by Alisa Woods
Just as her body crested the peak of those waves, Jak’s hand and mouth left her, and he stood. He shucked off his jacket and tossed it on the leaves.
“I need to be in you.” He quickly unbuckled his pants and kicked them off. His erection was thick and strong in the moonlight. She couldn’t help reaching for it, but he held her wrists away. “None of that. I want you to ride me with that beautiful body of yours, not your delicious little hands.”
His words made her body throb.
His hands left her wrists and trailed down her legs, tugging her pants off. Then he sat on his jacket and pulled her down facing him. She straddled him and took him inside her. He groaned and leaned back, giving her room to get settled. He was so deliciously big, filled her so completely, but she wasn’t quite sure what to do next.
“I’ve never…” Her breath steamed the night air. “I’ve never been on top.”
Jak half-laughed and grinned up at her. “You just hold still then, my love, and let me do the work.” He held her hips in place, hovering over him with only about half his length inside her, then he quickly lifted his body to thrust up into her.
She gasped with how deep he went and how his body met hers in just the right spot, sending an electric pulse of pleasure through her. He groaned again. “God, Arianna, you’re so tight… so good…” He thrusted up into her again and again, faster and faster, until she was seeing stars dance in front of her eyes, more than just the ones peeking through the canopy overhead. She bit her lip to keep her gasps and shrieks inside, but the pressure kept building until finally that mind-blowing pleasure wracked her body again. She came and came, and it seemed like an endless time until Jak stopped thrusting, his own body stilling with his climax. Her body deflated, collapsing on top of him, all pleasure completely wrung out of her.
She had never been so completely and wonderfully close to someone in her entire life as she was at that moment, half-naked on the forest floor, joined together, panting into Jak’s chest like she had just run a mile.
When her breathing settled a little, she sighed, long and contented. “I want this, Jak. I want it forever.”
His hands were in her hair, touching her face, running along her back. “I promise, Arianna. I promise.”
And she had no doubt in her heart that Jak could make the impossible happen. Because he had already done it: he’d already found a way to rescue her when she hadn’t even known she was drowning.
It was nearly Saturday night before Jak got the call.
The evening before, with Arianna in the forest, had sealed everything in his mind: he would find a way to free her, no matter the cost. That he would have to leave his pack was a given. It would mean moving away, getting a new job, and starting over... but it would be worth it. He might have to wait, though, at least a week, until the full moon, when the entire pack pledged their submission to Gage. If Jak didn’t re-up his submission to his alpha then, he would be free to do anything he wished: including killing Mace.
But he was hoping the witches would have a better way—one that wouldn’t involve him going to jail for murder. Not least because that would leave Arianna unprotected in a world where she was far too vulnerable.
But he needed to get Arianna free as soon as possible. Every day she was in Mace’s house was another day he was putting his hands on her. Jak’s claws came out and sliced into the leather grip of the steering wheel. He had a hard time keeping his wolf under control when he thought about Mace and Arianna together, so he pushed that image to the back of his mind and focused on the dangerous task at hand: bargaining with witches.
Hecca had messaged him using Morgan Media’s account—it was nothing more than a time, but he knew exactly what it meant. Circe had delivered his cryptic threat, and Hecca had realized her plan to capture Arianna and him for her dark magic had been exposed. And that Morgan Media’s relationship with Red Wolf was at risk. Hopefully, that meant she was ready to bargain… and not merely summoning him to his death.
Jak pulled his car into the parking garage and took the elevator to the 35th floor. He was right on time, and this time, the hot blonde witch in front didn’t even ask, she just escorted him through the cubicle-and-art-table open area to Hecca’s corner office in back. The receptionist knocked and let him in, closing the door behind him, once he was inside.
Hecca stood at the window, gazing out over downtown Seattle with her back to him. The dying rays of the sun were turning the city’s towers into purple obelisks and Hecca’s office into a palace of gold and shadows.
Jak waited.
“Give me a reason, wolf,” she said.
“A reason?” He didn’t like how this was starting out.
“A reason not to turn you into ash where you stand.” She finally spun to face him. Her long black hair flowed in a wavy flare, settling on her generous curves once she had turned. Her purple-tinted hair streak gave an artistic flair to business-sexy, curve-hugging lavender suit. But it was her eyes, alive with a dark fire, that told him they’d already skipped to the heart of the negotiations.
“You could kill me,” he said as coolly as he could manage, thankful that witches didn’t have a shifter’s ability to scent. Otherwise, she would smell the tremor of fear clutching his gut. “If you want to lose Red Wolf’s business and possibly start a war.”
“A war?” She was smiling, but there was no warmth in it. “A little dramatic for a wolf, don’t you think?”
“Wolves tend to take the attempted murder of our females rather seriously.”
Hecca’s smirk faded. “What are you talking about, beta?”
“Yesterday, two bounty hunters nearly captured one of our mated females and her guard. But you already knew that.”
Her dark eyes narrowed. “Bounty hunters.”
“Armed with dart guns and a bag.” Why was she pretending she didn’t know anything about this?
“So someone came after your pack. It’s hardly the first time.” She flicked her purple-nail-tipped fingers at him, as if this was some kind of pack business that was inconsequential to her. “Who says Morgan Media was involved in any of it?”
“The bounty hunters said so. After I beat the shit out of them.”
She frowned. “These bounty hunters pointed you here?”
“They called you out by name, Hecca.” Why was she dancing around this?
Her frown deepened, and she drummed her dagger-like nails on her desk. Then a phone appeared in her hand from somewhere in the folds of her purple dress. She spoke into it. “I need you in here.” A pause. “I don’t care. Drop it. I need you now.”
Jak was half-certain she was going to have him thrown out, and he wasn’t sure what his play was going to be then, but after a strained moment of silence, Circe floated into the room.
Now that they were standing together, Jak could see the sisterly resemblance: same dark hair, same carved cheeks of ivory. Circe’s red hair streak echoed Hecca’s purple one, and she favored the same tight-fitting suits. But Circe’s eyes were once again roaming Jak’s body, whereas Hecca’s had nothing but contempt for him.
“Please tell me,” Hecca said to her sister in a voice filled with danger, “that you haven’t been tramping around in my playground again, Circe.”
Circe curled a lip at her sister. Apparently there wasn’t much sisterly love among witches. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Jak decided he needed to lean in to this conversation. “Well, someone sent bounty hunters after Arianna… and given that the hunters say it was Hecca, I’m thinking someone in this office is operating in your name.”
Circe’s eyebrows lifted, and she seemed genuinely non-plussed. “Sister,” she said to Hecca, “you may disagree with my preferences in many things, but surely you know I’m not idiot enough to do magic—or kidnappings—in your name.”
Hecca looked grumpy but not the fire-spitting anger she had a moment ago. “No, that doesn’t seem reasonable. Even for you. And even if you did, I doubt yo
u would be caught by the likes of a beta wolf.”
Circe tipped her head in acknowledgment.
“Wait a minute,” Jak said, his frustration growing. “Are you actually saying none of you were involved in this? Is that really your story here?”
Hecca sauntered forward, and her sister watched on with amusement. “Little wolf, you should take care to come here making accusations when you have no proof.”
“I guess I can haul in the bounty hunters.” If they haven’t already fled town. Jak winced at his misjudgment there: he should have brought the hunters back to the pack. But he was so bent on working a deal with the witches, he couldn’t see past that.
Hecca arched an eyebrow. “Even if they squealed my name, that means nothing to me, wolf. I don’t know who was after your mate, but it wasn’t anyone in this office.”
“She’s not my mate. I’m just the guard.”
Hecca’s eyes narrowed. “And yet you’re on quite the quest here, storming in and making demands. Bargaining…” She looked Jak up and down and began to circle him, taking him in from all angles. Hecca threw a pointed look to Circe, who nodded. Jak didn’t like this silent witch conversation. At all.
“Tell me, little wolf, what did you expect to gain, coming here?”
Jak gritted his teeth. His leverage was gone. He had no idea who was actually after Arianna… or possibly even himself. And now he was deep inside a coven that he had just, apparently, falsely accused of capital crimes.
“I just wanted to keep a wolf-witch war from breaking out unnecessarily,” he said, backpedaling.
Circe floated across the room, the wisps of her red dress flitting around her legs as she moved. “He said he had personal business, Hecca dear.”
“Yes, I can sense that,” Hecca replied, still looking him over. “Your aura is giving you away, little wolf. You have very personal business here… about a woman who is not your mate… ahhh, yes. Now it’s clear.”
Jak didn’t like the look of recognition on Hecca’s face at all.
But she just twiddled her fingers again. “This is your domain, Circe,” she said, turning her back on him and heading for the door. “Kill the beta or… whatever. Just clean up after yourself and keep us out of a pack war, yes?”
Jak’s mouth dropped open as she whisked through the door and closed it behind her, leaving Jak alone with Circe.
“So, little beta. You want a female who doesn’t belong to you,” Circe said with a smile that made Jak’s stomach clench tight. “And you’re willing to walk into a witch’s coven to protect her. Or is there more to it than that?”
Jak shut his mouth and swallowed. This had spiraled quickly out of control. What was he thinking, coming here without his pack? They didn’t even know where he was: as far as they were concerned, he was still staking out the bounty hunters, who had probably fled the state. Which left him with precisely zero bargaining power. And a sinking probability of getting out of the building alive. Which, strangely enough, also left him with nothing left to lose.
Jak stood straighter and withstood Circe’s roaming gaze. “I have a need for a certain dark art. I can pay you well, if you have the ability to do the magic I need.”
“The ability…” Circe’s blue eyes flashed. “I have bent the knees of witches more powerful than you’ve dreamed of in your small, wolfy dreams, beta. You have no idea what I’m capable of.”
“Then you should have no problem breaking an unbreakable magic bond.” He folded his arms and dared her with his eyes.
They narrowed at him. “The mating bond. The female is mated already, and you desire her.”
There was far more to it, but… “Yes.”
Circe’s pointed look softened into boredom. “So simply kill her mate. That’s what you wolves like to do anyway, isn’t it? Brawl and thrash around with your claws and teeth, all animal-like.” Her lips were twitching into a barely repressed smile.
Jak had a strong feeling she had a taste for wolves and would very much enjoy his animal nature. That must be why he was still standing, still alive, and dealing with Circe, not Hecca, whose revulsion for wolves was much more typical of witches. But sex was a dangerous bargaining chip with a witch—one that before this very instant he wouldn’t have even thought possible—but it was also one that would likely land him as her permanent, and eventually deceased, love slave.
“Can you break the bond or not?” he asked, as if he might march out if the answer was no. He could only hope that option was still on the table.
She smirked and stepped closer, enveloping him in her spiced clove and sage scent. “What you seek can be done, little wolf. The question is: what would you be willing to give for it?”
“I can pay you handsomely.” Jak had more than enough cash tucked away. He never spent anything anyway, and Gage had brought him in early on the bonus pool for the projects he had worked. Over four years, that added up.
She edged even closer. “Maybe I’m not interested in money.”
Jak leaned back, regaining space. “Maybe money’s all I’m interested in offering.”
She moved in again, and he would have backed up, but he was already up against the door.
She smiled. “You might enjoy it more than you think, little wolf.”
“I’m certain you would find I’m not a little wolf.”
Circe bit her lip. And there was definitely a scent of arousal under the sage. He wasn’t sure if this was smart—in fact, he was certain it wasn’t—but he didn’t have many options at the moment.
He leaned forward, meeting her halfway, close enough that his whispered words would brush her skin. “I would definitely take my pleasure from you—repeatedly, little witch—but you can be sure that the females in my bed will always get their pleasure first. And often.”
She breathed a low sigh. “So you would bargain with me, wolf?”
He leaned back. “I would… except that spending time in your bed seems like a good way to lose all my blood.”
She pouted. “Why would I drain someone who kept me so completely satisfied?”
His wolf snarled, and even Jak could see that wasn’t exactly a denial. “You’re forgetting one important thing, witch.”
She was back to looking amused. “And what’s that?”
“I happen to be in love with another man’s mate. I’m willing to make a one time payment to break that unbreakable bond. But that’s it. And payment comes after the spell has worked.”
She tipped her nose up to look down at him. “The spell will work. You might not like the result, however.”
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“What makes a mated female’s heart so powerful in magic?” she asked rhetorically, amusement returning.
“I have a feeling you’re going to enlighten me.” Jak knew mated females were highly sought after for the properties of their blood, and he figured the heart was especially drenched in it… but he hadn’t really thought about why. Delving into what ghastly things witches did with wolf internal organs wasn’t something he spent a lot of time ruminating upon.
Circe licked her lips, still eyeing him. “A mated female has twice the magic of an unmated female, or a male in either case. That’s because she has two forms of magic in her blood, intertwined—her own magic and the male’s magic. The second one is what binds her to him. It’s a living force inside her. The stronger the male, especially an alpha, the stronger the magic and the greater the bond. The reason you cannot mate with this female you desire isn’t because the bond holds her to him—”
“It’s because my magic in her blood will kill her,” he cut her off impatiently. “Yes, I know this. I’m not a complete idiot, in spite of the evidence of me standing here right now.”
She smirked and ran an appreciate gaze over him again. “No, you’re not stupid, little wolf. Foolhardy and brave in your love, perhaps, but I can see you are not dim.”
“Gee, thanks.” He glowered at her. “Now, how does this spell work?”
Jak felt his own blood drain from his face. “Will it hurt her?”
Circe’s eyebrows arched up. “I imagine so. Although the pain is the least of your problems, little wolf.”
“Just… tell me.” He was growing tired of this witch’s games.
She scowled at him, but there wasn’t much heat to it. “In order to entice the wolf that lives in her blood, we will need somewhere else for it to go—another host, you might say. If you have an unmated female available, transferring the bond from one to the other would be relatively straightforward. Not least because the essence of the male is drawn to the female.”
Jak’s heart rate picked up. He could see where this was going. “There is no other female available.”
Circe nodded once, solemnly. “Then it will have to be a male. And the transfer will not be so simple.”
Jak’s face twisted up, disgust clawing at his throat. “You mean you have to transfer her mate’s essence into a male’s blood. But… what happens then? One male cannot be bound to another, not with a mating bond at least.”
She lifted one eyebrow. “What do you think will happen when the essences of two males are trapped in the same blood, little wolf?”
“They will fight.”
“To the death.” Circe sniffed and held her head high. “It’s not my fault that your species is so ridiculously violent.”
Jak felt suddenly light-headed. “They would fight to the death,” he repeated, the words bouncing around inside his head. With the witch’s spell, he could draw Mace’s essence out of Arianna, but only by bringing it inside his own body… where the war between their wolves would happen at the DNA level. And Jak would be the one dying because of it, slowly and painfully.