by A. J. Downey
“Ava,” I pushed her back slightly. “Ava what’s going–” she cut me off by pressing her lips to mine again.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she growled a minute later. “Just shut up and deal with it.”
I gave myself a mental shrug and pulled her shirt up and over her head. She lifted her arms obligingly and I grabbed the front of her bra, tearing it down the middle rather than try to fight with those stupid little hooks on the back of the damn thing. She grunted quietly as her breasts spilled free into my hands and a low moan worked its way up her throat when I gently rolled her nipples with my thumbs.
She rolled, coming up on top of me again and I went with it until I was on my back. When I went to sit up though she planted her hand on my throat and shoved hard until my back slammed back into the mattress. I let out a low hiss a second later as she raked her nails down my chest, definitely drawing a bit of blood that time, but I really didn’t care.
I don’t remember entirely when she managed to tug my pants down but suddenly they were bunched around my knees and she was tugging at the button on her pants. When I noticed she was having some trouble with them I decided enough was enough. I was hard as a rock and I wanted to be inside her more than just about anything right at that moment.
I shoved her off of me and she let out a surprised shriek as she fell, landing with her back to me. Reaching out I grabbed the waist of her cargo pants with both hands and pulled, tearing them right down the middle so I could easily pull them and her panties down, it took me a minute to get her out of her damn boots, to get to the and off portion of things.
“Come here,” I growled and laid down on my side, pulling her back until her back was pressed against my chest. She lifted her left leg slightly and reached down between her legs to grab ahold of me, stroking my length a couple of times before positioning me at her entrance. I don’t think either of us even realized at the time that we’d completely forgotten to grab a condom but I know neither of us cared at that particular moment.
When I sank slowly into her, it was while fighting off the urge to just slam my cock into her. I wanted to, I wanted to so bad, but she was only human and I didn’t want to hurt her.
“More, dammit,” she panted and pushed her ass back against me.
“Be careful what you wish for,” I muttered and let my hand find her hip, holding her still as I pulled halfway out of her and suddenly shoved myself back inside, sinking all the way to the hilt in one hard thrust. She grunted and her body shook, fingers clenching in the comforter on the bed.
“Son-of-a-bitch,” she groaned as I pulled almost entirely out and slammed back in again. I set a heavy pace. Our bodies slapping together. One arm snaked under her to wrap around her body, my hand tightly gripping her breast as my free hand slid down her stomach to find her clit. I flicked it gently with one finger as my dick slid easily in and out of her. With each thrust in she groaned in a rhythm broken by the sound of her ass slapping against my stomach. When I ran the tip of my finger over her clit she bucked against me, muscles clamping down on my dick like a fist, almost making it difficult to move inside her.
I growled and opened eyes that I hadn’t realized I had even closed. I was taller than Ava, by a fair amount, but it was mostly in the legs. With her positioned as she was, my chin was even with her shoulder and the first thing I saw on opening my eyes was that gentle curve just where her neck sloped into her shoulder. I leaned forward and pressed my lips to her skin, savoring the taste of her and the scent of jasmine and gun-oil that would forever cling to her body.
Her moans had grown louder with every thrust and she squeezed me harder, really making me work to fuck her. I let my finger gently slide across her clit again and her hands found mine, pressing them hard between her legs as she let out a frustrated groan.
“God fucking dammit, Remus,” she growled. “Don’t fucking tease me; I’m so fucking close...” she trailed off into another low moan and I grinned, finally attacking her clit with a firm, steady stroke.
I think it only took a half a dozen times rubbing my finger across that incredibly sensitive bundle of nerves. When it happened, she almost seemed to explode; she let out the loudest shriek I had heard anyone make in a long time and I slapped a hand over her mouth to muffle the sound. At the same time I could feel her pussy spasm around me, squeezing my dick in a rhythmic measure as she came and I forced myself into her one last time through the tightly grasping muscles and, buried as deep as I could get, waiting as she came around my dick.
I kicked my pants and boots loose, somehow, without pulling out of her and pushed, rolling us until she was lying flat on her stomach, my knees on the bed between her legs. As she came down from her high I started stroking in and out of her again, that pressure slowly building up that told me I was going to find my own finish soon. She grunted every time I shoved forward and took a deep breath when I pulled back, as if my dick slamming into her was actually pushing the air out of her lungs. Her fingers clutched at the bed spread, twisting and knotting the material in her fists.
I grabbed a fist full of her hair and she let out a choked shriek as I pulled her back, up onto her arms. Holding my weight on one hand I wrapped my free arm around her waist and held her tightly as I slammed myself into her one last time and buried my face against that intoxicating curve of her neck.
The world disappeared around me, my eyes sliding closed as all my senses centered on the woman in my arms, the feel of her body against me and surrounding me. She clamped down on me again as I emptied myself inside her and I shuddered violently at the sensation.
When I was finally able to get my breath back, I carefully slid back and away from her, both of us letting out a shuddering gasp as I slid out of her and stood, heading quickly for the bathroom to grab a glass and a washcloth. The cloth I soaked in some warm water and wrung it out after filling the glass with cold water. Back in the bedroom I handed her the glass and she took it, looking bemused as I gently cleaned her off with the washcloth.
“Done?” I asked a minute later and she nodded, handing me the empty glass. I tossed the washcloth into a clothes hamper in the bathroom, drank a glass of water myself and returned to the bed to find that Ava had already pulled back the blankets and climbed under them so I turned the light off and slid in behind her, wrapping my arm around her and pulling her back against me again. “Come here,” I muttered against her smooth skin, still warm with the flush of good sex.
She wasn’t nearly as stiff and rigid in my arms as she had first been the other night at the cabin. But she definitely didn’t relax immediately against me, either. “What is it?” I asked after a minute. The tension in her back and shoulders was pronounced to someone with my senses. A regular person might not have even noticed it.
“I’m sorry,” she muttered so quietly that even I almost didn’t hear her.
For a half a second I wanted to tease her and pretend I hadn’t heard but I decided caution was the better part of valor and simply asked, “For what?”
“For slapping you at dinner. And for trying to punch you.”
I shrugged one shoulder. “Pretty sure I deserved the one at dinner. A bit at least. You’ve got a hell of a left, by the way.”
“So I’ve been told.” I could almost hear the smile in her tone. It wasn’t a bright, happy smile, but there was a distinctive lightening in the set of her shoulders, as if some weight had just fallen away.
“And don’t worry about the others either. I’m fairly sure you had your reasons. But I’m not looking to pry. I figure if you wanted to talk to me about whatever it is you would,” I muttered. “Some people would say I should ask you about it, try to get you to open up, but I figure if and when you want to, you will. You know now that I’ll be here when you do, so why don’t we leave it at that and get some sleep?”
There was a tense silence that stretched out to nearly a full minute before the last of that tension in her body suddenly melted away. She turned in my arms until she was faci
ng me and the single window let in enough moonlight to make out the pensive expression on her face as she looked at me, studying my face in the dark. She leaned up and pressed her lips to mine again, and I had to say I was finding myself more and more pleased to find that the kiss she gave me before we left the cabin really hadn’t been our last.
Her body formed easily to mine, all soft skin and gentle curves, breasts heavy against my chest as she draped herself across me. Her tongue dueled with mine for a moment, fighting for dominance until she finally bit gently at my bottom lip and pulled away. She opened her mouth as if to say something but a moment later her lips closed again and she laid down, her head on my chest and one arm wrapped around me. One leg came up to lay across mine as I settled onto my back and I wrapped my arms securely around her, holding her within the cage of bone and muscle.
“Sleep, Babycakes,” I muttered and she snorted a small laugh, slapping my stomach lightly.
“Jack-ass.”
Within minutes we were both sound asleep, and I can’t remember the last time I slept so deeply.
Chapter 22
Ava
I slept, hard and when I opened my eyes in the morning it was to a deep, dark set peering back at me. Remus’ fingertips ghosted along my exposed skin, trailing along my body in a pleasing touch that didn’t fit at all with his physique.
“Good morning,” he murmured and I felt my guard go up.
“Morning,” I murmured back, unsure.
He sighed out and his face became resigned, “Want to talk about it now?” he asked and I didn’t. I really didn’t, but I guess I kind of owed him something for my weird assed behavior of the night before.
I wasn’t used to feeling things for people. I didn’t know how to quantify it, or know what to do with it.
“I don’t want you to protect me,” I blurted.
“I got that already, Babycakes. You want to tell me why?”
Because James protected me with everything he had and look where it got him…
“You don’t have to tell me,” he sighed and I could hear the disappointment. His fingertips stopped their soothing idle travel and he splayed the hand on my hip.
I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t have to look at him, and spilled my truth, “Because protecting me gets a whole lot of people – people I care about, dead. I don’t want anyone else to die. I don’t want you to die.”
He exhaled and his hand moved away, I opened my eyes and expected him to get out of the bed when it shifted, but that wasn’t what he was doing. He reached for me, and wrapped those tree trunks he called arms around my body, pulling me tightly against him. He rolled me beneath him and looked down into my face, dark eyes carefully searching.
“Care about you too, Baby,” he uttered and pressed himself between my thighs and inside of me. I shuddered in his grasp; eyes locked to his as he slipped his length inside of me, so slowly, so carefully, I thought he would never find the end. He wouldn’t let my gaze go, not to kiss me, not for anything, and I found it to be crazy intimate.
“What are you doing?” I gasped and he smiled, his coal black eyes warming as much as they were capable of.
“I’m making love to you, I think it’s time you learned what that felt like.” He dipped his head and silenced anything I would say with a kiss. Probably the gentlest kiss I’d ever received.
I brought my hands up and let myself have this, wrapping my arms around his shoulders as he slowly moved in and out of me, his lips finding that sweet, sweet, spot on the side of my neck that left me gasping. The entire side of my body his lips were on became awash in tingles and I twined my legs around his lean hips and let out a gasping moan that sounded suspiciously like a plea. A plea for this warm, soft place I was in to never end.
Remus pulled his lips from the side of my neck and one of my arms from around his neck. He placed a gentle kiss in the center of my palm and guided my hand between us. He watched me, a subtle heat and silent command in his dark eyes to touch myself and for once, I wasn’t difficult and simply did what he asked.
I found my clit with my fingertips and played with myself, letting that energy spiral and coil between us, winding us up and tighter together. Remus smiled and his eyes slipped shut, head bowing as I tightened around him. He kept the slow steady rhythm of his thrusting up, and I think it was the expression on his face that pushed me over the edge more than anything else.
Pleasure and joy, appreciation and desire, he looked at me and I saw devotion and I lost myself. To my orgasm, to his touch deep inside of me, but mostly, I lost myself to Remus; the important part anyways. The part of me that I had always held in reserve no matter what.
Fuck… How could I let this happen?
I shuddered beneath him as he slipped free of my body and sighed. He immediately gathered me against his chest like some kind of porcelain doll and as much as I wanted to be pissy about it, I couldn’t. It felt too good.
“Make you a deal,” he said, voice low; the timbre of it soothing… which automatically made me suspicious.
“Depends on what it is,” I said carefully.
“We protect each other. I’ll protect you, you protect me… partners, from here on in. As far as I see it, Ava, we’re there already. What do you say?”
I turned it over in my mind and nodded slowly, carefully against his chest.
“Okay, we can try that,” I agreed, and he squeezed me a little tighter.
“Okay, it’s a deal,” he murmured and sounded, dare I say, at peace? I turned it over and over in my mind and I couldn’t for the life of me say that I felt any different. It felt right, it felt strong and we needed to be strong.
“Partners,” I whispered once again, tasting the word like candy.
“Equals,” he murmured back and I really liked the sound of it.
“If we’re that, then we need to talk. No more keeping information back, no more not telling the other important things.”
“I agree.”
“So who goes first?”
“I believe I’ve told you a hell of a lot more than you’ve told me, Baby,” he followed this up with a hasty, “Not that I blame you.”
“Okay, what do you want to know?”
It was a long conversation, mostly carried out in whispers. One that was interrupted by first Remus holding out his hand and pressing it down twice in the classic sign for a request for quiet. There was a tapping at the door, ending our back and forth, though thankfully, as we were both winding down, the talk nearing completion.
“Yeah?” Remus called out, pulling the sheet over my body to shield it.
The door popped open and Markus dropped my bag of clothes onto the carpet from the truck, which I hadn’t bothered to lock the night before.
“Quite the armory you got out there,” he commented dryly.
“We’re going to need it,” I said levelly.
He raised an eyebrow, “Get dressed and get out here, the both of you. The food’s on.” He backed out the door and shut it, and Remus tossed back the sheets for me. I stood up and stretched but good.
“You really think there could be?” he asked, and I eyed him before heading to the bathroom.
“I’m a hunter, and I wouldn’t put it past him.”
Remus frowned and I went in to shower, when I stepped out, he was rinsing the last of the residual shaving cream off his face.
“I like this look much better,” I smiled.
“Noted. If it is a problem, what do we do about it?”
“Kill them,” I said lifting a shoulder into a shrug.
He didn’t look surprised by my answer, and I smiled thinly without humor, letting him have the shower. I got dressed, and just as I was tying the laces on my boots the door opened, the lady of the house leaning a shoulder against the frame.
“Doing okay?”
“Jim Dandy, fucking wonderful.” I performed weapons check and she raised her eyebrows.
“Didn’t sound like it last night,” she mused.
&nb
sp; “None of your fucking business, Princess.”
“Oh I’m not a princess, Sweetie,” she smiled a thousand watt smile, “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m the motherfucking queen, and you’re in my husband’s – that would be the King’s, house. So you might want to show a little respect.”
I gave her an appraising look, “Sorry, old habits die hard.”
“Old habits?”
“You’ve been called ‘The Little Princess’ behind your back since the day you were born. I know, I was thirteen and already into my training by about six years.”
She crossed her arms and leaned a little harder into the doorframe, “Why are you doing this?” she asked.
“Doing what?”
“Helping Remus, helping the pack.”
I shrugged, “Because Daddy’s a dick.”
“Your father or mine?” she asked frowning.
“No, Chloe, you’ve got it all wrong… Our daddy. At least he was in the way that Declan was William’s father. Mathias pulled me and James out of the system when we were six.”
She stared at me, blue eyes wide beneath her copper hair. I could tell she was mulling it over, I could also tell it was hitting her hard, even though she was trying to hide that part. Remus came out of the bathroom rubbing a towel over his hair.
“Brought these,” Chloe murmured and reached down to the floor outside the bedroom door, tossing in some clothes and boots.
“They’re William’s, so on you they’ll fit. Sorry, it’s the best we could do.”
I gave her a nod and she inclined her head in return and walked stiffly up the hall. I stared after her and asked, “You get all that?”
“You hear me asking what you girls were talking about?”
“Nope.”