“It’s supposed to be. It’s a piece of the Mother’s heart.”
“Creepy,” she muttered.
“Infinitely.” I reached for her hand, gently clasped my fingers about hers, and whispered, “Swim with me?”
She pressed her other hand to the stone and used it to lever off the rock. As she slipped into the water, she immediately moved into me, and when her arms clasped my waist and I felt her face burrow into the sparse hair on my chest, I was touched to feel the wetness that had nothing to do with being in a pool of water.
It had everything to do with her being upset.
“I almost lost you,” she rasped.
“But you didn’t,” I soothed.
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“I knew the Mother would help us.”
“I did too,” she huffed. “Once I stopped panicking. But that didn’t make me worry less. It’s not like you can go anywhere until we have a child, and in the chaos, me getting pregnant and spawning a gazillion kids wasn’t going to put my mind at rest.”
My lips twitched. “A gazillion? We’ll only have one.”
That took the wind from her sails. “Only one?”
I laughed. “Weren’t you just complaining about that?”
“Well, that was before,” she grumbled.
“Before what?”
“Before I knew we’d only have one,” she argued, but her arms tightened around my waist even more, to the point of discomfort. I got it though. I did. And I let my embrace reflect the need I felt for her, a need that went beyond sexual, that was even beyond corporeal.
I needed her in a way no man had ever needed his woman.
But she’d been through a lot today, and I wasn’t going to rush her. Wasn’t going to—
Her tongue traced over my pec, instantly making any and every thought whisper away. I had to cover the urge to groan just in case she stopped, but when her hands moved down to my butt, when she dug her nails into me, I didn’t even bother, just tipped my head down and pressed a kiss to her cheek, her temple, wherever I could reach.
She traced kisses of her own over to my nipples, licking and nipping as she moved before she hit the nub and started sucking on it. I gritted my teeth, annoyed by how susceptible I was to her, even if I loved it too.
My cock hardened, and I felt it rub against her stomach. Her back arched, and she shimmied against me, making the water splash, and I ground my dick into her, loving that she responded like wildfire, that she hitched her leg around my hip and hiked her way up my body.
From zero to hero, that kiss had morphed into something else. Her heat rocked against my belly, caressing the tip of my dick as water trickled down over me, and I grunted as our mouths finally collided.
She took total charge, and I let her. I had a feeling this might be her first time, and I was fine with her taking control, leaving her to set the pace, because I knew this was the one thing in this situation she could manage. The second she’d taken the fox bead, I’d learned about her. Everything that she’d hope I couldn’t know.
I knew about the taunts at school, the almost-assault that had only stopped when a teacher had walked into the locker room, I knew about the endless search for a quiet place, somewhere to live without being bothered, and I knew about the many years in a cabin in the middle of a forest.
I knew too much, but it would never be enough. What I knew revealed a past that saddened me, that urged me to do everything I could to improve her present and her future.
It was my task as her mate, but it was my pleasure, my joy to see her content. To see her living her best life. To be one of the reasons for it.
Her mouth trailed over my throat, licking along the sinew there, sucking down against my pulse point before she palpated it over the throbbing flesh, and I had to admit that, however I’d expected to spend the rest of the night once I dropped her off from the diner after our informal meal together, it wasn’t here. It wasn’t with her on me, trying to get so close because skin to skin wasn’t enough.
I groaned, unable to stop it as I moved my hand down over her ass and between her buttcheeks. When I encountered her wet slit, I traced further down and began to nudge her clit from the back. She squealed, hips rocking against me and my finger, before she nipped my throat. Hard enough to sting.
My dick pulsated at the touch, loving the bite, and when she moved higher, tracing along the hard line of my jaw, I said nothing, just let her explore, so long as she was happy to let me explore too.
I rubbed her clit, loving the mewls that vibrated against my skin, loving how she found no shame in her feet digging into my butt, her hips arching as she worked herself against me, helping me help her experience pleasure.
She finally found my mouth, her lips moving to mine, and when she ate at me, her tongue thrusting in deep, kissing me like I’d kissed her earlier, I grunted as she gave me everything she had to give.
She had no yeowoo guseul, but she didn’t need to have it. She was everything because she was mine.
Her knees squeezed my waist, and I had to admit, I’d never anticipated making my claim here, in Nevaehai, but it was right. It was perfect.
She arched up, like our thoughts were running parallel, and reached between us, her hand on my dick as she slipped the tip into her gate. My nostrils flared, discerning the faintest trace of hyena, but mostly, she scented of me. Of kumiho. Perfect.
I’d never imagined how orgasmic a smell could be, but then, I’d never met her before.
Darting forward as she slipped down onto me, I pulled her nipple into my mouth and suckled on it, tracing my teeth around the tip, licking and flicking as she rode me while I supported us both in the water.
Surface licks fluttered against our skin, the fall made waves shudder and lap too, forcing sensation after sensation onto us, amping up something that was already incredibly powerful. A groan rumbled from me as she ground herself into me, harder and faster, proving she wasn’t the virgin I’d thought as she moved against me like a woman who knew what she wanted—and I was damn glad for that.
I wanted her to know her body, wanted her to own it, to own her pleasure. To demand it from me, to take it.
Nibbling her nipple, I pulled back and did as she had, nuzzling between her chest before moving upward, licking and flicking, sucking here and there, before I reached her throat. I sucked on her pulse point, making parallel moves with every single one she made, and I groaned in response to the way her pussy tightened down around me.
Her head fell back, her hair trailing down, tickling over my hands which were high up on her shoulders and low at the base of her back as I supported her.
She rocked harder, getting herself off, taking us both higher and higher, until she clenched down around me, hard enough to trigger the knot.
As it pulsed into being, she released a shriek, her head rocked forward, her eyes on mine as she gaped at me, even as she rocked. Moving faster now, using the knot to her own gain, she tugged at it as she was supposed to, clinging to it with her pussy walls until she exploded around me.
As I’d been warned from the beginning of time itself, I watched as, with each exhalation she made as her orgasm detonated her from the inside out, small speckles of gold light burst from her pores, bathing me in it, soaking me in the rays.
Only then, when she had her pleasure, could I come. Only then, when I was touched by her light, could I explode into her, roaring my delight, roaring my need as my woman, my mate, claimed me as much as I claimed her. In the Pool of Dreams, Aqueirai, in Nevaehai…two places I’d never envisaged seeing, never mind where I imagined I’d mark her as mine.
For an eternity.
Sabina
When Austin slapped the hyena in the chair, I ducked my head, hating to see this, hating to be a witness to such brutality, but the bitch of it was, I knew when someone was lying in the pack, so my mates were hoping that, ergo, I’d be able to detect lies from the hyenas.
The logic sucked. Because here I
was, in a room in the basement I hadn’t even known existed, with instruments and devices strapped to the wall that I wished I could unsee, all as we tried to figure out what the purpose was for the hyenas’ attack.
Jana had always been self-serving, to the point of idiocy. She had to have brought her people here for a reason. It was how she worked. It couldn’t simply be because of that nonsense over a vision, could it?
It was a testament to how little sisterly feeling there was between us that I wasn’t even saddened by her death. Mostly, I was just saddened by the trauma we’d all been put through.
Knight had saved so many people the other day, not just our pack, but the pack of naturals too. But it wasn’t like he’d clicked his fingers and made everything better. We were both exhausted, both weary, and being here was the last thing I wanted or needed.
We’d locked the surviving hyenas in cages, and the man in the chair had reverted back to human skin while imprisoned. He was our second attempt at discovering the truth. There were another twenty cages in here, still with hyenas in them, shifters who refused to revert to this skin. It was smart, considering how much more vulnerable they were, which meant this one—and the guy before him—were not so smart.
The room was the length of the house, but half the width. Though I’d known there was a basement, and I’d known it was for storage, I’d never imagined there’d be an in-built torture chamber, ready and waiting for an attack that required people to be interrogated.
The rectangular-shaped room had gray walls with all kinds of spatter on them that I truly hoped was an artistic device and not blood, as well as rusty metal things that looked as if they’d been used during the Spanish Inquisition—not the latter half either. This stuff was all medieval, and disturbing with it.
At the back, there were randomly-strewn cages, and in the far corner, there was even a kind of jail cell, solitary confinement-style. Right at the front, toward the exit, there were four chairs that were bolted into the ground, crude wood carvings with steel bolts and rough clasps that looked pretty damn impossible to escape from.
The male in the hotspot’s hands and feet were bolted to the arm rests and legs, and he was naked. Not a stitch on him, except for the parts where blood had seeped and covered his flesh.
My mates had been born with a beast inside them, but I’d never been exposed to that side of them before. Not where it felt…unnecessary.
Of course, it was necessary. We needed to understand the motives behind the chaos of the other night, even if we’d managed to right all the wrongs that had befallen us. No one had died, thanks to Knight’s incredible gift to the pack, but that didn’t mean people weren’t confused, hurting, and distressed after the brutality of an unnecessary battle.
I could sense their unease, their need to understand, so that was why I endured this torture. Why I’d watched a man being butchered in front of his clan, by my mate, because that was what being a leader meant.
You had to do things you didn’t like.
You had to see things you didn’t want to see.
Austin knew each slap hurt me, but he’d stopped looking at me with apology in his eyes after every smack, every stab. I knew even that was only because each glance at me had made him look weak, and the other hyena had mocked him for it.
That was when I’d seen that my nurturing side was a weakness at this moment. That was when I’d learned I had to toughen up.
I stood by the door, ready to get the hell out of here if I thought I was going to puke like last time. Over by the only window in the basement, a low one that peered out onto ground level, Eli was sitting in a desk chair in front of a desk that was barren of all papers—because it made sense that there’d be no paperwork in torture—and Ethan was leaning against the wall at his side, watching events with a brooding stare.
Both of them had been quiet since the attack two nights ago. I wanted to comfort them, but my milk had just come through, and as Lara had said, Knight was no longer hungry. I’d expected to feel triumph at finally being able to nourish my son, but there was only relief and no joy at being enough for our wunderkind.
The second they’d seen how I could feed him better than before, however, they’d backed off, and because I didn’t understand the whys or the hows, and because there was a hell of a lot going on, I was okay just to climb into bed and to sleep.
But after today?
No way.
I needed affirmation. I needed it badly.
This side of my mates wasn’t one I was used to seeing, and I needed to feel the old them, to reconcile what battle did to them. I knew it changed soldiers, and my men, while alphas, weren’t soldiers. They were just shifters. Leaders. But not meant for battle.
I flinched when Austin sliced into the hyena, his claw appearing on his right hand like it was normal. Like he could just grow that kind of shit at his very whim. I’d never seen him do that before, and I had to figure it was because of the situation… At least, I hoped it was, and that it didn’t happen when he had a finger inside me.
Sheesh.
I’d only ever seen these partial shifts during moments where control was lost, but Austin was totally himself. Stern, assured, even.
I thought about anything other than watching the skin part, revealing shredded fat and torn muscle, about the blood oozing out of the wound, sliding down the hyena’s writhing chest as he struggled against his bonds, trying to escape the rough justice my mate was intent on giving him.
White noise filled my ears, buzzed in my brain, overtaking it like a swarm of wasps were invading my head. I knew it was them. I didn’t know how or why, just who. And it was overwhelming.
“Just tell us why, for God’s sake,” I shrieked, overcome, when Austin anointed the other side of his chest with a similar mark, and the beast howled.
The sound morphed into a cackle, one that I remembered from my haunted dreams, from my terrified nightmares. It sank into my bones, loading me with a fear that triggered an anger so deep, my she-wolf demanded I act. These bastards thought any and every emotion was a weakness.
It wasn’t.
Emotions, to feel them, didn’t mean someone was weak.
It was to be human.
And sometimes, being human, in a shifter world, was not a bad thing.
Of course, at that moment, I was pure she-wolf as I stormed forward and grabbed the hyena by the throat. My fingers dug into him, into the soft flesh around his windpipe as I squeezed. Mother, I squeezed so hard that it was like I was trying to squeeze the answers out of him.
“Just tell us!” I screamed, and with my spare hand, I batted at Austin and Ethan, who had rushed forward from his position against the wall to come and grab me. Even Eli sat up.
Only, I didn’t let go, and the hyena’s eyes bugged as he tried to reach for any and all air he could get.
When his face was bright pink, when his eyes were bloodshot with burst capillaries, only then did I release him and snarl, “Why?”
And the second I asked, he pissed himself and wheezed, “We were under orders!”
Of course.
Matriarchal.
I glared at my men, who raised their hands in apology, and I knew they’d been pushing me to do this. Pushing me into action.
Austin had been down here a while before they’d asked me to sit in, so they’d known then that the hyenas wouldn’t answer to just anyone. That was why I was here. Not because I could discern the difference between truth and lies when they were spoken, but because these bastards would only listen to a female.
I jerked back, my feet skipping away from the puddle of piss gathering on the floor as I turned away from my men, glaring at the door as I tried to figure out a way to comport myself without turning into a shrew.
Rubbing my face on my sleeve when I realized I was drenched with sweat, I glared at nothing, at the floor, at the fucking blood spatters on the wall, before I spun around and demanded, “Whose orders?”
“Jana’s,” the hyena whispere
d, his head bowed and his gaze unable to reach mine. “She’s our leader.”
“She was. She’s dead,” I told him coldly. “Why would you attack us?”
“To preserve our clan,” he replied miserably. “She was our future. Without her, we are nothing.”
My brow puckered at that, and for the first time, I cast glances at my mates. They all looked sheepish, and somehow, their minds were locked down tight or vice versa, I wasn’t sure which—if I was keeping them out, or they were keeping me out.
The idea actually pissed me off more than I could say, because if they were locking me out, then they sucked.
I reached up and rubbed the back of my neck, before I tried to broadcast my thoughts. It was harder than it should be, which made me wonder if it was because of the stress I was under.
I sucked down some air, tried to calm myself down, then carefully asked, “Can you hear me?”
“Yes!” Eli snapped.
Ethan roared, “Where the hell did you go?”
“How did you do that? Don’t do it again!” Austin ground out.
The answers bombarded me, and even though not a one of them had moved, even though they didn’t reveal the truth of their distress in their expression, I saw it and felt their anxiety at how I’d locked them out.
Ironic, really. Especially with Austin, who found it harder than the others to accept that I could pluck thoughts out of his mind like I was digging for the letter ‘G’ in a tin of alphabet soup.
Not willing to answer the question, not only because I didn’t actually know how I’d done it when I’d never managed before, I rumbled, “Is he lying? Is a leader the future of a clan?”
Ethan sighed, and in his eyes, I knew he saw that I was pissed, but because he was the most rational of my mates, he accepted it and gave me what I needed most at that moment. Not a kiss or a hug, but the truth.
“It depends on the clan. Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. The fact that Jana couldn’t shift, yet had to be guarded in battle and was still the leader, tells me that she was very skilled at controlling them in other ways.”
Moon Child: A PNR Shifter Romance (The Year of the Wolf Book 2) Page 26