by Rae Foxx
“I’ve heard they can make you feel things you wouldn’t regularly.”
Fuck yeah, he could.
I opened my mouth, but Scarlet cut me off, “I’m not answering anymore, Ivy. You can do your own homework.”
She tapped the paper between us. The question that had sent me into the stacks in the first place.
‘Describe the mating habits of supernatural creatures.’
“Oh fine. I’ve seen enough of mating in the last ten minutes anyway. I don’t need to know about wolf habits. So, don’t start.”
“Oh!” Scarlet popped up as though she had some grand epiphany. “I heard this morning that Selene is worried. She has been glued to Howl and asking people about you.”
Extra clingy and threatening, and bartering blow jobs for mafia hits apparently, everything I had overheard with them falling in place. I stared at Scarlet, chewing on my bottom lip.
“Don’t worry, there’s a mutual hatred going on between Howl and me. Anyway, she’s the one who challenged me. If she’s so insecure maybe she should stop letting her mate,” the word bit against my throat, “fight her battles for her.”
“Speaking of mates and fighting battles, I see someone eye-fucking you right this minute.”
All of a sudden, Scarlet was a slut and a curser. I was liking her more and more. She had become comfortable with me.
I didn’t flinch. “Who? I ain’t about to turn if it’s Evan. That guy thinks he’s halfway in my pants as it is.”
Although there were other guys that were now. I shifted in my seat and closed my legs tighter.
“Howl.” She whispered, eyebrows wagging.
I shuddered, my spine forcefully straightening.
“He’s probably imagining the ways to off me,” I mumbled, stubbornly refusing to look at him.
Didn’t stop the image of him and Selene pressed against the dusty shelves from sprouting in my mind. The deep growl of my wolf filled my head again. Although this time I recognized it for what it was.
Jealousy.
Aw, hell no.
Chapter 13
The second Scarlet yawned and proclaimed herself hungry for dinner, I was ready, but not for food, despite feeling so hungry I was apt to pass out. I smiled, mumbled something about needing to finish the chapter I was on and sent her off without another word.
I didn’t even wait to see if she was leaving, I pulled the old leather tome toward me with greedy fingers, glancing once at the title before flipping the thing open to somewhere in the middle. Hoping that no one else saw the gold inlaid image of what looked like five different supernatural creatures in a conga line.
Except, not a conga line.
There was too much ass for a conga line.
“What the holy fuck?” I hissed under my breath, earning myself an interested grin from one of the replicated librarians. Thankfully she didn’t come over here. Her ancient dry-as-a-bone vag would become a well with what was on this page.
A large drawing of a woman with what looked like four vampires, all buck ass naked, all of their dicks pressed deep inside of her. In every way possible.
‘Of course, the most treacherous of harem matches is that of the Vampires. The night creatures, while extremely loyal to their blood whores, are often overcome with lust and in mating circles that contain more than one Vampire may over-feed from their mate as a show of competition to their breeding brothers…’
“Breeding brothers?” I looked from the word to the image of the men and the woman who looked to be in so much ecstasy that even in black squiggly lines I could hear the moans. Although that might be from the most recent addition to the stacks.
I quickly turned a few more pages, thankful that not every page was accompanied by a picture worthy of Hugh Hefner’s Horny Time Papers. Not that the headlines were much better.
Breeding Practices of Shared Mates.
Loyalty and Sexual Pleasures.
Multiple Vaginal… Insertions.
Who knew that such a desensitized word could do such things to me? Would send that feral growling over me. The sound was so foreign, so animalistic, that I couldn’t imagine it coming from the golden-eyed Finn. Maybe he was just that territorial of his, I swallowed, mate.
There was nothing in this book about the mating habits of the supernatural, or about why I was suddenly finding myself connected to not one, but two supernaturals outside my race. Well, I guess just Finn, who was still outside my race. Given the graphic image on the right hand of the page, I was beginning to think that Vampire boy was as horny and cock-starved as the librarian. This book had nothing other than tricks on how to be fucked by both of them at once.
Everything was getting hot. Too hot for clothes, for breathing...
I exhaled and almost shut the book right then and followed after Scarlet, or the Vampire, but there was a hand in my way—a slightly calloused, tad bit hairy, and perfectly manicured hand. Weird combination, but it was all I needed to know who was now occupying Scarlet’s seat.
“What do you want?” I growl-hissed, still trying to close the book and whip the thing away from Howl. He was the last person I wanted to get their hands on this.
The wolf princeling sat there like a demi-god, a smug grin on his face, looking a little less like an asshole. He looked like a semi-decent human being. Somehow, extracting Selene from his ass, or I guess from his cock did wonders for his resting bitch face.
“Where’s your…” cock-sucking, don’t say cock-sucking, “girlfriend. Practicing for the next ass-whooping I am going to give her?”
I was walking on hot coals and I knew it, luckily Howl didn’t so much as growl, although his lip did tweak into what I could have sworn was a half-smile.
“Something like that,” he mused, leaning back in his chair and throwing his hands behind his head. “You fought one of the most powerful females in the pack--”
“And won,” I added before he could say anything else. That smile twitched once more before fading, although the smoky green color in his eyes did not leave.
“Yes, you did. I have to say, it was quite a display.” The smile was back and my heart was stopping again.
Goddamnit. I already had enough problems with my Fae mate, the vampire with the roaming fingers, and now my wolf was purring (yes, she was fucking purring) inside of me thanks to the smoldering look Howl was giving me. It was like he was shooting pheromones at me with his eyes.
God, why in the fuck was I trying to flirt when he hated me and had that sex on a stick girl? Hadn’t I already decided on day one that I wasn’t going to turn into a walking cliché?
Get your act together, Ivy.
“What? Are animals attempting to rip the throat out of other animals the equivalent to greased-up cage matches in shifter world?” Snark and sass. I expected the guy to lean away. Nope. He got closer.
“Something like that. We value strength and prowess in our mates. The stronger the female, the more a wolf wants her.”
“Wait. I thought we did that fated, true mates’ stuff. One look in the eyes and your genitalia fuses for time and all eternity.”
“Yes, but that is certainly influenced by the compatibility of two wolves. Strengths. Weaknesses. Bloodline.” He flipped his hand to the side like it was nothing, but my stomach was doing the same motion for a completely different reason.
“I don’t like where this is going.” Or how the guy was looking at me. I frantically turned the page, desperate for something to keep me from getting lost in the heat of his gaze.
It was a mistake. The orgy picture that was now staring up at me, was twice as bad as the first one, although thankfully Howl didn’t seem to notice.
“Haven’t you noticed how men have been following you around?” He gave a nod toward the stacks and Evan that was unabashedly staring at me from the shadows. “Not just shifters, either.” Another nod, this time to another guy, he wasn’t a shifter or a vampire. I didn’t know what he was, but the way he was looking at me made me uncomfortabl
e.
“They can sense your strength. They can smell your power on you.”
“Is that why you are here? You smell the pungent aroma of my power?” I rolled my eyes and went back to the book for a split second. “I must smell like a goddamned bouquet if it got you over here. I mean, you hate me.”
He blanched and leaned back in his chair, smile all but gone now. Guess I hit a nerve. Of course, I did that the second I beat his girlfriend’s ass. Which, now that I was thinking about it, was why he was over here.
If Scarlet was right and Selene was scared of me, there is no way she’s let him over here. Unless her blow job worked.
I shifted in my chair and moved to turn the page but froze when his hand wrapped around mine. His rough, warm, overly large hand that aroused my wolf which such force it was a miracle I didn’t shift right then and there.
“I don’t hate you. You are creating quite a few problems for me, Ivy.” The way he said my name should not be doing such things to me.
I pushed the twirling energy that was trying to infect my heart away and I leaned over the table my eyes digging into his.
“Is that why you have come to fix it?” I spat the words out, trying to calm down the electrical firestorm that was raging inside of me.
“No,” he sighed, hand dropping from mind to spread over the book between us, holding it in place before he slowly turned the incriminating thing toward him. “I’ve come for civilized conversation. Sometimes I can’t keep myself away from the things I want--”
He froze, his gaze falling to the page and the picture of another ecstatic woman that was splayed between a few naked males, although none of them vampires that time.
I don’t think I had ever gone so red, so fast.
“Give that back!” I tried to sound forceful. Instead, it came out as a squeak.
“What the hell are you reading, little wolf?” He said with a voice that was a bit like honey. Or it would have been if he didn’t irritate the hell out of me.
I growled and practically threw myself across the table to grab the book, but he spun in his chair and pulled it away, holding it above his head as he began to read.
“Oh my, you are a prude, ‘When engaging in a group mating ritual with more than one shifter, the shifters mate instinct should be considered to avoid disputes. The alpha male shall take the mate in any way he desires before the other males join in their bonding.’” He looked up at me, a weird expression on his face before he turned the page and read down a bit more.
“Seriously, give it back Howl.”
“The practice ages back to the beginning and the purest of blood,” He swallowed and skipped forward a few pages. “Have the alpha enter into the woman, placing her between himself and his second so that she is exposed for a second ripening. When both males have entered the woman, an alternating plunging pattered is favored as it increases the pleasure for all parties as well as leaving the throat of the woman exposed for a third entrance.’”
He had gone stone white, his eyes slowly lifting to mine as I sat in a cloud of red blush, having thoroughly forgotten how to breathe.
“Been roaming the stacks, have we?” Even his voice was choked. At this point the oxygen had been sucked away from our corner of the library.
“I have. You’d be surprised all the things I wandered into.” I wagged my eyebrows at him in a hopeful prod, he only exhaled and ran his hand through his hair.
“Like dirty books?”
“I’m supposed to be researching the mating habits of supernaturals.” I made a reach for the book, but he pulled it away, his chair squeaking loudly and pulling the attention of two of the replicated librarians.
“And how to be fucked by all of them at once.” Why did he use that word?
“No!” I tried to grab for the book again, but damn he was fast, spinning and squeaking as one of the librarians made her way over. “Someone gave it to me. It’s the wrong book.”
“Was is a Vamp? I bet it was a Vamp. This is exactly the kind of kinky shit those blood-suckers love.” He was flipping through the pages now, so many hard pricks flashing past that it was looking like a phallic flipbook.
“No, I just… I just found it okay.”
“Do you want to be fucked by a Vamp, Ivy?” He stopped dodging my grabby hands, stopped flipping pages and leaned over the table to me. His piercing eyes made my breath catch in my throat, his voice taking on a deep growl that was sending my wolf and my thighs into a thoroughly hot clench.
Yes.
“No.” I took the opportunity to grab the book and pull it away from him, shoving it in my lap before he got any more ideas. “Besides isn’t mating outside your race completely prohibited?”
“Yes.” He didn’t hesitate to answer. “Although judging by that ancient thing, it didn’t use to be.” Looking up he shook his head. “Even demons...who knew?”
“What?” I gasped, trying to wrap my head around what he had said.
“Purest of blood?” I repeated what he had said before, my wolf growling and lunging and pressing against my rib cage in an eagerness that I didn’t feel completely human.
“That’s referring to the originals. Thousands of years before our time.”
“You mean shifters have always been naked, horny masses? Shocker.” I resisted the urge to look back at the book. I needed to dispose of, or hide, this thing. Probably under my bed seeing as it was basically porn for shifters.
“I guess all the vamps and fae that fuck around this school know something we don’t.” He shrugged and stood; his pants tented enough that it was clear I wasn’t the only one reacting to the porn on the pages.
“Make sure you pay attention to the details on that one, Ivy. There’s some good info in there.”
With a wink, he was gone. Leaving me wet, confused, and with more questions than boners that were hiding in the stacks.
Although now I was left with one very serious question; if interspecies mating used to be a thing, why was I a magnet for it?
Even worse, why was I longing for it?
Chapter 14
I lightly fingered the fading scar on my cheek, Saenger’s lecture on the first Lycan serving more like background noise against my incessant internal monologue. It had been a week since my cage-fight with Selene and I had run over everything that had happened so many times I was starting to confuse facts with the disturbing fiction.
Like the voice in my head that I now realized I was delusional to think belonged to Finn, or the fact that my wolf had been so big I had looked down at Selene. Or that the cut had been so deep skin had freaking flapped off my face. Now it was little more than a faint pink line.
Fuck, shifters were supposed to heal rapidly from what I’d read, but this was ridiculous. I didn’t know if it was the magic Finn was convinced I had, or the werewolf blood, or both. I am sure the monster book I was currently trying to make my way through would have the answer. If only it was as interesting as the one the vampire had left me. I had scoured that one into the night, and even took it into the bathroom with me on more than one occasion.
The images, the way they described wolf and vampire mating practices… Yes, I had been looking for more info than that, but besides the constant chatter about ‘pure’ and ‘ancient’ blood, half of it used terms and phrases that I didn’t understand. I wasn’t going to ask Scarlet to play translator.
“Why are we learning about the bullshit wolf humper anyway?” Evan suddenly piped up, pulling me out of my revelry and right back to the class that was tittering at the word ‘humping.’
The teacher looked shocked like he had forgotten he was teaching two dozen nineteen and twenty-year-olds.
“Wolf humper!” Saenger gasped, the tops of his cheeks turning slightly red. “Kalensa was not a wolf humper, she was a witch. A witch that created your oldest ancestor! I will not stand for such… such…” he continued to sputter and gasp until he banged his walking stick against the ground, pulling himself to attention and causing ev
eryone to jump.
An especially terrified girl two rows over even dropped her book on the ground, giving a tiny yelp.
“As I was saying,” Saenger said at a near roar. “The first Lycan wasn’t a wolf at all. He was a human in love with a witch. The powerful Kalensa and her mortal lover, Oberion, were married in secret, but soon after Oberion became sick and was on his death bed in a matter of days.”
“Witch vagina. It’ll do it to you. Dry as a bone.” I turned to see who had spoken, but all I saw was the chuckling boys at the back. Evan sat right in the middle, laughing.
He winked at me like he had slid me some smooth pick up line.
“Sick,” I hissed at him and turned back around.
“Kalensa tried everything.” Saenger continued, writing names on the blackboard and unaware of the smut oozing from the back row. “Her journals describe how she took a newt’s heart and attempted to join it with his in the hoped the creature’s magic would heal him. She created a concoction of human flesh and the dark smoke from hell that she hoped would heal him. Spells and brews and vile acts that even the witches of today condone. None of it worked. Some say she even invoked a demon, to help, but it only tried to feed on her essence. Which is why we don’t allow demons in this school--they are feeders--nothing more nothing less--I digress.”
Most everyone had gone back to drawing, or reading, or passing notes, but I sat transfixed, chin in my hand as I stared at him.
“One night, out of pure desperation, Kalensa took the soul from a wolf who had wandered onto their land and placed it in her husband. Miraculously, it worked, for a while. Can anyone tell me what happened next?”
He spoke the question at a dull roar, the glassy-eyed class springing to attention as they frantically looked around, trying to figure out what he had asked. Unfortunately for us, Evan was ready.
“On the first full moon, Oberion shifted and killed her. He ripped her throat right open and guzzled her blood. He ate her organs and bathed with what was left.”