by Rebecca York
She felt her face flush. “I guess not.”
“Would you have believed it?”
“Probably not.”
“Until now, none of them has found out because it wasn’t important to them—or to me.”
“But I saw you change into a wolf, because we were attacked.”
“You would have found out anyway.” He lifted one shoulder. “I was trying to explain about myself when we were so rudely interrupted. I told you I came to San Marcos to outrun my destiny. And I found you waiting for me here.”
“Your destiny?” she asked, still grappling with everything that had happened, everything he had said—or not said. It was too much to take in. All of it.
Words came tumbling out of him like a confession. “Around the age of thirty, the men in my family are compelled to look for a mate. When they find her, they bond.”
She stood facing him, stiffening her legs to keep from swaying.
“What does that mean, exactly?”
“Wolves mate for life,” he said in a flat voice.
“You’re saying . . ..” She stopped short and started again. “What if I don’t want to . . . mate with you for life? What if I was just looking for a holiday fling?”
His face and body went rigid. “I hope that’s not true. I knew as soon as I saw you . . .” He stopped and started again. “I think you’re my lifemate now.”
He was about to say something else, when the sound of gunfire split the air.
Zack leaped forward, grabbed Jenna, and threw her down to the surface of the bed, covering her body with his, protecting her at all costs. Anyone who tried to get to her would have to go through him first.
With that realization, something inside her seemed to break apart. He’d told her she was tied to him. Was that really true? Could she walk away from him? Or would that be as bad as death?
The notion was absurd. She’d only met him a few days ago. She’d made love to him once when they were fleeing from danger. Yet as they lay together on the bed, she couldn’t stop herself from wondering if they truly were bound together. Everything about him drew her. His strong body. The woodsy scent of his skin. Even the way he’d stumbled around trying to tell her about himself.
She could only imagine what life was like for him. He always had to guard his secret, but he’d revealed it to her.
He shifted his weight off of her, keeping his body between her and the door, and she closed her eyes and stayed in his arms.
The gunfire went on for a long time, and she guessed that government troops had landed on the island and were fighting it out with the gunmen.
Finally there was a long silence.
“What do we do now?” she whispered.
“Wait until we know it’s safe.”
“How will we know?”
“A wolf could get close to the hotel without being noticed.”
She grabbed his arm. “No! It’s too dangerous. One of the soldiers could shoot you.”
“Would you care?” he asked in a gritty voice.
“Of course I’d care!”
He turned toward her, and she saw the strained look on his face, knowing that what she’d just said meant a lot to him. How much did it mean to her? He’d said she was his lifemate. And she’d been too shocked and frightened to deal with that reality. But she couldn’t hide from it forever.
She was about to speak when a blaring sound startled her.
“What?”
In the next moment, she realized it was a loudspeaker. “This is Capitán José Mendoza of the San Marcos military. We have secured the resort. If you are hiding in the hotel or on the grounds, it is safe to come out,” a man’s voice boomed out.
“Is it a trick?” Jenna asked.
“I don’t know. Stay here while I go find out.”
“No!” she answered as she reached for her shirt and beach skirt.
He looked angry.
“What? You expect your . . . mate to obey you?” she asked.
She’d said it without thinking. Was she his mate?
“I’m not expecting obedience, but you are precious to me,” he answered, emotion lacing his voice.
When he started slowly back toward the resort, she followed. At the edge of the jungle, they both stopped.
On the lawn, they could see armed men, but these men looked different. They were wearing camouflage uniforms.
“Stay here,” Zack growled, and this time she recognized an order.
“We’re American citizens coming in from the jungle,” he called.
Immediately, the man turned toward them. “Hands on your heads.”
Jenna stared at Zack. “Why?”
“They don’t know who we are, and they have to be cautious. Like when there’s a shooter in a school, and everyone is under suspicion until the police sort it out. But it’s going to be all right.” He put his hands on his head and stepped from the shelter of the trees. Struggling to hold herself steady, Jenna did the same.
Twilight was falling, which was probably a blessing, because she could make out the bodies of the people she’d seen earlier on the beach.
Another soldier with a gun approached them and patted them down. “Do you have your passports?” he asked in heavily accented English.
“In my room,” Jenna said.
“Mine also,” Zack said.
“Which room is that?”
“We weren’t staying together,” she answered.
“You’re together now.”
“Mr. Marshall . . .saved my life by taking me into the jungle.”
“You encountered some of the rebels?”
“I hid from them as they came up from the beach.”
“We’re both pretty shook up,” Zack said. “We’d like to collect our stuff and get out of here.”
They both gave their room numbers.
“I’m sorry. There’s ... carnage in the lobby,” the soldier said. “You’ll have to wait outside.”
“How many dead?” Zack asked.
“Thirty-two guests. So far. There may be more. And all ten rebels.”
Jenna closed her eyes for a moment. She would have been among the dead if Zack hadn’t come along.
The soldier led them to a patio area where other hotel guests sat in deck chairs looking shell-shocked.
A middle-aged man dressed in a rumpled flowered shirt and green pants glanced up as they also found chairs among the group. “What happened to you?”
“We hid in the jungle,” Zack said.
“We barricaded ourselves in our room,” he replied, putting his arm around a woman whose dyed red hair needed a good brushing. “The soldiers got here in time.”
Others chimed in. It seemed that except for her and Zack, the guests who had been in their rooms were the ones who survived.
The officer came back with their passports. “We’re evacuating everyone to the mainland,” he said. “Your bags will be packed and sent to you later. Your rooms will be paid for by the government.”
She didn’t love leaving her belongings, but she could see there was no point in arguing with the soldiers.
Twenty minutes later they were on a helicopter for a short ride to the capital, Santa Isabella.
The flight back was too noisy to have a conversation. And she couldn’t talk to Zack about anything important with other people around, anyway. She sat next to him, saying nothing, trying to work her way through everything that had happened since she’d arrived at the resort.
They landed at an airfield outside of town and were driven to a luxury hotel on the Grand Plaza, where they got in line with the other refugees at the registration desk. Knowing that everyone was staring at the people who had escaped the massacre, she kept her gaze straight ahead. As she stood at the registration counter, the clerk asked if she wanted a single room.
Decision time. She turned and looked at Zack. When she realized he wasn’t breathing as he waited for her to answer, she said, “Señor Marshall and I are together.”
oOo
When the door of their room had closed behind her, Zack asked the question that had been bursting inside him. “Did you change your mind about . . . us?”
She swallowed hard. “I don’t know,” she answered. “I think I need to find out.”
He went very still as he stared down at her. In the dimly lit hallway of the room, she raised her hand, touching his face, then his lips, tracing their outline.
The intimacy of that light touch flooded him with physical sensation and emotion he’d been holding in check since they’d returned to the resort. His mouth opened, so that his teeth could worry her fingertips, the contact sending heat through his body.
He moved her hand, and his lips came down on hers. This time he wasn’t as frantic as he was at their first mating. He could let himself enjoy the taste of her, the feel of her against the length of his body.
She spoke against his lips, nibbling the words, “Show me how it is for your lifemate.”
Unable to speak, he gathered her to him, rocking with her as they kissed and stroked each other—each touch, each kiss building the incredible sensual pleasure between them.
His hands shook as they worked to pull off her shirt, then her bikini top, and she helped him with her skirt before tackling his jeans and knit shirt.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, they were both naked, still standing near the door.
When he bent to press his face against her breasts, turning his head first one way and then the other, she stroked her fingers through his hair, holding him to her. He found one hardened nipple with his mouth, teasing her with his tongue, wringing a glad cry from her, then another as he began to draw on her.
He could feel his cock, hard and swollen, pressing against her middle.
“I suggest we get horizontal,” he murmured.
He swung her into his arms and carried her down the hall, then ripped back the covers and took her down to the surface of the bed.
With sighs and sounds of pleasure, they rocked together, touching, stroking, kissing.
He had thought the first time with her had been good. Incredi_bly, this was better. Because maybe they were on the same wavelength now.
He belonged to her—heart, mind and soul—and he dared to hope that she felt the same.
His hand slid along the curve of her hip, sending fire through his veins. The fire flamed higher as his fingers dipped into the hot, slick core of her.
He took a leisurely trip from her vagina to her clit, teasing her there before pressing two fingers inside her. Moving between her knees, he lowered his face to her, his fingers still working in and out of her as he lapped at her with his lips and tongue, drinking in the wonderful taste of her, then circling her clit.
“You’re going to make me come,” she panted.
He raised his head far enough to say, “That’s the idea.”
“Not yet.”
She slid away from him, then angled her body so that she could capture the hard, distended shaft of his cock with her mouth. Closing her lips around him, she sucked on him strongly as she slid her head back and forth.
He gasped, his fingers digging into her shoulder.
Tremors quivered along his length, and he knew she must feel them. Stopping before she pushed him over the edge, she lay back on the bed and held out her arms.
He covered her body with his, his eyes never leaving hers as he entered her slowly, inch by erotic inch, the joining a confirmation of what he felt. He belonged to her.
“Zack. Oh, Zack,” she breathed, her arms circling his shoulders with a possessiveness she had never known before.
When he began to move inside her, she matched his rhythm. He wanted the pleasure to last, but he knew the intensity was too great for that.
He felt her inner muscles contract around him, heard her call out his name once more. Then he was gripping her shoulders, pumping himself into her, his whole body shuddering as ecstasy washed over him.
Afterwards he held her in his arms, both of them gasping for breath.
“I said it wrong,” he whispered.
“What?”
“I said you belong to me. I should have said, I belong to you.”
She raised her head, her eyes meeting his. “I think it’s mutual. But . . . the wolf part is kind of scary.”
“I know. I’m sorry. And you didn’t exactly find out the easy way.”
She nodded against his shoulder. “Yeah, you did it to save my life. What’s the easy way?”
He made a low sound. “I was trying to tell you when those gunmen closed in on us, and I had to change—to save us both.”
“I know. It must be hard to talk about it.”
He ran his hand from her shoulder to her elbow, stroking her possessively.
“I’ll tell you anything you want to know, but I think it may help to talk to some of the other lifemates.”
“There are others?”
“My brothers and my cousins.”
“How . . . how did you get that way?”
“As far as we can figure, a long-ago Druid ancestor asked the gods for special powers.”
“That’s what you were chanting—Druid?”
“Gaelic. I think my ancestor got more than he bargained for. And it’s been passed down through the generations.”
“What do you mean?”
He dragged in a breath and let it out. “It used to be . . .” He stopped.
“Something bad?”
“Yeah. It’s a sex-linked trait. Only boy babies survived. And half of them died the first time they had to make the change—at puberty.”
“That’s scary,” she breathed.
“Yeah. But my cousin Ross married a geneticist. They have a little girl. And she’s going to give the boys hormone treatments that will get them through that first change.”
She nodded, accepting what he had told her.
He made a small sound. “Werewolf social relations used to be . . . strained. Each guy was the head of his own pack. But Ross showed us how to work together. Especially the married men.” He laughed. “The wives have helped socialize us—but there are still some dominance issues. Like if we gather at one guy’s house, he’s the alpha while we’re there.”
She nodded.
He could feel himself relaxing—finally. It was going to be okay, because he’d found the right woman. Someone beautiful and smart and able to wrap her head around what he was.
“Everyone will welcome you into the family.” He laughed.
“What?”
“I know they’ve been taking bets on when I’d find a mate. I’ll bring you to meet the clan as soon as we get back to Maryland, but I’d like to be alone with you for a few more days, first.”
“Um—they’ve probably heard the news. Maybe you should call them and tell them you’re okay. And I should call my parents.”
“Right. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Do you mind if I tell them I met the man I’m going to marry?”
He went very still, and he saw her flush.
“I mean . . . I . . .”
He gathered her close. “I’m glad you were thinking it. Yes, the man you’re going to marry.”
oOo
Jenna nodded again, knowing she belonged to this man, body and soul. She’d dated other men, and she’d had good relationships, but she’d never met anyone she wanted to spend the rest of her life with.
This was different. This was her man. Her mate. He’d excited her from the first moment she’d seen him. She hadn’t guessed what he would mean to her. But how could she? This was a situation so unique that she never could have dreamed it up.
He climbed off the bed to find the covers he’d tossed on the floor, and she admired his body. His muscles were well defined, but he wasn’t like a bodybuilder. More like a runner, and she imagined him in the woods at night.
&
nbsp; “Do you have to change to a wolf when the moon is full?” she asked.
“No. That’s just a legend. I change when I want to.”
“You live where you have room to run?” she asked.
“Yes. On the edge of a park. A werewolf wouldn’t do so well in the middle of the city.”
“I want to go out with you at night. I want to see you as a wolf, and not because we’re in danger.”
“You will.”
He pulled up the covers, tucking them tenderly around her, then settled down beside her again. Closing her eyes, she snuggled against him, thinking that she hadn’t realized there was something basic missing from her world. She’d focused on her work. Now everything was different. Lucky for her she’d been brave enough not to run away.
“If you’d taken off, I would have followed you,” he growled.
She raised her head and looked at him, just a bit warily. “You read minds, too?”
“No. But it’s not hard to imagine what’s circling through your head. Remember, I was the one who was trying to run away—from you.”
“Lucky for me you were there when I needed you.”
He gathered her to him, stroking his lips against her cheek. “Lucky for both of us. I think we should celebrate.”
“What do you have in mind?”
He answered with a wolfish laugh, and she held him tight, thankful that she had found this incredible man to share the rest of her life.
THE END
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PRAISE FOR REBECCA YORK
“Rebecca York delivers page-turning suspense."
—Nora Roberts
“A true master of intrigue.”
—Rave Reviews
"Rebecca York's fast-paced suspense, innovative stories and sexy characters set the standard for paranormal romantic suspense."
—Ann Voss Peterson
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ABOUT REBECCA YORK
A USA Today Best-Selling Author, Rebecca York is a 2011 recipient of the Romance Writers of America Centennial Award. Her career has focused on romantic suspense, often with paranormal elements.
Her 16 Berkley books and novellas include her nine-book werewolf “Moon” series. KILLING MOON was a launch book for the Berkley Sensation imprint. She has written 50 books for Harlequin Intrigue, many in her popular 43 Light Street series. Her recent releases include DARK WARRIOR for Berkley and DARK MAGIC for Carina Press. Two Harlequin Intrigues, SUDDEN INSIGHT and SUDDEN ATTRACTION, will be published early in 2012.