by Odessa Lynne
Ten short knocks.
Kem’s hands gripped Devon’s hips tighter, fingers flexing. Then he moved his hand to hold his dick as he pushed the head up against Devon’s slick hole.
Devon grunted at the first breach, and then groaned low when Kem leaned into him, driving himself in another inch.
“Enter,” Kem said, voice loud enough for the person on the other side of the door to hear.
“No!” Devon said, fingers clenching in the sheets.
The door opened.
Kem’s hands slid over Devon’s waist and up to his ribs. “Why are you scared?”
“I’m not scared, goddammit, I just—” Too loud, too strong a denial. Shit. “What if he—”
“I smell it on you.” Kem’s face grazed across Devon’s spine, and his ear pressed to Devon’s back. “I can hear it in your heartbeat. He won’t touch you. He knows I’ll kill him if he tries.”
“You can’t guarantee that. None of you can. That’s the—” Problem, he would have said, but Kem hadn’t stopped moving his hips and Devon dropped his head down between his arms and groaned past the sudden tightening of his throat. Kem felt so huge. Every time. The stretch and burn of that first invasion, the fullness and the heat sinking into him… His back curved and Kem’s inexorable push continued.
“I don’t want him here.” Then, through gritted teeth, “Listen—”
The door shut, the crack of wood on wood too abrupt not to have been intentionally noticeable. Devon lifted his head up.
“He’s gone,” Kem said. “I sent him away.”
Devon’s jittery rush of nerves eased, and his softening cock started to harden again. He rested his forehead on the bed and took a few deep breaths.
“He saw enough. He’ll be my witness with Alpha.”
Some of that nervous adrenaline still flooded his veins though. “God Almighty, would you just speak Human sometimes? I’m not as good with the language as my friends and I’m not exaggerating when I say they can’t speak wolf for shit, especially Ian.”
Kem’s hands squeezed Devon’s ribs just shy of painful and Kem thrust forward with his hips, his dick sliding deep, almost too fast, too hard.
Devon’s back bowed, a sharp grunt driven from his throat. He sucked in a breath, too shallow, and Kem pounded into his ass, rocking the bed, while the jolting pleasure of every hard thrust felt like it was going to break him in half.
He didn’t know why Kem had suddenly decided to ride him so aggressively but it was working for Devon; he was going to come and he was going to come fast without even a hand to—
He shoved his arm under him and started jerking his dick hard, his balls slapping against his fingers.
But then Kem covered his hand and Devon gasped, but Kem’s fingers were curled around his own, and the fear of an accident with flesh and claws dissipated as instantly as it appeared while Kem started to guide Devon’s motion, forcing him to slow down, to take it easier on himself, and then it was just too much sensation.
Devon had half a second to think it was going to be a long time before he found someone who knew how to fuck him the way Kem did and then his blood rushed and Kem’s back pressed tight to his again and his hand started pumping Devon’s cock a little faster and harder, his hips grinding his cock as far up into Devon’s ass as it would go, and Devon groaned as his own sticky hot semen splattered across his belly and the sheets under him.
His entire body quivered with the fatigue of a powerful orgasm and sweat dripped down his temple and he could taste the salt of it on his lips. He let out a rough exhale and the only thing keeping him on his knees as Kem seemed to work frantically to bury himself as far up Devon as he could get was Kem’s forearm under his belly.
Kem roared and Devon tensed and then Kem came with a spurt of semen hot and sudden deep in Devon’s ass.
He couldn’t hold himself up any longer and his elbows folded and his cheek smashed against the rumpled sheets. He’d never been fucked so many times in one eighteen—twenty?—hour period in his life. Sleep called to him again, but the bed jostled and Devon realized Kem hadn’t pulled out and then a heavy weight crushed him down before rolling to the side and pulling him over onto his side. Hot breath and moist lips touched the back of his neck.
“I have to go.”
Devon huffed out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a groan. “My ass is never going to recover.”
A short laugh tickled right down Devon’s spine. He twisted around to look at Kem. Brilliant green eyes, smooth brow, straight nose. “My ass wasn’t really made for fat alien dicks, you know.”
“You get pleasure from it.” Kem’s hand swiped down over Devon’s stomach, smearing semen across his sweaty skin all the way down to the root of his dick.
“Come on,” Devon said. “Did you have to do that? That stuff itches when it dries.”
“Your semen is thicker than ours. It’s strange.”
“No, ours is normal, yours is strange. After you fuck me, I feel like I have to take a piss out of my—”
Kem kissed him and effectively shut him up before he could continue with his complaint.
When Kem pulled away and then climbed out of the bed, Devon watched. He continued watching when Kem dressed.
“You’re going to stink of sex and sweat,” Devon said.
“Yes.”
“And you don’t care.” Not a question.
Kem looked at him, eyebrows drawn. “Not at all. It validates my claim on you.”
Devon rolled to face Kem, propping his head on his hand. “What was the witness thing about?”
“We mated. I needed a witness to validate—”
“You’re just confusing me.” Devon dropped back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.
“Rest. You’ll need it. My heat will start to ride me harder as the season goes on.”
Devon tucked his arms under the back of his head and glanced at Kem. “You’re a damn sight more rational most of the time than I expected.”
“Your submission confuses me.” With that Kem reached for the doorknob, but then gave him another look, this time with brow furrowed and eyes troubled. “You say you submit, and sometimes I can feel it even when you don’t say it, but it’s not easy. I don’t understand how you’re both submitting to me and defying me in the same breath but I trust my instincts and they tell me you are mine.”
“I’m not—” A yawn interrupted him. Probably a good thing too. He covered the yawn out of habit and then scratched at the itch on his belly. “At least I’m not the only one who’s confused.”
“My confusion is much more dangerous to you than your confusion is to me.”
“I don’t care. It’s not right for me to be the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on half the time.”
Kem said nothing further, just gave him another look, and then left.
As soon as the door clicked shut, Devon rolled off the bed, made a quick trip to the bathroom, and started rifling through drawers.
Chapter 9
“Shit.” He fought the urge to slam the last drawer and eased it shut instead, the glide barely a whisper of sound to break the silence. He’d have made more noise rolling over in the bed.
Devon watched the door anyway.
The window beckoned, but the fading glare of sunset told him this wasn’t the time to try getting lost deep in the woods. Wolves could see in the dark in a way no human could without the assistance of technology and once the wolves caught his scent, they would find him. He didn’t know how far ahead he’d have to get before his scent outran them but he doubted he could get there before Kem returned and found him gone.
What kind of dangers had the wolves faced in their natural environment to have created such powerful senses? Why did they still let their instincts control them even with all their technologic advancement? Devon couldn’t even make a good guess at the answers to the questions flitting through his mind.
The urge to get out and get on with his business was starti
ng to eat at him. Geoff didn’t have a lot of time. Devon should know. Gran’s temper and her intelligence were both dangerous, and she wouldn’t hesitate to follow through on her threats if Devon didn’t get those gold dollars to her on time.
Devon scraped his knuckles along the underside of his chin and looked around. Kem had been gone for at least five minutes. Devon would bet a gold ten-dollar Kem would probably go for food before he returned.
Devon went back to the first drawer he’d opened and pulled out a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. The shirt came down over his head easily; Kem was broader but not massively so. The jeans fit at the waist and length both. He adjusted the crotch and hurriedly zipped, careful to avoid any meet up between the teeth of the zipper and his unprotected skin, even as he approached the door.
He cracked the door open and breathed a sigh of relief when the hinges stayed silent.
He stuck his head between the door and the frame, to take a quick peek outside the room, ready to slam the door shut if any of the wolves stood in the hall, but the floor groaned at the shifting of his weight. He caught his breath and held it, then eased his foot to the side and tried again.
No one in the hallway.
A few doors down, the hall opened to the kitchen. He remembered that from the walk to the room last night. Warm light spilled onto the hardwood floor and onto the wall but the turn at the end kept him from seeing into the kitchen. A closed door stood at the very end of the hall. Devon had no idea where it led.
He hadn’t gotten a good look at the house in the dark the night he’d been caught, but lots of load bearing walls and sectioned off rooms down in the basement made him think the place had to be huge.
He’d guess the house had been built in the ’30s or ’40s, sometime after the great quake that had happened over fifty years ago. Very few of the homes to be found in the area predated the quake. Devon still remembered seeing pictures in school of the changed landscape and the massive flooding that had happened when the river broke.
While he’d been stuck down in the basement, he’d assumed he was completely underground, but after looking out that window and judging the distance to the ground, the backside of the basement had to be at least partially exposed. There could even be a window or door down there somewhere, hidden from view.
Devon considered his alternatives, realized he was shit up out of luck unless he wanted to do something stupid. Maybe this was as good a time as any to head for the woods after all.
He rolled the tension out of his shoulders and then stepped out into the hall. He could do stupid. Wouldn’t be the first time.
Even on bare feet, it was almost impossible to walk across the hardwood silently. Every step threatened to give him away with a creak or a pop and the path to the kitchen seemed to take forever. Luckily no one came out of any of the other rooms. With as many wolves as he suspected were denning here, he’d really thought he’d hear more noise—roaring wolves and all that shit.
He’d bet any wolf walking by Kem’s door had heard every last grunt and groan from him last night and today. The thought disconcerted him, unexpected as it was and an uncomfortable wave of embarrassment rolled over him.
Fuck that. He was doing what he had to do to keep that lust-crazed wolf from tearing out his spine. He had nothing to be embarrassed about.
He was halfway to the kitchen when voices carried to him from around the corner, and he tensed.
He understood Kem—a little—but the others…
Too many wolves gathered in the same place made him aware of just how vulnerable he was.
Stupid didn’t begin to describe what he was doing here in the hallway. But he stayed put, and listened, and he was rewarded for his daring when he heard Kem’s voice.
Kem was talking to someone and it took a moment for Devon to figure out what he’d meant, because Kem kept saying things Devon had to struggle to translate—at least a few had to be some of the wolves’ unpronounceable names. His mouth parted as Kem paused, seeming to wait for a response, and Devon realized—
Alpha. Witness. Mated.
Kem had mated him, and one of the wolves had acted as witness so it was—official? What the hell did that mean?
Devon scowled and eased another step closer, moving next to the wall, his bare feet noticing the coolness of the hardwood. He couldn’t hear well enough from his current spot and he kept missing words.
“They don’t understand,” another said, voice quiet and deep.
“No, but my claim on the human is valid. The Diviner’s words—”
“What do you know of him besides the fact that he trespassed into our territory at exactly the wrong time?”
“I have his name.”
“We’ll have to find out who he is. A name isn’t enough.”
“I know. He had nothing on him. He hasn’t said much but—the timing is difficult. When I’m with him, my senses—I can’t be cautious, I can’t think about anything but mating him, and my heat cycles aren’t appeased when we mate, not like they would be if he could breed.”
They were talking about him. Had to be. Devon had known if things went to plan, anything he carried would be confiscated. So he’d come without phone or tracker or anything that might rile the wolves against him. And breed? Of course he couldn’t breed. What the hell was that about?
Several words followed that Devon couldn’t understand; he either hadn’t heard them in their entirety or they didn’t translate—at least not for him, with his imperfect understanding of the wolves’ language.
But the other wolf had more to say in that deep voice again, underlain with a definite ring of authority. “Your situation is unique. Traesikeille will have concerns.”
“I understand, Alpha.”
Devon froze, panic hitting him hard. Alpha. What if the alpha caught his scent? What if Kem tried to fight—
He took a breath. Nothing had changed from a few minutes ago until now. Nothing but his own perception of what was going on on the other side of the wall. He had no reason to panic.
And—and—
Kem had left the room covered in his stink. He was still okay. No one had discovered him yet and he wanted to know—
Kem’s voice interrupted Devon’s racing thoughts. “He mentioned someone he called ‘his friend Ian.’ Wasn’t that your human’s name?”
“Humans share names quite often,” Devon heard the alpha say, “Could be a coincidence, but—” A pause. “Not likely. Considering the signal.”
Shit. Devon clenched his fist against his thigh. Ian was here. And—
Damn it, it sounded like the alpha had him.
“The signal’s blocked,” Kem said. “I took care of it myself just as you told me to.”
The signal? Devon frowned.
He missed the alpha’s response, still trying to work out what signal they might be talking about.
He exhaled, louder than he meant to. That fucker. Brendan again. He’d sent Ian in with one of those trackers Devon had configured for him. Son of a bitch. If Devon was right, he was going to kill Brendan when he got out of here. Fucking kill him.
Devon couldn’t stop the clench of his fist—he was so mad he could feel the tremble of it racing through him. Ian couldn’t—he hadn’t—
Goddamn Brendan.
Kem’s voice came again, louder this time, aggravated, “We already know all these humans trespassing in our territory just as heat season started isn’t a coincidence.”
“Without a signal they can’t communicate.” Another pause, maybe a low voiced reply from someone else, Devon wasn’t sure, but the hell if he was getting any closer than he already was. Too risky. He was already asking for it just by being here.
Then, the alpha’s voice came again. “You were there when he was caught. Do you think the human you’ve mated intended to get caught in our territory?”
Devon had no idea what they’d do to him if they thought for a moment he was part of one of the renegade groups who hunted the wolves’ dens.
Kem didn’t answer right away. Finally, Devon heard, “Yes.”
A flash of fabric caught Devon’s eye at the edge of the doorway into the kitchen. The wolves had gotten too close to the door for Devon’s position to be safe.
Ah, shit. Devon took a quiet step backward and—son of a bitch—the floor creaked. He stood completely still, holding his breath until his chest burned. He wasn’t stupid enough to think he wasn’t about to get caught but maybe he could pretend he’d just come out of the room looking for—
“I smell one of them—” A voice Devon didn’t recognize, hot with curiosity.
Devon heard a loud scuffle, a sharp grunt.
A hiss and then something heavy hit the floor.
“Get him out of here,” the alpha roared. “He’ll get all of us killed.”
Devon ran.
He slammed up against the door to the room, knocking it open with his weight, careening for the bed in an uncontrolled burst of speed. He hit the mattress and rolled all the way across the bed, pillows scattering and falling to the floor and he came down on the other side of the bed on his hands and knees and he crouched there just long enough to take a deep breath and hear the stomp of feet pounding into the room.
The door slammed shut. A shiver raced down Devon’s spine and he cringed, but he glanced at the window where the light faded into sunset and pushed himself to his feet.
“Submit!”
Devon caught his breath at the power in that one sharply spoken word. The bed wouldn’t even slow Kem down. Devon knew that, rationally speaking, but he needed to find Ian, and he needed to find him now.
But—
He saw the look in Kem’s green-eyes, the fiery hot stare, the flare of his nostrils, the tightness of his shoulders and the claws, fully extended and sharp as blades. Devon sucked in his breath and stumbled back against the wall.
“I submit!” he yelled. “I submit! Swear to God. I submit.” He yanked his shirt off over his head, his thoughts spinning so fast he wasn’t even sure what he was doing, only knew that he had to do something.
“I submit,” he said again. He flicked open the button on his pants and started pushing them down over his hips. “Here—”