by Lynn Hagen
Olsen grinned as he fell to his arms, his nose and inch from Tater’s. “On my ass, I hope.”
“Kinky bastard,” Tater teased as Olsen began to move. The pain morphed into a pleasure Tater never knew existed as Olsen snapped his hips. “Oh god,” he moaned.
“I knew you’d like it,” Olsen said before claiming Tater’s lips. He kissed him with an untapped passion as Tater wrapped his legs around Olsen’s waist. Hell, he’d bottom any time if it felt this fucking good.
Tater gasped as Olsen pulled back from the kiss and pulled his cock out of Tater’s ass. “What the hell?”
“On your hands and knees, Tater,” Olsen commanded.
Tater shivered as he rolled over. The commanding voice was such a turn-on. He spread his legs apart as Olsen entered him from behind. Tater rolled his head on his shoulders as Olsen pounded into him, the sound of skin clapping ringing off the walls.
He couldn’t take it. Tater tried to climb up the bed as the sensations threatened to drown him.
“Where you going, love? Get back here.” Olsen grabbed Tater’s hips, yanking him back as his cock drove deeper into Tater’s ass. Tater’s shoulders hit the mattress as he cried out. His body felt like it was going to explode.
“Do you feel it, love? Do you feel us bonding?” Olsen asked as he fucked Tater harder, deeper, and faster.
He felt something. It was like Olsen was inside of him, buried deep. Tater’s head fell back as he shouted when Olsen’s teeth sank into his skin. His cock erupted, sending his seed splashing toward the sheets. Tater clawed at the bed as Olsen held him in place, his teeth embedded into Tater.
A growl ripped through the air as Olsen snapped his hips at lightning speed. Tater didn’t think he was going to survive. Olsen’s teeth pulled free as a loud roar filled the room, hot spurts of cum filling his ass.
Tater was surprised the windows didn’t shatter as the sound grew louder, Olsen fucking him so hard that Tater knew he’d feel it for a month. Tater swore he felt Olsen’s cock grow larger. He had to be lost in the moment. There was no way Olsen’s shaft was growing.
“Tater,” Olsen gasped as his movements began to slow. “Please tell me I didn’t hurt you, baby.” His voice sounded worried as Olsen literally wrapped his body around Tater’s, almost like a protective cocoon.
Tater rested his head on the pillow as he felt Olsen’s heart beat out of control on his back. “No, you didn’t.”
But he was going to be walking funny for a while.
Olsen kissed the back of Tater’s neck as he moved over, spooning behind him, his cock still buried deep in Tater’s ass. “Good, mate.”
Tater felt panic rising up at that word. What the hell had he done? He was one-hundred percent lock, stock, and barrel committed.
Shit!
Chapter Seven
Pa chuckled as the little ones ran around the backyard. It felt good to have whelps running around again. He watched Matthew and Maddox chase Melonee around, trying their best to catch her, little Nevada tumbling a few times as he tried to keep up. He hiked Skyler over his shoulder as he patted her back, being rewarded with a loud burp from such a little package.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to get her?” Murdock asked for the hundredth time, hovering close.
Pa rolled his eyes. “It’s not like I raised any of my own. I could have sworn I had seven sons.”
“Yeah, exactly. None of them were girls,” Murdock said as he leaned closer, his hands outstretched as if Pa would drop her. He wanted to kick the man. Pa couldn’t blame the wolf for being overprotective. Skyler was cute as a button, but her dad was irritating as hell.
“Leave him alone,” Heaven chastised Murdock as he joined them. “I think he knows what he’s doing by now.”
Murdock glared at Heaven, his hands moving a bit closer. Pa chuckled as he finally relented and handed the babe over. Geez, he’d never seen a parent so damned nervous before.
Pa watched in utter disbelief as Olsen burst from the house in his bear form and then headed straight for the woods.
Yeah, this was going to be a peachy-keen sorta night.
“Where are we going?” D asked as he ran alongside Tater. “You’re walking too fast.”
“I thought vampires were quick,” Tater mumbled as he tried to walk his fear away.
He’d lain there in Olsen’s arms, enjoying the feeling of being held, until his obsessive commitment phobia kicked in. He wanted to kick his own ass for up and leaving the bear.
The fucked-up thing was, Tater craved the love and connection he felt with Olsen. He just was terrified of screwing it up, of Olsen depending on him. He was sure to make the wrong decision and then Olsen would hate him.
Hell, he couldn’t even commit to fixing his motorcycle. For years it lay in pieces and parts on the barn floor. Once, just once, he had put the entire thing together, took it for a ride, and then torn it apart again. He’d attempted to put it together hundreds of times, cleaned the parts a thousand times, but never managed to reassemble it completely after that first time.
“Don’t stereotype me. Just because I’m a vampire doesn’t mean I’m fast. Do I look tall to you? I’m not the typical creature you’ve seen on the big screen.”
Tater chuckled. “I wasn’t trying to say you were. Sorry.” They continued on the back road leading to Tater’s father’s house. He wanted his damn truck. Tater didn’t care if he had to push it off of his father’s property. It was his, and he had every right to go get it.
Tater jumped when he saw shadows emerging from the woods. He quickly shoved D behind him as he braced himself for a fight.
“Ah, you really do love me.” D giggled.
“Shut up,” Tater growled as at least half a dozen figures walked out. His heart rate increased, and then he let out a loud exhale when he noticed it was Cecil leading the way.
“What the hell? Don’t you use conventional methods of travel, like a car?”
Cecil waved him off as he turned to the group behind him. “Why should I when I have the elf express?”
“The what?” Tater cocked his head as a very tall and elegant-looking man stepped forward. He had a feeling that looks were deceiving where this man was concerned.
“Carter.” Cecil chucked a thumb over his shoulder. “He’s an elf. He can shimmer us anywhere we want to go. Although he can’t take an entire tour bus full of people. Six is a good number.”
Tater shook his head. Since getting involved with the Lakelands, everything around him made no sense.
“Are you ready?” Cecil asked.
Damn. Maybe Tater should have been listening when the guy had been talking earlier. “For what?”
Cecil gaped at him as if he couldn’t believe Tater even asked the question. “Dude. Were you not listening back at the cookout? Pizza? Italy?”
“Whoa. Slow down. What about pizza and Italy?”
“I was hankering for a pizza and thought it would be cool to go to Italy to get it.” Cecil grinned as he wiggled his eyebrows.
“Have you heard of takeout?”
“Where’s the fun in that? Carter is the one who suggested we go to Italy in the first place.”
“Hell yeah,” the man with the pointy ears cut in. “I’ve been there. They have pizza to die for.”
His eyes snapped past Cecil when he heard rustling. “Did you bring others?”
Cecil’s brows pulled together as he shook his head. “No, this is it.” They all turned to see one man after another walk from the woods a few feet down the road.
“Friends of yours?” Cecil asked as they started to back away. “Because I don’t remember inviting them.”
Tater swallowed, his throat drying out as even more men stepped onto the road. He wasn’t sure what the hell was going on, but he didn’t like it. They were being quickly outnumbered.
“I know him,” D said as he pointed to one man in particular. “He isn’t a very nice vampire.”
“Vampire?” one of the men with Cec
il squeaked.
“Just get behind me, Tangee,” Cecil said to the man.
“Like you could do any more damage than me,” Tangee protested. “I knew this was a bad idea.”
“I think we need to run,” D whispered. “This isn’t going to go in our favor. They have bloodlust in their eyes.”
Tater looked at the man he was referring to. His pupils were huge. Tater wasn’t sure if that was the sign of bloodlust or not. He wasn’t even sure what bloodlust was, but it couldn’t be good. It sure didn’t sound good.
“Run!” D shouted, and Tater didn’t hesitate. He took off toward his father’s home. It was the closest place he could think of. How they were going to protect themselves once they got there was an entirely different mess they’d deal with once they crossed that rickety bridge.
“Damn it!” Tater reached down and grabbed D when the vampire fell to the ground. “We don’t have time for you to fall. Not if you don’t want to get eaten.” Tater pulled D up and tossed the short vampire over his shoulder as he hauled ass.
“However you got here, use it to get the hell out of here,” Tater shouted over his shoulder at Cecil. He knew that Carter could only shimmer six people at a time. Cecil had stood there and told him that. And Cecil had brought five other men along. There was no way they could get him and D out of there.
“No way. I’m not leaving you,” Cecil panted and then yelled to the men behind him. “Carter, get them home.”
“On it,” the man with the pointy ears screamed as he and the rest of the men disappeared seconds later. The only ones left from Cecil’s group were Cecil himself, Blair, and a man with facial piercings.
“Oh shit!” Tater skidded to a halt when wolves, very large in fact, broke through the tree line and started heading their way at breakneck speed.
“Go.” Cecil pushed at him. “They’re the good guys.”
Tater sure hoped he was right. The wolves looked humongous enough to fucking eat them. He blinked, and then blinked again when three bears rushed in behind the wolves. He recognized one of them as Olsen. Well, he thought it was Olsen. The man was one in three of triplets.
Tater dropped to the ground, curling his body around D as the wolves and bears raced past him. He peeked up to see there were at least a dozen wolves. The men attacking outnumbered them, but the wolves and bears seemed to be fighting better than the attackers were.
“Get moving!” the man with the piercings shouted. “We have to get somewhere safe.”
Safe? Where the hell could they go? There was no place safe around here. “And where the hell is that?”
The guy looked around frantically and then threw his arms into the air. “Hell if I know.”
“Get down, Oliver!” Blair yelled to the man with piercings. Tater rolled off of D and got to his feet when a vampire jumped on Oliver’s back. He was amazed Oliver could fight so well, but not well enough. The vampire was winning. Tater jumped on the vampire, knocking him free of the pierced man.
“Go!” he shouted as he wrestled with the undead. Before Oliver could run, another man attacked the goth-looking man.
Holy shit!
A large portion of the attackers had shifted into wolves. What in the hell was going on here? Tater screamed when it felt like his neck was being torn from his body. He hit the ground and rolled over and over again, trying to dislodge the one tearing skin from bone.
He rolled to his feet and then fell backward, right on top of the vampire. He heard a yelp, but the fucker wouldn’t release him. Tater’s eyes widened when D bared his fangs and jumped onto Tater, yanking at the vampire still clinging to Tater’s back. “Get him off of me, D!”
“I’m trying,” D said helplessly as he clawed and bit at the undead.
Tater started feeling lightheaded, strange shapes forming in front of his eyes. He pushed to his feet and knew his vision was being affected by the loss of blood. And there was plenty of blood being lost. His entire right side was soaked in his quickly free-flowing blood.
“Get him off—” Tater collapsed in a heap onto the grassy field. His fingers clawed the grass as he tried to get to the bear fighting only twenty or so feet from him.
“I got you.”
Tater whimpered when a blue man with white hair grabbed him under his legs and back, lifting him from the ground. He hadn’t the energy to fight the thing off or the care to wonder how in the hell the man was blue.
He closed his eyes, hoping he wasn’t about to die.
He needed to tell Olsen he was sorry and that he had fallen in love with the bear. Olsen needed to know this. He needed to know that it wasn’t his fault. Olsen needed to be told that Tater had commitment phobia and that Olsen hadn’t caused it.
He needed…
Olsen was going nuts trying to get to his mate. He reared up on his back legs and swatted at the vampire, bringing his full body weight down to pin the son of a bitch before locking his jaws on the vampire’s neck and tearing it out. He was trying desperately to get to his mate, but every time he made some progress in Tater’s direction, another rogue got in his way.
Maverick shifted and shouted to Olsen’s brother, “Bryce, go tell your father to call Zeus and Christian.” Before the alpha shifted back, his head fell back onto his shoulders and his voice boomed across the open field. “Panahasi!”
Olsen concentrated on the wolf biting at his hindquarters when suddenly a dozen men emerged from the forest, immediately taking up the fight. Olsen wasn’t sure how the men knew who to kill, but they were dead accurate.
Olsen swung around to attack the wolf at his flank when he saw a blue man appear, scoop Tater up from the ground, and then disappear. He roared his outrage as he clawed and tore at the wolf, his rage consuming him at the thought of someone taking what was his. Olsen tore through the rogues, desperate to find out who the man was that had kidnapped his mate.
He was fighting with blind fury. Olsen no longer felt like himself but a beast unleashed. Tater was missing, and there was no way for him to go after his mate. It didn’t escape his notice that more rogues were appearing.
Olsen had a sinking feeling that not only was his mate in trouble, but that they were losing this battle.
Tater felt the fog lifting and his consciousness return. He lay there for a moment, waiting to be attacked, but all was silent. He cracked open his eyes, trying to see his surroundings without anyone knowing he was awake.
“You’re safe, human.”
So much for being sneaky.
He opened his eyes fully to see the blue-skinned man sitting in a window seat, staring out into the darkness. Strangely enough, the man looked melancholy as his eyes scanned for something out of the window.
“Who are you?” Tater asked and then groaned when his head began to pound.
“I am neither good nor bad. I am Ahm.”
What the hell kinda answer was that? Tater wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer with all the events that had taken place in only forty-eight hours. His life had gone from wondering about Olsen’s intentions to a three-ring circus from hell, clowns and popcorn included.
And Tater really hated clowns.
Damn Stephen King and the movie It. Every since he had seen that…Wait, what the hell was he thinking about that for? “Where am I?”
Ahm turned his head from his vigilant watch to look Tater over. “You lost too much blood.”
Maybe he was still unconscious and this was just a bizarre ass dream. “That’s not telling me where I am.”
“In a vampire coven.”
Damn it, damn it, damn it.
Why did he have to ask? The way things were going lately, Tater should have known he didn’t want to know the answer. “Sooo, how do I get home?” Odd question to ask, considering he didn’t have a home at the moment.
Tater didn’t like the low chuckle Ahm gave him. He didn’t like it one bit. “You will be returned to your bear as soon as you are up to traveling.”
“I’m fine,” Tater protested as
he sat up and then quickly fell back, his head swimming and bile rising in the back of his throat. “Okay, maybe not.”
“Rest.”
There wasn’t much else he could do right now. “What happened to me?” He remembered the fighting and being attacked. Tater’s hand went to his neck, and then he winced when he felt the bandage.
Olsen!
“I have to get back.” He made a second attempt at getting up, but the effects were worse this time. This time he actually vomited. Tater held his stomach as he wretched over the side of the bed. His headache became worse as tiny white squiggly lines danced in front of his vision.
“If you attempt to get up again, the sickness will only get worse,” Ahm warned.
“What the fuck is wrong with me?” Tater asked as he spit out some vile-tasting spew. He felt bad for upchucking on someone’s floor, but not bad enough since he didn’t want to be here.
“Shall we say you were given a donation?”
“A donation of what?”
“Blood.”
Tater groaned as his head hit the pillow. “Is that why I’m sick?”
“Yes and no.”
“I swear, if you don’t start explaining, I’m gonna sit back up and aim toward you,” Tater threatened as shards of pain pulsed through his brain. He wanted Olsen. As crazy as he had been acting toward the bear, Tater wanted his mate.
Mate.
How strange it was that he thought of Olsen that way now. The word didn’t seem as threatening as he thought it would. He thought of Olsen’s silky black hair and smoky grey eyes, and the pit of his stomach tightened. He wanted his bear.
“I don’t take kindly to threats, human.”
Tater threw his arm over his eyes, the lights hurting them and making his head pound harder. “And I don’t take kindly to having shit done to me while I’m unconscious. Now tell me what the fuck happened.”
“You lost a great amount of blood. I brought you here. Christian fed you before going off to help the shifters,” Ahm said irritably. “Beyond that, you’ll have to ask the prince.”
Prince? Tater sighed. He wasn’t even going to ask. He knew he wouldn’t like the answer anyway. He hadn’t liked any of the answers he had received so far. “Do you know what happened to everyone else?” To Olsen? Tater lay there and thought of the men who had shifted into wolves right before his very eyes, of the men who had hissed, sharp teeth gleaming in the moonlight, and wondered how he had survived. But the bigger question plaguing his mind was had his mate survived?