by T. S. Joyce
“You were a guard?”
Kirk nodded once. “I was dominant, bigger than all my half-brothers, and had come to an age where my animal instincts called for a family. A female and babies to protect. It’s all I could think about. All I wanted. Fuck.” Kirk clenched his jaw and shot a hard look up through the branches of the trees. “Let’s walk, or I won’t be able to do this.”
Silently, Alison kept pace beside him. She knew she shouldn’t touch him right now because Kirk’s voice had gone deep and feral and his entire body rigid. His eyes were glowing that sunny gold, and he made the air feel like it had weight, but she couldn’t not touch him when he was letting her in. Hesitating only a moment, she slipped her hand into his and bumped his shoulder.
Kirk gave her a slight smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Fiona chose me for guard duty, along with this asshole named Rhett, and she assigned us to her prize silverback, Kong.”
“King Kong,” she said softly as it clicked. “Of the Lowlanders.”
“Yeah, and he’s a brawler. He’s the first silverback I ever met who felt more dominant than me. And so I did the job Fiona assigned me. And I watched him fall for a girl in town. Layla. He tried to keep her at a distance. She was feeling something for him, too. I never believed in fate or anything like that, but those two were on this collision course, and I couldn’t stop it. After a while, I didn’t even want to. I wanted Kong to be happy, and he wanted a single mate and children he could raise himself because, deep down, that’s what I wanted, too. And the more I covered for him with Rhett, the more I let him slip into this relationship with a human, the more I knew Fiona would kill me for failing her.” Kirk shrugged, then pulled Alison against his side, draped his heavy arm around her shoulders. “I felt empty. Kong’s gorilla stifled my instincts to want anything for myself. My whole life was devoted to keeping someone I respected unhappy. Fiona was going to off me. Everything had gone sideways, and there was no way out of it.”
“So what did you do?”
“I made a stand with Kong. I didn’t have anything to live for, but I liked Layla, and I wanted Kong happy. Our people were so fucked up, but he had this chance to be okay with his mate, and I was grasping onto anything that gave me purpose.” Kirk kissed her hairline. “We’d chosen right when we moved here. We found unexpected allies. Kong killed Rhett, and when Fiona and all her guards came for her prize male, Kong and I didn’t face her alone. The Gray Backs went to battle for him too, and that dragon the humans are so afraid of ended Fiona and her reign. She’d been building an unwilling army with the silverbacks she wouldn’t allow to breed, but Damon freed us. Freed me.”
“But…you pledged as a Lowlander. You still pledged with your people.”
“With Kong. He’s a good man, and he and Layla are trying for a baby. And Kong’s mom, Josephine, is in the group. It might not be the life I wanted, but I got to be around good people. It was okay for a while. I was almost happy. I worked at Kong’s sawmill and even stayed in a spare room of his and Layla’s, but it was like watching the life I wanted through a window. Only I didn’t have the drive to actively find a mate because Kong’s animal keeps mine in check. I don’t think he even meant to. I started breathing easier when he released me to come up here and help out the Boarlanders for a logging season.”
“That’s the decision Damon was talking about,” she murmured as it all clicked into place. “You are struggling with the decision of whether to move back to Saratoga and rejoin the Lowlanders.”
Kirk huffed a breath and pulled her to a stop at the edge of a sandy beach on a river bank. To the right, there was a path up a cliff and a gorgeous waterfall tumbling over the edge. This was where she’d seen him and the Boarlanders for the first time when she’d come to retrieve Emerson.
“He’s been calling me.”
“Who?”
“Kong. I’ve been avoiding the talk. I know he wants me to come back to the sawmill. To his family group, but I don’t know what to say. Not yet.”
“What do you want to do? What do you imagine your future like, Kirk?”
She could see the moment he shut down. It was there in his eyes. The spark of conversation was snuffed out as the instant his face closed off. She hated that—his ability to push and pull so easily. Instead of answering her, Kirk pulled off his shirt and kicked out of his work boots.
She watched sadly as he shucked his clothes completely and strode into the waves, then disappeared under the dark water, aimed for the waterfall. And as he cut gracefully through the waves, it struck her for the first time that she loved him.
She’d never loved anyone. She hadn’t allowed herself to, but Kirk—hot and cold, sweet and hard, strong, protective, scared-of-affection Kirk—had drawn it from her. He hadn’t asked for her heart. He’d simply plucked it from her chest and held it gently, then dared her to come take it back from him. She didn’t even want to because at least she was capable of deep emotion. Of deep adoration. Of deep love.
It had taken someone who was damaged like her to give her this completely normal moment. This insecure, breathless, hope-filled, human moment that took a shifter to create.
Alison peeled out of her clothes. She was ready for him to see all of her. He’d tried to share all of himself, but he wasn’t strong enough yet, and that was okay. She would be patient. But she was already there—ready for all-in.
Alison stepped into the waves and stood on the sandy bottom for a moment, water lapping at her bare thighs as she took in the roiling dark clouds over the mountains. In the distance, lightning flashed through the sky in blinding veins of electricity. The storm would be here in half an hour, she guessed.
She held her breath and dove into the water, then swam toward the falls as long as her lungs could stand it. When she broke the surface, she was right by the pounding water. She inhaled deeply and ducked under. It was beautiful beneath the surface. Muted rays of light illuminated the underwater world, and bubbles danced toward the surface. Alison swam deep enough to avoid the harsh falling water on her back, then came up for air on the other side. Kirk sat on a ledge just under the water’s surface, chest heaving as he stared at the underside of the waterfall.
With a slow blink, he lowered his lightened gold eyes to hers. “I see you.”
With a frown, she cut through the water to where he sat. She rested between his legs, kicking at the waves languidly. “What do you mean?”
“You asked me how I imagine my future, and I see you.”
“That scares you.”
Kirk ducked his chin to his chest and snorted. “Nothing scared me before you came along, and suddenly I have this huge thing to protect.”
“You don’t have to protect me.”
“No, I mean, I have a shot at happiness, and it’s terrifying to think it’s up to me to keep it intact. I have this beautiful woman, and all my life I’ve screwed up. Couldn’t keep things together. Couldn’t do what I was supposed to. And I can’t bind you to me, Ally. I can’t put my last name on you or claim you. I’ll just have to stomach this feeling that you’ll really see me and leave when I disappoint you.”
“You silly man,” she murmured, pressing her breasts against the rock he sat on so she could be closer to him. “You’re the only one who has ever fit me. Where am I gonna go? This place,” she said, rolling her gaze over the rocky cliff face behind him, “feels more like home to me than any other.”
“How?”
“Because you’re here. And that bullshit about me not having your last name or not claiming me...” She pressed her finger against the bullet hole scar on his shoulder. “You already bear my mark.”
With a slight frown, Kirk looked at his shoulder. “You shot me. That’s not a claiming mark.”
“Says who? I gave it to you. I’ve told you you’re mine. I’ve chosen you. I marked you, and I’m not going anywhere. Rules be damned, we’re bound. Now, ask me what I see in my future?”
Kirk traced the intricate tattoos along her collar bone and
whispered, “How do you imagine your future?”
She smiled up at him. “I see you, too.”
“You do?” He said it with his head cocked like he didn’t believe her.
She laughed. For an intelligent man, he could be dense when it came to matters of the heart. “Obviously, Kirk. I came up here ready to roll some heads because I thought you were looking for another mate. I felt like a jealous psychopath.”
“Yeah, that was crazy,” he muttered through a baiting grin. “I have to admit, though, I liked seeing you all riled up over me.” He pushed her damp hair from her forehead and murmured, “Possessive little Ally Cat.”
She clamped her teeth onto his rib cage and grinned. “Mine, mine, mine. Now stop pushing me away. I don’t like chasing you.”
“Do that again,” he whispered, his eyes sparking with desire.
Her heart banged against her chest at how hungry he looked. Slowly, deliberately, she bit the skin over his ribs again, harder this time. Kirk groaned and rocked his body toward her as if he couldn’t help himself. She’d left a circle of indentations where her teeth had almost broken his skin, and suddenly, she couldn’t remember exactly what the new law stated. Did it include humans biting shifters? She thought not. And even if so, she was having a really hard time caring right now. Those law changes were fucked up anyway. She knew the people here better now. Kirk wasn’t just trying to procreate. None of them were. They were just looking for ways to feel like they belonged to the people they loved. And she loved him. Loved him.
Her breath hitched as she climbed onto his lap, and she gasped at how hard his erection was as she straddled him. The waves lapped at her ribs. She gripped the back of his hair with one hand, then ran her fingernails lightly down the scar on his shoulder—the one she’d given him. It was unfinished. His admission that it wasn’t a claiming mark said as much.
Alison rocked her hips forward, stroking her sex against his hard cock. Kirk gripped her waist and pulled her closer. She sipped at his lips, bit his bottom lip, then moved to his neck, where she teased him there with her teeth, too. This was his warning, and if he didn’t want this, she would stop the instant he told her to. But Kirk bucked against her, and as if he could read her mind, guided her head down his neck toward his bullet scar.
His muscles were taut, bulging, flexed just under the mark, like he was ready. Prepared. Wanting. “Do it,” he whispered, brushing his hand up her spine, then gripping the back of her neck.
Don’t think.
Alison bit him. Hard. Harder.
“More,” he gritted out. “Make it count.”
She tasted iron but still she clamped down until her jaw wouldn’t tighten any further. This moment was huge. It was sluffing off any remaining fear and diving in, heart first. There was no taking back her feelings after this. No taking back how devoted she already was. She pulled away and stared at the mark she’d made. A perfect circle around the bullet hole. It looked like an eclipse.
But her face fell, along with her heart, because it still didn’t feel finished. Stupid law. It wasn’t right. Wasn’t fair.
“You aren’t like the bear shifters. Your bite won’t Turn me,” she whispered, trying to understand why anyone would take this away from Kirk. From his people.
“No,” he said, his Adam’s apple dipping into his muscular throat with his hard swallow.
Not fair. Not right.
His gaze dipped to the mark she’d made, then to her tattoos. He traced the script in her half-sleeve of ink. Remember. Her reminder to never give into the darkness like Mom had. Eventually, she would tell him the story of every one of the tattoos, because he deserved to know all of her. That was the biggest gift she had to offer, and no one had come close to it before.
Kirk blinked slowly, then lifted an inhuman gold gaze to hers. “Turn around,” he murmured.
The sound of his deep timbre brushed up her spine and gave her a delicious shiver. Slowly, she gave him her back, arching it so she could feel his erection against her sex. Resting her hands on his knees, she looked back over her shoulder so she could watch his face when he saw all of her ink for the first time.
He dragged that sexy gaze down every inch of her tattooed back, then lifted her by the waist to take in the rest that curved around her hips and down one leg. And when he was through, he sighed and settled her entrance right above the head of his cock. She’d never had sex like this, backward and on a lap, but she trembled with the excitement of being with him again.
Positioned over him, she lowered down and took half of his length, then eased off with a moan. Kirk tensed under her and let off a soft, rumbling noise from his chest. He brushed his hand over the outer edge of her tattoos, then gripped her waist hard again and pushed her back over his dick. With his knees, he spread hers wider and slid into her again, deeper.
“Oh, my gosh,” she whispered at the intense sensation. Nothing had ever felt like this before.
Kirk set the pace with one hand, dragging her waist against him as he moved inside of her, and with his other brushed up her ribs and cupped her breast. With a gasp, she closed her eyes and bowed against his touch. Slowly, he pulled her back against his chest, and clamped his teeth over her shoulder, hard enough to burn but not break the skin.
Against the law…
Fuck a law that would strip rights…
Want to be with him…
Only him…
Teeth, teeth, teeth, gentle kiss…
Tease…
“Kirk,” she gasped out breathlessly as he moved within her, pushing her closer to climax with every stroke.
He sucked hard on her skin, and she could feel them now. Sharp teeth. Too sharp. Elongating. Kirk dragged them against her skin, and now the light was too bright, the sound of the waterfall was too loud, the sound of her pounding heartbeat deafening. She clutched onto his hand as he massaged her breast, desperate to keep him tight against her because she was falling. Her stomach dipped into the water, and she arched her neck back and cried out as her ecstasy intensified. “Please,” she whimpered, her skin lifting in chills under his teasing bite. “Claim me.”
The pain was instant, warring with the first pulse of an orgasm that seized her entire body. Deep throbbing pulses of pleasure drummed against resonating fire that sparked at the nerve endings in her shoulder. His teeth drove into her easily, so sharp, four puncture wounds that drew a wince from her.
Kirk released her skin and pulled her against him so hard it left her breathless. He bucked into her fast, and his body was hard as stone. He rested his forehead against the back of her neck and gritted out her name as his dick throbbed inside of her. Warm, so warm. Kirk grunted a sexy, out of control sound as he rammed into her again and shot more heat into her. Powerful legs, abs going rock hard against her back, arm so tight around her, like he never wanted to let go. And now he didn’t have to.
She was claimed.
As her orgasm pulsed on, encouraged by his own release, she smiled in potent relief.
Fuck what she’d been through and where she came from. Fuck all her mistakes. This right here was the moment she would be better, because now she had a reason. Kirk deserved a mate who was whole and strong, not broken and feeble. And what an empowering experience to be picked by a man like him. Strong, capable, dominant silverback shifter who could’ve had anyone in the world. And for whatever reason, he’d sifted through her rough edges and found her good parts. He’d seen his future in her.
Kirk made her feel normal, cared for, and safe.
Safe.
That word had meant nothing to her before she’d met him, and now she understood. It was warmth, security, and confidence. It was walking through the flames of loneliness and being shielded from the burn by the man she adored. It was relaxing into the idea that the other shoe wasn’t going to drop. That the bad was over and done. That she’d paid her dues and now she was bathing in the reward. That if she fell asleep against him, she would wake up whole and shielded from the grit of th
e outside world.
Caring for the injury he’d caused her, Kirk ran his tongue over the four puncture wounds on her shoulder. It was an animalistic need to take care of her, and she loved it. He hadn’t said it yet, but Kirk loved her too.
Now, neither of them had to be scared because they were bound.
Let the law try to take this away from them.
She would bring hell to earth to protect what she and Kirk had found.
Chapter Twelve
Alison came out of the river waves on legs that were so wobbly they didn’t want to hold her upright anymore.
Claimed. She was Kirk’s claim. A wave of joy and excitement washed over her.
Kirk turned in front of her, tall as an oak, strong and steadfast as a mountain. Every muscle rippled on his body as he lifted his hand toward her. And his eyes…yellow flames, glowing from the pupils out.
“You never hide him from me,” she murmured, feeling numb.
“Never felt the need to with you.”
She slid her hand against his palm and allowed him to help her slog through the sand to her clothes. As she dressed, he watched her with a slight frown marring his dark brows.
“What are you thinking?”
Kirk shook his head like he would shut down again, but when he reached for his jeans, he said, “I never knew how Kong did it.”
“Did what?”
His lips ticked up, then fell too fast for the smile to reach his eyes. Gaze averted, he said, “I lived with him, Layla, and Josephine for a while. I had to. Kong needed his family group close. I could see it was good for him. He talks...” Kirk ghosted a glance up to Alison and tried again. “He talks easy. Much easier than me, and I would just watch him with Layla. He was open, and it was good for her. It made her happy. She knows everything about him.”