white wolf.jpg

by White Wolf (lit)

  His dark eyes remained bolted to hers.

  “I'm good,” she whispered. In a normal tone, she added, “And I'm starved.”

  “It's the adrenaline,” Gray explained.

  When she tried to shift off his lap, he gave an imperceptible dip of his chin.

  Ah hell, she really didn't want to move anyway.

  “Did you summon them?” She rested a hand on his chest.

  He twined their fingers together, kissed her knuckles, and replied, “Not the way you're thinking. I called them on the way home.”

  She shifted her hips closer when he set her on the couch to the right of him.

  “No, honey.” Gray shook his head. “Stay where you are. I can't have you distracting me right now.”

  “You're right,” she said. “It feels like the air is loaded with static electricity and primed to explode.” Something niggled at the corners of her mind.

  “Bring the pizza and wings over here,” Gray called out as he pointed to the coffee table. “Susie, grab a stack of napkins. Mel, you get ice and glasses.” After everyone had settled around the coffee table and had a paper plate with a slice of pizza and a drink in front of them, Gray said, “Sorcha's memory's back. Honey, tell us everything that's relevant.”

  “It's much like the nightmare, but with the spaces filled in. Don't get your hopes up—I still don't know who killed my parents, but I remember more.”

  “Go ahead, honey. The more we know, the more we can extrapolate.”

  “We'd just had dinner. It was a Sunday. We'd been to church and people had come over for coffee and cake afterward.” Sorcha actually saw the picture in her head as if she'd TiVoed the whole event. “The doorbell rang. It was Miss L, and she had a huge chocolate cheesecake in her hands. We went to the kitchen together. She set the cake on the counter, I hung her coat up on the rack in the front, and then I went to my room.”

  “Honey?” Gray shook her shoulder. “What happened next?”

  “Dinner, then the grown-ups had coffee. I had cheesecake and ice cream; then Mom sent me to my room because I hadn't finished my homework.” The fire crackled and snapped, interrupting her conversation. Sorcha's glance swept the circle of individuals focused on her, and all at once she wanted to curl into a ball and say no more. “I remember hearing the door open and close a few times.”

  “Did the doorbell ring?”

  “I can't remember.” She closed her eyes and tried to see everything in her mind. “People were always coming and going on a Sunday. Mom volunteered at school on Mondays, and there was always some last-minute emergency.”

  Gray grabbed a notepad and a pencil from the side table and scribbled on the top sheet. “Continue.”

  “I finished my homework and changed into my pj's. I set my clock radio, turned on my favorite station, and I was just about to get into bed when I heard my Dad shout, 'No!'”

  Tears threatened to spill, so she gritted her teeth and balled her fists, but couldn't choke back a sob.

  Gray brought a glass filled with Coke to her lips. “Take a sip, honey. It'll help.”

  Looking at him over the rim of the tumbler, Sorcha sipped and tried to telegraph her gratefulness and her love.

  I love him. I always have, I always will.

  Strangely, the realization didn't make her self-implode but spurred a rush of joy, lifting the heaviness weighting her shoulders.

  “Better?”

  “Much,” she answered. As Gray set the soda on the table, Sorcha continued, “Then there were two bangs, one right after the other. It's funny—They weren't loud, sort of muffled, like a car backfiring far away.” Sorcha's attention faltered.

  “Go on, honey.”

  “It got really silent, and I got really, really scared. I opened my bedroom door, and the hall light wasn't on. Mom always left the light on for me. I knew something was wrong. Then I heard sounds coming from the living room.”

  A log fell in the fireplace, and the thud made Sorcha jump and her lungs stutter. She gave her audience an apologetic half smile. “Sorry, I think I was in the moment. It was so dark. For some reason, I crawled down the hallway until I got to the bend to the living room.”

  “You were on your hands and knees?” Gray interrupted.

  Nodding, she continued, “The living room was dark. I couldn't see anything at first. Then the light next to Dad's chair came on, and that's when I saw Mom on the floor, the blood coming out of her mouth. She looked at me and then above me, and I turned to see what she was looking at, and then my head exploded, or so it felt.” Sorcha shook her head. “Next thing I knew, I woke up in the hospital.”

  Gray set the notepad and pencil on the coffee table and in one liquid move swept her onto his lap. His arms held her tightly; he drew her head onto his chest. “You did good, honey. Are you up for more?”

  “More?” She tried to lift away from him.

  “You have the scene fresh in your mind now. Want to try an exercise to see if we can ferret out subconscious details?”

  “Yes,” Sorcha said without a second's hesitation.

  She needed to know the truth, needed to know everything.

  “Close your eyes and let me take you down that hallway.” She obeyed Gray's mesmerizing crooning. “You're on all fours. Can you smell anything? Cigarette smoke? Aftershave? Perfume?”

  “Shampoo from the carpet, Glade lemon air freshener… Nothing else.”

  “You turn the corner. Before the light comes on, do you hear footsteps? Feel a draft?”

  It seemed so real in her mind. “A footstep behind me.”

  Oh God, oh God. “My father's bedroom slippers. They were on either side of my mother's head. One was covered in blood.”

  “Which foot, honey?”

  She pushed away from Gray's chest. “Why didn't I remember that before?”

  “Concentrate, honey. Which foot?”

  Why did he have that tone in his voice? What did it matter which slipper had blood on it?

  “Honey,” Gray growled. “Which foot?”

  Closing her eyes, she pictured the dark living room. “The right foot.”

  “Fuck.” Gray sprang to his feet, knocking over the almost-empty glass of Coke.

  Sorcha leaned over to right it and then spread her napkin over the spilled liquid.

  He smacked the heel of his palm on his forehead. “I am a fucking idiot.”

  “For heaven's sake, Gray, watch your language. The girls are in the other room. And you know how Ariel fixates on inappropriate words,” Susie chided.

  “What are you so worked up about?” Joe asked.

  “Sorcha's father had an Indonesian mother and a Scottish father.” Mike locked his narrowed eyes on Gray. “I'm betting Sorcha's parents were our serial killer's first kill.”

  “It seems so fu—” Gray glanced at his sister and clamped his lips together.

  “Obvious,” Joe finished. “Hindsight's always twenty-twenty.”

  “Do you remember anything else?” Susie asked.

  “I should, shouldn't I?” She shook her head. “Nothing.”

  “Could our serial killer and the black wolf and the thing or person hunting Sorcha be one and the same person?” Chad asked.

  They all knew? Sorcha tried to keep the surprise from her face.

  “Honey, every white wolf can sense an evil presence. Chad, Joe, and Mike all sensed the thing hunting you the same time I did.”

  Obviously, she wasn't very good at concealing her emotions.

  Chad rose to his feet. “I need to get home.”

  Gray arched an eyebrow. “You leaving already?”

  Mike stood and pulled Melanie to her feet. “We're going to make a move too.”

  “Sweetheart, we should be going too,” Joe said.

  Susie held up a hand. “Not until Gray answers Chad's question.”

  “I need to take a look at Sorcha's parents' file before I can even begin to answer that one.” Gray dragged a hand through his thick hair. “I don't suppose you
feel like hanging around so I can make a run to the precinct?”

  “I have a conference call with Hong Kong tonight.” Joe checked his watch. “I'll barely make it as it is, and I'm the leader on the call. Oh, before I forget. Only one shirt matched any of the scents from the clearing at Leader Lake, the hand-dyed one.”

  “Great, that means one of the twins was up there,” Gray grumbled. “There's no way in hell we'll ever be able to prove which one, but my guess is on Ken.” He recounted his earlier phone conversation with James.

  A flurry of farewells followed, and once everyone had left, Sorcha tapped her mate's forearm. “Gray, the station's ten minutes away—”

  “Forget it, honey. I'm not leaving you alone for a second.”

  Wanting to protest his overprotectiveness, but knowing it was futile, Sorcha said, “I'll put on my shoes and get a jacket.”

  “Thanks for coming with me,” Gray said ten minutes later as they strolled into the station.

  “I knew you wouldn't rest until you'd been through that file,” Sorcha remarked. Her eyes swept the station, and she tried to picture Gray here on a daily basis.

  “We didn't expect you in tonight, boss.” The lazy drawl came from the full lips of a man who oozed testosterone from every pore. Sorcha's gaze met aquamarine eyes made a fascinating hue by the contrast with the officer's walnut-toned skin. The cop's chiseled cheekbones and square jaw reeked of cut-off-the-nose-in-spite-of-his-face stubbornness.

  Something about the man seemed familiar.

  Hands pillowing his large head, the man raked Sorcha. A languid glance trailed past her chin, paused and perused each breast, before sliding past her hips and down her legs. Her hands fisted when his stare boomeranged to her breasts.

  Averting her eyes, she lengthened her stride to match Gray's.

  “Didn't your midnight shift get rescheduled, Wicks?”

  Wicks? Sorcha stumbled. She whipped around and gawked at the man. This was the man she'd encountered at Victor Morgan's? The one whose squealing was partially responsible for her “punishment”? Save for his height and build, she'd never have recognized him. Had she been that dazed from her first encounter with Gray? True, Wicks'd been in the shadows for the few minutes she'd been in his presence, but this man must be the human equivalent of a chameleon, she decided.

  Gray's tone held a peculiar note. She glanced at him. He had schooled his features into careful neutrality. Her mate didn't like this man, Sorcha realized.

  “Traded with Ted. I'm going fishing tomorrow afternoon,” Wicks replied.

  Living in Canada and Chicago didn't afford her much of a chance to hear a real Southern drawl. She'd swear on a stack of Bibles before a judge that the man had had a completely different accent when he'd spoken that night. Yet Wicks's deep bass seemed vaguely familiar.

  “Want to grab me a coffee while I get the file, honey?” Gray angled his chin at a coffeemaker sitting on a long metal filing chest.

  “Sure,” Sorcha assented reflexively, all the while sneaking surreptitious peeks at Wicks. She walked over to the long filing drawers housing the coffeemaker.

  Two uniformed males, both well over six feet, entered the room as she poured coffee into a Styrofoam container. Neither acknowledged her presence.

  “That the boss's car?” The query came from a bald man with a wide handlebar mustache, which he twirled between a thumb and forefinger. Why did men who lost the hair on their head try to compensate with facial hair? Her fingers itched to find a pair of scissors and clip the officer's pretentious and offensive whiskers. This man's voice sounded familiar too, but Sorcha didn't recognize the uniformed male striding across the room.

  “Yeah. He's in the storage room.”

  Frowning, she tapped a Splenda packet on the chest, remembered Gray took his coffee black, and stuffed the packet back into its container. After clicking the lid in place, she picked it up.

  Right then Gray strolled into the room with a large file crate under one arm.

  “Hey, boss.”

  “Henry,” Gray said. “Things quiet?”

  So this was the famous Henry. Early fifties, she guessed, from the numerous liver spots on his face. The two men stood eye to eye, one exuding the vigor of a man in his prime, the other the weariness of one in decline.

  “As a church mouse.”

  “Good.” Gray looked over to her. “Ready?”

  She nodded and walked over to him. Gray introduced her to everyone in the room and then hustled her out of the precinct.

  Fifteen minutes later, as they entered the cabin, Sorcha asked, “You don't like Wicks much, do you?”

  Gray frowned as he shot her a glance. “I didn't think I was that obvious. You think the rest of the team has noticed?”

  “No. I only did because you sounded a little irritated when you asked him about the schedule.” Sorcha saw the sudden flash of anger in his dark eyes. “What's wrong?”

  “One of the women on the force asked not to be put on the same shift as Wicks.” Gray dumped the crate onto the kitchen table. “And Victor Morgan filed a complaint about his attitude when he handled the shoe shop's break-in.”

  Her lungs forgot to function. Buckling knees made her trip over her own feet, and she barely made it to the sofa before collapsing. Gray was at her side before she could gulp in air.

  “Are you okay, honey?” Cupping her chin with one hand, his dark eyes searched her face, and he moved onto the couch and settled her on his lap. “What's wrong?”

  “Wicks is prejudiced,” she whispered. “The serial killer is too.”

  “Wicks?” Three lines appeared on his forehead. His eyes narrowed. “He's only been in Twisp for four months. If the murders started with your parents, then that rules him out.”

  “I guess so,” she said. “Something about him bothers me.”

  “Don't worry. He's not going to be around for much longer.”

  “You're going to fire him?”

  “After the way he looked at you tonight, he's lucky he's still in one piece.” The cold wood in the fireplace combusted into a roaring and sparking inferno. “You don't know how close I came to losing it.”

  Her eyes swept to the blaze; the flames spiked and curled toward the mantle. “Tell me that doesn't happen every time you lose your temper.”

  Gray's warm palm nudged her face to his, and his cock thickened against her bottom.

  Desire dilated his pupils, and his eyes darkened.

  Need exploded in her.

  Their lips met and she ignited, thoughts, words vanishing. She tore at his shirt; popped buttons took flight as her tongue delved into the moist fire of his mouth.

  He shoved his hand down her pants.

  His teeth captured her tongue the second he plunged a finger into her pussy.

  Sorcha's neck muscles went slack as she convulsed, and her head fell back. Arms of steel tightened across her back.

  Breaking their lip-lock, he ordered, “Arms around my neck. Legs around my waist.”

  Mindless, she obeyed and burrowed her face into his damp chest, inhaling his musky spice, licking a drop of sweat, tasting the salt-sweetness of her mate. If she could, she'd crawl inside him.

  When he stood, his fingers slid deeper, and she clamped down on them. Each long stride drove his fingers closer to her womb; the heel of his palm ground against her sex, the tight jeans making the friction pain and ecstasy.

  They landed on the bed with a thud.

  Rising on his knees, he straddled her thighs. Using one hand, he tore off the brass button of her jeans and yanked the zipper down as he flexed the fingers inside her. Her passage gushed. Arms flailing, head thrashing side to side as he slid a palm under her ass and lifted her off the mattress, she moaned when a second finger joined the first. Orgasm lit the space behind her closed eyes blinding white.

  “Look at me.” Gruff and deep and growled, the words made her lids flicker open.

  The look in his eyes made her lungs burn, giddied her mind.

&nb
sp; Her vagina sucked at his withdrawing fingers.

  “Noo,” she groaned, digging her nails into his back. “No.”

  “Yes.” His mouth covered her breast as he nudged her legs wider.

  The head of his cock pushed into her protesting muscles. Thick and hot, his penis stretched her. His mouth changed breasts, and her bereft, wet nub ached and burned when he latched onto the other nipple. With soft, insistent nips, his teeth tormented the taut peak to a pulsing bonfire.

  She bit his shoulder, nibbled and licked her way down his chest, rooting for his tight male nipple.

  He grasped her ankles and raised her legs high.

  In one fierce thrust, he crammed her full to bursting and opened his mouth over her breast.

  Her pleas echoed around the room.

  When his blazing penis began a tortuous, slow withdrawal, she groaned and beat her hands on his back. “Hard. Fast.”

  Their eyes met when he leaned back, withdrew, then draped her legs over his shoulders.

  A slow, crooked grin lifted his lips. He licked a taut peak, then ordered, “Wider.”

  The shaft of his cock nestled her opening.

  She obeyed his command, separating her legs.

  Manacling her gaze, he plunged to her womb.

  Sorcha detonated.

  He stilled.

  “Please,” she begged and wriggled, needing, craving friction.

  “Mine.” His eyes glowed yellow sparks.

  Hot palms cupped the sides of her bottom cheeks.

  His fat cock distended the walls of her vagina as he speared her in one powerful thrust.

  Climax after climax burst through her as he rode her hard and fast, each orgasm building higher and higher.

  He roared, and sperm jetted inside her in hard, hot spurts.

  When her muscles locked around his throbbing penis, she careened into a pinnacle of pleasure-pain.

  She didn't know how long they lay bound together, her high too numbing for brain functions like time or place.

  “I put a cub in you tonight.” His lips moved against her nape, his tongue drawing a slow circle of fire.

  “Mmm,” she murmured, licking his sweat. This sudden need to taste him must be the wolf in him rubbing off on her. All at once, his words penetrated. She pushed at his chest.