A gentleman would have asked if she needed help, but he was never known for manners.
He hoped like hell that she felt the same as he captured those lips with his own and found solace in the curves of her body melded up against his.
She was rich softness, the kind you could explore endlessly and never get tired of discovering. She tasted like life and berries, a mixture that made him addicted to her flavors.
When she wrapped her legs around his waist, he prayed to the gods above that she would never release him.
Shifter’s Gift Chapter Five
When Danika broke through the surface, she knew someone was getting closer to her. She could hear another heartbeat, sense their panic, and smell their fear. What were they afraid of? No one had seen her shift. She’d made sure of that, so they couldn’t have feared her, could they?
The fear shifted as the person shortened the distance between them. It didn’t smell like fear from danger. This scent had a different emotional pull than the way a person or animal feared for their own safety.
A sensation underneath all the senses was familiar as well, a feeling she’d had before. She looked around and finally came face to face with a man. A man she both knew and didn’t know. Blaine.
She couldn’t speak, but she could feel. The water warmed suddenly as if a flame had shot right through it. Heat filled her core and expanded all the way down her limbs.
He looked so different, but it was the eyes that told her it was him, the boy who she would have fought for, killed for all those years ago.
His hair was curly and hung at his temples, but it wasn’t long enough to hide that penetrative gaze, one that still held her captive, but this one was no longer that of innocence. He took her in with the aura of a man with desires, a man with hunger. It was backed by something a simple touch wouldn’t satisfy.
Common sense should have told her to move away from him, but she wasn’t operating on rationality as her wolf found another that fit her perfectly. She felt her animal uncurl itself and rise to the surface as he came closer. If he hadn’t taken her mouth in a kiss, she would have stolen it from him. Her need was too great to detain, and she could feel the restraint he gave in that kiss.
Damn, he tasted good. Strength unfurled in his kiss that was more of a claiming than anything neat and gentle.
No thoughts came to her as she wrapped herself around him and allowed herself to just feel.
The water bubbled slightly around them as they became one magical entity.
He felt amazing so close to her, and she needed more. Nothing was enough to satisfy her or her wolf.
Without giving it a second thought, she ripped the shirt he wore off him. Her hands found the muscular shape of him and explored every taut inch as his mouth consumed her.
His fingers dug into her ass, getting her closer so she could feel the hardness of him pressed against her. She moaned against him as he slipped his fingers into her from behind, never leaving from their kiss.
With each touch he scorched her to the depths of her soul, and she became addicted to every part of him being next to her, inside of her.
Magic rolled through them. She’d never felt such raw attraction and desire course through her veins as she did with Blaine so close to her.
They were no longer in control as his water element and magic enveloped them and flowed around their merging bodies.
She was more aware of the type of magic he possessed since traveling around Florida and discovering other witches and warlocks, and Blaine’s magic was all-consuming.
Without putting much distance between them, she reached down and unzipped his pants, pulling out the hardness that awaited her. He felt long and thick in her hand, but none of that mattered. She needed him to be inside her, or she was going to cease existing.
“Blaine, please.” She had never said his name out loud before. She was always afraid if she did, he would be a figment of her imagination and disappear. Now she was grateful for treasuring it and using it with him in front of her, caressing her, adoring her.
She centered him close to her entrance, prepared to feel him fill her completely.
“Are you sure?” he asked between harsh breaths.
She could tell he took effort in waiting, but she didn’t want to wait anymore. Parts she didn’t know existed craved this man, and the only thing that made sense was satisfying those pieces of her that she didn’t even know could be made whole.
“Yes, Blaine,” she said. He didn’t need more encouragement as he pushed forward and into her until she could feel him stretching every bit of her.
Nothing mattered in that instant now that he was inside of her. She dug her fingers into his back, holding on for every breath of life as he began to move slowly. He pulled out of her and then thrusted back inside with a force that made her cry out.
His pace was glorious torture, and she didn’t know whether she wanted to savor him as he used a methodical and sensually slow pace to drag it out or to plead for him to move faster so she could feel more of him. It was all too much and not enough.
“Amazing,” Blaine said. “You feel amazing.”
Closing her eyes made her savor him more as he began to move in a quicker pace, hitting her clit at all the right angles. Shivers were forced from her until she was nothing but a bundle of ecstasy.
This was beyond her dreams of him, ones where she would wake up panting and wondering how they would meld together.
He shifted his hips and hit that sensitive spot deep within her, the one that almost had her screaming her lungs out. She kept it down to a loud groan by biting down on his shoulder, marking him as hers.
His muscle tensed against her teeth. It was deep enough to mark him, but faint enough to not break the skin. Part of her felt pride at the claiming, staking her territory on his pale skin.
Mine, she thought. All mine.
Danika never thought of herself as a desperate person. Still, she couldn’t help the thoughts that filled her mind as Blaine filled her body.
If anyone tried taking what was hers, she’d hunt a bitch down first.
He shifted again, bringing her focus back to him and him alone.
His breathing picked up, and she could hear the speed of his heart increase. The warmth between them and all around them eliminated all the bitter coolness that could have disturbed their intimacy.
As he got closer to pulling the strongest orgasm she’d ever had from her body, Danika experienced something brand new when she closed her eyes again, a moment that went far beyond the physical. She saw his wolf, at least she thought it was his wolf by the same color hair she knew him by, a brown that reminded her of cinnamon and allspice. There was no mistaking the wolf with the same brown fur the color of his hair and the eyes that she always dreamed about night after night, haunting her memories of him.
He was powerful and certain. She could tell just by the way he sat, observing the world around him.
She saw her midnight-colored wolf nuzzle his as if stirring it into action and begging it to come out and play with her. His wolf was beautiful and larger than hers. They seemed to go together as if their wolves knew what existed between them before they knew it.
The wolf stretched back and howled into the air, releasing a call into the air and through the wild. Hers joined in to make a sound that was whimsical and primal all at once.
Danika opened her eyes to find him staring at her with a gaze that glowed back at her, a light that showed his other magical self, the magical warlock that she was happy to accept as he became a part other.
His magic seeped into her until it soaked through her bones, traveled through her blood, and became an ultimate part of her. He was sharing a piece of himself with her, which both scared and exhilarated her. That knowledge was enough to take her to a sensitive high that merged on the brink of pain.
She didn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or scream. She sensed what it was like to hold his magical element within her. The water became h
er and she became the water. There was no end and no beginning, an unending cycle of power and pleasure to create the ultimate him.
Blaine’s arms tightened around her, as if he thought he would lose her to some hidden abyss, some mysterious aspect of life that held all the mystical secrets deep within.
Danika responded by kissing him, using all her remaining energy and strength to let him know that she was there with him the entire time.
“Close,” she said, panting. She didn’t want the feeling of him to end. It was too much and not enough. She had never in her life felt the magical bond she had with Blaine as he took over her mind, her body, and the most hidden parts of her soul. There was nothing like it that she could compare it to, nothing to explain the full need that filled her from head to toe.
The friction of him increased as she got closer to that sought-out edge, a place no one had taken her to like he did. He moved in directions that made her squirm on top of him.
Her orgasm hit her so hard that she thought she would fall into the deepest parts of the water and not get out. When she came, the whole world around them disappeared until there was nothing but the two of them.
Her body shook and Blaine’s muscles tensed as he exploded inside of her, leaving her a mess of nerves around him. She could feel that he was a part of her just as she was a part of him. The feeling was so permanent that it rocked her to her depths.
“You’re amazing, Danika,” he said. He kissed her shoulders and moved up to her neck, nuzzling her there for good measure.
She smiled against his shoulder. Even then she could see the mark she had given him, a bite that made him hers just as much as she was his. Seeing the imprint made her happy for once, the best emotion that she had forgotten how to experience.
Then it all had to disappear. What was she thinking?
She was supposed to join with another wolf. Someone to strengthen her pack as Lance had said.
Danika could never be happy, not when that happiness didn’t include the man who had just shown her what it was to begin with.
She pushed away from him and felt him slip out of her, which made her understand emptiness in more ways than one. “I have to go,” she said.
“What? Now?” He gave way to her departure, but his hands still lingered as if she would change her mind at any second and want them back on her.
She did want him to envelop her, to make the pain go away, but that was just a fantasy. She couldn’t allow herself to be happy, not when others depended on her.
“I’m sorry. I wish I didn’t have to, but I do.” She swam to shore with him right next to her.
“After all this time, we can’t just leave it like this.”
She turned to him when they were out of the water, and she regretted not coming to the water with decent clothes so she’d have something to cover herself with. The vulnerability made her instinctually wrap her arms around herself, hiding away even after what they shared.
“You don’t understand,” she said. “I’m promised to someone else.”
“You’re engaged?” he asked.
She sighed. “Something like that. My parents promised me to him years ago.”
“They can’t just decide for you,” he said. “I’ll help you talk to them. Maybe if they met me they’d let you—”
“They made the oath before they died, Blaine.” Her voice came out harsher than she wanted it to. She didn’t want to hurt him. That was the last thing she wanted, and still it was the only way they could leave each other.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He tried to hold her, but she held her hand up to stop him.
She needed those arms wrapped around her, and if he tried again, she didn’t know if she’d be strong enough to resist.
“They died because of a pack rivalry, a fight that could have been stopped if we were stronger. They adopted me when I was a baby because the same thing happened to my real parents, and I still lost them too. That’s why I have to keep their promise, even if I hate it. I can’t let my brother or our people risk their lives because of me.”
“Danika, listen to me. We can figure it all out together. We just found each other again. I can’t give you up now. I won’t do it.”
“There’s no other choice. I wish it were different,” she said. She shifted before he could stop her and ran like she had never run before. This time she didn’t appreciate the feel of it or the atmosphere around her. She ran hard and fast, so even she couldn’t change her mind. For the first time, she was running away from someone she wanted nothing more than to run to.
***
Blaine never believed in Christmas miracles, but finding Danika made him actually have hope. Realistic hope that he wasn’t too far gone to receive something good, someone he could cherish and call his own. He didn’t think that was too much to ask.
Until she ran away from him.
He had never felt anything or anyone consume him so completely as much as she did in those few moments. It went beyond sex and lust. She felt like part of him, a significant piece to his whole, and without it, there was no hope for restoration.
He had always thought he was useless, a half-breed that had no place of belonging, but being with her, merging his body with hers, had been the peak of his existence.
He couldn’t chase her after she shifted. The woman was just too fast. His woman. It was weird to call her his, but somehow it felt right. It felt like the only right thing in his entire world, and he had to get her back.
She’d said she couldn’t be with him. He’d been told he couldn’t do so much for most of his life, and he had started to believe it.
Danika made everything else seem like nonsense. She made him want to fight for her.
If he chased her, her pack would probably kill him. So be it. At least he could say he tried. He wasn’t going to retreat into his head anymore. Danika was his new safe place. He knew that just as much as he was living and breathing.
Despite what she said, he knew that she felt the connection they shared, the magic that accepted them both, their wolves that intertwined as they became whole.
Fuck those who stood in his way. He was going to get Danika and fight through any levels of hell to have her.
He thought about his family’s grimoire. There had to be a locator spell he could use to find Danika and track her down.
The Elemental Board knew where the wolves lived, but they kept it from the community to keep witches and warlocks from the shifters. They claimed it was to keep both sides safe, but many didn’t care about the shifters. Blaine always thought it was to keep the magic community from mingling and making more half-breeds like him.
It didn’t matter whether he had to find an Elemental Board member or do his own search. He was going to find Danika, no matter what he had to risk for him to find her and make her his.
He was heading back home to start his search for her when a sharp pain shot through his limbs. The agony brought him to his knees.
This was not part of his magic, but the pain felt otherworldly nonetheless. It was as if his body had been asleep for years and just figured out how to wake up.
The pain shifted to a high level of discomfort as his magic entangled with the new attack to give him some relief. The magic worked with the merging of a new force, but one that was still a part of Blaine.
When he saw his skin give way to brown fur, he knew what was releasing from him.
He was happy for it, but the damn thing had the worst fucking timing. As it happened, he realized what brought his shift. Danika. He knew warlocks and witches bound themselves through sexual magic, but he never knew about half-breeds. No one was there to teach him. Not his biological father, who his mother didn’t even remember, and certainly not Pete.
Maybe his lovemaking to Danika brought it on. He remembered seeing his wolf and her wolf together.
The harshness of his first shift ceased when he stopped fighting it and allowed it to take over. It was like that itch you get but can’t seem t
o reach it. Instead of being in one place, it consumed him all over.
Before his animal took over, he promised himself that he was going to use his wolf to find Danika, the woman he knew he was meant to be with for as long as she’d have him. She had saved him. Now it was his turn to save her.
Shifter’s Gift Chapter Six
“Where were you, Dani? I couldn’t find you anywhere. I thought something had happened.” Lance hugged her tightly when she appeared back at the main house.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” she said.
“So much loss over the years, I couldn’t lose you too,” he said. “I couldn’t bear it.”
Danika took a long look at her brother. She never saw him as anything less, blood relation or not. He was her kin, and it comforted her to know that he felt the same too, despite the words said earlier.
She sat down in the most comfortable chair in his office, the ugly one she used to sit in when their father did business discussions in the same office. It was always weird seeing Lance in there, but she could admit that being alpha looked good on him. He was a natural-born leader, and she knew both his and her parents would have been proud of him. Now she had to do something that would make them proud of her. She needed to fulfill the promise they made.
Lance slid a chair over to her, so they faced each other. “I didn’t mean what I said. You know I love you, right?”
She nodded. “Yes, but it still hurts when you say it.”
“I know. I would say it’s the stress of the job, but that’s no excuse. I’m sorry.”
“You should be,” she said, jabbing at his arm.
“I don’t know how dad handled this,” he said.
“He had mom to help him,” she added.
“Are you saying I need a mate?”
“You said it. Not me.” She was happy they were back to bantering again. Without him, she didn’t know how she would be able to meet with her soon-to-be mate.
The Alpha Warlocks' Own: An Alpha Warlocks of Kala West Story #3 (A BWWM and BBW Paranormal Ménage Romance) Page 15