her jaw fell open as he pressed his foot down on the accelerator and the car shot off down the road, almost as fast as her mortification swept through her.
After about an hour of following the pickup trucks tail lights down the darkening road, Dee noticed that they had started to drop back.
“That thing under your right foot, if you push it, we’ll go faster.”Dee sniped out and heard the slow roll of a growl come towards her.
“And if your car wasn’t such a piece of junk, we wouldn’t be losing power.”He offered back to her, another low growl rumbling along with his words.
“My car is not a…”Dee almost shook her head to make sure she wasn’t sleeping. “What? Losing what?” Were the Fates insane? How could stranding her out here, in the dark and cold, and the middle of nowhere with the caveman improve the situation between them?
“Power. Hold on, I need to pull it over.”
“Over? No. Go, go, go.”Dee looked out at the hedge lined road. Dark and creepy, just like her mate. Ok, she admitted to herself that wasn’t true. But come on? Really?
“Can’t go, go, go, when the car wants to stop, stop, stop.”Aidan informed her as they slowed, first to a crawl, and then to a halt.
Ok, so he had a slight sense of humour, and that did make her smile- internally. She wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of seeing it on her face…
His mobile screamed out inside the sudden silence of the car and her thoughts and made her jump in her seat. Not that she could go very far, having the seat belt around her.
Aiden fished the mobile from his front pocket and made it live. Bringing it to his ear, she knew she was only going to get half of the story.
“Broken down…”He growled and flicked his eyes towards her as if it was her fault, and she balked.
“Maybe if you knew how to drive…”She offered. Folding her arms across her chest again and squashing her boobs down as she huffed.
“No, we’ll be fine. Keep going. I’ll get us towed…”
“Wait. What?”Dee hissed. But all he did was raise that one sexy eyebrow in her direction.
“No, she’ll stay with me.”
“Why do I get to stay with you? Punish me for your lack of driving skills…”Dee raised her arms and dropped them to her lap in frustration. Ok, she didn’t really want to be in the pickup truck playing third wheel with the other caveman, but she certainly didn’t want to be stuck in the middle of nowhere with this one either. It was the lesser of two evils and right now, Evan was that lesser evil.
His brow went up again. And she saw the muscles in his jaw and neck clench and move. Damn, but he had muscles on muscles, and she liked that. Dee almost balked at herself. Now that couldn’t be, she thought, as she crossed her arms again and pushed herself back into the uncomfortable seat. She wasn’t into muscles, never had been, but him… Ohhhhh!
“Ok. Call you later.”Aidan pulled the phone away from his ear and turned the damn thing off. He turned towards her in his seat and she glared back at him. “I’m going to call a tow, are you going to stay quiet for ten minutes or act like a shrew the whole time?”He growled over at her.
Dee shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t answer him, because she didn’t feel the need to dignify his words with an answer.
Aidan shucked off his seatbelt and pulled his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans. A moment later he was holding a card in his hand and tapping numbers into the phones keypad. The moment he hit the call button she piped up.
“Jerk.”And she was gratified by the sigh that came from his lips. Turning to look out of the window, she pressed her forehead against the cold glass and told herself that this whole thing had been a bad idea from start to finish.
She should have told him to go to hell. She should have told Tanya to clear up her own damn mess. She should never have agreed to come on this adventure…
Dee’s mind stopped spinning and she focused with true clarity on that one word, adventure. That’s what this was. It was so simple that it was glaringly obvious to her now. He was an adventure. He was her adventure. She’d been thinking that she wanted something a little more stable, a little more permanent in her life, and here he was. You couldn’t get much more stability than bonding for life.
Dee twisted in her seat and traced her fingers down the coldness of the glass. Resting the side of her head against the cushioned back of the seat she stared out into the darkness and realised that Fate had given her everything that she thought she wanted. And an adventure too boot. She was either the luckiest person on the planet, or the most stupid. She just wasn’t sure which one applied.
Tanya kept watch in the side mirror as the headlights of Dee’s car faded into the distance. Even when she couldn’t see them anymore she kept a vigil in the hope that they might reappear.
They were supposed to be in this together. Dee was supposed to be with her as her Neanderthal man carted her off across the country and back to his house. At least she hoped he had a house, or even a room in a house, and that she wasn’t going to be sleeping in the pickup truck.
“We’re not stopping?”Tanya felt a little rise in her need to clarify the situation before her heart started to dance within her. Take your mind off it. Talk. She thought. And her mate grunted towards her. Wow, great chat.
“Are we going back for them?”Tanya tried to give it to him as slowly as she could. Obviously he was like a bad internet connection, there was a delay from his brain to his mouth.
“No. Aidan said I should take you home.”Evan offered. He felt her anxiety and he wanted to reach out and take her hand, sooth her, but he didn’t want to scare the hell out of he
r. Now that she wasn’t drunk she just seemed so flighty.
“You have a home?”She’d blurted it out without thinking, and the moment it left her lips his head snapped around towards her and his eyes questioned her sanity.
“Of course I have a home…”Evan growled, his eyes flicking back and forth between the road and her.
Tanya gave him a small smile and a shrug of her shoulders. It was the best that she could do. “Oh.” She pushed out and then wanted to slap herself on the forehead.
“What does that mean?”He growled again, and she shrugged again.
“It means…oh.”She turned her head away from him to look out at the blackness that had closed in around them. She hated these little unlit back roads they gave her the creeps.
“Oh, means more than oh when it’s said like that…”Evan assured her and she winced into the darkness.
“Said like what?”Tanya couldn’t see a way out of this conversation.
“Like you thought I was a hobo living out of my truck or something…”
“You’re one of those…”She thought she might just slip out of the backdoor of this conversation if she handled it right.
“One of those what?”He demanded. The agitation in his voice was more than evident as he scowled back at her.
“Those people that read things into what someone else have said when they innocently make a comment…”Tanya offered, sounding quite reasonable in her own mind.
Evan growled a little. “Now hold on a minute…”Evan growled a little more. It was the strangest sensation for her. Like a caress to her skin, and then deeper.
“Just throwing accusations around…”Tanya waved a hand in the air like she was the Queen of England. The sound of Evan spluttering made her want to chuckle out loud. Thankfully she kept a lid on it.
“Just you wait a God damn minute…”Evan growled harder. His hands tightened on the steering wheel until his knuckles were white.
CHAPTER FIVE
“I think we should end this conversation. I can see that you’re not concentrating on the road properly and I think our pup deserves better than that from you.”Tanya heard the small whimper that left his lips. She wasn’t entirely sure what to make of it. Either he wanted to kill her, or he felt some kind of remorse, maybe guilt.
Neither of which mattered because the job was done. She’d somehow managed to sidestep letting him know that she thought he might be a truck dwelling bum, and got him to relax in the process. His knuckles flooded with colour again as his hands eased their grip on the leather.
“The tow trucks here, sweetheart. You need to wake up now.”Aidan’s voice drifted to her in ways she could never have imagined, filling her mind and body with a deep seated, soothing awareness of him being beside her. She stirred in her seat, a little cramped up, and a lot fuzzy within her brain as the backs of his warm fingers brushed down the coolness of her cheek and she sighed.
The gentle growl that rolled from him seemed to envelope her, seeped into her body, and lulled her back to him. Her lashes fluttered open and she found herself still facing the window. The lights of a rumbling truck hit the wing mirror and caused her to turn away.
Dee found herself looking into those dark brown, sinfully sexy eyes and she caught her breath. The thought that she would wake up every day for the rest of her life to those eyes excited her more than she could have imagined possible. Her heart kicked her in the ribs and then took off at racehorse speed. A smile tugged his lips wide and she knew that he knew exactly what she was thinking, well almost.
“Less smirking, more penance for stranding me out here.”Dee offered, but this time not with her usual acidity.
“And I promise to make it up to you.”His voice was deep and gentle, but so full of sexual promise that she had to squeeze her inner thighs together.
He wished he had time to taste her lips. There was nothing else he wanted to do right now than claim her as his, and from the look on her face, she might just be feeling the very same way. But they had a tow truck pulling up behind them and he wouldn’t even have time to kiss her properly.
Aidan cursed within his own mind. “Stay in the car, I’m going to see a man about fixing the damn thing so I can get you home.”And he popped the door open and disappeared out into the coldness of the night before she could even formulate a thought.
The rush of the cold wind made her shiver, or maybe it was his words, she couldn’t be sure. But the car was certainly colder by the time he closed the door, and her body was certainly warmer on the inside.
Tanya slipped up onto the stool at the kitchen counter and watched her mate make a fresh pot of coffee. He seemed to know his way around a kitchen, which was good news because she didn’t even have a clue how to turn on a stove. Microwaves she could do, but anything else was either Lacy or Dee’s domain. But the flat mates complimented each other perfectly, because she was a neat freak, as Dee graciously put it. A speck of dust didn’t stand a chance inside her well ordered universe.
“So you live here with Aidan?”Tanya wanted to get the lay of the land. If she was to share a house with Dee then things wouldn’t be so different from back home. They’d just both have boyfriends, well mates. That wouldn’t be so bad, would it?
“Not with Aidan.”He growled gently at her. She couldn’t help but grin inwardly.
“So you and Aidan have never…?”Tanya wanted to see if it would push his buttons, and it did. Evan shook his head vigorously.
“Nooo. I like woman…”He assured her. Tanya raised her brows and frowned back at him.
“So you think Gay men don’t like women?”Tanya felt a little devil sitting on her shoulder and she liked to give into that little devil when he came calling sometimes.
Evan looked lost for words for a long moment, like he either didn’t understand what she was getting at, or he wasn’t sure how to answer her question, and then he gave a slight shrug off his large shoulders.
“I don’t think they hate women. I was speaking sexually…”Evan poured the steaming brew into and mug and slid it across the counter towards her.
“Because I have a few gay friends and…”Tanya pressed him and saw him fluster again.
“I know gay men…”It sounded like a rush to denial to her ears and she wanted to chuckle, but she held it at bay.
“You, do?”Tanya pressed him on it and he saw the spark of amusement flare in her eyes.
“Lycans are no different from anyone else, Tanya. There are gay Lycans…”Evan informed her, more confident now that she wasn’t pressing him about his own sexuality and his living arrangement at the house.
“So you’ve never been tempted?”Tanya couldn’t help just one more dig at his sexuality and she saw him throw down the towel he’d just picked up and stroll around the counter towards her. He kept eye contact with her the whole way; those piercing blue eyes seemed to knock the devil off of her shoulder and flat on his backside on the floor. Her mind couldn’t care less about pushing his buttons, testing him, at least not in that way.
“Did you not enjoy yourself last week with me?”Evan growled down at her. Just the reminder of their encounter within the small confines of his pickup truck made her mouth go dry. The thought of those strong arms about her, his hands on her body, and his hard length inside her made her clench her inner muscles and remember the feel of him inside her…
“You know I did, but that doesn’t mean…”Tanya saw the intensity of desire within those eyes. Saw the muscle in his jaw and neck strain as he bit down on his urge to relive those moments.
“No it doesn’t, but you’re my mate. So even if I did bat both ways, from this moment on, I’m all yours sweetheart.”The predatory growl in his tone made her heart lurch within her chest. Her stomach clenched and her sex tightened at the thought of him.
Talk about turn the damn tables on her, she thought. She had a need for him that was rising faster than a swollen river threatening to burst its banks. She’d had a taste of her mate and she wanted more. Needed more
. It was bad enough on the drive up here. Just the nearness of him inside that damn truck was enough for her to relive that night over and again within her mind. Snatches of the bits she could remember playing back and forth like it was on reply and rewind.
“You want that coffee?”Evans eyes flicked down over her body. He could hear her heart thumping a tune he definitely wanted to hear. He could see the flare of her eyes, the flush of her cheeks, and he knew that they had reconnected on the long drive, all she needed was a little push…
Tanya managed to turn her eyes to the cup, and he noted the way that she eyed it, as if she couldn’t even comprehend what it was. She flicked her eyes back to his and shook her head.
Evan’s hand came up and he fisted her hair around his fingers. In one quick movement he dipped his head towards her as he held her head where he needed it to be to claim her mouth. Just one touch of his lips against hers had her body firing on all cylinders and she opened to his pressing tongue.
Evan knew her taste like he knew her scent. It was imprinted on his memory from their night together, even so, it overwhelmed his senses, and his need for her overruled his intention to take it slowly.
His other hand reached out and wrapped around her waist, turning the stool with her on it towards him as he stepped between her thighs and pressed his hardness against the heat of her sex.
The sound she made in the back of her throat slammed into his mind, bringing back a fresh wave of memories for him, and it increased the potency of what he was feeling. He found the silken edge of her skirt and pushed it up over her thighs, exposing the smooth skin to his touch.
Evan released the hand in her hair and it made her a little wilder against him. Her tongued duelled with his, giving as good as she was taking from him. Her hands weren’t still either, they travelled up and down the hard muscled chest and abdomen that flexed and tensed under her touch.