A Fey's Wolf

by Elle Boon

  “Mine,” he said, kissing her neck.

  “Yours,” she agreed.

  He gathered her into his arms. “Thank you for loving me, for giving me a chance.”

  “It’s I who should thank you. You’re now shacking up with an old lady, you know.”

  Torq ran his hand down her chest, circling one of her nipples. “Hmm, I don’t see anything but beauty here. Age is nothing when you love someone.”

  She sniffed. “The next time things get ugly I’ll remember it’s okay to cry, but I’m going to cry pretty.”

  He leaned up on his elbow. “Even when you cry, and you got makeup running down your face, or your face gets all red and splotchy, you’ll still look beautiful to me.”

  Talia covered her face with her hand. “Did I look like that? Oh Goddess, do I still look like that?”

  Torq tugged her hand away. “You look perfect, and that’s not me just saying shit to get in your pants.”

  She raised her brows. “I don’t have any pants on.”

  He stroked his finger over her brows. “Good point. Guess what I have on?”

  Talia squinted. “Nothing?”

  Sliding back on top of her, he pulled her hands above her head. “I have a hard on for you.”

  Her laughter made him feel lighter than he’d ever felt, taking away years of uncertainty as he waited to find the woman who was his truemate.

  “Hm, you going to do anything about that?” she asked, running her leg up the back of his thigh.

  “I can think of a few things, if you’re game?” He bent and gently kissed her neck, moving along her jaw to claim her lips. Their link opened, flaring to life arousal that had yet to be completely satisfied.

  Hours later, Talia eased out from the bed. Her body was pleasantly sore and exhausted, but she felt a pull. Looking back, her mate lay sound asleep, the sheet pulled up to his hips. Even now, she could see the outline of his dick. Goddess, she was a lucky Fey.

  “Female, quit ogling your male and come outside,” Lula demanded.

  Talia double checked to make sure Torq was still sleeping before she slipped out the french doors to his back deck. Lula was leaning on the rail, staring up at the stars. “It’s strange how there’s only one sun and one moon here, yet I feel as if they’re full of magic, you know?”

  She glanced up through the trees and could see the moon. The night was clear with very few clouds, making it a beautiful evening. “Yes, it does.”

  Lula straightened. “The female, Sky, which is a strange name for a human, but that’s not the point. Anyway, she’s going to be a little changed after tonight, and not just because of he who we will not mention, unless you want to mention him because I’m that awesome. Ps. You’re welcome.”

  She bit her lip, knowing that dragons were a different breed in and of themselves, not to mention, Lula had grown up around Jenna. Again, enough said. “Um, thank you. But, can you elaborate on how Sky’ll be different? Will I need to explain things to her or the pack?”

  “Well, it’s like this. I’m a very big dragon, and I have lots of dragon to go around, ya know. So, she was sort of dying, and I could see that would’ve gutted those twin fellas, so I sort of gifted her with some of me. Well, she was already a wolfie, so I’m not really sure what she’s gonna be. But, yeah, she’s gonna be a little different.”

  Silence descended. Talia could swear she heard leaves growing on the large trees surrounding Torq’s home. Taking several deep breaths, she turned to face Lula. “Honey, have you any clue what you’ve done?”

  Lula growled. “Of course, I know what I did. I’m not a child, Talia Taluleth of the House of Talu. You may be decades old, but I’m centuries older. What I did, I did because she’s going to be needed in the future. Now, take your Fey ass back into your mate. He’s stirring, and I don’t feel like keeping him asleep any longer.” Lula stepped away, her back straight and prideful as any queen.

  “Lula, wait. I didn’t mean to offend you. I know you wouldn’t do anything to harm someone. But, and this is huge—you giving a piece of yourself away weakens you until you mate.”

  Waving her hand, Lula smiled. “Like I said, I have a lot of me to go around. No need to worry. I’ll be right as rain. Besides, I don’t have a mate. Listen, I got to go. Take care of Sky of the weird name.” Lula tucked a strand of Talia’s hair behind her ear, then she disappeared.

  Talia took a deep breath. “Oh, Lula, what have you done?”

  A pink feather lay on the deck by her feet. She reached down and picked it up, bringing it to her nose and inhaled. The sweet scent of cotton candy filled the air. Taking the feather back inside with her, she placed it on top of Torq’s dresser, then looked around for something to secure it with. A thick leather-bound book caught her eye. Not wanting to sneak and read what appeared to be a journal, she placed the feather inside the front page and shut the cover back, then made her way back to the bed. She’d tell Torq about their late night visitor when they woke up. Until then, she’d rest and bask in the knowledge her loved ones were safe.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Sky blinked, trying to bring the room into focus, wondering where she was. She remembered getting a call to the manager’s office at the lodge. She didn’t understand why they’d hired a human to run the place, but he seemed nice enough. When she stepped into Dave’s office the sight of him lying on the floor had her covering her mouth with her palm, a scream escaping, and then a man had stepped out from behind the door, nearly making her panic shift. The next thing she remembered was pain. So much pain. “Where am I?” Her voice was a raspy whisper as if she’d gone too long without liquid or she’d gargled glass for shits and giggles.

  “You’re at our place. Can I get you a drink?”

  The voice was one she recognized, the deep baritone belonging to one of two men. Twins who were identical in every way. Her mind felt foggy, her eyes felt as if she’d been in a sand fight. “Why am I here, and for fuckssake, what the hell is going on?” She blinked several times, trying to bring them into focus. “Did I get hit in the head or—that man.” Her mind began to race. Images of being tied to a chair, her mouth sewn shut as pain seared her with each needle poke. She reached up, touching her lips, feeling for scars.

  “You’re okay, you’re safe, Sky.” The other male with an identical voice spoke up from the other side of the room.

  “Why can’t I see you clearly? Am I blind? Oh, dear Goddess, did he...he, do something to me?” Panic had her scooting farther away from the voices until her back hit a wall.

  “Sweetheart, it’s me, Talia. Do you remember me?”

  She shook her head, tugging her legs up to her chest. “I want to go home. Please, let me go home.”

  The sound of more voices entered the small space. How she knew it was small, she didn’t know. The echoing sounds made her feel as if the room was no bigger than a cell. They had her in a cell. Did they lock her in. Were they with the man who’d taken her?

  “Sky, stop that shit and stop it now.” Her friend Taryn’s voice broke through her thoughts.

  “Taryn, where are you?” She held out her hand, batting at air.

  “Right here. You’re going to be fine,” Taryn promised.

  “Stop saying that. Everyone, stop saying that. I can’t fucking see. What happened to my eyes?”

  Silence descended. She counted seven people in the room by the heartbeats. All were breathing hard, and her friend Taryn was crying. “Stop fucking crying, Taryn. Just tell me what happened and don’t sugar coat it. I watched you be broken from the inside out. I had to wash the blood and gore from your body more than once. I even had to wipe your ass, so don’t you dare try to sugarcoat this.”

  When she thought nobody was going to answer her, she prepared to get up and—what she didn’t know. Hell, she couldn’t whoop her way out of a paper bag, let alone walk out of wherever the heck she was with dignity.

  “Right now, you appear to have a cloudy substance over your eyes, but they’re clearer
today than they were yesterday.” Taryn paused. “Every day they’re a little better, we just don’t know. It’s not like we’ve come across this before.”

  “How long have I been here?”

  Again, the silence was deafening. “Fucking answer me or get the hell out so I can make my way out of here. Someone will tell me.” Her parents would.

  “Two weeks, hellmouth.”

  “River, don’t.”

  “No, let him speak. At least he’s being honest.” She tried not to let the shock at the amount of time she’d been out of it show outwardly.

  “Now that you’re awake, I can try to heal you, if you agree.” Talia’s voice was even. Goddess, being unable to see, she was picking up on every other nuance of things. Next, she’d be counting breaths, knowing who was skipping one. Fuck. That.

  “Let’s do it, Fey.”

  “Wait, what are the consequences?”

  “The consequences are I’ll be fucking blind, and if you keep putting your two cents in, you’re going to get your nuts smacked,” she warned. River wanted to call her hellmouth, she’d show him hellmouth.

  “Hellmouth, keep it up, and I’ll put you over my lap and teach you some manners.”

  “How about everyone clears out while I see what I can do for Sky?”

  Didn’t Talia the broken Fey sound so damn reasonable.

  “Be nice, or my reasonable mate will leave your ass to whatever your fate has in store for you, Sky,” Torq growled.

  Shit, she didn’t realize she’d said that out loud. Goddess, she just wanted to rewind time and go back to before. Before they left the compound. No. That wasn’t true. At the compound her best friend was being abused by her crazy dad and her best friend’s mom, the woman who was now offering to heal her was being held captive in a cell. But dammit, her life sucked since then.

  The number of heartbeats went down to only three. She assumed it was her, Talia, and Talia’s mate.

  “Alright, hellmouth, you keep your cool and just do what Talia says. You got a lot of people surrounding you with good vibes and shit.”

  As far as devotions go, River really sort of sucked at them, but no shifter wanted to mate up with a blind female.

  “I’m ready when you are, Talia.”

  Talia took a deep breath and let it out. She’d tried to reach out to Lula, but the dragon female was being very elusive, damn her. For two weeks, Sky slept like the dead. They’d had to hook her up to an IV while Cora kept her hydrated and worried she wasn’t doing things right. The entire pack had taken shifts, watching over the young woman, hoping, praying, she’d wake up and be well. None of them had bargained on her not being able to see. Hell, she’d never fixed an injury on that scale.

  “Sky, if you begin to feel any pain, let me know. I’m going to place my hands on either side of your head.”

  She walked Sky through what she was going to do, explaining step by step the process so she didn’t scare the young girl. Her hands started glowing as soon as they touched Sky’s temples, her Fey powers like a magnet as they attached to Sky. She jerked, her body felt as if a volt of energy was shooting between her and Sky and back again, the charge almost painful. Sweat pooled between her brows, but she focused on the eyes, concentrating on fixing what had been done. Why had Troyer blinded her?

  Time slipped away as she worked slowly, methodically taking away coat after coat of the white covering. At last, she saw color, the young girl’s eyes were almost cleared from the film. With one last smooth removal, she eased the coating off and looked down into stunning purple eyes.

  Talia let her hands fall to the bed. They felt too heavy to hold up as she knelt in front of Sky. She waited, holding her breath, praying the girl could see.

  “It’s really bright in here,” Sky sobbed, wrapping her arms around Talia, her cries soaking into her shirt.

  “Does it hurt?” she asked, looking over at River who stood by the door, a shocked expression on his face. Raydon eased inside, his face a study in worry like they’d both aged a few years in the last couple weeks.

  “No, I just thought I was never going to see light again. I know it sounds stupid cause it’s only been whatever, but oh goddess, it was so scary. You don’t know,” she cried.

  Talia let her cry, felt her hands twisting in her shirt. Taryn eased into the room, her presence made Talia breathe easier, knowing she was close to the young girl.

  “How’s everything going?” Taryn asked.

  “I’m crying like a whiny ass bitch. How’s it look like it’s going?” Sky asked, raising her face.

  Taryn gasped, then wrapped her arms around Sky. “Don’t you ever do that to me again.”

  Talia eased off the bed, nearly falling on her ass when her feet hit the floor. “I got you, farfalla. Come on, let’s give them some time.”

  She and the rest of the pack settled into River’s and Raydon’s large family room. Her hand shook as she accepted a glass of water from Cora. “Thank you. Um, I made all the medical equipment disappear. If you need it, I can get you more,” she said to Cora.

  Cora nodded. “I appreciate that. Who knows when I’ll need it again.”

  “Her eyes are purple. Not like the light hit them and they looked purple, but they’re fucking purple. Like the dragon female’s,” River announced.

  Realization hit her. Her daughter had gasped when she’d met Sky’s eyes. Lula had given Sky a part of her in order to save her. Who knew what else was different inside the young girl. She took a deep breath, waved her hand so that the ones outside the room couldn’t hear, then explained what Lula had told her. The twins growled, got up, and paced back and forth, their shoulders rubbed against one another as they passed.

  “So, what you’re saying is, in order to save her, Lula put a dragon in her?” Niall asked.

  Talia shrugged. “I really don’t know, and neither did Lula. Only time will tell. One thing’s for sure, and that’s the fact her eyes are that of Lula’s.”

  Sky walked out of the room with a puzzled Taryn trailing her. “Newsflash, your bubble doesn’t work on me. Clearly, that’s something dragonish I’ve got. So, I have purple eyes, and I might be a fucking dragonwolf. Great. Sign me up for freak of the fucking week.”

  “Hellmouth, I’ll put you over my knee,” River warned.

  Raydon tilted his head back. “Goddess give me strength.”

  Torq clapped his hands. “Alright, folks, looks like our job here is done. I’m taking my Fey mate home and try to talk her into making babies.”

  Taryn groaned. “Oh lord I didn’t need to hear that. Sky, burn me with your laser eyes.”

  Talia looked over her shoulder as her daughter and Sky play fought, hoping all would work out. Goddess, she prayed for all of them.

  Sky met her gaze, purple eyes unblinking. “Thank you,” she mouthed.

  When things get ugly, sometimes you just gotta cry and realize you ain’t gotta cry pretty. In their world, she hoped there wasn’t a whole lot more crying.

  “I’ll do my best to make you only cry out in pleasure, my mate.” Torq kissed her, silencing any other words.

  Epilogue

  Talia entered Dave’s office with Torq trailing her, his wolf so close she could feel him reaching out to her. Goddess, she loved being mated to the man. Her boss looked up, a slight smile on his face. She tilted her head to the side, giving him a wave. When they’d realized he’d been knocked unconscious by her brother, after being used as a puppet for Goddess only knew how long, she and Payton had done all they could to erase his memories of that time from his mind.

  “Hello, Talia, how can I help you?” Dave asked, folding his hands on the top of his desk.

  “I know I just started, but I was hoping I could have the weekend off. We, Torq and I, are going to visit my family.” She wasn’t lying as she planned to take her mate to the Fey Realm, let him see where she was from, even if it was the last time she visited there.

  Dave tilted his head to the side, looking over Talia’s sho
ulder to where Torq rested against the door. “I see. Well, I don’t think that’ll be an issue, just don’t make it a habit. Ski season will be here before we know it.”

  She nodded, then took a deep breath. “How’s everything going?”

  “I’m sorry, what do you mean?”

  Her boss’s face was puzzled, attesting to the fact he had no clue what she was referring to. She breathed easier knowing he had no memories of the time her brother had used him for his evil plans. “I was just wondering how the planning for the expansion was going? I saw the proposal on your desk.” She pointed at the file in front of him.

  With narrowed eyes, Dave closed the open file, his mouth pressed into a thin line. “I haven’t presented the idea to the owners yet, so please, don’t speak of it.”

  Torq’s low growl warned he didn’t like Dave’s tone. She quickly stepped back, moving closer to him, hoping it would keep him from smacking the other man upside the head. “My mouth is sealed, sir. Okay, we’re off then. I’ll see you in a few days.” She turned, giving Dave her back and leading the way out of the office. Arguing with the manager of Mystic Lodge was last on her list of things to do. However, taking Torq to Fey was first. Once they were out of his office and outside her allotted cabin, the place she hadn’t stayed in since she’d mated with Torq, she reached for Torq, his anger palpable.

  “Let it go, love. He’s probably still feeling a little residual torment and doesn’t know from what. I’ll have Payton pay him a visit while we’re gone.” She went up on her toes, leaned in, and kissed his hard mouth.

  Torq growled, his arms coming around her, his lips opening. When they broke apart, they were both breathing hard. “You trying to distract me?”

  Talia grinned. “Did it work?”

  “Can we be naked when you take me to Fey?”

  “I think we should hold off on that until we know the lay of the land,” she said. The thought of popping into a public place with Torq buried inside her made her wet, yet also had her shaking her head.