Finding Luna: A Lion Shifter Reverse Harem Romance (PRIDE Book 1)

by Becca Fanning

  "Well, where are they?" she wailed.

  "They're in their bedrooms. We didn't want to overwhelm you, El," Shawn told her softly.

  She wasn't sure whether to be touched or not. Men could be such dingbats sometimes, couldn't they?

  An ache speared her between the eyes. "I'm tired," she admitted.

  "We left you here sleeping," Marc said with a frown. "I thought you'd want to talk."

  Sheepishly, she made another admission, "I faked it. I needed to be alone."

  Shawn sighed. "That's the last thing you need, El."

  "The next few days, maybe even weeks, are going to be crazy. And this past month, even before I met you guys, has been intense. I just wanted some quiet time."

  "Did it work? Do you feel better? Pushing us away?"

  She reached for Marc’s hand, having heard the hurt in his tone – a hurt she'd never intended on inflicting.

  "Hey, it was never about that. It wasn't about any of you. It was about me. My entire life has been a lie. And yet, I'm rich, and I've had a lot of experiences that so many people would never dream of getting to experience, but it hasn't been easy. It's never been easy.

  "My parents always seemed to hate me. I could never connect with my brothers. The only people who ever seem to like me in my house were the housekeepers. My grandad and I were close, but I lost him so early. Then, after that came the whole shitstorm about his will. Ever since I've been trying to figure out what's normal. And, I've come to realize that nothing is. Not for me." The breath she released was deep and filled with pain. "And that was all before this happened."

  Shawn reached for her hand and he squeezed it. "If anyone knows how tough you've had it, it's me. You're not some poor little rich girl, El. You've never been like that. Some things, sure you had it easy. But in others, no way. At least now you have answers. We can make sense of a lot of things that we could never understand."

  She frowned, and asked, "Like what?"

  He shrugged. "Like your mother. The weird relationship you have with her. And I know you think your dad doesn't like you, and that he is more obsessed about your money than anything else, but he isn't. He's obsessed with you." He tutted. "Don't shake your head at me," he chided. "You haven't heard him, haven't seen his reactions to the things that happen to you. I'm not saying you have a healthy relationship, because quite clearly you don't. I'm just saying that his behavior makes more sense now."

  "I don't understand your reasoning. With her, yes. But him? No way."

  "That's because you're being stubborn," Marc told her gently. "But Shawn is right. This new information changes everything. Like, why you've been under threat of abduction more than anybody else in your family."

  She blinked at him. "You think the Pantera are behind it?"

  Shawn frowned. "Wow, you really have been thinking, haven't you?"

  She rolled her eyes. "I do have a brain, you know."

  "Yeah, but never thought you'd think down that particular route. Self-protection has never been your thing." It was his turn to roll his eyes at her. "It's like pulling teeth trying to get you to train sometimes."

  Marc's brows rose. "What kind of training?"

  The curiosity in his voice had her nose wrinkling. "Don't get too excited. I might literally be Catwoman, but I don't have Halle Berry's moves."

  Shawn snorted. "Yeah, I can confirm that."

  She shoved him in the side. "Hey!"

  He grinned. "Since when have I been good for your ego? Nothing's changed just because everything between us has changed," he teased.

  Huffing, she shot Marc a look. "I'm not that bad. Just… I hate it."

  "She doesn't like the idea of hurting me," Shawn informed him, snorting again as though the very concept was impossible.

  She scowled at him. "If we did normal training, I wouldn't mind. You want me to do things that would hurt if I did them right," she complained. "If I kick you in the balls, even by accident how bad do you think that will make me feel?"

  "You wear a strap, don't you?" Marc demanded, horror in his voice.

  Shawn sniffed. "Of course. It still doesn't help."

  She pouted. "I'm feeling picked on."

  "Better than self-piteous," Shawn slipped in.

  "Jesus, you're right, you’re so good for my ego. Anyway, we are getting off topic."

  Marc chuckled. "You're half right," he conceded. "So, a little bit of back story so that things make a touch more sense, okay?"

  "Go for it," El prompted.

  "I'm not sure how much you know about shifters, Shawn, so I'm just going to go from the beginning."

  "That's for the best. I know some shit, but only from combat situations. Nothing about shifter history or anything like that."

  "Okay, so the Triad thing isn't unique to Lions. It's a feline thing. The trouble is, Lions are more fertile. Probably the most fertile group. Do you remember when Santiago showed you the picture of Jamie's graduating class?" he asked her. When she nodded, he continued, "Well, you'll also remember how there were no women. Now, the Pantera are very insular. They have a school on their land and they are taught on-site. Whereas Lions are taught to integrate with humans early on. His generation probably had very few women born to it. The ones who were, were probably homeschooled. So, women are precious to all shifter races, but to the Pantera? They are priceless."

  She blinked. "Seriously?"

  His nod was grim. "Seriously. The Triad was born out of necessity. There have always been more men than women, and if you ask a lot of people, they'll say it was the Mother's intervention. I don't know if that's true, I just know that the Triad bond is very special. It gives us a chance at having a woman of our own when numbers dictate otherwise."

  "But why? You can mate with humans. That particular pool never runs dry. We are the opposite, after all." Pain slashed her. She cleared her throat. "Humans have the opposite. More women than men."

  "I'm talking thousands of years ago here, El. Back then, I'm certain shifters stuck with shifters. Now, we integrate. We have no choice. There are too many humans not to. In that time? Shifters might well have been the dominant species. It's not like we'll ever know because there's no way to research it. And maybe, if the situation had been like it is today, the Triad bond wouldn't exist. But it does.

  "And let me explain, Lions mate with humans. A lot of the species don't. The Pantera being one of them "

  The breath she released was shaky. "So, what you're saying is that my mother was a Pantera, who shouldn't have had an affair with my father. And if that wasn't bad enough, she had a child who was a daughter."

  Marc nodded grimly. "Exactly. Two wrongs on so many Pantera levels. Not only that, but I have a feeling your mother was related to somebody important."

  Her eyes widened. "Why?"

  "For the Pantera to have been targeting you, trying to get you away from your father, who is who he is, that requires top level sanction. No ordinary Pantera would be allowed such freedom with Council funds."

  She gulped. "When did everything get so complicated?"

  Marc let out a soft, sad sigh. He reached over to tuck some hair behind her ear, and murmured, "Since the day you were born, baby."

  As the hot water cascaded over him, Marc reached for his cock. Guilt lanced him at the need spiraling throughout his body. El had gone to sleep in tears last night. Her sobs had nearly broken his fucking heart, and here he was, jacking off in the shower.

  Letting out a groan as his hand sped up, and with each pass his thumb caressed the sensitive tip of his cock, it wouldn't take much to come. This was need. Pure, animalistic need. It had no emotion. No connection. Another reason for him to feel guilt.

  Sex was no longer something he had to do, not now El was in his life. But the body needed what the body needed, and if that went in contradiction to his heart, nobody won.

  Tilting his head back as release approached, he nearly jumped out of his skin when the door opened. With the water running, his sense of smell was barely
there, so he dropped his cock and turned to make sure it was El, not Shawn.

  Not that being caught in the act by either of them would be considered fortuitous.

  Even though he whipped around quickly, the door to the shower opened. He didn’t jolt at the grating sound because he knew it was El. Only she’d enter the shower when he was there.

  Shawn had certainly made his disgust at the idea of a threesome felt.

  “What are you doing up?” he asked his mate softly, loving the soft, sleepy eyes she cast over him. The languid glance had his hard cock twitching with need.

  Naked, she was a delight. All curves and ripe lusciousness.

  A true woman.

  So rounded and sweet that his dick ached.

  She licked her lips, her gaze on his erection as she stepped toward him; her hand outreached.

  His eyes widened and he reached for her fingers. “You don’t have to do that.”

  His soft remark had her frowning. “Why wouldn’t I want to?”

  He sighed. “You’ve been through a lot these past few days, El. I don’t want to add to that burden.”

  She grabbed his other hand and shocked the hell out of him by dragging it between her legs. “Feel that?” she demanded grimly. “That’s me. Wanting you.”

  He groaned and immediately slipped his fingers into her slick core. She was so fucking wet that he couldn’t help himself. He made her squeal when he slid his fingers inside her core, then hooked them forward. Using his hold on her there, he dragged her toward him with a chuckle, loving how she slapped at his chest, making water splash everywhere.

  “Jerk!” she declared breathily.

  He grinned, thanking the Mother that she wasn’t scared of him. If anything, could fight fire with fire.

  “Maybe,” he conceded, tilting his head to drop a kiss on the tip of her nose as he curled his fingers once more and rubbed her clit with the back of his wrist.

  She clamped her legs together, holding his hand hostage, then pressed her forehead to his chest. His grin widened when she stayed silent, then it disappeared, morphing into a low moan when she grabbed a hold of his pec and bit down—not letting go.

  Loving her wildness, he rewarded her by plunging harder into her wetness. She was tense against him, a rigid statue in his arms as he put her body through its paces.

  Against her belly, his cock found a soft home, and he rocked his hips, adding to the friction.

  Fuck, this was so much better than his hand.

  Letting out a groan, he bowed his head and pressed a kiss to her temple. So damn grateful for her at that moment that his throat felt thick with the wonder of having her in his life.

  “Up,” he ordered out of the blue and she let out a moan as he pulled his fingers away from her. Her eyes were dazed as she looked up at him in question, but before she could do anything silly like complain, he grabbed hold of her, hooked her legs around his arms, then pressed her against the shower wall.

  With the water cascading between them, he pushed into her, loving how the liquid gathered and swirled where their bodies were joined. As he fucked into her, filling her with all he had to give, the water slapped against her clit, and each time he thrust into her, she moaned, her head rolling back against the wall, sliding from side to side as he took her the way Mother had intended.

  It was ridiculously quick, too quick to his shame, but she didn’t seem to mind.

  Before he knew what he was about, she was roaring her release. She reared up from the wall, stunning the shit out of him and nearly knocking them both over before he stacked his feet properly, before she clamped her teeth on his shoulder and bit down.

  That, alongside the ripples of her pussy about his shaft, was all he needed to roar out his own release.

  That lick of pain made the pleasure all the sweeter, and pleasure was an understatement.

  This was so much more than pleasure. It was ecstasy as his mate’s pussy milked him of all he was worth, uniting them in ways she couldn’t even begin to understand yet.

  But soon, she would.

  When Shawn heard Marc’s roar of release, he wanted to close his eyes against it. To hide from it.

  But he couldn’t.

  That would have been stupid.

  He was fortunate to be a part of El’s life at all. It would be churlish to handle it wrongly, to fail to appreciate how fucking fortunate he was to be here at all.

  And, the truth was, the sounds of them having sex wasn’t off-putting. Not totally. His cock was hard, not just from morning wood, but from the sounds they made together… because boy, they weren’t quiet. His lips twitched at the thought, and he surprised himself by being able to find something amusing about this whole situation.

  When Marc roared out his release, El moments later doing the same, he shamed himself by palming his cock under the sheets.

  He wouldn’t come, but the contact felt good. He squeezed his fist around his dick, needing the pressure.

  Holding himself like that, and every now and then sliding his palm over his shaft, he lay in wait.

  He knew this morning was the morning.

  After the insanity of the recent days, he knew El would want to ground herself in the only things that were cemented in her life.

  The men who loved her.

  Moments later, he heard the outer door to her connecting bath open. When El appeared in the door that led to her bedroom, without Marc, Shawn realized the other man had left silently from the hall door, and for that, he felt relief.

  When he let his gaze drift over El, he was almost stunned at the sight of her.

  She’d always been shy. The kind of woman who wrapped up in a towel, then as she headed to the steps to the pool, shrugged out of it quickly, tossing it to the side before she dove into the water to cover herself up again.

  Yet, here she was, as naked as the day she was born.

  Fuck, she was glorious.

  And the fire in her eyes?

  It about burned him to ashes.

  He leaned up on his elbows, a question in his eyes that was answered by the flames licking hers.

  “Come here,” he demanded.

  She froze in place, then started up again, her hips swaying so sinuously, he knew how a cobra felt when a snake charmer played his pipe.

  His gaze was glued to the roll of her hips, and he felt his already hard cock start to pound when she approached the bed, knelt up on it, then crawled over to him.

  All the while, he caught sneaky glimpses of her wet pussy, and her tits dangled as she moved toward him, lines of moisture licking along her curves from the shower she’d just had.

  He was surprised she was hungry after what had just gone down with Marc, but she was.

  That much was evident.

  Before he knew what she was about, she’d whipped the sheet down, revealing his cock—which he’d pulled out from underneath his boxers, and she’d cocked up her leg to straddle him.

  He gulped. “El?”

  She tilted her head to the side, then, in a contemplative voice asked, “Do you know how long I’ve waited to feel your cock inside me?”

  He groaned, her words stirring him in a way that beggared belief.

  Shawn reached for her, but she grabbed his hands and slid her fingers through his. Then, she stunned him with her aggression by leaning over him and pinning his hands to the bed either side of his head.

  “Are you okay, El?” he asked softly, not wanting to sway her out of this frame of mind, but at the same time, not willing to go through with this if she wasn’t feeling all right.

  And ‘all right’ was his way of referring to the complete one-eighty of her character.

  Aggressive and El, quite simply, did not go together in the same sentence.

  A wicked glint appeared in her eye. “I’m fabulous. This is a whole new day,” she murmured, moving her hips in a way that had her pussy coming down against his cock. She slipped her legs wider apart, letting her lips part too so that all of his was coate
d by all of her.

  A notion that had him shuddering underneath her.

  She rode him like that. Hands pinned to the bed, her tits swaying against his chest as she drove him crazy with the slickness of her pussy dragging against his shaft.

  “Fuck, El,” he bit off when she began to circle her hips too, not just rocking now, but changing the angle, making him need to be inside her more than he needed his next breath.

  She purred, and the noise had him tensing before he let air whoosh from his lungs less she realize how disturbing that noise was.

  Having petted her panther last night, literally, he was naturally cautious about what that sound meant.

  She didn’t notice though. He could sense she was further into this than he was. And considering she’d just had sex moments ago, the turbocharged sex drive that came as part and parcel of being a Shifter was obviously good to go now too.

  Probably a good thing considering she had four mates, he conceded ruefully.

  She unclasped one of their hands and his heart damn near froze in his chest. Any thoughts of her panther coming out to play immediately disintegrated as the promise of what that move meant hit home.

  She didn’t disappoint either.

  Her fingers clasped his cock, and within less than two seconds, the tip of his dick was notched to her gate and he was sliding home.

  Jesus, she felt good. Like home and his. But more than that, too.

  She began to purr again. This time, like the cat who’d got the cream. Those vibrations though were like nothing he’d ever known before. They rippled through his body, hitting his cock in all the wrong places so that his already stretched control was teetering on the precipice before she did more than just tease him with those damn purrs.

  His breath caught in his throat as she stared into his eyes, and as they looked at one another, she began to ride him. Properly, this time.