by Penny Alley
And the spectators, they were everywhere, loosely grouped in family units, content to watch and point, seemingly focused exclusively on neither the males nor the females, but on both collectively. Karly thought she saw money changing hands. It began to feel like Sunday morning at the races, and she was horse Lucky Number Seven. All she needed was a jockey…although with any luck, Colton would be riding her soon enough.
At once both excited and appalled, Karly rubbed her hands against her thighs, smearing the paints there until she caught herself.
“Get as far as you can,” Maya told her, her eyes brightening with that oddly lupine yellowish hue. “You’re human. If you’re brought down too soon, no one will think any worse of you than they already do.”
The excitement was building, and it was all around her now. It felt palpable, and just a little bit frightening.
“Where do I go?” Karly asked, tensing now herself.
“Just run,” Maya said, growled rather, her voice deepening into startlingly masculine tones.
Karly looked around to find Maya shifting, transforming right there by her side, her whole body rippling in that oddly fluid way as her face distorted, her limbs lengthened and thinned, her back hunched and her fur sprouted at a rate Karly had never seen outside of time-lapse photography. She dropped to the ground, an absurdly graceful canine yawn and stretch easing her into her fully wolfen form. Hollywood had it so wrong. There was nothing painful in Maya’s transformation, at least not that Karly could see. No discomfort, not even the slightest wince in the lupine face that turned to her, muzzle gaping in a toothy grin just before the males broke the fence that surrounded them.
Apparently, that was the gunshot she’d been waiting for. The ropes around the females dropped and everyone scattered. With no idea which direction to run, Karly tried to scatter with the group, but she was attacked. Somewhere in the panic, she had lost track of Joela, but when the furry weight of a shifted volka hit her sideways, knocking her sprawling on the ground, Karly thought she knew exactly who was snapping for her throat.
It was shocking how strong the woman in her wolf form was. She would have gotten her teeth into Karly, but for Maya and her three pack mates, who leapt into the middle of the fight, snarling, biting, ripping at the blonde’s scruff and flanks, and all Karly could do was scramble to get out from under them all without getting hurt. Someone yelped, and Karly felt the spattering of hot blood spray across her back. But there was simply no time to check who it was, because the males had already caught up with them.
Maya sprang away just as Joela was engulfed, every member of that impromptu pack fighting viciously to be the one to cover and hold her. She went down yelping, struggling violently to break free while they squabbled, snapping, biting, ripping into one another and sometimes, in the brutal excitement, into her. It was the football game all over again, only this time no one was playing. They drew blood, theirs and hers; bones snapped, that ominous cracking sound being what finally broke through Karly’s shock and launched her back into the race.
She ran, as fast as she could go, her bare feet slipping in the dew-soaked grass, following the path Maya and her friends had taken into the dense forest that surrounded the ridge. There would be no more help from that quarter. The closest things to friends that she had, they were already gone, but that didn’t mean Karly was alone. Someone was coming up fast behind her. Right behind her. She could hear the panting and growling, could all but feel the heat of his breath on her back, and both Maya and Mama Margo were right: humans were dreadfully slow runners.
Karly had barely reached the trees when she was tackled. Just as fast, however, the weight that hit her back was knocked off, but it wasn’t two wolves that she found herself pinned beneath. It was Seth McQueen, untransformed, naked and painted like every other participant, who wrestled the young grey that had knocked her down into the brush. Without any trace of either anger or enjoyment, McQueen hooked one strong arm around the snarling grey’s neck, his other hand latching onto the grey’s right front leg. In one savage yank, he broke it.
The grey yelped, with high-pitched screams that erupted into desperate writhing to break free.
Hugging the wounded volka, McQueen looked at her. “Run,” he growled, a quick nod of his head being the only encouragement she needed to do just that.
She dashed straight through a thick patch of poison oak before she realized what it was, and even then it hardly ranked on her list of immediate concerns. Hoping volka were as adverse to the stuff as humans, Karly kept going, only to have that thin hope dashed a few seconds later when she heard the crash of canine paws pursuing her through the leaves.
At least she wasn’t the first one tackled. That was the one thought that crossed her mind before two wolves collided directly behind her in a snarling, savage frenzy. Karly didn’t look back; she just kept running, up a sharp bluff dotted with thistles that cut at her legs. She barely felt the pain. All she knew was she could hear a stream on the other side of that bluff, and if she could just get to it, then perhaps she might be able to lose the wolves the way convicts in old prison movies lost bloodhounds.
What Karly didn’t realize until she was already falling was that the edge of the bluff was not as well defined at the grass led her to believe. She went down on her side, landing with a splash in the mud and water. She barely avoided whacking her head on a fist-sized rock, but she didn’t even have time to gasp her shock at the iciness of the water before the volka that had pursued her up the bluff leapt down after her.
He landed directly on top of her, a massive blondish-brown beast, the sheer weight of him was astounding. Nothing in his size had prepared her for just how big and heavy he was, although she remembered well how impossible it had been trying to lift Puppy into the back of her car. This wasn’t Puppy, though…Colton, rather. This was someone else entirely.
Lying on her back, Karly stared up at him, seeing nothing but muzzle and teeth. He didn’t have them bared, exactly, but it was obvious he was struggling internally, as if unsure he wanted to keep what he’d caught. He pawed at her, nudged her chin with his nose, then her breasts, filling his senses with the smell Mama Margo had coated her in. Head low, he slunk off her, then quickly changed his mind and covered her again.
In the distance, Karly could hear the sounds of other captures taking place, other squabbles erupting between males battling to see who was stronger.
The male on top of her heard it too. He moved nervously, flinching at nearby sounds as if expecting to be challenged at any moment. He began to paw at her again, nudging at her shoulder and side. He stuck his nose right up against her cheek, and still Karly lay frozen exactly as she was. She couldn’t run without first rolling over, but she knew if she presented her back to him right now, then she was done.
Shaking, Karly’s hand brushed that large rock a half second before a crash of brush on the bluff directly above them caught the wolf’s attention. Karly didn’t think twice. When her hand brushed that rock again, she grabbed it and struck. She’d been aiming for his head, but he jerked back at the last second and she wound up hitting nothing more vital than his shoulder.
The volka turned on her, but he only snapped once before a large black blur leaping over the bluff landed on top of them both. As large as he had seemed at first, the blond volka must have been younger. It wasn’t until she saw him jumping free of Puppy’s attack that she realized how much bigger Colton was in his shifted form.
Karly was knocked almost flat on her back in the water. While the stream wasn’t deep enough to dunk her completely, it was a terrifying sensation to have her ears suddenly submerged. She came up fighting and flailing, but Colton had already harried the younger volka off her. The blond, in the most anticlimactic show of deference, surrendered his conquest and fled in search of an easier catch.
Rolling over, fighting the current and the slippery mud and stones to get her hands and knees on stable ground, Karly crawled for the nearest bank. Every thrashing step c
louded the cold water, but no sooner had she grabbed a fistful of solidly-rooted grass than did she feel Puppy’s heavy paw step on her back. His teeth caught her nape, sending shivers of absolute panic and, in the strangest twist of what she could only comprehend as depravity, tiny thrills of exhilaration dancing across her skin. Every point of his teeth could be clearly felt as he held her, simply held her, until she stilled again.
He shifted his position, moving to cover her. His front legs framed her shoulders. They were all that she could see of him, though she felt everything—from the familiar comfort of his soft fur, to the heat of his breath, and finally, the release of his jaws as he, gradually, let go of her neck.
Neither one of them moved. Precious seconds ticked by like hours, with her feet still in the frigid water and her knees sinking into the mud and the grass tickling at her face.
The paws and legs began to change, that fluid ripple of transformation turning his fur to skin and his paws back into hands. Puppy’s chest against her back became Colton’s, naked and hot. His belly brushed her buttocks. His knees braced in the muddy earth to either side of her thighs.
“Shh, sweetheart,” he whispered against her shoulder. “It’s all right.”
Her pent up breath escaped with such shuddering force that it wracked her entirely. She sucked in a replacing gasp, but already the urge to flee was fast melting out of her.
Colton nuzzled her, his human lips brushing back across her nape, not kissing, simply caressing. “Accept me,” he coaxed. “Accept me.”
She wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t already. It was a powerful realization. One that left her shaking all over again.
Brushing her hair back over her shoulder, he kissed just behind her ear. He rocked, letting her feel his intent in the not-so-subtle sexual movements as his hips bumped her ass. His voice deepened, turning husky in that way that meant he might look human, but the wolf was right there inside him. “I need you to accept me, Karly.”
She loved it when he said her name like that. Not honey or sweetheart or any other meaningless endearment that most people, just tossed out on a whim; but her name, growled in the utmost intimacy while his teeth gently nipped her skin, right where he’d already bitten her—marked her, claimed her for his own—in the dark hours of the night before. She couldn’t stop trembling, but fear was the last thing she felt. No, this was something else. Desire, the most primal sensation unlike anything she’d ever felt. It was excitement too, those low thrills that rippled her with every rumbling breath that exhaled from him, only to vibrate into her.
Her skin tingled everywhere he touched her, and he was touching her everywhere. His cock, swollen and thick, cradled as it was in the crack of her ass, rocked in meaningful approximation of what he desired. And with each thrust, the heavy sack of his balls brushed into the shadowy triangle between her thighs to caress her where she ached most to feel his touch.
Quivering anticipation rocked her, much as he was rocking. Every caress made her body tighten and burn. Higher and hotter, a molten screw being twisted right to the snapping point, but in a way that promised pleasure too beautiful to be shared by two people who knew as little about one another as they did.
“Accept,” Colton murmured, nipping at the sensitive lobe of her ear.
“I do.” Karly whispered, her body instinctively arching back into the sleek entrapment of his own. She tried to hide her face in her arms so she wouldn’t have to face the embarrassment of just how much she wanted this. To be taken by Colton just like this, lying face down on the muddy bank. Doggy-style even. How appropriate.
He growled and bit her nape again, his hard body forcing all the softest parts of hers to mold to him. Her nipples tightened, tingling at the touch of his teeth on her neck. Aching for their chance to take a turn in the burning heat of his mouth.
“I do, what?” He moved to the other side of her neck and bit there now as well. Harder this time. The suckling heat of his mouth fastened on her, feasting, marking her as if she were his territory, because she was his territory, and she loved it.
She squirmed in the unyielding prison of his arms, loving the intensity of his possession and the way he took her hands in each of his, weaving their fingers together in a show of intimacy too overwhelming to hide from. “Please!” she breathed.
“Say it,” he growled again. He pumped his hips against her, three times in rapid succession, hard enough to make her bottom bounce and a seductive tightening to jolt straight from her sex up to her womb. Liquid arousal flooded her in response. She heard it, the slick slapping sound of his balls bumping her pussy, and the sharpness when he drew his next breath. He could smell it, the heady musk of her pussy as it wept to be filled by him.
“Please!” she gasped. “I-I do accept you! I do!”
He released her hand, but only long enough to guide himself to the entrance of all that liquid heat. Before that first invading push, he quickly re-captured her, weaving their fingers tightly together all over again. They both groaned at his next thrust, the cradle of his strong thighs forcing hers together and making the fit all the tighter for them both.
“Am I real to you now?” The scalding heat of his mouth caught the lobe of her ear, sucking and nipping until it was all Karly could do not to writhe. He rode her slowly, with long penetrating thrusts that pushed him in as deep as he could go. He filled her as if he’d been made for her, poured and molded to all of her most intimate specifications. And when he withdrew, the devastation of thinking he might leave her entirely made her frantic.
“Yes!” She strained against him, arching her spine and pushing back her hips in an effort to force his return. She needed to feel him deep inside her, she needed to feel that overpowering throb that showed just how well they fit together. He was her Alpha. She was just plain his.
His gripping fingers tightened around hers. He rose over her, his long, slow thrusts beginning to quicken. He growled and her sex spasmed, sparking that electrified shiver that brought the beginning of her end. She came much sooner than she wanted to, every inch of her seizing and shaking all around the unending glide of his cock pumping in and out. He lay a ring of hickeys, nips, and gentle bites, all over her neck and shoulders, his bites increasing in pressure as his thrusts quickened, became harder, more aggressive.
His growl and that fastening lock of his teeth on her shoulder made her come again even before the thrilling shocks of the first orgasm completely died away. She wailed into the grass, the overwhelming sharpness of the pleasure he’d brought her more than she could take without bursting into tears.
That’s when she felt him come, felt that last vigorous shove slam into her smaller body as he fought to lose himself as deep inside her willing heat as he could get. The hard expulsion of his breath scorched her back and shoulder as he shuddered, spurt after burning spurt washing the mouth of her womb.
“Shh,” he whispered, unweaving their fingers to stroke her head and hair. “It’s okay, sweetheart. Shh.”
“I’m sorry.” She hiccupped, sucking at air in an attempt to control her sobbing. “I don’t kn-know why I’m c-crying.”
Nuzzling at the nape of her neck, she felt it when Colton grinned. “Because I’m just that good, that’s why.”
Karly couldn’t help it. With tears sliding wet down both cheeks, she laughed and was about to roll over if he would let her, a ready remark already springing to her lips, but an interrupting rustle in the brush on top of that overlook bluff stopped them both.
Jerking his hands out of hers, Colton covered her again, his possession now having nothing to do with arousal and everything to do with ownership. He breathed in. His exhale came rumbling out in a warning growl. “McQueen.”
“Puppy,” came the drawling reply.
Colton began to ripple, his body one threatening motion away from wolfish transformation. Another soft rustle and then the leaves and grass above them parted and Seth McQueen came into view. Fully human, still naked, he gazed down on them, making absolute
ly no effort to interfere.
“For the record,” he said, smirking as he eyed all the parts of Karly that Colton wasn’t covering, “I never wanted to be Alpha. Everybody tromping through your property, bringing you their problems day and night, whining and bitching until you settle their petty-ass disputes.” He grunted his derision, then his eyes hardened. “A territory needs an Alpha. You want the job; fine. But you fail just one time…you neglect your responsibilities, you give the Deacon so much as a toehold into our town and I won’t give you a second chance. I’ll take the position from you, even if I have to wipe your pack out to do it.”
Colton returned his glare, saying nothing until McQueen shifted his gaze to Karly again. That’s when Colton growled, that animalistic snarl that grew by the second with deadly intent.
McQueen never lost his smirk. “Like I said, I hear you…Puppy.” Raising his nose, he tested the air. “Damn, that is a beautiful stink.” His crooked grimace came the closest that Karly had yet seen to a real smile then, just before his whole frame shimmered and he shifted. Turning, he dropped to the forest floor on all wolfish fours and disappeared into the thick greenery
Colton did not relax, not for the longest time, not until he was sure the other volka had truly gone. “I might have to kill him before this is over,” he muttered.
“He saved me for you,” Karly said. “When I got caught, he knocked the other wolf off me and told me to keep running. He could have taken me for himself, but he didn’t.”
Glancing down at Karly, his expression softened with slight apology before he grunted. “Come on. We should get back to the Ridge.”
What little of the romantic mood McQueen’s interruption hadn’t killed, died right there.
“Do we have to?”
Colton bent to nuzzle her shoulder. “You don’t want to show off your prime Alpha catch? I really am considered quite the catch, you know.”