by Christa Wick
Dana growled, the deep throb of Esme's cunt telling him she was close to surrendering her first climax to him. "Every inch." He pressed his lips against her shoulder, the fangs denting her skin before he kissed along the back of her neck. "Mine."
He growled. "Always."
His claim made, Esme's release thundered through her body. Her ass tightened around his dick, milked its surface for the tactile pleasure offered by each contoured vein and hard ridge as the flared head hooked and pulled inside her. His, completely, utterly, but only for the moment. She refused to give him more than that.
Dana slowly eased out. With no bulge of a knot in his thick girth, she knew he hadn’t been close to climax. Whatever pleasure he had derived from mounting like that, he had wrung it from her submission.
Giving Esme no time to recover, Dana flipped the witch onto her back. Seeing his cock start to balloon with need a few inches up from the base as he stripped the empty condom from his flesh, Esme was certain he would take her then. Instead, Dana dropped to his knees.
His gaze soaked in the glistening pink folds of her pussy as he sucked at his bottom lip. The color perfectly matched the kissable pucker of her mouth. Pinching one plump labia with each hand, he exposed her pussy more fully. He nosed the line of her clit, his breath as hot and moist as the juices steaming her cunt.
The tender contact threatened to whip another orgasm from her and she had to bite down on her tongue to keep from moaning. Lifting his head, Dana glared at her. The thick fringe of his eyelashes magnified the intensity of his gaze. "This is my pussy, Esme."
Dana took a slow, lingering, sucking, climbing lick along the line of her cunt, from the quivering hole, to the sensitive nodule hiding under the hood to the top split of her mound. Rolling his lips to smear her juices, he growled. "Mine to suck and lick and fuck."
His head descended again, his mouth delivering every promise and threat he’d just made. He'd practiced -- his tongue trained on woman after woman after woman. Her reserve no match for his skill, Esme squirmed as he continued to lick her, her fingers unclenching to tangle in his thick hair and guide his mouth. He sucked the hood of her clit, his tongue flicking over and over against the fleshy pearl hidden inside. Her head lulled back, magic expelled from the deep well inside her with each groaning, shuddering breath she released.
Esme came again in soft, jerking motions, her throat locked in a vibrato of dove calls.
His hand massaging her mound, Dana surfed up her body, a trail of warm, wet kisses marking his path.
"Baby…" He'd abandoned those awful words, notlove, notbaby. Words she had goaded him into using.
Dana cupped her face, stared into her eyes to see if he had erased even a fraction of the pain from her gaze. "Ems?"
Still there, raw and trembling but needing him nonetheless. Dana moved to kiss her mouth, his body straining forward as his fingers manipulated her clit. She turned her head at the last second, her lips trembling as she evaded the kiss. She closed her eyes, tears escaping their tight press.
"Love--"
She shook her head. "Finish it."
He didn't argue, not at first. He lifted her legs, coaxing small movements from Esme until he had her positioned in the center of the bed, her body vertical. He nudged her thighs apart, his torso lightly pressing against her breasts as he rubbed gently between her legs.
His hand slowed. "Not without a kiss."
Esme looked at Dana, her eyes imploring him once more to penetrate her and end the ritual. "Please don't make me," she whispered, a soft hiccough punctuating her distress.
He shook his head, gentle but unyielding. Between her legs, she felt his fingers close around his shaft and push the head down until it rested at her gate. His thumb flexed forward to stroke the swollen nodule still hiding inside the hood of her clit.
His gaze grew fragile for a heartbeat. "You think you were the only one aching all these years, love?"
His lips brushed the line of her jaw, his nose rubbing at the corner of her mouth. He shifted his hips, the change bringing his mouth closer to hers as his cock settled more firmly against the swollen entrance to her cunt. He didn't wait for her to acquiesce or refuse. He took a small, careful bite at her lower lip and then his tongue pushed into her mouth, his body’s weight sinking, his hips pressing against her. The head of his cock nudged her opening, the small amount of force still more exploratory than penetrating.
His tongue worked deeper, one hand knotted in her curls to keep Esme from turning away. A slow rock of his hips and the thick tip wedged itself within the tight ring of muscles. He could feel the way her cunt danced, the throb of her last orgasm rhythmically pulling it tight. He timed his progress, rocking his hips between the backbeat of her pulse when her pussy would relax.
There, in, fast, battering past her last defense to sink balls deep inside her pussy. Forgetting herself, she kissed him back, retreated. He pushed up on his arms, his control exhausted from fighting her. Staring into the shifting depths of her sea green eyes, he pulled back, drove forward. Again, the rush of a short-lived victory flushing his skin as her head tilted back and her lips parted. Her tongue slid out, curled against her top lip, held as her hips began to dance left, right, back, repeat. Another plume of magic escaped her to twine like fingers through Dana's hair.
He felt the tug of energy at the same time her muscles coiled and whipped around his cock. The erectile tissue near his base started to balloon. One puff…two. Locked insider her, he groaned.
"Baby…" Now he was the one breathless, aching for the next throbbing squeeze of her body along his shaft. ""Not yet...not."
Esme moaned, arched, neither one of them in command of the other.
"Love, a little more…time…" The air froze in his chest, the skin on his balls pulling tight. "Inside you."
Her pussy rolled up and down his cock, sucking, tugging, the muscles of her cunt every bit as deft as her mouth or hand might have been. She arched again, the pressure on his dick multiplying his pleasure. A dip back down, her cry visceral as she slammed her hips back up, her cunt seizing with the hard demand that he come with her.
Groaning, Dana thrust all the way inside her, the fat tip lodged against her cervix, every inch of his cock embraced by the hot rolling muscles of her cunt. Beneath him, Esme panted and squirmed. Her hands grabbed his muscled ass, her sharp nails threatening as she cinched him in place, denying his retreat.
"More…" Dana pressed a kiss against her neck as he fought his body’s total surrender to his mate. He couldn’t unleash, not yet. He had to drive her to this point again and again until she admitted that she wanted him every bit as badly as he needed her. If he finished now, she would force him from her bed the moment he unknotted. He had to possess her completely, had to leave her gasping and begging.
He wanted to see the sun rise on her naked body, watch its golden rays flicker approvingly inside her sea green irises as he descended down her lush body for a proper good morning kiss.
Sexy little whimpers escaped her as she bit and licked at her lush lips. He watched her do it, his eyes locked on her pearl white teeth, the scarlet tongue and that sweet pink pucker that was as pale as the lips he’d licked and sucked a few minutes before.
"Now," Esme pleaded, her hips rotating to pull him a little deeper inside.
"Not--" Dana came with a harsh moan, his mouth buried against Esme's throat. He pulled back as far as the knot would allow, her nails dragging along his flesh. He slammed forward, his cock pulsing, her sheath squeezing and jerking relentlessly along his length, delivering ecstasy from base to tip.
The last pulse of cum left him. He nestled closer to Esme, his lips against her throat as his tongue sampled the salt of her smooth skin. Feeling himself slowly deflate, he remembered to breathe again.
Shifting his weight, Dana tried to wrap his arms around her. She pushed at him, wiggling and shoving until she was free. She whipped the robe around her body, tying the sash in place as she quickly stepped to the wi
ndow and slammed her palm against the glass to signal Camille that it was over.
"Esme."
She could hear the confusion in his voice. Confusion and pain. She wanted to wrap her arms around her head to muffle the sound, but forced her hands down to her sides. "Nothing changed," she told him. "I don't want to see you ever again. All you have to offer me is your absence."
"Ems--"
"Go now, or I will -- away from the clan, any clan or shifter!"
Eyes corkscrewed shut, Esme listened to Dana pull on his clothes and leave, not another word spoken. Camille entered a few minutes later to strip the linen from the bed, her attempts to draw Esme from the window ignored until she gave up and left.
Another hour passed with Esme staring out the window, her gaze on the stars in search of some elusive meaning to the night's events. She couldn't know how many female shifters had prostrated themselves before their mates, their wombs quickening for the first time as they were mounted. She couldn't know how many children were conceived across the clan as Dana finally surrendered inside her or how, at the exact moment Dana claimed her virginity, a clot lodged itself deep inside Jack Cooper's brain and started growing.
She couldn't know.
She sure as hell didn't care.
**********
Leah visited Esme the next morning, and the morning after that and all the mornings after that for the three weeks the witch remained cloistered inside her home. Esme allowed only Leah and the sick inside and she left only for emergency healings. Even Jack Cooper had hauled his annoyed ass to her doorstep for a headache Camille couldn’t cure.
At the end of the third week, Leah followed her morning visit with one in the evening. She carried a binder of fabric tucked under one arm. Her green eyes twinkled, her whole body glowing.
Closing the door behind Leah, Esme tossed a dishtowel over her shoulder and rolled her eyes at the fledgling witch. She headed back toward the kitchen to put some water on for tea.
"What's got you over the moon?" She turned to the sink in time to see Leah lift her shoulders.
"Oh, you know."
Even with the ten feet of distance between them, Esme detected the blush of a lie across her friend's creamy cheeks. She quirked a brow up, her gaze narrowing just so she could watch Leah squirm with guilt. "Am I going to have to put a truth spell on you?"
Another blush, hotter than the first, and Leah swiveled in her chair. Shaking her head, she opened the sample book. "You're going to finish making me my tea, witch, and then help me decide on colors for the nursery."
Esme snorted. "Brown, green and...oh, yeah, more brown."
A scowl marred Leah's pretty face. "It's not going to look like a hole in ground!"
"They're very instinctual at that age." Esme cautioned. "I remember Tala's mother trying a traditional human nursery. Camille's ears are still ringing from trying to cure that case of colic. Ended the day the den was restored."
"But, it doesn't mean the room has to be ugly." Bringing the tea tray over to the kitchen table, Esme sat down across from Leah and took the swatches from her. "You can put some coppers and silvers in there, gold and pewter."
Looking up, Esme saw worry pinch at Leah's brow. "What's wrong, bestie?"
Leah rubbed nervously at her stomach, her cheeks pinking once again. "When he comes out…"
Esme tilted her head, nostrils flaring in search of Leah's scent. As a latent, her sense of smell was far removed from a wolf's, but a dozen times better than any human's. She couldn't detect enough of the baby's smell within Leah's signature to tell the cub’s gender. "He?"
Leah nodded, smiling. "Seth thinks so. He gets all growly and rubs himself over me, says that's because it's a boy." Her gaze turned serious again, her voice dropping an octave as she finished her question. "What will he look like?"
Esme relaxed back in her chair. "Like every other baby you've ever seen in your life, maybe just a little leaner. He probably won't shift until he's about seven."
Leah finished adding sugar and cream to her tea. Blowing on it, she took a little sip. "What do you mean by probably?"
"Assuming he's alpha like Seth," Esme explained. She had arranged the front of the binder with a rainbow of browns, greens, dark aqua and teal, rust and metals. Leah's smile when Esme passed the binder back to her eased a little more of the last month's weight from her shoulders. It was near impossible to feel sorry for herself when her friend was across from her beaming joy. "If not seven, it might be as late as nine or ten. I only know of one who shifted before seven…"
She trailed off, hoping Leah wouldn't ask which wolf she was talking about. Leah looked up from the fabric, understanding glowing in her eyes. Leah took another sip of tea, her expression and the energy buzzing around her telling Esme the question about the baby and the nursery were just two of the reasons Leah had stopped by for a second visit that day.
"Don't keep me waiting all evening," Esme teased.
Leah spent a few more seconds chewing at her bottom lip before she sucked a big breath in and released it, the news spilling out with the expelled air. "I'm not the only one pregnant!"
Esme nodded. "I hoped your pregnancy would trigger something in the--"
She stopped talking when Leah vigorously shook her head, the raven black hair flying around her shoulders. Leah froze, looked away, her mouth puckering and moving in some kind of internal debate before she turned back to Esme and captured her friend's gaze.
"They seem to have gotten pregnant on the night of the ceremony and I think there are a couple more pregnant, but…" She gave a little flick of her nose, indicating it wasn't something she would be able to smell and no announcements had been made.
Trying to deny Leah's meaningful gaze, Esme closed her eyes. It was nothing more than coincidence if the female shifters actually had conceived on the night of the ceremony. Just like it was coincidence that the baby well ran dry around the same time Dana rejected her a decade ago. The two events weren’t connected.
Esme shook her head. "Their bodies just needed a little time to catch up after they started scenting your pregnancy, Leah. That's all it is."
"What about you?" Leah asked softly. When Esme lifted a confused brow, Leah gestured at the witch's stomach. "Are you -- you know -- pregnant? Seth said you weren't allowed to use a condom."
Leah finished with her eyes cast down, another hot blush burning across her cheeks, the same one that surfaced on the two occasions she'd tried to talk to Esme about the ceremony. Closing her eyes, Esme soaked in the energy leaking from Leah and knew her friend felt ashamed that the clan had demanded the ritual and even more ashamed that a part of her, the part that wanted to keep her baby safe, was glad they had.
Esme brushed a tear from her own cheek and made sure her voice was even before she answered. "No, I'm not pregnant, thank the gods and goddesses."
Leah looked up, her shame transformed to a deep sadness. Esme reached across the table and wrapped her hands around Leah's.
"I am overjoyed that you are carrying Seth's child and that, when your baby is born, he'll have playmates to grow up with. But…"
Esme trailed off, thinking of how wrong everything would be if she were pregnant with Dana's child. Never mind Dana's claim to the child -- the whole clan had a claim. Knowing Coop, he might deny her the right to raise the baby and she couldn't flee off the clan's lands and keep the child safe. She shook her head, the very thought of it all making her faint and cold.
Leah reversed the position of their hands until she was holding Esme's. Feeling how the fingers had turned to ice, she rubbed at them. Mindful of the fragile look on Esme's face, she kept her voice soft and gentle. "But what?"
"But you have Seth."
Leah turned Esme's left hand over and softly brushed her thumb over the heart line. One line, unchained, unbroken -- one love her whole life through. "And you have Dana," she whispered and then her voice grew stronger. "All you have to do is crook your little finger and he's here."
Esme shook her head, the dark blonde curls bouncing in denial as she pulled her hands away and folded them in her lap. "It's not my palm you need to read, little sister. He hasn't been around the property at all -- unless he's wearing half a dozen charms."
"He's giving you room and time. He doesn't want you leaving the safety of the clan's lands." Another guilty look flashed across her face. "But he made sure Seth has you well guarded, and the wolves report to Dana, not Seth."
Another flash of pink rose on Leah's cheeks and Esme realized her friend had been eavesdropping on a private conversation. Only there was no eavesdropping around wolves. Seth would have known his mate was listening.
"Coop insisted you be watched, too," Leah continued. "Said it was Dana's head if you pulled a Gordon."
A shiver ran down Esme's spine as she remembered Gordon's betrayal and his death. Free of any blood oath, he had helped the Hunters kidnap her and Leah, his promised reward a siphoning off of Leah's magic to restore his failing reserves. He'd died with a Hunter's knife buried in his throat to keep him from spilling any secrets when it was clear that Seth's pack had discovered the cabin and was closing in.
Still, why would Coop blame Dana for anything Esme did? She looked at her friend, asking just that question.
"Because Coop wanted to extract a new oath from you." Leah fingered a dark brown swatch of fabric, her gaze tracing the faint coppery threads woven into it. "I swear Dana was going to take Jack out, but Jack backed down. Said it was Dana's head if you betrayed us."
Catching the import of "us," Esme raised her hand from her lap and gave Leah's arm a little pat. "I'd die first," she said and gave another soft pat. "And I'm not going anywhere, at least not anytime soon. Have to see that cub of yours born."
Leah's head bobbed. "Especially since you're his godmother."
The smile that had started to lift at the edges of Esme's mouth slammed flat. "Leah, honey, that honor is traditionally reserved for pack alphas or, since Seth is a pack alpha, to the clan alpha and his mate."