by Bella Jacobs
Or maybe he thinks I deserve the hazing from my peers, the beatings from my cousins, the way my uncle twists my skin in his fingers and hisses that I should have stayed away, that I should have stayed in the human world where the taint of my weakness couldn’t make Meadwood vulnerable to attack from our enemies. A crown prince who spent five years drugged in captivity, who didn’t shift for so long he had to relearn the skill like a child, who is so far behind in his studies and spell work he will never be considered fully Griffin, is a liability.
They’re all relieved when I enlist in the resistance, when I volunteer for a mission that requires me to forfeit my place in the line of succession. Now Cousin Phillip will be king when my father dies, and the court returns to a state of relative peace.
And I am happy for a while. Working hard and playing hard.
I even fall in love.
Visions of a beautiful woman with golden hair and a sunshine smile flit through my mind. Her name was Josephine and she was five years older, already an up and coming resistance operative when I was a clueless new recruit.
She teaches me everything I know about pleasure, and then she leaves me to marry a much older man, making me feel like a fool, a toy she’d grown tired of and tossed aside. I sleep with half the class of new recruits, fucking myself into a state of even deeper despair before I swear off women to concentrate on my duties.
Two weeks later, I’m asked to lead the mission to extract the Fata Morgana from her human family, as one of her potential mates. I see her face in the pictures Celeste shows me, and suddenly everything makes sense again.
It’s Wren, my Wren.
From that day on, through two years of grueling training to prepare for the biggest mission of my life, I sleep alone. I don’t want to be with anyone else. I want to wait for her, the girl I loved, the girl who’s become a woman so beautiful and strong I can’t wait to meet her again.
To love her again.
To make love to her, to show her with every kiss, every touch, how much she means to me. God, every cell in my body aches when she’s close. I’m in a constant state of semi-arousal, my cock refusing to get the message that she doesn’t want me that way. She desires Kite and Creedence, but I’m just her friend.
“Not just my friend,” I murmur, as the magic of the life fast fades away and Dust and I slowly retreat to the separate oceans of our own subconscious minds.
Dust sighs, and I open my eyes to find him watching me with an intensity that makes my skin hum all over.
“What’s that, beautiful?” he asks, fingers curling tight around mine.
“I don’t think of you as just a friend,” I repeat, pulse picking up as love and hunger mix in his stormy eyes.
“I know that now,” he says, adding in a husky whisper. “I liked being in your skin. Even the hard parts.”
“Me, too.”
“I’m sorry I left you alone for so long, Snow. If I’d known how much you missed me, I would have found a way back to you. Somehow. Even if I was just a kid.”
“You’re here now. That’s all that matters,” I say, my heart beating swift wings in my chest as I lean closer. “Though, I would like you to kiss me, please.”
I don’t have to ask twice. One moment we’re facing each other across the lightly melted remains of our lucky coin, the next we’re devouring each other from the mouth down. He tears my shirt over my head, and I return the favor, and soon there is nothing between us but skin and heat and a love so real nothing will ever come between us again.
Chapter 21
Dust
I’m lost in her. Found in her. I’m drowning, sucked into the depths of her beautiful heart, and I don’t ever want to be free.
I don’t need air.
I don’t need food or water or anything but the shelter of her arms.
“Yes. Oh please,” she murmurs against my lips as I cup her breast in my hand, rolling her nipple as she rocks on top of me. She’s still wearing panties—somehow I missed those in the initial clothes-tearing frenzy—but it doesn’t matter. The feel of her grinding against my cock is still the most electric, euphoria-inducing thing that has ever happened to me.
I don’t feel the hard floor beneath my back or the ache of the pain I so-recently relived in Wren’s body. All I feel is her heat and softness and the increasingly damp fabric between us that leaves no doubt that she wants me.
She’s seen every ugly, sad, pathetic moment of my life and she still wants me.
“I love you,” I confess against her lips as I slide a hand between us, reaching down the front of her panties to slide fingers through her wetness. I groan as I feel how ready she is, how drenched with heat because of me.
Because of us.
“I love you, too.” She gasps, trembling as I glide two fingers inside her.
“Then we can’t do more than this,” I say, forcing the words out even as a primal voice deep inside shouts for me to shut my fucking mouth. “If we take things any further, we’ll be bonded for life.”
“Good. I want you for life,” she says, making my chest ache. “And I don’t want to wait. I want to be yours. I want you to be mine. God, I want you, Dust. I need you.”
I suck in a breath, fighting to keep what remains of my wits about me. But it’s so insanely hard with her riding my hand and the smell of her desire making me wild, ravenous. “We’re too close, Snow. We should wait, give the spell-rush time to wear off.”
“I don’t want it to wear off.” She sits up, hands braced on my chest, her face flushed with desire and her lips softly parted. “I want to be this close. Even closer.”
Looking up at her, with her nipples tight and her breasts flushed, she is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. She is magical, ethereal, a goddess, impossible to resist. I’m going to worship her all the days of my life. I’m already falling, ripping, tearing down the center, making room for the woman I love to be stitched into the heart of me.
There’s no use in fighting this. Resistance is futile.
And stupid. Why on earth should I resist something that feels so damned right?
So when she rises onto her knees and reaches for the top of her panties, I pull my fingers away and watch her dispose of the last thin barrier to what we both want. I reach down, gripping my aching cock at the base, heart in my throat as Wren straddles me again and guides my swollen tip to her center.
My hands come to her hips, squeezing tight as she lowers herself down, oh-so-slowly, her eyes locked on mine as she takes me in, every inch, until I’m buried in her heat, her sweetness. Until there is nothing but love and hunger and her breath coming faster as we begin to move.
A part of me is desperate to pull her closer, to get her nipples in my mouth and her lips hot against mine, but I’m too lost in her eyes. I can’t look away. I don’t dare. I don’t want to miss a moment of the feeling dancing across her delicate features. She’s here with me now the way she was in every dark and beautiful moment in my past. And as we get closer to the edge, bodies straining and breath tight in our chests, I can see the future stretching out ahead of me.
And it is her—beautiful and perfect and filled with hope, the wild kind that spreads like blackberry vines in spring.
“Yes, oh yes,” she says, as if she sees it, too. And then she comes, staring fearlessly into my eyes as her body locks tight around my cock, and I follow her the way I always have. The way I always will.
The release that twists through me is so powerful it’s almost painful.
Almost. But it’s not.
This isn’t pain. This is…everything. The bond knits away the last of the separation between us, and I find the place that I’ve missed so desperately. My home, the one Wren made for me in her heart and kept warm with love and memory, no matter how the years stretched out between us.
She is mine. I am hers. And it is the rightest thing I’ve ever done.
I only pray it’s the same for her.
“No regrets?” I ask after, as she’
s lying limp and heavy on top of me, with my softened cock still tucked inside her and the evidence of how much we enjoy each other sticky between us.
She hums softly. “Never. You?”
“Never.” I run a hand over her head, smoothing her wild hair. “You’re all I’ve ever wanted, Snow.”
Wren lifts her head, gazing down at me with shining eyes. “Thank you. For coming here. Coming back to me…”
I cup her face in my hand, running my thumb lightly over her swollen lips. “No thanks necessary. You’re where I belong.”
“Ditto.” Her lips curve up on one side and an unspoken question flickers across her face. “You aren’t… You couldn’t possibly…”
I smile. “You know how long it’s been since I’ve been with a woman. What do you think?” I slide my hands around to cup her bare bottom, squeezing as I lift my hips, pushing my increasingly thick cock deeper into her welcoming body.
She bites her lip. “I want you on top this time.”
“The floor is hard,” I warn her.
“I’m not scared of the floor. I’m tougher than I look.”
“Don’t I know it,” I agree as she rolls to the side, dragging me with her.
I take her again, give myself to her again. I am lost and found in her again, and it is as beautiful as it was the first time.
But like all good things lately, our stolen moment comes to an end far too soon.
The only thing that makes it bearable is knowing that she’s mine. Forever. As long as we’re both living and breathing, and maybe even longer.
“So, we’re no closer to finding Scarlett. No secrets of that sort locked inside you. Though, there was one strange thing.” Wren cocks her head. “When you touched me while I was bleeding, when I was a little girl… It made you stronger.”
I nod. “My blood would do the same for you. We’re both from ancient bloodlines, the beasts of antiquity. These days, my people use blood therapies to help each other heal from sickness. In the old days, it was an…uglier practice.”
Wren arches a brow. “Do I want to know?”
I shake my head. “No. That’s a dark story for another day.”
“I believe you,” she says, shivering. “So what about Luke?” She slowly pulls on her T-shirt, seeming as reluctant to get back to the real world as I am. “What do you think we should do about that situation?”
I fill her in on what I learned—or didn’t learn—from Bill and lean back against the cabin wall by the door. “But his name is Luke, and the other man’s name was Lucas. There’s a chance it’s just a case of mistaken identity, not foul play on the part of the L.A. pack or Luke himself.”
Wren’s eyebrows form a WTF squiggle across her forehead, making me smile.
“Yeah,” I agree. “Not my gut-take either. The L.A. pack knew Luke. He wasn’t part of their crew, but he was friendly with several people who are. They knew he wasn’t Lucas Rivera, but they kidnapped him and brought him to us, anyway, instead of the man who volunteered for the mission. And now they’re refusing to take my phone calls. It doesn’t look good.”
Wren’s eyes narrow. “Maybe this Lucas guy can help. Can you get in touch with him? See if he knows where things went sideways?”
I clear my throat. “My contact tried. Lucas has been missing for weeks, since the night Luke was taken.”
“So…he’s dead.” Wren’s expression tightens. “Or being held prisoner somewhere to keep us from finding out we have the wrong wolf.”
“Either is possible.”
Wren paces toward the window, giving me no choice but to admire how fetching she looks wearing nothing but a pair of tiny black panties and a thin cotton tee.
When she turns back, I quickly lift my gaze to her face, but I’m too late.
She grins. “So I guess you don’t miss all the court finery and fancy lingerie?”
“You don’t need fancy lingerie,” I say, already regretting putting my pants on. I know we have more important things to do than make love all day, but I’m suddenly having some intense fantasies about Wren naked on the dining table. “But you’d be stunning in court dress. As soon as this is all over, I’m going to have something made for you. In artic blue to match your eyes.”
“I don’t need a dress. You’ve already given me something way better.” Her eyes dance as she reaches for the bottom of her T-shirt.
I’m feeling optimistic about my table fantasies becoming reality, when she adds in a breathy voice, “Open the door.”
I catch on, heart beating faster as I open the door and quickly shed my pants, determined to join her. A first flight isn’t something she should do alone, or something I want to miss.
I don’t want to miss another moment of her.
“Stay close to the trees.” I shove my boxers down as she strips off her panties. “I’ll cloak us both, so you won’t have to think about anything but enjoying the ride.”
“I can do this…” She pauses in front of me, her toes wiggling in the patch of afternoon sunlight painting the floor a rich gold. “Right?’
“You can do anything you set your mind to, Snow,” I say, believing it with all my heart.
Wren turns to me, smiling so big and bright it banishes all the darkness, and nods. “Then let’s fly.”
She jogs out the door, taking the first step on her human legs before leaping off the porch. She shifts in midair, skin rippling into feathers and claws and wings so wide there’s barely room for her to rise between the trees.
With a whoop of victory, I follow her, wings unfurling to push hard toward the wide-open sky.
Chapter 22
Wren
They say time flies when you’re having fun, but no one ever mentioned how fast it goes when you’re actually flying.
The next few weeks swoop past in a rush of learning to fight even harder, honing my shifting skills, and fine-tuning my control of the kin gifts I gained when Dust and I formed our mate bond. But it’s the evenings spent soaring above the clouds that seem to last forever and no time at all.
It’s all I want to do.
Well, not all I want to do…
I cast a glance across the fire at Dust, who’s busy whittling something with his curved knife, before shifting my gaze to Kite, who’s rereading Lonesome Dove for the fourth time. Before I was bound to two men, I worried I might have trouble managing a sex life with more than one partner, if only because I have a lot of other things on my plate right now.
But, as so often happens, reality is completely different than what I anticipated.
I’m having zero trouble keeping both of my loves busy in the bedroom. In fact, the more I’m with them, the more I want them. I want them so much there are times when it’s painful to have Dust on top of me, making me feel a thousand beautiful things, and know that Kite is only a few hundred feet away, all alone.
I want them both with me, their skin hot on mine, their hands everywhere, and no heart left out in the cold.
But how to start a conversation like that? With two men who clearly have zero interest in each other sexually? Would they be at all open to something like that? Or would they think I’m a freak who’s gone from virgin to deviant so fast I’ve probably set some kind of sex-pervert world record?
Freak. You’re definitely a freak. I pop my lightly toasted marshmallow between my lips and let the caramelized sweetness dissolve on my tongue. But sadly, it does nothing to banish my bitter thoughts.
It’s not just my increasingly voracious appetite for carnal pleasure that’s bothering me. Life-fasting with Dust was one of the most incredible things I’ve ever experienced, and I don’t regret it for a second, but it didn’t get us any closer to finding my sister. And I still have no clue which of my remaining three has the secret to discovering her location locked inside him.
At this rate, if or when I finally figure it out, it could be too late.
We’ve been here nearly a month, and Sierra’s stories about Atlas’s gift for being everywhere, all
at once, are the opposite of comforting.
“How about a walk, Slim?” Creedence tosses his marshmallow roasting stick into the fire, where it begins to sizzle, letting off sugar-scented smoke. “See if we can get your lynx going tonight?”
Dragging my eyes away from the flames, I nod. “Sounds good.”
It doesn’t sound good. I’m exhausted from training for three hours with Luke this morning, a run with Kite this afternoon, and an hour of cloaking work before flight training this evening, but I’m not doing anyone any good sitting here brooding.
“Let me grab a flashlight,” I say, starting toward the camper, where Sierra has already gone to bed.
“You don’t need it. I’ll be your secret weapon.” Creedence holds out a hand, his eyes going brighter gold around the edges as his pupils narrow.
I scrunch my nose. “I can’t decide if that’s really cool or really creepy.”
“Creepy,” Kite offers without taking his eyes off the book in his hands. “Keep that up, and they’ll get stuck that way.”
Chuckling softly, Creedence nods toward the darkness. I thread my fingers through his, and we start off through the trees, around the back of the silent cabin where Luke turned in early, not long after sunset. My ears strain as we pass the screen door Kite installed last week to let the warm, summer breeze through at night, but I don’t hear a thing. Not the whisper of a dream of a snore. Not the slightest shuffle of covers.
Luke must sleep like the dead.
“Wolf Boy is one of the reasons I wanted to have a chat,” Creedence says, apparently able to read my mind nearly as well as Kite. “Watch your step. Big rock.”
I step over the obstacle, glancing over my shoulder at the crooked silhouette of the cabin against the campfire flickering on the other side. “What’s on your mind?”