Hearts Unleashed: A Limited Edition Paranormal Romance and Urban Fantasy Collection

by C. D. Gorri

  “Let’s have a nightcap and some conversation,” Echo suggested, and after making sure that Cadie was situated comfortably with her shoes off in front of the blazing fire, all the brothers gathered around her.

  “We have more to tell you about our lives,” Largo explained, exchanging significant looks with Echo and Smoke,

  “A lot more actually. We only ask that you reserve judgment and hear us out. We appreciate so much your attitude toward our…our lifestyle, but there is a lot more to it and it is nothing that can wait I’m afraid!”

  “Largo you are scaring me,” Cadie said, sitting up with difficulty. She’d had quite a bit to drink during her birthday celebration and was feeling floaty and rather unfocused.

  Echo, sitting beside her, cradled her right hand in both his own.

  “You know that we are all not only men but also wolves, and therefore–” a flicker of a smile appeared on his lips briefly as he continued, “and therefore multicultural all by ourselves. Let me explain…

  We are human and so are subject to the mores and statutes of the modern human civilization. We are successful hoteliers and businessmen. We are educated and productive and support quite a few charities, mostly wildlife charities.

  We are also wolves, one of the most ancient and magnificent creatures to ever roam the planet. As wolves we are subject to other traditions, some are part of our DNA, and we live in the manner that wolves have lived since ancient times, in packs and following the pack hierarchy. To some, our wolf ways might seem cruel or arbitrary, but nature is the greatest economist. Every single rule is in place for one purpose, to assure the survival of the pack.

  I am the Alpha, Smoke is my right-hand wolf, second in command, my Beta pack leader. Largo is my third in command. It is a position generally occupied by elder wolves, but since our father was killed Largo has shown great wisdom both in advising me and strategic planning for the pack.

  The third culture we are members of is the shifter culture, a culture that thrives mostly unseen in the world of humans. There are different governing and regulatory bodies involved in global shifter and Animagus factions, and we are expected to observe them.”

  Echo looked over at Smoke and Largo, Smoke rolled his eyes and made a winding motion with his hands as if to say, “Get to the point, dude!”

  “What I am trying to say is that when we made love the very first time, I bit you—marked you, Cadie. My human side wanted to explain everything and ask your permission first, but my Wolf had different ideas, and so it happened that night.

  You will find over the course of the next few days that you will be able to transition into wolf form also. You are a wolfshifter now, and there is more…

  Wolves mate for life. I had a mate once before and I loved her dearly, but she died having our child. I despaired of ever finding another mate…

  And then one day, out of the blue, you arrived at the Winterborn Cascades, and it didn’t take my Wolf any time at all to alert me that my fated mate was in the house!”

  Cadie sat straight up, stretching her hands out in front of her.

  “Holy fricking shit—so one day I will go to freshen my lip gloss and discover that I have paws instead of opposable thumbs?”

  “Nothing so dramatic,” Largo assured her, “more like you will start feeling the presence of your own wolf. You will have heightened sense of smell, hearing and vision, as a true hunter and, also, mind you, the Alpha female of the pack.”

  When Cadie didn’t react, he added, “You will be our queen, Arcadia!”

  Cadie collapsed back against the leather cushions.

  “That’s a lot to absorb,” she said after a few seconds, “but the strangest thing…

  I feel like this was my destiny or something—does that make any sense at all?”

  Smoke, sitting on Cadie’s opposite side hugged her and kissed her on the forehead.

  “You are such a little sport,” he said chuckling. Then his expression became serious.

  “The reason we are all talking to you, Cadie, is that something very rare has happened, and we are afraid that the knowledge of it might be too much for you.”

  Taking a deep breath, he concluded, “We all perceive that you are our fated mate! Echo, Largo, and I all want to claim you, Arcadia, as our mate!

  An unusual situation to be sure, but by now I am sure that you understand this is nothing we have any control over.

  You on the other hand, do have some say! If you choose to reject any of us, with the exception of Echo, of course, we will respect your wishes, even though it would break both Largo’s heart, and my own. It would mean that we would have no choice but to languish in love for you until we die, for we can have no other mate while you walk this Earth.

  But if you will accept us as your mates, the Tetrad that will be formed will be a never-ending source for you of everything human beings want in life. We will all love you. We will all devote ourselves to protecting you, and making sure that all your needs are met…

  …All of them. If you accept us as mates, all of us, we will dote upon you, love you, make love to you, and hopefully, produce offspring with you.

  But, as I said before, it is really up to you!”

  Cadie looked around at the Winterborns. Echo smiled at her, because he knew that his love for her was shared. The other two, Smoke and Largo, had expressions both of longing and hope. They both looked like they were holding their breaths as they awaited her decision.

  “You can breathe now,” she told them, blushing slightly as she spoke and met their dark eyes full of expectation,

  “My Wolf Approves!”

  Chapter Eleven: Tetrad Temptations

  With a sense of complete wonder, Cadie found herself surrounded by Echo, Smoke, and Largo at the same time, in a celebration of the love and sexual magnetism that was as strong as any force of the universe.

  Stronger than gravity, electromagnetism, or even nuclear force.

  So many mouths to kiss, so many arms to fall into, so many hands caressing her at once. All of it, especially in her inebriated state where all the contact of their bodies with her own had its own mildly electrical sensation. It seemed to run over all of their bodies, connecting them.

  She allowed herself to be picked up and carried into the bedroom with a sense of sexual voracity. She felt wild with desire, greedy because she desired not just one, but all of them.

  Silently and as a unified beast with many strong backs, eager mouths and hands and no less than three cocks between them, they launched on a carefully orchestrated campaign to claim Arcadia permanently as their own mate for all time.

  So much gentle assistance in removing her clothing, all of it dropping off her body and onto the floor on the way to the bedroom.

  “So beautiful, you are so beautiful,” they told her, though Cadie wasn’t sure if they were speaking aloud or only in her mind.

  The sensation of having both her nipples suckled vigorously and simultaneously while her thighs were gently parted and a tongue separated her vulva to dip into her opening teasingly, circling it tantalizingly before sliding upward and capturing her clitoris between two lips, sucking and nipping at it were so pleasurable as to nearly be unbearable. She was so wet, and she was vaguely aware that they were changing position as they continued to explore and pleasure every inch of her flesh.

  Periodically she felt Largo’s silky black straight hair pass over her skin as he trailed his tongue between her breasts, down her belly to her pubic mound and back again. She was aware of Smoke’s beard and mustache tickling her pussy when he and Echo changed positions and Echo alternately kissed her possessively on the mouth while tugging on her nipples with his fingers.

  When Largo brushed against her lips with the head of his cock, she opened her mouth, taking in just the head at first and then strumming the length of it with her tongue. Then somehow, she was taking turns licking and sucking two penises, just as she felt eager hands cup both her buttocks and a third throbbing cock plunge i
nto her.

  “Come for us baby, please come hard for us,” three voices crooned in her head, “we want to make you come hard…”

  And then a crescendo of sensation seemed to roll over her like a tidal wave. She felt a hot rush of semen explode deeply inside of her, a torrent that she arched her back to eagerly receive, at the same instant that Largo came in her mouth and Smoke’s penis that she had held in her hand and been stroking ejaculated between her breasts.

  She heard herself scream as she came, though the sound seemed to come from somewhere distant. She was also aware that she had been twice marked in the process, the marking by Smoke and Largo had a pleasurable warmth and also the sensation of a coursing electrical current as Largo marked her above her left breast and Smoke marked her inner thigh.

  It was a sacred moment, and the bed in which she had received her wolfen shifter lovers became a Sacrificial Font. She had surrendered all that she was to them, and in return had been granted the love and everlasting devotion of three beautiful creatures that were perhaps the best combination of tame and wild, and also new abilities…

  But these would not be evident until the next full moon, and it was coming up fast.

  She slept dreamlessly held in their protective arms, two on either side and one curled around her feet.

  She awakened to a rumble of voices over her head. She reluctantly half opened one eye to see Echo, Smoke, and Largo gathered above her. All of them were already showered, groomed and dressed casually but nicely for their regular workday at the Winterborn Cascades Lodge.

  “Well, hello beautiful!” Echo said cheerfully, “Please don’t bother to get up. I already called to have breakfast sent to the room! We need to get to work, but don’t be in a rush…”

  “I love you so much,” Largo told her, bending down to plant a kiss on her forehead, “I know I speak for all of us when I tell you that we are beyond honored to…”

  “To be your mates and to be allowed to love you, Arcadia! I hope you feel the same way we do, in spite of the rather unusual circumstances…”

  “We didn’t know, you see,” Echo told her, reaching down to gently brush the hair from her face, “This kind of fated mating is rather rare, and I knew at first that I had not only fallen in love with you, but that you were definitely meant to be my mate…”

  “A surprise to all of us, let me tell you,” Smoke told her, placing his hand over one of her feet under the covers, “And even when I was sure that you were my destined mate, I knew Echo had claimed you already, and I thought he might kill me if I told him!”

  “I always knew, from the first moment I set eyes on you, sitting together at the bar lounge,” Largo said quietly, his smoke-colored eyes looking at her with admiration, “I waited my entire life to feel what I had always heard other Wolfshifters talk about—the sensation that somehow everything has changed, that you know your true purpose and that nothing is more important than being with your mate…

  I’m sure it must be overwhelming to wrap your head around, but it is REAL, I swear!”

  Arcadia found herself overwhelmed with emotion. What could she say to them? They were right—it had been a crazy whirlwind of events and revelations during the past few days.

  Her life had changed and so had she. She felt like a different person, kind of like a girl that had been living in a shell that the Winterborns had somehow managed to break open so that she could truly become her authentic self.

  …Wasn’t that what destiny was all about?

  Chapter Twelve: Her First Full Moon

  The first time Arcadia shifted into her wolf, she was barely conscious, still in a dreamlike state, and was conscious of being surrounded by the human forms of her fated mates, Echo, Smoke, and Largo.

  They looked like beautiful sleeping wingless fallen angels, and their bodies formed a protective nest around her.

  As she stretched, she saw in her line of vision two soft paws covered with silver fur, a color not unlike her platinum blonde hair she sported as a human.

  Her first reaction was to scream, but her wolf just emitted a sound that was something between a growl and a loud purr.

  Instantly all three of her mates became wide awake, gathering around her, and saying things that confused her.

  “I thought it would wait until tonight,” Echo was saying, “Well fuck me sideways—guess NOT!”

  “Don’t be afraid Cadie,” Smoke was saying, smoothing his hand over the fur on her head, “this is perfectly natural.”

  “We are here, my sweet darling,” Largo interjected, “don’t panic. Just as easily as you shifted, you can shift back…

  Just pull up the human energy from your lower plexus. All of this is controlled by the sympathetic nervous system—the adrenals and so forth.

  Easy peasy, sweetheart.”

  Cadie at once was aware of a tingling in the center of her wolf form, and she watched her pale human skin replace fur, and her vision, hearing, and sense of smell became less acute.

  “THERE YOU ARE!” Smoke chortled, “My you are great at shifting. A real natural. Call the press!”

  “I don’t understand why this would happen just now!” She said, examining her hands to assure herself she was fully human again, “I mean I was just dreaming…”

  “That’s how it happened for me, actually,” Smoke told her with an earnest and equally relieved expression on his face, “I was dreaming of hunting…

  Speaking of hunting tonight is the full moon and we will be hunting—as well as introducing your wolf to the pack formally.

  Your wolf looks amazing, by the way, very unique. I’ve never seen a Timberwolf shifter with a more glorious fur mantle—it’s kind of prismatic—I can’t wait to see it in the moonlight, Cadie.”

  Speechlessly Cadie threw her arms around Smoke, Echo, and Largo. And they moved in to envelop her in their arms also. All of them communicating calm and love and a sense of peace designed to slow her rapidly beating heart. Her first shift had definitely frightened her a bit.

  “I just wasn’t expecting that,” she said by way of an apology, finally letting go of Smoke, “took me off-guard. I don’t mean to be a Snowflake!”

  “It’s all good, really good in fact,” Echo assured her, “Today, per your request, I am setting you up in your own office as the Executive Manager in charge of Special Projects for the Winterborn. I had papers drawn up just to keep it kosher but you don’t need to sign anything if you don’t want…”

  “I think that’s a good idea,” Cadie told him, “It makes it more official somehow and I can’t wait to get started overseeing the projects we have planned.”

  What she wasn’t saying was that she needed a distraction, something that didn’t have anything to do with fucking all of her destined mates. It seemed to be all she thought about lately. Even though she secretly called herself a greedy girl, she loved the sensual attention they gave her.

  …And then there were the group orgasms. They always came together, and the amplified effect of experiencing her own orgasm plus sharing in the orgasms of her mates was the most fantastic feeling she had ever experienced.

  It was, in fact nearly impossible to describe, lasting longer than any single human orgasmic sensation and satisfying not only her body but her spirit and soul. It was transformative. It had established for her a permanent sense of belonging to Echo, Smoke, and Largo, and them to her.

  Nothing was more important. Nothing. Because they loved her unreservedly, she was able to return their love without holding back.

  The trio of her mates quickly helped her strip off her clothes and all of them showered in the huge gang shower with multiple shower nozzles, Smoke and Largo and Echo soaping her down as she playfully did the same for them.

  Even though there was no time for it, they managed to get in a quickie before breakfast—a stress relieving way to start the day.

  By the time she departed the suite for her office, Cadie felt completely relaxed.

  All of them were occupied
during the day, in their own pursuits and with a focus on keeping the complex operations of running the Winterborn Cascades Lodge on track. The goal of the Winterborns had always been to achieve balance and harmony. In as much as it was possible, they wanted to delight both their employees and their guests because good vibes and happiness were contagious, especially in a spectacular setting.

  Cadie had noticed that her stamina was increasing since she’d been bitten, marked by all three of her shifter lovers. Her appetite had increased, and even though she hadn’t lost weight, her generous bottom seemed firmer, her bountiful breasts higher and perkier than usual.

  They were so buoyant in fact that she found she was comfortable without a bra most of the time. She felt beautiful for the first time in her life.

  Because she had been born human with human perspectives of having one mate, and now was part of a Tetrad, she often checked to see if she loved any of her destined mates more than the others.

  It seemed impossible, but she loved all three of them. Echo would always have a special place in her heart because he had marked her first, or perhaps because he was the Alpha of the Winterborn Pack, but she felt the same devotion and affection toward all of them.

  The former plans she’d had before becoming a shifter seemed to pale in comparison. And privately, she had decided that EVERY female deserved three lovers…

  One just wasn’t enough!

  Chapter Thirteen: Moondance

  Cadie’s big reveal and first run with the pack didn’t turn out anything like she, or her destined mates, had anticipated.

  Echo had installed a special doggie door that went from the back of a large walk-in closet inside his master suite down an incline and into an underground passageway that terminated in a cave near Cobweb Hill. It was created for convenience, so that he didn’t have to lose too many clothing items in his transition from human to wolf form.

  All of the Winterborn Wolfshifters used it. After all, it wouldn’t do for guests to see huge Timberwolves emerging from the balcony of the suite. Even though very few guests were ever in the back of the Winterborn (all the entertaining outdoor activities were held on the Eastern side of the lodge, or the Southern side) they didn’t want to take any chances.