by Shannon West
He left me then, telling me to rest. I think I must have somehow fallen back asleep, because the next thing I knew, the light was gone and the room I was in--my old bedroom at my dad's house--was dark, but with that half-light brought on by the full moon. I stood up, feeling surprisingly good, just a little sore and achy here and there from my misadventures on the side of the mountain. My head ached, but even that was bearable. Nothing the next shift wouldn’t cure. I went to the window and looked out, seeing the landscape bathed in the silver light of the moon, the trees of the forest outlined by it and looking deep and mysterious in its light. I looked for a clock to tell me what time it was, and that's when the door swung open abruptly and Logan strode in.
“I'm glad to see you're awake,” he said, looking me up and down. “We need to talk.”
“Y-yes, of course. Sit down.”
“No, not here.” He was staring down at me intently, his eyes dark with the wildness that only a full moon brings us. “Out there,” he said, nodding toward the woods. “You need to shift anyway. Then we’ll go for a run.”
I nodded eagerly. It had been far too long since we'd been together, running under the stars and the goddess moon. I had suffered through many a full-moon night alone while I’d been away, yearning to be outside, my wolf trying to break free. I had never thought I’d be able to run with Logan again, and yet here he was, his hand outstretched to me.
I took it, feeling a spark, a little like an electric shock jolt through me. “Let's go,” he said, his voice already sounding low and bestial as he began the change. We both threw off our clothes as we got outside. The night air was cool and smelled of threatening rain. I lifted up my nose to scent it and felt the change coming on, fast and violent, like it always did, the strong enchantment always taking me by surprise at how helpless, and yet at the same time, how powerful it made me feel.
Then it was over, throwing me down violently to the ground, and I was in my wolf, throwing back my head and howling up at the moon above us. Beside me, Logan was howling too, his voice joining mine in a chilling chorus of other voices, from both near and far away. He sprang off through the woods, and I followed him, tree branches whipping past my face, the wind in my fur. I felt strong and fierce as I put on speed to keep up with Logan. He ran straight up the mountain trail and came out at last at the top. His wolf turned to me and stalked slowly toward me, showing me its teeth. When the wolf was still a few feet away, he made a leap and changed back to his human form midway. I stumbled backward when he hit me, shoving me to the ground. I shifted back, breathless and a little frightened. Had he brought me here to make love to me or to kill me? I had a feeling it could go either way.
He fell down on top of me, rolling me to my front and sinking his teeth in the back of my neck. I gasped but didn’t try to fight him. He’d never been so bestial with me before, even that night in the hotel room when he’d just found out I’d kept Carrie away from him. But tonight, I felt as if his instincts raged even more and demanded that he take me and claim possession. I knew instinctively that he felt his rights to me had been challenged—by me and by the other alphas who had provoked him—and all his basic instincts were telling him to reassert his ownership.
I could feel the hot blood running down my neck and throat. He shook me a little, setting his teeth, then he reached in front of me and slid his hand down my hard cock, continuing down to my scrotum. He hefted my balls in his hand and dared me to object. It takes a strong man to not move or make any sound when another man holds his balls literally in his hand, but I managed—just barely. He was trying to humble me and show me who was boss, and I got the message loud and clear. I whimpered and lowered my head.
Finally, his teeth relinquished their grip, but he was still on his knees behind me. He bent and licked the curve of my ass, squeezing and playing with it, slapping it playfully and letting me know my ass was his. He slid two fingers inside me, and I hissed at the burn. He gathered some spit on his fingers and spread me wider with it. He fingered my hole for much longer than I thought he would, getting me ready. I moaned and rode them like a bitch in heat, and I heard him make a soft noise behind me. He pulled the fingers away, bumped his cock against my slackened hole, and then with one long thrust he entered me. I made a loud, needy sound and he thrust in all the way to the root, deep and hard. Again and again, he pushed himself into me. Stroking my back and my ass, he thoroughly fucked me.
He took his time, and when he was done, he put back his head and howled again to the moon, a chilling sound that made me shiver. When he was done, he collapsed down over my back, caressed my balls one last time, and gave them a little pat.
He fell down on his back beside me, then, panting for breath. Still hard and aching, I put my hand around my shaft to stroke it, but he stopped me with a hand over mine.
“No. That belongs to me now.”
“Logan,” I groaned. “Please.”
“No. Damn it, I’m so angry at you, I want to put you over my knee and spank you.” He sat up and pulled me to him fiercely, crushing me against his chest.
“When I saw you fall on that mountainside, I thought you were dead. That just when I finally had you back that stupid bastard had taken you away from me again. Which part of stay in the car didn’t you understand so I can explain it to you?”
Coyly, I lifted my face to his. “Did it scare you?”
“Stop fishing. You know it did. You’re not allowed out of my sight again.”
I let him hold me for a long while until he calmed down a bit. I didn’t resent the words he was saying, because even though they were insufferable, I knew how much I’d frightened him. He was trembling.
“I never wanted to leave you, Logan. But I thought I had no choice!”
“Yeah, I've heard that shit before. I'm sick of that too.”
I groaned. “I know, Logan, and I don't want to sound like a broken record, but you don't love me.”
“Who says I don't?”
I pulled back and looked up at him in shock. “You did!”
“No, I never said that. I said I didn't think it was a good idea for us to get romantically involved because when it ended, like it would have had to if you'd been a beta, then it would have destroyed our friendship. Then I found out you were an omega, and all bets were off.”
“You never said that. Not in those words.”
“When did I have time, Kade? You would barely speak to me after that. I was trying to give you a little space and time before we discussed it again. I’m obviously not good with words anyway, as you’ve always told me. But I went after you when you left. I claimed you as mine. I made it official with the pack and even with the humans. Most people would have taken that as a pretty good sign of how I felt.”
“But you got a divorce as soon as I left the hospital. Like you were just waiting for a chance.”
“I regret doing that. I was angry, and I thought it would make you regret what…hell, it was a bluff, okay? And you called me on it. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but I wasn't thinking straight. I can’t seem to do that around you.”
“You could have just told me you wanted me back. And you were pretty quick to get the human divorce.”
“Human laws have never meant anything to me. To any of us. And I thought you knew that. I just wanted to hurt you, like you'd hurt me. But then you took me up on it. And you said Carrie wasn't mine, and I believed you until I actually got a good look at her. Damn it, you have to stop running, Kade. Running from me, running from yourself and who you really are. It has to be exhausting.”
“But I thought...”
“Yeah, I know what you thought,” he said, pulling me over in his lap. “And as usual, you got it all wrong.”
I snuggled into his big, warm body and sighed. “I was scared you'd end up hating me.”
“It would be a hell of a lot easier to hate you than to love you like I do.”
“L-love me? You love me?”
He took me by the shoulders. �
�Yeah, I love you. Haven't you been listening? I've loved you for a long time. Since we were kids, I guess. I just didn't think it would work, but then like a damn miracle, you turned out to be perfect for me after all. I'd been resisting it for so long, it got to be a habit, I guess. You put me through hell the first time you left, and then you ran the second time. When I found you, you said you had a 'crush' on me but you got over it. What the hell kind of a thing is that to say to me? How the fuck did you get over it, Kade, because I'm not having much luck with it. And then on that mountainside I thought you'd figured out a way to leave me permanently, and it damn near killed me.”
He cupped my face in his hands and leaned in to kiss me, but it didn't stop there. It was like he wanted to devour me, biting my lips and then licking over the hurt and moving on to my cheeks and nose and throat. Even my eyes. He pulled me up into his arms. “You can't leave me again, damn it. Not ever. I won't let you.”
“Okay,” I said softly. “But what about the pack? Maybe they won't accept you with a male omega and a baby girl.”
His face got a set and determined look. “Then they can fucking go on down the road. If the pack wants a new alpha, then one of them can challenge me. Until then, it's my pack and my rules. If they don't like it, and they can’t beat me in a challenge, then they can take off. I don't know what's going to happen in the future, Kade. Maybe our little girl will be omega and maybe not. We won’t know until she goes through puberty. Maybe that asshole will come back here with more of his pack and try to hurt you again. But I don't care. If he comes, I’ll be ready—we’ll be ready. It's my pack now, and I guess one day, if the baby's not an alpha, I'll pass the title on to someone else. Or if we both decide we want to have more kids, we can maybe think about getting a surrogate to have more children. It's not the worst thing that could happen. I know what the worst thing is, and that's losing you.”
He started kissing me again, and this time I was almost breathless by the time he was through. I wondered if this could be a dream, but he was too substantial in my arms not to be the real thing. “I should have told you all this sooner, but I guess I was still processing it. And I was so damn mad at you for keeping Carrie away from me. Promise me you'll stop running,” he said, his face buried in my hair. “If you do, I'll just come after you again. As many times as it takes, I’ll keep coming, and I'll drag you back here.”
“You’re a real sweet talker, you know that?” I said, laughing and kissing his throat. I felt the trembling in him, and I knew he wanted to make love to me again, and I wanted that too.
“There’s nothing sweet about the way I feel for you. It scares me sometimes how much I want to-to own you. To have you just for myself. To make love to you. All the time. When I see you walk into a room, I want to tackle you and take you off to a bed somewhere for the rest of the day. Every time you laugh and throw back your head with that pretty mouth open, I want to put my tongue in it. Or my dick.” He ran his hand over his face. “It’s driving me crazy. It’s like I’m obsessed with these urges all the time. That can’t be normal, can it?”
I laughed and wrapped my arms around him, holding on for dear life. This time, I was never letting go. “Normal is highly overrated. Maybe we should just give in to the urges. You know, just do them and get them out of our system. That worked so well for us the last time.”
He growled and swept me up in his arms to carry me somewhere to have his way with me—and that suited me just fine.
Epilogue
Six months later
Carrie and I had no sooner settled into Logan’s room in the lodge, than Logan had immediately started renovations, knocking down a wall so we could make Carrie her own bedroom. Then he decided that wasn’t enough, so he started working on plans for building our own log home close by the lodge.
I didn’t argue with him. Whatever he wanted to do was just fine with me. I guess I was feeling that “honeymoon” stage, but I knew it couldn’t last forever. His crazy need to make love to me or have me close to him all the time had to wear off someday. Didn’t it? So far, it showed no signs of slowing down, and I was basking in it. I didn’t seem to ever get tired of hearing him tell me how much he loved me and needed me, and I doubted I ever would.
It was comforting to me to be back in the pack again, which was something I never expected. No one seemed to think it was strange that I was now an omega, or some kind of mix between omega and beta. And if they did, they kept it to themselves. They had all been so welcoming, and the ones who were already parents had taught me a lot about taking care of a little girl—fixing her hair, for instance, which I just brushed every morning, and it had gotten so long it fell down to her shoulders. I thought it looked fine, and if she occasionally—okay, all the time—dragged it through her food, I just wiped it off with a napkin. It didn’t take long for that to outrage the females in the pack, who sat her down and made braids for her hair or tied it up in ponytails, insisting I watch and learn how to do it too.
Luckily, Carrie was such a little love, she wasn’t demanding or hard to care for. She was even endlessly patient as I learned to braid and “French braid” her hair, which was the style she liked the best. As a consequence of her being so easy, though, I began to get restless, and yearn for something more to do. I came up with an idea, and one day when Logan was in his office, working on the plans for our house again, I approached him with it.
As I came in, he glanced up at me and smiled, holding out his hand to me. I came over to kiss him, then perched on the edge of his desk. “I was thinking…”
“Hmm? About what?”
“You’ve never named a new head beta.”
“Just haven’t found the right one yet. There’s no rush.”
“True. But I was thinking in the meantime, why don’t I do it?” He glanced up in surprise, but before he could open his mouth, I kept talking, warming to my subject.
“I know you probably think I can’t do it, but I can, and you’re wrong. Being an omega didn’t change me on the inside. I’m the same as I ever was, you know. And if I could do the job before, then I can do it again. There’s no reason I can’t, so don’t even start.” I got to my feet and started pacing up and down. “I hate this idea that omegas are only good for breeding. It’s insulting and just plain wrong. I probably can’t have any more babies anyway, so what difference does it even make?”
He started to open his mouth, and I held up my hand. “No. Don’t say anything to start an argument. I’ve thought about this a lot. I’m not exactly an omega anyway, according to the doctors. They haven’t been able to figure out exactly what I am, so why does anything have to change? Why do I have to have a label?”
“Well, I…”
“No, don’t argue with me. I was a damn good beta to you, and you know it. You said so yourself, and you said you never wanted to lose me. This way, you don’t have to. I can just start doing my job again and help you out.”
“Kade, I…”
“Don’t worry about Carrie. There are plenty of people to help me look out for her, and she can play in the nursery if I’m too busy with pack business. Not every day, but some days, and…”
Logan shut me up by grabbing my hand as I paced by him and pulling me down in his lap. He covered my mouth with his. After a long, sweet kiss that got a little dirty there at the end, he raised his head and blew out a long breath. “Damn it, I’m going to have to take you to bed again. I can’t walk around with a cockstand all day.”
“Wait! That sounds good and all that, but what about what I said? Don’t just brush me off.”
“I’m not. I think it’s a great idea. So, let’s go fuck.”
“Wait, what?” I said, dodging his mouth, which was on its way to cover mine. “Did you say it was a good idea?”
“I did,” he said, nodding. “I’ve missed the hell out of you. And you’re right—the doctors said they don’t know what you are exactly. You did a great job before, so you’ll do it again. I have faith in you, Kade. Let’s go
.”
“Wait…you do?” I shouldn’t be so dependent on his good opinion. It shouldn’t light me up inside like it did.
“I do.” He nodded his head for emphasis.
“And you’re not just saying this to get me into bed?”
“Oh, I’m getting you into bed. Within the next…” he glanced at his watch, “five minutes. Maybe less. Should I start the countdown? How long will it take you to get naked?”
I pushed at his chest. “Logan, pay attention.”
“I am. Stop worrying. I’m not just trying to shut you up. I want you with me all the time, so this is a perfect solution.”
“Oh.” I sagged against him, loving the feel of his arms around me and hating how needy I felt around him, but really, I wouldn’t have it any other way. “Okay then. So, what do we do now?”
“You may remember I just told you. And you now have three minutes.” He let me go and gave me a little push toward the bedroom. “Consider it your first job as my new beta. Go get naked as fast as you can before I come in and start ripping your clothes off. Should I give you a head start? You know how much I love a good chase.”
“This is just silly. You don’t have to chase me.”
He stood up and walked slowly toward me. “Tick tock.”
My nerve broke, and I turned and ran for the bedroom, his laughter trailing after me down the hall.
The End
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shannon West lives in the southern United States, and is a lover and avid reader of M/M romances. She has four children, including a gay son, who is absolutely horrified that she writes sex scenes. Shannon began writing gay romance a few years ago, and now has over ninety short stories, novellas, and novels to her credit. Her stories have been translated into French, Italian, and even one Japanese Yaoi. Her favorite genre is paranormal and most of her characters don’t get really interesting to her until they grow a tail. Shannon loves men and everything about them, and writes Romance (with a capital R) unashamedly and unabashedly. She believes, in the words of Helen Steiner Rice that “love is the answer that everyone seeks, love is the language that every heart speaks.” But she also believes wholeheartedly in the words of Woody Allen, that love may be the answer, but “while you’re waiting for that answer, sex raises some pretty interesting questions.” Shannon mostly spends her days at the keyboard, ably assisted by her cats, Scarlett and Taz, and eluding housework, which stalks her relentlessly.